Jack T. Lamplighter

Greetings Fellow Avatars! This week’s update brings players of Shroud of the Avatar details about The Breach! The Breach is an upcoming new adventure scene featuring team-oriented boss mechanics. For those wishing to participate in any community activities, upcoming one-time and recurring community events have been announced! Be sure to also review the... Avatar’s Update #402: Upcoming Adventure Scene – The Breach! Latest News Q&A Friday Livestream!View the full article

Greetings Fellow Avatars! This week’s update brings players of Shroud of the Avatar details about The Breach! The Breach is an upcoming new adventure scene featuring team-oriented boss mechanics. For those wishing to participate in any community activities, upcoming one-time and recurring community events have been announced! Be sure to also review the Players Guide and Known Issues list for additional information on recent changes and upcoming fixes. Now, let’s see what we have for you in this week’s edition of Update of the Avatar: News Announcements Upcoming Adventure Scene – The Breach! Latest News Q&A Friday Livestream! New Vault Round! Latest Store Additions: Conversationalists & Seasonal Items! October Login Reward: Blood Spurting Headless Mask! R82 Rewards Program Login Items: Lord British & Spooky Themed! The Bug Brigade Rides Again! Recent Shroud of the Avatar Livestreams Streaming Reward Program Lord of the Isle Episode 2 Bundles Upcoming Events Calendar Community Updates Community Event: Catnip Games Weekly Fishing Tourney Community Event: Extra Life Charity Event Community Event: Terrifying Tea Tales Community Event: Net’s Diary Community Event: Kobold Invasion Event Community Event: TheAvatar.Express Needs You Community Event: Crafters Town Shopping Spree Community Event: Beran’s Reach Auction Community Event: The Poets’ Circle Returns Project to Support: Shadow of Valhalla Project to Support: Jar Wars Project to Support: Dragonfight Project to Support: Crowfall Project to Support: Avatar Express Resources: Players Helping Players Upcoming Adventure Scene – The Breach! Another new adventure scene is in design and will be revealed to players on the QA server shortly! Chris “Atos” Spears is hard at work creating a new style of boss encounter which can only be experienced in The Breach, a new location soon to become available to Episode 2 Access holders! This PvE scene is a modified version of Dysborg Ruins, a PvP scene located along the shores of the Naryad Channel. Much of the terrain has been altered to provide a chilly arctic feel with more visual changes to come during development. A dark and foreboding fog accompanied by frequent lightning strikes will most certainly put adventurers ill at ease! The Breach will also feature improved performance over Dysborg Ruins, and the creature spawns will be expanded considerably. By accomplishing team-oriented events within the scene, a highly difficult wave battle will commence in the center of the map. Players will face four guardian golem mini-bosses which spawn in key locations. Each golem will have a five minute respawn timer. Two of these golems will be highly resistant to magic. The other two golems will be highly resistant to physical damage. All four golems must be slain at nearly the same time, requiring considerable team coordination. A player must also be present at the wave battle spawn location to trigger the wave event when the four guardian golems are defeated. The resulting wave battle will be highly difficult, and provide a significant challenge to even the most powerful of teams. The Breach is coming soon, Avatars! So stay tuned, and happy adventures! Latest News Q&A Friday Livestream! Another weekly Community Livestream is this Friday, October 9th at 4PM CT on Twitch! Join Chris “Atos” Spears and other development team members for a community 1 hour livestream! To enter the prize drawings, type “I love fall most of all” into any in-game chat channel OR make a purchase on the website add-on store. Please submit questions into Twitch Chat by inserting !question at the beginning of your text. Watch on Twitch, Friday at 4 PM CT! New Vault Round! The current round of Vault items are available until Thursday, October 15th at 1PM CT. At that time, the next round of 9 items will be available for one week, and then the next, etc. Rotten Armor Outfit Ghost Raven Decoration Pet Grim Reaper Statue Witch’s Hat Zombie Mask Skull Cloak Autumn Leaf Shield Fall Wreath 2019 Large Nightmare Statue Latest Store Additions: Conversationalists & Seasonal Items! Additional Inky NPCs have been added to the store with MANY more soon on the way! Players can now enjoy customizing the dialogue for a variety of Kobold, Satyr and even a Faun Conversationalists! Conversationalist, Kobold Ghost 1 Conversationalist, Kobold Fighter 1 Conversationalist, Kobold Archer 1 Conversationalist, Kobold Mage 1 Conversationalist, Kobold Brawler 1 Conversationalist, Kobold Grenadier 1 Conversationalist, Kobold Gunner 1 Conversationalist, Satyr Fighter 1 Conversationalist, Satyr Archer 1 Conversationalist, Satyr Mage 1 Conversationalist, Faun 1 The fall and spooky store season is upon us, Avatars! From September 24th to November 6th, the following items will be available either in the Vault or as a recurring spooky/fall item: Baby Black & Orange Spider Pet Blood Spurting Headless Mask Bloodraven Pet Breathe Spiders Emote Day of the Dead Colorful Mask Day of the Dead Colorful Mask with Top Hat Day of the Dead Colorful Mask with Veil Day of the Dead Mask Day of the Dead Mask 6-Pack Day of the Dead Mask with Top Hat Day of the Dead Mask with Veil Dead Tree with Spider Webs 6-Pack Ghost Cat Decoration Pet Ghost Dog Decoration Pet Ghost Raven Decoration Pet Giant Grim Reaper Statue with Magic Portal Dungeon Entrance Giant Lich Statue with Magic Portal Dungeon Entrance Grim Reaper Mask Grim Reaper Mask 2016 Grim Reaper Statue Headless Horseman Grim Reaper Statue 2017 Headless Mask Jabbering Bertha Jack O’ Lantern 6-Pack 2015 Jack O’ Lantern 6-Pack 2016 Jack O’ Lantern 6-Pack 2017 Jack O’ Lantern 6-Pack 2018 Jack O’ Lantern Glowing Mask 2015 Jack O’ Lantern Glowing Mask 2016 Jack O’ Lantern Glowing Mask 2017 Jack O’ Lantern Glowing Mask 2018 Jack O’ Lantern Mask 2015 Jack O’ Lantern Mask 2016 Jack O’ Lantern Mask 2017 Jack O’ Lantern Mask 2018 Juggle Jack O’ Lanterns Juggle Severed Arms Emote Juggle Severed Heads Juggle Skulls Emote Juggle Zombie Arms Emote Juggle Zombie Heads Large Headless Horseman Grim Reaper Statue 2017 Large Nightmare Statue Large Spooky Fountain Ornate Giant Grim Reaper Statue with Magic Portal Dungeon Entrance Ornate Scythe Ornate Scythe 2017 Ornate Scythe 2017 Pattern Pack Ornate Scythe Pattern Pack Ornate Skull Candle Ornate Spider Legs Cloak Prisoner’s Mask Puke Blood Emote Rain Spiders Emote Rotten Armor Outfit Rotten Flesh Cloak Skull Cloak Spider Web Cloak Spooky Wax Cylinder Pack Tall Dead Hedge Fence Torn and Tattered Wedding Dress Outfit Torn and Tattered Wedding Tuxedo Outfit Undead Specimen Vats Set Witch’s Hat Woven Spider Web Cloak Zombie Cat Zombie Dog Zombie Mask Zombie One-Eyed Mask Zombie Raven Zombie Statue October Login Reward: Blood Spurting Headless Mask! Do you have the strange urge to decapitate yourself and spew blood upon your friends and enemies? Well… now you can! October’s login reward is a Blood Spurting Headless Mask! Simply log in during the month of October, and this mask will become available in the Rewards Window. Release 82 Rewards Program Login Items: Lord British & Spooky Themed! Avatars! Rewards Program login items for Release 82 are Lord British and spooky themed! Reward Program members must login during Release 82 to receive these login items: Ghost Conversationalist Skeleton Set 2 (5-Pack) Lord British Plate Greaves The Shroud of the Avatar Rewards Program lets you earn the best rate on purchasing Crowns, AND receive monthly reward items! For the low price of $9 USD per month you will receive the following: 900 Crowns of the Obsidians every month Monthly Login Reward Items (~ 3 per month) Exclusive Title every 3 months 3 Months: Keeper of the Faith 6 Months: Keeper of the Word 9 Months: Keeper of the Vow 12 Months: Keeper of the Flame 15 Months: Keeper of the Oath 18 Months: Keeper of the Pledge Pick any Dye 12-Pack every 6 months Pick any three of the 7 Obsidian Potions every month, including: Potion of Capacity: Increases carrying capacity Potion of Conservation: Reduces reagent use chance Potion of Expedience: Swift gathering on all gathering skills Potion of Precision: Increases Meticulous Collection to all gathering skills Potion of Preservation: Reduces armor and weapon damage Potion of Reclamation: Increases Salvage and Repair to all production skills The Bug Brigade Rides Again! The Bug Brigade was established to assist the community and the development team to work together to improve the game. Since then the program has gone through a number of changes and was eventually placed on hold. The stability of the game is as important to the development team as it is to the player-base, and for that reason the program has been revamped and is being relaunched. The program is now open to all players in good standing and bug rewards are back! They will be awarded on a progression basis monthly with only a minimal requirement to be filled to qualify. We are bringing the bug forums current and will make every effort to have triage and intake for each validated bug. To assist in doing this we have asked Alley Oop, Justyn, and Tazar to take on a moderator role within the bug and feedback forums. Please congratulate them the next time you see them in the game or on the forums! The Bug Brigade will be open to all. If you feel the game is your home, sign up and assist us in making it a better place to live! To sign up, read the post “Bug Brigade Rides Again!” in the main Bug/Feedback forums for both the Live or Player Test areas in the official forums. If you have trouble finding them, please ask a Hospitaller, or one of the Moderators via PM in the forums or in Discord. Recent Shroud of the Avatar Livestreams Atos and other members of the Shroud of the Avatar development team go live very frequently on our TWO Twitch Channels: twitch.tv/shroudoftheavatar and twitch.tv/communityoftheavatar — be sure to get these channels on follow and get the latest information right as we go live! Also, if you’ve missed our latest streams, check out our archive of content at our YouTube Channel (complete with “Mojito the dog” cam). Like! Follow! Subscribe! Prizes!!! Don’t forget to also join the Shroud of the Avatar team and community over at our other social media venues: Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/ShroudoftheAvatar/ Catnip Games Twitter: https://twitter.com/catnipgames Shroud of the Avatar Twitter: https://twitter.com/ShroudofAvatar Shroud of the Avatar Discord: https://discord.gg/GuBXakQ Are You a Livestreamer? Soon, the Streaming Reward Program will be returning. As the details are getting reworked, we’ll reveal more information. Traditional streaming rewards included an exclusive in-game Streamer Camera for being a veteran of our Streaming Program! Expect the camera reward to return! More goodies will come to your way as the program fully develops. Thank you for streaming Shroud of the Avatar! Lord of the Isle Episode 2 Bundles As one of the biggest and earliest supporters of Episode 2 you will be granted the largest lot deed in the land (Castle), the title Lord (or Lady) of the Isle, a tour of Lord British’s property, and dinner with the game leaders including Lord British himself! Only 24 of these unique bundles will be sold! Complete List of Rewards: Lord of the Isle Place Anywhere Castle Lot Deed: Tax Free Forever (when placed in a POT) and Tax Free for 1 Year (when placed outside of a POT). Placeable on water as well as land! Title: Lord of the Isle or Lady of the Isle Unique Lord of the Isle Home (pictured above) NEW – Lord of the Isle Fishing Expedition (This scene version will work like a large instanced property such as a basement and will feature decoration surfaces to further beautify the scene.) Town Size Upgrade (if a town is not owned by the LOTI supporter, they may gift this size upgrade to another town owner. Maximum possible town sizes will be taken into account, but the Teralopolis size just became available!) Choice of 1 House currently available in the store Castle Basement currently available in the store of your choice Castle Wall Set currently available in the store of your choice (with enough for Castle Lot) Unique Lord of the Isle Dungeon Room (To be revealed later) 140,000 Crowns 1000 Bank Slots Pick 12 Prosperity Tools Lord of the Isle Crown (In-Game Wearable Item) Unique In-Game Emote (To be revealed later) Early Access to Episode 2 Episode 1 Box and map signed by the team 1 hour one-on-one with Chris for design discussion (via video-conference) One real silver ring crafted personally by Lord British: Numbered 1 – 8 In-game version of the Lord British ring: Numbered 1 – 8 (including a place-able decoration version) Tour of Lord British’s property Fine dinner and drinks with Lord British, Darkstarr, and Atos at a location TBD in Austin or NYC. NOTE: Digital items that are currently available will begin delivery as soon as Release 62 (Jan 31, 2019). Other items will be delivered at a future date TBD. NOTE: Travel costs NOT covered by Catnip Games for Tour & Dinner. Upcoming Events Calendar Be sure to check out the Upcoming Events page for spotlighted events plus links to various areas to post or find events on our forums: 2020 Release Schedule: Release 83 – Oct 29 Release 84 – Nov 19 Release 85 – Dec 17 Community Event: Catnip Games Weekly Fishing Tourney Greetings Anglers! The weekly Catnip Games Fishing Tourney is live! These contests run for 1 week intervals, Friday Noon to Friday Noon CT. We’ll announce the winners every Friday during the livestream. Town Registration: Each week, the contest takes place in 3 Player Owned Towns, 1 Random PvP location and 1 Random Lava or NPC Town Location. Please register your Player Owned Town of choice in a reply to this thread, 1 entry per player, and these entries will be added into the town registry. The contest will cycle through the towns in the sequence they entered the town registry, then loop back again to the beginning. The town registry will be reset/wiped for new entries periodically to ensure only active/interested towns are within the registry. Fishing Prizes & Objectives: All prizes will be no-trade. Players may donate additional prizes in the name of their guilds or towns to sweeten the pot. This event timeframe is Friday the 9th at Noon CT to Friday the 16th at Noon CT, and these are the prizes and goals for the indicated week: Largest FRESHWATER Fish (Town): Rules: Must be caught from one of these towns. Governs can request loaner water conversion statues. Prizes: Player Owned Town Row Lot Deed, Large Gold Fishing Trophy PaxLair (@Sean Silverfoot) Novia Market (@Adam Crow) Dark Bayou, Novia Near Brittany (@Fiero Steele) Largest Fish (PvP): Rules: Must be caught in Libris Ruins Prizes: 2 Chained Obsidian Shard 3-Packs, Large Silver Fishing Trophy Largest Lava Fish: Rules: Must be caught in Bunker C Prizes: Fishing Rod of Prosperity, Large Bronze Fishing Trophy Participation Prizes: Rules: Everyone who caught at least 1 trophy fish in this week’s locations Prizes: Small Silver Fishing Trophy Cross-Over Events: Prizes provided by the Community Manager will be available for participants and winners of the Fishing event, but governors, guild leaders and players are welcome to sweeten the pot by providing additional prizes based on objective criteria entirely of their own design. In fact, please consider planning events to overlap the duration and chosen weekly locations of the PvP and Fishing developer events. Please post these events in the in-game events forums and the Community Manager will promote accordingly. Please submit links to event threads which take place in the spotlighted towns, PvP zone or PvE zone. Current Crossovers: PaxLair: The residents of PaxLair have a wondrous spin-off contest announced! If you’d like a chance for additional fun and prizes, check on the main forum post on this topic. Brittany Fort: A fantastic 2 week contest which features prizes and goals even a beginner or casual angler can compete! If you’d like more information, check on the main forum post on this topic. Novia Market: Head on over to Novia Market to compete in this spin-off contest run by Adam Crow and friends! Great prizes from a great community! 2 prizes every day! For more information, please visit the main forum post on this topic. Dark Bayou: Daily prizes! A large prize for the entire week! Find out more on the main forum post on this topic. How to Participate: To participate, players need merely catch trophy fish in the 5 locations indicated above. The locations will change every week at Noon CT on Friday, so be sure to pay attention to the announcements for new locations each week! Please do not send your fish to Elgarion via the in-game mail system. Through data logging, he’ll be able to determine the winners. SO please hold on to your fish, and feel free to use them in any fashion after the catch. Head on over to the Fishing Event Forum Thread for more information. Happy adventures, Avatars! Community Event: Extra Life Charity Event We gamers have a chance to help sick kids on Saturday, November 7, by doing what we do best: playing games! Extra Life is a 24-hour video game marathon to raise money to help kids at Children’s Miracle Network Hospitals. All the money raised for Extra Life will go directly to the Children’s Miracle Network Hospital of your choice. Browncoat Jayson is playing for the Dell Children’s Medical Center, located in Austin Texas (the home of our SotA developers). This year, Jayson will be streaming Shroud of the Avatar live for 24-hours over on his Twitch.tv channel. For more information about this charity event or how you can become involved, be sure to check out the main forum post on this topic on the official forums. Community Event: Terrifying Tea Tales Join the Jade Dragons and come on over to Jade Gardens on the middle island of the Mistrendur to find out why the freshwater in Jade Gardens turns fetid each October. Enter the fishing contest, hear the story, and have a dance with your favorite Avatars while enjoying the music from Stryker Sparhawk! When: October 18th, 3PM to 5PM CT Where: Jade Gardens For more information about this charity event or how you can become involved, be sure to check out the main forum post on this topic on the official forums. Community Event: Net’s Diary Curious what lands and discoveries community member Net has visited of late? Be sure to pop on by “Net’s Diary with Pictures” to keep tabs on this adventurous soul. Kudos to Goriah Kuulas for this intriguing wilderness perch! Community Event: Kobold Invasion Event As the new stone towers of Ironhall City were erected, reports of nearby Kobold sightings were brought to the Fortress and Knight’s Watch. These creatures have not been seen near Ironhall since the last war, a destructive event that left the Kingdom in ruins. Will you join and help us defend our lands? When: Sunday, October 11th, 7PM CT Where: Ironhall City For more story information about this spectacular player-created role-playing event, please see the main forum post on the official forums. Community Event: TheAvatar.Express Needs You! If you’re looking for a great way to get involved in the Shroud of the Avatar community, then look no further! The fine folks at TheAvatar.Express are looking for some new reporters. Avatars wishing to help with the following are highly desired: Developer Stream Summaries Twitter Reposting In-Game Event Coverage Events Calendar Management New Features/Changes Tutorials Interviews Editorials Any other game stuff you want to cover! Also, the Avatar Express is going to be visiting POTs and writing one or two articles highlighting Shroud of the Avatar’s great community! If you are interested in having your town featured, please reply to this thread with your town’s name. You will be contacted to answer a few questions about the town and will be notified when the article is to be published! To sign up as a reporter, visit https://theavatar.express/be-a-reporter. If you have any questions, feel free to start a private conversation with that_shawn_guy on the forums or shawnbutts #4362 on Discord. For more information, please also visit the main forum thread on this topic on the official forums. Community Event: Crafters Town Shopping Spree Greetings Avatars! Starting this month, a new Shopping Spree contest will be running in Crafters Town! Lots of prizes are available, including Crowns of the Obsidian! Where: Crafters Town When: October 1st to October 31st For more information about contest guidelines and prizes, please see the main forum thread on this topic in the official forums. Happy sales hunting, shoppers! Community Event: Beran’s Reach Auction Ladies and gentlemen! The Citizens of Beran’s Reach welcome you the weekly auctions! The auctions are about bringing together people from all corners of the community, with the Beran’s Reach market being the perfect place to do so! When: Sundays, 2PM CT Where: Beran’s Reach For more information about the auction house event, see the main thread on this topic on the official forums. Happy bidding, Avatars! Community Event: The Poets’ Circle Returns Kailef of the Poets’ Circle is back in action, and he’s ready to assist Avatars through the process of custom music review for possible inclusion into the game. Every Player-Owned Town has a customizable soundtrack available to it, and adding one’s own music to that soundtrack most certainly adds a personal flair to one’s governing endeavors. If you’re interested in requesting the assistance of Kailef or simply learning more about this process, please visit the main forum thread on this topic in the official forums. Project to Support: Shadow of Valhalla Shadow of Valhalla is a visceral physics-based VR combat game with dynamic RPG elements, set within an ancient realm of Viking lore and mystic powers! Early Access beta includes “endless horde mode” featuring a variety of enemies with progressive difficulty. Also, players can discover many magic spells to unlock! So much more is coming! Finn Staber with Chicken Waffle, will join the Shroud of the Avatar team on Twitch during their Friday the 28th livestream to showoff this new Early Access game! Also, here is a teaser video on YouTube:  The development team is working hard to create additional environments and new quests! Shadow of Valhalla is available on Steam as Early Access. Additional features coming to the game: More Enemies! More Environments! More Magic Spells! RPG Quests! Weapon Forging and Crafting! Much, much more! If you would like to learn more about Shadow of Valhalla, be sure to stop by the main webpage for the game as more news becomes available! Project to Support: Jar Wars While you are delving into Virtual Reality (VR), be sure to check out this exciting and hilarious new game, Jar Wars! Our very own Darkstarr has been busy on some side projects, one of which is Jar Wars, a slapstick multiplayer game made just for VR enthusiasts. Battle your friends with wacky weapons and intriguing gadgets for total domination of the Moon! Available for free on Steam! Project to Support: Dragon Fight Darkstarr has also been hard at work with the team for Dragon Fight VR which recently went live on Steam! Dragon Fight VR is an internal experiment to capture the “essence” of a dragon fight, the classic penultimate experience of every fantasy story. We wanted to create a short visceral, realistic experience stripped of user interface, lobbies, scores, levels, and other visual intrusions that might distract. There were some key elements of fighting a dragon that we wanted to capture and we felt VR was uniquely qualified to convey: Face to face with a large scale hostile creature trying to kill you Using a sword and a shield Fire! Nowhere to run! This started out as an internal experiment to learn some things about VR’s capabilities, be reductionist in our designs, etc. We felt that the experiment was successful enough to release as a free experience to share. Enjoy! Available for free on Steam! Project to Support: Crowfall Be part of shaping the next great MMO by becoming a Crowfall Backer! Crowfall is the first and only online Throne War game. You can win. Join intense PvP battles that demand strategy, survival and a fierce competitive spirit. Reap the spoils of war as an Eternal Champion! Claim virtual territory on behalf of your guild or faction. Capture mines, mills, and quarries to secure resources, build castles, and besiege your neighbors. Scavenge artifacts and relics from the Dying Worlds and install them in your temples to grant blessings to your vassals. Capture lost spirits to do your bidding — or bind them into your weapons to infuse them with sorcerous power! Project to Support: Avatar Express [Forum post by Vladamir Begemot] I’m pleased to report that The Avatar Express is clacking away furiously. News is being delivered and we have established systems to deliver it directly to your brain. You can use one of those systems by following us on Twitter at @avatar_express. Even more reliable due to its fully automated nature is joining us on the Discord server. News items are posted there via RSS. Or you can subscribe to RSS directly on the site. If you run an event, quests, etc, please consider helping out by self reporting. The Shroud community is big, and many things are happening that are never seen by others. With 10k monthly users, we would need a full time staff to track down everything that is happening. You can fill out the contributor form, message @that_shawn_guy here or post in the Discord server that you would like to help. There is no committment once signed up, you can post as much or little as you like. Writing up your own events has several benefits beyond the immidiate exposure. It serves as a record for others to see the history of New Britannia as we create it, in an attractive format. Publishing in the Express also has a higher chance than the forums of being seen by search engines and random readers, thus bringing more eyeballs and new players to the game. It will even make posting in the forums easier! You can upload images to your news item, and then link to those images in your forum post. No more need for 3rd party image hosts! So if you have something going on in your guild or town, or want to be a Reporter, Cartographer or Historian, please join us! Resources: Players Helping Players The official SotA New Player Welcome Forum and the Player Created Resources Forum have the best player created resources for Shroud of the Avatar, whether it’s a Player Written Guide, a Video Walk-through, or a Wiki-type Website. Visit the official Community Resources page for a complete listing of all things community. View the full article

Greetings Fellow Avatars! This week’s update brings players of Shroud of the Avatar details about additional teleporter revisions coming shortly! For those wishing to participate in any community activities, upcoming one-time and recurring community events have been announced! Be sure to also review the Players Guide and... Avatar’s Update #401: Teleporter Revisions Continue! Latest News Q&A Friday Livestream!View the full article

Greetings Fellow Avatars! This week’s update brings players of Shroud of the Avatar details about additional teleporter revisions coming shortly! For those wishing to participate in any community activities, upcoming one-time and recurring community events have been announced! Be sure to also review the Players Guide and Known Issues list for additional information on recent changes and upcoming fixes. Now, let’s see what we have for you in this week’s edition of Update of the Avatar: News Announcements Teleporter Revisions Continue! Latest News Q&A Friday Livestream! New Store Additions: Conversationalists & Seasonal Items! New Vault Round! October Login Reward: Blood Spurting Headless Mask! R82 Rewards Program Login Items: Lord British & Spooky Themed! The Bug Brigade Rides Again! Recent Shroud of the Avatar Livestreams Streaming Reward Program Lord of the Isle Episode 2 Bundles Upcoming Events Calendar Community Updates Community Event: Catnip Games Weekly Fishing Tourney Community Event: TheAvatar.Express Needs You Community Event: Mystic Isle Spotlight Community Event: Crafters Town Shopping Spree Community Event: Beran’s Reach Auction Community Event: The Poets’ Circle Returns Project to Support: Shadow of Valhalla Project to Support: Jar Wars Project to Support: Dragonfight Project to Support: Crowfall Project to Support: Avatar Express Resources: Players Helping Players Teleporter Revisions Continue! Soon, the governors and stewards of Player-Owned Towns (POT) will be able to enjoy extra functionality with their premium NPC Town teleporters. Currently, these 3 teleporters only take players to a single NPC Town. In Release 83, they will have additional capabilities, and the names of these 3 teleporters will be adjusted to coincide with the changes to their functionality as follows: “Teleporter to Ardoris” name changes to “Shogun Teleporter” “Teleporter to Central Brittany” name changes to “Bell Tower Teleporter” “Teleporter to Owl’s Head” name changes to “Tower Archway Teleporter “ Not only will governors and stewards be able to adjust which towns these 3 teleporters point to, but all NPC Towns, Player-Run Towns (PRT) and POTs will be available as destinations. Of note, the prices for these 3 teleporters will be significantly reduced for price balancing with other store items. Along these same lines, the recently added POT Interconnection Teleporters will also receive name changes. In a similar fashion, all of these teleporters will also allow NPC Town, PRT, and POT destinations. The names will update as follows: “Player-Owned Town Wagon” name changes to “Wagon Teleporter” “Player-Owned Town Hatch” name changes to “Hatch Teleporter” “Player-Owned Town Balloon” name changes to “Balloon Teleporter” “Player-Owned Town Boat” name changes to “Boat Teleporter” We hope this Quality of Life (QOL) improvement will enhance the gameplay experience of town governors, stewards, and residents. So many more QOL improvements are just on the horizon, so stay tuned, Avatars! Latest News Q&A Friday Livestream! Another weekly Community Livestream is this Friday, October 2nd at 4PM CT on Twitch! Join Chris “Atos” Spears and other development team members for a community 1 hour livestream! To enter the prize drawings, type “I love fall most of all” into any in-game chat channel OR make a purchase on the website add-on store. Please submit questions into Twitch Chat by inserting !question at the beginning of your text. Watch on Twitch, Friday at 4 PM CT! New Store Additions: Conversationalists & Seasonal Items! Additional Inky NPCs have been added to the store! Players can now enjoy customizing the dialogue for a variety of Kobold, Satyr and even a Faun Conversationalists! Conversationalist, Kobold Ghost 1 Conversationalist, Kobold Fighter 1 Conversationalist, Kobold Archer 1 Conversationalist, Kobold Mage 1 Conversationalist, Kobold Brawler 1 Conversationalist, Kobold Grenadier 1 Conversationalist, Kobold Gunner 1 Conversationalist, Satyr Fighter 1 Conversationalist, Satyr Archer 1 Conversationalist, Satyr Mage 1 Conversationalist, Faun 1 The fall and spooky store season is upon us, Avatars! From September 24th to November 6th, the following items will be available either in the Vault or as a recurring spooky/fall item: Baby Black & Orange Spider Pet Blood Spurting Headless Mask Bloodraven Pet Breathe Spiders Emote Day of the Dead Colorful Mask Day of the Dead Colorful Mask with Top Hat Day of the Dead Colorful Mask with Veil Day of the Dead Mask Day of the Dead Mask 6-Pack Day of the Dead Mask with Top Hat Day of the Dead Mask with Veil Dead Tree with Spider Webs 6-Pack Ghost Cat Decoration Pet Ghost Dog Decoration Pet Ghost Raven Decoration Pet Giant Grim Reaper Statue with Magic Portal Dungeon Entrance Giant Lich Statue with Magic Portal Dungeon Entrance Grim Reaper Mask Grim Reaper Mask 2016 Grim Reaper Statue Headless Horseman Grim Reaper Statue 2017 Headless Mask Jabbering Bertha Jack O’ Lantern 6-Pack 2015 Jack O’ Lantern 6-Pack 2016 Jack O’ Lantern 6-Pack 2017 Jack O’ Lantern 6-Pack 2018 Jack O’ Lantern Glowing Mask 2015 Jack O’ Lantern Glowing Mask 2016 Jack O’ Lantern Glowing Mask 2017 Jack O’ Lantern Glowing Mask 2018 Jack O’ Lantern Mask 2015 Jack O’ Lantern Mask 2016 Jack O’ Lantern Mask 2017 Jack O’ Lantern Mask 2018 Juggle Jack O’ Lanterns Juggle Severed Arms Emote Juggle Severed Heads Juggle Skulls Emote Juggle Zombie Arms Emote Juggle Zombie Heads Large Headless Horseman Grim Reaper Statue 2017 Large Nightmare Statue Large Spooky Fountain Ornate Giant Grim Reaper Statue with Magic Portal Dungeon Entrance Ornate Scythe Ornate Scythe 2017 Ornate Scythe 2017 Pattern Pack Ornate Scythe Pattern Pack Ornate Skull Candle Ornate Spider Legs Cloak Prisoner’s Mask Puke Blood Emote Rain Spiders Emote Rotten Armor Outfit Rotten Flesh Cloak Skull Cloak Spider Web Cloak Spooky Wax Cylinder Pack Tall Dead Hedge Fence Torn and Tattered Wedding Dress Outfit Torn and Tattered Wedding Tuxedo Outfit Undead Specimen Vats Set Witch’s Hat Woven Spider Web Cloak Zombie Cat Zombie Dog Zombie Mask Zombie One-Eyed Mask Zombie Raven Zombie Statue New Vault Round! The current round of Vault items are available until Thursday, October 8th at 1PM CT. At that time, the next round of 9 items will be available for one week, and then the next, etc. Ornate Scarecrow 2016 Headless Horseman Grim Reaper Statue 2017 Large Headless Horseman Grim Reaper Statue 2017 Juggle Skulls Emote Zombie Statue Zombie One-Eyed Mask Autumn Fairy Wings Scarecrow Mask Torn and Tattered Wedding Tuxedo Outfit October Login Reward: Blood Spurting Headless Mask! Do you have the strange urge to decapitate yourself and spew blood upon your friends and enemies? Well… now you can! October’s login reward is a Blood Spurting Headless Mask! Simply log in during the month of October, and this mask will become available in the Rewards Window. Release 82 Rewards Program Login Items: Lord British & Spooky Themed! Avatars! Rewards Program login items for Release 82 are Lord British and spooky themed! Reward Program members must login during Release 82 to receive these login items: Ghost Conversationalist Skeleton Set 2 (5-Pack) Lord British Plate Greaves The Shroud of the Avatar Rewards Program lets you earn the best rate on purchasing Crowns, AND receive monthly reward items! For the low price of $9 USD per month you will receive the following: 900 Crowns of the Obsidians every month Monthly Login Reward Items (~ 3 per month) Exclusive Title every 3 months 3 Months: Keeper of the Faith 6 Months: Keeper of the Word 9 Months: Keeper of the Vow 12 Months: Keeper of the Flame 15 Months: Keeper of the Oath 18 Months: Keeper of the Pledge Pick any Dye 12-Pack every 6 months Pick any three of the 7 Obsidian Potions every month, including: Potion of Capacity: Increases carrying capacity Potion of Conservation: Reduces reagent use chance Potion of Expedience: Swift gathering on all gathering skills Potion of Precision: Increases Meticulous Collection to all gathering skills Potion of Preservation: Reduces armor and weapon damage Potion of Reclamation: Increases Salvage and Repair to all production skills The Bug Brigade Rides Again! The Bug Brigade was established to assist the community and the development team to work together to improve the game. Since then the program has gone through a number of changes and was eventually placed on hold. The stability of the game is as important to the development team as it is to the player-base, and for that reason the program has been revamped and is being relaunched. The program is now open to all players in good standing and bug rewards are back! They will be awarded on a progression basis monthly with only a minimal requirement to be filled to qualify. We are bringing the bug forums current and will make every effort to have triage and intake for each validated bug. To assist in doing this we have asked Alley Oop, Justyn, and Tazar to take on a moderator role within the bug and feedback forums. Please congratulate them the next time you see them in the game or on the forums! The Bug Brigade will be open to all. If you feel the game is your home, sign up and assist us in making it a better place to live! To sign up, read the post “Bug Brigade Rides Again!” in the main Bug/Feedback forums for both the Live or Player Test areas in the official forums. If you have trouble finding them, please ask a Hospitaller, or one of the Moderators via PM in the forums or in Discord. Recent Shroud of the Avatar Livestreams Atos and other members of the Shroud of the Avatar development team go live very frequently on our TWO Twitch Channels: twitch.tv/shroudoftheavatar and twitch.tv/communityoftheavatar — be sure to get these channels on follow and get the latest information right as we go live! Also, if you’ve missed our latest streams, check out our archive of content at our YouTube Channel (complete with “Mojito the dog” cam). Like! Follow! Subscribe! Prizes!!! Don’t forget to also join the Shroud of the Avatar team and community over at our other social media venues: Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/ShroudoftheAvatar/ Catnip Games Twitter: https://twitter.com/catnipgames Shroud of the Avatar Twitter: https://twitter.com/ShroudofAvatar Shroud of the Avatar Discord: https://discord.gg/GuBXakQ Are You a Livestreamer? Soon, the Streaming Reward Program will be returning. As the details are getting reworked, we’ll reveal more information. Traditional streaming rewards included an exclusive in-game Streamer Camera for being a veteran of our Streaming Program! Expect the camera reward to return! More goodies will come to your way as the program fully develops. Thank you for streaming Shroud of the Avatar! Lord of the Isle Episode 2 Bundles As one of the biggest and earliest supporters of Episode 2 you will be granted the largest lot deed in the land (Castle), the title Lord (or Lady) of the Isle, a tour of Lord British’s property, and dinner with the game leaders including Lord British himself! Only 24 of these unique bundles will be sold! Complete List of Rewards: Lord of the Isle Place Anywhere Castle Lot Deed: Tax Free Forever (when placed in a POT) and Tax Free for 1 Year (when placed outside of a POT). Placeable on water as well as land! Title: Lord of the Isle or Lady of the Isle Unique Lord of the Isle Home (pictured above) NEW – Lord of the Isle Fishing Expedition (This scene version will work like a large instanced property such as a basement and will feature decoration surfaces to further beautify the scene.) Town Size Upgrade (if a town is not owned by the LOTI supporter, they may gift this size upgrade to another town owner. Maximum possible town sizes will be taken into account, but the Teralopolis size just became available!) Choice of 1 House currently available in the store Castle Basement currently available in the store of your choice Castle Wall Set currently available in the store of your choice (with enough for Castle Lot) Unique Lord of the Isle Dungeon Room (To be revealed later) 140,000 Crowns 1000 Bank Slots Pick 12 Prosperity Tools Lord of the Isle Crown (In-Game Wearable Item) Unique In-Game Emote (To be revealed later) Early Access to Episode 2 Episode 1 Box and map signed by the team 1 hour one-on-one with Chris for design discussion (via video-conference) One real silver ring crafted personally by Lord British: Numbered 1 – 8 In-game version of the Lord British ring: Numbered 1 – 8 (including a place-able decoration version) Tour of Lord British’s property Fine dinner and drinks with Lord British, Darkstarr, and Atos at a location TBD in Austin or NYC. NOTE: Digital items that are currently available will begin delivery as soon as Release 62 (Jan 31, 2019). Other items will be delivered at a future date TBD. NOTE: Travel costs NOT covered by Catnip Games for Tour & Dinner. Upcoming Events Calendar Be sure to check out the Upcoming Events page for spotlighted events plus links to various areas to post or find events on our forums: 2020 Release Schedule: Release 83 – Oct 29 Release 84 – Nov 19 Release 85 – Dec 17 Community Event: Catnip Games Weekly Fishing Tourney Greetings Anglers! The weekly Catnip Games Fishing Tourney is live! These contests run for 1 week intervals, Friday Noon to Friday Noon CT. We’ll announce the winners every Friday during the livestream. Town Registration: Each week, the contest takes place in 3 Player Owned Towns, 1 Random PvP location and 1 Random Lava or NPC Town Location. Please register your Player Owned Town of choice in a reply to this thread, 1 entry per player, and these entries will be added into the town registry. The contest will cycle through the towns in the sequence they entered the town registry, then loop back again to the beginning. The town registry will be reset/wiped for new entries periodically to ensure only active/interested towns are within the registry. Fishing Prizes & Objectives: All prizes will be no-trade. Players may donate additional prizes in the name of their guilds or towns to sweeten the pot. This event timeframe is Friday the 2nd at Noon CT to Friday the 9th at Noon CT, and these are the prizes and goals for the indicated week: Largest FETID WATER Fish (Town): Rules: Must be caught from one of these towns. Governs can request loaner water conversion statues. Prizes: Player Owned Town Row Lot Deed, Large Gold Fishing Trophy Whyte Roc (@Cypher Black) Brittany Fort (@Sonja) Beran’s Reach (@Duke Vallas [BEAR]) Largest Fish (PvP): Rules: Must be caught in Rhun Ruins Prizes: 2 Chained Obsidian Shard 3-Packs, Large Silver Fishing Trophy Largest Lava Fish: Rules: Must be caught in Blackblade Passage Prizes: Fishing Rod of Prosperity, Large Bronze Fishing Trophy Participation Prizes: Rules: Everyone who caught at least 1 trophy fish in this week’s locations Prizes: Small Silver Fishing Trophy Cross-Over Events: Prizes provided by the Community Manager will be available for participants and winners of the Fishing event, but governors, guild leaders and players are welcome to sweeten the pot by providing additional prizes based on objective criteria entirely of their own design. In fact, please consider planning events to overlap the duration and chosen weekly locations of the PvP and Fishing developer events. Please post these events in the in-game events forums and the Community Manager will promote accordingly. Please submit links to event threads which take place in the spotlighted towns, PvP zone or PvE zone. Current Crossovers: No crossovers announced. How to Participate: To participate, players need merely catch trophy fish in the 5 locations indicated above. The locations will change every week at Noon CT on Friday, so be sure to pay attention to the announcements for new locations each week! Please do not send your fish to Elgarion via the in-game mail system. Through data logging, he’ll be able to determine the winners. SO please hold on to your fish, and feel free to use them in any fashion after the catch. Head on over to the Fishing Event Forum Thread for more information. Happy adventures, Avatars! Community Event: TheAvatar.Express Needs You! If you’re looking for a great way to get involved in the Shroud of the Avatar community, then look no further! The fine folks at TheAvatar.Express are looking for some new reporters. Avatars wishing to help with the following are highly desired: Developer Stream Summaries Twitter Reposting In-Game Event Coverage Events Calendar Management New Features/Changes Tutorials Interviews Editorials Any other game stuff you want to cover! Also, the Avatar Express is going to be visiting POTs and writing one or two articles highlighting Shroud of the Avatar’s great community! If you are interested in having your town featured, please reply to this thread with your town’s name. You will be contacted to answer a few questions about the town and will be notified when the article is to be published! To sign up as a reporter, visit https://theavatar.express/be-a-reporter. If you have any questions, feel free to start a private conversation with that_shawn_guy on the forums or shawnbutts #4362 on Discord. For more information, please also visit the main forum thread on this topic on the official forums. Community Event: Mystic Isle Reporters of TheAvatar.Express have done it again! This time these inquisitive reporters have written about Mystic Isle, a Player-Owned Town owned by Barugon just off the northern tip of Spindrift Island. Featuring a ready-to-go market area as well as a gustball court, players will certainly feel right at home in this wondrously decorated town. But don’t take our word for it, read the full article to learn more about Mystic Isle, and head on over to the main forum thread on this topic to express your thanks to Thradia for spotlighting the town! Community Event: Crafters Town Shopping Spree Greetings Avatars! Starting this month, a new Shopping Spree contest will be running in Crafters Town! Lots of prizes are available, including Crowns of the Obsidian! Where: Crafters Town When: October 1st to October 31st For more information about contest guidelines and prizes, please see the main forum thread on this topic in the official forums. Happy sales hunting, shoppers! Community Event: Beran’s Reach Auction Ladies and gentlemen! The Citizens of Beran’s Reach welcome you the weekly auctions! The auctions are about bringing together people from all corners of the community, with the Beran’s Reach market being the perfect place to do so! When: Sundays, 2PM CT Where: Beran’s Reach For more information about the auction house event, see the main thread on this topic on the official forums. Happy bidding, Avatars! Community Event: The Poets’ Circle Returns Kailef of the Poets’ Circle is back in action, and he’s ready to assist Avatars through the process of custom music review for possible inclusion into the game. Every Player-Owned Town has a customizable soundtrack available to it, and adding one’s own music to that soundtrack most certainly adds a personal flair to one’s governing endeavors. If you’re interested in requesting the assistance of Kailef or simply learning more about this process, please visit the main forum thread on this topic in the official forums. Project to Support: Shadow of Valhalla Shadow of Valhalla is a visceral physics-based VR combat game with dynamic RPG elements, set within an ancient realm of Viking lore and mystic powers! Early Access beta includes “endless horde mode” featuring a variety of enemies with progressive difficulty. Also, players can discover many magic spells to unlock! So much more is coming! Finn Staber with Chicken Waffle, will join the Shroud of the Avatar team on Twitch during their Friday the 28th livestream to showoff this new Early Access game! Also, here is a teaser video on YouTube:  The development team is working hard to create additional environments and new quests! Shadow of Valhalla is available on Steam as Early Access. Additional features coming to the game: More Enemies! More Environments! More Magic Spells! RPG Quests! Weapon Forging and Crafting! Much, much more! If you would like to learn more about Shadow of Valhalla, be sure to stop by the main webpage for the game as more news becomes available! Project to Support: Jar Wars While you are delving into Virtual Reality (VR), be sure to check out this exciting and hilarious new game, Jar Wars! Our very own Darkstarr has been busy on some side projects, one of which is Jar Wars, a slapstick multiplayer game made just for VR enthusiasts. Battle your friends with wacky weapons and intriguing gadgets for total domination of the Moon! Available for free on Steam! Project to Support: Dragon Fight Darkstarr has also been hard at work with the team for Dragon Fight VR which recently went live on Steam! Dragon Fight VR is an internal experiment to capture the “essence” of a dragon fight, the classic penultimate experience of every fantasy story. We wanted to create a short visceral, realistic experience stripped of user interface, lobbies, scores, levels, and other visual intrusions that might distract. There were some key elements of fighting a dragon that we wanted to capture and we felt VR was uniquely qualified to convey: Face to face with a large scale hostile creature trying to kill you Using a sword and a shield Fire! Nowhere to run! This started out as an internal experiment to learn some things about VR’s capabilities, be reductionist in our designs, etc. We felt that the experiment was successful enough to release as a free experience to share. Enjoy! Available for free on Steam! Project to Support: Crowfall Be part of shaping the next great MMO by becoming a Crowfall Backer! Crowfall is the first and only online Throne War game. You can win. Join intense PvP battles that demand strategy, survival and a fierce competitive spirit. Reap the spoils of war as an Eternal Champion! Claim virtual territory on behalf of your guild or faction. Capture mines, mills, and quarries to secure resources, build castles, and besiege your neighbors. Scavenge artifacts and relics from the Dying Worlds and install them in your temples to grant blessings to your vassals. Capture lost spirits to do your bidding — or bind them into your weapons to infuse them with sorcerous power! Project to Support: Avatar Express [Forum post by Vladamir Begemot] I’m pleased to report that The Avatar Express is clacking away furiously. News is being delivered and we have established systems to deliver it directly to your brain. You can use one of those systems by following us on Twitter at @avatar_express. Even more reliable due to its fully automated nature is joining us on the Discord server. News items are posted there via RSS. Or you can subscribe to RSS directly on the site. If you run an event, quests, etc, please consider helping out by self reporting. The Shroud community is big, and many things are happening that are never seen by others. With 10k monthly users, we would need a full time staff to track down everything that is happening. You can fill out the contributor form, message @that_shawn_guy here or post in the Discord server that you would like to help. There is no committment once signed up, you can post as much or little as you like. Writing up your own events has several benefits beyond the immidiate exposure. It serves as a record for others to see the history of New Britannia as we create it, in an attractive format. Publishing in the Express also has a higher chance than the forums of being seen by search engines and random readers, thus bringing more eyeballs and new players to the game. It will even make posting in the forums easier! You can upload images to your news item, and then link to those images in your forum post. No more need for 3rd party image hosts! So if you have something going on in your guild or town, or want to be a Reporter, Cartographer or Historian, please join us! Resources: Players Helping Players The official SotA New Player Welcome Forum and the Player Created Resources Forum have the best player created resources for Shroud of the Avatar, whether it’s a Player Written Guide, a Video Walk-through, or a Wiki-type Website. Visit the official Community Resources page for a complete listing of all things community. View the full article

Greetings Fellow Avatars! This week’s update brings players of Shroud of the Avatar a new adventure scene! Now, adventurers can delve into Lord British’s Castle, the newest Episode 2 scene to be released! Among other amazing updates, the food system got a very significant improvements! For those wishing to participate in any community activities,... Avatar’s Update #400: New Adventure Scene: Lord British’s Castle! Food & Drink System Update!View the full article

Greetings Fellow Avatars! This week’s update brings players of Shroud of the Avatar a new adventure scene! Now, adventurers can delve into Lord British’s Castle, the newest Episode 2 scene to be released! Among other amazing updates, the food system got a very significant improvements! For those wishing to participate in any community activities, upcoming one-time and recurring community events have been announced! Be sure to also review the Players Guide and Known Issues list for additional information on recent changes and upcoming fixes. Now, let’s see what we have for you in this week’s edition of Update of the Avatar: News Announcements New Adventure Scene: Lord British’s Castle! Latest News Q&A Friday Livestream! Food & Drink System Update! Agriculture Trophies: Pumpkins & Jack O’Lanterns! Maps and More Maps! Player Dungeon Creature Spawner! New Town Sizes Available! Lord of the Isle Fishing Expedition! New Store Additions: Faun Conversationalist, Ornate Round Setees, & More! New Vault Round! October Login Reward: Blood Spurting Headless Mask! R82 Rewards Program Login Items: Lord British & Spooky Themed! World & UI Changes Crafting & Economy Changes Combat Balance & Changes Updated Player-Owned Towns Bug Fixes The Bug Brigade Rides Again! Recent Shroud of the Avatar Livestreams Streaming Reward Program Lord of the Isle Episode 2 Bundles Upcoming Events Calendar Community Updates Meretz: Win a Topiary Keep Dragon Statue (No Trade) Community Event: Catnip Games Weekly Fishing Tourney Community Event: TheAvatar.Express Needs You Community Event: Belly of the Snake Spotlight Community Event: The Poets’ Circle Returns Project to Support: Shadow of Valhalla Project to Support: Jar Wars Project to Support: Dragonfight Project to Support: Crowfall Project to Support: Avatar Express Resources: Players Helping Players New Adventure Scene: Lord British’s Castle!Master world builder Keith “Sannio” Quinn has done it again! His latest adventure masterpiece is Lord British’s Castle and is now on the live server for players of Shroud of the Avatar! The gorgeous gardens, theater, and décor would be quite inviting to guests under normal circumstances, but alas, these are not normal times, Avatars! Something is amiss at Lord British’s Castle in Mistrendur, and only Episode 2 Access holders can to rally to our ruler’s aid! Challenge yourself! Progress through the castle while fighting waves of progressively-harder enemies (similar to the Compendium of Pain and Suffering) Explore! After clearing out the whole castle, explore new areas that weren’t accessible while invaders were around, including Lord British’s vault (but only if you want your virtuous reputation tarnished!). Quests! Talk to the guards by the entrance to learn a little backstory and get 2 new repeatable quests. “Lord British’s Castle! Frequently under assault by those who want to slay the ruler of New Britannia or pillage the vast fortune rumored to exist within his private vault. Even now, deadly enemies have breached its walls and overrun the stronghold’s hallowed halls. Your reasons to venture to Mistrendur and into Lord British’s home will be your own, but know that each room will throw you against waves of the toughest enemies you have ever faced!” These words from Sannio should inspire caution amongst the intrepid. Those first to storm the gates of Lord British’s Castle will soon learn that the waves of enemies within will continue to grow in power such that even the greatest of New Britannia’s warriors will eventually fail. How far into the castle will your band of companions venture? What treasures could be within? A challenge unlike no other awaits thee! Latest News Q&A Friday Livestream! Another weekly Community Livestream is this Friday, September 25th at 4PM CT on Twitch! Join Chris “Atos” Spears and other development team members for a community 1 hour livestream! To enter the prize drawings, type “a September to remember” into any in-game chat channel OR make a purchase on the website add-on store. Please submit questions into Twitch Chat by inserting !question at the beginning of your text. Watch on Twitch, Friday at 4 PM CT! Food & Drink System Update! Avatars! Eat! Drink! Be Merry! A long-awaited round of love to the Food and Drink Systems is upon us! In the past, players could imbibe 2 foods regardless of which was eaten. Now, all foods and drinks have been assigned a numerical value from 1 to 3 which indicates how many food buff slots are utilized when eating and drinking that item. Up to 6 food channels are possible, so if a character eats 6 single point foods, they can fill up all 6 food channels. If the character eats 2 foods which have 3 points each, all 6 food channels are also filled. This new concept as well as a revisit/balancing to all food recipes should greatly increase the versatility of the food system and make a larger range of recipes desirable for use and consumption. Here are some examples of food recipe tooltips which show the buff slots as well as revised effects: Also, players can now feed their pets with newly added recipes! Pet food allows for 3 channels of food in a point system entirely separate from the 6 food channels available for characters. The newly added pet foods are as follows: Bear Bites Dragon Kibbles Fishy Nibblers Rabbit Pate Venison Jerky Even after these changes patch onto the live server, the system will continue to be tweaked and each food recipe scrutinized. Ultimately we hope players of Shroud of the Avatar enjoy the revamped system. So many more amazing game updates are just around the corner, so stay tuned! Agriculture Trophies: Pumpkins & Jack O’Lanterns! Gardeners of New Britannia, take heed! A strange occurrence has permanently altered pumpkins throughout the lands causing them to grow larger than ever before! Now, gardeners growing pumpkins through use of the Agriculture System have rare chances to harvest Trophy Pumpkins! Take those pumpkins to your crafting tables to convert them into Jack O’Lantern Trophies! The recipe for creating the Jack O’Lantern Trophies is for sale on Cooking Merchants. Sometime in the near future and before the expiration of this year’s appearance of Pumpkin Head, players can expect certain size ranges of Trophy Pumpkins to drop as loot from the spooky seasonal boss and his minions. Of note, the Agriculture System will likely produce the largest pumpkins available. Players can expect a considerable size range in available trophies, and the image above does NOT show the largest sizes! That’s for the players of Shroud of the Avatar to discover! Happy gardening, Avatars! Maps and More Maps! Mini-map creation in Shroud of the Avatar has resumed! The development team is hard at work adding additional maps so that players can find their way in the enormous world of New Brittania. As adventurers explore, they’ll encounter these additional maps added for Release 82: Celestis City of Yew East Perennial Trail East Veiled Swamp Eastreach Gap North Brightbone Woods Restless Forest South Brightbone Woods South Celestial Wetlands Spindelskog Tanglemire West Veiled Swamp Whiteguard Foothills More maps will be added with every monthly release, so gear up and get out there, explorers! Player Dungeon Creature Spawner! The Mysterious Swamp and Upper Tears are two adventure scenes amuck with the ever living… the lingering… those who should have passed on to their next lives but have not. The high level lich fighters in both of those scenes now have a small chance to drop a recipe for a Lich Fighter Spawner Statue! Once crafted, players can place these statues in their dungeons whilst in Design Mode. This marks the spawn point for a lich fighter. Once the dungeon is placed into Adventure Mode, the statue comes to life and is replaced by a Tier 15 Lich Fighter! Meant solely as a method to add “roaming monster immersion” into player dungeons, these lich spawners will not generate loot nor experience since they can only be placed in non-encounter rooms where decorating is possible. Expect a larger variety of spawners to become available in the future as the dungeon system continues to evolve. The majority of these spawners will become available as crafting recipes, with focus placed upon requiring underutilized crafting materials such as Aortic Thrombi and Ancient Essences. New Town Sizes Available! After the Megalopolis town size became available, the Player-Owned Town (POT) governors of New Britannia demanded even larger size upgrade options! And more upgrade options they shall receive! Now, players of Shroud of the Avatar can upgrade their POTs to the size of Gigalopolis and Teralopolis. Slightly before Release 82, these town sizes became available for town upgrades and direct purchase from the web store. The various decoration and feature limits for these new sizes are as follows: Lord of the Isle Fishing Expedition! For all existing and upcoming Lord of the Isle supporters, a new perk has JUST been added to the list of goodies! In a future release, Lord of the Isle supporters will now receive a version of the Fishing Expedition scene! This scene will feature decoration surfaces as well as a baked-in island castle. Because this special expedition will use our Basement mechanics (and will not be a Player-Owned Town), players will be able to access them from housing lots. Only the owner and visitors with appropriate permission levels will be able to enter and decorate the scene as they desire, and other players will also be able to visit the scene and fish to their heart’s content! New Store Additions: Faun Conversationalist, Ornate Round Setees, & More! An additional Inky NPC has been added to the store! Players can now enjoy customizing the dialogue for a Faun Conversationalist! Also, a new furniture style has been introduced and added to the Crown Store — round setees! Each setee allows for 4 occupants and is a must have for anyone with a reading room in their house! The setees feature two dye layers and a decoration surface behind the occupant’s head. The pictured lamp does not come with the setees, but is there to demonstrate the decoration surface provided. Also, a giant Golden Oracle Guardian Statue has been added to the store! Conversationalist, Faun 1 Ornate Red Floral Round Setee Ornate White & Gold Round Setee Golden Oracle Guardian Statue The fall and spooky store season is upon us, Avatars! From September 24th to November 6th, the following items will be available either in the Vault or as a recurring spooky/fall item: Baby Black & Orange Spider Pet Blood Spurting Headless Mask Bloodraven Pet Breathe Spiders Emote Day of the Dead Colorful Mask Day of the Dead Colorful Mask with Top Hat Day of the Dead Colorful Mask with Veil Day of the Dead Mask Day of the Dead Mask 6-Pack Day of the Dead Mask with Top Hat Day of the Dead Mask with Veil Dead Tree with Spider Webs 6-Pack Ghost Cat Decoration Pet Ghost Dog Decoration Pet Ghost Raven Decoration Pet Giant Grim Reaper Statue with Magic Portal Dungeon Entrance Giant Lich Statue with Magic Portal Dungeon Entrance Grim Reaper Mask Grim Reaper Mask 2016 Grim Reaper Statue Headless Horseman Grim Reaper Statue 2017 Headless Mask Jabbering Bertha Jack O’ Lantern 6-Pack 2015 Jack O’ Lantern 6-Pack 2016 Jack O’ Lantern 6-Pack 2017 Jack O’ Lantern 6-Pack 2018 Jack O’ Lantern Glowing Mask 2015 Jack O’ Lantern Glowing Mask 2016 Jack O’ Lantern Glowing Mask 2017 Jack O’ Lantern Glowing Mask 2018 Jack O’ Lantern Mask 2015 Jack O’ Lantern Mask 2016 Jack O’ Lantern Mask 2017 Jack O’ Lantern Mask 2018 Juggle Jack O’ Lanterns Juggle Severed Arms Emote Juggle Severed Heads Juggle Skulls Emote Juggle Zombie Arms Emote Juggle Zombie Heads Large Headless Horseman Grim Reaper Statue 2017 Large Nightmare Statue Large Spooky Fountain Ornate Giant Grim Reaper Statue with Magic Portal Dungeon Entrance Ornate Scythe Ornate Scythe 2017 Ornate Scythe 2017 Pattern Pack Ornate Scythe Pattern Pack Ornate Skull Candle Ornate Spider Legs Cloak Prisoner’s Mask Puke Blood Emote Rain Spiders Emote Rotten Armor Outfit Rotten Flesh Cloak Skull Cloak Spider Web Cloak Spooky Wax Cylinder Pack Tall Dead Hedge Fence Torn and Tattered Wedding Dress Outfit Torn and Tattered Wedding Tuxedo Outfit Undead Specimen Vats Set Witch’s Hat Woven Spider Web Cloak Zombie Cat Zombie Dog Zombie Mask Zombie One-Eyed Mask Zombie Raven Zombie Statue New Vault Round! The current round of Vault items are available until Thursday, October 1st at 1PM CT. At that time, the next round of 9 items will be available for one week, and then the next, etc. Rotten Flesh Cloak Banded Turkey 2017 Decoration Pet Ornate Scythe 2017 Headless Mask Autumn Leaf Mask Autumn Fairy Crown Autumn Fairy Outfit Spooky Wax Cylinder Pack Tall Dead Hedge Fence October Login Reward: Blood Spurting Headless Mask! Do you have the strange urge to decapitate yourself and spew blood upon your friends and enemies? Well… now you can! October’s login reward is a Blood Spurting Headless Mask! Simply log in during the month of October, and this mask will become available in the Rewards Window. Release 82 Rewards Program Login Items: Lord British & Spooky Themed! Avatars! Rewards Program login items for Release 82 are Lord British and spooky themed! Reward Program members must login during Release 82 to receive these login items: Ghost Conversationalist Skeleton Set 2 (5-Pack) Lord British Plate Greaves The Shroud of the Avatar Rewards Program lets you earn the best rate on purchasing Crowns, AND receive monthly reward items! For the low price of $9 USD per month you will receive the following: 900 Crowns of the Obsidians every month Monthly Login Reward Items (~ 3 per month) Exclusive Title every 3 months 3 Months: Keeper of the Faith 6 Months: Keeper of the Word 9 Months: Keeper of the Vow 12 Months: Keeper of the Flame 15 Months: Keeper of the Oath 18 Months: Keeper of the Pledge Pick any Dye 12-Pack every 6 months Pick any three of the 7 Obsidian Potions every month, including: Potion of Capacity: Increases carrying capacity Potion of Conservation: Reduces reagent use chance Potion of Expedience: Swift gathering on all gathering skills Potion of Precision: Increases Meticulous Collection to all gathering skills Potion of Preservation: Reduces armor and weapon damage Potion of Reclamation: Increases Salvage and Repair to all production skills World & Miscellaneous Changes These miscellaneous updates affecting the game world or aspects of the user interface (UI) patched in during R81, will go live with R82, or will go live shortly after R82: Troll’s Bridge: The Snowy Mountains Road Encounter that included the Troll Twins has been converted to a non-random scene called Troll’s Bridge. This scene is in the same location as the encounter version. This change will arrive sometime shortly after R82. Sprinting on Overworld: More abilities are becoming available on the overworld map each release, to now include sprinting! Not to be confused with Dash or Sprint in the skill trees, by double tapping forward (default “W”) a player will zoom faster across the map whilst expending focus. Tanglemire: Additional fetid water fishing locations will be joining one already by the waterfall. Explosive Barrels: The trapped barrels in NW Blackblade Mountains and Bunker C now feature initial physical damage in addition to the already present damage-over-time fire effects. QA Server Quest Resets: Players can now reset their quests an unlimited number of times on the QA server for testing purposes. Crafting, Items & Economy Changes These changes to the player economy, in-game items, or crafting patched in during R81, will go live with R82, or will go live shortly after R82: Conversationalist Recipe: A recipe for a new Conversationalist has been added to a decoration vendor in Xenos. The Beggar is the first craftable conversationalist, but won’t be the last! Additional Decoration Surfaces: The following items now have decoration surfaces… Castle Wall Sets Crafted Stone Crafted Palisade Dark Stone Dark Stone w/Ladders White Stone White Stone w/Ladders Viking Palisade Shogun Golden Stone Golden Palisade Crafting Stations (4 Varieties) Founder Benefactor Expert Gold Merchant Cylindrical Basket Recipe: A recipe for a new decoration container has been added to decoration vendors in Resolute, Bramble, Jaanaford, and Storms Reach. New Equipment Decorations: The following items now have decorative versions of the items… Gloves of the Cutpurse Boots of Skulking Torch of Jerik Thunderbranch Crown Store Price Reductions: Many Crown Store items received price reductions and/or normalization. These changes mostly affected… Conversationalists VFX Decorations Potions of Disco Fever Spooky & Fall seasonal items Devotionals: The tooltips for all devotionals now also indicate which types of buffs the devotionals provide. Stackable Items: The following items now stack in a player’s inventory… 1-Story Snowy Spruce Tree 2-Story Snowy Spruce Tree 3-Story Snowy Spruce Tree 4-Story Snowy Spruce Tree Aether Vibration Device Arrow Trap Blue Cylinder Construction Barricade Construction Crane Construction Planks Construction Ropes Construction Scaffold Walkway Construction Stone Wagon Darkstarr Chaos Throne Darkstarr Chaos Throne (Reverse Colors) Darkstarr Clock Tower Darkstarr Clock Tower (Reverse Colors) Epic Snowy Spruce Tree Flame Trap Gothic Dining Table Gothic King Size Bed with Black Leather Gothic Queen Size Bed Hanging Torture Cage Large Ornate Cordovan Harp Medium Ornate Yule Wreath 2016 Medium Ornate Yule Wreath 2017 Medium Ornate Yule Wreath 2018 New Britannia Globe Ornate Grand Piano Ornate Kettle Drum Ornate Pipe Organ Ornate Red & Gold Filigree Harpsichord Ornate Yule Music Box Painting of Cordelayne Painting of Crazy Teeka Painting of Lady Minerva Painting of Lady Shimizu Painting of Lord Deiter VomPasker Painting of Lord Serion Painting of Master of the Mint Painting of Master of the Mint #2 Painting of Rufus Painting of Scott Jones Painting of Scott Jones w/Special Frame Painting of William R55 Anywhere Lot Deed Raffle Ticket R55 POT Lot Deed Raffle Ticket Small Ornate Yule Wreath 2016 Small Ornate Yule Wreath 2017 Small Ornate Yule Wreath 2018 Spike Trap Torture Chair Torture Rack Torture Table Umber Upright Piano Universe Broadcast Orb Wind Power Generator Public Garden Revamp: This POT-only decoration now features baked-in flowers. Wall Clocks: These devices can now be rotated on a wall if players wish to display them in a crooked fashion. Luminous Atavist Robe: This robe can now be socketed. Rough Stone Craftable Walls: This crafted wall set can now be stacked upon other pieces within this set and can now scale from .5 to 1.3. VFX Items: Visual effects (VFX) items such as butterflies, fireflies, fog, and bats can now be placed upon other items such as blocks or tables, onto walls and exterior walls, and on water. These items can now be scaled from .5 to 2.0, but this mostly affects the altitude of the VFX item. Pole Torch: This decoration can now be placed in POTs as well as on other items such as blocks or tables. The Ring of Wisdom: This artifact now has an epic version. Combat Balance & Changes These changes to combat skills or concepts patched in during R81, will go live with R82, or will go live shortly after R82: Rusty Armor: This armor set has received Damage Resistance updates in line with recent changes to other armor. Shooting Star: The damage and focus cost for Shooting Star has been increased by 25%. This skill has also received significant VFX improvements. Combat Buffs: A very large number of changes have occurred across the spectrum of crafted food and drink which will greatly change how a player decides upon food buffs for combat. Pet food has also been added. See here for the main article. Updated Player Owned Towns These updates affected Player Owned Towns which patched in during R81, will go live with R82, or will go live shortly after R82: Brittany Fort: Added multiple interconnections. Cottage Grove: Upgraded to City. Dead Horse: Upgraded to Crossroads Village. Estate D’LaRose: Changed owner. Forgewright: Upgraded to Municipality. Hammaburg: Changed owner. Immortal City: Upgraded to City from Town. Jade Gardens: Upgraded to Crossroads Village. Jade Valley: Upgraded to Municipality. Norstead: New Holdfast added to Mistrendur (plot 103). Obsidian Market: Changed name (formerly Tower of Xee) and biome (now Forest 01c). Added interconnection with Tanglemire. Treasure Island: Upgraded to Metropolis. Wolves Den: Upgraded to Village. Bug Fixes Albeit many bug fixes patched in during R81, will go live with R82, or will go live shortly after R82, here are some of the highlights: Ichtyosaurus recipe now works correctly. Fixed the issue with the dyeable Fishing Rod not showing its dyed colors periodically. Fixes for large creatures getting stuck in several scenes were implemented. Fix for entry difficulties in Verdantis Shardfall was implemented. Several EP2 scenes with exit issues now send the player to the correct locations. Epic Pax Ring can no longer be equipped with other variations of Pax Rings. Bonus on the Epic Butcher’s belt has been fixed. Wallpaper fixes applied to Haunted Gothic Inn Village Home. Various paintings have received unique icons. Various collision fixes were implemented in Central Brittany. Bunny slippers no longer discolor a character’s feet. Elven Mage Robe received store entry fixes. Oski at the Ruins of Utheim now remembers player names. The UI now properly displays the difficulty for Tanglemire. Use of the Water Well is no longer considered stealing. Fixed an unreachable ore node in Tanglemire and the Hills Encounter. The names for epic item recipes now correctly display in the recipe book. The emote /breathehearts now animates correctly when seated. Stairs in the Shingle Roof 2-Story w/Balcony Village Home can now more easily be traversed. Batch watering of plants has been fixed. Armor set bonuses were fixed. Fixes for various basements missing collision were implemented. Crushing blow once again CRUSHES instead of taps. Characters in offline mode can no longer teleport to POTs. A stuck spot in Upper Tears has been fixed. The Epic Crossbow of Accuracy can now be masterworked. The Epic Wand of Undying Embers can now be masterworked. The New Beginnings Oracle Cover Painting now has the correct icon. The Portrait of a Gentleman now has the correct icon. Updated Tanglemire’s missing bones quest. The journals, responses, “footprint” highlighting, and compass markers all received improvements. Improved Erla’s “missing bones” reward in Tanglemire. Improved the flow of Erno’s quest at Crooked Shank. Light source brightness in character design interface reduced to improve appearance of hair colors. Lord British Plate Leggings now feature an eternal pattern if salvaged. Floating decorations removed from the Vertas scene. Linux players no longer fall through the floor of the Village Wood & Plaster Inn 2-Story Basement. Collision issues on a rock ledge in the Forest Siege has been fixed. The store preview for the Potted Giant Banana Tree has been fixed. Players can no longer fall through the stairs in Eastmarch. The wizard in Spectral Mines is now appropriately an Ebon Dawn Wizard. Fixed a typo in the Ariel Rosehaven quest within the “mystery” response. Beds not allowing players to lie upon them have been fixed. Player music has received a higher audio priority to fix an associated intermittent sound problem. Moving multiple stacks of items while extremely encumbered no longer causes drag and drop issues. Attack speed bonuses now properly apply to pets. The Bug Brigade Rides Again! The Bug Brigade was established to assist the community and the development team to work together to improve the game. Since then the program has gone through a number of changes and was eventually placed on hold. The stability of the game is as important to the development team as it is to the player-base, and for that reason the program has been revamped and is being relaunched. The program is now open to all players in good standing and bug rewards are back! They will be awarded on a progression basis monthly with only a minimal requirement to be filled to qualify. We are bringing the bug forums current and will make every effort to have triage and intake for each validated bug. To assist in doing this we have asked Alley Oop, Justyn, and Tazar to take on a moderator role within the bug and feedback forums. Please congratulate them the next time you see them in the game or on the forums! The Bug Brigade will be open to all. If you feel the game is your home, sign up and assist us in making it a better place to live! To sign up, read the post “Bug Brigade Rides Again!” in the main Bug/Feedback forums for both the Live or Player Test areas in the official forums. If you have trouble finding them, please ask a Hospitaller, or one of the Moderators via PM in the forums or in Discord. Recent Shroud of the Avatar Livestreams Atos and other members of the Shroud of the Avatar development team go live very frequently on our TWO Twitch Channels: twitch.tv/shroudoftheavatar and twitch.tv/communityoftheavatar — be sure to get these channels on follow and get the latest information right as we go live! Also, if you’ve missed our latest streams, check out our archive of content at our YouTube Channel (complete with “Mojito the dog” cam). Like! Follow! Subscribe! Prizes!!! Don’t forget to also join the Shroud of the Avatar team and community over at our other social media venues: Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/ShroudoftheAvatar/ Catnip Games Twitter: https://twitter.com/catnipgames Shroud of the Avatar Twitter: https://twitter.com/ShroudofAvatar Shroud of the Avatar Discord: https://discord.gg/GuBXakQ Are You a Livestreamer? Soon, the Streaming Reward Program will be returning. As the details are getting reworked, we’ll reveal more information. Traditional streaming rewards included an exclusive in-game Streamer Camera for being a veteran of our Streaming Program! Expect the camera reward to return! More goodies will come to your way as the program fully develops. Thank you for streaming Shroud of the Avatar! Lord of the Isle Episode 2 Bundles As one of the biggest and earliest supporters of Episode 2 you will be granted the largest lot deed in the land (Castle), the title Lord (or Lady) of the Isle, a tour of Lord British’s property, and dinner with the game leaders including Lord British himself! Only 24 of these unique bundles will be sold! Complete List of Rewards: Lord of the Isle Place Anywhere Castle Lot Deed: Tax Free Forever (when placed in a POT) and Tax Free for 1 Year (when placed outside of a POT). Placeable on water as well as land! Title: Lord of the Isle or Lady of the Isle Unique Lord of the Isle Home (pictured above) NEW – Lord of the Isle Fishing Expedition (This scene version will work like a large instanced property such as a basement and will feature decoration surfaces to further beautify the scene.) Town Size Upgrade (if a town is not owned by the LOTI supporter, they may gift this size upgrade to another town owner. Maximum possible town sizes will be taken into account, but the Teralopolis size just became available!) Choice of 1 House currently available in the store Castle Basement currently available in the store of your choice Castle Wall Set currently available in the store of your choice (with enough for Castle Lot) Unique Lord of the Isle Dungeon Room (To be revealed later) 140,000 Crowns 1000 Bank Slots Pick 12 Prosperity Tools Lord of the Isle Crown (In-Game Wearable Item) Unique In-Game Emote (To be revealed later) Early Access to Episode 2 Episode 1 Box and map signed by the team 1 hour one-on-one with Chris for design discussion (via video-conference) One real silver ring crafted personally by Lord British: Numbered 1 – 8 In-game version of the Lord British ring: Numbered 1 – 8 (including a place-able decoration version) Tour of Lord British’s property Fine dinner and drinks with Lord British, Darkstarr, and Atos at a location TBD in Austin or NYC. NOTE: Digital items that are currently available will begin delivery as soon as Release 62 (Jan 31, 2019). Other items will be delivered at a future date TBD. NOTE: Travel costs NOT covered by Catnip Games for Tour & Dinner. Upcoming Events Calendar Be sure to check out the Upcoming Events page for spotlighted events plus links to various areas to post or find events on our forums: 2020 Release Schedule: Release 83 – Oct 29 Release 84 – Nov 19 Release 85 – Dec 17 Meretz: Win a Topiary Keep Dragon Statue (No Trade) Whether you move a little or a lot, as a Meretz user you rack up valuable Meretz Points (MPs). The more MPs you have, the more stuff you can buy! Think: in-game SotA goodies, Sweepstakes entries and tons more. With Meretz, we launch several sweepstakes every month. This month, we’re giving away a Topiary Keep Dragon Statue (No Trade) to two lucky winners! AND, use your MPs every day for in-game items like potions and emotes. What’re you waiting for? Download Meretz TODAY! Community Event: Catnip Games Weekly Fishing Tourney Greetings Anglers! The weekly Catnip Games Fishing Tourney is live! These contests run for 1 week intervals, Friday Noon to Friday Noon CT. We’ll announce the winners every Friday during the livestream. Town Registration: Each week, the contest takes place in 3 Player Owned Towns, 1 Random PvP location and 1 Random Lava or NPC Town Location. Please register your Player Owned Town of choice in a reply to this thread, 1 entry per player, and these entries will be added into the town registry. The contest will cycle through the towns in the sequence they entered the town registry, then loop back again to the beginning. The town registry will be reset/wiped for new entries periodically to ensure only active/interested towns are within the registry. Fishing Prizes & Objectives: All prizes will be no-trade. Players may donate additional prizes in the name of their guilds or towns to sweeten the pot. This event timeframe is Friday the 18th at Noon CT to Friday the 25th at Noon CT, and these are the prizes and goals for the indicated week: Largest FRESHWATER Fish (Town): Rules: Must be caught from one of these towns Prizes: Player Owned Town Row Lot Deed, Large Gold Fishing Trophy Devil’s Lair (@Trinity) Rinzai (@Griffler) Knightmare Falls, Mistrendur East Island (@shadowvice) Recommended: Please put a mailbox for your anglers to use by the water. For salt or fetid water contests, town owners can receive a loaner statue to convert the water type of their town to that of the contest, if required. Largest Fish (PvP): Rules: Must be caught in Dysborg Ruins Prizes: 2 Chained Obsidian Shard 3-Packs, Large Silver Fishing Trophy Largest Lava Fish: Rules: Must be caught in Verdantis Mines Prizes: Fishing Rod of Prosperity, Large Bronze Fishing Trophy Participation Prizes: Rules: Everyone who caught at least 1 trophy fish in this week’s locations Prizes: Small Silver Fishing Trophy Cross-Over Events: Prizes provided by the Community Manager will be available for participants and winners of the Fishing event, but governors, guild leaders and players are welcome to sweeten the pot by providing additional prizes based on objective criteria entirely of their own design. In fact, please consider planning events to overlap the duration and chosen weekly locations of the PvP and Fishing developer events. Please post these events in the in-game events forums and the Community Manager will promote accordingly. Please submit links to event threads which take place in the spotlighted towns, PvP zone or PvE zone. Current Crossovers: Knightmare Falls: Tellana has announced a wonderful spin-off contest with additional prizes! Be sure to participate! How to Participate: To participate, players need merely catch trophy fish in the 5 locations indicated above. The locations will change every week at Noon CT on Friday, so be sure to pay attention to the announcements for new locations each week! Please do not send your fish to Elgarion via the in-game mail system. Through data logging, he’ll be able to determine the winners. SO please hold on to your fish, and feel free to use them in any fashion after the catch. Head on over to the Fishing Event Forum Thread for more information. Happy adventures, Avatars! Community Event: TheAvatar.Express Needs You! If you’re looking for a great way to get involved in the Shroud of the Avatar community, then look no further! The fine folks at TheAvatar.Express are looking for some new reporters. Avatars wishing to help with the following are highly desired: Developer Stream Summaries Twitter Reposting In-Game Event Coverage Events Calendar Management New Features/Changes Tutorials Interviews Editorials Any other game stuff you want to cover! Also, the Avatar Express is going to be visiting POTs and writing one or two articles highlighting Shroud of the Avatar’s great community! If you are interested in having your town featured, please reply to this thread with your town’s name. You will be contacted to answer a few questions about the town and will be notified when the article is to be published! To sign up as a reporter, visit https://theavatar.express/be-a-reporter. If you have any questions, feel free to start a private conversation with that_shawn_guy on the forums or shawnbutts #4362 on Discord. For more information, please also visit the main forum thread on this topic on the official forums. Community Event: Belly of the Snake Spotlight Stop the presses! Not long ago, reporters of TheAvatar.Express spoke with Warrior B’Patrick. Patrick is the governor of the Player-Owned Town known as The Belly of the Snake located in the lands of Mistrendur. Not only is the town incredible, but the article speaks volumes to the governor’s resolve in creation and design. Please be sure to visit this amazing news website to learn more about The Belly of the Snake, but also head on over to the main forum thread on this topic to express your thanks to Thradia and friends for spotlighting the town so effectively! Community Event: The Poets’ Circle Returns Kailef of the Poets’ Circle is back in action, and he’s ready to assist Avatars through the process of custom music review for possible inclusion into the game. Every Player-Owned Town has a customizable soundtrack available to it, and adding one’s own music to that soundtrack most certainly adds a personal flair to one’s governing endeavors. If you’re interested in requesting the assistance of Kailef or simply learning more about this process, please visit the main forum thread on this topic in the official forums. Project to Support: Shadow of Valhalla Shadow of Valhalla is a visceral physics-based VR combat game with dynamic RPG elements, set within an ancient realm of Viking lore and mystic powers! Early Access beta includes “endless horde mode” featuring a variety of enemies with progressive difficulty. Also, players can discover many magic spells to unlock! So much more is coming! Finn Staber with Chicken Waffle, will join the Shroud of the Avatar team on Twitch during their Friday the 28th livestream to showoff this new Early Access game! Also, here is a teaser video on YouTube:  The development team is working hard to create additional environments and new quests! Shadow of Valhalla is available on Steam as Early Access. Additional features coming to the game: More Enemies! More Environments! More Magic Spells! RPG Quests! Weapon Forging and Crafting! Much, much more! If you would like to learn more about Shadow of Valhalla, be sure to stop by the main webpage for the game as more news becomes available! Project to Support: Jar Wars While you are delving into Virtual Reality (VR), be sure to check out this exciting and hilarious new game, Jar Wars! Our very own Darkstarr has been busy on some side projects, one of which is Jar Wars, a slapstick multiplayer game made just for VR enthusiasts. Battle your friends with wacky weapons and intriguing gadgets for total domination of the Moon! Available for free on Steam! Project to Support: Dragon Fight Darkstarr has also been hard at work with the team for Dragon Fight VR which recently went live on Steam! Dragon Fight VR is an internal experiment to capture the “essence” of a dragon fight, the classic penultimate experience of every fantasy story. We wanted to create a short visceral, realistic experience stripped of user interface, lobbies, scores, levels, and other visual intrusions that might distract. There were some key elements of fighting a dragon that we wanted to capture and we felt VR was uniquely qualified to convey: Face to face with a large scale hostile creature trying to kill you Using a sword and a shield Fire! Nowhere to run! This started out as an internal experiment to learn some things about VR’s capabilities, be reductionist in our designs, etc. We felt that the experiment was successful enough to release as a free experience to share. Enjoy! Available for free on Steam! Project to Support: Crowfall Be part of shaping the next great MMO by becoming a Crowfall Backer! Crowfall is the first and only online Throne War game. You can win. Join intense PvP battles that demand strategy, survival and a fierce competitive spirit. Reap the spoils of war as an Eternal Champion! Claim virtual territory on behalf of your guild or faction. Capture mines, mills, and quarries to secure resources, build castles, and besiege your neighbors. Scavenge artifacts and relics from the Dying Worlds and install them in your temples to grant blessings to your vassals. Capture lost spirits to do your bidding — or bind them into your weapons to infuse them with sorcerous power! Project to Support: Avatar Express [Forum post by Vladamir Begemot] I’m pleased to report that The Avatar Express is clacking away furiously. News is being delivered and we have established systems to deliver it directly to your brain. You can use one of those systems by following us on Twitter at @avatar_express. Even more reliable due to its fully automated nature is joining us on the Discord server. News items are posted there via RSS. Or you can subscribe to RSS directly on the site. If you run an event, quests, etc, please consider helping out by self reporting. The Shroud community is big, and many things are happening that are never seen by others. With 10k monthly users, we would need a full time staff to track down everything that is happening. You can fill out the contributor form, message @that_shawn_guy here or post in the Discord server that you would like to help. There is no committment once signed up, you can post as much or little as you like. Writing up your own events has several benefits beyond the immidiate exposure. It serves as a record for others to see the history of New Britannia as we create it, in an attractive format. Publishing in the Express also has a higher chance than the forums of being seen by search engines and random readers, thus bringing more eyeballs and new players to the game. It will even make posting in the forums easier! You can upload images to your news item, and then link to those images in your forum post. No more need for 3rd party image hosts! So if you have something going on in your guild or town, or want to be a Reporter, Cartographer or Historian, please join us! Resources: Players Helping Players The official SotA New Player Welcome Forum and the Player Created Resources Forum have the best player created resources for Shroud of the Avatar, whether it’s a Player Written Guide, a Video Walk-through, or a Wiki-type Website. Visit the official Community Resources page for a complete listing of all things community. View the full article

Hello Avatars! For anyone wanting a sneak peek into tomorrow's release OR to help with edit suggestions for the release notes, here's a copy pasted into a Googly Doc: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1Vsa0bDk0H2jz4Q_PIAK-MvKk8YozA8hoM8ogNU_vd-Q/edit?usp=sharing It's gonna be a big one! I still have to get to the first article, but I'll get to that in the morning along with the edits. Happy adventures -- and many thanks View the full article

Greetings Fellow Avatars! This week’s update brings crafters and decorators of Shroud of the Avatar wondrous news! Now, players can decorate the surfaces of all 4 categories of crafting stations. For those wishing to participate in any community activities, upcoming one-time and recurring community events have been announced! Be sure to also review the... Avatar’s Update #399: Crafting Station Decoration Surfaces! Latest News Q&A Friday Livestream!View the full article

Greetings Fellow Avatars! This week’s update brings crafters and decorators of Shroud of the Avatar wondrous news! Now, players can decorate the surfaces of all 4 categories of crafting stations. For those wishing to participate in any community activities, upcoming one-time and recurring community events have been announced! Be sure to also review the Players Guide and Known Issues list for additional information on recent changes and upcoming fixes. Now, let’s see what we have for you in this week’s edition of Update of the Avatar: News Announcements Crafting Station Decoration Surfaces! Latest News Q&A Friday Livestream! Castle Wall Decoration Surfaces! New Vault Round! Latest Store Additions: Ornate Round Setees, Golden Oracle Guardian Statue & More! September Login Reward: Dyeable Fishing Rod! R81 Reward Program Login Items: Lord British & Farming Items! The Bug Brigade Rides Again! Recent Shroud of the Avatar Livestreams Streaming Reward Program Lord of the Isle Episode 2 Bundles Upcoming Events Calendar Community Updates Meretz: Win a Topiary Keep Dragon Statue (No Trade) Community Event: Screenshot & Video Contest Community Event: Catnip Games Weekly Fishing Tourney Community Event: Latest Video from Skeggy Media Community Event: Beran’s Reach Market Day and Auction House Community Event: TheAvatar.Express Needs You Project to Support: Shadow of Valhalla Project to Support: Jar Wars Project to Support: Dragonfight Project to Support: Crowfall Project to Support: Avatar Express Resources: Players Helping Players Crafting Station Decoration Surfaces! Avatars and decorators of New Britannia! Get some decorations ready to place upon your crafting stations, because those decoration surfaces will be functional when Release 82 hits! All 40 or so crafting stations were verified as working, as you can see in the picture above. Each station has a Lord of the Isle crown placed upon a decoration surface. These categories of crafting stations are affected by this change: Crafting stations on in-game gold merchants Expert crafting stations on the Crown Store Founder crafting stations Benefactor crafting stations The stations affected from each category are as follows: Alchemy Blacksmithing Butchering Carpentry Cooking Milling Smelting Tailoring Tanning Textiles So get to your crafting stations, Avatars! They’ll be awaiting your decoration efforts in Release 82! Latest News Q&A Friday Livestream! Another weekly Community Livestream is this Friday, September 18th at 4PM CT on Twitch! Join Chris “Atos” Spears and other development team members for a community 1 hour livestream! To enter the prize drawings, type “a September to remember” into any in-game chat channel OR make a purchase on the website add-on store. Please submit questions into Twitch Chat by inserting !question at the beginning of your text. Watch on Twitch, Friday at 4 PM CT! Castle Wall Decoration Surfaces! Of note, as we progress into further enhancement of existing decoration items, Castle Wall sets will soon receive significant updates on the QA server. The decoration surfaces on Castle Walls have been enabled! For any players wishing to help test the castle wall sets on QA, please see the testing directives thread on the main forums for further information. And for those wishing to assist with this and other Bug Brigade efforts, here’s more information to help you get involved. Happy decorating and testing Avatars! New Vault Round! The current round of Vault items are available until Thursday, September 24th at 1PM CT. At that time, the next round of 9 items will be available for one week, and then the next, etc. Black Clockwork Raven Decoration Pet Adobe 2-Store Village Home Shogun Five-Story City Home Ornate Obsidian Sarcophagus Black Ice Sword Admiral’s Hat Ladies’ Riding Outfit Dragonfly Wings Virtue Dirndl Outfit Latest Store Additions: Ornate Round Setees, Golden Oracle Guardian Statue & More! A new furniture style has been introduced and added to the Crown Store — round setees! Each setee allows for 4 occupants and is a must have for anyone with a reading room in their house! The setees feature two dye layers and a decoration surface behind the occupant’s head. The pictured lamp does not come with the setees, but is there to demonstrate the decoration surface provided. Also, a giant Golden Oracle Guardian Statue has been added to the store and two new plants are available to enhance your gardens! Ornate Red Floral Round Setee Ornate White & Gold Round Setee Golden Oracle Guardian Statue Potted Giant Banana Tree Potted Elderberry Plant Also, we’re scouring the realm for items that have long been missing from the store. Many items are being loaded into the Vault and will rotate in periodically which are announced each week as they go live, but here’s a small number of additional items becoming permanently available on the Crown Store: Glowing Jewel Cube 3-Packs (Blue, Green, Orange, Purple, Red, Yellow) Display Camera September Login Reward: Dyeable Fishing Rod! Anglers rejoice! September’s login reward is an indestructible dyeable fishing rod! Featuring both primary and secondary dye layers, anglers will really be able to show off their style whilst casting a line into the waters of New Britannia! Simply log in during the month of September, and this dyeable fishing rod will become available in the Rewards Window. Release 81 Reward Program Login Reward Items: Lord British & Farming Items! Avatars! Rewards Program login reward items for Release 81 are Lord British and farming themed! Reward Program members must login during Release 81 to receive these login items: Lord British Plate Leggings Large Haystack Small Haystack Strawbox Box Hay Bale 5-Pack Hay Pile Hay Drying Rack Hay Cart The Shroud of the Avatar Rewards Program lets you earn the best rate on purchasing Crowns, AND receive monthly reward items! For the low price of $9 USD per month you will receive the following: 900 Crowns of the Obsidians every month Monthly Login Reward Items (~ 3 per month) Exclusive Title every 3 months 3 Months: Keeper of the Faith 6 Months: Keeper of the Word 9 Months: Keeper of the Vow 12 Months: Keeper of the Flame 15 Months: Keeper of the Oath 18 Months: Keeper of the Pledge Pick any Dye 12-Pack every 6 months Pick any three of the 7 Obsidian Potions every month, including: Potion of Capacity: Increases carrying capacity Potion of Conservation: Reduces reagent use chance Potion of Expedience: Swift gathering on all gathering skills Potion of Precision: Increases Meticulous Collection to all gathering skills Potion of Preservation: Reduces armor and weapon damage Potion of Reclamation: Increases Salvage and Repair to all production skills The Bug Brigade Rides Again! The Bug Brigade was established to assist the community and the development team to work together to improve the game. Since then the program has gone through a number of changes and was eventually placed on hold. The stability of the game is as important to the development team as it is to the player-base, and for that reason the program has been revamped and is being relaunched. The program is now open to all players in good standing and bug rewards are back! They will awarded be on a progression basis monthly with only a minimal requirement to be filled to qualify. We are bringing the bug forums current and will make every effort to have triage and intake for each validated bug. To assist in doing this we have asked Alley Oop, Justyn, and Tazar to take on a moderator role within the bug and feedback forums. Please congratulate them the next time you see them in the game or on the forums! The Bug Brigade will be open to all. If you feel the game is your home, sign up and assist us in making it a better place to live! To sign up, read the post “Bug Brigade Rides Again!” in the main Bug/Feedback forums for both the Live or Player Test areas in the official forums. If you have trouble finding them, please ask a Hospitaller, or one of the Moderators via PM in the forums or in Discord. Recent Shroud of the Avatar Livestreams Atos and other members of the Shroud of the Avatar development team go live very frequently on our TWO Twitch Channels: twitch.tv/shroudoftheavatar and twitch.tv/communityoftheavatar — be sure to get these channels on follow and get the latest information right as we go live! Also, if you’ve missed our latest streams, check out our archive of content at our YouTube Channel (complete with “Mojito the dog” cam). Like! Follow! Subscribe! Prizes!!! Don’t forget to also join the Shroud of the Avatar team and community over at our other social media venues: Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/ShroudoftheAvatar/ Catnip Games Twitter: https://twitter.com/catnipgames Shroud of the Avatar Twitter: https://twitter.com/ShroudofAvatar Shroud of the Avatar Discord: https://discord.gg/GuBXakQ Are You a Livestreamer? Soon, the Streaming Reward Program will be returning. As the details are getting reworked, we’ll reveal more information. Traditional streaming rewards included an exclusive in-game Streamer Camera for being a veteran of our Streaming Program! Expect the camera reward to return! More goodies will come to your way as the program fully develops. Thank you for streaming Shroud of the Avatar! Lord of the Isle Episode 2 Bundles As one of the biggest and earliest supporters of Episode 2 you will be granted the largest lot deed in the land (Castle), the title Lord (or Lady) of the Isle, a tour of Lord British’s property, and dinner with the game leaders including Lord British himself! Only 24 of these unique bundles will be sold! Complete List of Rewards: Lord of the Isle Place Anywhere Castle Lot Deed: Tax Free Forever (when placed in a POT) and Tax Free for 1 Year (when placed outside of a POT). Placeable on water as well as land! Title: Lord of the Isle or Lady of the Isle Unique Lord of the Isle Home (pictured above) NEW – Town Size Upgrade (if a town is not owned by the LOTI supporter, they may gift this size upgrade to another town owner. Maximum possible town sizes will be taken into account, but the Megalopolis size just became available!) Choice of 1 House currently available in the store Castle Basement currently available in the store of your choice Castle Wall Set currently available in the store of your choice (with enough for Castle Lot) Unique Lord of the Isle Dungeon Room (To be revealed later) 140,000 Crowns 1000 Bank Slots Pick 12 Prosperity Tools Lord of the Isle Crown (In-Game Wearable Item) Unique In-Game Emote (To be revealed later) Early Access to Episode 2 Episode 1 Box and map signed by the team 1 hour one-on-one with Chris for design discussion (via video-conference) One real silver ring crafted personally by Lord British: Numbered 1 – 8 In-game version of the Lord British ring: Numbered 1 – 8 (including a place-able decoration version) Tour of Lord British’s property Fine dinner and drinks with Lord British, Darkstarr, and Atos at a location TBD in Austin or NYC. NOTE: Digital items that are currently available will begin delivery as soon as Release 62 (Jan 31, 2019). Other items will be delivered at a future date TBD. NOTE: Travel costs NOT covered by Catnip Games for Tour & Dinner. Upcoming Events Calendar Be sure to check out the Upcoming Events page for spotlighted events plus links to various areas to post or find events on our forums: 2020 Release Schedule: Release 82 – Sep 24 Release 83 – Oct 29 Release 84 – Nov 19 Release 85 – Dec 17 Meretz: Win a Topiary Keep Dragon Statue (No Trade) Whether you move a little or a lot, as a Meretz user you rack up valuable Meretz Points (MPs). The more MPs you have, the more stuff you can buy! Think: in-game SotA goodies, Sweepstakes entries and tons more. With Meretz, we launch several sweepstakes every month. This month, we’re giving away a Topiary Keep Dragon Statue (No Trade) to two lucky winners! AND, use your MPs every day for in-game items like potions and emotes. What’re you waiting for? Download Meretz TODAY! Community Event: Screenshot/Video Contest! With the holidays quickly approaching, it’s time for all New Britannians to partake in the festivities! Labor Day is right around the corner and within the game world, the in-game calendar is about to hit 600 P.C. for a new year and new century! To celebrate, it’s time for a screenshot/video contest! Theme: Fireworks show! All screenshots and videos for this contest must be of a choreographed fireworks show launched from the Overworld map or from in-game towns and adventure scenes. Get your guild/team together to compete in this world wide fireworks competition! Screenshot Requirements: Resolution: Minimum of 1920×1080, and always in 16:9 aspect ratio (cropping allowed). Quality: Use in-game settings to their maximum, no post-screenshot alterations allowed other than labels, overlays, or watermarks to promote your guild/team. Overlay holiday messages are also allowed. Time of Day: Nighttime shows only, no night vision please. Hide the UI: Please toggle off the UI using the default key F9. Video Requirements: Resolution: Minimum of 720p. Quality: Use in-game settings to their maximum, no post-screenshot alterations allowed other than labels, overlays, or watermarks to promote your guild/team. Overlay holiday messages are also allowed. Time of Day: Nighttime shows only, no night vision please. Hide the UI: Please toggle off the UI using the default key F9. Duration: 30 seconds minimum, 60 seconds maximum. Anything occurring after the 60 second mark will not be considered for judging. Guild/Team Requirements: Captain: Each guild/team must select a team captain. 12 Players Max per Team: Each team, to include the team captain, can have a maximum of 12 players. Submission Requirements: # of Entries Per Team: 1 screenshot and 1 video entry per guild/team maximum. Submission Location: Submissions must be placed as a reply into the main thread for this contest on the official forums by the guild/team captain. Post in Forums: In the submission post, the guild/team captain must post the screenshot as a viewable image and/or the embedded video. Participant List: The captain must list out all participants of their team (max of 12 players) in their submission post. The participant list must include the proper spelling of each character. If proper spelling and character names are not provided, prize delivery will be negatively affected. Deadline: All submissions must be posted by 6AM CT on Monday September 21st. OPTIONAL: Please post these on our Twitter and/or Facebook pages to help spread the word about the contest. Best Screenshot Prizes: 1st Place: 10,000 Crowns (delivered to team captain), Title: Master Artist (delivered to all team members). 2nd Place: 5,000 Crowns (delivered to team captain), Title: Master Artist (delivered to all team members). 3rd Place: 2,500 Crowns (delivered to team captain), Title: Master Artist (delivered to all team members). Best Video Prizes: 1st Place: 10,000 Crowns (delivered to team captain), Title: Master Artist (delivered to all team members). 2nd Place: 5,000 Crowns (delivered to team captain), Title: Master Artist (delivered to all team members). 3rd Place: 2,500 Crowns (delivered to team captain), Title: Master Artist (delivered to all team members). Prize Rules: Crowns will be delivered to team captain only. The team captain will determine how to split the Crowns amongst their team. Please ensure your team member list has accurate spellings of character names, or titles cannot be delivered. Each team can win once in the screenshot and once in the video categories. Players can only represent a single team. The Catnip Games team members will pick the winners based on aesthetic and creative qualities of the screenshots and videos. Winners will be announced during the community livestream 1 to 2 weeks after the contest’s deadline! Good luck, Avatars! Community Event: Catnip Games Weekly Fishing Tourney Greetings Anglers! The weekly Catnip Games Fishing Tourney is live! These contests run for 1 week intervals, Friday Noon to Friday Noon CT. We’ll announce the winners every Friday during the livestream. Town Registration: Each week, the contest takes place in 3 Player Owned Towns, 1 Random PvP location and 1 Random Lava or NPC Town Location. Please register your Player Owned Town of choice in a reply to this thread, 1 entry per player, and these entries will be added into the town registry. The contest will cycle through the towns in the sequence they entered the town registry, then loop back again to the beginning. The town registry will be reset/wiped for new entries periodically to ensure only active/interested towns are within the registry. Fishing Prizes & Objectives: All prizes will be no-trade. Players may donate additional prizes in the name of their guilds or towns to sweeten the pot. This event timeframe is Friday the 11th at Noon CT to Friday the 18th at Noon CT, and these are the prizes and goals for the indicated week: Largest FRESHWATER Fish (Town): Rules: Must be caught from one of these towns Prizes: Player Owned Town Row Lot Deed, Large Gold Fishing Trophy Devil’s Lair (@Trinity) Rinzai (@Griffler) Knightmare Falls, Mistrendur East Island (@shadowvice) Recommended: Please put a mailbox for your anglers to use by the water. For salt or fetid water contests, town owners can receive a loaner statue to convert the water type of their town to that of the contest, if required. Largest Fish (PvP): Rules: Must be caught in Dysborg Ruins Prizes: 2 Chained Obsidian Shard 3-Packs, Large Silver Fishing Trophy Largest Lava Fish: Rules: Must be caught in Verdantis Mines Prizes: Fishing Rod of Prosperity, Large Bronze Fishing Trophy Participation Prizes: Rules: Everyone who caught at least 1 trophy fish in this week’s locations Prizes: Small Silver Fishing Trophy Cross-Over Events: Prizes provided by the Community Manager will be available for participants and winners of the Fishing event, but governors, guild leaders and players are welcome to sweeten the pot by providing additional prizes based on objective criteria entirely of their own design. In fact, please consider planning events to overlap the duration and chosen weekly locations of the PvP and Fishing developer events. Please post these events in the in-game events forums and the Community Manager will promote accordingly. Please submit links to event threads which take place in the spotlighted towns, PvP zone or PvE zone. Current Crossovers: No crossover events announced How to Participate: To participate, players need merely catch trophy fish in the 5 locations indicated above. The locations will change every week at Noon CT on Friday, so be sure to pay attention to the announcements for new locations each week! Please do not send your fish to Elgarion via the in-game mail system. Through data logging, he’ll be able to determine the winners. SO please hold on to your fish, and feel free to use them in any fashion after the catch. Head on over to the Fishing Event Forum Thread for more information. Happy adventures, Avatars! Community Event: Latest Video from Skeggy Media  New Britannians! Skeggy Media strikes again! Skeggy has a wondrous library of helpful videos for new and veteran players of Shroud of the Avatar, and he’s added another fantastic video to aid the community! Be sure to visit Skeggy’s YouTube Page and peruse his entire library — the shear number of tutorial videos is nothing short of amazing! Also, please pop on over to Skeggy’s Twitch Channel and give this famous Hospitaller a follow! And if you’d like to give Skeggy a big thank you, please post a kind reply to the main announcement thread on this topic in the official forums. Community Event: Beran’s Reach Market Day & Auction House Ladies and gentlemen! The Citizens of Beran’s Reach welcome you to our September market day! This event is about bringing together people from all corners of the community, with our market being the perfect place to do so. Located within the main gate of the city, the beautifully decorated castle-plot sized market has facilities for just about everything you’d like to do while getting to know your fellow avatars, including features such as: Full set of crafting tables for custom commissions on-site. Set of freely-available commission-free vendors, for use without charge by residents. Many customizable market tables for avatars to sell their wares from, customizable via tenant access. Fancy using the stalls for another purpose? Promoting a book? Looking to recruit for your guild? Be creative! Open-air speaker session for exchanging thoughts and ideas. Stage with audience seating, perfect for auctions or performances. Bar area, perfect for food and drink or getting to know other residents and visitors. Governor help desk, open to handle POT requests immediately or to discuss bespoke pot placement needs and/or other issues. This event is empowering the community and bringing everyone together to have fun. This is a huge opportunity to bring what you love to do and finding others either that want your skills or enjoy similar things, so make the most of it! When: Sunday, September 20th, 2PM CT Where: Beran’s Reach Also, be sure to check out the auction house event also on the 20th but at 11AM CT! For more information about the auction house event, see the main thread on this topic on the official forums. And if you’d like more information about Beran’s Reach Market Day, see the main thread on that topic on the official forums as well. Community Event: TheAvatar.Express Needs You! If you’re looking for a great way to get involved in the Shroud of the Avatar community, then look no further! The fine folks at TheAvatar.Express are looking for some new reporters. Avatars wishing to help with the following are highly desired: Developer Stream Summaries Twitter Reposting In-Game Event Coverage Events Calendar Management New Features/Changes Tutorials Interviews Editorials Any other game stuff you want to cover! Also, the Avatar Express is going to be visiting POTs and writing one or two articles highlighting Shroud of the Avatar’s great community! If you are interested in having your town featured, please reply to this thread with your town’s name. You will be contacted to answer a few questions about the town and will be notified when the article is to be published! To sign up as a reporter, visit https://theavatar.express/be-a-reporter. If you have any questions, feel free to start a private conversation with that_shawn_guy on the forums or shawnbutts #4362 on Discord. For more information, please also visit the main forum thread on this topic on the official forums. Project to Support: Shadow of Valhalla Shadow of Valhalla is a visceral physics-based VR combat game with dynamic RPG elements, set within an ancient realm of Viking lore and mystic powers! Early Access beta includes “endless horde mode” featuring a variety of enemies with progressive difficulty. Also, players can discover many magic spells to unlock! So much more is coming! Finn Staber with Chicken Waffle, will join the Shroud of the Avatar team on Twitch during their Friday the 28th livestream to showoff this new Early Access game! Also, here is a teaser video on YouTube:  The development team is working hard to create additional environments and new quests! Shadow of Valhalla is available on Steam as Early Access. Additional features coming to the game: More Enemies! More Environments! More Magic Spells! RPG Quests! Weapon Forging and Crafting! Much, much more! If you would like to learn more about Shadow of Valhalla, be sure to stop by the main webpage for the game as more news becomes available! Project to Support: Jar Wars While you are delving into Virtual Reality (VR), be sure to check out this exciting and hilarious new game, Jar Wars! Our very own Darkstarr has been busy on some side projects, one of which is Jar Wars, a slapstick multiplayer game made just for VR enthusiasts. Battle your friends with wacky weapons and intriguing gadgets for total domination of the Moon! Available for free on Steam! Project to Support: Dragon Fight Darkstarr has also been hard at work with the team for Dragon Fight VR which recently went live on Steam! Dragon Fight VR is an internal experiment to capture the “essence” of a dragon fight, the classic penultimate experience of every fantasy story. We wanted to create a short visceral, realistic experience stripped of user interface, lobbies, scores, levels, and other visual intrusions that might distract. There were some key elements of fighting a dragon that we wanted to capture and we felt VR was uniquely qualified to convey: Face to face with a large scale hostile creature trying to kill you Using a sword and a shield Fire! Nowhere to run! This started out as an internal experiment to learn some things about VR’s capabilities, be reductionist in our designs, etc. We felt that the experiment was successful enough to release as a free experience to share. Enjoy! Available for free on Steam! Project to Support: Crowfall Be part of shaping the next great MMO by becoming a Crowfall Backer! Crowfall is the first and only online Throne War game. You can win. Join intense PvP battles that demand strategy, survival and a fierce competitive spirit. Reap the spoils of war as an Eternal Champion! Claim virtual territory on behalf of your guild or faction. Capture mines, mills, and quarries to secure resources, build castles, and besiege your neighbors. Scavenge artifacts and relics from the Dying Worlds and install them in your temples to grant blessings to your vassals. Capture lost spirits to do your bidding — or bind them into your weapons to infuse them with sorcerous power! Project to Support: Avatar Express [Forum post by Vladamir Begemot] I’m pleased to report that The Avatar Express is clacking away furiously. News is being delivered and we have established systems to deliver it directly to your brain. You can use one of those systems by following us on Twitter at @avatar_express. Even more reliable due to its fully automated nature is joining us on the Discord server. News items are posted there via RSS. Or you can subscribe to RSS directly on the site. If you run an event, quests, etc, please consider helping out by self reporting. The Shroud community is big, and many things are happening that are never seen by others. With 10k monthly users, we would need a full time staff to track down everything that is happening. You can fill out the contributor form, message @that_shawn_guy here or post in the Discord server that you would like to help. There is no committment once signed up, you can post as much or little as you like. Writing up your own events has several benefits beyond the immidiate exposure. It serves as a record for others to see the history of New Britannia as we create it, in an attractive format. Publishing in the Express also has a higher chance than the forums of being seen by search engines and random readers, thus bringing more eyeballs and new players to the game. It will even make posting in the forums easier! You can upload images to your news item, and then link to those images in your forum post. No more need for 3rd party image hosts! So if you have something going on in your guild or town, or want to be a Reporter, Cartographer or Historian, please join us! Resources: Players Helping Players The official SotA New Player Welcome Forum and the Player Created Resources Forum have the best player created resources for Shroud of the Avatar, whether it’s a Player Written Guide, a Video Walk-through, or a Wiki-type Website. Visit the official Community Resources page for a complete listing of all things community. View the full article

Greetings Fellow Avatars! This week’s update brings players of Shroud of the Avatar a small sneak peek at an upcoming new scene known as “Well of Aldur!” For those wishing to participate in any community activities, upcoming one-time and recurring community events have been announced! Be sure to also review the Players... Avatar’s Update #398: Well of Aldur Sneak Peek! Latest News Q&A Friday Livestream!View the full article

Greetings Fellow Avatars! This week’s update brings players of Shroud of the Avatar a small sneak peek at an upcoming new scene known as “The Well of Aldur!” For those wishing to participate in any community activities, upcoming one-time and recurring community events have been announced! Be sure to also review the Players Guide and Known Issues list for additional information on recent changes and upcoming fixes. Now, let’s see what we have for you in this week’s edition of Update of the Avatar: News Announcements The Well of Aldur Sneak Peek! Latest News Q&A Friday Livestream! New Vault Round! Latest Store Additions: Ornate Round Setees, Golden Oracle Guardian Statue & More! September Login Reward: Dyeable Fishing Rod! R81 Reward Program Login Items: Lord British & Farming Items! The Bug Brigade Rides Again! Recent Shroud of the Avatar Livestreams Streaming Reward Program Lord of the Isle Episode 2 Bundles Upcoming Events Calendar Community Updates Meretz: Win a Topiary Keep Dragon Statue (No Trade) Community Event: Screenshot & Video Contest Community Event: Catnip Games Weekly Fishing Tourney Community Event: Birthday Scavenger Hunt Community Event: The Prince of Brittany Community Event: TheAvatar.Express Needs You Project to Support: Shadow of Valhalla Project to Support: Jar Wars Project to Support: Dragonfight Project to Support: Crowfall Project to Support: Avatar Express Resources: Players Helping Players The Well of Aldur Sneak Peek! New Britannians! Rumors of a mystical and mysterious locale are spreading throughout the lands. “The Well of Aldur” is an upcoming new adventure scene for Episode 2 Access holders which will feature a variety of activities to challenge even the most stalwart of Avatars! Still very early in design, the image above is a small example of the wondrously ethereal ambience which this new scene will exhibit. “High above the mountain peaks of Mistrendur floats the crumbling remains of a civilization whose origins are lost to time. Only the greatest adventurers will decipher the secrets, survive the threats, and discover the true nature of the Well of Aldur.” Amongst other challenges, players can expect a jump puzzle to tackle with a reward upon reaching its end. More objectives will be available at this locale, so stay tuned for more previews of this astonishing new scene as it continues to develop! Latest News Q&A Friday Livestream! Another weekly Community Livestream is this Friday, September 11th at 4PM CT on Twitch! Join Chris “Atos” Spears and other development team members for a community 1 hour livestream! To enter the prize drawings, type “a September to remember” into any in-game chat channel OR make a purchase on the website add-on store. Please submit questions into Twitch Chat by inserting !question at the beginning of your text. Watch on Twitch, Friday at 4 PM CT! New Vault Round! The current round of Vault items are available until Thursday, September 17th at 1PM CT. At that time, the next round of 9 items will be available for two weeks, and then the next, etc. Brass Mini Automaton Decoration Pet Magic Sigil Cloak Ornate Norgard Axe Ornate Tansu Chest Elven Keep Village Home Ornate Viking Short Sword Dragon Polearm Candle Helmet Oracle Eye Throne Latest Store Additions: Ornate Round Setees, Golden Oracle Guardian Statue & More! A new furniture style has been introduced and added to the Crown Store — round setees! Each setee allows for 4 occupants and is a must have for anyone with a reading room in their house! The setees feature two dye layers and a decoration surface behind the occupant’s head. The pictured lamp does not come with the setees, but is there to demonstrate the decoration surface provided. Also, a giant Golden Oracle Guardian Statue has been added to the store and two new plants are available to enhance your gardens! Ornate Red Floral Round Setee Ornate White & Gold Round Setee Golden Oracle Guardian Statue Potted Giant Banana Tree Potted Elderberry Plant Also, we’re scouring the realm for items that have long been missing from the store. Many items are being loaded into the Vault and will rotate in periodically which are announced each week as they go live, but here’s a small number of additional items becoming permanently available on the Crown Store: Glowing Jewel Cube 3-Packs (Blue, Green, Orange, Purple, Red, Yellow) Display Camera September Login Reward: Dyeable Fishing Rod! Anglers rejoice! September’s login reward is an indestructible dyeable fishing rod! Featuring both primary and secondary dye layers, anglers will really be able to show off their style whilst casting a line into the waters of New Britannia! Simply log in during the month of September, and this dyeable fishing rod will become available in the Rewards Window. Release 81 Reward Program Login Reward Items: Lord British & Farming Items! Avatars! Rewards Program login reward items for Release 81 are Lord British and farming themed! Reward Program members must login during Release 81 to receive these login items: Lord British Plate Leggings Large Haystack Small Haystack Strawbox Box Hay Bale 5-Pack Hay Pile Hay Drying Rack Hay Cart The Shroud of the Avatar Rewards Program lets you earn the best rate on purchasing Crowns, AND receive monthly reward items! For the low price of $9 USD per month you will receive the following: 900 Crowns of the Obsidians every month Monthly Login Reward Items (~ 3 per month) Exclusive Title every 3 months 3 Months: Keeper of the Faith 6 Months: Keeper of the Word 9 Months: Keeper of the Vow 12 Months: Keeper of the Flame 15 Months: Keeper of the Oath 18 Months: Keeper of the Pledge Pick any Dye 12-Pack every 6 months Pick any three of the 7 Obsidian Potions every month, including: Potion of Capacity: Increases carrying capacity Potion of Conservation: Reduces reagent use chance Potion of Expedience: Swift gathering on all gathering skills Potion of Precision: Increases Meticulous Collection to all gathering skills Potion of Preservation: Reduces armor and weapon damage Potion of Reclamation: Increases Salvage and Repair to all production skills The Bug Brigade Rides Again! The Bug Brigade was established to assist the community and the development team to work together to improve the game. Since then the program has gone through a number of changes and was eventually placed on hold. The stability of the game is as important to the development team as it is to the player-base, and for that reason the program has been revamped and is being relaunched. The program is now open to all players in good standing and bug rewards are back! They will awarded be on a progression basis monthly with only a minimal requirement to be filled to qualify. We are bringing the bug forums current and will make every effort to have triage and intake for each validated bug. To assist in doing this we have asked Alley Oop, Justyn, and Tazar to take on a moderator role within the bug and feedback forums. Please congratulate them the next time you see them in the game or on the forums! The Bug Brigade will be open to all. If you feel the game is your home, sign up and assist us in making it a better place to live! To sign up, read the post “Bug Brigade Rides Again!” in the main Bug/Feedback forums for both the Live or Player Test areas in the official forums. If you have trouble finding them, please ask a Hospitaller, or one of the Moderators via PM in the forums or in Discord. Recent Shroud of the Avatar Livestreams Atos and other members of the Shroud of the Avatar development team go live very frequently on our TWO Twitch Channels: twitch.tv/shroudoftheavatar and twitch.tv/communityoftheavatar — be sure to get these channels on follow and get the latest information right as we go live! Also, if you’ve missed our latest streams, check out our archive of content at our YouTube Channel (complete with “Mojito the dog” cam). Like! Follow! Subscribe! Prizes!!! Don’t forget to also join the Shroud of the Avatar team and community over at our other social media venues: Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/ShroudoftheAvatar/ Catnip Games Twitter: https://twitter.com/catnipgames Shroud of the Avatar Twitter: https://twitter.com/ShroudofAvatar Shroud of the Avatar Discord: https://discord.gg/GuBXakQ Are You a Livestreamer? Soon, the Streaming Reward Program will be returning. As the details are getting reworked, we’ll reveal more information. Traditional streaming rewards included an exclusive in-game Streamer Camera for being a veteran of our Streaming Program! Expect the camera reward to return! More goodies will come to your way as the program fully develops. Thank you for streaming Shroud of the Avatar! Lord of the Isle Episode 2 Bundles As one of the biggest and earliest supporters of Episode 2 you will be granted the largest lot deed in the land (Castle), the title Lord (or Lady) of the Isle, a tour of Lord British’s property, and dinner with the game leaders including Lord British himself! Only 24 of these unique bundles will be sold! Complete List of Rewards: Lord of the Isle Place Anywhere Castle Lot Deed: Tax Free Forever (when placed in a POT) and Tax Free for 1 Year (when placed outside of a POT). Placeable on water as well as land! Title: Lord of the Isle or Lady of the Isle Unique Lord of the Isle Home (pictured above) NEW – Town Size Upgrade (if a town is not owned by the LOTI supporter, they may gift this size upgrade to another town owner. Maximum possible town sizes will be taken into account, but the Megalopolis size just became available!) Choice of 1 House currently available in the store Castle Basement currently available in the store of your choice Castle Wall Set currently available in the store of your choice (with enough for Castle Lot) Unique Lord of the Isle Dungeon Room (To be revealed later) 140,000 Crowns 1000 Bank Slots Pick 12 Prosperity Tools Lord of the Isle Crown (In-Game Wearable Item) Unique In-Game Emote (To be revealed later) Early Access to Episode 2 Episode 1 Box and map signed by the team 1 hour one-on-one with Chris for design discussion (via video-conference) One real silver ring crafted personally by Lord British: Numbered 1 – 8 In-game version of the Lord British ring: Numbered 1 – 8 (including a place-able decoration version) Tour of Lord British’s property Fine dinner and drinks with Lord British, Darkstarr, and Atos at a location TBD in Austin or NYC. NOTE: Digital items that are currently available will begin delivery as soon as Release 62 (Jan 31, 2019). Other items will be delivered at a future date TBD. NOTE: Travel costs NOT covered by Catnip Games for Tour & Dinner. Upcoming Events Calendar Be sure to check out the Upcoming Events page for spotlighted events plus links to various areas to post or find events on our forums: 2020 Release Schedule: Release 82 – Sep 24 Release 83 – Oct 29 Release 84 – Nov 19 Release 85 – Dec 17 Meretz: Win a Topiary Keep Dragon Statue (No Trade) Whether you move a little or a lot, as a Meretz user you rack up valuable Meretz Points (MPs). The more MPs you have, the more stuff you can buy! Think: in-game SotA goodies, Sweepstakes entries and tons more. With Meretz, we launch several sweepstakes every month. This month, we’re giving away a Topiary Keep Dragon Statue (No Trade) to two lucky winners! AND, use your MPs every day for in-game items like potions and emotes. What’re you waiting for? Download Meretz TODAY! Community Event: Screenshot/Video Contest! With the holidays quickly approaching, it’s time for all New Britannians to partake in the festivities! Labor Day is right around the corner and within the game world, the in-game calendar is about to hit 600 P.C. for a new year and new century! To celebrate, it’s time for a screenshot/video contest! Theme: Fireworks show! All screenshots and videos for this contest must be of a choreographed fireworks show launched from the Overworld map or from in-game towns and adventure scenes. Get your guild/team together to compete in this world wide fireworks competition! Screenshot Requirements: Resolution: Minimum of 1920×1080, and always in 16:9 aspect ratio (cropping allowed). Quality: Use in-game settings to their maximum, no post-screenshot alterations allowed other than labels, overlays, or watermarks to promote your guild/team. Overlay holiday messages are also allowed. Time of Day: Nighttime shows only, no night vision please. Hide the UI: Please toggle off the UI using the default key F9. Video Requirements: Resolution: Minimum of 720p. Quality: Use in-game settings to their maximum, no post-screenshot alterations allowed other than labels, overlays, or watermarks to promote your guild/team. Overlay holiday messages are also allowed. Time of Day: Nighttime shows only, no night vision please. Hide the UI: Please toggle off the UI using the default key F9. Duration: 30 seconds minimum, 60 seconds maximum. Anything occurring after the 60 second mark will not be considered for judging. Guild/Team Requirements: Captain: Each guild/team must select a team captain. 12 Players Max per Team: Each team, to include the team captain, can have a maximum of 12 players. Submission Requirements: # of Entries Per Team: 1 screenshot and 1 video entry per guild/team maximum. Submission Location: Submissions must be placed as a reply into the main thread for this contest on the official forums by the guild/team captain. Post in Forums: In the submission post, the guild/team captain must post the screenshot as a viewable image and/or the embedded video. Participant List: The captain must list out all participants of their team (max of 12 players) in their submission post. The participant list must include the proper spelling of each character. If proper spelling and character names are not provided, prize delivery will be negatively affected. Deadline: All submissions must be posted by 6AM CT on Monday September 21st. OPTIONAL: Please post these on our Twitter and/or Facebook pages to help spread the word about the contest. Best Screenshot Prizes: 1st Place: 10,000 Crowns (delivered to team captain), Title: Master Artist (delivered to all team members). 2nd Place: 5,000 Crowns (delivered to team captain), Title: Master Artist (delivered to all team members). 3rd Place: 2,500 Crowns (delivered to team captain), Title: Master Artist (delivered to all team members). Best Video Prizes: 1st Place: 10,000 Crowns (delivered to team captain), Title: Master Artist (delivered to all team members). 2nd Place: 5,000 Crowns (delivered to team captain), Title: Master Artist (delivered to all team members). 3rd Place: 2,500 Crowns (delivered to team captain), Title: Master Artist (delivered to all team members). Prize Rules: Crowns will be delivered to team captain only. The team captain will determine how to split the Crowns amongst their team. Please ensure your team member list has accurate spellings of character names, or titles cannot be delivered. Each team can win once in the screenshot and once in the video categories. Players can only represent a single team. The Catnip Games team members will pick the winners based on aesthetic and creative qualities of the screenshots and videos. Winners will be announced during the community livestream 1 to 2 weeks after the contest’s deadline! Good luck, Avatars! Community Event: Catnip Games Weekly Fishing Tourney Greetings Anglers! The weekly Catnip Games Fishing Tourney is live! These contests run for 1 week intervals, Friday Noon to Friday Noon CT. We’ll announce the winners every Friday during the livestream. Town Registration: Each week, the contest takes place in 3 Player Owned Towns, 1 Random PvP location and 1 Random Lava or NPC Town Location. Please register your Player Owned Town of choice in a reply to this thread, 1 entry per player, and these entries will be added into the town registry. The contest will cycle through the towns in the sequence they entered the town registry, then loop back again to the beginning. The town registry will be reset/wiped for new entries periodically to ensure only active/interested towns are within the registry. Fishing Prizes & Objectives: All prizes will be no-trade. Players may donate additional prizes in the name of their guilds or towns to sweeten the pot. This event timeframe is Friday the 11th at Noon CT to Friday the 18th at Noon CT, and these are the prizes and goals for the indicated week: Largest FETID WATER Fish (Town): Rules: Must be caught from one of these towns Prizes: Player Owned Town Row Lot Deed, Large Gold Fishing Trophy Caer Dracwych (Bowen Bloodgood) New Britannian Market, Novia West of Brittany (Lord Andernut) Rock Ridge, Mistrendur Middle Island (Redhammer) Recommended: Please put a mailbox for your anglers to use by the water. For salt or fetid water contests, town owners can receive a loaner statue to convert the water type of their town to that of the contest, if required. Largest Fish (PvP): Rules: Must be caught in Kas Ruins Prizes: 2 Chained Obsidian Shard 3-Packs, Large Silver Fishing Trophy Largest Lava Fish: Rules: Must be caught in Sunless Barrens Prizes: Fishing Rod of Prosperity, Large Bronze Fishing Trophy Participation Prizes: Rules: Everyone who caught at least 1 trophy fish in this week’s locations Prizes: Small Silver Fishing Trophy Cross-Over Events: Prizes provided by the Community Manager will be available for participants and winners of the Fishing event, but governors, guild leaders and players are welcome to sweeten the pot by providing additional prizes based on objective criteria entirely of their own design. In fact, please consider planning events to overlap the duration and chosen weekly locations of the PvP and Fishing developer events. Please post these events in the in-game events forums and the Community Manager will promote accordingly. Please submit links to event threads which take place in the spotlighted towns, PvP zone or PvE zone. Current Crossovers: No crossover events announced. How to Participate: To participate, players need merely catch trophy fish in the 5 locations indicated above. The locations will change every week at Noon CT on Friday, so be sure to pay attention to the announcements for new locations each week! Please do not send your fish to Elgarion via the in-game mail system. Through data logging, he’ll be able to determine the winners. SO please hold on to your fish, and feel free to use them in any fashion after the catch. Head on over to the Fishing Event Forum Thread for more information. Happy adventures, Avatars! Community Event: Birthday Scavenger Hunt A scavenger hunt in Immortal City is nearly upon us! Each participant will be given a book of clues. The clues will lead you to somewhere in Immortal City where you will need to pick up an item, and from there, the fun begins! 1st, 2nd, and 3rd place prizes are available! Where: Immortal City When: Saturday, September 12th, 3PM to 9PM CT Good luck to everyone and have fun! For more information about contest rules and prizes, please see the main forum thread about this topic on the official forums. Community Event: The Prince of Brittany Avatars! Matt “Gix” Schmitz at StudioGix.com has released a wonderfully entertaining music video about his time in New Britannia! Sit back and watch the humorous video “The Prince of Brittany” on YouTube. Also, if you’d like to see more from Gix (a.k.a. LavaGix), head on over to his twitch stream and give him a follow! Community Event: TheAvatar.Express Needs You! If you’re looking for a great way to get involved in the Shroud of the Avatar community, then look no further! The fine folks at TheAvatar.Express are looking for some new reporters. Avatars wishing to help with the following are highly desired: Developer Stream Summaries Twitter Reposting In-Game Event Coverage Events Calendar Management New Features/Changes Tutorials Interviews Editorials Any other game stuff you want to cover! Also, the Avatar Express is going to be visiting POTs and writing one or two articles highlighting Shroud of the Avatar’s great community! If you are interested in having your town featured, please reply to this thread with your town’s name. You will be contacted to answer a few questions about the town and will be notified when the article is to be published! To sign up as a reporter, visit https://theavatar.express/be-a-reporter. If you have any questions, feel free to start a private conversation with that_shawn_guy on the forums or shawnbutts #4362 on Discord. For more information, please also visit the main forum thread on this topic on the official forums. Project to Support: Shadow of Valhalla Shadow of Valhalla is a visceral physics-based VR combat game with dynamic RPG elements, set within an ancient realm of Viking lore and mystic powers! Early Access beta includes “endless horde mode” featuring a variety of enemies with progressive difficulty. Also, players can discover many magic spells to unlock! So much more is coming! Finn Staber with Chicken Waffle, will join the Shroud of the Avatar team on Twitch during their Friday the 28th livestream to showoff this new Early Access game! Also, here is a teaser video on YouTube:  The development team is working hard to create additional environments and new quests! Shadow of Valhalla is available on Steam as Early Access. Additional features coming to the game: More Enemies! More Environments! More Magic Spells! RPG Quests! Weapon Forging and Crafting! Much, much more! If you would like to learn more about Shadow of Valhalla, be sure to stop by the main webpage for the game as more news becomes available! Project to Support: Jar Wars While you are delving into Virtual Reality (VR), be sure to check out this exciting and hilarious new game, Jar Wars! Our very own Darkstarr has been busy on some side projects, one of which is Jar Wars, a slapstick multiplayer game made just for VR enthusiasts. Battle your friends with wacky weapons and intriguing gadgets for total domination of the Moon! Available for free on Steam! Project to Support: Dragon Fight Darkstarr has also been hard at work with the team for Dragon Fight VR which recently went live on Steam! Dragon Fight VR is an internal experiment to capture the “essence” of a dragon fight, the classic penultimate experience of every fantasy story. We wanted to create a short visceral, realistic experience stripped of user interface, lobbies, scores, levels, and other visual intrusions that might distract. There were some key elements of fighting a dragon that we wanted to capture and we felt VR was uniquely qualified to convey: Face to face with a large scale hostile creature trying to kill you Using a sword and a shield Fire! Nowhere to run! This started out as an internal experiment to learn some things about VR’s capabilities, be reductionist in our designs, etc. We felt that the experiment was successful enough to release as a free experience to share. Enjoy! Available for free on Steam! Project to Support: Crowfall Be part of shaping the next great MMO by becoming a Crowfall Backer! Crowfall is the first and only online Throne War game. You can win. Join intense PvP battles that demand strategy, survival and a fierce competitive spirit. Reap the spoils of war as an Eternal Champion! Claim virtual territory on behalf of your guild or faction. Capture mines, mills, and quarries to secure resources, build castles, and besiege your neighbors. Scavenge artifacts and relics from the Dying Worlds and install them in your temples to grant blessings to your vassals. Capture lost spirits to do your bidding — or bind them into your weapons to infuse them with sorcerous power! Project to Support: Avatar Express [Forum post by Vladamir Begemot] I’m pleased to report that The Avatar Express is clacking away furiously. News is being delivered and we have established systems to deliver it directly to your brain. You can use one of those systems by following us on Twitter at @avatar_express. Even more reliable due to its fully automated nature is joining us on the Discord server. News items are posted there via RSS. Or you can subscribe to RSS directly on the site. If you run an event, quests, etc, please consider helping out by self reporting. The Shroud community is big, and many things are happening that are never seen by others. With 10k monthly users, we would need a full time staff to track down everything that is happening. You can fill out the contributor form, message @that_shawn_guy here or post in the Discord server that you would like to help. There is no committment once signed up, you can post as much or little as you like. Writing up your own events has several benefits beyond the immidiate exposure. It serves as a record for others to see the history of New Britannia as we create it, in an attractive format. Publishing in the Express also has a higher chance than the forums of being seen by search engines and random readers, thus bringing more eyeballs and new players to the game. It will even make posting in the forums easier! You can upload images to your news item, and then link to those images in your forum post. No more need for 3rd party image hosts! So if you have something going on in your guild or town, or want to be a Reporter, Cartographer or Historian, please join us! Resources: Players Helping Players The official SotA New Player Welcome Forum and the Player Created Resources Forum have the best player created resources for Shroud of the Avatar, whether it’s a Player Written Guide, a Video Walk-through, or a Wiki-type Website. Visit the official Community Resources page for a complete listing of all things community. View the full article

Greetings Fellow Avatars! This week’s update brings players of Shroud of the Avatar some changes to the craftable stone walls with more updates soon coming to other wall and fence varieties! The Public Garden Player-Owned Town decoration has been revamped to feature decorative flowers! For those wishing to participate in any community activities, upcoming one-time and recurring community events have been announced!... Avatar’s Update #397: Decorative Wall Update! Public Garden Blossoms! New Store Items: Round Setees!View the full article

Greetings Fellow Avatars! This week’s update brings players of Shroud of the Avatar some changes to the craftable stone walls with more updates soon coming to other wall and fence varieties! The Public Garden Player-Owned Town decoration has been revamped to feature decorative flowers! For those wishing to participate in any community activities, upcoming one-time and recurring community events have been announced! Be sure to also review the Players Guide and Known Issues list for additional information on recent changes and upcoming fixes. Now, let’s see what we have for you in this week’s edition of Update of the Avatar: News Announcements Decorative Wall Update! Latest News Q&A Friday Livestream! Public Garden Blossoms! New Store Additions: Ornate Round Setees, Golden Oracle Guardian Statue & More! New Vault Round! Screenshot & Video Contest! Crowns, Deed Upgrades, & Two-Hour Flash Sales! September Login Reward: Dyeable Fishing Rod! R81 Reward Program Login Items: Lord British & Farming Items! The Bug Brigade Rides Again! Recent Shroud of the Avatar Livestreams Streaming Reward Program Lord of the Isle Episode 2 Bundles Upcoming Events Calendar Community Updates Meretz: Win a Topiary Keep Dragon Statue (No Trade) Community Event: WRFB Dance Party at Autumn Rising Brewery Community Event: Rajazel Fishing Tournament Community Event: TheAvatar.Express Needs You Community Event: More Orations at Caverns.net Community Event: Happy Bridge Troll Day Project to Support: Shadow of Valhalla Project to Support: Jar Wars Project to Support: Dragonfight Project to Support: Crowfall Project to Support: Avatar Express Resources: Players Helping Players Decorative Wall Update! Builders of New Britannia! A round of love for fencing and wall sets has begun! Demonstrated in the image above, this style of craftable stone wall can be stacked so players can build taller walls. The wall set also allows for significant overhang to encourage more interesting/creative wall structures. Decorators will be able to scale these wall objects from .5 to 1.3. That particular scaling change was also recently applied to all the building block packs. And for those decorators wanting to use these for indoor walls and partitions, go right ahead! Now, these walls can be placed indoors, in basements, and in dungeons! Expect these changes to patch in shortly, but many more changes are coming your way for fences and walls in the near future. Other varieties of these sets will receive similar changes listed above in the upcoming month, but additional decoration surfaces placed on these fence and wall assets are also on the horizon! Latest News Q&A Friday Livestream! Another weekly Community Livestream is this Friday, September 4th at 4PM CT on Twitch! Join Chris “Atos” Spears and other development team members for a community 1 hour livestream! To enter the prize drawings, type “a September to remember” into any in-game chat channel OR make a purchase on the website add-on store. Please submit questions into Twitch Chat by inserting !question at the beginning of your text. Watch on Twitch, Friday at 4 PM CT! Public Garden Blossoms! Governors and stewards of New Britannia have become accustomed to having a particular non-functional Player-Owned Town (POT) asset known as the Public Garden. The original intent of this item was to allow players without property to still have a means to grow crops in the agriculture system, but with the advent of Free-to-Play concepts in the game, continued design of these gardens was postponed. Now, since all players receive two free property deeds allowing use of the agriculture system, the original public garden functionality was no longer required yet a need to polish the asset in a decorative sense still remained. In a recent effort to improve the Public Garden, the partially designed agriculture functionality has been removed, and the planting beds have blossomed with a plethora of flowering plants! For any governors and stewards wanting additional Public Garden decorations, the garden will soon be added to the Crown Store. Happy decorating, Avatars! New Store Additions: Ornate Round Setees, Golden Oracle Guardian Statue & More! A new furniture style has been introduced and added to the Crown Store — round setees! Each setee allows for 4 occupants and is a must have for anyone with a reading room in their house! The setees feature two dye layers and a decoration surface behind the occupant’s head. The pictured lamp does not come with the setees, but is there to demonstrate the decoration surface provided. Also, a giant Golden Oracle Guardian Statue has been added to the store and two new plants are available to enhance your gardens! Ornate Red Floral Round Setee Ornate White & Gold Round Setee Golden Oracle Guardian Statue Potted Giant Banana Tree Potted Elderberry Plant Also, we’re scouring the realm for items that have long been missing from the store. Many items are being loaded into the Vault and will rotate in periodically which are announced each week as they go live, but here’s a small number of additional items becoming permanently available on the Crown Store: Glowing Jewel Cube 3-Packs (Blue, Green, Orange, Purple, Red, Yellow) Display Camera New Vault Round! The current round of Vault items are available until Thursday, September 10th at 1PM CT. At that time, the next round of 9 items will be available for two weeks, and then the next, etc. Virtue Flame Armor Set Red Fez Hat Tiny Airship Pet Ornate Katana Ornate Katana Pattern Pack Elven Elder Archer Armor Kobold Masks Set 1 Gentleman’s Admiral Outfit Black Ice Shield Screenshot/Video Contest! With the holidays quickly approaching, it’s time for all New Britannians to partake in the festivities! Labor Day is right around the corner and within the game world, the in-game calendar is about to hit 600 P.C. for a new year and new century! To celebrate, it’s time for a screenshot/video contest! Theme: Fireworks show! All screenshots and videos for this contest must be of a choreographed fireworks show launched from the Overworld map or from in-game towns and adventure scenes. Get your guild/team together to compete in this world wide fireworks competition! Screenshot Requirements: Resolution: Minimum of 1920×1080, and always in 16:9 aspect ratio (cropping allowed). Quality: Use in-game settings to their maximum, no post-screenshot alterations allowed other than labels, overlays, or watermarks to promote your guild/team. Overlay holiday messages are also allowed. Time of Day: Nighttime shows only, no night vision please. Hide the UI: Please toggle off the UI using the default key F9. Video Requirements: Resolution: Minimum of 720p. Quality: Use in-game settings to their maximum, no post-screenshot alterations allowed other than labels, overlays, or watermarks to promote your guild/team. Overlay holiday messages are also allowed. Time of Day: Nighttime shows only, no night vision please. Hide the UI: Please toggle off the UI using the default key F9. Duration: 30 seconds minimum, 60 seconds maximum. Anything occurring after the 60 second mark will not be considered for judging. Guild/Team Requirements: Captain: Each guild/team must select a team captain. 12 Players Max per Team: Each team, to include the team captain, can have a maximum of 12 players. Submission Requirements: # of Entries Per Team: 1 screenshot and 1 video entry per guild/team maximum. Submission Location: Submissions must be placed as a reply into the main thread for this contest on the official forums by the guild/team captain. Post in Forums: In the submission post, the guild/team captain must post the screenshot as a viewable image and/or the embedded video. Participant List: The captain must list out all participants of their team (max of 12 players) in their submission post. The participant list must include the proper spelling of each character. If proper spelling and character names are not provided, prize delivery will be negatively affected. Deadline: All submissions must be posted by 6AM CT on Monday September 21st. OPTIONAL: Please post these on our Twitter and/or Facebook pages to help spread the word about the contest. Best Screenshot Prizes: 1st Place: 10,000 Crowns (delivered to team captain), Title: Master Artist (delivered to all team members). 2nd Place: 5000 Crowns (delivered to team captain), Title: Master Artist (delivered to all team members). 3rd Place: 2500 Crowns (delivered to team captain), Title: Master Artist (delivered to all team members). Best Video Prizes: 1st Place: 10,000 Crowns (delivered to team captain), Title: Master Artist (delivered to all team members). 2nd Place: 5000 Crowns (delivered to team captain), Title: Master Artist (delivered to all team members). 3rd Place: 2500 Crowns (delivered to team captain), Title: Master Artist (delivered to all team members). Prize Rules: Crowns will be delivered to team captain only. The team captain will determine how to split the Crowns amongst their team. Please ensure your team member list has accurate spellings of character names, or titles cannot be delivered. Each team can win once in the screenshot and once in the video categories. Players can only represent a single team. The Catnip Games team members will pick the winners based on aesthetic and creative qualities of the screenshots and videos. Winners will be announced during the community livestream 1 to 2 weeks after the contest’s deadline! Good luck, Avatars! Crowns, Deed Upgrades, & Two-Hour Flash Sales! In celebration of Labor Day as well as the 600 P.C. in-game calendar event, various sales will begin on Friday and extend throughout the holiday. Crowns will be on sale for 20% off. Deed Upgrades will also be 20% off! To upgrade a deed, place the deed into your inventory, then right-click the deed to reveal upgrade options. But that’s not all! Two-Hour Flash Sales will also commence on Friday morning! So watch your clocks, Avatars! A new batch of 9 sale items will rotate into the in-game Crown Store every 2 hours! Players have until Monday, September 7th at 1PM CT to take advantage of these great discounts, at which time all 3 sales events expire. Happy shopping, Avatars! September Login Reward: Dyeable Fishing Rod! Anglers rejoice! September’s login reward is an indestructible dyeable fishing rod! Featuring both primary and secondary dye layers, anglers will really be able to show off their style whilst casting a line into the waters of New Britannia! Simply log in during the month of September, and this dyeable fishing rod will become available in the Rewards Window. Release 81 Reward Program Login Reward Items: Lord British & Farming Items! Avatars! Rewards Program login reward items for Release 81 are Lord British and farming themed! Reward Program members must login during Release 81 to receive these login items: Lord British Plate Leggings Large Haystack Small Haystack Strawbox Box Hay Bale 5-Pack Hay Pile Hay Drying Rack Hay Cart The Shroud of the Avatar Rewards Program lets you earn the best rate on purchasing Crowns, AND receive monthly reward items! For the low price of $9 USD per month you will receive the following: 900 Crowns of the Obsidians every month Monthly Login Reward Items (~ 3 per month) Exclusive Title every 3 months 3 Months: Keeper of the Faith 6 Months: Keeper of the Word 9 Months: Keeper of the Vow 12 Months: Keeper of the Flame 15 Months: Keeper of the Oath 18 Months: Keeper of the Pledge Pick any Dye 12-Pack every 6 months Pick any three of the 7 Obsidian Potions every month, including: Potion of Capacity: Increases carrying capacity Potion of Conservation: Reduces reagent use chance Potion of Expedience: Swift gathering on all gathering skills Potion of Precision: Increases Meticulous Collection to all gathering skills Potion of Preservation: Reduces armor and weapon damage Potion of Reclamation: Increases Salvage and Repair to all production skills The Bug Brigade Rides Again! The Bug Brigade was established to assist the community and the development team to work together to improve the game. Since then the program has gone through a number of changes and was eventually placed on hold. The stability of the game is as important to the development team as it is to the player-base, and for that reason the program has been revamped and is being relaunched. The program is now open to all players in good standing and bug rewards are back! They will awarded be on a progression basis monthly with only a minimal requirement to be filled to qualify. We are bringing the bug forums current and will make every effort to have triage and intake for each validated bug. To assist in doing this we have asked Alley Oop, Justyn, and Tazar to take on a moderator role within the bug and feedback forums. Please congratulate them the next time you see them in the game or on the forums! The Bug Brigade will be open to all. If you feel the game is your home, sign up and assist us in making it a better place to live! To sign up, read the post “Bug Brigade Rides Again!” in the main Bug/Feedback forums for both the Live or Player Test areas in the official forums. If you have trouble finding them, please ask a Hospitaller, or one of the Moderators via PM in the forums or in Discord. Recent Shroud of the Avatar Livestreams Atos and other members of the Shroud of the Avatar development team go live very frequently on our TWO Twitch Channels: twitch.tv/shroudoftheavatar and twitch.tv/communityoftheavatar — be sure to get these channels on follow and get the latest information right as we go live! Also, if you’ve missed our latest streams, check out our archive of content at our YouTube Channel (complete with “Mojito the dog” cam). Like! Follow! Subscribe! Prizes!!! Don’t forget to also join the Shroud of the Avatar team and community over at our other social media venues: Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/ShroudoftheAvatar/ Catnip Games Twitter: https://twitter.com/catnipgames Shroud of the Avatar Twitter: https://twitter.com/ShroudofAvatar Shroud of the Avatar Discord: https://discord.gg/GuBXakQ Are You a Livestreamer? Soon, the Streaming Reward Program will be returning. As the details are getting reworked, we’ll reveal more information. Traditional streaming rewards included an exclusive in-game Streamer Camera for being a veteran of our Streaming Program! Expect the camera reward to return! More goodies will come to your way as the program fully develops. Thank you for streaming Shroud of the Avatar! Lord of the Isle Episode 2 Bundles As one of the biggest and earliest supporters of Episode 2 you will be granted the largest lot deed in the land (Castle), the title Lord (or Lady) of the Isle, a tour of Lord British’s property, and dinner with the game leaders including Lord British himself! Only 24 of these unique bundles will be sold! Complete List of Rewards: Lord of the Isle Place Anywhere Castle Lot Deed: Tax Free Forever (when placed in a POT) and Tax Free for 1 Year (when placed outside of a POT). Placeable on water as well as land! Title: Lord of the Isle or Lady of the Isle Unique Lord of the Isle Home (pictured above) NEW – Town Size Upgrade (if a town is not owned by the LOTI supporter, they may gift this size upgrade to another town owner. Maximum possible town sizes will be taken into account, but the Megalopolis size just became available!) Choice of 1 House currently available in the store Castle Basement currently available in the store of your choice Castle Wall Set currently available in the store of your choice (with enough for Castle Lot) Unique Lord of the Isle Dungeon Room (To be revealed later) 140,000 Crowns 1000 Bank Slots Pick 12 Prosperity Tools Lord of the Isle Crown (In-Game Wearable Item) Unique In-Game Emote (To be revealed later) Early Access to Episode 2 Episode 1 Box and map signed by the team 1 hour one-on-one with Chris for design discussion (via video-conference) One real silver ring crafted personally by Lord British: Numbered 1 – 8 In-game version of the Lord British ring: Numbered 1 – 8 (including a place-able decoration version) Tour of Lord British’s property Fine dinner and drinks with Lord British, Darkstarr, and Atos at a location TBD in Austin or NYC. NOTE: Digital items that are currently available will begin delivery as soon as Release 62 (Jan 31, 2019). Other items will be delivered at a future date TBD. NOTE: Travel costs NOT covered by Catnip Games for Tour & Dinner. Upcoming Events Calendar Be sure to check out the Upcoming Events page for spotlighted events plus links to various areas to post or find events on our forums: 2020 Events Sep 24 – Release 82 Oct 29 – Release 83 Meretz: Win a Topiary Keep Dragon Statue (No Trade) Whether you move a little or a lot, as a Meretz user you rack up valuable Meretz Points (MPs). The more MPs you have, the more stuff you can buy! Think: in-game SotA goodies, Sweepstakes entries and tons more. With Meretz, we launch several sweepstakes every month. This month, we’re giving away a Topiary Keep Dragon Statue (No Trade) to two lucky winners! AND, use your MPs every day for in-game items like potions and emotes. What’re you waiting for? Download Meretz TODAY! Community Event: WRFB Dance Party at Autumn Rising Brewery WRFB presents a dance party at Autumn Rising Brewery with DJ Darkstarr! Location: Crossroads, Adventure Club’s Autumn Rising Brewery When: Saturday, August 5th, 12PM – 2PM CT Come out and sport some awesome dance moves, trade emotes and recipes, chat with friends, launch off fireworks and simply have a lot of fun! For more information, check out the main forum post on the official forums. If you’d like to learn how YOUR town can become a site for upcoming WRFB parties, please contact @Lazarus Long or @Jack SinAssist on the forums. Community Event: Rajazel Fishing Tournament! Avatars! LiJuan Zhang’s Player-Owned Town of Rajazel is hosting a saltwater fishing tournament! When: September 4th, 6PM CT to September 11th, Noon CT Where: Rajazel Rajazel is located right outside Soltown and fishing buff Devotionals are available! So grab your rods and tackle and head on over to Rajazel for some fantastic fishing and community fun! For more information, please see LiJuan Zhang’s main forum thread on this topic on the official forums. Community Event: TheAvatar.Express Needs You! If you’re looking for a great way to get involved in the Shroud of the Avatar community, then look no further! The fine folks at TheAvatar.Express are looking for some new reporters. Avatars wishing to help with the following are highly desired: Developer Stream Summaries Twitter Reposting In-Game Event Coverage Events Calendar Management New Features/Changes Tutorials Interviews Editorials Any other game stuff you want to cover! You can sign up at https://theavatar.express/be-a-reporter. If you have any questions, feel free to start a private conversation with that_shawn_guy on the forums or shawnbutts #4362 on Discord. For more information, please also visit the main forum thread on this topic on the official forums. Community Event: More Orations from Caverns.net Attention Avatars! The Shroud of the Avatar community is INCREDIBLY creative, and many community members have composed short stories, poems, and other creative works. Asclepius, along with a number of other narrators have had the privilege of rendering them into audio form. There is a huge vault of podcasts on the Caverns site with well over 200 amazing and creative contributions. Recent efforts from Asclepius have brought additional fan fiction orations into the library: Please take some time to listen to a story by Belladonna Rose which was masterfully orated by Asclepius, part 11 of the Black Rose Chronicles! Also, a new author and a new story have come to the library! We hope you enjoy A Not So Scary Short Story by Bee Striker! For more information about these reoccurring broadcasts on Avatar’s/Virtue Radio, please contact Asclepius on the official forums. Community Event: Happy Bridge Troll Day! In case you did not know yesterday, September 2nd was community member Bridge Troll’s birthday! This day has now been proclaimed as “Bridge Troll Day” by friends and companions of the birthday boy. To honor this day properly, an epic screenshot contest and giveaway has begun! For more information about this contest, please visit the main thread on this topic on the official forums. Project to Support: Shadow of Valhalla Shadow of Valhalla is a visceral physics-based VR combat game with dynamic RPG elements, set within an ancient realm of Viking lore and mystic powers! Early Access beta includes “endless horde mode” featuring a variety of enemies with progressive difficulty. Also, players can discover many magic spells to unlock! So much more is coming! Finn Staber with Chicken Waffle, will join the Shroud of the Avatar team on Twitch during their Friday the 28th livestream to showoff this new Early Access game! Also, here is a teaser video on YouTube:  The development team is working hard to create additional environments and new quests! Shadow of Valhalla is available on Steam as Early Access. Additional features coming to the game: More Enemies! More Environments! More Magic Spells! RPG Quests! Weapon Forging and Crafting! Much, much more! If you would like to learn more about Shadow of Valhalla, be sure to stop by the main webpage for the game as more news becomes available! Project to Support: Jar Wars While you are delving into Virtual Reality (VR), be sure to check out this exciting and hilarious new game, Jar Wars! Our very own Darkstarr has been busy on some side projects, one of which is Jar Wars, a slapstick multiplayer game made just for VR enthusiasts. Battle your friends with wacky weapons and intriguing gadgets for total domination of the Moon! Available for free on Steam! Project to Support: Dragon Fight Darkstarr has also been hard at work with the team for Dragon Fight VR which recently went live on Steam! Dragon Fight VR is an internal experiment to capture the “essence” of a dragon fight, the classic penultimate experience of every fantasy story. We wanted to create a short visceral, realistic experience stripped of user interface, lobbies, scores, levels, and other visual intrusions that might distract. There were some key elements of fighting a dragon that we wanted to capture and we felt VR was uniquely qualified to convey: Face to face with a large scale hostile creature trying to kill you Using a sword and a shield Fire! Nowhere to run! This started out as an internal experiment to learn some things about VR’s capabilities, be reductionist in our designs, etc. We felt that the experiment was successful enough to release as a free experience to share. Enjoy! Available for free on Steam! Project to Support: Crowfall Be part of shaping the next great MMO by becoming a Crowfall Backer! Crowfall is the first and only online Throne War game. You can win. Join intense PvP battles that demand strategy, survival and a fierce competitive spirit. Reap the spoils of war as an Eternal Champion! Claim virtual territory on behalf of your guild or faction. Capture mines, mills, and quarries to secure resources, build castles, and besiege your neighbors. Scavenge artifacts and relics from the Dying Worlds and install them in your temples to grant blessings to your vassals. Capture lost spirits to do your bidding — or bind them into your weapons to infuse them with sorcerous power! Project to Support: Avatar Express [Forum post by Vladamir Begemot] I’m pleased to report that The Avatar Express is clacking away furiously. News is being delivered and we have established systems to deliver it directly to your brain. You can use one of those systems by following us on Twitter at @avatar_express. Even more reliable due to its fully automated nature is joining us on the Discord server. News items are posted there via RSS. Or you can subscribe to RSS directly on the site. If you run an event, quests, etc, please consider helping out by self reporting. The Shroud community is big, and many things are happening that are never seen by others. With 10k monthly users, we would need a full time staff to track down everything that is happening. You can fill out the contributor form, message @that_shawn_guy here or post in the Discord server that you would like to help. There is no committment once signed up, you can post as much or little as you like. Writing up your own events has several benefits beyond the immidiate exposure. It serves as a record for others to see the history of New Britannia as we create it, in an attractive format. Publishing in the Express also has a higher chance than the forums of being seen by search engines and random readers, thus bringing more eyeballs and new players to the game. It will even make posting in the forums easier! You can upload images to your news item, and then link to those images in your forum post. No more need for 3rd party image hosts! So if you have something going on in your guild or town, or want to be a Reporter, Cartographer or Historian, please join us! Resources: Players Helping Players The official SotA New Player Welcome Forum and the Player Created Resources Forum have the best player created resources for Shroud of the Avatar, whether it’s a Player Written Guide, a Video Walk-through, or a Wiki-type Website. Visit the official Community Resources page for a complete listing of all things community. View the full article

Hello everyone, this is Asclepius, and I’m delighted to welcome a new author to the ranks. This is a piece by Bee Striker, entitled A Not So Scary Short Story Background music by Smartsound It started as a trickle as she walked under the awning to avoid the rain. As she extended her hand to touch the drops, a rough hand grabbed it, forcing her to swing around. A pale face with dark eyes met her surprised stare. Before she could respond, the man released her with a quick turn and walked off. The intense moment had gone straight through her entire body, and she felt something pull out of her…or in her. She couldn’t really tell. She shuddered. A quick look around made her realise nobody seemed to notice anything odd had just happened. Shaken, she headed home, quickly looked around, and locked her door. The unsettled feeling did not leave as she readied for bed. She felt silly as she double checked the lock on her door, the windows, every room, and even under her bed before she climbed into bed. She tried to calm herself but sleep would not come. “Please help me.” She sat up. What the hell was that? “Please…help…” The voice initially startled her but quickly grew faint. She flew out of bed and flicked on the light. She looked under the bed again, flung open her closet, and opened her bedroom door. She stared into the darkness in silence. Nothing. She didn’t know how long she stood in her bedroom doorway. A cool draft reminded here she was barefoot. After a quick glance around the dark house, she crawled back into bed. A man’s limp body lay with heavy chains anchoring his feet to the cement floor. A worn loincloth was his only covering. His damp hair stuck to his pale face. Each slight movement made him groan in pain. “help me..” He wasn’t sure if he actually voiced that or it was just in his head. He heard a door creak open and footsteps slowly descend the stairs. He turned away preparing himself for more pain. She woke up with a start, bewildered at what she just saw. The face of the man was eerily familiar. A quick image of the man who had grabbed her earlier flashed before her eyes. It was him! Why did she just have a vision of him? Was it real, or just a dream? It sent a chill through her to the core. The next morning she ran back to the awning where she first encountered the man. Eyes flitting back and forth, she saw no sign of him. Which direction had he gone when he walked away? She tried to think. Following what she thought was the direction, she headed down the street. At the end of the block she paused, not knowing which way to go. For no reason at all, she turned right, crossed the street, and headed down the sidewalk. The sidewalk started to decay as she continued walking. Something made her pause in front of a small lot. Weeds dominated the landscape, almost drowning out the small shack. Weeds scratched her legs as she approached the building. She listened for any indication of life as she slowly walked up to the door. The screen door was ripped and the shabby door was ajar. The door creaked as she slowly pushed it open. A sparse room gave her an apathetic greeting. The worn couch sat quietly next to an old coffee table. She felt the lone beer bottle resting on the table. It was warm. A groan made her alert to someone else in the house. She spun around towards the door. Nobody had entered behind her. Her ears almost perked up trying to listen. “Help me…” The helpless plea seemed to be calling from below. As she looked around the house, she noticed a small staircase around the corner. The stairs creaked as she cautiously descended. The dank room surrounded her as the aroma attacked her senses. She forced her eyes to adjust to the darkness. A man lay almost motionless on the floor. A chain anchored his ankles to the floor. A worn loincloth was his only covering. He was facing the opposite wall as she slowly approached. “Hello?” She saw his light skin shake slightly. As she turned him over and saw his pale face, she gasped. Echoes From the Caverns The post A Not So Scary Short Story – by Bee Striker – narrated by Asclepius appeared first on Echoes from the Caverns. View the full article

Hello everyone, this is Asclepius, with the next chapter of a wonderful story from Belladonna Rose, entitled Black Rose Chronicles Background music by Smartsound Trudging down the road back towards Farmer Filmore’s she could see all manner of creatures about. Bears, wolves, rabbits and squirrels. Crops growing in the farmer’s fields. Cotton. Strange. But that is probably how he makes his living. As she reached the entrance to the road that led to the farmer’s house some bandits made their way up the road….seeing her they turned and made way into the brush. Finding their comrades on the road…dead..they must of thought better than to approach her. Funny she thought. Halfway down the path she noticed fresh graves next to the tattered shack. The farmer must have gone inside and found Darwin and Quentin and decided to bury them. With that done she decided to leave the old man alone. With a turn of the heel she went on down the main path back to the bridge. As she got close to the bridge the lady guard stepped out and met her. Sadly, Bella handed her the note she found on Quentin’s body. The poor girl was distraught. After reading the missive she scribbled a message on a scrap piece of paper and handed it to Bella. “Please take this back to the Cap’n and tell her what you found. I will remain at my post as ordered. She need not fear that I will leave. It will be my duty to avenge my poor Quentin.” She slowly turned wiping the tears from her face and took her post near the bridge. Bella tucked the note in her vest and made her way back up the hill towards the camp. A few of the foolish bandits attacked her but she easily took care of them. This time she was going to check their pockets. A few coins and trinkets. She remembered something one guard said about returning heirlooms that the bandits had stolen. She would return these as well. The guards at the edge of the rope bridge were busy with a couple of those zombie things and immediately cleared the way so she could cross over. The camp was rather peaceful when she entered just before midday. Looking to the one side of the camp the children were playing around their small campfire. She approached and stood watching for a minute. One of them stopped and looked her way. “Ohhh. It be you. The Sword Breaker. What ya be wantin from us today? Here to spoil our fun some more?” Bella gave the child a scowling look and then walked closer to them. They all stopped their dancing and looked at her with a bit of fear in their eyes. “Nay I do not wish to spoil your entertainment. I just thought you might want this.” Holding the book up over their heads they all stared in disbelief. “Is that the Bloody Bones?” All the children ran towards Bella as she teased them with the book. She laughed as they jumped up and down trying to get the book. “Gimme that book Outlander. That is ours. We needs that book so we can sing the song right.” Bella looked down at them and scowled again. “You do know that Bloody Bones is not a fairy-tale don’t you? Bloody Bones is real. And each time you sing that song it brings that creature out searching for who is singing its song. “ The children looked at her with surprise. Then jumped up and down laughing and cheering. “She did it…she did it. The Outlander did it. She gots us the Bloody Bones.” It was obvious these children had no clue what they were doing. But that was none of her business one way or the other…..she tossed the book in the air and let them fight over it. Laughing over her shoulder as they scrambled about trying to hold onto the book she moved on towards the guard. The guard looked her up and down and smiled. “Thank you for giving them some glimmer of hope. They know not what they do but they just try to stay entertained best they can. Eventually we will get them to a town and have them looked after better.” Bella smiled at the guard and pulled out a small pouch and handed it to her. “I retrieved these from some fallen bandits on the road. I do hope you can return the items to their owners if they still live.” The guard looked into the pouch and she smiled. “Thank you Outlander for doing such a good deed. I will try my best to return them to their owners. By way what be your name.” Bella looked at the young guard and smiled…Belladonna Rose. Making her way through the camp she went straight to Captain Kinsey, handing her the note from Rhoswen about Quentin and the bottle of medicine from Ackerley. She proceeded to tell the Captain about the Ebon Cultists and that she had dispatched them from their ritual. She told her about the woman that appeared and disappeared at each ritual site. “Damn. Then its true. Mistress Valdis is trying to come back to this side of the realm.” She shook her head and explained that this creature was once very powerful and has been using the Ebon Cultists to make her way back to this side. The side of the living so she can try and take over the unrest of the lands. Bella looked at the Captain like she had lost her mind. What kind of sorcery is all this ? This realm has completely gone crazy. All this undead and such. Now master sorcery at work as well. Shaking her head she decided that she was no better off here than she was back in her world. Evil is just that…Evil. Captain Kinsey pulled a rolled parchment off her makeshift desk and handed it to Bella. Along with a rolled-up banner and pouch of coin. “Its not much but you have truly showed your worth since you came here. I apologize it ís not much but we have very little as it is. Please take this parchment to Captain Stanley at Soltown and see if you can be of service there. They are in need of help with all the migrating villagers from around this area. The undead and bandits are razing all the small towns so many are moving towards Ardoris. Soltown is where many have landed.” Bella took what was given her and looked at the rolled-up banner. “ That is the Banner of Love my dear Belladonna Rose. You have shown great love and compassion for us and these poor folks who have lost so much. I have a strong feeling you will do great things for our lands and help bring peace and Love back to our people. Take it. It will be better off in your hands than here in mine. Go now and safe travels Future Avatar.” The sound in Kinsey’s voice was that of courage and devotion to her task. And she would take the banner and put it in a safe place til she could later retrieve it. Looking around one last time at the camp she headed towards the gates. Back to Soltown is it then. Echoes From the Caverns The post Black Rose Chronicles 11 – by Belladonna Rose – narrated by Asclepius appeared first on Echoes from the Caverns. View the full article

We will be setting off fireworks on Novia to celebrate the year 600PC!! Join us on Novia near Central Brittany for a Fireworks display that will start at about 6:45pm CT and run until at least until the stroke of Midnight in game (7:00pm CT) It's been a rough year for all, come celebrate a new beginning! View the full article

Greetings Fellow Avatars! This week’s update brings players of Shroud of the Avatar a new town scene for Episode 2 Access holders! Tanglemire is located on the new continent of Mistrendur! Four new species of lava fish have been added, and many more lava fishing locations have also been added! Additionally, a sneak peek on the upcoming rideable mounts has been revealed, and building blocks now have a much more flexible behavior as decorations! For those wishing to participate... Avatar’s Update #396: Play Release 81 Now! New Town Scene: Tanglemire! Guest Speaker Livestream!View the full article

Greetings Fellow Avatars! This week’s update brings players of Shroud of the Avatar a new town scene for Episode 2 Access holders! Tanglemire is located on the new continent of Mistrendur! Four new species of lava fish have been added, and many more lava fishing locations have also been added! Additionally, a sneak peek on the upcoming rideable mounts has been revealed, and building blocks now have a much more flexible behavior as decorations! For those wishing to participate in any community activities, upcoming one-time and recurring community events have been announced! Be sure to also review the Players Guide and Known Issues list for additional information on recent changes and upcoming fixes. Now, let’s see what we have for you in this week’s edition of Update of the Avatar: News Announcements New Town Scene: Tanglemire! Guest Speaker Friday Livestream! Four New Species of Lava Fish! Rideable Mounts Sneak Peek! Flexible Building Block Placement! Screenshot & Video Contest! Crowns, Deed Upgrades, & Two-Hour Flash Sales! September Login Reward: Dyeable Fishing Rod! R81 Reward Program Login Items: Lord British & Farming Items! The Bug Brigade Rides Again! New Vault Round! Latest Store Additions: Leather Flame Armor Set, 6 Building Block 110-Packs & More! World & UI Changes Crafting & Economy Changes Combat Balance & Changes Updated Player-Owned Towns Bug Fixes Recent Shroud of the Avatar Livestreams Streaming Reward Program Lord of the Isle Episode 2 Bundles Upcoming Events Calendar Community Updates Meretz: Win a Topiary Keep Dragon Statue (No Trade) Community Event: Catnip Games Weekly Fishing Tourney Community Event: WRFB Dance Party at Autumn Rising Brewery Community Event: 2nd Annual Team Fishing Contest! Community Event: Show Your Stats, Win Your Stacks Raffle Community Event: Mad Splatter Tea Party Project to Support: Shadow of Valhalla Project to Support: Jar Wars Project to Support: Dragonfight Project to Support: Crowfall Project to Support: Avatar Express Resources: Players Helping Players New Town Scene: Tanglemire! Tanglemire is now available to Episode 2 Access holders! Inhabited by a deeply superstitious Norgardian-style populace, the people of Tanglemire protect their borders with Spirit Warders that impede the incursion of creatures from Spindelskog. The shadow-like beasts from within that nearby darkened wood infect their weary minds with crippling dread. The people of Tanglemire are ruled by a group of “elders” struggling to preserve their village, but how long can they delay the inevitable demise of their beleaguered settlement? What aid might an Avatar bring to a people so burdened by doubt and fear? “Life is a never-ending struggle for Tanglemire, a fading outpost in the north of Mistrendur virtually abandoned by the Norgard Empire. Surrounded by freezing cold, deadly swamps, and a haunted wood, it’s no wonder that the desperate locals have turned to unusual means for protection. But how long will their decaying “spirit warders” keep them safe from the untold horrors that threaten these peaceful people?” The outskirts of Tanglemire, in similar fashion to Valhold, features a variety of enemies to defeat and challenges to overcome. Much of the Tanglemire content will ultimately land somewhere in the middle of the Mistrendur storyline, but for this initial release, Tanglemire features two repeatable quests. Additional quests will be added as more Episode 2 content is released in the time ahead. Guest Speaker Friday Livestream! Another weekly Community Livestream is this Friday, August 28th at 4PM CT on Twitch! Join Chris “Atos” Spears and other development team members for a community 1 hour livestream! This week, we have a special guest! Finn Staber will be speaking about Shadow of Valhalla, a new project to support! To enter the prize drawings, type “wishing I was fishing” into any in-game chat channel OR make a purchase on the website add-on store. Please submit questions into Twitch Chat by inserting !question at the beginning of your text. Watch on Twitch, Friday at 4 PM CT! Four New Species of Lava Fish! Brave lava anglers throughout the lands have discovered four entirely new species of lava fish swimming deep within the molten hot magma pools of New Britannia! Will you dare to cast your lines into the lava, Avatars? These beasts are enormous! So be sure not to be pulled into the scorching lava. Once caught, take these denizens of depths to your crafting table and create display trophies to marvel all of your visitors and friends. The following trophies and recipes are now available: Plesiosaurus (Ground and Hanging Versions) Ichthyosaurus Coelacanth Trilobite But that is not all, anglers! You can scour the lands for additional fishable magma flows, thanks to many more containing lava fish! Some scenes received more expansive lava fishing spots, but other scenes were added as entirely new lava fishing locations. Be sure to have a lava fishing pole equipped and gemmed lures on your hot bars, for these gigantic creatures will only nibble upon gem stones! Here’s a list of all the lava fishing locations now available: Blackblade Foothills Blackblade Passage Bunker C Etceter Crag Mines K’rawl K’rul Northwest Blackblade Mountains Oracle Colossus Quel Passage Spectral Mines Sunless Barrens Verdantis Mines Rideable Mounts Sneak Peek! It’s been some time since Avatars have returned to New Britannia, and with their arrival came otherworldly tales of men and women riding upon beasts. The peoples of New Britannia have taken these tales to heart and have labored tirelessly to discover the art of riding for themselves. As you can see from this sneak peek video, their labors were fruitful! Soon, all players of Shroud of the Avatar will be able to dash across the lands upon rideable mounts. More news about the upcoming mount system and many other exciting new features are just around the corner! Flexible Building Block Placement! Builders of New Britannia, prepare to stack your building blocks like you’ve never stacked them before! As of Release 81, every piece of every building block set allows for much more flexible placement while decorating. In the image above, you can see that blocks now allow for a very significant amount of overhang. Also, larger blocks can now be placed on top of smaller blocks. With these changes as well as the recent scaling update allowing blocks to scale from sizes 0.5 to 1.3, builders will have a much wider variety of capabilities at their disposal. Happy block stacking, Avatars! Of note, there were some slight design aberrations with the particular blocks shown in the above picture. The original versions of these blocks flipped along a different axis than their counterparts in other block sets. All Crown Store entries now sell updated replacement blocks, but any player who’s purchased any of the affected block sets in the past 3 months will receive replacement blocks (applicable pieces listed below) sent to them via the in-game mail system in the coming weeks ahead. The blocks affected were as follows: Players who’ve purchased the new block sets (Polished Wood, Iron, Fallow Granite, Polished Granite, Black Marble, White Marble) would have received 15 of the 2x1x1 blocks. They will receive an additional 15 1x1x2 blocks via in-game mail. Players who’ve purchased the Black Ice and Ice block sets would have received 20 of the 2x1x2 blocks. They will receive an additional 20 2x2x1 blocks via in-game mail. If players already have the 1x1x2 blocks or the 2x2x1 blocks within these block sets, those are the newer versions so they’re good to go! Deliveries of blocks will begin sometime in the coming week, so please be patient as we work through the deliveries. Screenshot/Video Contest! With the holidays quickly approaching, it’s time for all New Britannians to partake in the festivities! Labor Day is right around the corner and within the game world, the in-game calendar is about to hit 600 P.C. for a new year and new century! To celebrate, it’s time for a screenshot/video contest! Theme: Fireworks show! All screenshots and videos for this contest must be of a choreographed fireworks show launched from the Overworld map or from in-game towns and adventure scenes. Get your guild/team together to compete in this world wide fireworks competition! Screenshot Requirements: Resolution: Minimum of 1920×1080, and always in 16:9 aspect ratio (cropping allowed). Quality: Use in-game settings to their maximum, no post-screenshot alterations allowed other than labels, overlays, or watermarks to promote your guild/team. Overlay holiday messages are also allowed. Time of Day: Nighttime shows only, no night vision please. Hide the UI: Please toggle off the UI using the default key F9. Video Requirements: Resolution: Minimum of 720p. Quality: Use in-game settings to their maximum, no post-screenshot alterations allowed other than labels, overlays, or watermarks to promote your guild/team. Overlay holiday messages are also allowed. Time of Day: Nighttime shows only, no night vision please. Hide the UI: Please toggle off the UI using the default key F9. Duration: 30 seconds minimum, 60 seconds maximum. Anything occurring after the 60 second mark will not be considered for judging. Guild/Team Requirements: Captain: Each guild/team must select a team captain. 12 Players Max per Team: Each team, to include the team captain, can have a maximum of 12 players. Submission Requirements: # of Entries Per Team: 1 screenshot and 1 video entry per guild/team maximum. Submission Location: Submissions must be placed as a reply into the main thread for this contest on the official forums by the guild/team captain. Post in Forums: In the submission post, the guild/team captain must post the screenshot as a viewable image and/or the embedded video. Participant List: The captain must list out all participants of their team (max of 12 players) in their submission post. The participant list must include the proper spelling of each character. If proper spelling and character names are not provided, prize delivery will be negatively affected. Deadline: All submissions must be posted by 6AM CT on Monday September 21st. OPTIONAL: Please post these on our Twitter and/or Facebook pages to help spread the word about the contest. Best Screenshot Prizes: 1st Place: 10,000 Crowns (delivered to team captain), Title: Master Artist (delivered to all team members). 2nd Place: 5000 Crowns (delivered to team captain), Title: Master Artist (delivered to all team members). 3rd Place: 2500 Crowns (delivered to team captain), Title: Master Artist (delivered to all team members). Best Video Prizes: 1st Place: 10,000 Crowns (delivered to team captain), Title: Master Artist (delivered to all team members). 2nd Place: 5000 Crowns (delivered to team captain), Title: Master Artist (delivered to all team members). 3rd Place: 2500 Crowns (delivered to team captain), Title: Master Artist (delivered to all team members). Prize Rules: Crowns will be delivered to team captain only. The team captain will determine how to split the Crowns amongst their team. Please ensure your team member list has accurate spellings of character names, or titles cannot be delivered. Each team can win once in the screenshot and once in the video categories. Players can only represent a single team. The Catnip Games team members will pick the winners based on aesthetic and creative qualities of the screenshots and videos. Winners will be announced during the community livestream 1 to 2 weeks after the contest’s deadline! Good luck, Avatars! Crowns, Deed Upgrades, & Two-Hour Flash Sales! In celebration of Labor Day as well as the 600 P.C. in-game calendar event, various sales will begin on Friday and extend throughout the holiday. Crowns will be on sale for 20% off. Deed Upgrades will also be 20% off! To upgrade a deed, place the deed into your inventory, then right-click the deed to reveal upgrade options. But that’s not all! Two-Hour Flash Sales will also commence on Friday morning! So watch your clocks, Avatars! A new batch of 9 sale items will rotate into the in-game Crown Store every 2 hours! Players have until Monday, September 7th at 1PM CT to take advantage of these great discounts, at which time all 3 sales events expire. Happy shopping, Avatars! September Login Reward: Dyeable Fishing Rod! Anglers rejoice! September’s login reward is an indestructible dyeable fishing rod! Featuring both primary and secondary dye layers, anglers will really be able to show off their style whilst casting a line into the waters of New Britannia! Simply log in during the month of September, and this dyeable fishing rod will become available in the Rewards Window. Release 81 Reward Program Login Reward Items: Lord British & Farming Items! Avatars! Rewards Program login reward items for Release 81 are Lord British and farming themed! Reward Program members must login during Release 81 to receive these login items: Lord British Plate Leggings Large Haystack Small Haystack Strawbox Box Hay Bale 5-Pack Hay Pile Hay Drying Rack Hay Cart The Shroud of the Avatar Rewards Program lets you earn the best rate on purchasing Crowns, AND receive monthly reward items! For the low price of $9 USD per month you will receive the following: 900 Crowns of the Obsidians every month Monthly Login Reward Items (~ 3 per month) Exclusive Title every 3 months 3 Months: Keeper of the Faith 6 Months: Keeper of the Word 9 Months: Keeper of the Vow 12 Months: Keeper of the Flame 15 Months: Keeper of the Oath 18 Months: Keeper of the Pledge Pick any Dye 12-Pack every 6 months Pick any three of the 7 Obsidian Potions every month, including: Potion of Capacity: Increases carrying capacity Potion of Conservation: Reduces reagent use chance Potion of Expedience: Swift gathering on all gathering skills Potion of Precision: Increases Meticulous Collection to all gathering skills Potion of Preservation: Reduces armor and weapon damage Potion of Reclamation: Increases Salvage and Repair to all production skills The Bug Brigade Rides Again! The Bug Brigade was established to assist the community and the development team to work together to improve the game. Since then the program has gone through a number of changes and was eventually placed on hold. The stability of the game is as important to the development team as it is to the player-base, and for that reason the program has been revamped and is being relaunched. The program is now open to all players in good standing and bug rewards are back! They will awarded be on a progression basis monthly with only a minimal requirement to be filled to qualify. We are bringing the bug forums current and will make every effort to have triage and intake for each validated bug. To assist in doing this we have asked Alley Oop, Justyn, and Tazar to take on a moderator role within the bug and feedback forums. Please congratulate them the next time you see them in the game or on the forums! The Bug Brigade will be open to all. If you feel the game is your home, sign up and assist us in making it a better place to live! To sign up, read the post “Bug Brigade Rides Again!” in the main Bug/Feedback forums for both the Live or Player Test areas in the official forums. If you have trouble finding them, please ask a Hospitaller, or one of the Moderators via PM in the forums or in Discord. New Vault Round! Vintage Blue Velvet with Nailheads Furniture Set Oracle Cloak Aether Two-Handed Mace Tansu Chest Ornate Elven Longbow Pattern Pack Ornate Elven Wardrobe Shogun Four-Story Town Home Viking Brynhildr Shield Elven Mage Outfit Latest Store Additions: Leather Flame Armor Set, 6 Building Block 110-Packs & More! For those wanting a more rustic version of the Virtue Flame Armor Set, the Leather Flame Armor Set is now available! Strike fear into the hearts of your enemies whilst wearing these dauntingly wicked leather armor pieces! Seven new building block sets have been added to your arsenal of construction materials! These new blocks come in the same 110-packs and size variants as the previous block sets. The new AND old sets can now be placed as Player-Owned Town decoration. All block sets can now scale from .5 to 1.3! New Block Letters and Numbers Sets have arrived! These sets have primary and secondary dye layers and can scale from .5 to 2.0! Additional items recently added to the store are the new Player-Owned Town Property Markers Set and the Player-Owned Town Wagons, Boats, Balloons Hatches and Signposts! Leather Flame Armor Set White Marble Building Blocks 110-Pack Black Marble Building Blocks 110-Pack Polished Granite Building Blocks 110-Pack Fallow Granite Building Blocks 110-Pack Polished Wood Building Blocks 110-Pack Iron Building Blocks 110-Pack Block Letters Set A-Z (Dyable, 5 Punctuation Types Included) Block Numbers Set 0-9 (Dyable) Player-Owned Town Property Markers Set Player-Owned Town Wagon (Dyable) Player-Owned Town Boat (Dyable) Player-Owned Town Balloon (Dyable) Player-Owned Town Hatch (Dyable) Player-Owned Town Signpost (Dyable) Also, we’re scouring the realm for items that have long been missing from the store. Many items are being loaded into the Vault and will rotate in periodically which are announced each week as they go live, but here’s a small number of additional items becoming permanently available on the Crown Store: Glowing Jewel Cube 3-Packs (Blue, Green, Orange, Purple, Red, Yellow) Display Camera World & Miscellaneous Changes These miscellaneous updates affecting the game world or aspects of the user interface (UI) patched in during R80, will go live with R81, or will go live shortly after R81: Offline Mode Episode 2 Access: EP2 Access is now always enabled in offline mode. Overworld Skill/Rune Functionality: A new developer tool has been created to allow for easy adjustment of what abilities/items can and cannot be used on the Overworld. Fireworks: All varieties of fireworks can be used on the Overworld. Anthem of Alacrity: This bard skill can now be used on the Overworld. Food: Food can now be consumed on the Overworld. Vanity Pets: These zippy little critters can now follow you around on the Overworld. Mistrendur: Wave effects have been added along the shorelines of Mistrendur on the Overworld map. Lava and Pets: Lava is now less dangerous for pets. Myrkur and Despair: These two dungeons have received a resurrection ankh by the spider area. Opalis Ruins: Ransom has been removed from this PvP scene. Spectral Mines: The hint that the Archlapin is hibernating now only appears when on a related quest, not if the “bones” quest is ended, and only once a day (thanks to a new “hint” daily flag). Plains Road Encounter: The Pumpkin Head encounter will once again appear in Drachvald. First Person on Overworld: Players can now view the Overworld in first person mode if they type the command /allowfirstpersonoverworld into chat. Underworld Passages: The following underworld passages have received increased resource spawns, random mimic or loot chests, as well as various collision fixes… Equitas Passage Quel Passage Paladis Passage Spindrift Passage Midmaer Passage Titles: The following titles are now available as prizes to players for upcoming developer community events… Master of the Arts: For winners of Screenshot and Video Contests. Master Angler: For winners of Fishing Contests. Master Decorator: For winners of Decoration Contests. Bone Collector: For winners of PvP Player Trophy Gathering Contests. Master of Collections: For winners of PvP Collections Contests. King of the Mountain, Queen of the Mountain: For winners of PvP King of the Mountain Contests. Master of the Maze: For winners of PvP Maze Contests. Master of Mayhem: For winners of Open-World PvP Contests. Trophy Fish Logging: Developers now have the ability to view logged information about fishing. Fish Size, Location Caught, Fish Type, and the Angler can all be determined through data pulls. This logging type will greatly assist use in more efficient developer-run fishing contests. Expect changes to the weekly fishing contest to be announced in the coming weeks. After the announcement and contest changes, players will no longer need to mail in their fish to compete. (Please continue to mail in your fish for the currently active contest.) As more trophy types become available, expect more exciting contests to come your way! Crafting, Items & Economy Changes These changes to the player economy, in-game items, or crafting patched in during R80, will go live with R81, or will go live shortly after R81: Property Deeds: Property deeds on the Crown Store have received a permanent 30% price reduction. Deed Upgrades: Deed upgrades have received a permanent 20% price reduction. Vault: Approximately 50 vault items which rotate into the store randomly have received significant price reductions. This mostly affects homes, pets, and some gear sets. Epic Rings: These rings are now enchantable. Epic Bandit Chest: This chest piece is now enchantable. Obsidian Plate Armor: This armor set, which can only be forged in Hilt at the Obsidian Forge, has received a significant power increase. Epic Artifacts: Almost all artifacts now have an epic version available. Only 2 Legendary Artifacts are required to craft Epic Artifacts. Books of Unlearning: Store descriptions have been improved to better describe their functionality. Building Block Sets: All building blocks can now be scaled from .5 to 1.3 and provided uniform values and weights. Shadow Creatures: These beasts now drop 4X more Shadow Essences and have received other small loot increases. Rough Wood Blocks: This new block set is now in-game and has recipes available. Letters and Numbers Sets: All letters and numbers sets can now be fully rotated. Mannequins: These wondrous display items can now be placed upon other surfaces such as blocks and tables. They can also now be scaled from 0.8 to 1.2. Moondials: All normal-sized moondials can now be placed onto other surfaces such as blocks and tables. Carnival Masks: The following items can now be placed as interior and exterior wall decorations as well as POT decorations… Plain Carnival Mask Virtue Dark Lepus Mask Virtue Silver Jester Mask Masquerade Mask White Lepus Mask Jester Carnival Mask White Butterfly Mask Black Butterfly Mask Butterfly Mask 2017 Lepus Mask 2018 Lepus Mask Autumn Leaf Mask Silver & Gold Lepus Mask Assassin’s Blade Hammer of Breaking Mace of the Undone Shard of Night Autumn Leaf Shield Autumn Leaf Trident Thorn Mace Thorn Wand Thorn Staff Electric Staff Decorative Egg Style D: This egg can now be placed in areas besides basements. Developer Community Event Trophies: The various fishing, decoration, and PvP trophies can no longer be stacked. This change was to ensure players do not stack like trophies which would erase the custom name applied to the item. Stacking Streetlamps: The following streetlamps now stack in a player’s inventory… Fancy Blue Streetlamp Fancy Red Streetlamp Fancy Yellow Streetlamp Streetlamps in Dungeons: The following streetlamps can now be placed in a player dungeon… Fancy Blue Streetlamp Fancy Red Streetlamp Fancy Yellow Streetlamp Kobold Spiked Streetlamp Ornate Elven Streetlamp Ornate Iron Streetlamp Ornate Wooden Streetlamp Shogun Streetlamp Stone Streetlamp POT Decorations: The following items can now be placed as POT decoration… Glowing Mugs (9 Items) Torture Devices (4 Items) Obsidian Altar Misc Armor/Gear (~50 Items) Glowing Cube Jewels: All variants of the glowing cube jewels can now be placed as POT decoration, exterior and interior wall placement, and resized from .5 to 2.0. Combat Balance & Changes These changes to combat skills or concepts patched in during R80, will go live with R81, or will go live shortly after R81: Stance Updates: Stance durations have been significantly increased. Elixir Skills: Elixir skills have been added to the master focus and tactics trainers. Only one can actively be trained. Training one sets the other to unlearn. Damage Resistance: This protective stat now scales with damage and Heavy Armor Specialization now improves how much it scales. Slow Effects: Skills with slow effects were enhanced to have a greater effect upon high level creatures. Skills affected are Disabling Shot as well as ice spell type effects. Shooting Star: A new single target, high focus, Moon Magic spell which has a short cast time, long cool-down, and very high damage. Ignite Weapon: This spell now also applies a small fire resistance debuff upon the target when they are hit by the ignited weapon. Reveal Hidden: This spell now reveals hidden objects every 2 seconds for 10-30+ seconds depending upon skill level. Also, the range for this spell has been significantly increased. Cocoon of Night: This Moon Magic spell now has a doubled healing effect and also now includes a large agro reduction. Sacrifice Combo: This combo (Healing Ray + Death Ray) now drains 50% of the caster’s health but applies 50-90% of the target’s health onto the target. Crafted Armor: Leather, chain and plate crafted armor pieces have received a damage resistance increase. Half torso pieces now have the same stats as full torso pieces. Plate pieces also receive additional damage avoidance. Armor Set Bonuses: Set bonuses for armor are now 2%, 5%, 9%, 14% and 20% based on the number of pieces equipped. Formerly, they were 2.5%, 5%, 7.5%, 10%, 12.5%. Updated Player Owned Towns These updates affected Player Owned Towns which patched in during R80, will go live with R81, or will go live shortly after R81: Allaman: Added new interconnections. Alphaine’s Academia: Added new Holdfast to Novia, west of the Blackblade Mountains. Arlia: Upgraded to Village from Hamlet. Bodega of Blood: Changed biome to Swamp Island 01 and moved to the southeastern edge of Mistrendur. Castle Barataria: Renamed from Ishum, moved to south of Owl’s Head in Hidden Vale, and changed biome to Swamp 01. Dragon’s Hollow: Moved to Novia, east of Brittany. Inselberg Wastes: Changed owner. Magincia: Moved to Novia east of Desolis and changed biome. Mysteria: Added new City island east of Brittany. New Britannia Swap Meet: Added interconnections. New Fawn: Moved to Novia west of Noreach and updated interconnections. Novia Market: Changed owner. Port Royal: Moved to Mistrendur from Hidden Vale and added interconnections. Rajazel: Added new Hamlet west of Soltown in Novia. Salem: Renamed from Goober’s Gas Station and changed biome to Forest 01c. Serpent’s Hold: POT Serpent’s Hold: Added new Hamlet north of Fortus End. Tower of Xee: Changed biome to Mountain 01 and moved to mainland Mistrendur. Treasure Island: Added new island northeast of Brittany in Novia. Valor: Upgraded to Town and added interconnections. Wakoku: Changed biome to Grassland 01a. Bug Fixes Albeit many bug fixes patched in during R80, will go live with R81, or will go live shortly after R81. Here are some of the highlights! Duration bonuses were fixed for all potions when new Elixir skills are applied. Multi-item dragging issues have been fixed. Fixed missing images for Block Numbers Set on the Crown Store. Fixed hex coordinates issue for the Player-Owned Town Rajazel. The banner for Spindelskog now indicates “Normal” difficulty to match the Enter button. Fixed an issue with the new rowboat list teleporter that connects Noreach with Mud and Dysborg. Added fixes to Timothy the Enchanter’s conversation in Ardoris for a typo, logic, and name-remembering. Fixed an issue where Helen and Owen misremembered players’ names when they first asked for those names in Brittany Graveyard. Fixed an issue for all island POTs with signposts teleporters that weren’t adding all secondary docks to the selection list. Fixed leaderboards issues caused by players receiving name changes. Pet foals can now be placed in the upscale stable. Fixed a small exploit in regards to the new Elixir skill training. Now, only 1 can be trained as intended. Elixir Extension skill now works correctly. If players have multiple stacks of the same consumable in their inventory, the stack that is used will now receive the reduction in quantity. Fixed an issue with Saddle Bag decorations where they could not be placed back into a player’s inventory. Fixed an exploit allowing non-Episode 2 access holders to enter Episode 2 areas. New You and initial character creation hair colors are no longer washed out by a bright light and will more closely resemble final character hair colors. Some female emotes would play 2 times per command. This issue has been fixed. Filmore of Solace Bridge Outskirts now properly indicates he wants 4 pieces of cotton. Improvements were made to Ulfheim cliff/platform collision. Improvements were made to Graff Gem Mines stairs collision. Moving lines graphical aberration witnessed in some scenes has been fixed. Aerie’s northern rockface has received improvements and fixes. Ulfheim’s teleporter in the “church” no longer clips through the floor. “Second Memory of Three” task is Solace Bridge Outskirts has received a typo fix. Rayond in Soltown now spends much less time in his tent and his off-duty dialogue has been removed. POT fishing merchants no longer mention the type of nearby water in their dialogue since governors can alter their water types now. An unreachable barrel in Elysium Mines can now be accessed. Fixed collision issues in Spectral Mines near where the Archlapin and its minions spawn. An unreachable maple tree in Lamech’s Bazaar and North Midmaer Way is now accessible. The monoliths in Far Hinterlands no longer display the names of towns when players mouseover them. Improvements have been made to the New You NPC conversations to better explain the transaction process. Players can no longer decorate with equipped tools. The tool must be unequipped first, then used for decoration. Stuck spot in Spindelskog is no longer sticky. Floating bricks have been removed from Blood Bay. Players can no longer activate the New You transaction in Ardoris by clicking on the mirror. They must speak with Bruno. Crafting explanation in the information window accessible at crafting stations has been improved. Housing explanation in the information window accessible at the property marker has been improved. Players will no longer know Vlasta’s name in Desolis if their quests have been reset. Preview of store items with fire VFX no longer show inappropriately scaled flames. The Silver Mini Automaton now properly indicates that it is an Inky NPC in its Crown Store description. The book “Concave of Celestis” is now correctly spelled “Conclave of Celestis.” The book “Formorian Wars” is now correctly spelled “Fomorian Wars.” 89 additional books can now be flipped onto their side: The Alchemist Ancient Experimental Logbook 1 Ancient Experimental Logbook 2 Ancient Experimental Logbook 3 Ardoris – A Tour Guide Ardoris Salon Register Ardoris Sewers – A Tour Guide Beast in the Cave Beast of Averoigne A Boiled Seed Cannot Sprout Book of Mighty Weapons Brightbone Pass – A Tour Guide The Broken Horse Castle Irvine – Lord Fearghas Castle Irvine – Lord Neachdainn Castle Irvine – Lord Solas Castle Irvine – royal Lineage Cave Fables I Cave Fables II Cave Fables III Cave Fables IV The Chains of False Belief The Courageous Mother Cruciatos Strides Death and the Woman The Dirae Prophecy Donec Imperdiet Don’t Give Up Your Goodness Everyone Needs Courage The Fearful Rabbit Flynn LEclot’s Journal For the Best Grandma kellen’s recipes Greyacre – a tour guide Grim Anthology vol. I Grim Anthology vol. II Grim Anthology vol. III Grim Anthology vol. IV Grim Anthology vol. V A Handwritten Journal A History of Lord Anapa House of the Past Hymn of the Final Conquest Hymn to Orta Kindness in Giving Creates Love Lifted by Your Wings Lighthouses and You The lion tattoo The Monkey and the Dolphin The Most beautiful Heart The Mouse and the Camel My Suffering Nameless City Necropolis – A Tour Guide North Celestial Swamp – A Tour Guide On the Following the New Order On the Nature of Orta On the Peculiar Qualities of the Artifacts Wielded by the Titans of Novia Orta’s Blinding light Paen to Lord Visayon Panther Partition of Virtuous Pretense Places to Live Player Events Register of the Lottery of Artifice Rendezvous with Death Report from “R.K.” Savrenoc Stronghold – A Tour Guide Savrenoc Timberland – A Tour Guide Solace Forest – A Tour Guide Solania – A Tour Guide Spectral Mine – A Tour Guide A Study of the Dire Prophecies III Through the Lunar Rift I Through the Lunar Rift II Through the Lunar Rift III Through the Lunar Rift IV Through the Lunar Rift V Through the Lunar Rift VI Tome of Death Tome of Friendship Tome of Greatness Tower of the Shuttered Eye – A Tour Guide Truth is Rewarded Vengeance – A Tour Guide Verdantis Shardfall – A Tour Guide The Village Street The Wolf and the Seven Kids Writing a book Various books that displayed as notes when read now properly display as books. Plains Road Encounter has received creature and pilgrim pathing improvements. Soltown’s Nyssa and Emily have new schedules and will be more easily available. Off-duty conversation responses have been removed. Recent Shroud of the Avatar Livestreams Atos and other members of the Shroud of the Avatar development team go live very frequently on our TWO Twitch Channels: twitch.tv/shroudoftheavatar and twitch.tv/communityoftheavatar — be sure to get these channels on follow and get the latest information right as we go live! Also, if you’ve missed our latest streams, check out our archive of content at our YouTube Channel (complete with “Mojito the dog” cam). Like! Follow! Subscribe! Prizes!!! Don’t forget to also join the Shroud of the Avatar team and community over at our other social media venues: Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/ShroudoftheAvatar/ Catnip Games Twitter: https://twitter.com/catnipgames Shroud of the Avatar Twitter: https://twitter.com/ShroudofAvatar Shroud of the Avatar Discord: https://discord.gg/GuBXakQ Are You a Livestreamer? Soon, the Streaming Reward Program will be returning. As the details are getting reworked, we’ll reveal more information. Traditional streaming rewards included an exclusive in-game Streamer Camera for being a veteran of our Streaming Program! Expect the camera reward to return! More goodies will come to your way as the program fully develops. Thank you for streaming Shroud of the Avatar! Lord of the Isle Episode 2 Bundles As one of the biggest and earliest supporters of Episode 2 you will be granted the largest lot deed in the land (Castle), the title Lord (or Lady) of the Isle, a tour of Lord British’s property, and dinner with the game leaders including Lord British himself! Only 24 of these unique bundles will be sold! Complete List of Rewards: Lord of the Isle Place Anywhere Castle Lot Deed: Tax Free Forever (when placed in a POT) and Tax Free for 1 Year (when placed outside of a POT). Placeable on water as well as land! Title: Lord of the Isle or Lady of the Isle Unique Lord of the Isle Home (pictured above) NEW – Town Size Upgrade (if a town is not owned by the LOTI supporter, they may gift this size upgrade to another town owner. Maximum possible town sizes will be taken into account, but the Megalopolis size just became available!) Choice of 1 House currently available in the store Castle Basement currently available in the store of your choice Castle Wall Set currently available in the store of your choice (with enough for Castle Lot) Unique Lord of the Isle Dungeon Room (To be revealed later) 140,000 Crowns 1000 Bank Slots Pick 12 Prosperity Tools Lord of the Isle Crown (In-Game Wearable Item) Unique In-Game Emote (To be revealed later) Early Access to Episode 2 Episode 1 Box and map signed by the team 1 hour one-on-one with Chris for design discussion (via video-conference) One real silver ring crafted personally by Lord British: Numbered 1 – 8 In-game version of the Lord British ring: Numbered 1 – 8 (including a place-able decoration version) Tour of Lord British’s property Fine dinner and drinks with Lord British, Darkstarr, and Atos at a location TBD in Austin or NYC. NOTE: Digital items that are currently available will begin delivery as soon as Release 62 (Jan 31, 2019). Other items will be delivered at a future date TBD. NOTE: Travel costs NOT covered by Catnip Games for Tour & Dinner. Upcoming Events Calendar Be sure to check out the Upcoming Events page for spotlighted events plus links to various areas to post or find events on our forums: 2020 Events Aug 27 – Release 81 Sep 24 – Release 82 Oct 29 – Release 83 Meretz: Win a Topiary Keep Dragon Statue (No Trade) Whether you move a little or a lot, as a Meretz user you rack up valuable Meretz Points (MPs). The more MPs you have, the more stuff you can buy! Think: in-game SotA goodies, Sweepstakes entries and tons more. With Meretz, we launch several sweepstakes every month. This month, we’re giving away a Topiary Keep Dragon Statue (No Trade) to two lucky winners! AND, use your MPs every day for in-game items like potions and emotes. What’re you waiting for? Download Meretz TODAY! Community Event: Catnip Games Weekly Fishing Tourney For the Anglers of New Britannia, a weekly developer run fishing event has arrived! These weekly tournaments start at Noon CT every Friday and will last until Noon CT the next Friday. Players may register towns to be put into a registry list which will dictate most of the venues available for the fishing competition. Every week, the venues shift to the next 3 towns from the registry. Also each week, a new spotlighted PvE and PvP scene cycle into the contest. Each category (POT, PvP, PvE) features different prizes and goals. All fish must be caught within the timeframe of the contest. Here are some of the details: Largest Saltwater Fish (Town): Prizes: Player-Owned Town Row Lot Deed, Large Gold Fishing Trophy Rules: Must be caught from one of these towns Meadow’s Edge, (@Jefe) Dragomir Mori (@CatherineRose) Arlia (@Zeek Latreck ) Largest Fish (PvP):​ Prizes: 2 Chained Obsidian Shard 3-Packs, Large Silver Fishing Trophy Rules: Must be caught in Verdantis Shardfall Largest Lava Fish: Prizes: Fishing Rod of Prosperity, Large Bronze Fishing Trophy Rules: Must be caught in Spectral Mines Consolation Prizes: Prizes: Silver Fishing Trophy Rules: Everyone who submitted an entry that did not win an above prize Spinoff/Crossover Events: Arlia: Lots of additional prize options for anglers in Alria as well as Lava and PvP zone fishing from @Zeek Latreck — check it out! Prizes provided by the Community Manager will be available for attendees, but governors, guild leaders and players are welcome to sweeten the pot by providing additional prizes based on objective criteria entirely of their own design. In fact, please consider planning events to overlap the duration and chosen weekly locations of the Fishing developer events. Please post these events in the in-game events forums and the Community Manager will promote accordingly. Expect a constant stream of weekly events, each to feature new locations and new objectives. Head on over to the Fishing Event Forum Thread for more information. Happy adventures, Avatars! Community Event: WRFB Dance Party at Autumn Rising Brewery WRFB presents a dance party at Autumn Rising Brewery with DJ Darkstarr! Location: Adventure Club’s Autumn Rising Brewery When: Saturday, August 5th, 12PM – 2PM CT Come out and sport some awesome dance moves, trade emotes and recipes, chat with friends, launch off fireworks and simply have a lot of fun! For more information, check out the main forum post on the official forums. If you’d like to learn how YOUR town can become a site for upcoming WRFB parties, please contact @Lazarus Long or @Jack SinAssist on the forums. Community Event: 2nd Annual Team Fishing Contest Anglers! The Second Annual Team Fishing Contest is nearly upon us! Phamyns and crew are planning a team fishing contest! During the week of the contest, the Official Catnip Games Fishing Tourney will be suspended to encourage maximum participation in this annual event. Many prizes will be available! Once players determine their 2-Person team, please contact @Phamyns on the forums or via in-game mail with your team name! When: August 28th Noon CT to September 4th Noon CT For more information about the contest, please read the main forum thread on the official forums. Community Event: Show Your Stats, Win Your Stacks Raffle Titania Xylia and friends have created a raffle related to your play time in-game! For each hour your character appears in the stats, whether it is one kill, death or receipt in-game. You will receive a raffle ticket. Eventually, your raffle entries will be reported on your character’s page on their API site, so expect this feature shortly! Once raffle entries are showing on the character pages, search for your character’s name using the search bar just under the banner at shroudoftheavatar.net to determine your number of raffle entries. To participate, all you have to do is share your stats in the API. To share your stats, simply right-click your health bar at the top-left corner of your in-game screen, the select “Show name in public stats.” Prizes will be mailed in-game the during first week of September! Raffle prizes are chosen randomly. Players can only win once in a raffle. For more information about the raffle rules or prizes, please visit Titania Xylia’s forum thread on the official forums. Community Event: Mad Splatter Tea Party [Forum Post by Lily Byrd] The Mad Splatter Tea Party takes place every 3rd or 4th Sunday of the month, which is a tea party in my back garden at my home in Jade Valley. There are drinks and eats, there is sometimes music, there are often party games with prizes, and sometimes we just sit and talk about life in Novia. Where: Jade Valley, Lily Byrd’s Cottage and tea garden is south of the Hall of Inquiry and Learning in Jade Valley When: 3pm CT, August 30th (Usually every 3rd or 4th Sunday of the month) Attire: This is a role playing event tea party so come as your avatar We play games, we eat cake and drink…various teas and drinks… There are goofy prizes for winning games if we play them. See you there, Lily Byrd. Project to Support: Shadow of Valhalla Shadow of Valhalla is a visceral physics-based VR combat game with dynamic RPG elements, set within an ancient realm of Viking lore and mystic powers! Early Access beta includes “endless horde mode” featuring a variety of enemies with progressive difficulty. Also, players can discover many magic spells to unlock! So much more is coming! Finn Staber with Chicken Waffle, will join the Shroud of the Avatar team on Twitch during their Friday the 28th livestream to showoff this new Early Access game! Also, here is a teaser video on YouTube:  The development team is working hard to create additional environments and new quests! Shadow of Valhalla is available on Steam as Early Access. Additional features coming to the game: More Enemies! More Environments! More Magic Spells! RPG Quests! Weapon Forging and Crafting! Much, much more! If you would like to learn more about Shadow of Valhalla, be sure to stop by the main webpage for the game as more news becomes available! Project to Support: Jar Wars While you are delving into Virtual Reality (VR), be sure to check out this exciting and hilarious new game, Jar Wars! Our very own Darkstarr has been busy on some side projects, one of which is Jar Wars, a slapstick multiplayer game made just for VR enthusiasts. Battle your friends with wacky weapons and intriguing gadgets for total domination of the Moon! Available for free on Steam! Project to Support: Dragon Fight Darkstarr has also been hard at work with the team for Dragon Fight VR which recently went live on Steam! Dragon Fight VR is an internal experiment to capture the “essence” of a dragon fight, the classic penultimate experience of every fantasy story. We wanted to create a short visceral, realistic experience stripped of user interface, lobbies, scores, levels, and other visual intrusions that might distract. There were some key elements of fighting a dragon that we wanted to capture and we felt VR was uniquely qualified to convey: Face to face with a large scale hostile creature trying to kill you Using a sword and a shield Fire! Nowhere to run! This started out as an internal experiment to learn some things about VR’s capabilities, be reductionist in our designs, etc. We felt that the experiment was successful enough to release as a free experience to share. Enjoy! Available for free on Steam! Project to Support: Crowfall Be part of shaping the next great MMO by becoming a Crowfall Backer! Crowfall is the first and only online Throne War game. You can win. Join intense PvP battles that demand strategy, survival and a fierce competitive spirit. Reap the spoils of war as an Eternal Champion! Claim virtual territory on behalf of your guild or faction. Capture mines, mills, and quarries to secure resources, build castles, and besiege your neighbors. Scavenge artifacts and relics from the Dying Worlds and install them in your temples to grant blessings to your vassals. Capture lost spirits to do your bidding — or bind them into your weapons to infuse them with sorcerous power! Project to Support: Avatar Express [Forum post by Vladamir Begemot] I’m pleased to report that The Avatar Express is clacking away furiously. News is being delivered and we have established systems to deliver it directly to your brain. You can use one of those systems by following us on Twitter at @avatar_express. Even more reliable due to its fully automated nature is joining us on the Discord server. News items are posted there via RSS. Or you can subscribe to RSS directly on the site. If you run an event, quests, etc, please consider helping out by self reporting. The Shroud community is big, and many things are happening that are never seen by others. With 10k monthly users, we would need a full time staff to track down everything that is happening. You can fill out the contributor form, message @that_shawn_guy here or post in the Discord server that you would like to help. There is no committment once signed up, you can post as much or little as you like. Writing up your own events has several benefits beyond the immidiate exposure. It serves as a record for others to see the history of New Britannia as we create it, in an attractive format. Publishing in the Express also has a higher chance than the forums of being seen by search engines and random readers, thus bringing more eyeballs and new players to the game. It will even make posting in the forums easier! You can upload images to your news item, and then link to those images in your forum post. No more need for 3rd party image hosts! So if you have something going on in your guild or town, or want to be a Reporter, Cartographer or Historian, please join us! Resources: Players Helping Players The official SotA New Player Welcome Forum and the Player Created Resources Forum have the best player created resources for Shroud of the Avatar, whether it’s a Player Written Guide, a Video Walk-through, or a Wiki-type Website. Visit the official Community Resources page for a complete listing of all things community. View the full article

Folks! If anyone wants a sneak peek or would like to help me with any error catches, here's the draft notes for R81. I'll look over your suggestions tomorrow and will consider adding/changing based upon the suggestions. Thanks folks! I tell you, this one is PACKED with info... (I'm pooped). I've done zero proof reading so far, but anything you spot will speed me up before publishing tomorrow.... DRAFT: Release 81 Notes View the full article

Greetings Fellow Avatars! This week’s update brings details new functionality for the recently created Player-Owned Town Signposts! For those wishing to participate in any community activities, upcoming one-time and recurring community events have been announced! Be sure to also review the Players Guide and... Avatar’s Update #395: New Player-Owned Town Signpost Functionality! Latest News Q&A Livestream!View the full article

Greetings Fellow Avatars! This week’s update brings details new functionality for the recently created Player-Owned Town Signposts! For those wishing to participate in any community activities, upcoming one-time and recurring community events have been announced! Be sure to also review the Players Guide and Known Issues list for additional information on recent changes and upcoming fixes. Now, let’s see what we have for you in this week’s edition of Update of the Avatar: News Announcements New Player-Owned Town Signpost Functionality! Latest news Q&A Friday Livestream! New Vault Round! Latest Store Additions: Leather Flame Armor Set, 6 Building Block 110-Packs & More! August Login Reward: Giant Potted Sunflower! R80 Reward Program Login Items: Lord British & Flame Items! Double EXP Continues! Streaming Reward Program Recent Shroud of the Avatar Livestreams Lord of the Isle Episode 2 Bundles Upcoming Events Calendar Community Updates Meretz: Win a Topiary Keep Dragon Statue (No Trade) Community Event: Community Event: Catnip Games Weekly Fishing Tourney Community Event: Lord British Mac & Cheese Recipe Revealed Community Event: Drizz D’s Birthday Fishing Contest Community Event: Ëlf Lore – the Fate of the True Elves Community Event: 2nd Annual Team Fishing Contest Contest! Community Event: Show Your Stats, Win Your Stacks Raffle Project to Support: Jar Wars Project to Support: Dragonfight Project to Support: Crowfall Project to Support: Avatar Express Resources: Players Helping Players New Player-Owned Town Signpost Functionality! Governors and stewards! Even more teleporter love is coming your way! Soon, players will be able to experience additional functionality for the Player-Owned Town (POT) Signposts that were recently added to the store. Functionality for these signposts includes a lot of amazing customization options already, but another feature has just been added: NEW! Town Spawn Locations: In an upcoming patch, any player attempting to enter a POT with Player-Owned Town Signposts placed will see those destinations amongst the list of spawn options. This is a fantastic way for players to immediately travel to the parts of the town that’s been marked with signposts. Governors and stewards can mark favorite locations such as shops, theaters, fishing areas, Oracle Confirmatories, banks — the list goes on! No limit has currently been placed on the amount of custom signposts a town can utilize. Please keep in mind, changes to your signpost locations, names, or amounts will appear instantly for people already inside of your town, but visitors arriving to your town from other locations will not see these spawn locations as options until approximately a day after a signpost was added or changed. Custom Names: Signposts can be named while in your inventory. Right click the signpost, use the rename option, then place the signpost as a decoration in your town. Once placed, any signpost in the town will feature that newly placed signpost as a destination option. Custom Colors: Signposts can be dyed with primary and secondary dyes! What better way to make that signpost more noticeable than to use vibrant colors! Decoration Surface: The signposts base allows for decorations, so if players want to place books, notes, lights, or other decorations at the base, go for it! This new signpost functionality is just one example of the wondrous things coming to town governors, stewards, and residents this year! Be on the lookout for more exciting changes on the horizon. Release 81 will be packed with game updates, so stay tuned for next week’s announcement on Thursday, August 27th! Latest News Q&A Friday Livestream! Another weekly Community Livestream is this Friday, August 21st at 4PM CT on Twitch! Join Chris “Atos” Spears and other development team members for a community 1 hour livestream! To enter the prize drawings, type “wishing I was fishing” into any in-game chat channel OR make a purchase on the website add-on store. Please submit questions into Twitch Chat by inserting !question at the beginning of your text. Watch on Twitch, Friday at 4 PM CT! New Vault Round! Vintage Blue Velvet with Nailheads Furniture Set Oracle Cloak Aether Two-Handed Mace Tansu Chest Ornate Elven Longbow Pattern Pack Ornate Elven Wardrobe Shogun Four-Story Town Home Viking Brynhildr Shield Elven Mage Outfit Latest Store Additions: Leather Flame Armor Set, 6 Building Block 110-Packs & More! For those wanting a more rustic version of the Virtue Flame Armor Set, the Leather Flame Armor Set is now available! Strike fear into the hearts of your enemies whilst wearing these dauntingly wicked leather armor pieces! Seven new building block sets have been added to your arsenal of construction materials! These new blocks come in the same 110-packs and size variants as the previous block sets. The new AND old sets can now be placed as Player-Owned Town decoration. All block sets can now scale from .5 to 1.3! New Block Letters and Numbers Sets have arrived! These sets have primary and secondary dye layers and can scale from .5 to 2.0! Additional items recently added to the store are the new Player-Owned Town Property Markers Set and the Player-Owned Town Wagons, Boats, Balloons Hatches and Signposts! Leather Flame Armor Set White Marble Building Blocks 110-Pack Black Marble Building Blocks 110-Pack Polished Granite Building Blocks 110-Pack Fallow Granite Building Blocks 110-Pack Polished Wood Building Blocks 110-Pack Iron Building Blocks 110-Pack Block Letters Set A-Z (Dyable, 5 Punctuation Types Included) Block Numbers Set 0-9 (Dyable) Player-Owned Town Property Markers Set Player-Owned Town Wagon (Dyable) Player-Owned Town Boat (Dyable) Player-Owned Town Balloon (Dyable) Player-Owned Town Hatch (Dyable) Player-Owned Town Signpost (Dyable) Also, we’re scouring the realm for items that have long been missing from the store. Many items are being loaded into the Vault and will rotate in periodically which are announced each week as they go live, but here’s a small number of additional items becoming permanently available on the Crown Store: Glowing Jewel Cube 3-Packs (Blue, Green, Orange, Purple, Red, Yellow) Display Camera August Login Reward: Potted Giant Sunflower! Gardening time, Avatars! Now, with this wondrous Potted Giant Sunflower, players can enhance their gardens even further! Simply log in during the month of August, and this potted sunflower will become available in the Rewards Window. Release 80 Reward Program Login Reward Items: Lord British & Flame Items! Avatars! Rewards Program login reward items for Release 80 are Lord British and flame themed! Reward Program members must login during Release 80 to receive these login items: Lord British Plate Gauntlets Flame Trident Flame Cloak The Shroud of the Avatar Rewards Program lets you earn the best rate on purchasing Crowns, AND receive monthly reward items! For the low price of $9 USD per month you will receive the following: 900 Crowns of the Obsidians every month Monthly Login Reward Items (3 per month) Exclusive Title every 3 months 3 Months: Keeper of the Faith 6 Months: Keeper of the Word 9 Months: Keeper of the Vow 12 Months: Keeper of the Flame 15 Months: Keeper of the Oath 18 Months: Keeper of the Pledge Pick any Dye 12-Pack every 6 months Pick any three of the 7 Obsidian Potions every month, including: Potion of Capacity: Increases carrying capacity Potion of Conservation: Reduces reagent use chance Potion of Expedience: Swift gathering on all gathering skills Potion of Precision: Increases Meticulous Collection to all gathering skills Potion of Preservation: Reduces armor and weapon damage Potion of Reclamation: Increases Salvage and Repair to all production skills Double EXP Continues! Head out into the lands of New Britannia and charge headlong into the dangers therein, Avatars! For the near future, Shroud of the Avatar players will receive double experience points (EXP) for their endeavors in Adventure and Crafting! Please take advantage of the extra experience points! Stay home, stay safe and explore New Britannia! Are You a Livestreamer? Soon, the Streaming Reward Program will be returning. As the details are getting reworked, we’ll reveal more information. Traditional streaming rewards included an exclusive in-game Streamer Camera for being a veteran of our Streaming Program! Expect the camera reward to return! More goodies will come to your way as the program fully develops. Thank you for streaming Shroud of the Avatar! Recent Shroud of the Avatar Livestreams Atos and other members of the Shroud of the Avatar development team go live very frequently on our TWO Twitch Channels: twitch.tv/shroudoftheavatar and twitch.tv/communityoftheavatar — be sure to get these channels on follow and get the latest information right as we go live! Also, if you’ve missed our latest streams, check out our archive of content at our YouTube Channel (complete with “Mojito the dog” cam). Like! Follow! Subscribe! Prizes!!! Don’t forget to also join the Shroud of the Avatar team and community over at our other social media venues: Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/ShroudoftheAvatar/ Catnip Games Twitter: https://twitter.com/catnipgames Shroud of the Avatar Twitter: https://twitter.com/ShroudofAvatar Shroud of the Avatar Discord: https://discord.gg/GuBXakQ Lord of the Isle Episode 2 Bundles As one of the biggest and earliest supporters of Episode 2 you will be granted the largest lot deed in the land (Castle), the title Lord (or Lady) of the Isle, a tour of Lord British’s property, and dinner with the game leaders including Lord British himself! Only 24 of these unique bundles will be sold! Complete List of Rewards: Lord of the Isle Place Anywhere Castle Lot Deed: Tax Free Forever (when placed in a POT) and Tax Free for 1 Year (when placed outside of a POT). Placeable on water as well as land! Title: Lord of the Isle or Lady of the Isle Unique Lord of the Isle Home (pictured above) NEW – Town Size Upgrade (if a town is not owned by the LOTI supporter, they may gift this size upgrade to another town owner. Maximum possible town sizes will be taken into account, but the Megalopolis size just became available!) Choice of 1 House currently available in the store Castle Basement currently available in the store of your choice Castle Wall Set currently available in the store of your choice (with enough for Castle Lot) Unique Lord of the Isle Dungeon Room (To be revealed later) 140,000 Crowns 1000 Bank Slots Pick 12 Prosperity Tools Lord of the Isle Crown (In-Game Wearable Item) Unique In-Game Emote (To be revealed later) Early Access to Episode 2 Episode 1 Box and map signed by the team 1 hour one-on-one with Chris for design discussion (via video-conference) One real silver ring crafted personally by Lord British: Numbered 1 – 8 In-game version of the Lord British ring: Numbered 1 – 8 (including a place-able decoration version) Tour of Lord British’s property Fine dinner and drinks with Lord British, Darkstarr, and Atos at a location TBD in Austin or NYC. NOTE: Digital items that are currently available will begin delivery as soon as Release 62 (Jan 31, 2019). Other items will be delivered at a future date TBD. NOTE: Travel costs NOT covered by Catnip Games for Tour & Dinner. Upcoming Events Calendar Be sure to check out the Upcoming Events page for spotlighted events plus links to various areas to post or find events on our forums: 2020 Events Aug 27 – Release 81 Sep 24 – Release 82 Oct 29 – Release 83 Meretz: Win a Topiary Keep Dragon Statue (No Trade) Whether you move a little or a lot, as a Meretz user you rack up valuable Meretz Points (MPs). The more MPs you have, the more stuff you can buy! Think: in-game SotA goodies, Sweepstakes entries and tons more. With Meretz, we launch several sweepstakes every month. This month, we’re giving away a Topiary Keep Dragon Statue (No Trade) to two lucky winners! AND, use your MPs every day for in-game items like potions and emotes. What’re you waiting for? Download Meretz TODAY! Community Event: Catnip Games Weekly Fishing Tourney For the Anglers of New Britannia, a weekly developer run fishing event has arrived! These weekly tournaments start at Noon CT every Friday and will last until Noon CT the next Friday. Players may register towns to be put into a registry list which will dictate most of the venues available for the fishing competition. Every week, the venues shift to the next 3 towns from the registry. Also each week, a new spotlighted PvE and PvP scene cycle into the contest. Each category (POT, PvP, PvE) features different prizes and goals. All fish must be caught within the timeframe of the contest. Here are some of the details: Largest Saltwater Fish (Town): Prizes: Player-Owned Town Row Lot Deed, Large Gold Fishing Trophy Rules: Must be caught from one of these towns Meadow’s Edge, (@Jefe) Dragomir Mori (@CatherineRose) Arlia (@Zeek Latreck ) Largest Fish (PvP):​ Prizes: 2 Chained Obsidian Shard 3-Packs, Large Silver Fishing Trophy Rules: Must be caught in Verdantis Shardfall Largest Lava Fish: Prizes: Fishing Rod of Prosperity, Large Bronze Fishing Trophy Rules: Must be caught in Spectral Mines Consolation Prizes: Prizes: Silver Fishing Trophy Rules: Everyone who submitted an entry that did not win an above prize Spinoff/Crossover Events: No spin-off contests announced Prizes provided by the Community Manager will be available for attendees, but governors, guild leaders and players are welcome to sweeten the pot by providing additional prizes based on objective criteria entirely of their own design. In fact, please consider planning events to overlap the duration and chosen weekly locations of the Fishing developer events. Please post these events in the in-game events forums and the Community Manager will promote accordingly. Expect a constant stream of weekly events, each to feature new locations and new objectives. Head on over to the Fishing Event Forum Thread for more information. Happy adventures, Avatars! Community Event: Lord British Mac & Cheese Recipe Revealed Our very own Lord British posted his ever so famous Mac & Cheese recipe on the official forums recently! Get your pen and paper out, because if you want the cheesiest Mac & Cheese ever? You’re gonna have to write this down. Let’s see what is in his family recipe: OK: True story… I am a HUGE Macaroni & Cheese fan… specifically a KRAFT Macaroni and Cheese fan. However, I have my own special recipe… which IS, I said IS the best Macaroni & Cheese recipe. Now I’m not saying there are not some other wonderful variations out there. I too can greatly appreciate periodic additions of things like bread crumbs baked on top, or lobster pieces, and even occasionally some truffle… BUT, for basic everyday consumption, my recipe is the Lord British Certified Recipe, I hope you all try sometime. Before I get to the recipe, I would like to share a bit about the depth of my love for Kraft Macaroni & Cheese. My passion for KM&C began long before college, but it became a staple there and has lasted to this day. Years ago, Kraft offered “The Cheesiest” T-Shirts to those that saved up about 20 box tops, and sent in something like $20. I thought “well, this is certainly the T-shirt for me”, so I started saving box tops. After Some months, I had saved a few hundred, and thought “Now I will get a FEW T-shirts!” I sent in my money and box tops, but got a letter back, expressing that they were sorry, but the promotion had ended. Saddened, but not defeated, I decided to keep saving box tops until the promotion returned… It has never returned… However, after years and years, a new promotion caught my eye. If you sent in something like 20 box tops and $20, they would print a CUSTOM box of macaroni with the picture of “your child” on it. By now, I had saved up LITERALLY THOUSANDS of box tops. So, I packed up THOUSANDS of box tops and a large check, for my hundreds of custom boxes of macaroni and cheese. In a few days… a got a phone call from Kraft. They wanted to know who I was, and why I had been saving this vast amount of box tops etc. They were as excited as I was. They happily printed me cases of personalized Lord British “The Cheesiest” Kraft Macaroni & Cheese boxes. I gave them out as gifts to family and friends that year… A few may be in circulation as an extra rare collectible. BTW… I still collect box tops… have hundreds if not thousands poked away in zip lock bags… still waiting for the T-shirt promotion to return. Now… ON TO THE RECIPE! First, ignore the instructions on the box. You will not need milk or butter… but you WILL require Kraft Cheese Whiz! Of course, begin by adding HOT water to a pot and putting it on to boil. Add some salt. The reason you started with HOT water, is so you can add the macaroni before it comes to a real boil. If your water is hot enough from the tap, the water and mac will come to a boil quickly, and you just saved an extra few minutes. Don’t over cook the mac. Pour off (discard) the water with a pot side strainer, as imaged above, as soon as its just al dente. Pour off just what comes easily. the dampness that remains will both help make the powder mix well, but will also be absorbed by the mac soon enough. Add the provided cheese powder. The MOST IMPORTANT STEP, is how much Cheese Whiz to add. Too little, and you can hardly taste it. Too much and your just eating lumpy Cheese Whiz. The right amount for 1 traditional box of Kraft Macaroni and Cheese is 1 well rounded dollop of Cheese Whiz. See illustration above. It is neigh but perfect. Now mix all together. Wait a minute and mix again, as it all absorbs. Then serve to yourself and your adoring fans, In this case, pictured above, Prince Ronin, who like his sister Princess Kinga, greatly enjoys this special recipe, and often request it. A request, I am always happy to oblige. Of course, I keep the box top. Thank you Lord British! If anyone would like to thank our liege for sharing, please be sure to chime in on the forum post where this extra cheesy recipe was revealed. Community Event: Drizz D’s Birthday Fishing Contest We’re celebrating the birthday of @Ciinen (Drizzet Dragonfyre) by doing one of his favorite in-game past times, FISHING! Come have some fun with us! Where: Immortal City When: Saturday, August 22nd, 2PM to 8PM CT Fishing Categories: Freshwater – 2PM to 4PM CT Fetid Water – 4PM to 6PM CT Saltwater – 6PM to 8PM CT Prize-Winning Requirements: Turn in your one largest fish from each water category when the water is changed. The combined length will be added together form all three water types and the person with the most combined length will be the winner! For more information about contest rules and prizes, please see the original forum thread posted by Alleine Dragonfyre on the official forums. Community Event: Ëlf Lore – the Fate of the True Elves Attention Avatars! A WORLD PREMIERE is about to be shared! Gabriel Nightshadow has crafted another epic audio play, and it has been brought to life by the New Britannia Theater Troupe! This radio play has been 1.5 years in the making, and a lot of love and sweat has gone into it, from all our cast members. When: Mondays 7PM CT (5 Segments) Stream: https://www.twitch.tv/alleinedragonfyre Radio: https://zcu.io/jXP8 It will be broadcast on Virtue Radio as part of the regular Podcasts and Poetry segment each Monday. It is an epic piece, so for easy listening it has been broken into 5 bite-size chunks. Join us for an amazing adventure over the next 5 weeks! Players can also tune into Virtue Radio using your in-game Aether Vibration Amplifiers! This announcement was posted by Asclepius on the player maintained Shroud of the Avatar Facebook Group. Community Event: 2nd Annual Team Fishing Contest Anglers! The Second Annual Team Fishing Contest is nearly upon us! Phamyns and crew are planning a team fishing contest! During the week of the contest, the Official Catnip Games Fishing Tourney will be suspended to encourage maximum participation in this annual event. Many prizes will be available! Once players determine their 2-Person team, please contact @Phamyns on the forums or via in-game mail with your team name! When: August 28th Noon CT to September 4th Noon CT For more information about the contest, please read the main forum thread on the official forums. Community Event: Show Your Stats, Win Your Stacks Raffle Titania Xylia and friends have created a raffle related to your play time in-game! For each hour your character appears in the stats, whether it is one kill, death or receipt in-game. You will receive a raffle ticket. Eventually, your raffle entries will be reported on your character’s page on their API site, so expect this feature shortly! Once raffle entries are showing on the character pages, search for your character’s name using the search bar just under the banner at shroudoftheavatar.net to determine your number of raffle entries. To participate, all you have to do is share your stats in the API. To share your stats, simply right-click your health bar at the top-left corner of your in-game screen, the select “Show name in public stats.” Prizes will be mailed in-game the during first week of September! Raffle prizes are chosen randomly. Players can only win once in a raffle. For more information about the raffle rules or prizes, please visit Titania Xylia’s forum thread on the official forums. Project to Support – Jar Wars While you are delving into Virtual Reality (VR), be sure to check out this exciting and hilarious new game, Jar Wars! Our very own Darkstarr has been busy on some side projects, one of which is Jar Wars, a slapstick multiplayer game made just for VR enthusiasts. Battle your friends with wacky weapons and intriguing gadgets for total domination of the Moon! Available for free on Steam! Project to Support – Dragon Fight Darkstarr has also been hard at work with the team for Dragon Fight VR which recently went live on Steam! Dragon Fight VR is an internal experiment to capture the “essence” of a dragon fight, the classic penultimate experience of every fantasy story. We wanted to create a short visceral, realistic experience stripped of user interface, lobbies, scores, levels, and other visual intrusions that might distract. There were some key elements of fighting a dragon that we wanted to capture and we felt VR was uniquely qualified to convey: Face to face with a large scale hostile creature trying to kill you Using a sword and a shield Fire! Nowhere to run! This started out as an internal experiment to learn some things about VR’s capabilities, be reductionist in our designs, etc. We felt that the experiment was successful enough to release as a free experience to share. Enjoy! Available for free on Steam! Project to Support – Crowfall Be part of shaping the next great MMO by becoming a Crowfall Backer! Crowfall is the first and only online Throne War game. You can win. Join intense PvP battles that demand strategy, survival and a fierce competitive spirit. Reap the spoils of war as an Eternal Champion! Claim virtual territory on behalf of your guild or faction. Capture mines, mills, and quarries to secure resources, build castles, and besiege your neighbors. Scavenge artifacts and relics from the Dying Worlds and install them in your temples to grant blessings to your vassals. Capture lost spirits to do your bidding — or bind them into your weapons to infuse them with sorcerous power! Project to Support – Avatar Express [Forum post by Vladamir Begemot] I’m pleased to report that The Avatar Express is clacking away furiously. News is being delivered and we have established systems to deliver it directly to your brain. You can use one of those systems by following us on Twitter at @avatar_express. Even more reliable due to its fully automated nature is joining us on the Discord server. News items are posted there via RSS. Or you can subscribe to RSS directly on the site. If you run an event, quests, etc, please consider helping out by self reporting. The Shroud community is big, and many things are happening that are never seen by others. With 10k monthly users, we would need a full time staff to track down everything that is happening. You can fill out the contributor form, message @that_shawn_guy here or post in the Discord server that you would like to help. There is no committment once signed up, you can post as much or little as you like. Writing up your own events has several benefits beyond the immidiate exposure. It serves as a record for others to see the history of New Britannia as we create it, in an attractive format. Publishing in the Express also has a higher chance than the forums of being seen by search engines and random readers, thus bringing more eyeballs and new players to the game. It will even make posting in the forums easier! You can upload images to your news item, and then link to those images in your forum post. No more need for 3rd party image hosts! So if you have something going on in your guild or town, or want to be a Reporter, Cartographer or Historian, please join us! Resources – Players Helping Players The official SotA New Player Welcome Forum and the Player Created Resources Forum have the best player created resources for Shroud of the Avatar, whether it’s a Player Written Guide, a Video Walk-through, or a Wiki-type Website. Visit the official Community Resources page for a complete listing of all things community. View the full article

Greetings Fellow Avatars! This week’s update brings players some wonderful news about deed prices! They’re being reduced! For those wishing to participate in any community activities, upcoming one-time and recurring community events have been announced! Be sure to also review the Players Guide and... Avatar’s Update #394: Property Deed Price Reduction! Latest News Q&A Friday Livestream!View the full article

Greetings Fellow Avatars! This week’s update brings players some wonderful news about deed prices! They’re being reduced! For those wishing to participate in any community activities, upcoming one-time and recurring community events have been announced! Be sure to also review the Players Guide and Known Issues list for additional information on recent changes and upcoming fixes. Now, let’s see what we have for you in this week’s edition of Update of the Avatar: News Announcements Property Deed Price Reduction! Latest news Q&A Friday Livestream! New Vault Round! Latest Store Additions: Leather Flame Armor Set, 6 Building Block 110-Packs & More! August Login Reward: Giant Potted Sunflower! R80 Reward Program Login Items: Lord British & Flame Items! Double EXP Continues! Streaming Reward Program Recent Shroud of the Avatar Livestreams Lord of the Isle Episode 2 Bundles Upcoming Events Calendar Community Updates Meretz: Win a Topiary Keep Dragon Statue (No Trade) Community Event: Community Event: Catnip Games Weekly Fishing Tourney Community Event: 2nd Annual Team Fishing Contest Contest! Community Event: Show Your Stats, Win Your Stacks Raffle Community Event: Mythical Dance Party in Sparrowfall Community Event: Release 80 Dance Party in Knightmare Falls Project to Support: Jar Wars Project to Support: Dragonfight Project to Support: Crowfall Project to Support: Avatar Express Resources: Players Helping Players Property Deed Price Reduction! Avatars! In celebration of the upcoming 600th New Year of the New Britannian calendar, incredible new Crown Store discounts are coming your way! Since the Lord British birthday celebration, deed upgrades have been on sale for 20% off. This 20% off price is now the new normal! Any future sales for deed upgrades will be calculated from this new base price. The in-game Crown Store will also receive a permanent price reduction related to deeds! All 11 varieties of available deeds will receive permanent price reductions of 30%! This means any future occurrences these deeds are randomly flagged for a 20% off sale, the sale price calculation will be applied to the new base price for the deeds. These 30% price reductions will be applied in-game soon with an upcoming patch. For around 2 years now, players have greatly enjoyed being able to obtain a free Player-Owned Town Row Lot Deed and a free Player-Owned Town Village Lot Deed as a Free-To-Play player through start and completion of the main Episode 1 storyline. Now, players wishing to upgrade or obtain additional deeds as they expand their enterprises and activities within the game, will find supporting Shroud of the Avatar through additional deed purchases to be far more affordable. As we continue to update our store items for price balancing and normalization, players can expect many store adjustments going forward which will make vanity and convenience purchases far more affordable and accessible to new and existing players. Store price reductions are just one of the many exciting changes to come your way this year. Stay tuned for more content, mechanics, and store updates as each week unfolds! Latest News Q&A Friday Livestream! Another weekly Community Livestream is this Friday, August 14th at 4PM CT on Twitch! Join Chris “Atos” Spears and other development team members for a community 1 hour livestream! To enter the prize drawings, type “wishing I was fishing” into any in-game chat channel OR make a purchase on the website add-on store. Please submit questions into Twitch Chat by inserting !question at the beginning of your text. Watch on Twitch, Friday at 4 PM CT! New Vault Round! Ornate Flamberge Ornate Vile Mace Pattern Pack Elven Elder Mage Robe Elven Elder Mage Robe Pattern Pack Elven Wardrobe Viking Tyr Shield Pattern Pack Elven Archer Armor Virtue Aeronaut Helmet Hot Air Balloon Latest Store Additions: Leather Flame Armor Set, 6 Building Block 110-Packs & More! For those wanting a more rustic version of the Virtue Flame Armor Set, the Leather Flame Armor Set is now available! Strike fear into the hearts of your enemies whilst wearing these dauntingly wicked leather armor pieces! Seven new building block sets have been added to your arsenal of construction materials! These new blocks come in the same 110-packs and size variants as the previous block sets. The new AND old sets can now be placed as Player-Owned Town decoration. All block sets can now scale from .5 to 1.3! New Block Letters and Numbers Sets have arrived! These sets have primary and secondary dye layers and can scale from .5 to 2.0! Additional items recently added to the store are the new Player-Owned Town Property Markers Set and the Player-Owned Town Wagons, Boats, Balloons Hatches and Signposts! Leather Flame Armor Set White Marble Building Blocks 110-Pack Black Marble Building Blocks 110-Pack Polished Granite Building Blocks 110-Pack Fallow Granite Building Blocks 110-Pack Polished Wood Building Blocks 110-Pack Iron Building Blocks 110-Pack Block Letters Set A-Z (Dyable, 5 Punctuation Types Included) Block Numbers Set 0-9 (Dyable) Player-Owned Town Property Markers Set Player-Owned Town Wagon (Dyable) Player-Owned Town Boat (Dyable) Player-Owned Town Balloon (Dyable) Player-Owned Town Hatch (Dyable) Player-Owned Town Signpost (Dyable) Also, we’re scouring the realm for items that have long been missing from the store. Many items are being loaded into the Vault and will rotate in periodically which are announced each week as they go live, but here’s a small number of additional items becoming permanently available on the Crown Store: Thorn Staff Thorn Wand Electric Staff Obsidian Order Pavers Torture Chair Torture Rack Torture Table Hanging Torture Cage Dragon Egg (8 Colors) Dragon Skin Rugs (8 Colors) August Login Reward: Potted Giant Sunflower! Gardening time, Avatars! Now, with this wondrous Potted Giant Sunflower, players can enhance their gardens even further! Simply log in during the month of August, and this potted sunflower will become available in the Rewards Window. Release 80 Reward Program Login Reward Items: Lord British & Flame Items! Avatars! Rewards Program login reward items for Release 80 are Lord British and flame themed! Reward Program members must login during Release 80 to receive these login items: Lord British Plate Gauntlets Flame Trident Flame Cloak The Shroud of the Avatar Rewards Program lets you earn the best rate on purchasing Crowns, AND receive monthly reward items! For the low price of $9 USD per month you will receive the following: 900 Crowns of the Obsidians every month Monthly Login Reward Items (3 per month) Exclusive Title every 3 months 3 Months: Keeper of the Faith 6 Months: Keeper of the Word 9 Months: Keeper of the Vow 12 Months: Keeper of the Flame 15 Months: Keeper of the Oath 18 Months: Keeper of the Pledge Pick any Dye 12-Pack every 6 months Pick any three of the 7 Obsidian Potions every month, including: Potion of Capacity: Increases carrying capacity Potion of Conservation: Reduces reagent use chance Potion of Expedience: Swift gathering on all gathering skills Potion of Precision: Increases Meticulous Collection to all gathering skills Potion of Preservation: Reduces armor and weapon damage Potion of Reclamation: Increases Salvage and Repair to all production skills Double EXP Continues! Head out into the lands of New Britannia and charge headlong into the dangers therein, Avatars! For the near future, Shroud of the Avatar players will receive double experience points (EXP) for their endeavors in Adventure and Crafting! Please take advantage of the extra experience points! Stay home, stay safe and explore New Britannia! Are You a Livestreamer? Soon, the Streaming Reward Program will be returning. As the details are getting reworked, we’ll reveal more information. Traditional streaming rewards included an exclusive in-game Streamer Camera for being a veteran of our Streaming Program! Expect the camera reward to return! More goodies will come to your way as the program fully develops. Thank you for streaming Shroud of the Avatar! Recent Shroud of the Avatar Livestreams Atos and other members of the Shroud of the Avatar development team go live very frequently on our TWO Twitch Channels: twitch.tv/shroudoftheavatar and twitch.tv/communityoftheavatar — be sure to get these channels on follow and get the latest information right as we go live! Also, if you’ve missed our latest streams, check out our archive of content at our YouTube Channel (complete with “Mojito the dog” cam). Like! Follow! Subscribe! Prizes!!! Don’t forget to also join the Shroud of the Avatar team and community over at our other social media venues: Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/ShroudoftheAvatar/ Catnip Games Twitter: https://twitter.com/catnipgames Shroud of the Avatar Twitter: https://twitter.com/ShroudofAvatar Shroud of the Avatar Discord: https://discord.gg/GuBXakQ Lord of the Isle Episode 2 Bundles As one of the biggest and earliest supporters of Episode 2 you will be granted the largest lot deed in the land (Castle), the title Lord (or Lady) of the Isle, a tour of Lord British’s property, and dinner with the game leaders including Lord British himself! Only 24 of these unique bundles will be sold! Complete List of Rewards: Lord of the Isle Place Anywhere Castle Lot Deed: Tax Free Forever (when placed in a POT) and Tax Free for 1 Year (when placed outside of a POT). Placeable on water as well as land! Title: Lord of the Isle or Lady of the Isle Unique Lord of the Isle Home (pictured above) NEW – Town Size Upgrade (if a town is not owned by the LOTI supporter, they may gift this size upgrade to another town owner. Maximum possible town sizes will be taken into account, but the Megalopolis size just became available!) Choice of 1 House currently available in the store Castle Basement currently available in the store of your choice Castle Wall Set currently available in the store of your choice (with enough for Castle Lot) Unique Lord of the Isle Dungeon Room (To be revealed later) 140,000 Crowns 1000 Bank Slots Pick 12 Prosperity Tools Lord of the Isle Crown (In-Game Wearable Item) Unique In-Game Emote (To be revealed later) Early Access to Episode 2 Episode 1 Box and map signed by the team 1 hour one-on-one with Chris for design discussion (via video-conference) One real silver ring crafted personally by Lord British: Numbered 1 – 8 In-game version of the Lord British ring: Numbered 1 – 8 (including a place-able decoration version) Tour of Lord British’s property Fine dinner and drinks with Lord British, Darkstarr, and Atos at a location TBD in Austin or NYC. NOTE: Digital items that are currently available will begin delivery as soon as Release 62 (Jan 31, 2019). Other items will be delivered at a future date TBD. NOTE: Travel costs NOT covered by Catnip Games for Tour & Dinner. Upcoming Events Calendar Be sure to check out the Upcoming Events page for spotlighted events plus links to various areas to post or find events on our forums: 2020 Events Aug 27 – Release 81 Sep 24 – Release 82 Oct 29 – Release 83 Meretz: Win a Topiary Keep Dragon Statue (No Trade) Whether you move a little or a lot, as a Meretz user you rack up valuable Meretz Points (MPs). The more MPs you have, the more stuff you can buy! Think: in-game SotA goodies, Sweepstakes entries and tons more. With Meretz, we launch several sweepstakes every month. This month, we’re giving away a Topiary Keep Dragon Statue (No Trade) to two lucky winners! AND, use your MPs every day for in-game items like potions and emotes. What’re you waiting for? Download Meretz TODAY! Community Event: Catnip Games Weekly Fishing Tourney For the Anglers of New Britannia, a weekly developer run fishing event has arrived! These weekly tournaments start at Noon CT every Friday and will last until Noon CT the next Friday. Players may register towns to be put into a registry list which will dictate most of the venues available for the fishing competition. Every week, the venues shift to the next 3 towns from the registry. Also each week, a new spotlighted PvE and PvP scene cycle into the contest. Each category (POT, PvP, PvE) features different prizes and goals. All fish must be caught within the timeframe of the contest. Here are some of the details: Largest Freshwater Fish (Town): Prizes: Player-Owned Town Row Lot Deed, Large Gold Fishing Trophy Rules: Must be caught from one of these towns Knight’s Watch (@Belladonna Rose) Krabnevir (@Grumpy Krabnevir) Islands of Wonders (@Sole) Largest Fish (PvP):​ Prizes: 2 Chained Obsidian Shard 3-Packs, Large Silver Fishing Trophy Rules: Must be caught in Libris Ruins Largest Lava Fish: Prizes: Fishing Rod of Prosperity, Large Bronze Fishing Trophy Rules: Must be caught in Sunless Barrens Consolation Prizes: Prizes: Silver Fishing Trophy Rules: Everyone who submitted an entry that did not win an above prize Spinoff/Crossover Events: Island of Wonders: @Rook Strife has created two spin-off contests — “Flappin’ Fish” and “Beat the Locals!” Many prizes are available! For more information, check out Rook Strife’s forum post on the official forums. Prizes provided by the Community Manager will be available for attendees, but governors, guild leaders and players are welcome to sweeten the pot by providing additional prizes based on objective criteria entirely of their own design. In fact, please consider planning events to overlap the duration and chosen weekly locations of the Fishing developer events. Please post these events in the in-game events forums and the Community Manager will promote accordingly. Expect a constant stream of weekly events, each to feature new locations and new objectives. Head on over to the Fishing Event Forum Thread for more information. Happy adventures, Avatars! Community Event: 2nd Annual Team Fishing Contest Anglers! The Second Annual Team Fishing Contest is nearly upon us! Phamyns and crew are planning a team fishing contest! During the week of the contest, the Official Catnip Games Fishing Tourney will be suspended to encourage maximum participation in this annual event. Many prizes will be available! Once players determine their 2-Person team, please contact @Phamyns on the forums or via in-game mail with your team name! When: August 28th Noon CT to September 4th Noon CT For more information about the contest, please read the main forum thread on the official forums. Community Event: Show Your Stats, Win Your Stacks Raffle Titania Xylia and friends have created a raffle related to your play time in-game! For each hour your character appears in the stats, whether it is one kill, death or receipt in-game. You will receive a raffle ticket. Eventually, your raffle entries will be reported on your character’s page on their API site, so expect this feature shortly! Once raffle entries are showing on the character pages, search for your character’s name using the search bar just under the banner at shroudoftheavatar.net to determine your number of raffle entries. To participate, all you have to do is share your stats in the API. To share your stats, simply right-click your health bar at the top-left corner of your in-game screen, the select “Show name in public stats.” Prizes will be mailed in-game the during first week of September! Raffle prizes are chosen randomly. Players can only win once in a raffle. For more information about the raffle rules or prizes, please visit Titania Xylia’s forum thread on the official forums. Community Event: Mythical Dance Party in Sparrowfall Mythical Music Radio Presents the Mythical Dance Party! Also listen in on Mythical Music Radio with your Aether Vibration Devices! Location: Sparrowfall (Near Xenos) Host: DJ DarkStarr a.k.a. Starr Long When: Saturday, August 15th, 1:00 – 3:00 PM CT Listen || Website || Attend In-Game Location Join us along the riverwalk in Sparrowfall as we dance to the music of DJ Darkstarr! Sparrowfall is located in Elysium not far from Xenos next to Port Phoenix and Silver Hold. Once you enter the city, turn left and follow the riverwalk just a short distance from the docks. Come out and sport some awesome dance moves, trade emotes and recipes, chat with friends, launch off fireworks and simply have a lot of fun! For more information about the party, please stop by the forum thread on the official forums. Community Event: Release 80 Dance Party in Knightmare Falls By Royal Warrant, Virtue/Avatars Radio presents the Release 80 Dance Party & Stress Test Location: Knightmare Falls When: Saturday, August 15th, 3:30PM – 5:30PM CT For more information, check out the main forum post on the official forums. If you’d like to learn how YOUR town can become a site for upcoming Release Dance Parties, find out here! Project to Support – Jar Wars While you are delving into Virtual Reality (VR), be sure to check out this exciting and hilarious new game, Jar Wars! Our very own Darkstarr has been busy on some side projects, one of which is Jar Wars, a slapstick multiplayer game made just for VR enthusiasts. Battle your friends with wacky weapons and intriguing gadgets for total domination of the Moon! Available for free on Steam! Project to Support – Dragon Fight Darkstarr has also been hard at work with the team for Dragon Fight VR which recently went live on Steam! Dragon Fight VR is an internal experiment to capture the “essence” of a dragon fight, the classic penultimate experience of every fantasy story. We wanted to create a short visceral, realistic experience stripped of user interface, lobbies, scores, levels, and other visual intrusions that might distract. There were some key elements of fighting a dragon that we wanted to capture and we felt VR was uniquely qualified to convey: Face to face with a large scale hostile creature trying to kill you Using a sword and a shield Fire! Nowhere to run! This started out as an internal experiment to learn some things about VR’s capabilities, be reductionist in our designs, etc. We felt that the experiment was successful enough to release as a free experience to share. Enjoy! Available for free on Steam! Project to Support – Crowfall Be part of shaping the next great MMO by becoming a Crowfall Backer! Crowfall is the first and only online Throne War game. You can win. Join intense PvP battles that demand strategy, survival and a fierce competitive spirit. Reap the spoils of war as an Eternal Champion! Claim virtual territory on behalf of your guild or faction. Capture mines, mills, and quarries to secure resources, build castles, and besiege your neighbors. Scavenge artifacts and relics from the Dying Worlds and install them in your temples to grant blessings to your vassals. Capture lost spirits to do your bidding — or bind them into your weapons to infuse them with sorcerous power! Project to Support – Avatar Express [Forum post by Vladamir Begemot] I’m pleased to report that The Avatar Express is clacking away furiously. News is being delivered and we have established systems to deliver it directly to your brain. You can use one of those systems by following us on Twitter at @avatar_express. Even more reliable due to its fully automated nature is joining us on the Discord server. News items are posted there via RSS. Or you can subscribe to RSS directly on the site. If you run an event, quests, etc, please consider helping out by self reporting. The Shroud community is big, and many things are happening that are never seen by others. With 10k monthly users, we would need a full time staff to track down everything that is happening. You can fill out the contributor form, message @that_shawn_guy here or post in the Discord server that you would like to help. There is no committment once signed up, you can post as much or little as you like. Writing up your own events has several benefits beyond the immidiate exposure. It serves as a record for others to see the history of New Britannia as we create it, in an attractive format. Publishing in the Express also has a higher chance than the forums of being seen by search engines and random readers, thus bringing more eyeballs and new players to the game. It will even make posting in the forums easier! You can upload images to your news item, and then link to those images in your forum post. No more need for 3rd party image hosts! So if you have something going on in your guild or town, or want to be a Reporter, Cartographer or Historian, please join us! Resources – Players Helping Players The official SotA New Player Welcome Forum and the Player Created Resources Forum have the best player created resources for Shroud of the Avatar, whether it’s a Player Written Guide, a Video Walk-through, or a Wiki-type Website. Visit the official Community Resources page for a complete listing of all things community. View the full article