Cepheus Protocol News

AmA about Factions live stream on Twitch and Discord

Fri, April 9, 2021
5:00 PM PDT Starts
6:30 PM PDT Ends

Stream Url https://www.twitch.tv/halcyonwinds

https://steamcommunity.com/games/979640/announcements/detail/2996556496593205637

Over the past few weeks, we have had numerous projects, and it is time we caught you folks, up with a nice update!

We could have implemented a generic Faction AI that aimlessly attacks and dies with no real goal in mind. We have taken the last few months to adopt a strategy closer to how the Civilization developers handles their AI by writing in underlying systems to give each CP Faction a personality of how they play.

Take Captain Pierce’s Faction for example. They will secure/take over just enough zones to give themselves a buffer, so they do not stretch themselves thin and then use a method of vassaling nearby civilian groups to exert control across the map. This strategy means that an attack on one of them is an attack on all of them, so they will work together to keep their “safe zones” under control.

But then Natalie has another method of maintaining control or chaos really. She will work with just about anyone utilizing a strategy of the ends to justify the means she will carry out suicide attacks, use civilians as shields, and disappear just as quickly as she appeared, leaving devastation in her wake.

Starting Friday, we will be releasing the first layer of this and, over the next few weeks, expand upon these systems working with our community to address balance issues and pacing.

The cover system will be delayed and will go in within 1-2 weeks of this Friday. Shortly after, Dynamic Civilian groups will start showing up, and lastly, we will put the icing on the cake and ensure they fully fulfill the roles described above over this month.

As an added treat we will be doing a regular YouTube series 1-2 times a month showing more of our development process and cataloging our progress as we go to ensure you folks are always kept in the loop! Tell us what you think about the new format here or on discord in general chat! . This will be bit of a trial period as we push our tech from a presentation standpoint ːCPWintersLaughː

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RxnzuWh9f1A

Factions beta + live stream are being rescheduled for April 9th

We will be using the extra time to improve Faction AI like squad tactics, their utilization of our new cover system and reformulating the ROE window . We apologize for the delay but it's just not ready yet and we need the extra time to implement factions properly.

Thanks for your continued patience

Stream Url https://www.twitch.tv/halcyonwinds



Over the next month you will notice a drought in terms of patches as we will be heavily focusing the implementation of Factions. If there are any severe issues/bugs these will be prioritized first but we will be putting a hold on adding any further community suggestions for the month of March until April. We will be aiming for at least 1 patch a week for the next 2 weeks.

Arsonist Faction

Police Faction


[h2]Factions and Dynamic Civilian Factions Live Stream [/h2]

We will be having a live stream on March 26th to essentially do a breakdown of factions and have it as a community event to gather feedback and talk openly about our first implementation of factions.



Our plan going into April will be for any remaining adjustments needed for Factions and then move into the polish stages. We will be putting up a special "branch" for those having optimization issues to provide "stat" files these will allow us to quickly and effectively fix performance issues.

Short List of Polish Items

* Infected can climb building
* Infected can swim
* Improving Path Finding
* Formation Dance Bug
* Squad Formation overhaul
* A system for allowing all units to enter a building and climb the stairs to get to a rooftop ( will not be a full garrison system like they fire out of windows)
* Performance profiling and improvement
* Cleaning up the code base and optimizing it for modding and coop support
* Infected Growth on structures and VFX to show when a zone is owned



This month will be on the focus on any leftovers from polish and then situating Coop. 95% of this month will be coop and we expect to have a beta this month. It will stay in beta for a 1-2 month period while we work to get systems fully online and take into consideration feedback on any adjustments that might be needed to really provide a proper coop experience. We will be announcing a Year 2 Roadmap on May 15 that will go over all the systems coming next.

Because of recent delays modding is still planned but being fit into Year 2 content now.

Starting a few weeks ago we pushed out the started inklings of Operation Hammer Down. Our first major patch which targets adding more replayability and simulating a larger world to fight in. We want to hear what you folks have to say about how it plays so we can properly focus the aspects that need the most attention. After we feel they are in a good place overall we will shortly afterwards put up a factions public beta.

• Finalized Open World Map
  
• Doctrines
  
• Juggernaut
  
• Little Guy enemies
  
• Leviathan
  
• Revised Power Generation System
  

[h2]Patch Notes - 0.7.90 Stability and further Minor Bug Fixes[/h2]



There is an economy rebalance coming soon. Also quite a few refinements are coming to the Worm/Leviathan

As a reminder here is our schedule for the next 3 months of development!
https://steamcommunity.com/games/979640/announcements/detail/3025827991049876866

Share your feedback here on the Worm/Leviathan
https://steamcommunity.com/app/979640/discussions/0/3113646913571960146/

[h2]Patch notes from this patch[/h2]

• Added a crashfix for infinite-loop horde-sphere following logic for Leviathans
  
• Improved Leviathan 'avoid Restrictor' logic to look more smooth (had rotation issues)
  
• Added another safety to prevent circumstances where the Leviathan would 'scoot along the surface' while 'standing'
  
• Improved Leviathan 'underground movement' to be more reliable (without situations where he starts potentially going ever deeper, and reduced situations where he's tunneling on the surface)
  
• Added a fix for the Leviathan getting 'stuck' in a non-moving state
  
• Added a fix for the Leviathan getting utterly confused under a Restrictor to the point of never emerging until it decides to leave combat
  
• Fixed a potential crash from spine turret delegate binding when loading a save
  
• Removed the Leviathan's 'hiding from thermal vision while burrowed' logic
  
• Added logic to better clear the Leviathan's horde-following logic (should it clear early for some reason, or similar situations)
  
• Also to make the horde-following logic allow the Leviathan to target the zone in question if we lose track of the horde we're following (due to the horde's destruction, perhaps)
  
• Improved Leviathan to better account for travel distance when setting his 'leave combat' timer when attacking a zone as part of a horde
  
• Improved Leviathan's 'unnavigable move emerge point' logic to be a bit more reliable (not perfect yet)
  

Cepheus Protocol Novelization is now available on Steam Store!
https://store.steampowered.com/app/1387390/Cepheus_Protocol_Novelization

Keep in mind this book takes place before, during and a bit after Pandemic mode and follows dozens of characters around the events of CP. It will hint to our year 2 content(So spoilers if you analyze it close enough). Its not for the faint of heart (Very violent deaths and all that). You can pick it up for $3.99 now!

It will also be available on the Steam Store as an DLC on October 1st if you prefer to get it there! Just keep in mind on our website we make 99% of the sale the rest goes to PayPal

Feel free to use the #💬lore-questions on our Discord to discuss the ramifications of what the book brings to the universe and how it will affect the game as we start to work in story elements presented in the novel

Starting a few weeks ago we pushed out the started inklings of Operation Hammer Down. Our first major patch which targets adding more replayability and simulating a larger world to fight in. We want to hear what you folks have to say about how it plays so we can properly focus the aspects that need the most attention. After we feel they are in a good place overall we will shortly afterwards put up a factions public beta.

• Finalized Open World Map
  
• Doctrines
  
• Juggernaut
  
• Little Guy enemies
  
• Leviathan
  
• Revised Power Generation System
  

[h2]Patch Notes - 0.7.89 Leviathan AI Improvements & further minor fixes[/h2]



There is an economy rebalance coming soon. Also quite a few refinements are coming to the Worm/Leviathan

As a reminder here is our schedule for the next 3 months of development!
https://steamcommunity.com/games/979640/announcements/detail/3025827991049876866

Share your feedback here on the Worm/Leviathan
https://steamcommunity.com/app/979640/discussions/0/3113646913571960146/

[h2]Patch notes from this patch[/h2]

• A new Restrictor building blockout has been added that will scare away Leviathans.(This mesh will receive more refinement over the next few weeks as we broke our rule for any more community suggestions to ensure this got in for you folks! Now back to Factions!! )
  
• Restrictor Unlocks in Phase 2, costs $5000 and requires 50 power
  
• Added logic to make the Leviathan 'change his mind' about emerging if its within a non-navigable location (he'll try to adjust rather than emerge from within a building)
  
• More SFX/Ambiance added to the Islands
  
• Leviathans will now only be summoned by Hordes
  
• Once a Leviathan enters the world, he will only assist hordes until he's bold enough to strike out on his own (after 6 horde participations, he'll be able to start flanking on his own instead of assisting a horde, though he can do that too)
  
• Leviathan incubation rate boosted to 1200-1600 seconds (from 800-1000) (multipliers for incubation rate from difficulty/custom mode still apply, but the value they're multiplying is larger now)
  
• Fixed grenade throw visualization
  
• Result: Leviathans should be more manageable now. When you see one, you can be sure that he'll be striking at zones of yours that are bordering infected zones unless you let him live too long, in which case he'll be emboldened and start flanking you.
  

Cepheus Protocol Novelization is now available on Steam Store!
https://store.steampowered.com/app/1387390/Cepheus_Protocol_Novelization

Keep in mind this book takes place before, during and a bit after Pandemic mode and follows dozens of characters around the events of CP. It will hint to our year 2 content(So spoilers if you analyze it close enough). Its not for the faint of heart (Very violent deaths and all that). You can pick it up for $3.99 now!

It will also be available on the Steam Store as an DLC on October 1st if you prefer to get it there! Just keep in mind on our website we make 99% of the sale the rest goes to PayPal

Feel free to use the #💬lore-questions on our Discord to discuss the ramifications of what the book brings to the universe and how it will affect the game as we start to work in story elements presented in the novel

Over the next month you will notice a drought in terms of patches as we will be heavily focusing the implementation of Factions. If there are any severe issues/bugs these will be prioritized first but we will be putting a hold on adding any further community suggestions for the month of March until April. We will be aiming for at least 1 patch a week for the next 2 weeks.

Then shortly around the 19th to the 26th we will be enabling the public beta branch for the remainder of the month for early adopters to try out Factions.

Arsonist Faction

Police Faction


[h2]Factions and Dynamic Civilian Factions Live Stream [/h2]

We will be having a live stream on March 26th to essentially do a breakdown of factions and have it as a community event to gather feedback and talk openly about our first implementation of factions.



Our plan going into April will be for any remaining adjustments needed for Factions and then move into the polish stages. We will be putting up a special "branch" for those having optimization issues to provide "stat" files these will allow us to quickly and effectively fix performance issues.

Short List of Polish Items

* Infected can climb building
* Infected can swim
* Improving Path Finding
* Formation Dance Bug
* Squad Formation overhaul
* A system for allowing all units to enter a building and climb the stairs to get to a rooftop ( will not be a full garrison system like they fire out of windows)
* Performance profiling and improvement
* Cleaning up the code base and optimizing it for modding and coop support
* Infected Growth on structures and VFX to show when a zone is owned



This month will be on the focus on any leftovers from polish and then situating Coop. 95% of this month will be coop and we expect to have a beta this month. It will stay in beta for a 1-2 month period while we work to get systems fully online and take into consideration feedback on any adjustments that might be needed to really provide a proper coop experience. We will be announcing a Year 2 Roadmap on May 15 that will go over all the systems coming next.

Because of recent delays modding is still planned but being fit into Year 2 content now.