Sep 3, 2023

Goblin Camp - mikaelhalila

Goblin Camp is set in a forest, and that's no coincidence. Where Tolkien's goblins were only really comfortable underground, and the goblins of the Warhammer world roamed the plains, our goblins are definitely forest-dwellers. Finnic paganism developed in the northern forests, and much later, when the idea of a Finnish national identity was invented, forests became very important to it. So it was obvious to us that our game needs to take place in a forest.

When is a forest not a forest, though? When it's a tree plantation. All over the world, fewer and fewer forests are in anything like a natural state. Of course, deforestation has been going on ever since ancient times, but it's accelerated greatly over the last few centuries.

A particularly important development was the invention of scientific forestry in 18th-century Germany. The idea of scientific forestry was to create forests optimized for human use. In such a forest, trees of the same kind would be planted at the same time, at optimal intervals, to ensure maximal lumber production. These are what we call "economic forests" (talousmetsä) in Finnish. They don't support anything like the diversity of life that forests in their natural state do, and are much more vulnerable to various diseases and destructive insects.

Because these tree plantations can be made to produce predictable amounts of lumber, though, they've spread all over the world. A common practice is to clearcut a parcel of forest, which means cutting down all the trees and destroying any bushes or other smaller plants. Tree saplings are then brought in and planted, and a tree plantation begins to grow, replacing the original forest. The plantation can then be cut down when the trees have reached the desired age, and replanted.

These tree plantations are replacing natural forests everywhere. Finland, for example, is proportionately the most heavily forested country in Europe, with something like three quarters of our surface area covered in woods. Yet of all this forest, less than three percent is in a natural state. All the rest has been clearcut, and much of it is tree plantations, made up of almost entirely single tree species, all of the same age. In southern Finland, where we all live, less than one percent of forest is in a natural state.
What this means for us is that, paradoxically, if we want to set our game in the kind of forest our ancestors lived in, and where Finnic paganism was born, we need to create a forest that's very different from the one that most Finnish people today know.

The one thing a forest in its natural state has and a clearcut tree plantation doesn't is diversity. A natural forest has all kinds of different trees. Of course, all trees have their preferences in terms of light, soil and other things, so some kinds of trees will be more common than others in places. But there will still be a much wider variety of trees.

There will also be trees of completely different ages. Sometimes trees die from diseases, pests or lightning strikes and forest fires. Dead trees may remain standing for a long time, or get knocked down in a storm. In a forest in a natural state, there's a lot of dead wood lying on the ground, in various states of decomposition, and bushes and young trees growing in the gaps left by dead trees. The longer a forest stands, the bigger the discrepancies can become: trees can live for centuries, and massive ancient trees can exist right next to young saplings. A natural forest lives and changes as time goes on.

We want the forest in Goblin Camp to be like this: diverse, alive and dynamic. We’ve modeled lots of different trees, bushes and other plants, with particular preferences for soil type, light and wetness. When we generate a map for a game, we first figure out how the underlying terrain is formed by glaciers, and then simulate the forest growing on it. As I’m writing this, the simulation runs a century of forest growth every time you start a new game. And the trees don’t stop growing when the game starts, either: through the game, trees will grow older, die, and be replaced by new ones. Chopping down trees will open up new spaces for plants that thrive in the light, and some plants even prefer to grow near buildings you’ve built. You can practice forestry of your own by cutting down tree saplings or clearing bushes, to make space for kinds you’d rather see. Because the forest is a living environment, your actions as a player will change the woods your goblins live in.

The northern forest is the indispensable backdrop for Finnic paganism, and for Goblin Camp. Later on, we’ll be taking a look at some of the creatures and spirits that live in these woods.

Sep 3, 2023

Game Update [v1.2] & Melvor Idle's 4th Birthday!

Melvor Idle - Malcs

Melvor Idle: Atlas of Discovery is realeasing on 7 September 2023.

https://store.steampowered.com/app/2492940/Melvor_Idle_Atlas_of_Discovery/

Melvor Idle's 4th Birthday

Can you believe it's already been 4 years since I began working on Melvor Idle? It's quite unreal where the game has ended up. I'm forever grateful for the continued support from everyone, and we're definitely not slowing down just yet!

To celebrate this incredible milestone, we have quite a few surprises in store throughout the entire month of September.

Alongside Atlas of Discovery which is launching on September 7, we have 4 surprises in store for everyone. I wonder what they could be?

Take a look at the calendar of dates here.

Breakdown of Dates:

4 September 2023 - ??? (Today's game update is not the surprise)
7 September 2023 - Atlas of Discovery Release
13 September 2023 - ???
18 September 2023 - ???
21 September 2023 - ???

When each new chest is unlocked, we will post on all socials with an updated calendar so you know what was unveiled. Be sure to check in on the days listed to know what was revealed!

Thank you again to everyone for their continued support of Melvor Idle. We definitely wouldn't be able to continue working on the game without the love and appreciation you all show for it.

Game Update [v1.2]

This update is the “pre-expansion” update which adds all the required changes to the base game in preparation for Atlas of Discovery’s release on 7 September 2023.

Important: Due to the changes to the game, there is a chance that your enabled Mods will stop working and your character will fail to load (You character is still safe if it fails to load). If this happens, please disable your mods until updates to the Mod are released. If you have content mods, this may result in the loss of Mod data.

New Shop Purchases

Extra Bank Tab

+1 Bank Tab. 100M GP

Agility Item Cost Reduction Enhancement

Item cost reduction in Agility can now reach 100%.
Requires Level 99 Agility, Level 99 Firemaking, 5 Into the Mist completions, and costs 250M GP.

Notifications v2

Notifications v2 is now out of Beta and enabled for everyone. These notifications attempt to greatly improve the notifications in game with a new style, as well as performance improvements.

Breakdown of notification features:

Notifications will remain on screen and increment in value until it disappears, which resets the count.
Has a much more compact styling compared to the old notifications.
You can toggle “Importance” for error messages and Summoning Mark notifications. This means the notification will remain on screen until you click it to remove it.
You can adjust the position of notifications to left, center or right alignment.
You can adjust the delay until notification disappears.
You can toggle Item names and current bank quantities for Item notifications.
You can toggle whether Skill XP notifications appear or not.
All existing notification settings still work with Notifications v2.

If you prefer the old notification system, you can toggle “Use Legacy Notifications System” in Settings.

New Quality of Life UI Additions

[EN only] Added colour coding and icons to Item descriptions, Special Attacks, and Passives to greatly improve readability.
Items that can be upgraded or downgraded now show an icon within the Bank. This makes it easier to spot items that can be upgraded/downgraded at a glance.
Added “Open in Wiki” icons around the game for Items, Skills (in the Game Guide), and Monsters. Clicking this will open the respective official Wiki page (if it exists). There is an option in Settings to disable this.
Auto eat icon now displays the HP threshold next to it without needing to go into the tooltip.
Updated the Hitpoints section within the Combat UI to increase readability.
Added Base Summon Max Hit text to summon item tooltips and also within summoning when creating the tablet. If the Summon doesn't attack, it will also mention this.
Added a "Consumable" badge to items that can go in the consumable slot.
Added colour coding to Combat Areas, Slayer Areas and Dungeons to denote which Expansion they are part of. This can be disabled in Settings.
Added a visual “Game Guide” link to Skill headers.
Farming now has icons that show what XP/MXP/MPXP is earnt.

Other Additions / Changes

Combat Area and Slayer Area difficulty is now determined based on the Slayer tier of the Monsters inside.
Added new “Super Dark” mode which can be toggled in Settings.
You can now select what Background the game uses from Settings.
Added new performance Setting for Steam - Reduce CPU & GPU usage by pausing actions for all Skills when the game is minimised or placed in the background to activate offline progression upon return (This was already available on the Web).
Cleaned up UI for View my Runes page in Combat
Typing an equipment slot name into the bank search will now display all items that can be equipped into it. This includes consumables and passive slot items.
Ignore bank full setting is now enabled by default for new characters (Skill will progress even if bank gets full).
Slightly updated Bank UI.

Game Balance

[TotH] = Throne of the Herald only

Agility

Reduced base Gold & Silver Bar Item costs for Pillars to 5K each, down from 10K.
[TotH] Reduced base Carrion Log & Divinite Bar Item costs for Elite Pillars to 10K, down from 30K

Woodcutting

Rebalanced Axe upgrades from the Shop to provide a total of -40% Interval reduction, instead of a total of -50%.
The specific Axes that changed are the Black Axe and Mithril Axe only.

Township General

It is now possible to repair buildings if your population happens to fall below the requirements to build that tier due to building degradation.

Township Buildings

Storage buildings no longer degrade. If yours is sitting at below 100%, it will require one more repair to get back up to 100%.
Town Halls can now degrade again.
Town Halls now also require 100k Bars, 50K Herbs & 50K Potions to construct.
Increased Wood and Stone cost of Town Halls to 100K each.
Trading Posts now require 5M GP each to construct.
Trading Posts also now require 2K Potions and Herbs to construct.

Township Modifiers

Increased/decreased building cost no longer affects GP cost of buildings, only Township resource costs.

Township Seasons

Added +50% Repair Costs to Winter Season.
Added -25% Repair Costs to Spring Season.

Township Trader Consumables

Fervor Scroll - Now decreases Target Damage Reduction by 4%, up from 2%
Quick Burner Scroll - Now provides -2% FM Interval, up from -1%
Quick Burner Scroll II - Now provides -5% FM Interval, up from -4%
Looter Pouch - Now provides +4% chance to double loot in Combat, up from +2%
Leather Crafter Scroll - Now provides +10% chance to double Leather/D-Hide in Crafting, up from +5%
Burning Scroll Of Gold - Now provides +10% GP from FM, up from +5%
Burning Scroll Of Gold II - Now Provides +20% GP from FM, up from +10%
Gem Finder Scroll - Now provides +10% chance to locate a second gem, up from +5%
Slayer Deterer - Now provides +2% DR against Slayer Task ,up from +1%

Township Trader Boxes

All boxes from Township now provide "Up to x" instead of always providing the maximum amount of an item.
All Boxes now require level 40/99/120 [Tier I / II / III] Township to purchase from the Trader.
All Boxes that had a secondary level requirement now also match the above 40/99/120 level requirement.
All T1 Boxes now also require 40 tasks to be completed to purchase (Not casual tasks).
All T2 Boxes now also require 95 tasks to be completed to purchase (Not casual tasks).
[TotH] All T3 Boxes now also require 115 tasks to be completed to purchase (Not casual tasks).
Potion Boxes now have an additional Hitpoints level requirement to purchase.
Herb Boxes now have an additional Herblore Level Requirement to purchase.
Bar Boxes now have an additional Mining level requirement to purchase.
Herb Boxes now provide the Herb Seeds instead of Herbs themselves. Also changed the quantity for Herb Boxes to "up to 10".
Adjusted the weighting of items in all Boxes so the higher level products are now rarer to obtain per box.
Potions in the Potion Boxes now provide up to 300, instead of 422.

Combat

[TotH] Reduced the sale price of Vorloran gear to 250K / 500K / 750K / 1M / 1.5M for Gauntlets / Boots / Helmet / Platelegs / Platebody.

Bug Fixes

Optimized game rendering functions to improve general performance throughout the game.
Optimized how the game saves locally to improve general performance.
Optimized mobile layout for Fishing.
Lots of fixes applied to translations.
Adjusted Combat equipment tooltip positioning in an attempt to fix the overlapping of information tooltips on top of the combat quick equip tooltip.
Fixed visual only bug where Township displayed incorrect values for each building inside a Biome (Like population, happiness etc).
Fixed a bug where Township would not automatically update the UI for building requirements when increasing your Health.
Fixed issue where Township Rewards are lost due to no bank space. Rewards will now always be added to your Bank regardless of Bank space.
Fixed issue where modifiers from Township buildings would not update correctly per tick
Fixed incorrect category tag for Township Skilling items that caused them to show up in certain bank searches.
Fixed a casual task that incorrectly provided Smithing Skill XP as the reward instead of Township XP.
Fixed Alchemist Bag II being consumed upon potion use instead of charge use
Fixed issue where some Township repair costs were not deducting the intended value.
Fixed issue where a building that was fully upgraded would display the requirements to build.
Fixed issue where it was possible to start Cooking without the required resources.
Fixed issue where the game would reload when pressing "enter" upon entering a custom shop amount/quantity.
Fixed game crash when Agility level was decreased.
Fixed incorrect Mastery token drop chance for Agility.
Fixed issue where Steam would not automatically link your Steam account to your Melvor Cloud account.
Fixed blanket issue where Item Effects were not applying to the enemy as intended in some circumstances.
Fixed issue where chance to avoid sleep was incorrectly calculated.
Fixed issue where chance to hit was able to go below 0% in some circumstances.
Fixed issue where it was possible to get infinite Prayer Point preservation in some circumstances.
Fixed issue with Mobile character selection UI when trying to display large values of GP
Fixed offline combat disabled alert not disappearing automatically when enabling offline combat
Applied formatting to item quantities in artisan menu when quantity is greater than 100M
Fixed issue where Monster respawn time interval could go below the game’s 0.25s interval threshold.
Fixed unique astrology modifiers trying to check costs when start was already maxed
Game Center should now be centered.
Fixed issue where coloured Item synergy borders did not display in the top-right equipment dropdown menu.
Fixed missing modifier description for Increased Minimum Spell Damage