We’ve made good progress this week. The new roster and quest system are settling nicely. A large part of the main quest and tasks you can perform for the benefit of Haven have been integrated into the new quest system. On top of that, clan envoys now also offer quests for the benefit of their own clan. Completing those quests will befriend them and add new characters to your roster.
Another significant change is the return of many ‘old’ combat skills. You will find that the wayfarer has much more potential for growth, partially because some aspects of combat that previously were a given (parrying, riposting, blocking many times with a shield), are now unlocked by acquiring skills.
This patch also means a return to the more hardcore no-save-restore loop version of the game. Previously made worlds will keep the possibility to save and restore, but for new worlds the feature must be added in the difficulty setting of a world. Instead the option to restore a save, an option to abandon a quest has been added to the pause menu.
We still need to polish all these changes up some more, but slowly and surely the beta is getting close to a good enough shape for a wider release…
Gameplay Changes
- Most steps of the main quest are now presented as a quest you can (and sometimes need to) commit to.
- Many extra missions (to collect sigils or other treasures) are also presented as quests.
- Each quest description indicates a challenge level. This is a first rough draft of that system, it will take some time to increase its accuracy.
- Brings back many combat skills.
- Trainers offer a wider range of skills to train.
- Most deeds can only be collected on quest locations, this limits the number of deeds you can collect to 1 or 2 per quest in most cases.
- Save game features must now actively be added to a world as an easy difficulty option.
- You can abandon a quest from the pause menu.
- In most cases, after completing a quest the quest will only end when you leave the area.
- If you leave a quest location without completing a quest you will abandon it.
- Clan envoys offer quests as well (unless they are angry with Haven).
- Befriending clans will add new characters to the roster.
- Missions to claim keeps and discover possible mines are now integrated into the new quest system and need to be accepted before starting a journey.
- When you finish a quest, your accomplishments are listed on the ‘win/lose’ screen. (WIP)