Clanfolk News

Hi Everyone,

It has been a very busy two weeks, and the Testing Branch just got a Big Update.
Note: Anyone can join the Testing Branch under Clanfolk/Properties/Betas on Steam.

Here are the details.

Before I go into the tale of the last two weeks, for those of you who just want the high level info, here it is:

[h3]New Stuff:[/h3]

• Beavers
  
• Swimming
  
• New Better Shoreline System
  
• Natural River Generation
  
• Bridges
  
• Piers that can be built on!
  

For those who want to know how this all came about, please pull up a chair.

This is the tale of how one thing lead to another and two weeks of unplanned work was born.

So two weeks ago, after working intensely on the Story Generator systems for the previous few months, I decided, "Hey, I should add something cool for players for the weekend!"


It all started with a Beaver.

I decided, Beavers are cool, lets add them as that weekend surprise. I got to work modifying the Bunny template, then made some AI tweaks and there were Beavers in the game. Woohoo. I set up the art, then made a Beaver Lodge and things were going quite smoothly and all in time for the weekend. (two weeks ago)

Then it struck me when I saw the Beavers... walking on water... Oh no. Beavers must swim! But how can beavers swim on a 2d plane!?! Soo... That lead to me having to create the concept of Water Depth. To have Water Depth, I needed to add a new camera to the game that could write depth data that the other cameras could use to determine what to draw and what not to draw. So after a few more days, tada! Beavers were swimming, and it looked pretty good! So I tried a few more animals and they swam mostly sensibly, but sometimes floated a little high or low, nothing to serious. It was all cool.

Then I put a person in the water... Annnnnnnd their clothing went semi transparent and their bits were showing... Originally water was semi transparent, but Humans have a dozen layers of clothing on them, that all went semi transparent and suddenly you could see through the cloak, jacket, shirt, and braises. Oh no. So after banging my head on the keyboard, I reworked the water and converted it to opaque (which in the end does look better) Crisis averted, and now Everyone Swims with their modesty intact!

Now we have swimming Beavers and Water Depth. The Water Depth had a very interesting side effect in that the shoreline got a LOT more realistic where the terrain leading up the the shore was now visible and would appear an disappear with the waves. So this was a big win as well. I was feeling pretty great.

I decided to show a preview pic of the new changes to one of my go to players/friends on Discord, and to paraphrase the response. "Cool!, but Beavers are kind of lame without Rivers." My triumphant unveiling was properly crushed and a brain worm was now loose in my head. I had worked so hard on this new feature, but if players first response was going to be "Where are the Rivers?" this was going to be a problem. I mean Beavers need highways too I suppose...

So, I got to thinking and thinking and grumbling and thinking. I never thought natural looking Rivers would work with square tiles, but I set out to at least make an attempt to see for sure. I owed Beavers that much for giving me Swimming and Water Depth.

After the first day of experiments, Rivers were functional. They looked like ruler drawn lines between Lakes, but they did work. There was enough there to keep a grip on, so I continued. The next day, I started applying noise textures to the river flow, and the hard lines started getting natural and wavy, then I started varying their width in places, and finally I created some narrows for animal crossings and unbelievably, Rivers looked great! I was thrilled.



Ok, so a week had now passed since Beavers, but there was lots of good new stuff so it was all worth it. Time to generate a testing build... (this was about a week ago)

Animal crossings... Oh no. What about "People Crossings"... So now that there was swimming, do people really want to take a dip to cross a River 10x a day. I needed Bridges too! That meant building on water and breaking a bunch of very specific "Never On Water" rules everywhere in the game. So back to experimenting.

After a couple more days and a few tears, simple bridges started to work. As a side note, for a while people were swimming in the stone of the bridges instead of walking on them, which was a sight to behold. And by early this week, Bridges were functional, but they did not feel "Bridgey."

Next I did an experiment with the shaders to generate some railings on the bridges, and much to my surprise, they looked amazing. They even rounded off the ends. I was thrilled. Then I realized that they ALSO rounded off then ends whenever not connected to a path. So that looked terrible, especially with double wide bridges. A bunch of rules later and the bridges were open in the right spots and railed in the right spots and things were finally looking done.

By now I had some pretty nice looking bridges and was planning on writing some rules to enforce that bridges be 1 lane. I didn't want people paving lakes for example. On a whim, I tried to make one last Mega Wide Bridge before enforcing the single lane, just to see how it looked. For whatever reason, I decided to roof the path to the bridge, then it happened. I could roof the path, BUT not the bridge... There was still a "Don't Even Think About Building Here" rule for Water that was heavily bent for Floors to become Bridges, but what about Walls and Roofs!?!?! That was getting nuts because then bridges support walls which support roofs or decorations. What about other Objects built on the bridge. What if the Bridge Deck was removed? It was best to avoid this insanity.



So I asked my Son's opinion of my big wide unroofed test bridge. Would people "really" want roofs on their bridges thaaaat badly? He just kept chanting "Lake House, Lake House" and then made some jazz hands. The decision was made... Not only would we need to Roof the bridges, but we needed Piers and Decks to allow that lakeside house. I can't resist Jazz Hands accompanying an idea.

So another couple days of breaking rules that were never meant to be broken, and it was done. I built a beautiful deck coming off of a bedroom next to a lake. I also added some decorations to the floor and placed a roof over it. I was thrilled. Tomorrow would be the big day where I unveil this secret project!

So it was Thursday now (Yesterday,) and I was going through some final tests and just looking at the bridges, feeling pretty happy with them, but something was bothering me. They were STILL flat. they had rails, but no lighting. They weren't "there" like all the other world objects. It was time for one last experiment.

So since I had the data that was used to produce the railings, I tried sending that info along to the lighting engine, and sure enough the Bridges popped right off of the ground and suddenly began creating shadows like everything else. Yes!

Then the race was on to get the build out yesterday, but the Beavers had one final trick up their sleeve. In my final tests of the build, I thought: "You know, I really should test the beavers one last time since they started all this," and sure enough, they were moonwalking. This turned out to be a new pathfinding issue due to them being aquatic and not having the usual water slowdown with movement. It is never a good idea to push a build in the evening, so that got us to this morning and here we are.

I hope you enjoyed a glimpse into the crazy adventure started by just wanting to add a Beaver for fun.

Please note: It is highly likely the Testing Branch will have a few issues because of the amount of new material in there over such a short time. I will try to get these fixed as quickly as possible.

I will also be going back to fixing bugs and reading emails etc. I have been very much "in the zone" again over the last couple weeks so I am just coming up for air again now.

Thanks very much for your support!

Andrew Hume (Blorf)
MinMax Games Ltd.

From now until March 10th, you can get Clanfolk at 25% off! Come check the game out!

[previewyoutube][/previewyoutube]

https://store.steampowered.com/app/1700870/Clanfolk/

Hi Everyone,

The Negotiation System now has a working Story Element in the Testing Branch! It will still be a while until this reaches the Default Branch as it needs more testing, but it now works and anyone can opt in to try it today.

The Testing Branch is open to everyone and is available via Steam/Clanfolk/Properties/Betas

The Negotiation System turned out be be quite complex due to the interaction of so many game systems to make Negotiation work as a live event vs a traditional instant dialogue tree, but that is the cool part so I think it is worth the extra time.

As part of v0.457 there are many other new mechanics to be aware of as well (part of why this update took a while)

Note: There is a single prototype Negotiation Event right now. It is triggered by denying the Outcast Father when he arrives looking for the Outcast Mother. Wait a few days and it will happen.

Lets dive into all the new stuff!

[h2]The Negotiation System[/h2]


The Negotiation System is a Live Event that is triggered by a Messenger. In this case, Lauchlan wants Janat and Keneth to come with him. Lauchlan has also brought backup after being turned away the first time.

The Player has the option to Send them Away or start a Brawl at any time, but the options to keep Janat and Keneth are gated behind Authority and Courage Thresholds. This is where the Live Negotiation happens. The Player needs to finesse the Courage and Authority bars to unlock the options they desire before patience runs out.

Note: Though always available, brawling is a very dangerous option and should be considered a failure case. More on that below.

[h3]Patience[/h3]
Patience will lower over time as the Negotiation progresses. When Patience runs out, a failure case will trigger. In this example the failure case would be a Brawl. Tempers got to hot.

Patience can decrease more quickly if the Opponent feels threatened and more slowly if they are in a dominant position.

[h3]Conversation Topics[/h3]
The major factor in Patience reduction is the conversation flow. When the flow is left on Natural, this can be seen as the conversation topics flowing logically from one to the next. On the other hand, imagine moving the slider all the way to Intimidation. This means your Clan Leader will ONLY pick intimidating topics, and the Opponents patience will go down much more quickly.

Opponent: "Wow looks like rain"
Clan Leader: "You have a very punchable face"

Opponent: "What a nice rug"
Clan Leader: "You really do have a very punchable face"

Listening to that would get tiring quickly, which is what I am trying to model here.

Another important piece of the puzzle are two new skills Intimidation and Persuasion. I will go into more detail on these below, but someone who is very persuasive will do much more Authority "damage" to the Opponent when a Persuasion topic is picked. This is the same for Courage and Intimidation.

[h3]Authority[/h3]
Authority is the Opponent's sense of being "in the right" and conversely the Clan Leader's sense of being "in the wrong." When Authority is maxed, the Opponent will choose an outcome and the Clan Leader will have to agree because they have been out debated.

On the other hand, if the Clan Leader moved the Authority bar to zero, the Opponent will give up their argument and leave.

Authority changes based on both sides Persuasion skills. So trying to out talk a very smooth talking messenger could be difficult. There are ways to help with this though.

Authority can be influenced by the Environment. As seen in the Picture above, Jon lead Lachlan into the Clan Hall, which is very large and also richly appointed. Lachlan has gotten the affliction "Such Luxury" from the surrounding area. Lachlan is very impressed and as such, his Authority constantly takes a small decrease every second.

So WHERE the argument takes place really matters. Talking to a Tax collector in a Grand Hall would not be a good idea.

[h3]Courage[/h3]
Courage is the Opponent's will to fight. When the Opponent's Courage Bar reached zero, they will flee, but if it reaches the Maximum, the Clan will surrender and give in to the Opponent's demands.

An important note on Courage is that if a Brawl does break out, the Initial Courage values of the Opponent's side will be determined by the Courage Bar location when the negotiation ended. Low courage opponents are quite easy to scare off with a show of force or knocking a few down.

The Player Clan's Courage will be the inverse of the Opponent's Courage. So if the Opponent is at 20%, the Player Clan will be at 80%. So handling a Negotiation well can put you in a much better position in a Brawl!

[h3]Signal For Backup[/h3]
Signal For Backup can also be a very powerful option. In some cases, it it smart to let the Opponent think that they are in a much stronger position. Having greater numbers than the Clan Leader will make the Opponent lose patience more slowly. This can give the Clan Leader time to make more convincing arguments and win via Authority.

In the picture above, Lachlan has the "Overwhelming" affliction. This is because he has 3 guards with him, all glaring at Jon while they Negotiate. Lachlan's Courage increases quickly, but his Patience decreases more slowly, which can be used to the Player's advantage.

On the other hand, if the Player wants to Scare Off Lachlan and his cronies, then a full show of force should do the trick as well. In some cases, sacring off the Opponent would be a very bad idea, so again the Negotiation flow needs to be tailored to the outcomes that the Player wants to unlock.

[h3]Negotiation Summary[/h3]
Since the Negotiation flows over time, the Player has some control over its outcome based on the Conversation topics chosen, the Environment, as well as the amount of Backup they have.

As a Negotiation progresses, it is important to adapt to the flow of the conversation. If it turns out that Intimidation just is not working, then perhaps a compromise option unlocked with Persuasion could give a good enough compromise.


[h2]New Skills[/h2]
To make all this work, two new Skill have been added, Persuasion, and Intimidation.

[h3]Persuasion[/h3]
Persuasion will directly modify Authority changes in Negotiation, but the addition of this new skill also may have some other cool side effects. Since Persuasion is a Skill, it can have a priority. This means that it could potentially be some Clanfolk's job to "Cheer People Up" when they are not working on higher priority tasks.

So imagine guests who were close to leaving due to low satisfaction having someone look after them a bit. This opens the door to more hospitality options that I am excited about.

Currently, the Persuasion Skill is levelled up via Talking. So the Clanfolk with high Social needs will tend to be the best at Persuasion over time because they talk the most :)

[h3]Intimidation[/h3]
Intimidation will directly modify Courage changes in a Negotiation, but it also increases the damage done in Brawls.

Intimidation values increase via hard labor. Things like Hauling and Chopping Trees create the biggest gains.

Intimidation Skill Priority determines WHEN a Clanfolk will provide backup in a Negotiation. If the skill is at the bottom of the list, they will only come during free time. If it is at the top of the list, they will come as soon as they finish their current task.

When a Brawl erupts, everyone with the Intimidation Skill active will drop their current task and participate. (Babies don't Brawl though)

Those with the Intimidation Skill Disabled will Hide during a Brawl.


[h2]Brawling[/h2]

When a Negotiation fails, sometimes the outcome may be a Brawl. Brawling does not use weapons and is not meant to be fatal. It is a failure case in a Negotiation where long term injuries are possible.

I struggled with the idea of Combat in Clanfolk quite a bit. Initially, when Negotiations were a normal Dialog Tree instead of a Live Event as they are now, I considered making the Brawl Injuries a dice roll as part of the Dialog tree, but once the Live Negotiation happened, the Brawling had to be Live to feel right.

The Important outcome of Brawls is the threat of Injuries and Avoiding them. The Player should consider less optimal compromises in a Negotiation to prevent a Brawl from happening. In some cases it is better to compromise than risk an injury.

Brawls track two forms of "Health." There is the Health Bar, which will get knocked down as the fighting progresses, leading to a Knock Out state. There is also the Courage Bar. It is possible to Scare away opponents in a Brawl. As an Opponent is surrounded or sees their ally Knocked Out, their Courage goes down and eventually they will flee.

[h3]Knock Outs and Injuries[/h3]
As a Brawl progresses, people get Knocked Out as their health gets low. The Higher the Intimidation Skill, the more damage done during a Brawl, and the less likely Damage will be taken.

When a Knockout does happen, there is a change of Injury. These new Injuries are the most important part of the system, and I think will add a lot of flavor to the personal stories of each Clanfolk.

I will be writing an Injury Manager System to handle distributing a wide variety of these afflictions in the future, but for now the test case is a broken left or right arm. This will lower work efficiently drastically until healed and should make the player thing twice about throwing punches.

[h3]Brawling Optional[/h3]
I have put quite a lot of thought into making the Brawling fit into the peaceful but also historically accurate atmosphere of Clanfolk, but in the case where players just do not want to have it ever happen, there will be an option to bypass this stage in a Negotiation as well.

[h3]Clan Leader (Future Content)[/h3]
Currently the Clan Leader comes up a lot in the descriptions above. The Clan Leader is currently auto picked as the oldest Clan Member, but I plan to add a new system to choose them as well as have story outcomes to this selection in the future.

I am very excited to hear your thoughts on the Negotiation System.

Thanks again everyone!

Andrew Hume (Blorf)
MinMax Games Ltd.

Hi Everyone,

I have been unusually quiet for the last few weeks (post Winter Holidays,) and I wanted to let everyone know what I have been up to and that I did not fall into a snowbank somewhere :)

My brain has been totally occupied with a new system that has caused a domino effect with other cool potential additions, which I shall explain below.

Note: Usually I update the Testing Branch at least a couple times a week, and I know the testing branch crew (anyone can join) have been particularly wondering what's going on. I have not been able to update the testing branch because the system that I am currently working on is very much in progress, evolving and quite large.

[h2]So What Happened[/h2]
When I got back to work after the holidays, the first thing I did was continue the Outcast Mother's story with "The Father Returns" That eureka moment mentioned in the Update 13 notes where I was able to create group based tasks via the Story Element system allowed me to assign some Guards to the Outcast Father, and that is where things got...interesting, and where the last 3 weeks vanished for me in the blink of an eye.

So the Outcast Father comes back demanding the Mother and Child return. This lead me to do a lot of thinking and MANY prototypes on what conflict could mean in Clanfolk. The Outcast Father likely would not just leave, so there had to be the danger of a fight. So how to to handle this?

I didn't want to dive straight into traditional combat, so I needed something completely different and hopefully more personal. I also needed a system that would work for Tax Collectors, Emissaries from the King, and Conflict from within the Clan. One system to rule them all. If the end result was a fight, how did we get there? The important part is why did the fight break out.

So after many iterations, I am ready to at least explain the system and show the current interface. It is vitally important to explain that this is a glimpse of current development and the end result may change as I work on it and get opinions. But you all do deserve to at least see what is going on behind the scenes and what it all currently means. So again, this is "in-progress" design work and over the last few weeks have undergone a lot of iteration and this is likely not final, but I am very excited about showing it none the less.



So, the Negotiation System is now fully integrated into the Story Element system, and some Story Element choices will now trigger Negotiations.

A Negotiation is a real time conversation between your Clan Leader (more on this later) and a Messenger of some sort (in this case a very angry Father.)

The goal in the Negotiation is to move the Patience, Authority, and Courage values to the required thresholds to allow the desired choice to be picked. It is like a battle of wits.

The Negotiation progresses between the two Clanfolk, each speaking and responding based on their Personality Traits (more on this later.) The Player guides the flow of the conversation, using the Conversation Topics slider seen in the picture above.

This is a balancing act because the further the player deviates from the Clanfolk's natural personality, the more forced the conversation becomes and the quicker the Patience decreases. Patience reaching 0 is a failure case for the conversation, and in this case would mean a fight breaks out.

The player wants a particular outcome, BUT, the Clan Leader is their own person and will tend to have either a more Aggressive or Persuasive personality type. This means that when an Aggressive person picks an Aggressive conversation topic, that topic would have more impact overall. They are just better at being intimidating.

Having a very aggressive leader negotiate with the Angry Father is probably very effective (and believable), but not so much with a Tax Collector who has the might of the King behind them. The player may shift the conversation topics slider to the Persuasive side, but the more they shift the conversation, the less natural it will be and the quicker patience decreases.

The Conversation will progress live in the game and the other non player participant will make their own choices as well. So while the Patience ticks down, the conversation will start to unfold and between the Clan Leader's personality and the Other. The Player does their best to weight the topics to get the result they want, but it is not guaranteed. So the choice of Clan Leader directly impacts what choices likely become available as the Negotiation progresses.

If we look at the image above, for "Demand Andrew leaves the area" to be valid, Andrew's Courage needs to be quite low, and Andrew's sense of Authority also must be diminished. On the other hand, this demand can be made at any Patience level. So the player wants to get the White lines into the dark yellow portions of the meter by guiding the Conversation... Or using other means.

[h2]Other Means[/h2]
A very powerful side effect of the Negotiation taking place over time is that environmental factors can also modify how the Authority and Courage values change over time. Triggering the Negotiation in a favorable environment can add environmental Afflictions to either side of the Negotiation. A couple scenarios below will demonstrate.

In the Case where it is desirable to have the Courage bar very low, the Player could position some of their Clanfolk near the Negotiation as backup. In the picture above, Poor William is all alone, facing Andrew and three guards, but in the case where William had a dozen Clanfolk supporting him, Andrew's Courage would naturally decrease over time as an "Outnumbered" Affliction could be triggered.

In the Case of trying to impress a visitor, Meeting them in a grandly appointed Clan Hall, could give just the authority boost needed. On the other hand, meeting the Tax Collector next to the dump may be a smart idea if trying to explain how poorly the Clan has been doing.

Currently these examples are all theoretical, but I really love the idea of these Negotiations taking place over time like a little mental battle and having unit placement and environment matter.

[h2]Clan Leader[/h2]
The Idea of a Clan Leader has been on my mind for a while, but now with the Negotiation System, their role has become very important. The choice of leader and their personality would really guide the future of the Clan.

The system for choosing the Clan leader as well as the outcomes from within the Clan if multiple people thought themselves in line for the role will also lead to a whole new set of Negotiations and interpersonal relationships/alliances.

The Clan Leader system will likely develop over time as the Negotiation System itself is the priority right now. For Update 14, I want to focus mainly on expanding the Story Generator using the new Negotiation System which puts us in a great position for delivering the Year 2+ content in an interesting way. I suspect Update 15 will be about fleshing out the Clan Leader system.

[h2]Elephant in the Room[/h2]
So, this whole Outcast Father returns with guards has lead to another obvious question. Combat? Well not exactly. I want to keep to the spirit of Clanfolk which is a peaceful homstead in 1300's Scotland and not the front line of a warzone. But I also realize that in some cases arguments will get physical, and I think there is a good solution to this.

In 1300's Scotland, there were still laws and people having disputes did not randomly murder each other, for the most part. So in the case where words fail them, the Clanfolk will be able to get physical, but not stabby. This system will be an extension of the Negotiation system and is directly connected to Courage/Intimidation.

The goal is not to kill an opponent, it is to get them to flee or surrender. Based on the outcome of a Negotiation, the level of the Courage bar will be given to all the "enemies" on the map. (but modified by their personal attributes. This means new quirks like being fearless or a coward come into play)

So a fight can break out, but this Courage bar is "mostly" what is taking the brunt of the damage vs health (though health will go down, and more importantly injuries will happen.) Again, unit placement is important here. Someone who is surrounded will have a negative Courage affliction, diminishing their courage per second. Call the deerhounds, enemy afraid of dogs, boom, they may flee.

If someone gets pushed, or a particularly nasty insult is thrown from the nearby mob, or is hit with a Haggis, more Courage loss.

So the end result is supposed to be more of a brawl, with shoving, insults, and positioning. The goal is to make it interesting to watch, but also remaining mostly hands off. I don't want this to be an RTS or a bloodbath. Just an argument that got out of control.

There are a few large positives from this. Injuries are a great way to modify gameplay and give some long term consequences. All kinds of new quirks become valuable in relation to personality. And we don't kill off our story actors, so the Player can get to know them when they return looking for trouble in the future.

I am going to get back to work on this now. As you can see there are a LOT of moving and interconnected parts, but the whole interconnectedness is what I think will make it awesome :)

Thanks again everyone!

Andrew Hume (Blorf)
MinMax Games Ltd.

Hi everyone!

Clanfolk is currently on sale for 25% off. At the end of the sale, the price of the game will be raised to reflect advancements made during Early Access. We wanted to provide advance notice in case anyone would like to purchase the game at the current discounted price.

Thank you for all of your support!

https://store.steampowered.com/app/1700870/Clanfolk/

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