Bulwark Evolution: Falconeer Chronicles News

[p]Alright everyone,

Seems like unity messed up and any game build since a very long time has hidden security vulnerabilities. [/p][p][/p][p]On the beta branch you will find a new hotfix, but it also contains a few game fixes.[/p][p][/p]

• [p]Built with a newer version of unity that fixes the security issue, but version changes are always a bit ick.[/p]
• [p]Capital ships in your air fleet will remain in formation during combat, this way you can can keep em out of the fight or bring em closer in, as they follow your surveyor. This started as a solution to the bunching up of capital ships during combat, but this is actually now a major gameplay change that brings much more effect from your movement orders when leading a large fleet.[/p]
• [p]clocks on the entagon are now the right way up [/p]
• [p]entagon coloring improved a tiny bit[/p]
• [p]Master of ammunitions voice lines after upgrading are now audible. [/p]

[p][/p][p]Now these changes where in-production changes now brought into beta earlier than intended due to the security issue, even tho Valve has apparently already implemented some safeguards.

So I will leave it in beta for the remainder of the weekend. perhaps other stuff might get added as people report issues..[/p][p][/p][p][/p][p]Cheers,
Tomas[/p][p]
[/p]

[p]Hi everyone,

A small hotfix is live on the Beta branch. Go to game properties/betas and select the Beta Patch branch.,

here's the fixes[/p]

• [p]upgrading behemoths and surveyors failed to subtract the required funds (oops) now fixed[/p]
• [p]sometimes hammerhead small airships had incosistent turret scales[/p]
• [p]leaders of a faction cannot be acquired thru subterfuge[/p]
• [p]made upgrading a faction surveyor cheaper[/p]

[h2]It is time for BEHEMOTH![/h2][p]but first a few requests to help keep Bulwark and a new game development going as a niche Solodev on steam. [/p]

1. [p]please review the game, any review helps even critical ones. [/p]
2. [p]please follow me as a developer, this will enable you to be notified of updates or new games, but also helps me establish a following that sticks around not just for one game.
   https://store.steampowered.com/developer/TomasSala. Valve has told me many exciting things that will make this super worthwhile in the future. [/p]
3. [p]Buying the support scoped mini-DLC helps me in many ways, mostly with food for my hungry dog and hungrier kids ;) [/p]

[p][/p][previewyoutube][/previewyoutube][p][/p][h2]Changelist:[/h2][p][/p][p]Upgradable Surveyors:[/p]

• [p]Mechanics have upgrade interfaces when installed[/p]
• [p]you no longer get the faction surveyor upon installation[/p]
• [p]purchase the surveyor and subsequent faction upgrade at the appropriate mechanic[/p]
• [p]Mancer, Imperial and Bannerless Surveyor now have a tier 2 upgrade[/p]

[p]Behemoth[/p]

• [p]Added 'Master of Ammunitions' location/event in the silent sea[/p]
• [p]Acquire the Master of Ammunitions to unlock the Behemoth[/p]
• [p]The Behemoth has 3 distinct tiers to upgrade[/p]
• [p]The Behemoth is OP AF![/p]

[p]Entagon [/p]

• [p]Unique location south east of Shard , Entagon HQ[/p]
• [p]Acquire the HQ to unlock subterfuge diplomacy events[/p]
• [p]events for acquiring other faction settlements outright[/p]
• [p]events for acquiring/corrupting other faction commanders[/p]
• [p]events for undo-ing vassal-ization[/p]
• [p]events for acquiring map info on other factions[/p]
• [p]events for disrupting settlement defences[/p]

[p]Arbologies[/p]

• [p]Freebooter secret locations are dotted around the map and near the Stump and Hole[/p]
• [p]These locations harbour a Arbology tower[/p]
• [p]any walkways connected to an Arbology and supplied with workers will spawn trees[/p]
• [p]Trees cost splinters instead of providing them[/p]

[p]Curved Segments[/p]

• [p]Curved segments are now indicated at the right pip on the buildline UI[/p]
• [p]Curved segments are previewed with a curved build line[/p]
• [p]Tier 1 wood has it's own curved segment[/p]
• [p]Tier 3 iron also has its own curved segment[/p]
• [p]interesecting curved segments with other walkways provides a gated segment (like the stone tier 2 had)[/p]

[p]Various QoL additions[/p]

• [p]new Anti Aliasing settings for Supersampling (beware hella heavy)[/p]
• [p]new 3D pointer/grid cursor to help with 3d picking and folks read that the cursor is a 3d cursor.[/p]
• [p]new pacification system for commanders added. If you acquire a commander thru subterfuge or consquest they are now added and pacified to work (they are loyal to you now, their soul broken)..[/p]
• [p]you can use the 'travel here' button in the soultree to instantly go to a commander or captain location/harbour[/p]
• [p]Stuff I forgot to write down during development.. oops[/p]

[p]Balancing[/p]

• [p]Balanced razor beetle rate of fire and health[/p]
• [p]Balanced manta rate of fire[/p]
• [p]You can mine resource points near fortresses[/p]
• [p]Made it that fixed locations can also spawn aggressive units.[/p]
• [p]unit costs increase with armysize as an upfront upkeep price[/p]

[p]Perfomance[/p]

• [p]fixed v-sync and general frametiming to allow higher and more consistent framerates[/p]
• [p]make sure to use Vsync if super high fps gives erratic results [/p]

[p]Bugfixes[/p]

• [p]fixed uinique building description in inventory[/p]
• [p]fixed commander events on the map having the wonder icon[/p]
• [p]fixed a UIissue where you couldn't select a diplomatic message cuz you kept selecting towers[/p]
• [p]fixed an issue with the resource range indicator not going away when near another settlement[/p]
• [p]fixed the soultree action popups to switch state better[/p]
• [p]made the transition from air to ground and back snappier and more direct[/p]
• [p]fixed that "start" turns into "continue" if you have an existing save[/p]
• [p]fixed selecting fx for ancient fortress[/p]
• [p]made bigger surveyors more lumbering and less floaty[/p]
• [p]changed flight characteristics for all but the base surveyor made the ground hugging effect smoother[/p]
• [p]made title of settlement hide automatically when far away or inactivefixed spawn animations/effects to be more accurate[/p]
• [p]when selecting a command tower from the air, if it has no cap, one is build[/p]
• [p]added new logo to splash[/p]

[p]

This is another big one, and likely the last for quite some time. Behemoth is a lot of player requests combined into a nice big mix of stuff that really felt missing before. There are also some balancing suggestions integrated that should make conquest both in total conquest and regular play feel more challenging.

Offcourse there will be hotfixes and small balancing fixes the coming days and weeks, please post anything you find here and on discord.

Could not do this without all of you!
Cheerio
Tomas [/p][p][/p][p][/p][p][/p][p][/p][p][/p][p][/p]

[h2][/h2][h2]BEHEMOTH RELEASES FOR FREE WEDNESDAY OCT 1![/h2][p]
Hi everyone, in a few days I'll throw the switch on the Behemoth Update. A free expansion to Bulwark that will likely be this year's biggest free expansion. I am just waiting on some voice recordings and doing some last minute closed beta testing.

(If you want some BETA access, join the discord https://discord.com/invite/falconeer). [/p][h3]
Get the game on Autumn Sale discount and get new content![/h3][p]Off-course the game will be on a big discount starting with the Autumn Sale, so take this opportunity to support the game by buying some of the small supporting DLC. Because that's how all of this free content is being powered. Small DLC sales allow me to keep on working on Bulwark and other games.

[/p][h3]Feature Breakdown[/h3][p]
1. Upgradable surveyors

The previously rather simple faction mechanics have gotten a feature boost, you now buy your upgraded faction surveyor from them. And once you have acquired a new type of surveyor they also offer a single tiered upgrade. This isn't just stats and more guns, it's a visual upgrade as well.



2. Behemoth Surveyor

The Behemoth is a new Surveyor/Flagship that's well..... a bit of a chunky boy.
It comes back with a naval cannon and several large guns. Besides a plethora of point defences and hitpoints to match. It's going to be OP AF, but this is what quite a few where asking for. But it's gonna cost a good coin to acquire it. Also the entire surveyor crash system has been revamped, if you lose your faction surveyor or Behemoth its gone forever and you revert to the tiny vanilla surveyor and you'll have to re-buy at the mechanic or Master of ammunitions.
3. Entagon Subterfuge Events (and clocks on the Ursee)
Someone here on the forums once expressed that they found the late game conquest grind a bit tedious and were looking for a way to acquire those last few settlements easier, thus the Entagon Subterfuge events were born. This sneaky secret society (retconned into the Falconeer Remaster btw) are going to be available and they unlock a new series of espionage and disruptive events. Such as acquiring commanders of a hostile faction (and pacified to boot) or acquiring an entire settlement outright or disrupting defenses.
[/p][p]You also get two Entagon unique buildings that you need to deploy in order to unlock these events and visits from an subtly familiar airship (similar to the regular diplomacy events). Take note that I finally fixed the lore absence of accurate timekeeping with the Entagon HQs, tho this isn't a 60m/24h clock.. It's nice and odd. 4.TREES
You will find Arbology towers smattered across the Ursee, Freebooter experiments that you can use to add greenery to your settlements. There is again a nice bit of integrated backstory to these that will I will retro-actively am also adding into the Falconeer Remaster coming later this year.. It also ads that extra bit of tragic backstory to the Lost cave-dwelling tribes and how they were victimized in the Falconeer but always had a key to the future as well. Also trees look nice ;)
5. Curved Wall segments.[/p][p]Well every free update has brought new architecture options and the curved stone segments already existed but they had no GUI implementation and were un-found by most players, so there are now curved sections for every tier of walkway/wall and they are visually foreshadowed in the interface.
So just a few days,, really pushing it to the edge on this one, I even still have to get a few subterfuge events working ;) But you can join in and test on discord already.

And don't worry, this might be the biggest free expansion this year, but I am already planning something else for Bulwark, something big but in the early stages that will be announced later this year. But of such a scale that its pushing out other free expansions for the year.
[/p][p]Also as always small DLC keeps my work afloat and every user review for the game helps me survive.
Follow me as a developer on steam is also a great support :[/p][p]https://store.steampowered.com/developer/TomasSala

Cheers and hope this one drops well in a few days.
Don't forget , the game is gonna be on discount so don't buy it yet.,

Tomas Sala, the solodev.[/p][p][/p]

[h3]Hi everyone let's do another small update ;)[/h3][p]
It's good to be back up to a decent production speed, holiday and all that is good, but man it takes a long time to get back up to speed.

But up to speed I am, to the point that the update is now feature-complete and I just need to add some sidequests, hints, get voice lines recorded and do some testing. Working hard to get this one out to you all.

There will also be some announcements regarding futher Bulwark content in the near future as well, but let's not get ahead of ourselves yet...[/p][h3]
Quick recap of the features you can expect[/h3]

• [p]Behemoth upgradable surveyor[/p]
  1. [p]tiers of upgrades of hulking battle-surveyor[/p]
  2. [p]small miniquest to unlock the "master of ammunitions" that builds it for you[/p]
• [p]Upgradable faction surveyors[/p]
  1. [p]The Mechanics that exist each now have a single (fairly expensive) upgrade option for your existing faction surveyors[/p]
  2. [p]existing faction surveyors get a 1 tier buffed visually upgraded version (see previous news post)[/p]
• [p]Arbology tower[/p]
  1. [p]Scattered freebooter locations, fight to unlock the Arbology tower[/p]
  2. [p]Arbology tower spawns pines around it in your settlement [/p]
• [p]Curved wall sections [/p]
  1. [p]they are curved and large.[/p]

[p][/p][p]But there is also the "Entagon" a new unique bulding which serves as the HQ to a mysterious organisation that sells their subterfuge and intelligence services to the highest bidder (that's gonna be you).[/p][h3]
Finding and building this HQ will unlock the following events [/h3]

• [p]purchase all map data on a faction[/p]
• [p]bribe and acquire traiterous commanders from other factions (that are pacified and will work for you)[/p]
• [p]bribe and acquire traiterous captainsfrom other factions (that are pacified and will work for you)[/p]
• [p]acquire commanders and captains from destroyed factions (survivors)[/p]
• [p]disrupt the defences of hostile settlements[/p]
• [p]cause a revolt/change of leadership at a settlement and acquire it outright (very expensive)[/p]

[p]
hmmm that entagon blimp looks mildly familar..... Also why does spymaster Harmon look like John Lennon... who knows..

[/p][p]Fun fact, I am retconning some of this stuff into the Falconeer remaster as well, cuz that's just too much fun.

So there's another update. The Behemoth is getting its final pass and looks to be the big update for this year, and it will be here soon.

There will be further Bulwark content but in light of needing to finance all this free content it might turn out to be that old roadmap item that never manifested ;) Announcement on that to follow after Behemoth drops.

And remember buying the small DLC or even the Falconeer or the OST (it's amazing and Benedict Nichols gets supported with that Purchase) supports all these free updates. And it supports development of the third game "ancient waves" production of which will start early '26.

keep leaving user reviews as well (even negative ones, all feedback is appreciated) cuz it tells Steam that this game with worthwhile and worth showing to other potential fans.

Thanks for all the support, cheerio
Tomas
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