DragonFable -

Project News Design Note Archive - See the good, bad, and the buggly -- all the way from the start!
Alac Gone hunting	April 30th 2010* Wanted: Civic-minded Heroes and Hunters Hunt the monsters of Lore for the good of us all! Head South from Valencia's zone this weekend and you'll find the Hiking Trail we opened last week. If you explore around it, you'll be sure to come across the Hunter's Paradise Tavern, which is having its Grand Opening this weekend! The Hunter's Paradise is owned by Teral, a weaponsmith who will be more than happy to craft you new weapons provided you bring him the proper materials. And where can you get those? Why, by talking to Karina, representative for the New Dawn! She and her compatriots collect information on the monsters running rampant around Lore and give that information to heroes and hunters just like YOU! This weekend you'll have TWO quests from Karina, with the request that you hunt the new monster species that are terrorizing the citizens of Lore! Take the quest rewards back to Karina to sell them for gold or to Taral to merge them into new rewards! And when I say new rewards, I mean NEW REWARDS! There's a ton of them, and all available by merging the loot you get from hunting the Cabit and Rhoddu! Ameronian Edge Ameronian Slicers Ameronian Rod Axe of the Gleaming Lantern Blades of the Gleaming Lantern Staff of the Gleaming Lantern Rhoddu Hood Rhoddu Helm Golden Cabit Ears Rhoddu Cape Golden Mantle Monster Claw Necklace Leather Gloves (trinket) Leather Gauntlets (trinket) You're not done exploring Ravenloss quite yet! Talk to Tomix to make your way through the three Ravenloss random quests! You'll be going back to Dusk Alley, the Market District, and Silkwood Park battling a host of baddies and gaining Shards of the Spirit Loom for your troubles! Haven't heard of the Shards of Spirit-Loom item before? That's because it's a brand-new drop, and you'll definitely want to collect them! They'll be used later on to train up your SoulWeaver armor once the end of the Saga gets closer! We're not going to go into more detail than that about the armor training because it will spoil the end of the Ravenloss storyline! Start speculating! The weekend is HERE! Every Friday is another DragonFable release AND it means the start of the weekend! Two whole days to laze about and do NOTHING (or if you're feeling productive, lots of FUN somethings!) With the beautiful weather we're experiencing around the Secret Underground Lab, I might try to talk some people into going to the beach! Sand, sun, and fun in the surf will relax and re-energize us for next week! * I have valiantly battled and won against the insidious machinations of the time-travel fairies, correcting myself BEFORE they could get into the Design Notes and tinker with time. Win!

Alac Is sneaky.	April 28th 2010 Time to tease and tempt you It's Sneak Peek Wednesday again! Who's ready to be titillated and tormented with a tempting taste of what's to come? You are? Excellent! Get ready to go on the Hunt! That's right, Hunter's Paradise is opening this weekend! Two new NPCs, two new monsters, and a TON of new rewards that those NPCs will craft for you! Are you ready to save Lore from an invasion of these new monsters? You are? Good! Because it's up to you to save Lore as Karina sends you around the world hunting strange new beasties! You know her as Warlic's Assistant... But Nythera is much, much more! And this Summer we'll go more deeply into her story, which left off after the Elemental War. If you haven't played it, now's a great time to start because this Summer will see the unveiling of the Nythera (the staff member) and I met for almost 2 hours today and got the whole story mapped out in between phone calls, Zazul making funny voices and weird noises, and lunch demanding to be eaten (there was no Hero around when I was attacked by my Hero sub. Surprised face!). Now we just need dialogue, art, cutscenes animated, rewards drawn, NPCs drawn... ok, there's a lot left to do. But now you know we're doing it, and that it'll be done this Summer! See you Friday! (Or maybe earlier, if Rolith finishes his Codemonkey Day Challenge. He says it'll be done by Friday at the latest, but don't be scared. It won't leave you in tears. He hopes. /grin)

Alac Gave the scythe a makeover.	April 27th 2010 You gave us feedback, and we answered The Rutilated Ripper is in Cysero's Superstore of Savings! We understand that many of you on the forums were upset that you weren't able to participate in the Rixty Card offer, and you voiced your opinions to let us know that. We do not control which countries receive the offers we participate in; the companies sponsoring those offers decide where to take them. We DO, however, control what content we can offer for Dragon Coins, and Dragon Coin items are available to everyone! With that in mind, we've recolored the Ripper scythe a gleaming silver and will offer it for sale! The Rutilated Ripper and Oversized Rutilated Ripper (because some of you wanted the GIGANTIC version that was first released mistakenly) is now in Cysero's Superstore of Savings! The level 30 versions will sell for 300 Dragon Coins and the level 50 versions for 400 Dragon Coins. The gems on the scythe will customize themselves to whatever your armor trim color is, too! * Thank you for your feedback about the Rixty promotion. Many of you were very excited about it, but for those of you who did not have the offer available to you, we understand how it could be frustrating. You are very important to us, and we always try our hardest to make sure we give you our best! Enjoy the Rutilated Ripper series! P.S. - The Statue of Pandora is now in the DC Shrubs shop at your Real Estate Orb, so if you just HAVE to have one for yourself (and really, who doesn't?), then head to your house and pick one up today! * The Rixty scythes were supposed to have this feature, as well, but the code did not work on them. It does now. Sorry about that!

Alac Is happy to be back at the Lab.	April 26th 2010 Monday at the Lab It's always nice to get back after a relaxing weekend I remember dreading Mondays back when I was in school (sound familiar?). I didn't want to get up in the morning, and would pull the covers over my head and pretend I didn't hear my mother calling me to get up. Now, though, Mondays aren't a day to be feared or dreaded, because it means it's time to get back to the Secret Underground Lab! Here's a run-down of my Monday so far: After getting up and getting ready (total time: 15 minutes), I am on my way to the Lab with a breakfast bar in my bag and a song on my lips (Yes, I sing in the car!). Pulling up to the Lab reveals that I'm early, but not early enough to beat Wrayth, Warlic, and Galanoth! (I can NEVER beat Warlic and Wrayth. I wonder if they don't sleep. It's got to be that!) On the way in, it is mandatory to stop and play with Daimyo, who guards the Lab from the hordes of undead which would DEFINITELY invade if he wasn't there. Then down 40 flights of stairs and into the DragonFable room (right next to the MechQuest room) and time to set up my laptop. Remember to feed the Server Hamster a treat so that my connection doesn't drop during the day, then signing on and getting ready to rock this week out! Interrupted by Beleen arriving and sharing pictures of her Pom-Chi puppy, Leviathon, (she likes to gnaw on carrots now!) and Lim arriving with arms full of D&D equipment for later tonight. Then Cysero showed up and gave a movie review (note to self: buy tickets to theater today) and Galanoth came in to talk about a new secret project I get to work on. (So exciting! I love secret projects!) I talked to Tomix about what we need to do for the next Ravenloss quest (coming in a few weeks) and asked him and Lim to do some work on a project for Falconsnest (to come out in a week or two). Rolith showed up and I cornered him about a couple bugs Verlyrus had mentioned over the weekend. Then it was FINALLY time to open Flash and address a few bugs with the Random Encounter button (it lets you access quests it shouldn't) and work with Lim to fix the color customization on the Kathool helm. (Status: Fixed!) And NOW it's Design Notes time! Today's topic: Monday morning at the Secret Underground Lab and Inspirational Poster Contest winners! So lets get right to that! Time to announce Poster Contest winners! Thanks to EVERYONE who entered, we had a ton of fun judging the entries! Miko linked to the contest winner's page on Friday (on the Artix Entertainment Portal page) but we're announcing them here, too! Congratulations to everyone who placed, and great job to everyone who entered! See the Contest Winners page here! Grand Prize Winner (2000 Dragon Coins) Lord Coxy Runners-Up (1000 Dragon Coins) Stephen Nix Tunnel Lord Honorable Mentions (500 Dragon Coins) monkeyman4241995 tthorn4 Percy Jackson Fan! Oblivion Incarnate War Hero Vaasth warcrusher1 Elgert Adder1 Hemiboy95 Princess_Hallie Darkonus San Robin iony drDOT Purple112 FlarePhoenix Wildroses theemperorko Naigiri AzX BobbyBerserker Noax56 lellyna Dermado MantaMasters Congratulations again to the winners! I'll award prizes today! Last day to get the Rixty Ripper! Today is the LAST day you can redeem your Rixty Card to get a Rixty Ripper! But don't worry, you'll be able to use the Rixty card at Coinstar machines to add your loose cash and change to the card after this promotion ends! You can even purchase Dragon Amulets or Dragon Coins! It's easy! Here's how: Click here to find the Coinstar machine or Rixty prepaid card retailer nearest you. Visit https://portal.battleon.com and login or create a BattleOn Games account. Click Shop from the menu, and choose Buy Points. Choose Rixty as your payment option. Enter your Rixty Code (or login to your Rixty account) and follow the instructions to complete your BattleOn Points purchase. Click Dashboard, and select the game user account you want to upgrade with your Points (in this case, DragonFable). For this special promotion, you will need to obtain at least 2,000 Points ($10) in order to receive the Rixty Prize Coupon that unlocks the Rixty Ripper scythe. Suddenly, the Rixty Ripper magically appears in your DF backpack! Have a GREAT Monday! See you on the forums and Twitter!

Alac Fed the ducks this morning.	April 23rd 2010 Face your fears, face your greatest foe How are you feeling these days? Everything's good with you, right? You're not hearing voices or seeing strange twists in reality, right? Of course not. To think otherwise would mean you'd have to fear that you're heading towards a confrontation with something that can reach deep inside you and twist your perceptions. And THAT is a scary thought! You've never faced something like that before... And speaking of facing enemies, here's a picture of who you're going up against this weekend! Any guesses? You'll have to log in and play the newest Water Orb Saga quest to see who you're going to have to face down! Rewards for this quest will be awesomely corrupted. Wear them if you dare! Up for a picnic? Everyone loves a good picnic in the park, right? Sunshine, butterflies, friendly ants... green grass, blue skies, majestic trees offering cool shade... Parks are REALLY nice places to hang out. But not when they're in Ravenloss! The landscape there has become just as twisted as the hearts and minds of the Chaosweavers who built it, and it's to Silkwood Park in the heart of Ravenloss that you're headed! But if you want to find the Shell Key (and you really, really do), then you'll need to talk to Tomix this weekend and head to the Park to face Chaosweaver Nobles, Sneevmoles, and other monsters. Keep an eye out for a very SPECIAL new monster, one which should give you a clue about the Equilibrium Gate if you can guess it! Quest drops from the Ravenloss quest will be Chaosweaver Baubles, which you will need to turn in to Murk (located at the start of the quest, which means to get a reward, you'll need to go BACK into the quest to use Murk's merge shop). But that's not all! We've got MORE stuff for you to check out this week! Talk to Cysero in Falconreach to access the Random Encounter button which will send you on one of a TON of quests taken from throughout DragonFable! And if you have time, make sure to go hiking on the trail linking Falconreach to Amityvale and DoomWood! (Head to Valencia to access the trail.) The Mana Potion training minigame should be easier to beat now that Rolith's fixes are going live, so let us know if you're having an easier time with it on the forums! It's been a BIG week for us, and we hope you enjoy everything we've put out there for you this weekend! See you Monday! Rixty Ripper only available for a few more days! If you haven't had a chance to pick up a Rixty Card, toss your loose change onto it, and redeem it for BattleOn Points at the Artix Entertainment Master Account Portal site (found here: https://portal.battleon.com) to get the awesome (and orange!) Rixty Ripper, then you're running out of time! The Rixty Ripper will only be available through this MONDAY, April 26th, so be sure to find a location selling Rixty cards near you by going here: www.rixty.com before time is up! P.S.: Look for the DragonFable Inspiration Poster Contest results on Monday! We've had some AMAZING and really funny entries!

Alac Is Earth-friendly!	April 22nd 2010 Save the Earth (and your armors!) Happy Earth Day 2010! Earth Day isn't a holiday you want to trash; it's important and we should all be conscious of helping to save the planet! (Come on, where else are we going to go? The Moon and Mars aren't even NEAR ready for colonies!) So on this day- if not every day- do your part and remember that the Earth is our home, except there's no Mother to make you clean your room, so you have to do it yourself! To celebrate Earth Day in DragonFable, we're selling the rare Dragon Amulet-only Rubiaceae Reaper in Falconreach! It's as pretty as a posy but as deadly as belladonna, so we're sure you'll want to pick up this stunning scythe and get ready to flourish some floral fury on your enemies! (Stab'em in their stamens!) Want to save your starting armor? Here's how! For all you players new to DragonFable, listen up! (And it's not a bad idea for you older players to read along, anyways. You might have forgotten what I'm about to tell you) If you're looking to save your starting armor, we have a few options for you to do so: DA-only Armor Closet DA-only Orb of Savings The Dragon Amulet-only Armor Closet will let you load or save ANY armor you have access to (that is in the closet). It is a ONE-TIME PAYMENT of 1000 Dragon Coins. Then, every time you want to use it, it will be FREE! If you don't want to spend Dragon Coins on saving your starting armor, you can purchase the Dragon Amulet-only Orb of Savings for 20,000 gold. The catch is, every time you want to use it to save an armor, it will cost you 7,213 gold. Both of these can be purchased at your DragonFable house's Real Estate Orb (the Armor Closet in the DC Stuff shop and the Orb of Savings in the Gold Stuff shop). If you haven't gotten an Armor Closet or Orb of Savings yet, there's no better time than now! The convenience of not having to run all over Lore in order to equip your favorite armor before starting to play is REALLY nice! These two house items are ONLY for Dragon Amulet holders, though, so if you want the convenience and extra rewards which come with being a DragonLord, you'll need to have a Dragon Amulet of your very own!

Alac Loves new monsters and random battles!	April 21st 2010 Peeks for you to Sneak at Random Encounter button is almost here! That's right, you've been asking for a Random Battle button on the forums for years now, and we're finally bringing it to you! Our Random Encounter button isn't quite like AdventureQuest's though; instead of doing random monster battles, we're going to offer whole quests! Which of the MANY DragonFable quests will be offered through Cysero's Random Encounter button? You'll have to click to see this Friday! Hunter's Paradise: Opening for Business in the near future! If you've gone hiking between Falconreach, Amityvale, and Doomwood this week, you'll have noticed there's a new walkaround path connecting those three towns. And you'll ALSO have seen the all-new Hunter's Paradise tavern! This is a new location which will be coming to DragonFable soon! Right now, all that is available is the entrance art on the hiking path. The inside of the tavern. Soon you can join them! What IS the Hunter's Paradise tavern, you ask? It's a place where heroes and adventurers can gather and swap stories about the monsters they've hunted AND go on new quests to hunt the never-before-seen monsters which have recently started invading the area! Sketches of two of the new monsters by Ghost Talk to Karina once the tavern opens to go on many new quests to hunt these rare beasts, and turn in their pelts to merge them into all-new rewards! Remember the Rixty Ripper! This is the last full week you'll have a chance to get your very own Rixty Ripper in DragonFable and our other Artix Entertainment games! The promotion ends Monday, April 26th, so if you haven't purchased your Rixty Card and redeemed it for BattleOn Points at AE's Portal site, your time is almost up! See you Friday for brand-new quests in the Water Orb and Ravenloss Sagas!

Ghost Is dusting off his hiking boots! Alac Thinks the new path is really cool!	April 19th 2010 New Path is Open for Hikers G'day, adventurers! I am very pleased to kick off the week with a quick little update like this.. Today we've added a new connecting area between Falconreach and Doomwood* that you can travel on instead of taking the gryphon. Sometimes it's nice to just get outdoors and go for a walk, y'know? If you go east from Falconreach, you'll find Valencia, and travelling south from her will take you to Doomwood. (If you get lost, don't forget there is a map at Serenity's Inn in Falconreach). If you do decide to go out exploring, don't forget to stock up on adventure supplies before you leave. ** We plan adding lots of areas such as this in the future, and we always welcome your suggestions and input. So check out this thread on the forums and you can brainstorm with other players to help make Dragonfable even better! Not that you'd ever want to go there. Cause it's creepy & stuff… *Like powerful weapons, good defensive gear, and yummy snacks for the roadtrip. Don't forget about the Rixty Ripper! The Rixty Ripper promotion is still going on! Remember, you can get BattleOn Points (Artix Entertainment's Master Account currency) or Account Upgrades AND a Rixty Ripper on your DragonFable character when you purchase a Rixty card to buy points. Rixty cards are great because you can turn your loose change (any money you have sitting around the house. Or your car. Or that you find on the sidewalk) into BattleOn Points! All you need is a card and a Coinstar machine, which can be found at 10,000 locations throughout the United States!

Alac Has a spotted Chickcalf	April 16th 2010 Water Orb, Mana Training, and MORE We've got a TON of things for you this week! So many, I'll make a list! The Water Orb Saga quest continues! Train your Mana Alchemy skill! The Locker town has been added to the Travel Gryphon! Shadow Armor Base class merge is ready! The Grenwog Eggs have hatched! We have been VERY busy this week; it feels GREAT to put out so much stuff for you! Details, details, everyone likes details. And I've got some for you: Gotta wake up, gotta wake up! This is a dream, right? When that rock hit you on the head last week, it must have knocked you out cold! It's got to be a dream! More like a nightmare! This week's Water Orb quest is like nothing we've ever done before! When I close my eyes, I still see.... I'm not quite sure WHAT I'm seeing, but it's definitely nightmarish. On the plus side, we'll see what REALLY happened to the Water Elves in Tethys! What could have happened to the water elves?! Rewards for the quest will be the new Fugu series: The Fugu series, level 10 The Deadly Fugu series, level 29 The Toxic Fugu series, level 48 Sweet dreams! Time to train that Mana Alchemy! Alac's Mana Potion shop opened in Falconreach LAST week, but her Mana Alchemy training supplies hadn't quite arrive yet. But she's set up the training apparatus now, and she's ready to teach you how the wonders of Mana Alchemy! Before you can begin training, you will need to gather Mana reagents. Mana Alchemy uses gems and stones with symbols inscribed on them as reagents while Health alchemy uses organic materials. Take the reagents back to Alac. Then, once the minigame starts, you'll need to click on the glowing gem, then drag your cursor to the next glowing gem. This is how you draw a Transmutation Circle, one of the basic components of Alchemy. (Unless, of course, you're Edward Elric!) Once you've completed the symbol however many times your level requires, your Mana Alchemy skill will increase! "Welcome to my Potion Shop!" Once you've reached level 10 in your Mana Alchemy training, a Helm Shop will open! The helms are INT and WIS-heavy, so if you've been looking for items heavy on those stats, these will be good for you! Double-Plumed Dome Helm, level 5 Blind Sage Helm, level 10 Tyrant Hood, level 20 Plague Mask Hood, level 30 Hooded Sight Cowl, level 40 Magepriest Hood, level 50 There are also some color customizable Helms in Alac's Helm shop being sold for Dragon Coins: Magical Double-Plumed Dome Helm, level 25 Magical Tyrant Hood, level 35 Magical Tyrant Hood, level 55 Good luck training! Need to go to The Locker? We have a way to help you! If you'd like to keep your regular armor equipped when going to The Locker, you now have a way to do it! Just head to the Travel Gryphon in Falconreach and click the button to take you to The Locker! Shadow Base Class Armor Merge! If you talk to the BlackMarket Moglin (located in Falconreach between Alac and Reens' Potion Shops) you'll see he now has two new shops. One is a Shadow Token, and costs 50,000 gold. You will need this if you want to switch your Shadow Armor's base class to a different one. Once you've purchased the Shadow Token, click on the button for the Merge Shop. Select which class you want to change your armor too, and there you go!! The Grenwog Eggs have turned into Spring-themed Grenwog items! We hope you've enjoyed our Grenwog Scavenger Hunt! Feedback from the forum says you prefer the Scavenger Hunt (with clues) to having to hunt without clues, so we'll do that in the future. Another option would be to hide the eggs around the towns in DragonFable, and make them appear randomly. Would you like to try that next time we do a rare item hunt? Here are the Grenwog Egg items: Striped Egg is now Brightwing, a level 10 Light butterfly pet Mottled Egg is now Ironwood Leaf Helm, level 20 Spotted Egg is now Ironwood Vines Cape, level 30 Bright Pink Egg is now Firehead Daisy, a level 40 Nature pet Sparkly Egg is now Spotted Chickcalf, a level 50 Nature pet Golden Egg is now Chillwing, a level 60 Ice pet Have a GREAT weekend and enjoy the release! I can't wait for next week, more details on Monday! See you!

Alac Is letting you Sneak a Peek!	April 14th 2010 Sneak-ersnack goes the Vorpal Peek One, two! One, two! And through and through The vorpal Peek went Sneak-ersnack!* It's a Wednesday, and we've got another Sneak Peek for you! You can probably guess what this one will be about, since the Mana Potion shop was opened last week, but we didn't have the minigame quite ready. Now, though, you can take a look at the interface Ghost drew for the Mana minigame, because it will release this Friday! Purples and blues are the color of Mana. This is a similiar minigame to the HP Alchemy game, but it's definitely got a unique feel to it. The base for the game comes from BladeHaven, our newest (as yet unreleased) minigame! You can get more sneak peeks about THAT game at https://portal.battleon.com! Rolith said what?! In Tuesday's Design Notes part 1, Rolith gave you a hint about something he's working on. Today, I get to tell you that it's a minigame for this week AND I got to take a screenshot from it in testing! Yes, this is the screenshot. After taking the screenshot, Rolith and I had the following conversation: Alac: This is a pretty dark minigame, Rolith. Rolith: It's haunting my dreams. I can't get the code or text for it out of my head. Alac: Awww! Rolith: Can't sleep, game will eat me! Alac: Would it help if I hit you over the head with your hammer? You'd sleep then! Rolith: ... No. Alac: Just trying to help! /grin Have a good week Sneak-Peekers! We'll see you Friday! PS: Hang on to your Grenwog eggs, they'll be opening THIS Friday! PPS: We ALSO have a Water Orb Saga quest this week, but no Sneak Peeks from that. Kind of. Maybe. * Boldly borrowed from Lewis Carroll's "Jabberwocky"

Alac Really likes the Ripper!	April 13th 2010 Buy BattleOn Points at Coinstar using Rixty Got loose change? We are happy to announce a new way for players in the United States to buy BattleOn Points through our latest partner: Rixty. Getting Points allows you to get what you want- whether it's microcurrency or a full upgrade- when you want, for any of your favorite Artix Entertainment games! When you get BattleOn Points on your Master Account, you will be able to redeem them for any AE game that you have an account in, as long as you have linked it to your Master Account. With Rixty, you can use cash and coins to buy points. No credit card? No problem! Have a jar full of coins at home staring back at you? How about a stash of crumpled bills? Rixty lets you purchase BattleOn Points by exchanging your old dollar bills and coins for FREE at 10,000 Coinstar machines throughout the USA. You can also buy a Rixty prepaid card at a nearby convenience store and transfer your cash online with no fees. Rixty currently has over 18,000 convenience store locations nationwide. It’s easy! Here's how: 1. Click here to find the Coinstar machine or Rixty prepaid card retailer nearest you. 2. Visit https://portal.battleon.com and login or create a BattleOn Games account. 3. Click Shop from the menu, and choose Buy Points. 4. Choose Rixty as your payment option. 5. Enter your Rixty Code (or login to your Rixty account) and follow the instructions to complete your BattleOn Points purchase. 6. Click Dashboard, and select the game user account you want to upgrade with your Points. There are no fees to use Rixty! For more information about Rixty, visit www.rixty.com. And, as an added bonus, for the next two weeks (Until April 26th), if you use a Rixty card to purchase BattleOn Points, you'll be able to get a RARE item in the game of your choice! In DragonFable, you'll get the Rixty Ripper, an awesome scythe made by Miltonius specifically for this promotion. And once the promotion ends, there'll never be another chance to get this scythe! Need to make a Master Account login of your own? Visit https://portal.battleon.com and start linking ALL your Artix Entertainment game accounts today for better security and ease of playing! Questions? Comments? Visit https://portal.battleon.com/help anytime.

Rolith Really Wants Pasta!	April 13th 2010 Oh Man Guys! It's been a long time, a VERY long time, actually. Sorry about that. My sleep schedule is clearly destroyed (I'm starting to post this at 4:20 am). I blame Alac. No, no not the Alac that's capable of hitting me with a nerf sword for blaming her! Heavens no. No, The problem is Alac, the NPC, and her potion shop. It's gone from a "one or two days to program" thing to one of those projects. You know the type I'm talking about. The ones where we talk it up like it'll be coming soon but really we have no idea the hornets nest we're about to stir up. Wether it's the fact that DragonFable's engine overwrites the moveTo method (A big deal if you do any drawing in flash… which we haven't done before apparently) or that the game seems to work on 50% of computers (including any that I tried it on) but on others? Horrible game-crashing/unplayable bugs that couldn't be explained. At all. It's just one of those projects. Fixing the Potion Shop was how I spent most of my weekend nights, as well as tonight. And I think I've almost got it working, or at least ready for the rest of the team to test again, so keep your fingers crossed on seeing it this week. We pride ourselves on delivering on what goes out in the newsletter. This usually means us working as late as we need to Friday and also a bug or two. But this week was just beyond our control. The bugs were so sudden and so untraceable there wasn't any other recourse. Oh, and as for a sneak peak of something I'm playing with for fun? Here you go: Have a good week, and hopefully it won't be almost 2 months before you hear from me again! Cya on the forums! (Or Twitter)

Alac Has a new contest for you!	ctest in a while, and this one is the PERFECT way to get your creativity going and let you explore your favorite scenes from new and old quests alike: an Inspirational Poster contest! You've probably seen posters like this as you've wandered the Internet (it IS the World Wide Web, after all!), but you might not have realized what you were seeing. The posters have a picture on them, then a word or phrase beneath the picture, and then below THAT a funny caption. Here are two examples from me and Lim: For more examples, see the winners from the first Inspirational Poster contest here! The contest will run from today through Wednesday, April 21st, and the thread you can post your entries in will be locked at 5pm server time (make sure you know when that is in your time zone!). You'll be able to post TWO entries per person; the contest submission thread can be found here, and a discussion thread for it is here. You can use ANY screenshot from ANY zone, town, or quest in DragonFable. The funnier your entry, the better, so get out there and get inspirational!

Alac Is building a mystery.	April 9th 2010 Wait, Aquella said WHAT?! It's going to be a busy weekend for you! You've got a LOT to do this weekend, starting with the TWO Water Orb quests! In the first, you'll talk to Aquella and find out some VERY interesting information about this Aquateen! Then you'll be exploring the home of the Water Elves-Tethys- but the only elf who remains is Aquella! The bottom-feeder! Make sure he doesn't feed on YOUR bottom! (Or top, or sides...) In the second quest, you'll be heading into their lovely, liquid-less Water Tower to finish exploring everything Aquella disclosed in the first quest! In the best of traditions, the Mighty 100K has come to DF! In AdventureQuest and AdventureQuest Worlds, there are weapons which cost 100,000 gold to purchase. We feel that our players deserve a status symbol just like that, only ours is mightier (and drawn by Cysero, see the green?)! Plus, it's rarity score is OVER 9000! (Seriously, it is.) Just talk to Ash in Falconreach, he has a new shop specifically for this weapon. And If you don't have the time or inclination to farm for 100,000 gold to purchase the Mighty 100K, there is always the option of purchasing the Big 100K from Cysero's Superstore of Savings for 400 Dragon Coins! Delay in the shipment of mana potion bottles? We push every week to get out as much content as we can, and 99% of the time, we get everything out that we tell you about Monday through Thursday. This week is, unfortunately, not one of those weeks. Rolith has been working all week on the mana potion training minigame and oddly enough, the game works perfectly OUTSIDE DragonFable. But once we put it INTO the game, it breaks badly. For everyone but Rolith. Don't slip! That has caused codemonkey to fling bananas at his testers so, in the interest of not having anyone's eyes put out by a pointy banana end or slipping on an errant banana peel, we're going to hold off on the Mana Training minigame. However, you'll be able to look around Alac's shop and talk to her about mana alchemy! The egg hunt continues That's right. Due to many people having holiday commitments and projects going on at school and work, we've decided to have the eggs hatch NEXT Friday!! So if you haven't had a chance to go egg-hunting yet, now's the time to gear up and go forth into the wilds of DragonFable! Search the grasses, search the trees, search the quests using these! Last weekend for the RARE Chocolate Bunny pet! April 11th (this Sunday, server time) is the last day you'll be able to redeem an Artix Entertainment Upgrade Card for a rare Chocolate Bunny item in any of our AE games! If you want the most adorably delicious pet in all of DragonFable, then head to any of the stores on this list and pick up an Upgrade Card of your own! Have a phenomenal weekend! The weather is starting to turn nicer all across the country, so make sure to take some time to go outside and revel in the Spring! I know I'll be going on a walk, and possibly talking Rolith into showing me how this geo-caching thing works. Enjoy the release! See you next week!

Alac Likes hot sauce.	April 7th 2010 Sneaks for you to Peek at This is what is coming this week Who wants another Water Orb quest? You do? You're in luck! The Water Orb storyline is continuing this week as you head back underwater and into a heretofore unknown underwater city! And- what's this I've got on my desktop? Oh, oh, it's a picture from Ghost of one of the buildings! Mr. Green Guy volunteered to be the first hero to explore the building. And if you've been waiting for Mana Alchemy training to be introduced (and we know many of you have been), then this week should be an exciting one! The mana alchemy quest, shop, and minigame are scheduled to launch this weekend, so get ready to hunt for mana* reagents! They're a bit different from the health potion ingredients. You'll be hunting for: You'll need these in order to cast your transmutation circles! While Health Potion alchemy uses organic ingredients, MANA alchemy uses the very building blocks of Lore- rocks, gems, and other stones- because when you're using your mana in battle, you're tapping into the very heart of Magic on Lore, using yourself as a conduit to channel the energy. The mana training minigame will be something entirely new to DragonFable! The Transmutation Circle-casting game was developed by Warlic for our new (as yet unreleased) minigame, BladeHaven! If you like swordfighting and spell-casting and a whole host of new monsters, you should look for news about BladeHaven on the Artix Entertainment Portal website, which you can find here! See you Friday! * Mahna-mahna!
Alac Is at the meeting.	April 5th 2010 Monday is meeting day We need your help to finish this meeting! You guys know that we make DragonFable for you; it's YOUR game, we're just the ones who put the art together and stick bits of code here and there. And now we need your help (again) to make DragonFable the best game it can be, so get your thinking tiaras (or crowns, if you don't like sparkly rhinestones) on and get ready to send us your questions! What questions, you ask? (That is a very good question to start with!) We decided that it was time to start tying up all of the loose ends in the game. that have accumulated over the past 4+ years. What questions do YOU have that still need to be answered? * What plots haven't been concluded, whose stories haven't been ended? Those are the kinds of things we need to know so that at the NEXT meeting we can sit down and brainstorm just how to work in all of those important details. You can ask all your questions in this thread on the forums! We look forward to reading them! Note: Answers will not be posted on the forum, they will be put into quests and cutscenes and shown in-game. Thank you for your help! Remember the Chocolate Bunny! The Artix Entertainment Upgrade card promotion is still running (until April 11th) for DragonFable and all the rest of our games! By purchasing any Artix Entertainment upgrade card and using it in one of our games, you'll get a Chocolate Bunny-themed item! In DragonFable, it is the delicious and adorable Choko-Bun pet! You can find a list of stores which carry our upgrade cards by going here. * We WILL show you who the Spy in Falconreach is eventually. Promise!
Alac Likes dyeing eggs.	April 2nd 2010 Captain Davey's going down He can't stand to have Aquella taken from him! It's time to rescue Aquella from the clutches of Captain Davey and his band of undead pirate brigands! This weekend, our intrepid young water elf will join your party (though she's been weakened by the time spend in captivity), so make sure you keep an eye on her health. We can't have her dying NOW! Once you've gotten her out of Captain Davey's demesnes, the story will really start to take off, because Aquella will finally have a reason to trust you. ... Right? New belts will drop from the quest as rewards! Reintroducing DragonFable's Quest Log! It's been a long (LONG) time coming, but we've finally updated the Quest Log. We've wanted to rework it long before now, but with all of the new content we've introduced over the last year, there just hasn't been time. Until now! Clear your cache and then log back in! Click on the Treasure Chest (it's next to the Dragon Amulet symbol on your game interface) and the new Quest Log will pop up! It's divided into main and side storylines, towns, badges, and features. The Dragon Egg, Orb, Xan, and Nythera Sagas can all be accessed from the Storyline button while all other quests can be found under the Quests button. What we're planning on doing from now on is adding each Orb Saga to the Quest Log once you complete its story. (So look for the Water Orb to be added in a month or two!) The Towns button will link you to all the main locations within DragonFable, so if you're standing in Amityvale and don't want to walk all the way back to Falconreach to get to a travel gryphon and go to Osprey Cove, now you can just look in your quest log! Badges are finally here, too! Long-time players will find they've already collected many badges, but be sure to check them out anyways, because there might be one or two (or more!) that you've missed. New players can use the badges as a checklist of things to achieve in the game, too! Badges are divided into a few categories: Quests, Armors, Skills, and Miscellaneous. (The only miscellaneous badge right now is the DoomKnight Armor Owner badge.) Features will let you access a heal/potion refill button OUTSIDE of quests along with a button that will teleport you to your hometown or DragonFable house! The Grenwog Scav-Egger Hunt starts today! Egg drops are being added to a ton of quests (both old and more recent ones) as rare to semi-rare drops! This year we're going to give you some clues to help you locate the eggs (since we have over 500 quests, we figured you could use just a LITTLE help!). Read the clues here and feel free to work together on the forum to come up with a comprehensive list of quest locations: Chocobunny still available with an AE Upgrade Card! Don't forget, you'll still be able to get Choko-Bun, DragonFable's chocolatiest bunny pet through Aprill 11th! You can go to any store that stocks our upgrade cards (just look here for a list!), pick one up, and get your pet the SAME day! It is the most delectable pet we have in-game, AND it's upgradeable all the way to level 60 just by going to Grams' Pet Shop in Falconreach! Have a great weekend, good luck hunting, and enjoy the release!

Oh Man Guys!