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Tuesday, January 7, 2020

Release 2: "Guidance"

This is a small update which fixes bugs and implements several changes suggested in the feedback to the first release.  I hope it's enjoyable!

Click here to download.

  • Balance: INJU's multiplier to circumstance damage is now x4 per level (down from x5).
  • Balance: The "Weakness Sense" upgrade now increases circumstance damage to surrounded Chosen by 50% (up from 20%).
  • Balance: Damage from Suppressor-class Commander upgrades increased by 33%.
  • Bugfix: A Commander which is sent to capture its target at the start of battle will no longer lose any additional captures bought for it.
  • Bugfix: Cleaned up code for Chosen arriving in the middle of battle.  They should always be showing up when intended now.
  • Bugfix: The text window will no longer fail to keep up with new lines of text added.
  • Bugfix: The displayed color of DISG damage against surrounded and captured Chosen will now correctly reflect how much of the damage level will be applied to the opening level after their escape.
  • Interface: The text window will automatically clear itself upon the start of a new day.
  • Interface: The menu for upgrading your Commander will now display available upgrades and their costs regardless of whether you can afford them.
  • Interface: The game now calculates the total multiplier currently applied to each damage type and includes it in the damage display.
  • Interface: Circumstance damage is now color-coded as well, so that you can tell at a glance where you're getting a higher multiplier.
  • Interface: An Examine button has been added to combat.  With the "Psychic Reading" upgrade, this allows the player to check the target's vulnerabilities in the middle of battle.
  • Content: Even without the associated upgrade, using Examine will report in more detail any damage to the target's body, mind, and clothes.
  • Content: When circumstance damage reaches the next level, what's happening to the target will be described in more detail, with particular focus on clothing damage.
  • Content: A tutorial has been added to the main menu.  This walks the player through a battle against a pre-generated team of Chosen.  The player can go off the rails at any time in order to try other strategies.
  • Content: Various improvements and polishing to descriptive text and dialogue.
  • Other: The tips that display on the shop screen have been copied into a text file so they may all be browsed at the user's leisure.
  • Other: The guide has been updated to answer some frequently asked questions and provide some more strategy suggestions for new players.

The balance changes deserve some explanation.  Prior to this update, Chosen who were weak to INJU were much easier to corrupt, and Chosen who were strong against INJU were much harder to corrupt.  The changes decrease the INJU multiplier, but increase the base amount of circumstance damage (especially from Commanders, who were a bit underwhelming before).  The result should be that targets at INJU 0 take more damage, targets at INJU 1 take at least as much damage, and targets at INJU 2 take a bit less damage.  The difficulty of breaking vulnerabilities is overall about the same, but it's more consistent between different Chosen.  Scores might be a bit lower since it's harder to farm loads of trauma from whichever target is weakest to INJU.

The next release will be a larger content-focused one.  It will add another tier to the upgrade tree as well as the next stage of corruption, which involves special actions that become available against surrounded targets at 10k circumstance damage.  Once that release is completed, the midgame will have begun to take shape, and it will be more clear whether the game's overall balance needs adjustment.

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