Coloniser News

We have quite a few items testing internally to push live in the next patch (or two), but we weren't able to get them stable enough for this build. We anticipate pushing next weeks patch a bit earlier with a few important bug fixes as well as some new features. I've outlined a few of those items below. Thank you to playtesters for passing along such great feedback. It's greatly appreciated.

[h3]New Features[/h3]

• Steam Tags in Chat
  

[h3]New Content[/h3]

• (new Technology) Escorted caravans
  
• (new Technology) Formation
  
• (new Technology) Recurve bow
  
• (new Technology) Mobile Artillery
  
• (new Technology) Artillery shield
  

[h3]Upcoming (within two weeks)[/h3]

• Big Server Overhaul (Better latency, faster connections, and few disconnects)
  
• Steam Tags in Diplomacy Menu
  
• Steam Tags with Opposing Units
  
• Map Visual Improvements
  
• Map Design Improvements (More buildable terrain, easier to navigate)
  

[h3]Bug Fixes in this Patch[/h3]

• Map 2.0 lacks any resources
  
• Non-aggresive and domestic animals are missing on Map 2.0
  
• High terrain is visible in fog of war on Map 2.0
  
• Palm trees are visible in fog of war on Map 2.0
  
• Era 2&3 Homesteads have visuals of Era 1&2 stacked together
  
• Buildings become invisible after rejoining the server
  
• User cannot place and build a Wall construction
  
• The construction preview of University doesn't match the preview of other buildings
  
• Multiple buildings are missing Selection SFX
  
• Steam users' nicknames are displayed as a sequence of numbers in the chat panel
  
• User can select animals through FoW
  
• User can select enemy/hostile units through FoW
  
• [Map] Walkable and buildable parts of the map are inconsistent
  
• Gate cannot be built
  
• HP bar for enemy Units is missing
  
• Section titles are unaligned in the lobby
  

Just in time for the holidays we're rolling out a big update. The biggest items in this patch are a new map engine (details below) , diplomacy mechanics (more below), and quite a few bug fixes.

[h3]New Map Engine[/h3]

• Vastly improved fog of war
  
• 4x the size of our previous map (tile wise)
  
• Improved terrain textures
  

We're still tweaking the terrain textures, lighting, camera movement, resources, and so on. If you could please pass back feedback on those items it'd be very appreciated. This is the first playtesting build with these big changes so apologies in advance if any gamebreaking bugs occur.

[h3]Diplomacy Mechanics[/h3]

• Request/Change Diplomatic Status with Players (War/Peace/Neutral)
  
• Shared Line of Sight / Non-aggression with Allies
  

Known Diplomacy Issues
The UI is the "old" placeholder interface. We're rolling out the fresh game interface next month and this will be updated to something much nicer looking. We'll share on discord!

• Users cannot use diplomacy system if they played before the instance was stopped In progress
  
• Units and defensive buildings lack Retaliate Upon Attack behaviour when attacking player has Peace status
  
• Diplomacy menu lacks requirements of Meeting New Players
  
• Players are able to change Diplomacy status from War directly to Alliance and vice versa
  
• Players are unable to leave Alliance one-sidedly by entering Peace state
  
• Caravans are unable to trade with the Marketplaces of other players with Peace or Alliance statuses
  

Known Map Issues
(Note: Please pass along any you encounter.) FPS/Framerate is much lower then it should be, we know the primary causes and will fix these asap although it likely won't be fixed until after the holidays since much of the team is out.

There is also an issue with "clipping" where units are sometimes not able to walk in certain areas of the map where there are elevation changes. We may be able to hotfix this with the team who are still here.

[h3]Bug Fixes:[/h3]

• Buildings lack line of sight and are unable to reveal fog of war
  
• Outpost's construction preview uses a placeholder asset
  
• Units can construct a Keep only from its one side
  
• Player colour is missing on Wooden Tower's model
  
• Keep's selection grid is not visible
  
• Wooden & Stone Towers' selection grid is 2x2
  
• Walls and Gates are z-fighting with their construction preview while they are being built
  
• The resource tile UI is still visible after selecting units with click&drag selection box
  
• Units are missing walking animation after being recruited and approaching the rally point
  
• Outpost's selection grid is 3x3 Bug
  
• Ballista has no highlight when covered by buildings or resource tiles
  
• Units are hidden without a green/red backlight behind leaves of some trees
  
• Units cannot progress with building a Stone Wall Pieces Bug
  
• Several units have fighting or death animation triggered after being recruited and approaching the rally point
  

[h2]The Highlights[/h2]

• Server Improvements
  
• Balance Changes
  
• Bug Fixes
  

[h3]The Server Improvements[/h3]
We've made a significant improvement to our servers that should vastly improve load times. This should reduce load times in most situations to under sixty seconds! We've also changed our server connection messaging to be a bit more clear about the progress being made to connect.

[h3]Balance Changes[/h3]
We got some good feedback from the playtesting event on some balance adjustments. We've begun to work some of these into the game so you'll see the following:

• Archer rate of fire and damage per shot has been reduced
  
• Javelineer rate of fire and damage per shot has been reduced
  
• Catapult adjusted
  
• Battering ram adjusted
  
• Most unit type speeds have been adjusted slightly
  
• Colonist gather rate was corrected to intended gather rate. There was an error making them gather resources about 20-40% quicker then intended.
  

[h3]Bug Fixes[/h3]

• Units move with the same movement speed
  
• Colonists have a base gather rate of 2
  
• Stone Wall is missing in construction menu in Third Era (Enlightenment)
  
• Stone Wall & Gate are available in the Second Era
  
• Stone Wall and Stone Gate are missing in the construction menu
  

[h3]What's incoming?[/h3]
We're stil making good progress on the diplomacy mechanics and we hope to push those out live with this upcoming week's patch.

The team is also working hard on the improvements to our map engine and we are hoping to release the first build with it this month before the holidays. Many of our team members will be on holiday at year end, so any patches around New Years will likely be limited in scope.

We are also making great progress on the UI/mini-map/big map which we're targetting for next month since the map engine is a higher priority.

Thanks again for taking the time to read, play, and provide your feedback. It's greatly appreciated!

Our new patch for Black Friday has arrived just in time for the streaming event! The team worked really hard to deliver as much as possible and we were able to get most of what we wanted in this patch, although a few items have slipped out a week or two.

[h2]What's new?[/h2]

[h3]New Defensive Buildings:[/h3]

• Scout Outpost (Available in the First Era)
  
• Wooden Guard Tower (Available in the Colonization Era)
  
• Stone Guard Tower (Available in the Enlightenment Erea)
  
• Keep (Available in Era 3)
  

[h3]Balance Adjustments:[/h3]

• Your Homestead can now fire defensive arrows. Both tower types and the keep also fire arrows at attackers.
  
• Arrows and archer unit damage/rate of fire/accuracy has been adjusted so that they are a bit less powerful.
  

[h3]General Improvements:[/h3]

• Building hotkeys added. Double-clicking a building should select all buildings of the same type on screen.
  
• Additional Unit and Building Sounds Added
  

[h3]Bug Fixes:[/h3]

• Farms use old assets in Era I
  
• User can assign an enemy unit to a Control Group
  
• User can assign buildings to Control Groups and accidentally destroy them
  
• Healer does not move with a formation when attack order is given by User
  
• Destruction animation is missing for Ballista units
  
• Ballista lacks elements in player colour
  
• Movement animation is missing for a Ballista unit
  
• Attack animation is missing for a Ballista unit
  
• Ballista is displayed behind the selection circle
  

[h3]What Got Delayed?[/h3]
Our team has been working really hard on diplomacy mechanics and they're very close to release. However we wanted to have our most stable and bug-free build yet, so to be cautious we've pushed these features our a week or two.

[h3]What's on the Horizon?[/h3]
We've got the diplomacy mechanics above pushing out shortly and then we'll be working next to release a BIG improvement to our map engine + levels as well as our UI/mini-map/big map. I will update as that timeline firms up. We will continue to push bug fixes and general improvements as well. We really appreciate all the feedback and people who've taken the time to playtest. Cheers!

Hey hope ya'll are doing well! Here are the details for the November Playtesting Event.



[h2]Starting on Friday at 3PM EST (21:00 in Western Europe) and all-day Saturday.[/h2]

If you haven't requested the free Coloniser playtest, visit here to request. We'll great access on Friday after the next patch releases!

Some of us will be streaming and we'd love if you did too, but all good if not! Hope you enjoy the new buildings. We'll have a sandbox/peace server up too for those who'd just prefer to build as well!

Cheers and thank you again for the great ideas & feedback!