Major Changes Of Albion Online From Hector Version 1.0.324

The day is closer and closer when Albion Online will finally be released - July 17, 2017. Before that, the developers decided to revise some game mechanics and test the changes in the last major update called "Hector". The installation date for the patch is June 7, and UpAlbion will tell you some details about the new features and major changes.

The Black Market

The Black Market is now open in Caerleon! Your new rotund friend is waiting for you west of the main square.

Buys gear, sells it on to shady characters

♦ The merchant will put up buy orders for equipment he wants.

♦ You can also make sell orders and wait for his prices to match.

♦ Items bought by the merchant mysteriously find their way into the hands of mobs in the world, which will then occasionally drop them as loot.

♦ Quality and enchantment level will remain intact throughout the process.

♦ "Crafted by" is not currently retained, but we're hoping to improve this in the near future.

Pricing auto-balances itself

Every time a mob wants to drop an item, it checks the black market storage for that item, and if there aren't any in storage, it increments the buy order for that item by an amount based on item value, so prices for items will rise until they're high enough to be worth selling to. Also, a certain percentage of items are mysteriously lost along the way, so there's an inbuilt destructive element in the cycle to keep the economy flowing nicely

Equipment Item Stacking

Equipment items can be stacked

♦ Items of the same type, quality and durability may now be stacked on top of each other.

♦ Equipping items will automatically split the item stack.

♦ On knockdown all items in the stack will receive damage.

♦ On death, each item in the stack has an individual chance of destruction.

♦ Note: though not implemented yet, in an upcoming update names of crafters will be recovered once the stack is split again.

Equipment items can be mass crafted

♦ You may now craft a large number of equipment items at once.

♦ Equipment items will automatically stack during the crafting process.

Equipment items can be mass traded

♦ Stacks of equipment items may be freely traded from player to player.

♦ You may now sell and create sell orders for stacks of equipment items at marketplaces.

Outlands Changes

Harbors and Black Cities are gone

♦ Harbor clusters are now normal clusters.

♦ The three cities in the black zone - Fort Thursair, Farewich, and Sheerbrough - have been removed.

♦ Islands in the three cities, and all market orders in both cities and harbors, have been moved to Caerleon. Any items left in banks in these cities or in harbors have been lost, as have any buildings left standing.

The Realmgate

♦ The Caerleon Realmgate has now opened!

♦ This glowing gateway in Caerleon (in the middle of the Royal Continent) will allow you to travel to one of numerous realmgates in the Outlands.

♦ Outlands gates all connect exclusively to the Caerleon gate.

♦ You can't use a realmgate on a different continent (Anglia, Cumbria and Mercia) for 60 minutes after travelling.

♦ You can't travel to a different realmgate on the same continent for ten minutes after travelling.

Outlands resources

♦ Outlands regions in Anglia and Cumbria now spawn the same number of resources as the equivalent region in Mercia.

♦ The better outlands regions now have increased chances of having enchanted resources (Cumbria having twice the normal chance of enchantment, and Mercia having four times).

♦ Tier 7 resources now have more spawn locations, but spawn with 23 units.

♦ Tier 8 resources now spawn differently (see Territory changes below), and spawn with 27 units.

♦ Red zones now have substantially better loot chances than safe zones, and outlands now have substantially better loot chances than red zones.

Territory Changes

Improved watchtowers

♦ Watchtower territories in the Outlands are now the sole source of T8 resources.

♦ All resources in watchtower territories now respawn at the beginning of their prime time.

♦ The resources are guarded by NPC guards, but can be raided by other players.

Declaring fights

♦ All GvG fights now need to be declared 20h in advance.

World PvE Improvements

This part of changes are main focusing on mob camps and dungeons:

♦ Many new medium-sized mob camps have been added, which replace around half of existing solo dungeon entrances.

♦ New large mob camps have been added, and their regions reworked to make them more visually significant.

♦ All the old large camps have been retired.

♦ New, huge dungeons can be found beneath large camps, some of which have multiple layers; these replace (and substantially improve upon) all existing non-raid group dungeons.

Hellgates

New layout

♦ Hellgate areas have been rebuilt from scratch.

♦ The map now forms a pentagram, allowing groups to rotate around them as they see fit - this should be much better from a PvP perspective.

♦ You can enter at any one of five points.

Mob revisions

♦ Mobs are now set up to be much easier to disengage from.

♦ Consistent DPS reduced to make it less crippling to be ambushed while fighting them.

Minibosses

♦ There are now five minibosses.

♦ You need to kill all five to trigger the main boss.

♦ Helping to kill a miniboss gives a short 5% buff to damage and resistances.

Exit timer

♦ You can't leave any hell until you've been there for at least four minutes (or until you die).

Infernal Hellgate

♦ This is the new name for the Hellgate found in red and black zones, which still exists, but with all the changes outlined above

Ignited Hellgate

♦ Ignited Hellgate is a new Hellgate, found in yellow zones

♦ When you lose all your health inside this gate, you're knocked down and ejected from hell

♦ The hostile counter is enabled

♦ Item power is soft-capped to keep them competitive

♦ Fame and loot are scaled appropriately for its reduced danger level

Ashen Hellgate

Ashen Hellgate is a new Hellgate, found in safe zones. Similar to the Ignited Hell, with the following changes:

          • It's limited to two players only

          • The boss is replaced with a lootable chest

          • Mobs are appropriately balanced for the player numbers

          • Fame and loot again scaled for danger level

New Mounts

Undead, Keepers and Morganas now all have two faction mounts: a regular one, and an epic one which has activated ability. Note that the Undead Bonehorse already exists and is therefore not listed here.

New Tier 8 Undead epic mount: Spectral Bonehorse - One of the new epic faction mounts, the Spectral Bonehorse is a prestige mount with an active ability, allowing you to briefly turn invisible. To craft, needs a regular Bonehorse and a special item that drops from the weekly Undead raid boss.

New Tier 5 Keeper mount: Swiftclaw - The Swiftclaw occupies a similar role to the Direwolf, but losing a bit of speed in exchange for more protection. Swiftclaw Cubs will drop from Keeper bosses.

New Tier 8 Keeper epic mount: Rageclaw - Another of the new epic faction mounts, the Rageclaw is a prestige mount with an active ability, allowing you to sprint even faster for a short period. To craft, needs a Swiftclaw and a special item that drops from the weekly Keeper raid boss.

New Tier 5 Morgana mount: Warhorse - The Warhorse is an improved version of the Armored Horse. To craft, needs an Armored Horse and a special saddle that drops from Morgana bosses.

New Tier 8 Morgana epic mount: Nightmare - The third of the new epic faction mounts, the Nightmare is a prestige mount with an active ability, allowing you to leave a trail of burning fire behind you for a short time, damaging any enemies who touch it. To craft, needs a Warhorse and a special item that drops from the weekly Morgana raid boss

New Tier 8 mount: Transport Mammoth - Transport Mammoths are the ultimate Guild-level transport: it carries huge amounts of cargo, and while it's slow enough that it probably needs a sizeable escort through dangerous territory, it's also tough enough to withstand some punishment while you fight the enemy off. Mammoth calves are a rare drop from mammoths.

New Tier 4 mount: Giant Stag - The Giant Stag is a fun alternative to the regular Horse, with some small stats differentiation. Fawns drop rarely from Giant Stags (similar to a Direwolf drop).

New Tier 2 mount: Mule - Given as a reward for completing the tutorial. The perfect starter mount!

New Tutorial

• Once you get into the first town, you will find friendly Royal agents around to help you find your feet. 

• Finish all their tasks, and they'll reward you with the new Mule mount and a Novice's Cape.

Journeyman's Weapons

• All base weapon types now exist at Journeyman (T3) level.

• Added in this release: hammer, crossbow, quarterstaff, dagger, cursed staff, frost staff.

• This also eliminates the remaining weirdness with the Adept nodes for those weapons.

Potion Rework

• All potion have been revisited and reworked.

• Potion Cooldown has been reduced to two minutes, and in some cases even lower.

Healing Potions: Heals a portion of the max heals over the course of 15s (Duration is the same on every tier)

Energy Potions: Instantly restores a percentage of the max energy

Resistance Potions: Increases Resistances and Crowd Control Resistance for 6s.

Revive Flasks are now Gigantify Potions: Increases Max Health and Max Load for 15s

Chilling Flasks are now Sticky Potions: Can be thrown at a ground target, to create an area which slows and reduces damage of enemies.

Recovery Potions are now Poison Potions: Can be thrown at enemies to poison them, dealing true damage over time and reducing armor.

Cleansing Potions are now Invisibility Potions: The caster turns invisible after consumption.