Darkfall Developer Tasos recently announced that "Conquer the Seas," the game's second free expansion, is tentatively scheduled to launch late next week (which falls around Thanksgiving for North American players). If the team misses that window, the expansion should come out within a few days after that.

According to Tasos, the launch of "Conquer the Seas" was delayed for a month to add "hundreds of smaller improvements and thousands of corrections and fixes. A lot of testing is involved in getting this right, and to correct all the problems that come up during the testing." Basically, the team wanted to get it right before releasing the expansion, which is something most players understand as being a necessity.

Darkfall Developer Tasos announced today that the team has launched the Darkfall Community Publishing Program, which is a way for subscribers to make some extra money by referring new players to purchase the MMO. According to the post, active players will be able to make 20% on all Darkfall client products by sharing a unique link on their sites and blogs.

"The best Community Publishers will earn more than the standard share and be invited to cooperate with the Aventurine Publishing Team. Some may even be offered further opportunities in the gaming industry," Tasos said. So if you're a Darkfall player who wants to participate in this program, head over to the Community Publishing tab in the account management system. You can read the full announcement after the jump.

The Darkfall team continues to reveal information about the upcoming "Conquer the Seas" expansion on the game's official forums, which can be seen in posts made yesterday and today. The first post discusses skill extensions that will focus mostly on melee and ranged combat, while the second post spotlights the new player vendors and a new player-owned house type that are coming in the expansion.

The player vendors certainly sound interesting: "Once you got a hold of the appropriate item it will enable you to have your very own little gnome vendor setting up shop outside your house. Happily counting the money he'll make for you, always on the lookout for potential customers." Who doesn't want a gnome selling stuff outside their house? You can read both posts after the jump.

Tasos announced today that character transfers are now live in Darkfall. According to the post, "character transfers are currently available only to players wishing to transfer from the EU1 server to the NA1 server. There is no transfer fee if the transfer takes place before December 6th 2009." You don't need to buy an NA1 Darkfall client to transfer your EU1 character and the whole process could take up to 24 hours. More details can be found after the jump.

During this transfer period, the team is offering a 30% discount on six-month subscription packages for both the EU1 and NA1 servers. For example, new players can buy the NA1 client and a six-month subscription for $87, which is $38 cheaper than the regular price. The special offer ends on Dec. 5.

Aventurine held the introductory test event for the Darkfall Dynamic Lore System yesterday and has followed it by posting a Q&A session with the development team. According to the post, these events will be ongoing and will allow players to have an "actual impact on the world lore and the history of Agon." For example, the names of players and clans may appear in future quests and events.

The Q&A also states that yesterday's event "went smoothly considering that the majority of tools to support the system won't be in place until after the November 'Conquer the Seas' Expansion." The team plans to add tools to help players join the events more easily so everyone can participate. The full Q&A can be found after the jump.

Darkfall developer Claus announced in August's state of the game address that the game's second free expansion would launch by the end of October. Well, Community Liaison Mr. White said in a post on the official forums today that the expansion will be delayed until mid-November because "the developers decided to include a major revamp of the siege and conquest mechanics."

In addition, Aventurine has finally launched a Web site that provides information about the company. While the site is fairly simple, it does list the Darkfall developer credits for the first time to showcase the team behind the game.

The Darkfall team implemented a major patch yesterday that lays the groundwork for the game's next expansion, which is coming in October. For example, the expansion will bring some big changes to naval combat, so this patch has made it so damaged ships will move slower, lowered the hit points of all ships and made ships cheaper to produce.

A small patch was also added today that fixed some bugs from yesterday's patch. You can read the full notes from the main patch after the jump.

Darkfall developer Claus has published a state of the game address today that discusses the next patch, which should be ready by the end of the week, and Darkfall's upcoming second free expansion.

According to the post, the new patch will be adding skill-up bonuses for both combat skills and magic schools so new players can catch up with veterans faster. The team also hopes it will lead to more open field PvP by enticing players to fight monsters for skill-ups.

The second free expansion should launch by the end of October and will include changes and additions to ship building, sea combat, local banking, player-owned local vendors, racial skills, a barber shop, archery and melee combat, and more. You can read more about what's coming in the patch and expansion in the full letter after the jump.

The first part of a developer Q&A has been released on both the NA and European Darkfall Web sites, and the six questions focus mainly on the recent launch of the North American server.

To start off, Tasos said the developers were happy with the launch of the NA server and noted it was a "really smooth experience for everyone." The reason NA players have to wait three months after the server's launch to transfer their characters is simply a balance issue, and Tasos doesn't expect any other restrictions will be needed.

The dev team has found that the number of hackers in the game has remained low since the initial mass of bannings. If newer NA players or older players begin to cheat, they will be perma-banned. Also, a second European server is definitely planned and may be launched in a couple months.

You can read the full Q&A below.

Yesterday, Adventurine launched the first North American Darkfall Online server. Unfortunately, because the European and the American rights to Darkfall do not belong to the same company, players who wish to play on the North American servers will need to purchase a North American Darkfall Online client / account. If you have an account on the European servers, however, Tasos notes that European players with European accounts may 'clone' their character and transfer them to the North American server, without any of their possessions, three months after the launch of the North American Server. Thus, while players may have to wait a little while longer to port themselves over to the new Darkfall servers, at least they won't have to purchase another Darkfall Online client!

You can register for a North American account here, and you can read about the details of downloading the North American client here.