Siege battle campaign integration update - May 15th 2023
Hello everyone!
There are a lot of big changes in this exciting new update! Among the visible updates are a lot of under the hood mechanical changes that open up the game to exciting new possibilites and more dynamic battle landscapes.
Hotfix incoming for campaign building crashes and some other small things. Thank you for your patience!
Siege battles This updates integrates a first iteration of siege battles into the campaign gameplay loop. You can build two tiers of fortifications: A wooden tower and a stone tower. These will spawn fortifications in battle when attacked.
You can storm the fortifications using storm ladders and a storm ram and try to gain entry inside. The AI is adjusted specifically for the siege battles and will try to move towards interest points when charging rather than a specific formation. You will need to build an engineers quarter or siege workshop before you can siege a fortified settlement.
Combined battle maps All battle maps are now directly based on the campaign map and contain multiple settlements per map. So instead of a seperate map for each settlement you fight in large scale environments, there is always something on the horizon if not sea.
Wood resource During the campaign you will use a different resource for siege engines. You can produce wood by building forestry huts and lumberyards.
Your ruler is also a unit You ruler is now also a unit in a garrison. You can now keep him safe while fighting with a lower level officer in battles. You can also send him to the front lines for 'high risk, high reward' gameplay.
The future of the game There is a lot of cool stuff in development right now including a historically accurate armor set which is well underway and more historical architecture. Stone castles are coming to the siege battles and expect a lot of fixes and optimizations to the general gameplay loop.
Thank you for playing!
If you encounter issues, bugs or don't like new features. Let me know in the steam discussions or on discord!
https://discord.gg/Sd3XF8nq2h
Full changelog:
Add siege battles to campaigns
Add historically accurate wooden tower
Add wood resource to campaign
Add new dunes biome
Add under construction stats prop to buildings: Propagate replaced buildings stats when under construction
Add special castle garrison compositions for campaign ai >> Only infantry and archers
AI only builds advanced siege engines when they have a siege workshop built
Add under construction campaign map icons for fortifications
Tweak AI campaign building behavior
Player can only attack fortified settlements if they have an engineers quarter
Update some building icons
Decrease unit pathfinding collision radius
Fix stormram teleporting all over the place
Reenable skirmish siege battles
Add forestry hut to west frisia for standard wood production
Add missing farm to frisia for food income at beginning of campaign
Remove infantry unit from Gelre capital
Lower gallows income penalty to -150
You also earn wood and food when razing and plundering a settlement
Fix player accidentally executing friendly units
If a unit is stuck/floating for too long, knock it down to reset it's pathfinding
add siege AI that targets interest points around the fortifications
Add platform to defense catapults
Add campaign advisor that gives gameplay tips, can be turned off in settings
Food production halts in summer due to harvest seasons
decrease random reaction time to improve formation thightness
Add new check to see if targeted enemy is in view
Change sector policy names to middle dutch
Fix floating fire arrow braiziers
If formation is changing shape when charging give formation enough time to reform before charging
Fix settlements winding up in rebellion loop on low public order by resetting public order to around 50 when rebellion has ended
Fix AI Reinforcement related crash
Add palisade gate
Add new palisade model with walkway
Make campaign ai more aggressive
Fix units not attacking new reinforced units
Optimize unit targeting
Engineers Quarters is now the basic building for constructing wooden contraptions, upgrades to siege workshop
Forestry hut now only generates wood, Lumber yard generates 2 wood
Change navmesh generation to dynamic
Optimize AI navigation performance
Tweak fog values
Fix blurry chainmail on player
Change start siege sound
Improve visibility of cursor and some UX elements in winter
Add ladder unit that tries to place a ladder at the designated location
Fix units trying to execute grounded friendlies
Increase time reinforcements take to arrive in battle
Spawn attacker archer defenses dynamically from castle
Make siege defense AI more reactive
Notify siege ram of battle ended
Unit AI Tweaks
Add number to formation icons for better controls clarity
Spawn castles dynamically in battle when settlement has one built
Improve siege defense AI
Lower unit step height
Tweak battle temperature values
Basic training fixes
Tweak unit prices
Refactor garrison public order bonus, you get +1 per turn when having at least 3 units in garrison and another +1 when having a full garrison
Lower public order hit to -2 from -3 when settlement has bordering enemy settlements
Fix full garrison public order bonus being lower than displayed value
Lower public order at high populations
Lower settlement base taxes
Limit max food stockpile to 45
Decline settlement population when public order is really low
Fix units sometimes not engaging in combat
Increase low public order rebellion chance
Fix army icons being stretched in battle dialog when no reinforcements are available
If enemy ruler dies in battle his army will flee and his faction will be lost
If main lord is not in battle play as generic officer
Main lord is also a unit
Lower general disease chance
Lower general rebellion chance
add region based map for oversticht
add region based map for zuid holland
Add region based map for muiden utrecht
add region based map for kennemerland
add region based map for frisia
add region based map for veluwe area
Add region based map for west friesland
Refactor gamemode, spawn and map travel logic
Add 13th century english heraldry
add one headed eagle heraldry
add Castille heraldry
add brabant lion heraldry
Remove siege ramp
Add storm ladders
Implement ladder placement system
Reinforcements and Tactics Update - April 21st 2023
Hello all,
This update adds the ability to select renforcements to come to your aid from neighbouring settlements. You can now also choose what to do with surviving enemy officers after a battle. You can hire, release or execute them.
This update also implement deployment tactics for AI armies. The enemy will deploy his army in a way to makes sense to his army composition. This system will be refined over the coming period. The enemy army is now hidden until you have finished deploying.
The siege battle test has been disabled in preparation for the full scale rollout. More on this soon!
Full Changelog
Add pre battle deployment strategies to NPC armies
Hide enemy army until player finishes deploying
Add prebattle screen to select reinforcements for upcoming battle
Surviving enemy officers can be hired, executed or released after winning a battle
Fix enemy lord run speed
Remove test siege battles in preparation for campaign implementation
Fix mouse focus after selecting what to do with conquered settlement
Add external game credits to main menu
Add screen blood for executions
Add better crawl animation for injured units
Show unit type and officer name in battle status report
Add afterbattle officer status screen to quickbattles
Make smoke softer and more realistic
Add tooltip to english unit names option to restart game
Show holding fire icon on archer formations that have drawn their sidearm
Rename campaign to conquest
Fix AI Excessively retreating broken formations
Add slightly different movement speeds to units
Add different reaction times to units for movement orders
Slightly lower chance of sunny weather
Add historical naming to faction overview categories
Add Middelzee to campaign landscape
Tweak Campaign landscape
Increase food cost of all cavalry units
Patch Notes 30th March 2023
Changelog
Finetune pushing friendly units
Fix finish move victim animation ending too soon
Add Wieringen Island
Fix dummies in training area being killable
Change keep to dutch stone tower in combat tutorial
Add Brederode to packaging config
Rename Coevorden to geographically more correct Swolle
Rename Groningen to geographically more correct Dockum (middle Dutch spelling)
Add some missing water bodies to campaign map
Fix Horichede unit attack stats: unit without shield has 2 attack, unit with shield has 1 attack
Historical naming fixes
Fix brabant surcoat color / change char model
Fix floating/in ground execution animations
Fix kennemers middle dutch naming
Fix frisian lords naming
Rename Fulnaho to Vollenho
Replace Her with Here
Various Naming fixes
Patch Notes March 29th 2023
A more detailed blog post outlining some of the biggest changes is coming soon! This is not yet 'the big siege update' you probably have been waiting for, but it's coming soon!
Thank you for your support so far!
Battle Changes
Implement fall from horse mechanic. Units can get dehorsed by hard impacts while having speed and wearing chainmail or getting hit by a lance while blocking.
Implement finish mechanic for knocked down and injured enemies
Slightly push friendly infantry away with player unit while on foot
Add Iframes to player dodge
Add Iframes to player attacks
Reset on foot camera distance to correct length
Use static death pose on executed enemies instead of ragdoll
Fix player earning XP for friendly kills
Remove negotiation during siege battles
Fix attacking archers always staying low during siege when not in cover
Only fire arrows can damage siege equipment
Add proper stormram strike animation
Optimize melee trace methods
Set the right footstep sounds for each type of armor
Add specific executions for each weapon, no more stabbing with axes
Only do dismemberment with strong impacts
General Unit AI improvements
Add snow to tree trunks in winter
Optimized bush mesh lods
Fix knocked down or injured characters playing animation on arrow kill
Cavalry bumps now use the right velocity to calculate wether the unit needs to fall on the ground or just get pushed back
Campaign Changes
Add upgrade button to building detail screen
Adjust razed settlement text
Adjust settlement disease text
Slightly increase chance of AI player razing settlement instead of occupying it
Razed settlements now stay razed for an entire year (4 turns)
Fix AI not using advanced selection of sector policies
Fix AI being too passive during campaigns
Tune AI building construction
Rebalance unit cost
Update settlement names to middle dutch variant
Change campaign map to a more accurate representation of the 13th century low countries
Fix game crash when staying in the mainmenu too long
Change skirmish button graphics
Showcase new dutch tower castle in menu
Add historically accurate stone tower
Fixed vsync menu option not showing correct value
Add Duchy of Brabant as playable faction in quick battles
Save game crash hotfix March 12 2023
Unfortunately the last patch broke savegames again. I need to find a better solution for this, but in the meantime I made a hotfix that clears your savedata to prevent the game from crashing.
Changelog
Increase save file version, this clears your save data on launch of the game.
Patch Notes March 11th, 2023
Hello everyone!
This update revamps unit movement allowing infantry a far wider moveset in battle. This makes battles feel more dynamic. The health and armor of units is also updated to better reflect differences between armored and non armored units. These changes make infantry battles drastically more fun to participate in and make the battlefield feel more realistic and alive. I also tweaked some attack distances to make formations wrap around and properly engage eachother.
Units now also utilize their polearms better against cavalry. A dedicated spear bracing mechanic has been implemented. If a formation is left idle with enemy cavalry near they will assume a spear brace pose. When fighting or not in a spear brace pose spear units are just as effective against cavalry as normal infantry. This nerfs spearmen while at the same time making them more deadly when used correctly.
There is also a lot of stuff being worked on behind the scenes and I can't wait to tell you more about it! I am spending a lot of time working on getting the siege battles ready for a campaign rollout.
Thank you!
Changelog
Implement proper spear bracing for two handed spear units. Units now brace spears when cavalry is near and the formation is left idle.
Tweak infantry formation behavior in battle
Implement advanced infantry movement during combat
simplify health/armor model: Universal health for all units. Armor value based on armor type: Light, medium, heavy. Being Mounted gives a small aditional bonus to health.
Fix elite units not being recruitable while having a stone tower
Tweak landscape flowers, increase variety
Improve sharpening of landscape textures
Optimize animation class methods
Lower amount of NPC peasant recruitment during early game
Fix dropped arrows floating
Increase crossbow volley interval with 2 seconds, Crossbow units now shoot slower than archers
Optimized some wood and weapon textures
Tweak heraldic bridle color
Implement basic weapon selection for custom lord
Add support for different lord weapons
Tweak materials for mace, sword, lance and axe
Fix non player owned forestry huts and siege workshops unlocking things for player
Change Holland heraldry colors
Change polearm sergeants weapon to a lance
Add heraldic weapons to chivalric units
Add heraldic generic bastard sword
add heraldic scabbard
Add heraldic Axe
Add heraldic mace
Add heraldic lance
Add heraldry support to weapons
Add assorted helmets to knights
Patch Notes March 4th, 2023
Changelog
Add rain drop effects to water when it's raining
Tweak autumn dead grass color
Make unit AI more aggressive
Raise unit melee distance slightly
Lower Run speed of infantry units by ~30%
Add idle animations to units in fighting formations when not fighting
Slightly increase trebuchet fire fog intensity
Fix frisian knights having a beard as surcoat
Increase unit target range during sieges
update buildings when demolishing building, add sound
Fix game battle data persisting after dying in campaign
Add performance option for smoke effects to main menu
Slightly lower image sharpening
Patch Notes 28 Februari 2023
Changelog
Allow player to rotate formations during deployment by holding the left mouse button
Fix battle balance bar color interpolation
Tweak archer skirmish distance
Show unit positions in deployment phase
Add smoke to fire arrow braizier
Trebuchet fire presistance is now based on arrow lifetime setting
Add fog to trebuchet fires
Add smoke effect to trebuchet fires
Add siege workshop, allows player to build advanced wooden contraptions like trebuchets
Add forestry hut, allows for archer stakes and needed to build siege workshop
Remove economic decrees
Add upgradeable stockpile building to store surplus food
Fix first person archery camera shake
Fix giant wood splinters flying off siege engine when hit by rocks
Slightly tweak melee distance
Fix formation units staying in idle pose when attacked
Building & Campaign update 27 February 2023
Hello everyone,
This update adds the construction of buildings to settlement management, visual improvements to the campaign map and UX improvements.
Full Changelog
Create new settlement flag widget displaying important stats for player settlements
Left click now opens unit details, right click moves the unit
Add modifier to public order stat
Change some loading screen tips
Remove staff tab
Lower archer and crossbow melee attack damage
Fix custom faction only selectable once you have created one
Fix custom faction default color
Fix possessed player spawn position
Slightly increase distance player is allowed from formations
Building a port creates supply lines across water
Remove vague sector policies
Simplify sector income calculation
Make public order modifiers easy to understand and point based
Make food production easy to understand and directly related to the construction of farms
Settlements show important constructed buildings on map
Add more data to settlement UI
Make battle balance bar based on battle status instead of heraldry, show lose margin
Add coat of arms to faction decree target select
Add selectable color modes in gameplay settings: Colorful (Standard), cinematic and black and white
Refactor settlement upgrade logic to building based approach
Improve some sounds
Update tutorial scene with new assets
Fix a couple of locomotion animations playing too slowly
Fix player locomotion jitter when walking back
Merchants use new roads on campaign map
Add roads to campaign map
add new trees to campaign map
Fix defending catapult not fleeing when walls are breached
Add icons to supply lines indicating invasion routes
Prevent archers from moving during shooting
Fix two handed stance sword clipping player head
Improve crossbow locomotion animations
Improve stability of on foot animations for player
Lower player run speed on foot
Add small camera shake to player running
Tweak player input and camera
Change cursor when hovering over settlements
Add boundaries to limit player camera movement during campaign
Slightly increase unit attack distance
Player can now click all settlements
Settlements show supply lines when hovering over them
Change 'Player controlled' icon to green dot
Add new settlement icons for campaign map
Add new main theme music
Streamline all surcoat styles to lord
Implement multiple save slots for custom factions
Prevent possessed player from dismembering enemies with non fitting attacks
Add a small chance of injury that sends the unit crawling out of battle
Add more colors to custom faction screen
Fix gamemode checking game balance before battle start causing victories while in prebattle
Heraldry and visual update 12 February 2023
Hello everyone,
This update contains visual enhancements further pushing the game towards a brighter and more detailed look. The game is sharper, has less fog and more colors. I also adjusted the lighting to be a bit brighter during bad weather. It also contains new house models and a swamp siege test battle that can randomly occur when playing a siege quick battle.
The biggest change is the heraldry system. You can now manually choose 3 colors and build up your heraldry using 3 layers. This allows for more creativity and allows a more historical representation.
Full changelog:
Rework heraldry system: support for 3 colored layers
allow player to select specific heraldry colors
Reduce game fog / Tweak lighting
Increase default game TAA sharpening
Add new village models
Add new tree models
Add swamp siege test level
Fix siege projectiles not killing units
Add stones and shrubs to dirt
Add pebbles to sand
Fix AI formations making constant move noises during sieges
Defending siege player can sally out, rush out of gate and start battle
Fix defensive catapult flee distance, should now flee when enemy breaches the walls
Remove middle mouse button zoom
Remove slowmotion effects except a subtle effect during executions
Prevent AI from selecting non playable lords in quick battle
Further optimize save files
Add new scene for main menu
Add new Scene and UI for customization
Fix archer stakes not deploying for defending players outside of siege battles
Fix loading screen from afterbattle screen to campaign map
Implement more historically accurate maces
Add new heraldry for Brederode
Add new heraldry for Amstel
Rework Utrecht heraldry to be more historically accurate
Set Archer draw sidearm animation to only affect upperbody
Fix one handed no shield animations
set correct heraldry color for simpler horse saddles
Fix officers unit classes to be compatible with their portrait
Only show order controls when you can use them during siege
Fix Saddle rigging
fix no saddle horse material show AO lines from saddle
Rotate west friesland heraldry the right way
Fix enemy lord not dying
Fix siege night battles ending battle
If you have questions, suggestions and bugs to report. Feel free to open a topic in the discussions or join the discord at: https://discord.gg/Ucm4fCDwz3
