This update brings with it a major technology update for the game as well as some new tweaks, adjustments and additions to the game.

New Veteran Rewards

Veterans will now find a host of new faction related items in the Veteran vendors. These items will help give veterans a boost for their characters when it comes to working through the faction ranks. This is part of the current focus on improving the faction progression in Khitai, which will continue in subsequent updates with a significant increase in the speed of progression for faction.

Improved PVP mini-game & matchmaking balancing

The latest twelve man mini-game has been tweaked to improve game-play balance, and the matchmaking queue algorithms have been improved to provide better balancing between teams.

Dreamworld Technology Integration

The major component of this update is of course the release of Dreamworld Technology Integration to the live servers. This upgrade to our proprietary Dreamworld engine contains various improvements to many of the game’s core systems but also many changes and updates to tools used by our developers.

Improved performance

  • Improved memory handling – optimised for 32 bit operating systems to prevent crashes
  • Improved loading times
  • Improved frame rate for most systems
  • Improved network and latency solutions


New tech features – rendering for both DX9 and DX10

  • Improved visual options for DX9 and DX10 clients
  • Godrays, tree wind and higher quality water simulation in DX9
  • Significantly improved performance in DX10
  • New improved Shadows using Adaptive shadow mapping using Multi-resolution filtering
  • New FXAA system from NVIDIA, Age of Conan is one of the very first games to get access to this new solution. FXAA provides highly effective edge smoothing, based on image luminance variations.
  • Improved Lighting, using a “light pre-pass approach”. This gives us the ability to render a large amount of lights simultaneously on screen, while maintaining both performance and material diversity. This also means that lighting in general is of higher quality


Improved tools for the developers in the back-end (back end stuff for us, but it means you will get to see some cool new content in the future as we have improved our scripting, cinematic and design tools).


CLASSES

Assassin
  • Fixed an issue that caused the assassin miasmas to have an incorrect cooldown.


Dark Templar
  • The feated 'Invulnerable Soul' buff will no longer disappear when casting 'Covenant of Invulnerability'.
  • Any Rank of "A Soul for Our Feast" can now overwrite Rank V of this buff, as intended.


Demonologist
  • Hell Fire Stream Rank 6 will now properly apply column damage.


Guardian
  • Replaced the Tempest feat Stand Off with the new feat Stalwart: 'Increases the guardian's Hit and Critical Damage Ratings.'
  • Storm Blade rank 4/5 will now give a 20% power increase as intended.
  • Readiness will now properly reduce the reuse time of Overreach III & V, Shield Slam and Shield Strike.
  • Stall the Advance will no longer go on cooldown when executed while stunned or knocked back.


Necromancer
  • 3rd rank of Quick Steps will now cost Prowess Points and not Mastery Points, as intended
  • Fixed an issue where the necromancer's "frenzy" ability could sometimes cause an NPC to stop attacking


Ranger
  • Clarified the tooltip description for Hunting Hawk.
  • Fixed the bow and character-animations (and sounds) for the "Deadly Draw" Ranger-combo.


Tempest of Set
  • Ether discharge should now return mana for every healed target



COMBAT
  • Fixed an issue where being knockbacked while snared could cause unintended loss of stamina
  • Fixed an issue with stagger immunity ending up on the wrong target when the target got hit by a sneak attack.
  • You no longer get the Exhausted debuff when you run out of stamina.




PVP

  • A player attacking another player of higher level will now get the “Aggressor” buff when a combo is only started but not finished, as intended. This will result in the attacked player not getting Murder Points when defending against the attacking player.
  • Fixed an issue preventing the nametags of low level players turning red when they attack a high level player. Low level players' nametags no longer turn gray in the middle of a fight they started.


Sieges
  • Siege camps should now again have the proper mesh when done building.


Minigames
  • You will no longer get Coward's Shame for declining a minigame or a minigame timing out. If you crash you will be able to rejoin the minigame that was in progress and doing so will remove Coward's Shame.
  • Minigames will now balance players on their class, prioritizing classes that have fewer amounts of players. Players will properly get balanced when joining a minigame that is in progress.
  • The conquest gui should now properly reset after doing a conquest minigame.
  • Your team will no longer be disbanded if all players of group 1 leave the group.


The Call of Jhebbal Sag
  • Reduced the chance of getting Jhebbal's curses.
  • The curse of flame now has a shorter duration and thus does less damage in total.
  • The Blessings of an Ancient god quest now only requires a single blessing to complete. However the amount of tokens have also been reduced to one.
  • Fixed a few collision issues in the map.


Annihilate Opposing Team
  • The minigame instructions now show when you enter the playfield, rather than when the minigame starts.


Arena
  • Players will no longer get their PvP kills and Deaths incremented in the taverns and social arenas.



RAIDS / GROUP ENCOUNTERS
  • Thoth-Amon's Stronghold: Rogues can now also use upgraded Khitai/AA ranks of combos in the tier 3 crafting encounter.
  • Players will once again be able to receive the demon blood when they kill the Dread Abomination in Cavern of Malice.
  • Leaving your group while not in a dungeon is no longer restricted to being out of combat
  • Restrictions applied when attempting to leave a group and when attempting to kick someone from a group are now consistent.




GUI
  • The tooltip for the AAFeat window will now close when the feat window is closed.
  • Fixed an issue with putting multiple item links in a message
  • Fixed an issue where a text line's formatting in the chat windows could affect the formatting of unrelated lines below it
  • Fixed an issue where you sometimes could not start the client in full screen when selecting full screen in the launcher options.
  • Emotes are now customizable using /emote [message]
  • The mouse pointer graphics will now properly update when you run towards a target while keeping the pointer on it, and when you are standing still and the target is moving towards you.
  • Fixed an issue where trading with a player who's zoning in would make item icons in the trade window not appear for the player who was zoning.




MOUNTS
  • All classes can now use Quick Dismount while moving on a mount (not siege mounts).
  • Reduced the cooldown of Quick Dismount to 30 seconds for rogue classes, and 2 minutes and 30 seconds for non-rogue classes.
  • Players will not get stuck in the air when trying to mount right after dismounting
  • You can no longer use Quick Dismount while hiding on a mount.
  • When you enter an area mounted where mounts are not allowed, the player will now get knocked back and stand up instead of the mount just disappearing and the player continue to run. This also should fix the issue where characters kept the riding animation when their mount was already gone.




ITEMS
  • Veteran rewards: Veteran vendors now offer Simple Trophies, Marks of Acclaim and Imperial Insignias in exchange for Veteran Tokens.
  • When learning social abilities or paths you will no longer be told you learned a new pet.
  • The 'Spirit Necklace' item which drops of Zang Xin in Northern Grasslands now has a proper icon visual again.
  • Fixed an issue that caused several Ring items to randomly change inventory icons.
  • You can no longer buy the items for veteran abilities you have already learned, this is to prevent people for accidentally spending points on something they already have.




MOBS / NPCs
  • Removed an unintended mechanic where npc's would not step on the bodies of their dead comrades
  • Fixed death-animation not playing upon death while moving for various hooved mammals (buffalo, cow, goat, sheep, yak)




PETS
  • Social Pets: Increased the size of the Fearless Crab and Owlet social pets. The Fearless Crab now also moves faster.
  • Pets should now teleport to the owner more reliably when they get too far away from the owner.




GUILDS
  • The guild leader will now keep the guild leader rank when changing governing forms
  • Added a confirmation dialog box when changing guild name
  • Guild Event: The round will now end correctly when all players (other then the Ymir and the spectators) are frozen during Ymir's Hunt.
  • Resolved an issue where NPCs would sometimes appear below or inside a guild city.
  • Guild Renown/Quest: "In Remembrance": Minicia the Disfigured will now ask her fellow Khitans for help, as intended.
  • Guild Renown/Quest: "A Good Home" can again be resolved correctly by talking to the Expert Tree-climber.
  • The Mossy Angular Pillar guild city decoration can now be built correctly.




QUESTS
  • The quest "Hunting the Spider" now contains dialogue for Khitaian characters




GENERAL
  • Removed level restriction on the "New Player Help" chat channel, allowing high level players to participate and help out the new ones
  • Fixed many issues which should reduce the rubberbanding effect.
  • If you have a free feat reset, it will no longer check if you would have enough gold to pay for the reset.
  • Fixed some locations that were causing players to become stuck.
  • Corrected some visual texture issues in several playfields.