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Update 14 - Nature and Negotiation!
Hi Everyone!
Update 14 is here! It is a big one.
The first half of my time was spent on the new Negotiation System which works with the Story Generator to deliver Year 2+ challenges.
The second half was because I added Beavers one afternoon for fun. One thing really led to another with those Beavers.
With this being such a large update, I will link the related "Progress Update" announcements for deeper details on the changes.
Those progress updates explain my thought processes and why/how the changes came about. I will need to stick to a higher-level overview here, or I will run out of text space. (it has happened before :)
Update 14 covers versions 0.457->0.479 from the Testing Branch.
(Note: anyone can join the testing branch under Clanfolk/Properties/Betas, and it is updated multiple times a week)
New Stuff
- The Negotiation System
- Patience - How long a Negotiation lasts
- Authority - How "in the right" the Negotiator is feeling
- Courage - How brave the Negotiator is feeling
- Persuasion - Skill at lowering opponent's Authority
- Intimidation - Skill at lowering opponent Courage
- Brawling - When all else fails (Player Initiated Only)
- Patience - How long a Negotiation lasts
- Nature
- Beavers
- Swimming
- New Better Shoreline System
- Natural River Generation
- Bridges
- Piers that can be built on!
- New Natural Terraformer (much nicer maps)
- Riverbank Seeding (the rivers have life growing along their edges)
- Undergrowth System (makes the forests, grasses, and rocks feel a lot more "there")
- Clouds
- Lightning
- Beavers
For those who want more detail, let's dive right in!
The Negotiation System!
A Negotiation is a Live Event that progresses over time. The Negotiation will continue until an Outcome is picked or Patience runs out.
New Outcomes become available based on Courage and Authority thresholds being met.
The Negotiator can modify the Opponent's Courage and Authority by steering the conversation with their Persuasion or Intimidation skills. Depending on the strength of this steering, Patience will lower more quickly.
Environmental factors such as a grand meeting hall or having a backup at the ready will also change Courage and Authority over time, making other Outcomes available.
If an Outcome is not picked before Patience is exhausted, the Opponent will win the negotiation and be granted their original demand.
If Patience is about to run out, and the Player is unwilling to lose the Negotiation, the Player can choose to trigger a Brawl as a last chance to scare off the opponent.
The Brawl is only ever triggered by the Player faction. Brawls exist to not tie the player's hands when a Negotiation has failed. There is a cost to Brawling. Relations will suffer greatly, and permanent (But nonfatal) injuries may also occur. It is important to think carefully before abandoning Reason in favor of a Headbutt.
Currently, there is one Story Event Chain: The Outcast Mother. Some new events have been added to this chain and one of these will lead to a Negotiation. Many more story event chains will be added in the future, and the current Outcast Mother chain should be seen as an example.
For in-depth detail on the whole Negotiation System please see this (mostly still accurate) post:
https://steamcommunity.com/games/1700870/announcements/detail/6089499397576415358
Nature
So, as mentioned above, this all started with adding some Beavers one afternoon after wrapping up the Outcast Mother story event.
There is a very detailed step by step process listed in the next two Progress Updates, and I suggest giving those a read if you are wondering exactly how Beavers lead to Rivers to Bridges to a New Terraformer all the way to Lightning. They should both be somewhat entertaining :)
Here are the Progress Update Links:
https://steamcommunity.com/games/1700870/announcements/detail/4119176366789362099
https://steamcommunity.com/games/1700870/announcements/detail/4182229294562593636
Here is a much higher-level description of the changes.
Beavers
It turns out that Beavers were quite common in 1300s Scotland, and Europe in general. The Beavers were hunted for their pelts as well as their castor sacs which used for medieval medical purposes and just about anything else you can imagine, even beekeeping.
Beavers will build Lodges in lakes, and their presence will cause reeds to be replanted along the shoreline. Beavers don't currently gnaw down trees, but that will also likely come.
Swimming
Beavers looked really odd walking on water, so Swimming was added. Now, all humans and wildlife will swim and wade into the water from the shoreline.
New Better Shoreline System
To make Swimming work, it required a rethink of how the Shoreline worked. I needed the Idea of depth to allow me to figure out how much of the Beaver to draw. Snapping the Beaver from walking on the ground to being in the water looked terrible, so we needed a gradual transition.
This new wading transition looks good about 90% of the time, but will sometimes seem a bit odd. Just remember that a real beaver is bendy, so if the wading seems weird, well that is just the beaver bending :)
Natural River Generation
A long time Clanfolk player mentioned to me that Beavers were kind of lame without Rivers, so I groaned audibly and decided to give Rivers a quick try.
I *never* thought that Rivers would look right with square tiles. I expected straight lines and stair cases, but surprisingly, in the end (and a lot of iterations) they turned out really well!
Rivers will now connect Lakes and thin out as they travel through bogs. They wind around mountains and seek simulated natural low spots in the terrain. The rivers will also widen in areas and create crossings in others. There should be quite a bit of variety to the shape and paths of the rivers for each map.
The Rivers also slice the map up into zones quite well, requiring the player to think more about homestead placement. 100% love for the rivers now.
Bridges
So now that we had rivers dividing the land into zones, we needed to be able to cross those rivers.
Bridges had to happen next. Bridges broke most of the rules I had created to keep the tile-based construction sane, but in the end, I got a road to span the water.
In running a few visual tests, it became apparent, even to me, that people were also going to want cover these bridges with roofs (yet another rule broken. roofs over water? inconceivable!)
Then my son started chanting "Lake House" and showed me jazz hands, annnnd I decided to make bridge tiles provide full build support.
This led to:
Piers that can be built on!
Now we can also have decks over water and piers to go fishing off of.
It is even possible to build walls and fences on bridges, so creating sealed animal pens that border lakes is now a reality.
Bridges also have span distances similar to roofs. Completely paving over lakes is not possible, but if there is a small island in a lake, it can provide support for a nice Lake House!
With how nice the Rivers and Bridges were looking, I felt empowered to try one more experiment.
New Natural Terraformer (much nicer maps)
The Terraformer wasn't exactly producing natural-looking results by randomly blasting trees and plants here and there. I had also seen some very nice pictures of hand-seeded forests. The new tech for river placement was also begging to be applied to forest seeding, so one more experiment couldn't hurt!
The end result was almost instant, beautiful forests. There were dense patches, little forest paths, and larger open areas on the map for building. The new forests looked natural and had some personality. So I decided to apply the Forest Seeding Algorithm to grasses and even rocks and the result was also a dramatic improvement.
We now had proper-looking forests, with paths, grass fields, open areas, and dense rocky areas, all placed naturally. The map was starting to look very convincing.
So, next, I decided to show this new tech off on Discord, and people were excited. One of the users also mentioned how the Rivers were empty on the edges. They were right! Rivers have life along their banks.
Tinker Tinker...
Riverbank Seeding (the rivers have life growing along their edges)
Riverbanks now generate trees or grasses or even sometimes rocky sections along their shoreline. This new plant life also extends around Lakes and Bogs tying everything together.
Back to Discord to show off the new Riverside a bit, and another pretty critical insight from that same player. The Trees were pretty bare underneath, and they just kind of popped out of the green grass. They said this in a lot nicer way, but my brain translated it to that.
I could not unsee it now.
Undergrowth System
There is a new Undergrowth layer that grows and shrinks over time as the Trees grow or are removed.
So if a forest is chopped down, expect to see the grass plains slowly take over the old forested area.
Also if a new forest grows, the undergrowth will slowly return along with the ferns and bluebells. It is quite gradual, but will happen even in older saves.
At first I just applied this new system to Forests, but have since also given Grasses and Rocks their own form of undergrowth.
It turns out Bluebells grow in Forests and are also tied with Thistle as the national flower of Scotland. There are some very nice pictures on Bluebell Forests in Scotland, and I suggest searching for them.
At this point we were getting pretty close to Update 14, and I knew there was not time for a new Story Element Chain, so I decided to try applying that River tech to one more thing that had been on my mind for a looooong time.
Clouds
The Rivers and Natural Terraformer both sample a heightmap texture (think of a black and white picture of a bunch of clouds) to determine where to place tiles, buuuut You know what a cloud heightmap also look like? Clouds!
I decided to try panning that texture across the map in relation to the wind speed. The first few attempts were ugly, but it was pretty obvious that it was going to work. After enough tinkering with the shaders, there were light clouds on Sunny days that wandered across the landscape as well as "light holes" on very cloudy days that showed breaks in the clouds.
I think it is obvious to everyone what has to come next...
Lightning
Lightning was originally to be a Friday afternoon task (like the Beavers.) But it turns out lightning is actually quite complicated lighting wise. I wanted to deliver on the experience of a Thunderstom slowly rolling past the homestead.
Thunderstorms do not happen very often, but you can expect at least a couple within a game year. They tend to be more likely with heavy rain, but can come at any time, even in the Summer.
You will know when one is coming by the sound. There is a set of sound for strikes off map and ones on map. The flashes will also become more intense as the lightning approaches.
Lightning will cause fires so beware. Currently I have it in "merciful" mode and it will not set roofs on fire, but there will be a toggle for that in the future. Lightning will set fields on fire though.
There are many more upgrades and changes in Update 14, but that covers the largest additions.
Please take a look at the Progress Updates linked above, or the Change Logs listed below for further info.
The Big List Of Everything
For those interested in detailed change logs, following this link and starting at V0.457 will give you a listing of all the changes since Update 13
https://steamcommunity.com/app/1700870/discussions/0/3183488858470509508/?ctp=21
Road Map
There is a lot more to come! Please take a look at the Road Map for further long term details as well.
https://store.steampowered.com/news/app/1700870/view/3388412789658793666
Diving back into the code now.
Thanks very much for playing Clanfolk!
Andrew Hume (Blorf)
MinMax Games Ltd.
Watch out for Beavers. They can send you places you never expected!
Clanfolk Progress Update! (Natural Environment Upgrades)
Hi Everyone,
The Testing Branch just got another big Update, and this one is all about the Environment.
The improvements brought about due to the Rivers, Beavers, and Bridges from my last Progress Update inspired me to divert from the Story Generator temporarily to see just how far these new atmospheric improvements could go.
Here are the details.
One important note right off the bat if that I am pushing the Testing Branch to the Default Branch in about 2 weeks (Probably April 20 or 21.) So those of you who have been waiting on all these changes, don't have much longer to wait!
Those who want to try this out now can join the Testing Branch under Steam/Clanfolk/Properties/Betas.
New Stuff:
- New Natural Terraformer (much nicer maps)
- Riverbank Seeding (the rivers have life growing along their edges)
- Forest Undergrowth System (makes the forests feel a lot more "there")
- Clouds
- Added Heavy Rain/Snow mode to the New Game Options
- Lightning
For those who want the finer details, please once again, pull up a chair. :)
After the previous progress update, I had planned to jump right back onto the Story Generator, but the response to the surprise River's update was so positive, that I just wanted to do a bit more. This once again kind of compounded on itself, but this time instead of Beavers, it all started with a quick experiment on the Terraformer...
New Natural Terraformer
So for a very long while, I have not liked how the Terraformer literally shotgun seeded trees and grass on the map in blocks. The process was to fire a blast of seeds from orbit, then use a growth algorithm to spread them. It was functional but it did not look natural.
One of the very active Clanfolk players has been spending years in game cultivating natural looking forests by hand as well. This showed me that the forests in particular could look a lot better, but how...
The answer was a new piece of tech provided by the rivers. Rivers use a heightmap to figure out where to flow. (A heightmap is a black and white image where the brightness of the pixel determines its height) The heightmap gives the rivers their natural flow patterns, instead of looking like a grid.
I decided to apply that heightmap system to the fertility of the soil and to make MANY more planting passes with the now circular shotgun seeder to see what happened. Annnd the map looked amazing. The forests had dense spots and walking paths and were no longer amorphous blobs.
Thrilled, I applied the new seeding logic to... everything. Suddenly the map had well differentiated zones with personality!
As usual when looking for ideas/validation, I posted some progress pictures to Discord. (I work alone, from home, so an occasional external atta boy is great) The Discord group were all very supportive and excited, but there was also one really key suggestion. Essentially: "What about the river edges?"
Riverbank Seeding
So I was blind to this, but it made perfect sense as soon as I read it. These new rivers were mostly bare on their sides... Rivers just don't work like that!
Surely just one more tweak won't take too long. I set to work and started applying seeding logic to the Riverbanks, creating grassy fields, rocky areas, and thick tree lined edges.
The result here was a shocking improvement, making the Rivers feel like a part of the environment "and" influencing it. The same tech also encircled lakes and bogs with new life.
So now we have the map nicely delineated with the rivers and their growth on either size traversing the map, tying things together.
New open areas also appeared for building due to the natural seeding. Just like there were natural forests and fields of heather, clear patches developed, begging to be built on.
So "now" it was time to get back to work on the Story Generator. The map looked great! It was about a week of unexpected work in total, but well worth the effort in the end.
Then the same Discord user who mentioned the riverbanks meekly asked about Ferns/Moss in the Forest. Harumph.... hmmm... So I took a look, and of course once this was mentioned, it did feel weird that the trees just kind of sprang out of the green grass... Trees usually have a mess under them and especially in thick forests... thinking thinking...
I suppose it is worth a "short" experiment... just to see...
Forest Undergrowth System
Undergrowth is an interesting problem, because trees come and go, as do whole forests. They can be planted and cut down. I couldn't just plop down a floor tile that looked like a clump of moss as it would be very jarring as trees were added and remoded.
My first experiments used the Desire Path system to create patchy ground under the trees over time. This sort of worked, but didn't really look right.
But, it then struck me that there WAS system that I could adapt. Most people have not seen this, but after fires, there can be very large ash areas that slowly wither away to nothing over time. I could potentially use this. So I tried applying ash over time under the forests and it worked! Better yet the ash density could grow and shrink over time with the forests, no popping!
So the density of the forest determined the density of the ash.
After a bit more work and yet another tile layer in the game, we had decent looking undergrowth. Undergrowth grew with forests, and diminished over time as a result of clear cuts, with the grass slowly reclaiming the land. We had decent looking ...flat... undergrowth. Time for some research!
So it turned out that Bluebells are just as iconic for Scotland as the Thistle, and guess where they grow!
I recommend searching for pictures of bluebell forests. They are delightful.
Bluebells are also really easy to make look nice. I love you Bluebells.
Looking at you Ferns...
So whereas the Bluebells took maybe an hour to make look nice, the Ferns, oh the Ferns. So many tries and when I finally had something decent, I posted it to Discord and one of the first comments was "why are they all pointing the same way" Oh no, they noticed the one thing I didn't want them to notice! Back to the drawing board....
Finally after many more attempts, the Ferns looked great, and much better than the original ones that all bent to the right.
One very interesting side effect of the new Natural Terraformer was that the forest undergrowth created Bluebell patches AND Fern patches and some border zones with a mixture. So part of the map was bluebell forests and others were dark forests with fern cover.
So this was great! Forests looked fantastic. About another week down, but again well worth it. Back to work on the Story Generator!
...Long time Clanfolk Discord superstar: "You know what would be great, if there were cloud shadows." Oh no, this had also been on my mind since forever, and it was brought up RIGHT when I was in the zone environment wise. Surely just one more experiment... For Science!
Clouds!
Once again the tech from the Rivers made something new possible. (Thank you again Beavers)
That same heightmap used for river pathing, and for tree seeding, could also kinds be used for cloud density... If I moved it with the wind, and hooked the results into the shadow system... Worth a try.
So right off the bat, it looked like the system was going to work. The quick experiment showed me dark patches moving across the landscape, and the terrain suddenly took on a more real 3D feel. There were holes where light got through and other very dark (too dark) spots that were ominous and it all panned across the map with the wind. Sigh. I am doing this aren't I?
Days of Shader work later, and the clouds felt real. You couldn't ever actually see them, but you knew that the clouds were there from the shadows.
The next step was to connect the weather system to the cloud system such that there was a gradual increase in cloud as rain approached as well as heavy cloud vs light cloud days.
Watching a single wandering cloud slowly cross the map on a calm day was also quite relaxing. I found myself zooming out on the map a lot more, just to look at it. That used to be a weak point, but over the last few weeks and particularly with the addition of the clouds, the zoomed out map was becoming appealing to look at.
We now had cloud shadows roaming across the map, reacting to wind, growing and dispersing naturally, as well as dark spots on sunny days, and what I have come to call "sky holes" on very cloudy days. I like these in particular where a bright patch moves across the land when it is overcast.
That was great. Clouds are awesome. Another week down. Lets have a nice long Easter weekend, then get on to that Story generator (rubs hands together)
It was Friday afternoon. Beautiful clouds, and no lightning. That is like Beavers without Rivers... Lightning will be quick, I just flash some light and draw a white wiggly line. I will do it in the afternoon, no problem...
Lightning
So I finished Lightning Last night (7 Days Later)
It became apparent rather quickly that Lightning was going to be a bit of work. The real problem with light-ning is the light-ing. Lightning is not a light at a point in space. It is a line of light. Lightning creates VERY distinct shadows. I cannot just make the map bright for a second and be done with it.
This next bit may get a bit technical, but it is really quite interesting I think:
Where lightning strikes, there is a blinding flash from above. This means that there are also almost no shadows at the strike point since the light rays are pointing down. Far away from the lightning though, there are very long shadows, but not too long. Lightning is also high up. So we can't just create a huge light bulb at the strike point with infinite length shadows. We need to create a huge bulb "above" the strike point, way above. In a 2D world, with no up.
This was a problem. I do already have lights that can exist at virtual heights off the 2D plane and create shadow length based on that. So a Standing Torch creates shorter shadows than a campfire on an object of the same height at the same distance, but the problem is the light rays moving out from the source point. That just won't work. A Wall blocks torch light once a ray hits it, but the wall should not block the lightning light, not all of it.
I couldn't push light rays from the source pixel to the target pixel, instead I needed to pull shadows from the target pixel towards the source! So a new lighting system was born for Lightning. Instead of light travelling from the source to the target, shadows were sucked from the target to the source and would not block each other. If you pause the game during a lightning flash and look around the map, this will make a lot more sense. Imagine the difference if the lightning light was at a height of 0 vs 100 meters.
So after a few days, the flashing looked perfect. I could call lightning on demand and got the appropriate lighting effect. I did channel my inner Zeus for a while with that, zapping a great many things. I have mouthed so many "Kaboom","ChhkWhoosh" sounds over the last week while tuning the lightning bolt animation and effects.
Finally I added sound. Mouth can now rest.
The next phase was to hook the lightning system up to the weather manager to create storms, but not to many storms (please let me know if there are too many, I just don't know at this point, so much lightning, a lifetime of lightning)
Lightning will start far off the map and there will be slight flashes in the distance, then after a time, a low rumble. As the lightning approaches it gets louder and the flashes become brighter until it reaches the map. The lightning will traverse the map (but sometimes missing it entirely at the top or bottom) and then fade out again in the distance.
There are different storm intensities that are triggered based on atmospheric conditions. More clouds, wind, rain, and moisture mean bigger storms (in general) but Summer storms are possible and lightning can cause fires.
Lightning also lowers the moisture and create scorch marks at the point of impact (this is fun to watch.)
The color of the lightning will change based on the overall atmospheric color at the time, so at night it will tend to glow more blue, whereas at sunset it may glow a bit orange. This was a nice lighting side effect that I noticed in the pictures of real lightning as well.
For now, I have put the lightning in "kind mode" so strikes will not set roofs on fire, but a toggle is coming for that soon.
Conclusion
I got distracted by shiny things again. All in all though, it was definitely the right move.
I am very thankful that the community has been so supportive of me exploring these surprise additions.
The response to the Rivers and Beavers progress update was so overwhelmingly positive that I just wanted to do more.
The improvements to the atmosphere of the game have been enormous, and I think since those changes are ever present vs transient with the story events, this was probably the right time to tackle the additions.
So over the next two weeks I will get preparing for the Default Branch release of all this new content, going all the way back to the Negotiation system! There have been an enormous amount of additions, and I need to test it all and fix bugs. (As well as get it all translated)
Thanks very much for your support!
"ChhkWhoosh"
Andrew Hume (Blorf)
MinMax Games Ltd.
Hooded Horse Spring Sale
Clanfolk Progress Update! (My unexpected 2 week water adventure!)
Hi Everyone,
It has been a very busy two weeks, and the Testing Branch just got a Big Update.
Note: Anyone can join the Testing Branch under Clanfolk/Properties/Betas on Steam.
Here are the details.
Before I go into the tale of the last two weeks, for those of you who just want the high level info, here it is:
New Stuff:
- Beavers
- Swimming
- New Better Shoreline System
- Natural River Generation
- Bridges
- Piers that can be built on!
For those who want to know how this all came about, please pull up a chair.
This is the tale of how one thing lead to another and two weeks of unplanned work was born.
So two weeks ago, after working intensely on the Story Generator systems for the previous few months, I decided, "Hey, I should add something cool for players for the weekend!"
It all started with a Beaver.
I decided, Beavers are cool, lets add them as that weekend surprise. I got to work modifying the Bunny template, then made some AI tweaks and there were Beavers in the game. Woohoo. I set up the art, then made a Beaver Lodge and things were going quite smoothly and all in time for the weekend. (two weeks ago)
Then it struck me when I saw the Beavers... walking on water... Oh no. Beavers must swim! But how can beavers swim on a 2d plane!?! Soo... That lead to me having to create the concept of Water Depth. To have Water Depth, I needed to add a new camera to the game that could write depth data that the other cameras could use to determine what to draw and what not to draw. So after a few more days, tada! Beavers were swimming, and it looked pretty good! So I tried a few more animals and they swam mostly sensibly, but sometimes floated a little high or low, nothing to serious. It was all cool.
Then I put a person in the water... Annnnnnnd their clothing went semi transparent and their bits were showing... Originally water was semi transparent, but Humans have a dozen layers of clothing on them, that all went semi transparent and suddenly you could see through the cloak, jacket, shirt, and braises. Oh no. So after banging my head on the keyboard, I reworked the water and converted it to opaque (which in the end does look better) Crisis averted, and now Everyone Swims with their modesty intact!
Now we have swimming Beavers and Water Depth. The Water Depth had a very interesting side effect in that the shoreline got a LOT more realistic where the terrain leading up the the shore was now visible and would appear an disappear with the waves. So this was a big win as well. I was feeling pretty great.
I decided to show a preview pic of the new changes to one of my go to players/friends on Discord, and to paraphrase the response. "Cool!, but Beavers are kind of lame without Rivers." My triumphant unveiling was properly crushed and a brain worm was now loose in my head. I had worked so hard on this new feature, but if players first response was going to be "Where are the Rivers?" this was going to be a problem. I mean Beavers need highways too I suppose...
So, I got to thinking and thinking and grumbling and thinking. I never thought natural looking Rivers would work with square tiles, but I set out to at least make an attempt to see for sure. I owed Beavers that much for giving me Swimming and Water Depth.
After the first day of experiments, Rivers were functional. They looked like ruler drawn lines between Lakes, but they did work. There was enough there to keep a grip on, so I continued. The next day, I started applying noise textures to the river flow, and the hard lines started getting natural and wavy, then I started varying their width in places, and finally I created some narrows for animal crossings and unbelievably, Rivers looked great! I was thrilled.
Ok, so a week had now passed since Beavers, but there was lots of good new stuff so it was all worth it. Time to generate a testing build... (this was about a week ago)
Animal crossings... Oh no. What about "People Crossings"... So now that there was swimming, do people really want to take a dip to cross a River 10x a day. I needed Bridges too! That meant building on water and breaking a bunch of very specific "Never On Water" rules everywhere in the game. So back to experimenting.
After a couple more days and a few tears, simple bridges started to work. As a side note, for a while people were swimming in the stone of the bridges instead of walking on them, which was a sight to behold. And by early this week, Bridges were functional, but they did not feel "Bridgey."
Next I did an experiment with the shaders to generate some railings on the bridges, and much to my surprise, they looked amazing. They even rounded off the ends. I was thrilled. Then I realized that they ALSO rounded off then ends whenever not connected to a path. So that looked terrible, especially with double wide bridges. A bunch of rules later and the bridges were open in the right spots and railed in the right spots and things were finally looking done.
By now I had some pretty nice looking bridges and was planning on writing some rules to enforce that bridges be 1 lane. I didn't want people paving lakes for example. On a whim, I tried to make one last Mega Wide Bridge before enforcing the single lane, just to see how it looked. For whatever reason, I decided to roof the path to the bridge, then it happened. I could roof the path, BUT not the bridge... There was still a "Don't Even Think About Building Here" rule for Water that was heavily bent for Floors to become Bridges, but what about Walls and Roofs!?!?! That was getting nuts because then bridges support walls which support roofs or decorations. What about other Objects built on the bridge. What if the Bridge Deck was removed? It was best to avoid this insanity.
So I asked my Son's opinion of my big wide unroofed test bridge. Would people "really" want roofs on their bridges thaaaat badly? He just kept chanting "Lake House, Lake House" and then made some jazz hands. The decision was made... Not only would we need to Roof the bridges, but we needed Piers and Decks to allow that lakeside house. I can't resist Jazz Hands accompanying an idea.
So another couple days of breaking rules that were never meant to be broken, and it was done. I built a beautiful deck coming off of a bedroom next to a lake. I also added some decorations to the floor and placed a roof over it. I was thrilled. Tomorrow would be the big day where I unveil this secret project!
So it was Thursday now (Yesterday,) and I was going through some final tests and just looking at the bridges, feeling pretty happy with them, but something was bothering me. They were STILL flat. they had rails, but no lighting. They weren't "there" like all the other world objects. It was time for one last experiment.
So since I had the data that was used to produce the railings, I tried sending that info along to the lighting engine, and sure enough the Bridges popped right off of the ground and suddenly began creating shadows like everything else. Yes!
Then the race was on to get the build out yesterday, but the Beavers had one final trick up their sleeve. In my final tests of the build, I thought: "You know, I really should test the beavers one last time since they started all this," and sure enough, they were moonwalking. This turned out to be a new pathfinding issue due to them being aquatic and not having the usual water slowdown with movement. It is never a good idea to push a build in the evening, so that got us to this morning and here we are.
I hope you enjoyed a glimpse into the crazy adventure started by just wanting to add a Beaver for fun.
Please note: It is highly likely the Testing Branch will have a few issues because of the amount of new material in there over such a short time. I will try to get these fixed as quickly as possible.
I will also be going back to fixing bugs and reading emails etc. I have been very much "in the zone" again over the last couple weeks so I am just coming up for air again now.
Thanks very much for your support!
Andrew Hume (Blorf)
MinMax Games Ltd.
35% off sale for Clanfolk
https://store.steampowered.com/app/1700870/Clanfolk/
Clanfolk Progress Update! (Negotiation on Testing Branch!)
The Negotiation System now has a working Story Element in the Testing Branch! It will still be a while until this reaches the Default Branch as it needs more testing, but it now works and anyone can opt in to try it today.
The Testing Branch is open to everyone and is available via Steam/Clanfolk/Properties/Betas
The Negotiation System turned out be be quite complex due to the interaction of so many game systems to make Negotiation work as a live event vs a traditional instant dialogue tree, but that is the cool part so I think it is worth the extra time.
As part of v0.457 there are many other new mechanics to be aware of as well (part of why this update took a while)
Note: There is a single prototype Negotiation Event right now. It is triggered by denying the Outcast Father when he arrives looking for the Outcast Mother. Wait a few days and it will happen.
Lets dive into all the new stuff!
The Negotiation System
The Negotiation System is a Live Event that is triggered by a Messenger. In this case, Lauchlan wants Janat and Keneth to come with him. Lauchlan has also brought backup after being turned away the first time.
The Player has the option to Send them Away or start a Brawl at any time, but the options to keep Janat and Keneth are gated behind Authority and Courage Thresholds. This is where the Live Negotiation happens. The Player needs to finesse the Courage and Authority bars to unlock the options they desire before patience runs out.
Note: Though always available, brawling is a very dangerous option and should be considered a failure case. More on that below.
Patience
Patience will lower over time as the Negotiation progresses. When Patience runs out, a failure case will trigger. In this example the failure case would be a Brawl. Tempers got to hot.
Patience can decrease more quickly if the Opponent feels threatened and more slowly if they are in a dominant position.
Conversation Topics
The major factor in Patience reduction is the conversation flow. When the flow is left on Natural, this can be seen as the conversation topics flowing logically from one to the next. On the other hand, imagine moving the slider all the way to Intimidation. This means your Clan Leader will ONLY pick intimidating topics, and the Opponents patience will go down much more quickly.
Opponent: "Wow looks like rain"
Clan Leader: "You have a very punchable face"
Opponent: "What a nice rug"
Clan Leader: "You really do have a very punchable face"
Listening to that would get tiring quickly, which is what I am trying to model here.
Another important piece of the puzzle are two new skills Intimidation and Persuasion. I will go into more detail on these below, but someone who is very persuasive will do much more Authority "damage" to the Opponent when a Persuasion topic is picked. This is the same for Courage and Intimidation.
Authority
Authority is the Opponent's sense of being "in the right" and conversely the Clan Leader's sense of being "in the wrong." When Authority is maxed, the Opponent will choose an outcome and the Clan Leader will have to agree because they have been out debated.
On the other hand, if the Clan Leader moved the Authority bar to zero, the Opponent will give up their argument and leave.
Authority changes based on both sides Persuasion skills. So trying to out talk a very smooth talking messenger could be difficult. There are ways to help with this though.
Authority can be influenced by the Environment. As seen in the Picture above, Jon lead Lachlan into the Clan Hall, which is very large and also richly appointed. Lachlan has gotten the affliction "Such Luxury" from the surrounding area. Lachlan is very impressed and as such, his Authority constantly takes a small decrease every second.
So WHERE the argument takes place really matters. Talking to a Tax collector in a Grand Hall would not be a good idea.
Courage
Courage is the Opponent's will to fight. When the Opponent's Courage Bar reached zero, they will flee, but if it reaches the Maximum, the Clan will surrender and give in to the Opponent's demands.
An important note on Courage is that if a Brawl does break out, the Initial Courage values of the Opponent's side will be determined by the Courage Bar location when the negotiation ended. Low courage opponents are quite easy to scare off with a show of force or knocking a few down.
The Player Clan's Courage will be the inverse of the Opponent's Courage. So if the Opponent is at 20%, the Player Clan will be at 80%. So handling a Negotiation well can put you in a much better position in a Brawl!
Signal For Backup
Signal For Backup can also be a very powerful option. In some cases, it it smart to let the Opponent think that they are in a much stronger position. Having greater numbers than the Clan Leader will make the Opponent lose patience more slowly. This can give the Clan Leader time to make more convincing arguments and win via Authority.
In the picture above, Lachlan has the "Overwhelming" affliction. This is because he has 3 guards with him, all glaring at Jon while they Negotiate. Lachlan's Courage increases quickly, but his Patience decreases more slowly, which can be used to the Player's advantage.
On the other hand, if the Player wants to Scare Off Lachlan and his cronies, then a full show of force should do the trick as well. In some cases, sacring off the Opponent would be a very bad idea, so again the Negotiation flow needs to be tailored to the outcomes that the Player wants to unlock.
Negotiation Summary
Since the Negotiation flows over time, the Player has some control over its outcome based on the Conversation topics chosen, the Environment, as well as the amount of Backup they have.
As a Negotiation progresses, it is important to adapt to the flow of the conversation. If it turns out that Intimidation just is not working, then perhaps a compromise option unlocked with Persuasion could give a good enough compromise.
New Skills
To make all this work, two new Skill have been added, Persuasion, and Intimidation.
Persuasion
Persuasion will directly modify Authority changes in Negotiation, but the addition of this new skill also may have some other cool side effects. Since Persuasion is a Skill, it can have a priority. This means that it could potentially be some Clanfolk's job to "Cheer People Up" when they are not working on higher priority tasks.
So imagine guests who were close to leaving due to low satisfaction having someone look after them a bit. This opens the door to more hospitality options that I am excited about.
Currently, the Persuasion Skill is levelled up via Talking. So the Clanfolk with high Social needs will tend to be the best at Persuasion over time because they talk the most :)
Intimidation
Intimidation will directly modify Courage changes in a Negotiation, but it also increases the damage done in Brawls.
Intimidation values increase via hard labor. Things like Hauling and Chopping Trees create the biggest gains.
Intimidation Skill Priority determines WHEN a Clanfolk will provide backup in a Negotiation. If the skill is at the bottom of the list, they will only come during free time. If it is at the top of the list, they will come as soon as they finish their current task.
When a Brawl erupts, everyone with the Intimidation Skill active will drop their current task and participate. (Babies don't Brawl though)
Those with the Intimidation Skill Disabled will Hide during a Brawl.
Brawling
When a Negotiation fails, sometimes the outcome may be a Brawl. Brawling does not use weapons and is not meant to be fatal. It is a failure case in a Negotiation where long term injuries are possible.
I struggled with the idea of Combat in Clanfolk quite a bit. Initially, when Negotiations were a normal Dialog Tree instead of a Live Event as they are now, I considered making the Brawl Injuries a dice roll as part of the Dialog tree, but once the Live Negotiation happened, the Brawling had to be Live to feel right.
The Important outcome of Brawls is the threat of Injuries and Avoiding them. The Player should consider less optimal compromises in a Negotiation to prevent a Brawl from happening. In some cases it is better to compromise than risk an injury.
Brawls track two forms of "Health." There is the Health Bar, which will get knocked down as the fighting progresses, leading to a Knock Out state. There is also the Courage Bar. It is possible to Scare away opponents in a Brawl. As an Opponent is surrounded or sees their ally Knocked Out, their Courage goes down and eventually they will flee.
Knock Outs and Injuries
As a Brawl progresses, people get Knocked Out as their health gets low. The Higher the Intimidation Skill, the more damage done during a Brawl, and the less likely Damage will be taken.
When a Knockout does happen, there is a change of Injury. These new Injuries are the most important part of the system, and I think will add a lot of flavor to the personal stories of each Clanfolk.
I will be writing an Injury Manager System to handle distributing a wide variety of these afflictions in the future, but for now the test case is a broken left or right arm. This will lower work efficiently drastically until healed and should make the player thing twice about throwing punches.
Brawling Optional
I have put quite a lot of thought into making the Brawling fit into the peaceful but also historically accurate atmosphere of Clanfolk, but in the case where players just do not want to have it ever happen, there will be an option to bypass this stage in a Negotiation as well.
Clan Leader (Future Content)
Currently the Clan Leader comes up a lot in the descriptions above. The Clan Leader is currently auto picked as the oldest Clan Member, but I plan to add a new system to choose them as well as have story outcomes to this selection in the future.
I am very excited to hear your thoughts on the Negotiation System.
Thanks again everyone!
Andrew Hume (Blorf)
MinMax Games Ltd.
Clanfolk Progress Update! (The Negotiation System)
I have been unusually quiet for the last few weeks (post Winter Holidays,) and I wanted to let everyone know what I have been up to and that I did not fall into a snowbank somewhere :)
My brain has been totally occupied with a new system that has caused a domino effect with other cool potential additions, which I shall explain below.
Note: Usually I update the Testing Branch at least a couple times a week, and I know the testing branch crew (anyone can join) have been particularly wondering what's going on. I have not been able to update the testing branch because the system that I am currently working on is very much in progress, evolving and quite large.
So What Happened
When I got back to work after the holidays, the first thing I did was continue the Outcast Mother's story with "The Father Returns" That eureka moment mentioned in the Update 13 notes where I was able to create group based tasks via the Story Element system allowed me to assign some Guards to the Outcast Father, and that is where things got...interesting, and where the last 3 weeks vanished for me in the blink of an eye.
So the Outcast Father comes back demanding the Mother and Child return. This lead me to do a lot of thinking and MANY prototypes on what conflict could mean in Clanfolk. The Outcast Father likely would not just leave, so there had to be the danger of a fight. So how to to handle this?
I didn't want to dive straight into traditional combat, so I needed something completely different and hopefully more personal. I also needed a system that would work for Tax Collectors, Emissaries from the King, and Conflict from within the Clan. One system to rule them all. If the end result was a fight, how did we get there? The important part is why did the fight break out.
So after many iterations, I am ready to at least explain the system and show the current interface. It is vitally important to explain that this is a glimpse of current development and the end result may change as I work on it and get opinions. But you all do deserve to at least see what is going on behind the scenes and what it all currently means. So again, this is "in-progress" design work and over the last few weeks have undergone a lot of iteration and this is likely not final, but I am very excited about showing it none the less.
The Negotiation System
So, the Negotiation System is now fully integrated into the Story Element system, and some Story Element choices will now trigger Negotiations.
A Negotiation is a real time conversation between your Clan Leader (more on this later) and a Messenger of some sort (in this case a very angry Father.)
The goal in the Negotiation is to move the Patience, Authority, and Courage values to the required thresholds to allow the desired choice to be picked. It is like a battle of wits.
The Negotiation progresses between the two Clanfolk, each speaking and responding based on their Personality Traits (more on this later.) The Player guides the flow of the conversation, using the Conversation Topics slider seen in the picture above.
This is a balancing act because the further the player deviates from the Clanfolk's natural personality, the more forced the conversation becomes and the quicker the Patience decreases. Patience reaching 0 is a failure case for the conversation, and in this case would mean a fight breaks out.
The player wants a particular outcome, BUT, the Clan Leader is their own person and will tend to have either a more Aggressive or Persuasive personality type. This means that when an Aggressive person picks an Aggressive conversation topic, that topic would have more impact overall. They are just better at being intimidating.
Having a very aggressive leader negotiate with the Angry Father is probably very effective (and believable), but not so much with a Tax Collector who has the might of the King behind them. The player may shift the conversation topics slider to the Persuasive side, but the more they shift the conversation, the less natural it will be and the quicker patience decreases.
The Conversation will progress live in the game and the other non player participant will make their own choices as well. So while the Patience ticks down, the conversation will start to unfold and between the Clan Leader's personality and the Other. The Player does their best to weight the topics to get the result they want, but it is not guaranteed. So the choice of Clan Leader directly impacts what choices likely become available as the Negotiation progresses.
If we look at the image above, for "Demand Andrew leaves the area" to be valid, Andrew's Courage needs to be quite low, and Andrew's sense of Authority also must be diminished. On the other hand, this demand can be made at any Patience level. So the player wants to get the White lines into the dark yellow portions of the meter by guiding the Conversation... Or using other means.
Other Means
A very powerful side effect of the Negotiation taking place over time is that environmental factors can also modify how the Authority and Courage values change over time. Triggering the Negotiation in a favorable environment can add environmental Afflictions to either side of the Negotiation. A couple scenarios below will demonstrate.
In the Case where it is desirable to have the Courage bar very low, the Player could position some of their Clanfolk near the Negotiation as backup. In the picture above, Poor William is all alone, facing Andrew and three guards, but in the case where William had a dozen Clanfolk supporting him, Andrew's Courage would naturally decrease over time as an "Outnumbered" Affliction could be triggered.
In the Case of trying to impress a visitor, Meeting them in a grandly appointed Clan Hall, could give just the authority boost needed. On the other hand, meeting the Tax Collector next to the dump may be a smart idea if trying to explain how poorly the Clan has been doing.
Currently these examples are all theoretical, but I really love the idea of these Negotiations taking place over time like a little mental battle and having unit placement and environment matter.
Clan Leader
The Idea of a Clan Leader has been on my mind for a while, but now with the Negotiation System, their role has become very important. The choice of leader and their personality would really guide the future of the Clan.
The system for choosing the Clan leader as well as the outcomes from within the Clan if multiple people thought themselves in line for the role will also lead to a whole new set of Negotiations and interpersonal relationships/alliances.
The Clan Leader system will likely develop over time as the Negotiation System itself is the priority right now. For Update 14, I want to focus mainly on expanding the Story Generator using the new Negotiation System which puts us in a great position for delivering the Year 2+ content in an interesting way. I suspect Update 15 will be about fleshing out the Clan Leader system.
Elephant in the Room
So, this whole Outcast Father returns with guards has lead to another obvious question. Combat? Well not exactly. I want to keep to the spirit of Clanfolk which is a peaceful homstead in 1300's Scotland and not the front line of a warzone. But I also realize that in some cases arguments will get physical, and I think there is a good solution to this.
In 1300's Scotland, there were still laws and people having disputes did not randomly murder each other, for the most part. So in the case where words fail them, the Clanfolk will be able to get physical, but not stabby. This system will be an extension of the Negotiation system and is directly connected to Courage/Intimidation.
The goal is not to kill an opponent, it is to get them to flee or surrender. Based on the outcome of a Negotiation, the level of the Courage bar will be given to all the "enemies" on the map. (but modified by their personal attributes. This means new quirks like being fearless or a coward come into play)
So a fight can break out, but this Courage bar is "mostly" what is taking the brunt of the damage vs health (though health will go down, and more importantly injuries will happen.) Again, unit placement is important here. Someone who is surrounded will have a negative Courage affliction, diminishing their courage per second. Call the deerhounds, enemy afraid of dogs, boom, they may flee.
If someone gets pushed, or a particularly nasty insult is thrown from the nearby mob, or is hit with a Haggis, more Courage loss.
So the end result is supposed to be more of a brawl, with shoving, insults, and positioning. The goal is to make it interesting to watch, but also remaining mostly hands off. I don't want this to be an RTS or a bloodbath. Just an argument that got out of control.
There are a few large positives from this. Injuries are a great way to modify gameplay and give some long term consequences. All kinds of new quirks become valuable in relation to personality. And we don't kill off our story actors, so the Player can get to know them when they return looking for trouble in the future.
I am going to get back to work on this now. As you can see there are a LOT of moving and interconnected parts, but the whole interconnectedness is what I think will make it awesome :)
Thanks again everyone!
Andrew Hume (Blorf)
MinMax Games Ltd.
Discount (25% off) and upcoming price change
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