Hello Elders!
I got a surprise for you all! Do you remember the Roadmap Prophecy? It turned out to be reality! To celebrate the addition of the Chinese language to the game thanks to HQ, a new elder is coming to the world of dotAGE: the Foolish Old Man that Moves the Mountains - Yugong!
I remembered a new Elder!
This Elder comes with a new mechanic of his own: Intensive Farming. All Crops get a bonus of +1 for every 5 of the same Crop in a clump. This means +1 for 5, +2 for 10, and so on. Make sure you take advantage of this and plan your layouts accordingly!
Due to his stubbornness, Yugong can even move mountains (of course, he's not doing this alone, and instead Pips will lend him a helping hand). Yugong's Pips can perform all tasks in just one turn
This is a direct reference to an old Chinese tale that is very well known in the country!
Yugong also adds a set of dwellings that are larger, but do not allow placement far from the town center, creating a close-knit village in the valley. He also adds a few new resources and crops inspired by China's culture
Of course, this Elder has his own map too! The new map sports a long river that cuts the map into two, and is filled with scattered mountain tiles that need to be removed to make space. The large plains are yours to conquer! Be wary, however, as the events that hit this land tend to change it up a bit!
New Boons!
Alongside Yugong, while working on the Events Balance patch I also added a new Memory that adds
16 new boons to the game! The new Boons are designed to promote a bit wackier strategies, and can be very strong if used effectively, so make sure to take advantage of them! One boon doubles the power of your graves, another gives a bonus if you use fewer buildings, another even doubles down on randomness! What else could there be?
Balance Patch!
In the last months, I have collected all the feedback received since release and have been working on a big patch to improve the balance of the game. The focus has been on helping making players who are struggling get back into the game on one hand, and to make it more challenging for players that are snowballing, especially at higher difficulties!
The 1.2 patch is now live on the main branch! Thank you to everybody who helped testing it!
Here are some highlights:
- Event level now scales with the residual chance of winning an event (i.e. barely lost events will have a lower level!)
- Weathers have been completely redesigned to be more interesting and less annoying in general
- The Deadly event mechanic has been redesigned to be less "feel-bad", and more as a way to close lost games
- Almost all events have been rebalanced and reshuffled to add more variety and decrease feel-bad moments
- Cows are stronger
- Frozen Pips do not need to eat anymore
- Crops do not refill anymore at season changes (but the function has been moved to a new Boon!)
- Threat range to get 100% or 0% increased from 3 x Danger to 4 x Danger (this goes both ways, effectively helping struggling players)
- Seasonal buildings do not work anymore during apocalypse (unless you choose a new Apocalyptic boon!)
- Some cures now appear earlier, and Pips can cure themselves (not if frozen or burning)
- Overpipulation now triggers earlier (30+ Pips)
- Dirt can now be removed
- Post-Apocalypse games will now switch seasons like the base game, but without events interfering
There are *a lot* of changes, so if you want to know more, you can find the
full changelog here!
New Localizations
At last, the new patch adds Polish and Chinese localization added by three awesome volunteers, so if you speak either, do give them a try and give us feedback
here!
Next Steps
Now that this new patch is out, this ends successfully the current roadmap efforts! What else will the future bring? I'll be reorganizing my notes and prepare a plan for the next steps (of course, QoL and bugfixes will still come). I now have access to all development resources for Console versions and will probably dive into that for a while! Stay tuned for more information about what will come next as I will be posting a new roadmap.
Sale upcoming!
Heads up: the game will be on 20% sale starting monday during the Endless Replayability Fest, so if you are on the fence about the game, it would be a good idea to wait for that!
Until then, have fun!
- Michele
P.S: The Golden Prophecy is still waiting to be completed and needs help from the community!
