Caves of Qud News

2.0.176

When you're looking at something with the Look command, you can now hit space to bring up an interaction menu for the object you're looking at. From there you can target the object, untarget it, or bring up its list of visible status effects.
Special follower interactions (rename, give items, attack target) are now accessed through the look interaction menu. Some of them work at a distance but only if your companion is able to hear you or you have telepathy.
Renaming and giving items to a companion now takes a turn.
Directing companions now has an action cost of 100, or 10 if you are able to communicate telepathically.
Companions who unfollow you because you beguiled or proselytized a new companion no longer continue following the last order you gave them.
Added an option to enable music while the application is in the background.
Halved the default horizontal size of the overlay message log and made it reposition itself depending on where you are on the map.
Fixed long messages from being improperly truncated in the overlay message log.
Added overlay icons for dragging and resizing the message log.
Added gentling cones, which function like gentling masks but occupy the head slot.
The wild-eyed watervine merchant now sells legitimate severed body parts instead of mockups.
Sparking baetyls no longer request mockup severed body parts.
Metal folding chairs can now be repaired.
Attacks against sleeping creatures now have a +4 penetration bonus.
'Energy cost' is now referred to as 'action cost'.
The game manual (F1) now includes a section on action cost.
NPCs who can't melee attack their target because of a phase or flight mismatch now look for another reasonable target to attack, or they temporarily flee.
Electrical discharges now respect phase and are visually distinguishable by their phase.
Cave spider hired guards no longer attack anyone who gets stuck in their webs.
The NPC-only Heightened Smell mutation is now more fully implemented.
The force barrier that protects Grit Gate's front entrance now works more reliably.
Chromelings no longer open the tinted glass doors in front of Grit Gate when they're bored.
Jab now correctly doesn't work with robotic hands, as described in its description.
Made the Swimming power description more descriptive.
Floating yell-text now only shows up if you're in earshot of the yeller (ex: zealots and preachers).
Severed limbs and equipment lost due to dismemberment now more reliably drop into empty adjacent tiles if the creature whose limb is being severed occupies a square with a solid object.
Temporal fugue clones that use Force Bubble no longer leave ghost bubbles behind.
Oboroquru's lair no longer gives an incomplete message when you find it.
Fixed a bug that may have caused a game lockup when completing Kith & Kin with illness motivations.
Fixed a typo in the clan names of certain legendary goatfolk.
[modding] Added support for binary serialization of types from mods.

2.0.175

Added a new book: The Artless Beauty.
Added a new energy cell mod: radio-powered.
Added reasons for why satellite-sourced radio-power might be occluded: orbital debris, glass storms, flocks of birds, acid rain, drift film, or unidentified anomalies.
Added new dialog for hatters, glovers, and chefs.
You can now name unnamed locations in your journal (Locations tab > hit 'N').
All villagers can now give you directions, regardless of their species.
You can no longer jump while prone.
Robots in sleep mode no longer snore.
When a creature with a carapace is knocked prone, there's a chance they become stuck in that position until they make an Agility save. This applies to players with the Carapace mutation.
When the Barathrumites teach you to craft thermoelectric cells via the water ritual, they no longer pour lava on you. Same with lead-acid cells and acid.
Amnesia no longer causes autoexplore to cycle endlessly.
Recoilers are no longer auto-identified, except for the ones you receive as quest rewards.
Feral lah no longer produce pods while frozen.
Dazed now applies the correct move speed penalty.
Dart and booster turrets deployed by dynamic turret tinkers now use only empty injectors as ammo.
Large-scale reality stabilization effects are less laggy.
Remove the errant dais tiles from the top of the Six Day Stilt cathedral map.
Fixed a bug that sometimes caused you not to receive the recoiler reward from non-Joppa starting village quests.
Fixed a bug that caused Heightened Hearing and Sense Psychic to continue detecting creatures once they moved outside your range of detection.
Fixed a bug that caused historic relic retrieval quests to fail to register as completed.
Fixed a bug that prevented rocket turret tinkers from properly setting up their turrets.
Fixed a bug that caused juice saps to obliterate stacked energy cells.
Fixed a bug that caused unequip messages to appear when a creature died.
Fixed Sparafucile's maker's mark.
Fixed some grammar issues when traversing historic sites on the world map.
Fixed typos in Barathrum's dialogue and Issachari dialogue.
[modding] Added a new tag, TurretStockExclusive. Among the ammo blueprints that are candidates for a turret's stock ammunition (via MagazineAmmoLoader), if at least one has this tag, then all the blueprints that don't have this tag are excluded from consideration.
[modding] Added a new tag, TurretStockWeight, that can be used to specify a blueprint's relative frequency in turret ammo stocks. Specify the weight in the value; the default is 1.

2.0.174.5

We remodeled Grit Gate.

• The whole layout is new. Explore!
  
• Added a new music track to Grit Gate.
  
• Added a functional power grid to Grit Gate. Power is generated at power stations, conducted through power lines (or, in rarer cases, wirelessly), and consumed by various kinds of artifacts in place of battery power.
  
• Added new objects in support of the power grid infrastructure: fusion power station, broadcast power station, wired fulcrete, wired door, power line, and heavy power line.
  
• Added a functional hydraulic power system to Grit Gate. Power is generated at pumping stations, conducted via liquids through pipes, and consumed by various kinds of artifacts in place of battery power.
  
• Added new objects in support of the hydraulic infrastructure: fusion pumping station, glass hydraulic pipe, metal hydraulic pipe, fulcrete with piping, and hydraulic irrigator.
  
• Added three new Barathrumites: Hortensa, Iseppa, and Neek. They'll be getting personalized descriptions soon.
  
• Urshiib now correctly have the Quills and Triple-Jointed mutations.
  
• Gave several of the Barathrumites new tiles.
  
• Gave several of the Barathrumites relevant tinker skills.
  
• Gave several of the Barathumites guns.
  
• Barathrumites now repair broken contraptions if they're nearby.
  
• Barathrumites now flee from danger if their HP gets low.
  
• Wounded Barathrumites now seek out healing installations.
  
• Added several new gadgets: unicomputer, liquid-cooled unicomputer, powered telescope, loudspeaker, gas burner, hydraulic brass foaminator, and chromeling signal relay.
  
• Added two new types of workbenches.
  
• Added some powered defensive structures to the grid: chain laser emplacements and force projectors.
  
• Added a new forcefield variant: force barrier. Force barriers block all projectiles and block movement for creatures who don't have proper clearance.
  
• Replaced the force field entrance to Grit Gate with a force barrier.
  
• Added a mainframe computer to Grit Gate. She calls herself Ereshkigal.
  
• Added mainframe supporting objects: monitor, control panel, status panel, and vacuum column tape drive.
  
• Added an intercom to the mainframe room.
  
• Added two new sculptures: chrome bust of Mehmet I and chrome bust of K4K5.
  
• Added a new type of arc sconce.
  
• Made some architectural adjustments to Barathrum's Study.
  
• Refreshed Rodanis Y's stats and abilities. They now default to an unpowered state but can be powered -- via the grid -- by interfacing with Ereshkigal, assuming you have the appropriate security clearance.
  
• Refreshed chromeling and plated chromeling's stats and abilities.
  
• Added a new chromeling status effect: overclocked.
  
• Gave certain NPCs a new item: safety bracelet.
  
• Grit Gate quests now correctly award Barathrumite reputation again.
  
• We fully refreshed the quest 'A Call to Arms'.
  
  • Added two new subquests: Grave Thoughts and The Assessment.
    
  • Tweaked the stats of several existing Putus Templar.
    
  • Added a new item: gentling mask.
    
  • Added a new member to the Putus Templar ranks: newfather. Newfathers spawn with force-domesticated creatures (via gentling masks) who are eager to win their affection.
    
  • Tweaked dialog all across the entire Grit Gate questline.
    
• Made several other small tweaks in support of the remodel.
  

Added a new heavy weapon: chain laser.
Added power buttons to some grid-powered contraptions. You can power them off and on if you have the proper security clearance.
Added support for grid power to several gadgets.
You can no longer beguile, proselytize, or otherwise woo wraith-knights.
Wraith-knights are now excluded from dynamic encounters.
Added new tiles for glass walls and doors.
Added new tiles for tetraxenonoglass walls.
Added tinted glass walls and doors.
Added a new vase tile.
Added a new tile for taco suprema.
Added color and tile variety for tables with objects on them.
Banner of the Holy Rhombus now only bestows its status effect if its being wielded or on the ground in the 'raised' position.
Furniture is now excluded from autoget.
Force walls and portable walls may no longer be built on diagonals.
Portable walls must now start adjacent to their deployer.
Creatures with the Quills mutation are now immune to other creatures' quills.
Creatures with the Force Wall mutation can no longer walk through the forcefields they create with it.
Smart use on unidentified artifacts now brings up their interaction menu.
Reasonably intelligent NPCs are now somewhat more tolerant to friendly fire.
You are no longer considered to have violated the covenant of the water ritual if the NPC who died was responsible for their own demise or if they were non-hostile to you and the damage that killed them appears to be accidental.
Creatures who like to occasionally wander now occasionally teleport if they have the ability to.
When you're on fire, beating at the flames now requires you to have hands. The alternative of rolling on the ground is available to you as a fallback, if you are on the ground and capable of interacting with it.
Creatures who are on fire now try to put out the fire with the methods available to them, depending on their intelligence and willpower.
Creatures and objects that are on fire now have a "fight fire" interaction menu option that you can use to try to beat out the flames with your hands.
Weapons that stun or electrify on hit are now rated more highly by creature AI.
NPCs can now use Jump.
You can no longer jump without feet.
Hindren, ice frogs, and bloated pearlfrogs now have Jump.
When you kill one of your companions, they are no longer awarded XP for their own death.
Gathering liquids with the 'collect' command now carries the same dangers as pouring those liquids.
Force bubbles no longer generate fresh force fields every time their emitter moves.
Technological force emitters now have a chance per turn to regenerate destroyed fields.
Activating and deactivating force bracelets now costs a turn.
Forcefield activation and movement no longer pushes objects that are out of phase with the forcefield or creatures that have a forcefield nullifier implant.
Solar arrays that are nonfunctional due to not being in the sun now display that status if you have access to telemetry.
The prone status effect now gives -6 Agility, -5 DV, and -80 move speed.
There are now some creatures who cannot be knocked prone and others who cannot stand back up if knocked prone.
Fixed an AI pathing issue.
Fixed a formatting issue with the Ruin of House Isner story.
[modding] The tag ExcludeFromTurretStock will now prevent an ammo blueprint for being considered for the stocks of turrets that use MagazineAmmoLoader weapons. This can be used to avoid the situation that has been arising where mods that add new kinds of ammo cause turrets to show up with small amounts of each of the different varieties.

Hey all,
No mainline patch this week. Instead, we've posted a beta of the 'Grit Gate, Remodeled' patch. If you'd like to help us test it, right-click on Caves of Qud in Steam, select Properties, click the Betas tab, and switch to the 'beta' branch. Post your bugs in this thread.

Specifically, we're looking for folks to run through the Grit Gate quest line, especially the new 'A Call to Arms' sequence. You can fast-forward directly to the start of that sequence by wishing for 'stage5'. (Note: the encounter relies on some UI elements that are currently only available if you have tiles enabled.)

Live and drink!

We remodeled Grit Gate. Here's a short summary of the changes. We'll post the full patch notes when the patch goes live on the main branch.

The whole layout is new. Explore!
Added many new items.
Added new creatures, including new Putus Templar and Barathrumites.
Added a functional power grid, fusion power station, and water pumping station to Grit Gate.
Added new interactions to grid-powered artifacts.
Updated many existing items and creatures.
Entirely refactored the 'A Call to Arms' quest.

Hey all,
We're planning to post the 'Grit Gate, Remodeled' patch to the beta branch, but we're not quite ready yet, so Feature Friday will be Feature Saturday this week!

See you tomorrow.