October 02, 2011:Finally! An update!

So I've been gone for quite some time now mainly due to college and work. After several months of inactivity, CrystalShire has finally been updated once again, and it's looking sharper than ever!

Several features have been completely overhauled such as the GUI, character selection, some new monsters, and a few other things here and there.

I will be posting if there are any future updates. I really wish the new bosses and guild system are put into place soon though lol.

On a side note, only 27 more days til I'm 21! Huzzah :O

Raven

July 12, 2011:Semi-back

So if anyone is wondering where the hell I have been, here's what happened...

So Comcast, my former internet provider, decided to try and bill me $400 for using their cable box that I did not even have. Long story short, I cut off connections with them and I'm currently looking for another internet provider with little success. I've only had internet access about 4 times in the past 2 months that I've been gone. I should be able to get on more frequently in a month or less hopefully.

Again, sorry for my absence but, then again, I didn't miss any updates. However, the new GUI that Robin is working on is pretty nice looking and a lot more complex than the current one. I hope to see more improvements during the next update, whenever that will be xD.

Raven

May 16, 2011:Gold Making Guide

So a lot of people have been wondering how I make my gold so quickly. It's actually really simple and only requires a bit of mindless killing. Hope this guide helps and inspires more people to farm gold like I do. It honestly only requires about an hour or two of killing every other day. I am currently up to 52k gold and 400 mushrooms. If you don't believe me, here's a pic:

-------------------- Level 1-10 --------------------

The easiest way to make quick cash from level 1 to level 10 is to simply kill cows and wolves. It's not a lot of cash in the grand scheme of things but it will get the job done and let you purchase your equips fairly easily. Cow hides sell for 2g a piece and wolf skins sell for 4g a piece. Not bad.

-------------------- Level 11-14 --------------------

  Here is where you'll start making a decent amount of money fairly quickly. A lot of people need mushrooms to exchange for their level 10/13 equips from the Mushroom Man. However, gathering mushrooms can be a long and tedious process considering you'll need 190 for the level 10 armor set and level 13 weapon and an additional 80 for a convenient skill scroll that will enable you to teleport outside of Glenvale (a great time saver). Mushrooms sell for about 5-7g a piece depending on the person and bees have the highest mushroom drop rate. 100 mushrooms will take roughly 30 mins to an hour to gather.

Another great method of gold farming is killing bats in the sewers on the way to the Sewer Troll. They hit fairly hard though and are auto aggro until you pass their level. However, they drop a hefty 12g a piece which is a fairly large amount at this level.

-------------------- Level 15-16 --------------------

This is more of a filler area and bees/bats would probably still be your best bet for gathering money. However, an alternative area would be the Savage Sheep map. They drop 2 wolf skins as well as other various food items. They hit hard for their level but at least you'll get a fair amount of exp for killing them.

-------------------- Level 17-20 --------------------

Here is the point at which you'll make large amounts of money fairly quickly. Currently, Bandits are the best source of gold farming in the game. The Warrior Bandit can drop a whopping 90g at a time (if you're lucky). Normally they'll drop around 20-50g a kill. The other Bandits will drop around 20g and some food items so you won't have to buy them again and again. This means that Bandits are pretty much 100% profit. The only thing you have to worry about is their damage ranges. Only take on one at a time as any more can be bad for your health. 

-------------------- Bossing --------------------

An experimental way of making money would be to sell the unique equips dropped by the various bosses. However, due to the SB on pickup problem, you can't sell these the traditional way. The only way to "sell" these items would be to form a team who could actually kill the boss and inviting "buyers" along to sit back, wait til the equip drops, drop a certain amount of gold corresponding to the value of the item or whatever the attacking party is willing to sell it for, and then loot the equip(s). An even split of the gold would also have to be factored in as each member of the attacking party would have to get their fair share. Say you charged 1500g for a Flame equip dropped by Molten Lady. When an equip drops, the buyer will first drop the 1500g, the leader of the party will loot the gold, and then the buyer is free to loot the flame equip. The leader would then have to divide the total gold amount by the total number of attackers in the party and split it up that way. So if there were 3 people in the attacking party, each member would receive 500g.

That is how we got around the problem of untradeable unique boss items in several other games I've played (at least until the creators finally decided to make boss equips tradeable via a certain method whether it be a quest or an item you had to pay for). It isn't the most trustworthy method and it is quite easy to be ripped off, but if your group is powerful enough, it's fairly easy to just declare that person a dick and follow them everywhere killing them when possible to make sure their life is a living hell. After all, they can't trade that item to another character so there's no way for them to transfer it to another one of their accounts which would ultimately make that item useless to them.

Raven

May 08, 2011: Stat Builds

-------------------- Warrior Stat Builds --------------------

Bossing Build - Max Agi, Rest into End

Training Build - Max Str, Rest into End

Hybrid Bossing Build - Max Agi, Some into End until HP = 300, Rest into Str

As a Warrior, you will be the tank of the party when bossing. This means you will be taking the full force of the boss and any monsters that happen to be spawned with the boss. Simply stand in front of the boss and hammer away at it while a Whisperer heals you. The Training Build ensures that you have plenty of HP and dish out a large amount of damage at all times. The Hybrid Bossing Build allows you to have the defense/avoidability of a Bossing Build Warrior while allowing you to have a decent amount of physical damage. However, keep in mind that you will have significantly less HP than other builds.

-------------------- Wizard Stat Builds --------------------

All Encompassing Build - Max End, Rest into Int

As a Wizard, you will be sniping 99% of the time while training and 100% of the time when bossing so there is no real need for Agi, Will, or Str.

-------------------- Whisperer Stat Builds --------------------

All Encompassing Build - Max Int, Rest into End

As a Whisperer, your main job will be healing during boss fights so a large pool of Spirit is necessary. Like Wizards, you will be sniping 99% of the time when training so there is no real need for anything but Int/End.

Note: When I say, "Max [stat1], Rest into [stat2]," I mean put all the points you can into your main stat until you get the message stating that you are unable to add anymore points to that stat. Then add points to your secondary stat UNTIL you able to add points to your main stat again. After a certain level, it's usually [2 points into your main stat and 1 point into your secondary stat] every time you level up.

There are plenty of other stat builds but these are the ones that I've found to be the most effective. If you have stat builds of your own, please post them for others to see :)

May 07, 2011:Version 1.4.4 Released!

"Patch Notes v1.4.4:
• Usergroup support in the engine.
• Tier 2 and Tier 3 supporters now have gold names & text.
• Hopefully fixed the cause of the map change errors.

Not much to add here. If anyone can go see if they continue to get the map change error then that'd be fantastic. I think I've come across at least one of the causes of CTD on map change and fixed it but there may be more.

Anyone who's in the support groups should check if they have the right name & text colour ingame. You may need to login twice for the change to take effect.

Apart from that very little was done. Expect the Developer's Edition to be released later." - Robin


Basically here's the rundown on the update:

1. There a now different usergroups, supporters and regular users
2. The "Support" usergroup will have golden text in-game and there names will appear in gold both in-game and on the site.
3. Some people have experienced map change errors (disconnect for an unknown reason when you change maps). Supposedly fixed, but maybe not.

Note: If you do decide to donate £40+, you will get the open source game engine for CrystalShire AND it will include pretty much all updates as the actual game, just not at the same time.


Raven