Robber Knight News

As you know, this project has been planned for 5 years, because thanks to our cooperation with you, the list of ideas has grown considerably longer than the original and literally everything has changed - including the developer.
In the last post, we informed you that we need about 7 months, to go through the next two points on the road-map.

0.34 - All found bugs fixed, Fast travel from certain places with carts, water buckets and wine skin to fill in the river, return of the bigger premade buildings.
0.35 - Added community suggestions like 3rd person, controller support, numbers on hot bars, turning off head bob etc. Level system based on doing an activity. Life AI or pre-built buildings so that those non-builders can also enjoy the magnificent knight mansions.

[h2]Early Access[/h2]

This is a very specific state of the game. Where the player has to show a lot of trust in the developer that the developer will not abandon the project and the developer often has to grit his teeth reading unflattering comments, even though he knows the product is not even halfway there.
However, it's this specific form that allows us to stay on top of things with you and ultimately deliver a game that we will all be proud of.

Let me remind you again that this is version 0.33, a very early alpha. This means that a great many things will be added and a lot of activities will be smoothed out. And again thank you for your support, all of you who understand this, support us strongly, and cheer.

[h2]I am less active in interacting with you[/h2]

It costs a lot of time to make a game, so I just can't write back to everyone, but I'm reading, checking the recordings, and looking for what annoys you in the game so that we don't duplicate these mistakes in the next update.

And again, many thanks to Bender, Skinny, JoeFried, Han solo, Mad Kitty, Oberonu, Opi-Alt for all the hard work in building our comunity in particular on discord - https://discord.gg/Vy3amSjDfT you are welcome whether for help or to submit your ideas/needs

[h2]Trouble with castle construction[/h2]

Due to the fact that there is no possibility of terraforming in the project (we are considering the possibility of adding this to the game. It is recommended that you begin castle construction by laying the foundations in the construction area.
Towers

To add towers to the walls you need to start with a proper connector for either the round tower or the diamond tower. Unfortunately, at this point a tower can be a connector between walls, a corner, or a junction, there is no possibility of other snap towers.

Player castle projects

Sn4keeye

Bender

[h2]2 gameplays[/h2]


[previewyoutube]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QXmxFg_Pal0[/previewyoutube]
[previewyoutube]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O8Nhx7suMOI[/previewyoutube]


The next update will be in a month - February 16. For the duration of the code repair I will give up on 2-weekly updates because I don't want to pester you with messages like hey we're alive, unless you really want it then let me know



- Elimination of Crashes caused by animal spawn optimization logic
- Changes to animal spawn logic so that animals do not fall from the sky but are born on the ground
- Disappearing mouse after death in co-op for client
- Missing German translations
- Polish Translation

If there's anything missing in them let us know. (except the traders there is a bug preventing the translation to appear in it)

- fixed icons for stone mason items
- dialogue UI optimization (little performance fix nothing seeable for the player)
- Trade UI optimization (little performance fix nothing seeable for the player)
- AI performance optimization, eliminating unsued tasks, – first step on bringing them back and adding AI life
- Animal AI animation performance optimization – another little step to make the game more fluent.
- A fix in an AI optimization tool, to make it more efficient – Another little step in performance fixes.
- Gathering points (Villages, quarries etc.) several performance fixes
- Network performance fix – changing the AI state „checker” to only server insted of server and client
- Border logic (preventing you from going over the map) – Performance update
- „Water box” Logic responsible for drinking and slow water movement – performance update
- Removed particle from digging clay – it was not nice but was giving a big performance hit.
- Save function performance optimization – removing not important data from the save system

Well except the crashes fixed, this period will be not very fascinating for you as gamers but in few months you will feel a big difference in the game performance and we will be able to deliver the full road-map.

[h2]Next update: 16 February.[/h2]

It will be focused on fixing new problems you report during the month(hopefully not the crashes anymore), more performance fixes, Co-op fixes, but it's main focus will be on making the game UI and building system more transparent.

Because we have around 600 items and buildings possibilities in game, but I see, a lot of them are known by maybe 15% of the players.

Your humble scribe and developer
Sartorian

Welcome Dear Knights and Princesess

After a much longer time than we expected and a lot more troubles we finally have new content for you, a lot! Please read the patch notes to avoid any confussion. The game will be a survival/builder for some time. We have to fix the code to be able to add NPCs and their live rutine, gatherable foliage (on the bigger map it was imposible to keep), and to deliver the road-map we have together agreed on and worked so hard to create. One more time, thank you for all the heart you all pure into our project. It is very motivating.

Unfortunately what we have now is not prepared for such a great road-map/game. So we will fix it. What is sort of according to plan - cause the next points on the road map are:

0.34 – All found bugs fixed, Fast travel from certain places with carts, water buckets and wine skin to fill in the river, return of the bigger premade buildings.
0.35 – Added community suggestions like 3rd person, controller support, numbers on hot bars, turning off head bob etc.

We have just found a lot more than we wished for ːsteamfacepalmː :D


16.12.2023

! You have to start a new game because of the new map and many new options !

[h3]What is new[/h3]

-New, bigger, map with a lot good places to build and to visit(just for fun there is no loot in them - not yet).
- CO-OP
- You can build your own Castle in 5 styles Limestone, Slatestone, Granite, Brick, Sandstone (unlockable with the mason skill)
- New graphics (I still have to work on the light but new materials and textures should make you a lot happier - For your fun there is no limit on the parts you can build, but please use with caution.
- Quests "from the narrator" explaining the game.
- Gathering points (villages, mines, fishing huts etc.) to buy (24 of them to generate resources for you),
- More merchants in game, on the road you can find trading posts and a merchant in it.
- Tons of new items, buildings and materials. I have not counted by I think around 100, maybe more. In it a lot of copper, bronze, iron and steel weapons, armor parts.
- Scale armor and swords like grossmesser, estoc, flamberge.
- 5 types of trees with different wood from it
- Mineable rocks
- Iron, copper, tin found in cave walls not only on ground
- A new building system, with special foundations to even the land, 7 tiers (slate, limestone, sandstone, brick, pine wood, spruce wood, bavarian-plaster to upgrade your house as you choose. And much more types of floors(marble, granite, ceramic) that you can now place also as an overlay on the foundation.
- The first tier is now very cheap, so you can lay out the plan for your mansion very fast. And put your afford and time in the final project you would like to make. Not in the plan itself.
- Tons of decorative items, to make yourself feel at home like tables, beds, cupboards, paintings, chests, chairs, benches
- Cooking with new dishes and places to get all the resources you need for it.
- New cooking resources like for example wheat, beans, flour, bread, mushrooms, dry meat instead of food rations and salt.
- 5 tiers of tools, each tier allows you to gather resources faster.
- Knowledge tab under K that helps you learn the game
- Rivers used as map borders, so you always know where you will crash into an Alpha wall.
- New map and mini map with your friends visible on it and for now one shared marker. + Marked intresting spots like mines or merchants. For now we just want you to have fun building.
- Under B you can check if you are on claimed area. Or where they are around you.
- Arrows sticking to enemies and corpses (Only single player)
- Chance to break and arrow during attack
- Backpacks giving you more lifting capacity and slots


[h3]Down for maintance but will be back[/h3]

- Caravans
- Other NPCs than merchants
- Gatherable foliage
- Loot on map
- Bandits in ruins
- Quests from NPCs (quite obvious but just to be sure)


[h3]Fixed/changed[/h3]

- Easier leveling due to the lack of caravans
- The big buildings are reduced to build in house, on foundation, floors versions. They will stay so until we upgrade the premade building on land building system.
- The roof does not crush in the middle
- The basic tools are now made for free. If you need the resources to build, you can mine stone or get tons of sticks from a log to build. It is made mainly for performance reasons.
- no more wood decal on hitting for example stone
- Fixes in icons and item names
- The map is accurately showing players position
- Map scrolled and zoomed in with the mouse
- 100% return of raw materials after destroying a building
- Easier to position buildings on the landscape
- Fixed hitboxes on mineables
- Fixed dmg applying on trees and mineables

[h2]Next steps for the game[/h2]

You can play in peace at least for the next 7 months. During this period we will work on rewriting the code, and eliminating the bugs in it so we can make a great game, we all deserve.

- During that period there will be small, non destructive updates with new items, animals at least once a month.

- You don`t have to report bugs from this version as we have a very long list to fix. Of course if something will crush your game or destroy your fun - let us know. We will try to fix it out of the
queue.

- I will continue to give you a small report once every 2 weeks. But I will make a christmass break - lasting until 16 January

So I Wish you all Happy Christmass, a great new year and a lot of fun with the new update, I hope you will enjoy it.

Your humble scribe and developer
Sartorian

P.S Cannot wait for all the things you build with the new system. Cheers!

Welcome Dear Companions

[h2]CO-OP[/h2]

So there is the co-op on the beta version. So you can test it out.
It is very simple to connect. Just press multiplayer, create game

IMPORTANT

You must remember about making a password for the session. For now the option without password is blocked out. (You will be able to create a session but no one will be able to join)

To join the game - multiplayer, join game - find you friends session, enter the password and play.

[h2]Some bad news but not very bad[/h2]

After a long fight we have to admit the code is complete toast. So there is no option for us to make a living world in it - without crashes.

How we plan to fix it. The next update will be the castle and co-op update

But we have to take down most of the npcs( so unfortunately any story with it - it will be replaced with some classic survival quests "coming from God". So the game will be a survival/builder/co-op for some time. Fortunately 80% of you are builders so you will still have fun, in the time we will be fixing the game to make it bigger and achieve the road-map we made together.

Despite the failure, the next update is still huge. 16 December it will hit Steam - small chance for next Friday.

0.32 - Co-op up to 4 people
0.33 – Castle update – You will be able to build your own stronghold with towers and drawbridges.

[h2]So to sum it up[/h2]

You will get this two points + many, many bonus points including a new map and upgraded graphics. But so you can play without crashes and drops in fps we have to turn out some function like for example NPCs, Caravans and the quests from conversations.

It will of course all come back. But we have to rewrite big parts of the code to deliver you a polished expierience.

Sn4keeye was so nice to make a video of a castle he build in beta. Good info is he made it from the new house/village building parts. Imagine what he will achieve when he will recieve the new 110 parts from the Castle.

[previewyoutube][/previewyoutube]

Have a nice week.

Hello

Unfortunately, this 2-week was full of unexpected difficulties and the discovery that some things have errors much deeper than we expected.

But don't worry, it doesn't faze us, it just takes longer than we anticipated.

[h2]The biggest difficulties[/h2].

1. caravans and crashes associated with them

2. the appearance of more NPCs in some place, causes an immediate significant drop in fps. You can already experience this in Harta.

3. Objects hidden on the map and ordinary items to collect. They also cause problems. If they are in greater numbers in a given place, for example, a field of flowers, reeds on a river bank, x single coins scattered on the ground.

On fixing or rather improving this we now focus. Because theoretically on a small game it works but you guys don't want a small game. Over the course of early access we plan to make a really great and big game. Therefore, the more patience we will show now. We and you. The more enjoyable the next stages and the game itself at the end will be.

And unfortunately we have one more difficulty on the way, we are working in a building from the 70s and the electrical grid is going down. Therefore, we will have at least a 3-day break.

[h2]Overall plan[/h2].

We still have 11 A4 pages of bugs to fix, including the 3 serious ones mentioned above.

In Co-op, we are stuck on a dialogue system. So that not only the host can interact with the NPC but every player.

Therefore, I think it will be reasonable if we fix these 3 big bugs, add new quests and release an update.

And we will fix these 11 pages already with you in the game. These are mostly things in the series of funny not spoiling the game very much. Type - axe blends into tree, comical ragdoll, lack of sounds in some buildings, typos etc.

[h2]Thank you[/h2].

We have already been supported by 5000 knights, for which we thank you very much. Thank you for having the courage to believe in something new and for your willingness to be a pioneer blazing the trail to a great game.

P.S Anticipating questions on blackfriday there will be no promotion. As the current price will be the best you can get throughout Early Access and at least 4 years afterwards.

Welcome, dear Knights and Princesses.

So we are cleaning the project up pretty fast. There is a lot to do - so the game can support more NPC and the incoming AI life. But we are getting there.

In the meantime, I'm getting my head stuffed with medieval books, so I hope you will like the new quests that are coming with the next official update. The quests will last for about 4 hours. It is not much, but I remind you the main story will come when we finish up all the features from the road-map.

Co-op is also very close from being playable. With the next beta branch update in 2 weeks, it will be available for testing.


Changes to the beta-branch on 04.11.2022

- ammo (arrow and bolt) stick in enemies and corpses,
- They stick into tress without activating them as a resource (a little performance upgrade)
- The arrows bounce off stones
- 25% chance to break for arrows/bolts
- Mining - no more problems with mining.
- hatchet - works from the first hit on the tree, instead of only activating the tree. (no one even noticed ;P)
- pickaxe - same fix as for the tress, but with mining.
- marble - Is mineable.
- vegetation disappears under buildings (newly built)
- when you destroy a building - ammo drops on the floor to collect
- new look for bolts
- tools: hatchet, pickaxe in versions: bronze, copper, iron, steel have the correct materials
- Modular_Ceiling_Bavarian removed, was a duplicate for brick
- Modular ceiling - bad destruct fixed for slate
- destructible-material replaced for Slates:
- change of scale for bread furnace + barrel (decrease)
- reduction of ore from mine for stonemason ore
- change in stone production in stonemason - decrease
- milk +90 hydration; water weight 0.5
- icons for items + modular
- bread furnace - bug fix - that on pickup it was converting into a regular furnace
- leather bag - in addition to adding slots in inventory (+5), also raises lifting capacity +10, reduced its weight itself - to 0.5 kg
- Added backpack: adds + 20 slots and +50 weight, can be produced in Tailor Workshop

And some screens from the Beta-Branch from the Community

Warzeus


Sn4keeye


Next information in 2 weeks. As I switched to bi-weekly updates to save some time for the work on the game. The next update will be with a sum up video with all the changes to the first version of the game, as we will be really close to the official update.

Have a nice week
Your humble scribe and developer Sartorian