Imperian: A Year in Review
It’s no secret that things were rocky in 2019, and that we didn’t accomplish everything we set out to do. As we look back over 2019, though, there are quite a few standout events that are worth recollection!
In January, along with the giftbag promo, we introduced the concept of buying into the promotion using in-game means by selling Giftbags for Doubloons. Going forward, we plan to continue to do this where it makes sense, and allow for a truly free experience while playing Imperian. This doesn’t mean you can’t or shouldn’t still make purchases on the website! It does mean that those players not able to, but who still want to see gains from their time in-game, can continue to do so.
February saw the implementation of a handful of classleads, continuing the project that would continue to go on all year and into 2020. More on classleads at the end of this review.
Though March was a quiet month, and saw the unexpected temporary departure of Eoghan due to outside responsibilities, April saw the return of the Tournament of Ages! The ToA continued into May with the Duelling Tournament. May also saw adjustments to raid objectives, and continued work on classleads.
Going into June, Dec implemented a scheduling system that would allow for regular games, which came with credit rewards for placing, and daily credit rewards for participation.
July was a big month! It saw the introduction of the Fight Club, a feature that allows players to participate with fully kitted out characters to remove any artifact imbalance that might exist. The system also logs the fights to the website so others can review them and work on their own combat! Also in July was the introduction of Non-Binary gender! This was received very well, and is a huge step for inclusion! Classlead implementation also continued in July.
In August, not only did Eoghan celebrate a birthday, but they brought everyone else along by removing Tokens of the Creator as a secondary currency – moving the artifacts that were gated behind this hard-to-find token over to Credits, which can be earned via dailies!
During September, things were all quiet on the front as the team worked in the background on some things to come
October saw the triumphant return of Eoghan, no longer just checking in sparsely but now back and fully involved in the goings-on of Imperian.October saw the culmination of months of planning and work on the Aspect system revamp, as well as an uptick in player engagement and bugfixes.
In November, additional clarity, long requested, was given to several types of organizational and personal PK – in particular clarifying Obelisks, Bounties, and Leylines. November also saw the introduction of Eoghan’s periodic Bug Fix news posts, updating everyone on the various things being worked on in the background. We also saw the release of a new Helper App for Android!
Finally, in December, we saw the introduction of more Aspect features, as well as Liquid Rifts! In the end of December, the team also dove back in to Classleads to continue working on them.
Overall, though it was a quieter year than we’ve had in the past, the community has nonetheless come together quite a bit, and we’re seeing things ramp back up to a more reasonable speed going into 2020. There will be a post detailing some of our 2020 plans coming soon, so we won’t get into that too much here. We’ve been pleased by the engagement (and civility) that we’ve seen in the Official Imperian Discord, and encourage anyone that hasn’t joined yet to consider doing so. It will continue to be a great resource to engage with other players (and with the occasional member of the Administration).
We’re looking forward to great things in 2020!