Goblin Squad Member
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Depending on how long you have been gone ..
this was the end of year announcement ( Dec 29 2015) and last official statement regarding the game.
"Hello Pathfinder Online Players!
The year 2015 has been an exciting but tumultuous time for us at Goblinworks. The team delivered 11 expansions to the game including holdings and outposts and the warfare associated with them; the ability to craft and build your own settlements; new monsters and escalations such as the elementals, duergar and dark elves; new spells, armor, weapons, feats and classes such as the Expert and Freeholder, and much more! But as many of you are aware, we never found all the funding we needed to finish building the game that we have been describing to you. This led us to laying off the majority of the Goblinworks staff at the end of August.
But there is good news to be relayed! Just today, I received a signed letter of intent from a company that wants to take on the Pathfinder Online legacy and see it through to completion. One of the principals of this company has been playing Pathfinder Online since day 1 and understands the vision for the game we are making. The company recently came up to Seattle to the Goblinworks offices and we had 2 productive and exciting days planning for the future and what this game can be.
Now this acquisition of the Pathfinder Online game is incumbent upon them finalizing the funding they are currently in negotiations for, but all signs are very positive on that front right now. This funding will give Pathfinder Online more money to invest in the game than has been spent in over 4 years of development. This will significantly accelerate the development and support of the game to a point unprecedented in Pathfinder Online history. If things continue to go well, they expect to take over the game entirely by March 1, 2016.
In the meantime, the legacy team has been working for the month of December on doing a bunch of polish and bug fixing in the game. The biggest new thing will be the long-awaited and desired vault sorting of personal, company, and settlements vaults. The vaults will use an interface very similar to that used in the Auction House right now. Also, auctions will last for a month instead of a week.
Another much needed feature will be a command for you to use if you become stuck somewhere in the game. By typing /stuck, you will enter a countdown timer for five minutes. During that time, you cannot move nor engage or be engaged in combat. If any of those things happen, the /stuck command expires. If you can manage to not move or be part of combat, after five minutes, you will be teleported to the nearest shrine and none of your items will take durability loss.
Mike has also enabled cloaks and packs in the game, so you will now be able to equip them and have them show up on your characters.
There are more fixes that will be revealed when EE11.1 goes live. The goal is to do testing when the team is back after New Years and if all goes well, launch it in January.
In closing, I thank you all for your support for Pathfinder Online and your friendship in the game. I thank you for an exciting 2015 and look forward to seeing the game expand to its full potential in 2016. Thank you once again!
-Lisa Stevens
Acting CEO
Goblinworks Inc."
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Goblin Squad Member
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There is currently a noticeable uptick in people playing. Emerald Lodge isn't crowded - but it seems no matter which time I log in I see either some of my members or visitors around.
These visitors are from all over the map - Forgeholm, Brighthaven, Keepers, HRC, PFU - I even spotted a few notorious Fianna members behaving well while our guests.
Golgotha / Kreuz Bernstein are currently dead. There are still players out and you see an uptick. Call it a sleeping dragon. My TT group just awakened one in Rise of the Runelords and the 1on1 Ancient dragon against level 14 Dragon Deciple ended Eren Jaeger style (Attack on Titan) - only one severed hand was what was left. Too bad he didnt regenerate.
But I digress
What is new / exiting in the game
All older settlements still playing have build up their own settlement using buildings they have chosen. Settlements therefore differ now according to what players wanted them to be.
There was a rush to build up free slots which is mainly over now. The need to have +1 or higher buildings to have high training isn't implemented yet. Instead you can burn bulk goods and EL currently has a level 18 training for that which I know we won't be able to afford long term.
PvP is at a lull. Don't expect it to pick up before EoX is back or someone else enters - both only likely when a finl announcement of the new company happens.
EL is using this time to build up themselves as trade hub. In my view this game only ever will work if there is movement of goods and resources which will drive conflict. We had >20,000 raw materials change hand over the last month, 15,000 in the last two weeks - tendency increasing.
Most is not from EL as this amount would lead to strip mining. All of this is still an order of magnitude to small to drive conflict over resources. But it goes in the right direction.
Otherwise there is the hunt for tier 3 recipes which are rare with only one escalation allowing them to be farmed - so whenever this escalation shows up hordes are descending there - peacefully so far - and tempers flare when the escalation gets killed instead of farmed by a so far unknown group/individual (there are lots of accusations flying though).
Crafters now take around a month or two to get new levels. The level 15 and 16 gates proof hard for some of them. You need to craft an uncommon +4 or +5 item. In principle this isn't any problem as you get all the refined materials for free crafting 10 +3 (for a +4) or 200 +3 (for a +5).
The problem is - optimising crafting by avoiding +3 materials can make it more difficult. And off course there are many more crafters wanting to go through these gates as players buying/ needing the produced items.
There isn't a market (yet) for +5 refined materials as everyone needs them. +4 can be bought easily enough though.
There also isn't a market for T3 recipes or T3 crafted items. Players either know someone who crafts it for free or rant willing to pay a price that makes sense for a crafter.
T3 + refined goods are still very, very rare. This is a combination of level (you can't make a +1 if you just learned the refined item on that level) and lack of recipes. So a lot is done using lucky drops and we are back to +0 or +1.
The game has been at a low between start September and the arrival of 11.1. Since then it is slowly growing again. You see new players starting, old ones coming back. This game by no means is healthy yet. It still needs the money from the new investor and a new team to kick it up a gear or two.
But in my view it has recovered from stuttering and dying to a more cruising and sleeping pace. Let's see what happens in March/April. I'm not expecting wonders - but I know a lot of players sitting on the sideline waiting to be back.
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Goblin Squad Member
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Cool, got my first T3 resources. Some blue, some purple, yay! Did not know that, Cal, thanks. So far the 2 monsterhexes I visited had T3 materials in their mining nodes so that makes me happy. Not that many monsterhexes around that have Mining nodes where I am living though.
High Road has it pretty good, concerning the amount of monster/home hexes near.... ;)
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Goblin Squad Member
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NewCorp apparently pays half the GW bills - which is a good sign for commitment.
All news seem to indicate it is moving forward. - albeit no time lines are given.
NewCorp apparently should be given a voice on the GW forum 'soon' to connect with the community. This was announced on 31st May and should happen 'in a few weeks.
In summary - all still moving forward but very, very slowly.
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Goblin Squad Member
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Thanks, Thod. I agree that contributing to the bills is a good sign!
Is NewCorp the actual name of a company, or just an anonymous designation for "the un-named company that has been in discussions with GW for quite some time now"?
Edit: Based on way the term is being used on the GoblinWorks forums, it appears to be an anonymous label for "that company".
I hope something happens soon. With a few more scraps of encouraging news, I'd consider re-subscribing.
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Goblin Squad Member
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Is NewCorp the actual name of a company, or just an anonymous designation for "the un-named company that has been in discussions with GW for quite some time now"?The latter.
That tells me there is a lack of confidence in the deal and or in the project, so the new party can avoid embarrassment if it does collapse.
It could also mean that this new company has absolutely no experience in making an MMO, in marketing an MMO or in properly funding one and likely all of the above is true.
It has been admitted to that this new company is also seeking third party funding, which means they are not even self supporting themselves.
By January 2017, the last of the original maximum time Kickstarter accounts will end, then they will have to rely on new money and players coming in to sustain the game.
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Goblin Squad Member
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That tells me there is a lack of confidence in the deal and or in the project, so the new party can avoid embarrassment if it does collapse.Is NewCorp the actual name of a company, or just an anonymous designation for "the un-named company that has been in discussions with GW for quite some time now"?The latter.
Your ability to interpret corporate motivations from the name players are using to refer to the potential buyer is interesting.
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Goblin Squad Member
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@Bluddwolf
I once respected how you tried to make PFO better by your vision and contributions. But speculations about an alias for the new company and deriving a negative slant on it is not constructive. Especially as far as I remember it was us - the players - which 'named' the company to have a name we could refer to.
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Goblin Squad Member
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If it were an established company, it would have a name. I recall in one of Lisa's posts that she claimed they had game development experience, and did they gain this experience under a pseudonym?
Could it be that if the name of the company was revealed, it would not inspire confidence? Or worse, would it elicit the response of "Who?"
It has been 7 months since the initial announcement that a new investor was being spoken to. What is not constructive in my opinion is the lingering perception that there is no deal, and they are just running out the clock.
I guess we will see where things are at in 5 months as I project that is when the longest term KS accounts will have to decide to resub or not.
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Goblin Squad Member
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You could be right, Bludd, but for a very long time your tendency has been to ignore anything except the possibilities that support your own personal hypotheses. They could be publicly traded and forced to deal carefully, they could be working on an unrelated deal with someone that doesn't like Paizo, or extricating themselves from a deal with someone like that whom they've decided to break with and want to reduce penalties for ending it, they may have been bitten in the past by a competitor pushing into deals to interfere.
Human beings thrive when their decisions are proven correct. You abandoned the game in disgust, as is your right, and now you have a degree of personal investment in its failure, since that will justify your decision.
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Goblin Squad Member
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Seems Newcorp have announced there presance still not giving a company name and the fact there still doing a capital raise after all this time indicates (Admitadly to just me at least) they are most likely not a major game development company
No one besides the biggest publishers (because that's what they really are giant funding sources) uses their own money and even they arrange for influxes of outside funding when they can. If the development budget isn't some minor fraction of your profits you get outside funding.
The line has gotten blurred as publishers started buying up studios years back.
Chief Technical Officer
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...the fact there still doing a capital raise after all this time...
The phrase "doing a capital raise" doesn't paint an accurate picture of the current state, as it suggests that they are still looking for people to give them money. The phrase they used was "finaliz[ing] a significant capital infusion into our company." They have people committed to give them money, and are in the process of dotting 'i's and crossing 't's to get that money into the bank.
This was a complex and slow process because there have been a lot of parties involved, some of them private, some of them not. Deals had to be negotiated between Party A and Party B, contingent on other deals between Party C and Party D, and so on. It has been in the works for many months, and as Erik Mona said the other day, it felt like Achilles' Paradox: every two weeks, we moved halfway to the finish line. But that's *almost* all behind us know, and, as "NewCorp" has said, they're starting to assemble a PFO team that is much larger—and far more well-funded—than Goblinworks ever was.
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Goblin Squad Member
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@Bluddwolf
The sad thing in today's society and especially on the Internet is the pick and choose your arguments. I'm living in the UK but didn't have a vote. But all this discussion here reminds me of the pre-Brexit vote.
One side predicted catastrophe and he other promised utopia. Guess what - suddenly both sides backpaddle. Nirvana no longer was what the leave campaigners promised - people voting for them misunderstood them they claim and they suddenly are in no hurry to leave.
The remain campaign now faces the fallout but the UK didn't implode overnight either.
Real life is messy. Deal with it. Anything else and you just delude yourself - one way or the other.
But what is common between both sides - they tend more NE more to drown out voices of reason who try to paint more nuanced pictures. A sad development.
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Goblin Squad Member
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Human beings thrive when their decisions are proven correct. You abandoned the game in disgust, as is your right, and now you have a degree of personal investment in its failure, since that will justify your decision.
I disagree with that assessment of my motives. I gain nothing from its failure, my only gain is from someone actually producing the game in a state I believe will be fun to play and viable in the long term.
The reason I sold my account was simply to offset a purchase I made for another game and the fact that an opportunity to make back my entire investment was appealing.
The only failure that I consider was a vindication was that of Ryan Dancey, who personally attacked me for my opinions and ultimately I was proven correct over his.
If we had only gotten the game that was described in the Dev Blog on this forum, what a world of difference PFO would have been. Cynically, I look back at those Dev Blog entries as a near perfect sales pitch. They did not only promise much innovation, they had also made it seem like their development team could pull it off, just not with Ryan at the helm.
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Goblin Squad Member
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Case in point about how humans thrive. Ryan's departure, whether voluntary or otherwise, doesn't actually vindicate anyone. I'm certain it makes some people feel good about themselves (as was no-doubt intended), but looked at objectively, there's no evidence one way or another whether he failed, or was sacrificed (willingly or unwillingly) on the altar of change. Furthermore, although failure and success generally overlap, one person's failures are not inherently another person's success. The gain comes in feeling like we were right all along. It's a very human feeling to desire.
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Goblin Squad Member
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...the fact there still doing a capital raise after all this time...The phrase "doing a capital raise" doesn't paint an accurate picture of the current state, as it suggests that they are still looking for people to give them money. The phrase they used was "finaliz[ing] a significant capital infusion into our company." They have people committed to give them money, and are in the process of dotting 'i's and crossing 't's to get that money into the bank.
This was a complex and slow process because there have been a lot of parties involved, some of them private, some of them not. Deals had to be negotiated between Party A and Party B, contingent on other deals between Party C and Party D, and so on. It has been in the works for many months, and as Erik Mona said the other day, it felt like Achilles' Paradox: every two weeks, we moved halfway to the finish line. But that's *almost* all behind us know, and, as "NewCorp" has said, they're starting to assemble a PFO team that is much larger—and far more well-funded—than Goblinworks ever was.
Thanks for the update.
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Any news since July 2016?
See here for a pretty comprehensive update.
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Does anybody actually still believe that this game will *ever* get a lift-off?
It's been dead in the water for years. Literally!
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Goblin Squad Member
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Any news since July 2016?See here for a pretty comprehensive update.
I guess I asked the right question on the right day!