Ancient Frontier - Patch 1.18
Greetings Commanders! We hope that everyone is enjoying their exploits on the Frontier. Today we bring you new events and a major balance pass. New Events We continue to expand the number of random events in the game. This should continue to make each playthrough even more unique
Greetings Commanders! We hope that everyone is enjoying their exploits on the Frontier. Today we bring you new events and a major balance pass.
New Events
We continue to expand the number of random events in the game. This should continue to make each playthrough even more unique and immerse you in the life of being a fleet commander on the Frontier. This has been a popular addition to the game, and we hope to continue to bring you more events. This patch adds another group of random events to the pool.
Balance Tweaks
Today we have also added a number of balance tweaks based on continued player feedback. This first piece of feedback we are addressing is that several of the unique mercenaries are not good enough for how hard they are to unlock. We made a couple of the missions slightly easier, and we also buffed the stats on several of the merc ships, putting them more in line with the strength of the mercenaries found in Steel Shadows.
Second, we have heard that even after the last pass the late part of the game is too much of a grind, even on the easy difficulty. We looked at both campaigns, and slashed the numbers of enemy ships for story missions past 14 for the Alliance Campaign, and story missions past 17 for the Federation Campaign.
- Improved the stats and abilities on several of the unique, mercenary ships.
- Lowered the difficulty of several of the mercenary missions.
- Reduced the difficulty of the middle and endgame of the Alliance Campaign.
- Reduced the difficulty of the endgame of the Federation Campaign.
- Fixed all bugs related to all events not spawning for older games.
- Fixed several errors in mission objective text in the Federation campaign.
- Fixed minor display errors that could occur on a ship's detail inspection.
Greetings Commanders! We hope that everyone is enjoying the new year. We bring you a smaller patch today that adds two new features.
New Events
We continue to expand the number of random events in the game. This should continue to make each playthrough even more unique and immerse you in the life of being a fleet commander on the Frontier. This has been a popular addition to the game, and we hope to continue to bring you more events. This patch adds another 5 random events to the pool.
Quality of Life Improvement
Today we have also added a pop-up box to inform you whenever new ships are available to be purchased. We know that it could be tedious checking the market after each story mission to see if there were new ships to buy.
And... that's it! We hope everyone continues to enjoy their adventures on the Frontier.
Thank you for playing our games!
Greetings Commanders!
We have recently made a number of balance tweaks and quality of life updates to Steel Shadows. We wanted to be sure that we updated this game as well so that both are an equally polished experience. Read on for all of the tweaks in this patch.
Optional Mission Display
A user suggestion was that we hide all optional missions when there are none available, as they clutter up the interface. After talking about it, we saw no advantage to displaying all of the Optional Missions when a player has no Optional Deployments remaining. So, we have tweaked the display to hide optional missions when you can't take them.
Shadows
We have improved shadows from the main light sources on all levels. These will be disabled on the lowest two quality settings.
Balance Changes
It has been a long road, and now Steel Shadows is available! Dive back into the world of Ancient Frontier playing as an all new faction through a new campaign.
Let us know what you think! Be sure to drop us an email, comment in the forums or leave us a review. We really appreciate your feedback.
https://store.steampowered.com/app/734730/
Thank you for playing our games.
Great news! A free demo of Steel Shadows is now live. Go ahead and check out the game and let us know what you think in the forums.
Thank you for playing our games.
Greetings Commanders!
We hope that everyone is able to enjoy the holiday season. We have been hard at work on the next game in this series, Steel Shadows, which releases in just three short weeks. However, some of the work we have done on that game is now going to be available in Ancient Frontier.
External Save Files:
For a small number of our customers they were concerned with the save location of the game using the Unity default. To address this we have written an entirely new back end save system for Steel Shadows that will save to an easily accessible external folder.
With today's patch, Ancient Frontier will now also use a hybrid of the original save system and the new system from Steel Shadows. That means that if you start a new game you can now find your save files. Going forward save files are located at:
C:\Users\username\AppData\LocalLow\Fair Weather Studios\Ancient Frontier\
Thank you for playing our game!
Wow, it is hard for us to believe that it has already been a year since Ancient Frontier finally launched.
Thank you to each and every one of you. We are incredibly grateful to our fans and players who continue to play this game. Looking back the last year has been a whirlwind with two additional DLCs launched and 14 patches. All of this work was driven by you, our player, through your suggestions and feedback. The game has now been played for several hundred thousand hours across all of our users and we could not have done it without you. We are a small studio of just two people, and it is sometimes crazy to think what this game has already accomplished.
Looking ahead we have even more planned. The first follow-up game, Steel Shadows, is on track to launch later this year. We have also already begun work on the next patch which will add more events and more lore to the base game. We hope to be able to continue to bring you more quality content in this game and others going forward.
One year. Thank YOU!!!
Greetings Commanders!
Today we reveal the new Outrigger ship the Manticore class heavy cruiser. This appears along with several new missions where you fight the Outriggers in the Alliance campaign. Finally, we have addressed a few minor bugs.
The Manticore
This massive heavy cruiser is constructed at a secret location known only to the Outrigger engineers. Packed with stolen modern weaponry the Manticore is one of the most modern ships on the Frontier.
The primary weapons of the Manticore are twin Coil Cannons. Coil technology was originally developed for the Federation by the Outriggers, and they kept the blueprints of the technology. Coil Cannons are long range, accurate weapons that add extra shield damage. As primary weapons the main guns allow the cruiser to deal heavy damage even through shields.
Located in the center of the chassis is a massive Drive Harpoon. The harpoon is a perfect weapon that compliments the scavenging ways of the Outriggers. It drains the energy from the main engines of its target, reducing its movement to a crawl. This allows the Manticore to stun its prey before moving in for the kill and eventual juicy salvage.
These weapons are backed up by an imposing set of quad Shredder Cannons. This is stolen technology from the Pirate clans, and serves the Manticore well. It provides very high damage at short range for engagements that close in.
All of this weaponry makes the Manticore very capable in duels with other capital ships. What really sets the ship apart, however, is its anti-fighter abilities.
First, it houses a pair of hanger bays. These typically house two Gunship heavy fighter squadrons. However there are rumors that there are Manticore captains that prefer to use lighter Explorer squadrons to better scout out targets to ambush.
Second, it uses a massive battery of eight pulse laser turrets. Pulse laser technology is closely guarded by the Federation and the High Temple on Mars, and how the Outriggers were able to steal this coveted piece of technology is unknown. The turrets allow the Manticore to deal with enemy fighters even if it loses its own squadrons.
All of this makes the Manticore an ideal flagship for an Outrigger fleet. While rare, the few that do exist are very deadly.
New Missions
There are a total of 4 new missions available in the Alliance campaign. All of the missions are optional Bounty missions, but they give the Alliance player more options for the enemies they face.
There is one new mission in Tarsis, two missions in Hadron, and one new mission in Cygnus. Hopefully these missions add a few more choices and a little more variety to this mid game stretch of the campaign.
In addition Outrigger forces (and related rewards) have been increased in missions for both campaigns in Tarsis, Arx, Hadron and Cygnus. The Outriggers are out in force. Beware of the Manticore!
Bug Fixes
Greetings Commanders!
Today we have a group of balance changes and bug fixes that we wanted to get out right away.
We are working on another content update that will feature additional Outrigger ships and missions. There was not time to fully test the missions for this patch, however, so they will be launched in a future update. Rumors say that a new Outrigger heavy cruiser has been sighted in deep space. You have been warned.
Graphic Enhancements
With this patch we have made several changes to the display of the UI in all of the ship management screens. The UI will appear larger on most resolutions, and should lead to a better experience when playing at a variety of 2k and 4k resolutions.
In addition we made changes that should allow the game to play on most TV monitors the same way it plays on computer monitors.
Balance Changes
Greetings Commanders!
This is a small follow up patch to the release of the new DLC, and only makes three changes:
Greetings Commanders!
We have a very small update for you today. We put together a video from the different cutscenes and environment videos in Ancient Frontier and arranged it to the main theme done by Mimi Page. Now presenting, The Ancient Frontier Music Video:
[url]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AKvRC6hlHgo&t=44s[/url]
We have also added this video to the trailers on the main store page. It is the third trailer now. We hope you enjoy this fun little diversion.
Behind the scenes we are also working on another patch with a small bunch of improvements. Look for that later this week or next week.
Thank you all for playing our games!
Greetings Commanders! We are pleased to announce that our second DLC, Quests and Events, is now live and will automatically update everyone's game. This DLC is completely FREE as a continued thank you to all of our old and new fans. This DLC introduces a host of changes, most notably adding a Quest system and random Events. Read on for the full change log.
You can only have three quests at a time, so if your quest log is already full you won't be awarded with any new quests until you have room. Quests can be manually deleted from your log if you want to make room for new contracts. Completed quests will also be removed from your quest log as they are finished.
A new 'Quests' button has been added to the ship management areas of the game. The quest log will track what quests you currently have, and what progress, if any, you have made towards completing the quest.
Events can have positive or negative effects depending on your choices, so choose carefully. There are over 50 different events that you will be able to encounter so no two play-throughs of a campaign will be the same.
Each mission is rated between one (easy) and five (hard) by the number of enemy symbols. The rating system is based on where you are at in the game, so a three difficulty mission at the start of the game is very different from a three difficulty mission at the end of the game.
As we have continued to differentiate the different factions with ships, gear and crew it now makes more of a difference to know which faction you will be facing. Previously players had to mostly guess on the difficulty of a mission by looking at the rewards offered or through trial and error experience. We believe this change will help all commanders make more informed choices about which missions to undertake.
System Menu
This is a pretty simple change that was a long time coming. When the game was originally designed the only option was to Autosave, where progress was always tracked. During development the system menu was removed as an unnecessary extra click.
With the introduction of manual saving, the lack of a system menu became a problem. Players could accidentally lose their progress by exiting to the main menu with one click. The system menu has been added to address this. It also allows you to customize the options settings at all points in the game. While this is a relatively standard addition, we hope this will help your experience.
Save Images
Another piece of feedback that we got is that it could be difficult to tell the backup saves apart from each other. To help differentiate the visual look of saves that are at different points in the game, we have added images to the save files that represent how far in the story campaign you have progressed.
Sound Effects
We added sound effects to a number of actions in the game (leveling up, for instance).
Hero Ships
With the last DLC we added the ability for some Hero ships to take part in Bounty Missions. However the description detail of all Hero ships continued to say that they were unavailable for Bounty Missions. The description detail has now been updated for all Hero ships, and only ones that are truly unavailable for Bounty Missions display that language.
Fair Weather Studios is proud to announce Ancient Frontier: Steel Shadows.
Continue the epic saga of Ancient Frontier in an all new campaign. Steel Shadows is a standalone RPG set in the epic universe of Ancient Frontier. Take command of a rag tag band of pirates and outlaws as you fight your way across the Frontier for treasure and glory. Delve into our latest turn based tactical RPG.
With over 20 new story missions, new ships to command and new missions there will be plenty for commanders to sink their teeth into. Steel shadows is set to be released in 2018.
Check it out right now:
https://store.steampowered.com/app/734730/Ancient_Frontier_Steel_Shadows
Will you survive the frontier?
Greetings Commanders!
This is a small follow up patch to the release of the new DLC, and only makes two changes:
First, we have performed another round of optimization. This should allow the game to run better on people running with only 8GB of RAM. You also may notice slightly shorter loading screens.
Second, we should have fixed a bug that could cause the "Launch" button to become obscured on some resolutions with the new DLC.
We hope you enjoy these updates, and thank you for playing our game!
** Edit: Also fixed a bug where when loading old saves crew were not available for purchase. You can now purchase crew from the store in your old saves as well as new games.
Greetings Commanders! We are happy to announce that The Crew DLC is now live and will automatically update everyone's game. This DLC is completely FREE as a thank you to all of our new and old fans. This new DLC introduces quite a few changes, so keep reading for the full change log.
The store screen now has a new tab that you can click helpfully called "Crew" that will display your current crew members, as well as a list of all of the crew available. All of the types of crew can be hired right from the start of the game, if you can afford them. Crew members are much more expensive than items, but they don't increase your deployment cost and they offer a wider range of bonuses. Choose wisely.
The second way to get crew members is at the end of missions.
Simulator missions have never been a popular option. While they offered a lot of experience, that never really stacked up against the potential resources available from Bounty missions. Well, now the choice is more interesting. All Simulator missions will now award you with one random crew member or officer for a successful simulation run. This represents the experience earned by your many un-named midshipman for the grueling trials that simulations represent.
in addition, several major story missions will also award you with random crew members.
How do I use Crew members?
In order to gain the effects of a crew member it first must be assigned to a ship. This is done from the Fleet Management screen:
There have been several changes made to this screen. First, there is now a helpful "Crew" tab to let you manage your officers (highlighted in red). Beneath your ship display will be a roster of all your unassigned crew members (highlighted in purple).
Each ship has between one and four crew slots. Fighter squadrons only get one crew slot, escorts get two slots, regular capital ships have three slots and the super heavy capital ships get four slots. Simply drag a crew member into an appropriate slot on a ship to assign them to that ship (highlighted in light blue).
Finally, as a Commander there are now even more choices for how to equip your ship, and all of that can be a lot to keep track of. So we have added a display to all the ship focus panes in the game (highlighted in green) which will display the crew and equipment equipped to a ship, so you can better track what gear and officers you have on which ships.
In addition, you can now check your items and crew members in battle by focusing on a units information with the magnifying glass. This ability is so powerful, it will even let you see the items and crew on enemy ships if they have any!
How do I make my Crew better?
Deploy them in combat and crush your foes! Another way that officers differ from equipment options is that they gain experience at the end of battles just like the ships they are assigned to.
The victory screen now displays all crew members on each ship, if any, and the experience they gain. Crew members gain the same experience as the ship they are equipped to. This experience is for the crew member personally, and it stays with them even if you assign them to a new ship.
As a crew member gains levels the stat buffs that they provide will increase. A level 25 crew member will provide significantly higher stat boosts to its ship than a level 1 crew member. So get out there and win some battles!
The Vor already were having trouble making it in to players forces, and were also not necessarily a huge threat to fight against. While they had high damage output, they were too easily killed for this to matter.
The introduction of the Crew really left the Vor in the dust. As living organisms, the Vor were not able to benefit from the substantial buffs of crew members. This made them especially weak in the later game of both campaigns. For them to stay viable something had to be done.
We have made several changes to the Vor. As player units they are now much cheaper to buy and to deploy. This should make them more viable as an option for those with a tight resource budget.
In addition the hit points of the Vor have been increased across the board, to give them a little more staying power with all of the tougher ships flying around. This makes them more survivable as player units and a little tougher as enemies.
Finally, enemy AI Vor have been given a significant increase to the amount of equipment mounted on each unit.
Enemy Gear
Wait a minute, enemies have equipment?
Well, they didn't used to. However, as the player ships now can be a lot stronger the enemies needed a buff in order to keep pace. And adding the ability for enemy ships to equip items and crew gave us some interesting options.
Before the Crew DLC enemy ships could not have gear. This led many of the enemy ships to being the same. There were four different versions of the Gunship fighter wing in the game, one each for the Alliance, Militia, Pirates and Outriggers. But while they had different paint jobs they had identical stats. No more.
With the introduction of items on enemies we have distinguished each of the core ships from each other in subtle but important ways. Outrigger ships are more likely to have better shields and do more shield damage, while pirates have higher dodge, accuracy and crit chances. All of the different gunships (and every other ship in the game) is now different due to gear. And they still get to keep their unique paint jobs.
Rebalanced the Entire Game
So, all of these changes interact with each other in complicated ways. This is one reason it was not possible to release the features of this DLC piecemeal, or to release just the Crew members first and rebalance later. The players got more powerful, the game got longer, the players got more options, the enemies were tweaked to compensate.... there was a lot going on.
The result of the rebalance broadly had two impacts. First the middle and especially late game of the Alliance campaign have been made easier. Conversely, the middle game of the Federation has been made tougher, so it is a little harder for them to roll into the late game with an unstoppable force.
This took a lot of time, and was tested to the best of our ability over the last three months. That is not close to the almost two years of testing that we did on balance prior to our initial launch however. We are still taking feedback and testing and retesting the overall experience, and it may be possible that future patches will continue to tweak balance if we find that there is a point where many players are getting stuck.
Also, overall the entire game is slightly easier.
Other Changes
We also made a variety of other more minor changes to help with the overall experience. They include: