Ancient Warfare 3 News

This update is a bit smaller than usual, because a lot of work is being done for Alpha 0.36.0 which will feature more advanced battle editing tools an mechanics.
There will be triggers and visual scripting to create events and custom battle rules. That update is planned to be released later in April and there will be bug fixing patches until then (if required).

Content

• Added some single horn variations for custom units
  

Features & Improvements

• New map size: Medium
  
• Some units in guard mode can now:
  
• Use an idle pose (animations are not available for all unit types, but for most of them)
  
• Crouch
  
• Lay down
  
• The gladiator arena is available again
  
• Added some variants of the tattered battle banner object
  
• A message is shown when a unit cant be controlled
  

Bug fixes

• Adjusted the position of certain weapons in first person
  
• Fixed some problems when aiming through scopes
  
• Fixed some attachments and weapon settings
  
• Fixed a bug that caused incorrect lighting in first person in some biomes
  

[h3]Content[/h3]

• Added 9 decorative horn variations for custom units
  
• Added a trench shotgun (WMC reward)
  

[h3]Features & Improvements[/h3]
First person improvements
The first person view is now properly implemented. Started as a small feature with just a different camera position, we now have a 'real' first person mode. The perspective got changed, so that more of the weapon is visible. The fov does no longer affect how the weapons look and the overall feel of weapons got improved. Instead of being static, they are now a bit disconnected from the player while moving and pre-move slightly while rotating. Depending on the weapon, they are more or less sluggish.
To further improve the first person view, there are small animations when jumping and landing.

First person view by default
With the changes made to first person and the increased amount of options for players to interact with objects in the world, it was time to make first person the default view when starting a battle to make interactions easier.

Animation improvements
The rifle animations got slightly adjusted to have better default poses. There was a lot of snapping in some repeating animations, which got fixed now and everything is smooth. In addition, there are new animations for pump shotguns, repeat rifles and bullpup reloads.
The pistol animations got reworked. Units will now hold the pistols closer and more centered which also fixes the annoying off center aiming when playing as a player with a pistol.
Also, ranged weapons will now be blocked when the muzzle hits a wall in first person, which means you can no longer glitch shoot through walls.

Recoil improvements
Recoil got completely reworked and will now continue after a lot of shots. Previously the recoil stopped when the weapon reached a certain point. Weapons will now move more with more horizontal recoil, which can be difficult to predict and control when shooting fully automatic weapons. Shooting while moving is also more difficult. Overall, rifles have much more recoil than before and submachine guns are very easy to control. You can see the individual recoil values for each weapon in the arsenal.

Overview
The best way to experience the changes to the weapon feeling by playing, but here is a small video to show some of the changes above:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4u8HGXWe5gc

Other improvements

• The OKP and PSO sights can now be attached to the S12 rifle
  
• Taking damage repeatedly in very short time is now more obvious
  
• Attachments modify how sluggish a weapon is
  
• Shotguns will now reload 50% faster, but pump shotguns require to be pumped before shooting again
  

[h3]Bug fixes[/h3]
There are a lot of bug fixes in this update to improve the overall experience of the game

• Fixed shadow flickering while aiming down sights
  
• Fixed a lot of problems related to prefab placement and duplicating selected objects
  
• Fixed that shooting too fast after running would cause the weapon to get stuck in the run animation
  
• Fixed that spamming the weapon key (1, 2, 3, 4) would reset the recoil
  
• Deleting custom units will now directly remove them from the game and always delete their icons correctly (when deleting from the embedded unit editor in the battle editor, you can still place deleted units in the editor until you restart it)
• Fixed that custom zombie units could not be added to zombie spawners
  
• Fixed that keyboard shortcuts for selected units did not work while the mouse was hovering the UI
  
• Fixed a bug that caused unit animations to randomly turn into T-poses (very rare)
  
• Fixed a bug that allowed units to clip between foundations if many units got placed in one spot
  
• Fixed a bug that caused wrong placement collisions after rotating objects
  
• Fixed that searching for a face equipment and selecting it would reset all other face equipments
  
• Bugs related to editing units from within the battle editor
  
  • Changing to a weapon with different animations would trigger the T-pose
    
  • Changing the unit size would cause problems
    
  • Changing skinned clothing objects caused invisible joints
    
  • Editing a horse/elephant unit would cause the unit to fly up in the editor
    
• Fixed that replacing duplicated buildings after a terrain change would cause problems
  
• Fixed that placing prefabs would not update trees
  
• Fixed missing menu music in the apocalypse menu background
  
• Fixed aiming with the AA launcher
  
• Fixed that weapons couldnt be dropped while holding a shield
  
• Fixed that players could control passive or thrower units after dying
  
• Fixed that airdrops would always be enabled in zombie survival mode
  
• Fixed grid overlay on siege weapons in the prefab editor
  
• Glass will no longer break from the player touching it
  
• Fixed player camera rotation before the battle started
  
• Fixed workshop TOS UI button centering
  
• Fixed not working weapon attachments in the arsenal
  

[h3]Content[/h3]

• Added 3 safe objects
  
• Safes can be locked with keys/keycards and some weapons will snap into certain positions in the safe
  
• Added apocalypse menu scene
  

[h3]Features & Improvements[/h3]

• You can now create custom hostage units (Unit type = Hostage)
  
• You can now create custom throwing units (throwing axe, flamespear, knife, snowball and spear in the unit creator)
  
• Throwing units got updated to use the latest AI features (similar to the default ranged AI)
  
• Integrated the custom unit creator into the custom battle editor
  
  
  
  • You can now quickly create custom units by clicking on the custom unit item in the placement list
    
  • You can edit already placed custom units by selecting them and click the edit button
    
  • Similar custom units can also be selected after selecting one of them
    
• Updating an workshop item will now keep the already added tags
  

[h3]Bug fixes[/h3]

• Fixed a bug that caused hostages to be placed into the ground
  
• Fixed problems with the apocalypse laser attachment
  
• Fixed RPG aim positions
  
• Fixed that some traps would not fall when the depending object got destroyed
  

[h3]Upcoming updates[/h3]
24.02.21 - Alpha 0.35.6
Small feature update, bug fixes
16.03.21 - Alpha 0.35.7
Improved first person view & gameplay, updated rifle and pistol animations
22.03.21 - Alpha 0.35.8
Improved 3rd person view & gameplay, crouching/lying AIs in guard mode
Early-Mid April - Alpha 0.36.0
Event based visual scripting, triggers

There is a video available to show and explain the new features:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nMNDMXIHUu4

Features & Improvements

• When the player dies, the picked up keys will be dropped so that the next player can pick them up
  
• Added new unit interaction settings (Only visible when a single unit is selected)
  
• Added adjustable unit dialogs which can have different endings depending on the player's answers
  
• Added adjustable unit traders which can sell equipment objects
  
• Added hint units which show a speech bubble when the player approaches
  

For more information about the features above, I recommend watching the 5 minute video at the beginning of this post

Bug fixes

• Fixed a bug that caused red units to spawn on their base flag without a reason
  
• Fixed that updating workshop units would not update their thumbnails
  
• Fixed sky flickering in the medieval menu background
  
• Fixed that dropped health fields would block the unit visiblity
  
• Fixed player rotations while the game is paused
  
• Fixed rotation direction of the dust particle effect
  

Below is a list of fixed problems and changes since the 0.35.4 release. Update 0.35.5 is scheduled for next monday.

Improvements

• Added clothes to hostage units
  
• You can now choose weapons for the left hand of passive/corpse units
  
• Cardboard boxes can now be placed on shelves and tables
  

Bug fixes

• Fixed various problems related to controlling of units after the player died
  
• Fixed various problems related to flag spawning
  
• Fixed name of the baseball cap
  
• Fixed that face equipments with glass would turn black in the editor and while playing
  
• Fixed winter jacket culling issues
  
• Fixed clipping of winter jacket through unit heads
  
• Fixed a visual bug that caused tank control units to be visible from below the vehicle
  
• Fixed a bug that stopped the async delete process when trying to delete many objects
  
• Fixed that timer based zombie survival battles would not end when switching the player mid battle
  
• Fixed a bug that prevented doors from being placed in drywall doorframes
  
• Fixed that trying to control units from spawners would make them disappear
  
  [The fixes below are only available for the 64bit Windows version! Win32 and Linux builds are pending]
• Fixed disappearing of face equipment objects with transparency on corpses
  
• Fixed that the spot where the player died would be blocked when trying to move there with another unit
  
• Fixed that rotating the dust particle effect had no effect