- Tanglewood's spawned weeds renamed and tooltips improved
- Panning and zoom now work when hovered over cards
- Fixed cases where armor/evade would not be reduced from object damage
- Fixed consume cards being recovered by effects targeting exhaust
- Fixed thrix babies not moving or animating in final boss
- Marked card/buff text clarified as it does not effect non combat damage
- Misc text fixes
Zor: Pilgrimage of the Slorfs
Tuning update follow up patch
Major Tuning Update
Summary
This update focuses on clarity and consistency, with the goal of creating a simpler more robust set of board rules that never involve guesswork or memorization. The tactics should be about tempo, position, planning and card play. Not memorizing the various weird cases where there are exceptions to the normal rules or complex behaviors.
Streamlining or reworking the rules and designs that contribute to confusion or ambiguity
The pattern we have seen in videos and feedback is that there is a frustrating amount of ambiguity with the rules, and that that isn't really a good fit for a game with such high stakes to every decision. "I didn't know that would happen" is something that just kills us to see, and we are striving to completely eliminate those moments from the game.
Increasing the consistency and amount of information
The other side of the coin, is there is too much hidden information, so in tandem with the above we will be surfacing more information that is missing and creating categories and keywords with predictable rules so you know what the deal is at a glance.
Performance and stability
Ongoing work on tech debt and improving the core systems continues, this time focusing on card interaction and animation
Also, there are a few things in the game that take up a huge chunk of the dev time dealing with edge cases and bugs so we took that as a sign they are too complex and streamlined them to fit the adjusted core rules.
Core Changes
Every game element is now categorized as one of the following types:
Slorf, Enemy, Object and Terrain
The rules these types must conform to:
- Enemies always appear in the turn sequence, have a turn, and must be cleared to get camp card
- Objects are never in the turn sequence (although they may have end round effects), and can always be harvested and removed
- Terrain is inherent to the tile, and can have effects, but can never be removed or harvested
- Buffs can always apply to Enemies and Slorfs, and never to Objects or Terrain
Every existing game element that was in a grey area between these has been reworked to fit the new rules (see tuning section below)
Effects
All effects are visible in the tooltip in a box showing which of these causes trigger them:
Enter Tile
Enter effects happen when entering the tile, but no longer are allowed to occur at the end of the turn.
Only Slorf's trigger enter effects (enemies don't each mushrooms, fall in sinksand)
Harvest
Harvesting always removes the target, no exceptions (sinksand, giant mushroom, etc)
Every object can be harvested (harvest can remove boulders, trees)
Destroy
This effect happens on destruction of enemy/object
End Round
After the entire turn sequence is over, these effects resolve in sequence before the next round starts
When an end round effect happens, the camera always shows it (things like lightning strikes, grubs)
Enemies Cleared
These effects happen as enemies are cleared (Eg. bug eggs going inactive)
Evening is no longer a term, and is replaced by "if enemies are cleared"
General: Effects can no longer fail to resolve. Examples: Walking on mushrooms at full food, using a nut card at full health
Content
New crafted card
Sticky Trap - Structure, Immobilizes an enemy in range during end round, and is removed from tile
Tuning
Reworks
Underflock
- Were in a grey area between an object and an enemy, so have been promoted to full enemies of the Slorfs
- Elevator removed (for now)
- New behavior suited to an enemy with a turn rather than the reaction of a game object
- Turrets now have two versions and get stronger later in the game
- Is now terrain
- Fills water at end round, rather than on entering the adjacent tile
- Were in a grey area, and graves complexity caused confusion and bugs so streamlined
- Ghost are now an enemy with evade and low health but retaining that horrifying 99 attack
- Graves are now an enemy and have been reworked to have a turn
- Now explodes during end round after being damaged instead of instantly
- Cycling spike behavior removed (will be used for special levels in future, but not in the general pool)
- Nests now lay in wait and attack any Slorf standing in the tile at end round phase
- Now appear side by side and made clearer that you choose one
- Note, you can get both effects with an area harvest
Misc
- Enemies clear check moved to end of turn (safer, avoids happening middle of a sequence of events due to area, etc)
- Slorfs can no longer attack their own structures
- Tutorial writing improved and some tuning to level 2
- Rotating turret no longer turns in a direction with no tiles, and reverses direction instead (scanning back and forth)
- Fish in pond made huge and obvious
- Root mother range increased so they don't just do nothing on their turn
- Bug egg, conforming to object rules, can be harvested to remove safely (from a distance)
- You can harvest glyphs as well as enter them
- Cards tuck downward when not able to be selected
- Attribute keywords used in cards/behaviors shown in tooltip (tree, water, thrix, etc)
Bug Fixes
Fixed issue where widgets failed to remove, resulting in performance getting worse over time
Fixed entity HUD disappearing until rolling over a card
Maximum panning momentum of map clamped to avoid rare cases where map can go flying 100km
Slorf hex is no longer a clickable move hex during movement
Work/Labor now recognizes buffs when deciding which card to discount
Ranged Thrix no longer prepares an attack vs a stealthed slorf
Fixed instances of loot animation being delayed by other animations
Fixed glare enemy buff tooltip text that referred to the enemy drawing cards
Burrowing Thrix no longer loses Mark buff when retreating
Sept 14th - Hotfix
Turn got out of sync on thrix babies hiding, leading to a crash.
Also:
Stinkleaf now visually clearer that it blocks flying
Only one lightning can occupy a hex
Ambush buff tooltip corrected to +2 damage
The Card Update!
The Card Update
We hope everyone is enjoying ZOR, and is as excited as we are to start seeing fresh content and tuning in the patch notes.
There are many areas we want to focus on, and we decided to start with cards. Adding new cards, and balancing existing cards in the roster. Of course, we are constantly fixing bugs and improving the experience too!
New Cards
Prepare (Triobelisk, Move) - 1 food: 1 action, +1 damage next turn. Upgrade -> 2 food cost, 2 action, +2 damage next turn
Foresight (Upgrade, Move) - 2 food: 2 actions, draw 2 cards. Upgrade -> draw 3 cards
Disengage (Upgrade, Attack) - 1 water: 1 damage, step back 2 tiles and gain stealth for 1 turn. Upgrade-> 4 tiles
Mark (Upgrade, Attack) [Exhaust] - 1 water: 1 damage, range 3, target receives +1 damage when attacked. Upgrade -> range 6
Shredder - (Crafted, Attack) [Consume] - 2 water: 1 damage, range 4, bleed. After impact the spinner spawns on a tile at the impact site
Poison Bait (Crafted, Effect, Structure) [Consume] - poison the attacker for 3 turns
Barbed Shield (Crafted, Effect) [Exhaust] - 1 water: gain 2 armor, gain thorns for 2 turns
Snack (Crafted, Effect) [Exhaust] - gain 2 food (share)
Drink (Crafted, Effect) [Exhaust] - gain 3 water (share)
Harpoon (Crafted, Harvest) 2 water: harvest at range 4
New Clearing
Dunes - midway through the warren, you may stumble on this battle of wits where you face a gustwood across a maze of sinksand
Tuning
Note: Free cards remove too much tension from the game which is at the core of what makes ZOR tick so we have removed many cases of them, especially attack and move cards. However, making costs cheaper via secondary methods is still alive and well (day fire, work)
Sneak - reworked: gives extra slorf turns instead of skipping enemy turns (a subtle but meaningful difference, and clearer)
Dig Stick - reworked: recipe in early pool and cheap to make, cost 2. Additionally harvests the tile beyond the target
Hiking staff - reworked: no attacks, food cost 1, 3 actions
Run - reworked: interaction rules removed, now a cheap long distance move with no attacks that exhausts
Collect - cost reduced
Cyclops wand - cost of 1 water
Work - exhausts, upgrade removes exhaust
Rock flinger - distance increased, nut flinger no longer a component of recipe
Thrix enrage - now +2 damage for 2 turns but does not stack
Thrix babies now hide when all Thrix are eliminated and not all enemies
Food placement in early ringed level improved
Delays tuned and simplified to improve consistency of turn flow timing and feel
Lots of tooltip and text polish
Bug Fixes
Area harvest hang fixed - system reworked to be safer and resolve in sequence
When swapping the player can scroll
Climb bonus now effects attacking uphill
Hypno thrix can target decoys, and respects stealth
Unmaker can now target non enemies at close range
Food previews disappear when thrix babies leave
Jump no longer stops map from panning
Encourage aura hides at appropriate time
Work can no longer target a 0 cost card in hand
Charge behavior fixed and clarified - does not enter any hex but final tile. Note: Escaping quicksand via attack cards like charge is intended (since immobilization is simple being unable to use move cards and nothing more)
Sept 5th Update
Bug fixes
Dig deep card info fixed
Underflock turret overlapping path issues fixed
Shaken berries can now handle hex height
Grass resource no longer named sticks
Turn sequence issues fixed by addressing some tech debt
Turn sequence HUD widget handling improved (more tech debt)
Auras can now display on mixed heights thanks to Gavin shader wizardry
Cursor show and hide logic made more bulletproof
Upgrade button can no longer be clicked when invisible
Upgrade button setup improved to reduce weird glitchy cases
Tuning
Cost now shown in crafting tooltip
Gustwood can no longer appear in the quicksand level in pilgrimage mode. Note: The difficulty of that combo can be fun for an expert player, but is extreme compared to everything else at that point so considered an imbalance
Gustwood replaced with a bug nest in trial level 4
Extra food was sprinkled in the trial mode
Trial boss map improved so objects don't cluster in one spot
Tutorial Hulga rescue now explains that the Slorfs share cards
Tutorial Hulga rescue level now reveals and locks card hand more appropriately for messages coming up
Tutorial message popup button now orange
ZOR has arrived!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wZGLiJMxbls
Early Access Roadmap
It’s been posted on the main page but in case you haven’t seen it, here’s the roadmap for ZOR. What you see above are the current plans for features and updates coming around the corner. Since we’re launching in Early Access there’s still a lot of development ahead, and we’re looking forward to seeing your feedback on the game and adjusting the roadmap accordingly. So what you see may not be set in stone but it gives you a good idea of what we’re planning for ZOR going forward.
Feedback & Community
As the game launches, we’d love to hear your feedback on the game and are always open to suggestions. Feel free to post here in the Steam forums, or better yet, check out our Righteous Hammer Games Discord, where you can see updates and join our community,
Thank you so much for your interest and support. We hope you enjoy ZOR! If you do, we’d really appreciate it if you had time to leave a review or comment. We’ll be posting more updates on Steam soon, so check back often.
- Righteous Hammer Games
ZOR: Pilgrimage of the Slorfs
August 31st bug fixes
Rare case where a Slorf does not spawn in trial boss level fixed
Fixed issue where bugs killed on Grimp boss kill would be stuck an unresolved state
The roasting spit upgrade now working (buff to food gains)
Empty message no longer comes up when health cost paid for Strain card
Crafting screen tooltip and layout no longer go off screen in certain resolutions
Fixed issue where rapid hovering could leave the tooltip stuck visible
Card snap glow no longer stays after canceling card play
Digest, Digging Stick, Underflock Blaster info now matches behaviour (the digging stick still loves you though!)
Armor sfx now conform to volume settings
Tuning
Bugs no longer auto killed on defeat of the Grimp monstrosity (they still do in the trial)
Developer ZOR stream
Development Diary #4
Strategic Snacking
Believe it or not, eating in ZOR is more tactical than some combat systems. How, where and when you eat can be life or death as you try to grab a snack between monsters trying to rip your head off.
Movement cards cost food to use, and Slorfs only have 8 to spend at start which is not nearly enough for the full day. So you need to include eating in your game plan.
Food isn't always a matter of just gobbling it up like pac man, there are different sources and methods of getting food, each with their own tactical considerations.
Foraged food
In each clearing you will find some food is just lying there, and you autmoatically eat it entering the tile. With these, its just a matter of working it into your path, dividing between the slorfs and not wasting any.
Dynamic food
Some sources of food are more dynamic than the previous options so a bit more thought is required. In order from left to right:
- The Flying Grub grows in size each turn and then takes off into the sky like a tiny blimp. Grab it at its biggest for the most food, but don't get greedy and miss it entirely
- Nomadic Grubs are always on the move for reasons that don't concern Slorfs. Just realize they aren't staying put!
- Burrowing Grubs will hide in the ground one by one, grab them as soon as possible for the biggest snack
Harvested food
These food sources require breaking a sweat to acquire, so you must spend your water reserves and use a harvest card. This action will also use up the Slorfs entire turn, so there is even more to think about. In order from left to right:
- Giant Mushroom's will fill your food to maximum so plan ahead and wait until you are on the edge for the most value.
- The Fish Pond will give you a fish card which you can share or save for crafting recipes at camp.
- Mushroom Stump isn't anything special, just a more inconvenient source of food. Whether to use a card on these depends on the situation.
Food cards
Like the fish mentioned above, some food can be carried around. These are added to your hand as an effect card. Save them for crafting soups and stews, or if you decide, consume it during the game. If Slorfs are adjacent they share and both get the food, so try to plan ahead for that huge value!
The perfect soup isn't worth dying for
Get ready to set up camp, ZOR is coming next month!
We know you’ve been patiently waiting to find out when you can get your hands on more Slorf adventures, and we can finally tell you: ZOR is launching in Early Access on August 30! We’re working on creating a new trailer to show off gameplay from the upcoming build.
And we have another cool announcement to make, ZOR will be a part of Yogscast’s Tiny Teams event August 1-8! Check out the livestream on Twitch to see new ZOR gameplay as well as other games from small studios. In preparation for these events, the ZOR demo will end this weekend.
We’re looking forward to sharing ZOR with you all and hearing your feedback! If you haven’t already, make sure to wishlist the game here on Steam and follow us on Twitter for updates.
- Righteous Hammer Games