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Mostly Olympiad movies: http://www.l2skirmish.com/category/media/

Updated to Infinite Odyssey

Thanks for all the support above! Pew Pew growing daily

Updated to Ertheia

It looks really nice but feels really wrong; no freedom of choice and everything seems meaningless

Hello nerds! Skirmish is back! (kinda... lots of work left, but it's finally playable!) Login, set up your character (2 minutes), and you are ready to PvP. When you restart you get all your items auto-enchanted to +6, auto-element, and maxed +30/+15 skills. Mana potions are disabled, CP potions are automatically used, 24/12 buffs, NPC buffer without cat/pony/dwarf/kamael stuff, and cancel returns buffs. Olympiads are 24/7 and PvP zone rotates every 1h. No farming. That's basically it. If you don't enjoy retail nonsense (damage, debuffs, not exactly balanced), I don't recommend it, because that's pretty much how it is. Have fun either way ! www.l2skirmish.com

Hello nerds :) Playable Alpha is up www.l2skirmish.com See you soon!

Server is gone for now Have faith, it will reopen, same concept etc - no ETA

Updated links, added new icons

IconsHelios.7z https://mega.nz/#!6p4HgCTZ!mb2extZJ-b2cF0DUWMvGkxseZXM62pVGPyHuSyufRDA last updated 05/07/2016

Imo change donations from buffer to an increase in adena/drops/spoils/exp/sp from normal mobs, shared in party. People don't have so many problems if you make things consume less time for donators, but hate it when they are simply superior in stats. Make it so that people that vote get full vitality or something, too. Maybe even just give vitality items to donators, idk, but I'm not a fan of restricted npc buffs, should be available for everyone, and be sure to include all buffs too if this is the case, no one likes making buffers Don't include custom coins, make S80+ cost a ton of adena and key mats from drops or something, else adena will become useless in no time Could also probably make D-S free/shadow/common whatever, real trading game begins in S80 nowadays, no one cares nor wants to invest in D-S grade Gatekeeper idea will only make you lose time, the RPG element of this game is gone since primeval island, fantasy island, and later on when clown armors were introduced Just my thoughts

I liked Pandora a lot, but this buff system solves only random or small scale PvP, it won't solve anything else, in organized PvP you end up with the same problems as retail, or you'll lose trying Imagine a 9vs9, if you just get a SWS, BD, WC, you are already forcing the enemy party to get the same classes or they will lose because of buff differences. Then you get a BP and an EE. Now you force them to get again the same classes or they won't be able to deal with Mana Burn/res. 5/9 obligatory classes again. The main problem is buffer classes suck but are needed because they win pvps, but 3/5 are not needed live, so that's why everyone boxes them if it's possible

The buff system in this game has 3 major problems: number of buffs, time of buffs, buffer classes I like to classify buffs in 2 types: Static and Dynamic. Static is basically long time buffs that are always available in the reuse/time or that you could easily box and always have whenever you want. 99% of the buffs you see in NPC Buffers are here. Dynamic are basically PvP buffs... high reuse, low time (Prahnah, Shield of Faith, Appetite, etc). You won't have a problem with cancel/steal if everyone only has Dynamic buffs, you can play against it because you still have the same "normal" stats To make a better game, absolutely all the classes in which their job consists of buffing people with buffs of the "Static" category, should disappear. Either give the buffs to everyone as base stats or to no one, but as it is, this only encourages multiboxing or static elements in a party (OL/WC, EE/SE, BD, SWS, for example) 1) Classes: The buffer classes of this game are fuked up beyond believe. There is no logic behind it, too many similar classes, too many similar buffs, too many useless buffs, and on top of all that, the majority of classes suck because they have very low potential impact on PvP compared to other classes if the enemy has the same buffer class in party. 2) Buff time: Long time buffs are never a good idea except if you add it as a static element that everyone has access to, because classes should be self-sufficient without any exterior help. That's what the NPC Buffer fixes in mid/highrates. It's mainly a good move, it solves more than it fuks up. 3) The number of buffs you can get in this game (and what is considered standard) is way too much. Every class should have 5-6? strong self buffs (UD, Focus Death, Dash, etc) and 1-2 strong party buffs (Prahnah, Shield of Faith, Great Fury, etc) In other words, whatever you choose, it will be fuked up at some point. There is no easy way, there is only the remake game way. Example: Delete all the Static buffs from all the classes. See what classes still have a role. Delete classes that don't have a role. Basically only Bishop and OL will survive from the support classes. Add support classes unique skills to the pomander selection, give bishop 4 pomanders, and your buffing problem is solved. I know this is radical, but it's the only real way of really fixing the game... remaking it

One of the big thing that defines what type of MMO the game you are playing is, is how strong your impact can be on the server for the rest of the players. Saying this, you clearly won't achieve anything of importance alone. So you have to pretty much decide if you want a clan-driven server or a faction one. Clan based means limited resources, constant drama, server domination as an objective, and people quitting because of it. Faction usually means that your actions don't really affect the server to a great extent, so nothing matters in the long run. Writing the history of a server is some cool stuff, and I think most players prefer the clan-based one for this reason, and maybe because the faction way is too limited in what they want to do. No one remembers who was the guy that conquered location X, tomorrow it will be another guy. With clans it's different, because when they dominate the server they can do whatever they want, which usually means annoying other players, dominating the market, being the strongest, etc. You don't simply forget what clan backstabbed you and took your castle for free. That right there is server history. I think it's important to understand how important for many players freedom of action and server impact is... you can't really do that in a faction, because the possibilities are limited. If you make server domination a possibility, make it difficult to achieve or easy to break, constant tension of who the strongest clan is is exactly what you want in a clan-based server Maybe you can try something inbetween, like EvE Online did, which includes both faction and clans. You can fight for your Faction (there are 4) and fight against the other players that fight for their own faction. Factions give global quests and stuff (in a way, it's similar to TW... conquer this, conquer that, creating big battles), also greater rewards the more you participate, etc but it's completely optional. What really matters there is 0.0 space dominance, which means constant PvP between really big alliances, gate-camping (chokepoints and entrances to 0.0 space, if you see someone that doesn't have positive standing to your corp/ally, you gang rape him. It basically translates into spawncamping, except that you have some time where when you appear, you are invisible until you move... but they know someone is there), and the occasional infiltrations/raids (group of players blowing others up as they travel into more and more owned/conflicted/dangerous territories). You can greatly effect other players and their relation with the territory by building small space facilities (not so expensive), or giant space stations that require extraordinary time, resources, and cooperation for a whole ally to use. Or simply destroying or conquering what others once created. Where is the ability to build your own castle in L2? That would certainly be a cool feature to have. This might even be possible with an updater and 3 map/geodata files. Territory with no castle / built castle / destroyed castle PvP Reward in EvE Online is a % of the modules(gear) of the guy you just killed. You loose all your gear, yep. Ship included, but you can buy an insurance to minimize losses, but no one gives you back the modules... which is the expensive part, so you have to farm it back up. This creates a never-ending cycle between farming and PvP, farming creates PvP, PvP creates PvP, PvP creates farming... and it's why you always have something to do. This cycle in L2 is the exp loss when you die, but it doesn't seem to really work... remember back then when you died, you lost part of your exp bar, and dropped part of your equipment? That was some cool PvP reward. Now it's almost inexistant. Linear character development is just the grind before becoming the same as everyone else, dinging 85, getting bored on endgame, and finally quitting or farming eternally the same mobs for slightly better stats. When the average guy hits endgame, new areas, armors, and quests get released so he doesn't get bored and quits. That's called a chronicle. Repeat. That's where it fails. Endgame. It means the game ends, log off and come back in 6 months, you finished farming, congratz! Instead of having endgame, you could give a ton of possibilities which are super time-consuming to master, but not so hard to have at a decent level, and let people choose their own way to make their character as they want to. It's very difficult to imagine in L2, but you would have a clear image if it wouldn't be so level/class-based as it is. Maybe even include subclasses. Infinite subclasses, why not? Don't include stronger armors, just include variations. Same for weapons, same for skill enchant routes, same for everything else. Let players build their own class and gear, basically. They will want to try all the possibilities. You can have instant endgame for the guy that just logged in, but have optional farming for variations. Essentially you have endgame, but you don't have to ever reach it because you are competent enough even if you just created your char. This is just a bad example, but the idea is that you never want players getting bored because they are overwhelmed and have the feeling of necessity that is too much to do, or the contrary, when they have nothing that is worth their time to do and there is no sense of progression. Maybe look at Tribes: Ascend to get a feel of what I mean. For the items part, A Grade armors had it right, S wasn't so bad too because there were always drawbacks. Anything above S is simply better, not different... which means farm it up or suck it up. Shouldn't be like that. TLDR: Server impact is cool, but be sure that the underdogs have a chance to come back, else it's boring for everyone. Variation: different from simply better, optional stuff. Linear character development sucks. Extreme player customization: let them decide what they want to do with their char. That would be what I would consider doing if I were to change something on L2.

This pretty much sums it up for 99% of custom servers, where custom = armors/weapons/tattoos/etc copypaste bullshit. All the accumulated fails of custom crap created a bad reputation for the "custom" meaning, same for pretty much anyone who dared changing something that was considered standard L2 Battles for Glory 2 (http://www.bsfg.ru/) - is the closest thing to custom server that I would recommend and that is live atm. Pretty cool, it had perma 2k players when I was playing. A lot of farming though, but easy to find PvP at all level ranges Pandora - looked awesome, innovated on many areas, lots of potential, never finished L2Luna - was good, died after a week, monotone - but with cool ideas. Also amazing to make all that work in L2Off platform I don't know more custom servers that are worth mentioning. Long ago I was working on one that I never finished, but I eventually gave up because it was too much work for the 20 people that would log in

I'll tell you why private l2 servers are shit and no one wants to innovate, only lure more noobs to their servers. It's very simple. The grand majority of server owners are only in for the money. The best inversion they can do is to spend as little time/money as possible to setup a server for the greatest amout of money they can get, which results in crappy jobs. They don't try to make a change in the L2 community, nor they care about it, they only want their money. They don't even care about L2, or even know basic PvP things about it, yet they try to balance(read: screw up) classes for some reason. They don't care at all either if their bugged server is shit and smells bad: if they stop getting money, it gets closed, and they repeat the process with another name, changing a few settings in hopes of people staying longer. You can see a very similar pattern in the music, games, film industries. Sloppy shop where you need to make 100 clicks to get something, or unorganized and incomplete buffer? They didn't make the Shop, and much less the buffer. Don't expect them to look through them either High buff count, +50 max enchant, mp pots, shitty mobs, retarded stuff in general? Noobs like it, noobs donate. You don't need to think about anything, just press random buttons, you'll do fine. The simpler stuff gets, the better, because people that think, think twice before donating for gear. They realize it's -beep-ing stupid, in other words Balance? Start with setting up your server in a non-retarded way, and it will get so much better that you won't want to believe. NCSoft are no genius in terms of PvP balance or logic, but most servers are plain retarded. You can actually enjoy L2 PvP with so many random chances if they are setup correctly Standards for PvP server? This is not a decision, but a community-driven natural transition I don't even know. Unfortunately, since so many people are still donating for retarded servers, the standards are... guess what, retarded servers. Until people don't stop donating on retarded servers, it won't happen, because admins get what they want, no need to change if the end result is already good And that's why the grand majority of PvP servers suck (for you, for the noobs they are probably awesome). The servers are not meant for people that like PvP, they are a scam waiting for noobs to join and donate

Honestly: it's not worth it. Too much work for a small (and decreasing) userbase, and potential donations. I don't care about donations, but most admins do. If there is no players, there is no money, and there is no time to invest in it either. So it won't happen. You can make the same or more money with 10% of the work and no headaches by setting up a crappy generic pvp server. Your server design is good, fair, competitive, etc - it will fullfil its objective and surely create opportunities for good players to have fun and so on. But the reality is that only 2% of the community isn't retarded and the rest prefer that crappy pvp server over yours.

I don't know what your prferences are, but it might just be what you are looking for: www.skirmishpvp.com It's been in beta for a while, everything is free in beta We have our share of lovers and haters. Many say it's balanced, many say it's not. One word before you join: PvPing isn't easymode F1 spam, you need to know what you are doing and how to play/setup your class Have fun

People sleep at night, you know. Usually ~100 peak on day and tons of clan/party pvp (instead of random respawn pvp, which we ofcourse have too but it's all that the other pvp servers out there usually have) l2j retail doesn't exist

oO no way OL > cardinal in healing aspect OLs got Chain Heal in H5 if that's what you mean about summoners... they are only a factor in small scale pvp

you can be competitive in PvP without farming at all, but ofc the farm is there

max was around 170 no dualboxing :p

nope when a clan controls a zone, all the mobs that get killed in that zone produce AA that gets deposited into clan warehouse AA -> clan skills, gear, etc Also raids are in DVC/LOA, not WOA :p

final features (not on first post) General High Five Instant 85 Features Balanced gameplay Zone Control TvT Event PvP Reward H5 Olympiad (beta) Raid Status NPC NPC Buffer Balanced Classes All available classes are viable and fill their own unique role PvPs are fast paced, debuffs land, skills make more damage than autoattacks, and support classes are needed for Clans, Mass PvP, and Raids Gameplay All skills autolearn Free element Enchants: Safe +3, Max +10, 40% chance No Epics/Olympiad/Territory War Jewels No mana potions If MP is at 30% or less, MP regeneration will be doubled Damage over Time skills do increased damage (retail in olympiad) Grief buffing protection Infinite buff time from NPC Buffer 18+0 buff slots, 12 d/s slots Buffs that are triggers, selfbuffs, or special buffs (Shield of Faith, Prahnah, etc) don’t consume buffslot Cancel/Steal Divinity only affect buffs that don’t consume buffslot (Ignore NPC Buffer buffs, works retail-like in Olympiad) No buff loss on death for Players and Summons (can be resummoned with buffs) If you are not in combat, olympiad, and PvP mode, HP/MP/CP regeneration will drastically increase Tons of formula fixes (debuffs, skills, etc) Other No dualboxing Clan Gate working Macros working correctly (you can instantly equip whole armor set in a click) 10 seconds spawn protection Detailed drop statistics on mobs via shift-click Drop protection: The item goes for the player/party that did most damage All NPCs not related or necessary to the PvP world have been deleted or replaced Free project with fair donations (no ingame stats change) Live 08/10/2011 18:00 GMT +1 Check us out at http://www.skirmishpvp.com/

no idea, I bet it's Fyyre's files, false positive imo the system folder is a clean updated H5 system, patched, and some really small mods in etcitemgrp, armorgrp, skillgrp and itemname-e; then it also has dsetup.dll, fire.dll, l2.exe and unichat.dll from Fyyre that's all it has