AVWW Beta 0.586 "Sheer Cliffs" Released!

[x4000]

Original: http://arcengames.blogspot.com/2012/02/avww-beta-0586-sheer-cliffs-released.html

This one is the second and final release of today, and it might be the final release for beta phase 2.  All of the features and fixes that we had wanted to get in place before moving into beta phase 3 are now in place and ready to go... but the catch is that some of these have not been tested as extensively as we would like, just yet.

In the interest of not handing a build with a bunch of regressions in it to the press and a wider audience of players, we're going to give this one another 12 hours or so in the hands of our core playerbase before we do a press push.  I still haven't had time to build the installers and finish getting the website updates from Josh and Erik propagated anyhow, and it's late and I'm exhausted, so pushing this out a few more hours works for me.

But this is basically beta phase 3, aside from any bugs you might find!  Assuming this release turns out to be as clean as we hope, here's what our focus is going to shift toward for the next 3ish weeks until we hit 1.0 for the game:

- Enchant containers working better.
- Add hand-crafted touches into procedural exteriors and undergrounds.
- Walking monster interactions with cliffs to be better.
- Integration of mysteries-to-be-solved into the game (replacing what were memory crystals once).
- Multiplayer server listing and admin controls.
- More enchant-items and enchant-effects.
- More spells.
- More enemies, bosses, and environmental threats.
- More guardian powers, including ones for NPC skill level 4 and 5.
- More mission activities.
- A few more traps and other supplies to find in stash rooms.

More to come soon.  Enjoy!

This is a standard update that you can download through the in-game updater itself, if you already have 0.500 or later. When you launch the game, you'll see the notice of the update having been found if you're connected to the Internet at the time.  If you don't have 0.500 or later, you can download that here.

[BobTheJanitor]

I'm liking the new stash rooms. Much more rewarding to go for those over the other rooms now.

However, I must also say that I just came across one with three moderate inner light enchants in it. I believe my personal enmity for moderate inner light enchants is probably a matter of public record right now, so I will try to restrain myself, and just say AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAARGH!

Edit: The next one had two more. You're doing this on purpose somehow, right? Somewhere, on some internal dev changelog, there's a hidden patch note that says * Added even more moderate inner light enchants which only appear on Bob's computer.

[HellishFiend]

You're going to make him go crazy, joshing him about those enchants. Especially since he's probably been just as eager as anyone to be able to shift focus towards content. 

[BobTheJanitor]

Hey, new baseline enchants that can spawn in stash rooms (instead of moderate inner light curses enchants) ARE new content.

[x4000]

Hey, new baseline enchants that can spawn in stash rooms (instead of moderate inner light curses enchants) ARE new content.

There won't be much of that -- we only seed utilitarian stuff in stash rooms.  Things classed as "supplies," regardless of how they are used.  All the cool enchants come from the containers.

[Martyn van Buren]

But am I right to think stash rooms are better places to find enchant containers than other rooms?

[mrhanman]

speaking of inner light enchants, will there be a use for 15 of them?  could there be the possibility of synthesizing a number of them into a stronger variant?  maybe you could even combine different enchants together.

[Terraziel]

I'm liking the new stash rooms. Much more rewarding to go for those over the other rooms now.

However, I must also say that I just came across one with three moderate inner light enchants in it. I believe my personal enmity for moderate inner light enchants is probably a matter of public record right now, so I will try to restrain myself, and just say AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAARGH!

Edit: The next one had two more. You're doing this on purpose somehow, right? Somewhere, on some internal dev changelog, there's a hidden patch note that says * Added even more moderate inner light enchants which only appear on Bob's computer.

Actually I think it might just be an actual issue I just had a room with 3 of them in it.

[Minotaar]

I'm liking the new stash rooms. Much more rewarding to go for those over the other rooms now.

However, I must also say that I just came across one with three moderate inner light enchants in it. I believe my personal enmity for moderate inner light enchants is probably a matter of public record right now, so I will try to restrain myself, and just say AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAARGH!

Edit: The next one had two more. You're doing this on purpose somehow, right? Somewhere, on some internal dev changelog, there's a hidden patch note that says * Added even more moderate inner light enchants which only appear on Bob's computer.

Actually I think it might just be an actual issue I just had a room with 3 of them in it.

My personal record would be about 4 or 5 in a single room, however, it doesn't matter how many I pick up, it only shows 4 in the inventory.
Time to rename them to Induce RAGE Enchants.
Or, more sensibly, just throw other things in there instead if you have one already.

[tigersfan]

But am I right to think stash rooms are better places to find enchant containers than other rooms?

Nope, not necessarily. They are often found at the ends of hallways and stuff.

[Souls-Stream]

First of all, thank you for working so late on this update, except some text that have words that repeat themselves (seen for the wooden box in planning window) I think it's totally great !

The new stuffs helps the player a lot more but now I find myself lacking of a lot of wooden box I got stuck a couple times because of the lack of them and because we can't use the wooden platform
I think in outside areas when there's land above you there should be a cave to be able to place platforms and that the pirates shouldnt be able to touch you when there's a land above your head !

I saw for the first time a whale and the carp and I have to admit that it's pretty freaky at first sight ! Lol
Hope to see more interesting stuff about underwater adventure coming !
And especially a water suit allowing you to swim rather than sink at the bottom

Anyway, great great updates you all made here ! Thanks a lot !

Edit: about all those duplicates that I have too, I think there should be a shop with a way to sell those for resources ! A secret shop or a npc that would wander and that we would meet a bit randomly to sell our stuff ! That npc could be a monster who just want those king of stuff and doesn't agree with the invasion ? There's always a rebel somewhere, isn't it ?

[TechSY730]

My personal record would be about 4 or 5 in a single room, however, it doesn't matter how many I pick up, it only shows 4 in the inventory.
Time to rename them to Induce RAGE Enchants.
Or, more sensibly, just throw other things in there instead if you have one already.

The only problem with that sort of avoid duplication logic is multiplayer. Just because you don't have one doesn't mean that everyone doesn't. And just because you don't have one doesn't mean that another player that may not be connected right now but may connect later doesn't have one.

I love the using excess enchants for some sort of synthesizing of something else idea. Most games with dynamically generated drops deal with the problem of duplicates in two ways, stores or synthesis/forging/whatever. Since this game does not have any stores (civilization has pretty much collapsed, who cares about an economy when you can't even walk outside without being mauled by something like a floating ball of lightning?), synthesizing/forging/whatever seems to be the way to go.

[BobTheJanitor]

The only problem with that sort of avoid duplication logic is multiplayer. Just because you don't have one doesn't mean that everyone doesn't. And just because you don't have one doesn't mean that another player that may not be connected right now but may connect later doesn't have one.

If someone doesn't have moderate inner light, it can only be because they are actively avoiding it. Within 10 minutes of searching buildings last night I found about 15 of them. That's just over the top. There was at least one in every stash room. And often, as noted, 2 or 3. If they are really intended to be this common, why not just have an infinitely spawning copy of the enchant in the home settlement so everyone automatically has one, and then stop seeding them all over the place?

[x4000]

Coming up:

* Moderate inner light stash changes:
** Settlements now include a moderate inner light enchant that players can pick up under the same multiplayer rules that this worked in stash rooms.
*** In place of moderate inner light enchants, the stash rooms now will seed enchant containers instead (it was not previously possible to get enchant containers inside of stash rooms).
** In each region, there are some specialized items (snowsuits, heatsuits, etc) that can show up in their stash rooms.  Previously, the game could add as many of these per stash room as it might randomly decide to do.
*** Now, once it has seeded one such stack of special items in a stash, it instead seeds enchant containers where it would have seeded duplicates previously.

[Oralordos]

*** Now, once it has seeded one such stack of special items in a stash, it instead seeds enchant containers where it would have seeded duplicates previously.

Would that count for upgrade stones too? Because I don't want it to count for upgrade stones.