[ACE] Pre-Release 0.9.5.7h

DaniAngione · December 4, 2020, 5:00am

Non-STEAM Download links near the bottom of this message!

Many seasonal greetings, everyone!

Oof! Finally.
I missed writing one of these…

It’s finally time for a Stonehearth ACE ACE update! And guess what - it’s even bigger than the last one. (I hope this isn’t a standard )

I don’t even know where to start with the highlights for this version… But if you haven’t been following the Preview Thursdays and all the juicy news, I guess you can probably expect things like… The Brewer, a new class responsible for awesome beverages and drinks - or a huge herbalist overhaul with a whole new system of herbs, very dangerous but exciting wounds and treatments, a complete rework of certain systems like fishing traps, new visuals for the Arctic, exciting and immersive new weathers and ambient sounds, lots of combat changes including new types of equipment and a new role for the Cleric, new animals like ducks and oinkers and much, much more!

Important
We super-strongly recommend that you start a new game for this update. It’s serious, and we’re going to stress this more than once! This update changes a lot about everything and is very likely to cause dozens of issues with existing saves! This only - unfortunately - makes bug reporting more complicated because of lots of false alerts that we can get of all the old games exploding. So, please, start a new game or download an older version of ACE to finish/reembark your current game! Also, be patient with other modders - many of them will need to update their mods to properly work with this version of ACE, so we recommend you all to only use the mods that are ready for this version!

So be ready because this update is here to completely change the game!
And there is a reason it is so thorough and complete… And the reason is because - as said before - this is the last update before our planned Release 1.0 and Dwarves! Woot!
(This doesn’t include this version’s hotfixes and incremental patches, of course)

This was a long and complicated year for everyone, and we’re really, really sorry we haven’t released an update in so long… But that is because we’ve been working hard to get all these things and features ready, and hopefully you’ll all think it was worth the wait!

Maybe we can help you have a slightly better end of the year, to compensate for all the sad things we’ve all endured - and maybe as a sign that everything will be better if we stick together!

And as this message goes off, we’ll already start working on more awesome things for all of us, because it is the passion and the great community that we have that keeps this project running and, hopefully, will keep it going until we’ve gone through all the ambitions, dreams and ideas that we’ve been nurturing together to have an awesome experience with this beloved game! So, as always, a big thank you to all of you, to (and from) ourselves at the ACE Team and to the original Radiant team members for this little gem!

That’s it, now let’s get practical!

Stonehearth ACE

Previous release thread | Our official Discord Server | Our GitHub Repo

Pre-Release 0.9.5.7g - THE MASSIVE UPDATE

Download non-Steam Version | Download older versions

Important
This version of ACE is massive and touches a bit of everything, on every sphere of content of the game. We genuinely, strongly recommend that you START A NEW GAME for enjoying the most of this update. Existing saves are likely to burn, explode and cause injury.
MODS:
Although we have worked close to many modders and most of them already have “almost finished” or “finished” ACE 0.9.5 versions of their mods, many of them still don’t so please be careful when using mods - don’t try dozens of them at once and remember to point out you’re using mods (and which ones) when you report an issue!

If you are still playing a 0.9.4+ game and is really invested on it, you may continue by downloading the older version by following the link above!

So, with all that out of the way… if you’re mentally prepared for it…
Patch Notes!

0.9.5

(Please note, if you’ve read the “Changelog” that was made available on Dec. 2 in our Discord Server, that version was slightly incomplete and full of jokes please refer to this one for the official changelog!)

View Patch Notes

IT IS THAT TIME OF THE YEAR AGAIN…

Frostfeast is back!
The “Holiday Cheer Cap” recipe is once more unlocked for the Weaver.
The “Decorated Frostfeast Pine” recipe is once more unlocked for the Herbalist.
And just like last year, you may also craft presents (small, medium and large) with all basic crafters (Carpenter, Potter, Mason) using gold!
This time, however, all these recipes are under a new crafter category: “Frostfeast”
Presents contain all sorts of goodies, from valuable items and high-level equipment to a huge assortment of Frostfeast-themed decorations, foods and drinks.
Frostfeast foods will now provide health regeneration buffs.

BREWING HAS COME TO THE HEARTHLANDS

Please welcome the Brewer! This new professional will be responsible for bringing into existence all the flavorful, delicious drinks that your town shall consume! The Brewer is an advanced job (it requires a level 2 herbalist) with multiple tools and techniques for preparing beverages at their disposal.
The Brewer has 4 crafting stations: the Brewer’s Table (level 1), the Treading Vat (level 2), the Brewing Kettle (level 3) and the Copper Distillery (level 5). Additionally, they can also use - although not exactly crafting stations - Wine Casks (level 2), Fermenting Carboys (level 3), and Fermenting Vats (level 4)
Brewers can’t craft bee skeps but are able to take care of them.
The Brewer can craft several simple drinks like juices, some prepared drinks like teas and alcoholic beverages, which include a wide range of options - from strong, directly crafted spirits and liquors to weaker but more artisanal goods that require some time like ale, beer and wines.
As you expect, this means there’s a whole bunch of new drinks like fruit wines, a new type of tea (Pine Needle Tea) and more.
Many beverages have a new type of placement - similar to how tea works - and can be crafted by the Brewer. All of them require a serving keg, crafted by each basic crafter (Carpenter, Mason, Potter) and provide your town with a more efficient (and good looking!) way to distribute drinks. These special drink containers have a new stockpile filter for them.
With the addition of the Brewer job, the Herbalist and the Cook have now been released of all their brewing roles and recipes. They can still produce a couple of useful ingredients for brewing, however - the Cook can malt grain while the Herbalist can bundle gruit. The levels of all these recipes have been rebalanced.
Also because of that, many items that were previously crafted or handled by the Cook or Herbalist - like fermentation vats or carboys - have been redefined and will disappear and cause errors upon loading a new game where they existed. We’re sorry about that - we recommend starting a new game to enjoy the most of this update, as usual!
Also because of the new job and related resources, there’s a new food ingredient that is actually crafted by the Brewer: Vinegar. Not only used in some foods, vinegar is also now necessary for cheese-making and also for certain types of medicine. The Brewer can make vinegar from any of the fermented drinks (mead, beer, ale, wine).
Finally, like foods, Brewers of different factions have some unique recipes. Ascendancy Brewers can craft Sage Water and Buttered Beer, Rayya’s Children Brewers can craft Golden Gourd Juice and Almond Liqueur, and Northern Alliance Brewers can craft Sweet Potato Juice and Northern Spirit.

MORE DYNAMIC HERB RESOURCES

The herbs in the game have been re-organized to make crafting with herbs more interesting. Instead of being able to just hoard a single herb for all your herbal needs, they are now divided into different types that will be required to mix and match.
The two major groups of herbs are “Aromatic” and “Bitter” herbs. As a general understanding, think of aromatic herbs as fragrant, usually edible plants; and of bitter herbs as possibly toxic, more dangerous or simply unpleasant ones.
Beyond that, herbs are also divided in six color groups - red, blue and green (analogous to Body, Spirit and Mind) and yellow, white and purple, which are rarer.
Different combinations and matches of these qualities (for example, “red aromatic herbs”) will be the new requirements in recipes, giving the player an incentive to cultivate many types of herbs.
Most of the recipes that use herbs in the game have been tweaked.
Because of these changes and to provide a more diverse array of options per biome, many new herbs and plants have been introduced in the game. Go out there and discover roses, chives, daylilies and much more! Just be careful to not eat the ominous nightshade berries…
Finally, all the existing herbs in the game have been tweaked and streamlined over all. Descriptions of fully grown herbs, resources and seeds have been adapted to inform the player of their properties; models were centered and fixed; sizes were all fixed as well (for example, no more the Brightbell herb will be really tiny while the grown flower is really big)
Plants that had “Wild” on their names have been renamed to simply their actual names.

PICKED THE LAST FLOWER? FEAR NOT AND GRAB A BASKET!

You can now give “Foraging” orders under the Harvest menu. (The icon is a basket)
Foraging utilizes the same Wilderness mechanic that Trapping does - and requires a relatively large patch of terrain to be selected. Because of that, you’ll likely need wild, forested areas of the map for foraging.
Foraging is not an efficient way for acquiring resources. The animation for harvesting a foraging node is slightly longer, the odds of actually getting something are not the best and, when you do, most times it will be a single seed or a bundle of thatch. There are, however, some interesting uses for Foraging:
Although the chances vary according to the season, Foraging allows you to actually find any resource from a certain biome. This means that if the player, for some reason, runs out of a certain type of herb, tree or bush, they are able to get seeds or herbs through foraging.
It can also be used as a supplement for acquiring other resources that can be slightly difficult to obtain more of, like mushrooms or lily flower seeds.
Foraging tables are defined per biome, however custom biomes that are not adapted for it will still have a base table of simple drop that they can obtain.
Combined with the new herb mechanic that turns all previously renewable herbs into simple resource nodes, Foraging arrives not as a reliable gathering mechanism but as an option for when you’ve ran out of certain resources or they’re too far away from you.

THE HERBALIST: FROM ZERO TO HERO

The Herbalist and their mechanics have been completely reworked! After a long time serving as the most Internet Explorer of all jobs (for many players, its only useful purpose was to promote a Cleric) the Herbalist is now ready to prove their worth with expanded and improved capabilities on all their areas: Herbalism and Healing.
Wild herbs and flowers are not renewable anymore and will disappear upon harvesting. (the foundations of Stonehearth start shaking), but fear not…
Herb Planters have arrived to save the day with a new and renewable way to obtain herbs. Tended by Herbalists, they replace flower farms which are now available only as decorations. (More on that later, fasten your seatbelts!)
Herb Planters require seeds to work. Once planted, a planter will produce herbs without ever needing seeds again.
Because of that, seeds have also been changed. They still decay over time - however only if left outside/in the wilds. Any seeds you bring into your storage (chests, stockpiles, etc…) will not decay! This applies to all seeds in the game, tree seeds included.
Every once in a while the Herbalist will tend to a planter. Tending has a chance - based on several things like the Herbalist’s level or active buffs - to increase the plant’s quality.
There are many types of planters; window-boxes have been adapted to the system and will allow you to customize their contents (yes, you can now have any flower on window boxes!), there are also ground planters, pots, tree-planting pots for farming saplings and water planters for algae or lilies. Rumor has it that even mushroom planters might exist, but this is a secret that only a dwarf would know… Will they share it, though?
Finally, herb planters are not based on town knowledge (like farming) but on seed availability. All kingdoms can plant all herbs - as long as they have seeds.
Other than herb planters, Herbalists can now be promoted to a Brewer on level 2 - as mentioned above - giving them another specialization route.
There are also some new tonics with novel and interesting properties: Creativity Tonics, Curiosity Tonics, Refreshing Tonics, Warmth Tonics, Hydrophobic Tonics, Nightsight Tonics; and enhanced versions of all the existing tonics, crafted in a new and improved “Herbalist Metal Cauldron”. Tonics have been completely redefined and will mostly feel very new and exciting!
Additionally, certain tonics will have small negative effects when they wear off… Consider it an exchange - or a price - for their amazing benefits!
They can now craft most seeds in the game, including wild carrots, sweet potatoes and golden gourds or seed boxes for all nut trees and fruit trees, among others.
That said, they’re also able to craft consumables of different qualities now - which will have different effects like increased healing or improved (or longer) buffs and effects. High quality tonics will also prevent the aforementioned negative effects.
They can also craft new “equippable potions”. These consumables are carried by hearthlings and used when needed. More on that in the “GEAR UP WITH SOME NEW COMBAT STUFFS” section of the log!
Last but not least, the Herbalist is back to claim their rightful place as a healer with the Herbalist Beds, a very useful new piece of furniture that will be the preferred choice for wounded hearthlings to be taken to (that way you can keep them close to their curatives!) and an expanded selection of new healing items that are being introduced to deal with…

WOUNDS & NEW HEALTH MECHANICS

Wounds are new, special debuffs that hearthlings can acquire under several conditions. Most wounds will come from combat - but there are some wounds that might be encountered elsewhere - like frostbites.
Wounds have a very specific coloring and descriptions giving you all the needed details. As a summary, however, wounds are conditions that can only be removed with proper treatment (or, sometimes, over time) and will hinder the hearthling’s health while present - literally lowering their maximum current health points.
In simpler words, what that means is: Clerics will only be able to heal hearthlings up to a certain point, a limit determined by their wounds. After that, the wounds must be removed by a Herbalist before they can reach full health again.
You will be able to quickly tell a hearthling is wounded because their maximum health will be displayed in red numbers. Their unit frame health icon will also change to a damaged purple heart.
In the long run, what that means is that hearthlings with unattended wounds will grow weaker and weaker, reaching a point where their maximum health will be so low they won’t be useful in combat anymore - unless they get proper treatment.
The maximum amount of health that can be reduced by wounds is limited by the game’s difficulty setting. Wounds in Peaceful games will be a nuisance at worst; wounds in Hard games can be lethal. The description of each game mode has been adapted to reflect this.
Combat wounds, probably the most common wounds, are divided in three categories: cut, pierce and impact. Each category has lesser (bruises, scratches, etc…) and major wounds (slashes, broken bones, incisions…) Categories have specific medications and within these types of items, specific levels. For example, the Coarse, Light and Heavy Bandages are now the three levels of medications for cut wounds.
Lower level medications of the same type can still be used for higher level wounds, however they will require multiple treatments. For example, an ugly rend (the maximum level of the “Cut” wound category) can be completely removed with one application of Heavy Bandages or with multiple applications of Light or Coarse Bandages. That means that it is very easy to treat most wounds even without many resources, however the disabled time for the wounded hearthling (the time they’ll be in bed waiting for treatment) will be much longer when they don’t get the proper medications.
Hearthlings that are in bed because of wounds (recovering) will now spend resources (energy, hunger, thirst) three times slower. Combined with the fact that most medicine also have a certain nutritional value, this should allow well cared for hearthlings to be able to stick to bed for the entirety of their healing process.
The “Recently Treated” cooldown was increased to 12h. While “Recently Treated”, wounds will not be able to develop worsening conditions (like infections)
Medications for poisons and for infections will not apply the “Recently Treated” buff.
Obviously, major and more challenging wounds will only come later in the game - while early enemies shall rarely inflict light wounds.
There is also a new gameplay setting (toggled on by default) that allows you to let the game automatically queue crafting orders for the healing items your people might need. It works by queueing the order every time a new wound or negative effect is added to a hearthling. This will alleviate the micromanaging of the system a bit for those that would prefer to not think too much about it!
Some wounds can cause collateral effects (more general debuffs) like High Fever or Infections.
Additionally, when healed or otherwise removed, certain wounds have a chance of leaving a permanent effect on a Hearthling. Not all of these are necessarily bad - scars will definitely make them more menacing to enemies, right?
In summary, this system means that Clerics are no longer capable of keeping your town perfectly healed but will instead function as “combat healers” - what they’re meant to be. Proper, long term maintenance of your town’s health and your soldiers capabilities will require physical and material investment - and the correct professional, the Herbalist.
But fear not - there is actually something that the Cleric can still help with. Starting on level 2 and getting upgrades on level 4 and 6, a Cleric will be able to heal a hearthling’s wounds with magic. This ability has a long cooldown, however - and is probably not the most reliable way to stay alive - but it can be helpful for situations where you’re completely unable to obtain a certain medicine!
Finally, balancing difficulty-related mechanics is always a challenge so please share your experiences so we can always strive to find a better spot!

GEAR UP WITH SOME NEW COMBAT STUFFS

As mentioned above, there are now equippable consumables that can be carried by your soldiers to give them a slight edge in combat! There are basically two types of consumables at the moment: healing potions and anti-toxin potions. Healing potions, as suggested by their name, will work as a single use “healing” ability that they can perform on themselves when needed. Anti-toxin potions will also heal them but with the added benefit of cleaning (and protecting) them from toxins!
Added some new toxins. Toxins are similar to poisons but with a very short duration and a special effect other than damage over time. The only toxin in the game so far was the “Sleeping Toxin”, inflicted by the goblins with blowpipes… There are now five new toxins with multiple severities (from weak to strong) for you to find out! Get those anti-toxin potions ready!
The description of all the equipment swap/combat role commands has been edited to include some pointers on the benefits of using this or that, preferring bows or crossbows, etc.
A new weapon type has been added for the footman (alongside a new weapon debuff). This new weapon is a shorter polearm option that can be used with a shield. These weapons fit somewhere in-between basic hacking main hand weapons (like axes) and the swords (with the hamstrung debuff).
The new debuff type is called “Flanked” and it reduces the enemy Menace stat and also lowers their received healing value.
The “Hamstrung” debuff caused by cutting Footmen weapons has been slightly improved and will now slow down the enemy a bit more.
These same weapons also had their damage values slightly increased to compensate for the addition of the new, equivalent weapon type (main hand footman weapon)
There is also a new type of armor, Ring Mail, which can be worn by archers. They’ll slightly improve their defensive capabilities. As usual, it comes with Northern Alliance and Rayya’s Children variants.
The Archers combat logic has been improved and they’ll no longer use bow skills or play bow animations when using Crossbows. Which means they’ll actually respect the longer crossbow reload times now, attacking less often.
To compensate for their now (actually) slower speed, their damage per second was improved by reducing the cooldown, and the “Using Crossbows” buff armor penetration has been doubled.
Finally, the origin of the Crossbow projectile (bolt) has been fixed and should look nicer.
The Cleric now has two roles - similar to the other combat jobs. They are “Tomes” and “Scepter & Shield”. Each role has their own characteristics, basically acting as two sub-jobs.
Additionally, there is a new type of armor for the Cleric. This new and reinforced outfit will boost your cleric’s defensive capabilities, and also enhance their stats.
When preferring Tomes, Clerics will act as support/healers and will focus on keeping some distance and healing your soldiers. They’ll also have some new abilities and healing skills provided by the new enhanced Tomes the Herbalist is now able to craft:
Fine Tome of Healing adds a new spell that is very fast to cast but will only heal a small amount. It will, however, add a buff that provides some healing over time.
Ornate Tome of Healing adds the same spell above and also a really powerful - however with a long casting time - single-target healing spell that will heal between 4~5 times more.
The Legendary Tome unlocked by the Tier 3 shrine will add both spells and also a third one, Divine Intervention, that creates a shield of light around the target, protecting it from damage for a while.
To compensate for the new and powerful healing spells (and the items that can improve healing power), the basic healing spell has a small cooldown now. It’s not long, but it will prevent the cleric from being able to spam healing spells repeatedly.
Finally, the cleric will now use a weak ranged attack instead of hitting foes with their sacred texts. The range is somewhat short so their aura can still be useful.
When preferring Scepters and Shields, Clerics will be able to use any Footman (Light) Shield up to the Light Iron Shield and will fight enemies up close, debuffing them with multiple abilities meant for lowering the enemies’ capabilities.
When in this role, Clerics won’t be able to heal as efficiently. They will have no access to any of the single-target healing spells, providing only their passive aura as a small support.
They will, however, emit a new aura that will weaken foes. This aura replaces the Muscle Aura.
Their secondary weapon, scepters, come in three levels (Bronze, Silver and Gold) and are weak melee weapons when compared to Footman weapons.
They inflict a new debuff, however, called Rebuked. Rebuked enemies will have their healing received and their courage reduced.
The Silver and Gold scepters also have a chance to Turn and Smite Undead, respectively. This may only happen to undead enemies - but it will harm them greatly, if not destroying them right away.
Finally, the player weapon inflicted debuffs (Open Wounds, Flanked, Fractured, Hamstrung, etc…) are now restricted to being applied on enemies only. This is how it has always supposed to have been - and enemies being able to inflict these by using craftable weapons was an overlook from our part. This is now fixed and these can’t be inflicted on player characters anymore.

DaniAngione · December 4, 2020, 5:01am

More Patch Notes...

FARMING: A-MAIZE-ING CHANGES

Farming has also been redesigned with an expanded “Field Type” system.
Now, when you select “Farms” in the Zones menu you’ll be taken to a new sub-menu with different farm fields. These are: Farm Field, Bush Farm, Decorative Flower Field, Orchard, Timber Farm and Undefarm Field.
Farm Fields are the regular farms that players are mostly used to. They behave essentially the same as they’ve done before, but now you are actually able to rotate them when placing (similarly to how you can rotate furniture) choosing the direction of the furrows.
Bush Farms, as the name suggests, is a special farm for bushes or larger plants like Berry, Wintermoss or Dwarfsbeard bushes.
Decorative Flower Fields are dense farms with no furrows, useful for making beautiful flower patches or zones. These can not be harvested.
Orchards are special farm zones for cultivating nut or fruit trees like Almonds, Chestnuts, Apples or Plums. They will be automatically harvested and you can manually cut the trees, which will force them to be replanted.
Timber Farms are like Orchards but without fruit or nut bearing trees. The purpose of Timber Farms is to provide a reliable source of wood as they’ll be automatically cut and replanted.
Underfarm Fields are special underground farms and require special knowledge to be obtained…
All the farm fields will now display “ghost images” of crops so you can have an idea of their positions, being allowed to better plan and place them.

SHEPHERD CHANGES: WE’VE HERD YOU

The Shepherd is now somewhat easier to acquire due to a couple of changes, listed below:
Crafting a Shepherd’s Crook now requires a pelt instead of leather.
Becoming a Shepherd now requires a Level 2 Trapper or a Level 2 Farmer - instead of a Level 4 Farmer.
Other factions have received their own Shepherd’s Crook recipes and can now try to get a Shepherd before having to get a Carpenter (which itself requires a Blacksmith).
The Shepherd is now a very basic crafter, getting their own building, simple tools and few recipes, usually related to their products or animals.
They are now the only job with cheesemaking abilities. Cooks are not able to make cheese anymore.
They can also craft all the animal feed types and pasture beds.
Finally, they are also the ones that can craft “Butter” now, and received some new recipes as well:
Mayonnaise, food/cooking ingredient. Using oil, vinegar and eggs the Shepherd will also be able to make mayonnaise, a simple food itself but usable on fancier recipes.
Cream, cooking ingredient. The Shepherd can use milk to skim cream, a mildly valuable cooking ingredient.
Sour Cream, cooking ingredient. Obtainable through a cheese vat.
Small animal pastures (Rabbit, Poyos) can now hold a bunch more animals than before. This should allow players to make tighter, nicer looking chicken coops. They have a maximum amount of animals as well, to prevent pastures with 60+ poyos, for example.
Ducks, new pasture animal. Ducks are like poyos, providing some meat, feathers and a steady supply of eggs. Unlike poyos, however, ducks will require more space and produce eggs slightly slower. The advantage is that they’re unlocked on level 1.
Oinkers, new pasture animal. Oinkers - or pigs - are friendly and chubby creatures that will provide a lot of meat when slaughtered, including (finally!) a renewable source of “Pork” meat, only obtainable through trapping or trading until now. But perhaps their most prized product comes from keeping them alive…
Rare Truffles, food/cooking ingredient. Rare truffles are very valuable and usable in extremely valuable recipes that will provide not only great nutrition but also a powerful new buff: Earthly Flavors. They are sometimes dug up by Oinkers, more often in the Winter.

FUEL SYSTEM REVAMP

The fuel system has been entirely changed and should be much better now!
Instead of simply requiring fuels as recipe ingredients, workbenches will now actually require to be fueled. While the fuel grades remain as broader categories, different types of fuel can now have their own effectiveness. This new mechanic aims to bring two improvements by itself:
The first is that you can now craft multiple items with a single unit of fuel (for example, a potter can now craft 3 recipes with a single unit of Bundle o’ Firewood up to 8 recipes with an unit of Lumps o’ Coal - which should be very helpful for Desert and/or Rayya’s Children players that struggled with fuels.
The second improvement will directly affect the crafters’ efficiency by not requiring them to find and haul the extra ingredient on every recipe, reducing their workload noticeable for those that used a lot of fuel (Cooks, Blacksmiths, etc…)
Fuel items will be consumed by the workbenches as soon as they are required. For that reason, all the fueled workbenches are now containers as well - with the highest priority - and fuel can be stored within them before being consumed.
You can customize the fuels used by each workbench with filters, just like storage crates!
By clicking the workbench, you can also visualize the amount of fuel available it currently has.
Workbenches without fuel will be unlit, will have different models (For example, ovens won’t display the firewood underneath them) and will have a special icon on top of them.
Fueled workbenches will be lit and look as they’ve always did - however, even though they look like they’re constantly burning, there is no passive fuel consumption. Fuel is only consumed during crafting!
Obviously, unlit workbenches will not provide warmth.
Fuel-related recipes and products have been re-balanced to accommodate those changes. In general, crafting charcoal or coke is now faster and more efficient.
Finally, as expected, fuel as an ingredient has been removed from all recipes in the game. Please note that some recipes might still require fuel items (For example, the “Steel Ingot” recipe requires charcoal) but that’s because charcoal is actually an ingredient for making steel.
Firewood recipe has been reduced to provide only one “Bundle o’ Firewood” instead of two. However, when compared to logs, firewood is twice as efficient. This was done to reduce the amount of extra items created - instead, Firewood doubles your wood/fuel efficiency through the new system.
Only the Carpenter can split blocks now. We’re considering (eventually) allowing workers to split firewood - so you wouldn’t require a specific job to obtain this basic fuel - but for now we’re limiting it to the Carpenter because it makes more sense and carpenters are now easier to acquire.

BUILDING: A SOLID FOUNDATION

The Builder code in Stonehearth is very daunting and scary. We’ve managed to experiment with it a bit for this release, however, and here are some nifty improvements.
First and foremost, a very requested feature is finally here: Building templates will now consider alternate workbenches when you can’t craft (or doesn’t have) the ones in the template. What this means is that they’ll now use a different version of the same workbench if available, thus allowing you to build most templates regardless of the faction now.
Secondly, the game now has a proper Fence Tool! Found under the Place Menu, the Fence Tool can be used to draw fences. You can save and load fence patterns (with some coming by default); You can set different steps of a pattern and which fence will occupy that step - and then you can drag and drop to draw a repeating line of your pattern. If the building material base game toggle is active on the settings menu, drawing a fence will also automatically queue all the necessary parts.
However, the major and most important systemic change we did is that we’ve changed how building effectively happens - part of an effort to make the game more efficient and weird mistakes less likely to happen (like abandoning certain materials on unreachable positions)
That change is: hearthlings will now “deposit” construction materials into the building site instead of carrying them around. Once “deposited”, the building material is deducted from the building costs, so you can visualize how many materials are left to be deposited simply by checking out the required/remaining materials.
Once “deposited”, hearthlings can just go and start plopping blocks without actually needing to carry the material as they move. This improves building speed greatly not only because as long as they’re willing to work they can without having to go back for more resources, but also because if you have diverse materials in use (like bricks, stone, wood) they won’t have to go back and forth between materials all the time. You might notice a severe improvement in building speed.
We have added support for ”ordinals” on building materials. They’re present in the base game’s files, but irrelevant for the UI code. Until now.
We have reordered some materials that had wrong positions (for example, they were split from other colors of the same shade but different lightness)
We have renamed some materials that had inconsistent names (for example, some vanilla materials had the mid tone refer to itself as “Shadow” and the darker tone as the mid tone)
Once upon a time, a command to dump an in-game construction to a .qb file (voxel model) existed for the console, but stopped working when Radiant updated to the new builder… That function is now fixed and the command can be used again!
Additionally, we fixed another base game issue where the materials of the very first “slab” of construction were actually ignored by the builder when computing the material price of a construction (!!!), we’re amazed this existed, but the reason it was never found out is simply because of how the fabrication actions work, previously requiring materials on hands for hammering every single bit - so these materials always got actually used even if ignored by the builder price calculation. Funny nonetheless!
We also added some new colors, like Slate stone colors and rooftops.
Finally but definitely importantly: the collision and placement of many (if not all) the objects that are not fixtures (windows, doors) and used the old “Align to grid” function has been remade. This is because we found out that this was the reason behind objects sometimes rotating wrongly when you rotate a building template. This is an old, base game issue that has been around for a long time and is now finally fixed. There are a couple of caveats, however - the first one is that this probably broke lots of furniture items from existing building templates - sorry about that. The other reason is that square objects with even sides (like 2x2) will not rotate on their own axis anymore.
And one last thing: Because of the issue above, we had to fix all the existing base game templates. Due to that, we took the opportunity to refine lots of them, adding icons to their names (identifying their town tier) and changing/adding some furniture, other than fixing previously broken furniture like bar counters. This is part of an ongoing effort to create nice, functional templates for all jobs for all kingdoms in all tiers (1, 2 and 3)! You’ll notice that the first Kingdom we started this process, Northern Alliance, now has a complete Tier 1 set that is much faster to build than their previous buildings, which is now the Tier 2. And we already have a Tier 3 planned for them - so expect that in the future.

(RE) VISIT THE ARCTIC

The Arctic biome has been improved! We’ve decided to bring it to the same standards of all the other biomes by giving it some things that it was lacking when compared to the Temperate Forest, the Desert and the Highlands: slightly more diverse generation, visual variants for all trees in all seasons and a better distribution of unique resources. So now the Arctic will have a more special and unique look on each season, and you’ll also encounter more available base resources (like boulders for stone) and new unique features (like marble veins)
The Arctic trees will now behave differently as well. They no longer drop specific, visually identical seeds to each color variation of tree but instead a single seed for arctic junipers and a single seed for arctic pines. Planting the arctic seeds has a random chance of giving you any of the tree types. The specific seeds are still in the game but now as a buyable or craftable commodity.
Spring and Autumn in the Arctic have had their durations increased (three days each) because they were too short and barely had time for seasonal model changes. To compensate for this, the Winter is now one week shorter and the Summer is one day longer. Call it global warming.
Finally, a new game starting on the Arctic will have the “Summer” season selected by default.

WEATHER CHANGECAST

We’ve tweaked the weather-selection mechanics and now biome files support arrays of weather weights, each value being an equal time fraction of the respective season. In simpler words: the game is now able to consider how far into the season it is before choosing the next weather, which means that we can create smoother transitions…
…And so we did! We’ve basically tweaked all the seasons on all biomes to give them a much more immersive experience! Get ready for a colder late autumn, blizzards and deep snow only around the middle of the winter, occasional late snow in early spring and so on… Weather will now be much more dynamic, hinting at which point of the season you are instead of being randomly spread across. No more going from sunny straight into a blizzard!
More details on how to use this new mechanic on your own biomes under the “Modders & Enthusiasts” section.
Weather buffs were all adapted to use the category and rank system instead of simply rejecting each other, which should make them slightly more lightweight (shouldn’t be anything noticeable, though).
The hot weather debuffs (“Hot Weather” and “Extremely Hot Weather”) will now have a lesser effect on hearthlings’ speed.
Additionally, the “Freezing Weather” and “Freezing Water” debuff was tweaked to take different levels of cold protection into consideration. While it only considered protection against freezing weather before - and everyone else was damaged the same regardless of being naked or wearing cold protection - it now takes that into consideration and reduces the rate at which it damages hearthlings (and also increases the minimum health they’ll be left with). To compensate for the change, the minimum health for completely unprotected hearthlings was reduced to 20%.
There’s a new animation for hearthlings walking under heavy storms, blizzards, etc… They’ll cover their faces! It’s adorable.
The consumption buff “Warm Belly” will now slightly slow the damage over time and increase the minimum damage of the “Freezing Weather” and “Freezing Water” debuff. All in all, if wearing only cold weather clothing and eating stews or drinking tea, hearthlings can pretty much withstand blizzards without much health - so the game will be less punishing if you didn’t manage to craft freezing weather clothing for everyone before the winter.
The sounds and ambience of many of the weathers have been rebalanced and tweaked for a more immersive experience, which generally means a raise in volume and effects across the board, for louder storms and winds, etc. You can always lower the volume for ambient sound separately, if that change bothers you, but we assumed it is better than not being able to hear it at all.
Additionally, some new sounds and effects were added to different weathers, and some to new weathers, as an attempt to also give some flair and personality to each season. Things like spring cicadas, summer crickets, migrating birds in autumn, etc… But we’ll let you discover these!
Some existing weather effects were improved to look a bit nicer, most notably the sandstorm.
Improved the icons for “Sunny & Hot”, “Heat Wave”, “Early Snow” and “Late Snow” to be clearer.
Slightly adjusted the descriptions of certain seasons and weathers to better reflect all the new changes and tweaks to weather.
Finally, there’s a bunch of new weathers to spice up your seasons even more! From autumn breezes or sand drifts to hailstorms or a complete whiteout, get your seasonal clothing out of the wardrobe because things are about to get even more interesting!

FISHY CHANGES

Fish traps are reworked and completely different from their previous iteration.
You can now place fish traps as soon as you promote a Trapper, with no restrictions. They do not need to be crafted anymore - and will instead be “built” by the Trapper itself.
Once placed, a fish trap shall provide similarly to how it did before, although with a new (fancier) animation of the trap being checked. The system is much more lightweight and should perform better - for that reason there is no limit on the amount of traps anymore.
That said, they will influence each other - so you can’t place traps much closer together or they’ll have lower efficiency. You can see their “influence region” when placing.
Fish Traps now have biome and season loot tables, which means that certain fish meat are - once again - unique to their biomes.
And just like before, you can click the trap’s anchor and choose whether it will harvest the fish for its meat or capture it for the player to release it wherever they want!
Finally, as with all changes that might affect game balance, please report your experiences with this - if you feel like you’re getting too much (or too little) fish from your efforts!

OTHER TRAPPER CHANGES

Trapping areas are now divided on more categories, and can present more animals than before.
There’s now a “Medium Game Trapping Ground” that will allow you to capture animals like deer, boars and sometimes raccoons or foxes.
The “Large Game Trapping Ground” has more diversity and now focus mostly on the large beasts like stags or bears.
And there’s a new “Exotic Game Trapping Ground” for getting animals like Duckducks or Ostriches.

FOOD & DRINK SPOILERS

We’ve removed the “Raw Food” complaint from all the foods that have quality 3 (Raw and Tasty). This is because it feels weird that being raw is a problem if it is tasty nonetheless, and complaining about things like a fruit being raw makes no sense. Some things are meant to be raw, and are tasty like that, so expect fruits or certain nuts and mushrooms to not give negative thoughts anymore.
As part of the everlasting challenge of balancing food/production gameplay, we’ve introduced something that was “dormant” in the base game files: prepared food decay. Just like ACE drinks, prepared food can now decay as well.
Prepared food takes much longer than non-prepared food to decay, giving you more than enough time to consume it or sell it. So it will really ever be a problem if you produce far too much more than you need. It might present a slightly more interesting challenge on harsher biomes or during the winter, however.
Some changes have been made to give the player options on dealing with that, though. Just like the change with plant seeds, food and drinks that get stored in a container (or stockpile) shall last slightly longer than food or drinks left out in the open.
Additionally, there are now some new craftable containers that can help out with food and drink preservation. A couple of simpler versions can be crafted by the Mason and Potter, and an improved one by the Engineer.

DON’T TALK TO STRANGERS - UNLESS THEY’RE FRIENDLY

With this update, we’re also introducing a new “campaign” in Stonehearth that we’ve been thinking about for a long time. We call it the “Friendly Strangers” campaign, and it is basically a dynamic foundation for tutorials and tips that can be slightly more interesting (and funny/cute) than common, technical tutorials.
This happens through the visit of a “friendly stranger” that arrives when certain conditions are met. For example, Bruno the Fisher shall visit your town and help you understand how to use fish traps after you promote a Trapper.
These strangers will have strong personalities and unique dialogue, providing you with their insight. They’ll also hang around your town for a while.
This campaign will only be active depending on the difficulty level chosen during game creation; Hard will not have any friendly strangers while Peaceful and Gentle will not only feature the tutorials but each stranger will also leave a gift to your town upon departure. Normal difficulty will feature the strangers but they’ll leave no gifts.
Finally, the way it is set up is very modular and easy to replicate, allowing other mods to use this campaign as a foundation for their own friendly strangers, if they wish.

IT LOOKS BETTER, AND HERE IS UI

The Unit Frame (for those unaware, “Unit Frame” is the name given to the small, dynamic window on the bottom left of the screen that appears only when you have something clicked, giving you information about that something like its name, mood (if a hearthling), health points, etc…) has been overhauled and should now display information more clearly:
Buffs and debuffs have been moved from the left side, where they would often get cut out from the screen. They will now appear on top of the UF, buffs on the left side and debuffs on the right side.
Party commands have also been moved to a better location on the side, where they won’t get in the way of buffs and debuffs. That same side is now also used by new party attack commands that can be given directly into hostile entities, if you have them selected. There’s also a new border color to point out hostile entities.
The amount of commands was becoming too much for certain entities, so now there’s support for “Command Groups”. These will open up and show all the available commands when you hover over them, but look as a single item when not hovering. The most common example of this is the Move and Undeploy commands that are now grouped under the same “Move” group. Hover over the “Move Item” command to see the Undeploy command, when available.
Entities that can receive titles now have a little “lock” icon next to their names that allows you to lock their title to whatever it is set. That way you can have your hearthlings carry around your favorite titles without it changing automatically!
You can now Save and Load storage filters settings. The storage filters that you can load are based on the type of storage and the filters it uses (for example, a common chest will have different saved templates than a drink cask)
We’ve included a wide range of default storage filters that should help you get used with the system before you make your own!
You can also Save and Load embarking profiles. This basically refers to the Roster Creation screen, allowing you to save a certain roster, preserving the hearthlings names, appearances and stats. This is very useful for people looking for the perfect map, for example, because it allows you to quickly restart your game several times without having to create and customize a new roster every time. Got a landmark you don’t like in the wrong place? No problem! Just restart and load your saved embarking.
Some icons and images have been refined and improved to better fit the Stonehearth universe. This includes several traits like “Sleepyhead” or “Light Sleeper”; some buffs like bee-related buffs and other images like the icon for cheese.
You can now see a highlight around the recipes that can be crafted with the currently selected workshop (or the ones that can be crafted without a workshop if the crafter itself is selected - or if the recipe menu was opened through the start menu). This option can be toggled in the settings menu.
You can also see a very small number between parentheses on the top left of recipes inside the crafting screen. This amount represents how many items like that you already have in your town’s inventory.
There is now a harvesting overlay for Vegetables.
Drink satisfaction icons on the crafting UI have all been centered.
The “Light Headed” and “Quite Woozy” icons have been recolored to account for the new, lighter level of alcohol, “Slightly Mellow”.
The “Item Palette” UI file has been changed to a patch instead of an override, this should help with compatibility for other modders.
Changed the icon for the “Clothing & Tools” stockpile filter so it looks less like armor and more like civilian clothing (which is what it actually represents)
Fixed an issue that caused UI problems in the job screen when an inactive job was present.
Fixed a base game issue that caused the unit frame to not properly update and move its elements when a new command was added to an entity you have clicked.

DaniAngione · December 4, 2020, 5:02am

Even more Patch Notes!

EVERYTHING ELSE…

Added

The Suspendable component is a new ACE component that can be used to define the behavior of other components when a town is “suspended” - that is, when this player is disconnected from the game. By default, ACE will pause certain timers like farming or shepherding timers, etc… But it can be highly customized! More information will be provided on the “For Modders & Enthusiasts” section.
There are now two new social interactions in the game that are randomly performed every time hearthlings decide to socialize (when their social value is low). These new interactions will basically have the same efficiency when affecting their social values but have shorter durations. One of them is a slightly shorter conversation (just one exchange) and the other one is simply an emote exchange - for example, one will laugh and the other will wave. The results of this change is that not only do town interactions look more natural (with more diverse interactions, small chats and cute waves) but also be generally shorter on average, thus increasing the time hearthlings have to perform their work. The main purpose of this addition is, indeed, to increase their efficiency without removing any of the flair or cute aspects of their behavior.
There is now a “Wooden Wagon” containing all your starting items near your standard when you start. The wagon can’t be undeployed but will provide you some starting storage space without having to draw huge, cluttered stockpiles. The entity used can be customized per kingdom, allowing modders to create their own thematic wagons! Check the “For Modders & Enthusiasts” section for more.
We’ve added support for multiple talismans to be able to promote hearthlings into the same job. What this means, in essence, is that you can now have a Carpenter by promoting them with either a normal “Carpenter’s Saw” or a “Bone Saw”.
Hearthlings promoted with alternate talismans will have alternate tools in-game as well.
You can check out the alternate talismans on the job screen - just hover the mouse over the required talisman display.
Some factions will only be able to craft talismans with certain looks.
The talismans that can be crafted by certain crafters and available to certain factions have moved around a bit:
The Northern Alliance Mason can now craft a stone axe to be used as a footman talisman; They can also make a Weaver’s Spindle out of bone and a Herbalist’s Staff; The Shepherd’s Crook, however, was moved to the Potter.
The Rayya’s Children Potter can now craft a ceramic spear to be used as a footman talisman;
They can also make a Herbalist’s Idol, a ceramic shepherd’s crook and Stone Chisel.
The new Stone Axe is a two handed weapon, giving the Northern Alliance a starting two-handed (damage) footman.
All loadouts have been updated to reflect the above changes.
We’ve updated the “Destroy” command with a new feature: it will now instantly remove/disappear with items that get selected, after confirmation. Hearthlings will still have to go and remove larger/placed objects, but items on the ground will now just disappear, making the tool much more useful for performance cleaning/abandoning stuff.
Bale of Boughs, resource. Usable as a lower grade fuel or as thatching material, it commonly drops from trees with leaves and will definitely help you out early on! It decays over time into common firewood. During the winter, only evergreen trees will drop boughs.
“Bug Stew Tagine”, a new food to replace the “Tasty Bug Stew” recipe when playing Rayya’s Children.
Royal Jelly, consumable. Rarely obtained while harvesting bee skeps, can be used as a medicine on its own, as an ingredient for crafting even better medicine or as a resource to create new bee colonies from existing bee skeps, allowing you to multiply your production without needing to cut more trees…
Leeches, consumable. Also rarely obtained but from water plants like algae or lilies, and mossy water boulders. Can be used to treat infections.
Wild Golden Gourds will now spawn on the Desert and can be used as an early vegetable.
There are now filters for pine cones, birch catkins and purple wax plant seeds under the “Brewing Ingredients” category of input containers.
There is also a filter for hearthbud seeds under the “Plants” category.
Water Lily Pads and Water Lily Flowers, previously available only through traders, can now spawn on all biomes. The available colors will be different per biome.
Dressers and Desks are now storage containers. They have limited capacity and storage, but can be very useful for safekeeping your workbenches or talismans, outfits for crafters and workers or other types of tools. Desks can’t hold outfits but can store gold coins and other trophies and treasures.
The Reembarking system is now able to keep track of certain buffs for reembarked citizens, thus allowing some of the new features like wounds or scars to be taken on new journeys!
We’ve added support for item quality odds on loot tables, so you can now make certain loot come with a certain quality by default.
It’s also possible to add other filters on loot tables now, like - for example - seasonal requirements.
There’s now a toggle under the ACE Settings menu that allows you to display (or not) the water zones on farms. These are the blue lines that show how far a farm can reach for water.
All basic crafters are now able to repair items that can be damaged and are crafted by their profession. What that means is that your carpenter is now able to repair broken wooden doors, your mason can repair broken stone doors and so on… Which means you won’t get stuck with damaged doors after an invasion anymore! As before, the Engineer can still repair all items.
Cactus Flower Helm, armor. A funny new helmet that can be rarely bought from Rayya’s Children blacksmithing traders. It damages attackers when worn.
Ore veins have a new description that will point out the other (new) things they drop when mined, like Marble or Feldspar.
All ore veins will now have a small glint effect when they’re selected/moused over.
The Geomancer can now create summoning stones for spawning marble and feldspar veins.
There’s now support for buff whitelists and blacklists for entities. Whitelists will basically allow only these buffs to be applied on that entity while blacklists will specifically block these buffs from being applied.
Vines like Daisies or Highland Vines will now have a “Remove all parts” command that allows you to give them a multiple harvest order without having to worry about things on different levels that required several clicks to remove.
We’ve added a new settings menu toggle that allows the player to choose if they want their soldiers to get issued squad orders when their Job setting is off. The default setting is that they will still follow orders when their Job setting is off.
A new kitten has, unfortunately, joined the family of lil’ kittens that you can randomly and rarely get to visit your town… Please welcome Mila with all the comfort and kindness in your hearts. Like Teddy about a year ago, Mila was part of that same group of three kittens living in Dani’s (from ACE Team) area, and are mostly abandoned and neglected by their “legal owners”. They are, however, much cared for by lots of people around, people that are happily providing the things they lack the most: family, food and love. Sadly, for not really belonging to any of those good people, they have to remain free… And on May 20th, 2020, Mila was fatally hit by a speeding vehicle. If it is any comfort, it was very quick and she did not suffer - and now she shall join her old pal’ Teddy and the original Stonehearth kittens Jack-O and Koda in making your town a better place, forever spreading their joy and sweetness, for as long as we play the game and honor their little, shiny memories. <3 Mila was very cuddly and playful but also quite feisty and brave - for that reason she shall be e town protector, fighting off enemies with you!

Changed

Input Casks have had their collision and destination improved and can now be accessed from more directions, allowing them to function better when stacked. They can also be placed on walls in the Builder, which allows you to stack them there as long as there’s a wall behind.
The values and amount of servings of most beverages has been tweaked to reflect their new recipes and crafting logic due to the creation of the Brewer job.
Stockpile filters have been tweaked to include the new “serving containers”; additional and new ingredients have also been added to input container filters.
The Input filters themselves have been cleaned of leftovers or unnecessary resources and has been remade to better reflect what the players usually need together.
Most supply items like baskets or chests are now multi-filterers instead of single-filterers. That means you can have multiple types of herbs in the same Supply Bin, for example.
Some “heartier” foods will now provide a buff that slowly recovers health when eaten. There are three levels of this buff and they’re mostly present on Chef’s Specials.
Many of the food and drink related thoughts have been rebalanced and had their values changed.
Additionally, thoughts related to certain traits, like lovely food or drink, have also been rebalanced.
Hearthlings can now get servings from food and drinks without having to remove the item from inside the container it is stored in. What that means is that if a hearthling wants to eat a slice of bread from a bread that is inside the chest, they’ll just go and take it directly from the chest. This should help keep towns a bit more organized with less work, since they won’t be removing things from inside containers all the time now! Additionally, there might be a tiny performance improvement for having to deal with less restocking tasks.
The way the drinking needs and AI actions are handled has been changed, and so were the eating libraries as well. Users should see no difference but modders might have to adapt some things differently. More will be explained in the “For Modders & Enthusiasts” section.
The “Porcelain Flower Planter” was renamed “Porcelain Daisy Vase” to not be confused as a new herbalist planter. This will throw errors and cause them to disappear in any saved games where they might exist.
The recipes for all window planters have been changed - they now require the seed of the planted flower instead of the herb itself.
The Potted Cactus recipe has been moved to the “Building Parts” category, like all other window planters.
Changed the animation of the Herbalist when crafting Bee Skeps. They won’t use their mortar and pestle anymore.
The way bee attacks work is now different and should be much less annoying. The principle and how it happens is still the same – but now instead of being held in place by constant attacks in case they can’t leave the range of the skeps, once attacked a hearthling has a “cooldown” period before it can be attacked again. That period should ensure that hearthlings are able to complete the task at hand and leave without being stun-locked.
Additionally, the Beekeeping hats have been renamed and tweaked. They are now the “Professional Beekeeping Hat”, usable by any crafter, and the “Simple Beekeeping Hat”, usable by workers and field workers.
The capacity of Supply Casks has been increased from 48 to 64.
Slightly reduced the happiness penalties for being in cramped environments.
Existing herbs have been adapted to the new system. Colors and types have been assigned to all of them, and balanced across all biomes. All of them have had their descriptions change to also inform the player of their type of herb.
Green Wax Plant and Purple Wax Plant now drop “Green Wax Plant Leaves” and “Purple Wax Plant Leaves”, green bitter and purple aromatic herbs, respectively.
Silkweed plant now drops “Silkweed Leaves”, a bitter green herb.
“Silkweed Bundle” has been renamed “Silkweed Fiber Bundle”.
The recipe for making Silkweed seeds now use Silkweed Leaves instead of Fiber Bundle.
The visuals of all the Water Lily Flowers and Lily Pads have been updated to be more similar to Stonehearth’s style, especially the already-existing lilies in the game (they can be found as part of an unique Ascendancy Tier 3 decoration)
Additionally, Lily Pads will now drop a new herb, “Lily Pad”.
The Ascendancy Craftsman mason recipe “Lilypad Basin” has been updated to use ACE’s lilies as resources.
You can’t start the game by placing the Town Banner underwater anymore.
Frostsnap will not spawn in the Highlands biome anymore.
The Highland Vines have had their models updated.
Vines have been refactored and count with two new functionalities. You can now choose a setting in the gameplay settings menu that will allow your mouse to highlight all the entities belonging to the same vine; and you can also click a single button to order the harvest of all the parts of a vine.
Additionally, the way they work has been slightly improved and they should be a bit more functional.
Mushrooms can now spawn ready for harvesting - and not always one stage prior.
The spawn rates of many plants, trees, and objects has been tweaked. You’ll notice that nut trees are quite less common now, for example.
The bulk charcoal and bulk coke recipes for the Blacksmith have been given new icons so you can tell the difference from the default recipes now.
You can no longer give party commands to non-soldiers with a hotkey.
A lot of things have been changed for how restocking works. One of the major changes is that now when you select the “All” filter it will instead choose all the possible things that container can accept rather than anything. What that means is that a crate that can only contain, for example, corn, wheat or apples will now contain only the three of them if you choose “All”, rather than anything in the game. The former behavior was intended for helping poorly tagged items get restocked however it also limits modding capabilities for creating more interesting containers and options… We considered that the benefits of this change outweigh its only reason to be, and that poorly tagged items are a responsibility of their creators and should just be fixed
Due to the new way filters can work, the Kibble Bowl filters now do not include an “Any Kibble” choice but rather let you choose which kibbles are allowed.
Continuing the effort started in the last few updates, now all the base game “mixins” have had their “type” removed, effectively allowing them to be freely used and modified by other mods without breaking the types of entities.
Added a spinning spoon for the herbalist cauldron.
Completely overhauled the existing boulders, both from the base game and ACE. They will now have pre-determined collision regions (rather than dynamic ones generated on loading) and the folder structure of the ACE-added boulders has been organized to mimic the base game structure. This change should actually have a positive (albeit very small) impact on game performance, and a more noticeable effect on loading and game creation times.
The “Meteorite” landmarks are now slightly rarer.
Tweaked the graphics for the “Cooking Oil” item so it is easier to identify the contents of the jug.
Added the new ingredient, Vinegar, to some of the Cook’s recipes.
We’ve tweaked the values of clay supply bins and amphorae to make more sense when using the same resources and producing the same ability over time.
The “Saw” animation has been tweaked and fixed to use whatever tool is in hand instead of always using the generic saw animation.
Improved the recipe text on some “advanced” workbenches to point out that they can replace other workbenches entirely; for example, the enhanced blacksmith anvil can be used for any crafts that require the normal anvil.
Tweaked (and hopefully improved) the logic when applying terrain blocks (like Geomancer’s blocks), particularly when placed on water.
Buffs can now add thoughts by default and so the “add thought” buff script from ACE was completely removed. Buffs that previously added thoughts (Merry Time, The Morning After, etc…) have been adapted for the new method - and some thoughts were added to other buffs like Undead Infection.
Daisies will now drop herbs more often when harvested.
Bundle of Thatch has been renamed “Bale of Thatch” to be more easily associated to the “Bale of Wheat” and more distant from the “Bundles” of fibers.
Bale of Thatch is now more efficient when building, which means that less thatch can build more blocks.
Finally, Bale of Thatch can no longer be used as fiber.
The Weaver “Woven Baskets” are now made with thatch instead of fiber.
The overall value and shop tier of many weapons was slightly tweaked for balancing.
Slightly tweaked the visuals of the Archer outfit for Rayya’s Children, changing the default metal hat to leather.
The Ascendancy Cleric’s outfit model was slightly changed to not look like platemail under the cloth so much, and be more consistent with its armor value.
All the weapons and armor from ACE and from the base game have had their material tags re-organized to be completely standard. More details on how to adapt your mod under the “Modders & Enthusiasts” section. This will probably not break existing items from other mods, however, so it is not necessary.
Bear attacks and bear packs will not spawn on Winter anymore. Already spawned bears will despawn when winter arrives.
Consumption and other ACE buffs were all adapted to use the category and rank system instead of simply rejecting each other.
The Geomancer’s “Hearthbud Seeds (x3)” recipe has been changed to produce two seeds instead of three.
The final “Geomancy” quest in the Amberstone questline will now provide 2 Hearthbud planter pots instead of the plants themselves since the plants are not renewable resources anymore.
Additionally, when getting your first geomancer you’ll also unlock the recipes for Amberstone planters - they’re the only ones that can grow Hearthbud flowers.
Wax Plants seeds can now be purchased form traders.
The Cook’s crafting section previously called “Animal Feed” is now called “Pet Kibble” to make it clearer.
The Mega Watermelon can now be harvested for special animal feed for ducks instead of common watermelon baskets.
The “Leather Bolt” weaver recipe is now a level 2 recipe and the “Plushie Toy Rabbit” level 3.
“Fine Stuffing”, refined resource. This new refined item can be crafted with wool, feathers or cotton and will replace these same items on many recipes like cold weather clothing or beds, thus allowing the player to be able to provide these two important things with less challenge. Some very specific recipes still require the correct resource - for example, a knitted winter cap still needs wool and can’t really be made with feathers.
Improved the logic for the application of fertilizers.
Pets should need to eat around 40% less often - and will be able to “storage” more calories when eating.
Most pets will also have more health, thus becoming more difficult to kill. Specially a certain pet acquired through a certain quest - should now have a lot of health.
Made it so you can’t embark on water anymore (unless specified on the kingdom’s settings, allowing for modders to make water kingdoms)
Some cooking recipes were adapted to require mayonnaise, cream or sour cream instead or in addition to things they required before. For example, the “Any Milk” ingredient from “Fruit Yogurt” was replaced by “Sour Cream” while “Mayonnaise” was added to the Sushi recipe. Ew, I know – but apparently it is a thing.
Changed the “Auto Cricket Golem” models to look like they’re old, slightly mossy and dented, since they’re usually obtained on the side of the road or left to you.
The “Blacksmith Hammer” and “Knight’s Shield” model replacements are now done through the entities rather than file overrides, which allows modders to customize these for their own mods like new kingdoms.
Likewise, the “Knight Outfit” and “Knight Helm” have also been adapted to be more compatible, mixing into the base game entities rather than copying them.
The Northern Alliance’s “Spear Horn” legendary weapon has had its description fixed (it was too big, not fitting the unit frame) and the model changed completely now that the original model is being used as a Herbalist’s staff. It’s more similar to the other upcoming legendary equipment pieces for the Northern Alliance.
“An Ancient Monument”, the big rabbit statues, has been renamed “Ancient Monument”.
All edible nut baskets will now last much longer before spoiling
Paddy will now last longer before spoiling.
The “Testament to the Righted Wrong” decoration can now be re-embarked. If you don’t know what that is, just keep playing
Thorulf and Rattley will now require “Small Healing Tonics” instead of “Coarse Bandages” for the hunting trip.
Prickly Pears are now fruits and not vegetables anymore.
Potter’s Amphorae now require 3 clay to be crafted instead of 2, and are worth more gold.
Potter’s Ceramic supply bins require 2 clay to be crafted instead of 3, and are worth less gold.
The Mason’s Bonecarving Studio recipe now requires ore instead of ingots. For the Northern Alliance, it requires bone material instead of ore.
Slightly improved the colors on the little note in the different “Herbalist Lab” models.
Changed the icon for the buff your crafters receive when they visit the Clan Amberstone.
Improved the icon for the “Basket of Sugarbells” item.
Separated the brewing colors from the “ACE Color Map” and created a new “Brewing Color Map” - this should prevent model issues with all the other things using the ACE color map.
We’ve tried to improve the color coding of many aspects and objects of the game, like buffs and such.
We’ve also returned to the base game system of color coded job uniforms. We’ve reached the conclusion that not only this helps in locating certain hearthlings more easily, especially when from a distance, but it also simply looks better. It really does - and adds diversity to your town!
Military uniforms remain unchanged, as these are the only pieces of clothing that make sense to have faction colors.

Fixed

Properly fixed a couple of issues that were still lingering with pets, kibble and pet feeding. They’ll now properly eat kibble from bowls and prioritize them over other foods.
Also fixed an issue that made pets get stuck while trying to eat honey.
Corrected a lot of small typos, bad commas and other small issues in many files of the mod by validating them through JSONLint.
Fixed an issue that actually prevented certain foods and drinks to have higher priority depending on the weather, as it was intended. It should now function correctly.
Deleted and/or removed a lot of unused assets or old files that are not necessary anymore.
Fixed many typos in game loading messages or tips.
Fixed some typos within the Thorulf & Rattley questline.
Fixed lots of typos with items’ names and description, like instances where “chain mail” was called “chainmail” and such. Chainmail per se is not wrong but we had conflicting cases and standardized it all as “chain mail”.
Fixed a typo in the “Shepherd’s Crook” recipe where it said “Shepard” instead of “Shepherd”.
Fixed a typo in the “Broth” recipe.
Fixed a small typo in the “Bronze Shield” recipe.
Fixed the “Rabbit Hair Shield” description to not be too long and clip through the Unit Frame.
Fixed an inconsistency with the description of small supply casks. All of them would mention a capacity of 28 items while the casks can actually hold 32 items.
Fixed a vanilla error that caused chitin items to float in the air under certain circumstances. That happened because none of these items had their basic properties set up.
Fixed an issue that allowed the player to use assigned hotkeys for Combat Party Commands (like “Move To” or “Attack Move”) when selecting objects that can’t even move, like a tree. (No, it did not cause the trees to move - just gave an error )
Fixed a couple of issues with combat training and improved how it works.
The Moonbell and Daisy Flower herbs were uncentered and have been corrected.
Fixed an issue that prevented Highland Vines from displaying their seasonal models.
The Yew Tree Seed, Highland Pine Tree Seed, Parana Pine Tree Seed and Willow Tree Seed had issues with their scaling and position and have been adjusted now. The God of Symmetry feasts once more.
Fixed a base game bug that ignored the effects of buff stacks after a reload; only the effects of one stack were being considered.
Fixed several base game restocking AI issues and problems. All in all, restocking should be slightly smoother. We might have introduced some new issues as well, so please report any oddities!
Also fixed some crafter logic for when choosing ingredients and collecting them.
Fixed some localization issues with stockpile filters.
Water bodies that are created by or part of landmarks will now properly merge/connect with existing terrain water bodies.
Fixed a long-standing issue with Iron Doors, their model used to clip inside the terrain and should now look nicer!
The icon for the “Change Owner” button present in certain objects like beds has been properly centered.
Fixed an issue that caused Footmen and Knight to equip weapons that were not their set preference if their current weapon was the initial wooden sword. They’ll now prefer to keep the sword similarly to how the Archer keeps the initial bow even if you have a crossbow lying around.
ACE properties were not being properly applied to the “Wolf Helm” Northern Alliance’s exclusive armor piece. This issue is now fixed.
Fixed an issue that could happen when a melee unit had the option of hunting. That was not present in ACE itself but should work for compatibility with future mods, and is now fixed.
Fixed a problem within the “Transform” component that prevented it from being used alongside the “Evolve” component.
Fixed an issue that allowed a hearthling to have both the “Bohemian” and “Alcohol Intolerant” traits at the same time.
Fixed a harmless engine error that often happened whenever the Titan Fight started.
Fixed an issue where the specific biome hearths were not being loaded. Now they should have biome-themed colors.
Fixed an engine error that could appear when a neutral event destroyed a tree and was lucky enough to drop a beehive (for example: lightning during a storm).
Fixed an issue that caused a lot of Raw Rice recipes being automatically queued by the Cook.
Also fixed an issue that caused animals to “get stuck” trying to eat “Raw Rice”.
Fixed some water fluid simulation issues with the sponge/source component.
Fixed some base game weather state small issues.
The God of Symmetry has awoken from its slumber and plunged into their first holy strike against an old enemy… The “Stone Bench” is now reworked, has a proper size, centering and position. Its name and description has also been updated.
Some of the Orc/Goblin random shields had a weird placement and were appearing floating near the arm. They’ve been fixed and should now look more similar to the existing shields.
Fixed an issue where the cold protection buffs (Bundled, Very Bundled, etc.) were not properly working for NPCs.
Fixed a base game issue that forced game_master nodes that can be repeated to always use the same string for text or dialogues if multiple, random options were provided. For example, the Amberstone “Strange Trading” quest had multiple different dialogues available for the visitor that offers the trade, however once the quest ran once, the same dialogue would always be chosen. Now there’s support for actual random dialogues.
Fixed an issue with pillaging quests (some invasions).
Fixed an issue with donation nodes that were not registering the donations correctly into the player’s inventory.
Added a limit to the base game “Crystal Charging” Amberstone quest to prevent it from ever going over 100%.
Fixed some base game issues and edge cases with the dispatch citizen nodes, like sending away a crafter while they’re crafting.
Fixed a base game issue with storage filters for certain fiber items like “Coarse Fiber” - the item was not accepted by its own input container filter due to some inconsistencies. They should now be properly filtered.
Fixed a base game issue with some landmark blocks not properly tagged, mainly ore types.
Fixed an issue that caused deer Antlers to still be recognized as pelts by the game (this is from the base game and was supposedly already changed in ACE, but the change wasn’t working)
The God of Symmetry is back after a long slumber and has come to smite two very old enemies at once: Market Stalls (Clay & Stone) and Chests (Leather-bound, Ornate and Amberstone). These items are now better positioned/symmetrical and won’t look off when placed back-to-back with each other.
The God also took the opportunity and visited the “Golden Supply Wall Stone Shelf” Tier 3 item from the Northern Alliance to fix its weird misalignment.
Aquatic animals will no longer be damaged by sandstorms.
We fixed a base game bug that caused certain objects to break their collision and placement when evolving or transforming on tight spaces next to other objects. This caused certain ill-desired effects (for example, drink fermenting vessels that couldn’t be refilled for being placed tightly with other vessels)
Fixed an issue that made some objects that get spawned on world generation to be created as their iconic versions instead of placed objects.

DaniAngione · December 4, 2020, 5:03am

[Reserved for “Modders & Enthusiasts”]
(Sorry, we couldn’t get all the documentation ready!
We’ll try to update it as we go but please feel free to ask any questions/advice with modding using ACE resources!)

Well, congratulations are in order if you’ve read everything!

And if not, that’s ok too. It’s always nice to jump into a game and surprise yourself with all the new things
As usual, we all hope that you’ll have an amazing time, will enjoy it as much as we enjoyed putting it all together and get your appetite ready for more!

Oh, and you know: if you find any bugs or issues please MAKE SURE TO REPORT THEM! This is very important and it is what keeps us going forward!
So please make sure to always report them, here or in our Discord Server (preferred) and we’ll do our best to see it squished!

Thank you very much for your time and stay warm!
-Dani

ThisDude · December 4, 2020, 9:01am

It might be my own fault, but the update doesn’t seem to work properly. The non-steam version with no other mods, doesn’t work. The steam version is fine tho.

Wouter_Sikkema · December 4, 2020, 12:15pm

What about it doesnt work? Do you get an error? If so what error?

DaniAngione · December 4, 2020, 12:54pm

The upload might be borked, I’ll re-upload it later today

ThisDude · December 4, 2020, 2:04pm

it just simply wont start, unlike the steam version that is running perfect. (slight bug i found tho, the new bone weapon for the northern aliance, the bone short spear is displaying the wrong name)
Other than that the update is amazing

DaniAngione · December 4, 2020, 3:43pm

I re-uploaded the non-steam version, feel free to try again

Also, if the game launches with a black screen but you have music and such in the background, might be a known issue - try pressing F5

ThisDude · December 4, 2020, 6:29pm

Yes, thank you, I am familiar with that trick but it was not working. I will test it out now

Lexal9 · December 4, 2020, 6:56pm

i’d pay the ace team to support them, but i have no income, and legal sticky
also great update! is amazing

NRising · December 4, 2020, 10:16pm

The game crashes on me about ten minutes in, this time I was trying to click the “disallow” hunt button to see if that’d let her (an archer) hunt, and… game crashed. Last night was just letting the hearthlings do whatever, and crashed. No idea what lead to either, yesterday or today.

DaniAngione · December 4, 2020, 10:18pm

Hmmm that’s interesting.

Any mods in use? (if so, which ones?)

If you can provide the log that would be helpful too (in the game’s folder, stonehearth.log - has to be right after the crash, if you launch the game again the logs are lost)

NRising · December 4, 2020, 11:20pm

No mods, took me three years before I’d even allow that in Fallout 4 >.> I rather prefer Stonehearth modless.

I’m gonna try and attach the log.stonehearth.log (63.2 KB)

NRising · December 4, 2020, 11:20pm

There ya go. (I hope?)

NRising · December 5, 2020, 3:33am

Crashed again, this time after I marked a few animals for the archer to hunt. I’ll attach the log…

Also, someone pointed out that game doesn’t completely exit upon crash, rather freezes. That’s how mine crashes. stonehearth.log (85.2 KB)

DaniAngione · December 5, 2020, 4:29am

I’m not being able to understand nor reproduce these crashes, played for hours straight today, no crashes
Since you’re not using mods, I’m guessing that maybe your mod download is corrupted somehow? (or the game itself?)

I’d try unsubscribing to ACE, let it be removed and then subscribe again. Or simply verify the game files or reinstall it (if you don’t have it on Steam, then just reinstall it straight away)

I’m sorry, but it seems like there’s something specific crashing your game, maybe a model or file, and I’m not being able to make it crash by doing the same things so I suppose it could be corrupted files.

Findersword · December 5, 2020, 4:35am

About a week ago, I was having weird unexpected crashes. Searching the forum here, I came across some advice that fixed it. Deleting the folder named animations in the Stonehearth folder, and then restarting the game, made it recreate that folder. Somehow the data inside was corrupted.

NRising · December 5, 2020, 5:40am

I’ll delete and reinstall, quite possible it’s something small. At the very least, best way to find a problem is to start fresh.

NRising · December 5, 2020, 5:41am

I’ll try that first. Thanks

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