The Kickstarter Era

(2014)

IMPORTANT: This section documents official statements from January 2014 to December 2014. Any game-related information therein may no longer be applicable. These references are provided for historical purposes only.

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Pantheon’s Kickstarter Site

Video Interviews
Text Interviews
Kickstarter Q&A Series
Announcements
Kickstarter Image Gallery

= "Curator's Choice": a reference that the Library of Pantheon curators have deemed particularly important or informative.
Click on the badge to see the full list in the Curator Collection.

Video Interviews

Curator’s Note: Timestamps are provided only for clips related to Pantheon’s design, lore, and development. Timestamps for personal questions such as “What is your favorite…” have been omitted.

2014-Apr 15: Pantheon Round Table #7

Status of project and funding
Needing funding to resume development
Staffing
Plans to release prototype footage
Pros and cons of showing a lot this early
Are Tom and James Orschell still on the team?
Launch date
Business plan
Status of prototype
How fans can help
Plans to release a comprehensive ledger showing where funding has gone
Business plan (cont’d)
Specific funding needs
Chris’s financial credentials in the MMORPG genre
Volunteer work
Crowdfunding and engaging with the community
How confident Brad is that he will find investors
When happens when team members leave
Opening up the website to the public
Changes for people who are already subscribed to the website
Funding tracker on the website
Monthly pledge payment plans
Release of design documents (HLDD)
Use of funding that exceeds what’s needed to keep the website up
Lore
What to say to people who feel they aren’t getting their money’s worth
Funding rounds
How the developers determined how much funding they need
Startup equity for company founders
Brad McQuaid engaging with the community post-Kickstarter
Contact info
Community involvement
How long to enter full development if full funding is received
Plans to continue round tables

2014-Apr 14: Boogie Knights -With Game Developer Brad McQuaid!

Status of project and funding
Status of game prototype
Sunken Sanctum
Prototype vs. Alpha 1
Using the prototype to pitch to investors
Why MMORPG players are dissatisfied with the current state of the genre
The importance of socializing in an MMORPG
Player reputation
Releasing a smaller game to raise funds for a full launch
Current state of the MMORPG genre
Cooperation in other genres
Endgame
Potential of planar collisions lore
Kickstarter crowdfunding
Working remotely
Grinding
Voice acting
Virtual reality
Sexualized female character models
Accommodating limited playtime
Target audience
Pantheon overview
Looking for angel investors
Funding to make an MMORPG for a target audience

2014-Apr 8: Pantheon Round Table #6

Ogres
Sam created the Gruun language
Information to be released next
Hero Ogre lore
How Sam met Tony Garcia
How the Gruun language was created
Unique racial dictionaries
How sentences are formed in different languages
Racial dialects
How involved Tony Garcia is in language development
Will some races have multiple words for the same thing?
Implications of Ogres being smarter than their stereotype
Ogre racial abilities and attributes
Ogre concept art
Are Taurokians and Ogres enemies?
Racial inherent attributes scaling up faster than others
Ogre home world
Inspirations for the Gruun language
Pronouncing the Gruun language
Ogre motivations on Terminus
In-game books written in racial languages
How big are Ogres?
Pros and cons of grouping with conflicting races
Finding quests by translating letters written in a different language
Learning languages as a skill
Do all Ogres know Gruun?
Learned in-game languages auto-translated to English
Common tongue language
Revenants as different races
How has the Ogre culture changed from their home world and Terminus?
Racial starting areas
Ogre architecture
How advanced is Ogre society?
Ogre clan structure
Racial run speeds
What it means to be a godking
Can Gnomes ride Ogres?
Worshipping deities of different races

2014-Mar 31: Pantheon Round Table #5

Travel
Types of travel
Boats
State of the game
Types of mounts
Mounts listed as pledge perks
Mounts will be rare
Travel options at launch
"Climatization" [climates]
Mounts abilities
Porting limitations [fast travel]
Meeting players of different races
Group finder tool / LFG
Evac ability
Making travel meaningful
Preventing travel from being too tedious
Paths or items affecting travel and Climbing
Teleport hubs
Binding
Weight affecting run speed
Can Gnomes ride Ogres?
Preview of upcoming announcements

2014-Mar 25: Pantheon Round Table #4

State of the game
Updates since the previous week
The Stones of Panthea
Combat system
Weapon mechanics and skills
Ability loadouts
Number of abilities per hotbar (Limited Ability Sets)
Preventing the template system from leading to cookie cutter builds
Class specializations in combat
How the team takes something from concept to reality
Ability acquisition
Global cooldowns
Macros
Casters and Ranged classes having unique auto attacks
Switching class specializations
Targeting
Ground targeting reticles
Cone Area-of-Effect (AoE) abilities
Healing and buffing NPCs
Friendly fire Area-of-Effect (AoE) abilities
How the environment and Climate affects abilities
Resists
In-combat resurrection
Abilities that need to be changed
In-combat mana resource regeneration
Will the template system be available in Pre-Alpha?
Are Thojians and Gnomes enemies?
Fan fiction influence on official lore
Group experience bonus and splitting group experience
Content for small groups
Soloing and nerfs

2014-Mar 18: Pantheon Round Table #3

State of the game
Consumables and Combat
Tony Garcia working on lore
Consumables and combat (cont’d)
Experience loss on death
Different death mechanics based on how you die
Corpse runs
Do bags stay on your corpse on death?
Item level restrictions
Corpse decay time
Corpse retrieval mechanics
Multiple corpses for each player
Resurrection
Corpse dragging and summoning
Will resurrection remove all buffs?
Animate corpse
Preventing the death penalty from getting less meaningful over time
Weight and encumbrance

2014-Mar 10: Pantheon Round Table #2

State of the game
What Corey LeFever does at Visionary Realms
Rare spawn camps and rare NPCs
Instancing
Content monopolization
Preventing content monopolization
Kill credit
PvP and PvE rare NPCs
Tiers of rarity for items
Camping and progression for limited playtime
Bound items
The effect of unbound items on raiding

2014-Mar 3: Pantheon Round Table #1

Website chat room
Lessons learned from Kickstarter and new website
Funding through methods other than crowdfunding
Making the new Pantheon website
How long did it take to make the website?
Lessons learned from Kickstarter
Tiered raid progression content
Funding tracker on website
Apprentice Developer pledge perk
Future plans for the website
Combat resources
User Interface customization
Community feedback on lore
Merch
Post-Kickstarter team meeting
Post-Kickstarter pledge perks

2014-Feb 18: MMOBuff Podcast - Episode 19 - Pantheon: RotF Returns (Full Episode)

Kickstarter status
Terminus lore
In-game exploration of lore and history
Gameplay overview
Community
Classes
Rogue lore
Wizard
Chaos energy
Monks and Bards
Dark Knights
Factions
Betrayal quests (betraying your home city/faction)
Development after the Kickstarter
Engaging with the community on Kickstarter vs. pitching the game to other development studios
Perks for Kickstarter pledges after the Kickstarter is done
Benefits of planar collision lore
Deity influence changing over the course of the game
Instancing
Player interactions with deities
Pet class
Death penalty
Enchanter

2014-Feb 17: Pantheon Developer Series #4

Tony Garcia’s background and what he does at Visionary Realms
Sunken Sanctum flyover
Kickstarter review
Salim Grant
Planar collision lore
Wizards and magic planes lore
Inspiration for lore
Is the Sunken Sanctum a raid zone?
Subclasses
Deity selection
How involved deities will be in the world
Making each deity unique
Crafting mechanic
Making the world look alive
Limited Ability Sets and how many abilities will be used in combat
Deities competing with each other
Changing deities
Epic quests
Racial concept art
Zone loading screens
Halfling deity
Gear cosmetics
Preventing the player base from getting too topheavy
Mounts
Deities for things other than races
Can players become godkings?
Dynamic events
Unique GM quests
Attributes and skills
Gated zones

2014-Feb 13: Pantheon Developer Series #3

Sunken Sanctum exterior flyover
Water textures
Sunken Sanctum
Kickstarter updates
Enchanter description
Ten Ton Hammer interview
Designing a new zone
Pet classes and soloing
Gamepad compatibility
Placeholder art assets
Wizard description
Wizard ports and fast travel
Pure tanks vs. hybrids
Planestalker
Shaman description
Halfling and Gnome stretch goals
Concept art and gameplay demo for Kickstarter
Combat system status
Dragon model
The Wastes
NPC models status and concepts
World and zone size
Planar collision lore and world expansion
Factions
Realm-vs-realm (RvR)
Factions (cont'd)
Shaman description (cont’d)
Expansion pace for hardcore vs. casual players
Camping vs. global loot for casual players
Crafted items vs. looted items
Funding plan if the Kickstarter doesn’t meet its goal

2014-Feb 4: Pantheon Developer Series #2

Building a dungeon transition
Sunken Sanctum overview and lore
Design documents for world building
Ben Dean posts on the Kickstarter website
Crusader
Rogue
Planar collision lore
Balance
Healer classes
Human, Dwarf, and Elf races
Soloing vs. group combat
Blood Mage
Implementing Kickstarter stretch goals if a publisher provides full funding
Kickstarter status
Unity engine physics
Daylong dungeons and quests
Mentoring
Dragon and flying mounts
Loot system
Loot table
Physical vs. abstract loot
3D sculpting
Character model development
Rare looted items
Unbound loot
Class updates
Randomized attributes on gear
Rare looted items (cont'd)
Subscription revenue model

2014-Feb 1: Pantheon: Rise of the Fallen Q&A with Brad McQuaid, Salim Grant, and Ben de la Durantaye!

Development team
Pantheon overview and how it's different from other MMORPGs
Group size
Horizontal progression
Different playstyles and horizontal progression (cont'd)
Travel
Multicolor mana
Raiding
Instancing
Death penalty
Lore
PvP
Boats and underwater content
Trading and economy
Dynamic vs. static dungeons
Bards, Rangers, and combat pacing

2014-Jan 30: Interview with Brad McQuaid - Everquest, Vanguard, Pantheon

Social and community-driven MMORPG design
Death penalty and corpse runs
Social downtime
Raid size
Auction house
Handholding, tutorial, and onboarding new players
MMORPG genre and lessons learned from Vanguard's development
Pro bono development team
How Pantheon is different from other MMORPGs
Classes and roles
Group size
The importance of MMORPGs and the target audience for Pantheon

2014-Jan 28: Pantheon Developer Series #1

Sunken Sanctum world building demo
Unity engine version
Architecture design process
In-house vs Unity store placeholder art assets
Placeholder art assets
Hardest parts of development
Development team size
Development timeline
Dungeon design process
The development team’s history with Brad McQuaid
Developer guild Kickstarter pledge perk
Design an Item pledge perk
Next world building step after art asset placement
Traps
Trap types
Races and factions
Revenant
Race class combinations
Dual wielding
Dark elves
Crafting
Which NPCs are attackable
NPC AI in combat
GM Events
Ability animation progression
Unity engine
Safe areas in dungeons
Backend server and database architecture

2014-Jan 27: MMOBuff.TV Episode 17 - Pantheon: Rise of the Fallen (Full Episode)

Pantheon overview
Sense of accomplishment and target audience influencing the development of Pantheon
Risk vs. Reward
Why the tenets are important
Class roles
Catering to a target audience
How to create a dynamic and changing world
Is Pantheon the spiritual successor to Brad McQuaid's previous MMORPGs?
Boats
Progression and open world monopolization
Complex open world vs. instanced boss encounters
Guilds
User Interface customization
Character creation
GM events and community
How developing an MMORPG through Kickstarter is unique
Combat

2014-Jan 25: Pantheon Rise of the Fallen - Interview with Brad McQuaid, Ben de la Durantaye, Salim Grant

How Pantheon is different from other MMORPGs
Quests
Guilds
Is Pantheon a theme park MMORPG?
Starting areas
Race class combinations
Alternate advancement
Class combat roles
Unique class playstyles
Level progression
Speed leveling
Gear progression
NPC AI
Dungeon design
World size and geography
Mystery and spoilers
Server player population
Revenue model
Estimated number of subscriptions [revenue]
Virtual reality and mobile compatibility
Reaching out to investors and publishers if the Kickstarter fails
Post-Kickstarter crowdfunding
Fansites in the community

Text Interviews

2014-Feb 26: Brad McQuaid on What Comes Next [Kickstarter, crowdfunding]

2014-Feb 10: Pantheon Interview - The Everquest Era Niche [matchmaking, target audience, classes, group roles, crowd control, auctions, iconic items, healers, exploration, corpse runs]

2014-Feb 3: Brad McQuaid Talks Portalarium Partnership

2014-Feb 3: The father of EverQuest pitches his next-generation online fantasy game world [Kickstarter, team size, combat, lore, abilities, target audience, funding, development, limited playtime, Unity engine]

2014-Jan 29: How the creator of EverQuest plans to bring MMOs into a new era [target audience, limited playtime, difficulty, lore]

2014-Jan 29: I am Brad McQuaid, one of the creators of EverQuest and Vanguard: Saga of Heroes and CCO for Pantheon: Rise of the Fallen. AMA! [epic quests, flying mounts, Kickstarter, funding, leveling, clickies, immersion, limited playtime, community, pet class, auctions, economy, development timelines, gear, casters, loot, class design, Vanguard, art asset reveals, zones, open world, crafting, diplomacy, starting areas, progression, corpse runs, weather, soloing, camping, NPC spawns, server rulesets, raid size, travel, maps, class roles, combat, guides, bound items, matchmaking, Ranger tracking, female character models, class ability specialization]

2014-Jan 29: The Official Pantheon Wiki and Developer Interview! [epic quests, starting areas, iconic items, loot tables, dungeon design]

2014-Jan 28: Brad McQuaid Discusses Pantheon : Rise of the Fallen [target audience, revenue model, graphics, Unity engine, team size, Kickstarter, crowdfunding]

2014-Jan 24: Exclusive MMORPG.com Q&A with Brad McQuaid [leveling progression, crafting epic items, deity choice, playstyles, quests, bound items, combat pacing, class group roles, item restrictions, crafting, economy, roleplaying]

2014-Jan 24: Pantheon Rise of the Fallen Interview with Brad McQuaid [class roles, abilities, Climates and situational gear, target audience]

2014-Jan 22: Pantheon: Rise of the Fallen characters may have to acclimatize to their environments [Climate, Atmospheres, situational gear, abilities and Climates, gear loadouts, bane weapons]

2014-Jan 13: Brad McQuaid talks Pantheon: Rise of the Fallen, Kickstarter campaign launches today [target audience, grinding, combat, telegraphs, Limited Ability Sets, grouping vs. raiding, progression, economy, team size]

Kickstarter Q&A Series

Curator's Note: The timestamps below direct you to reuploads by various YouTube users that have been retrieved by the Library of Pantheon for historical purposes. Click on the dates next to each title below to see when that video was originally posted by Visionary Realms.

2014-Jan 30: Kickstarter Community Q&A #7

Will Pantheon have alternate ruleset servers like Firiona Vie in EverQuest?
Has there been any more concept art for Pantheon?

2014-Jan 28: Kickstarter Community Q&A #6

Can you describe the revenue model for Pantheon?
Do you plan on purchasing the Unity license and using it? [Unity engine]
Will Pantheon appeal more to EverQuest or Vanguard players? [target audience]
Can you describe the internal team structure?
Will we see the return of “pain and suffering tries to strike you but misses!”?
Will we see physical pledge rewards, like cloth maps?

2014-Jan 24: Kickstarter Community Q&A #5

Will gear in Pantheon be tradeable? Will it have level requirements? [bound items, restrictions]
Is there a plan for situational (resist) gear?
How will players be able to manage their different gear sets? [loadouts]
Would you classify Pantheon as a sandbox, a theme park, or some combination of the two?
Can you talk about the downtime we can expect in Pantheon?

2014-Jan 23: Kickstarter Community Q&A #4

Will stretch goals be designed before hitting them?
How can you fund an MMO with only $800,000?
Will dungeons be open like EverQuest, or more like instances in WoW?
Will we be able to align our character to specific deities?
Will NPCs drop loot that looks like what they’re carrying?
Will we see really complex dungeons?
Will you be working in the trenches as a designer/coder on Pantheon?

2014-Jan 20: Kickstarter Community Q&A #3

Will we see the return of epic-style quests?
Will there be multi-classing?
Will the world be more of a sandbox or theme park?
Are you creating a world waiting to be discovered?
Can you tell us what to expect from Terminus?
Do you plan to bring back a sense of danger?
What intellectual property will you be using?
Will there be big, open zones?
Will Pantheon mainly be PvE or PvP?
What feeling will Pantheon evoke?
Will there be factions in Pantheon?
Will there be faction grinds?
What is the genre?
Will there be contested content? [monopolization]

2014-Jan 16: Kickstarter Community Q&A #2

Will there be fast travel?
Will quests be meaningful?
Will you support the Oculus Rift?
Will casters be mobile?
Do you have a project manager?
What is the best way to help the project?
How far into the process are you?
What input is the team looking for?
Will there be auction houses?
What is your motivation for making Pantheon?
Is loot going to be similar to EverQuest and Vanguard?
How open is the development process going to be?

2014-Jan 13: Kickstarter Community Q&A #1

Why are you making a more challenging game?
How will you be funding this game?
What operating systems will be supported? [compatibility]
Does Pantheon’s creation scare you? [development]
What do you mean by “more challenging”?
Will there be raids?
Will there be open world raids?
How big will the game world be at launch?
Will races be more than a cosmetic choice?
Will Pantheon use open dungeons or instances?
Will exploration be dangerous and exciting?
Will the world be zoned or seamless?
Will the combat be more tactical or action oriented?
How will reactionary abilities work?
How will targeting work in Pantheon?

Announcements

2014-Dec 1: New Video Released!

2014-Nov 8: Pre-Movie Teaser

2014-Nov 3: Mini Update

2014-Oct 13: Promotions [Chris Perkins]

2014-Oct 13: New Video Up!!

2014-Oct 7: Seeking World Builders [world building]

2014-Sep 23: Screenshots of the new UI [User Interface]

2014-Sep 21: Updated Atlas [map]

2014-Sep 11: New Screenshots

2014-Aug 27: Our Awesome Growing Development Team [team growth, team size]

2014-Aug 26: Progress Video

2014-Aug 21: 08/21/14 Update

2014-Aug 19: 08/19/14 Mini Update

2014-Aug 4: Update 8/3/14

2014-Jul 21: Update 7/21/14

2014-Jul 7: Update 7/7 part 2

2014-Jul 7: Update 7/7

2014-Jul 2: Video Update 7/2/14

2014-Jun 27: 6/27 Follow-up Update!

2014-Jun 26: Mini Update 6/26/14

2014-Jun 17: Work-in-progress Video, 6/17/14. [reveals]

2014-Jun 3: Building Pantheon [team growth, team size, development, network stack, crowdfunding, Unity store placeholder art assets, Unity engine, character artists, programming, CEO]

2014-May 12: Re-building Pantheon!! [team growth]

2014-May 6: Re-building Pantheon Part 2 [team growth]

2014-May 4: Re-Building Pantheon Part 1 [funding, team growth]

2014-May 2: New Status Report and Plan [funding, development, team]

2014-Apr 28: Kingsreach Lore and Map

2014-Apr 25: Ancient Rivals II

2014-Apr 14: Heroes of Terminus: Ancient Rivals

2014-Apr 13: Pantheon’s Financial Situation [funding, investors, development, team]

2014-Apr 10: Ogre Concept Art Revealed

2014-Apr 9: Introduction to Gruun Language [lore]

2014-Apr 6: Celebrate in Gruun Style with Ogre Week

2014-Apr 4: Further Work on the Dragon

2014-Apr 2: Kaedryn Keep [lore]

2014-Apr 1: Roundtable 5: Travel Archive is Now Available

2014-Mar 31: Official Pantheon: Rise of the Fallen T-shirts Now Available [merch]

2014-Mar 31: It’s Roundtable Monday

2014-Mar 28: Roundtable 5 - Monday March 31 - Travel

2014-Mar 27: More Polish on the New Sunken Sanctum Entrance

2014-Mar 25: Roundtable 4 Archive Available, Brad’s New Blog

2014-Mar 25: The Taurokian - Now a Playable Race [lore]

2014-Mar 24: The Stones of Panthea [lore]

2014-Mar 24: Weekly Roundtable 4 - Combat Mechanics

2014-Mar 20: The Celestial Warstaff [lore]

2014-Mar 19: Two New Contests at K-TAM and Project Pantheon

2014-Mar 19: Roundtable 3 Archived

2014-Mar 17: Weekly Roundtable 3 Today, More Dev Blogs

2014-Mar 14: Weekly Roundtable 3 on Monday

2014-Mar 13: Creature Feature: The Taurokian [lore]

2014-Mar 12: The Triundan Calendar [lore]

2014-Mar 11: Roundtable Week 2 Video Archive Now Available

2014-Mar 10: Roundtable Reminder for This Afternoon

2014-Mar 7: Roundtable #2 Scheduled for Monday at 4pm PDT

2014-Mar 6: The Map and Lore of Celestius [world, zones, Terminus, Kingsreach]

2014-Mar 4: Creature Feature: The Goblin [lore]

2014-Mar 3: Roundtable Discussion Scheduled for Today

2014-Feb 28: Tuesday’s Dev Meeting Recap (with pics!)

2014-Feb 26: Introducing the Crystal Tower [lore]

2014-Feb 25: The Pantheon Team Meets Today

2014-Feb 22: Site Launch Letter from Brad [target audience, Kickstarter, crowdfunding, investors, publishers, team size, website, pledge perks]

2014-Feb 21: The Final Hours of the Kickstarter are Upon Us [crowdfunding]

2014-Feb 20: The Planes of Arcana [lore]

2014-Feb 19: Introducing The Summoner

2014-Feb 18: On the Sunken Sanctum [lore]

2014-Feb 18: On Death in Pantheon [corpse runs, resurrection abilities]

2014-Feb 18: More on Twitch, More AMA

2014-Feb 18: The Djinn (The Bound) [lore]

2014-Feb 18: The Vrilaska (The Lost) [lore]

2014-Feb 18: The Shaman

2014-Feb 18: The Gnome [lore]

2014-Feb 18: The Halfling [lore]

2014-Feb 18: Class and Race Combinations

2014-Feb 18: The Wizard

2014-Feb 14: New Terrain Screenshots [environment art]

The Kickstarter Era in Pictures

This gallery contains screenshots, concept art, and promotional material released by Visionary Realms in 2014. Images released after 2014 are located in the main Image Gallery. Due to the large size of files, we recommend not viewing these galleries on mobile with limited data. Use the links below to jump between sections. Each section is organized in reverse chronological order, so the most recently released images appear first. Click on any image to enlarge it and see more info.

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Jump to: Screenshots • Concept Art & Maps • Promotional Material