Welcome to Gaia! ::

I am, and it isn't that hard to add it to the PHP/MySQL. They choose not to to conserve guild ID#s.

Hey, we just enjoy their service (which is free for now). They have every right to do what they will with it, and we have to either deal with it or leave.

Gaia is still in what they refer to as their "beta stage". I'm guessing that the battle ssytm will trigger the change to the full and complete version of Gaia. There are two things. Either you can get a premium membership which, for a price of [$] you get [X] donation items form each month for a year. there's also the thought where it will become a pay service as a whole. We all hope that curent members wil be allowed to continue, not affected by the changes, but with hope there is let-down.

That would be their smartest move, but they'd better not make the battle system an upgrade-only feature (my old donation items had better make me stronger than newbs with damascus armor). They would make an amazing amount of money if they did, though.

They may be worth it n the battle system. Then again, they may have everybody start out at the same plane, current Gaia items not doing a thing for you 9except to make you look different). Maybe all your weapons, armor, and acessories will be special new game items. They'll probably link the battle system (from what I've seen of the screenshot) with town, meaning that you can traverse the outer boundaries of the Gaia world beyond the shelter of the towns environment. Hopefully you won't have to buy an adventurer's license, a house, or any of that silliness. I feel bad the the 56k dial-up modem users who can't play. I can't tell if battle will be live on the field (Chrono Trigger style), or if it will transport you to a separate arena where you fight (FF style). They may even make it a tactical/stragetic system (Shinig Force Style). I suppsoe we'll know all once it has been released (though it will no doubt have an amazing number of glitches and bugs to iron out). They're going to hav to buy twice the servers they already have if they expect to not have any downtime or lag when they open it. Look how the initial quest system turned out. I do hope that they make more quests (being separate from the battle system quests that ther will inevitably be). They'll no soubt incorporate battles, towns, quests, shops, and the rest of Gaia during official events in the future.

True, we'll all probably start at the same level, but items must be involved somewhere (whether existing ones or special new ones).

Definitely! *whips out his ice gauntlets and lunar cloak* The problem would be that, if they use existing items, their values would spike tremendously. *wonders what the horns would do and how high they would spike* Not to mention an angelic halo's power (which'd probably be invinciblity). Maybe the way you wear an item affects what powers it has/gives.

Yeah, the problem is that they'll be all the more a target for account hackers. Some would have really neat effects provided gaia is imaginative.