Early Access v0.8 - Blood & Sand
Full Changelog
We Who Are About to Die Early Access v.0.8 is here! It's finally time to share this major update with you!
We wanted to overhaul combat, add Sandbox Mode and tackle the most common feedback by the community. There's lot to explore with the Blood & Sand update!
For more details, check out Preview #1, Preview #2 or Preview #3, or check out this overview video, which is a complete look at all the new stuff in Blood & Sand! (I recommend watching on Youtube!)
MAJOR new content & features
NEW: Sandbox Mode
Sandbox mode allows you to customize dozens of settings in the game, changing it fundamentally, and make a Sandbox Profile to play
Make your own flavor of the game! Make challenge runs and experiment!
NEW: Sandbox Steam Workshop support
Share your Sandbox profiles with other players on the Steam Workshop
Browse and download other players' runs! https://steamcommunity.com/app/973230/workshop/
NEW: Combat - Attack Direction UI
A new UI that shows the possible attack directions
The new UI is context-sensitive based on the weapon type
OVERHAUL: Combat Animations & Physics
We rebuilt the entire character physics and animation systems. No more weak hits and hit reactions.
Every physics ‘state’ is reworked resulting in general physics stability (eg. at low or high FPS as well)
New: Animation based Hit reactions instead of 100% pure physics impulses. Movement and hits are more realistic and fluid
More stable and reliable tired / low stamina: new Stamina-based animation that adds a clear visual cue for a character’s stamina level. Physics will no longer completely take over the character’s body and you can see heavy breathing
New: Pelvis turning during attack, footwork & foot planting resulting in more powerful strikes ("Heavy attacks")
Improved Combat Stance and Idle poses
Performance improvements, better blending and smoothing across all animations
Improved look-at animation (eye contact) and torso bending
Improved death ragdolls
Improved animation reaction on knockbacks (character dynamically balance with their arms)
Soft version of hit reactions play on shield hits too. Based on how you hit the shield, this can create openings
Improved proportions of the characters
Big makeover for the character in the Career Menu
Adjustments to the character general stance and pose for 2H weapons
Many many attack animation tweaks across all weapon types
Countless other physics and animation tweaks
OVERHAUL: Polearms
3 new attacks for Polearms! Left, Left up and Left down stabs have been added to replace the old generic knockback attack
Blunt polearm stabs now act as knockback attack
Polearm stabs update (more correct damage types, stats)
Moved most polearms up the hands, meaning longer reach
Updated tooltips to reflect stance switching and more
NEW: Weekly Report panel
A majority of the post-battle notifications are now neatly grouped into a Weekly Report panel.
Shows an overview of all the match bracket levels + how the player rank affects them
Timeline panel now appears in the new weekly report panel
Betting Overhaul
New: Smart Bets. Eliminates impossible bets
Betting is now integrated in the match option panels
Changed the amount of bets to three bets per match
More user friendly: players will get a warning when switching matches or rerolling and there are active bets
Bets now also payout patron Favor
Increase of the minimum bet payout
Patrons System Improvements
16 new patron events!
Added Patron "Festivals" - special events that also appear on the Calendar. Each run may only have 1 festival
Complete redesign of the Patron UI panels and tooltips providing much more information and clarity about the system
A general rebalance of Favor
MINOR (Content, features, balancing changes)
Weapon Stance Switching
Now players can switch between 1H or 2H stances if the weapon is a weapon hybrid (ie. spear/polearm, or 1H/2H weapons)
Career
2 extra shop slots, 8 total
Rearrangement of the shop layout: Shop reroll button as well as shop-discount and -refund are located the bottom of the shop to fit this change
Upgrade of the resolution of the shop Icons, making them crisper and clearer
FX & SFX
New: Shields now have visible damage states (wood and metal)
Shields now have new damage particle effects (wood chips, sparks)
Better impact particle effects, that also showcase attack direction and impact location (provides gameplay clarity)
Better combat sparks on metal armor and weapon clashes
Better footstep particle effects and sound (dust etc)
Hitting the environment now makes a noise (based on which material you hit)
Much more performant particle effects across the game
Overhaul of the audience thrown items: audience will throw items appropriate for the tier of the player from the entire pool of existing items
Items
New Item: Bronze Lophosi War-Chaka (1H Axe)
New Item: Rusty Spade (Polearm)
New Item: Iron Spade (Polearm)
New Item: Iron Voulge (Polearm)
New item: Great War Mala (Polearm)
New Item: Valkarion (Godly 2H Axe)
New Item: Malathrax (Godly 2H Mace)
New Item: Leather Ringed Lamellar Chest
New Item: Bronze Plated Maille Shirt
New Item: Dormorii Scale Shirt
New Item: Bronze Plated Chest
New Item: Bronze Executor Helm
New Item: Leather Bracers
New Item: Bronze Plated Boots
Other changes
Stamina nerfs damage a lot more (60% to 0% stamina scales from 1x to 0.3x instead of 0.6x)
AI uses more stamina during attacking (because it no longer regens stamina during an attack)
Weapon weight now scales stamina cost per attack a bit. So heavy weapons cost more stamina (on top of the weight calc on stamina regen itself)
Weight impacts AI max stamina more
Overhaul of weapon damage velocity calculation. Weapon velocity stat now has a larger impact
Smoothed Attack Animations and weapon speed & damage stability (avoiding random spikes due to physics)
Impact point velocity of a weapon now matters more (30% to 50% weight of velocity)
You can now get disarmed (same as unwieldy) if you hit stuff under 30% stamina
Light weapon class is now below 3 weight instead of 4
Disabled stab on Hooked Daka's
Nerf on Great Chaka (durability, minor range nerf)
Buff for Seal of Approval Scollo upgrade: (Gain +2 Favor with each Patron after every battle) (before: Gain +1 Favor)
Fundraise maximum values pulled down (300->250, 600->500)
Item droppers will drop less lutes
Camera: Minimum zoom is further
Much more, and many small stat tweaks on many items
Bugfixes
Fixed issue of fire not being able to deal damage to multiple characters
Resolved issue of oil patches not catching fire when characters on fire, other than the player, would walk over them
Fixed issue of player character catching fire when not overlapping the fire
Fixed issue where Draft was possible on veteran aspirant run after killing end boss
Fixed issue in the victory overview panel not showing the correct fame multipliers for the equipment
Resolved an issue where multiple trait prompt messages could go out of bounds
Keys now update on tutorial tips after key-rebinds
Pilums and Throwing Asc's will now correctly break after damage dealt
Fixed a bug where the Senator's Shield would break after one hit
Fixed issue with item spawners keeping spawning destructible items
Fixed issue of draft bets paying out the bet amount, not the cost associated with the bet
Fixed issue where matches would be different when saving and quitting the game in week 1
Hitting environment makes a sound now
Audience is more responsive (fame guage-bugfix)
Fixed a bug where Damage Numbers and Weapon Trail settings would reverse when saving
Fixed some Steam Deck tooltips being offset
Countless more bug fixes!
Thank you Aspirants!
Want to stay up to date on the game and studio's development?
As always,
We who are about to die salute you!
Jordy
