End of CB4 NA Beta

Last night was the last day you could participate in the fourth NA closed beta hosted by En Masse Entertainment. It was a lot of fun and the level 38 dungeon was very, very beautiful. Unfortunately, during the dungeon run, our party wiped and I never got another chance to record another (I only ran Cultist's Refuge twice). Next beta, I'll make sure I get another run in while recording to showcase how amazing the whole things looked. For now though, I can only provide you with some cool looking pictures.

Beginning of Cultist's Refuge

Last Boss

Cool-looking Room

Next weekend, it'll be the Europeans' turn for their CB4 beta. Hope you guys have fun!

Patch 16.03.07 and TERA Beta!

In 12 hours from this post, the NA TERA server will be up and running full throttle to kick start the fourth beta! A nice countdown timer to look at is here. Get ready!

Oh and if you haven't yet, please run your launcher now so you can pre-patch before the servers go up to save time and frustration.

Patch notes:

Cool New Stuff

• In PvP situations, player level will be exposed when you target another player (just like monsters display their level). This should help those "fight or flight" decisions.
• Doubled the maximum number of characters you can type into all chat channels. We promise it won't go all "Barrens chat" on you, though.
• Increased difficulty from levels 1–15 on an experimental basis. Players will have around 30% less HP and return to baseline by level 20. That red bar at the top of your screen? Kinda important.
• Terron Treasure Trove Event: Added surprise boxes around the world (except for Island of Dawn). We'd tell you more, but then it wouldn't be a surprise, would it?

Bugs Squashed

• Certain quest items were nonexistent due to continent restrictions, but now they're back. Quest gatherables and monsters will be back in Osgarath province for level 30–33 characters.

Raw Link: http://tera.enmasse.com/news/patch-notes/patch-160307
Countdown Timer: http://tera-na-countdown.info/

NA Game Content Updates!

With the 3rd closed beta over, EME has been hard at work making TERA a better experience for all their customers. Today, they changed 3 quite impactful things that you might like or hate:

We've been working hard on bringing TERA to North America, and have also had a hand in shaping TERA specifically with our gamers in mind. This past GDC we spoke with media about what we've been working on specifically for North America, but I wanted to talk about a few changes that we’ve made:

• Removed private stores – we removed private stores from TERA so we could make the broker system the central hub of the player economy. We’ve increased the limit of items that can be sold from 8 to 50 and think this will help players to go to one place to find whatever they need

• Implemented Bind on Pickup (BoP) items – For some items, we’ve implemented a BoP system which lets us give better equipment to players without having to worry as much about RMT farming items.

• Removed Boxes of Mischief – I personally have a negative winning streak with these, and overall we felt that it was a chance based system that frustrated more players than it benefited. We removed them and used the space in the loot drop tables to chances for other cool things to drop

There are a lot more changes and enhancements that we’ve been working on, and as we get closer to our OBT and Launch we’ll keep sharing what we’re doing so y’all know what to expect and give us feedback.

Thanks!
-Chager

Yes, they've taken out player shops, introduced soulbound items, and removed those boxes that steal your materials. I'm personally against all 3 of these changes:

1. I use private stores to buy things while I'm afk at my own prices. This means I don't have to spend time and energy to look for the things I want to buy, except initially setting up the store.
2. I've always found soulbound items to be a nuisance and caused more harm then help.
3. Boxes of Mischief are fun to play with. I don't think people use these seriously in any way because they have a negative win rate. I've always treated this like a small mini-game to pass the time.

Raw Link: http://tera-forums.enmasse.com/forums/news-announcements/topics/Game-Content-Updates

Patch 16.03.06 for NA TERA!

New patch for the upcoming NA beta!

PvP Server Changes

• We've added more PvP rules with this update—it's now uncool to kill players 6+ levels lower than you. These players will now receive the red name of shame and their punishment will be left up to the community.
  • You will now earn Infamy Points for killing lower-level players—60 points for players 6-10 levels lower than you; 120 points for players 11 or more levels lower than you.
  • If you have even one Infamy Point, you will be labeled an outlaw.
  • We won't penalize you for being an outlaw (having Infamy Points), but the community may retaliate as it sees fit.
  • Infamy Points will diminish at a rate of one every five minutes. You can also work them down one at a time by killing monsters equal to your level or higher.

Controller Updates!

• We added a /controller command to access the controller options. We're looking at you, Nostromo users.
• The controller option will now default to camera- or reticle-facing rather than character-facing. This should also please players using a controller-plus-mouse combination.
• Quick tip: if you are using a controller with a melee class, try using the character-facing option.
• All classes can now hold down the main attack controller button to activate the combo attacks. This works the same way as holding down your mouse button.

Quest Updates

• Strife in Fey Forest and Keeping the Quota now spawn their quest objectives more often in more places.
• A Measure of Vengeance will now spawn its objective in three different locations.
• Faeries in a Fix is no longer a prerequisite to the Faerie Emissary quest.

A Few Other Miscellaneous Changes

• Implemented a five-second cast time to switch between channels. No more sitting on the couch and channel-surfing.
• Zone channels now have better scaling based on population, so should provide a more seamless party experience when zoning into an area.
• The "Exchange" menu option has been changed to "Claim Items". You won’t have items to claim yet, but this is where your pre-order and Collector's Edition goodies will be!
• Guild slash commands (/gkick, /guildkick, /gmaster, /guildmaster) are no longer case sensitive to the player's name. Rage-kicking your guildies has never been easier!

What Happened? (Some Things to Still Look Out For)

• Circle the Wagons – Cinematic will not render environmental detail if player has Distant Environmental detail below the max setting of six.
• Cancelling a teleport still consumes the scroll.
• Mystic thrall re-engages monster after player dies. Seeking revenge, we presume.
• Closing your launcher after entering TERA will cause possible crashes at server select. Please keep your launcher running to avoid this issue.
• Dynamic Veridian – This mount quest will appear twice now if you are level 11 and log into 16.03.05. It won’t, however, get you a horse of another color.
• Queues are displaying ordinals incorrectly. ("You are 1th} in line.") If it was just "1th" it wouldn’t be a big deal, but you can’t handle the "2th".
• Items with a re-use cooldown over 20 minutes display the cooldown abnormally in the tooltip window.
• When the Negotiate Confirmation popup (the brokerage negotiation) UI shows under ten seconds remaining, clicking OK does not work.
• When a priest's Final Reprisal is triggered as a chain skill, the chain skill icon disappears too quickly.
• Lock-on skills that are not registered on the first skill tray do not fire with left-click.
• Mystic's Thrall of Life reports amount healed twice. That thrall…what a showoff.
• The effects of both glyphs for the mystic's skill Teleport Jaunt do not apply at the same time.
• When a stacked item without a cooldown (such as a charm) is placed on the shortcut tray and right-clicked, you will spend two rather than just one. Charming.

Raw Link: http://tera.enmasse.com/news/patch-notes/patch-160306

Super Super Super Sampling!

Forgot to post this but a while back, I got my hands on this picture that shows how to get SGSSAA (Sparse Grid Super Sampling Anti Aliasing). What this does is it smooths the entire frame instead of the edge of each polygon (normal Anti Aliasing). In layman terms, basically it makes the game look better with no jagged edges you always see in 3D games, but at the hefty cost of your precious framerate. It is also recommended to only do this if your machine is relatively good, else stay away or you're going to make your game unplayable. I haven't had the chance to test this yet as I haven't played for almost two weeks and I only recently got this info. Unfortunately, this picture only shows how to do it with an NVidia card, though I'm sure ATI cards can also enable SGSSAA if you really wanted to.

Click to enlarge

Source was from a TERA General thread on /vg/ of 4chan.

NA Closed Beta 3

Friday this week at 12:00pm PST! I'll be playing my Slayer again, but hopefully, my Mystic will get some playtime as well.

Whilst they're upping the level cap to 32, the bad thing is that there is no new dungeon. What this ultimately means is, we're going to be stuck with the manor dungeon; doing runs over and over again to get all the gold equips. I don't mind it though, as we will be seeing some new grinding areas. The scenery in this game never fails to astound me.

I can't wait!

Big Patch for KTERA in 1 Hour!

That's right! The KTERA patch that was talked about here is about to be released in about an hour. Koreans will have their first look at the 2 new dungeons while grinding their way up to level 60 (I'm sure in a mere few hours). Expect new dungeon gameplay videos as well as other new things soon!

Sidenote: If you want to watch a good KTERA stream, I recommend viewing Yinwaru's twitch.tv stream. He's an English-speaking player who plays at end-game TERA level and is very insightful. Check out his stream here.

Raw links:

• http://tera-info.blogspot.com/2012/02/big-patch-for-ktera.html
• http://www.twitch.tv/yinwaru

TERA Closed Beta 2!

Started around 14 hours ago. Was too busy playing to write on my blog lol. New videos will be up this coming week so stay tuned.

NA Closed Beta 2 Soon

The second closed beta test will be online in about 20 hours from when this post is created. Get your rig, food, drinks, and piss bottle ready!

Second Closed Beta Information Announced

Here's an excerpt by Scapes, the Digital Marketing Director of En Masse Entertainment:

• Duration: Friday, February 24 at 12:00 PM PST to Sunday, February 26 at 11:59 PM PST
  
• Servers: Arachnaea - PvE, Serpentis Isle - PvE, Valley of Titans - PvP
  
• Maximum Level: 27
  
• Character Slots: 2 per server

This is good news for all of us who want to roll a new character and try something different for the next time around as well as those who wish to continue their previous characters (which I'm sure most of you will to see the new content in store). A new server will also be included in the beta and lo and behold, it's a PvP server! Now the fun begins.

Original post is here: Click!

NA TERA Patch 16.03.04

The patch that I've been waiting for! It covers the true max graphic settings that TERA can offer.

An excerpt of the patch notes:

Fixed Issues

• The "Contact Support" button now brings you to the TERA Customer Support page on the website.
  
• Moving the mouse pointer no longer skips the opening cinematic movie. It can be skipped by press any key.
  
• The LFG, Vanarch, and Party Alert chat channels will now be moderated.
  
• The description for Soothing Rhomb has been corrected.
  
• When trying to create a new character, you will now be notified if you have reached the maximum number of characters on your account for that particular closed beta test.
  
• Achievements will now display in the chat window properly.
  
• This build replaces some existing textures with high-resolution textures. They will display if you set the graphics options to maximum.

Known Issues

• The client may crash when trying to login to server after exiting the server queue screen.
  
• The cinematic for the Circle the Wagons quest will not render environmental detail if your Distant Environmental Detail setting is below the max setting of 6.
  
• Outlaw quests point you to NPC Kareras who is currently not labeled or clickable, and may not appear on the Mini-Map.
  
• When changing locations, party members may "arrive" in a different channel.
  
• The Contaminated Well area in the Quarantine Zone map has the incorrect environment textures.
  
• Cancelling a Teleport Scroll mid-use will cancel the teleportation but still consume the item.
  
• The quest objective and text of the Promised Support quest conflict.
  
• The right ALT key registers as a double press with each single press. Use the left ALT key in the interim.
  
• Piglings occasionally drop huge amounts of gold.
  
• Battlegrounds are not implemented in this build.
  
• The mystic's Thrall summon may re-engage monsters even after its summoning mystic dies.

You can patch to 16.03.04 by running and logging into the TERA launcher. Have you not downloaded TERA yet? If you've pre-ordered TERA from the En Masse store or applied a beta code to your En Masse account, you can visit your account page and grab the TERA launcher from there. For more information on downloading TERA, please refer to our Customer Support page.

Original post here: http://tera-forums.enmasse.com/forums/general-discussion/topics/Patch-160304-Now-Available-5895

Big Patch for KTERA!

The Korean TERA will get a large patch at the end of February which includes a plethora of new things:

1. New Regions
2. Two new instance dungeons
3. New level 60 skills
4. Level cap raise from 58 to 60
5. War against the Argon
6. Warrior stack system
7. Reputation quests and updated repeatable quests
8. Tons of new items
9. New mounts
10. Crystal system changes
11. Large scale PVE content: The Dark Rift
12. Currency system modifications
13. Auction House modifications
14. Pegasus can now be flown from one city directly to another without going through Velika as an intermediate step

All that was just a short summary of what's to come in KTERA very soon. For some neat pictures, please visit steparu's blog at: http://steparu.com/previews/mmo-rpg-previews/823-tera-queen-of-argon-part-1

NA Closed Beta 1 Finished

Welp guys, the NA TERA servers just went down as the first Closed Beta finishes up its last remaining minutes. See you all in the Next upcoming Closed Beta phase!