v2.0.7a (Open beta branch)

Hello everyone!

As you migt have seen on the news/Forums, we have an open beta branch for the game! Here are the changes that have been done for this 2.0.7a update on the beta branch.

v2.0.7a

CHANGES TO RESOLUTION, WINDOW/FULLSCREEN AND UI SCALING

• changed the way the game draws things in different resolutions

• UI scale 100 is now default

• UI scale 100 draws everything at a 1:1 scale for all resolutions

• due to the new use for UI scaling, the arrows for UI scaling now change the scale by 10 points, and the buttons for "Reset Scale" and "Auto-Scale" have been removed

• all common resolutions are now available as options for the size of the window mode

• changed the way the game view updates when changing resolutions

• the game should now support all aspect ratios without black bars

• the game now remembers your window resolution and windowed/fullscreen settings

FEATURES

• you can now toggle on and off mods within the game settings menu. Restart is still required

• a new button in the game options menu now allows you to restart the game to instantly reload mods. Might lead to memory leak if used several times

• uploading mods to steam workshop has been changed to be more user friendly and give better feedback

SKILL BALANCE

• when units created via bodyguards die, they will now take some time to replenish (10% replenishment per day)

• the champion statue now gives:

• week 1-3: +1 bodyguards rank

• week 4-6: +2 bodyguards rank

• week 7-9: +3 bodyguards rank

• armorer now gives 6% health increase (up from 5%) and 50% chance of projectile protection (up from 20%)

• offense now gives 6% attack speed and movement speed increase (up from 5%) and 15% rage damage increase (up from 10%)

• archery true-strike proc chance is now 4% + rank (down from 5% + rank)

• hydromancy, aeromancy, terramancy and pyromancy now give +65% base spell effectiveness increase (up from +50%)

• all spells now have a 6.667% longer cooldown

• sorcery now gives 35% faster cooldowns and scales more predictably (up from 33% with diminishing returns)

• scouting's diminishing returns from proccing often are less powerful (-25% per proc, down from -33% per proc)

• diplomacy, necromancy and demonology now offers 5% more units, and at 10% less cost

• diplomacy description has been updated with the v1.9 buff + the new buff

• demonology procs are now less random

• mysticism now gives +40% base spell effectiveness increase (up from +25%)

• plunder now gives 10% more gold after combat

• plunder now has a moderate chance of yielding artifacts after combat

• First Aid tent now costs 2000g (up from 1000g), and Ballista now costs 1500g (down from 3000g) - since the total cost of both is now 3500g instead of 4000g this is considered a buff to Engineering

• combat now gives +100 hp (up from 75) and +30% damage per rank (up from 25%)

• midas touch now gives +65 hp (up from 50) and 20% proc chance (up from 15%)

• bloodwarping now scales less strongly - rank I now and before are the same, but rank IV now will be only as strong as rank III was before

FACTION BALANCE

• Counting House, Hostler, Conscription Centre and Gryphon Tower are now all available one town level earlier

• the cost of using the Aether Forge now increases by 5% each time it is used

• Banner of Champions now costs only 2 crystals (down from 5)

• Sky Pillar is now available at town level 2, but also costs 5 ore

• Pearl mechanic for Tide is now 50% more impactful

• Pillars of Essence now costs 10% more resources to use

• Recipes for the Pillars of Essence are now randomised each match

• Pillars of Essence is now available one town level later

• Tea House is now available one town level later

• Enclave and Earthen have a buff scheduled for v2.1

CHANGES

• minor adjustment of the detailedness of the unit coloration surface in battles

• the main menu battle now draws a black background

• dragging the screen with middle mouse button now disables the auto camera the same way that scrolling or WASDing does

• changed the way the UI for selecting the position of using an adventure map spell looks

• Pillars of Essence unique building is now placed on the 4th row of the build grid

• Tea House unique building is now placed on the 3rd row of the build grid

• the hero window UI will now always show the hero page at the start instead of showing the spellbook if you had opened the spellbook last time

• units with Rebirth active (phoenixes) will now be resurrected when combat is won

• MODDING: the various ways of spelling the Windup and Projectile Prot abilities now all work

• MODDING: Artifact mods can now give faction skills

• Faction choice screen has been redesigned to better support various resolutions and extra modded factions

• The Lexicon is now shown at 100% scale always, but players using lower resolution displays can scroll around it using WASD or holding the mouse at the edge of the window

• The Achievements lexicon page no longer moves as you move the mouse

• the AI will now choose the 2nd alternate unit instead of always picking the first

• spell descriptions for Magic Arrow and Iceball are now more precise

• island maps will no longer generate landmasses that reach the edge of the map, which fixes issues with unlucky placement of Docks

• the game will now display the world scaled to 1x - 2x - 3x - 4x instead of 1x - 2x - 2*sqrt(2)x - 4x when zooming in and out

BUG FIXES

• fixed Puzzle Master achievement not unlocking

• fixed the previous balance changes to neutral units applying to the wrong units

• fixed how adventure map building windows were placed on the screen to better support low resolution monitors

• changed the position of the "Done" button in the town screen for low resolution monitors

• changed the position of the Army Creation screen in the town screen for low resolution monitors

• the position of the "Advanced" and the "Back" buttons in the map selection screen have been fixed for low resolution monitors

• fixed the UI for selecting the position of an adventure map spell being weird in some resolutions

• fixed a crash happening whenever you hired too many heroes as a modded faction

• fixed a rare issue that could cause a crash in combat

• fixed a rare crash that could happen when alt-tabbing from the game at the precise moment it opened

• fixed an unexpected interaction between right clicking units in the army deployment tab and right clicking to split war groups on the battlefield, which could be used for unit duplication

• Bodyguards units no longer die at the end of combat the way that summoned units do

• fixed a bug that would make some of your units disappear if you exited an adventure map building UI by unconventional means

• opening the lexicon in the main menu now pauses combat, improving performance while in the lexicon

• fixed Resurrection spell resurrecting corpses of upgraded units as their base versions

• fixed unit group mods breaking if more than 1 of them were loaded due to their names loading wrong

• fixed (unused) the technical unit groupings being messed up when faction mods were loaded

• fixed the Tooltip for Overgrown Gold Mines saying they give 5000 gold each week when they actually give 2500

• fixed the Overgrow Gold Mine? UI window saying they give 5000 gold each week when they actually give 2500

• fixed a building being able to spawn right at the diagonal lower left corner of a town, blocking paths to the left

• fixed a bug that would unlock the Patience achievement when playing on a custom map

• fixed a bug that would give a hero infinite XP gain if you continuously equipped and unequipped an artifact that gives Learning

• fixed a rare crash that could happen when entering battle while tabbed out

• fixed the tooltip of spellpower erronously saying it increases power by 5% when it actually increases it by 10%

• fixed an issue that made the game hang when using certain cheats in debug mode