This is a multi-purpose blog. First I'll announce that the ghost/zombie, Stramineus, and Joe's Halloween items will be disappearing on the 10th. Hunt those ghosts while you can!

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Next, some small updates/bug fixes.

The padding on forum posts was bugged after the anonymous forum update. I fixed that (also added 10 px padding on top of forum posts, up from the 5px before. I think it looks nicer).

I added the active skills on a drone run on mouseover of the drones module and on the drone bays page.

I buffed the drone skill Evasion, so that it rolls Reliability * 3 instead of 2. With 25 Reliability, you'd have a 75% chance of evading danger, up from 50%. It was one of the least used skills, so hopefully this encourages more players to try it. Heavy Forcefield and Nanobot Repairs are also underused, but not sure how to go about buffing them.

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Finally, everybody go sign up in Wolf's Werewolves thread in Games Forum. It'll be fun, I promise.

While the outfits aren't available just yet, that doesn't mean a few other things can't happen in the meantime.

First off, the holiday season has begun. Halloween right around the corner and Christmas not to far behind. That said, a somewhat familiar face is going to make her appearance once again to try and terrorize the Hive. You know her as Shadress.

For those unaware, Shadress is a mysterious entity that made her first appearance some time ago and for some reason mostly manifests when there is a surge of power or when Halloween is near. Don't ask why. It's one of the more unknown things about her.

Shadress seems to change her combat style slightly each time we see her. The biggest problem is her overwhelming power when she first appears. In the past it has taken getting her to at least 60% fatigue for it to be a fair fight. This time however she doesn't seem to be sporting that much power. She has sacrificed a massive portion of that power for an overwhelming amount of HP. What will make this particularly challenging is that once the first attack against her is initiated, you will be on a strict time limit to take her down.

If you put forth an noticeable effort to take her down, you will be rewarded. If you get the killing blow, you will receive some extra goodies. The killing blow is not required for the banner, but it will definitely make your chances better. Also Shadress will mostly stay on a square that is neutral so Avatars are able to phase to her more easily. If she has to move for whatever reason, the timer will pause until she relocates and people follow her.

Oh, and don't worry. I will get Zorg to add the Halloween costumes next time I see him

The Halloween hunt groups have been released, as well as Stramineus the special NPC. Joe's Merchandise is selling Halloween themed stuff as well.

Happy Haunting!

Halloween is over (despite what the Legacy banner tells you) and Shadress has vanished from the Hive for the time being. In the short time she was here, many of you challenged her. Ultimately, she was only impressed with a small handful of you. Those individuals were:

Shade, Mary, Persephone, UnicornBob, bigchaos, greggy, smythe, matt770, Zach, Merkleman, Mert, Pjay, blenok, Cartucho, Gryll, and motodragon

But of everyone who fought her, some of you actually brought her down.

Graponis, dagreek, Kage, crippler, and MrItrickzu

Those who defeated her were granted the Shadress banner, a Toolbox, and a Voodoo doll by default. Everyone else were sent items for participating.

Also want to give a special shoutout to Merkleman for despite not being an Avatar, kept attacking Shadress so she would gain fatigue so everyone else could dispatch her more easily