GM Blog : Coming Soon: "The Battle of Crimsonwood Keep"

In every way imaginable. This quest is complex, it furthers the storyline of MapleStory, it's challenging, it's fun, and there are measures to make sure that it is never exactly the same thing twice. We can't spoil all of the secrets of this quest (Where's the fun in that?), but we do want you to know how much fun it is going to be, as well how much work has gone into it. So, without further ado, here are some of the notes that have been scribbled across the PQ briefing:


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Those just give you an idea of the air of mystery Crimsonwood has, as well as the dedication players will need to crack those same mysteries. In addition, we would like to tell you that you will need experienced Maplers of almost every job path to complete this quest. You will definitely want to contact your guild and buddies to get through this one. You may also wish to go reread some teasers that are scattered throughout the forums and game itself, to help you understand what's going on.

Based on the fact that it's NEVER the same Party Quest the same time and it sheds more light on the storyline, I have a feeling that you don't truly resolve the problem in order to keep with continuity; and it'll only be gradual efforts or a "temporary solution" in the grand scheme of things; and an NPC will say things will hopefully get better the more you keep going or "You've only stopped it for now, but it'll be back someday" kind of thing, but it never truly resolves out; yet you can move on in the plotline after performing some sort of "temporary resolution"/gradual effort done in the PQ. I wonder if there will be tie-in quests as well.

As for why Pirates popped up in Crimsonwood Keep- hadn't they existed around Elin and pre-Elin era even; after all, there was a Pirate representative in the Poison Fog Forest Party Quest; and I'm pretty sure they aren't new and appeared for the first time, they merely vanished and then returned right? As for how Pirates tie to Crimsonwood Keep, let's keep our eyes peeled on iTCG Set 6 or any of these hints over the forums or the PQ itself. What's going to happen with the logo of Crimsonwood Keep as well- will it Pirates get representation- and if so, how would Nexon incorporate the mysterious change in the logo; would it be that it reacted to and detected the re-emergence of Pirates? Ah, so many questions to even establish on how Nexon can do this properly without doing anything contradictory or lacking in proper logic in the flow of the storyline.

I'm already pumped about being able to play through the Party Quest; just thinking about the thrill-ride they've thought up plus the goodies that come with it sound charmingly enticing enough. Pure spawn sounds amazing; hopefully might be weaker than Guardians, range-friendly, and like a good transition away from where I trained in 3rd job and the good spots I don't have access to in 4th Job due to my low HP and lack of TT.

Speaking of rewards, any of you wanna hazard a guess at how it works and what it gives? Some things to consider: will it go Kerning/Ludi PQ style rewards, will it go GPQ/APQ style rewards, a point/tally system kinda like with Ariant Colloseum PQ/Monster Carnival/Magatia PQ, or a choose-a-reward system like Christmas PQ. I'm hoping it might give skill and mastery books as rewards, special equips (possibly either as a rare reward or one you need to work for), and scrolls as some of the possible goodies.

*puts on his Complainer Hat just for Felix"

Meh, I've never been a fan of Bosses or PQ's and this doesn't sound like it will be very much "fun" to me. Upward scrolling Totem of Doom...yeah fun. I said ages ago that NxProse has a weird definition of "fun". And I wont be disappointed by the sound of it.

I'm guessing 5 Bosses for the 5 classes, one for each of the weapons the statue is holding. I see it holding a Wand, Claw, Bow and Sword in its hands with a Gun on its belt.

That chick in the corner is hawt


...Jokes aside, this has potential. I hope they do follow through with this, and well. Even though I probably won't ever get to try this. Well not until much later, like when v66 is the new v55...

Based on the fact that it's NEVER the same Party Quest the same time and it sheds more light on the storyline, I have a feeling that you don't truly resolve the problem in order to keep with continuity; and it'll only be gradual efforts or a "temporary solution" in the grand scheme of things; and an NPC will say things will hopefully get better the more you keep going or "You've only stopped it for now, but it'll be back someday" kind of thing, but it never truly resolves out; yet you can move on in the plotline after performing some sort of "temporary resolution"/gradual effort done in the PQ. I wonder if there will be tie-in quests as well.

As for why Pirates popped up in Crimsonwood Keep- hadn't they existed around Elin and pre-Elin era even; after all, there was a Pirate representative in the Poison Fog Forest Party Quest; and I'm pretty sure they aren't new and appeared for the first time, they merely vanished and then returned right? As for how Pirates tie to Crimsonwood Keep, let's keep our eyes peeled on iTCG Set 6 or any of these hints over the forums or the PQ itself. What's going to happen with the logo of Crimsonwood Keep as well- will it Pirates get representation- and if so, how would Nexon incorporate the mysterious change in the logo; would it be that it reacted to and detected the re-emergence of Pirates? Ah, so many questions to even establish on how Nexon can do this properly without doing anything contradictory or lacking in proper logic in the flow of the storyline.

I'm already pumped about being able to play through the Party Quest; just thinking about the thrill-ride they've thought up plus the goodies that come with it sound charmingly enticing enough. Pure spawn sounds amazing; hopefully might be weaker than Guardians, range-friendly, and like a good transition away from where I trained in 3rd job and the good spots I don't have access to in 4th Job due to my low HP and lack of TT.

Speaking of rewards, any of you wanna hazard a guess at how it works and what it gives? Some things to consider: will it go Kerning/Ludi PQ style rewards, will it go GPQ/APQ style rewards, a point/tally system kinda like with Ariant Colloseum PQ/Monster Carnival/Magatia PQ, or a choose-a-reward system like Christmas PQ. I'm hoping it might give skill and mastery books as rewards, special equips (possibly either as a rare reward or one you need to work for), and scrolls as some of the possible goodies.

Ok heres my guess(es):
I'm thinking this pq will be in the 110-130 range if not 120-200 just from the idea that its a grand masters and the needing of almost all job paths...
Nexon seems to love tie in quests so it makes total sense for the barricades to want some artifacts out of the keep to study...
The idea that after so many pq's you've made a significant difference and thus get a reward/upgrade to your reward also makes sense though a reward per run just for surviving seems logical also the latter being my guess
As for rewards I'm saying a brand new weapon for each class lvl req 120 and just blows current 100/110 stuff out of the water such as a 70/75 base atk dexless claw *drools* (way too overpowering but hell its a guess) that are untradeable or hey gm untradeable scrolls could be well worth the possible 2+hr pq

At any rate I'm prob way too low lvl being only 85 so I can only enjoy the pure spawn maps, of which my hermit and priest (once i start lvling it again, damn retards in magatia pq) will enjoy quite a bit. Hell, if nexon actually was goning to be fully epic with this they'd fix the glitched kb's/missing hitboxes on their current CW content

Am I one of the few that aren't exactly excited about this news? From someone fresh out of 3rd job, all of this doesn't seem to benefit me at all... unless they throw in healable monsters I can kill at my level.

Besides, the last few patches have been riddled with bugs. Without a doubt something as huge as this will have plenty of bugs NexonAm will miss by the time the patch goes live.

Am I one of the few that aren't exactly excited about this news? From someone fresh out of 3rd job, all of this doesn't seem to benefit me at all... unless they throw in healable monsters I can kill at my level.

Besides, the last few patches have been riddled with bugs. Without a doubt something as huge as this will have plenty of bugs NexonAm will miss by the time the patch goes live.

Well we still dont know the level ranges on the PQ, but the reason you're not excited is because your level range has been catered to for the last few patches, all 120+ people have gotten is one high level map thrown in every patch here and there (CGs, Wolf Spiders, Himes). Aside from Leafre, I dont think we've ever had a patch that focused solely on higher end content like we do for lower end content.

Im kinda interested on the "no two pqs will be the same" thing...Some people seem very excited by this but the thing is, some of our pqs are "no two pqs are the same" already: No two Guild PQs are the same as the odds are that you'll never get the gatekeeper and combo stage exactly the same twice. Same with KPQ vines/cats/barrels and LPQ boxes (though the combo JQ stage remains the same each time).

Im curious what other people think: Is "no pqs will be the same" a reference to bigger things or just what Ive mentioned above?

Im kinda interested on the "no two pqs will be the same" thing...Some people seem very excited by this but the thing is, some of our pqs are "no two pqs are the same" already: No two Guild PQs are the same as the odds are that you'll never get the gatekeeper and combo stage exactly the same twice. Same with KPQ vines/cats/barrels and LPQ boxes (though the combo JQ stage remains the same each time).

Im curious what other people think: Is "no pqs will be the same" a reference to bigger things or just what Ive mentioned above?

Unless the stages 'shift'. For example, let's say 1st stage, you had to run (like APQ). 2nd stage, you may be doing a number-algorythgm (sp?), etc. However, the next time you PQ again, the 2nd stage could be something like

"Kill 100 Monsters within 30 seconds"

Thus, what I meant by stage-shifting. Of course, assuming that I'm correct on this, it's going be one hell of an interesting PQ.

Well we still dont know the level ranges on the PQ, but the reason you're not excited is because your level range has been catered to for the last few patches, all 120+ people have gotten is one high level map thrown in every patch here and there (CGs, Wolf Spiders, Himes). Aside from Leafre, I dont think we've ever had a patch that focused solely on higher end content like we do for lower end content.

That is true, but in terms of CWK in general... the majority of healers are pretty much shafted from the area. ;; Don't get me wrong for me being ungrateful though lol, as I do love Magatia and the Magatia PQ.

And I've already mentioned the other reason I'm not so excited: Betting NexonAm will screw up somehow with this big thing and add more bugs to the game.

Unless the stages 'shift'. For example, let's say 1st stage, you had to run (like APQ). 2nd stage, you may be doing a number-algorythgm (sp?), etc. However, the next time you PQ again, the 2nd stage could be something like

"Kill 100 Monsters within 30 seconds"

Thus, what I meant by stage-shifting. Of course, assuming that I'm correct on this, it's going be one hell of an interesting PQ.

no kidding, this is the kind of flare youd wish to see in a game that seems somewhat linear with the quests and PQs.

And I've already mentioned the other reason I'm not so excited: Betting NexonAm will screw up somehow with this big thing and add more bugs to the game.

Definitely: Expect Glitches.
Especially since this is entirely new content, not something translated from another version (which can still have major glitches, viz. Capt. Latanica). It has never been tested by real players. (With all due respect to the GM Blog's raving about getting to test this stuff... note how all the quotes talk about "them" (= the players)... the GM's don't talk about how "we" (= the GM testers) will have a hard time getting through... )

Especially if they do new stuff like stage shifting, portals that go different places at on different runs, or monsters that spawn depending on which classes are facing them, it's all too likely to have glitches in it.

Then there's the question of dealing with hackers.
If they put in new auto-bans :f6:
If they use a new format for data encoding to slow down extractors and .wz editors
And if they don't do anything the dedicated-spawn maps will be taken over, if they're any good at all. As for the PQ, hard to tell. I've seen nodelayers at PPQ and MPQ, and of course there are hackers at Zakum and HT. Will they consider this new PQ worth their time? We'll have to wait and see.

Hopefully, the glitches won't be game-breakers like BigFoot or the Xmas PQ glitch. Or a Capt. Latanica type of thing, where you can only do the PQ once every two weeks, IF you're quick.

Well, we know that atleast the KB glitch's should be fixed. If you don't trust me on that one I can direct a post from prose on that.

So BF might be killable on my hero without me dieing from it not getting rushed...(I.E Wrath spawns inside it I hit rush key and fling myself into death )

Also, hackers most likely will be taken care of, last few patch's have had nothing stoping hackers so there working on somthing I'm geussing.

Thing is, once a hack goes public then GM's can take them and see how they work to fix them.

yes, the KB frames should be fixed, in the Q/A thread, he said that they were trying to do something new (from what i saw, initial hit animation>>>prolonged after hit animation) so they may try to make the monster hitable during the prolonged, or just revert it to having a single KB hit animation.

Glitches are a definate.

NLC had boomers.
The mansion had the Loki Boxes (though that may not have been a glitch per se)
Phantom forest had bigfoot

But as long as its not anything game-shattering ill be okay with a small glitch to be fixed later on
At least have a little faith in Nexon

Somthing else I'll point out is that we all know the min level is ATLEASt 70. So this PQ you won't be able to do untill 70 or after 70. I'm not saying it IS 70 just you don't get the keystone+2nd quest to get inside untill 70+.

And to mention this thing already looks higher level the way it is.

And if anything this should clear up some things revolving around the Keep and whats going on. Just seems like its going to be so long untill we can do it. I'm setting up a Scania Party for the PQ. If anyone wants to do it first thing day one. Finish all your NLC quests and contact me. Just make sure your high leveled.

Glitches are a definate.

NLC had boomers.
The mansion had the Loki Boxes (though that may not have been a glitch per se)
Phantom forest had bigfoot

Boomers weren't a glitch. They were merely a good idea that was used to people's abuse; so Nexon had to patch that (the whole Poison abuse issue).

Bigfoot wasn't entirely a glitch either- the fact it was poisonable was one of Nexon's intended ideas- Prose even seemed to embrace the idea of it when prompted about the use of poisoning it; but when Bigfoot killing abuse became a problem, it got labeled as a glitch.

The glitches that really come to mind with NLC I can think of are the Phantom Forest-Crimsonwood Mounts area are the messed up Knockback animations and god-modes; and in addition, the whole issue over Pirates not getting the quest and the pirates' version of the quest not working with Urban Warrior quest oddly.

My guesses for what the Party Quest's interactive-storyline, given in mind it could be a "gradual effort that's said to make things better but never really does" or a "temporary solution where the problem isn't resolved and may return to be able to stop again, but the story can move on" is that you stall/temporarily stop the attack on New Leaf City sounds like an objective or the whole thing in it's entirety. With that in mind, here's what I'm going to guess-

• The boss really COULD be the 4 Twisted Masters; though you don't quite kill them but defeat them to get them and the troops to delay their plan by having targeted the leader and causing a temporary halt, yet they still hold control.
  
• You don't even see the 4 Twisted Masters- at all; it really could just be stopping the onslaught of the Versalian soldiers with a few nasty bosses at their disposal.
  
• Interestingly, here's one theory possibly involving the either of the above: what if your objective- in addition to stalling the troops, was to "weaken" the Versalians' control over the Keep with something- ending with a "it helped" and could move on in the story; however, it doesn't truly resolve out.
  

Boomers weren't a glitch. They were merely a good idea that was used to people's abuse; so Nexon had to patch that (the whole Poison abuse issue).

Bigfoot wasn't entirely a glitch either- the fact it was poisonable was one of Nexon's intended ideas- Prose even seemed to embrace the idea of it when prompted about the use of poisoning it; but when Bigfoot killing abuse became a problem, it got labeled as a glitch.

"glitch" doesn't refer only to programming errors.
It can also mean a design error.

When Nexon came up with the brilliant idea of Boomers, they just didn't think it through. They forgot that whatever killed the original boomer might still be around to kill its instant replacement, instantly.

And Bigfoot... The idea of a mob that is boss-like in HP and EXP but spawns in several maps and has weaknesses is certainly original. However, again, they didn't think it through. If they'd made him weak to fire, say, it might have worked. But whoever decided to make him poisonable must have forgotten (if he ever knew) how poison works. Surely they didn't mean for something with so much HP to be taken down in a minute.
Or, if they did, just what did they think would happen? An F/P would meet this new monster, try out her entire arsenal of skills against it, see that poison works and she got 3m exp. Did Nexon think she would then say to herself, "Well, that was fun, I think I'll go back to Wolf Spiders now"?
If Nexon thought that, that's even worse than forgetting the finer details of the poisoning skills. It's a complete incomprehension of how the game is played. Players will always try to train wherever they can get the most experience. Obviously that F/P would say, "Wow! I gotta find me another one of those!" and another, and another... Bigfoot "abuse" was bound to happen.

So, it's possible that the CWK PQ (and the rest of CWK II update) will be perfectly coded, yet glitched in design. Some nifty-keen idea that turns out not to work so well in the real maple world.

For instance: one of the unique class skills the PQ requires might be one that people get very late, if at all, because it's not very useful in regular training or bossing. So, it would be close to impossible to find a party.

Masteria updates excite me most since it is something fresh and new. But I never let my expectations get too high for the reasons listed above. I commend Nexon America on their wiliness to think outside the box and try and incorporate new game ideas and elements. I wish this happened a lot more in KMS updates. But sadly they always seem to cock up the implementation of it and it just never seems to work out as it was intended. But hey there is always a first time. So maybe they will get it completely right with CWK 2, lol.

I just wanted to remind you guys about what might be in this pq. This pq is the Pq that Sheloman, from nexon, hinted to us that we would fight 4 bosses at once. This was from a nexon interview in Massive onLine Gamer Magazine. btw everything so far in his interview has been released(such as pirates, magatia, duck pet, etc), so what's left is the "Crafting recipes", which im guessing is maker skill and this pq.

...so what's left is the "Crafting recipes", which im guessing is maker skill and this pq.

They could easily be new Crimson Weapons. (hopefully it is maker, though that might be asking a bit much)