Amer's comments are in dark red.

Rhayde : Hello and welcome to the Lineage House of Commons chat! To ask the developers a question, please /query [QT]rosie or [QT]flippie. Please do not message me or any of the NCsoft staff, these questions will be ignored. captsturm : Hello, I'm CaptSturm. I'm the producer for Lineage North America Leilo : Hi everyone : I'm Leilo, Community Relations Manager for NCsoft North American. :) Kyzah : Hello everyone! I'm Kyzah, Community Coordinator for the Lineage message boards. :) Darkwing_ : Kyzaaaaaaaaah! Kyzah : LOL Lena : Hello I'm Lena I work in Support for Lineage Darkwing_ : Hello everyone, I'm Darkwing and I'm part of the Support team :) Hyrrix : Hello! A question: I heard that Lineage wasn't very succesful in North America, while Ultima Online wasn't very succesful in Korea. Do you have any idea why that is? Are these markets distinctly different? In which ways? * captsturm : I think the markets are different. I think that a number of factors impact this::but I don't really feel comfortable speculating on another companies product. captsturm : I will say that we'd like see the Lineage numbers continue to grow in North America and are working on new content designed for our market. Well, tons of articles have been published on the cultural differences between Korea and North America. However, we are the expansion country, and it takes us longer to adopt (as well as NC longer to adapt) what was successful at the home country to here. We just have to hope that NC-Korea has the motivation to do so. aaron|westlife : ok, I've never heard of lineage. any chance of a brief overview? Leilo : Brief Overview : Lineage is an online game that was originally developed in Korea, where it currently has millions of subscribers. It's a huge fantasy world where players band together... Leilo : in bloodpledges, to siege and control castles, which in turn control the economy of the game. It has both PvP and non:PvP gameplay options as well. And, well, we think it's a pretty cool game. :) Leilo : You can find out a bunch more info on it by visiting www.lineage.com, as well as start a free trial. :) Nothing much to be said here, but it's refreshing that new people are being introduced to Lineage every day. clin : Will NC US make a Lineage Shop like that in Korea? Leilo : It's long been a plan (and a question that's come up before) to put together a US version of the online Lineage Shop. Leilo : And we are moving forward on it. As a matter of fact, we just got a bunch of test merchandise in today : baseball caps, t:shirts, fleece pullovers, mousepads, and coffee mugs. :) Leilo : Once we settle on some good, quality merchandise, we'll be putting it all up in a site for you. Now, don't get your hopes up that they will sell the SAME items as www.lineageshop.com, since all the things Leilo listed are not the same as the little figurines and trinkets available there, but it would be nice to finally have something with Lineage on it. Hopefully NC will give us permission to make Lineage Compendium stuff too :) Rhayde : any idea when we can look forward to a fix for the npc lag? :) captsturm : We have been working on that issue. We're making slow progress, but we hope to have a fix very soon. You can also keep up on the status updates by reading the lineage.com forums. Siferenthiusi : With all the frequent problems with your servers for Lineage, do you plan to change over to a new server? Apparently Players are starting to get restless with this. Hence the many events lately. * captsturm : Actually, we're just taking a more aggressive approach to ensuring players are having a great time. captsturm : So, when there have been problems along different points of the network outside of our control, we've decided to go ahead and do more frequent events There is a common misperception that getting disconnected from the servers can only be a problem with the machine at the other end. After all, we're not network experts, we're just gamers. We click the icon, Lineage comes up, if its a problem, it's probably their fault, because IE seems to work just fine. No one ever thinks about the hundreds of miles between you and Austin, Texas, the 20 or so network devices along the way and all the different companies which NC has no control over. After all, if you call your ISP up and say "I'm getting too much lag" would they just say "Oh, right away sir, let me press the "Lag Off" button right now! Anyway, point of all this is: just because NC gave us an event doesn't mean it was their fault. They're just being sympathetic. In the case of the last event, NC's ISP told them about the maintenance and then it took longer than NC expected. We got disconnected, but NC didn't cause it. They felt bad for us and gave us the event. You want to see angry, imagine what NC said to their ISP on the phone. NC pays a teensy bit more $15 a month to their ISP :) lin_grendel : How does NC determine the election of a mayor : specifically, does it matter (1) where and (2) what you hunt? Kyzah : First off, you have to declare your hometown : after you decide which town you want to declare, go talk to the Village Manager in that town. Kyzah : Once you have your hometown set, you'll get contribution points by killing monsters based on your character level compared to the monster level. Kyzah : These points are tallied to elect a Mayor each week, who can then determine the town's tax rate for the week. Kyzah : You don't have to hunt around your hometown to get these points, you can hunt anywhere. Okay, so YOU CAN HUNT ANYWHERE. 'Nuff said. agris : Was wondering if anything is being done to make it easier for korean and english speaking players to be in the same game.. currently we just spam each other's screens with un:readable symbols captsturm : Currently, you can prevent non english fonts from being displayed. But there's no current plans to add any translation assistance in game. It's impossible to translate automatically. Amateras is a rare commodity over at LC, he's fluent in English and Korean. The best anyone can do in game to bridge the language gap is learn a bit of Korean (if you speak English) or learn a bit of English (if you speak Korean). It's what everyone else on the planet does when they want to make friends with people from other countries. Ask anyone who has duties (work, military, study) outside of their home country. BadAxe: Hi there. I was wondering if it will ever be possible to add something simple like color dyes of different types and colors, to add a little uniqueness to the characters. I understand that this game is 2D so items worn can not be visible, but a little color maybe to spice things up? * captsturm : I'm not sure how practical this would be with our current engine. It may require new sprites for any possible appearance, requiring substantial art assets and downloads. As it was explained to me long ago, when we do a download from NC, every single file that we get that ends in .SPR is a sprite file. These files contain the animations for one action from one angle. So, if I'm facing North and I swing my sword, that's one file. If I'm facing Northeast and I swing my sword, that's another file. If I'm facin East.. and so on. So, for every single action, it takes 8 files. Now, if I want to cast a spell, that's 8 more files to do that. Swing an axe, 8 more files. Shoot a bow, 8 more files. Now, imagine if I had color coding! Swing a sword with a red hat and blue shirt, 8 files. Red hat, red shirt, sword, 8 files. Blue hat, red shirt, shooting a bow, 8 files. It just multiplies exponentially. This is a limitation in the way the server and client are coded, which is why "Lineage: Forever" is such a big deal. But hey, the engine is like 8 years old, it's not perfect but that's what we have right now. clin : Will DS ever come back to the game? captsturm : That item isn't currently planned to be reintroduced. I know that Cray's Quest is an old favorite of veteran players and has been requested of the dev team for re:implementation This question gets asked every month I think. Answer this month: No. Answer last month: No. I'm seeing a pattern.. Rhayde : what's with the orc town arena in tomorrow's publish? :P captsturm : For the LoA server, we're "reserving" the orc town arena for special events captsturm : Pending a live environment test, the NC staff can do occasional Dragon Fights or work with fan sites to provide PVP tourneys This will be very cool. ;) Lebannen: Hi there. A single question : it's been a month since the last fan art; when are the results going to be published? * Leilo : That on is my fault, and I'm sorry I fell behind on it. I'll go through the recent submissions and choose a winner this week. :) And the posted it the next day. :) Taera : Lineage is not Lineage without the players. What can we, as lovers (and addicts) of Lineage do to help keep the community growing, besides word of mouth? I feel helpless here! captsturm : First, the dedicated fans of Lineage are fantastic::I really mean that. captsturm : You've been great captsturm : The word of mouth method of growth for lineage shouldn't be underestimated. If you're having a good time, please, invite a friend captsturm : And when you see a new person in game, help them out. Not just with items, but welcome them into the world. Answering newbie questions on the forums or in-game without jumping down someone's throat is nice too :) LeroyBrown : when will we see the new lv 45 quests on the us servers? also why is the new elf glove only safe to +4, when it is obviously an elven armor item (elf only)? why would people use this item over the very popular bracer? * captsturm : That content is currently on the Korean Test Server. We generally apply new content to the US servers within 2 weeks (often within a few days) of their publish to the Korean Main Server. captsturm : All content on Korean Test is considered to be highly subject to change and I'd prefer not set an expectation on items that may change. Level 45+ quests (as of today, March 13) are still not on the Korean Live Servers.. so, it will be at least April for US. Taera : Level 49:50 is like getting from 1:49. In my opinion, and the opinion of many players, this level should deserve some sort of reward. Would a level 49+ morph or some other reward be possible? captsturm : We've discussed possible morph options. I do like the idea of rewards at different levels. But even so, unless Korea implements it, captsturm can only do his idea on LoA. So, if this is important to you, ask NC to suggest it to Korea on the lineage.com forums or through their support tool at http://support.lineage.com Rhayde : <Rhayde> Are there any plans to release the marriage and trade systems soon? captsturm : I don't have a time table on that one. But we'll deploy it as quickly as we receive the content from development. :) It's not even on Korean test yet.. M3Gz : Can you please Tell them that the orange potion price increase was an unexpected thing and it has seriously thrown off balance the economy and is decemating the middle class in the game. If there is a pot increase,alot of players feel that the damage that mops do should be buffered to match this * Kyzah : We've heard your complaints about this, we're continuing to check the OJ petition on the Lineage boards, and you are being heard, we are passing these comments along. Kyzah : In addition to chiming in on the OJ petition, we'd also like to hear your suggestions for change and why you think it's a bad (or good) idea. Kyzah : So keep the constructive commentary going! Not much we can do there except speak our mind on the forums and hope NC-Korea takes notice (unless you play LoA, then you can just hope captsturm agrees with your game philosophy). However, this is just unlikely to change. Not only has NC-Korea had 200a oranges for months and months now, but if you think it will be an economic shift here, imagine the impact there.. Siferenthiusi : I've been on a lot of the Korean Lineage fan:sites lately and I have seen ads for "Lineage Tournament" or something similar to that name, what is this? I'm puzzled because I'm heavy into PvP and it strikes a little child in my brain. :) * captsturm : It's basically a seperate server that is solely PvP or team vs team. It'll pull the character data over so that you don't affect your normal server character. captsturm : It'll have its own "arena" type maps. We're (LC) actually going to post some information on this very soon, so keep checking. Petrucci : I posted a message on the Loa boards about Clear potions was wandering if there was any plans to change either the healing powers of them or reduce the delay * captsturm : Yes, that'll be tweaked a bit::probably a little of both. captsturm : I intended that for tomorrow, but, uhm, well... captsturm : But, I've got it on my task list This goes to show, talk about it on the forums, things will get considered. Siferenthius : Ok, with lvl 15 quests that give you really good items or alter stats.. and lvl 30 that either give you something really good items or stats... what fair would this be to a new person in a tournament situation? * captsturm : If you're asking if it would be a fair fight between a level 50 player and a level 10 player::I'm thinking, not so much. captsturm : But the tournament server will have rooms that you can join, like a smaller 10v10 battle captsturm : So you can choose to play against other players of your exp level captsturm : However, we haven't determined if or when the Tournament system will come to our market. The Lineage Tournament has "rooms" where you get to pick people who are near your level. There is a 52+ room, a 46-51 room, etc. lin_grendel : Is the limited style of the events a technical limit or are you guys taking suggestions? captsturm : We do have some pretty strict technical limits in regards to events, but we're always open to suggestions. captsturm : Even if what you suggest turns out to be impractical, it may spark an idea that ends up working out nicely. So if you have a better idea for an event, instead of spamming global about how this event sucks, suggest it. Maybe the next event will be better. (Although it would be nice if NC would tell us what limits there were and why certain events are not possible so we could refine our ideas into something useful) amer : Some of us have seen these new GM sprites which look like Talass of the Ivory Tower. Tell us more. What is the deal LENA? * Lena : Support has been working with a new body style for use in our in game interactions. We like the idea of being able to spend more quality time with the players. We hoped the new body choice might get everyone's attention and based on the initial reactions we were right! Lena : Don't get discouraged if we sometimes still send you off to http://support.lineage.com as that will always be the best resource for most of your issues and questions! :) They posted about this on the forums, so that's good to see that they want to be in game in a visible way. Hopefully they'll start showing up in places where I don't have to risk death to see them, like Werldern town. Taera : For years the internal debate has been going on, answered by religious leaders, political martyrs, even fast food depot owners. So here, now, we want to know what you, the NC Austin team thinks: What came first, the chicken or the egg, and why? Darkwing_ : mmm, foood Leilo : I have absolutely no idea, but a sudden craving for an omelette for dinner... Kyzah : Mmm, tamago. Kyzah : Now I need soy sauce. captsturm : Obviously either choice is impossible, therefore chickens and eggs cannot possibly exist. Darkwing_ : whoa Darkwing_ : and the world now has meaning Leilo : Capt wins. Kyzah : 42? *lowers his head in shame at the LC reporter's question* Leilo : Thanks for joining us tonight everyone! And a big thank you to our hosts and question takers! :) Lena : Farewell! Kyzah : Bye everyone! Nice to see you here, look forward to seeing you on the forums! :) Rhayde : Thank you for attending tonight's Lineage HoC! Logs will be up soon at http://www.stratics.com captsturm : Goodbye everyone::thanks for stopping in! Darkwing_ : Take care everyone :)