Gene Endrody on Facebook:
''I've put up a test release of a version of Sherwood that includes the Shadowfey Knight and Priestess allies. As I mentioned in the last note,  the Shadowfey are lost decendants of the Picts. Latin for "painted or tattooed people", the Picts were a confederation of Celtic tribes living in what was later to become eastern and northern Scotland before the Roman conquest of England.

I'm going to run the test release for a few days to catch bugs as there was many changes under the hood neccessary to get everything working. If you want to have a look, it's at:

www.maidmarian.com/sherwood2.htm''
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Pets preview
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Shadowfey Priestess
 
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Preview of Shadowfey Knight & Priestess
Gene Endrody on Facebook:
''I'm writing this in the interest of transparency and to give you an idea of how things are going on behind the curtain. We are coming up on the one year anniversary of the Prophecy of Bane update. Since then we've had Midnight Glade, Bows and Arrows, the Pirate Ship and a variety of other updates. The game has also received some amazing coverage and reviews in the games press in recent months. It's been a big year. The last few updates have been about ensuring the continued survival of the game and making sure that the costs associated with running the game are covered. This includes the mobile payment option and enhanced feature set for pets. They were part of the overall goals for this year. We cover about half of our costs from ads and the other half from pet sales. In effect, the players who pay for pets ensure that the game exits for the players who play for free. Simply playing the game alone does not ensure it's survival, even for those who have been loyal for years. Recent posts have made it clear that there continues to be some players who believe that it should be a simple mater for pets to be free and draw no connection between this and the survival of the game. To put it in perspective, we need to sell about 3000 pets a month to cover bandwidth and server expenses alone. So far we've been able to make ends meet.

The reason I mention this is because the long term plan is to expand the number of pets, mounts and allies from the twelve we currently offer to eighteen (a third row of six on the pet interface). I will be maxed out with coding work for updates to the existing game and with the transition to Flash in the coming year. I'm trying to find a way to be in two places at the same time and boost our production capacity. For this reason I started a search for a high quality 3D art services company to handle the modeling and texturing of new pets and allies. This will have the added benefit of providing a set of fresh models for monsters as well. I will provide art direction, rigging and implementation but most of my time will go to other features in the game. Some of these new pets will be allies and share the same animation set as the human style characters in the game. They will cost well over $20,000 to make and I hope they are going to be great, but I'm not willing to compromise on quality. So I'm sure the next question is "Are they going to be available as avatars?" The short answer is no. As pet/allies they can pay for their own production costs over time but as avatars it becomes an expense we can't simply absorb. Free players may consider this an issue of fairness, as many of them do with the existing pets, but although Sherwood is a fantasy world, it has real world costs that need to be covered and I truly believe we are doing everything we can to provide as much of it for free as humanly possible. Most future updates will continue to be free. It's about finding the right balance to ensure the future viability of the game and using outside help where it makes sense to boost our production capacity.

"Would it be viable to have a paid-for avatar? "

You could argue that with the transform button on a wolf or dragon, we are already selling "premium avatars". All of the new pets will have a transform button, including the ones that share the human/biped animation.''

 
Gene Endrody on Facebook:
''I've introduced a new feature that lets you post a note to the Facebook newsfeed when you advance to a new rank. Ranks were introduced a few days ago and they are basically names for level ranges inspired by the original D&D Basic and Expert set. These names didn't have any specific impact on the game other than to provide a splash of color to XP levels. When you advance to the next rank the game will ask if you would like to post your achievement to Facebook. If you are not already logged into Facebook, a window will pop up giving you the opportunity to do so.

IMPORTANT NOTE: This feature only works from MaidMarian.com. Facebook only allows one URL so this feature is disabled when played from SherwoodDungeon.com. If you press play game at SherwoodDungeon.com, you are now linked to MaidMarian.com automatically. Also on some browsers, like Firefox, you will need to disable pop up blockers for our site to allow the Facebook login window to appear''
 
Gene Endrody on Facebook:
"It is actually names for levels or the level varies in this case, inspired by the original D & D Basic and Expert set.

http://www.wizards.com/DnD/Article.aspx?x=dnd 2F4alum%% 2F20090206

These names had no specific impact on the game, but they offered a splash of color to what was otherwise a rather mundane piece of the game machines.

''They dovetail with something else I'm doing, actually a small opt-in feature that lets you update the status of the achievements in the post game to your Facebook wall. As far as I'm doing a very limited list of what a performance, so I'm still experimenting, but I would soon come up with an early version.

I found "DarkSandor advanced to XP Level 25" a bit boring and found the D & D idea of ​​the level names. "Dark Sandor earned a rank of Guardian." I purposely omitted many traditional military ranks (sergeant, major, captain), because they have no connection guilds ... it's just naming level to achieve."

-- "1 Novice"
-- "2 Apprentice"
-- "3 Journeyman"
-- "5 Pathfinder"
-- "10 Squire"
-- "15 Adventurer"
-- "20 Scout"
-- "25 Guardian"
-- "30 Fighter"
-- "35 Brawler"
-- "40 Scrapper"
-- "45 Brigand"
-- "50 Skirmisher"
-- "60 Battler"
-- "70 Marauder"
-- "80 Slayer"
-- "90 Huntsman"
-- "100 Mercenary"
-- "120 Swordsman"
-- "140 Freelancer"
-- "160 Swashbuckler"
-- "180 Vanquisher"
-- "200 Chevalier"
-- "220 Duelist"
-- "240 Gladiator"
-- "260 Legionnaire"
-- "300 Veteran"
-- "350 Swordsmaster"
-- "400 Keeper"
-- "450 Protector"
-- "500 Defender"
-- "550 Warder"
-- "600 Gallant"
-- "650 Knight"
-- "700 Exemplar"
-- "750 Myrmidon"
-- "800 Conqueror"
-- "850 Lord"
-- "900 Palidin"
-- "950 Hero"
-- "1000 Champion"
-- "1100 Legend"
-- "1200 Demigod"
-- ''2997 God''
 
Gene Endrody on Facebook:
''I've just launched Version 2.1m. This includes the ability to use Wolf and Lion pets as mounts. It also gives the owners of animal and monster pets the ability to transform thier character into the form of thier pets. This means you can wander around the world as a Unicorn or Dragon. Also when mounted or transformed, the <ctrl> key now attacks rather than dismounting. You now use <ctrl> to dismount (same as block).</ctrl></ctrl>

I still have work to do on amulet effects against players transformed into pets. Initially players transformed into pets will not be able to do PVP damage. This may change in the future. There is also still tuning to happen, but I hope you like the update.''
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Mounting a wolf
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Mounting a lion
 
Today Sherwood Dungeon: Version 2.1k has been launched

Update notes:
  • Sherwood Castle is back to normal
  • Dragon statue has been changed to black
  • You can now mount and summon a Unicorn and Horse.
  • New command added: /server emerald, /server sapphire, /server ruby