Oh, come on, you couldn't have resisted either, if you were me.

Q: The Labyrinth press release says the new race can use 2H weapons in one hand! Have you thought about XYZ?

A: Yes, we have, and we think we can do it in a good way for the game. This is where I mention that it's only a plan. Actual play testing may yet prove that we should not do this, in which case, we won't. It's a press release, not holy writ.

Q: If you pre-register for the Vegas roundtable, and later are unable to actually attend, will you still get the expansion and be able to participate in the beta?

A: Yes to both. But I sure hope you're able to come and party - the whole point of the event is to meet new and old friends, and for us to talk to you in person.

Q: Regarding 1.85B: Could we have another Wreath option added with 5 qui cap (since there's no qui cap available in the Hib Reinforced section)?

A: According to the Trade Goddess, we’re getting qui cap armor pieces set up for next Pendragon version.

Q: Need some clarification on the Cathal Valley rr cap. It was stated that cap is 4L9; is this the absolute cap, or can we get to RR5 in Cathal valley?

A: Like the other caps in RVR area, you can get over the cap, but once you're over and you leave the area, you can't come back.

Q: According to my sources, a paladin´s damage per second should be increased while under the effect of its haste aura. Could you confirm/negate this rumor, please? Also, during some test fights against the same time of monsters, it seemed that the weapon´s base damage increased when being hasted, but the used style´s growth rate decreased at the same percentage, thus causing the sum of damage over a long period of time (say, five to ten hits) to remain virtually the same, regardless of the paladin being hasted or not.

For example, the same style caused in sum 150 damage (40 damage from the style) with the haste aura being turned off, but 150 (20 from style) while being hasted. Could it be the growth rate of the weapon styles adjusts itself to the relative weapon speed?

A: I would like to thank you for spelling everything properly, using punctuation, and using paragraph breaks to boot. As you probably know, punctuation and grammar can drastically change the meaning of a question.

I got the answer from the Redheaded Stepchild. Short answer: Haste = more damage over the long haul.

By the way, there are so many factors that play minor roles that we could not even begin to answer you without simplifying matters somewhate. Or, as the Redhead put it: If we try to factor [all that] into examples, heads will explode, kittens will die, and little children's toys will burst in to flames.

That aside, there are two components of melee damage we are interested in. The first, base damage. The second, styled damage. Base damage remains constant per swing. So, no matter how fast or slow you are swinging, that damage should be the same for each swing. Styled damage remains constant over time. So, over one minute, if you swing 100 times or 10 times, your style damage will add up to the same amount, and it will be split evenly across each swing in that time frame.

When you add melee haste, like Celerity, your swing speed is increasing. The base damage per swing is staying the same, but the styled damage is going down. Because the styled damage over a time period is the same, and base damage over time increases the faster you swing, damage over time will increase with melee haste. It might not be readily apparent because of the melee damage variance. As your statistics professor would say, five to ten swing test runs can be incredibly deceptive because of this variance. The sample size is much too small. An appropriate sample size to see a clear difference would be around 1000 styled hits for each test run.

Q: I was wondering why the Black and Grey Unicorns do not have any glowy horns.

A: Player feedback from roleplayers - they were pretty clear that not all unicorns are or should be sparkly vessels of wonderment.

Q: What are the caps for str, con, dex, and quick? Are there two caps for quick when considering swing speed and evasion?

A: There are no hard caps anymore, exactly. There are soft caps, past which further increases to a particular stat are not effective - but that depends on the class and what it is you're trying to do. I'm not trying to be vague, I just can't answer the question as written.

To your second question, I turn to Mighty Marty: "There aren't separate caps on quickness with regard to swing speed vs. evasion.  There is, however, a cap on swing speed (the fastest you can swing a weapon is once every 1.5 secs) and both quickness and dexterity are considered equally when checking evades."

Q: When you have +10% to casting speed, is that taken off the total speed before dexterity comes into play, or after?

A: After.

***

Y'all, I CANNOT talk about accounts with anyone but the owner of said account. If you were writing to complain about a particular person having his character names changed, I did not answer you because I could not answer you. But I am WAY ahead of you. The player himself did the right things in the right order. He appealed, then he wrote to the Dispute email address, got an answer, and wrote to me and my team. My team and I are arguing on the player's behalf, as we usually do, and a decision will be made by early next week. Believe me when I say that after a gazillion years of this, I know server drama when I see it. I do not know what will happen, but I do know that the process is as fair as possible.

As a side note - I have not been "cool" or up on current slang in years. Okay, more like I have never been cool or up on slang. When someone asks how I'm doing, I say "Peachy keen, jelly bean," for heaven's sake. When I hear that some perfectly innocent thing has taken on some sick connotation thanks to some attention whore with a recording contract, I'm usually just disgusted. There is a huge gray area when it comes to that sort of thing in our game. We have to decide if the player knew about the gross meaning… and even if we decide the player was innocent in his intent, we have to decide if the gross meaning is widespread enough that most players would be offended.

I can think of less complicated ways to spend a few hours. But that's why we have an appeal process.

We have a very special speaker lined up for Las Vegas. If you know anything about fantasy, you know this guy. But I can't tell you his name. All I can tell you is that we are planning to cap the number of tickets we sell to keep the event feeling personal - and that I have a hunch the event may sell a whole lot of tickets once the speaker's secret identity is announced.

I'm off to the Leipzig Game Convention! If you didn't make an appointment, I can't make any promises, but I sure would love to meet you - we'll be under GOA's wing in Hall 3, booth D20.

Have a peachy keen weekend.