Author Topic: Skyward Collapse 1.901 Beta "Release Candidate 2" Released!  (Read 6268 times)

Offline x4000

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Skyward Collapse 1.901 Beta "Release Candidate 2" Released!
« on: August 19, 2013, 02:53:44 pm »
Original: http://arcengames.blogspot.com/2013/08/skyward-collapse-1901-beta-release.html

If you've not yet read about the general changes in the 1.4 beta line, now is a good time to do so. It's expected that we'll stay in beta for the new features until we release the 2.0 version of the game in late August, alongside the new Nihon no Mura expansion.  A lot is different in the base game since 1.4, so we want to make sure and give this time to mature before we put this out to everyone.

This one is another substantial one, despite the features list for the new expansion already being done.  This one is mostly in the tuning department, though.

This release is the second "release candidate," which basically means we're into fine-tuning-only mode until this launches... at some point.  We were hoping that it would be this Wednesday the 21st, but that timing may not quite work out with one of our larger partners.  At worst I'm told it will be Wednesday the 28th.

So anyway, what's new this time?

Lots and Lots of Fixes and Tweaks
Some for the expansion, some for the base game, lots of good stuff.

Random Maps And Factions
Another long-requested feature.  Worth highlighting, but not a lot to say here.

Rebalanced God-Related Mythological Creatures
Some of the god-related mythological creatures were less than useful if you were trying to win (as opposed to cause as much chaos as possible).  So 8 of the creatures have been hugely altered in their abilities, while the costs of and points from pretty much all of them have changed.

My thoughts on the resulting balance of all this are here.  Please share your thoughts as well!

Hamlet Stuff (Again)
As I noted last time, I think that Hamlets are going to be evolving for a while.  That said, these really did jump upwards again in fun this release, I feel.  My main worry is that now it is too hard, so let me know.  I was doing okay, but I don't play on Expert or Insane, either. ;)


Enjoy!

This is a standard update that you can download through the  in-game updater itself, if you already have any version of the game.  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.
Have ideas or bug reports for one of our games?  Mantis for Suggestions and Bug Reports. Thanks for helping to make our games better!

Offline Fluffiest

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Re: Skyward Collapse 1.901 Beta "Release Candidate 2" Released!
« Reply #1 on: August 19, 2013, 03:22:57 pm »
Ok, after one game - and a few false starts - at Hamlet Idyll, I found it much improved. On several occasions I found myself wanting to play a lower-scoring tile to build a combo, and towards the end I placed slums - from the low-scoring end of the queue, penalizing me only -6 points - right in the middle of a block of noble housing, specifically to barge the nobles out and allow me to place the Mayor's Residence from the top-scoring end of the queue in a space where it scored about 900 points.

Edit: That said, I think the score gates for this mode are a bit on the low side, or the turn counts are too long. I just managed to finish a Hard game by mindlessly placing the highest-scoring tile every time. Admittedly, I had quite good luck and did end up with only 14 turns to go, so maybe I need to test it more.
« Last Edit: August 19, 2013, 04:00:28 pm by Valtiel »

Offline nas1m

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Re: Skyward Collapse 1.901 Beta "Release Candidate 2" Released!
« Reply #2 on: August 19, 2013, 04:45:56 pm »
Just tried Hamlet Idyll mode again. Much better now!

Getting rid of town specializations in favor of currency based upgrades was the right choice I think.
Just lost on Hard (due to failing the score requirement) and did not miss a thing ;).

As a sidenote: I encountered Loki's Wildfire, which did not affect Bamboo Forests (which are forests of a sort after all). You might want to adjust this...

Also gave the new random selections and the projectile following option a shot. They worked like a charm ;D.

Thanks!
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Offline Misery

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Re: Skyward Collapse 1.901 Beta "Release Candidate 2" Released!
« Reply #3 on: August 20, 2013, 08:56:53 am »
Ok, gonna try to be brief here because ow, though it's not as bad as it was earlier.

The reversing of the hamlet queue, a very good change.  Kudos to Valtiel for thinking of that one (I think it was him, anyway).  This combined with the "builder" guys seems to fully complete the mechanics of the hamlet system, at least in my view.  It's not so easy now at all to just keep getting points from the same tiles, so space can be a premium, encouraging more destruction.  Very good.

Lessee.... god units.  There's one problem with these, as far as feedback goes:  I cant see how much most of them cost.  They dont show costs in sandbox mode, so the only way to get them to show is to just happen to have the specific god show up in normal mode, which... yeah, takes awhile.

I can at least say to lower Nue's cost by quite a bit.  He's still 40+ moonstone, which is a bit absurd, especially since he's very specific about targets if I recall his ability correctly.  Hou-ou's cost is much better considering the power of it's effect now, Basan should go down a little since it's effect will barely activate unless you're on the right map.  Very powerful unit on that map, but just an average myth unit on others.

Oh, also, a problem with the currency thing:  The levelup changes are all out of whack.  For example, levelling a rock thing to level 2 changes it from 4 per turn to 8 per turn;  but leveling it to 3 only adds like another .8 or some amazingly tiny number like that.  Seems to be the case with every building.   Once that's fixed though, I think this system should work out quite well.  It is better than the specialization and forces the player to make difficult choices about the often-limited currency, I am definitely liking it.  And I think Njord just became even more powerful as a result :p

A good update, whole thing is coming along nicely.

Offline Fluffiest

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Re: Skyward Collapse 1.901 Beta "Release Candidate 2" Released!
« Reply #4 on: August 20, 2013, 09:08:00 am »
If you want to check costs of units in sandbox mode, start a sandbox game, place all the Japanese gods, then press the L key and select "toggle free placement" or something like that. Press L again to hide the sandbox menu, and you'll be able to see the costs for all the god-specific myths.

Offline nas1m

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Re: Skyward Collapse 1.901 Beta "Release Candidate 2" Released!
« Reply #5 on: August 20, 2013, 09:59:15 am »
If you want to check costs of units in sandbox mode, start a sandbox game, place all the Japanese gods, then press the L key and select "toggle free placement" or something like that. Press L again to hide the sandbox menu, and you'll be able to see the costs for all the god-specific myths.
Nice one! I did not remember that...
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Offline Misery

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Re: Skyward Collapse 1.901 Beta "Release Candidate 2" Released!
« Reply #6 on: August 20, 2013, 11:10:23 am »
Aha, I had not known about that trick there.

Well, went and had a look at them....  most of these still seem too high to me.  Moonstone & sunstone just dont generate very fast at all.  Particularly in the first half of the game.  Sunstone in particular is troublesome, since it also slows down moonstone while being produced.  Generally, I consider sunstone the most "expensive" resource in the game;  all of the really powerful things use it (or should, anyway).   

Now, one thing you could do is make it so that the 4 gods who can appear in the age of monsters have lower average costs for their units than the ones that appear in the age of gods;  costs of 20-30 sunstone might make sense if it's the late-game-only gods that have those units.   This would fit with the theme that the Japanese have of units that are really bloody expensive, while not being frustrating or useless due to cost.   In the first half of the game, I'd say 10 sunstone is pretty dang expensive.   Particularly when you consider that many of these units carry additional risk;  for example Gagoze (I think I spelled that wrong) costs like 47 sunstone;  I've never SEEN 47 sunstone in the reserves at any point.  His cost could be muuuuuuch lower and it'd still work; he's got a powerful effect of shutting down production, but there IS risk with him;  it wont turn back on until he's dead, and if he kills some units and levels up, it becomes harder to kill him without Super Smite or Shinigami; and using either of those is it's own additional cost.    Or Akateko;  this one could cost 5 sunstone instead of 27 and make sense.  Sure, it can kill anything other than a god, BUT, the correct unit has to actually be the one to attack it, and on top of that it ONLY kills one unit at a time; you'll need more than one of these to make a difference in many battles.

Of course, there IS the fact that these guys also give a multiplier to the usual myth unit score, so that's a plus as well, but still, TOO expensive and that wont really matter.  And note, I'm not saying that all of these should change super drastically in terms of cost;  there's a couple that could do with a very drastic change (Gagoze, Nue), but others dont need to be changed THAT much.

That said, there are a few that should remain at their very high cost.  Like Keukegan, who not only has a super-useful effect, but also gives 8x points, has no risk, and is then a decent unit once placed.  He's expensive as hell, but used right he can be a game-changer, so that cost makes sense.  Tanuki's cost makes sense too with his new effect.

And there's two that I think should go UP in cost, particularly since they're using the easier-to-get moonstone, and they are Zorigami and Bakezori.  I can think of great uses for both of these, and compared to other units with such usefulness they're somewhat cheap. 


So, that's my thoughts on that.    Feel free to point out arguements against any of this;  I always think that the costs of things is one of the hardest things to balance out properly in a game like this, so the more input from different people, the better.


Offline nas1m

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Re: Skyward Collapse 1.901 Beta "Release Candidate 2" Released!
« Reply #7 on: August 20, 2013, 11:53:45 am »
I also think that most costs of the god related myth units are too high. IIRC the costs of god tokens for the other factions are around 2-8 moonstone/sunstone at most.

I could see some/all Japanese god related myth units costing twice as much as far as moonstone is concerned. The real costs for some units are/were (I did not check the mist recent costs yet) more like ten times as much while also requiring additional resources in some cases. This is way too much, especially as the Japanese faction will have to play more of them to generate the same output in terms of score as a god token.

As far as sunstone is concerned I would not charge the Japanese faction any more at all as compared to the other factions....
« Last Edit: August 20, 2013, 12:20:17 pm by nas1m »
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Offline x4000

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Re: Skyward Collapse 1.901 Beta "Release Candidate 2" Released!
« Reply #8 on: August 22, 2013, 10:12:58 pm »
Thanks guys -- balancing my time with this versus Bionic has been tricky.  Both have pretty pressing deadlines, and Bionic was more in need the last couple of days.  Anyway, new version is now up!  http://www.arcengames.com/forums/index.php/topic,13727.0.html
Have ideas or bug reports for one of our games?  Mantis for Suggestions and Bug Reports. Thanks for helping to make our games better!

 

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