Kudos to the area designers

[Ithildur]

Before I forget I want to throw out props to the two people who designed the areas... they are fantastic in both aesthetic quality and game balance/sense.

There are parts of the starting town that are just.. drop dead gorgeous.

I really love the chests and traps in the goblin cave that forces a party to try to recruit a rogue. Someone thought things through.

My only recommendation might be to modify locations of a couple places to be a bit closer to ATs in order to make them more likely to become PC activity hubs. the smithy by the gate is a good setup; the mage shop by the main gate is much less accessible and that area will likely not see much activity except when PCs arrive or need to shop for scrolls. But then again maybe that was intentional, for good reasons. Wouldn't surprise me given how well thought out most places are on the server.

[Forlorn]

Yes the areas are beautiful but I think they need to be populated more with npcs and shops/points of interests. Like both Aquor and Sesstra have only like one shop each (and a cave in Sesstra I think?) but other than that not much else. But yes I understand we're still in beta and activity for the areas will come in due time, I just thought I'd poke a gentle reminder at the devs since we're talking about the areas. But all in all so far, I really like what I see.

[Saulus]

Those two areas were recently added and rather than wait longer to add a suitable number of interiors we got them added so people could at least start to explore in them.

[Ash]

"...I just thought I'd poke a gentle reminder at the devs since we're talking about the areas..."

If we went any faster the areas wouldn't be this good. Once or twice I've pushed myself pace wise and an area might not get the attention it deserves as a result. When I take my time you get an area full of eye-candy, that's worth exploring, that inspires roleplay, gives NPC/quest designers something to really get their teeth into and something DMs will be able to use for a long long time.

Keep in mind that area design is only 25% of the work. I agree that a pretty area is nothing without the actors, automation and activity but these things take time if you want them done right. And I would imagine the players want that just as much as the designers.

[GodBeastX]

I want flat areas with no placeables, that way people can clearly see I'm out to smite them without needless obstructions

Ash, you are doing excellent work in my book and faster than I would expect by all means.

[Forlorn]

I agree that an area that is beautiful to start with and slowly populated over time is more important than a small highly populated area that isn't as aesthetic. Like I mentioned I know we're still very early in beta and so far what we have here is already very good.