Meta-Power & Beta-Test
Hi,
finally we're drawing close to the next Major Update. Last missing Features are getting added, gaps are getting patched, bugs fixed and the weight of every decision is growing.
In the past four weeks I had to make some very tough choices what features to include/exclude in 0.11. So let's have a closer look what the 0.11 release is going to look like.
Organizational things first. At this moment Beta looks to be starting during the week June 9-15th (i.e. in two week's time from now the earliest). If all goes well, full release of 0.11 would happen in the first week of July.
However this update is huge (not perhaps by added playtime, but rather by code change size) so I'll try not to be too optimistic here.
My time-capacity will also be a bit smaller during end of June, so the odds are this beta could take 4 weeks or more to get things sorted out. I also decided to add some small features to the scope last-minute so not exactly made my life easier now (but hopefully will make it better later)
I promised to give you more details about the Judgement System so here goes.
[h3]Judgements will be Crises fought while in the Ascension Tree. [/h3]
That's basically all. But of course there is a ton of little details that matter...
[h2]What will cause a Judgement to appear?[/h2]
Same as for Crises, there will be several ways of summoning a Judgement. The main method will be through 'Locks' in between Ascension Tree nodes. Remember how you have to face Neolithic Revolution before researching Division of Labour in the Tech Tree? Same way Judgements will have their own 'locks' in Ascension tree and their role will be the same as Era Crises in Tech Tree - A Boss fight.
But as with Crises there will also be other ways to summon Judgements later on, involuntarily...
Work-in-Progress Judgement combat screen.
[h2]Where will Judgement be fought?[/h2]
Judgements will always be fought outside of the normal game screen after Ascending. You will not typically fight one every ascension. Initially this will be limited to specific thresholds in the Ascension Tree. A more generic combat system will emerge in Tier 4 (v0.12)!
[h2]What are Judgements?[/h2]
Judgement represents an unnamed higher power. Its purpose (or hers, since I chose to illustrate the Judgement as a feminine form) is to test if you are worthy of the powers you have. If you are considered unworthy, you will be pushed back.
Judgement is not evil or good, friend or enemy .... it is an essential part of your civilization itself. The part of you which will punish you for your own failings even if nothing else does. You will never be able to completely destroy it. (If you would, you would have no way to measure your worth!)
[h2]How can you overcome a Judgement?[/h2]
Because they are fought outside normal game, Judgements cannot be destroyed by Military or usual abilities. Instead a brand new set of 'Units' will be added to the game - for lack of a better name now let's call them 'Meta-Powers'.
[h3]Horn of Resolve[/h3]
First meta-power is already known because it already is in the game. Costing 1 Gold Lotus to buy (owning up to 3 at a time) I have reluctantly introduced the Horn early on as part of a 'patch' for difficulty. Besides its current in-game use it will have its own special effect on Judgements as well. However Horn of Resolve is not going to be accessible in Tier 3 (because Gold Lotuses aren't). We will revisit it in Tier 4 in the future.
[h3]Consonant of Cognition[/h3]
A new damage-dealing meta-power purchased for Black Lotus. It will deal small amount of damage to a Judgement and Expend one of it's attacks. It will be possible to use it in-game with similar effect (also being able to expend unblockable attacks).
[h3]Hymn to the Dead[/h3]
Hymn is the third meta-power added in 0.11. This one will be bought for a White Lotus. It will be capable of reducing Judgement Health percentage. It will also be useful in-game with a different effect of wiping all existing Predicaments and lowering Risks.
These are an initial set of meta-powers introduced in the upcoming update. Because of the large number of new features introduced in Tier 3 I decided to limit the exposure to Judgements only to a bare minimum and I will ramp that up as soon as the player moves on to Tier 4.
Because we're now closer to a mid-game in Tier 3 I am starting to open cookie boxes with some of the good stuff I prepared along the way. Let's name a few.
[h3]Hero Slot 5 and 6[/h3]
Both the extra slots will be available in Tier 3. They will work the same - allowing Unique Heroes only. However with the Introduction of Idols and Infusion, it will introduce more ways to combine your builds.
[h3]White lotus & Hymn of the Dead added also to Tier 2[/h3]
To reduce a big-bang introduction of three new types of Lotus in the same Tier I will add one of them earlier - The White Lotus will be added to Tier 2 Tree along with the Hymn Meta-Power.
This will give you an early tool against Predicaments before Tier 3 Idols.
[h3]Starting Research Level[/h3]
New Ascensions will be available increasing your starting Tech level. With each instance of this ascension you will automatically have one level of technology for free at the beginning of each game (all techs in the same vertical column). There will be limited number of this ascension obviously.
[h3]Extra Perk slots[/h3]
For an expensive price, you will be able to buy Ascensions increasing your Perk capacity permanently.
[h3]Wonder Magnitude[/h3]
You will be able to spend Secrets to multiply your Wonder effects (same as with Workshops). But be warned that your Tech era is limited basically to Neolithic in the Tier 3 so no Artemis/Zeus/Pyramid crazy stuff (yet).
[h2]Difficulty Settings coming[/h2]
After some contemplating I decided to introduce Difficulty settings to the game. But because I made this decision only about 2 weeks ago I'll have to do this in two steps. First I will add Normal & Easy difficulty in this update. Hard difficulty will be added in 0.12 hopefully along with a Hardcore option (perma-death).
My main reason to rush this feature in now is to let it settle down as early as possible. Because there's only 0.11 and 0.12 before full 1.0 there's only so much space to test this in real world.
So far the work on Tier 3 is on track of the January Roadmap and no significant changes were necessary. I will be doing my regular Roadmap update after 0.11 is out. But because this one update has been taking so long I thought it might be appropriate to talk about the long-term plan again a bit.
There's a huge amount of decision making still to be done. But there's a couple of points I can make already:
That's all for today. Stay tuned for the Beta and I hope I'll see you in two weeks time there.
Cheers,
Ondrej
finally we're drawing close to the next Major Update. Last missing Features are getting added, gaps are getting patched, bugs fixed and the weight of every decision is growing.
In the past four weeks I had to make some very tough choices what features to include/exclude in 0.11. So let's have a closer look what the 0.11 release is going to look like.
Beta test of 0.11
Organizational things first. At this moment Beta looks to be starting during the week June 9-15th (i.e. in two week's time from now the earliest). If all goes well, full release of 0.11 would happen in the first week of July.
However this update is huge (not perhaps by added playtime, but rather by code change size) so I'll try not to be too optimistic here.
My time-capacity will also be a bit smaller during end of June, so the odds are this beta could take 4 weeks or more to get things sorted out. I also decided to add some small features to the scope last-minute so not exactly made my life easier now (but hopefully will make it better later)
Judgement System
I promised to give you more details about the Judgement System so here goes.
[h3]Judgements will be Crises fought while in the Ascension Tree. [/h3]
That's basically all. But of course there is a ton of little details that matter...
[h2]What will cause a Judgement to appear?[/h2]
Same as for Crises, there will be several ways of summoning a Judgement. The main method will be through 'Locks' in between Ascension Tree nodes. Remember how you have to face Neolithic Revolution before researching Division of Labour in the Tech Tree? Same way Judgements will have their own 'locks' in Ascension tree and their role will be the same as Era Crises in Tech Tree - A Boss fight.
But as with Crises there will also be other ways to summon Judgements later on, involuntarily...
Work-in-Progress Judgement combat screen.[h2]Where will Judgement be fought?[/h2]
Judgements will always be fought outside of the normal game screen after Ascending. You will not typically fight one every ascension. Initially this will be limited to specific thresholds in the Ascension Tree. A more generic combat system will emerge in Tier 4 (v0.12)!
[h2]What are Judgements?[/h2]
Judgement represents an unnamed higher power. Its purpose (or hers, since I chose to illustrate the Judgement as a feminine form) is to test if you are worthy of the powers you have. If you are considered unworthy, you will be pushed back.
Judgement is not evil or good, friend or enemy .... it is an essential part of your civilization itself. The part of you which will punish you for your own failings even if nothing else does. You will never be able to completely destroy it. (If you would, you would have no way to measure your worth!)
[h2]How can you overcome a Judgement?[/h2]
Because they are fought outside normal game, Judgements cannot be destroyed by Military or usual abilities. Instead a brand new set of 'Units' will be added to the game - for lack of a better name now let's call them 'Meta-Powers'.
[h3]Horn of Resolve[/h3]
First meta-power is already known because it already is in the game. Costing 1 Gold Lotus to buy (owning up to 3 at a time) I have reluctantly introduced the Horn early on as part of a 'patch' for difficulty. Besides its current in-game use it will have its own special effect on Judgements as well. However Horn of Resolve is not going to be accessible in Tier 3 (because Gold Lotuses aren't). We will revisit it in Tier 4 in the future.
[h3]Consonant of Cognition[/h3]
A new damage-dealing meta-power purchased for Black Lotus. It will deal small amount of damage to a Judgement and Expend one of it's attacks. It will be possible to use it in-game with similar effect (also being able to expend unblockable attacks).
[h3]Hymn to the Dead[/h3]
Hymn is the third meta-power added in 0.11. This one will be bought for a White Lotus. It will be capable of reducing Judgement Health percentage. It will also be useful in-game with a different effect of wiping all existing Predicaments and lowering Risks.
These are an initial set of meta-powers introduced in the upcoming update. Because of the large number of new features introduced in Tier 3 I decided to limit the exposure to Judgements only to a bare minimum and I will ramp that up as soon as the player moves on to Tier 4.
Goodies
Because we're now closer to a mid-game in Tier 3 I am starting to open cookie boxes with some of the good stuff I prepared along the way. Let's name a few.
[h3]Hero Slot 5 and 6[/h3]
Both the extra slots will be available in Tier 3. They will work the same - allowing Unique Heroes only. However with the Introduction of Idols and Infusion, it will introduce more ways to combine your builds.
[h3]White lotus & Hymn of the Dead added also to Tier 2[/h3]
To reduce a big-bang introduction of three new types of Lotus in the same Tier I will add one of them earlier - The White Lotus will be added to Tier 2 Tree along with the Hymn Meta-Power.
This will give you an early tool against Predicaments before Tier 3 Idols.
[h3]Starting Research Level[/h3]
New Ascensions will be available increasing your starting Tech level. With each instance of this ascension you will automatically have one level of technology for free at the beginning of each game (all techs in the same vertical column). There will be limited number of this ascension obviously.
[h3]Extra Perk slots[/h3]
For an expensive price, you will be able to buy Ascensions increasing your Perk capacity permanently.
[h3]Wonder Magnitude[/h3]
You will be able to spend Secrets to multiply your Wonder effects (same as with Workshops). But be warned that your Tech era is limited basically to Neolithic in the Tier 3 so no Artemis/Zeus/Pyramid crazy stuff (yet).
[h2]Difficulty Settings coming[/h2]
After some contemplating I decided to introduce Difficulty settings to the game. But because I made this decision only about 2 weeks ago I'll have to do this in two steps. First I will add Normal & Easy difficulty in this update. Hard difficulty will be added in 0.12 hopefully along with a Hardcore option (perma-death).
My main reason to rush this feature in now is to let it settle down as early as possible. Because there's only 0.11 and 0.12 before full 1.0 there's only so much space to test this in real world.
Leaving Early Access with v1.0
So far the work on Tier 3 is on track of the January Roadmap and no significant changes were necessary. I will be doing my regular Roadmap update after 0.11 is out. But because this one update has been taking so long I thought it might be appropriate to talk about the long-term plan again a bit.
There's a huge amount of decision making still to be done. But there's a couple of points I can make already:
- I intend to leave Early Access before the end of this year.
- After leaving Early access I still have enough work in backlog for a minimum of two Major Updates (of about the same size as the quarterly major updates these days)
- I have not yet made my mind which other features to add before leaving Early Access and which to add after.
- Before version 1.0 (leaving Early access) there will still be another Major Update (v.0.12) roughly around September.
That's all for today. Stay tuned for the Beta and I hope I'll see you in two weeks time there.
Cheers,
Ondrej