Hey all,

As you may have heard, we are slowly working on building a new and improved forum for ORIGIN. It will have new features such as a Character and Group Portal, automatic Magicka claims, Magicka bounties/account feats, and more. The database will be transferred so all of your old posts and progress will carry over with you. You will be able to claim your characters in the Character Portal, so don't worry about having to re-make their profiles in the new system. The old URL will also redirect to the new one when we are ready to start using it as the main forum.

Though we have a ton of cool things planned, we're at the point now where we will start gauging interest and feedback from you, the community! Below is a list of planned features, which may or may not make it into the final build. Because all of these are works in progress, there is not a lot of information about them yet, and unfortunately we cannot answer questions about them yet.

Planned features:
• Character Portal
• Group Portal
• Automatic Magicka claims
• Magicka Bounties
• Character and Account Feats
• Table builder and saver (for codes)
• Updated/upgraded Guidebook
• Integrated Wiki
• Automated Threadlog
• Random generators (GM/event responses, characters, prompts, etc)
• Individual cave light statuses
• ...and more!

The list above does not reflect the full list of planned features for ORIGIN.

What do we want from you?
Over the next few months, we will be pushing out polls and feedback forms regarding certain features. To start, this thread is open for you to reply to and submit your own suggestions for things you would like to see. We will not be replying to responses but will note anything on our side if it is new or different from a feature already on our secret list.

ooh, ooh! i've got some!

i've always had something of a hard time picturing the different caves, especially the specific locales inside of them. we do have resources, of course — the images on the index and within the forums themselves, the written descriptions, and the map, all of which i use in conjunction — but it can still be hard to actually conceptualize some of these places, since i haven't been in a whole lot of caves myself before! rooms like hydra and pegasus are easy enough because they resemble outdoor biomes, but others, such as canis, polaris, and gemini (some of the places where i write the most), are more specific and challenging.

to that end, i was thinking it could be really nice to have big, sexy high-res images for reference and inspiration? i'm not sure exactly how they would be integrated, and it wouldn't be a quick and easy project — i know cj already put a lot of hard work into just the smaller manipulations for the new rooms — but it's something i've been yearning after for a long time.

on a related but less work-intensive note, maybe common/native lessers could be listed along with caves' descriptions for easy reference. the lessers guide is a lot to look at, but it would make it much easier and clearer if we could just look right there next to the locales and adjoining tunnels and see, "ah yes, pitch rats, lurkers, and hallowed callers! cool, got it, i'll head over to the guide and remind myself what those are! no need to ask a gm for clarification, all has been revealed unto me and i am certain of my place in this world!"

one other thought, not so much a suggestion: i'm not sure what character profiles will look like within the new portal system, but i very much hope that they will still be customizable with css, ideally more so than they are right now (as the current layout has a lot of the styling locked up within direct span tags rather than linked to alterable classes). i really like having the ability to play with how my character's profile looks, and i'm faintly worried that the portal system may make profiles more restrictive, especially with any navigation boxes or bars. i feel the same about user titles — they're pretty unique to origin, i think, and i would really love to see them stick around.

i might edit this later if i think of any more!

(ALSO, this revamp: sounds GREAT. i am off-the-wall stoked, fellas, we are in for such a fun ride watching this happen and feasting upon the final result! thank you, cj & team!!)