Change log 121216 -> 1301xx

These changes are already implemented in the upcoming beta 3 which is due to come out in January.

Client Changes

Turn Undead and Banish Daemon spells now count as orb spells.
Scroll of Turning and Scroll of Banishment are no longer affected by the target creatures' level and will work similarly against creatures of any level.
Trying to create a character with an invalid name should no longer enable all heritage checkboxes.
Register account text fields are now twice as wide to fit longer email addresses.
Client now correctly exits if a connection error happens after the user attempts to close the program.
The name of the first King on each server is now Mercen. Primus had his chance but he failed to hold the throne. Offline mode will always be played against Mercen. Thank you John for showing it can be done.
Client now sends highscores to the server when the player character dies or wins the game.
Client now has a highscore screen that shows the top 50 highscores of the server the client is connected to. Offline mode, surprisingly, only shows the highscores of the offline "account" the player is using at the time. Your personal top 50 scores are still shown when you die just like before.
Mindlessly kicking walls and unbreakable things now prints "... and remember that right-click uses things." instead of "... and it seems solid.".
F2 now works as a shortcut for highscores when the player is in a dungeon.
F3 now works as a shortcut for heritages when the player is in a dungeon.
Abilities now have tooltips that describe what they do.
Resistances now have tooltips that describe what they do.
Effect icons now have tooltips that describe what they do.
Player character state is sent to the server twice as often now.
Player character state is now instantly sent to the server upon death.
Player can no longer travel back to town while snared by a trap.
Player can no longer be damaged by an effect while traveling back to town.
Ranged attacks and spells now target the nearest enemy if the player hasn't targeted something else nearby (this applies to all actions involving the targeting cursor).
Account data files are now protected from manual editing. Unfortunately this will result in players losing certain data such as heritages, highscores and key bindings. I will try and see if I can tinker a tool that will convert all the "Epixx.org" accounts so that data isn't lost but there's nothing I can do about private servers and offline data.
Client now reports its version to the server before connection is fully established. If the version is not equal or newer than that of the server, you are informed to update the client.
Client now has a gold spent statistic that is used to calculate the amount of gold the player has spent during his time. This statistic is added to the number of gold coins in the player's possession at the time of death and it has a small effect on the highscore.
Modifying ability or resistance values using memory mapping tools will now result in automatic deletion of your account.
Modifying any string or integer value contained within any item will now result in automatic deletion of your account.
Fixed a bug that sometimes caused the game to crash when looting items.
Kings and Queens can now view their statistics before starting a new game.
New encounter game mechanic has been added: 2D6 is rolled whenever the player clears a dungeon, certain penalty modifiers are added to the roll and if the result critically fails, there will be a random encounter.
Players can now see their approximate chance of random encounter while they're in town (next to the crossed swords icon).
End-game encounter mechanic has been added: There will be a number of unique encounters consisting named characters wearing full sets of "epixx". These encounters can and probably should take place in regular dungeons. If they are not dealt with, they will always take place in the final battle (making it slightly more entertaining).
New unique encounter has been added containing Prince Altren and his personal guards. This one also comes with a "feminine" side unless you're skewered by his repeater before that...
New unique encounter has been added containing Master Gifin-Gif and his Blackhand assassins. These guys like to have their weapons poisoned and you may end up shouting "Effin-Eff" with them...
New encounter has been added containing an orc boss and his horde of orcs.
New encounter has been added containing a dread wolf and its pack of wolves.
New vulnerability game mechanic has been added. See "Basics" section for more detailed description.
Ring of regeneration now causes its wearer to become vulnerable to fire.
Summoned daemons no longer drop any loot that they haven't picked up after being summoned - surely "warlocks" can't have an unlimited supply of easy loot next to the town stairs...
Ring of Evasion should now correctly add one point to either block, dodge parry modifier.
Ring of Deflection should now work correctly with Ring of Evasion.
Sweeping Blow talent now adds +1 minimum block modifier and +1 maximum parry modifier while a large weapon is equipped.

Server Changes

Server now correctly removes the overthrown King's or Queen's data entry from the disc as well as from the memory. This should show the latest King or Queen at server startup instead of the player with the oldest account (who has become King or Queen at some point).
Server now correctly removes the King or Queen whose account has been banned by the admin or deleted by the user and sets the King back to default, which is Mercen.
Server now has a list of top 50 highscores.
Server now requires that client version is equal to or newer than the server version.
/whois admin command can now be used to reverse lookup a rogue's current name with userid.
/ban admin command can now also be used with userid.
Server performance has been slightly increased by changing almost all data entry searches from O(n) string comparisons into O(1) pointer assignments.
New admin command /email has been added. It prints out an account's registered email address.
New admin command /serial has been added. It prints out an account's userid and serial number.