Survivalist: Invisible Strain News

Hey everyone, happy 2023! Here's what I've been up to for the latest patch:

• Steam Deck - support for 1280x800 resolution without black bars (except in menus), better support for controllers navigating menus, and suchlike
  
• Added options to show metric weights and fahrenheit
  
• Added Power Nap button on character inventory page in multiplayer, which you can use once per day to fast forward a character's sleep. Because using the actual fast-forward button for that can be a bit awkward for co-op players.
  
  
  
  
• Added caffeine drinks (old cans of soda) that reduce your sleep deprivation
  
• Added sleeping snoring sound
  
• Increased insulation on puffy jackets and beanies, and reduced on camo jackets, to try and make it more of a trade-off and encourage more clothing variation
  
• Added policy to clothing dialog to not strip particular items of clothing (e.g. when trying to find warmer ones). You may need to set this now if you want to stop them changing their helmets for beanies when it's cold.
  
  
  
  
• Added separate option for vsync count in Graphics Settings, and made graphics quality settings save to registry rather than settings file so they can be different on different machines
  
• Implemented Log Page
  
  
  
  
• Changed the way morale is calculated so the effect on morale of a particular memory fades more quickly over time (trying to stop people from moping around forever just because something bad happened 3 weeks ago)
  
• Less figdetty idle holding rifle animation
  
• Tweaked some of the clothing models
  
• Italian and Latin American Spanish updated, fixes for some wine criticism translation bugs
  
• You can build on top of bushes and tree stumps, which automatically clears them. You can also build on top of fences to upgrade them to different types of fences.
  
  
  
  
• If someone falls unconscious from body temperature falling below 28°, they will need to get above 30° to recover (fix for bug where they get into a loop of recovering, walking away to get clothes, and immediately falling over)
  
• If you set raider percentage above 25%, this reduces the cooldown time between raiders of that type
  
• Added Load Favourite button in debug menu character editor
  
• Fix for NPCs telling you someone dead or unconscious is looking for a fisticuffs challenger
  
• Fix for bug introduced last patch where equipment amounts on character creation screen are all red zeros
  
• Fix for bug where allying with a community that was previously at war with another community, that was defeated, causes the defeated community to send mercenaries against you
  
• Fix for builder getting stuck in a loop going in and out of a building just outside their zone
  
• Fix for other communities sometimes buying seeds from your characters even if you have ticked Don't Share
  
• Fix for being able to view NPCs inventory by pressing F1 on the Notes/Brain Scan page
  
• Fix for extorters waiting at your gates sometimes not talking to you when you come out to them
  
• Crash fixes
  

EDIT - I've added a mini-patch (v175) to fix a few crashes, here's the change list for that:

• Some more menu navigation fixes
  
• Italian translation updated and typo fixes
  
• Crash fixes
  

[h3]What's this publicbeta thing?[/h3]
v175 will be in the "publicbeta" branch for a while, before pushing it to the main game. If you want to try the latest features as they come out (and help test them!) it's a good idea to start using this branch. But keep in mind:

• Because it's the bleeding edge it could be less stable
  
• If you want to be able to play online co-op with someone you'll need to be on the same version as them
  
• If you go back from the "publicbeta" branch to the main branch you may not be able to load savegames created on "publicbeta".

To use publicbeta, just right-click on Survivalist: Invisible Strain in your Steam library and go to Properties, then Betas and in the drop-down select "publicbeta".

I've finally got round to adding a basket and checkout system on the trading screen! If you've played a Bethesda Fallout game or similar RPG you know how this works - you can add multiple items from your inventory and the trader's inventory to a basket, then click Confirm to make the trade. This means you can barter for items even if neither of you have a large enough amount of gold to cover their total cost. It's been on my todo list for a while.



A few months ago I introduced a shortcut when trading and transferring items where right-clicking on them would transfer the whole stack instead of showing you the dialog where you set the amount to transfer. If you left clicked it showed the dialog, which I made it default to 1 item. So if you wanted to transfer 1 item you would left click then mash OK, if you wanted to transfer all you would right click.

But I think I got it the wrong way round. I've changed it so right-click transfers 1 item immediately, and left click shows the dialog (still), but defaulting to All. So if you want to transfer 1 item you right click, if you want to transfer All you left click and mash OK. The advantage of this is if you want to transfer, say, 2 or 3 items you can just repeatedly mash right-click without having to operate the dialog box. So I think it's better, but it does take a bit of getting used to if you just got used to the other shortcut - sorry about that.

Other cool stuff: I added distinct map icons for traders and leaders in AI settlements, and for unconscious people. And I made the speeches people use when you ask how they're feeling, or their opinion of you, a bit more varied and more appropriate, so if you want a better idea of why they're feeling the way they are you can try asking them again.

Here's the full list:

• Basket & Checkout system on trading screen
  
• When transferring or trading equipment, right-click transfers 1 item instead of all the items. Left click shows the dialog to set the amount, which defaults to All.
  
• Hint about using Notes screen
  
• Allow Notes screen to be accessed from hovering over characters on map screen
  
• Fix for traders sometimes creating fires in the player's base
  
• When characters tell you their opinion of you, or their morale etc, there will be some variation in the memories they pick each time, and they will try to pick some that fit the way they are feeling, rather than just the strongest 3 each time
  
• Added distinct map icons for unconscious people, and for leaders and traders in AI settlements, also made the map icons higher resolution
  
• Fixed a few bugs with people joining your community
  
• Fix for one character picking up all the ammo
  
• Fix for chef getting who was set to auto-deposit wood getting stuck in a loop picking up wood for a fire, then depositing it again
  
• If extortion squads demand to be let into your gates while you are in combat with someone else, they won't escalate so quickly
  
• Made NPCs less likely to attack you if you pick up an unconscious community member of theirs who isn't close to a fire, and try to bring them to one
  
• Added theoretical support for Dutch and made languages page scrollable
  
• Fixed message when you try to give a book to someone twice saying you (the giver) has already read that
  
• Crash fixes
  
• Updated Korean, Lithuanian and Latin American Spanish translations
  

[h3]What's this publicbeta thing?[/h3]
v173 will be in the "publicbeta" branch for a while, before pushing it to the main game. If you want to try the latest features as they come out (and help test them!) it's a good idea to start using this branch. But keep in mind:

• Because it's the bleeding edge it could be less stable
  
• If you want to be able to play online co-op with someone you'll need to be on the same version as them
  
• If you go back from the "publicbeta" branch to the main branch you may not be able to load savegames created on "publicbeta".

To use publicbeta, just right-click on Survivalist: Invisible Strain in your Steam library and go to Properties, then Betas and in the drop-down select "publicbeta".

It's patch time! There's a lot of new dialog in this patch. It's a lot of little things, but probably the biggest addition is that when you ask people "What's up?" they will gossip about the skills of their other community members, telling you how bad someone is at archery or how great they are at construction, for example.

To help you keep track of all this I've introduced the Character Notes/Brain Scan screen. This was a feature in the original Survivalist - if you had a brain scanner, you could see a screen showing people's personality and opinions. I've reintroduced it, but you don't need a brain scanner. Their personality, relationships and skills are revealed as you discover them by talking to people. (If you have a brain scanner, everything is revealed automatically.) It's easiest to explain with a picture:



You can show that screen by highlighting a character and pressing B. I've also tried to make less likely that people will keep repeating the same lines in response to "What's up?", e.g. if you already know someone likes chili, they won't keep telling you that.

Another big dialog change is I rewrote the questions you ask to determine if someone has invisible strain. I wasn't very happy with the writing before. There are more of them now, and they're less waffly, and the responses are more varied so they help you discover people's personalities as well as if they have Invisible Strain. Speaking of Invisible Strain, infected characters can sometimes just silently kill people in your community now instead of biting them and spreading the infection.

[h3]Other notable additions[/h3]

I've tried to increase the difficulty of fighting NPC communities by making looter settlements hire mercenaries from outside the map to come and attack you, if you are at war with them.

You can make people run when doing tasks for you, by ticking an Urgent checkbox on the Role display on the Inventory screen. They'll also take less time to craft and build stuff. There's a trade-off - they'll get unhappy that you're overworking them. But they will also respect you a little bit. You can also toggle this Urgent setting on and off by pressing the Sprint button as they are going about their task.



Here's the full list:

• Added Notes/Brain Scan screen showing the personality, skills, relationships and memories of the person you are talking to, if they are known
  
• Added dialog in reply to What's Up where people tell you about the skills of others in their community
  
• Rewrote the Invisible Strain interrogation dialog, and added the option to accuse someone of having Invisible Strain (available once that interrogation dialog is discovered)
  
• Characters with Invisible Strain can sometimes just silently kill people instead of infecting them
  
• When you are at war with a looter settlement, they will hire mercenaries to attack you
  
• When recruiting people from AI settlements, if more than one would be joining you they will ask if that's okay first
  
• Added surrender dialog for if you carry an unconscious enemy back to your base and bandage them and look after them until they revive
  
• Dialog for if you try to make an alliance with a community whose leader is dead
  
• Ask someone who's drunk what's up, they might say something drunk. Ask someone who's bleeding/infected how they're feeling, they should say 'I need bandages/antigen!'
  
• Added some other bits of gossip dialog, and tweaked some of the existing lines
  
  
  
  
• Added personality type for liking snacks/sweet food, which you can gift cookies to
  
• Extortion squads will demand to be let into your gates instead of just overriding the permission state
  
• Made it possible to open gates of an enemy community if they are all unconscious
  
• Some tweaks to LeadershipDefeated memory to give morale boosts when you defeat raiders
  
• Some tweaks to how roles are displayed on the Community screen
  
• Added Urgent checkbox to roles, which makes them run when they go about the task. Using this makes them dislike you but slightly respect you a bit over time.
  
• People chopping wood etc to take over a building can take more than one piece at a time
  
• Fix for refugees having a negative 'LeftCommunity' memory of others from the group after they all join you
  
• Fix for bandaging sound not playing in multiplayer
  
• Fix for it being possible to throw things outside the terrain boundaries, which could then cause a crash
  
• Allow depressed characters to be controlled if there is no leader, so you can choose a new one
  
• Fix for characters being able to repair or capture buildings outside of their zone
  
• Fix for glitch when you go unconscious in a building and NPCs rescue you, where you teleport back to the building
  
• Fix for NPCs declaring war on you when you throw a single snowball at them
  
• Fix for Stop Role: Supplies command not working
  
• Fix for an odd bug where you sometimes can't speak to people after an Invisible Strain character is deleted somewhere
  
• Fix for some Cyrillic characters not displaying correctly
  
• Fix for same turf war/rebellion/intimidation quest being given twice after change of leader
  
• Possible fix for multithreading crash
  
• Made game less likely to crash if a quest in a mod is deleted
  

[h3]What's this publicbeta thing?[/h3]
v172 will be in the "publicbeta" branch for a while, before pushing it to the main game. If you want to try the latest features as they come out (and help test them!) it's a good idea to start using this branch. But keep in mind:

• Because it's the bleeding edge it could be less stable
  
• If you want to be able to play online co-op with someone you'll need to be on the same version as them
  
• If you go back from the "publicbeta" branch to the main branch you may not be able to load savegames created on "publicbeta".

To use publicbeta, just right-click on Survivalist: Invisible Strain in your Steam library and go to Properties, then Betas and in the drop-down select "publicbeta".

Hi everyone, I've released a new patch in the publicbeta branch. The main addition in this one is that when you are recruiting people, they won't join you if they have a family member or a friend or lover in the community they would leave behind, and that other person doesn't want to join. This means you can sometimes recruit a little chain of people at once, as someone brings all their relatives with them. Or sometimes you can't recruit someone because their spouse doesn't want to. That's just how the cookie crumbles. (Speaking of cookies, I stopped them from being used for gifts for now as they could be mass produced and given to anyone and so felt a bit too overpowered.)



When people leave your community they'll also take their friends/lovers/family with them. But they'll only leave if they all want to (or you kick one of them out). So I guess it's a little less likely that people will leave you when things go wrong. When recruiting from a group of refugees, they will all join you at once (regardless of whether they are related etc), as I felt it didn't really make sense for only one to join, when they are all looking for a home. Lastly, none of this applies if you threaten people to recruit them.

There has been a mod out for some time called Relationships Matter which did something similar to the above, but I've implemented it differently. So this should supersede that mod, but thank you to the mod author for filling in the gaps there while I worked on other things, I think it was one of the most commonly used mods and I greatly appreciated its existence. (If you are using the mod, remember v171 is still just in publicbeta, so don't stop using it until it gets into the main branch).

Here's the full changelist:

• Relationships matter when asking people to join your community
  
• Increased probability of guns on some of the mid-game raiders
  
• Fix for followers not depositing wood and minerals that they mine while following someone
  
• Slowed down limping non-zombie characters a little
  
• Fix for fleeing NPCs sometimes stopping and turning round while you are right behind them
  
• NPCs rescuing their teammates give up a little more easily when you shoot them
  
• Fix for trees sometimes being deleted when multiple lumberjacks chop them
  
• Fix for organizers dropping off clothes and backpacks after you set them to wear them
  
• Past tense versions of some memory speeches, for eulogies
  
• Fix for occasional crash when placing crops in multiplayer
  
• Fix for arrows and bullets bouncing off invisible buildings that are under construction
  
• Some new hints and tooltips introducing skills, bandages, shovels, assassinations and white strain
  
• Fix for characters getting into an infinite loop auto-depositing sealed containers which they were try to use to get water
  
• Fix for one of a stackable item being seen as insanely valuable gift when you have multiple of them in your inventory
  
• Fix for war breaking out between your community and NPCs if someone got zombified and someone else accidentally hurt a human while trying to shoot the zombie
  
• Stopped cookies from being used as gifts for now, they were too overpowered
  
• Reduced range at which you can hear footsteps, and added sliders for footstep sound range and volume in the Sound Debug menu
  
• Added SetSkill and SetPersonality events to script editor
  
• Editor crash fix
  
• Allow you to continue Turf War, Rebellion and Intimidation quests if they wanted the body of the leader, but they were buried, by just returning any other body from the community
  
• Fix for NPCs taking unconscious people to their base if enemies are currently in the base
  
• Fix for a case where NPCs sometimes got stuck forever in combat or just died of their wounds
  
• Fix for zombies sometimes running when the targeting display shows them as crippled (after you hit them with a molotov)
  

I'm also moving v170, which I released to publicbeta a couple of weeks ago, to the main branch. Here's what's in that:

• Sounds for footsteps, bushes, wind in leaves
  
• Fix for fleeing algorithm that meant rabbits etc would often run towards you instead of actually fleeing
  
• Fix for everyone in your community hating you if you destroy a snowman with molotovs
  
• Fix for blood loss recovering when you have unbandaged wounds from a blunt object
  
• Lumberjacks won't chop down baby trees
  
• Fix for big performance drop when a character is set on fire
  
• A few fixes for speeches characters say when finding resources
  

[h3]What's this publicbeta thing?[/h3]
v171 will be in the "publicbeta" branch for a while, before pushing it to the main game. If you want to try the latest features as they come out (and help test them!) it's a good idea to start using this branch. But keep in mind:

• Because it's the bleeding edge it could be less stable
  
• If you want to be able to play online co-op with someone you'll need to be on the same version as them
  
• If you go back from the "publicbeta" branch to the main branch you may not be able to load savegames created on "publicbeta".

To use publicbeta, just right-click on Survivalist: Invisible Strain in your Steam library and go to Properties, then Betas and in the drop-down select "publicbeta".

Hello, it's finally time for that big main branch update - the last one was in May, so all the work that's been in beta testing since then is now live for everyone ːsteamhappyː That's a lot of changes, so I'll just summarize some of the bigger new features here:

• Save tokens are much more rare, instead the game saves automatically when you open the menu, overwriting your previous save so if something tragic happens you have to commit to it instead of reloading, and it becomes part of the story (but you can still turn this off, as is the case in the Slightly Easier difficulty mode)
  
  
• There's a Constitution skill which lets you fall unconscious instead of dying of blood loss, if it's greater than 0. Food choices matters more since better food improves your constitution.
  
  
• If you fall unconscious and have no community members to revive you, other communities will 'rescue' you - this reduces your constitution. NPCs will try to rescue each other if they fall unconscious.
  
  
  
  
• Looter communities will send squads out to extort gold and other things from you
  
  
• You can make alliances with other communities
  
  
  
  
• You can assign multiple roles to the same person
  
  
  
  
• You can queue up multiple types of building, and multiple people can work on the same building
  
  
  
  
• You can choose where you want different types of equipment to be stored, and there's an Organizer role and Auto Deposit policy to do it
  
  
  
  
• There are new quests for stealing chickens, and giving NPCs food for the winter
  
  
• You can try to surrender to enemy settlements if you started a war with them
  
  
  
  

I've also released a new patch in the publicbeta branch, v170. The biggest addition is your character makes footstep sounds when they walk, with different sounds for the terrain type and weather of course! There's also new sounds for wind in the grass and trees, when the wind is strong.

• Sounds for footsteps, bushes, wind in leaves
  
• Fix for fleeing algorithm that meant rabbits etc would often run towards you instead of actually fleeing
  
• Fix for everyone in your community hating you if you destroy a snowman with molotovs
  
• Fix for blood loss recovering when you have unbandaged wounds from a blunt object
  
• Lumberjacks won't chop down baby trees
  
• Fix for big performance drop when a character is set on fire
  
• A few fixes for speeches characters say when finding resources
  

[h3]What's this publicbeta thing?[/h3]
v170 will be in the "publicbeta" branch for a while, before pushing it to the main game. If you want to try the latest features as they come out (and help test them!) it's a good idea to start using this branch. But keep in mind:

• Because it's the bleeding edge it could be less stable
  
• If you want to be able to play online co-op with someone you'll need to be on the same version as them
  
• If you go back from the "publicbeta" branch to the main branch you may not be able to load savegames created on "publicbeta".

To use publicbeta, just right-click on Survivalist: Invisible Strain in your Steam library and go to Properties, then Betas and in the drop-down select "publicbeta".