Customisation Changes

Customisations are once again opened and the help files have been updated to reflect all the new changes. We’d like to give you a rundown of the most important changes and explain our reasoning behind the bigger ones.

1) HELP CUSTOMISATION INDEX or HELP 23, is a whole new help file section set aside for customisations only. You will find the usual help files there, in expanded forms, and some new ones.

2) Pricing has increased across the board. We know this one is the toughest of the changes but it is necessary due to the influx of credits from the daily credits and org credits systems, both of which have multiplied customisation requests beyond what we can support.

3) All customisation e-mails should now be directed to support@lusternia.com, rather than the old artifacts@lusternia.com.

4) A new add-on was added for custom beasts and dwellers called Lore Review. This must be requested if the type of beast or dweller that you are requesting does not already exist somewhere in Lusternia. Things like that require a thorough lore review, review of any potential conflicts related to ongoing development, and often also include reviews from various org patrons. You will only be charged on successful review. More on that in HELP CUSTOM BEAST and HELP DWELLERS.

5) Inherents for beasts have increased in price relative to how many trains they cost. You now also have a new tool to help you price inherents ahead of time via INHERENTCOST. More on that in HELP CUSTOM BEASTS.

6) The cost of Sentience has increased for beasts, but has been lowered for dwellers as their primary purpose is roleplay.

7) Homesteads with retired or dormant owners (1+ year) that are not deeded to a family will have access to their public spaces closed, and re-opened upon the owner’s return. This is being added to future-proof homesteads and avoid situations in which numerous empty and open homesteads are occupying space in an organisation. Deeded homesteads can be managed by the head of the family, which removes the issue.

8) Typecast customisation is being retired. In its current incarnation, the system allowed for a first-come, first-served economy with adjectives. People could claim words and no one else could have access to them. Even revamped, we feel personalised typecasts should be rare as their proliferation undermines their value as unique features of Guilds, Communes, Cities, and Divine Orders.

Going forwards personalised typecasts will be auction-only. All existing deeded typecasts will remain as they are. Players with multiple personal typecasts will be messaged and asked to choose one typecast to keep.

9) The in-game Reactions system (syntax: REACTIONS) for custom beasts and dwellers is being retired. The system has several issues which have led to this decision, including: a multitude of bugs which have claimed countless coder hours over the years; a growing divergence in how it interacts with reactions progged by us as a part of requests; the inability to add cooldowns or mutes which we have been implementing more readily in recent years to cut down on spam; and its inherent ability to allow players to create, without oversight, reactions we would normally reject due to copying artifact functionality or otherwise imbalancing combat.

The option to add or activate reactions will be disabled immediately as of this post. We will systematically review in the near future all reactions in the system and either move them to our current system if they meet our current standards or can be adjusted to meet them, or refund them if this is not able to occur. Reactions can continue to be requested through the e-mail route.

10) The Shopkeeper feature for dwellers will now be able to be set up only in manses to avoid situations in which empty shops of retired or inactive players keep hawking their wares. The number of dwellers which this feature is very small and all owners will be consulted whether they would like to move their shopkeepers to a manse, or would like a refund.

11) It will no longer be possible to submit Artifact Shop Skins and existing player-submitted skins will be disabled. We would like artifacts to have many skin options that match their play styles and organisations but the current system was favouring organisations with active designers who wished to submit. You will find many options for one organisation, but none for others. Instead, we will be hosting contests for skin submissions and making sure new skins get an even distribution. Any player-submitted skins you own are yours to keep. Designers of those skins are encouraged to submit their designs for competitions when those take place.

12) Dwellers are receiving a new feature – Companions. Only one dweller at a time can be your companion, and that is the dweller that will be accompanying you outside the manse or homestead. They will reset to your inventory while they are a companion. Once you choose a new companion, the old one will return to their intended dwelling. HELP DWELLERS has the syntax and additional information. All dwellers that did not have a dwelling set up, received a dwelling. If you own only one dweller and their dwelling was your inventory or a manse or homestead, nothing has changed. If you own two or more dwellers, they had their dwellings set up in one of their owner’s manses. If you would like to change those, please contact support@lusternia.com.

13) All existing customisations will have their progs reviewed in the near future to give older beasts, dwellers, and items, additional functionality – muting, cooldowns, etc. In addition, the Companion system requires some behind the scenes changes as well so a few inconsistencies will crop up while we iron that out.