Today’s War of Rights alpha update is a relatively small one but we thought it best to get it to you all as soon as possible as it contains a few rather nice improvements, fixes and additions to the game.
Update 192 Patch Notes
Further optimized the game code, this time focusing on instancing the character attachments such as hats and bayonets as well as improved the river renderer efficiency, resulting in upwards of 30% performance improvements at isolated moments in the game such as when looking at the Shenandoah and Potomac rivers of Harpers Ferry.
Recapturing the point in skirmishes while overtime and counter attack is active should no longer result in a faulty end of the game round.
Added 4 new customizable units to the game: 1st and 2nd US Sharpshooters, 1st North Carolina Sharpshooters and 1st Virginia Battalion. These will now also be available at random in the Conquest, Contention and Picket Patrol game modes.
Fixed the artillery round smoke trails sometimes appearing to be wildly zig-zagging.
Fixed the 1st person camera jolts when returning to shoulder arms.
Tweaked the sunset lighting and sky colour for a more realistic look.
Getting headshot before entering the spectating camera should no longer result in VoIP being muted until you spawn back into the game.
Added the regimental flag of the 17th Michigan.
Added the national flag of 1st North Carolina Sharpshooters.
Updated the 14th North Carolina national flag, now matching surviving artifact.
Added the national flag of the 39th New York.
Added a regimental drum for the 39th New York.
Added the regimental flag of the 1st Virginia Battalion.
Fixed the flag snapping out of the hands of the flag bearer in 3rd person as he turns around.
Fixed the bigger Pry Barn doors being locked.
Fixed up all of the victory scenes of the Skirmishes game mode to once again include musicians.
The Mumma graveyard stonewall is now vaultable.
Added the flag of the selected flag bearer to the deployment screen.
Fixed the wrong rank, weapon and secondary weapon sometimes being shown on the deployment screen.
That's all for today's update. See you on the fields of glory!
Today, we’re happy to be bringing you another alpha update to War of Rights! Update 191 primarily features a sizable processor usage optimization pass within the game, resulting in up to a 20% overall FPS gain between update 190 and update 191 if you happen to be bottlenecked by your CPU in your setup.
Other notable features of update 191 include a complete hair and facial hair overhaul for much improved character-details, especially up close. This addition also paves the way for future character specific updates.
Lastly, we’d like to highlight a few new anti troll measures making their way into the game; carried flags and artillery rounds will now drop to the ground if a player disconnects while carrying them, thus making it much harder to disrupt flag bearer or battery play.
The update also includes several quality of life additions, tweaked rainy weather environment visuals as well as numerous bug fixes. For a complete list please read the patch notes below.
Update 191 Patch Notes
Optimized the CPU usage of the game by a considerable amount:
Benchmark results in update 190: 84 FPS
Benchmark results in update 191: 105 FPS
Overhauled all of the hair and facial hairstyles in the game for much improved details up close.
Disconnecting from the server while carrying a flag will now drop the flag at your last position.
Artillery rounds will now be dropped on the ground when artillerists are killed or disconnected while carrying one.
Knockdowns caused by artillery rounds now result in varying lengths of recovery: the closer to the round going off you are, the longer duration the resulting knockdown will last.
Knockdowns now cause suppression at a varying degree.
Small caliber rounds such as pistol rounds and the buckshot pellets in buck and ball loads are no longer lethal at extreme ranges. Instead, they are lethal up to a distance of roughly 40 yards and will then gradually lose the damage caused per additional yard traveled. The ball contained in buck and ball loads remains lethal (however inaccurate) at long range.
Implemented a potential fix for some of the instances where a user’s level would be falsely shown as 1.
Fixed the wobbling soldier animation issue.
Fixed a glitch caused by picking up a dropped flag while reloading your musket resulting in a ghost flag spawn point on the terrain.
Added the remaining missing weapon images to the class selection and deployment UI menus.
Added support for more letters and symbols in the game chat and name tags.
Optimized the main menu of the game.
Added an additional grass type to the game.
Updated the lingering smoke particle effect and increased its visibility and lifetime for added immersion on the battlefields.
Updated the bullet trail, bullet water impacts and artillery round trail particle effects.
Updates to the R. Miller Tenant house model.
Fixed the broken texture on twigs.
Updated the Mumma graveyard stonewall model.
Several minor fixes to Pry grist mill, Piper barn, R. Miller spring house and Pry barn models.
Updated the model of the Sherrick summer kitchen.
Hand fixes for various artillery animations.
Updates to the visuals of the rainy weather environment: the terrain will now darken much more realistically as it gets wet.
Darkened the name tags of the players that are not within your company to easier be able to tell them apart at a glance. This setting can be disabled in the gameplay options menu.
Coloured the name tags of your Steam friends green in order to be able to easily meet up in-game. We suspect this addition is going to be useful for new players in particular who will now have the chance to be green in more ways than one! This setting can be disabled in the gameplay options menu.
That's all for today's update. See you on the fields of glory!
- The Campfire Games Team
Update 190: Polish Pass - Released!
Hello everyone,
We’re excited to bring you the 190th alpha update to War of Rights today! With the update comes the end of the grace period of class and rank unlocks tied to the experience level system debuted recently. We’d also like to remind you all that the time to redeem your loyalty bonus is nearing its end, the feature is being removed on the 31st of May. If you are in doubt as to how to redeem your earned experience points, click HERE to read a detailed guide on how to do so.
The main focus of today’s update is a general cleanup of long-time issues present in the alpha, as well as adding some more quality of life additions for a more polished and fun experience for everyone.
Update 190 Patch Notes
Crowdfunding backer names are now shown within the credits section of the main menu.
Added a “Join Battle” button to the main menu for an easy way to join the most populated server with open slots (locked servers and drill camp mode excluded) without having to enter the server browser.
Updated the in-game player name tags to a new font in order to resolve an issue that would result in flickering name tags.
Updated the saved battle reports to be using the recently added automated overview maps.
General UI cleanup passes in the various menus of the game, resulting in less unsupported characters being present.
Added a preview image of the battle flag tied to the selected regiment/company when selecting the flag bearer of said unit in the regimental/class selection menu.
The text chat now supports more characters.
Fixed the overtime mechanic to match its old, intended, setup. This means that a complete recapture of the point by the team trying to stop overtime is no longer required in order to cancel it. Instead, a short amount of time with the majority of players on the point will be enough to stop it. This in effect, means that overtime as a mechanic will be harder to game as the risk of it getting stopped is considerably greater now.
Artillery has gotten a much needed polish pass, resulting in:
The added ability of being able to move the trail spike while the piece is moved forwards or backwards. This should greatly help in the overall control of the pieces during movement as you can now reliably steer them using the trail spike (or the pole for the limber).
Fixed elevation screw seat camera behavior glitching out when someone is moving the trail spike at the same time.
Fixed the elevation screw becoming off-center of the rest of the geometry of the cannon whenever the trail spike is picked up.
It is now possible to freelook during the sponging/ramming and insertion of rounds.
Carried artillery rounds are now shown in first person as a visual reminder of which round type you are carrying and why you cannot sprint.
Holding the sprint key (shift) when carrying a round while at the quicktime movement speed will now put you into double quick instead of doing nothing.
Artillery pieces now ignore the shot up fence posts in the ground when pushed for easier navigation across destroyed fence lines.
Fixed the long-standing issues with the rifle behavior in third person during the reload animations that would cause it to jitter.
Improved the first person fix bayonet animation.
Added new flags: 20th New York Infantry National and Regimental colors; 52nd New York Infantry National and Regimental colors:
Photographic evidence shown above reveals that during the Maryland Campaign, the national flag of the 20th New York Infantry featured a luminary pattern sewn on the canton and the regimental flag was a painted contract flag. For some years, the regimental flag of the "Turner Rifles" has been represented in War of Rights and other Civil War games and mods as yellow silk. Not only did we find no evidence of this regiment bearing a yellow flag, but all surviving contract flags in the New York State Military Museum are blue.
The 52nd New York Infantry’s new national flag replaces a generic placeholder texture. The updated texture is the same historical pattern as the placeholder, however the new texture features an embroidered unit designation matching the regimental flag. The new regimental flag replaces the last of a number of community-provided textures in our collection of flags. This new texture is fully embroidered to match the still extant artifact shown above. This new regimental flag also differs from the old texture in that it features no battle honors, as originally presented to the “Sigel Rifles” and as carried during the Maryland Campaign (all of the regiment's battle honors, which include Antietam, were applied after the campaign). Lastly, the dimensions of the flag more closely match the artifact.
We owe special thanks to the assistant curator and staff of the New York State Military Museum for their assistance in researching and recreating these flags. For the last four months, the conservators of these treasured artifacts have patiently endured countless phone calls and emails, supplied us images of these and other artifacts, and provided helpful feedback over several drafts of the textures.
Reworked several of the barn roofs to feature wooden shingles, a far more likely, and often documented, roofing material used in the era than metal sheets.
Added randomized splash screens to the game.
Added more Steam achievements.
Possible fix for the weapon locking up when getting knocked down while reloading it.
That's all for today's update. See you on the fields of glory!
- The Campfire Games Team
Update 189: Loyalty Bonus - Released!
Hello everyone,
Today, we’re happy to be releasing Update 189 featuring a loyalty bonus for every player that has logged playtime hours in War of Rights!
Due to several technical restrictions, the loyalty bonus is redeemable for a limited amount of time. It can be redeemed starting today, the 21st of April and until the 31st of May.
The loyalty bonus can be redeemed via the in-game menu (accessed by pressing the escape key after joining a server).
In order for us to be able to grant you experience points for your logged hours, you will need to make sure that your steam profile is set to public.
This is done via “View my profile”:
Then “Edit Profile”:
Then “Privacy Settings”:
And then lastly setting My Profile and Game Details to “Public” (also make sure that the “Always keep my total playtime private even if users can see my game details” option underneath it is unchecked):
After this is done please allow the steam account servers 1-2 minutes to properly update your settings before trying to redeem your loyalty bonus in-game.
Once redeemed you will be shown your new level as well as the amount of experience points awarded to you:
Click “OK” and enjoy your new level in the game, befitting someone of your experience!
While the main focus of today’s update is that of the introduction of the loyalty bonus system, update 189 includes a handful of additional fixes and additions:
Update 189 Patch Notes
Fixed a rare edgecase where the flagpole of Conquest/Contention could get stuck in an uncapturable state.
Player names on the TAB menu no longer get cut off, leaving out half letters.
Tweaked the rain environmental visuals in order to make characters less slimy.
Fixed the rain effects not blending properly between a wet and dry environment.
Fixed the floaty blood particle triggering above water bodies.
Minor updates to the Roulette Farm model.
Updated the Pry Farm stonewall model.
That’s all we have for now. We look forward to be seeing you on the fields of glory!
- The Campfire Games Team
Veterancy Feedback: Loyalty Bonus
Hello everyone,
We received a lot of strong feedback from the community regarding the level system after we rolled out Update 188. Most of the negative feedback we received was about the lack of a reward for hours previously played. While we thought that starting all players on a level playing field with a grace period would be more enjoyable, we now understand that this is not how the community feels, and we hear you. As a result we have decided to issue a loyalty bonus for our veterans.
Loyalty Bonus
To ensure that the loyalty bonus for veteran players is distributed fairly, we have calculated the average in-game playtime against hours played. As a result, we will issue approximately 1600 XP for every hour played. The loyalty bonus will be available to anyone who has purchased and played the game before the release of Update 188. However, players with private Steam profiles will need to temporarily make their profiles public to retrieve their rewards. This is due to technical limitations imposed on us by Steam, and unfortunately, there is no way around this. It is the best compromise we could achieve.
We expect the loyalty bonus to go live within the next week or two.
The above is a breakdown of the unlocks as well as the experience required to level up one time within each level bracket (symbolized by its own unique wreath).
Balance Tweaks & Fixes
We have also released a potential fix for the issue with experience not saving correctly. However, we are still in the process of migrating our back-end away from Steam for a more secure and reliable system.
Finally, we have already implemented several balancing changes to the experience earned in a match:
Increase the base rate of experience gain by 90%.
Reduce the formation bonus from 50% to 25% to make it more consistent with skirmishing and reduce the impact on artillery players.
Lift the staging zone restriction on XP gain for artillerists.
Add the option for server owners to disable progression restrictions for passworded events, but at the cost of disabling experience payouts.
Tweaks to Hookers Push, Piper Farm & Pry Ford staging zones in order to better facilitate the new xp system.
Going forward, we will continue to make adjustments to ensure the experience system is fair and just for both veteran and new players alike.
- The Campfire Games Team
Update 188: Veterancy - Released!
Hello everyone,
Today, we’re pleased to be releasing Update 188: “Veterancy” for War of Rights!
This update brings exciting new features that allow players to track their progress across multiple matches and provides a more rewarding experience by unlocking ranks and roles that match their proficiency level.
Your earned experience, in the form of a growing wreath, will be prominently displayed alongside your name, providing a clear indication of your level of expertise to other players. This feature will make it easier to establish a quick overview of the competency of your fellow comrades when coordinating strategies on the battlefield.
NOTE: New and existing players will have a 30-day grace period starting from today to reach the required experience level to play their preferred soldier classes. After this period, class restrictions will be enforced. However, rank restrictions will be in place starting today. We hope this resolves some long standing disputes with Officer and NCO selections in relation to new players trying to lead without much grasp of the mechanics of the game.
While the various class unlocks are relatively quick and easy to get, the individual ranks of said classes are not. From today, the in-game rank of the NCO and officer standing in front of you will be directly tied to the amount of experience levels gained by said individual. Gone are the days of Sergeant Major or Colonel spam.
To ensure a fair and equal playing field moving forward, we have opted not to reward initial experience based on playtime or time of purchase. This decision means that all players will start at the same experience level and have an equal opportunity to progress through the levels and ranks.
When designing the experience system, we were careful not to have its introduction cause a sudden change in the way players behave. Unlike in other games where experience points are earned by killing and capturing, such actions do not grant experience in War of Rights. Instead, we focus on the time spent being "In Formation" or "Skirmishing" while outside of the spawn area, as this is what matters most in the game. We also added a minor experience gain for being "Out of Line", although this provides a negligible amount. We may expand this in future subject to community feedback. The experience points are rewarded at the end of a match only, so be sure to stick around until the round has finished!
We are absolutely thrilled to introduce this new mechanic to War of Rights. It's a bold step outside the norm in our game design, and we are eager to hear what the community thinks about the Veterancy update. We want to make sure that the system, and any future changes, stay true to the War of Rights experience that we all cherish. In the coming weeks, we'd love to hear from you about how, or if, you'd like to see the system expanded to include other types of rewards.
Update 188 Patch Notes
Added an experience-based level system to the game featuring class & rank unlocks and updated player nametags.
Rewrote the achievement/stat integration.
Added new steam achievements.
Potentially fixed the Skirmish overtime game mechanic not working as intended.
Overhauled the Piper Cave house model.
Made tweaks to the rainy weather in order to make puddles more clearly visible.
Changed the 7-rivet bayonet scabbard into the period correct 2-rivet one.
Removed the blue trouser option from the 3rd Arkansas customization in order to lessen the amount of uniform trolling.
Added a left-sided feather for the Hardee hat.
The LeMat revolver is now only available for Confederate Lieutenant Colonels and Colonels.
Minor Harpers Ferry level polish work.
That's all for now, we look forward to be hearing your feedback about the new experience system!
- The Campfire Games Team
Update 187: DLSS - Released!
Hello everyone,
As part of our continued efforts in pushing the boundaries of what is possible in terms of visuals, immersion and performance in a game with hundreds of players partaking in battle, we're pleased to be releasing War of Rights Alpha Update 187: DLSS today!
The main feature of the update, as the name would suggest, is the implementation of Nvidia’s nifty DLSS and DLAA offerings for anyone using an Nvidia RTX graphics card, sporting much improved post processing options available within the game.
While DLAA brings the best, cleanest post processing to War of Rights to date, DLSS offers a potential major boost in performance should your system be GPU bottlenecked. DLSS achieves this by upscaling from a lower than native resolution.
Below are a few examples from the benchmark of what sort of performance improvements you might be able to get using the different DLSS modes - please note that this will greatly vary on your hardware setup. The results below are tested on the Very High graphics settings preset in 4k resolution using an i9900k CPU and a RTX 3080ti GPU:
DLSS Off (Native Resolution) Average FPS: 55.11
DLSS Quality Average FPS: 74.29
DLSS Balanced Average FPS: 75.83
DLSS Performance Average FPS: 77.47
DLSS Ultra Performance Average FPS: 79.47
DLAA (Native Resolution) Average FPS: 53.67
Using another PC consisting of a 7950x CPU and a RTX 4090 GPU as well as a 1440p monitor and running higher graphical settings than even available in the released game, the differences between the old native modes and the new DLSS options are rather stark at very little, if any, image quality loss as demonstrated in the below gif:
Other features of Update 187: DLSS include a wide release of the latest game mode to join the roster, Contention, now available to all server owners and supported across all battlefields within the game. Another long-awaited quality of life addition is also part of the update; the missing overview maps in a hand drawn style of the active area. We have spent some time moving away from individually authored maps and now instead support an automated, but accurate, generation based on the actual in-game levels. This automation will be crucial in, eventually, being able to support overview maps of community created levels using the Atlas editor (currently in-development).
Update 187 Patch Notes
Added Nvidia’s DLSS and DLAA (available to Nvidia RTX graphics card users) settings to the graphics options menu.
Contention on Antietam, Harpers Ferry, South Mountain and Drill Camp is now available via the server settings menu.
Added automated overview maps to all game modes and areas within the game.
Added a “Tiffany” -style Eagle flagstaff finial.
Added shell jackets for musicians.
Added gloved shell jacket and sack coat variations.
Added rank striped navy blue trouser variations.
Updates to the customization options of the 4th Pennsylvania cavalry.
Minor updates to character hair materials.
Added snare drum textures for 14th North Carolina, 12th South Carolina, 7th Maine and 32nd Ohio.
Added national flags for 8th Florida, 13th Georgia and 7th Maine.
Overhauled the R. Miller barn model.
Fixed a badly scaled stables model, Antietam.
Prevented ragdolls from getting impulses from bullet hits in an effort to reduce the amount of corpses getting yeeted.
Players in spectator mode are no longer counted in the team balance calculation.
Prevented knocked down players from attempting to enter vehicle seats (possible fix for getting stuck in a knocked down state if a player was knocked down while interacting with artillery).
Adjusted decal sorting/overflow prioritization order in an effort to reduce large, flashing decals on buildings for instance.
Fixed the chat not automatically scrolling to the bottom when new messages are received if the user has manually scrolled up in the chat, making it look like new messages won't show up.
That's all for now. We look forward to be seeing you all in the sharpest, most detailed, and best performing WoR experience to date!
- The Campfire Games Team
Update 186: Contention - Released!
Hello everyone,
We’re excited to be releasing Update 186: Contention for War of Rights today!
The update features a new, work in progress, game mode named Contention as well as a host of performance improvements and quality of life additions to the alpha.
Let’s dive into the details below.
New Game Mode: Contention
A new game mode, "Contention" is now available for testing. The mode is centered around a randomly selected capture point in the areas featured in the Conquest game mode:
Each faction must rush to capture and hold the point for 7.5 minutes in order to inflict a morale level penalty on the enemy team. Once the point has been captured and held successfully, a new capture point will be randomly selected. Neutralizing a point captured by the enemy will reset the hold timer, starting at 7.5 minutes each time the point is retaken.
If the point remains uncaptured, it will turn inactive after 15 minutes, and a new point will become active.
Contention will be available exclusively on the Official War of Rights Test Server as we seek feedback from the community on specifics such as area sizes, the number of possible capture points, the time required to hold a point, and so on before fully committing to a wide release in a later update. Our target is a dynamic game mode such as that offered when playing Conquest while maintaining the exciting gameplay of large groups of players converging on and fighting over a single point at a time, which is key to Skirmishes.
Contention is thus planned to be a mode that bridges the gap between Conquest and Skirmishes.
Update 186 Patch Notes
Added Contention, a new WIP game mode to the game.
Removed a ton of unused features from both the client and server, simplifying the code and improving performance.
Changed the AVX binary to target AVX2 instead. The compatibility build will continue functioning, but will not get all the benefit from latest optimizations. Dedicated AVX2 code paths introduced for particle system updates and global illumination voxel data generation.
Small performance improvement to animations.
Stopped players from being able to use their weapon while they are knocked down.
Players holding onto the artillery or getting hit by the recoil of the artillery or any heavy moving object in general, will now get knocked down when such an impact occurs.
Players that are out of line can no longer capture the skirmish capture points.
Added a visual indicator (red and blue background bars) to the compass menu detailing how much morale is left of each morale level.
Changed the Deployment page to make it a little more visually clear if the spawn point you are queued on is paused or not, in case the flag is dropped or out of line.
Added a visual volume bar to the microphone test.
The microphone test now also works when connected to a server.
Added social media links to the main menu.
Added a new experimental spawn system for particle effects which offers great performance with no particle spawn delay. The old system worked with a queue, which could make the particles spawn a bit delayed if too many particles got queued in quick succession.
Added a context menu which can be activated by walking up to a player, looking at them and pressing E. It offers a quick way of demoting and muting a player, rather than having to look the player up in the tabview. For admins it also allows for kicking and banning players.
Added several UI slider controls to the spectator camera to alter various image settings to capture the perfect cinematic shots. The controls can be toggled on and off by pressing Q.
Added a Spectate button on the left of the Faction Selection page for players only interested in spectating.
Added a checkbox to the tabview to make it only show teammates that are closer to you than 25 meters.
Spectating and enlisted players are now also getting sorted by name on the tabview.
Added descriptions to the settings on the Server Settings page for admins.
Fixed the change map and gamemode feature of the server settings being unreliable.
Fixed the Counter Attack indicator getting stuck on permanently in the battle report.
Fixed a potential small stutter when opening the tabview.
Players with rifles will no longer holster their weapon when vaulting.
Greatly improved the performance of exploded bodies.
Updated the materials of the gore assets.
Visual overhaul of the Piper Barn model.
Visual overhaul of the R-Miller Stables model.
Various tweaks to the vaulting animations.
Fixed the instances of entering the binoculars causing you to get stuck in a zoomed-in state.
Restructured the layout of the graphics settings.
Added graphics settings for Global Illumination and Destruction, the default settings of Medium and 100 is recommended for most systems.
Destroyed fences now leave a little bit of their fence post behind so players can still see there used to be a fence there.
Added more cloth rattling sounds to vaulting.
Added new customizable items to 4th Pennsylvania.
Improved the performance of the big smoke column on Antietam.
Fixed the Conquest area Framing Fencelines on Antietam causing a mass crash when loaded.
Added the 12th NYM regimental flag.
Replaced the old and outdated 33rd VA regimental flag.
Added the 4th and 6th PA cavalry battle flags.
That's all for now. We look forward to be testing Contention with you all!
- The Campfire Games Team
War of Rights Winter Sale: 50% Off!
Hello everyone,
We hope you've been enjoying the snowy christmas event (3 days left to go, hurry up and get in there to experience it!) as well as the features of the recently released Update 185 as 2022 settles down.
If you are still unsure whether or not to give the game a try or you have friends in this position, now is the perfect time to grab a digital copy in order to enjoy (we hope) an immersive and historically authentic line batte experience as War of Rights is currently 50% off as part of the Steam Winter Sale!
You can grab a copy for yourself (or those who are dear to you, or maybe that one guy you've been trying to recruit into the ranks really hard as of late) below:
Finally, we'd like to wish everyone of you within the War of Rights community a happy holiday season - and extend a thank you to you all for being part of this journey with us. We can't wait to get started bringing you game updates come 2023 (and beyond!).
- The Campfire Games Team
Update 185: Traversal & Destruction - Released!
Hello everyone,
Today we’re pleased to be bringing you update 185: Traversal & Destruction for the War of Rights alpha!
We are going to outline the three new features that have been in development these past months. The following features are important stepping stones on the path towards the community level editor and the release of horses. With that said, let’s take a look at their specifics!
Destruction System
With Update 185 comes our new destruction system, focusing initially on fence destruction. Each object is configured with its structural integrity in mind. For example, each individual rail can be independently damaged and broken by small arms and artillery rounds alike, but if you target the posts, you cause a collapse of the entire segment.
Initially, we will only be rolling out post and rail fences as well as one type of stonewall while we gather network performance statistics and make balancing changes. More fence types and other objects are to be supported by the destruction system soon.
Artillery canister round versus a post & rail fence
Knockdowns
Another new feature with this update, designed to work in conjunction with the destruction system, are knockdowns. Artillery-round explosions now have a chance of knocking you off your feet, with the direction of the blast determining the direction you fall. In the future, we expect to expand knockdowns to other instances such as standing too close to a recoiling cannon, getting hit on the head by a musket butt, falling from a great height, and, eventually, getting hit by a horse at speed.
A knockdown caused by a nearby exploding shell
Artillery shell explosion versus a post & rail fence resulting in a knockdown
Vaulting and Climbing
Another big change in this update is the total overhaul of vaulting and the introduction of climbing.
The first thing you will notice with vaulting is that it will behave differently depending on the height of the obstacle; the taller it is, the longer it will take to clear it.
Secondly, you might notice that you can vault in a lot of locations you previously couldn’t. We have rewritten the obstacle detection to be more dynamic than before; vault areas that were previously hand-drawn in the editor are now calculated on the fly. This was an important pre-requisite for moving forward with the development of the Atlas level editor.
Finally, there is the addition of climbing. You can now clamber up obstacles that previously had to be navigated around. Climbing also lets you get on top of small objects such as barrels, rocks, and boxes, giving you access to new sightlines on some maps.
Vaulting a medium & a tall fence
Climbing the embankment
Now that we’ve gotten the major additions of Update 185 out of the way, let’s dive into the rest of the fixes and additions of today’s patch.
Update 185 Patch Notes
Updated several environmental textures including leaves, plowed dirt fields, dry dirt, mud and dirt as well as MacAdam roads.
Overhauled the Sherrick barn model.
Updated the Roulette Farm scene to match the earliest known photograph (from the early 1900s) of its yard and stonewall entrance layout.
Started the task of adding variations of flagstaff finials to the battle flags of the game. In this batch, we’ve added five finial models, including a common “acorn” style, three types of spades (decorative spears), and an eagle. More flags will get their historically correct finials as the amount of finial models is expanded.
Above is an Eagle finial, owned by Campfire Games Historical Artist and battle flag connoisseur, Bradley and the eagle’s digital self now featured in the game.
Various character uniform and insignia tweaks in the wake of the visual changes of update 184: Luminance.
Added Georgia State-issue (with cuff flashings) and Columbus Depot shell jackets to CS regiments and the character customizer.
Fixed LD Moore House proxy.
Changed the time of day of Colquitt’s Defence, South Mountain from 8.75 to 16.5 as was always the intended time of day.
Updates to the materials of Dunker Church to better match its real life counterpart.
Various model fixes for the structures featured in the game in order to better facilitate the lighting upgrades that update 184: Luminance brought to the table.
Updates to the campfires for a more immersive drill camp.
Battle flag materials are now either using cotton or silk presets based off of the historical artifact in an effort to showcase their digital counterparts as authentically as possible.
Slight tweak to the spawn points of the Bloody Lane, Antietam skirmish area due to the updated Roulette Farm scene.
Fixed the inverted artillery spawn points of the Framing Fencelines, Antietam conquest area.
Updated the tree billboard textures for more dynamic and pretty visuals.
Updated the visuals of the stone walls.
The stacked bundles of wheat on the fields are now destructible.
Updated the model of the larger bush in the game.
Improved the proxies of a few environmental assets to better facilitate the requirements of the dynamic vaulting system.
Fixed a few broken UI overview maps on South Mountain.
Fixed the cloth of the battle flags sometimes vanishing.
Fixed bayonets are no longer visually vanishing when cycling weapons (NCO sword/rifle).
Various updates to the Christmas Event - you’ll have to join us in a few days to find out what exactly!
That's all for today - we look forward to be seeing you all vault, climb, destroy and get knocked off of your feet in the game!
