Regular Update A-0.0.0i
Buildings
Line-of-sight blocking issues caused by interior walls inside buildings have been fixed.
The ability to look through windows has been added.
Adjacent rooms, as well as the outside world, are now completely blacked out while inside a building instead of merely being darkened.
A building's roof now becomes transparent when approaching it.
The "Enter Building" function in the context menu has been improved.
Rain, thunder, and other weather sounds are now muffled while inside a building.
NPCs
Wermar the Battlemaster and four tournament NPCs have been added to the world.
Instances
Transitions between surface textures are now smoother.
The outer boundaries of instances are now shrouded in darkness.
A sand surface has been added.
New instance added: Helmarvin - Southern Outskirts. It is located south of Helmarvin - Southgate.
Map Objects
The Wooden Fence and Wooden Fence Gate map objects have been added. They block movement like a wall, but do not block a character's line of sight.
The Wooden Barrel map object has been added. It is the first open-world inventory container. Items can be stored inside and taken out again. The barrel can also be opened and closed.
The "Wall" map object has been reimplemented.
The "Wallgate" map object has been added.
There will be several types of walls with fixed heights in the future. The variable height setting for walls has been removed again due to technical issues.
Combat System
The combat system has been improved in several areas.
Artificial timing pauses have been introduced to slow down combat. Previously, animations and attacks happened too quickly, making fights difficult to follow.
The Battlebar has been moved from the Instance scene to the Map scene.
In addition to the Morale parameter, a Stamina parameter has been added to the Battlebar. Neither parameter currently has any functionality within the combat system.
Events
Events translate exploration and the current state of the game world into short, meaningful decision-making situations. Triggers and choices are evaluated server-authoritatively. Events can be triggered and presented through different systems: the Event Decision Overlay, NPC interactions, world interactions, and later also player interactions.
Events are intended to turn movement, changes of location, and server-side story impulses into short decision-making situations. Visually, they are designed around a focused event window displayed over the 2D map, featuring a transition, title, description, optional media, possible responses, and a visible presentation of the outcome.
The first event implements a fist-fighting tournament in the newly added "Helmarvin - Southern Outskirts" instance. This provides an opportunity to further test the combat system while also testing the newly introduced Quest feature, which acts as an intermediate step between the event and the activity itself.
Quests
Quests are completable tasks and are intended to eventually be assignable not only by NPCs, but by players as well.
Based on the current direction of development, NPC quests are not intended to be introduced in excessive numbers. Unlike quests in many RPGs, their primary purpose will not be leveling, but encouraging roleplay. This also raises the question of how NPC quests could directly involve other players. One possible example would be a notorious criminal player being declared wanted by an NPC city guard.
The first quest involves entering an event as part of the fist-fighting tournament. Not every quest will lead to an event, and not every event will necessarily require a quest.
Active quests now have their own tab in the Character Sheet.
Skills
Levelable skills have been introduced. Skills are not executable abilities like Abilities, but statistics representing how proficient a character is at a particular activity. Attributes interact with skills.
The "Dodge" skill has been added. It is leveled by successfully dodging attacks.
The "Unarmed Combat" skill has been added. It is leveled by successfully hitting other characters with unarmed melee attacks.
Skill increases now play a small sound effect and appear as golden messages in the chat.
Bug Fixes and Improvements
Fixed an issue where Action Points would refill after the end of a combat round.