Author: Ronchiporc

The National armies update

This update adds a new type of formation : National Armies. They behave in the same way as regular armies except for the fact that they can be controlled not only by its owner but also by all the superiors of that player in the Nation. This will allow to organize national operations more easily without needing every member of it to be online at the same time.

Strategic tools have been improved: defensive zones stop at enclosed spaces like palissades, range units now display their range visually, and formations can now remember their deployment positions in each region they’ve been deployed to, meaning it will no longer be reset if your army leaves your city and comes back!

This update also brings a lot of re-balancing and new mechanisms to counter gameplay exploits.
Units now cost coins to recruit and their equipment has to be paid. It is no longer possible to recruit units if in debt.
Honor now affects Legitimacy instead of State Power. It decays with time. Lots of new actions can affect Honor, such as sacking cities, abandoning cities,  or losing a city to a rebellion…
Penalties for having a negative state power, being in debt , or distance from capital have been overall increased.
Also noteworthy: some policies such as “Fair Exchange” now cause an immediate conflict penalty if repelled.
Exploration ‘exploits’ via the extensive use of lonely civilians in the sea or via the polar regions is now prevented by new events.

This is a pretty large update, although with nothing much new visually. 
Please take the time to read the change log as it contains lots of modifications to gameplay and balance!

National Armies
v0.0.16.x
– WARNING: all prior deployment data is lost! you will have to recreate defensive zones and redeploy all your troops.
– added a new type for formation: “national armies”. they can be controlled by all the nation superiors of the formation’s owner, allowing to delegate military management for national operations.
– national armies provide authority to any city of the nation where they are stationned, even those of a different character.
– added the ability to change the type of existing formations: militias can now be converted to regular armies.
– defensive zones propagation redone: it will now stop at palissades if inside an enclosed space!
– troops now remember their respective deployment positions in every region they have been deployed to.
– range for missile units such as archrs is now displayed during deployment
– troops missing deployment data will now autodeploy with orders copied from similar units, or, if none available, get assigned to defend any created deployment zone.
– nation state power transfers and taxes for inactive characters is now capped at 10% regardless of their rank settings.
– increased state power maintenance of subordinates from distance + now non linear: expodential increase with distance
– added state power cost from total number of subordinates (not just direct subordinates)
– coin transfers in treaties are now limited by your current treasury and income.
– trading rights and coin transfers are now only available when the fair exchange policy is enabled.
– added new polar events
– some events can now be triggered when moving even on already explored territories
– changed culture from faction based to character based
– colonies no longer contribute to your GDP, culture or score
– revoking or passing certain policies can now cause an immediate penalty of conflict in all your territories. example: revoking fair exchange now causes +40 of conflict.
– recruiting new troops now has a recruitment cost = training cost + equipment cost
– it is no longer possible to recruit new troops if in debt
– honor no longer affects state power, but legitimacy instead. positive honor now provides a bonus, though less important than its malus if negative.
– honor, wether negative or positive, now slowly decays with time
– cancelling debt now also causes an honor penalty
– sacking now causes an honor penalty of 15
– renouncing control of a region now causes an honor penalty of 25
– losing a region to a rebellion now causes an honor penalty of 25
– increase loyalty penalty from negative state power
– increased waste penalty from negative state power
– reduced waste penalty from weak local administration
– increased local culture from capital distance
– added waste UI details in the economic tab of the territory menu
– reduced production of the “guard” service for towers
– increased (greatly!) upkeep of elephants and mammoths
– reduced number of herds
– reduced meat from herds
– lowered growth of elephant and mammoth herds
– lowered odds of successfully capturing elephants and mammoths
– upkeep of elephant and mammoth units greatly increased
– increased conflict generated by the “seized materials” policy from +5% to +10%
– fixed bug when unloading resources from a formation and not enough room available
– added event to counter the exploit of using defenseless civilians (piglets,oldpigs,sows) to explore
– fixed visibility not removed when a formation got destroyed on the worldmap
– fixed issues and exploits with resistance missing in some cases in NPC cities
– fixed issues with research projects getting stuck
– fixed bug with colonies generating abnormal tax income
– fixed colonies counted as cities in the administration stat calculation
– fixed exploit allowing destroyed building to be repaired for free

This patch includes an engine update to its latest version.
It is also the first “full build” of the game, which is a more optimized version of the game ( but potentially more unstable and with less error feedback ).
This means everyone should experience a significant improvement of framerate and that the servers should run a bit more smoothly.
This patch also includes significant memory optimizations on the server to allow for bigger games and support more players.
In terms of gameplay, i added fixes to city griefing and rebalanced the different breedable animals to give more unique properties to each.

Engine update
v0.0.15.x
– experimental first ever “full build” of the game. A full build is much more optimized version of the game, improving its overall framerate and memory usage. However its likely to be more unstable!
– updated engine to latest version
– improved server starting speed
– greatly optimized memory usage of the server
– optimized the water and reflection shaders
– demolition speed of buildings is now 0.1 in resistant cities. Local builders do not participate.
– demolition of buildings is maxed to 3 at a time in resistant cities.
– it is now impossible to clear terrain and destroy infrastructures in resistant cities.
– new hierarchy button allows to see the hierarchy of foreign nations
– redesigned the region owner UI in the worldmap
– livestock pastures reduced cost from 2 to 1 res unit of animals to build
– livestock ‘meat’ pastures efficiency reduced from 1 to 0.7
– rabbit and chicken production’s perk is that it takes less space than other animals
– ostrich production produces meat faster
– buffalos and cows produce more leather as byproduct (1.8 and 1.5) but require more space
– llamas, goats and sheep leather production reduced from 1 to 0.8
– horses and camels production is slower and they produce less leather

Reorganized the customization of nation flags.
Now using a palette of colors instead of hue + 2nd color for the flag symbol.
Removed old placeholders and started adding the new final flag icons.
Also fixed various issues.

Flags
v0.0.14.x
– reorganized nation flag customization, now using a color palette and with 2 colors: flag and symbol
– replaced placeholder flag symbols with new final ones
– flag icon lines color will auto-invert from black to white to adapt the filling color
– reduced victory points from score
– dead nation now removed from the score
– carriers no longer spawned for free when evacuating a region
– fixed resources not consummed when located in warehouses being upgraded
– fixed renegociating treaty with ‘join faction’ causing an error
– fixed culture transfers when disbanding troops not working in some cases
– fixed cultural problems when taking over an abandonned territory
– fixed cultural problems with the succession start
– fixed asking to terminate treaties not working
– fixed table display missing line highlights
– fixed explored map not updating properly in some cases
– fixed issues with trade routes from the world map
– fixed ownership issues with claiming previously settled territories
– fixed formation inventory not being auto-unloaded when disbanding the last troop

A small update bringing reorganized text files that allows to begin the translation work of the game.
Ymir now supports all latin and cyrillic characters.
Each language is now a directory, and new ones can be created simply by copy pasting the default English directory and translating its content.

Besides that, the resources, trading and creation of new formations is now possible directly from the worldmap, making it more convenient.

Also, new test persistent game is being launched!

 

Translator’s update
v0.0.13.x
– reorganized external text files system
– missing text strings are now auto-added at the end of any text file for a language after running the game once
– each language is now a directory
– now supports all latin and cyrillic characters
– started adding french localisation
– UX: resources inventory and trading is now available from the worldmap
– UX: its now possible to create new formations from the worldmap
– fixed issue with terrain heights tool and platform
– fixed some trees having the wrong size
– fixed schools and academia not distributing their service
– reduced odds of consecutive barbarian waves in a short time

The colonies update

3 new character spawning types have been added to the game to facilitate players joining an ongoing game: succession of inactive characters, new leader of rebel territories, and colonies.

Succession
If a character becomes inactive and doesn’t have any subordinates in his nation, he automatically becomes a new “succession” starting point available to any new player joining the game. 
The player will inherit all the character’s possessions : techs, treaties, units and territories. The character’s name and portrait are replaced by the ones chosen by the new player during the character’s creation.

New leader
All the territories in “anarchy” because they rebelled or were purposely abandoned by their previous owner now become valid starting points. A character joining as their new leader will inherit the anarchic territory and a set of techs matching the content of the territory. A minimum amount of population, food, and materials is insured to make sure its not an impossible start. This type of start is however pretty random and risky, probably only for experienced players. 
If you inherit a rebel city you might be facing the wrath of the territory’s previous owner!

Colonies
And lastly : colonies. Players can now change the status of one of their cities to make it a colony. This action is irreversible and the player will lose control of the city by doing so: he will no longer be able to build and access its resources. 
The colony then becomes a valid starting location for new players to join.
While the territory is a colony, it costs no upkeep, no state power, has stable loyalty, administration and 0 waste. It provides a 5% income tax to its founder (regardless of tax rate in policies).  
A player starting in a colony will receive full control of the colony and will start automatically in the founder’s nation as one of his subordinates.
The ‘colony’ then loses its status and becomes the new player’s capital.
The new player is bound to the founder by a colonial treaty ensuring that he remains in the nation and pays the colonial tax of 5% of his incomes.
If the new player chooses to illegally break the treaty, he will suffer its breaking penalties : 50% of his GDP and war with the founder.

Why build colonies ?
– territories generate a safe and reliable 5% tax income without costing anything, and require no management as they have a stable administration and loyalty. 5% might seem low but there’s no ‘waste’ reducing the raw income.
– you can expand your influence for “free”.
– you can exploit a specific resource and transfer it back via trade route without the cost of maintaining a new city.
– you can expand your nation and recruit new people in it. new members start with the advantageous colonial treaty giving you 5% extra tax on top of the nation rank taxes, and advantageous breaking closes to discourage them from leaving.

Why start as a colony?
– you start with all the techs of the colony’s founder, instead of starting from scratch. perfect to catch up if not joining a game from the start.
– you start within an existing nation, meaning you can benefit from their help and protection instead of starting alone.
– you start with a potentially well developed city and resources (depending on what the colony founder provided)

 

The colonies update
v0.0.13.x
– added succession start.
– added new leader start.
– added colony start.
– territory menu is now accessible from the worldmap.
– fixed issues with storage resource transfers.