New game update 1.6.0 deployed Nov 6th - Highlights, Eldar campaign and news!
This update features Challenges 1.0 that are your personal goals, the brand new map Promethium mine, and the first step of Steam Workshop.
Ongoing combat balancing, melee fixes, matchmaker, map fixes and improvements, preparations on Steam for our new partners, as well as Steamworks changes.
Oh, and one more thing. The Eldar campaign, the Autarch hero arriving after the Eldar campaign. We expect to start the campaign Friday the 10th.
Here are some of the patch highlights!
- Challenges are now live. These are repeatable goals that award requisition points upon completion. Completed or dismissed challenges are periodically replaced with new ones.
- Uploading to Steam Workshop is now available from the hub.The Workshop on Steam will go live shortly, with the first categories and specifications required to upload, on our Support FAQ.
- Promethium Mine, a new 15 vs 15 player infantry only Supremacy map has been added to the rotation. This map focuses on taking strategic positions surrounding the Capture Points in order to obtain victory.
- The flanking route in Agnathio to attack point B from the left side has been reworked to offer more flexibility to the attackers
- Garrison’s first part (tutorial) modified to better guide new players to the Control Points mechanics
- Eldar campaign, with associated rewards, will be turned lives, followed by the introduction of the Autarch Eldar Hero after the campaign. It also has an associated Steam marketing campaign, as well as promotions with other partners.
General
- Standard-tier "Crimson" boltguns (for Space Marines and Chaos Space Marines), twin-linked shuriken catapult (for Eldar), and big shoota (for Orks) are now available from the store for 750,000 requisition points each.
- Standard-tier "Hazard Stripe" chainsword for Iron Warrior characters is now available in store for 6,000 RTC.
- The scope sensitivity slider is now available under general settings.
- UI scaling and sensitivity sliders can now be adjusted in increments of 0.01 instead of 0.5.
Combat balancing updates and fixes
- A strong attack against the start of a defensive bash will now do its full damage pre-mitigation rather than half.
- Standard Tempest Launcher:
- Increased aim time from 0.12 to 1.0
- Shots interval from 0.14 to 0.2
- Delay between bursts from 0.72 to 1.0
- Heat per shot from 9 to 20
- Master-crafted Tempest Launcher
- Same as above but except Heat per 8.1 to 18
- Fusion Pistol Heat ailment reduced from 2 to 1.5.
Other
- Fixed a bug where the Ork Loota would hover in the air before falling when vaulting over a wall.
- Opened the railings near the “Pistol Lock” servo skull in Garrison
- PVE: Collision removed on tyranid spawners above lava areas
- Fixed several vehicles exploit allowing vehicles to reach forbidden areas in Blackbolt, Pegasus, Ronan and Maggon.
- Fixed flickering on fortress walls
- Fixed minor floating affecting certain assets
- Fixed double railing on the wall in Agnathio preventing proper bracing
- Fixed bracing on the short low wall present in the quadgun room of Point A.
Steam changes for new partners
This update does contain some stranger things than just the game itself. You will notice that our steam store page changes, as part of our backend Steamworks changes.
This is to accommodate new partners, ranging from digital retailers to platforms specifically created for hardware bundling of games. We're quite excited to see active promotion finally starting to happen more than a year after launch.
We will continually add new partners as well, since after this change, artist formerly known as "The Free to Play Button" - changes into the standardized "DEMO BUTTON".
This allows our partners to directly promote the bigger packages with only a single key, both on paper slips, emails as well as of course direct purchases on partner platforms.
You won't notice a thing. Only this change to the Steam store.
This is actually more to let you know the ball is rolling on partners, which means more revenue, which means more development and players to socially interact with through diplomacy and mass destruction.
Thank you, everyone, for staying with us, it's been about 18 months live counting our Alpha, and some of you are even still with us, keeping on rolling forwards.
More announcements to come, on partners, Workshop, next things we work on and of course, we're picking up on some crazy community ideas, which at this point in time are just crazy enough to work. We'll pas them by you in due time.
Ave Crusader,
Nathan
Warhammer 40k: Eternal Crusade: The Workshop Interview
Hey Crusaders!
We recently sat down with the folks at MMOHuts to chat about personal goals, a new map, and other systems & mechanics that are all upcoming in Eternal Crusade.
Just a quick update for more visibility. Hotfixes are usually only notified ingame, but this one has a considerable game impact. Note: Patch size does not indicate patch contents, the Steam patcher doesn't always work that way.
This hotfix addressed the speed bugs for Marines, as they were as fast as Eldar. There might be edge cases that are still in there, so please continue giving us feedback!
UAT, the public test server, will continue running the new map fulltime, with scheduled playtests.
In development, as mentioned before, adding the content to Objectives (personal goals) and starting to add Objective content to Campaign content. The systems are done and in polish mode, available on UAT.
We've started preliminary work on the Workshop, where you will have instructions on our Support website, and a forum to collaborate! We're very excited, but since a client needs to upload the assets, we have to build one. If anyone happens to have one lying around and is open source, please pass it on! (we already found the old deprecated ones on github etc.).
Have a great day and please help people in need if you can.
Nathan
Want try to take on PVE Co-Op alone? Theoretically, winning is possible (Not possible). More news as well.
"Say hello to my little friend"
If you ever wanted to try to take on the PVE Co-Op in Eternal Crusade on by your own, now is your chance. We're testing out on the public test server (UAT) and on our Live servers 1-person Tyranid Hives.
That's right. You can try to take them on as it is theoretically possible to finish it alone. We'll change this back when we've gotten the data we're after, but who knows, maybe this is a thing. Will you be the first?
I'll give you a Relic Pack if you can. We'll see it in our logs ;)
Ps. We also require a video of you doing it, as we want to use it for promotion. Already have quite a few good tries!
In other news
Objectives - Personal Goals - is also on the test servers, and the ability to tie Objectives into Campaigns is done, we just need to populate it with data and try it out.
Friday we have a playtest on UAT on our new map in development. There will be a couple Relic Packs to give out for top players as an incentive. CSM vs SM @6:30 PM UTC - 2 Matches. Map feedback goes to the official forums.
New relationships with new digital distributors and promotions are coming up, which should bring more fresh meat to the grinders, and we continue working on the setup of the Workshop and how that works, including details on how to work with our files.
"Let's work it" as the poet said.
Twitch news: Workshop approved, New map and personal goals on public test (UAT)
If you didn't tune in on Friday for our Twitch show, here are the highlights!
Eternal Crusade Steam Workshop approved
We've gone through a lot of hoops to reach this momentous occasion. The workshop is approved by all parties, with limitations in the beginning. We start with the simple categories that people can contribute to.
The primary requirement, to lessen the integration massively, is that we can now give you the specifications of our assets and you need to submit a finished Unreal Engine 4 file. The workshop is in Curation mode, which means people vote, and what we approve ends with us implementing it in the client. No download for anyone and everyone sees it.
We will, of course, continue with our official work so this is entirely complimentary. We look immensely forward to expanding on the workshop over time with you. There is no ETA yet, as we now have to implement the pipeline.
New map and map modifications
We showed a new infantry only map that's in progress. It's a map that was almost finished, copied and repurposed. It's hitting the public test server, and feedback is most welcome in the UAT thread.
We will also continue with changes like we've done on Blackbolt, and Agnathio is now on UAT with similar changes.
Objectives - Personal Goals
Objectives are going on UAT so you can start messing around with it and give feedback. The objectives in there are usually just for test purposes, so they are not indicative of final Objectives, nor are Objectives connected to other systems such as Campaigns yet.
Digital Stores
We're now taking over the digital store relationships as we have on Steam. This means that they'll have the same new products as we are, get a good cut of the revenue to encourage promoting us, and special offers. In some cases, current players can even take advantage of these. If you know of a store that has the old version or don't have us at all, by all means, submit a support ticket, and we'll talk to them!
Long term, we're talking to new worldwide partners, as we do not have a presence in many territories. Since Eternal Crusade hasn't had any ads since September last year, we have massive untapped potential in a great partner fuelling more development as well as untapped markets.
You can watch the Twitch here:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O-Y1TicN6ig
Hotfix enroute
We're looking into deployment problems which have caused some bugs. Amongst them is the speed. This is _not_ to be confused with Field of View changes which makes everything seem faster; this is like everyone just got the same speed. Hence Eldar is slower.
This is of course not intentional, and the simplest explanation is usually the right one. I did enjoy the conspiracy theories today that emerged over the weekend, 10/10 would read again :)
Have a great day everyone!
September Update Thursday 14th! Changes to melee, balancing, game systems
This update is primarily focused on the ongoing combat balancing, melee balancing and fixes to melee system to make it more reliable but also has improvements to game systems, matchmaker, map fixes, new graphics performance improvements and DirectX 10 support.
We are back this Friday for our next live stream!
We've also got quite a lot to show and update you on, so stock up on snacks, drinks, set your reminders, and come hang out with us at 2 pm EST >>> www.twitch.tv/40kcrusade
- First look - the new map!
- Surprise!!!!
- Personal goals
- Reviewing this week's patch, detailed below
- Q&A
Here are some of the patch highlights!
General
- Blackbolt got a new flanking route
- Massive melee combat balancing
- Reduced strafe speed across the board so that it is no longer as high as forward run speed.
- Most FOVs has changed from 70 to 90.
- Default graphics quality is now the new Medium instead of High.
- Medium and Low presets have been reconfigured based on community efforts in EC, PUBG, and other UE4 games.
- DirectX 10 launch option for older hardware, works great with the new Low setting. Right click on the game in the library.
- Optimised performance of the radar, which is the first part of moving from Scaleform to the native UE4 UMG UI framework.
Balancing Updates:
- Short stagger duration increased to 1.1 seconds long.
- Adjusted melee attack damage so that they reflect the animation length.
- Reduced Chainsword of Fury cost from 370 to 320.
- Reduced Git Prod cost from 450 to 370.
- Auto targeting now locks onto a lower position on Ork targets.
- Modified shield break warning VFX to be yellow instead of red to better reflect its warning state.
Map changes
BlackBolt:
- Brend new flanking route to Capture Point C. You will see more of these.
- Fixed raised terrain behind Blackbolt Capture Point C.
Zedek:
- Fixed LOD of a pipe asset at several places around point C on Zedek.
- Improved bracing on ruined buildings between A and B on Zedek.
- Characters can now brace downwards on most of the ledges.
- Fixed vault issue on the pipe inside the ruins North East of A on Zedek.
- Fixed bracing on the railing on the balcony near A on Zedek.
- Fixed a rock that was lacking collision by the ruins near Capture Point B on Zedek.
- Fixed issue where characters can become stuck in a corner behind a railing after falling from the top of the broken Aquila pillar on Zedek point B.
- Fixed texture gap on Zedek next to the ramp outside of point A.
- Removed a low cover asset that was duplicated on A top floor.
Maggon:
- Fixed vault on a railing outside of point B on Maggon.
Agnathio:
- Fixed misaligned floor tile on the east side of the fortress wall on Agnathio.
Torias:
- Fixed collision where the character can become stuck between a barrel and pillar next to Capture Point B on Torias.
General fixes
- Fixes to the matchmaker, primarily, you do not auto-queue to the next match, so war parties don't get assigned to a match and disappear as canceling the queue usually happened after you were assigned to a match often resulting in an imbalanced start.
- Fixed black smoke VFX that was originating from an incorrect position during explosions.
- Ork Skull DLC now shows properly with all armor types.
- Fixed rare crash when entering an Eldar character's HUB from the Character Selection screen.
- Fixed issue where the wrong audio line is played for defenders when a gate is destroyed on Fortress game mode.
- Fixed issue where creating over 127 Loadouts would cause a Character Creation Failed message.
- Fixed issue where Settings Menu can be seen briefly after closing it.
- Fixed issue where the Warlock's hand appears in a pistol grip when Embolden is equipped.
- The announcer's voice is now based on the subfaction of the current highest ranking player on the scoreboard.
- And a metric intercourse ton of minor fixes
When?
The patch was deployed today Thursday the 14th of September.
The Twitch is Friday September 15th at 2 PM EST >>> www.twitch.tv/40kcrusade
UAT will be updated with the new development build after the Twitch, including the new map, and personal goal, all in development and waiting eagerly for your feedback on the official forum thread for the UAT server.
Livestream is this Friday Sep 14th 2PM EST! First look - new map, personal goals, a big surprise & more!
Hey Crusaders!
We are back this Friday for our next livestream! We've got quite a lot to show and update you on, so stock up on snacks, drinks, set your reminders, and come hang out with us at 2pm EST >>> www.twitch.tv/40kcrusade
On the show:
First look - new map!
Surprise :CSMWord:
Personal goals
Reviewing this week's patch
Q&A
See you Friday! www.twitch.tv/40kcrusade
New Campaign & Imperium Discount!
Hey Crusaders!
We've just launched a new campaign, A Brewing Storm, focusing on the Orks! Hop into game > World Map to check its progression until Thursday August 31 @ 10am PST. After the campaign has ended, re-visit the World Map to claim your reward!
During the campaign, the Imperium Edition is 50% off! It is the full version of the game, giving you access to all the classes and a 3x faster character progression. The Imperium Edition also includes 25,000 Rogue Trader Credits, 4 faction packs (DLCs) to customize your character with unique weapons and armour: the Champion, the Zealot, the Waaagh! and the Mael Dannan Pack.
Waaagh!
Katie
Public Test Server changes, battle the devs today 3:30 PM Eastern
We have a number of changes coming quite rapidly to UAT, our public test server, in the last weeks. This is because we're utilizing UAT more, iterate faster, do rapid prototyping.
Today, if you join us at 3:30 PM Eastern on UAT (and haven't before), you will get to do the following:
Try out the 5th iteration of Melee changes
New Field of View (FOV) for Melee
New Field of View for Ranged on SM and CSM (only those two as we're testing still)
New radar, moving from old Scaleform UI system to the better performing Unreal Engine 4 UI system.
Get the "Kill a Dev" accomplishment. Yes, accomplishments are enabled on UAT in case you didn't know to encourage participation.
The radar change is a pilot, as it is one of the biggest offenders. Very much work in progress, so I want it on UAT now, so we can start hammering and optimizing it.
Scaleform is a very special UI system which has now been continued - for a reason. So if the radar ends up good, we'll start doing UI in UMG instead. This enables more people to do simple UI, and offloads from our UI person.
All the melee changes, FOV on Melee, and the testing of Ranged Melee on SM/CSM will all change before entering live, based on the feedback from these tests on the public test server. It will of course be applied to Ork and Eldar if we feel the changes are good, next week.
The forums have a specific thread for this feedback, make sure it's posted there for all of us to see.
Next in-game Campaign is being set up and will be announced separately!
Have a great weekend!
Le Team
Campaign of Blood - Friday the 4th! Also WINE and Unreal Engine upgrade.
As the famous poet once said, there will be blood.
This weekend, we continue our series of campaigns, with a new one starting every two weeks from now.
Get in there and get some RTC! I mean, shed blood!
Easy Anti Cheat now allows Linux emulators for Eternal Crusade
Easy Anti Cheat just enabled you to try out WINE and others with Eternal Crusade, where before they were usually blocked. This is of course not supported by us, as in, we can't help you with setting it up, but this is sanctioned used and quite happy there is interest in doing this.
Mac users should be able to use their favorite emulator/boots to run Eternal Crusade.
Next update, Unreal Engine 4.15?
We're continuing work on the next update, and while we could talk about a lot of things, like balancing, itemization (you know, stuff for your loadout) and such, the main thing causing uncertainty for a release date is we just got the Unreal Engine 4.15 integration from our sister team.
They used the same code base as us and finished most of the work; now we need to integrate it back into Eternal Crusade.
If you are interested in seeing what has happened from UE 4.12 to UE 4.15, I have linked to the release notes of the version, as they can't possibly fit in here. You know, 12 to 15 in version doesn't sound like a lot, but check them out.
This is what we are integrating into Eternal Crusade. Enjoy your hours of reading release notes.
