No Creeps Were Harmed TD News

START CRED DIFFICULTY CHANGES
Start cred differences based on difficulty are now percentages instead of a fixed value.

TWEAKS
-Improvements to random maps to ensure helper tiles are always present (boosters, Gleep vats, etc).
-Relay map base start cred increased from 250 to 300.

FIXES
-Shield power will scale with hyper creeps similar to how health scales.
-Player start cred split is applied after bonuses from XP level (co-op only).
-Fixed late game hyper creeps awarding score after the player has lost the map.
-Fixed Toxic Launcher having a hard time shooting straight up or down in some cases (please keep an eye out for weirdness).
-Fixed XP not changing sometimes at very high XP levels.

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UPDATE 0.6.0 VARIANCE! Variance
Check out 6 new maps, 4 of which CHANGE every time you play them!?!? The rest of the silly story is complete (English only .. for now). Frenzied creeps! New artifact mods, experimental controller mode, and way more!

MORE STORY (English only ... for now)
The rest of the story is now complete, bringing the total number of chapters to 15. You can of course keep playing afterwards. The story was always intended to be a minor goofy feature. I hope you enjoy!

RANDOMIZED MAPS (Experimental)
This update features a new map type (randomized). Random maps are DIFFICULT challenges that change every time you play. Due to their difficulty, you will find them at the very bottom of the map list. Randomized maps have a mixture of authored and generated content. The map still has an overall designed shape and layout, but bridges, tiles, creep types, and other elements are semi-random. Randomized maps have a higher endless score rate compared to static maps.

6 NEW MAPS!
-Relay (Static)
-Shrouded (Static)
-Gnarled (Randomized)
-Astray (Randomized)
-Stacks (Randomized)
-Twisted (Randomized)

EARLY XP RATE CHANGES
I’ve slowed down the level rate a little bit in the early part of the game in hopes of not having the player get overwhelmed with new stuff. This “might” result in some players no longer having access to structures they normally would until they reach the new unlock gate.

ARTIFACT ART CHANGES
The artifact icons that use to look like “a weird thingy” have been changed to simply show the icon for the turret or unit it focuses on.

SCORE BONUS CHANGES
The score bonus rate will be “higher” early on, but will taper off and become harder to increase as the number gets larger. Currently the new value is “roughly” tuned that your score bonus values will only be higher unless you’ve completed all maps with high scores, in which case you may notice a tiny decrease. This change was necessary due to how many new maps are being included every update, all of which can increase your bonus score rate. Now the map list can grow indefinitely without totally breaking the scoring and artifact system.

CONTROLLER MODE (VERY Experimental)
You can enable controller mode from the main options menu. This setting will override various mouse and keyboard functions (for now), so using both modes like some kind of octopus isn’t currently supported (maybe later). I expect this feature will go through quite a few growing pains, hence the experimental state. Please send any bugs or feedback my way (Steam forums, Discord, E-mail, etc).

NEW ARTIFACT MODS
Ground Pounder: Boost Self On Fire (range).
Beam Emitter: Boost Self On Fire (damage).
Ranger Turret: Reverse Time On Hit.
Lag Field: Periodic Self Boost (range).
Flame Turbine: Penetrate Shot.
Brian Jar: Toxic Cloud On Hit.
Chain Bolter: Freeze Wave On Hit.
Snap Trap: Reverse Time On Hit.
Toxic Launcher: Boost Self On Fire (damage).
Mini-You: Toxic Cloud On Hit.
SRM Launcher: Vortex Bomb On Hit

TERMINOLOGY
-All Best Scores now changed to Meta Score.

TWEAKS
-Tweaks to make artifacts tend to pick more related stats.
-All damage and all health artifact stats are highlighted if they effect the target object (artifacts).
-All damage artifact stats now increase the damage of Genocide Strike and Vortex Bomb.
-Loot sort type is now saved.
-Boost tile effects are lifted to appear on top of the walls so you know the booster is underneath.
-Periodic freeze wave artifact for Lag Field rate increased to every 7.5 seconds from 10 seconds.
-Clicking on a selected object while holding shift will now deselect it.
-Slight adjustment to map selection button colors.
-Tweak to “how to play” images (different artifact icons).
-New tips added.
-Tutorial for artifacts is persistently on the artifact menu now.
-Map and artifact scroll bars will remember their positions (note: map scroll will always focus on the next playable map until you have completed all of them).
-Improved leaderboards reporting.
-Bunch of UI tweaks and improvements.

FIXES
-Fixed Toxic Launcher sometimes not being able to hit targets it should.
-Fixed instant reload artifacts sometimes triggering another instant reload, and so on.
-Fixed Bricks sometimes staying on fire forever (rare).
-Fixed periodic artifacts triggering more often than they should be.
-Fixed All best scores (meta score) being one map behind when uploading to the leaderboards.
-Fixed All best scores (meta score) reporting zeros on leaderboards.
-Fixed damage over time types (toxic, fire) not correctly modifying the damage values for creeps that can scale damage (Bricks, Skits). All damage is now modified on contact.
-Fixed case where sometimes artifacts would generate the same item.
-Fixed some missing Japanese story dialog.
-Fixed a few cases where victory score would read as victory XP.

STRANDED CREEP CHANGES
Creeps teleport back to their starting point if stranded or walled in, instead of being killed. Stranded creeps have their health restored AND still cause mutation of other creeps. Stranded creeps are frenzied one level (see below).

FRENZIED CREEPS (Experimental)
-Creeps now have a frenzied level. Creeps are frenzied if the get stranded, or if they get old.
-Stranding creeps repeatedly will continue to increase the frenzy level (no limit).
-Every 5 minutes a creeps frenzy level will increase by 1 (Roamers and Stingers excluded).
-Frenzied creeps will move faster depending on the frenzy level (200% at level 1, 300% at level 2, etc).

AUTO UPGRADE IMPROVEMENTS
-You can now flip through auto upgrade structures by right clicking on the auto upgrade button (left side panel).
-You can now “cancel all” auto upgrades by shift + right clicking on either the left side panel button or upgrade buttons on the selection card. The left side panel will cancel every auto upgrade, while the selection card buttons will only cancel matching upgrade types if selected.
-Auto upgrade tool-tips adjusted.

TERMINOLOGY
-Easy difficulty renamed to “Reduced”.
-Very Easy difficulty renamed to “Casual”.

TWEAKS
-Easy (Reduced) difficulty extra start cred increased to 850 from 750.
-Very Easy (Casual) difficulty extra start cred increased from 2500 from 2250.
-Booster structure max count reduced to 5 from 10.
-Removed “Kills” from main selection card (moved to advanced tool-tip).
-Added more in game tips (can be seen when selecting maps).
-Callout width increased, allowing more text to be shown without encroaching on the middle of the screen.
-Improved stranded creep detection.
-Base creep old age death timer increased from 8.5 minutes to 15 minutes of game time (Roamer excluded).

FIXES
-Added some safety code to prevent Stingers from sometimes getting stuck in the geometry (rare).

SPLITTERS CREEP CHANGES
-Splitters will only split twice per creep at maximum (3 generations total).
-The final split will always be Critters.
-3 Critters will spawn instead of 2 if the parent Splitter creep level is higher than 1.
-Second generation levels are no longer limited. This means that a Hyper Splitter level 10 will split into 2 Hyper Splitters at level 9, and then into 6 Hyper Critters at level 8.
-Splitter description slightly adjusted.
-Splitter reward values reduced from 1, 1.5, 2.5, 4, 7.5, 10 to 1, 1.5, 2, 3, 5, 7.5 (Note: This was reduced since most of the rewards you get will be from the final critter spawns, which are now not limited in level).

OVERDRIVE DAMAGE VALUE CHANGES
-Default for most turrets is now 6% from 5%.
-Artillery remains at 5%.
-SRM Launcher reduced to 4% from 5%.
-Beam Emitter increased to 5% from 4%.
-Ground Pounter increased to 4% from 3%.

TUNING
-Ground Pounder final range upgrade removed.
-Ground Pounder health upgrades changed from 1500, 2500, 3500, 7500 to 1500, 2500, 7500.
-SRM Launcher final fire rate upgrade reduced from 1.2 to 1.
-SRM purchase cost increased to 450 from 425.
-SRM upgrade cost increased to 185 from 180.
-Increased max driller escape damage from 5% per hyper creep level to 7.5%.

TWEAKS
-Start Pow text changed to Max Pow (clarity).
-Remove per map difficulty text (misleading).

FIXES
-Mini-You will no longer frenzy reload when hovering over their spawner while attacking something.
-Fixed callouts flickering in size at low fps.

ADVANCED STATS
You can now view some advanced stats when you mouse over the title header when selecting a unit you own. Kills, kills per wave, total damage, damage per wave, and total upgrade counts have been moved to this popup. All base stats are listed here as well, which are unmodified by boosters and artifacts (for you number enthusiasts).

TWEAKS
-Fixed sell price not including overdrive levels.
-UI tweaks for overdrive button.
-Slight tweak to how overdrive damage is calculated so it plays nice with boosters.
-Beam Emitter overdrive damage reduced from 5% to 4%.
-Ground Pounder overdrive damage reduced from 5% to 3%.