CaptainBunny093 on Jan 26, 2014 wrote:

Blind Mew, a few questions:
1) a few days ago, I was playing Pirate101 and noticed every time I entered a new zone, my notifications said that I had a gift. I clicked on redeem gifts but no gift shows up. Is this a bug?
2) Can you tell us when book 15 comes out? I reached the end of the storyline in October and have been waiting VERY Patiently!
3) How many promotion quests will come up in Book 15? I know many of them are overdue.
4) Will we visit more Wizard101 worlds like Krokotopia, Grizzlehiem, or maybe visit more of Dragonspyre besides Avernus Skyway?
5) This last one is more of a compliment than a question! I really like that you answer all of our questions about the story without spoiling anything. I also like the many references to Pirates of the Carribean and Pirates of Penzance in Port Regal (her father is a Major General!) Love it! Also the Dr. Who and Charles Dickens References in Marleybone were great. I really liked the Iliad and Odyssey references in Aquila. It shows how much effort you put in the story!

1) Something clearly out of the ordinary is happening - I'd talk to One-Eyed Jack about that.

2) I cannot - I don't talk schedule. Your patience is appreciated: trust me, I think I want the next Book to come out more than y'all do!

3) There will be an awful lot - at least one bloc of 5 will get one.

4) Yes. Which ones? That would be telling.

5) Thanks for the kind word! Hinting online is one of my favorite activities, and i love seeing the theories that arise in the community. As to the references, one of the first things we do when brainstorming a new world is listing the things we want to reference, the high points that no trip to that world would be complete without. Then it's a question of figuring out our spin on those classics, and how they fit into main or side quests.

Frozenmuskets on Jan 27, 2014 wrote:

Hello Mew. I was wondering about the Magnificent Seven, then these two questions sprung out of my mind.

1. You have stated that only speaking companions get promo quests. How come the Seven( er..six) do? I was crushed when i found out they didn't talk, and their dialog in the promo quests were great. (Duck Holliday's was by far the best.) Could you have the Seven promote? ( I currently have a cold, and thus am coughing, and I spend a lo of time practicing Duck's voice..)

2. I know a new class is a unlikely idea, but that Mutineer class in the Shipyards is interesting, ad who knows? But, back to the Seven. If there is a new class, could it have a angler/lagooney Mag 7 companion named Bill Gillman? ( based off Bill Tilghman, famous lawman of the Wild West.) Perhaps After Wyatt died, he bcame the seventh? I know there's a puppet show already and all, and the quest is set up, but he could appear after the rest of the puppet show. And if that seems unappealing, you could just have him as the foreman of Bat's mine who always wanted to be a lawman. Plus, Bat needs company in the Musketeer-dominated 7.

Dolan of the Dynamic Duo of Frozenmuskets!

1. The seven are a bit of a special case. There are SO many speaking companions that it's getting difficult to ensure they all get an adequate appearance, and from a writing standpoint I just didn't want to go that far. They are, however, way too cool to never get into the spotlight again. Promo quests for them are a compromise. There may be a few more like that before we're done.

2. A new class would be a major challenge, and that's not my decision to make (although i agree, the Mutineer has some cool points). As for the 7, the player is the new 7th: that's why the Book has that title, after all. A Lagooney companion is an awesome idea - I was already looking at ways to make that happen in the future.

Blind Mew on Jan 27, 2014 wrote:

Oops - responded too quickly.

3. I've traditionally been against the idea of side worlds, at least in the near term; it always seemed to me that our effort would be better spent on finishing the Main Story. However, I must admit that I've been mellowing on the idea. It's possible.

4. Well, I presumed it'd be ludicrous for a player to NOT promote one of the A list companions as soon as they could. That quest has bitten us twice: Deacon's cameo and the use of Catbeard (I thought the idea of not havign a tier 3 Bonnie Anne by the time you got to MB was unthinkable, but players will always prove you wrong ).

Honestly, Blind Mew, I like having side worlds in Wizard101 because they provide more adventures to endure, and they tell such additional storylines.

Hopefully, and I'm just saying, someday soon, when the Pirate101 crew gets large enough later on to handle both main story arcs and side story arcs at the same time, we may receive one in the game. And even so, I would be very much thrilled to endure it. You were against the idea at first since one of the goals are finishing the main story arc before anything else, but now, you're starting to like it.

I liked seeing Gortez again in Book 14, which I was happy to see him become Monquista's newest King and Eleanor becoming Queen once again, and I was sure their roles would be more involved afterwards, but I had thought that there would be more involvement in the "Banana Seed" debacle (a word I put in nicely, by the way) as part of one of the main quests' side story adventures, but, the involvement turned out to be very little. What's with the involvement reduction?

Oh, I almost forgot to tell you, after I first promoted Bonnie Anne, Ratbeard, one of the Mooshu 5, Old Scratch, Presidio 5, and Kraken Skulls 5, I didn't receive Badges from clearing their first promo quests. Could this be sorted out by adding the badges that should have come with them?

review of the three lists of questions: (i'm gonna skip a few)

List 1:

1. dont you know what the coven is? the coven is a band of ravens that sought to bring forth the everwinter to grizzleheim and the spiral! well since they are part of a side world, dont you think that they might play an important role to the storyline?

2. have we seen any nods or winks related to legend of zelda that we may have missed? i know i dont remember any! are they part of some side quests?

3. has the third world with the crabs in it already been mentioned? i think its darkmoor.

8. are y'all developing another kingsisle game like warrior101, detective 101, or even knight101?

9. i mean sailing on actual water. no windlanes, but it may be possible for stormgates to work out. i would like to see some sort of mechanic kinda like legend of zelda wind waker.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

List 2:

3. wait, you said in a current reply that we are gonna fight all of the armada elites, but earlier you said we wont. did i miss or mistake or something?

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

List 3:

4. why didn't you answer the catbeard's lair question?

6. so are y'all gonna reveal where the foxes originally came from later in the game?

8. i forgot about aquila. sry

9. are y'all gonna reveal the helephant's and oni's home too?

10. i meant did you have no more room to add worlds we had never seen before in wizy like darkmoor or polaris. like did y'all have no more room to fit them in before adding borrowed worlds like mooshu?

11. woah, woah, woah, hold up! so yer saying that the skeletal warriors and other skeletons came from the underworld? is this tartarus in aquila from wizy or another place?

Blind Mew on Jan 27, 2014 wrote:

1. Well, the way i figure it, we have to sustain the menace of the Armada across 20 books - having a slow build up will not only keep them from becoming boring by the end of things, having the Armada appearing a lot early int he story undercuts their status as big, monolithic enemies - if they're so tough, why can't they take down a newbie pirate? Come book 13, taking them on directly doesn't strain disbelief nearly as much.

2. I wanted you to have to make a real payment to get the answers, and 1 gp was so ludicrously low a sum that I figured nobody could get tripped up there. Also, a street beggar demanding 500 gp (or whatever) seemed just outrageous to me. But, generally speaking, this sort of thing is not the best in terms of quest design: quest goals shouldn't take something that has value from the player, and ideally should always be accomplished by player effort - they can be really hard, but not dependent on possessions. If cash-based barriers were to cost more money, they could easily turn into unfair barriers, and would be much more annoying. I don't think we'll do much more of it, at least not for the Main Story.

Re: The one gold coin. If you think about it, over 5 million players each with at least 6 pirates........I would say that Blind Mew made out like a bandi.......er....Pirate.

Swordroll on Jan 27, 2014 wrote:

I have a couple of questions of pacing questions you get an opportunity. ;)

1. Cool Ranch, perhaps one of my favorite worlds, was spaced out over five books, not including our trip to Port Regal which involved the same map piece. Is its length in terms of the entire arc so long because it was originally planned to be a full Wizard world, or simply because there were that many great stories to tell there?

2. Of the first five worlds (Skull Island, Monquista, Valencia, Cool Ranch, MooShu), only two took a single book or less. With the latest expansion, the two added worlds felt like they carried even more weight than these first five, and may have even been similar in length to some of the longer ones, but each one occupied only one book spot. Was this because our trip there was actually shorter than previous worlds, or because our goals there were uniform enough to place into one book?

3. With approximately six books remaining in the arc (if I remember correctly, you said it'd be somewhere around twenty), can we expect a sort of "mad rush" at the end? We surely have at least two trips to Valencia left, and then we've got to go searching for both Erika and our mother, and I figure it'd be pretty darn lucky if we happened to stumble upon the exact two worlds in which they or their pieces were located. Marleybone and Aquila were already so great. I don't know if I can handle the excitement.

Thanks!

1. That's an interesting story. I think I told it at some point on these forums, but that was a while back. For various reasons, Cool Ranch was the first world we built. At that point, we didn't have any idea how long a Book ought to be, or even how many Books we wanted. Our initial design was that each world would have 5 book, and that they'd progress in sequence. Very Wizard style. But once we got into the thick of things, we realized that was too much - as happy as I am with how Cool Ranch turned out, it runs a bit long. Cutting hours of content that it took significant effort to create was never an option, so as a result Cool Ranch just happens to be the biggest world (in terms of Books) that we've released. As we were wrapping it up, we decided to follow the story on the other worlds, and let the flow determine their length. As the main outline got solidified and we realized that we were aiming for 20 Books, the time spent in future worlds shrank, and the tempo of the story has accelerated nicely for it. So far as i know, Wizard's story for Cool Ranch wasn't really fleshed out yet when they opted out of the world and handed it off to us. If it was, we never used any of it.

2. See above - we decided to not let artificial constraints dictate how many books we would spend on a world: we just want to tell a story. MooShu's two books felt right, and the war story we presented in MB was a very tight single book. Bear in mind that some of our worlds will be like Skull Island in that their Books will not go in sequence - Valencia at least will follow that pattern.

3. I expect the story to keep accelerating. If the budget allows for it, I'm intending for later books to be more like Book 4, with some quick visits to multiple worlds all in the course of a single Book. We shall see.

Trimond297 on Jan 27, 2014 wrote:

Well, I did say for anyone to suggest other candidates for the Red Pen job, too, but I'm certain it's up to the P101 crew to decide. Why not have a voting poll of sorts to that?

These happen, but can also be possibly corrected. I certainly do hope there'll be enough time to at least re-evaluate his recent promo quest appearance to correct that inconsistency someday.

Say, Blind Mew, since many Companions, main story or otherwise, only get their new Epic Powers from promotion quests for the time being, what about the other Companions that don't get their Epic Powers outside of promotions, for example, the creature Companions? They only get Talents from leveling up, but they only get starting Epic Powers by the Pirates' choosing, and nothing more. I feel that it's a bit constraining for that, and it makes their chances for combat reliability very slim. It may be a design bit, I know, but why not have a new Companion Epic Power Vendor that offers new Epic Powers, for main and side quest Companions and Crown Shop Companions so that these said Companions could receive more Epic Powers upon reaching certain levels only outside of promotions? Also, have the vendor give out exclusive Powers for select main and side quest companions. (Honestly, I think El Toro could've had more exclusive Powers besides the ones he's got right now.) Anyway, that suggestion would help to increase their reliability and power variety in combat. I'm just thinking of new ways for Companions to receive new powers beside promotions, you know.

Thanks once again for answering my questions!

By the way... longest... story thread... yet.

We're looking at ways to spice up Companion epics, especially for ones that only have one tier. That's Ratbeard's bailiwick. So stay tuned.

jdr8280 on Jan 28, 2014 wrote:

In general when can we look forward to a new story line quest, taking us beyond the lvl 65 cap, regardless of the worlds it may entail?

If you've followed this tread for any length of time, you know my answer. Book 15 is coming. More than that I will not say at this time.

Hey Blind Mew!

Ever since I began playing P101 I've had a familiar feeling while enjoying the storyline. I finally remember what I was thinking about, an old game called Skies of Arcadia.

It has a similar concept in storyline, but very different in its own way.

One of the pirates party members Aika who has orange hair reminds me of Bonnie Anne, and Drachma another party member reminds me of Ratbeard.

The villains in the game are the Valuan Empire and their Armada. The Queen of Valuan has her 5 Generals (Alfonso, Gregorio, Vigoro, Belleza, and De Loco) out patrolling the skies looking for the ancient Moon crystals While her Military Commander Galacian stays in Valua. If they gather them all they will summon the ancient gigas to control the world.

(Ours is the Valencia Armada, The King of Valencia has his military commander Kane and his generals patrolling the Spiral looking for Pieces of the Map to find El Dorado to control the Spiral)

The player and its party has to prevent that from happening by searching for the moon crystals themselves.

The Valuan Empire is barricaded behind a huge metal wall with cannons and guards looking out.

Early during the game, the player actually has to sneak into Valua to save his Father and Aika's fathers from getting executed from the Queen's executioner.

So yea my question is if you have heard about it before :D

If you haven't heard about it or played it, defiantly worth checking it out, was an awesome game, love the storyline in P101 so far, cant wait to see more!

Pirates o the Spir... on Jan 29, 2014 wrote:

Hey Blind Mew!

Ever since I began playing P101 I've had a familiar feeling while enjoying the storyline. I finally remember what I was thinking about, an old game called Skies of Arcadia.

It has a similar concept in storyline, but very different in its own way.

One of the pirates party members Aika who has orange hair reminds me of Bonnie Anne, and Drachma another party member reminds me of Ratbeard.

The villains in the game are the Valuan Empire and their Armada. The Queen of Valuan has her 5 Generals (Alfonso, Gregorio, Vigoro, Belleza, and De Loco) out patrolling the skies looking for the ancient Moon crystals While her Military Commander Galacian stays in Valua. If they gather them all they will summon the ancient gigas to control the world.

(Ours is the Valencia Armada, The King of Valencia has his military commander Kane and his generals patrolling the Spiral looking for Pieces of the Map to find El Dorado to control the Spiral)

The player and its party has to prevent that from happening by searching for the moon crystals themselves.

The Valuan Empire is barricaded behind a huge metal wall with cannons and guards looking out.

Early during the game, the player actually has to sneak into Valua to save his Father and Aika's fathers from getting executed from the Queen's executioner.

So yea my question is if you have heard about it before :D

If you haven't heard about it or played it, defiantly worth checking it out, was an awesome game, love the storyline in P101 so far, cant wait to see more!

Nope - I've never heard of it in detail until now - it got mentioned earlier someplace I think, but I haven't had the time to follow up on it.

bearkat904 on Jan 29, 2014 wrote:

ugh, now that you said that book 15 might be coming after april or may......i'm very excited and i am very patient now with wizy's khrysalis pt 2 coming to release! wizy will keep me busy while y'all will be working more on book 15. dont rush yerselves please!

1. with the malistaire cameo in mooshu revealed, will we get more of those, maybe a mention of him or even morganthe?

2. are y'all planning on making a hawaiian world? that sneak peek of that shark in the witchdoctor sanctum kinda got me excited.

3. is mr lincoln on wizy from cool ranch or another world?

4. a superhero world based on the avengers or x-men (or both!) would be nice. planning something based off of that?

5. are there any other islands in the imperial skyway in mooshu that are probably around the island that the wizards go to in wizy? around the skyway with marleybone city?

6. will any other characters from wizy be appearing more in this game like prospector zeke and eloise merriweather or grace "gracie" conrad?

7. does this game's story go by a lot faster than wizy's? it seems to be timed around when the wizards go to mooshu.

8. one last thing: you said before that it was pretty obvious what the next world is gonna be. the valencia revisit immediately popped into my mind. then i thought about it for a second and i got something. right after the final fight in aquila we got the 3rd map piece to el dorado and the rosetta stone which had labels on it. it had aquilan and krokotopian languages written upon it. krokotopia came to mind. are we going to go to krokotopia in the next major update? if its a "that would be telling" answer, am i close to my theory?

Fishy Devesh Higgins Level 53 Buccaneer: 1st mate - the KING of MONKEYS!
"Let's set the skies on fire!" - Monkey King to Pigsy

The next update is coming in April or May? That seems way too long. Blind Mew please say that aint true! Or at least that you never said it would come out then.

P.S. Pirate101 has been out for a little over a year and so far we are at lvl 65. Wizard has been out for around 5 or so years and they are at lvl 95 currently. Is there any specific reason why pirate101 has been going faster than wizard?

Scarlet Freeman on Jan 28, 2014 wrote:

Speaking as an aspiring writer, I'd love to (try to) get some questions answered, if you have the time.

1. How hard was it giving each of the Armada elites just enough similar and different traits to make them each their own unique um... life form? (If they can be called a life form. I'd probably add in mechanical before that though. Anyways.)
2. I know that I've seen Deacon's, Phule's, Rooke's and Bishop's personalities discussed on here, some to quite an extent, but I'd love to know how you and the other writers envisioned their personalities. This is a point that has truly fascinated me for some time because their writing was done so well. If so, could I please ask for a thorough description of their personalities?
3. Also, a couple of pages back you mentioned something about how Bishop was able to escape because he had a lot of escape routes and such while Rooke's own arrogance brought about his demise. (He didn't think that we could win against him, and thus had no escape plans, right?) Was the same reason we defeated Deacon? (Even if he could have just turned and ran back to the docks. ) Did he want to stay and try to finish his job because of pride or his loyalty, such as it was, to Kane?

One last thing before I go. Thanks for the amazing game. It allows me to have an outlet for creativity and I enjoy making up stories for my characters. This has also helped me in terms of being an artist. Just yesterday I managed to finally draw a sword that at least resembled a sword one would use for fencing. (The bit of metal that protrudes to protect the user's knuckles has always been my downfall, but this time I think I got it right. )

Many thanks for taking time to read this thread and answer the questions on here. I hope you have a good day!

Always happy to talk to an aspiring writer! Keep writing - and above all, keep reading: that's how you get better.

1. When formulating the Armada elites, we focused on their personalities, and mainly worked to ensure that they were each distinct. As to the similarities, I think they're all defined by their arrogance and disdain/hatred of your pirate - the similarities just emerge. We tend to focus on their dialogue more than most - they're too big a deal, and we want them to really shine.

2. Well, we were trying to build something like a family, or a superhero team. Each needed a purpose, what they do for Kane. Another prime consideration was their role in the story: what kind of plot points and exposition could believably come from them, and what story beats we need them to fulfill. Finally, in addition to being direct adversaries, they're the means by which you learn what the Armada really is. We wanted the Armada to be powerful, indomitable, smart, creepy, mysterious, and to have a Plan. They teach you this, directly or indirectly.

Bishop: The scientist, who we can pin esoteric exposition on. From a story standpoint, Bishop emphasizes that Kane has a plan, and that it's pretty intricate and weird. He's also a direct reminder that the Armada are creepy.

Rooke: The warrior, pure and simple. He's there to prove that the Armada is powerful. Nuff said.

Deacon: We wanted a preliminary adversary who could come and go in the storyline, who embodied the nefarious smart villain, always cooking up plans that come out of left field. From a story standpoint, he reinforces the idea that the Armada is hunting you (even if you don't know why at first) - the Armada is indomitable, and has a plan.

Phule: We had a lot of fun with him. His initial concept - the two-faced split personality guy who's a little crazy, emerged pretty organically. His biggest role so far has been to sell the creepy. He also emphasizes the mystery. He knows a lot about you, and is always mentioning other Elites you've never heard of. He confirms that the Armada is keeping tabs on you and tracking your movements: they know what you're up to, but you have no idea what their plan is. He's supposed to catch you off guard.

As to the other two, I'll keep from going too deep until we meet them.

3. That's a pretty good take on the fall of Deacon. I think ultimately he was feeling that this cat and mouse chase had been going on too long. So he set a trap he thought would work, and went for it. The failure of his gambit with the Duck of Death also really rankled him, I think. I must say, in original versions of the story we didn't kill of Deacon in Cool Ranch. But as the whole outline took shape, it seemed wrong to me that we'd get more than halfway throught he story without defeating your preliminary adversary - 10 books was enough. Time for you to graduate to dealing with the others.

I'm glad you like the game! Being able to inspire people is perhaps the greatest joy I get out of this job.