Dear Devs: Some items that I think the community would REALLY love some detail on

Given that we've have the most info so early before release than any game I can think of, don't push your luck.  I for one am not part of the 'community who would really love what you want more detail on' who demand everything now and even more later.

You obviously need to learn the difference between a demand and a request. And as I stated in my OP, I am very appreciative of how forthcoming they have been with information so far. The points I raise are not even all things that I personally care about all that much - they seem to be things that some are (likely needlessly) fretting over that a little clarification could ease those concerns.

Give an inch.... :p

Well, damn, I go out of my way to take the suck-up, kiss-ass approach and it seems like I am being labeled some kind of troll-fan who is being demanding and just all around ungrateful.

THe real problem is that we (all of us) want to know everything about the game. Now. No excuses. If the alpha was released right now, many would have problems to take the time to post a "thank you" before pouncing over Impulse to download it and... well, you know.

The multiplayer aspect is the only special topic that wouldn't be solved with the alpha/beta release but I think that it's just a matter of time for Starodck to really see how things develop before taking a final stance about it.

I'm expecting most of the answers for this thread to be in the official stardock dev journal.

Don't  worry about   astrath   he hates any comments/topics regarding multiplayer.  

 Thanks for creating the topic... and we recently received a response which came as a response in a recent developer journal.    

 Official Response =

Frogboy:
LAN almost certainly. Hot seat maybe. PBEM, not sure yet.

And here I thought Denryu meant "Troll" in some ancient tongue... :p

It means electric dragon in Japanese actually. He is actually a dark blue dragon with golden eyes that uses electricity as his breath weapon...Been my online persona for as long as there has been in interweb...

My own pseudonym seems pale in comparison: a mere phonetic set of letters that aren't likely to be repeated in the English-speaking world. 

Mine is downright pathetic: my black lab's name, plus her genearl species.

In any evernt, a major question:

Will essence regenerate? Denryu, Luckmann, pidgeonpidgeon (man, that's hard to spell), GW Swicord, and I have been bashing each other over the head about this over in the ideas section for a few days now, and while the dev journals tell us what we can do with the essance, they say nothing about it coming back or not. I seem to get the genearl vibe that it is finite in some way, but I really don't know.....

I thought one of the earlier Journals specified it was finite.

As far as my memory goes, essence doesn't come back. You use it, you lose it. So you save it and become a god-like being or you spend it in other minions, losing yourself power but making stronger servants. At least that was the idea Frogboy was preaching somewhere along the timeline.

Well, you made it harder to spell than it really is

I was under the impression the Essence is finite, however magic shards spread across the realm can be found to provide new Essence. 

Ideally the game would provide at least two options... one being finite amount and the other allowing a regeneration of essence over time... perhaps a slider by how much it regenerates as well.

I'm pretty sure that the shards are essentially 'mana wells,' not essence sources.

Good point. In MoM, mana didn't "come back" either. You needed a steady supply. In crude economic terms, however the magic system shake sout as a whole, essence will be some form of precious resoure while mana is a bulk commodity. If you're food-literate, think truffles vs. rice.

I think GW Swicord has it right.  Mana wells are for spells and magic.  Essence is something your Channeler gets when levelling up....can then be used to boost the Channeler or other stuff.

Now getting new essence when you levelled up I could totally dig. That would correspond to unlocking "partitions" of magic as you gained skill and did research. I just don't like the idea of recharging (even if it is slow) or getting more in any mundane way. As a rare quest reward, possibly.

It may be that "Essence" and "Mana" are two different things: the former representing a non-corporeal part of the channeler; the latter representing more of a "short-term endurance".  I don't think every little spell should cost Essence, but major works should.  Otherwise the end-game will just become a physical slugfest.