Hello Poxnorans, Kaervas here.  I’m going to be popping in from time to time in order to give you guys some insight and teasers for the expansions we’re working on here at Octopi.  This time, I’m going to preview one of the runes in Expansion 9 for you and give you some insight into what goes into the conceptualization and creation of a playable rune.  So, without further ado I give you the :

Undertortoise
Faction: Underdepths

Attack: 11
Defense: 26
Speed: 7
Damage: 6
Range: 1
Hit Points: 52
Size: Large
Race: Horror

Abilities:
o Attack: Physical - This unit makes a Physical attack at its Range. This is a basic attack.
o Antagonize - Target champion within 2 spaces can only target and attack this champion for the next 2 rounds.
o Planar Bound - This unit cannot be affected by certain spells and abilities which would relocate it or remove it from play.
o Turtle - This champion becomes Impervious (this champion may not take damage) and Pacified (this champion may not attack) and has 0 SPD until the end of the next turn.
o Defender 1 - Friendly champions within 2 spaces get +3 DEF.

Upgrades:
o Defender 2 - Friendly champions within 2 spaces get +6 DEF.
o Defender 3 - Friendly champions within 2 spaces get +9 DEF.
o Unstoppable - This Champion cannot be Stunned, Slowed, Ensnared, Paralyzed or Rooted, and is immune to Knockback. This unit is also immune to any effects that cause the loss of AP.

So, let me go into some of the thinking behind this guy.  Underdepths is naturally one of the most melee heavy factions.  This presents some difficulty for us, as we have to endeavor to keep things fresh and also stay true to their theme of deadly, close combat demons.  Going into design of 9, one of the things that it was felt they lacked was a strong defensively themed close combatant - end result is the Undertortoise.  Statistically the rune isn’t very complicated.  It has very impressive defense and high hitpoints, emphasizing the defensive nature of the rune.  Offensively it isn’t so hot, it primarily relies on the Underdepths bonus to do real damage - however, 11 damage in a full faction battlegroup is not negligible, especially because he can certainly stick around in a fight to get a few hits off.  As a tortoise, he’s definitely not the quickest of runes, but since his role is primarily defensive he doesn’t have to be.

This champion, however, is not made to be used for his stats, rather his abilities.  He has a few things going on in the ability area.  First off is the combination of antagonize and turtle.  As a 2×2 champion, he’s already quite good at roadblocking for the rest of your forces with his defensive stats.  Antagonize allows him to defend your more fragile champs against a specific threat as well, including ranged units, which are normally quite hard to block off totally with positioning.  Adding Turtle into the mix means that the antagonized champion won’t even be able to damage the Tortoise if it chooses to turtle up.  Defender, then, was a natural choice to enhance the main purpose of the rune - as a 2×2 champion, he will cover a decently large area with the aura, and it will provide some impressive defenses on a few of UD’s key units - sheouls and nefari dragons, notably, will have 26, which as Sundered Lands has shown, can make a big difference.  Unstoppable and Planar Bound round out his assortment, making it potentially very difficult to remove or disable the turtle.

Of course, even at this level the rune is not fully completed.  We continue working on them until the day of release, and often we think of things to add or modify that will make the rune better.  In addition, the champions are previewed to the Player Design Committee before the general beta, and often they’ll have ideas that didn’t occur to us.  In particular with this rune, we’re still considering an upgrade ability to give him a buff when equipped with a heavy crossbow.

Hope you guys enjoyed this insight into our world.
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Kaervas Intern

The PoxNora Giving Tree Charity Event was a great success and experience, thanks to the $9,850 that was raised by the sale of the special rune!

We appreciate everyone who purchased a Giving Tree rune and helped in this event of giving to those in need. The Charity Event, itself, was a lot of fun - for anyone who has ever done something like this you’ll understand how much of an impact it has on those families and individuals who are struggling to make it. Thanks again for all your support.

Here are some photos documenting the Greenies helping out at the event!

[View Charity Photos]
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Hawk Community Manager

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Hello there, Poxers! How long has it been?

I just thought I’d take some time to let you guys know what I’ve been working on.

You know that Tutorial on the webpage? That one that has been gathering dust? That will be changing pretty soon. With the help of KaizerSozay and HawkFain, I’ve been working on updating it. This should help bring new players into the game, with a more comprehensible Game Overview page. Hopefully, this will eliminate many of those common questions you hear in the game lobby. “How do I buy Runes?” will be a thing of the past!

Several misspellings have been brought to our attention recently. They have been around for a while. The dilemma with these was that they have become a part of the PoxNora culture. The jokes that have risen from this are humorous, and changing them might take all of the fun out. However, I’ve recently seen that people want the changes made. So, with PoxVega at the helm, I am navigating the sea of bad grammar and will begin making the necessary changes. Forward, ho!

I am also keeping a close watch on the world of PoxNora. It seems the Bookburners of Valdac have made an interesting find. I took the liberty of confiscating a certain book before it could be burned, and I am glad I did! It seems to be a religious text. It holds a wealth of information about the world before the Separation. It also makes some very strange predictions about the world. I will share more when I am finished. However, I will say this… Watch the skies carefully.

Thanks for checking out the Green Room. Continue the fight! See you soon.

SirQuimbel Writer

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Before I begin my ramble, Sir Quimbel is working his magic and will have a blog entry for you all this Wednesday, Dec. 17, 2008! The goal is every 2 weeks to have a post from one of the greens on one of their projects. Between those you’ll be subjected to my rambles about activities or topics of interest in the Community. Today I’m feeling inspired by you all, so here I go.

Recently there has been a lot of talk about the Comments and Suggestions forum - why does it exist? Why is it its own forum? I’d like to take a bit to delve into the topic….

Originally when Octopi first began the forums, long before I came here - Comments and Suggestions was a place that players could share what they would like to see added to the game. It was a place for you, the player, to voice their ideas and feedback, without talking about in game strategies and experiences. No doubt it was the happening place to give ideas and I’m sure that in the beginning greens posted there much more than they do now.

With the recent change to new forums within the last year, we seriously considered putting the forum into one large general forum. But, as I created each forum I decided against it, and here’s why - Comments and Suggestions are vital to the life of the game. They are vital because it allows you, the Community, to have a place to voice and express your thoughts, just like in the early days of PoxNora. It’s also a place that greens can go to pick and choose what they like. It’s a completely different mindset and forum discussion then General. Yes, I agree that there is some gray here, but in the end it needs to be its own unit.

If you post in C&S and want a response, you’re going to have make it interesting…. very interesting. Now I’m not talking annoying and immature titles (gerben and dirk!); but I’m talking about good, serious, absolutely fantastic ideas and feedback on the game. Then, just maybe you’ll get a response. But keep in mind, it may be one word, a sentence or maybe even a paragraph - and that doesn’t mean it will even be put into the game; but don’t be upset if you don’t get the green paint to your thread. There are literally thousands of ideas to sift through, and it’s just not possible for a staff of 14 to comment on everyone’s individual idea.

We are going to continue to have the Comments and Suggestion forum separate from General because it needs to be there, sitting in the background, always growing, always collecting…it’s there for the creative users of this community to have a voice to connect with the greens. We appreciate everyone that takes the time to make a post. I challenge you all to really make use of it. I do believe that there are those users in the game that just have a great suggestion they want to share - it doesn’t always have to be about getting the greens to read it; it could just be about sharing it with your friends in the Community. Maybe we should have a weekly poll where users could vote on their favorite idea? I’d be happy to set that up.

Anyways I should stop rambling…..

Hawk Community Manager

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Welcome to The Green Room, Octopi’s new blog. In the coming weeks you’ll be seeing posts from the greens here. Our hope is that you’ll be a little more informed on what we’re working on individually, and as a whole. And of course you’ll also be subjected to more of my material too!

With the release of our latest expansion, Dawn of Elements, and a new patch today that focuses on some much need buffs to older runes; things couldn’t be more awesome right now for PoxNora. Going into the holiday season, many of you have seen the rune that we releasef specifically to raise money for a local charity here in Tucson.

In any event, I’ll stop rambling. Those of you who know me are quite familiar with this.

I’m working on getting that European tourney going this week, we have 3 hosts that will be moderating if I can’t be there, I’m hoping that this will show some of our European users that we have them in mind too. The Elemental Highlander Challenge is in full swing and will be continuing through the weekend.

We hope you enjoy, and be sure to let us know your thoughts.
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Cheers,

Hawk Community Manager