Greetings friends and fellow managers!
We’re back today with a fresh and important update containing a feature that has been requested by many players since Epic Manager’s Closed Alpha Release - the ability to simulate (auto-resolve) battle scenarios!
Today’s update also brings forth many bug-fixes, balance changes, pacing improvements and other various interesting tweaks. Make sure to read the patch notes below for the complete list of changes!
We’ve also included a few words on our development roadmap and upcoming features at the end of this update, so stay with us ‘till the end if you want all the juicy details! ːsteamhappyː
As from v.0.2.7, and whenever attempting to complete a combat quest*, players will now be able to choose to enter battle and control their troops directly, or to use the all-new Combat simulation interface and auto-resolve the scenario.
*Please read the “What’s Next?” section at the end of this update to learn more about the upcoming different quest types!
How the new Combat Simulation System works
The new combat simulation system takes in account a wide (and growing) variety of factors, ranging from the levels of adventurers in a party, to their “preparedness” (influenced by equipment) and more.
Some degree of Luck will also be involved in Combat Simulation, as your party’s rating (influenced by factors such as those described above) will ultimately determine your odds (DC) of obtaining a Critical Failure / Failure / Success / Critical Success while throwing a good old D20.
Any result other than a Critical Success may lead your party members to obtain wounds, and obtaining a Failure or Critical Failure will require you to throw an additional dice for each party member (saving throw) to determine if this character survives the encounter.
Scouting Quests is now more important than ever
Scouting a Quest will now also fully reveal the odds of successfully auto-resolving a battle scenario. The % values of all outcome types (Crit. Success / Success / Failure / Crit. Failure) will be displayed as a mouse-over tooltip while hovering over the “Simulate” button.
Things to keep in mind
- Party members will not use any consumable items while auto-resolving combat.
- It is impossible to flee from an auto-resolve attempt. Should you decide to simulate a battle scenario without scouting the quest before hand to make sure you have a high enough chance of success, be prepared to face the consequences if you miss your dice-roll. Remember - scouting is your friend.
- While our team did its very best to balance this new system in a way that accurately represents combat difficulty, keep in mind that we will continue to fine-tune the values in upcoming patches and, as always, we’ll be very attentive to player feedback in order to direct our future balancing efforts.
*Make sure to exit Epic Manager and Restart Steam to get the new version. Top-Right corner of the Main Menu should now read : Alpha Build v.0.2.7*
*While old save-games are still compatible with this new update, we HIGHLY RECOMMEND STARTING A NEW GAME to make sure you receive all bug-fixes and balance changes.*
New Features
- COMBAT SIMULATION : It is now up to the player’s choice whether to enter combat scenarios and control their troop directly, or to auto-resolve them entirely.
Game Pacing and Meta-Balance
- Accelerated Party Movement sequence on the World Map.
- Deployed Parties can no longer be ambushed by enemies while using the “Camp” order. This should remove the case where players would camp to heal wounds, but end up gaining them back (or even more) immediately by being ambushed on the same turn.
Map Improvements
- Added new “Portal Towers” to all populated areas on the World Map. These towers now light-up with blue flames when a portal is active at that location.
- Added a moving Cloud Layer to the World Map.
Bug-Fixes
- Fixed an issue preventing players to Terminate and/or remove adventurers from parties during the opening 6 turns, when skipping tutorial.
- Re-worked Warlock’s Hellfire damage calculations.
- Fixed an issue with Elemental Missile and Unique Enemy Characters.
- Fixed an issue where Human Unique Characters always had a “null” 3rd Combat Skill.
- Fixed incorrect Tooltip information in the Monk’s “Defensive Stance” Skill Description.
- Fixed an issue that would sometimes arise with an adventurer’s equipment, after re-negotiating that character’s contract.
- Party Disbanding should now work properly in all cases, even when on a location without an active portal.
- Fixed a game-breaking bug that would sometimes appear in Trimester 1 of the Gold League.
- Contract Termination should now properly consider all contract conditions (such as Locked or Champion) in all instances.
Balancing
- Warlock passive skill mods now give +25% (stacks), instead of +50%.
- Warlock Blood Offering now gives +3AP, instead of +4AP.
- Tweaked Quest Prospection algorithm to distribute Threat Levels on a normal curve.
- Frozen characters now have a 0% chance of dodging.
- Captain’s “Rally” Skill is now single-target instead of AOE. AP cost has been reduced from 6 to 4.
Audio
- Alt-Tabbing in and out of the game should now longer cause issues with audio playback.
- Battle Theme Song should now loop correctly.
UI
- Removed “Fuzzer” behind Quest Prospection / Recruitment panels, in order for the HUD’s Top Bar ressources to remain visible when performing these actions.
- Made a series of minor visual changes in the Staff panel.
- Added new “Contract Status” visual indicators to the Roster panel’s List View Mode.
- Added new visual cues to differentiate empty Kit/Accessory slots in the Party Panel / Character Sheet (Basics) / Character Sheet (Equipment Tab)
Misc
- Fixed various typos reported by community members.
We’re already hard at work on many (many!) cool new features that will progressively make their way into the game over the course of the next updates. Here’s a non-exhaustive list outlining some of the changes you should be expecting in the near future.
User-Created Content (Kickstarter Rewards)
As you’re reading these lines, we’re putting the final touches to a series of Google Forms we’ll soon be sending to Kickstarter Backers who are eligible to creative in-game rewards. We expect these forms to ship out later this week or early next week.
User-created contents coming soon to Epic Manager :
- Unique Adventurers
- Random Encounters
- Quests
- Unique Items
- Prestige Classes (About 10 will be created by Kickstarter backers, and around 6 more by the ManaVoid Dev Team...did I hear “Indie Guest Stars”?)
- Location Naming
- New Deities and special effects!
All Kickstarter backers with creative rewards should expect to receive an email from our team very soon - so make sure to check your mailboxes from time to time! ːsteamhappyː
New Merchants - Alchemist and Enchanter
Two new merchants will soon be opening their shop in Astraeus - and they mean business!
The Alchemist will allow players to purchase powerful potions with the ability to grant and/or remove character traits from adventurers. Rumours around the Tavern have us believe that the fabled Alchemist can even remove permanent wounds… for a price, of course!
The Enchanter can be described as part genius, part wackjob. It is said his long pilgrimages have brought him an uncanny wisdom and knowledge of equipment pieces. It is also said that the vapors from his many late-night experiments have left him… somewhat eccentric. Give him an Equipment piece (Kit or Accessory) and a bit of Gold, and he’ll get to work transmuting the item’s special properties into, well, different properties! Veteran managers have reported that this process is *relatively* painless, but that results seem to vary! :)
Skill Quests
We’ll soon be transforming some existing quests (and adding new ones) with a fresh new twist! Without giving too much away, let’s just say that these new “Skill Quests” will NOT involve battle scenarios, and will require players to carefully plan the composition of parties they send on the field to undertake them.
Difficulty Settings
You’ve asked for it! We’ll be implementing new difficulty settings in an upcoming patch. These global modifiers should please those looking for a smooth ride, or one heck of a challenge!
More than 7000 managers have already ventured into the world of Astraeus, and we expect many more to join the fray as we slowly pave the way towards the 1.0 release of Epic Manager.
Our whole team would like to say a huge THANK YOU to each and every one of you for your continued feedback and kind words. One thing is for sure, none of this would’ve been possible without the involvement and support of our ever-growing community.
Rest assured that we always have been, and remain, fully dedicated to making Epic Manager the game YOU want it to be.
As always, don’t hesitate to reach out to us with any comment, question or feedback you might have. It’s always a pleasure to hear from you!
Until next time friends,
Stay tuned and, above all, stay EPIC!
- Best regards from the whole ManaVoid Dev Team
ːsteamhappyː