May 20, 2024

NIMBY Rails - Weird and Wry

Version 1.12 has been released as the default game version! This version completely changes the way pax are spawned and the way they pick their destinations, and gives players and modders new tools for influencing these choices.

Population density, geographical point based pax origin and destinations

In 1.12 pax are spawned on specific geographical points, rather than by picking a station. And their destinations are also points in the map. Only after these points have been established are stations also picked, based on which stations can be reached from these points. Geographical points are picked based on population density. For now there is no visualization of these points so pax still just appear inside their origin stations, but the consequences of this previous step are very directly noticeable, specially when enabling the new "best path" mode.

Additionally, the way demand is generated has also changed. In 1.11 and earlier the achievable pax spawn rate of a given station was fixed, based on the station coverage. In 1.12 the pax rate depends both the population density around a station, and the reachable population from the station, subject to the distance demand curve. This means that opening more destinations in your network will not cut down on the desirability of the existing destinations as much as it did in 1.11.

All existing saves will see changes in their pax demand and generation flows, some of them very severe. A combination of changing the global demand % and the demand curves will help restore similar levels of demands compared to 1.11. For example, if more local demand is desired, you can change the destination curve to have much smaller % demand for 50km or more distances (less than 1%), then hike up the global demand %.

Overlapping station areas

Since pax now spawn on map coordinates, and they have a (player configurable, limited) capability of picking their origin and destination stations, it does not make sense to divide station coverage like in 1.11. In 1.12 station coverages can overlap:

Additionally, maximum station area radius has been increased from 1.5km in 1.11 to 2.3km in 1.12.

Points of interest

Players can now create special sign-like buildings which add some amount of population to a point in the map:

These signs count as population points, just like the built-in population texture. They can be used to for example liven up areas which see high demand in real life but have low population, like airports.

Mod POI layers

In addition to player created POIs, mod authors can also provide map mod POI layers. Players can subscribe to these mods to immediately layers of POIs to their game map. These layers can be hidden, or have their proposed demand curve altered by players if desired.

Multiple, player customizable demand curves

To make the new POI feature even more powerful, it is possible pick a different demand curve for each player created POI, or globally for each mod POI layer. This allows to define POIs which have a different time based demand curve, for example a stadium only being active for a few hours a week, but having an outsized effect on its nearby stations by combining it with a large population value. Or making the distance demand curve of an airport much less dependent on the distance, compared to the default curve.

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For more information check the blog posts:

https://carloscarrasco.com/nimby-rails-february-2024/

https://carloscarrasco.com/nimby-rails-march-2024/

https://carloscarrasco.com/nimby-rails-april-2024/

May 20, 2024

v1.5.0 Hybrid Costs, Cirno Rework, New Cards

Touhou: Lost Branch of Legend - Alice

5/21 v1.5.0 Hybrid Costs, Cirno Rework, New Cards

General

Added theme songs for the Act 1 Elites.
Themes for the later act Elites will be added in future updates.

Implemented animations for Crow Tengus.
Fully completed animations for Hata no Kokoro, masks will now rotated around her.
Upgraded to Spine ver.4.2 and updated character animations.

New Card Art: Evil-Sealing Circle, Binding Border, Hakurei's Evilest Orbs, Three Gods of Sumiyoshi, Time Magic, Apotheosis, Necromancy, Eviction Order.
Updated Card Art: Gift of Nature, Mana Freeze, Frog.

Hybrid Mana Costs

Lost Branch of Legend has always had a problem with the context of two-colored cards with odd numbered costs, especially 1-cost two-colors that always end up with a generic cost.
Our solution to that problem is introducing Hybrid Mana Costs.

It's worth noting that while MtG has cards with multiple types of Hybrid Mana on their cards, such Leyline of the Guildpact with its 4 types,
LBoL only allows for one type of Hybrid Cost on its cards, mostly due to a lack of need for multiple types on the same card and to not complicate automatically spending mana on these cards.
In plaintext notation, we'll be using "H" followed by the letters of the colors in that Hybrid cost.
E.g.: H:WR refers to a cost that can be paid with either one White Mana or one Red Mana. 2HH:WG refers to a cost of 2 generic mana and 2 mana that can be paid in any combination of White and Green.

A large number of two-colored cards had their costs changed to Hybrid (In most cases, this is a buff)

New White/Green Neutral Card added: Half-Human, Half-Phantom.
Maiden's Waltz now provides Barrier pre-Upgrade, Barrier output decreased:5→3, Upgraded cost decreased: WR→H:WR.
Around 30 total cards have had their costs changed to Hybrid, check in-game for further details.

Cirno Rework

Cirno's Blue cards have been completely reworked. While she retains her Cold status, her damage output has increased.
Some of her more experimental cards have been removed, while cards that synergise more with Blue's color identity of strong card draw have been added.
The changes are too numerous to list here, check in-game for further details.

The Neutral Card Yuki-Onna Visitation has been removed.

New Cards, Generally Filling The Blanks in the Neutral Card Pool

New Sakuya Card added: Danmaku Deflection.
New Marisa Card added: Supernova.

New Mono-White Neutral Cards added: Heart Excerpt Slash, Superspeed Flier, Gather Faith, Noctilucae's Nest.
New Two-Colored White Neutral Cards added: Summon Take-Minakata, Oomonoimi's Banquet.
Devour History changed from Rare to Uncommon.

New Mono-Blue Neutral Cards added: Riptide, Tao Fetal Movement, Teacher's Dedication, Memories of the Divine Age.
New Two-Colored Blue Cards added: Dragon Palace's Message, Gathering of Drunk Oni.
Reworked Blue Neutral Cards: Melancholy Eruption, Water Blanket, Transmigration of Hieda, Heavenly Water Miracle.
Other Blue cards had their values and rarities adjusted.

New Mono-Green Neutral Cards added: Flash of Spring, Garden of the Sun, Forest Depths, Moonlit Lotus.
Reworked Green Neutral Card: Beauties of Nature.
Other Green cards had their values and rarities adjusted.

New Red/Green Neutral Card added: Wind God Girl.
New Three Colored Neutral Cards added:Hell's Animal Realm Road, Magic of the Mallet, Runaway Seasons.

Added a new keyword trait: Gadget. Cards with this trait can only appear in the main eight slots of the shop and have an appearance weight of 2.
New Colorless Neutral Cards added: Cucmber Missile, Clean Energy, Private Radar.

Other Gameplay Adjustments

Reimu Hakurei's Spell Card Omnidirectional Demon Binding Circle no longer produces a Yin-Yang Orb.

After Boss Marisa uses her spell card, on top of increasing its next damage by 5, her other attacks deal 1 more damage.
Reduced the damage on most of Boss Cirno's attacks.
Reduced Fox Youkai's life by 4.
Reduced the initial and additional levels of Poison Death from Dolls of Nerium and Belladona.
The final boss's Pyramid-Shaped Puzzle now also adds a card that allows cards to be drawn past its limit at the cost of life.

Adjusted most Mana Gain cards (For the most part they've been buffed)
Examples include: Sunlight Prayer,Ship's Phantom,News Fabrication.
Other noteworthy changes on Mana Gain cards:
Spring-Colored Path cost increased, 0→1.
"Borrow" Materials now costs 0, only adds one Rainbow.
Short Break now costs 0, adds a Radiance instead of a Rainbow.
Sure Gamble now has Retain by default, Upgraded cost decreased:4U→2U.

Most beneficial effects that trigger when a given card is drawn now occur when such cards enter the hand, such as Forest Adventure and Sight of Distant Blade.

Buffs to X cost cards:
Watermelon Knife reworked to not be an X cost card, now gives Firepower after the attack.
Propelling Silver & Gensokyo's Blossoming damage per mana increased, 6/8→7/9. Propelling Silver also has the target change capabilities of pre-rework Watermelon Knife.

Miscellaneous card changes:
Secret Border Upgraded cost reduced,4W→3W, damage is now the same in both versions, 16/20→18.
Faithful Meditation cost reverted, 1WWW→WWW.
Spread Amulet base version damage increased, 12/14→13/14.
One's Last Home Upgraded cost reduced, 2B→2, Upgrade doesn't increase Block gain.

Mushroom Feast now Common and has Exile, life gain increased: 4/5→5/7.
Hand Warmer now Uncommon, reworked to Exile cards for Concentration equal to cards Exiled, Upgrade adds Innate.
Danmaku Notes Upgraded cost loosened1R→2.
Rocket Broom Upgraded cost loosened:RR→1R.
Red Star Explosion cost loosened:1RR→2R.
Shoot the Moon's Overdrive cost is always 2, Upgrade increases damage and adds Accurate.
Emergency Defense Block increased, 20→21.
Starlight Typhoon base hits increased, 1/2→2/3, Upgraded Starlight Convergence no longer Upgrades its Starlight Typhoon, instead increases its damage. (Still places it on the top of the draw pile)
Replenish Fuel now costs 0 by default, has Exile which is lost on Upgrade.

Purchase Materials Upgraded cost loosened, W→1.
Frozen Time's Upgrade no longer increases retained mana.
Quantum Tunneling cost removed, R→0, damage reduced by 4.

Lost Raiment (Token from The Fallen Moon-Rabbit) cost removed:W→0, now has Replenish.
Bass of Taiko damage increased by 1, Upgraded cost loosened:1R→2.
And Then Will There Be None? Upgraded cost increased, 1R→2R.
Grimoire Study life loss increased, 2→3.
Dance of Empty Masks now applies 3/4 Temporary Firepower Down on use
Faith of Native God life loss increased, 1→2.
Waves of Reversed Scale now has Exile
Century's Doppelgangers now has Ethereal, Upgrade removes Ethereal instead of increasing the card limit on its extra turn.
Water Gun damage increased,25→30.

Miscellaneous

Instances of 10 or more colored mana in text will now display as 10x followed by the mana icon.
Tooltip size now also affects enemy intent size.
It's no longer possible to interact with the hand outside of the player's turn. (This is to prevent softlocks from attempting to play cards outside of the player's turn)

If there are more than five Innate cards (Including the Smart Speaker card) in the library, they will all be drawn on the first turn (this does not ignore the maximum hand size).
Tanuki Suwako's Jinx doesn't trigger on Extra turns, similar to Apex Speedster.
The first choice of the "Miyoi: The Solitary Sommelier" now directly draws from enemy pool with 3-3. If the player makes it there afterward, different enemies than those from the event will be prioritized.
Fixed an issue with the Perfect Elegance bonus being invalidated by entering the Final Act. Now it and the Elegance bonus only check for Acts 1-3.
Fixed cards getting stuck in a 3D rotated state.

5/21 Hotfix

Overall buff for the new 0-cost cards.
Reduced the costs or otherwise buffed some of the other new cards, such as Wind God Girl.
Memories of the Divine Age cost increased, 0→U, now reduces the cost the cards it draws.

Fixed Melancholy Eruption still discarding cards as per its previous effect.
Fixed Meltdown softlock when targeting a card with a Hybrid Cost. Such cards now produce Philosopher's Mana when Exiled this way.
Fixed issues with conditional triggers like Poison Raze's.
Tao Fetal Movement now also discards Unplayable cards.

The following change was part of the initial patch, but wasn't mentioned in the changelog:
Boundary of Life and Death now has a Growth effect increasing its damage.

5/28 Hotfix

CirnoA (Blue) complexity level increased from 2 to 3
Ice Lance is now Accurate before Upgrade.
Frosty Garden is now Blue/Green
Ice-Forged Blade reverted to a multihit attack
Flash of Spring damage increased to 24/32, mana requirement reduced, 8/7→6。
Yukari Tips Bag's Extra Danmaku added Shoots increased: 3→5.
Fixed Embrace The Darkness not interacting correctly with cards with Hybrid Costs.
Updated card art.

Cards not in the Card Reward Pool are now indicated as such via a tooltip.

Card Pool Advanced Rule adjustment:
"For cards with mana value 5 or greater that have a generic mana cost component (1, 2, etc.), only their non-generic mana cost will count toward rule 1. These cards' mana costs can be reduced through effects."
For this, "5 or greater" was changed to "greater than 5", and the in-game logic was adjusted accordingly. This is closer to how it was intended to be implemented, and doesn't affect a large number of expensive cards.

6/7 Update

Implemented animations for Rabbit Tricksters.

Danmaku Deflection, Cucumber Missile, Clean Energy values increased.
Frosty Garden is reverted back to its original version.
Beauties of Nature is now an Uncommon.
Moonlit Lotus has Retain, and one of its mana gain is changed from G to P.
Haniwa Front now has 1/1 initial values.
Runaway Seasons has a cost of 4, and Upgraded Runaway Seasons gives 3 extra Firepower.
Updated card art.

Bug fixed: Spirit and similar status effects cannot increase Defense cards' Block/Barrier value if it has already been decreased to 0 (for example, from 5 Temporary Spirit Down).
Sculpture - Circle and its series of card was unaffected by Echo, now fixed.
The timeframe of Echo-generated card adding to hand is now slightly earlier than when the original card goes to the Discard Pile/is Exiled. This change is an attempt to handle edge cases of when Echo has failed to resolve.

6/15 Update

Absolute Zero Upgaded cost increased: U→UU。
Updated card art.
Updated localizations.

6/20 Update

New Cirno card added: Garden Gathering.
Updated card art. Most of the new card now have their art completed, and ver. 1.5.0. will be moved to the main branch.

Pressing F4 can view the BattleLog even in the main branch.
This is only a testing tool used to resolve bugs, and will not have its UI updated.

May 20, 2024

Dev Diary: State of the Game and Future Plans

TerraTech Worlds - Cassie @ Payload

Hello, Prospectors!

It’s been about a month since we’ve given you a proper look at what we’ve been working on here at Payload, as we’ve been busy making sure the recent patches and hotfixes went out without a hitch after the launch of Early Access!

We’re still hard at work on squishing bugs and creating brand new shiny things for the game, but we wanted to take some time today to talk about the current state of TerraTech Worlds, and to show you some of what you can expect to see in-game over the next few months.

State of the Game

As it’s been a little while since we’ve checked in with you, we wanted to give you a quick overview of the current state of TerraTech Worlds.

Since launching in Early Access in March, we’ve been listening to your feedback and suggestions from Discord, Steam Discussions threads, Reddit, Twitter and our Feedback Website, and the Community team has been working in tandem with the Development/Design teams to make sure that all issues, queries and suggestions are passed on to the appropriate Payload developers.

Whilst we can’t list every single thing we’re working on here (mostly because it would be an incredibly long post that would become someone’s full-time job to write!), we’re mostly focusing development around the following areas, based on the feedback we’ve been seeing:

Grind: resource spawn rates, resource health and item stacking.
Tech Limits: cab capacity, build size and Tech Repairs.
Awkward Blocks: limited attachment points and block shapes.
Automation: limited conduits, and unclear power information.
Onboarding/Tutorials: confusion around reward claiming and some game features not being overtly explained in the tutorial.

We’re committed to continuing to updating the game using Community-driven development, and here are just a few of the most recent updates/changes that have been made based on your direct feedback:

Grind

We’ve already reduced resource health, recipe costs, crafting times and adjusted some power settings, as well as increased resource yields, item stack sizes and block/ammo drops.
We’re now reducing more recipe costs and increasing more item stack sizes, and we also have plans to improve the flatbed and reintroduce the seam scanner into the game.

Tech Limits

We’ve already added different Cabs with larger Cab Capacities, as well as reduced Reactor costs for some blocks. With 0.2, we also increased the Tech Size Limit from 16x16x16 to 32x32x32, and added in Fusion Cores.
We’re now working on creating items that help you further expand Tech limitations–more info on this coming soon!

Awkward Blocks

We’re working on adding new blocks with more APs on them, as well as planning to add more APs to existing blocks in the future. (The first set of these was added in the recent 0.2 update!)

Automation

We’ve already fixed batteries and sped up the way that conduits work, as well as added new animations to help you understand when machines are powered/working. We’ve also changed the way that power consumption works, so that machines no longer consume resources when idle.
We’re now working on adding splitters, mergers and filters, simple conduit placement and direction flipping, in order to improve the overall efficiency of automation. (More on some of these below!)

Onboarding/Tutorials

We’ve added automatic reward collection for some objectives and increased BB reward amounts.
We’re now working on updating the Objectives Panel to make it easier to use, and will most likely overhaul this menu completely in the future. Additionally, we're integrating the tutorial into the main game and removing the separate tutorial planet. We’re also building contextual tutorials that teach you about all sorts of mechanics at relevant points throughout the game, so you’ll get the chance to explore at your own pace whilst also getting tips to help you along the way.

Now, let’s take a look at some of the other things we’re working on!

T-Junctions, Conduits and Splitters/Mergers

This has been a big topic of discussion internally, as we’ve been reading a lot of comments mourning the loss of the ‘T-Shape’ piece from the early demo version of TerraTech Worlds.

Whilst the simple answer to this might seem to just be ‘Put it back in, Payload! Duh!’, we’ve actually been working on some splitter/merger type pieces which will both function as a ‘T-Shape’ piece and also provide other much-needed functionalities within TerraTech Worlds. Because of this ongoing discussion between devs, we’re asking you to wait just a tiny bit longer before we debut these, and show you what we’ve been working on, but we think it will solve some of the shape-based issues whilst also bringing new conduit flow features to the game.

We’re very keen to take our time with Community-flagged queries and desires, and to make sure that we’re thoroughly investigating and testing all possible directions before anything makes it to the game. This is why, instead of simply adding the ‘T-Shape’ back in, we’ve been focused on the root of the problem that you’ve been raising with us, and working on coming up with the best solution that isn’t necessarily just the easiest or most obvious thing to do.

We can tell you a little bit about what will be coming as a result of these internal design discussions, though, and tell you that we’re currently re-working the idea of Inputs & Outputs as a whole.

We're moving away from the "Inputs on the left" and "Outputs on the right" concept and focusing on a more direct correlation between the machine's Conduit APs and the machine's "inventory slots".

On top of that, we are currently working on seven (number subject to change!) types of advanced Conduits:

3-Way Alternating Splitter: a Splitter that players connect to with Conduits which pushes items through its 3 Outputs in an alternating fashion.
3-Way Priority Splitter: a Splitter that players connect to with Conduits that pushes items through the Input and down to the 3 priority-based Outputs.
3-Way Alternating Merger: a Merger that players connect to with Conduits that collects items through its 3 Inputs in an alternating fashion and pushes them down the Output.
3-Way Priority Merger: a Merger that players connect to with Conduits that collects items through its 3 fixed priority Conduits, and pushes said items down the Output.
4-Way Alternating Junction Box: a more "dynamic" node-type structure that can Merge and/or Split, depending on how the Conduits to and from the machine are setup.
3-Way Splitter (Target) Filter: a Splitter similar to the 3-Way Alternating Splitter except the player can configure it to filter the Outputs depending on the item placed on the available slot.
3-Way Merger (Target) Filter: a Merger similar to the 3-Way Alternating Merger except the player can configure it to filter the Inputs depending on the item placed on the available slot.

Bear with us, and we’ll have a more thorough Dev Diary update on this coming within the next few days, which will include a more detailed look at upcoming splitters/mergers and conduits.

Planet Settings

Another thing we’ve been talking about is how to best facilitate different play styles throughout TerraTech Worlds: some of you are pro 360 noscope pewpew experts who can take down our mini boss in just a few hits, whilst some of you would rather spend your time mining and foraging your way across the gentle rolling hills.

There’s no wrong way to play TerraTech Worlds, and we think one of the best ways to allow you to customise your games but still have a balanced experience is through Planet Settings, where you’ll be able to choose from the following options (all very much still in-development/subject to change!) when starting a new game:

Explorer: for those who want a friendlier experience, and are focused on harvesting resources, growing structures, and taking their time to explore the open road.

Prospector: this is pretty much the experience you’re having in-game now (as of May 2024). If you’re happy with the spawn rate of resources and the chonkiness of enemies as they are now, choose this option!

Pioneer: for any of you who are finding enemies too squishy, and the harvests too plentiful. Choose this option to make enemy Techs hit harder, and resources more sneaky.

1st Wave: this is for those who really love a challenge. Good luck out there.

Custom: this option is for anyone who wants to tweak with any of the default planet settings. Playing God is fun!

These settings can be changed at any time (after loading into the planet for the first time) from the Planet Select screen, so you can change your options whenever you want, without having to restart your game from scratch.

More information about Planet Settings will also be coming soon, and you’ll see these options in-game before the summer!

And finally, we have one last thing to show you...

"I don't like sand. It's coarse and rough and irritating and it gets everywhere.”

Talk to you soon, Prospectors!