Patch #27: Exploration Dock, Ship Loadout Controls, Nerfed Cannon Taxes

Patch #27

Welcome to the Patch after the Nautical Update!

My name is Daniel and I'm the lead programmer on Whiskerwood. I want to say thank you to so many players for starting Whiskerwood! Thanks to you and returning players we actually had more people playing Whiskerwood after the Nautical update than we did at our early access launch!

The nautical update was a big undertaking for our team. Over the weekend we released 5 hotpatches and I appreciate everyone's patience during that buggy time.

This patch brings both a ton of deeper bug fixes plus new features driven by player feedback. The two highlights I want to give are the Exploration Dock, and configurable ship loadouts.

The Exploration Dock

New in this patch is the exploration dock. Many players reported it was confusing that they first needed to build a fishing dock, then set sail, and only then override the commands of a fishing ship. We realized the Exploration Dock would be a better first introduction to nautical mode. Now with the exploration dock you can set sail into the wild ocean and your goal is purely exploration. Once you've found something to fish, harvest, or trade then you can invest research into unlocking the matching schematic.

Configurable Loadouts

If you want to explore or trade further you'll need more food. Or perhaps you desire to fishout the ocean and need more nets! Now with configurable load outs you control if the Whiskers load up extra items for the voyage.

Thank you for playing our game!

Daniel

Lead Programmer on Whiskerwood

Changelog

v0.7.206 Patch #27

Features

• Add Exploration Dock now introduced before Deep Sea Fishing Dock to allow players to scout the ocean

• Add dock controls to increase loadout before setting sail. Now players can increase how much Canned Food, Nets, etc are loaded before a ship departs. The ship navigation mesh now tracks ship paths for obstruction detection, and ships whose path is blocked by new buildings quickly compute a new path to circumvent the new obstacle

• The ship navigation mesh now tracks ship paths for obstruction detection, and ships whose path is blocked by new buildings quickly compute a new path to circumvent the new obstacle

• Add new BGM Isle of Outlaws for islands with populations above 199

• Add manual only fishing action which does not require nets but catches fewer fish. Useful for long voyages

• Add more variety of accepted items on trade islands

Gameplay

• Nerf cannon frame and cannon production ratios from 5:8 to 1:1

• Reduce taxes generated by cannonframe and cannon production

• Tweak world map generation to make empty islands more common nearer the player island

• Add tin ore and copper ore to mining related trade islands

• Halve fish production by shore fishing

• Boost fishing stocks on fishing spot, increase fish per net

• Increase number of whiskers carried by ferries

• Damaged ships have their maximum movement speed reduced as damage increases

• Optimization: Pirate ships attempting shakedowns now only update their path when necessary

• Ships within the fog of war now do not display their foam trails

• Switch rock salt to table salt in trade offerings

Optimization

• Add shakedown pathing optimization for fast case

• Optimize building supports batching

Bugs

• Fix island trade personality randomization causing duplicates and underfill of personality variations

• Fix a radiant quest exact duplicates being offered before first instance is completed

• Fix Stormie's ship missing scouting permission

• Fix ships docking yet still claiming to be starving

• Fix starving ships sometimes teleporting to assigned dock instead of sailing home

• Fix players cannot attack smuggler ships

• Fix cursor in nautical map leaking position of potential trade islands

• Fix large shipyard building armed barque despite no matching schematic

• Fix sunk ferry dock lifeboats do not destroy selves after getting back to a raft side. Becoming a zombie ferry

• Fix ferry ships only picking up one whisker per travel if there are whiskers waiting at both docks

• Fix escort ships getting stuck at the home dock in certain circumstances.

• More accurate pathing for ships with turn radii at both ends of straight paths.

• Fix Barge ship ignoring food consumption mechanic

Crash Fixes

• Fix crash when selecting raft building linked to invalid pair

• Fix crash when interacting with ships that have sunk while at main dock

• Fix crash when corpses arrive on docked ships

• Fix corrupted docked ferry causing map loads to crash

Acknowledgements

• Thank you to the many players who reported excessive taxation from the too generous cannon production recipes

• Thank you to FatFreddy01 for reporting the ferry building crash

• Thank you to our composer Lucas Ricciotti for making Isle of Outlaws

• Thank you to brilyn on the Discord for reporting the missing permission on Stormie's ship and reporting the ships claiming to starve at docks

• Thank you to Goose Rookie on the discord for reporting that Smuggler ships are unattackable

• Thanks to bana on the Discord for reporting the information leak

• Thank you to Simoni on the Discord for reporting the large shipyard building Armed Barque by default bug

• Thank you to StrikeWyrm for reporting the crash when clicking on docked yet sunk ships

• Thank you to Brilyn on the Steam forum for suggesting we increase the carry capacity of ferries

• Thank you to DiabloThe2nd on the Discord for reporting the dead sailor crash

• Thank you to GustaGamerMTW on the Discord for reporting that escort ships were getting stuck at the home dock

• Thank you to Locoparentus on the Steam forums for suggesting we switch rock salt to table salt

• Thank you to Careful(Expanse) on the Discord for reporting that barges were ignoring food

• Thank you to Satsuki Shizuka on the Discord for suggesting we expand the accepted items in trade

• Thank you to Lena for reporting the corrupted ferry path crash over email

Steam Reviews

We'd really appreciate it if you could take a moment to share your thoughts about Whiskerwood in a Steam review. Each review helps us understand what you enjoy, what you'd like to see changed, and what you'd like to see added next. It's a powerful way for you to not only share feedback with us directly but also influence what comes next in a patch. We're carefully reading through all feedback, and your opinion matters!

Official Wiki and Beginner's Guide

We have some fantastic resources to help get you started on your colony building in Whiskerwood. Check out our beginner's guide and our official community wiki page to help get you the answers you need.

We also have a compilation of tips and tricks sourced from the community to help you out right here:

Join the Whiskerwood Community

Become part of the Whiskerwood community. Join us on Discord to chat with other players, share your villages, and see what others are creating. You can also follow updates and discussions on Reddit, stay informed through BlueSky and Twitter.