[Tiggs]

<Zephenia> Welcome everyone, we will be starting the Fallen Earth HoC shortly - please send all your questions to [QT]Stiv and [QT]Alton, no one else will be able to take the questions! Thanks!

<Zephenia> Welcome everyone to the Stratics IRC House of Commons chat with the deveiopers of Fallen Earth and Icarus Studios. They will all introduce themselves and then will get to your questions!

<Tiggs> Welcome Everyone! I am Tiggs the Community Director and protector of the Devs for Fallen Earth.

<FELee> Hi, I'm Lee Hammock and I'm the Lead Game Designer on Fallen Earth

<Morgana> Hi, I'm Morgana a community team member, in world and on the forums for Fallen Earth

<[FE]James> Hey, this is James... Lee's minion. I'm a writer and content designer.

<FE-Funslayer> I'm Funslayer and I'm the lead scripter. My job is to make toys for the players and keep the designers from blowing up the servers.

<Zephenia> *gunghoe* how is the game shaping up when will we end up seeing a new gameplay video
<FELee> Pretty well, we're getting more bugs fixed everyday and our last patch note list was like 11 pages long. We are in the process of creating new game play videos that should be released within the next few weeks (we did the voice over prep readthrough this morning). As always look for new stuff to come out around GDC.

<Zephenia> <Dash> Can you elaborate on the specifics of how PvP towns are captured. Also, what bonuses/rewards are given to the faction that has captured the village.
<[FE]James> Conflict towns, when captured by a faction, change guards and merchants in the area. If the guards are protecting something good... for example, a sweet pile of rare harvest nodes, it will be REALLY hard to get to if an enemy faction is in control. In addition, at different states, different content and missions show up that can only be taken while your faction is in control. It really depends on the particular town.

<[FE]James> Hollister Point, for example, is a town built entirely inside a mine underneath a nasty villain camp. Once your faction takes control, you kick the villains out of the mine. If the villains control the mine, it's tough. If an enemy faction controls the mine, there's no way.

<Zephenia> <Dash> Will certain armors offer specific bonuses? For example, will lighter armors offer bonuses to speed and agility? Will heavier armors impact mobility?
<FELee> Armors are very specific in how they provide protection. Armor protects from up to eleven different damage types, varyiong from Ballistics to Radiation damage. So your hazmat suit may protect from radiation but won't be much use against bullets. Light armor does not penalize player Coordination or Dexterity, while heavier armors do.

<Zephenia> <dragonaut> heya, just a couple of general questions. How in-depth is the beginning character creation? and How will mutations work in relation to character developement? -- Are you able to add and drop them for a cost?
<FELee> Character creation is focused on appearance, not stats. You determine skin color, facial structure, hair color and style, tattoos, piercings, face pain, etc. All characters start with the same clothes, but can get new gear quickly when in game. Mutations must be found in play and are heavily tied into factions. They require AP investment and finding (or making) the injectors necessary to get new powers. We're still looking at dropping a

<Zephenia> *Clone64* The devs seem to want players to take sides in the faction conflicts rather than stay neutral. Why is neutral not considered equally important as a play-style?
<[FE]James> There's a LOT of neutral content available to players. Most of the towns in the game are available to any player. The entirety of sector 1 is available, since the players won't be "officially" taking sides. In addition, we have plenty of neutral storylines, such as the Bankers and Franklin's Riders.

<Zephenia> <Seraph_Xen> Could we get a few examples of what special attacks Lightbearer Kung Fu will give ?
<FELee> Autumn Leaves is one of the Dodge abilities Lightbearers can learn for example, which temporarily increases defenses. Lightbearers have more advanced Melee abilities than most other factions, but they don't have a whole separate tree of abilities all their own.

<Zephenia> *Gunhoe* is there any massive dungeons in the game that will take 30 min to an hour to explore
<FELee> Yes, lots. Everything from caves to mines to underground facilities, including ones that change based on where you are in the story.

<Zephenia> *WarFury* Will there be "mounted combat" ?
<FELee> Yes, though it is limited to ranged weapons and limited by mount/vehicle type. For example, on horseback you can use rifles or pistols, while those on motorcycles cannot use rifles.

<Zephenia> <Clone64> Is it possible to restart a character if you've levelled it and don't like it? What about resetting skills and APs. Can their names and bodies be changed
<FE-Funslayer> We're still looking at how to allow players to respec their characters. While it's relatively easy to simply reset all of your skills and grant all your APs back, we need to find a way for players to relearn all of the numerous skills they've picked up from sector to sector without running all over the Grand Canyon.

<Tiggs> Trivia time for a Fallen Earth Tshirt - first person with the correct answer to this question...
<Tiggs> What is Daedalan?
<Tiggs> Please PM me with your answer
<Tiggs> The winner was WarFury!! <WarFury> the Tech militant sub-faction that refuses to hide behind the Enforcers

<Zephenia> *ZsasZ* Will there be 'live' events that advance or alter the storyline? If so, will player actions have an impact on the outcome?
<[FE]James> We don't have any specific plans for live events right now. We are planning on special events for holidays and special occasions, but for now, the plans only include additional content rather than GM events.

<Zephenia> <MMORPG_Immlemann> How will you be handeling Character custimization. Players have become accustomed to a certain level these days and i'm curious as to how you'll be tackeling this.
<FELee> Characters can customize appearance through skin color, facial hair, hair color and style, makeup, tattoos, face paint, piercings, and gear. There are 19 different slots for gear that players can wear, which varies from armor to 3-D glasses to top hats to high tops.

<Zephenia> <Dash> Will starting towns for all factions be located in sector 1?
<[FE]James> Yes

<Zephenia> *Gunghoe* Is there going to be passangers able to get in the vehicles
<FE-Funslayer> Not at this time. While it's a very cool idea, it's not something that's easy to implement and we have a laundry list of things we think players would enjoy and the game needs more than that.

<Zephenia> *Zsas* Will characters have first and last names, or just one word names?
<FELee> Characters have a total limit for number of characters and can't have certain characters, like numbers in their names, but they can have space so they can have first and last names.

<Zephenia> <dragonaut> are there plans for multiple server types on release?
<FE-Funslayer> While we don't see a need for specific RP or PVP servers at launch it is certainly an option we will explore if a sufficiently large player base requests it post-release.

<Zephenia> <Seraph_Xen> Do you know if anybody is working on a strategy guide or will there be a list of items and their stats anywhere ?
<FELee> Currently we don't have a strategy guide planned, but that may change, but there are likely to be a large number of fan sites players can reference. We've already got a great community of people recording out every word.

<Zephenia> <Dash> How large will sector 1 be? I am a bit concerned of the server load if everyone starting characters is crammed into the same zone.
<[FE]James> Each sector is huge. It can take an hour on horseback to go from the furthest south of sector 1 to the edge of sector 2 to the north. It's more like 1 1/2-2 hours on foot. Each town is separated by a huge amount of space. Server load being a concern, areas are divided up into regional servers. It's a seamless transition to the player.

<Zephenia> *Lansolyn* We know that FE is a classless game but how are you working with the content to prevent character builds from falling into the ranged dps, tank, healer triad?
<FELee> We give characters enough APs to advance through several skills, stats, and mutation paths simultaneously, so players aren't so easily pigeonholed into a single role. Also with the way many of our skills interact players can easily pick up certain other skills outside of a core DPS/Healer/Tank role. Most characters will be some DPS, some support, and some tank abilities.

<Zephenia> <Gunghoe> is the UI going to be better than WoW it is annoying how many plug ins thare are in that game to make it good
<FE-Funslayer> I think "better" is a really subjective term. While I enjoy playing around with interface addons in Warcraft, we've decided to go with a more standard UI that players can modify to some extent to fit their needs.

<Zephenia> <MMORPG_Immlemann> Will any tools for Roleplaying be added? Such as chat channels or items that lend to it?
<FELee> We've got lots of different types of clothes and other items player can use for RP, plus lots of places to do it. We don't currently have plans for custom chat channels aside from group and clan chat.

<Zephenia> <darth_bacon4> How will the skill system be presented?
<[FE]James> There's two main UI windows for skills. The first is your stat window that displays all attributes, skills, tradeskills, and faction values in different tabs. This is for information and spending advancement points. The other main window is your actions display, which shows all the skill and mutation actions you can use in and out of combat. This window has icons sorted by skill type and you can drag these to your action toolbar.

<Zephenia> <Lansolyn> What is your view of the balance between ranged weapons and melee weapons?
<FELee> The balance between ranged and melee is VERY complicated. Ranged has better reach obviously, but costs more money. Melee also affects your defense against melee attacks. We've been working constantly to develop the balance between these two so they both produce about the same end results in PvE (thoug Melee does make more money in the long run) and about the same results in PvP (though a melee person will loose to a range person on an ope
<FELee> So each has its strengths in certain situations and they are not always equal, but we try to make the overall play experience equal.

<Zephenia> *ZsasZ* Any merchandising plans? T-shirts, soundtracks, collectible card game, etc?
<Tiggs> As soon as our website is revamped we will have downloadable music samples available
<Tiggs> T-shirts - we would love to have plans for some sort of component for that later on as for right now Stratics is running a contest for shirts and we are going to be running contests on other fan sites as well.
<Tiggs> How about another chance to win a tshirt? The first 2 people to respond to me with the answer to What is the Sun and the Moon groups? will win a tshirt and closed beta key.
<Tiggs> We have 3 winners, I am being generous... They are Zsasz, Seraph_Xen and Clone 64 - the answer is They are a highly secretive Lightbearer cult that believe mutants are superior. Ninjas, deadly

<Zephenia> <Seraph_Xen> What kind of weapons are the highest end Melee weapons ?, Is there a limit to how many mounts,pets and vehicles you can have and can you sell them ?
<[FE]James> Our high-end melee weapons begin to get somewhat high-tech, but there's always a nice, sharp blade for those who want them. Folks who lean lighbearers have their high-end katanas, while the less subtle among us who just want to smash things have their huge tesla hammers. Imagine if a sledgehammer and a stun gun had a baby with a growth disorder.

<Zephenia> <MMORPG_Immlemann> How will guils/clans be helped or catered to? What sort of menu options will the be privded with to assist in forming recruiting and organizing activities.
<FELee> Clans have a great deal of control over their functions, including creating and setting their ranks, rank names, messages of the day, clan vaults, etc. Each rank can be set with its own permissions, including promoting, demoting, accessing vaults, etc.

<Zephenia> <MMORPG_Immlemann> Will there be any options for those who stray from combat. Such as crafting healing or preforming?
<[FE]James> Healers are essential to any big group battle, but they'll probably want to be armed. You don't want to just bring bandages to a gunfight. Scavenging and crafting are a huge part of our game, and you can easily spend as much time on that as you can our combat content. Crafting nets the best gear in the game, so everyone will need to either be a crafter or have a friend who's a crafter.

<Zephenia> <darth_bacon4> When traveling through the different towns how big will they be? I.E. how long would it take to walk from the south end to the north end of the town?
<FELee> It depends on the town. Some are little more than hovels that take all of 30 seconds to walk through, but then there are major cities like New Flagstaff that take upwards of 5-10 minutes depending on the route.

<Zephenia> <Dash> Can you explain how cover factors into combat. Also, can you touch on hit locations of people, mobs, and vehicles? Do headshots and shooting tires do more damage?
<[FE]James> Cover is importantin PvP, because if you don't have a clear shot to see the enemy, you just can't hit them. As for human crumple zones, we have four hit boxes on characters - head, torso, arms, and legs. Damage is modified by which area the player hits. For vehicles, there's no separate hit boxes at this time.

<Zephenia> <MMORPG_Immlemann> How will travel be handeled. Apart from mainland will there be quick travel like a train or boat?
<FE-Funslayer> Quick travel is a balancing act. We have a lot of ground in out game and we want players to feel the scale of it. On the other hand, we don't want anyone to get bored going from points A to B. Our solution is to give players progressively better and cooler vehicles. Horses to ATVs to Dune Buggies to who knows what Lee will think of next? There aren't any trains in the game though you'll be able to see the old monorail tracks.

<Zephenia> <Tiran> Any thoughts on vault space for crafters? An active crafter requires a HUGE amount of vault space, and usually games short them in this area.
<FELee> Currently players have access to several vaults, each with 64 slots (and all our crafting components stack in stacks of 100). You have your sector vault, which you can access in any town. You have your crafting/barter vault, which you can access from the centrally located barter town in each sector. Then you've got various special vaults you can find throughout the game that may not be convenient, but do allow more storage. Plus characters can store things on mounts, vehicles, etc.

<Zephenia> <MMORPG_Immlemann> How will Lore be handeled? Will there be a sort of book of events on the web page or in game? And will this change over time with the game and the events of the players?
<[FE]James> Right now, most of the official story of the game is told from the mouths of the residents of Grand Canyon Province. We have some books that are "conversers" that you can read in the game. In the future, we would like to add more of that kind of flavor.

<Zephenia> *Xaron the Wolf* Will there be any form of loot off player bodies, whether from that player's inventory, or from a seperate loot table?
<FELee> There's no player loot from bodies. You get points for killing other players in the terms of faction and in Death Toll, which is a kill counter that goes up and down as you kill or are killed. Death Toll allows you to access new content.

<Zephenia> <darth_bacon4> Roughly how many different vehicles will be available when FE is released? and will there be expansion on vehicle avaiability and crafting?
<FELee> There will be a about 15-20 vehicles, though not all of these are unique models. Also some models can be upgraded with plating, weapons, etc. We are looking to expand this after release. All vehicle are crafted.

<Zephenia> *Kin3000* What are the other skills besides crafting a player can learn and how many skills can a player obtain?
<FE-Funslayer> There are a ton of different skills that players can learn and we don't limit the number that anyone can learn. THere's a host of harvesting skills (plants, mammals, insects, reptiles), mining (coal, metal types, etc.), as well as tons of different crafting areas (clothes, melee and ranged weapons, ammunintion, medicine, food). I don't think anyone who enjoys crafting will be disapointed with the depth and breadth of our system.

<Zephenia> *Gunghoe* how is mob haste treated in this game. will snipers get attact a lot, or will the melee char be able to hold the attention on themselves.
<FELee> We don't focus as much on aggro control as in most MMOs. There's not a lot of taunting, etc, since we don't focus on boss mobs, instead setting up fights with lots of smaller opponents. So a sniper is going to have to be careful to take out targets sufficiently far from the targets friends that they don't all rush him.

<Zephenia> <Shabnam> U have plans of a european server and translate it into other languages else ?
<Tiggs> That has yet to be determined at this time.

<Zephenia> <Dash> Are there any plans for server events? Raids by NPCs? Roaming bandits attacking outposts?
<[FE]James> Like I answered before, we don't have any specific plans for live, GM-run events at this time. However, we do have scripted events in many areas including raids, roaming bandits, and other town events that make the world live and breathe on its own. Some things, such as town events, can be initiated by the player, who can influence the ultimate outcome.

<Zephenia> *Seraph_Xen* Is there a limit to how many mounts,pets and vehicles you can have, and can you sell all of them ? Are there faction specific mounts,pets and vehicles ?
<FELee> Players can have up to 5 mounts/vehicles. Mounts and vehicles can be traded before they are used the first time, but once they are first use they are bound to you. Vehicles can be salvaged for parts but may not be traded to other characters once used. There are some faction specific mounts/vehicles.
<Tiggs> Trivia question for a shirt and beta key -- first 2 people to message me with the correct answer...
<Tiggs> How many families are the travelers divided into
<Tiggs> The winners are Stranger_BL and Shabnam with the answer being 8

<Zephenia> <MMORPG_Immlemann> Are skills... SET? or do they diminish over time if not tended to?
<[FE]James> Once you've learned a skill, the game doesn't take it away from you, even if you never use it.

<Zephenia> <darth_bacon4> Will There be skills availbale to unlock when you reach a certain level of experience?
<FELee> Players have to get their skills to a specific level to learn higher level attacks and abilities, so in a since advance in level and skills will unlock new abilities you can learn. Level isn't as important as where you spend your APs, however.

<Zephenia> *ZsasZ* How will 'ganking' be handled? In other words, if a sufficiently skilled player catches another player unaware, would it be possible to kill them before they have a chance to react/ escape?
<FE-Funslayer> Simple answer: Yes, a sufficiently skilled/geared/levelled player will be able to gank another player.
<FE-Funslayer> Longer answer: Yes, but it won't be easy. To gank someone of equal level you'll need to be extremely combat focused, well geared and good at what you're doing. It'll be easier if they're lower level than you or if they are not a combat character. Of course that they'll have to be in a PvP zone. And if they're too far below your level we kick in the anti-griefing debuff. So don't be a jerk!

<Zephenia> <Lansolyn> What is the current view of bind on pickup or bind on equip equipment? -AND- <Lansolyn> I believe that this game is going to do a wonderful job with money sinks (like equipment and armor) will these things also degrade over time to ensure an outflow of money to stabalize the economy?
<FELee> Most equipment does not bind on equip, but higher level crafted items do bind on equip. Nothing binds on pickup. All equipment that is not consumable, like food or medicine, does suffer wear and tear over time and must be repaired or it will become nonfunctional, possibly destroyed.
<FELee> Lots of gear will probably end up be salvaged for rare components as well, but you never salvage as much as went into the item.

<Zephenia> <Seraph_Xen> What can you "craft" with the Cooking skill and can you sell it ?
<FELee> You can craft wonderfully tasty things like Dingo's Kidney pie made with real tainted coyote kidneys, Mystery Meat Sandwiches (My baloney has a first name, it's-OH MY GOD WHAT IS THAT?), all kinds of good stuff. And you can sell it.

<Zephenia> *Rokot* How was this match? Did you tested the PVP system? How does it work?
<FE-Funslayer> There isn't a match making system for PvP fights. All PvP takes place in PvP "zones". Normally these zones have something worth fighting over. As for testing, well, we're always trying to balance PvP. We do lots of internal testing (who doesn't want to shoot a coworker every once in a while) and have been listening to the feedback we get from our Beta testers.

<Zephenia> *Earthmonger* What are our tools for everyday life? Will farmers need hoes and shovels and such? Will miners need pick axes, or maybe dynamite? I already know crossbows/rifles and knives are in the game, so hunters are set. What about mechanics (Techs)? To put it simply, what tools are we going to need to harvest a 'node' or build something besides skill?
<[FE]James> Each tradeskill in the game requires the use of a tradeskill kit to craft items and harvest in the world. If you want to harvest a plant, you better have a nature kit. If you want to mine copper, you'd better have a geology kit. It is assumed that these kits have all the specialized tools and equipment you need to do the job.

<Zephenia> <MMORPG_Immlemann> How important will Gear be? WIll it be a deciding factor in all-most battles or will it make no difference in the scheme of things?
<FELee> Gear does matter, but since its a FPS system all the gear in the world won't matter if you can't hit someone. If you hit someone you'll always do some damage, though you may not do as much as you would hope if they have stacked out armor and skills.

<Zephenia> *Rokot* Arena: What can you tell me about this part of pvp? Will this influence on gameplay? And are you going to develope "arena" as WoW arenas or this is not the same?
<FE-Funslayer> We don't have arena combat like Warcraft does. Of course you have to remember that at launch Warcraft didn't have arena's at all (Or multiple party vehicles, battlegrounds, flying mounts,,,). We're concentrating more on goal oriented PvP at this point. If players are going to kill each other we want it to have an in game purpose. Take over a town, an area or other resource and gain something from the combat rather than just earnin

<Tiggs> Trivia Question - First 2 people to send me the correct answer will get a shirt and beta key... What two factions are polar opposites
<Tiggs> The answer is Enforcers and Chota -- the winners are Darth Bacon4, kin3000, and Tiran

<Zephenia> <dragonaut> Are you able to inspect other players or do you have to guess what they are using by the graphics?
<FELee> You cannot inspect players, you can only judge by what they are equipped with by sight.

<Zephenia> *frak* How many large "dungeons" will you have for groups of 2-6 PCs? Will they be for low level and high level or just high level?
<FELee> Lots across the entire level range. We have a smaller range of large scale instanced areas that are group focused, but we have a good number of levels groups can go muck about in.

<Zephenia> *Seraph_Xen* Whats the range limit of the highest end sniper rifle/scope combo ?
<FELee> 100m. Beyond that it gets really unfair in PvP.

<Zephenia> <MMORPG_Immlemann> What is the group size? And will there be a Raid mechanic in place?
<FELee> 24 is our max raid size. It's effectively three teams of 8.

<Zephenia> *Gunghoe* you have said there is experimenting on the resipies how is it done
<[FE]James> Our experimentation system involves taking a perfectly good item, adding a few other components, and seeing what happens. You have a chance of getting something better, but you also have a chance of ruining it and losing your gear. For weapons, you can modify things like speed, damage, range, etc. for better or worse.

<Zephenia> <darth_bacon4> I've heard that vehicles and pvp will not be available, will you be working on this issue and possibly release it in an update after FE is released?
<FELee> You can totally drive into a PvP zone with your car and shoot people with vehicle mounted machineguns. I would not recommend it, but you can.

<Tiggs> Thank you everyone! Don't forget to sign up for Stratics tshirt contest and the Devs and I will see you in #fallenearth to talk to you one on one
<[FE]James> Thanks, everyone! I'll see y'all next time.
<FELee> Goodnight everyone! Thanks!
<Tiggs> Type /join #fallenearth to join us!
<FE-Funslayer> Thanks for the questions everyone! I look forward to seeing you in Fallen Earth post-release!

<Zephenia> Thank for coming everyone - Go to http://chat.stratics.com for MORE chances to win Tshirts and Beta Keys!
<Zephenia> Logs will be posted later this evening folks! Thanks again!