Trion had their 21st February 2014 Friday Livestream Extravaganza with new Trion livestreamer Cole Marshall (known as Commercial on the Rift forums) as well as Game Director Bill “Daglar” Fisher and Senior Design Director Simon “Dead Simon” Ffinch.

Cole spent the livestream attempting to level to 60 on Seastone without dying to Defiants whilst Daglar and Dead Simon answered questions from the Livestream Chat.

Click here for a replay of the 21st February Friday Livestream Extravaganza video on twitch.tv.

Summary:

• Patch Info
  • 2.6 just launched. Updates every week or two for next month and a half at least.
  • 2.7 being worked on. Big announcements – but not yet.
  • More info on 3.0 coming out; news ramping up in the next few weeks and months.
• Conquest Power
  • Thinking of getting rid of it. The Perks will disappear too.
  • ‘Possibly’ adding the perks back in for Tier 1 and Tier 2 raids.
• PvP Dimensions coming out during 2.6.
• New Classes?
• Other Misc.

Below is a summary of all the important things relating to the livestream. As always, everything can be subject to change prior to the content hitting Live.

Legend:
Black/Normal Text = Livestream Summary.
[Dark Blue Text] = My own comments. i.e. May not be indicative of actual content.

Table of Contents:

• Patch Info
• PvP-related Info
• New Classes?
• Others
  • Chronicles
  • Achievements
  • Types of Mounts
  • Player-shared Banks
  • Optimisations
  • Other Tidbits

Patch Info

Patch 2.6

Patch 2.6 just launched last week. [More info here] There will be updates every week or two for at least the next month and a half.

[Thus far there’s still the following additions to 2.6 that are not yet released on Live that we know are coming:

• Arc 4 and Arc 5 of the Air Saga [Guide];
• Bloodfire Behemoth, The Bloodfire Army and Power of Nightmares Zone Events;
• Bloodfire Stronghold + 6x bosses [Guide];
• Tier 3 Raids – the start of the Tier 3 Raid encounters will begin to flow into Live at the very end of 2.6, with the rest hitting 2.7. ]

PvP Dimensions are slated to come out during 2.6, although Daglar was unsure what date they’ll hit PTS. [Click here for more info on PvP Dimensions.]

Patch 2.7

Patch 2.7 is being worked on right now. Daglar stated that there are big announcements to look forward to for Patch 2.7 but that they are not ready to announce them just yet.

[Thus far we know that the majority of the Tier 3 Raid encounters will hit Live with Patch 2.7. This also means that the Runic Athenaeum is likely to hit Live during either Patch 2.7 or on the tail end of 2.6.]

Patch 2.8+

Daglar stated that there were at least two major updates to go prior to 3.0. Thus at least a Patch 2.7 and a Patch 2.8. This doesn’t rule out a 2.9 though.

Rift 3.0

Daglar and Dead Simon reiterated that 3.0 content will be free, except the new 3.0 souls.

Also, the Storm Legion souls will not become free when 3.0 hits. Also, souls will not be sold individually – those will always be a bundle.

PVP-related Info

PvP Dimensions

First up, PvP Dimensions are coming within the Patch 2.6 release cycle. They’ll be released on PTS for testing prior to Live release.

Conquest Chest

The Conquest Chest is here to stay and will not be moved to Faction bases – they are meant to be fought over. [It’s now at the Eye of Regulos in the middle of the map; same with the final boss.]

Conquest Power

Trion is thinking of removing Conquest Power. If Conquest Power is removed, you will lose the Conquest Perks.

However, the team is currently in discussions and looking into adding the Conquest Perk buffs for Tier 1 and Tier 2 Raid instances. It will not be available for Tier 3 Raids.

The reason for this would be so that raiders who are on the cusp of downing a boss in Tier 1 or Tier 2 will not lose the CQ perks that could be detrimental to their progression. However, Tier 3 isn’t out yet and so there’s a level playing field there.

Again though, this is under discussion and not 100% confirmed to make it to Live.

[There’s a feedback/voting thread on whether to keep or remove Conquest Power here. Note: There’s no mid-way; only remove or keep. ]

Other PvP

Dead Simon confirmed that there are plans for new Warfronts and other PvP-related content.

New Classes?

Think this deserves it’s own heading. Daglar responded to a player in chat with the following, word-for-word: “Yes we are absolutely thinking about new classes, there are people playing new souls on the PTS right now”.

Had to re-watch that multiple times to make sure I wasn’t hearing things.

Was this just a slip-up/brain fart or did Daglar just say that Trion are looking to introduce new classes?

[I’m guessing it’s a brain fart and he got classes and souls confused – adding in new classes would be a lot of effort.

However, if he actually meant that there will be new classes – that would be very interesting and would be a huge announcement. What more could be added? Plus a new class/es would entail 10 souls at that point each (8 original + Storm Legion + 3.0) and all the balance work required.

For that reason, I’m leaning towards ‘he misspoke’. It would be one shocker of a reveal if otherwise.]

Others

• Chronicles
• Achievements
• Types of Mounts
• Player-shared Banks
• Optimisations
• Other Tidbits

Chronicles

Not looking at adding any new chronicles in the near future.

Achievements

May or may not be possible to add Twisted Artifact achievements. Dead Simon will look into it.

It’s also a lot of work to add in account-wide achievements. There’s no ETA or any 100% ‘going-to-do’ confirmation on this.

Types of Mounts

With the new Land Mount classification, viewers asked whether there would be Flying Mounts.

• Dead Simon: No plans for Flying Mounts.
• “Maybe gliding some day, but not today.” – Daglar.

[There are – however – Water and Amphibious Mount classifications datamined by TehFrank as well as what looks to be a new Water/Amphibious mount skin.]

Player-shared Banks

Dead Simon stated that they are “looking into the technical issues involved in doing [player-shared banks]”.

On the subject, Daglar stated that what they feel they can deliver in the near future would likely be a bag that can be shared, or at least accessible across multiple characters.

Optimisations

2.6 added in some VFX optimisations that seems to have helped a variety of players. The engineers are currently working on stuff to help out 3.0 artists but as soon as that is done they’ll be concentrating on optimising Shadows.

Other Tidbits:

• Patron Vial Stacking – Daglar reiterated that Patron vials now stack with normal vials.
• Mech Mounts – Daglar: “Yes there are more of the Mech Mounts coming down the pipe in a couple of weeks I think”.
• Loot from Bosses – Daglar: “We are not going to increase the number of drops from bosses.”
• Mount Dyes – Not currently on the production list. – Daglar.
• Dimension Dyes – Difficult – they may end up just making a bunch of different colored versions of current items.

Conclusion

Daglar and Simon answered a few questions and Cole – although new – seems to have a decent grasp on Rift. Look forward to seeing future livestreams and info on new content to come.

Simon stated he would like to hear from players about what they would like to see in the Livestreams by posting on the forums. There’s a thread started by Gwenddydd if you are interested in posting some feedback/ideas.