A whole new world! Latest update brings us to version 0.9.8.a

Summary

Today's update brings some massive changes and additions to Veil of Crows. Polish and optimization is my current goal, and I feel this update brings the bacon! Some of the major improvements

New campaign map

The campaign map has had a major upgrade! I built a new procedural system to aid in creating new world maps, and not only does it make it a lot faster, but the maps produced are also much nicer to look at and feel more varied and natural. It is recommended to start a new game, however, your old savegames & maps still work. When we leave early access two new world maps will become available, these will have a unique climate, with varying effects on village production and raider factions. More on that at a later date.

Custom unit grouping

You may now group units with one of your heroes for additional combat bonuses. Unit limits are now impacted by the heroes management skill, and these preferred groups will be remembered between battles so you don't need to keep re-arranging your heroes into groups. The hero units leadership skill will add additional bonuses to your units on top of the general's leadership skill.

Tutorial voiceover added

The very talented folks at Humble Sage games have written, recorded, and mastered a voiceover for the tutorial. Expect a snarky adviser with the personality traits of Snape meets Jaffar to help you along your way until you have him executed. The voiceover is voiced by the talented Marc Dubois.

New battle music

Composed by yours truly, and re-sampled and mastered by Dean Watkin (Humble sage games), the battle music has been completely replaced. I am super pumped as it needed a serious upgrade.

Major bug fixed

This could be a major cause of a CTD (Crash to desktop) bug that has been plaguing VOC for the last few months. Fingers crossed for some promising results. The bug consisted of a continuous loop (In a Coroutine for any of your programmers out there) in the resource cart code. In the editor it was causing some serious slowdown, but this would absolutely cause a CTD on a build version. Fingers crossed we have caught the bugger! On with the patch notes!

Campaign map

• Tutorial text updated. - Fixed issue where Norse camps are saved and loaded as Barbarian camps. - Rebalanced how engineers are purchased by AI (And player Ai) to prevent disproportionate amounts. - Party resources no longer scroll horizontally. - Buildings displayed in the buildings panel will now display if you can afford the upgrade before clicking. - The player is now warned when their actions have been noticed by other factions. - Village upgrades now display the current upgrade level. - Bribing an army to join forces will now detect if the faction has been defeated when successful. - Hero units will now join the player's army after a successful bribe. - Building descriptions have been updated. - Invasions will now also target villages, not just towns. - Heroes created now have faction appropriate equipment - Heroes the player may hire will have militia level equipment and a smaller chance of being mounted. - Hero price now uses the same multiplier whether purchased in town or an AI town. - Peacefully occupying a village will now transfer any AI hero units into the leaving army instead of just erasing them. - Hero units now gain experience when reducing army cost. - Hero units now gain experience when increasing tax income. - Hero units now gain experience form diplomatic events, tributes & bribes. - Heroes Accounting and Management skills can help reduce gold and resource costs for units, building, and village upgrades. - Runoff faction relation influence will only impact the player if they were the instigator. This was causing Ai to constantly declare war even after the player made peace. - Town and village names now loaded with localization. - Auto-resolve battle now calculates army strength more accurately. - The player should now receive rescued prisoners (Peasants) if auto-resolving a campfire battle. - Seasonal impacts have been adjusted. - Town names now always face the camera. - New town info panels displayed above each player owned towns. - Village strength now properly calculated. - Ability to scroll next town, village, or army in the selection panel. - Button added to zoom on the current selected Town, village, or party. - Selecting an army in the side panel no longer zooms to its position, but now selects the army. - Battle panels now have a focus button. - Event panel now has a focus button option. Camera no longer automatically focuses on the player. - Tutorial updated with more indicator arrows and camera focus. - HeroPortraits now contain helmets. - Resource carts boat should now properly show above water level Tutorial now has a voiceover. - Further LOD's (Level of detail) use to optimize campaign map. - AI will no longer send kings on patrol, potentially only with a siege army. - Hero accounting skill can reduce the cost of building upgrades, unit hire, and village upgrades. - Hero management can reduce the resource cost of building upgrades and unit training. - The issue with incorrect cost reduction fixed - was always based on hero units diplomacy. - Fixed issue where hero experience wasn't showing on the experience bar on the selected hero screen. - The correct unit gold cost charged when purchased. - The Ai will now correctly set vassals for its hero units. - Option to control battle should no longer show if the battle is over the ocean. - Additional hero agility added amount reduced. - Faction town, village, and hero info now allows the player to focus the camera on each item. - Army leaders now displayed on floating icon above player armies. - Ships are now controlled by LOD's (Optimised). - When units are created unit names are now read correctly from the localized text, and town name is mentioned. - Construction complete message will display localized building name. - The player is now alerted of hero units needing upgrades by a green cross on the hero's overview panel. - Secondary faction colors are now shown in the balance of power. - An enemy army entering an empty village will take control and no longer create a battle. - Form alliance button no longer shows after alliance formed. - Tier 4 - 5 units purchase and daily payment increased. - Confirming hero upgrades will reset green crosses on the heroes side panel. - Fixed elusive bug where defending a siege battle would update the wrong town's population after the battle. - AI owns will now create fewer patrols. - Towns will only create scouts if the faction only has a small number of towns. - Heroes will now remember the combat groups they have been put into. Whenever available they will create a combat group to match the last one they have been assigned at the start of battle provided units are available. - Event messages are now pooled for optimized efficiency. - Major bug fix (Possible cause of the crash to the desktop bug) fixed. endless loop in resource caravan code. - Unit purchase and daily payments increased. - All cavalry now require food to purchase. - Duplicate gold mine name renamed. - Error trying to find siege armies general when displaying armies fixed. - Town heroes panel properly masked. Should no longer have hero units scroll above the panel.

Armory

• All items now have text descriptions. - Item text now available to be localized. - Unit names are now loaded correctly from localization text.

Battle scene

• Tutorial text updated. - Town Gates no longer break navigation. This is to prevent unreachable paths causing unresponsive units during a siege. - Tweaks to unit acceleration and responsiveness. - Caught a rare exception when setting ranged units to melee. - Heroes panel should now scroll vertically. - Fixed a glitch with the Stillwater map where the castle was cloned on top of itself. - Increased chance of taking prisoners when an army is fleeing. - Helper text now shows on top of win/lose panel. - New battle music - Composed by me (Kerry Fawdray), and re-sampled & mastered by Dean Watkin! - Text alerting of a hero leveling up now has its own color; - Hero units are no longer selected when selecting melee, mounted, or unit cards. Can still be selected with the portrait, or by pressing 0. - Holding left CTRL will include relevant hero units in the Unit card or numeric selection if preferred. - Ranged units set to melee attack will no longer become selected when all melee units are selected (2 Key). - Hero units now have their own unique hero card. - Army general is now displayed with a star next to its health button. - Hero health panel will now display with a red background if a hero has been killed. - Tutorial updated. - A bug has been caught when units try to pick up a destroyed ladder. - Tutorial now has a voiceover. - Units can now be placed into unit groups with hero units Ctrl + 0 - 9. - Hero units will remember selected groupings and will be placed into groups at the start of each battle if units are available. - An issue where all units would gain full health after their general was killed fixed. - Secondary faction colors now displayed on the balance of power bar. - AI retreat delayed preventing complete gridlock and unresponsive units.

Main menu

• Minimum music/sound volume lowered. Now mutes properly. - Town loader starting condition starting town changed. - Create character and tutorial armor changed. - Starting conditions equipment altered. Faction color randomization improved. Can now include black & white.

Mod Support

• Current mod toggle no longer used. Select mod and hit confirm to load the mod. - Currently loaded mod now displayed next to game version text on the main menu start screen.

Updated 19/09/2018:

Just uploaded a quick patch for some minor issues I came across after uploading this build: - Fixed issue when completing a bandit camp quest with the arrow tracker enabled. - An issue where hero units weren't being cleared from villages when peacefully occupied resolved. - Battle tutorial voiceover echo removed. - Slight adjustment made to the tutorial to prevent issues creating the siege army - Bandit camps now have a lod (Level of detail) level. - Bandit camp text now follows the player. - Highwater position fixed. - Balance of power removed from balance of power in battle. already obvious enough. - Bandit camp tribute price lowered. - Auto resolve "Time has come' missions bug fixed. - Hero skill influence will now show when determining if player can upgrade a building not in the buildings list.

Updated: 20/09/2018

• Safety put in place to make sure the player always has enough resources to build siege equiment in the tutorial. - Check now made when setting Normal/Slow mode to prevent erratic camera after retreat panel is shown. - Faction colour randomisation improved. - Equipment reference nyumbers added to armoury item details - this can be used when eqipping heros when modding starting conditions. - Old savegames having an issue playing has been fixed. Please let me know if the problem still happens.

Updated 21/09/2018:

• Paleseid walls towers material fixed. - Campaign map borders visually fixed - no more grey line. - Peasant carts should no longer be seen under the ship. - Deserter, Norse, and Barbarian camps text now follows. - Only one general should be showin to the player. - Unit cards name text will now scale. - Light lancers agility (Movement speed) fixed. - Tutorial saves will no longer show on the continue game panel Thank you all for your ongoing support as we get closer to announcing the release date, with the awesome new features available. If you have not done yet, please remember to leave a review! VOC has come a long way in its time in Early access, and it is all due to your support. Let me know how you feel! Reviews not only provide valuable feedback, but they also help games stay relevant on steam. If you have any issues with the game please let me know, I am always looking for ways to improve the experience and fix issues. Thank you all! - Kerry Fawdray