"If there is one thing that my friend James Larant is terrible at when it concerns his beloved game, it is compromised."
"You work his way or can take the highway as he cares little if a few people get annoyed at him or quit out of anger."
"For there will always be desperate people playing his game to try to go up in the world."
"And businesses competing to use his new virtual market to sell their products."
"But then again, he has always been an eccentric bastard."
Theodore Felond, CEO of Felonds Fashionable Goods.
….
Name: Railius Aurellion
Dynasty: Aurellion
Age:18
HP: 40
MP: 50
Race: Half Dwarf
Faction: House Aurellion
Attributes:
Strength: 8
Agility: 7
Dexterity: 8
Vitality: 8
Intelligence: 10
Wisdom: 10
Charisma: 11
Equipment:
Renowned Fallen Martial Nobles Starter Kit.
Money:
Gold: 35
Silver: 70
Copper: 1000
Skills:
Administration (Novice) (Passive)
Deception (Novice) (Passive)
Insight (Novice) (Passive)
Leadership (Intermediate) (Passive)
Military Strategy (Intermediate) (Passive)
Negotiation (Novice) (Passive)
Swordsmanship (Intermediate) (Passive)
Riding (Novice) (Passive)
Rallying Call (Active)
Race Traits:
Interspecies Humanoid Reproduction.
Stout of Heart.
Versatile.
Inheritable Character Traits:
The Rightful Lord of House Aurellion.
….
Once again, the description and effects of his skills were removed from his character sheet to make it easier to read and navigate. Seeing that he had new skills, Railius quickly tapped on them, bringing up the usual blue screen in front of him, which displayed the skills information.
….
Administration (Novice) (Passive)
Description: The basic skill of administration is needed for all landed nobles and bureaucrats. Even merchants will find this skill useful as it has many applications and helps increase the productivity and efficiency of a nobles' territory and find discrepancies in paperwork.
Effect: 5% increase in the production of a territory or land. Able to see through very basic inconsistencies on ledgers. At higher levels, these numbers can increase, and a skilled administrator can vastly improve the economic power of a territory, making lords adept at administration an economic powerhouse amongst their peers.
….
Deception: (Novice) (Passive)
Description: As the basic art of deceiving, many professions and people use this skill as it is essential to both war and politics. The more skilled someone is with this skill, the harder it is for someone to see their true motivations. This skill also helps prevent magic or magical devices from detecting your lies or manipulations, making it a staple skill in professions where lying and concealing your motives are paramount.
Effect: You can lie to people more easily, and people are more likely to believe your lies. A 5% increase in the chance to deceive people. At higher levels, this skill can help you conceal your intentions from even the most insightful people and powerful magics.
….
Insight (Novice) (Passive)
Description: A skill used for figuring out someone's intentions and a critical social skill for all, no matter their profession. It is common for veteran merchants and politicians to have a high level in this skill. It is an essential skill that can be used with other skills to give a player unique advantages, such as finding a weakness in an opponent's fighting style.
Effect: It is easier for the player to see through the intentions of NPCs. Higher levels of this skill can help you to find out the current psychological state of NPCs and their deposition between you.
….
While the skills did not do much for now and were rather lacklustre for now when they levelled up, they could become essential skills with devastating effects, especially the administration skill, as an increase in a noble's territory production of 20% can completely change the economic situation of a nobles territory showing how important and powerful these skills could become at higher levels.
The last thing Railius wanted to look at before going and getting a nice long rest was the new Character Trait he had received, as it was not there the last time he checked out his character sheet.
….
The Rightful Lord of House Aurellion: (Inheritable Character Trait)
Description: You are the rightful lord and master of House Aurellion, allowing you to control the noble house and all its resources. This trait differs from the 'Unrightful Lord' trait as you are the legitimate and appointed successor, making your control and claim to the house much easier to press than others, and you will also attract more people willing to support you. It also helps you maintain control of it, as other claimants will find it hard to find legitimacy against a house's rightful lord.
Effect: Gives you control over House Aurellion's resources and people loyal and affiliated with it and makes it hard to claim your right to leadership of the noble house.
….
After looking at everything, Railius asked the next obvious question to the friend system, who seemed to have a blank expression. While he stood there, it was evident that the DO administrator was very busy coming and going as needed and as he pleased.
"Friend System What is an Inheritable Character trait and what makes it different from an Inheritable Dynasty Trait."
Railius asked as to him Inheritable Dynasty Traits and Inheritable Character Traits seem to be almost the same thing.
"An Inheritable Character Trait is something that can be inherited from one character to another, unlike an Inheritable Dynasty Trait that tends to affect every single person within a dynasty or bloodline and is usually unique to that bloodline. An Inheritable Character Trait only affects one character. These are usually titles that can be passed down from one character to another and are not tied to blood like an Inheritable Dynasty Trait, which is more like the culture or traditions shared by one family."
"For example, the kingship of a country is not an Inheritable Dynasty Trait because they could be usurped by another dynasty but survive, at which point the next king would gain the inheritable character trait previously held by the usurped king."
"Any remaining descendants of the king would, of course, have a claim on that title, but having a claim on a title or trait and having it are two completely different things. This is why the wording of these traits, such as rightful and not rightful, is so important, as it gives a sense of legitimacy to the rule of the dynasty or king."
"Of course, if the usurper proves himself a worthy king, then he can become a rightful king from being a usurper or non-rightful king, but it is usually a representation of the feeling of the country as to who has the right to rule in not only in the eyes of the nobility but the commoners too."
"Take care of this as having legitimacy is essential to maintaining one's rule."
Friend system said, giving a long explanation of exactly what it was and the differences and nuances between Inheritable Dynasty Traits and Inheritable Character Traits, as while both can be inherited, one is based on bloodline while the other is not and as soon as he finished the friend system left again busy with something.
With that cleared up, the game finally gave the system announcement that everyone was expecting.
[Dynasties Online will now close its servers for an update. The details of the update can be found on our forums. Congratulations to all the players who have passed through the Dynasty History System and have successfully integrated their characters into the game using the unique opportunity presented by the game company.]
[We hope you have enjoyed playing the game and will now eject you from the game. The forums will remain open, and our excellent community management team will answer any questions there.]
[Have a good rest! The servers will open again at 8 am tomorrow. We hope to see you then!]
After the system had finished and given a few seconds for everyone to read its words, it returned all the players to their VR lobbies as it was just the game, not the interconnected new virtual reality that James Larant had created that was offline.
This means that players can relax in the virtual world and even buy things well, such as the allowed products that are all conveniently made or sold by companies controlled by James Larant.
In this way, famous drinks like Rango could be bought by people from James' supermarket store, much to the annoyance of many companies in the world who were hoping that the lack of diverse products would pre-emptively make the market less valuable to consumers.
The only thing the business world could do was grit their teeth in frustration. A few even complained to the competition authority for collusion, but as each of these companies is controlled and owned by the same person, there was little they could do about it, especially because he even sold the products of his controlled companies amongst each other at the same price he charges outsider which shut down any competition claim that could be lodged as he was selling his products to them at the same price he sold them to himself. Also, James had many contacts, including in politics and even in the competition authorities themselves, to ensure the success of his venture, not that he gave his enemies any ammunition in the first place, but even if they did, little would of it.
Many who did not know him would be surprised by how meticulous the 30-year-old eccentric businessman was when it came to this point though it was only when their own profits were being sucked by the cunning genius that they would take note of why.
Right now, many were still laughing at him, with only a few of the most perceptive people in the world feeling something was wrong and prematurely investing in the game that would have such an enormous influence on the real world in the future.
Ignoring all the manoeuvring and conflict between the upper class in the world, Railius exited the game thoroughly exhausted, not even taking off his headset before falling into the deep void of sleep. It was only at 4 PM that he yawned and finally awoke. Deciding to take the day easy, he lay on his bed, opened up his phone, and looked at the updated patch notes for the game.
….
Dynasties Online V1.01 Patch Notes:
An Open World and Sandbox Experience.
Players are left to their own devices, and much like in other famous games like Gemcraft, there is no end goal or ending for this game, and your goals will be up to you, whether that is to get money, power or live a peaceful all of that will be up to you.
Quests are there to act as a sort of guide for players, giving you direction in an otherwise directionless game, but don't trust them completely, for they are not infallible, and you may find that following a quest leads to your demise.
A Persistent World Player Characters When the Player Is Not Present.
Up until now, this has not been a problem, but in the future, there may be times when a player may not be able to play when the servers are open. To clarify for players, unless the servers do not open for a day, for example, at Christmas and other important holidays, to allow families time together, then in the event a player is not present, an AI will temporarily control the character. This means that things may have changed by the time the player returns, while the personality of the character will be replicated as much as possible but how good an AI does in the role of playing a player character will be decided by your skills and the AI will be as good as other AI's of that level.
This means that if you have a novice level of strategy yet have won battles through your human intelligence and experience, your AI will not have this, meaning that battles that you may have won will be lost if the player does not delegate the task to another, which an AI is likely to do.
We advise players who want to succeed and do well in the game to be as active as possible, or an AI will take over and potentially ruin what you have built.
Introduction of the Dynasty Screen.
Players may have noticed that their character sheets that once held all the information about their dynasties and characters now only contain the stats, skills and traits related to that single character.
This is an intentional change, as from now on, there will be a separate Dynasty Screen, which will record all of your Dynasty Traits, information, allies, enemies, and much more. This will include many things, such as a family tree showing the leader of the dynasty and help players record the history of their dynasty's most influential characters.
This should help streamline the game and make it easier to find everything.
One Central Realm.
There will be one realm for everyone to connect to. Relays to this realm with countless servers will be present and run in parallel to allow for the extraordinary amount of players that play the game and will be present in all countries that allow the game to be sold to ensure a fair connection for all and allow players of different nationalities to interact with each other in one ever-evolving world while ensuring that ping is low.
This means that everyone will fight amongst each other for resources in one central realm, so make sure to hold on to your hard-earned money tightly!
Addressing Timezones.
To allow everyone to play simultaneously, the game servers will be open at the same time, 8 am to 8 pm GMT, throughout the world, regardless of whether it is day or night in your country.
We apologise to those people in different time zones who find this inconvenient and realise that it is our fault that some may not be able to play anymore. Anyone who wants a refund for the game and equipment may get it as long as they have not used the system to trade any in-game and real-life money.
The closing of the servers allows us to upkeep the game and fix bugs periodically while also allowing players to play for almost the entire time the game servers are up if they wish.
Bugs.
Many bugs and potential hacks and exploits will be fixed.
Thank you for playing the game. Any feedback is appreciated, and we once again warn against anyone trying to be a bad gamer.
For bad gaming is treason and treason is punished most severely.
….
There was not much to be done, as most of the game had already been done, but there were a few important announcements that would affect the game as until then, players had been able to play the game at their leisure while now they had to be active at specific times as well as other quality of life improvements.
The warning at the end was also ominous, and now, few people would dare to try to hack or do anything against the game if they may be psychologically tortured for it by going to hell in the game.
Just the thought of being in the clutches of the sadistic system sent shivers down Railius' spine, and he visibly shook a bit.