Welcome adventurers to our long awaited update V0.19 Pestilence!
This update we have lots of new features, systems and changes to The Black Death. New character creation options, Journal and Context Wheel, Questing, Profession progression changes, Housing update, Dissections, Sickness stages and more!
Here’s what’s in Patch V0.19…
Character Creation Screen
You can now create your own appearance and choose from different hairstyles, head types and clothes combos. You can also choose from any unlocked titles you may have in this section too. Titles can also be changed once in game in the new Journal.
Expect to see more options for character customisations in our future updates.
Journal & Context Wheel
Our UI has undergone a Medieval makeover in the form of the Journal and Context Wheel.
The inventory has been replaced with a journal where you can view recipes, craft items and get info such as view days survived, Knowledge/Experience and World Map. The goal is to be a one-stop shop for all your needs, easily viewable and digestible information displayed in a compact UI. The Map can also be accessed from in the Journal too.
The interaction wheel is a new addition to the game, this can be used to quickly talk to NPCs, use items, equip items, gather resources and much more. Holding “E” brings up this wheel, a simple mouse over a selection and a left click.
These improvements should make it easier for new players to understand some of the more complex systems. It should also prove quite useful for experienced players who want a quick way to get to key items, switching weapons in combat for example and using healing items without the need to open a full menu.
Character Progression and Professions
Professions now include Plague Doctor, Peasant, Hunter, Cook, Bandit, Militia, Smith & Artisan. You will find recipes from before and also new additions too, more cooking recipes and even a Crown and Royal Tunic can be crafted!
Choose a tab and begin unlocking skills. Mix and match between multiple professions to create a character that suits you or focus on a single profession and becomes a master of that area.
Questing
You can now uncover more information about the lands and people of Mercia and the devastating effects the plague is having on them. And pick up some tasty rewards as you go!
As with the other features, this system is very expandable. Depending on what works expect to see more quests popping up in future updates. An epic quest to the depths of Raven’s Reach Crypt anyone.
Sickness, Infection & Dissections
Starting out with the basic plague doctor skills inspect parts of the corpse you are studying such as the groin, armpits and other gruesome areas, open wounds with crafted scalpels and wash parts of the corpse with boiled clean water. As you progress down the plague doctor tree you will unlock more dissection skills which can allow players to even harvest organs!
Some dissection skills require tools. Each tool is craftable and requires various materials, some which require other professions to access.
The plague itself has undergone some changes as well.
Stage 1 sickness will cap your health at 25%, this means that you will need to keep a close eye on your food, thirst and infection level. If you catch the plague again you will encounter…
Stage 2 sickness. This is hard to recover from, your character will start to cough and vomit more, you can take this as an opportunity to find other healthy adventurers and infect them too, or try to craft or steal a cure!
Hand To Hand Combat, Player Knockouts And Carrying Other Players
You no longer have to craft a weapon to begin beating up your friends, punching has arrived! Left click for jab and right click for a right hook.
You also have a 10% chance to be knocked out when you are hit by a punch. Providing you’re not wearing a helmet!
When knocked other players can steal from you and pick you up. This allows you to knock people out and carry them back to your house for dissection…
Housing Updates
Housing Plots are now represented by a Housing Workbench atop a base structure and can be found in the world in place of where the old houses were located. Now to claim land you must purchase a housing plot from a Town Earl, once you have acquired this visit any plot and use it at the workbench available.
Once purchased you are able to deposit resources into your houses storage. You’ll have to do this to meet your house’s upkeep cost. A Peasant Contract can also be purchased from the Town Earl, giving you the ability to have a Farmhand at your property.
Housing now has “upkeep” implemented, much like a medieval rent system, keep your storage full of gold and resources to prevent your newly bought home falling to pieces.
When upgrading your house the cost of the upgrade will also come from this pool of items. Once the house has been upgraded you will have several nodes throughout the building, each represented by a small pile of rubble and tools. Accessing these gives you options as to what you would like to build in that specific spot. You can even hire NPC Guards to help defend your property.
Health
Hunger and thirst now directly link to your health “state” meaning the more well-fed you are the more your health will increase over time, obviously, this means it can go the other way, the more hungry you are, the slower your health increases, which will eventually result in health loss. Don’t worry though, swabs, bandages, and gauzes still increase health but act as a “buff” over time.
All players, Barricades, and NPCs have health bars when in sight of your crosshair. NPCs and players also have their health bars displayed alongside these.
This should make it easier to judge progress as you smash your way into your friend’s house and then kill your friend!
New Main Menu & Quick Play
Our Main Menu has had a Plague makeover with this gruesome opening scene to welcome you into Mercia!
Those of you who are keenly eyed may have noticed the addition of our “Quick Play” option. Selecting this will instantly log you into your last played Server and get you straight into the action without having to select through the Server Browser.
The First kingdom in Bywick
The first version of the Kingdom system is in. This is a location in Bywick, for a large sum of gold you can purchase yourself a Kingdom with a vast amount of upgrade options including your very own blacksmiths, merchants, and bakers.
NPC Behaviour
To make the world feel more natural NPC’s have had improvements made, they now look at you and wander the world giving more opportunities for adventure and realism. They can also spread the plague dynamically, the more NPCs clustered together the faster the plague will spread, this is clearly shown by how ill the NPC looks, so keep an eye out for sick peasants walking your way.
New Enemy NPCs has also been added including beggars, monks, and templars looking to deal divine justice upon the unclean.
Updated locations
Most Towns have had raidable houses set up so you can break down barricades of infected homes to find loot and bodies inside. These are clearly marked with the red “X”.
Freeman’s port has been changed into a new landing area for players starting out, rich with content and art, this has allowed us to use it as a testbed and keep an eye on performance. Hopefully, this will result in us treating the rest of the game with similar quality and design.
Bywick has had a visual and gameplay improvement to give the feeling of infection and how the outer villages are ridden with the plague and are now abandoned and left to rot.
Dunstead has had some progress made, to make it feel more atmospheric and in line the rest of the larger towns.
KNOWN ISSUES
- Changing your house door code within the house workbench will 0 out the 3rd digit. (Initially setting the code on house claim works fine).
- Bleeding currently cannot be stopped with healing.
- Barricades will sometimes not display the correct broken state
- A.I. can sometimes block all directions at once.
- Sometimes the first quest/tutorial will reset when you log in
- NPCs will sometimes “ignore” you and walk aware when you are interacting with them
- Your house position will not display on the compass
- The first slot in your recipe/craftable will sometimes be non-responsive this will require you clearing automatic recipe fills prior to crafting your chosen recipe.
- Some weapons will not block correctly * These are the most serious issues we currently have listed. There are more minor ones. Expect hot fixes soon. …See you in Mercia! // The SIG Team