Hey all,
I wanted to give you a bit of an overview regarding the battle tower as the information presented in the press articles sometimes lacks detail (this being a direct result from it being transcripts from notes which are transcripts from presentations which have to done at a fast rate).
The battle tower is an ancient structure which you'll have to conquer at a certain point in the game. Once you have it, you'll get access to a number of centralized "services" which you previously found scattered over the game world.
The services take the form of different exterior platforms that are attached to your tower and each platform houses the appropiate machinery or equipment and a platform dude (or dudette). There are four types of platforms: An enchantment platform, an alchemy platform, a necromancer platform and a skill trainer platform.
Each platform is operated by a npc which you put there, meaning that you'll have a choice between npc's. The choice of npc will decide the particular strengths of an individual platform. For instance, you can choose between an enchanter who's good at armor or an enchanter who's good at weaponry.
Each platform can also be upgraded. This not only changes the looks of your platform, but also increases the quality of what it can produce. In the case of the necromancer, it becomes a particular nice bloody mess
-The enchanter allows you to enchant and disenchant equipment you discover in the world.
-The necromancer allows you to customize your Creature. The Creature is a stitched together Frankenstein like err... creature where the limb composition determines its abilities and stats.
-The skill trainer allows you to increase the maximum level of certain skills and perhaps the unlocking of a skill here and there
-The alchemist allows you to brew all kinds of potions
The tower can be accessed using what's called a dragon stone, which allows you to quickly teleport at almost any point in the game back and forth to your tower.
The inside of the tower is also an interesting place. There you'll find a huge chest where you can store all the junk you find in the world and there's also a teleporter which allows you to teleport to various waypoints that you first need to unlock while travelling through the world. Other highlights include a throne room and your living quarters.
There are also some inhabitants in the tower. These include your runners. Runners are npcs that you can send out on various missions to collect ingredients/formulas for your platform npcs. You can send them out on easy but also on hard missions. Their chances of success are determined by the gear you provide them with.
We consider the tower an important feature of
as it presents an important "axis of character development" for the game. The design goal for the character development has been to allow you to grow your character by the choices you make, the way you level up/select your skills, the gear you equip and the way you develop your tower.
Any questions, fire away.
Cheers
Lar
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