Valkyries and Greater Valkyries now wield Runeglaives. Lesser Valkyries still have Runeblades.
Heralds of Discord (Chaos 5): New unit type. Heavy Infantry with a chaos-imbued mallet dealing multiple types of damage (physical, arcane, lightning, true) and having a short-range sonic missile attack from banging their gong-shields.
Gremlins (Chaos 2): New unit type. Fragile skirmish/ambush unit with weak attacks, one of which deals increased damage to construct/machine units. In other words, they're pesky little golem saboteurs.
Spirit Ravens (Divination 3): New unit type. Weak unit but fast, flying and with a high scouting stat. Useful for exploration and scouting.
Smilodons (Beast 5): New unit type. Giant cats with big teeth.
Spirit units have been reworked slightly, to create a clean distinction between undead and shamanistic/animistic spirits. The former are now Spectral and Undead. The latter have the Spirit tag, and include the following unit types: Spirit Hounds, Spirit Wolves and the new Spirit Ravens. The unit types previously named Spirit Host and Ancient Spirit Host have been renamed Spectral Host and Ancient Spectral Host.
Culture Unit Generator: When generating culture unit types, any Weapon Preference/Mastery traits are processed, and their inclusion guaranteed. Previously it only affected the weapon generation weights on a per-unit basis, which could often lead to the traits not being reflected in any unit type. There is now a culture-wide analysis step making sure this does not happen.
Culture Unit Generator: Several Animal Affinity culture traits now have a chance to assign cavalry units a special unit.
Culture Unit Generator: Elemental Affinity culture traits can now result in magical attacks or unit stats/abilities. Game settings for world prevalence of magic affects the chance of this. Elite units have a higher chance to roll these bonuses.
UI and Graphics
The Split Army action now opens the Unit Transfer Window after creating the new army.
Dungeons and Minor Sites now have a context-specific action to hide (and un-hide) them from the world map. This is useful to hide empty dungeons and burial sites. The hide/show filters will not override this per-site setting (ie hiding a minor site and then toggling the global minor site filter twice does not re-show that particular minor site).
The Text Input Window used for renaming things now responds to the enter key as a short-cut for the OK button.
Worker Window: Added a 'Go To' button which focuses on the assignment location.
Worker Window: The name part of each element now has tool tip with extended info on culture, race and other relevant attributes not normally listed in the element.
Worker Window: Workers can now be renamed via a button in this window. The new name is of course reflected in the outliner and anywhere else the worker is referenced.
Unit Icons: Dynamically generated units for Dwarf cultures now have 5 different icons for infantry icons. I intend to expand the variety of 'mundane' unit icons in coming patches, gradually covering more races, and hopefully also finding a way to indicate armament as part of the icon.
Character Window: Several prompts for selecting a follower/character are now sorted by Idle status and name (alphabetically). I haven't covered all prompts yet, so more will follow.
Modding
Mods can now override unit icons again. Note that this is different than creating new mappings (eg adding a new image for Angels of Hope), it replaces a built-in icon (eg replacing the pikeman image does so for all units using it). The modding guide explains the usage of these two in more detail (UnitGfx vs UnitIcon).
Fixed a number of unit type import bugs, where some attributes were not read correctly from the mod xml file.
Unit Types which have a Culture and/or Race will no longer 'lose' these if the unit stats are modded.
Playing with a Mod which changes unit stats will disable achievements (for the active game). In addition, on saving a game any such mod use will be written to the save file. So even if you disable the mod during subsequent turns, the campaign will still be invalid for achievements.
Misc. Mechanics
Unpaid Unit upkeep will now prevent (non-regeneration/healing) replenishment for 1 turn. This also has the effect of fixing the issue where desertion was immediately replenished and made irrelevant.
Grand Barracks: New city building which provides an additional progress path to unlock elite units. It is intended to cover the gap between War Academy and Inner Circle Warrior Lodge. Some cultures, even war-like ones, did not fulfill the requirements for either of these, which led to a weird lack of elite units.
Beast Handler (Character Trait): New skill-type trait. Gives a stat bonus to beast/monster units when general or unit commander, may enable unit hunt food production. Gives additional beast mastery progress if Wizard's Apprentice.
Hunt Food (Unit Special Ability): The food income part of this ability now requires beast 4+, life 7+, or beast handler (scout captain, level 5+ general, level 3+ quartermaster). The upkeep reduction does not have any such requirement.
Hunt Food (Unit Special Ability): Being location in a Blighted hex now reduce food produced. A Primal hex increases it. Cities no longer block this ability if the city culture has the Pact with Nature trait.
Forage Food (Unit Special Ability): Cities no longer block this ability if the city culture has the Pact with Nature trait.
Scavenge Food (Unit Special Ability): If the owner is unable to pay upkeep and the missing upkeep is gold and food only, the unit will not suffer a debuff. If the unpaid upkeep is food only, the unit will not suffer desertion.
Army General (Army-wide bonus): Undead units only get bonuses from an undead general or general with Necromancy.
Army General (Army-wide bonus): Celestial units only get bonuses from a celestial general.
Army General (Army-wide bonus): Demon units only get bonuses from a demon general or general with Occult Lore.
Army General (Army-wide bonus): Fae units only get bonuses from a fae general.
Army Champion (Army-wide bonus): Removed base +1 Courage, and replaced it with : +1 Courage if Level 6+, +1 Courage if Level 9+. (+1 Courage with Inspire Courage as before).
Army General/Scout Captain/Champion: Army-wide unit bonuses no longer apply to mindless units, Train Troops now only affect warrior/soldier/regular units, Incite Frenzy doesn't affect unfeeling/monsters/extra-planar/magical, Inspire Courage doesn't affect unfeeling/monster/limited mind.
Bug Fixes and Tweaks
Map Search window now responds to the Enter key. Selecting the chosen result if possible, and closing the search window and panel.
'Next Turn' is no longer triggered by pressing Enter while Map Search is active.
Right-clicking an item in the outliner is now equivalent to double-clicking. The settings are only opened if right-clicking an outliner header.
The minor sites filter is not shown when there are no minor sites on the map.
Fixed a number of windows not responding to the Escape key as intended.
Fixed the Reaper's Due spell hitting too many targets.
Fixed some dynamically generated culture unit types not being assigned the intended main weapon defined by a template.
Fixed a bug causing some character portraits to almost never be used.
Fixed a bug causing missing text separation in a couple of UI elements.
The map scrolling is now blocked when using shift/alt/ctrl. Some multi-key shortcuts were also scrolling the map which was not intended.
Fixed a bug causing some achievements to not always be granted as intended. They would still be granted if the achievement evaluation logic was triggered by certain conditions and actions, but the per-turn evaluation was not being run.
Split Units
Changed the mechanics regarding 'split units'. This is in preparation for making it a battle-only option, usable during the pre-battle phase and when creating army battle plan. For now, it is still used from the Army Window, but with a number of significant changes.
Split unit are now automatically renamed with a Detachment postfix. They're also marked with an asterisk in most parts of the UI. The unit they were split from is considered their parent unit.
Split units can no longer merge with any unit except their parent unit. A parent unit cannot be merged with any unit, until all split units have been merged back into the parent unit.
Units which cannot replenish losses can no longer be split. They can still merge with any unit having the same unit type identity. A future patch will include the option to merge two sub-strength units into equally sized units (e.g. 90 + 50 currently gives 100 + 40, but the plan is to make 70 + 70 an option).
Splitting a unit from an already split unit will now result in a unit which is considered a split of the original 'master' unit. E.g. Unit B is split from Unit A, then Unit C is split from Unit B - resulting in B and C both being considered split from Unit A.
Split units no longer incur a special upkeep penalty. Their upkeep is now purely based on the numerical size of the unit.
Split units can no longer be moved to a different army.
Patch 1.0.1.72
Map terrain graphics can now be modded. The modding guide has a new section on how to use this.
The modding guide now has sections on sigil modding and mechanics modding. Some of the other sections have been updated as well.
Added a new Territory Overlay toggle, which shows a colored map overlay using the faction colors. This provides an easier way to quickly get an overview of faction province control.
Research Projects now have a short name which is used in the list when browsing projects, removing a lot of repeated text when listing projects from the same category.
Randomly generated cultures can now have weapon/shield/armor variants with different (usually better) stats than the basic version. These are given special names based on culture and language - and applied automatically to the unit types of the culture.
Unit types generated as part of randomly generated cultures can now have magical weapons. The chance is based on the game settings for magic rarity. Elite and special unit types tend to have these more often. The name of the weapon and the stats/abilities given depend on cultural traits.
New unit weapon: Glaive. It's a polearm and a pretty good one.
Units with the Hunt special ability now generate Food if the army is not at a City or garrisoned.
Units with the Forage and Hunt special abilities now consume less Food for upkeep based on the hex the army is located in.
Undead Units now have lower upkeep in Blighted hexes.
Darkened hexes now cause armies to have a higher upkeep while in the hex.
Added Death Knight Lords, an improved version of Death Knights, at Necromancy 8, and moved Risen Champions to Necromancy 7.
Buffed a number of Fae, Beast and Monster unit types by reducing their cost and/or improving their stats.
Increased the variety of units Wizards can be given as starting army. These are tied to traits and terrain as usual, improving the chance of thematic starting army.
Improved the algorithm which determines cost for randomly generated units so that it gives consideration to additional factors.
Fixed a number of bugs where some (non-randomly generated) units did not have the weapons they were supposed, making them much weaking than intended, and in a few other cases not giving them the intended bonus stats. Using the new equipment variant system, these units now work as intended.
Fixed a bug where the Encyclopedia did not properly reset when loading or starting a new game, using unnecessary memory until it was opened again and showing phantom pages from the previous game.
Fixed a bug where character and army contributions to expected gold and resource income was not included in the info panel and in the economy ledger.
Fixed a bug where weapon/attack stats were not always in sync in various windows.
Fixed a crash bug relating to the nomad raider AI.
Fixed a bug causing recruitment modifiers to not be selectable in many cases.
Fixed Beacon of Elemental Frost targeting not working as intended.
Patch 1.0.1.68
Wizard AI has learned to use Drain Mana Nodes, and will tend to research it early in the game.
Wizard AI is now more biased towards recruiting magic units over mundane units - especially in situations where it has a low number of Fortresses/Cities.
Wizard AI is now better at picking useful research projects.
Independent Realms will now remember if given requested aid during a war, and tend to not declare war on the assisting faction due to aggressive expansion.
Fixed a bug where AI armies would gather an increasingly large army at a Mana Node that could not be bound (due to lack of Mana).
Fixed a text display bugs relating to unit special abilities.
Patch 1.0.1.67
Just a small bug fix patch. A good amount of my time since the patch a few days went into the battle beta patch coming out later today.
Bug Fixes / Tweaks
Upgrade Outpost: The toggle to assign (or not) the Leader after construction is now respected.
Acid Spray (Water Spell): Now deals the intended number of hits (10, up to unit size).
Upgrade Resource Site: Progress display is now correct for Level 2+.
Search Province: Fixed a number of issues related to joining a party with this task and re-starting the task with a party.
Unit Type Display: Removed weird empty lines placed in the middle of unit type stats sometimes.
Sorting: Changed a number of lists (in text and UI) to be sorted alphabetically.
Icons: Blood Beasts and Abominations got a new unit icon image. Arcanosaurians now use a lizard icon image and not a sword.
Patch 1.0.1.66
Mechanics and Units
World and Battle Movement has been separated into two separate stats for Units. This makes balancing the stat easier and it allows for units that are slow on the battlefield but not almost useless in a non-Garrison army. I have reviewed all units and adjusted the new stats, but I'm expecting to adjust further according to player feedback and my own findings with this new system.
The Supply Depot and Forced March movement modifiers are now integrated into the effect system, making them less glitchy, and more visible in the relevant parts of the UI.
Mana Nodes with garrisons can no longer be Bound or Drained without defeating the garrison.
Most of the City stat modifiers applied during Leader interactions on conquest are now cleared when a subsequent conquest is resolved (and re-applied or not, depending on the outcome of new interaction).
Reworked numerous 'baked modifiers' to City stats - mostly Unrest and Squalor. These would previously change the value permanently and without trackable source. They are now stat modifiers with durations and visibility in tool tips.
City Pop role drift is now locked to max. 1 pop per turn to reduce jitter and role change spam.
Spells cast during battles now count for purposes of Mastery Progress.
New Unit Types: Greater Blood Beasts, Blood Abominations, Stormlings.
Barghasts, Djinni and Efreeti are now unlocked through Mastery Progress rather than requiring a research project.
Reduced the upkeep cost for most Demon unit types and buffed several of the unreasonably weak ones.
Significantly reduced the resource cost of many research projects.
Massively reduced the cost of the 'Mark' line of unit recruitment options. This goes for recruitment and upkeep modifiers both.
Garrison army units no longer get an upkeep reduction if they have moved during the turn. This removes the ability to 'garrison-hop' as an unintended way to reduce unit upkeep.
Increased Garrison upkeep reduction from 10% to 20% for Gold (Food is unchanged at 20%)
Dedicated Garrison: New recruitment modifier. Max 2 per site. Unit will dedicated garrison of the chosen recruitment site. While garrisoned at this site the Food/Gold upkeep is reduced by 50%/75% respectively. If away from the site, the unit has increased Gold upkeep of +50%.
AI
Independent Nomad AI and raid mechanics have been streamlined and improved. This includes the battle decision and raid movement logic on the AI side. On the mechanics side, the logic for raising new units, raid frequency, raid targets and raid sizes, has been changed. The game settings regarding marauders (frequency/power) will now have a greater impact on all of these.
AI rivals will now declare war when attacking Player sites and/or armies. Previously the AI assumed the player would do so (as this happens for AI vs AI interactions). Apart from annoying many players, this could lead to odd situations where the AI forgot about the war if they player didn't declare it.
Wizard AI now prioritizes units with low movement and (relative) upkeep for garrison duty and units with high movement for warfare/exploration.
Wizard AI now considers resource site opportunities prioritized by the value of expected resource output and no longer tries to spread construction evenly across provinces.
Wizard AI is now capable of using unit recruitment options.
Sieges
Siege engines and towers can now be destroyed by defenders during a protracted siege. The chance is based on the number and power of defending units. Sappers, flyers and fire units contribute additional ability.
Siege durations involving a random element (ie Siege Engines) now show the estimated duration as a range.
The max number of Siege Towers is now limited by the number of sieging units.
Bug Fixes, UI and Misc
Several events, notifications and entities have been given new icons replacing the prior generic ones.
Army (Unit) Transfer Window: Now has tool tips for units and three different sorting options.
The Select Character or Party prompt mode for the Followers window now has a context-specific 'selection' button label. Ie if a character with no party is selected the button will say 'Select Character' - if a character with a party is selected the button will say 'Select Party'.
Recruitment Window: Now displays unit size.
Improved the 'Plea for Help' prompt to have tool tips and Go To links for the relevant armies/sites.
All resurrection and rebirth effects now modify the 'recent losses' value preventing multiple same-turn applications of such effects from resurrecting more than the number of fallen
Recruitment (unit) options are now sorted by state and name.
Fixed a research panel refund amount display bug.
Fixed a bug where 'Create Army' would act weirdly when used on 1-unit garrisons.
Fixed a recruitment options not having any relevant upkeep modifier applied (during preview or after recruitment).
Fixed a bug where invalid recruitment options could be selected when recruiting multiple units in sequence.
Fixed a bug with the Arcane Denial spell.
Fixed a bug where retreating armies would not reveal adjacent fog of war hexes.
Fixed a bug where estimated Siege duration was incorrectly calculated.
Fixed a bug where armies would keep a Siege target after retreating to another hex. This allowed the faction to contribute to a Siege as a 3rd party and/or at a distance.
Fixed a bug where the AI would mobilize armies to lift a siege and then just halt adjacent to the target hex.
Fixed a bug where a Beacon of Elemental Water targeting criteria was inverted.
Fixed a bug where some notifications were not created as intended.
Fixed numerous bugs and inconsistencies with Character Task validation.
Fixed a number of bugs with the Party/Character selection logic that allowed selection of invalid parties if they were partially valid.
Patch 1.0.1.63
Added a toggle for the session-based 'Auto-Resolve All Battles' setting in the Settings Window. This allows reverting the option without re-starting the game. It can be found in a new 'Session' Tab.
Rival Wizard AI: Improved the use of recruitment and research. It will now greatly prefer recruiting more powerful units when possible.
Rival Wizard AI: Hard and Very Hard difficulty now get a slight reduction in unit recruitment cost. I know this is a kind of cheating, and I intend to make it optional and/or remove it (if the economic performance of the AI has improved enough) in the future.
Divination 5 now allows a Wizard to determine the Mastery levels of other Wizards (use diplomacy window to inspect).
City Building Tweaks: Sewer no longer reduces Fortification Value. Tavern no longer reduces Squalor.
Beacon-type spells now cancel any magical recruitment if overriden with a different Beacon spell. A warning when targeting will list any on-going recruitment that will be canceled on cast.
When a Wizard is defeated any formerly owned resource sites switching to unaligned ownership will now be given to the province owner, if any such exists. This is especially relevant for site along borders of provinces.
When a Province changes ownership any resource sites with no owner will now be transferred to the new owner.
Fixed an issue where armies/units with depleted movement could be 're-activated' by using a movement buff after the depleting event/action. Depletion of movement is now 'sticky' and cannot be counteracted in this manner. Note that this doesn't include movement allowance being reduced to 0 through spending movement points - this is only when a mechanic specifically depletes movement fully.
Fixed a bug where Worker Training wouldn't complete on reaching the progress threshold, making the estimated duration off by 1 turn and showing a confusing 100% progress.
Fixed a few bugs where task assignments were able to circumvent some of the validation criteria.
Fixed a bug where the Emissary task category was aborting the UI flow from the Followers Window shortcut.
Fixed a bug where the haunting army attacking a looter of an ancient battle site would have units each the size of the upper threshold for the size of the entire army.
Fixed a bug where Spell Targeting Warnings were not shown when using the shortcut to cast spells valid for a selected site. These are now shown in the list of valid spells prepended to the spell description.
Fixed a bug where the Join Party button was not disabled in all cases when it should be (despite the text indicating so).
Fixed a bug causing merges between a Level 0 unit and a unit with a Level of 1+ to be blocked.
Fixed a bug causing the AI to discard large amounts of gold and mana in the early game. This did not help its performance against the player.
Patch 1.0.1.62
The 'No Upkeep' effect for Units now shows the projected normal upkeep in the tool tip.
The Rival AI now tries to avoid border gore (ie isolated provinces and territorial bulges) when picking provinces for Outposts.
The Rival AI is now better at utilizing Resource Site construction, and will consider it more often.
The Rival AI will now consider Outposts in the primary pool of targets for aggression. Previously they would only be chosen under extremely specific circumstances where nothing else was relevant.
The Rival AI will now avoid constructing Outposts in the vicinity of hostile armies. It is still a bit too optimistic about this, but much less stubborn and somewhat less reckless.
When a Rival faction is defeated, sites under construction will now be destroyed and in-progress site upgrades cancelled (except for Cities and Fortresses).
A number of lists now support arrow keys for up/down navigation. It's far from all lists in all windows, and some of them don't yet scroll to the new selection if it's out of view. I'll keep expanding the number of lists supporting keyboard navigation in successive patches now that I've added the foundational code for this.
Added some missing text to the Assign Task flow. A number of categories had no text at all.
Improved the formatting of Deity/Religion tool tips to make the Domains stand out more clearly at a glance.
Fixed a number of bugs where selection on the world map would change when casting spells or resolving prompts.
Fixed a bug where world map selection could have a partial state and actions/info not be aligned with the proper selection.
Fixed a bug where the camera would not automatically zoom/pan to the selection as intended for a few specific cases of automatic selection change.
Fixed a bug where the Battle Mana cap could be exceeded by using the 'More Spells' flow during battle resolution.
Fixed a bug where some Factions paid full upkeep for units that should be free or reduced in cost.
Fixed a bug where City Pop promotion and demotion would include invalid targets in the pool of candidates and thus produce nonsensical results.
Fixed a bug where Character Discontent would accumulate silently and to an unreasonable extent due to Office desire. This Discontent would also never expire.
Fixed a bug where some AI-controlled factions could not raze outposts.
Fixed a number of bugs with the Undead Conquest resolution. Some options were available when they should not be. Options removing pops have been changed to always leave 1 pop. A few crash bugs have been fixed. There is just a bugfix pass and not the final changes to that mechanic.
Fixed a crash bug related to world spell casting and selection changes.
Patch 1.0.1.61
The 'Additional Resources' part of the Resource Info Panel now includes expected income/expenditure in the tool tip.
Fixed a bug where level 0 Masteries could not be chosen as Focus.
Fixed a bug present in several dialogs where the color of an invalid option would change after selecting it and the deselecting it.
Fixed a few bugs where party mechanics could be used to circumvent some of the requirements of a task and/or send fatigued/wounded followers on a task.
Fixed a bug where the Join Party button was active (and actually executed the action) despite requirements not being met.
Fixed a bug where the City Income/Production display was incorrectly calculated and out of sync with the underlying mechanics.
Patch 1.0.1.60
Just a small patch today. Didn't really plan for a patch today, but I thought the scaling fix should be released asap.
When starting the game with a low resolution, the game will check against reference UI scaling values and prompt about possible issues and present the option to automatically change to a better scale.
The Battle UI will now independently scale the UI if necessary for proper display - this is done independently of the general UI Scale setting.
Warlord AI is now better at threat evaluation and army management.
Warlord AI is now better at planning new site construction and hiring new workers.
Warlord AI will now prefer higher-tier units, when possible.
Wizard AI is now capable of picking a Focus mastery, which is more important now that there is a stacking bonus from keeping the same Focus for 10+ Turns. It also helps make them slightly more thematic in their progress.
Fixed a bug where a resurgent Independent Realm (ie post-rebellion) would still have the dormant flag set. This messed with intra-AI diplomacy and a number of mechanics.
Fixed a bug where the battle UI would have buttons and text panels placed outside of the visible area - even when using UI Scaling.
Fixed a bug where tower expansions that do allow duplicates could be constructed in multiples anyway by doing this in parallel.
Fixed a bug where an 'empty' Entangle effect would linger. The Stat modifier was being removed correctly. Now the parent effect is removed as expected.
Fixed a bug where the AI would build copper quarries on marble deposits.
Patch 1.0.1.59
Rebalanced Mine, Logging Camp, Vineyard, Fishing Village and Quarry resource output. Some have been buffed and some have been nerfed. Volcanoes now improve the output of adjacent hex mines. Fishing Villages now produce Trade Goods in addition to Food.
Greatly increased the Lumber bonus from Primordial Trees.
New Game Setting - Mine Output: You can choose half, normal or double output for mines and quarries (affects all factions).
The E key can now be used to execute the planned movement order for a selected army.
Level 0 Masteries can now be abandoned, returning them to the state of not being unlocked. They will have to be unlocked again. Click a Mastery in the Table or All view to do this.
Not-yet-unlocked Masteries can now be blocked (and unblocked) from the Mastery Views.
Wizard Research Projects are now sorted alphabetically.
When unavailable Research Projects are toggled, already researched projects are no longer included.
Wizard AI has been tweaked to be less relaxed about launching attacks against superior armies.
Improved the diminishing return mechanism for Prospectors, making it much less likely that they will discover a steady flow of new resources.
The Base Production shown when previewing hex build options is no longer rounded, but shows accurate amounts including decimals.
Rebels will now sometimes execute leaders of cities they liberate.
Mana Nodes now show their expected 'payout' time in turns and mastery progress per turn as part of the Bind tooltip.
The last unit in an Army can now be disbanded.
Beast Mastery now gains progress from Insect Hive specials in the realm of a Wizard.
Life Mastery now gains progress from Primordial Trees specials in the realm of a Wizard.
Dark Pact quests will now usually yield Mastery Progress on completion.
Dwarf Units now have the Hardy ability and +1 Melee Shock.
Vampire Units can now replenish and have been buffed.
Added Celestial Phoenixes. The same three tiers exist as for the other types of Phoenixes.
Fixed a bug where Champions and Quartermasters were not included in various mechanics that traversed all characters in an army.
Fixed a bug where rebels liberating a city would interact weirdly with tolerated leaders and unrest.
Fixed a bug where 1-distance army movement plans could not be created.
Fixed a bug affecting Scales of Justices and targeting.
Fixed a number of bugs where the movement history/plan line was not updated/cleared.
