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Captain's Log 24: Public Test Realm Ahoy!

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Ahoy Pathfinders!

This will be a rather compact Captain’s Log focused around updating you all on our progress as we work towards the upcoming megapatch -- which we’re going to designate “ATLAS 1.5” so that we don’t have to keep calling it megapatch! It will include information on some changes along with further details related to our Public Testing Realm.

     :anchor: public testing realm Ahoy :anchor:

large.chest07.jpg

A submarine is used to salvage a treasure chest on a new procedurally generated shipwreck. 


PvP Networks

We have made a decision in regards to our PvP networks for ATLAS 1.5 based upon taking your feedback into consideration along with our own development pipelines and vision for the game. We feel our players are interested in, primarily, two distinctly different styles and scopes of gameplay. One group of players is interested in design focused on small to mid-sized companies (2-50 players) and another has a preference for large company-centric design (200+ players). Rather than aiming to strike a middle ground between the two groups, which might end up diminishing the experience for either style of gameplay, we wanted to support two modes separately to see how that plays out. We’re going to be running 2 uniquely configured PvP networks, to allow players to choose the game mode which best represents your playstyle. To be clear, while we hope both of these networks prove permanently successful for their specific purposes, we’ll continue to iterate on their rules if necessary.

 

ATLAS 1.5 will feature three unique game modes:

Large-scale PvP Mode:
ATLAS: Empires

ATLAS: Empires will honor the original ATLAS system with which players are familiar whilst incorporating some small adjustments to the claiming system to address issues players were experiencing. To clarify, ATLAS: Empires’ claiming system will be very similar to the traditional claiming system, but adjusted for maximum speed (increased rates) and no “anti-size” scaling. This will be the go-to hardcore mode for those looking for sandboxy high risk and high reward on a grand scale. We will not be limiting large companies, there will be no scaling based on members and there will be no pvp windows or war system.


Mid/Small-Scale PvP Mode:
ATLAS: Colonies

ATLAS: Colonies will be more structured and will utilise the new claim system we’ve announced. It will include hard company and alliance limits, the war system, and raiding hours. This game mode will be survive-and-thrive, targeted towards smaller and medium sized groups. We will be seeking to incentivise players to fight in the open world and on the sea whilst maintaining the options to raid bases and seize territory from enemies for those dedicated to doing so.


PvE Mode:
ATLAS: PvE

This game mode will be spooling up with changes and the system will be based upon details discussed in the last Captain’s Log. We will monitor our PvE mode in the PTR and beyond and continue to iterate on it as we move forward.

 

GouXrQO.gif

The submarine harpoon is a new underwater weapon which will ramp up oceanic combat.

 

Public Testing Realm

Work is still continuing on the upcoming game systems changes and, to ensure we put out the most quality and complete patch possible, we will be delaying the release schedule. As such, the PTR will be released late March / early April and we expect the test realm will run for approximately 1 week. Please bear in mind the run time may be adjusted after players get a feel for the changes, and, if any critical issues arise. We know that players are keen to get back into ATLAS, we are excited for you to do so as well! We’re committed to a quality ATLAS 1.5 launch though and it will take a little more time.

In relation to our Public Testing Realm overall, we’re planning to get multiple smaller clusters online which will incorporate the three game modes as well as everything else listed in the patch notes. Players can expect higher rates to facilitate fast progression and testing of the new systems along with the fact these servers are likely to wipe as needed.

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Various armor skins to help you personalise your character will be included in ATLAS 1.5!

 

Kraken Bowl

Various Companies organised and participated in an entertaining FFA Kraken Bowl on NA PvP on the 3/6/2019. OwO emerged victorious after various rounds of ship on ship combat. You can check out some highlights from their event here: 

 

 

 

:anchor: released patch notes :anchor:

:skull: up to v22.21 :skull:

v22.21

Fixed a bug where tamed creatures, boats, and NPC Crew stats didn't replicate properly.

v22.1

- Fixed a case where players would disconnect on certain servers when loading into large bases. We advise setting your "Client Network Bandwidth" Option value back to Epic if you had previously changed it, to deal with the disconnections.
- Fixed a case which would cause creatures to flash or flicker.
- Fixed a case where players on saddled creatures would teleport back to the server's origin if the creature they were mounted on had been killed by another creature.
- Sail canvas now takes twice as long to repair. Repair hammer can no longer be used to repair a canvas. A canvas must be repaired using the pinwheel option on the mast, which can be accessed by holding down E.
- Target Soft Spots will no longer add torpor to other player teams in PvE.
- Camera no longer interpolates to origin when destroyed.
- Glider will no longer activate when encumbered.
- Buoy signs remain attached after server restart (retroactive).
- Server and client performance optimizations.
- Fixed an exploit which allowed players to stall and potentially disconnect other clients.
- No longer able to turn off cannons that do not belong to your team.

v21.43

- Fixed some server side crashes and added additional server performance optimizations for NPC Crew

v21.1 (client)

- Fixed choppy claim flag physics

21.42

- Further optimizations to NPC crew

21.41

- Optimized replication and ticking of NPC crew on turrets, for significantly improved server performance.

v21.31

- Improved Structure replication rate from servers, though this may increase client stalls slightly. Clients can reduce their "Client Network Bandwidth" Option value if they are experiencing too many stalls with this change (we do recommend the default, 60 KB/s).

v21

- Optimized how items are networked resulting in significantly higher performance and less bandwidth usage
- Added the Hook Hand and the Peg Leg to the Freeport cosmetic vendor

v20.1

With our planned changes for March, the game will be heading into a more rule based system, so for the next few weeks we’ll be making some changes to experience what it would be like if we took an alternative route. 

We’ll be releasing an update tomorrow which includes the following changes:

- 6x Rates - Harvesting, Taming, Experience, Gold, Farming, and Breeding.
- Claim flags will no longer prevent enemy building. You can now build anywhere, and only structure build radius will prevent it. This does not apply to cannons and mortars, which will still require a claim flag. This is a non-default, which will be enabled on our PvP Networks. Unofficials can also use this as a custom server-side config.
- All servers, other than Golden Age Ruin servers, can be set to home servers, allowing players to respawn at them. (PvP only)

Game.ini:
[/script/shootergame.shootergamemode]
bDontRequireClaimFlagsForBuilding=1
bIsLawlessHomeServer=1
bForceRequireClaimFlagsForBuildingCannons=true
This is what we’re enabling on all our non-Golden Age ruin servers, but please note that you must also flag the corresponding grids as homeservers on the servergrid.json

This patch will also include:

- Whispering voice hotkey [* [numpad] key]
- Server side config that allows you to alter the distance for the 3 voice modes: Whispering, Normal, and Yelling.

Game.ini:
[/script/shootergame.shootergamemode]
ProximityRadius = 8500
YellingRadius = 22000
WhisperRadius = 2000
- Removing the Destruction Mesh on Lighthouses
- Increased the limit of folders in inventories from 20 to 40, and 80 in Bookshelves
- Treasure Map names now includes the grid for easy filtering
- Explosive Barrels can no longer be used as an ammo type for cannons. Any loaded ones will just fire regular cannons. They'll be receiving a large redesign in the major update coming in March.
- Fixed chat scrolling, so it now works again with Page Up and Page Down
- Fixed an edge case where voice chat would stop working unless the client relogged

These changes will allow us to see how the game would pan out if we didn’t have the claim system affect build rules, which helps us collect more feedback on playstyles.

 

    :pirate_mask: SHOW 'N' TELL #6 :pirate_mask:

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Continue to show us yer mighty fleets, paint pieces, flags & sails, impenetrable forts, hellish tats, scenic screenshots, 'n entertainin' videos! The Show n’ Tell deadline is the 28th of March. 

 

:wheel:

Alrighty, that ’s it for this log! Thank you so much for becoming a part of our crew and we can't wait to show all you scallywags, landlubbers, captains, and seadogs what lies ahead!

Happy Sailing,

Grapeshot Games

🏴☠️For the latest dispatch on #playATLAS keep yer one good eye trained on this here information🏴☠️

Natter n' chatter on Discord: https://discord.gg/playatlas
Navigate ye olde Subreddit: https://www.reddit.com/r/playatlas
Hear ye, hear ye on Twitter: https://twitter.com/sailtheatlas
Watch us scallywags on Twitch: http://twitch.tv/sailtheatlas
Plus ye can band with us Pirates on Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/playatlasgame


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It's like you don't really have a firm grasp about the game you are trying to make or you simply can't agree internally so you just said fuck it, lets just make as many copies as it takes to keep everyone happy. 

Stop trying to make a game and focus on making a world that feels alive. 

This game could be something really special imho. But not like this.

Edited by Sklex
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Christmas has been delayed this year!

~Lotus

Edited by Lotus
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I believe that to create 2 separate PVP systems to try and please 2 different player populations is an error on your part. It may show that you dont have a clear vision of how the game should have its PVP system implemented in the future or at minimum are uncertain of it. I would ask, even though i know that it may not make much difference for me to ask this, that you continue with your previously decided PVP system as the rule of thumb for this patch and if needed adjust it further down the line and not segregate even more the low population of players that we currently have.

I also believe that when you keep pushing the PTR and wipe dates as you have been, its making you lose players to other games that are coming out of alpha and beta stages. This is something you will need to address internally from a marketing and management perspective. I predict a huge quantity of players now complaining about this delay again and quite a few, even, give up on investing any time into waiting for this.

Please review this internally and consider things before you make them... i bet that if you had asked the company/alliance leaders about their opinion on this 2 pvp system (where you still have the NA and EU separate also, making it a 4 pvp system) they would of told you in unison that they would disagree with this system.

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hm not really sure what to think of this, to some extend it shows you try to listen on the other hand i am not sure if you need to get your vision straight before moving on - isn't it getting a little to complex for too little gain to maintain all these different modes and claim systems that you told us are so intense to develop too?  

on the one hand i like it that the old claim system will stay tho your vision for it is for large companies. my super small company still loves the old claim system tho some sort of offline protection was needed (mind you that could be better turrets/tougher walls and no raid window - odd enough you made raiding way easier in the past) which is now off the table as it seems. i see this coming..half of the allies we had will move here, the other half there ^^

dunno as far as i take the feedback i read thru or talked to other ppl most wanted: limit on how many claims a player can set and some sort of offline protection, i think nothing that could not been added to the old system. we get: complicated rework in a totally different direction, wipe with endless delays to still basically keep the old system with a few new islands after a few weeks of limbo. *shrug* 

Edited by Xenom

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I'm sure I font just speak for myself, and we want to get back to playing. I love the game but the wait is becoming annoying. Just release it how you planned to with the new claim system and fix it as you go along. You may end up losing more players by delaying it further. 

 

 

 

 

 

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I dont like to think negavitely, but it gets harder and harder after each time i read the upcoming patches. 

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fuuuuuuuuuuuuuu (sorry)

 

PS it is really takes so long to wright this Cap log??

Edited by Redrick

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3 minutes ago, Calliri said:

I believe that to create 2 separate PVP systems to try and please 2 different player populations is an error on your part. It may show that you dont have a clear vision of how the game should have its PVP system implemented in the future or at minimum are uncertain of it. I would ask, even though i know that it may not make much difference for me to ask this, that you continue with your previously decided PVP system as the rule of thumb for this patch and if needed adjust it further down the line and not segregate even more the low population of players that we currently have.

 

I Disagree. I think they really listened comments on the forum players in this game. In this forum you could see people complaining about griefing, offraiding etc... and others complaining about the new claiming system with whitch you are not free to attack when you want (hardcore survival) . I don't think there is any option for both type of people to play on the same server so i guess making two separate ones was the best option they had.

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Part of the issue here is not just the repeated delays, but the fact that changes are constantly being made based on feedback from the community, feedback that is being given before even testing the proposed changes. By doing this it makes it look like the Developers have no clue how they want their game to be.

The delay to the PTR is not good, but it's not the end of the world, but there's too much of a focus to make everyone happy and making constant changes based on pre-testing feedback.

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I feel like splitting the small pvp playerbase is not the answer. Also, announcing the wipe more than 1 week in advance of a hard timeline for the PTR was not the answer, especially since we all know how punctual ya'll are with making deadlines. The cumulative effect is now everyone will have stopped playing for a month by the time 1.5 comes out where other things may have pulled their attention and it will be harder to get them back. I understand the point is to make a great and balanced game, but I really don't feel good about the split pvp playerbase (Empires and Colonies). Also, as part of a large company that will almost certainly reside on Empires, we were all looking forward to the old claim system going away, so that doesn't feel good either right now.

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you guys keep killing this game with every delay atlas already lost most of its players guess for this week or next one none will be playing it

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40k whent to 20k whent to 10k whent to a few ppl, this is sad, hope you get it up rinning this year, was a fun game 🙂

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so we have to wait like 2 month´s to play after wipe with same configs .... cant wait
This Delay and early anounce of the Wipe is killing the game 😄

not the bugs not the Serverlags or the game, you organisation is killing it.

Learn Time Management!

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9 minutes ago, Sysca said:

I Disagree. I think they really listened comments on the forum players in this game. In this forum you could see people complaining about griefing, offraiding etc... and others complaining about the new claiming system with whitch you are not free to attack when you want (hardcore survival) . I don't think there is any option for both type of people to play on the same server so i guess making two separate ones was the best option they had.

I dont think you understood what i was talking in my post or at least i didnt make myself clear on it... to have 2 different pvp systems (4 actually due to the NA/EU servers) is to separate even more the very limited population that we already have and add even more development work for themselves as they would have to mantain 6 types of servers (4 pvp and 2 pve). It does indeed show that they are listening to the things players are saying but instead of having a clear route of development they decided to try and please everyone instead of deciding internally on what they wish to obtain out of their own develpment as future for the game.

Also to note that, unless i am wrong, the previously announced pvp system would still allow you to be raiding outside of your war timer by the use of a token...

At this point i dont really care so much as to what system they implement but that they actually implement something and go ahead and work from there instead of complicating things and segregating even more the dwendeling population of this game.

 

I WOULD ALSO RECOMMEND TO THE DEVELOPERS TO UNDERSTAND A LITTLE MORE ABOUT PROJECT MANAGEMENT AND PERHAPS USE SOME SIX SIGMA OR AGILE/SCRUM METHODOLOGIES IN ORDER TO STOP MAKING ALL THESE MANAGEMENT MISTAKES.

Edited by Calliri
note for developers added
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3 minutes ago, [GP] Guybrush Threepwood said:

Part of the issue here is not just the repeated delays, but the fact that changes are constantly being made based on feedback from the community, feedback that is being given before even testing the proposed changes. By doing this it makes it look like the Developers have no clue how they want their game to be.

The delay to the PTR is not good, but it's not the end of the world, but there's too much of a focus to make everyone happy and making constant changes based on pre-testing feedback.

I could see a delay on a patch because bad coding but to delay a PTR means the raw coding isn't really functional.

~Lotus

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To be honest, at this time, i think it would be better to wipe the servers at the time that is set (in one week or so), and wipe it with ONE WEEK notice the next time when you guys have something ready, because right now, it seems like it will be done in 4-5 months. 

Ofc it wont have 15x15 maps, the servers couldnt even reach the players expected in one grid at launch, it will more be like 5x5 grids i fear

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This Captain's Log is so lacking in actual substantive information that I've really gotta question why it was four days late.

The future of Atlas currently has a very serious problem where there are too many unanswered questions and too few concrete answers. And since this Captain's Log actually reduced the number of concrete answers we had, and raised plenty of new questions, it actually makes the current problems worse, not better.

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1 minute ago, Lotus said:

I could see a delay on a patch because bad coding but to delay a PTR means the raw coding isn't really functional.

~Lotus

Clearly they've delayed PTR because they have yet again changed their plans, which will require further work prior to launching the PTR.

Just now, Amy3 said:

This Captain's Log is so lacking in actual substantive information that I've really gotta question why it was four days late.

It's not 4 days late. They never planned one for last week.

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1 minute ago, [GP] Guybrush Threepwood said:

Clearly they've delayed PTR because they have yet again changed their plans, which will require further work prior to launching the PTR.

They don't have any big changes announced that would actually warrant a delay though. They planned the new 1 flag system a while ago and announced they will keep another set of servers that don't follow that. No drastic changes are announced.

~Lotus

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When ARK introduced Small Tribes and Conquest, they were welcome and a great asset to the Official server modes so smaller groups could feasibly exist. ATLAS does not have the same dynamic due to having so many available places to build. I'm sure others have countering opinions but I played all 3 server types in ARK with very successful groups (of which quite a few of us are here together in ATLAS) and they certainly have their place, but ARK also wasn't an MMO game.

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