Shieldwall Chronicles: Swords of the North News

Hi everyone,

Just want to let you know that Strike Team Gladius, the next entry in the Strike Team series is launching in early access on Jan 15. The game's campaign is complete and the main reason for early access rather than normal launch is to have a period where I can get more player feedback for game balance and gameplay fine-tuning.

New elements in the gameplay include destructible terrain objects, events that occur when creatures die (acid blood spray, etc.), lots of new passive ability mechanics and new traits like attacks that penetrate armour, attacks that auto-hit and those that have a blast radius. The gameplay also takes place planet-side so look for much more open battlefields that have room for bigger units like tanks and mobile artillery.

Please share among your friends and add to your wish list. Every wish list entry helps a lot in rankings on launch day so is super important.

Strike Team Gladius - Store Page

Today's patch addresses some minor bugs such as the mind control achievement and some animation bugs for the dwarf bombardier class (among a few other tweaks). The update has been delayed because it was part of a major upgrade to the underlying Unity game engine. If you see anything odd, please let me know and I'll address it asap. It's possible the engine update broke something but it appears to be working well.

Hi everyone,

Today's 1.6 patch includes a significant amount of new content.

- New playable character class: The dwarf bombardier is a heavily armoured warrior armed with a medieval handgun. The male variant is a close range fighter / shooter hybrid with a large shield. The female is a longer range marksman with a long rifle. Each has a separate set of skills and stat line to suit their role so play very differently from one another.

- 3 new extra battle levels added set in the drakefang mountains. These feature large waves of higher level enemies including goblins, monsters and undead.

- All playable characters (and most enemies) now have passive abilities. These include aura effects and abilities that kick under specific conditions (low health, surrounded, etc.). These abilities add a new layer of tactical depth to the game and help to further differentiate the player characters and enemy types.

There are, of course, the usual round of bug fixes and minor tweaks. Please note that this update also coincided with a major upgrade to the underlying unity engine version. Therefore, if you notice anything strange, please report and we will do our best to fix asap.

Here is a quick WIP of the Dwarf Gunner class, tentatively called Dwarf Bombardier. However, we may change it to something more fantasy-esque such as "Gate Warden" or something similar. If you have a good suggestion, please share below or in the community discussion.

The male version will be heavily armoured and armed with a hand-cannon and tower shield. It will be a front-line unit but one that relies on a powerful missile attack to actually kill his enemies. He will have various defensive buffs and artillery weapons such as oil bombs and perhaps be able to summon a mechanical ally of some kind.

The design for the female variant may be a slightly longer range missile unit that replaces the tower shield for a long rifle. She will be designed to be a more mid-range shooter with greater accuracy. If you have thoughs, please share them as her design is still in the early stages.

The 1.5 patch contains two new playable characters as well as several improvements and bug fixes.

New Content:

• Male and female Centaur classes added to playable character list bringing the total character selection to 32.
  
• New combat mechanic called "Charge Bonus" for fast moving flyers and cavalry units (including the new Centaur class). This mechanic provides a combat bonus whenever these units move 5 or more tile in a single move.
  

Improvements:

• The shop instructions now appear only when you first enter the shop.
  
• Players can now close the game directly from the game menu.
  
• Players can now change the names of any of their characters in the camp site menu from the "Manage Team" menu.
  
• Increased the amount of magic items rewarded from winning a battle.
  

Bug Fixes:

• Players can no longer leave the shop if they have picked up an item.
  
• The game now rewards more magic items when the player completes a level on extreme difficulty.
  
• Fixed the incorrect text on the Book of Saric item.
  
• Fixed a bug where the music would play twice in the shop.
  
• Fixed several minor bugs.