KeeperRL News

KeeperRL Alpha 33 is released! New additions include a playable dwarf faction, overhauled z-level content, as well as numerous gameplay improvements, such as new crafting materials and an improved storage system. Check out the patch notes below for more detailed information.

I’d like to thank everyone involved in crash testing this patch, sending bug reports and suggestions. Your help was invaluable!

If you would like to continue your saved game from Alpha 32, you can opt-in into the "Alpha 32 save compatibility" BETA branch under the game's properties in Library. Make sure to opt-out of the branch to go back to Alpha 33 when you're done!



[h3]Gameplay[/h3]

• Playable Dwarves faction
  
• New crafting materials: adoxium and infernite
  
• Combat experience is based on the number of unique kills
  
• New specialized storage system with custom storage furniture for various equipment types
  
• Reworked flanking/parry mechanic with visual indicators and hints
  
• Smelting unneeded equipment in furnaces
  
• New fog effect
  
• 'Gargoyle' and 'blast' trap
  
• All doors and gates are stronger
  
• Minion training and crafting efficiency depends on the speed/slowness buffs
  
• Certain minions will dance when bored
  
• New z-level enemies with progressing difficulty
  
• Ground level allied vaults are moved to z-levels
  
• AI won't waste throwable items on super weak enemies
  
• Dark elves and goblins villains difficulty adjusted
  
• All crafting is sped up by 50%
  
• Added crossbows to the game
  
• Fire elementals on the red dragon level aren't considered fighter units
  
• Black dragon moved from the top-level campaign to a z-level
  
• Minions won't build bridges or dig when pathfinding
  
• Special immigrant trait that aggravates enemies
  
• Giant spider won't place webs all over dungeon when captured/recruited
  
• Ranged weapon glyphs
  
• Artifact bows made from tree spirit wood
  
• 'Unclaim tile' order
  
• New 'swamp' biome for some villains, courtesy of the DigRealm mod
  
• Craftable fog and poison gas emitting potions
  
• Traps are constructed by workers like all other furniture, and not crafted in workshops
  
• New wall type with arrow slits, new 'archer' vision that allows shooting through arrow slits.
  
• Prisons must be surrounded by prison bars
  

[h3]UI[/h3]

• Added fast travel between z-levels in the turned-based mode
  
• Added workshop window tabs for different crafting materials
  
• Archery range shooting positions are visualized when placing it
  
• Map cursor highlighted red when it's not possible to place a construction
  
• New, easier way of implementing ranged traps such as gargoyle and boulder traps
  
• New crops and scarecrows sprites courtesy of the PureLands mod
  
• Conflicting equipment like shields and two-handed weapons will be automatically unequipped instead of blocking the action
  
• The game announces when you have discovered an allied that can be traded with or recruited
  
• Retired dungeons list shows dungeons uploaded by Steam friends
  
• The 'under attack' message is shown in a separate window
  
• New game intro
  
• New 'exit game' menu
  

[h3]Modding[/h3]

• New minion promotion system made for the dwarves faction is fully moddable
  
• Moddable dynamic and static (world gen) gas effects
  
• Added 'AddSpellSchool', 'IncreaseMaxLevel' effects
  
• Added 'Gender' creature predicate
  
• Added 'DistanceD' predicate, which allows circular area effects
  
• Added an optional duration parameter to the 'Lasting' effect
  

[h3]Fixes[/h3]

• Fixed bogus ability timeouts in bows found in retired maps
  
• Team won't follow the player into the sokoban levels to avoid game crashes
  
• Fixed an exploit that allowed crafting unlimited items from one unique ingredient
  
• Fixed construction debt inconsistency crash
  
• Fixed items that grant multiple abilities
  
• Fixed the display of item price in shops
  
• Fixed recruitment from goblin caves
  

An unofficial Alpha 33 build is out on the BETA branch. Check it out if you're an experienced player and want an early glimpse of all the new stuff!

Please post your feedback in this thread or in the comments below.

If you are new to KeeperRL, it is strongly recommended that to stick to the official Alpha 32 patch for now, as this build is very unstable, and the tutorial doesn't work at the moment.

Please also note that until the patch is officially released, the save file format may change at any moment, and you saves may be lost. (although I'll do my best to avoid this).

To opt into the build, please go into the game's properties, BETA tab, and choose the "dev" branch.

What’s a dungeon building game without dwarves? Of course the little neckbeards have always been present in KeeperRL as an enemy, but a playable dwarf faction has long been due. As a rule I try to add unique gameplay with each new faction so that it’s not a mere reskin of existing content. The dwarves are no different.



The main dwarf characteristic is that you start with exactly twelve of them, and it’s impossible to gain any new minions for the entire game. This is accompanied by a promotion system that lets you specialize your initially blank dwarves with various combinations of skills. The promotions are awarded together with new available technologies, as your faction gains levels.



Together, these two mechanics will force you to take long term strategic choices, as well as to choose your battles very wisely. This is unlike most other factions in KeeperRL, where minions are quite expendable. From initial playtesting it seems like this will be a very ‘roguelike’ experience, which I’m super happy about.

New content is always fun, but I also remember about adding important quality-of-life features to KeeperRL. One that has been requested for a long time is item smelting. It allows you to get rid of unneeded equipment, while recovering some resources. Another such feature is the ‘unclaim tile’ order, which lets you remove parts of territory that you aren’t interested in.



To add some variety in the landscape, I’ve added a fog effect which simply obscures vision. Since KeeperRL has already had a similar poison gas effect, I decided to merge these two into a general gas system. This is of interest mostly to modders, as it’s possible to add custom gases with various effects, and they can be placed on the map permanently during level generation or temporarily, for example as the result of a spell or crashed potion.



These are only some of the new features that I’ve been working on in the last weeks. If you’re interested in finding some fun surprises, you can try out the Alpha 33 testing build on Steam, which I’m going to release right after publishing this blog post. Stay tuned for another announcement with the instructions on how to opt into the new build.

After a bit of a break following the last patch, I’m back with some new, exciting gameplay features that will arrive in KeeperRL Alpha 33.





I’ve been looking to add more ores/materials to the game for a while, as an extra reward for exploring deeper z-levels. Quite a lot of mods add new materials, and it’s really a no-brainer feature for vanilla. For now I’ve settled on adding two new ores. The first one, “adoxium”, is named after your favourite evil god. It allows crafting items with magical properties, and is super rare, to the point that you’ll only craft a few full sets of equipment with what you can mine with reasonable effort. The other material is “infernite”, borrowed from the Bonus Mod, as it is a cool and unique idea. It is a permanently burning ore, which allows forging weapons that deal fire damage. The only issue is that it burns whoever touches it, which means that you’ll have to solve the problem of fire resistance for your workers and the users of infernite weapons. It is as rare as adoxium.

What was previously stopping me from adding new materials was the workshop UI. Requiring listing every new item/material pair, it would become quite unreadable. After a bit of research, I’ve ended up adding simple tabs to the menu, which you can see in the screenshot above. They’ll help a lot in finding your desired item.





A storage system overhaul has been on the table for a while, partly because piling items on the floor randomly is a bit counter-productive, and also because I want to give players new ways to design their dungeons in creative ways. On the other hand, I don’t want KeeperRL to require sophisticated storage micromanagement. A simple “designate and forget” should do.

The first step towards this goal was to create a hierarchy of storage types, starting from the general “equipment”, “resources”, etc, and specializing them into more and more narrowing categories, like “weapons”, “bows”, “gold”, and so on. When a sword is produced, the game will start with looking for a specialized weapon rack to store it, and fall back to the old equipment storage if it’s not found. This way you can have your items neatly organized, but you don’t have to. Your minions won’t really care.

It’s worth mentioning that the new storage system is fully moddable, so you can probably expect your favorite modders to come up with new custom storage furniture as well.

Another topic are storage limits. Right now you can store your entire dungeon’s treasure on one tile. This is both due to simpler implementation, and for players’ convenience. I know from other games that having to constantly create new storage rooms for your ever growing pile of stuff can be annoying. I think that a middle ground would be practical, where basic storage types have limits, but one can eventually build some sort of bottomless magical chests. I still need to think about all gameplay and implementation (performance) consequences of this, as it would be a big change to KeeperRL’s engine.





In another improvement inspired by modders, I’ve added two new prison features. Mostly to improve realism, the game will require you to secure all prison tiles by either prison bars or prison door. It’s mostly an aesthetic change, as prisoners can still move freely around your dungeon when doing work. This might change though in a future prisoner overhaul.

Something that has been suggested by players, is the idea of arrowslits. In KeeperRL it is a special wall tile, which creatures with the attribute of “arrowslit vision” can see and shoot through. It’s a human equivalent of “elf vision” (which you may have fallen victim to if you were ever shot by elves through the trees). It will be available to the white knight faction as well as AI villains. Expect more unexpected arrows flying in your direction

KeeperRL will feature two more traps. The first one is the gargoyle, which is a stone guardian that comes to life whenever enemies appear. The other trap is the blast trap, which is pretty similar to the "directed blast" spell. While pretty simple on the surface, with some clever tricks it can create very interesting situations involving attackers.





Inspired by one classic fantasy story, I’ve added a special end-game event to KeeperRL, in which the last standing enemies gather in a final, desperate attack against you. It is a fully scripted scenario, so don’t expect any simulated enemy diplomacy. It’s thought of as an occasional change of pace, most likely to your doom.

The attack, when it happens, involves all the forces from the remaining main villains, including their leaders. Therefore, resisting it should secure your victory in the game.