Latest Update 25/08/2017 - Major battle optimisation. Improve loading times.
Campaign map
- Sharpened unit images slightly
Armoury
- The spelling of Gambeson has been corrected.
- Heavy round shield text fixed.
- Armor requirements adjusted.
- Plated gambeson texture fixed.
Battle scene
- Units are more likely to find targets with fewer units around them to help prevent so many blobs.
- Significant unit scripting optimisation.
- Minimap no longer shows terrain, just units.
- Optimized unit colliders.
- Units will no longer be given attack orders when the player is attacking walls with siege equipment unless siege equipment has a ranged attack.
* Edit: Just fixed an issue with cavalry caused by this patch.
Main Menu
- Default battle size increased to 300.
- Game loading time reduced.
- All substance materials pre-baked, reducing load times. This will increase install size.
* Edited: - Added a loading panel for when the armory is being loaded into the scene. This was moved to when the player clicks the 'New game' button to improve the games initial loading time.
I hear you like optimisation... So I put some optimisation into your optimisation! Battles have had a significant frame rate boost and that means you should be able to play with larger battles! On my beast of a rig, I went from a comfortable 250 - 300 unit battles to around 500 units with an acceptable frame rate!
I have also pre-baked most substance materials, in turn, reducing load times. Booting up the game should be much faster than after the last patch (caused by all of the new materials being loaded for the armory).
Once again, please remember to review Veil Of Crows on steam!
All the best!
- Kerry
Latest Update 23/08/2017 Tier 5 units and TONNES of new equipment!
Campaign map
- AI scouts and patrols are larger but fewer - less clutter in the campaign map.
- Heavy Lancers.
- Halberdier.
- Foot Knight.
- Bardiche.
- Lucerne Hammermen.
- Ablest.
- Recurve Bowmen.
- Peasant caravans faction set properly on level load.
- Peasants will desert to bandits and military to deserters from towns.
- Unit icons replaced - each unit has own icon.
- Controls are now displayed in the controls menu.
- Unit strength and weakness text updated.
Armoury
- Hero units can now use each different body/armour type.
- Ocular kettle helm added.
- Halberd.
- Bardiche.
- Lucerne Hammer.
- Lance.
- More varieties of each armour type.
- Crusader Helm.
- Surcoat.
- Peasant outfit.
- Scale mail.
- Leather armour.
- Peasant clothing.
- Surcoats.
- Chain shirt.
- Padded Gambeson.
- Leather surcoat.
- Studded surcoat.
- Hardened round shield.
- Crusader helm.
- More leggings varieties.
- Boots requirements adjusted.
- Mace.
- Warhammer.
- Hardened leather gambeson.
- Studded leather gambeson.
- Studded vest.
- Plated gambeson.
- leather coat.
- Heavy weaved gambeson.
- Heavy leather leggings.
- Studded leggings.
- Heavy scale armour.
- Scale surcoat.
Battle scene
- Heavy cavalry attack and defence adjusted.
- Fixed an exploit/bug where you could activate siege equipment without having anyone attached to it.
- Battle map nav adjusted.
- Heavy cavalry helmet changed to Sallet.
- Heavy cavalry weapon changed to Claymore.
- Metallic material properties adjusted.
- Helper text moved above unit cards.
- Hero units to use any body type mounted now built dynamically.
- Infantry now wears sugarloaf helm.
- Hammermen now equipped with plated pot helm.
- Mounted units LOD fixed when dismounting.
- Spearman leggings changed.
- Fowler, Miner, Serf and hatchet men all have individual colouring.
A massive drop of new units and equipment in this patch. I have been put back a bit with the move to a new location, but I should be back on track from now. The internet is... questionable, but it works!
Please remember to review Veil of Crows on steam! Your review helps shape the game into something better!
- It is now much easier to give attack orders by simply right clicking on enemy units with a wider click area.
Main Menu
- Faction creation background changed to the blacksmith area to prevent crashes on some systems.
Hello friends!
This is most likely the shortest update list, and that is for a couple of reasons...
A) After a bogus engine update I needed to roll back a couple of days losing a few changes, as they didnt come up until a build was made. All changes will appear in the next patch.
B) I am working on a few things under the hood that will not make any impact until the next big update.
I decided to post this patch in its current state mainly because a few of you were getting crashes when trying to load the faction creation screen, this is why it has been changed to the blacksmith background. This change may also help prevent crashes when exiting the game.
The next couple of weeks may be a bit slow because I am moving house (this includes my office), but I am working hard on the next tier of units. This includes all of the new weapons and armor pieces that come with them.
I also hope to have every unit model available to hero units as opposed to just the armour texture.
We are also working on a 'weapon wheel' system where you can easily target specific enemy unit types... you may currently do this by pressing F4 and accessing the attack menu. We are working on streamlining this process.
Please remember to review VOC on steam as your user feedback is important to me, and helps me shape the direction of the game.
All the best!
- Kerry
Latest Update 04/08/2017 - Cavalry fix - Lost army bug fix
Campaign map
- Failing a bribe attempt now correctly disables bribe option for that army.
- Fixed a bug with victory in certain circumstances would set winning armies to dead - causing them to disappear once the campaign map has loaded.
- Train 5x and 10x units by holding LShift or LCtrl when clicking the train units button. Helper text will display this option.
- New message displaying when an army has been defeated shows up after battle load.
- Fog of war is turned off by default now - Current FOW is being fazed out. You can turn off the FOW in the game options.
Battle scene
- Dismounting units now properly convert to a separate unit from the horse.
- Heavy Cav helmet fixed.
- River scene water height fixed. Units should no longer run completely under water.
Happy Friday!
The list is small, but the content rich! It took me two full days to fix cavalry, but now cavalry will not act strangely when units have dismounted. I have tested this new system thoughroughly, but as always if you notice anything strange please let me know if the forums.
Another big fix is for armies disappearing after a battle. This has eluded me for a long time as I could not replicate, but by chance, it finally happened to me so I was able to repeat the battle and fix the issue.
Battle Controls
As I have mentioned previously, we are revising the battle controls over the next couple of weeks. If you have any input I would love to hear it from you in the dedicated discussion thread on the steam forums. Tell me what you like and don't like about it. The more input we get, the better we can re-evaluate the controls.
Please remeber to review Veil of Crows on steam, your input helps me shape VOC into the game you will love.
Cheers everyone and happy weekend!
- Kerry
Latest Update 1/08/2017: A new Keep to smash!
Campaign map
- Box select a single army added.
- Season cycle days count decreased to 40 days.
- Snow added.
- Rain replaced by snow in cold months, and rain replaces snow on warm months.
- More preventative measures to stop interaction with disabled armies.
- Fix for production stopping bug. YES FINALLY!
- Units in the build queue when a siege starts will now be complete to give the defender a better chance.
- AI more likely to have engineers and siege equipment when defending a siege.
- Ability to end war with bandits faction has been fixed.
- Tribute bandits has been fixed.
- Offering an alliance to bandits now sets the button text to "Offer"
Armoury
- Sugarloaf helmet model and texture improved.
- Sallet Added.
Battle scene
- Full helm fixed on heavy cavalry.
- Snow particle adjusted to prevent snow disappearing when the camera moves away.
- Snow optimized.
- Snow range, movement and accuracy deductions have been implemented.
- Esc key to open the menu during battle.
- Stonesfall walls fixed.
- Keep now represented on the battlefield.
- Minimap height increased - displays most of the battle area.
- Units attacking a target will force their target into a melee if that target is moving to another position or target. This will help curb units breaking away past the front line. More tweaks to come.
- Peasant units are now selected with the bludgeon unit card.
Main Menu
- Changing faction during custom battle now correctly changes the army name.
Hey all!
The next keep level to be represented during castle sieges has arrived! These take me some time to put together because the destruction, so I will probably look into the next two in a couple of weeks.
I am also 90% sure I have solved our issue with production stopping randomly. After running the campaign map on 10x speed for a couple of hours I found an error preventing the production cycle from continuing. This should be fixed now and we can rejoice!
UPDATE: Needed to fix the heavy cav helmet, so I have added to this update. You can now box select a single army on the campaign map for ease of selection. Because of the way it is designed it currently only works with single selected unit. This could change.
- Snow replaces rain if the terrain is snow when raining.
- Battle hill level snow fixed
Other
- Minor fixes and tweaks
Yes! Seasons!
Purely cosmetic for now, but seasons are coming into play in Veil of Crows.
Season rotate on a 56-day cycle, but this is subject to change. Rain will also turn to snow on a snowy terrain during battle.
Soon I will be adding seasonal effects, such as impacting crop growth, wood usage, and movement speed.
Winter is coming!
- Kerry
Latest Update 21/07/2017 - Unit Cards and post processing upgrade.
Campaign map
- Fix for hero vassal panel not showing on some resolutions.
Armoury
- Leather pot helm.
- Pot helm.
- Plated pot helm.
- Steel plated pot helm.
- Mist added to the scene.
Battle scene
- Unit cards Added.
- Circular minimap.
- Hero portraits art adjusted/ resized.
- Clicking hero portrait now makes clicking sound.
- Battering Ram now moves away from gate after succesful breach.
- Spearmen now equipped with leather kettle helm.
- Guisarme now equipped with Kettle helm.
- Macemen now equipped with a leather helm.
- Hammer men now equipped with Footman helm.
- Infantry now equipped with plated pot helm.
- Crossbow and light crossbow now equipped with pot helm.
- New option to persue or end battle after enemy army retreats.
- Post processing pipeline improved.
- Grass shadows now handled through the ambient occlusion effect.
- Fog colour now suited to each time of day.
- The Selection menu will also select hero units that match selection criteria.
- Ladder navigation fixed on some castles walls.
Main Menu
- Grass shadows changed to ambient occlusion.
- Mouse screen scroll default set 'off'.
- Mist added to the scene.
- Mouse screen scroll option moved to controls.
- Changing faction in when creating a custom battle now correctly changes the army faction header.
Happy Friday!
Unit cards! You guys asked for it, we deliver! I must point out, unit cards represent each weapon class as opposed to individual unit classes. This is to reduce the amount on the screen and making it easier to manage your forces. We are still working out the best way to implement the selective attack menu, so that has not changed just yet. Once it is fully operational I plan on making an advanced battle tutorial so you can learn more about the new controls and abilities in detail.
The post processing effects pipeline has also had an upgrade. This not only comes with a slight increase in performance, ambient occlusion has been added and is also replacing grass shadows. Grass shadows have been the cause of crashes for some people so they have been removed.
On top of this, some new equipment has been added, and some unit equipment has been swapped around and I am preparing tier 5 units in the process. Look forward to them soon!
EDIT: Just wanted to make a quick fix, but have added a couple of things with a quick patch.
- Campaign map fog now matches ambient light.
- Snow will fall on snowy levels if it is 'Raining.'
Thank you all!
- Kerry
Latest Update 17 / 07 / 2017 - Major upgrade to all battle areas!
Campaign map
- AI is now more likely to have engineers when defending.
Armoury
- Skullcap normal maps fixed.
- Helm replaced with a much nicer asset.
Battle scene
- All battle maps replaced.
- Archer friendly fire range adjusted.
- Ranged AI defending siege set to defensive stance.
Main menu
- Grass shadows default set to 'off' as it seems to be the cause of crashes for some users. You can turn it on in the performance options.
Hi all!
Using a new procedural pipeline, all battle areas have been upgraded. Terrain heightmap data is baked using real world landscapes. Texture, trees, and foliage are placed depending on height and slope of the terrain. Not only does it improve battle areas visually, each area feels a lot more unique from a tactical perspective.
All battle areas have been replaced, but because of how quickly I can put together new terrain areas, you can expect more variations for battle, village, and bandit camps in the future.
All the best, and enjoy!
- Kerry
Latest Update - 7/7/2017 Auto resolve siege - New starting options
Campaign map
- Fix for faction King not being removed properly from the faction when killed.
- AI is now more likely to send engineers to a siege.
- Mouse-over battle info scale increased.
- Towns no longer show being under siege when they are not currently under siege.
- Offering an alliance now properly shows the other faction name.
- Heroes in taverns level are increased with the Armory level. Inn level allows more hero units available at once.
- Village selected upgrade icons now show correct upgrade.
- Hire mercenaries now checks army gold as well as faction gold.
- Hire mercenaries gold cost is correctly paid.
- Confirm begin siege battle panel.
- Option to auto-resolve siege battles now available.
- Option to auto-resolve break siege battles.
- Confirm break siege battle option added.
Battle scene
- Fixed errors showing unit blood.
- Can no longer open menu during battle load to prevent errors.
Main menu
- Improved faction color randomization to prevent similar hue for main and coat of arms.
- Baron of Greywatch added: Start with a town, some villages, and a small army.
- Mercs for hire added: Start with an army, but not much gold. Mixed relations with other factions.
- Desperate Miner: Start with a steel mine, low money, and some peasant units.
Happy Friday all!
Managed to squeeze in a bunch of other fixes and features this week while fixing a few issues with the new campaign map UI.
I hope you all have a great weekend, and I look forward to pushing forward with some more major changes coming soon. I hope to have an artist working on Unit cards soon, so this highly requested feature is on its way!
I will be posting an article of all of the changes so far since early access launch, followed by an in-depth look at what to look forward to in the future. You are going to love some of the features planned.
- All text auto re-sized in preparation for localization.
- Tweaks to armies, pooling and saving targets to reduce some strange behavior.
- Army unit state resets to prevent armies being created as a ship.
- If a selected army enters a town the disabled army no longer remains selected.
Armoury
- Kettle Helm improved.
- Kettle Helm added.
- Iron kettle helm added.
- Scale gambeson changed to heavy gambeson. Chainmail added.
- Chainmail Leggings added.
- Claymore added.
- All text auto re-sized in preparation for localization.
- Pig Faced Bascinet added.
Battle scene
- "Exit tio Windows" - Corrected.
- Siege defense panel background changed.
- Infantry armor texture improved.
- Icons are now colored. Still to be updated.
- All text auto re-sized in preparation for localization.
- Crossbowmen no longer have shields.
- Crossbow kettle helm changed.
- Light crossbow now wears a leather skullcap.
- Skullcap texture improved.
Main menu
- Starting gold increased for some backstories.
- All text auto re-sized in preparation for localization.
- New loading scene background - much more to come
Hey all!
Big update to the campaign map UI included in this patch. I have fixed all issues that I have found from the testing branch so this version looks pretty stable. Please let me know if anything is not working, or is not visible on your resolution.
I have also adjusted more code dealing with disabled armies in the hopes of fixing the 'disappearing armies' bug. This has completely eluded me as I have never experienced it, but I have my suspicions as to potential causes.
Hope you enjoyed the summer sale!
UPDATE: Hey all! Seems some users are experiencing issues with panels/icons disappearing at different resolutions. I know how to fix these issues, but I am not experiencing them myself. So if you come across any strange behavior please report it here or in the support forum and I will get a quick patch up asap. Cheers
