Broadsword has been talking up Ultima Online’s incoming New Legacy server since the game’s 23rd birthday stream last fall. So far, we know that the server isn’t just a fresh-start or classic or progression server; it’s a whole new ruleset that will both onboard new players and offer a different seasonal experience for veterans. Broadsword has said that New Legacy will have a simpler skill and gear system, that it will have PvP but won’t be a gankbox, and that it’ll emphasize new features like weather, climate, and families.
We’re poised to learn more today with yet another livestream from the tiny team, live just as this post publishes at 2 p.m. EDT. “Join the UO Dev Team for a special Livestream Event where we take the newsletter live,” the studio says in a blog post and newsletter push. “We’ll be talking about what’s next for UO: Live and UO: New Legacy!” And we’ll be recapping with some of the highlights after the show is done.
Source: Newsletter, official site
Notes from the stream
• The team has begun by discussing the Treasures of Wildfire event, which is live through September. It’s a spinoff off the old Treasure of Tokuno event, which drives players into specific areas for currencies to exchange for some pretty sweet loot.
• Anniversary rewards are coming in September, followed by the usual October, November, and December holiday events. Bonnie “Mesanna” Armstrong has also run down the new cash-shop items, including individual items from larger sets.
• New pets are coming, although they’re really just reskins for cu sidhes that function as dragon barding. Expect those in the cash shop.
• Meet-and-greets on Japanese shards are on hold until they can find a new translator.
• Bards will eventually be able to provoke at champ spawns. “It will not be tomorrow.”
• Greg “Kyronix” Havlusch is explaining how the start for New Legacy will work as players begin under their family legacy – yep, definitely a new starting experience on Ocllo. The team ran through a champ spawn in basic crafted gear and basic old-school spells under the rescaled difficulty, and they apparently could pull it off, though not without wipes. The goal was to suss out what the game’s first 15 minutes should feel like. They want to “dial back the bloat” when it comes to gear and rewards (and he’s not wrong).
• Stephen “Bleak” Brown has detailed some of the gear changes and the types of stats on gear – things like fast casting are gone, resists have been rebalanced, and you’re not going to be a platemail-wearing mage. In fact, it sounds like the team is adding more armor types.
• Mesanna says billing is completely out of Broadsword’s hands. (Presumably it’s all on EA.)
• “With New Legacy, crafters are going to become much more important to the game, like they used to be. […] You’re not going to get everything from a dungeon.”
• New Legacy doesn’t really have Felucca or Trammel ruleset; it has a new flag PvP system. There will be a loot-based incentive to coax people into PvP. It sounds like it’s somewhat inspired by the Vice and Virtue system.
• The “majority” of New Legacy gear won’t be transferrable to the prodo shards. They’re not sure how item insurance will work yet, but “there will be something.”
• Moongates are in smarter places.
• At this point, some of the players were getting super rude (demanding that the devs abandon work on Legacy), and the devs called them out.
• More emphasis on how this is not Classic UO. It’s meant to capture nostalgia but remove the bloat that creates barriers to entry and make it something that “appeals to a modern gaming audience.”
• No hard date yet. In response to a comment about it being out before 2024, Mesanna says it will be before that. She doesn’t say how much before then.
• There won’t be an event moderator on the shard; the server will be “curated by the dev team.”
• Some of the High Seas ships will make it into New Legacy, but they are hedging – it sounds like at least some of the ship combat will be cut.
• All Magery spells will be in. Some will be re-evaluated (players asked for one of them to be changed into a cold spell). The other caster skills (like Chivalry, Necromancy, Mysticism, Spellweaving) aren’t going to make it to New Legacy – just Magery.
• Guilds are in. They’re not letting you reserve guild names.
• Thieving will be available but limited to reduce impact on other players. (Several devs are apparently avid UO thieves and still say it needed curbing.)
• Some of the more useless skills in the games will be improved. Skill gain will be tweaked and much quicker than in the original game. You will once again have to have reagents to cast spells; there’s no “lower reagent cost” attribute on gear on New Legacy.
• Some New Legacy stuff might someday make it over to the live game.
• Weather and seasons will impact which quests are active at any given time.
• They’re not doing a ground-up do-over for UO, here or ever. Mesanna says she understands the desire for a mobile client, but it’s probably never happening. The devs would love to have a mobile interfacing to (for example) let people stock vendors from their phones, but nobody is working on anything like that. No plans at this time, basically. Same with fixing MyUO (it was the website that showed off your toon).
• Mesanna notes that the team still has six people (only three are on this stream) and that everyone still loves the game, so nobody’s going anywhere.
• Treasure maps are definitely making it to New Legacy (this makes me happy!).
• There will be some sort of formal testing for players. No ETA. “As soon as we’re confident when it’s ready.”
• And that’s it!
• Anniversary rewards are coming in September, followed by the usual October, November, and December holiday events. Bonnie “Mesanna” Armstrong has also run down the new cash-shop items, including individual items from larger sets.
• New pets are coming, although they’re really just reskins for cu sidhes that function as dragon barding. Expect those in the cash shop.
• Meet-and-greets on Japanese shards are on hold until they can find a new translator.
• Bards will eventually be able to provoke at champ spawns. “It will not be tomorrow.”
• Greg “Kyronix” Havlusch is explaining how the start for New Legacy will work as players begin under their family legacy – yep, definitely a new starting experience on Ocllo. The team ran through a champ spawn in basic crafted gear and basic old-school spells under the rescaled difficulty, and they apparently could pull it off, though not without wipes. The goal was to suss out what the game’s first 15 minutes should feel like. They want to “dial back the bloat” when it comes to gear and rewards (and he’s not wrong).
• Stephen “Bleak” Brown has detailed some of the gear changes and the types of stats on gear – things like fast casting are gone, resists have been rebalanced, and you’re not going to be a platemail-wearing mage. In fact, it sounds like the team is adding more armor types.
• Mesanna says billing is completely out of Broadsword’s hands. (Presumably it’s all on EA.)
• “With New Legacy, crafters are going to become much more important to the game, like they used to be. […] You’re not going to get everything from a dungeon.”
• New Legacy doesn’t really have Felucca or Trammel ruleset; it has a new flag PvP system. There will be a loot-based incentive to coax people into PvP. It sounds like it’s somewhat inspired by the Vice and Virtue system.
• The “majority” of New Legacy gear won’t be transferrable to the prodo shards. They’re not sure how item insurance will work yet, but “there will be something.”
• Moongates are in smarter places.
• At this point, some of the players were getting super rude (demanding that the devs abandon work on Legacy), and the devs called them out.
• More emphasis on how this is not Classic UO. It’s meant to capture nostalgia but remove the bloat that creates barriers to entry and make it something that “appeals to a modern gaming audience.”
• No hard date yet. In response to a comment about it being out before 2024, Mesanna says it will be before that. She doesn’t say how much before then.
• There won’t be an event moderator on the shard; the server will be “curated by the dev team.”
• Some of the High Seas ships will make it into New Legacy, but they are hedging – it sounds like at least some of the ship combat will be cut.
• All Magery spells will be in. Some will be re-evaluated (players asked for one of them to be changed into a cold spell). The other caster skills (like Chivalry, Necromancy, Mysticism, Spellweaving) aren’t going to make it to New Legacy – just Magery.
• Guilds are in. They’re not letting you reserve guild names.
• Thieving will be available but limited to reduce impact on other players. (Several devs are apparently avid UO thieves and still say it needed curbing.)
• Some of the more useless skills in the games will be improved. Skill gain will be tweaked and much quicker than in the original game. You will once again have to have reagents to cast spells; there’s no “lower reagent cost” attribute on gear on New Legacy.
• Some New Legacy stuff might someday make it over to the live game.
• Weather and seasons will impact which quests are active at any given time.
• They’re not doing a ground-up do-over for UO, here or ever. Mesanna says she understands the desire for a mobile client, but it’s probably never happening. The devs would love to have a mobile interfacing to (for example) let people stock vendors from their phones, but nobody is working on anything like that. No plans at this time, basically. Same with fixing MyUO (it was the website that showed off your toon).
• Mesanna notes that the team still has six people (only three are on this stream) and that everyone still loves the game, so nobody’s going anywhere.
• Treasure maps are definitely making it to New Legacy (this makes me happy!).
• There will be some sort of formal testing for players. No ETA. “As soon as we’re confident when it’s ready.”
• And that’s it!
