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Topics - Sami

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1
Development News / Portion based cooking
« on: March 07, 2025, 06:56:12 PM »
Now working on portion based cooking, which means that you will be able to cook multiple portions of certain recipes and prepare for example a full pot of porridge if need be.
The number of portions to prepare is asked when you start cooking and the amount of required ingredients are adjusted accordingly.
Portion based cooking won't be a thing for all the recipes, but for the relevant ones where it becomes most handy; porridges, some stews and soups.
At the same time we'll be checking all the recipes and some ingredients adjustments and corrections will also take place.
There will be also a new [portion:num] modding header tag added so that you can utilize the portion based cooking with modded recipes too.


As Klavus goes for cooking basic porridge he's now asked how many portions to prepare. 5 is maximum in this recipe, and it equals to preparing full pot of porridge.


Klavus starts to prepare 5 portions of porridge, and the ingredient requirements are increased accordingly. It takes good amount of flour to make a full pot of porridge.

These are future features - not yet functional in current version 3.85.


2
Slender trunk wood types and their effect on item crafting.
Wood type being derived from the raw materials into certain crafts.
Separate menu for modded items.
These are things that have been on the table lately, and they've kept me quite occupied - as I expected.
Lots of code re-write, lots of checking and adjusting with the existing content, and several little spin-off features emerged from these additions
but now we're in a good situation where these can be wrapped up - and then move onto other features.
You'll be seeing the full potential and effect on the gameplay in the next version, and now let's wrap this post up with a few screenshots and remarks of these additions.


Sara is crafting wood slats, with an intention to make arrow shafts from them - and there are several additions to be seen in the screenshot.
Firstly, we'll see that birch is now also a preferred wood type, in addition to pine. As a result the best wood slats, and the arrow shafts thereof, are now made of pine and birch.
But here Sara goes making her wood slats from spruce, which is also doable, although the highest quality results can't be expected.


Sara has been making some wood slats from slender spruce and birch trunks and is now crafting arrow shafts.
Here you can see that Sara's inventory shows wood slats described by their wood type rather than the generic name. This is the new wood types in effect.
Certain applicable timber type items now derive the original wood type from the materials used.
Notice also that the material requirements dialog now shows the actual item name, "Arrow shaft", rather than previously seen generic "Craft an item".


Sara goes exploring some modded stuff in the newly added mOdded items make menu.
Modded handcrafts menu is blank to start with, and here there are two item categories defined. Notice that r[e]peat option at the bottom-right of the screen now also
tells the exact item name for repeated crafting, marked with (mod) prefix to indicate this specific item was crafted from modded handcrafts menu.

3
Separate menu for modded crafts is mostly up and running by now although thorough testing that follows will likely bring some more work on the table.
A good amount of re-thinking (and code rewriting) was required to get the [r]epeat last task option to learn and properly distinguish what menu action should be performed
and from which files the data should be fetched. As a spin-off result we'll be now seeing the actual craftable item name always displayed in the [r]epeat last action field.
Moreover, if the item was crafted from the modded crafts menu there will be (mod) prefix tag to indicate that. Eg. "(mod) Big club" or "(mod) Decorated fishing rod".
This way one can easily distinguish [r]epeat crafting of modded alternatives from the original ítems, especially if they have the same name.

We'll be also featuring a new [masterwoodtype] modding tag that can be used to derive the original wood type from the used wood resource into the crafted item. We'll likely also put this in use with some selected items, eg. wooden stakes which will then start to appear as pine stakes or spruce stakes etc. It's not appropriate to have all the wooden items to derive the wood type as this would only make the character's inventory less readable and functional, but it will be used where the wood type really makes difference gameplay wise.
For this and data structure reasons it's likely that the tag can be used only for timber type crafts.  There are bunch of issue still to solve to have all this work properly, but the wood type will start to appear as a visible and effective item property also elsewhere than with tree trunks. One of the things still being worked on is that names of the items with wood type property are being generated on-the-fly rather than using hardcoded item names. For example, an item called '"Wooden stake" we'll be displayed as "Pine stake" if it's made of pine.

These are future features - not yet functional in current version 3.85.

4
Development News / Separate make menu for modded crafts
« on: January 29, 2025, 06:36:14 PM »
The work for adding a separate make menu for modded crafts has been started.
It will be opened up by the key-command O and will work exactly the same way as the existing original [M]ake menu, expect that it will be reserved for modded content only and will be blank/unavailable unless there's some content to added in.

The existing method of adding modded items to the original [M]ake menu with diy_*.txt and menudef_*.txt files will works the same as always, so there are no changes required for your mods unless you want to have them appear in the new separate mOdded crafts menu.

To add items to mOdded crafts menu only the file naming needs to be changed. The modding and sub-menu definition syntax itself remains the same.
Shortly, you'll be now using mod_diy_*.txt and mod_menudef_*.txt file names to assign the items to the mOdded crafts menu.
It will be basically simple as that. For a modder.
Within the actual code I believe there's still work for a week or two, if everything goes smoothly, but the preliminary setup and plans are clear already.

These are future features - not yet functional in current version 3.85.

5
We're proceeding with slender trunk wood type preferences and their impact on the crafts using slender trunks.
In some cases selecting the preferred wood type for this and that craft is quite simple as the age-old traditions originating from the required wood type characteristics
are still alive and followed in the countryside, or among the people preserving the handcraft traditions.
For example, axe handles are best made of birch or rowan trees for the required durability.

But when it comes to items like blunt arrows, lippo poles or spear hafts we've relied on books and item collections of the National Museum of Finland -
which is conveniently available online: https://www.finna.fi/
And the sources have revealed that blunt arrows were almost exclusively made out of birch, and spear hafts of spruce.
A modern spear haft crafter might choose their wood differently but we use the historical sources as our basis, and sometimes it may remain a mystery
why the ancient preferred this over that. They had their reasons for sure.

One new aspect that comes into play now along with the slender trunk wood type is that some items that weren't previously possible to
craft in higher than decent quality will now reach higher quality levels. This will happen for example to lippo, ski stick and wooden stakes.
This comes in as a result of adding preferred slender trunk wood type for the crafting of said items. Using the preferred wood type is the highest quality material,
other kinds will be the decent average.

And as a curiosity for lippo, ski sticks and wooden stakes the spruce is preferred wood type for them all.
In case of lippo pole we can imagine the spruce is light, flexible yet resilient if needed, and maybe the color is also the kind that the fish are most tolerant with.
In case of wooden stakes the spruce is preferred because these are used in the game most often for fences and trap-pits. Of all the available wood types the spruce
remains intact within the soil the longest. Traditionally the spruce used even had to be of slow growing trees found on mires.
For sti sticks the spruce just was found being the most commonly wood within the old ski stick item collections browsed. On the other hand, its lower end hoop was usually made
of birch withe, so it maybe that some of the crafting recipes will undergo little additions as we proceed.

We'll still check and adjust these things before it's all settled but it's looking quite good with the slender tree trunk wood type preferences already.

These are future features - not yet functional in current version 3.85.

6
Development News / Wood type for slender trunks, and some more tree stuff
« on: January 15, 2025, 08:11:32 PM »
Some more tree related additions and adjustments are underway. Firstly, we'll be adding wood type now also for slender trunks.
This means that from now on slender tree trunks will be called eg. slender spruce trunk, slender alder trunk, and so on.
There's also different slender trunk tile graphics for different tree species so that the different type of slender trunks are easily distinguishable the same way as the big trunks currently are.
And as a natural and expected consequence of this addition some crafts will now require slender trunks of specific species.
Young birch trees have been also added into the game world now as slender birch trunks now become an essential wood type preference for certain crafts - for example the axe hafts.
There's also some young tree tile redrawing/stylizing being made, eg. for rowan trees, so that they better express the essence of the tree species both in their standing and felled appearance.

Let's let this screenshot tell it all.
Here you can see small piles of slender alder, rowan and birch trunks placed to the south of the relevant standing young trees.



These are future additions - not yet functional in current version 3.85

7
It's 2025, so happy new year and all the best for everybody!

In the development chambers the new year starts with adding a new tree species into the game world - and that is the aspen tree.
Aspen is a large deciduous tree growing up to 15-30 meters in height. Grows in groves, fresh coniferous forests, rich spruce mires as well as on clearings and hills.
This addition precedes a slightly more distant goal of eventually adding character crafted punts into the game.
For the time being, aspens will bring nice variety into the world, and an additional type of timber to utilize. Grown aspens provide big trunks when felled and their bark can be also peeled for tanning purposes.


Aspens growing tall at a beautiful grove.


In the dirt month aspens have already dropped their leaves but the standing trees as well as the felled trunk are easily recognizable.

8
Once again the year is nearing its end and with these season's greetings we wish you all the best with the festivities and holiday season you might have at hand, and happy new year!

As this years speciality I shall a share a fresh episode from my traditional archery YouTube channel which offers a different
view to devs life in and outside the development chambers.
Now we've just recently passed the winter solstice in the Northern hemisphere and the days are slowly but steadily getting
longer and longer. So why don't we celebrate it with this sort of a northern fire works - the birch-bark fire arrows!
https://youtu.be/JdsLobHDp1Y?si=UPqTs2MklfUlYp4q

And let's not forget the picture greetings, this time with Enormous Electric Elk!


Take care, all the best, see you in 2025!

9
Development News / Version 3.85 (stable) released
« on: November 27, 2024, 07:29:59 PM »
And now, stable version 3.85 is released on Steam, Itch.Io and for lifetimers.

Here's the changelog:

---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Version: 3.85 (stable)

** Saved characters from version 3.80-> are compatible with this version. **

 - added: wooden canteen - a new item

          Wooden canteen is a closed wooden container for carrying water, milk or other beverages. They have a capacity of holding 5 lbs of liquid. Wooden canteens are not craftable by the player character but can be found in the villages.

 - added: WOODEN CANTEEN encyclopedia (F1) entry

 - improved: grinding flour

          Foremostly, grinding flour is now pausable task. You can cancel the task at any time and the receiving container will be filled with how much was ground at the time. Even though you may be asked how many items from the stack you wish to grind the receiving container size always defines the actual amount used. So you can freely select too much, and only the necessary amount to fill the container will be ground. Also, there are no more limits to how many pounds you can grind at one go, except for the receiving container capacity.
 
 - added: pausable log carving with the original tree species inherited

          Carving logs is now a pausable task. The produced logs now also inherit the trunk's tree species property, so you'll get pine logs, birch logs and spruce logs.

 - fixed: preferred tool autoselect issues, eg. with blunt arrows

          Axe or sturdy carving wasn't autoselected upon crafting blunt arrows.

 - fixed: plural form missing from the message for trying to pick up several items in crafting

 - fixed: tree species property missing from the lumber products found in the villages and at certain start-up scenarios

---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

And here's the changelog of things we already had with 3.85 beta release:

Version: 3.85 (beta)

- added: tree species property for big trunks and some assorted timber products

Upon felling big trees the tree species now gets derived into the produced tree trunk. As a result the tree trunks are now called as pine tree trunk, birch tree trunk or spruce tree tunk - depending on what species of a tree was felled. Felling small trees still produces the generic slender tree trunks, but in the future tree species property will be added for slender trunks as well.
There are also different tree trunk tile graphics for pine tree trunk, birch tree trunk and spruce tree trunk. These have been added as separate columns within truetile/trunk.png tile graphics file.
When making blocks of wood or boards out of the big trunks these products now also inherit the original tree species property. As a result these basic timber products will be now called for example as "block of spruce wood" or "pine board", etc.

- added: some crafts now require wood material of specific tree species

Some crafts now require specific species of wood as raw material. This is indicated within the material and tool selection dialog the same way as all the other preferences. For example, you may be given a messages such as "You need a board, preferably of pine or birch." or "You need a spruce trunk."
In cases where certain tree species is preferred it's still possible to use material of any tree species, but if it differs from the preferred types the produced item will be of lesser quality. In that case the generic "...can't make good out of bad." message will be shown upon obtaining the finished craft.
A specific wood species is now preferred when crafting the following items. And this feature will likely get more widely utilized in the future updates.

* Longbow, pine or birch is preferred
* Shortbow, pine or birch is preferred
* Wooden shovel, birch is preferred
* Wooden cup and bowl, birch is preferred
* Wood slat, pine is preferred
* Shingle, pine is required
* Paddle, spruce is preferred

- modding add: preferred tree species requirement

Where applicable you can specify preferred tree species as a required material within <> tag. For example:

{Tree trunk} <Spruce, Birch> [remove]
{Block of wood} <Birch> [remove]

On the first line a big tree trunk is required, and it should be preferably of either spruce or birch. On the second line block of wood is required, and it should be preferably of birch. In these cases it's still possible to use material of any tree species, but if it differs from the preferred types the quality of the produced item will be lower.
If only a certain type of tree species is accepted you should specify it directly by its full item name including the species. For example:

{Pine tree trunk}
or
{Spruce board}

- added: shingles - a traditional light source

Shingles are thin and flat oblong pieces of pine wood which were burnt to produce light - especially for lighting up houses during the dark time of the year. In addition, shingles are also used as handicraft raw material in the making of shingle baskets - which is a new item featured in this verison.
Shingles are timber type items, and they are lit by using [a]pply command. Once a shingle is burning you can drop and set it wherever the light is needed, or carry it with you. Traditionally shingles were burnt in a specific stand that kept them in a good angle for proper burning, but in the game the dropped burning shingles are imagined to be inserted between the wall logs or set firmly in place by some other means.
One shingle burns for about 30 minutes in the game so for continuous lighting a new one needs to be lit before the previous one fades out. This sort of shingle replacement is done automatically if your character is located beside the burning shingle and there's a stack of new shingles nearby on the ground. You character then automatically replaces and lights a new shingle when neccary, and you don't need to worry about maintaining the lighting even if the task you were doing would take a long time. Your companions will also automatically set a new shingle burning if they happen to be beside the fainting one.
Villagers now also stock shingles and can utilize them to light up their cottage houses. Villagers set shingles burning only when necessary so this kind of lighting in the villages is mostly seen only during the dark autumn and winter periods.

- added: SHINGLE game encyclopedia (F1) entry

- added: crafting shingles

You can find the option for crafting shingles at [M]ake menu under [L]umber category.
Shingles are split from a block of pine wood. The process requires an axe, knife and hammering tool such as club. First the block is split into smaller pieces and then the shingles are split and pulled apart one by one by using a knife and hands. One block of wood yields hundreds and hundreds of shingles, but it is time consuming process that can take a full working day. The exact amount of shingles produced from one block of wood is based on the success of your TIMBERCRAFT skill.

- added: shingle basket, a new container item

Shingle basket is a rather large container made out of shingles. You can craft shingle baskets from [M]ake menu under Utility articles.

- changed: Staff item type and role

Staves are now classified as timber type items rather than weapons, and considered mostly as raw material for crafting and construction purposes.
There are no changes to staff making. They are made from slender tree trunks by delimbing and debarking the trunk and cutting it to suitable lengths. A common staff is thought of being about two meters in length with a diameter that fits nicely in one's hand.

MIGRATION NOTICE: Weapon type staves obtained in previous versions do work in crafting the same way as the current version staves.

- updated: STAFF game encyclopedia (F1) entry

- changed: Flail item type and role

Grainflail is now classified as a tool type item, rather than being a weapon. For a long time flails were considered weapons but that approach was foremostly generic medieval weaponry relic from the past and quite inappropriate for the game world. Naturally the FLAIL combat skill no longer exists either.
In addition, the small flail item has been removed completely so there's only one flail item in the game world now - the grainflail.

MIGRATION NOTICE: FLAIL skill gets removed from the migrated characters upon their first load in this version. The old flails continue to appear as weapon type items, but their usage as weapons is now unpredictable.

- updated: GRAINFLAIL game encyclopedia (F1) entry

- added: pausable arrowhead making

Crafting of the arrowheads are now pausable tasks allowing you to have breaks and continue at will later on.

- changed: bone and stone arrowhead crafting batch size increased from 5 to 10

- changed: blunt arrow crafting

Blunt arrow crafting batch size is now increased to a dozen (12). As one slender trunk now yields 3 blunt arrows this is more reasonable batch number considering the sparing material usage.
An axe or carving knife is now also required in making of blunt arrows - for efficient rough cutting. You can still craft a blunt arrow with any knife alone, but using an axe or sturdy knife makes things easier.

- added: pausable fishing equipment

Crafting of the items in [M]ake -> "Fishing" category are now pausable tasks allowing you to have breaks and continue at will later on.
To continue paused crafting use the same crafting option again standing beside the said partially finished item.
There are changes to the crafting recipes as follows;

* Wooden fishhook

It now takes 30 minutes on average to make.

* Lippo

It now takes 6 hours on average to make.

* Netting needle

A wooden stake is now required as a raw material to carve the netting needle from.

- added: pausable tying equipment

Crafting of the items in [M]ake -> "Tying equipment" category are now pausable tasks allowing you to have breaks and continue at will later on.
To continue paused tying equipment crafting use any similar type of crafting again - ie. any cord, rope or withe - standing beside the partially finished item. So, even if you had for example a leather rope in the making, trying to craft birch-bark rope beside it still continues the original paused craft. So with tying equipment we hereby have an exception to pausable crafting continuing rules. If you choose to craft any type of cord, rope or withe the existing paused cord, rope or withe at the location will be finished first.

- added: pausable textilecraft

Spinning yarn and crafting of the spindle in [M]ake -> "Textilecraft" category are now pausable tasks allowing you to have breaks and continue at will later on.
To continue paused crafting use the same crafting option again standing beside the said partially finished item.
There are changes to the crafting recipes as follows;

* Spindle

It now takes 2 hours on average to make. Moreover, in addition using a knife alone, an axe or carving knife is preferred for rough cutting of the initial spindle shape.

- added: pausable utility articles

Crafting of the items in [M]ake -> "Utility articles" category are now pausable tasks allowing you to have breaks and continue at will later on.
To continue paused crafting use the same crafting option again standing beside the said partially finished item.
There are changes to the crafting recipes as follows;

* Grainflail

It's now made of two staves instead of a slender tree trunk. The staves are carved smooth and the impact stave is joined to the handle with a piece of cord.
It now takes 3 hours on average to make.

* Wooden cup

They can be now made in batches of up to 5 at a time, and one block of wood yields five cups. Production time of one cup has been increased to 90 minutes. Previously it was 1 hour.

* Wooden bowl

They can be now made in batches of up to 4 at a time, and one block of wood yields two bowls. Production time of one bowl has been increased to 3 hours. Previously it was 2 hours.

* Torch

They can be now made in batches of up to 10 at a time. Some tying equipment is now also required to keep the bundle of branches tight and convenient to handle. The tying equipment can be anything from withes to cords.

* Bandage

To make one bandage 0.5 lbs of cloth is required, instead of previous 1 lb.

- removed: skin (ie. waterskin) item

This item was actually a remnant from the very early years of the game where wilderness exploration and abundance of water wasn't so obvious. Moreover, water containers made out of leather are also somewhat anachronistic for the game world.

- modding add: [sucmodqty] tag to specificy success modified quantity of obtained items

Using [sucmodqty] tag at the item header modifies the number of items to produce, specified as (num), based on how the crafting attempt succeeded. Very succesfull crafting produces close to or exactly the specified number of items, and failures produce that much less.
For example, if we had an item header like this:
.Club. (10) /5h/ *COMMON* [sucmodqty]

This would always produce 10 clubs if there wasn't [sucmodqty] in use. But now as there's [sucmodqty] tag it can produce something like 7-10 clubs based on how the crafting attempt succeeds.

- changed: wood slat production amount is now prone to success modified quantity

The number of wood slats you get from one board is modified by how the crafting attempt succeeded.

- added: yield information of raw materials, where applicable, is now indicated upon starting to craft something

For example, when starting to craft staves there will be a message telling that "You can make 3 staves from one slender tree trunk." This way crafting can be planned sparingly in cases where certain raw material yield has been set.

- adjusted: availability of small garments such as socks and mittens in the villages has been increased

The chances to find small garments such as socks and mittens from the villages has been increased. You still may have to visit several prosperous villages to find a spare pair of precious woollen socks or mittens, but there's noticeable increase to the previous.

- added: proper stocking of skis and ski sticks in the villages

Skis and ski sticks are now properly stocked in the villages and the equipment quality can vary depending on the culture. Ski equipment restocking, if needed, is based on the village population and season.

- fixed: start-up scenarios generated too close to the villages

Sometimes a new character's location and start-up scenario were generated too close to the existing villages which caused scenario effects to spread into the villages. This was noticed for example with scenarios like "Unfortunate hunting trip" and "Not all who wander are lost."

- fixed: two animals getting caught in the same trap

- fixed: holes in the ice refreezing in slightly above zero degrees celsius temperatures

- fixed: glitches with using village trade credit for blacksmith orders

If you had enough village trade credit to cover the whole blacksmith order, asking the blacksmith's opinion about preferred items to trade only used up your credit but didn't proceed with the order.

- fixed: crawling while skiing

These two movement modes were erroneously simultaneously allowed. Now the crawling character with skis keeps only crawling, with the crawling speed.

- fixed: running while skiing

These two movement modes were erroneously simultaneously allowed. Now running is not possible when skiing.

- fixed: felled saplings in darkness displayed incorrectly

- fixed: rare shovel disappearance potential when digging a pit was paused

- fixed: NPCs occasionally setting fires at unsuitable and random locations

- fixed: being able to shoot broken arrows with a bow

- fixed: shoreline waters at the village area converted into spring water for migrated characters created before the spring addition

----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Cheers!

10
Development News / Version 3.85 beta released
« on: October 28, 2024, 06:48:55 PM »
And now, the time has come and version 3.85 beta is hereby released on Steam, Itch.Io and for lifetimers. It's a beta version, so functionality of all the new features still remains to be confirmed.
But in few weeks time, if no serious showstoppers are found, we can expect a stable release.

Here's the changelog:

Version: 3.85 (beta)

** Saved characters from version 3.80-> are compatible with this version. **

BETA NOTICE:

This is a beta release. There are likely bugs, things are still somewhat under construction, and some of the listed improvements will be tweaked and polished further in patches to follow.


- added: tree species property for big trunks and some assorted timber products

Upon felling big trees the tree species now gets derived into the produced tree trunk. As a result the tree trunks are now called as pine tree trunk, birch tree trunk or spruce tree tunk - depending on what species of a tree was felled. Felling small trees still produces the generic slender tree trunks, but in the future tree species property will be added for slender trunks as well.
There are also different tree trunk tile graphics for pine tree trunk, birch tree trunk and spruce tree trunk. These have been added as separate columns within truetile/trunk.png tile graphics file.
When making blocks of wood or boards out of the big trunks these products now also inherit the original tree species property. As a result these basic timber products will be now called for example as "block of spruce wood" or "pine board", etc.

- added: some crafts now require wood material of specific tree species

Some crafts now require specific species of wood as raw material. This is indicated within the material and tool selection dialog the same way as all the other preferences. For example, you may be given a messages such as "You need a board, preferably of pine or birch." or "You need a spruce trunk."
In cases where certain tree species is preferred it's still possible to use material of any tree species, but if it differs from the preferred types the produced item will be of lesser quality. In that case the generic "...can't make good out of bad." message will be shown upon obtaining the finished craft.
A specific wood species is now preferred when crafting the following items. And this feature will likely get more widely utilized in the future updates.

* Longbow, pine or birch is preferred
* Shortbow, pine or birch is preferred
* Wooden shovel, birch is preferred
* Wooden cup and bowl, birch is preferred
* Wood slat, pine is preferred
* Shingle, pine is required
* Paddle, spruce is preferred

- modding add: preferred tree species requirement

Where applicable you can specify preferred tree species as a required material within <> tag. For example:

{Tree trunk} <Spruce, Birch> [remove]
{Block of wood} <Birch> [remove]

On the first line a big tree trunk is required, and it should be preferably of either spruce or birch. On the second line block of wood is required, and it should be preferably of birch. In these cases it's still possible to use material of any tree species, but if it differs from the preferred types the quality of the produced item will be lower.
If only a certain type of tree species is accepted you should specify it directly by its full item name including the species. For example:

{Pine tree trunk}
or
{Spruce board}

- added: shingles - a traditional light source

Shingles are thin and flat oblong pieces of pine wood which were burnt to produce light - especially for lighting up houses during the dark time of the year. In addition, shingles are also used as handicraft raw material in the making of shingle baskets - which is a new item featured in this verison.
Shingles are timber type items, and they are lit by using [a]pply command. Once a shingle is burning you can drop and set it wherever the light is needed, or carry it with you. Traditionally shingles were burnt in a specific stand that kept them in a good angle for proper burning, but in the game the dropped burning shingles are imagined to be inserted between the wall logs or set firmly in place by some other means.
One shingle burns for about 30 minutes in the game so for continuous lighting a new one needs to be lit before the previous one fades out. This sort of shingle replacement is done automatically if your character is located beside the burning shingle and there's a stack of new shingles nearby on the ground. You character then automatically replaces and lights a new shingle when neccary, and you don't need to worry about maintaining the lighting even if the task you were doing would take a long time. Your companions will also automatically set a new shingle burning if they happen to be beside the fainting one.
Villagers now also stock shingles and can utilize them to light up their cottage houses. Villagers set shingles burning only when necessary so this kind of lighting in the villages is mostly seen only during the dark autumn and winter periods.

- added: SHINGLE game encyclopedia (F1) entry

- added: crafting shingles

You can find the option for crafting shingles at [M]ake menu under [L]umber category.
Shingles are split from a block of pine wood. The process requires an axe, knife and hammering tool such as club. First the block is split into smaller pieces and then the shingles are split and pulled apart one by one by using a knife and hands. One block of wood yields hundreds and hundreds of shingles, but it is time consuming process that can take a full working day. The exact amount of shingles produced from one block of wood is based on the success of your TIMBERCRAFT skill.

- added: shingle basket, a new container item

Shingle basket is a rather large container made out of shingles. You can craft shingle baskets from [M]ake menu under Utility articles.

- changed: Staff item type and role

Staves are now classified as timber type items rather than weapons, and considered mostly as raw material for crafting and construction purposes.
There are no changes to staff making. They are made from slender tree trunks by delimbing and debarking the trunk and cutting it to suitable lengths. A common staff is thought of being about two meters in length with a diameter that fits nicely in one's hand.

MIGRATION NOTICE: Weapon type staves obtained in previous versions do work in crafting the same way as the current version staves.

- updated: STAFF game encyclopedia (F1) entry

- changed: Flail item type and role

Grainflail is now classified as a tool type item, rather than being a weapon. For a long time flails were considered weapons but that approach was foremostly generic medieval weaponry relic from the past and quite inappropriate for the game world. Naturally the FLAIL combat skill no longer exists either.
In addition, the small flail item has been removed completely so there's only one flail item in the game world now - the grainflail.

MIGRATION NOTICE: FLAIL skill gets removed from the migrated characters upon their first load in this version. The old flails continue to appear as weapon type items, but their usage as weapons is now unpredictable.

- updated: GRAINFLAIL game encyclopedia (F1) entry

- added: pausable arrowhead making

Crafting of the arrowheads are now pausable tasks allowing you to have breaks and continue at will later on.

- changed: bone and stone arrowhead crafting batch size increased from 5 to 10

- changed: blunt arrow crafting

Blunt arrow crafting batch size is now increased to a dozen (12). As one slender trunk now yields 3 blunt arrows this is more reasonable batch number considering the sparing material usage.
An axe or carving knife is now also required in making of blunt arrows - for efficient rough cutting. You can still craft a blunt arrow with any knife alone, but using an axe or sturdy knife makes things easier.

- added: pausable fishing equipment

Crafting of the items in [M]ake -> "Fishing" category are now pausable tasks allowing you to have breaks and continue at will later on.
To continue paused crafting use the same crafting option again standing beside the said partially finished item.
There are changes to the crafting recipes as follows;

* Wooden fishhook

It now takes 30 minutes on average to make.

* Lippo

It now takes 6 hours on average to make.

* Netting needle

A wooden stake is now required as a raw material to carve the netting needle from.

- added: pausable tying equipment

Crafting of the items in [M]ake -> "Tying equipment" category are now pausable tasks allowing you to have breaks and continue at will later on.
To continue paused tying equipment crafting use any similar type of crafting again - ie. any cord, rope or withe - standing beside the partially finished item. So, even if you had for example a leather rope in the making, trying to craft birch-bark rope beside it still continues the original paused craft. So with tying equipment we hereby have an exception to pausable crafting continuing rules. If you choose to craft any type of cord, rope or withe the existing paused cord, rope or withe at the location will be finished first.

- added: pausable textilecraft

Spinning yarn and crafting of the spindle in [M]ake -> "Textilecraft" category are now pausable tasks allowing you to have breaks and continue at will later on.
To continue paused crafting use the same crafting option again standing beside the said partially finished item.
There are changes to the crafting recipes as follows;

* Spindle

It now takes 2 hours on average to make. Moreover, in addition using a knife alone, an axe or carving knife is preferred for rough cutting of the initial spindle shape.

- added: pausable utility articles

Crafting of the items in [M]ake -> "Utility articles" category are now pausable tasks allowing you to have breaks and continue at will later on.
To continue paused crafting use the same crafting option again standing beside the said partially finished item.
There are changes to the crafting recipes as follows;

* Grainflail

It's now made of two staves instead of a slender tree trunk. The staves are carved smooth and the impact stave is joined to the handle with a piece of cord.
It now takes 3 hours on average to make.

* Wooden cup

They can be now made in batches of up to 5 at a time, and one block of wood yields five cups. Production time of one cup has been increased to 90 minutes. Previously it was 1 hour.

* Wooden bowl

They can be now made in batches of up to 4 at a time, and one block of wood yields two bowls. Production time of one bowl has been increased to 3 hours. Previously it was 2 hours.

* Torch

They can be now made in batches of up to 10 at a time. Some tying equipment is now also required to keep the bundle of branches tight and convenient to handle. The tying equipment can be anything from withes to cords.

* Bandage

To make one bandage 0.5 lbs of cloth is required, instead of previous 1 lb.

- removed: skin (ie. waterskin) item

This item was actually a remnant from the very early years of the game where wilderness exploration and abundance of water wasn't so obvious. Moreover, water containers made out of leather are also somewhat anachronistic for the game world.

- modding add: [sucmodqty] tag to specificy success modified quantity of obtained items

Using [sucmodqty] tag at the item header modifies the number of items to produce, specified as (num), based on how the crafting attempt succeeded. Very succesfull crafting produces close to or exactly the specified number of items, and failures produce that much less.
For example, if we had an item header like this:
.Club. (10) /5h/ *COMMON* [sucmodqty]

This would always produce 10 clubs if there wasn't [sucmodqty] in use. But now as there's [sucmodqty] tag it can produce something like 7-10 clubs based on how the crafting attempt succeeds.

- changed: wood slat production amount is now prone to success modified quantity

The number of wood slats you get from one board is modified by how the crafting attempt succeeded.

- added: yield information of raw materials, where applicable, is now indicated upon starting to craft something

For example, when starting to craft staves there will be a message telling that "You can make 3 staves from one slender tree trunk." This way crafting can be planned sparingly in cases where certain raw material yield has been set.

- adjusted: availability of small garments such as socks and mittens in the villages has been increased

The chances to find small garments such as socks and mittens from the villages has been increased. You still may have to visit several prosperous villages to find a spare pair of precious woollen socks or mittens, but there's noticeable increase to the previous.

- added: proper stocking of skis and ski sticks in the villages

Skis and ski sticks are now properly stocked in the villages and the equipment quality can vary depending on the culture. Ski equipment restocking, if needed, is based on the village population and season.

- fixed: start-up scenarios generated too close to the villages

Sometimes a new character's location and start-up scenario were generated too close to the existing villages which caused scenario effects to spread into the villages. This was noticed for example with scenarios like "Unfortunate hunting trip" and "Not all who wander are lost."

- fixed: two animals getting caught in the same trap

- fixed: holes in the ice refreezing in slightly above zero degrees celsius temperatures

- fixed: glitches with using village trade credit for blacksmith orders

If you had enough village trade credit to cover the whole blacksmith order, asking the blacksmith's opinion about preferred items to trade only used up your credit but didn't proceed with the order.

- fixed: crawling while skiing

These two movement modes were erroneously simultaneously allowed. Now the crawling character with skis keeps only crawling, with the crawling speed.

- fixed: running while skiing

These two movement modes were erroneously simultaneously allowed. Now running is not possible when skiing.

- fixed: felled saplings in darkness displayed incorrectly

- fixed: rare shovel disappearance potential when digging a pit was paused

- fixed: NPCs occasionally setting fires at unsuitable and random locations

- fixed: being able to shoot broken arrows with a bow

- fixed: shoreline waters at the village area converted into spring water for migrated characters created before the spring addition

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Cheers!

11
Development News / Beta release of version 3.85 expected this month
« on: October 23, 2024, 01:31:50 PM »
Yep. We're now working on to be able to release version 3.85 as a beta version this month.
Recent playtesting has been succesful with no serious setbacks.
Stay tuned, keep your thumbs up.


12
Development News / Shingle AI for NPCs
« on: October 18, 2024, 12:42:39 PM »
Regarding the upcoming use of shingles as a new light source a little bit of AI  has been given to NPCs so that they can also actually utilize these new items.
      It was mentioned in the earlier shingle summary that lighting a new shingle when necessary is automatic for the player character. Now it's made so that your companions will also automatically set a new shingle burning if they happen to be beside the fainting one.
      Moreover, villagers now also stock shingles and can utilize them to light up their cottage houses. Villagers set shingles burning only when necessary so this kind of lighting in the villages is mostly seen only during the dark autumn and winter periods.

These are future features - not yet functional in current version 3.84.2

13
Development News / Pausable fishing equipment
« on: October 10, 2024, 06:53:41 PM »
And now we've accomplished bringing crafting of the items in Make->Fishing category into pausable crafting system.
Thus, in the upcoming release only "transport" and "clothes" crafts will still remain unpausable.
For the items in those two categories there are several new features and additions planned so they'll need a good deal of work on their own, but naturally the plan is that all the crafting will be eventually made pausable.

Now I guess I'll turn my focus into fixing some bugs and start wrapping things up for a release so that we'll see a new version still this year.

14
As mentioned earlier,  proceeding with the pausable crafting requires many kind of changes to the delicate core functions of the crafting system.
As feared earlier, mistakes or faulty code within these core functions might bring the whole crafting system into a state of malfunction.
And quite recently we experienced that as several batch production multipliers stopped working and the whole system kind of went out of order.
Luckily it didn't take too long to get things back in order, but it was a good reminder to continue paying careful attention to this transition and to proceed piece by piece, category by category.

When the hiccups started we were in the middle of converting crafting of the items in "textilecraft" and "tying equipment" categories into pausable crafting system.
That is now accomplished, and next we'll move into converting crafting of the items in fishing category into pausable system. When it's done, I think it would be best to start wrapping up things for a release.

With pausable tying equipment we had to allow a certain exception to the rule of continuing the paused craft. To continue paused tying equipment crafting you use any similar type of crafting again - ie. any cord, rope or withe - standing beside the partially finished item. So, even if you had eg. paused leather rope in the making trying to craft eg. birch-bark rope beside it continues the original paused craft. So, if you choose to craft any type of cord, rope or withe the existing paused cord, rope or withe at the location will be finished first. This is because comparing the item name to the recipe item name isn't as straightforward as we can have things like "Nettle cord" or "Mixed cord" etc. to be produced with "Cord" recipe. And so on. Having it work like this can be slightly confusing, but hopefully still tolerable. If not, we'll see about adding more complex comparison routines in the future versions.

And as we proceed, some new modding tags/properties will be also added as necessary. Now there will be a new [sucmodqty] item header tag to specificy success modified quantity of obtained items.  Using [sucmodqty] modifies the number of items to produce, specified as (num),  based on how the crafting attempt succeeded. Very succesfull crafting produces close to or exactly the specified number of items, and failures produce that much less. This kind of system is already in use with some hardcoded crafts but now it becomes also a modding feature, and for starters will be in use at least with wood slats and shingles.
As an example, if we had an item header like this:
.Club.   (10) /5h/ *COMMON* [sucmodqty]

This would always produce 10 clubs if there wasn't [sucmodqty] in use. But now as there's [sucmodqty] tag it can produce something like 7-10 clubs based on how the crafting attempt succeeds.

These are future features, not yet function in current version 3.84.2

15
Some of you are aware of this already, and for the rest it's time for a little cross-promotion...

Ancient Savo, another game by Enormous Elk was recently on Steam.

Created by Erkka Lehmus (UnReal World co-designer) this open-ended survival and resource management game is focused on raising a family. The game takes place in 1200 CE Eastern Finland, in the pristine woodlands of a region called Savo. If you have played UnReal World you may notice some familiar elements there, drawn from the same pool of inspiration, but Ancient Savo is an independent game its own. Maybe you'd better go see yourself, the introductory sale is on until 30th of September:

Ancient Savo on Steam
Ancient Savo trailer on YouTube

Ancient Savo is being developed independently and aside from the UnReal World, and the route the Enormous Elk's flagship is sailing remains the same - as does the crew.

A few screenshots from Ancient Savo:







Cheers!

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