Grab Bag - May 15, 2009

Well, well! I see you're back again! And so am I. My apologies for leaving unannounced... something... came up.

Anyway, like I promised you, I've got something else for you to take a look at. It looks like you got here just in time, too -- this happens to be the last copy of the scroll my man on the inside sent us. As a reward for your devotion, I'll give you this one as a gift as well.

Now, now, no need to thank me, but if you really insist, you could always purchase some of our other wares, or maybe make a donation...

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This one has been bugging me for some time, and I can't quite figure out why I'm having trouble with it. Sometimes when I try to use my friar's offensive proc buffs (the PBAoE or group heal buffs), I'm unable to activate it. What gives?

One of the Knights quickly responded to this one:

"The Friar will not be able to activate their offensive proc buff while targeting someone who currently also has an offensive proc (such as a Warden, Thane or Valkyrie). If the buff is active on the friar, however, the heals will still be able to proc. This is a known issue, but at this time there is no ETA on a fix."

I have a question about the Friar's Spec AF buff. How does this interact with the Paladin's AF Chant? Does it stack or coexist?

A couple of the Knights talked this one over:

"The Friar's AF shield (Shield of Faith line) does not stack or co-exist with the Paladin's armor factor chant (Crusader's Ward line). The Friar's armor factor buff will not be overwritten by a Paladin using their armor factor chant."

Do buff shears still have no effect on self buffs (such as the Thane's self Str/Con buff)? How about concentration buffs cast on yourself (like the same Thane using the Champion Level concentration buffs)? Do they have any effect on buffs from potions? I recently discovered potion buffs benefit from buff effectiveness bonuses, so I was curious as to whether or not they could be sheared.

The Lady Templar channeled her divine might to formulate an answer for this one:

"Any buff that is placed upon a character and originates from that same character (be it through spell or item) is unshearable by the cleric/druid/shaman buff shears (the Battlemaster and Vampiir shears will hit any effect, selected at random -- my favorites to pick off with these include Mastery of Concentration and water breathing buffs). This includes regular concentration buffs, self buffs, concentration buffs from CLs, buff charges, and buff pots.

As you mention, potions (and charges) benefit from +buff% gear. You might think that this means players would run around using charges and pots instead of buffs from group mates, but at higher levels potions are less effective than concentration buffs, and charges use up your item charge timer (generally a minute and a half), making charge buffing a less appealing option for anything but a 'critical' buff that they cannot provide themselves with (like Dex/Qui on a Nature druid) or a solo player."

In the 1.97 patch, you changed the Damage Add chants for the Skald, Paladin, and Warden by adding a Celerity subspell component to them, with a lower delve than the "original" Celerity spells. How do these interact with the "original" Celerity spells? Do they stack?

The Lady Templar smiled, clasping her mailed hands together, and rattled off an answer to this one:

"The interaction of these spells was one of the first things I wanted to test when this ability hit Pendragon. The two chants do not 'stack', but I can safely assure you that the the stronger delve Celerity overwrites the weaker delve Celerity (essentially, they safely coexist). On a Paladin, for example, you may be confused when you see the "you already have this effect" messages -- this is simply caused by the Celerity component of the DA + Celerity chant seeing that your "original" (higher delve) Celerity spell is in place.

Please note that the DA + Celerity's Celerity component will still hit allies within its radius but outside of the standalone Celerity spell's radius."

I've noticed that using a yellow Spec AF buff will cause it to overwrite a red Spec AF buff from my bot. Why is this taking place?

The Wicked One tested this anomaly out to get as much information as he could. Upon conclusion of his trials, he had this to say:

"This appears to be a bug. This has been sent off to the Royal Exterminator to be handled. Thank you for your report!"

I have some characters that have hit level 50, and I have been making liberal use of the /level command for my alts. I created a character on the Bossiney cluster, and noticed that I couldn't use the /level command there. Why is this the case?

The Lady Templar, though unable to say for sure whether this was the reasoning behind it, felt confident in offering this explanation:

"When the classic servers were released, the /level command was removed from the rule set. Since the server was brand new and everyone was starting from scratch, this seems to have served a dual purpose of keeping the playing field level, as well as encouraging players to group and level together."

What is the /faceloc command, and how does it work?

Despite the fact that I've always seen him with a bottle in hand, that Inebriated Elf sure knows his way around town:

"The /faceloc command, which is short for 'face location', will turn your character to face a specific set of coordinates in the current zone. No in game elements refer to coordinates specifically, so it is most commonly used to find locations provided to you by other players (such as their current location, or the location of a specific quest mob, to give two examples). The syntax for this command is /faceloc x-coordinate y-coordinate. A player can obtain their current location using the /loc command.

A similar command is the /houseface command, which can be used (with a syntax of /houseface lotnumber) to have your character face a specific lot number in housing. This command does work across all zones in your realm's housing region, as it references the lot number instead of specific coordinates.

You can find a fairly good listing of slash commands on the Herald."

I recently completed a quest to get a horse. After picking up my trusty steed, I departed to the battlegrounds and noticed that I was unable to use my horse. However, I saw an enemy invader on a horse in the same battleground! Where did they get that horse? I want it!
 

The Inebriated Elf took time away from trying to figure out how to fit one of his bottles into his horse's overloaded saddlebags to address this one:

"The free horse obtained from the quest cannot be used in any RvR areas (including battlegrounds). For that privilege, you must pay a visit to the merchant in your King's throne room to purchase one of the horses they have available -- once they are, of course, ready to sell you one (you can purchase your first at level 45 for the low price of one platinum -- see this page of the Darkness Rising guide for details)."