Head starts and an upcoming launch aside, Dan Tudge took time this morning to chat with us about Sword Coast Legends. After playing in the head start last weekend we had some questions for Dan surrounding what the team is working on in these final weeks and what their plans are for after the game launches.
We began the conversation talking about the feedback from this past week’s head start. Dan said that the team is working hard on polish and tweaks to make sure things are lined up for launch in on September 29th. Even going into today’s head start phase two, there list of features, improvements and bug fixes in the patch notes. A lot of changes are coming in on the story side, most of which were driven by the community. Dan said that the team looks at community feedback as well as their own updates to decide on a priority list.
Next we covered the topic of character progression and depth. Dan has played through to level cap several times. “There is progression both horizontally and vertically for the characters,” he said.
You can work on your skills or spells in the ability tree which is one part and you also have the chance to get the right bonuses from gear. It is very similar to table top in that your gear compliments the type of character you play. The game is challenging early on because you don’t have as much to work with, just like regular D&D. As you get to higher levels, your options open up and there are a lot more ways to solve problems or face combat. Dan said that as he had reached up to sixteenth level, he felt pretty strong as a character, just like table top.
We next took on the topic of group dynamics. Dan was quick to say that a well-rounded group makes the most sense. During in-house testing, many of the dev team look to fill the core roles of any party when they start up a campaign. Dan said that healing is always critical and a party with no healing has to prepare for the worst. Using potions and heal kits can still make that party viable, but you preparations have to be made. Mixing a group really yields the most from a party. Having the rogue to check for traps or secret doors, the cleric to heal, a mage for spells, and some type of fighter bring a solid dungeon crawl to life. Still, players can go any route they want and mixing parties always makes it interesting.
We asked Dan if players would be able to host their own persistent worlds in the game. He said, from a D&D perspective, players can host their own campaigns in the game. So you can make a long drawn out campaign which you can add to on a weekly or even daily basis using the DM tools. You can always add new adventures and quests and work on the map templates for your players. However, hosting a persistent world of forty to fifty players is not necessarily the idea with the game. The persistence comes from the endless campaigns that a person can write to take their friends on huge adventures.
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All of this player created material is fantastic, but we asked Dan about the Story part of Sword Coast Legends. He got very excited and said that is something he feels is not getting enough attention. Dan said there is a huge epic campaign already built into the game. The team worked really hard on making sure it screams classic D&D. He said that players will be really excited for what they have created. The story is great and the team plans a lot of updates to it in the future with DLCs.
Finally, we jumped on the DLC comment to find out what they are planning for post launch. Dan said they already mentioned the Rage of Demons content. He also explained that the team has a wish list of things they want to get into the game. This even includes races, classes, maps, more materials, and more tools. The list is based on both player and developer feedback. Dan was nice enough to share the Patch notes for this weekend’s Head Start.
Players have a lot to look forward to with Sword Coast Legends coming in just two weeks. Keep up with us at MMORPG.com as we continue to bring you head start coverage and more interviews on the game leading up until launch.
