AVE ASPIRANTS!
V0.87 is OUT NOW!
v0.87 is primarily another balancing patch but we also addressed some of the more pressing bugs.
From our testing, the difficulty and general flow of the new AI is in a much better spot now. We've added breathing room, new attack movement logic, and custom code to improve flow of 1vsMany situations and reduce team damage. Additionally, Commoner, Gladiator and Lionslayer now all feel very distinct and the pressure ramps up dramatically as we've scaled the AI's abilities more based on the difficulty setting.
Give it a go and let us know if you agree it's playing better! Best place to do so is on Aegic's Discord (though I regularly read Steam discussions and comments as well!)
AI behavior and Combat balancing changes
AI now hangs back a bit and moves in to attack instead of being in melee range all the time.
Melee range itself is a tad further out, adding breathing space
When not attacking, the AI will default to a slow circling mode
Retreating distance is clamped to max 5 meters from theoretically infinite (just timed out, but sometimes they could retreat very far as there's randomness involved)
In any very assymetrical fights in Gladiator difficulty, usually only two enemies will be "on" you now (previously 3-4). Any more than that will enter "defensive circling", hanging back waiting for their turn
On Lionslayer difficulty it's 3, on Commoner difficulty its now 1 at a time
The turn taking is based on Stamina. Tired characters will fall back and a more energised one will take his place.
The distance at which they defensive circle is reduced to 3.5 meters from 6. They hang around close but not too far (we call this the "Kung Fu circle")
In assymetrical fights the AI has increasingly more bias towards Overhead and Stabs to reduce team damage. Even more bias against left and right slashes (the widest one)
The emergent AI really wanted to surround the player "optimally" on the left and right side, sometimes even wrapping behind, which didn't feel fun. In the most common case of 2 enemies attacking, they will stay more in front of the player now, making it much nicer to fight
With 3 or more on you, the AI will circle you as before, including hard flanks. Lionslayer players beware!
Reduced AI maximum max stamina from 200 to 180. (Player remains at 200.)
Further damage model balancing. Note: AI and player have the exact same damage model (on the normal "Gladiator" mode)
Reduced influence of Stamina on damage output (meaning more damage when tired)
Increased influence of velocity of attack on damage output (More damage at higher skill & raw velocity)
Career & Balancing
Redesigned the Character Trait Collector. Players will gain +100 fame per week per matching Attribute among owned equipment + a -25% Shop Rerolls base cost.
Map generation has been rebalanced. Quite a few small changes but generally speaking, there will be less Inner City maps (Slums, Plaza, Market, Terraces) and more of the others for added variety. Ultra late game maps will also bias more towards middle or later game maps with a small chance to still roll early game maps
Slightly reduced Audience Favor gravitation to "neutral" (meaning actions that give positive or negative audience favor are a bit stickier over time.)
Slight damage nerf on Dormori Daka (primarily with Draft in mind)
Elite Cultivator Cren now has 1 less minion, moved spawning around so he spawns alone at the last wave
Coin King Elite Fight now has 2 less minions in total, removed from his own wave
Rebalanced wooden weapons (the starting / training ones) - generally they have more damage and less durability now
Bugfixes
Fixed a bug where corpses would still animate sometimes
Fixed bug where the new trait Traditionalist would not always run a new culture each run
Fixed a gamepad issue where focus was lost in certain cases after returning from a fight
Fixed an issue for gamepad where the focus was set incorrectly after pressing 'Hide' on the Rank Up reward
Resolved an issue where, after an unexpected exit, returning to an ambush would incorrectly load a standard fight instead of the ambush event.
(Probably) fixed an AI bug on Draft, causing them to pass each other oddly at the start.
(Probably) fixed a bug where on Survival in City Center, some enemies could spawn in the floor and get stuck, never entering the arena
Fixed some missing options when using Reset To Defaults in Game Options
Slight improvement on physics of the Cloak accesory
If you like what we're doing, please consider sharing this update and the game with your friends: we still rely on word of mouth more than anything.
As always,
We who are about to die salute you!
Jordy Lakiere
