Songs of Conquest News

Yes, the time has finally come! Today we are releasing the highly awaited campaign for the Barony of Loth, and this one will surely rattle your bones.

Carrying gunpowder to the battlefield comes with both benefits and hazards, as this poor Musketeer just found out. Either that or someone just dropped a well placed Fireball.

The campaign features four missions available on Easy, Normal and Hard difficulty, offering a real challenge similar to the previous campaigns of the Arleon and Rana factions. You will gain insight into the history of the Barony of Loth, as well as the tragic fate that befell the Aurelian empire. The campaign begins with the tale of Baron Aldus of Loth, who encounters a mysterious scholar that offers him a chance to seize an ancient power. Desperate to save his declining Barony, Aldus strikes a deal with the stranger, only to find out that there is a grave price to be paid. Yet, there might be a sliver of light at the end of the tunnel.

Who’s that lurking in the shadows? Someone is prying on the Baron as he offers prayer and sacrifice to Aurelia Eternal. Quite rude if you ask me.

We’re very excited for you all to experience the Barony of Loth campaign starting today. We’ve been dead set on perfecting this story and expanding on the game’s intricate lore to give you all a chance to explore yet another aspect of Aerbor, the world of Songs of Conquest. As always, the cinematic cutscenes are delivered in the form of a song, which is written and performed by our game designer Carl.

He sings, he designs and he even starred in a horror movie. Is there anything this man can’t do? (Drop a comment below if you know what movie it was, for serious trivia bonus points!)

The whole team is immensely proud of what we have achieved so far and the Loth campaign is not the end of it. You can look forward to more unit abilities and siege battle improvements, as well as AI becoming smarter and a better adversary. We also have a few surprises up our sleeves, but that is for later, today we celebrate the return of the dead and wish you all a good play session!

Can the Faey be trusted? Maybe, maybe not. In our experience they lie quite a loth.

Leave a comment below and let us know if you are excited to try out the new campaign! Or just drop a message to the team. Your ideas, feedback and encouragement are greatly appreciated!

/Team Lavapotion

Full patchnotes can be found here!

Early access strategy RPG Songs Of Conquest has added its newest necromantic campaign today, letting us raise an army of undead and knock a few bones about. The Barony Of Loth campaign features four singleplayer missions, and similar to the previous campaigns - Arleon and Rana - we’ll be focused on one main faction: the necromancer.

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The first quarter of the year is behind us, this means we have the chance to look at what we’ve done so far during 2023. Even though Q1 only has six specific items listed we’ve done much more than that, both big and small changes that have made Songs of Conquest a different game compared to what it was before.

It looks like a great year, doesn’t it?

Beacon Improvements
So how did we actually improve beacons? Quite a few things actually! We enhanced their role as a victory condition and turned them into teleports, which in turn made us rework the way teleports work. You can now choose which beacon you teleport to if you own several of them, creating some very useful and tactical networks, especially for those bigger maps.

Imagine taking over an enemy's home beacon, leaving them stranded in hostile territory!

Artifact Marketplace
We added something called the Raider’s market. It's building on the adventure map where you can trade those hard-fought-for artifacts or just buy that item that you were missing. This mysterious trader has now appeared on a few of our maps and is ready to lighten that coin purse!

The difference between winning and losing could be that new golden mask!

Map editor finalized
This one is brand new as it came out with out last update. But are we completely done? No and yes. There might still be tweaks and small fixes left to do but our map editor is now in a state that we are proud over, ready for our 1.0 launch.

We put a lot of effort into making the map editor more user-friendly and updated a few features. Search functionality was added, as well as drop-down menus to make it easier to find those entities that you were looking for. We also added a feature that gives you the option to crop maps after creation. And an overall a better UI and user experience. (We hope!) Let us know if you agree or disagree!

The map editor has been vastly improved in Q1. Did you know that Songs of Conquest is one of the most active games on mod.io in terms of most downloaded maps? Almost half a million user created maps have been downloaded so far!

For those of you that enjoy creating more story-driven maps we updated the way you add a chain of objective groups. We also added a bunch of more portraits for custom dialogues. We can't wait to see what type of stories and scenarios you guys will create with these new tools!

A face for every occasion!

Update troops on recruitment screen
Sometimes it's all about the quality of life improvements. You can now upgrade troops directly in the "wielder interaction header" if the building has a troop pool with the upgraded troop type.

It’s the little things in life that make it better. Like seeing your enemies driven before you or a new UI update.

Rana random events
We absolutely delivered on this one! Rana now has exactly 100 random events, a nice and round number. Some are more random than others and some require certain conditions to occur before getting them. These are singular or sometimes a series of events that can act as both a boon or a drawback during your games. Tell us in the comments is you have any events that always happen to you? Might they be a clue to how you play the game?

This would be one of those boons we mentioned.

More skirmish maps
Since the start of Q1 we have added four new skirmish maps. Triad pass, Proving ground, Divided and From rags to riches. These are four beautiful and lovingly-crafted maps but more are on the way, including our largest map yet!

This map is going to be huge!

AI Improvements
Improving our AI is an ongoing work and doesn't have a public list of bullet points in the roadmap, but we still wanted to highlight the work done. Through feedback from our community (keep leaving us comment on Steam, on our Discord, Reddit, etc, it helps us make the game better!) and through internal discussions and testing, we try to improve the AI with just about every update. For example, we recently released a vast improvement for our battle AI. It now has better tactical awareness and makes better use of spells like repel or swap!

Now the AI pulls that trick on you!

As the AI now plans battles differently, it tries to protect its ranged troops and use its melee troops wiser than before. It also views the unit roles differently, changing tactics if it's defending or attacking or if it's behind obstacles or not. It’s a whole new tactical ball game and it has made quite a difference.

The AI has also learned to path its course across the adventure map better, clearing out pockets of resources with more efficency (but again, let us know if you spot problems!). It uses several Wielders to act as mules, sending reinforcements to the front and making longer trips than before.

The quartely results: Check marks all around. Yes, we are happy about it.

We hope that you are pleased with everything we have done so far and that you, like us, look forward to what’s coming next. If you want to go into the gritty details for updates the last months, we recommend reading up on our changelogs. If you do, would you please leave a comment about your one favorite update, of all the ones done in Q1? Or just let us know what upcoming feature you are most excited about.

Keep up the Adventure!

/The Lavapotion team

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[h2]Greetings Wielders![/h2]
Another month, another update. This time we’ve focused on the map editor in an effort to make level creation just a bit easier for everyone! It is an important feature of Songs of Conquest. Not only it is the tool that we use to create our maps and campaigns, but it’s also something that you, the community use to create awesome maps

So what have we been up to this busy spring month? As we mentioned we have been focusing on the map editor, making sure it’s easier to work with, and updating a bunch of its features. For instance, you can now search for entities and crop maps and we have added drop-down menus for your convenience.

It’s ever so convenient!

We have also added more features for those of you that want to create story-driven maps with objectives, just like how we create our campaign maps. Our fantastic artists have created more portraits for custom dialogues and we have thrown in an “objective group” field to story objectives, making it easier to create a series of objectives when you create your own maps. We look forward to what you will create with these new tools.

And speaking of community-created maps, to celebrate our new map editor we have just launched a competition together with mod.io, be sure to look it over on its very own steam post. You have the chance to get your map into the official Songs of Conquest map list and win some money too!

Get creative and submit your map for the chance to win. Read about the competition here!

We also gave some development love to one of our experimental features, co-op. Although we aren’t done yet we made sure this got some much-sought-after improvements. For example, you can now ping each other on the mini-map and send resources.

Get in there and do things together!

There has also been more work done on AI, both for adventure and battle. We are proud of all the improvements made with last month's AI update and community feedback has been important for those extra additions and fixes. One of those fixes has been to change the AI behavior during sieges, now we force AI attackers in sieges against players to always be the aggressor.

We have worked a lot with unit roles and behavior and that work will continue to be important for us. This update introduces many small changes, fixes, and updates and as always we recommend reading the entire changelog down below, we promise it’s a rewarding experience.

Keep up the adventure!

/The Lavapotion team

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[h2]Changelog v0.83 - March 24, 2023[/h2]
Notable additions
Added a new hierarchy view in the map editor, where all the placed map entities are listed and searchable.
Most objects in the map editor now have tooltips and better English translations
33 new Random Events for the Rana faction

Notable bug fixes
Fixed issue causing passive AI on randomly generated maps
Fixed bug where upgrading Eth’dra could cause Dragons to exceed their max Troop Size
Fixed bug where upgrading troops could cause upgraded troops from the pool to disappear
Fixed bug where the AI could do actions on the adventure map while stashed in a town
Fixed a bug where towns sometimes could not get attacked, which was also a cause for AI freezing on their turn.
Fixed bug related to Rapid Fire spell, Onslaught spell, or Double Strike trait, where you could get stuck in Battle after killing a troop and still having attacks remaining.

Adventure
Tweaked scouting thresholds (hostile threat levels can now be seen one tile further away than previously)
Fixed text size problem on post adventure stats menu
Fixed team color glow on the mini menu.
When ejecting a wielder from a town or settlement it is automatically selected
Don't close town interaction menu when the enemy is storing wielder in sim turns
Updated behavior for how the camera follows wielders
Slowed down building in progress smoke effect
Updated cursor notification pivot to show notification left of the cursor if it's too far to the right of the screen
Invisible “story actor” map entities no longer block movement
Fixed being able to exceed stack size limit when upgrading troops
Add overflowing scouted troops in pre-battle into the tooltip instead of the cover grid
Allow aborting forced camera movements by pressing WASD or begin panning with the mouse
Refresh town list when initiating a raze/convert the town
Fixed town wall gates being placed underwater
Fixed color tinting map entities not being active at map start
If a research building is banned on a map it no longer shows up in the research menu
Show building cost even if players don't have any available build site
Fixed the issue of not generating an alternate valid path for the wielder when the optimal path goes through unexplored parts of the map
The behavior is now always the same when capturing neutral settlements no matter which faction the capturing team belongs to
Fixed showing “pillage” mouse cursor and tooltip for neutral buildings that could not be pillaged
Fixed wielders sometimes unnecessarily move when the ground underneath them changes appearance
Show level-up menu before joining popup after the battle

Battle
Add retaliations to melee attack preview
Stop reload animation after troop has ended turn the second time after firing
Fixed battle outline null reference exception
Increase damage of most spells
Lower cost of Biting insects to 4
Increase the cost of Earth block to 5
Increase the cost of Repel to 8
Only show equipped artifacts in battle on the wielder tooltip
Update wielder tooltip layout
Fixed being soft-locked after killing the initial target with troops that have additional attacks left
Remove troop essence section in battle tooltips for troops without a wielder
Add notification to troops that can hit again

Common
Fix localization of codex faction headers in the building category
Fix some troop portrait positions
Fix localization bug in the codex research section

Map Editor
Removed old “Island” type random map generation
Improved mirroring when drawing using “circular mirrored” mode
Make it possible to disable the ability to build walls in cities
Added “objective group” field to story objectives, allowing them to be grouped as a single entry in objectives HUD in-game
Story actors now correctly get the color used by the team selected for it
Added a way to add custom map editor names to entities to make them searchable.
All lists and fields in map entity properties now have a different way of drawing themselves, so they should now be more responsive
All dropdowns now have a search bar
Fixed issue where the area trigger grid never disappeared from a wielder spawn point once added
You can now see where roads and walls will end up around towns and settlements in the editor
Added keybindings, most can be found in the tooltip for each tool. Keybindings added but not found in tooltip - cycle tool context, and set brush size, and to change height when drawing terrain height.
Added 11 neutral personas to use in dialogues
Added tools for padding and cropping maps

Multiplayer
Show other players’ selected teams in the lobby when the co-op is enabled
Exploration data is now shared between allies
Scouting is now provided by allies’ wielders and map entities
Added a tooltip for allies’ wielders showing level, skills, troops, and equipped artifacts
Allies can now use each other’s Beacons as teleports in co-op games
Allies can send minimap pings to each other during co-op games by right-clicking the minimap
Allies can now recruit their own troops from each other’s rally points during co-op games
Allies can now send each other resources during co-op games
Prevent showing pillaging mouse cursor and tooltips when pointing at allies’ buildings

AI - Adventure
Fixed exception bug that happened when AI rebuilt map regions
Fixed some guarding issues to better help the AI abort thinking in transitions to/from battle, when an AI team dies, and when the game is over.
Fixed a bug that made it possible for AI wielders to attack across the map even if they were stored in buildings
Remove Option creation redundancy (optimization)
Usage of portals entirely refactored
Map loot pocket scoring tweaks
Removed mismatch where the AI was braver when planning long routes, but chickened out when it got close.
Map interaction improvements
Changed how the troops are valued by the AI when recruiting or transferring troops

AI - Battle
Tweaked when the AI uses the Aim ability
Increased chance of AI casting a spell during a troop round
Removed some restrictions on AI casting spells if is has 20 or more essence in total
If AI can afford it, it will try to fill the path of a Repel spell with Explosive Fungi
Made AI more restrictive about using the Aegis spell
AI should be more willing to “waste” damage in order to use Ice Bolt and Rupture more often
Defensive AI teams are more restrictive about using Sabotage spell
Defensive AI teams are much more restrictive about using Destroy Essence spell
Defensive AI teams are more restrictive about using the Lethargy spell unless very early in combat
AI is much more likely to use Entangle spell if the enemy only has one unit left
AI no longer should cast Pacify spell as often, and not as a must cast when one enemy left
Defensive AI teams less likely to waste Onslaught spell on troops with support roles
Rebalanced Wait ability to work like other abilities and actions to make it viable again
Aggressive AI teams are much less likely to use the Wait ability
Removed elevation scoring bonus for attackers unless they are in reach of an enemy
Added an extra elevation bonus when occupying a hex next to an enemy
Fixed the bug of troops not being able to just stay in place if they had a valid melee target that was too dangerous to attack
Force AI attackers in sieges against players to always be the aggressor
Increased the aggressiveness of a team without a wielder meeting a team with a wielder
Added a “no retreat” penalty to discourage aggressive attackers to retreat toward the back edge of the map
Added a “retreat” bonus to encourage passive defenders to retreat toward the back edge of the map for certain troop roles
Tweaked down the fear of damage for troops with supportive roles for teams with high aggression

Audio
Don’t trigger wielder death sounds from opponents in the fog

Random Map Generator
Tweaked random faction chance for random hostiles and should now be more varied

Misc
Change the percentage of beacons needed to win from 70% to 64%