The NPC Update part 4 is LIVE

As chosen by the Update Poll, part 4 of the NPC Update is up! Focusing on setting up and commanding your Party Members, and improving NPC AI and behavior in general. It also features massive improvements to performance in Cities, and many more fixes and improvements!

Changelog

• Added Command Actions for NPCs: Party Member-exclusive orders you can give, acessible from the Talk Menu, such as:

  • Manage Items: Trade, Use and Equip Items

  • Manage Spells: Teach, Forget and Cast Spells

  • Item Usage: Determine what Item types to use in battle, and when (% of HP or MP)

  • Spell Usage: Set how Party Members use spells for support

  • Mount Animals: Change if NPCs should or should not mount animals (they can ride) with you

  • Set Home: Set the current location as an NPC's house/home, where they'll come to rest when you dismiss them (including outside in the Overworld)

  • Set Work: Set the current location as an NPC's workplace, where they'll come to work when you dismiss them (including outside in the Overworld)

  • Change Job: Change the Party Member's Job at a hefty Disposition cost. Changing now only the Services they offer, but also their behavior once you dismiss them!

• New layout to the Talk Menu, to support the new Command Actions

• New Light source: Lamp Posts! Replacing the many torch stands in Cities (to improve performance), these solid wood posts hold Lamps instead of Torches!

• Stone Floor Tiles now come in Small (default), Medium and Large sizes, and the Large one is now used to build City streets, thus severely optimizing them

• Party Members can now Heal you and other party members with target Spells!

• Slightly better randomization to determine NPC races

• Switched managing Party Members' Items from the Barter Menu to the Container one, so that you can also Barter with Party Members if you wish!

• You can now freely use and equip Items to Party Members using the Container Menu accessible from the Talk One (Manage Items). Party Members no longer constantly update their equipment while in combat

• NPCs attempt to Heal more often, from every 15 seconds to 10

• NPCs can now use Ailment-curing Items and Spells if necessary

• NPCs can now use Scrolls and other Consumable Items for Healing, especially if instructed to do so as Party Members

• NPCs must now cry in silence about their equipment breaking if they're unconscious

• NPCs no longer suffer fall damage while inside houses, to avoid physics issues causing random deaths

• Improved the generation of NPC Spells based on their Attributes and Job

• Better barks for when NPCs use Items or Spells to heal

• Lowered the volume of the NPC speech sound effect

• Fairies' Invisibility and Light abilities now turn off if they run out of MP, and also they work better on reloading

• Grass, herbs and mushrooms now no longer grow on roads

• Improved the naming of all Talk Menu Action Buttons

• Levitating characters, including Flying Heads, Fairies and Avians, now spawn a little above others

• Prisons that are Zombified or Vampired now have their pyres outside snuffed out

• Reduced the excessive number of Swamps in the World

• Roamers no longer spawn in special Biomes like Swamps and Skylands

• Scrolls and Grimoires can now properly stack if they contain the exact same Spell

• Settlements and Dungeons no longer spawn in special Biomes like Swamps and Skylands, for now without special treatment and modifiers

• Slightly better randomization for settlements to dungeons

• The visual effect for Self-Effects of Abilities (level 0 Spells) no longer plays on cast

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