Greetings Adventurers,
v0.3.0.7 is now live!
This update takes another important step towards one of our main goals for Guilds of Mountgate: making Vellgar feel like a world that continues to exist around you rather than simply waiting for the player.
The centerpiece is the first version of our new Living NPC system, but that's far from everything. Friends, Private Messages, player statistics, improved Storages, Farming additions, a major Auto-Health overhaul, and many smaller improvements are also included.
Selected NPCs can now do much more than simply repeat predefined dialogue.
Living NPCs can remember important interactions, develop different relationships with the player, and interpret the same actions differently depending on their personality.
Their reactions can also take previous interactions, mood, trust, weather, and events happening in the world into account.
The first four NPCs prepared for the system are Innkeeper Mira, Warden Fenna Reed, Hanna of the Fork, and Steward Elira Voss.
This is the first iteration of a system that will continue to grow significantly throughout development.
We've also introduced our first fully traveling Living NPC: Edric Wayfarer.
Edric follows an actual route through Vellgar. He stays in settlements for a while, physically travels between them, and is unavailable while he's on the road.
But his journey isn't purely visual.
Edric transports regional goods between settlements, meaning his travels can actually influence the local economy. His schedule continues even when nobody is online and remains consistent for all players.
The social side of Guilds of Mountgate has received a major expansion.
You can now search for other players, send and accept Friend Requests, maintain a Friends List, block players, and exchange persistent Private Messages.
Unread messages are tracked directly within the Social interface, which has been integrated into the existing chat system.
Founder Edition players can also customize their player name color, which is displayed across public chats, Private Messages, Friends Lists, and the local player list.
The Journal now contains separate sections for Journal, Statistics, and Achievements.
Statistics make use of the data that has already been collected in the background and allow you to take a closer look at your journey through Vellgar.
Achievements are already represented within the new structure and will follow in a future update.
Regional Storages have received some much-needed organizational tools.
You can now search, filter, and sort your stored items in several different ways.
The new Tidy Bank option can permanently apply your preferred sorting instead of only changing the current view.
Storage shipping has also been improved, particularly when dealing with larger amounts of items.
Farming continues to receive additional depth.
New small discoveries can occur while harvesting or working with Compost, and Compost Mites can now be found and used to improve Compost processing.
Apiaries can now accumulate up to 12 completed production cycles, making them considerably more suitable for idle and offline progression.
Cooking Stations and their Firewood requirements have also received a larger overhaul, while Smoking now follows a straightforward 1:1 production ratio.
The Auto-Health system has been extensively reworked.
It now operates more reliably during active gameplay, AFK processing, inactive browser tabs, and other situations where the frontend isn't constantly updating.
Active Heal-over-Time effects are taken into account and the system is better at deciding when another healing item is actually necessary.
Scraps can once again be smelted into their corresponding Metal Bars, time-sensitive events behave better for players with higher latency, Player Camp creation has been fixed, several unlock inconsistencies have been corrected, and automatic Tool replacement will no longer equip Tools you haven't unlocked yet.
Scheduled server backups also no longer interrupt normal gameplay.
And, as usual, there are plenty of smaller balancing, UI, localization, stability, and Quality-of-Life improvements throughout the game.
You can find the complete patch notes on our website.
Thank you for continuing to send us your feedback and bug reports.
The Living NPC system in particular is something we've wanted to bring into Guilds of Mountgate for quite some time, and v0.3.0.7 is only the beginning of what we want to do with it.
See you in Vellgar!