Module 3 Patch 2: Evil Resurgent

=Module 3 Patch 2= Welcome to the Release Notes for Module 3 Patch 2 (Also known as Module 3.1). These release notes were posted on 13th Dec, 2006

=Evil Resurgent - Release Notes=

The most dangerous evils have the deepest roots…
Parthilcar Tower Crypt - Anabele d'Jorasco claims that someone tried to kidnap her but she managed to escape. She found herself outside of Parthilcar Tower Crypt, remembering nothing but an insidious voice in her head and a vague image of several house nobles. What is going on in the depths beyond the blue barrier?

From Beyond the Grave - Deathshadow is long in the ground but his evil lives on. Through dark magics and sheer force of will, the necromancer haunts the convict cemetery called Penitent's Rest and is now summoning forth an army of the undead. With a legion of walking corpses and ethereal horrors at his command, he intends to break out from the pauper's grave and invade Delera's Graveyard, the resting place of Stormreach's prosperous and elite. Meet his forces head on in a fight to the death…again!

Spire of Validus - The Spire of Validus recently burst through the ground in Delera's Graveyard. Now the torches are lit and the door is open. Ascend the tower to meet the lich, Calliphor Validus, and to send him back from whence he came.

Whisperdoom - When Splinterskull fell, Whisperdoom found herself with a very large new lair. However, a group of Ogre Magi came upon Splinterskull and Whisperdoom and captured her. They have taken her to a new lair, and have begun to imbue her with magical abilities, with the hopes of creating an army of magic wielding spawn of Whisperdoom to do their bidding.

Haywire's Grotto - Haywire has a new contract with House Kundarak and has established a mine in the Black Anvil Forest to construct improved Iron and Clay Golems, but something has gone wrong. The last shipment never arrived, and Haywire's speaking stones have been silent. What has the artificer managed to get himself into this time?

Gate of Nightmares - Long ago when the Dal Quor invaded Xen'drik, they built many temples that were attuned to the Plane of Dreams, and served as conduits for their soldiers. The Cult of Madness has found one of these temples, and has managed to alter the attunement to be aligned with Xoriat. Several of the smaller portals have been reopened, and the central gateway is not far from becoming fully operational.

Something special's in the air
We are receiving reports that Festival Coins have started appearing in the treasure chests of Stormreach. This can only mean one thing - The Jester of Festivus must be on his way!

Changes to the Social Panel
One of the best aspects of Dungeons & Dragons Online is finding a great party and then running through an adventure together. The most important tool we have to help you find a good group is the Social Panel. Since the launch of DDO in February we have changed and expanded the social panel several times in an effort to make finding a group easy. These latest changes are based almost entirely off player feedback. We feel that our newest iteration is a huge improvement and we hope you like what you see.

General

 * The Wayfinder's Foundation has offered to subsidize the exploration of the Menechtarun Desert! Zerchi Spire-Keeper in the Marketplace now offers free airship travel to Zawabi's Refuge.
 * Zawabi's refuge has been added to both the postal service network and the auction house network.
 * We have added some monetary caps to the Auction House. Initial price and buyout price can no longer exceed 2M pp. Bid price can no longer exceed 4M pp.
 * When blinded, floatynames will once again appear over friendly and neutral people. You will still not be able to see the names of hostile people.
 * There are new tooltips for ability damage that give you information about how to recover from that type of damage. For example, "Your Strength has been damaged. Resting at a shrine will allow you to recover partially. To recover fully, stay at an inn or tavern."
 * Players who have their name changed should not have to log out and back in for their friends list to work properly.

UI Improvements

 * We have added an "invite to guild" button and an "add friend" button to the focus orb.
 * When hitting the "create party" button on the LFM UI, the Create Party UI will now appear as its own window.
 * Players will no longer be able to post LFM and LFG want ads while anonymous. Don't worry Clerics - this is a temporary situation only.
 * If you click on white bolded player names in the chat window the chat entry line will automatically be filled in with "/tell ".
 * The map of the Sands of Menechtarun has been revised for greater accuracy.
 * The Resist Disease enhancement has the proper octagonal (passive) icon instead of a square one.
 * The Spell Penetration and Greater Spell Penetration feats have new icons.
 * Fixed the blank space in shield examination.

Monsters

 * Changes to monster classification. We have introduced a new color coded system that will help you determine the difficulty of the named monster you are facing.
 * Minibosses will have orange names and limited protections. This is actually a departure from before - minibosses are no longer immune to many of the things they were previously immune to. In particular, casters will enjoy this change.
 * Bosses will have red names and will have the same immunities as before. It is important to note that some monsters who used to be classified as bosses (such as optional bosses) are now designated as minibosses.
 * Raidbosses have purple names. There are currently only four raidbosses: Sorjek, Velah, the Warforged Titan, and Queen Lailat. Raidbosses have all of the immunities of bosses and a few more as well.
 * Monster names will default to these colors but can be reset via the UI options panel.
 * Queen Lailat
 * Queen Lailat has enhanced her defenses by modestly improving her guards and raising the lava level around the circle of eternity. Zawabi has countered by adding a new portal that allows you to escape the pit should you accidentally fall in.
 * Wrack now has a saving throw.
 * Monsters which are stealthed will now break stealth anytime they cast a spell (the same way players do), instead of only breaking stealth when casting harmful spells.
 * Monsters charmed by a Symbol of Persuasion will now remain charmed even if they wander away from the symbol.
 * Ogre Mages now disappear properly after a fiery death.
 * Harga Fire Dancer and Yurrugh the Swift will now drop treasure from their correct treasure tables.
 * The description for the poison Hulrak Slime Mold now lists all three abilities that may be damaged: Wisdom, Intelligence, and Charisma.

Combat

 * Low level ranged combat speeds have been increased.

Spells

 * Spell crits were not working properly on some AoE spells; now they will properly register the crit when casting and then apply the extra damage to all targets for the full duration of the spell.
 * Disintegrate, Harm, Heal, and Otiluke's Freezing Sphere now penetrate spell resistance the same way other damage spells do.
 * The duration of both Aid and Protection from Energy now increase at levels 11 and 12. Please note: their effects are still capped at level 10. In addition, the duration of Resist Energy now increases at level 12, although the effect is still capped at level 11.
 * Barkskin was erroneously giving a higher natural AC bonus than intended. We have therefore adjusted it to consistent with p&p rules (2 ac, +1 for every 3 levels past third, to a maximum of +5 at 12th level).
 * The Wall of Fire spell will now burn away webs and obscuring mists and can set burnable things (like crates and barrels) on fire.
 * The Waves of Fatigue spell is now properly considered a fatigue effect (it can now be removed by effects that remove fatigue). Therefore, creatures (such as warforged) that are immune to fatigue are also immune to the spell.
 * Disease effects, such as Filth Fever, now use their own disease icons rather than poison icons (this does NOT affect Mummy Rot, which has its own icon).
 * Glyph of Warding and Glyph of Warding, Greater were inadvertently doing too much damage. Their damage has been reduced to what is stated in the spell description.
 * The bard's Song of Freedom now has the correct icon.

Skills, Feats, & Abilities

 * If you respec out a toggle feat (metamagic feats, for example), they are now toggled "off" when they are removed.
 * The Quick Draw feat's description has been updated to reflect the changes made to the feat in The Demon Sands Module.
 * Manyshot's description has been updated to properly include the scaling number of arrows rather than claiming it's always 2.
 * Warforged are now immune to all of a Beholder's Flesh to Stone rays (and not just some of them).
 * Fixed instances where warforged immunities were still being called resistances.

Items

 * Reports of fantastic ancient treasures are coming in from the Restless Isles. Some say the ogre mage, Ghola-Fan, is hoarding legendary items. Others tell of crystal-forged items imbued with the resonant power of the Shrieking Mines.
 * Ancient treasures have been unearthed in the desert of Menechtarun. Will you be lucky enough to find them?
 * Sale on Bless potions! 80% off!
 * Spell casters can now attempt to activate scrolls containing spells higher level than they can currently cast by using a caster level check. Characters must roll d20 + 2*CasterLevel >= 2*Minimum level to cast the spell to succeed in activating the scroll. This is a deviation from pen and paper D&D that does not double the caster levels to determine success. We feel that given the higher availability of scrolls in DDO it is necessary to reduce the chance for lower level characters to activate higher level scrolls.
 * Tools and scrolls will appear less frequently in random chest treasures.
 * Mithral Armor now weighs 1/2 of the normal steel armor weight. This change will be retroactive.
 * "of Backstabbing" weapons now do even more additional damage on any attack that would qualify as a Sneak Attack.
 * Items that cast the various damage amplification spells X/rest now have a much quicker activation time.
 * Newly found Filtration Modules will now have Acid Resistance instead of the previous +4 bonus to saves versus Poison. Filtration Modules already in existence will not be affected by this change.
 * The effects on Tyrzza's Bane, a weapon found in the Invasion dungeon, have been modified so that the weapon will properly negate the Damage Reduction of Tyrzza. This is not a retroactive fix.
 * The Staff of Arcane Power is now equipable by Wizards, Sorcerers and Bards. This change affects all Staffs of Arcane Power, those already in existence as well as newly created staffs.
 * The named weapons that lacked the +to-hit/damage portion of the Bane effects have been corrected.
 * Kelmar's Justice
 * Sword of the Giant Slave-Masters
 * Giant Stalker's Knife
 * Spider Spike
 * Spiked Mace of the Elements
 * Several of the new named treasure items that were erroneously marked Bind on Acquire are now freely tradeable:
 * Spectacles of Spirit Sight
 * Thornlord
 * Whirlwind
 * Sirroco
 * Bejeweled Letter Opener
 * Stinkpelt's Hide
 * Vambraces of Inner Light
 * Silken Mail
 * Beholder Optic Nerves will once again protect against ALL Beholder eye beams.
 * Fixed a situation that would sometimes cause crests not to spawn in some dungeons.
 * Fingalar d'Phiarlan is now being properly credited as being a source for a replacement Pendant of Time if you were to lose yours for any reason.
 * The Circlet of Persuasion and Minor Circlet of Blasting have been updated to use new Circlet art.
 * The Armor and Shield examination panels now show the arcane spell failure percentage for that item. Please be aware that bards do not suffer arcane spell failure if they are wearing light armor and casting bard spells. To find out what your total current spell failure chance is, please refer to the tooltip of the spell that you will be casting.

NPCs

 * Items forged by Galrias the Smith in the Black Anvil Mines will now be stored in your overflow slots if your inventory is full.
 * Masei Mkembe will now offer you your deserved reward even if you accidentally closed his window while talking to him. He will also give you more items to choose from when you turn in Ancient Brass Tokens. WARNING - DO NOT abandon the quest the Mkembe gives you to select your reward. You will not be refunded any tokens in this case.
 * Trader Trevia in the Wavecrest Tavern will no longer train enhancements for players after they reach level 3.
 * Harvender Dragonborn in the Portable Hole has finally reached level 12 and is now able to help other Sorcerers switch out Level 6 spells.
 * Sigmund Bauerson, proprietor of the Wavecrest Tavern, has had a startling realization: Warforged do not eat ham! He now offers a more appropriate reward to Warforged adventurers for fetching his cask of Old Sully's Grog.
 * Ostler Caulstone (a vendor in the Restless Isles) will no longer have his shop window get "stuck open" if you walk away from him without closing it.
 * Fred the Feat Respec Mindflayer has relocated to an area with less sunlight. He will now also properly close his dialog box.

PVP

 * We have changed the water depth in certain arenas to prevent unintended player behavior.

Quests

 * If you ended your conversation with Nyx Durandimion before acquiring your +2 Manual/Tome (when you reached 1750 total favor) you should go talk to Nyx again and he will reward you for your efforts. Additionally, when you gain 1750 favor you will now be told to talk to Nyx to get your reward, rather than the current, less-informative message.
 * "Titan Awakes," "Bounty Hunter," and "Path to Madness" will all properly show up in the Adventure Compendium again.
 * Black Anvil Forest
 * The survey crew no longer inappropriately respawns.
 * Black Anvil Mines
 * The Duergar in the King's wing in Black Anvil Mines will now return to their posts if they stray too far away.
 * The Court of Lailat
 * About 4% of the time the text for the "Tome of the Six Swords" riddle was incorrect. This has been fixed.
 * Desert Caravan
 * You should no longer be able to destroy the caravan.
 * The Foul Chambers
 * Fixed a kobold thrower who wasn't scaling properly with quest difficulty level. Solo players should now encounter the proper CR.
 * Restless Isles
 * There is now an extra key-bearing overseer in the Restless Isles.
 * The Scavenger's Warren
 * Furor should no longer become stuck at the top of a ladder.
 * Shrieking Mines
 * Wildmen caught sleeping on the job have been severely chastised by their masters and are consequently far less lazy.
 * The Mind Flayers living here were always kind of shrimpy. Something in the air must have been stunting their growth. Whatever it was has been cleared out, as the Mind Flayers are now just as big as their other brethren.
 * Shrouded Vale
 * Recalling from the Shrouded Vale will now always return you to House Phiarlan.
 * Sorrowdusk Isle
 * Libram of the Six will now drop upon exit. Seriously. We promise.
 * Tomb of the Physician
 * Picking up the Seal of the Soul will now award a small amount of optional XP.
 * Tomb of the Wizard-king
 * Now has higher level collectibles in it.
 * Twilight Forge
 * The Twilight Forge has just gotten friendlier! There is now an extra chest at the end with a chance to spawn unique loot. In addition, several of the other chests throughout the dungeon will also have a chance to spawn unique loot. And if that's not enough reason to try the dungeon again, more rest shrines have also been added throughout!
 * The Warforged Titan should get stuck on broken pillar bases less often.
 * The power crystal in the WFT encounter will now go into an overflow slot if you pick it up when you have a full inventory.
 * The power crystal in the WFT encounter is no longer destroyable. If you drag it out of your inventory, it'll fall to the ground.
 * The Vulkoorim Creche
 * Vulkoorim Creche now has chests and collectables.
 * Fixed a problem where players were receiving multiple alerts that they had charted the breeding pits.
 * The Waterworks
 * Pets and monsters will no longer refuse to follow you across the bridge before the entrance to Clan Gnashtooth Lair.