Cross of Auria News

This patch is released for me to test functionality of DLC, which I sadly cannot do outside of the live environment. Many background systems and extra data have been added to prepare other upcoming releases. As of writing this patch note, I do not yet know if DLC in the way I imagine it will be possible for Cross of Auria. The result of this test will decide this game’s future.

On a more personal note, our baby is just over one month old - so I am sorry about the delay between the last few patches. Realistically, I don't have much new ready to put out right now other than background data. However, I have added two learnable skills for Ruby to be found in the houses at the main Lvell city area. Usually I wouldn't say anything and let you find these on your own - but I felt a gift necessary for the delay.

There's so much more I want to say, but I'd rather save the surprise for the update launches. See you out there! Don't forget - if you have any questions, feel free to reach out to me @ www.facebook.com/CrossOfAuria, or on my personal discord @ https://discord.gg/j4pZKuv.

3.2.3.2 [Build #76, Release Date: July 10, 2020] New:
- New NPCs continue to arrive in Lvell. Save restrictions have been lifted from their houses.
Founder’s Pack I (Preparation):
- FP1 brings a new type of Burn. If the tests go well, other damage and heal over time statuses will conform to the new structure.
-- Flamestrike now has a chance to inflict 1-5 turn burns. Each # burn is a separate state which gives immunity to the other burns while active. Example: it will not be possible to apply a 2 turn burn over a 5-turn burn. However, it will also not be possible to apply a 4-turn burn over a 3-turn burn which only has one turn remaining. This should give a bit more predictability to the way HoT and DoT states function, resulting in less sad moments where stronger DoTs are overwritten by weaker ones which currently happens both by player characters and enemies.

Changes:
- Flying and levitated enemies are now damaged more by weapons and skills with Bird-Killer.
- Flying and levitated enemies are now immune to Earth damage.

Other:
- Base data has been added for a new wave of player elemental attacks. These will be fully tuned and released in future updates.
- Background data has been added for the Founder’s Packs.



Edit @ 7:28PM - Good news. It works. =D

Since the last update, there haven't been any changes to the game world itself.. however, I am excited to announce that a new species is in development as both friend and foe. With a touch more detail, a long time twitch/youtube viewer of mine who dabbles in pixel art has decided to make some new assets for the generator of the engine along with some other odds and ends, such as minor tiles and new animations. Additionally, I have personally taken a crack or two at making edits to some of the onboard tilesets which will find their way into the game at some point in the future.

But onto some fun news! We here at the hardytier household are welcoming Player 4 into the mix next Wednesday! This pretty much sums up why development has slowed down for the time being. Ideally this will pick up after birth.


Since I don't have any new patch notes for you, I'll give you an update on the short to mid-term goals. Keep in mind that this does not detail the when of the releases. What I can say up front is the Orc War and An'ura Recon events will be in game and completely concluded before Scarlet Fire or any other "content" DLC are made.

Short-Mid Term Goals [Build #??, Release Date: ?? ??, 2020] New:
- Kenmono cat creature NPCs find their way to Revan.
- Two more quests will be added to The Phoenix Ash.
- Bookcases in various homes across Revan will now contain helpful information about the game.
- The exit tiles of the Auria entrance zone will trigger the next step in the Orc War quest line. During the Orc War scenario, it will not be possible to return to the majority of previous zones in their current condition. A "passage of time" mechanic is currently in development to be a clear line as to when sidequests at hunter lodges can be completed.
- A new race of friend and enemy has found their way to Revan.

Fixes:
- Quest Log dialogue and plugin commands will be completely removed from the game.
- Bugs will continue to be fixed upon their detection and rolled out immediately to Windows users. Mac users will have to wait for the next moderate update to receive these fixes. (This is because as far as I know, there are no active Mac players. If you are an active Mac player and need a fix for something, please reach out to me immediately as a comment to this post or on facebook @ facebook.com/CrossOfAuria )

Changes:
- Gazer battlegroups will appear on the field.
- Wolf battlegroups will appear as wolves on the field.
- Misc. Lvell structures with save blocking will be detailed with the save restriction removed.

An’ura Recon:
- The Delivery Boy has a message for Ruby.

DLC: Scarlet Fire:
- Details for Scarlet Fire DLC are being figured out. The "An'ura Recon" scenario is meant to serve as a taste for what to expect from Scarlet Fire and future DLC. (This is why An'ura Recon content is notated separately in patch notes)
- Upon release of Scarlet Fire, the base game will be updated to contain additions to both versions of The Pit in Agartha. However, the Scarlet version of the Colosseum will be for DLC owners only.

DLC: Other
- Founder packs are in the process of being created. These packs will serve as minor item boosts such as Flasks and Item Enchantments. Additionally, a single skill per character is being considered. This skill, while useful, will not be game-breaking or required by the main story for completion.
- Scarlet Fire is currently in the planning stage. DLC of this nature will contain roughly 3 hours of story content and potentially new party members. Scarlet Fire in particular will contain one new party member. SF will add a new dungeon on the field and a changeable Colosseum variant in Agartha.
- A Frost Forest, Frostbrood, and Hell's Gate DLC are also in pre-planning stages. Each of these would also add a dungeon and a Colosseum variant. Their play time will be similar to SF when it releases.

Alpha Ruins:
- New field spawn enemies will be on the prowl in Alpha Ruins.
- A commotion can be heard coming from beneath the Black Forest (level 8+).

Obscurite:
- A commotion can be heard coming from Obscurite, the Dusk Kingdom (level 8+).
- Other uses for the inner city section are in the planning stages. Some of it is already detailed and in game but not yet accessible.

Earlier today, a game-breaking bug was discovered by a tester. It was possible to not collect the Toxic Cores in Den An'ura and then be locked in the Heart zone when prompted to create the poison weapon. This has been resolved and it is currently possible to leave den an'ura with Miles, Riley & Alex without creating the poison item.
Additionally, an audio load issue was discovered and resolved just before meeting Miles & Riley in Scarlet Cavern.

3.2.3.1 [Build #75.1, Release Date: May 20, 2020]
Steam Store:
- On May 19th, the description and title in the Steam Store were changed.
File Size:
- Many new assets were added to the game data resulting in slightly larger file size.
-- The “x. Credits” file included with the game files has been updated to reflect the use of new assets.
Fixes:
- Fixed an audio load issue in Scarlet Cavern.
- Fixed an issue where the game could become locked in Den An’ura if the party did not have both Toxic Cores.
Changes:
- It is now possible to leave Den An’ura without the completed poison item.
- Miles will tell Ruby if she does not have all the components to complete the poison item when trying to exit the Heart zone in Den An’ura.

On Friday, I spent most of the time working on the next steps of the An'ura Recon questline. Specifically, fully creating and making live the next step of the quest and designing several skills for a new character which involved hours of testing and tweaking. If I'm going to give you an archer, he's going to do cool things. The VOD for this will be available on the CoA youtube channel within the next 24 hours. I'm piecing both small streams together and removing some of the down time where I had to walk away.

In addition to the progression of the quest, I found it necessary to dramatically scale back the level of the enemies in the Encampment. Based on my most recent test, a new player could get to the end of the current main campaign at level 8. Sidequests from the Rabbit's Foot and Agartha would push a player to 20, but I won't rely on that for these side stories.

- Build already released on May 15th. I had every intention to make another update before this post, but I was sidetracked creating a rewards system and harvesting new assets.

The Rewards System
- Full details in the #coa_rewards channel of my discord. Invite link here: https://discord.gg/JcxZmeG
- Channel points accumulated from watching me on Twitch will now be used to make your own additions to the game! The details are still being worked out, but the highlights of this system are:
-- X points to create an NPC, the dialogue of which you may control if you want. Creation of an NPC or enemy involves hopping in a private discord call with me to make it in the engine generator.
-- X points to create an enemy, the backstory (of the days leading up to this character encountering the party) of which you may write given the existing lore of the world. You must also create at least 3 notable battle attacks for this character.
-- 100,000 points to create pretty much whatever you want, be it a small zone, a non-canon event, a playable character, etc.

Please keep in mind this will be one of the only times I mention this reward system here on Steam forums, as it has more to do with Twitch than it does with communicating with the players. If you're interested in participating, please join the Discord and coordinate there.
-- Points are obtained and exchanged on my personal twitch, @ twitch.tv/hardytier

Note: If you know how to make pixel art and want to inject an NPC into the game without using the generator, this does not cost points. You will need to provide a 3x4 sprite sheet of 48x48 px images, a name for the character, what they've been doing up until the party meets them, and an idea for what you want them to do moving forward. More specific detail to be discussed in discord. Keep in mind, this offer is only valid for non combat NPCs and for static enemy battlers only.

3.2.3 [Build #75, Release Date: May 15, 2020] MAC:
- This build will serve as the most recent for MAC users.

Fixes:
- It is now possible to create Fire Flasks and Poison Flasks.
- Fixed an audio load issue inside the Encampment.

Changes:
- Minor terrain pass-ability changes in The Black Forest.
- Alchemy tables now display required item counts on command in addition to after each success and failure.
- Dagger Rush (Miles) reworked:
-- Now has the same animation as Blitz.
-- TP cost reduced to 40 from 60.
-- Now has a 2-turn warmup and 1-turn cooldown.
-- Can now critically hit.
-- Now has a 6% chance to cause a bleed, up from 3% (per slash).
-- Damage formula remains the same (gains +1 to minimum damage every 2 times its used, effect is permanent.)
- An’ura enemies no longer show the cast animation on most attacks.

An’ura Recon:
- An expert in An’ura texts has arrived at the Grand Library. She would be interested in the “An’ura Documents” right away!
- Existing enemies in the Encampment have been scaled to level 7-8, down from 20-21
- Background data added for ????.

Last week's stream went so well that I think I'm going to make this a regular thing. Stop by on Fridays to watch the next update of CoA being prepared right before it goes live!

As of right now, there's no set schedule for exactly what time I'll be live (or times, in the event I have to take a break for family reasons). However, VODs stay live on the twitch channel for 14 days and will later be added to the CoA YouTube channel for those of you who missed out.

What goes on during the dev stream?
- This is where most of the next content update will be prepared which takes place in more than just the game engine. You'll get a look at some of my back end mechanical designs which are held in various text and excel documents in addition to how I place and test things in the engine itself.

Questions, Suggestions & Bug Reports
- These streams will be an excellent place to ask questions you have about the game such as functionality and mechanics or even about the lore of the characters and planet they inhabit. This will also be the absolute best place to alert me about a bug, as I will be able to take care of it immediately.

What I can't show...
- Sadly, there's part of the process that is covered by NDA with Steam, so I can not show anything having to do with the upload and distribution process. However, all things that go into making and exporting the game itself can be shown.


Where to catch the show
- I'm live every day doing the streaming thing, but part of every Friday from now into the foreseeable future will be reserved for CoA development.
https://www.twitch.tv/hardytier is my personal twitch where the live streams will take place.
https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCGxc2-7sJbZ9L3Lpgak43XA is the CoA YouTube channel where VODs of the development streams will end up after they have concluded.
-- Please note that due to the affiliate agreement with Twitch, these VODs will not make their way to YouTube until after 24 hours past the time in which they ended.


The Reward
- I'm in the process of preparing a reward for 100k channel points involving CoA, the finer details of which are TBA. What I can tell right now is: it will have to do with an entire new character, piece of gear, or zone added to the game based on YOUR description.... within reason. Things of a profane or otherwise too meme-y nature will be rejected and your points refunded to try again.