In this week monthly update, bringing a smaller set of changes but what we believe has a big impact on the game.
Wind in your Sails,
The entire world of BitCraft now has wind throughout it which can be seen through a handful of means. The wind is most easily visualized on the main map, which now has its toggle-able elements on a side panel (previously in the setting menu) for quicker access. You can toggle on the wind directions there to see an overlay of the wind directions. The wind can also be seen on a new wind flag on the top of all boats. Finally you’ll also notice particles and effects in the world are now responsive to the wind direction, such as wind streams, smoke, or falling leaves.
What does the wind actually do you might ask? For now the primary thing the wind will impact is sailing. All boats with sails (currently all boats) will receive bonus speed when sailing with the wind. Going 180 degrees towards the wind will result in a moderate boost and the 90 degrees towards the wind will result in a major boost. Going in the 180 degrees against the wind will result in the current base boats speeds (no penalty).
These boosts have some base amount but can be raised further as you reach higher sailing levels, currently topping out at nearly double speed when going with the wind at level 100 Sailing. While the bonus scales, even the level 1 Sailing impact is nothing to scoff at.
We’re aware that sailing directly with the wind isn't the most realistic but we decided that it was the most intuitive for those not well versed in the intricacies of gybing and tacking.
Sailing EXP and Skilling Game loop,
With the addition of wind we also wanted to give players a stronger reason to get out on the high seas and sail! So we’ve added a new type of resource - Lost flotsam.
These resources can be found somewhat uncommonly out on the ocean and give a hefty amount of sailing EXP when collected. Once acquired the flotsam can be brought back to the new sailing station to be cracked open for further sailing EXP and a variety of goodies.
Our goal with these flotsam resources is that they respawn regionally, which means that untouched areas of the ocean can potentially pile up a lot of them, whereas areas which are constantly pillaged will naturally have less. This should reward getting out there and exploring the further reaches of the oceans. One thing which is challenging for us to balance internally is how many of these create a good equilibrium for a live world amount of players, so we will be monitoring the state of these and determining if more are needed to get the right feel and balance
Boat and Deployable Progression.,
Another aspect of this update is an exploration into a new possible direction for deployable progression. This is not a full commitment yet, but a targeted experiment to try a new pattern for progression. In this update we’ve added sidegrades for the raft and the skiff as a sample/experiment of this new direction. In short, deployables would have more crafted and less formulaic upgrades and sidegrades which generally come from deeper investments in the associated Skill. In the future if this sort of progression is determined to be fitting, we will likely expand it to include the other boats and possibly other deployable types such as mounts.
Some of what you’ll find in the flotsam items are untiered sailing materials which can be used to modify existing rafts and skiffs into varied versions of them with unique stats (and likely unique visuals in the future if we commit to this direction).
Impact on Logistics/Hauling,
While the wind system is at the center of making sailing and getting around more enjoyable and interesting, we also put a lot of thought into the impact this can have on hauling, merchanting and logistics.
We’ve intentionally tried to design the patterns of the wind to have some permanence that allows for optimal “routes” to be found and taken advantage of for some time, but also to not have the wind be completely static. So far we balanced it in a way where the base wind changes slowly over the course of days, while also having a higher frequency layer that gives the wind some life and leaves room for more second to second steering (albeit minor) during your journey.
We'll be keeping an eye on the effects the nature of the wind has on the game and tuning if needed. We'd love to hear your thoughts on if you think the wind should change more often or less often or have more or less complexity to it.
Armor and Weapon Scrapping,
Finally unrelated to wind or sailing, but worth mentioning is we finally have Armor and Weapon scrapping.
Thank you for your patience waiting for this one. Weapons, Tools and Armor all have their own type of scrap which we believe will keep the economy of these things more stable and scrapping only works on profession crafted equipment so no scrapping or upgrading your favorite dungeon weapon. Our plan is to instead fill in more tiers and rarities of these unique sourced weapons and equipment as we add more PVE content while also expanding on more types of crafting armors and weapons as well, similar to the duelist set which was recently added.
Winds of Trade - Patch Notes,
Added,
Global wind system affects boat speed with the wind.,
Map settings UI added directly to the map for toggling icons.,
Additional craftable boat variants.,
New sailing resources found in the ocean for crafting and sailing EXP.,
Sailing craftable workbench introduced.,
Various visual wind direction indicators.,
Armor and weapon scrapping now available.,
Mounts can be set to auto-follow via context menu.,
Changed,
Enhanced player animations when sailing.,
Fixed,
Skitch meat from T1 dungeon now grants cooking XP when cooked.,
Tier 10 clay spawns in the world.,
Can now leave player house during all tutorial stages.,
Passenger animations reset correctly after extraction.