Hello everyone!

To begin with, we’d like to thank everyone who believed in us and decided to support the development by purchasing the game over these last two days. The amount of players was completely beyond our wildest expectations, and we consider it a great success for our team – we will continue to diligently work on the game to repay your trust. We fully understand that the game still has a long way to go. We plan to gradually fix the shortcomings which were pointed out as well as add new content. Thank you all once more -- we are set on doing everything in our power to implement everything we’ve planned.

After receiving the feedback it became clear to us that the biggest flaw of the game is the lack of the save system. We’d like to assure you, it was not a conceptual decision, designed to make players suffer by losing time and progress. Saving on exit is a fairly obvious QoL feature, which we would implement if we had the opportunity. Unfortunately, due to a combination of multiple factors – procedural world generation, huge number of objects in every location, as well as parameters which require saving, this task is impossible to perform from the technical standpoint.

The reason is not GMS2, as it could be misunderstood from the message about “engine limitations”, the reason is our procedural generation engine. The saves currently used by the game technically differ from saving in any part of the game world – they save the seed of visited locations, regenerating the world on each loading, they don’t save the state of the world, as it was left by the player. Otherwise, the saves would end up weighting a few gigabytes and take minutes to load. That’s why the saving is done in designated locations which don’t contain objects requiring their state to be saved – tavern rooms, the archive in the Prologue, the location with Archon etc.

With the addition of a mobile caravan which would serve as a save spot, this problem would disappear on its own, since the player would have a place to save their progress at just a short walk away. However it will take a long time to implement it, and there’s already a need for a solution – that’s why we’ve decided to add extra save spots to the existing world by reworking the current camp system.



Now the brigand camps, initially marked with a question mark on the map, can be cleared out and then used as a save spot by clicking on bed. We’ve changed the algorithm for their generation to spread them more evenly across the map, placing them closer to roads and dungeons. We hope that this measure will make your game experience more pleasant. In the future, as it was already mentioned, there’ll be even more save spots. Other than the caravan, some random locations, roadside inns, etc. will also be used as save spots.

Thank you!

• It’s now possible to save in brigand camps
  
• Map can now be opened by clicking on corresponding Journal tab or with M hotkey. Initially this was planned for the upcoming global map, but many people were left confused and thinking that map navigation isn’t yet available.
  
• Journal and Map hotkeys now can be redefined.
  
• Maps were added to Elders stock. You can now purchase the map if you somehow lose your starting one.
  
• Many text fixes in all localizations
  
• We’ve temporarily added small stock of leather/cloth items to Smith’s Apprentice in Mannshire. Initially we wanted settlements to have different distinctive features and craftsmen, but since there’re only two settlements and no caravan yet, the lack of tailor in Mannshire ended up being a nuisance.
  
• Added a hint regarding moving the camera around with MMB to the tutorial sequence.

• Added new brigand camp’s variation for temperate biomes
  
• Added new brigand camp’s variation for Steppes
  
• Many visual fixes of brigand camps
  
• Visual fixes of Witch’s Hut
  
• Many visual fixes of equipment
  
• Fixed missing on-character sprite for Magistrate Gambeson
  
• Fixed playable characters having wrong corpse spites

• Fixed rare crash upon starting the game
  
• Fixed Vampiric Rune-related crash
  
• Fixed unique items droplist resetting on load, allowing them to drop more than once
  
• Fixed crash on enemy examination
  
• Fixed Proselyte Apostate attacking from 2 tiles away instead of 1
  
• Fixed carts generation on locations’ edges

• Brigand Camps spawns now depend on player level
  
• Reduced damage of Jorgrim’s starting weapons
  
• Reduced damage taken by body parts by 8%
  
• Proselytes, mid-tier and high-tier brigands were buffed by ~5-10%, as they didn’t present much danger to 4+ lvl characters.
  
• At launch wolves were especially deadly because of their bugged “Rend Flesh” ability causing two attacks instead of one. Now this issue is fixed, so their health and damage values were reverted to pre-Hotfix values.
  
• Because of Pain Limit formula changes, passive pain reduction was increased. (-0.1 > -0.13) on >75% Health and additional (-0.15>-0.2) on >90% Health.
  
• Dungeons don’t generate 4th floor anymore. Deep 4-5-floored dungeons will return once we revamp dungeon generation to make their exploration less monotonous.
  
• Reduced durability of equipment found in Luxurious Tombs.
  
• Reduced Jewelry drop rates from Crypt urns.
  
• Increased Golden Teeth drop rates from wooden coffins.
  
• Antitoxin is now more effective (-20% Toxicity > -25%)
  
• Reduced Toxicity of Stardust (+30% > +25%). Now it’s time to reduce toxicity of our Steam discussions.
  
• Antivenom now provides +75% Poison Resistance x30t.
  
• Food spoilage rates were increased by 50-100% depending on type.
  
• Rebalanced secondary attributes of most daggers to make their stats less clogged and more varied.

• Many changes to default price modifier when selling items to NPCs:
  
• Increased base price modifier for Alcohol (+30% > +50%) – it's assumed alcohol should be a valuable trade good to find and sell
  
• Increased base price modifier for Medicine (0% > +20%) – during war times people are more willing to pay for medical supplies
  
• Increased base price modifier for Beverages (0% > +10%)
  
• Increased base price modifier for Drugs (0% > +10%) – they say drugs are a hot commodity… for some people.
  
• Decreased base price modifier for Scrolls (0% > -10%)
  
• Decreased base price modifier for Treatises (0% > -10%) – no one reads them anyway

• Fixed Crow Heater Shield crashing the game
  
• Fixed Archers not using Take Aim when in melee range
  
• Fixed enemy spellcasters using spells outside of their casting range
  
• Fixed Lacerate skill (used by Wolves) triggering two attacks instead of one.
  
• Fixed dual wielded weapons overlapping in a single slot after loading
  
• Fixed Osbrook merchant’s name not displaying in the corresponding contract’s text.
  
• Fixed dialogue-related crash
  
• Fixed wrong description of Geomancy Treatise III

• Salves limb healing increased (12% > 15%)
  
• Damage values of melee weapons were reverted back to closed beta values (+5-12% increase on the average)
  
• Decreased armor durability loss to make playing as melee character less penalizing.
  
• Drastically reduced Fumble chance for weapon active skills to make playing as melee character more consistent and less RNG-dependent.
  
• Slightly increased gold stock of some merchants and craftsmen
  
• Fixed overtuned Wolf spawnrate in the Pineforest, wildlife in other biomes became slighlty less abundant as well. Mooses became more rare.
  
• Contract rewards were slightly increased (~10-15%) to compensate cases of poor loot runs.
  
• Leg injuries have smaller chance to immobilize now.
  
• Rebalanced Pain Limit formula. Decreased base Pain Limit from 0 to -25, but the Pain Limit loss from missing health was reduced by 25%.
  
• Laceration skill (used by Wolves) now deals less bonus Bodypart damage (100% > 75%)
  
• Damage over Time effects (except Bleeding) now deal set amount of damage each turn instead of scaled to Max Health. Meaning they are much less effective against high health enemies now.
  
• Decreased bonus Bodypart damage done by traps (200% > 150%).
  
• Beartrap Immobilization chance increased (85% > 100%).
  
• Bleeding now gives -30% Healing Efficiency instead of -4% Health Restoration, due to Health Restoration being disabled when taking damage anyways.

Hello!

This is our second hotfix, dealing with the most frequent crash reported so far (80% of total reports).

• Fixed the most occurent crash related to renting

• Some visual fixes for morning mist

• Reduced renting price by 60%

Current save system is the most controversial issue, as it seems from discussions and reviews, and we would like to write a post regarding it soon, explaining the technical reasons behind it and how it will be alleviated in the future with introduction of the Caravan, roadside inns and other possible saving spots. For now, we've decided to adjust renting prices to ease it a bit.

Stay tuned for the soon updates!

• Fixed Snake-related crash
  
• Fixed crash happening during trading

• Low-tier enemies had their Damage and Health reduced by 5-10% to have more gradual difficulty curve
  
• Rebalanced Pain Limit formula and Pain Gain from injuries.

Greetings!

We'd like to thank all those who've been supporting us all this time. Our game is about to enter into the next stage, and we hope we can see it through together.

You can purchase the game here:
https://store.steampowered.com/app/625960/Stoneshard/

You can learn about the development plan and see answers to the most frequently asked questions in the previous news post.

Cheers!

Hello everyone!

As a reminder, it’s just 3 days until the Early Access release! That’s why we’d like to answer some of the most frequently asked questions as well as tell you about the current status of the game, what will happen during the EA, and our plans for the future.

Early Access is just the beginning of the long way, which we are yet to walk with your support. There are still lots of mechanics and content to be added. We’ll need approximately 2 years to implement everything we’ve planned.

Let’s start with the most important part - the current content. Right now the basic gameplay cycle is pretty much in place. Combat, dungeon crawling, health system, character development, and economy are all functional.

To fully explore all the content with one character, you’ll need around 7-10 hours, which is roughly translated into gaining 8-10 experience levels.

Currently in-game content includes:

• Two settlements - Osbrook and Mannshire
  
• Two types of dungeons
  
• Three enemy factions: brigands, the undead, proselytes
  
• 16 types of contracts
  
• 200+ items and 100+ abilities
  
• Hunting
  
• Health system
  
• Economy

Unfortunately we couldn’t implement everything we had planned by February 6, so some of the content (new boss, a couple of new skill trees, expanded dialogues and so on) will be added with the first update – Trollslayer, which will be released in March. This february will mostly be spent on fixing reported bugs and adjusting balance.

For now, let us introduce our roadmap:


Keep in mind that new content and features are not limited to things listed in the roadmap, they only represent high priority targets. The listed dates are an approximation and may be subject to change in the future versions of the roadmap. We may also add or remove features at our discretion.

• Supporter pack. It will be available on release for $10 and will include OST along with two unique starting items (they don’t offer major gameplay advantage). In the future the pack will be expanded with, among other things, a digital manual and an artbook. These items are granted automatically to every purchaser of the Supporter pack, there will be no need to buy them separately.
  
• The Prologue. It will be included in the main game, so you won’t have to download and play the Prologue as a separate game. It also doesn’t matter how you complete it or what items, experience, character build, etc. you acquire there -- these things are part of the story of a separate character. If you’ve already finished the Prologue, you’ll be able to start playing in an open world right away.
  
• Permadeath. Even though the game is balanced around permadeath mechanic, enabling it is purely optional, and you’ll be able to turn it off when starting a new game. If you play without permadeath, you can resume your game from the latest save.
  
• Save system. It’s only possible to save the game in taverns. To save your progress, you need to find a tavern, rent a room, and sleep for any amount of time. Unfortunately the game’s engine doesn’t allow saving anywhere and anytime when the game is this expansive.
  
• Progress wipes. Large updates which add new mechanics will likely lead to save file incompatibility. However, if you want to continue playing as a character from a previous version, you can rollback to the previous version of the game via Steam game options.
  
• Languages. English, Russian, Chinese, German and semi-official fanmade Polish will be available on release. We also plan to add the following languages soon: Spanish, French, Italian, and Brazilian Portuguese. The work on them will begin soon after the EA release. In the future we also plan to add Korean and Japanese localizations.
  
• Multiplayer and co-op. They are not planned, the game is an exclusively single-player experience.
  
• Achievements and trading cards. They are planned, but not for the nearest future.
  
• The main story is not yet available. For now there is only a sandbox mode, where you can travel between the settlements, fulfill contracts, and explore dungeons. We want to finish the game mechanics and content first before we add the main story as a single large expansion, which will arrive right before the game leaves the Early Access.
  
• Full keyboard and gamepad support. At the moment the controls are designed for the mouse, but we plan to improve keyboard controls in the future and add gamepad support.
  
• Mac and Linux. The game will be available for Linux on release. Mac OS support will be added later, the date is TBA.
  
• GOG release. It’s planned, but not for the first few months.

If you still have questions, you can ask them in the comments below. That’s it for now.

Thank you for your support and see you on February 6!

Hello everyone!

We’re here to remind you only 7 days left until Stoneshard launches in Early Access on the 6th of February! For those of you still wondering, the price tag will be $15 for the US / 15€ for the EU.

To celebrate this, we’ve just released our launch trailer. Check it out!



In the coming week prepare for more news and updates, including our Early Access FAQ, development roadmap and other interesting things.

Cheers!

Hello everyone!

This devlog is dedicated to a variety of small tweaks and improvements, which have accumulated over the last few weeks.


Casual cooking is the best way to ease your mind after slaughtering the whole bunch of bandits.

Ever since the old Prologue, many players have been complaining that there are no uses for raw meat. In fact, we do have a fairly complex cooking and ingredient system planned, but implementing it is a very complex task, so it won’t be coming any time soon. Nevertheless, there is already a need for some option to cook meat acquired from hunting - that’s why we’ve added a small placeholder system, which will allow roasting it. To do it, you will need to find a campfire or an oven, start a fire, and cook raw meat through the context menu. Simple, fast, filling.



With the addition of a new village (we’ll tell you more about it in the next devlog), the necessity of expanding the map became rather apparent. As a result, the map is now almost twice as large. Every village is also surrounded with its own dungeons, which are repopulated with enemies after a certain amount of time.




The amount of available equipment has been increased with the addition of new, regular gear, as well as some special, unique items. Unique items can only be acquired in a single copy and are often gained in a very specific way - during certain encounters or as a rare drop after killing an appropriate miniboss. These are not legendary items, so they don’t have any unique properties, but they are generally better than the alternatives of the same level. All preset characters also start the game with two unique items, unobtainable in any other way.




During the closed beta, many players complained that inventory space is too limited and is too fast to get cluttered with gold. We’ve fixed this problem with the addition of purses - special containers, which can only hold crowns. A purse only takes up two inventory spaces, while being able to hold up to 2000 coins, saving lots of space.

Backpacks are equipped in the cloak slot, adding 12 extra spaces, which increases your inventory capacity by almost 25%. Why just 12 spaces? Because that’s the exact amount of space taken up by a backpack if you put it in your inventory. We wanted to avoid the situations when players fill their inventories with many backpacks to maximize their inventory capacity. In our game the small inventory size is vital for balance and is an important tactical element, meant to encourage players to plan and optimize their equipment.

We don’t plan to add item stacks, as they interfere with the sense of size for each individual item. However, we plan to add more bag types for different items, such as tubes for storing scrolls, alchemy pouches for potions and ingredients and so on.


Geomancy is the most unique magic school in the game at the moment. However, it had many problems: it was fairly independent from gear, and it could become an absolute weapon from level one if used correctly.

Our task was to fix it without affecting other well-loved abilities. As a result, Runic Boulder, the cornerstone of the skill tree, was the only ability which got significantly rebalanced. Its problems included overly strong bonuses, lack of cooldowns, and no adverse effects of using the spell. These factors resulted in preventive boulder spam before each battle instead of placing boulders tactically.



To fix this, we’ve rebalanced the effect of Runic Empowerment, making it less versatile. We’ve also added a small 2 turns cooldown between raising boulders, as well as introduced energy cost for maintaining them. Each boulder now drains 2 energy points per turn. If your character’s energy runs out, the summoned boulders crumble. On top of this, boulders crumble if the caster loses sight of them, so it’s no longer possible to lure enemies into rooms with pre-casted boulders.


Little QoL-improvement. Now you don't need to re-cast boulders to get rid of them.

Some other geomancy spells also had their numbers tweaked: for instance, stone spikes and stone armor durations have been reduced. To compensate for that, energy costs for all geomancy spells are lower as well - it’s now possible to create more complicated spell combinations without running out of energy. Thanks to these combined changes, geomancy now feels way more tactical, while still being very powerful in skilled hands, remaining just as fun to use as before.

That’s all for now. Until next time!

====================

Also you can follow us on:

• Our Steam Creator page
  
• Discord
  
• Twitter
  
• Facebook

Hello everyone!

In today’s devlog, we’d like to share some details about the character selection system.
As some of you may not know, Verren isn’t the main character of our game. He only comes under your control in the Prologue. In the main game, however, he is an employer and a mentor figure to your character.



We plan to introduce an option to create your own mercenary, but at the moment the game lacks systems necessary for implementing a fully working character generator. Instead, we added an option to choose from four preset characters. Each of them has their own appearance, portrait, starting inventory, starting attributes, some special dialogue options and also a unique perk, unavailable to other characters.

An important thing about preset characters is that they have affinities, governing which skills are initially unlocked. For instance, Jorgrim is good with melee weapons and can start leveling swords, axes and maces from the get go. But to learn starting skills of the pyromancy and geomancy trees, he’ll have to find a corresponding treatise first.

We intend to expand this system at the same time as working on the character generator. According to our plans, some heroes will have access to unique content, which can’t be discovered when playing as other characters. For now this type of content is represented with unique starting equipment. For example, Arna starts the game with a family cuirass and sword, which can’t be obtained in any other way. We also plan to expand the character selection as we add more skill trees.

Some may ask: but what about classes? How do they fit into this system? Yes, at first we did consider adding classes, but as the development went on, it became quite clear that it would be completely redundant. Class abilities came in conflict with our vision for character development, and they weren’t really working with all possible archetypes, forcing you to play in a very specific manner. We wanted to avoid that. Class abilities also turned out to be fairly generic and boring when compared to common skill trees. As a result it was decided to transfer the best ideas into the existing skill trees and get rid of the rest.

Now let us present you with the backstories and affinities for each character:



Affinity: Axes, Swords, Maces, Shields
Unique trait: Berserker Frenzy (increased Weapon Damage and Crit Efficiency for 10 turns after every kill)

Bio:

Not so long ago people of Aldor would shake in their boots the moment someone mentioned Tyr the One-eyed, a legendary leader of Fjall brigands. Tyr's band was infamous for their audacious raids on the northern border - even well armed troops of the local lords suffered defeat after defeat from these ferocious dwarfs. Jorgrim was one of them, the best warrior in the band, he hadn't lost a single battle in his life.

Yet as time went by, the One-eyed's brutality towards captured settlements became too unsettling even for his own underlings. Jorgrim was the one who despised unnecessary cruelty the most: he always held a belief that violence against the weak and defenseless is unworthy of a true warrior.

It's unknown when Tyr crossed the final line, but eventually Jorgrim's patience ran short and the brigand leader's scalp found its place in the dwarf's long list of trophies. Left without guidance, the band fell apart: some dwarfs returned to Fjall, while others, including Jorgrim, decided to go south and try their luck as mercenaries.



Affinity: Swords, Maces, Shields, Greatswords
Unique trait: Vow of the Feat (every enemy within your vision range decreases Cooldowns Duration and Abilities Energy Cost)

Bio:

Few noble houses of Aldor can boast history as impressive as of the House of der Vyrne. By law, the title of a knight can only be passed down to a man, so it's not hard to imagine the chagrin of Arna's father, when after years of fruitless attempts his long awaited heir turned out to be a girl.

To save his house, Arna's father decided to invoke an ancient custom of the northern foothills: Arna was to be raised as a boy. Her entire childhood and youth were dedicated to rigorous training and serving as a page to one of the noble families. When she reached adulthood, Arna was knighted. Over multiple tournaments, she managed to earn herself a reputation as a skilled warrior.

Unfortunately Arna never had a knack for the most important skill to an aldorian noble - scheming. Soon after her father's death, Arna lost her fief, her title and her inheritance - the House of der Vyrne ceased to exist. Shaken by these events, Arna gave an oath to redeem herself by a heroic deed and embarked on an endless journey into the lands of Aldor.



Affinity: Ranged Combat, Axes, Maces, Daggers
Unique trait: Sharp Eye (every tile between you and your enemy increases Crit Chance)
Bio:

Dirwin spent most of his life in loyal service to the late king, relentlessly patrolling the hunting grounds of his Majesty. He had great aim, knew the forest as the back of his hand and very few poachers, orcs and monsters survived their encounter with the royal ranger. Over his years of service, Dirwin eradicated countless dangers lurking in the woods, making one notch after another on his bow.

After King Etbert's death, the Royal Rangers disobeyed the Council's orders and refused to participate in the fratricidal war. As a punishment, the unit was disbanded, so Dirwin took his weapons and headed back into the woods.

During the war he continued to do what he always did: fulfill contracts and bounties, hunt dangerous monsters and help peasants. Common folks rightfully consider him their stalwart protector.



Affinity: Staves, Daggers, Geomancy, Pyromancy
Unique trait: Arcane Lore (each learned spell increases Magic Power)
Bio:

Since ancient times there is a strong belief in Aldor, that women and magic don't go well together and can only bode ill. Lectors of the Academy fully shared this prejudice, rarely eager to accept women for magic training. However, Jonna's talent for magic was so great, that they decided to make an exception.

After completing her training with flying colors, Jonna became a court sorceress to one of the aldorian nobles. Unfortunately her lord had a rather foul temper, something Jonna wouldn't put up with. One morning servants discovered their master's body burned to a crisp. The sorceress' sudden escape didn't leave much room for interpretation.

If it wasn't for the war breaking out, Jonna would have likely been caught and burned at the stake, but in the chaos of the Strife she managed to elude the chase by joining a mercenary band.

------------

Just Jonna picking some field herbs.
That’s all for now. Until next time!

Also you can follow us on:

• Our Steam Creator page
  
• Discord
  
• Twitter
  
• Facebook

Hello everyone!

Ink Stains Games here! We’d like to wish all of you Happy Holidays and to present you the long awaited update for the Prologue as a Christmas gift.

The original Prologue was published in May 2018. At the time it was more of a proof of concept, designed to demonstrate Kickstarter backers our vision of the future game. A lot of time has passed since then, most systems of the game have changed beyond recognition. And at some point the Prologue grew so outdated that updating it became a priority.

Now the Prologue is mechanically equal to the main game and we hope it will make it easier to wait for the February release :)

https://store.steampowered.com/app/869760/Stoneshard_Prologue/

The list of changes is too expansive to be presented in detail – after all, this update includes a year and a half of hard work. The Prologue’s structure remains the same, but if we are to list the most important changes, here is what you should expect from this update:

• An improved tutorial with detailed advice on main game mechanics.
  
• Vampires were swapped with Proselytes – a new group of enemies with their own set of abilities.
  
• A reworked boss fight, which now consists of two consecutive phases instead of two parallel outcomes.
  
• A reworked health, injury and needs system. The old Prologue had it functioning based on RNG. Now it’s a transparent, deterministic process which you can assess at any time.
  
• More weapons, equipment and all kinds of items.
  
• Abilities from the closed beta are now available in the Prologue.
  
• Destructible environment. Press CTRL to attack environmental objects!
  
• Reworked Dual Wielding system.
  
• Lots of QoL improvements: better controls, more hotkeys, item comparison, inventory auto-sorting, pop-up hints and more. Though keep in mind that the game is designed primarily for mouse controls.
  
• Most of the game art was reworked.
  
• Dialogues and lore notes were rewritten to better clarify the opening events of the story. New voice-overs for the characters.
  
• Lots of changed and added mechanics (reworked Attributes, for instance).
  
• A reworked UI.
  
• Fullscreen support for 1366х768, 1440х900, 1600х900, 1680х1050, 1920х1080 and 1920х1200 resolutions.
  
• Added an event log.
  
• “Last Hope” and “At What Cost?” achievements were replaced by “The Bitter Beginning” and “Eternal Hunger” achievements. The rest of the achievements were updated to fit with the content changes.
  
• Enemies learned how to open doors.

It’s worth to remember that many of the planned mechanics are still missing. On February 6 the game is just being released for Early Access, during which we plan to continue developing it for another couple of years, gradually implementing our vision.

===================


Stealth mode was temporarily removed from the game. It will return during Early Access after being reworked. Same for the unavailable skill trees.

Unfortunately you can’t. For now we can’t say for certain when the game will be available for these platforms.

Don’t worry, your progress remains. The achievements were changed, not removed, so you automatically get their changed versions.

===================

Merry Christmas and good luck finding your way out of the dungeon!