DwarfCorp News

The unstable build has been updated with the next release candidate. This one has taken a bit longer than planned, for a few reasons largely personal, but beyond those I also had to rewrite a very fundamental part of the game - all resource handling. This build is still missing several pieces of art, but is functionally 'locked' for release. The only changes will be bug fixes. As always, no update to the stable branch yet. This is an opt-in beta and will break all saves.

In this update:

• All dwarf clothing / tools is now removable and interchangeable.
  
• You won't find them in the crafting interface just yet, but you can find some color variations on common items of clothing in the god menu.
  
• Tools will break. Different materials will last different times.
  
• Tools do not yet determine how effective a dwarf is at their task, so they are mostly cosmetic. They will happily mine with their bare hands.
  
• Fixed a bug where the teleporter could leave a dwarf in solid rock and kill them.
  
• Large voxel build orders will be composed into a single task in the list.
  
• Zones are designated by a border, not by specific floor voxels - so build them on whatever you want.
  
• Added a couple of new block types.
  

Greetings all,

Progress continues on the next major feature, and I felt it was a good time to drop an update on it. So the goal is to give dwarves equipment, and I'm starting with tools - you probably noticed them in the most recent updates. At the moment they serve no purpose, but picks can be crafted out of different materials. Eventually, different types of tools will have different properties, and tools will wear down and break.

In implementing wear and tear, I discovered that the existing resource system just couldn't handle it. Which led me to rewriting the resource system almost entirely. That set me back almost two full months, but it is finally done.

Now that I'm past that - I finally have some picks that wear out and break. Well, iron picks at least.

Part of this goal was getting these different tools to appear in dwarve's hands when equipped. I really think I under estimated just how much art would be required to make that happen, so I don't really know how long that's going to take yet. The first release with this feature is likely to include only picks.

This is a small update to mitigate the problem of dwarves getting stuck in overhead blocks while jumping below them. You will also find some minor features

• Default embarkments - which should remove some confusion for new players.
  
• Starting cash is adjusted by the difficulty level chosen.
  

A new stable update has been released. We delayed this one a bit despite having a desperately needed fix because we just couldn't figure out how to do it without breaking saves. Finally, we realized that without the fix your save is probably unplayable anyway - so we broke them.

So new things in this update - including all the stuff in the last few unstable updates...

• Crafting and placement are now completely separate.
• Chairs and tables can be made out of candy.
• Metals in the ground will produce ore, which needs to be smelted.
• You can no longer craft things using 'any' as the resource type.
• Added bamboo.
• Redesigned the employee info popup.
• Added a view on the contents of a specific stockpile, available through the zone list.
• Added job descriptions to the hire employee screen.
• Craftable tools - this feature is in progress, so right now they aren't useful for anything except selling.
• Added a bunch of hotkeys - esc closes everything, hotkeys for cycling through employees, hotkeys for all panels on the bottom-left.
• Dwarf idle behavior was greatly improved at some point.
• Fancy new ruins shapes.
• Metal block voxels.

I'm pretty sure that just scratches the surface. And for bug fixes...

• Fixed issue where stone could not be included/excluded from allowable stockpile contents.
• Fixed issue where teleporters would leave dwarves stuck in the ground.
• Fixed an issue where teleporters left dwarves invisible.
• Fixed an issue causing the first underground layer to only be one voxel thick.
• Fixed an issue where creatures could spawn in violation of the species limit.
• Fixed an issue causing flags to not wave.
• Fixed an issue where traders came but didn't bother to bring anything.
• Fixed issues where doors didn't animate.
• Fixed issue where factions would get pissed because they sent a war party against you.
• Fixed an issue where mouse-over text didn't update to reflect a creature's health.
• Fixed an issue where sprites on the edge of the screen popped in and out.
• Fixed an issue where cancelling a build task left behind a ghost object that prevented building other things there.
• Fixed an issue causing particularly steep terrain to show gaps until dwarves explored the area.
• Fixed an issue with the voxel selector not appearing while building a zone.
• Fixed - after over two years of hunting for it - a bug that caused dwarves to get very excited about anvils and do unspeakable things to them.
• Fixed an issue where cancelling an attack command didn't actually cancel it.

In this update...

• Gold ore blocks now produce gold ore, which must be smelted.
  
• Gold blocks join copper and iron blocks.
  
• New biome - wetlands. Occurs where land is relatively low and wet.
  
• New plant - bamboo. Grows in wetlands.
  
• Employee info screen is now tabbed and includes some additional info.
  
• Backpack isn't a separate dialog, and shows icons.
  
• Digging now requires dwarves to equip picks. Miners come with a pick already so you won't notice - but this is the first step toward equipable items.
  
• Why not make tables and chairs out of peppermint??
  
• Kill things on the debug menu now uses the selection buffer so it will be more useful if you've got a pest problem.
  
• Sliders on options screen show a value (where it makes sense)
  
• Added confusing slider for species limit - 100% means 100% of the default limit of 15.
  
• Building floor will now queue up a dig task first.
  
• Fixed bug that let creatures spawn without beyond species limit.
  
• Fixed bug that made craft icons vanish.
  
• Added hotkey (esc) that closes popups.