Version 0.250 is out!

[armagan]

Version 0.250 is ready for download. Changes in this version include:

- Improvements to combat AI. AI has got more aggressive and smarter.
- Improvements to Face generator and faces.
- Horses stop less often when they bump into footmen and other horses.
- Player may lose gold and trade items if completely defeated in battle
- If player's horse falls in battle it may die or be crippled permanently
- If Player's shield is knocked off it may be downgraded or lost permanently.
- Companion Heroes gain double the normal experience.
- Tracking skill is operational
- Two new skills: athletics and trainer
- Weapon and armor stats reduced
- Offensive bonuses reduced.
- Removed the "hopelessly outnumbered" condition
- Battle size option
- "invert mouse" option
- verbose damage option
- verbose shot difficulty option
- Numerous bug fixes.

This should be quite obvious but I just want to say that beta-testers' feedback and suggestions have been enormously useful in making these improvements. I am truly thankful and indebted to everyone who contributed to the game by posting observations, bug reports, ideas and suggestions. Thank you and I hope you enjoy the new version!

 

[Pavlov]

Edit: figured it out, DL'ed it.

It's like 4am here and i'm too tired to play. Can hardly wait untill tommorow to give it a go tho

 

[Zajcew]

Heh, you promised you'll make it more difficult, and it is indeed more difficult. Especially at the begining. After finishing the river pirates quest there's nothing left for me to fight with, as even mountain badits are to tough. I have no money to hire more soldiers, no way to ern more exp. You should consider adding river pirates permanentally, so that low lvl char would have someone to lvl up a bit, before they set out to the world.
And lower their speed, cause it seems they are always faster then me, and catching them is difficult, if they are always "running away from Zajcew's party"
Can't wait to check out the battle size option. Too bad I'll have to wait quite a bit, as my old save games don't seem to work in the new version.
So far so good, I'll be back later with more thoughts.

 

[armagan]

River pirates are permanent in the new version. Although there are fewer of them after completing the river pirates quest.

Forgot to say it: Older savegames won't work with the ne version.

 

[Zajcew]

Well, they are permanent, but difficult to come across. And when I do find them, they run away, and they always move faster then I do. What I think is that around Zendar there should be a kind of "kindergarden" in which fresh players can get a grip of the game, and buff up their chars a bit, before they set out in to the world. Her's how I think it should work:
Area around Zendar should be a "River Pirate Area" with lot's of small groups ( 3 - 8 ) of them running around, even after compleating the river pirate quest. Remove the manhunters from that region, so they do not steal your river pirates, and decrease the river pirate speed, so that the player can catch them if he wants, while being able to escape if he doesn't want to fight. This area should also Dark Knight free After player reaches a certain lvl (I dunno, 5-10?) everything should go back to normal.
I would also want to be able to attack peasents that wonder around the map. Simply for fun of killing something easily and effortlessly. Why not make that avialable after player joins one of the factions, so his factions peasents are still "un-attackable" while hostile factions peasents are. There is no way ppl would exploit that to buff up their lvls, as you should get very small amounts of exp points and stuff from peasensts. What do you guys think about that?

 

[ShadowMoses]

I really like the "verbose shot difficulty option" it's really cool to pull off a 12.6 !!

How about adding an archery tournament where you can challenge other heroes to a shoot off. maybe 3-5 shots at a target, most points wins. You could also have greater difficulty by increasing the range. Greater range = more gold etc.

Or to make it a bit more bloody you could each stand 100 yards apart and take it in turns to fire at each other!

 

[ShadowMoses]

I had a bug in the Arena:

It occured as the last person died. I think it was caused by this person being pushed half way through the wall as he died.

Basically he was standing by the wall and a horse charged him with a polarm which killed him and at the same time pushed him through the wall.

The screen completely froze without any error message. It was very difficult to get out of the game.... it think it was luck more than anything else. ctrl alt del brought up task manager but the game was still full screen so you couldn't see it.

 

[armagan]

Shadowmoses:
I think I know what may have caused that bug. There's a section of code which probably went into an infinite loop. I'll look into it. Thanks for describing it so clearly.

 

[Pavlov]

Ok been playing most of the day now, just got my avatar to level 12.

things I noticed

- First off, it's WAY too hard to get started. You're poor, ill equiped and fighting in tourneys just dosen't get you enought money now. I got over this problem by fighting as hard as I could and taking down a few Mountain bandits early on. Still, was way too hard and an amature player would be more likley to just give up then to keep trying. I opt for putting the starting items and money back like you had in 240.

- Bows have been nerfed. This upsets me quite a bit since that is my primary (if not only) weapon. Once again I adapted by qickly beefing the bow skill, but still the bows are simply too weak. Now it can take as many as 6 or 7 to bring down a knight. Thats just irritating. In my opinion you should have left the Archery damage as it was. I think it was perfect.

- Whats with Javelins? they seem almost useless. 21 damage and 5 of them? and they take a whole weapon slot. So even if you get 3 packs thats still only 15 of them and doing 21 damage... there is no point in using them... I suggest maybe adding 3-4 more to a pack and seriously upgrading the damage to like 70-80. That way you will be able to take down even the most powerful opponent in one shot, but you will REALLY have to aim it first.

- I know I asked before but... more factions? Kharagit faction? Bandit faction? could give the game some real depth. Plus playing an alternative less powerful faction will give the novice player a bit more of a challange. Plus give the game more replay value.

-Merc camps. This would trully be awesome. I can't tell you how many times I thought to myself "man, it would be kindda sweet to have a 30 man troop of bandits over these knights" Once again it would add more depth and freedom.

- Conquering? is it possible for you to do something that would allow the player to conquer enemy towns? this would ofcourse reqire to add in more towns or maybe even Cities that would control the towns, or basically something that will allow you to conquer.

-Your own independent faction. This comes of the conqering thing. Maybe after taking an enemy town you could have an option for letting the player pick if he wants to be King of that town, therefore making his very own faction. You could add in diplomacy, option to build armies not under you control, etc... I know this is more of a Warrider II thing tho (:


Note that I only pointed out the things that I didn't like all too much, everything else that you fixed or changed is awesome, bigger battles, more realism on the horses and shields. One again I have to salute you for making such quick and exellent progress. Keep up the good work. (:

 

[armagan]

- First off, it's WAY too hard to get started. You're poor, ill equiped and fighting in tourneys just dosen't get you enought money now. I got over this problem by fighting as hard as I could and taking down a few Mountain bandits early on. Still, was way too hard and an amature player would be more likley to just give up then to keep trying. I opt for putting the starting items and money back like you had in 240.

Heh heh. This is what happens when everyone tells me the game is too easy. Well, I am putting back some starting money, although I'm not too sure about the items. Also I'm adding an extra reward for killing the river pirates. That should ease down things a bit.

- Bows have been nerfed. This upsets me quite a bit since that is my primary (if not only) weapon. Once again I adapted by qickly beefing the bow skill, but still the bows are simply too weak. Now it can take as many as 6 or 7 to bring down a knight. Thats just irritating. In my opinion you should have left the Archery damage as it was. I think it was perfect.

This wasn't intentional. Bows have been nerfed down with everything else. I'll make them more powerful in the next version. Note that Dark knights have got harder to kill as well since they now have ironflesh level 6.

- Whats with Javelins? they seem almost useless. 21 damage and 5 of them? and they take a whole weapon slot. So even if you get 3 packs thats still only 15 of them and doing 21 damage... there is no point in using them... I suggest maybe adding 3-4 more to a pack and seriously upgrading the damage to like 70-80. That way you will be able to take down even the most powerful opponent in one shot, but you will REALLY have to aim it first.

Allright, I'll increase their power, but not to the point of making them a viable alternative to bows; That would not be realistic. However they should be useful in cases like carrying a mace along with a sword and shield, or carrying two shields...

- I know I asked before but... more factions? Kharagit faction? Bandit faction? could give the game some real depth. Plus playing an alternative less powerful faction will give the novice player a bit more of a challange. Plus give the game more replay value.

I want to add the opportunity to hire khergit raiders and bandits, but I'm not sure about adding random quests for these. I'll think about it.

Thanks for your encouraging remarks. I'm happy you liked most of the modifications.

 

[ShadowMoses]

Just to add that i don't mind starting off weak, in fact i like it as i think it will be more rewarding later but there needs to be more opportunity to build up at the start.

 

[Kalamar]

Wow I go away for the weekend and a new version is up - I like the sound of the changes.
I haven't played yet but I'm w/ ShadowMoses that I like to work my way up from being weak. How about a higher level of difficulty for those that want the challenge.

Also did you get a change to read my suggestions #2? You probably have but I just wanted to make sure it didn't slip through the cracks.

Beat Testers how about a round of thanks for the WR team?

Thanks guys!

 

[armagan]

You are most welcome Kalamar.

I read your suggestions#2 . I even fixed the bug you reported, and adressed one of the points you raised in the new version (Enemies take some of your gold and stuff when you fall in battle.)

 

[Kalamar]

You are most welcome Kalamar.

I read your suggestions#2 . I even fixed the bug you reported, and adressed one of the points you raised in the new version (Enemies take some of your gold and stuff when you fall in battle.)

*Smacks Forehead*

I guess I should of read my own thread before posting. =)

 

[armagan]

Actually, I should have written a longer reply... By the way, I was thinking that I had made river pirates permanent. Even posted that info somewhere. And now I realized I haven't.

 

[Zajcew]

Actually, I should have written a longer reply... By the way, I was thinking that I had made river pirates permanent. Even posted that info somewhere. And now I realized I haven't.

Hehe. So how about you consider my "kindergarden" idea from this very thread?

 

[armagan]

Heh, so it was this thread after all.

Kindergarden idea is fine. However:
- It is technically too much of a hassle to make an area dark-knight free. Instead I can add some NPCs that advise the player to run like hell if he comes across them. Or perhaps dark knights may start to operate after player is level 5 or something....
- I don't want to make peasants and such attackable. That's evil.
- I don't think competition from manhunters is such a big deal. They are, after all, just AI.
- Currently, NPC's take some skills randomly. In your game, river pirates must have spent a lot of points on path-finding and such which must have made them that fast . Hopefully, I'll specify the skills for each NPC sometime, which will solve the problem.

I made the river pirates really permanent in the development version. Let us see how that works out...

 

[Zajcew]

- It is technically too much of a hassle to make an area dark-knight free. Instead I can add some NPCs that advise the player to run like hell if he comes across them. Or perhaps dark knights may start to operate after player is level 5 or something....

That's cool.

- I don't want to make peasants and such attackable. That's evil.

Yes, it is evil, but:
1. It is an RPG right? So it should be up to the player to decide if he wan't to be evil or not.
2. It stays true with history. Back in medival times knights used to burn down entire vilages, kill all men, rape woman and so on. If it's imposibile to burn down villages, at least allow us, poor evil players, to kill peasents.

- I don't think competition from manhunters is such a big deal. They are, after all, just AI.

You're propably right here.

- Currently, NPC's take some skills randomly. In your game, river pirates must have spent a lot of points on path-finding and such which must have made them that fast . Hopefully, I'll specify the skills for each NPC sometime, which will solve the problem.

Hehe, no matter how fast I go, they are always 0,1-0,2 faster. If you could fix that somehow, it would be great.

I made the river pirates really permanent in the development version. Let us see how that works out...

I think it will work out fine.

 

[Anonymous]

Edit: Originally Thormac's post used to be here before I accidentally posted my reply over it...

Hi Thormac,

Sorry for the late reply. I wanted to fix some of the problems you mentioned before replying.

When player shoots non-shield wielding AI with an arrow, and there is another AI with shield behind the first one, the arrow gets blocked. So the shield's protecting distance is too far to the front. This was in v.2.40 and probably is in v.2.50 too if you haven't fixed it.

Thanks for bringing this up. I am reducing that distance in the new version.

Horses no longer rear when they collide to each other in low angles, which is good. Bad thing is that now they simply clip right trough eachother. This is really annoying.

I did a few quick fixes to it in ver 0.26 but it may still be not perfect.

When AI reaches it's weapon back to make a swing player takes damage when coming to contact with AI's weapon. So AI is making damage eventhough it's weapon is only reached back and has no momentum yet. Could you change this so that player would only take a fraction of the damage or that there wouldn't be damage delivered until AI really has some speed in it's swing.

OK. Increased the time at the beginning of the attack where the opponent won't take damage. Hopefully it will be more realistic from now on.

...Shields are build to take hits, but what about when someone uses a wooden staff to parry a war axe swing?...

Good point. But that may be Warrider 2 stuff...

...Edged weapons could also dull down after being used a long time. There could be blacksmiths to sharpen these for a price. Player could upgrade a battered shield or cracked helmet at blacksmith etc...

This is possible. However some players find it repetitive and boring to have their stuff constantly repaired. It would be good if it was made into a gameplay element (where you repair/upgrade your equipment with a sophisticated system, adding a new dimension to the game) But I guess I won't have time for this.

...Current morale would be then affected by; staying in the same place (player exploits training skill by sleeping in towns), lack of food (or low quality food) and most importantly nearby enemy.

Morale is not fully implemented yet. Currently I believe it is only affected by the quality of food and starvation. However losses in battles, going into hopeless battles etc. should effect it as well. When morale is too low, your soldiers start deserting your party. When it is high your party moves faster.

I would very much like some after battle kill log. It could say who killed who with what weapon. It would be cool to check out after battles. It could also give valuable information about effectiveness of archers or cavalry vs. footsoldiers for example.

I am making a note of this. Also, I increased the verbosity of the messages in v0.26. Hopefully that will help a bit too.

Thanks for your suggestions!

 

[Thormac]

That was me. Forgot to sign in. Again.

About my first suggestion:

Basically equipment could wear in use. So they become battered, crude, bent etc. You could then upgrade them at appropriate weaponmaker.