DevlogSaves you can trust, groups that cross zone lines, and creatures that go home

A day of making the game dependable: every way a character could be lost, every way a cheat could get in, and every place a fight felt wrong, gone through one at a time.

Your character is saved whole, every time. Crossing a zone line used to leave part of you behind (your AAs, friends, buffs, title and keyring), and a late save could wind a character back a minute. Now every save carries everything, saves land in order, and an old one can never overwrite a newer one. The whole world is also backed up every six hours, and a restore test proves each backup comes back complete.

Nothing goes missing between two actions. Eleven ways an item or reward could vanish are fixed. Bags can't go inside bags, and nothing goes into a bag too small for it. Corpses and loot rolls keep charges and dye, and a roll you have no room for goes back on the body. Selling takes the slot you picked, and a combine with no room uses nothing up.

Harder to cheat. Hostile spells follow the PvP rules, range and line of sight. Chat, the bazaar and the boards can't be flooded, and nothing invisible or far away can be targeted.

Groups cross zone lines. As in the original, a group stays a group wherever its members are. Those in another zone show as "away" and the leader stays leader. A resurrection reaches a player in another zone: accept, and you're taken to your body and raised there.

Fighting feels fairer. Swings, kicks, bashes and arrows land only on what's in front of you. Turning on auto attack turns you to face your target once, and a kick or a shot turns you by itself. Every creature from level 16 up now sits on one scale, with named creatures and group creatures clearly tougher. Most classes win most even fights at every level. Bards sing on the move, arrows and kicks count against armour and earn hate, and creature spells need line of sight.

Creatures that behave. A creature that can't reach you gives up, heals and walks home along its paths, instead of standing stuck forever.

Smoother cities. Each city used to draw about 1,800 pieces a frame; now it draws about 400, and looks exactly the same. Slower computers feel it most. Empty zones no longer keep a processor core busy, and Ctrl+H opens help again (H hails, as in the original).

A new player's first minutes. A bot tried all 82 race and class choices. Every one gets in, starts in the right city and can move. It also found the next job: neither city has a creature camp, a zone line or a workbench yet. Draft city staff, camps and quests are being prepared for that.