Pioneers of Pagonia News

[h3]Dear Pioneers,[/h3]

Enjoy watching a pre-recorded session of our Dev-Team playing Pioneers of Pagonia in our shared co-op multiplayer mode! Would you play Pioneers of Pagonia together with your friends?

https://store.steampowered.com/app/2155180/Pioneers_of_Pagonia/

[h2]0.13.1 - Hotfix 1[/h2]

[h3]Fixes[/h3]
Fixed UI layout issues in predefined maps screen
Some localization fixes
Fixed a rare crash in the effect system
Fixed a rare crash in the building selection UI when using a hotkey for priority change
Fixed a rare desync when a Scav base is demolishing while joining match in multiplayer

[h2]Dear Pioneers,[/h2]
it's time for a new Quality-of-Life-Update! Our team has been working on this for quite some time, and we can't wait to show you all the new improvements! Some highlights like savegame naming or additional hotkeys were highly requested by our community and we are so glad that it's finally in the game!

Also have a look at our brand-new UI with loads of changes to the production, recruitment and unit control interfaces. This is still the first iteration and possibly subject to change in the ongoing development process. We have already received a lot of positive feedback from our beta-testers.

Now it's your turn to tell us what you think! Please let us know what you think of the new improvements in our feedback forums on Discord and Steam.

But without further ado let's dive into all the changes starting with the highlights:

General UI overhaul, first iteration
New production, recruitment & unit control interface
Savegame Naming
Construction Priority
Additional Hotkeys
Seagulls
and many more!

[h2]Seagulls[/h2]
Let's begin with the obvious: We added Seagulls to the game. Since our first announcement teaser you were able to spot Seagulls in most of our key artworks. They have always belonged to the natural inhabitants of Pagonia and we are very excited that they finally made it into the game!



You can spot them flying around or resting in their nests close to the landing ship and on the rocks near the seashores. They also have gameplay impact because larger flocks of Seagulls indicate a swarm of ocean fish underneath.

[h2]Construction Priority[/h2]

Next up is that the construction priority is separated from the economy priority. The construction section of the building interface now allows to enable or disable priority for the construction process independent of the economy priority.



Separating these two priority options ensures that you no longer have to remember to change the economy priority of the building after the construction process is finished. You can set it separately once the building is placed. Yay!

You can still enable or disable priority of a building for both the construction process and all recipes with a single click at the top of the building selection interface.

[h2]New Unit Control Interface[/h2]
Commanding troops is now much easier! If you select a military unit assigned to a territory building (like the guard tower), all other military units assigned to the same building are now highlighted too. The unit selection interface now offers direct access to change building settings like focus points for patrol, attack or claiming territory.

New Unit Control Interface

This is also valid for civilian units. And the interface offers a button that links to the related building. This will make your life a lot easier.

[h2]New Production Interface[/h2]
The production interface has been reworked and there are major improvements of the functionality. It is now possible to define the individual priority of each recipe. This is very useful in various situations, e.g. if you want to produce a specific amount of a tool or weapon immediately without the need to change all the other settings of the building.

Toolsmith New Production Interface

“Minimum stock” setting: It is now possible to continue production of a commodity until a specific minimum quantity is available for further use. This is very helpful to manage production chains more efficiently. A minimum stock of e.g. some tools or weapons ensures available equipment as it is needed for training.

“On demand” setting: It is now possible to continue production until all missing and requested commodities are produced. The production will continue until all requests of the commodity like missing for construction, recruitment, trade, production, etc. are fulfilled. The production will continue until all buildings that produce or recruit continuously have full input piles.



Read a more detailed description on the new production interface and functionalities in the patch notes down below!

[h2]New Recruitment Interface[/h2]
The improvements to the recruitment interface are very similar to the production interface, turning it also into a much more powerful utility. This change grants new functionality and includes several enhancements of the economy and transport system.

Adventurer's Guild New Recruitment Interface

“Target amount” setting: It is now possible to continue recruitment of a unit type until a specific target quantity exists. As long as the number of units do not exist, the building will continuously train this unit type (if equipment is available). This is very helpful to replace lost military units or construction units that lost their equipment due to Spectres.

[h2]Savegame Naming[/h2]
We thought this day might never come, but it is here: you can finally name your savegames, jippieh! This also includes existing saves, meaning you can rename them, too. Happy savegame naming, everyone! (Tell us in the comments how you named your first one!)



[h2]Visuals[/h2]
We would like to highlight our new character models for Woodcutter and Baker here. What do you think of their new appearance?

Woodcutter New Character Model

Baker New Character Model

The Seagulls are not the only new animals in Pagonia. We spotted two new cats at the Geologist' Hut and one dog at the Provisioner.

Samuel's Cats

As always, we hope you enjoy all the new improvements in Pagonia. Let us know about your feedback on Steam and Discord! Don't forget to read the patch notes below to get all the detailed changes.

In the meantime. we are busy working on the story campaign for the full release. There is a lot of exciting stuff coming your way, stay tuned for more updates! If you are curious about the backstory, check out our latest video about the mysteries of Pagonia.

[previewyoutube][/previewyoutube]

What else do you want to know about the backstory of Pagonia? Tell us in the comments!

Pick up your tools, Pioneers!
Your Envision Entertainment Team

[hr][/hr]


[h3]Highlights[/h3]

• General UI overhaul, first iteration
  
• New production interface with a lot of new options
  
• New recruitment interface with a lot of new options
  
• New unit control interface
  
• Several highly requested improvements: Savegame naming, construction priority, additional hotkeys
  

[h2]Gameplay[/h2]

[h3]Construction priority separated from economy priority[/h3]

• The construction section of the building interface now allows to enable or disable priority for the construction process independent of the economy priority
  
  • The priority can be changed right after placing a new building.
    
  • If you want a different priority setting for construction and economy, you no longer have to remember to change the economy priority of the building after the construction process finished
    
  • You can still enable or disable priority of a building for both the construction process and all recipes with a single click at the top of the building selection interface
    

[h3]New unit control interface[/h3]

• Commanding troops is now much easier
  
  • If you select a military unit assigned to a territory building (like the guard tower), all other military units assigned to the same building are now highlighted too.
    
  • The unit selection interface also lists all other units assigned to the same building
    
  • The unit selection interface now offers direct access to change building settings like focus points for patrol, attack or claiming territory.
    
• Controlling civilian units
  
  • If you select a civilian unit assigned to a building (like an explorer or a woodcutter), you now co-select all other civilian units assigned to the same building
    
  • The unit selection interface now offers direct access to change building settings like the focus point for the work procedure.
    
• The interface also offers a button that links to the related building
  
  • Left-clicking the button will focus the related building
    
  • Right-clicking the button will select the related building
    
  • This behavior has been added to other unit and building icons
    

[h3]New production interface[/h3]

• The production interface has been reworked and there are major improvements of the functionality. This change grants new functionality and includes several enhancements of the economy and transport system.
  
• It is now possible to define the individual priority of each recipe
  
  • This is very useful in various situations, e.g. if you want to produce a specific amount of a tool or weapon immediately without the need to change all the other settings of the building
    
  • High priority means that the commodities for this recipe will be ordered with high priority.
    
    • Carriers will execute those transports first and available ingredients will be reserved for high priority recipes first
      
      • If e.g. coal is needed for a high priority recipe, it will be ordered with high priority even if other recipes in the same building that use coal are not on high priority
        
    • If there is an amount defined to produce, only the ingredients needed to meet the amount are ordered with high priority
      
  • High priority means that, if ingredients are available, the building will continuously execute this recipe and non-priority recipes will be skipped.
    
    • Means that non-priority recipes will only be executed if the high priority recipes lack ingredients or if their requested amount is met already
      
    • If multiple recipes are on high priority, they take turns as usual
      
  • If at least one recipe is set to high priority, the building will hire staff with high priority, means that it gets staffed before non-priority buildings
    
  • If at least one recipe is set to high priority, the building will show the green priority flag in the game world
    
  • Low priority means that the recipe will only be executed if all high and default recipes lack ingredients and cannot be executed or already met their requested amounts.
    
    • This is very useful to define products which are not urgent and should not slow down other production processes, but still make sense to produce if nothing else can be done.
      
• “Minimum stock” setting: It is now possible to continue production of a commodity until a specific minimum quantity is available for further use
  
  • You can define a minimum quantity of the commodity to be available. As long as this condition is not met, the building will continuously produce the commodity (if ingredients are available)
    
    • This is very helpful to manage production chains more efficiently. A minimum stock of e.g. some tools or weapons ensures available equipment as it is needed for training, on the other hand e.g. a minimum stock of 200 construction material avoids that the economy continuously produces and transports something that is already available in large quantities.
      
    • You can define this setting individually for each building, means that e.g. one Weaponsmith stops producing silver blades if 20 are in stock, but the other one already stops if 5 are in stock. This enables you to define urgency depending on the current amount stored
      
    • Note that only commodities which are available for further use count for this condition. You can see the amount available in the tooltip of each commodity in the top bar. Missing and reserved commodities do not count as part of the minimum stock
      
      • All commodities which are currently missing for construction, trade, etc. will immediately be used for these and are not available for further use
        
      • If other production processes continuously request this commodity, they will be delivered to those buildings unless the input piles are full. As soon as they are reserved, they are not available for further use
• “On demand” setting: It is now possible to continue production until all missing and requested commodities are produced
  
  • The production will continue until all requests of the commodity like missing for construction, recruitment, trade, production, etc. are fulfilled
    
  • The production will continue until all buildings that produce or recruit continuously have full input piles
    
• All recipes offer any setting option now
  
  • Before, equipment production only had an amount setting and non-equipment only had continuous production. Now, any production setting (continuous, quantity, minimum stock, on demand) can be applied to any recipe.
    
    • The default settings still reflect the commodity type:
      
      • Non-equipment is set to “continuous production enabled” by default. A few recipes with rare use, e.g. rations made out of delicious deer meat are disabled by default as before.
        
      • Equipment is set to “on demand” by default. Means that equipment missing for manual or automatic training will be crafted.
        
• It is now possible to differentiate between pausing and stopping a recipe
  
  • Pausing a recipe means the ingredients to produce it will still be delivered for later use, but they will be redirected if they are needed elsewhere.
    
    • If another enabled recipe at the same building needs the same ingredient, it obviously keeps ordering
      
  • Stopping a recipe means the ingredients will no longer be ordered and ingredients already there will be redirected if there is room anywhere else.
    
    • If another enabled or paused recipe at the same building needs the same ingredient, it obviously does not stop ordering.
      
  • By default, a disabled recipe will be paused, not stopped. This allows to continue production faster if enabled again since the ingredients might still be on site.
    
• The amount of commodities to produce or store can now be entered via keyboard too

[h3]New recruitment interface[/h3]

• The improvements to the recruitment interface are very similar to the production interface, turning it also into a much more powerful utility. This change grants new functionality and includes several enhancements of the economy and transport system.
  
• It is now possible to define the individual priority of each recruitment process
  
  • This is very useful in various situations, e.g. if you want to recruit a specific number of a unit type immediately without the need to change all the other settings of the building
    
  • High priority means that the equipment for this unit type will be ordered with high priority.
    
    • Carriers will execute those transports first and available equipment will be reserved for high priority recruitments first
      
      • If e.g. chain armor is needed for a high priority recruitment process, it will be ordered with high priority even if other recruitment processes in the same building that use chain armor are not on high priority
        
    • If there is a unit quantity defined to train, only the equipment needed to meet the quantity is ordered with high priority
      
  • High priority means that, if equipment is available, the building will continuously train this unit type and other non-priority unit types will be skipped.
    
    • Means that non-priority unit types will only be trained if the high priority orders lack equipment or if their requested amount is met already
      
    • If multiple training orders are on high priority, they take turns as usual
      
  • The priority of automatic recruitment processes in the guild house is defined by the priority of the building that orders the staff.
    
    • E.g. if any or all recipes in a Weaponsmith are set to high priority, the smiths for the Weaponsmith will be ordered with high priority at the Guild Hall. A green flag symbol will indicate the high priority order in the Guild Hall interface.
      
  • If at least one recruitment order is set to high priority, the building orders units to be trained (available carriers) with high priority
    
  • If at least one recruitment order is set to high priority, the building will show the green priority flag in the game world
    
  • Low priority means that the unit will only be trained if all high and default recruitment orders lack equipment and cannot be executed or already met their requested amounts.
    
• “Target amount” setting: It is now possible to continue recruitment of a unit type until a specific target quantity exists
  
  • As long as the number of units do not exist, the building will continuously train this unit type (if equipment is available)
    
    • This is very helpful to replace lost military units or construction units that lost their equipment due to Spectres.
      
    • You can define this setting individually for each training building, means that e.g. one Military Academy ensures that 30 Guards exist while another trains Soldiers continuously.
      
• By default, all recruitment processes are set to “amount 0”. All recruitment and training processes can have any of the new settings.
  
• It is now possible to differentiate between pausing and stopping a recruitment process
  
  • Pausing a recruitment process means the equipment for it will still be delivered for later use, but it will be redirected if is is needed elsewhere.
    
    • If another recruitment process needs the same equipment, it obviously keeps ordering it.
      
  • Stopping a recruitment process means the equipment will no longer be ordered and equipment already there will be redirected if there is room anywhere else.
    
    • If another enabled or paused recruitment process needs the same equipment, it obviously keeps ordering it.
      
  • By default, a disabled recruitment process will be paused, not stopped. This allows to continue recruitment faster if enabled again since the equipment might still be on site.
    
• The amount of units to train or have can now be entered via keyboard too
  

[h2]Balancing[/h2]

• The Malthorn have been rebalanced:
  
  • The first attack wave of Malthorn bases has an additional delay depending on the distance between player starting position and the Malthorn base
    
  • The chances of Baneroots destroying nearby military units have generally increased. The formula to calculate a hit/defeat on a targeted unit now scales better with the combat power of the unit.
    
  • Warlocks destroy Baneroots faster than before
    

[h2]Other improvements[/h2]

• Saves can be named manually now. Finally!
  
  • Existing saves can be renamed too
    
  • The saved game interface has been improved in general
    
• Increased the amount of fishing spots in generated maps
  
• Attacking player units that survive will now move back simultaneously once they find no more enemies in the target area.
  
  • Before this change they decided individually if it is time to move back, causing them to be more vulnerable on their way home and causing an additional delay for the player before they could be sent elsewhere moving together.
    
• If a lacking commodity is produced in small amounts only, now it will still distribute to different target buildings taking turns depending on the distance
  
  • In the past, if you e.g. had a low output of iron ingots and multiple buildings requesting them continuously wait for more, the few units produced went to the building(s) closest to your Smelting Works. This could mean that the nearby Weaopnsmith gets supplied while the more distant Toolsmith was not getting anything. After this change, if a building gets not supplied at all, it will increase the urgency over time, and at some point it will receive a delivery even if it is more distant.
    
• The prediction of unit types that will be trained next in any training building has been improved.
  
  • Previously, the display did not update if the situation changed in the meantime. Arriving equipment and new recruitment commands issued by the player will now immediately modify the prediction.
    
• Units waiting for equipment to arrive to start their training process will now wait closer to the training building entrance if space is available
  
• Notifications now inform about the affected unit type bitten by Werewolf or panicked by Spectre.
  

[h2]Visuals[/h2]

• Added seagulls to landing ship and rocks in the ocean and also above fish swarms
  
• Improved cat model and texture quality
  
• Added Samuel’s cats to the Geologist
  
• New unique 3D model for Woodcutter
  
• New unique 3D model for Baker
  
• Slightly changed Farmer textures
  
• New VFX and SFX for Warlock scare spell
  
• New VFX for Torch and Magic Torch of the Ranger
  
• Slightly improved look of wind animation on trees
  
• Cleaning Idle Animation now uses a cloth prop
  
• Added a dog to the Provisioner building
  

[h2]UI[/h2]

• General UI overhaul, first iteration:
  
  • The UI has received multiple improvements to increase overall the readability. This process has been started with this first iteration and not all improvements are distributed within the UI evenly, yet. Current focus was the overall more appealing look and the new production and recruitment menus.
    
  • It will receive further updates and improvements in the future. We’re also happy to receive ongoing feedback from the community.
    
    • Improved UI rendering for more clarity in low screen resolutions.
      
    • Contrast:
      
      • The UI appearance is overall darker to improve readability of text and icons.
        
      • The average font brightness is increased or in other cases decreased.
        
      • Slightly decreased menu background transparencies.
        
      • Adjusted contrast of minimap colors
        
    • New buttons:
      
      • Completely revised the main buttons' look.
        
      • Visual improvements for hover highlighting and pressed state.
        
      • Streamlined button sizes.
        
    • Fonts:
      
      • Exchanged info text & figures font to improve readability, especially for smaller resolution settings.
        
      • Overall bigger font sizes.
        
      • Adjusted outlines for small text version.
        
    • Building menu layout (at right screen side):
      
      • Is slightly wider to offer more space and keep readability of its many elements high.
        
      • Can extend higher to offer more space and to reduce scrolling.
        
    • Icons:
      
      • Replaced and improved various icons for readability and understanding, like e.g.
        
        • Increased icon sizes on main buttons.
          
        • The new control button icons.
          
        • New “Food” category icon in the building construction menu, replacing the single “Bread” icon.
          
        • The icon states and tooltips of “fell all trees” have been improved. It is now named “Remove forest” and the default state has been changed to “off”, as this is the common setting to harvest trees continuously.
          
          • You can change the default setting of Woodcutters in the options menu too, if you prefer.
            
      • The new artifact icons have been polished visually.
        
      • Added all new character icons for the reworked units matching their new 3D look.
        
      • Exchanged the icon for choosing the metal type at the Toolsmith.
        
      • Improved Provisioner building icon
        
• Hotkeys
  
  • The hotkey layout has been updated and extended. Existing keybindings are not changed. All keys can be reassigned in the keybindings section of the options menu.
    
  • You can now use hotkeys to mark up to 10 units / unit groups / buildings and locations to access them quickly.
    
    • Press “Ctrl+1” (2, 3, …. 0) to save your current selection. If no unit or building is selected, the current camera position will be saved.
      
    • Later, press “1” anytime to select the saved selection and hit “1” once more to center your view on it. If it was a camera position or was already selected, it will already center your view when you press it the first time.
      
  • We added 10 configurable building construction hotkeys to select specific buildings without using the construction menu. Eight of those are configured by default: F1 to F8 are bound to some often used building types.
    
  • Added hotkey configuration possibility for quick select.
    
• Tooltips
  
  • Default tooltip delay has been adjusted
    
  • Some tooltips were instant, those have been corrected
    
  • Tooltip delay is now adjustable in the options
    
• Added an option to enable border scrolling
  
• Various
  
  • The dropdown list of commodities in the top bar will now show the full tooltip when hovering any commodity
    
  • Adjusted look of disabled interface segments to easier identify them
    
  • Fixed the few visible seams of tutorial character images.
    

[h2]SFX[/h2]

• Added seagull calls to now visible seagulls
  
• Added unique sounds for Warlock scare ability
  
• Enemies now shout when fleeing or being scared
  

[h2]Fixes[/h2]

• Destroying a Scav base is no longer prevented by a new unit currently spawning inside
  
• Destroying an enemy base is no longer prevented if all leftover units are scared by Warlocks
  
• Fixed culling of crows and seagulls while they are still on screen.
  
• Fixed rare multiplayer desync which happened when joining the game while having a building under construction.
  
• Treasure hunter building UI will no longer extend width depending on found treasures by mistake
  
• The tooltips of found treasures show more information about the commodities now
  
• Removed white flag idle warning status of player Trading Post if Pagonian village Trading Post was waiting for goods to arrive
  
• Fixed a rare case of multiplayer desync when setting a market stall to priority
  
• Improved compatibility with some AMD graphics cards
  
• Improved picking box of the ship and of some buildings
  
• Fixed mini map rendering after applying changes in video options
  

[h2]Known Issues[/h2]

• UI
  
  • Due to the replacement of the new font for info text, more formatting issues can occur.
    
  • New UI input styles, like e.g. new enter amount pop-up aren't implemented everywhere, yet.
    
• There are no seagulls near fish deposits in old savegames including guidance and predefined maps
  
• Decals of Baneroots may flicker.
  
• Predefined Tutorial map Banners are slightly too big.
  

[h2]Dear Pioneers,[/h2]
we would like to invite you to the latest Beta test!

Version 0.13.0 just went into the beta branch on Steam for all Early Access players. Our new Quality-of-Life Update is packed with a lot of highly requested stuff!

Here are some of the Highlights:

• General UI overhaul, first iteration
  
• New production interface with a lot of new options
  
• New recruitment interface with a lot of new options
  
• New unit control interface
  
• Several highly requested improvements: Save game naming, construction priority, additional hotkeys
  

Please write us your feedback on Discord or in our Beta branch discussion forum on Steam.

As always thank you for your support and have fun testing!
See you in Pagonia!

[hr][/hr]


[h2]Improvements[/h2]

[h2]Gameplay[/h2]

[h3]Construction priority separated from economy priority[/h3]

• The construction section of the building interface now allows to enable or disable priority for the construction process independent of the economy priority
  
  • The priority can be changed right after placing a new building.
    
  • If you want a different priority setting for construction and economy, you no longer have to remember to change the economy priority of the building after the construction process finished
    
  • You can still enable or disable priority of a building for both the construction process and all recipes with a single click at the top of the building selection interface
    

[h3]New unit control interface[/h3]

• Commanding troops is now much easier
  
  • If you select a military unit assigned to a territory building (like the guard tower), all other military units assigned to the same building are now highlighted too.
    
  • The unit selection interface also lists all other units assigned to the same building
    
  • The unit selection interface now offers direct access to change building settings like focus points for patrol, attack or claiming territory.
    
• Controlling civilian units
  
  • If you select a civilian unit assigned to a building (like an explorer or a woodcutter), you now co-select all other civilian units assigned to the same building
    
  • The unit selection interface now offers direct access to change building settings like the focus point for the work procedure.
    
• The interface also offers a button that links to the related building
  
  • Left-clicking the button will focus the related building
    
  • Right-clicking the button will select the related building
    
  • This behavior has been added to other unit and building icons
    

[h3]New production interface[/h3]

• The production interface has been reworked and there are major improvements of the functionality. This change grants new functionality and includes several enhancements of the economy and transport system.
  
• It is now possible to define the individual priority of each recipe
  
  • This is very useful in various situations, e.g. if you want to produce a specific amount of a tool or weapon immediately without the need to change all the other settings of the building
    
  • High priority means that the commodities for this recipe will be ordered with high priority.
    
    • Carriers will execute those transports first and available ingredients will be reserved for high priority recipes first
      
      • If e.g. coal is needed for a high priority recipe, it will be ordered with high priority even if other recipes in the same building that use coal are not on high priority
        
    • If there is an amount defined to produce, only the ingredients needed to meet the amount are ordered with high priority
      
  • High priority means that, if ingredients are available, the building will continuously execute this recipe and non-priority recipes will be skipped.
    
    • Means that non-priority recipes will only be executed if the high priority recipes lack ingredients or if their requested amount is met already
      
    • If multiple recipes are on high priority, they take turns as usual
      
  • If at least one recipe is set to high priority, the building will hire staff with high priority, means that it gets staffed before non-priority buildings
    
  • If at least one recipe is set to high priority, the building will show the green priority flag in the game world
    
  • Low priority means that the recipe will only be executed if all high and default recipes lack ingredients and cannot be executed or already met their requested amounts.
    
    • This is very useful to define products which are not urgent and should not slow down other production processes, but still make sense to produce if nothing else can be done.
      
• “Minimum stock” setting: It is now possible to continue production of a commodity until a specific minimum quantity is available for further use
  
  • You can define a minimum quantity of the commodity to be available. As long as this condition is not met, the building will continuously produce the commodity (if ingredients are available)
    
    • This is very helpful to manage production chains more efficiently. A minimum stock of e.g. some tools or weapons ensures available equipment as it is needed for training, on the other hand e.g. a minimum stock of 200 construction material avoids that the economy continuously produces and transports something that is already available in large quantities.
      
    • You can define this setting individually for each building, means that e.g. one Weaponsmith stops producing silver blades if 20 are in stock, but the other one already stops if 5 are in stock. This enables you to define urgency depending on the current amount stored
      
    • Note that only commodities which are available for further use count for this condition. You can see the amount available in the tooltip of each commodity in the top bar. Missing and reserved commodities do not count as part of the minimum stock
      
      • All commodities which are currently missing for construction, trade, etc. will immediately be used for these and are not available for further use
        
      • If other production processes continuously request this commodity, they will be delivered to those buildings unless the input piles are full. As soon as they are reserved, they are not available for further use
        
• “On demand” setting: It is now possible to continue production until all missing and requested commodities are produced
  
  • The production will continue until all requests of the commodity like missing for construction, recruitment, trade, production, etc. are fulfilled
    
  • The production will continue until all buildings that produce or recruit continuously have full input piles
    
• All recipes offer any setting option now
  
  • Before, equipment production only had an amount setting and non-equipment only had continuous production. Now, any production setting (continuous, quantity, minimum stock, on demand) can be applied to any recipe.
    
    • The default settings still reflect the commodity type:
      
      • Non-equipment is set to “continuous production enabled” by default. A few recipes with rare use, e.g. rations made out of delicious deer meat are disabled by default as before.
        
      • Equipment is set to “on demand” by default. Means that equipment missing for manual or automatic training will be crafted.
        
• It is now possible to differentiate between pausing and stopping a recipe
  
  • Pausing a recipe means the ingredients to produce it will still be delivered for later use, but they will be redirected if they are needed elsewhere.
    
    • If another enabled recipe at the same building needs the same ingredient, it obviously keeps ordering
      
  • Stopping a recipe means the ingredients will no longer be ordered and ingredients already there will be redirected if there is room anywhere else.
    
    • If another enabled or paused recipe at the same building needs the same ingredient, it obviously does not stop ordering.
      
  • By default, a disabled recipe will be paused, not stopped. This allows to continue production faster if enabled again since the ingredients might still be on site.
    
• The amount of commodities to produce or store can now be entered via keyboard too
  

[h3]New recruitment interface[/h3]

• The improvements to the recruitment interface are very similar to the production interface, turning it also into a much more powerful utility. This change grants new functionality and includes several enhancements of the economy and transport system.
  
• It is now possible to define the individual priority of each recruitment process
  
  • This is very useful in various situations, e.g. if you want to recruit a specific number of a unit type immediately without the need to change all the other settings of the building
    
  • High priority means that the equipment for this unit type will be ordered with high priority.
    
    • Carriers will execute those transports first and available equipment will be reserved for high priority recruitments first
      
      • If e.g. chain armor is needed for a high priority recruitment process, it will be ordered with high priority even if other recruitment processes in the same building that use chain armor are not on high priority
        
    • If there is a unit quantity defined to train, only the equipment needed to meet the quantity is ordered with high priority
      
  • High priority means that, if equipment is available, the building will continuously train this unit type and other non-priority unit types will be skipped.
    
    • Means that non-priority unit types will only be trained if the high priority orders lack equipment or if their requested amount is met already
      
    • If multiple training orders are on high priority, they take turns as usual
      
  • The priority of automatic recruitment processes in the guild house is defined by the priority of the building that orders the staff.
    
    • E.g. if any or all recipes in a Weaponsmith are set to high priority, the smiths for the Weaponsmith will be ordered with high priority at the Guild Hall. A green flag symbol will indicate the high priority order in the Guild Hall interface.
      
  • If at least one recruitment order is set to high priority, the building orders units to be trained (available carriers) with high priority
    
  • If at least one recruitment order is set to high priority, the building will show the green priority flag in the game world
    
  • Low priority means that the unit will only be trained if all high and default recruitment orders lack equipment and cannot be executed or already met their requested amounts.
    
• “Target amount” setting: It is now possible to continue recruitment of a unit type until a specific target quantity exists
  
  • As long as the amount of units do not exist, the building will continuously train this unit type (if equipment is available)
    
    • This is very helpful to replace lost military units or demoted construction units
      
    • You can define this setting individually for each training building, means that e.g. one Military Academy ensures that 30 Guards exist while another trains Soldiers continuously.
      
• By default, all recruitment processes are set to “amount 0”. All recruitment and training processes can have any of the new settings.
  
• It is now possible to differentiate between pausing and stopping a recruitment process
  
  • Pausing a recruitment process means the equipment for it will still be delivered for later use, but it will be redirected if is is needed elsewhere.
    
    • If another recruitment process needs the same equipment, it obviously keeps ordering it.
      
  • Stopping a recruitment process means the equipment will no longer be ordered and equipment already there will be redirected if there is room anywhere else.
    
    • If another enabled or paused recruitment process needs the same equipment, it obviously keeps ordering it.
      
  • By default, a disabled recruitment process will be paused, not stopped. This allows to continue recruitment faster if enabled again since the equipment might still be on site.
    
• The amount of units to train or own can now be entered via keyboard too
  

[h2]Balancing[/h2]

• The Malthorn have been rebalanced:
  
  • The first attack wave of Malthorn bases has an additional delay depending on the distance between player starting position and the Malthorn base
    
  • The chances of Baneroots destroying nearby military units have increased
    
  • Warlocks destroy Baneroots faster than before
    

[h2]Other improvements[/h2]

• Saves can be named manually now. Finally!
  
  • Existing saves can be renamed too
    
  • The saved game interface has been improved in general
    
• Increased the amount of fishing spots in generated maps
  
• Attacking player units that survive will now move back simultaneously after they found no more enemies in the target area.
  
  • Before this change they decided individual if it is time to move back, causing them to be more vulnerable on their way home and causing an additional delay for the player before they could be send elsewhere moving together.
    
• If a lacking commodity is produced in small amounts only, now it will still distribute to different target buildings taking turns depending on the distance
  
  • In the past, if you e.g. had a low output of iron ingots and multiple buildings requesting them continuously wait for more, the few units produced went to the building(s) closest to your Smelting Works. This could mean that the nearby Weaopnsmith gets supplied while the more distant Toolsmith was not getting anything. After this change, if a building gets not supplied at all, it will increase the urgency over time, and at some point it will receive a delivery even if it is more distant.
    
• The prediction of unit types that will be trained next in any training building has been improved.
  
  • Previously, the display did not update if the situation changed in the meantime. Arriving equipment and new recruitment commands issued by the player will now immediately modify the prediction.
    
• Units waiting for equipment to arrive to start their training process will now wait closer to the training building entrance if space is available
  
• Notifications now inform about the affected unit type bitten by Werewolf or panicked by Spectre.
  

[h2]Visuals[/h2]

• Added seagulls to landing ship and rocks in the ocean and also above fish swarms
  
• Improved cat model and texture quality
  
• Added Samuel’s cats to the geologist
  
• New unique 3D model for woodcutter
  
• New unique 3D model for baker
  
• Slightly changed Farmer textures
  
• New VFX and SFX for Warlock scare spell
  
• New VFX for Torch and Magic Torch of the Ranger
  
• Added new character icons for the reworked 3D models of several units
  
• Slightly improved look of wind animation on trees
  
• Cleaning Idle Animation now uses a cloth prop
  

[h2]UI[/h2]

• General UI overhaul, first iteration:
  
  • The UI has received multiple improvements to increase overall the readability. This process has been started with this first iteration and not all improvements are distributed within the UI evenly, yet. Current focus was the overall more appealing look and the new production and recruitment menus.
    
  • It will receive further updates and improvements in the future. We’re also happy to receive ongoing feedback from the community.
    
    • Improved UI rendering for more clarity in low screen resolutions.
      
    • Contrast:
      
      • The UI appearance is overall more dark to improve readability of text and icons.
        
      • The average font brightness is increased or in other cases decreased.
        
      • Slightly decreased menu background transparencies.
        
      • Adjusted contrast of minimap colors
        
    • New buttons:
      
      • Completely recreated main buttons look.
        
      • Visual improvements for hover highlighting and pressed state.
        
      • Simplified white and black approach for active and deactivated state.
        
      • Increased button sizes.
        
    • Fonts:
      
      • Exchanged info text & figures font to improve readability, especially for smaller resolution settings.
        
      • Overall bigger font sizes.
        
      • Adjusted outlines for small text version.
        
    • Building menu layout (at right screen side):
      
      • Is slightly wider to offer more space and keep readability of the many elements on it high.
        
      • Can extend higher to offer more space and to reduce scrolling.
        
    • Icons:
      
      • Replaced and improved various icons for readability and understanding, like e.g.
        
        • Increased icon sizes on main buttons.
          
        • The new control button icons.
          
        • The new “Windmill” icon for “Food” category in the building construction menu, replacing the “Bread” icon.
          
        • The icon states and tooltips of “fell all trees” have been improved. It is now named “Remove forest” and the default state has been changed to “off”, as this is the common setting to harvest trees continuously.
          
          • You can change the default setting of woodcutters in the options menu too, if you prefer.
            
      • The new artifact icons have been polished visually.
        
      • Added all new character icons for the reworked units matching their new 3D look.
        
• Hotkeys
  
  • The hotkey layout has been updated and extended. Existing keybindings are not changed. All keys can be reassigned in the keybindings section of the options menu.
    
  • You can now use hotkeys to mark up to 10 units / unit groups / buildings and locations to access them quickly.
    
    • Press “Ctrl+1” (2, 3, …. 0) to save your current selection. If no unit or building is selected, the current camera position will be saved.
      
    • Later, press “1” anytime to select the saved selection and hit “1” once more to center your view on it. If it was a camera position or was already selected, it will already center your view when you press it the first time.
      
  • We added 10 configurable building construction hotkeys to select specific buildings without using the construction menu. Eight of those are configured by default: F1 to F8 are bound to some often used building types.
    
• Tooltips
  
  • Default tooltip delay has been adjusted
    
  • Some tooltips were instant, those have been corrected
    
  • Tooltip delay is now adjustable in the options
    
• Various
  
  • The dropdown list of commodities in the top bar will now show the full tooltip when hovering any commodity
    
  • Adjusted look of disabled interface segments to easier identify them
    
  • Fixed few visible seams of tutorial character images.
    

[h2]SFX[/h2]

• Added seagull calls to now visible seagulls
  
• Added unique sounds for Warlock scare ability
  
• Enemies now shout when fleeing or being scared
  

[h2]Fixes[/h2]

• Destroying a Scav base is no longer prevented by a new unit currently spawning inside
  
• Destroying an enemy base is no longer prevented if all leftover units are scared by Warlocks
  
• Fixed culling of crows and seagulls while they are still on screen.
  
• Fixed rare multiplayer desync which happened when joining the game while having a building under construction.
  
• Treasure hunter building UI will no longer extend width depending on found treasures by mistake
  
• The tooltips of found treasures show more information about the commodities now
  
• Removed white flag idle warning status of player Trading Post if Pagonian village Trading Post was waiting for goods to arrive
  

[h2]Known issue list[/h2]

• UI
  
  • Due to the replacement of the new font for info text, more formatting issues can occur.
    
  • New UI input styles, like e.g. new enter amount pop-up aren't implemented everywhere, yet.
    
  • Few new icons are placeholder, yet.
    
  • There are no seagulls nearby fish deposits in old savegames including guidance and predefined maps
    
  • Seagulls at the venture sometimes clip out of view
    
  • New patrol icon on the minimap has wrong position
    
  • Savegame naming letters “H”, “J” and “K” appear at wrong position
    
  • Rare case of broken road texture.
    

[h3]Hey Pioneers, [/h3]

I am Katja, the 3D Character Artist working at Envision Entertainment, and today I pick up the topic of readability from our last dev blog and talk about the latest changes that our Intern Judith and I worked on together.

Like our buildings we also want our characters to offer a lot of personality and storytelling through their design to enrich the overall feeling and immersion of the world. For a long time, our main focus was creating individual looks for the many different professions, enemies or creatures that exist in the world of Pagonia. This is still an ongoing topic, as you may have noticed with the Forester in our latest patch. He got a completely unique design fitting his nature-loving job and his very own stylish backpack for carrying all kinds of saplings.

New Forester incl. backpack

Our latest efforts were to improve readability, i.e. reworking and expanding unit variations which already had variations and adding new ones to those that still were lacking some.
In the very early development when our focus was mainly on building new designs for new units rather than expanding on variations, we used a rather simple formula to create unit variations. This was usually just adding come color highlights or tinting certain parts of the clothing. As time allowed later during production, we started focusing more on variations designs while modeling the characters.

In this blog I will highlight four of the units that we have improved even though we have also reworked most of the military units and a few enemy types. If you look closely while playing Pioneers of Pagonia, you might notice some other improved unit variations.

[h3]Our Goal & Approach [/h3]
With the goal of improving the readability we had to think about what was making the current unit variations hard to differentiate. Just adding some color highlights like we did to the Spectres and Bandits created the issue that the highlights were getting harder to read when zoomed out far or were washed out completely. And of course, this kind of variation design did not really add to the personality and storytelling of the unit.
In order to control the design not only through texture variations, we also decided to work with the models themselves. Of course, creating completely new and unique designs for every variation would be an overkill not only time wise but also within the game itself. As a player you already have to get to know and distinguish between all of your seven military units and six enemy types. Expanding those units with even more differentiating character designs would have made it too chaotic. We wanted to keep the essence of a character and try to tell a story regarding the character’s rank and experience as the names of the different ranks already do. For the players’ units we also considered what kind of resources are needed to recruit a certain rank and tried to implement that as well in some of the variant designs.

[h3]Bandits [/h3]
For each unit we put together notes on the character’s personality and key elements. Since the Bandit’s design is kind of “birdlike” with the feathery cape you could think of them as stealing magpies or bowerbirds. They raid and steal your stuff and would potentially like to decorate themselves with their stolen treasures.



My idea was to reflect this in their appearance and give them silver and gold details that they would have made from stolen weapons and ores. The Elite Bandit, being not only the strongest but also somewhat of a leader personality in the Bandits ranks, has some additional weapons they carry and of course lots of gold reinforced details in their clothing.



Our intern Judith created some design proposals based on those characteristics which you can see here.



While all of the designs have their own charm and some design aspects may look cooler or more interesting than others at first glance, the most important aspect for the design was to consider whether it will be easy to read in the default game camera distance. This is why all design proposals include a top-down view, to check what details will actually be visible and pop out in this perspective and which were maybe too small-scale for our style.

While the intricate jewelry hanging between the feathers of the Bandit’s cape looks like they used some of the stolen treasures, we agreed that in the game perspective and default zoom they may be too small to really pop and make the character visibly different from the other ranks. That’s why we decided to go with the gold-plated feathers. It's easy to see them from far away and they are not melting into the cape color in the silver version for the Veteran Bandit.



[h3]Soldiers [/h3]
The Soldier was one of the very first units in general but also the very first military unit in Pioneers of Pagonia. He has a knight-like appearance though he is not completely armored. The Veteran Soldier, for example, has big shoulder pads, metal bracers and a helmet with a big fluffy feather which protects him against any type of enemy unit for a long while.



There are four strength levels of the Soldier. The simple Soldier uses a wooden shield and a bronze sword, the Advanced Soldier an iron sword with a wooden shield. The Veteran Soldier uses an iron sword and shield, and the Elite Soldier has a big steel shield and mace. We decided to keep the original design for the full iron soldier. The first and second version are known to be lighter versions of the design with no helmets and the first soldier looks more squire-like without the metal armor. The second one is more in-between level 1 and 3 with an iron shoulder pad, bracers and a gorget.



Since the fourth and strongest soldier uses a steel mace and a big and heavy steel shield, I decided to adapt the heaviness of his weapons into his armor giving him additional chainmail for heavy attack protection and a bigger and more protecting helmet. My goal was to make him stand out and be recognizable as the strongest and most elite soldier like his name suggests.

[h3]Guards [/h3]
Our Guards are brave women that not only expand the territory sometimes not knowing what's behind the mysterious fog but also ready to run into battle and protect the villagers when they happen to come across enemies.
They did have some visual distinctions showing in their armor, but we wanted to enhance the readability. As long as you are expanding your territory you have to rely on your Guards. Depending on where you are sending them to expand (maybe somewhere you know that danger is nearby) being able to distinguish between them will help you make the right decision which Guards to send to the border of your territory.



Similar to the Soldier variations I kept the original design for the Veteran Guard and simplified the simple Guard, removing her helmet and chain armor as she also doesn't need a chainmail as a resource when being recruited. The Elite Guard also uses steel armor and a very big sharp and pointy steel halberd. That's why I gave her a more prominent helmet with steel reinforcement and a pointy tip matching her halberd, a chain hood and several steel reinforcements on the gloves and boots.



[h3]Spectres [/h3]
I had the most fun reworking the Spectre variations. Even though I did not stray too far away from their highlight colors, I did increase the usage of their color scheme and added more "accessories" to create a more interesting and unique silhouette. With the chains that the Restless and the Haunting Spectres are wearing I wanted to suggest what type of being they had been before they were buried and forgotten in the Broken Tomb. With chains around its arms and being chained to its tomb for a long time, now wonder the Restless Spectre deserved his name for being ... well ... restless.



The Haunting Spectre is of course a master of fright and the strongest of the Spectres.
Its name suggests that it not only likes to scare away the occasional Pagonian crossing their way. But also that it has made haunting poor souls its only purpose ... or hobby?
The Haunting Spectre has not only broken free from its chains like the Restless Spectre but is also wearing one of the chains around its body like a belt. Every move and every swirl create a spine-chilling sound that will make even the bravest soldier shriek and run.



In addition to the extension of using the variation color I also adjusted the "body" colors of the Spectres fitting their general color scheme. I also changed the colors of their ghostly VFX as well.



As you can see, being a 3D Character Artist for Pioneers of Pagonia is not only creating the characters from concepts but also putting in a lot of our own creativity into the designs. For me personally, it is a lot of fun taking over the creative responsibility and challenging myself to create a character design that radiates an interesting personality and tells a story while still fitting into our established style and worldbuilding of Pioneers of Pagonia.

And of course, I hope that you guys enjoy our hustling and bustling little Pagonians and creatures as much as I had fun creating them.

If you want, check out the improved buildings from our last dev blog or some of the reworked resources and deposits in our latest update. You can find all of the changes in our detailed patch notes. As always, we’re very excited for your reactions to the upcoming patch and looking forward to everyone’s feedback once again.