Hey all, getting a lot of IM's about respecs and the like so just wanted to take some time to update everyone on the state of development.

We're looking to have CCS 1.0.5 out by the end of October, it is our hope that this will coincide with our revamp of the CCS API system, switching it over to API 3.0.

All major system updates, which we do about every 90 days, always end with a free respec that you can choose to use when you want, or a mandatory respec you must use immediately if major changes are made that the entire game base must adapt to, then a free respec is issued a week or two after that.

We have a lot of irons in the fire as we work on the new CoLA mesh rebuild, and we work on CCS 1.0.5 and API 3.0, we've also got some player security features going into CCS that will make peoples CCS data harder to access by anyone but the actual player....and a bunch of meter performance and security fixes as well.

So don't get all angsty out there, we've got a lot of work going on behind the scenes and we expect you'll have it all in your hands by Halloween.

So have RP, have fun, and enjoy yourselves, we've got fixes and new toys on the way for the holidays.

As everyone is well aware, we do not allow age play or child avatars in the City of Lost Angels, this has been in our rules for years literally since almost the day I opened the doors of the city back in 2006, I established this as an unacceptable part of Second Life that I was not going to allow in CoLA.

Of late though I've been getting a lot of requests for what constitutes a "child avatar" and people asking me for definitive definitions of what the exact criteria for being allowed to play in CoLA is.

Now you have to realize that this is somewhat similar to the United States Supreme Court's dilemma when they attempted to regulate the porn industry. They had to define what "obscenity" was, and the only true answer to that question is; "You'll know it when you see it."

This means that the United States Supreme Court, in essence realizes that it is nearly impossible to distinctly quantify what obscenity was in a singular definition that would define it legally in all respects.

Determining what constitutes a "child avatar" in Second Life is much the same as this dilemma. Its nearly impossible to make one blanket definition for what is right or wrong in regards to the way an avatar is designed, especially in a role play environment, and say "you must be "this tall" to ride this ride."

The simple facts are, a lot of problems come up in overall avatar development based on relative scales. My own avatar for Suzanna stands at 5'9" tall according to the viewer's avatar editor, but relativistically if I go to sims where other people aren't paying much attention to that, Suzanna looks like a midget or a very short person.

So the simple ruling on what constitutes a "child avatar" in CoLA simply must fall back on the discretion and judgment of the community and GM's on a case by case basis, its very much a case of "you'll know it when you see it". Being "short" does not immediately constitute the representation of a child, but depending on how its being played, it can.

So to try to answer this question once and for all, there is, technically, no "height" requirement for avatars in CoLA, there is simply the judgment and observance of our GM team, if they feel your avatars visual presentation is in violation of our zero tolerance policy for age play/child avatars, then they will tell you and you'll need to make a few adjustments to the avatar to try to avoid any questioning of your intent in how you represent yourself within our community, or any of the communities in the CCS network that have similar policies.

Sorry I cannot give you a more solid answer on this question, but its always been a subjective question and a subjective observation. This does not in any way change our zero tolerance policy in CoLA, if you come into CoLA and you're four feet tall and you're wearing bobby socks carrying a baby doll and start skipping around presenting yourself visually as underage, you will be pulled aside and told to change it or leave.

Effectively the GM's and Admins of the system have the ball on this, and they'll know it when they see it.

A GLOBAL MANDATORY RESPEC HAS BEEN ISSUED FOR THE ADJUSTMENTS TO CCS FOR THIS RELEASE PLEASE DO NOT IMMEDIATELY ASK GMS OR ADMINS FOR A SECOND RESPEC A SECOND FREE RESPEC WILL BE ISSUED TO THE NETWORK APPROXIMATELY TWO WEEKS AFTER THIS BALANCE PASS HAS GONE THROUGH.


FIRST OFF: DO NOT USE INTERNET EXPLORER 9 TO DO YOUR RESPEC IT WILL NOT WORK, IE9 DOES NOT WORK WITH OUR JQUERY COMPILE AND WE ARE NOT GOING TO RECOMPILE JQUERY TO MAKE ONE BROWSER WORK. USE FIREFOX, CHROME, SAFARI, OPERA OR EVEN THE INTERNAL SECOND LIFE BROWSER. NOT IE9!

Secondly we're pushing a new meter to incorporate a small fix to stop the meter bugging that has been caused by stack heap overflows and to introduce some more security to the meter unit.

Changes to CCS Balance are as follows:

• Lycan Point Method changed to Lacerate
  
• Neko Point Method changed to Claw
  
• Human Point Method changed to LegSweep
  
• Undead Point Method changed to Gore
  
• All Racial Caster intelligence modifiers increased to 1.25x to increase overall damage for intelligence investment.
  
• Increased Felshield by 10 points of armor per level of the ability. I agree +1 Armor was sort of a joke...right? Get it...+1? Damn no one gets my jokes.
  
• All Racial Caster chance to hit increased to 98% to match melee DPS chance to hit.
  
• Cyborg PleasureBots and NanoMedics had their Intelligence Mod increased to 1.15x
  
• BioField Ability Removed - This was generally a throw away ability for most healers and was only used to cancel racial regens.
  
• Malice changed to single target, damage base increased to 67 points of damage (scales with intelligence) curse duration 25 seconds, 98% chance to hit
  
• Neko Reflexes increased to 15 second duration/decreased cool down to 25 Seconds
  
• Removed attacking/attacked animations from all racial point method generation skills to balance out quick use abilities with ones that get slowed down by an animation delay.

Lets see how it plays before everyone screams and cries, thank you.

Spanish:

UN RESPEC GLOBAL MANDATORIO HA SIDO EXPEDIDO PARA LOS AJUSTES DE CCS EN EL NUEVO LANZAMIENTO. POR FAVOR NO APABULLEN INMEDIATAMENTE A LOS GMS O ADMINS DE INMEDIATO PIDIENDO UN SEGUNDO RESPEC. EL SEGUNDO RESPEC SERÁ EMITIDO PARA TODOS APROXIMADAMENTE EN DOS SEMANAS DESPUÉS DE QUE HAYA SALIDO EL NUEVO BALACE.

PRIMERO: NO USES INTERNET EXPLORER 9 PARA HACER TU RESPEC, NO FUNCIONARÁ. IE9 NO TRABAJA CON NUESTRA COMPILACIÓN JQUERY Y NO VAMOS A RECOPILAR TODO NUEVAMENTE SOLO PARA HACER QUE ESE NAVEGADOR FUNCIONE. USEN FIREFOX, CHROME, SAFARI, OPERA O HASTA EL NAVEGADOR INTERNO DE SECOND LIFE. NO IE9!

En segundo lugar, estamos sacando un nuevo meter para incorporar pequeños arreglos y detener los meter bugs que han estado siendo causados por sobrecargas. tambien para introducir algunas mejoras de seguridad a la unidad del meter.

Los cambios de balance son como siguen:

El método para ganar raciales para los Lycans es ahora Lacerate
El método para ganar raciales para los Nekos es ahora Claw
El método para ganar raciales para los Humanos es ahora LegSweep
El método para ganar raciales para los Undead es ahora Gore
Todos los modificadores de inteligencia para los Casters ha aumentado a 1.25x de incremento de daño por inversión de inteligencia.

Incremento de Fleshield por 10 puntos de armadura por nivel. Estoy de acuerdo que +1 de armadura era casi un chiste.
El chance de golpe para todos los casters se ha incrementado a 90% para igualar el chance de golpe melee de los DPS.
El modificador de inteligencia de los Cyborg Pleasurebots y NanoMedics ha incrementado a 1.15x
Habilidad de Biofield removida - Esta habilidad era normalmente inservible para la mayoría de healers y solo era usado para cancelar regens raciales.
Malice cambió a objetivo personal, daño básico incrementado a 67 puntos (escala con inteligencia) duración del curse 25 segundos, 98% de chance de golpear.
Reflexes de los Neko incrementado a 15 segundos de duración y se le bajó el tiempo de cooldown a 25 degundos
Animaciones de ataque/atacado removidas de todos los métodos para ganar raciales para de esta manera balancear el rápido uso de habilidades de los que se colgaban con la demora de las animaciones.

Vamos a ver como funciona hasta que todos empiecen a gritar y llorar. Gracias.