Developer's Diary, Day... I've lost count. Factions.
We have completed work on some of the game's factions that I'd like to showcase. The factions differ not only visually but also in their behavior during combat, as well as in their protection and equipment. For example, a headshot can often lead to instant death of an enemy, but if they are wearing a helmet, it becomes much harder as the damage area is reduced and the damage only affects the parts not covered by the helmet. If the fighters are wearing a bulletproof vest, it also absorbs some of the damage. The factions are also armed with a variety of weapons, from firearms to sniper rifles.
First faction: "Doomsday" - Fighters of the "Doomsday" faction are one of the strongest and most mysterious groups in the Zone. Many stalkers say that these fighters seem to have been created by the Zone itself. They possess excellent equipment and are nearly invulnerable to headshots thanks to tactical masks that not only protect their heads but also provide excellent vision both day and night. Typically armed with M16s or a unique, custom-designed Uzi and often equipped with sniper rifles. They consider all other factions in the Zone their enemies.
Faction "Strike" - Fighters of the "Strike" faction, devoted communists, aim to destroy all dissenters in the Zone. They are equipped with standard bulletproof vests and sometimes helmets, and are armed with AK-47 and M16 rifles.
Bandits or marauders — representatives of the criminal world who have come to the Zone for various reasons: to make money from selling artifacts, to buy or sell weapons. There are many such elements in the Zone, ranging from petty thugs to serious fighters. They are mainly organized into gangs. They consider everyone, except for the fighters of the "Strike" faction, their enemies. They are typically armed with AK-47 and AK-74 rifles, but their equipment is often poor, making them easy targets in battles with more prepared opponents.
Free Stalkers — these stalkers belong to no particular faction and primarily operate either solo or in small groups with a changing lineup. They have their own small bases throughout the Zone, where an unwritten rule prevails: almost every visitor is considered a friend. They are usually armed with AK-47 rifles, but fighters with SMGs and assault rifles are also encountered. They have decent equipment and maintain good relations with the Scientists of the "Dawn" faction, the "Freedom" faction, and the AFU.
AFU Special Forces — elite units that have undergone specialized military training, guard important objects in the Zone. These squads were established when the military high command decided to conduct special operations and expeditions within the Zone. They are capable of engaging in combat with any faction depending on the objectives set, but they unofficially maintain connections with the "Dawn", "Freedom", and "Free Stalkers" factions.
The test kicks off on May 31, 2024 7:00 PM UTC for all servers globally and is scheduled to end at 3:00 AM UTC on June 2nd.
What are we testing?
We have three areas we are focused on for this weekend’s playtest:
Latency: Last time we had some issues with players not getting paired up on their closest servers. We’re going to be trying out a solution this weekend.
Hit-reg: Last playtest you told us that there were some major hit-reg issues. We are tweaking a few things that should help improve your experience here.
Who needs their fix: We’ve had thousands of you requesting access to our next Alpha playtest after our last test on the 19th, and folks on our Discord have been asking about the next test daily. One goal this weekend is to see how many folks actually show up with their friends to play some Combat Champions!
How are we granting access?
A few hours before a server goes live, everyone who has requested access to our playtest on Steam will be allowed in to start downloading the game. Once the playtest begins, we’ll open up the playtest so all your buddies can roll in, request access, and hop right into the action.
Important notes!
We will be seeking specific feedback you can send us via the in-game feedback button, but to join the ongoing conversation please join our Discord server here: https://discord.gg/hpWNUyNNkM
There are lots of small changes in this update, mostly related to controller support, as we had some more polish and improvements that we made for the upcoming NIntendo Switch release. I also changed the settings to allow for windowed mode. You can always go to fullscreen if you want, but this will allow players more flexibility.
I updated the UI placement options so the popUps don't cover up UI elements in any position.
I'll be working on another content update to be released in the fall, but I'm happy to continue fixing any (bad) bugs or minor QoL improvements as we go. I always appreciate it when players let me know of what needs to be fixed or what they'd like to see! Keep those suggestions coming on our Discord server!
It seems that some of you have discovered some bugs in my perfect crypts– and not the kind whose soul you slurp up. I would like personally to apologize to those who had to listen to Finks laugh and not being able to skip it, attacks not doing the correct damage, and a few more issues the visitors have found. My goal is to make the crypts as welcoming as possible so that more souls can become trapped and try to escape. I will personally take away a few letters from my minions.
Before I finish, Cryptmaster has almost 500 reviews on Steam with a 96% positive rating. If we keep above 95% at 500 reviews, my unholy crusade will be upgraded to “overwhelmingly positive” on Steam so if you have some time, please leave us a review.
Now back to the patch notes, here is the full notes
Additional looting "Fingers" on enemies' letters accessibility toggle for quicker skill unlocks.
Reducing the difficulty on god scrolls
Stopped Vitus rap looping from the start when you want to enter something else.
Disable screenshake option in menu
Tomb kings hold subtitles added, so the subtitles don't fade away.
Additional fishing tooltips on first cast
To palace to change to palace/swamps, and or generally better swamp markers.
Gel cube area named as location, removing a bit of swamp confusion
Lorias door still glitches out sometimes, will rebuild that script.
Swamps altar, between the palace and the pools to add another save point
Add block minimap rotation option in options
Ratty respawning even if quest is complete
Temple audio upgrades on the speaker system.
Embezzle - deal 1 damage when it mentions 2 damage
Dogwhistle - damage fixed.
Goggos script dead ends and blocks progress after you revisit him post Pantry.
Bump zombie names at top of tower, increasing difficulty slightly.
N and M skulls are too close together, they will be moving further apart.
Add controller real-time slowdown, so real-time is a bit more forgiving on controller.
The icon on the map where you entered so that you can see your map entry point.
New level-up music and world music.
Self-damage in cards plays wrong sound effects
Rare fish are a bit too skittish right now
Finks laughs variation, also fix it so it is skippable.
Double Darkness skull in the Bonehouses
Highlight on whatever on start sometimes missing
Removed RNG on shields + armor combinations so you cant get damage locked.
Slow down murder/drums cooldown, so you can preempt those out of combat.
Urchins gets buffed to 4 projectiles.
Fish highlighting white between maps
Library east wing/right labels
Iss shader toned back
Remove line breaking on danger letters entirely, so that it doesn't break on Iss's island.
Eyestone card is bugged, will be renamed to "Eye" also.
Pipers final rap has wrong lines on final/repeat version.
Joros self damage abilities will be buffed to allow for more variety in his use.
Payns boulders not activating if you go the long way.
Moving one of the dead paladins in the downwood to a more central location, making a generic mob you get the helmet from, the other will be either a dead body, or a mob, depending on which you kill first, this will lead into the update beyond 1.034....
Spanish news puzzle has been correctly realigned on the levels to represent N O S E instead of N O E S
Riddle04 despawning bug fixed.
Fixed combat lock when fighting gel cubes in the swamps
Hey all! This is a smallish update for the demo build.
Bugfixes -fixed an issue that caused the camera to clip through geometry sometimes -implemented a fix for an issue that prevented antialiasing -fixed several typos -Fixed issues with loading screen timing. Now more accurate and smoother experience overall -fixed stutter on rotating the frame. Much smoother now.
Improvements: -added a hint system that allows player to press a button to receive a contextual hint at any time -further improved snakes to actually pause when you look at them. This causes some very tense moments as you try to maneuver. Added more snakes... -improved ember visibility in waterfalls -Added perdiodic reminders to player to submit feedback (not in demo build) -Changed default controls to simplify throwing embers (replaced RMB binding with F interact) -Changed default controls to simplify message reading (changed to RMB binding) -hand position of flipped frame was unnatural and has been adjusted -Updated Crawler AI to be more aggressive when pursuing the player -doubled the chat space at the expense of the websites/podcast player. The player spends much more time in the chat, so quality of life should be improved -improved the frame message UI to be more obvious and added a text reminder -removed unneccesarily pulling frame down when sending the player a message -improved performance in "another day" section -added more story content to the "another day" section -added subtitles to "another day" section -improved grabbing ember first person animation -added the most glorious billboard
Known Issues: -Issue with pausing during the opening credits. It's weird. Maybe don't do it.
For anyone having constant crashes or disconnects, this update should fix it. The issue stemmed from the entity pool where components sometimes wouldn't be matching. (mainly on blueprints)
Bug Fixes:
Fixed entity component mismatch after entity was sent to the object pool. This should fix 95% of cases where players were disconnecting or even crashing.
The test kicks off on May 31, 2024 7:00 PM UTC for all servers globally and is scheduled to end at 3:00 AM UTC on June 2nd.
What are we testing?
We have three areas we are focused on for this weekend’s playtest:
Latency: Last time we had some issues with players not getting paired up on their closest servers. We’re going to be trying out a solution this weekend.
Hit-reg: Last playtest you told us that there were some major hit-reg issues. We are tweaking a few things that should help improve your experience here.
Who needs their fix: We’ve had thousands of you requesting access to our next Alpha playtest after our last test on the 19th, and folks on our Discord have been asking about the next test daily. One goal this weekend is to see how many folks actually show up with their friends to play some Combat Champions!
How are we granting access?
A few hours before a server goes live, everyone who has requested access to our playtest on Steam will be allowed in to start downloading the game. Once the playtest begins, we’ll open up the playtest so all your buddies can roll in, request access, and hop right into the action.
Important notes!
We will be seeking specific feedback you can send us via the in-game feedback button, but to join the ongoing conversation please join our Discord server here: https://discord.gg/hpWNUyNNkM
0.7.5-EarlyAccess! Build Change Notes - May 28, 2024
NEW CARDS
CLEVER CAPTAIN REYNARD
On Play: Destroy the last Card you played and add 2 copies of it to your hand.
FISH PRINCE
On Play: Turn a random Card here with less Attack Power than this Card into a Fish.
LONELY SHEPARD
Channel: At the end of each turn, +3 Attack Power if there are no other Cards here.
DAME ALICE
On Play: Transform the Cards in your deck into random Cards. Cards you draw get 1 extra Attack Power.
NEW REALMS
THE BATTLEFIELD
When a Card is played here, it attacks an opponent's Character. They both deal damage equal to their Attack Power.
FROGS FORTRESS
1-Mana Cards cost 1 less.
NEW ART
Mother Malcho
Bittern
Hoopoe
Cinderella - Post-Apocalyptic Variant
ADDITIONS:
n/a
CHANGES:
Allerleirauh has been re-added into the Card unlock pool.
FIXES:
Fixed a bug where Huntsman would kill Snake Prince and softlock the game.
Fixed a bug where sometimes damage taken would not be shown in the Realm's details when clicked.
Fixed a bug where Golden Princess's ability would not activate.
Fixed a bug where Cursed Shadows's ability would not activate.
Fixed a bug where Sunjimah, Malian King's ability would not activate.
Fixed a bug where Ravenswood's Realm ability would not activate.
Fixed an issue if a card with a Channel ability was destroyed, the buff would not be removed from surrounding cards.
Fixed an issue where Stepsister Florinda would not destroy the appropriate amount of cards.
Fixed an issue where Snake Prince's Snakes would not receive the Dark Forest debuff.
Fixed an issue where Imitate Arcana would not cooperate.
Fixed an issue with XP bars at the end of the match not matching up to their numbers.
Fixed an issue where Miller's Daughter would not activate her On Play ability.
Fixed an issue where Torture Chamber would not trigger Fury.
Quests were not properly rerolling at the correct time.
KNOWN ISSUES:
We're aware of sometimes an interaction between cards does not completely resolve, freezing the match into a "Waiting" state. Conceding is the only way to currently bypass this.
