Okay - Rephrasing, some sort of “API” to “do stuff” and interact with the game, rather than replace a model? shrug Maybe I’m missing the point… :x
As xaphnog mentiones, this is a core-feature of Stonehearth so the devs might have troubles to “hide” it from us 
. But I would expect that we will have easier access to all the interesting things with the start of the Alpha.
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I guess that’s a good way to put it, something more accessible to get started with modding.
since it wasn’t expressly mentioned, the easy-to-use modding tools will likely not be present … but I’ll bet @Geoffers747 lunch money that mods will be flowing within the first hour of the alpha 1 release…
re: castlestory, as a once staunch supporter, I can assure you, with the utmost certainty, that these two development houses are nothing alike… 
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I have to say… beginning parts are mostly the most fun parts in any kind of game… MMO’S, city building games… You name it!
I’m just ffing glad (excuse my french) they kept their promise. It’s something rare in game design world these days.
Edit: Look at how much attention they are giving their fans… releasing such a rough alpha and already asking our priorities? And I’m sure saving will be one of the first patches they release. Don’t worry, be happy, because every little thing is gonna be alright, that’s what I’ve been told… by three little birds… by my doorstep…
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Awesome! I say this as though I was expecting anything less, but I’m just glad to have confirmation of it.
Saving will be missed, and I can’t say it isn’t something I don’t want to see, heck I’d sacrifice the first month of updates to content and gameplay for saving, however at this stage maybe it’s not so necessary. After all, whilst intended to be fun to play, it won’t be initially, and for those who choose to be helpful, this will also act as a bug-tester.
My goal is to find as many bugs as possible 
Based on feedback, I assume some hefty work will be done towards saving though. I’m expecting hoping to see it by March if not February.
Awesome guys! 
s for everyone!
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No one mentioned the final paragraph? Clearly you all got caught up in the alpha info and stopped paying attention by that point. So let me say what I liked most in the post, next week we get the new graphics test, it includes the terrain generator. It includes the terrain generator! A whole new toy to play with in the two weeks leading to the alpha (because the start of the last half is way more likely the end for december).
We’ve actually already got that, over in the modding thread it was being used to do things add models or change the terrain. The main problem has been that the only way we can tell what stuff does is to copy it and experiment which are a bit limiting.
As for an easier way of modding, the modding tool from ye olde times is still a hope, still no idea how much will be possible though.
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Firstly I’m obviously massively excited, and throughout the past 6 months have had nothing but positive things to speak of in relation to both the concept of the game and the way that Team Radiant have handled everything and communicated with us as the community.
The next year is going to see so much change both inside the game and within our community and I am looking forward to watching both of those things grow - definitely fruitful times ahead and I’m glad we’ll all be there every step of the way
Secondly, on to the matter at hand - whilst the save feature is going to be missed, in the scheme of ‘alpha 1’ I’m not sure it will be that much of a nuisance - in terms of what we will have to play around with perhaps smaller play times are going to be more fun than a longer one (I imagine you’re gonna run the well of gameplay dry after a prolonged effort), I’m sure it will be implemented before long - or at least alongside a build that is needing a save function.
Onwards!
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After a few thoughts and minutes, that is actually very true, in my mind. I mean, there’s really nothing to do in the game at Alpha 1 other than start up a settlement and mass-produce a cookiecutter building or two. I mean, only one class, the Carpenter, means that a player can’t do anything complex or do much crafting, and the “basic construction” engine won’t allow a huge amount of flexibility, presumably. In a sense, this lack of saving just forces the player to continually reload the world, and, also presumably, the player will also be forced to explore and build in a variety of settings and environments.
TL;DR – The lack of save is good, because there’s little to do in the game and it will force the player to explore in new terrains, at least in Alpha 1.
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Definitely agree with all of the above.
And I think the dev blog sums the purpose of Alpha 1 up perfectly:
“We want your feedback, both on the things that we’ve finished and on priorities for what you would most like to see next in the game.”
Whilst it may not sound much on paper we’re getting access to essentially the core architecture that runs the game - anything we do to help remove bugs, or improve the function of these things is a bonus in my eyes.
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Their nothing wrong with complaining or voicing your opinion on things you would like to see or unhappy with. But if you are unhappy with what your reading. You should avoid playing the Alpha. All alphas are extremely buggy and will crash often. Also, the ability not to save is not a big deal. Why? Because this is not the final version of the game, it’s an Alpha.
If you want a more polished version of the game or one that you will be happy with. Then you should wait until they release it.
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I can’t wait to play the new alpha!
I just did some quick math to figure out the approximate number of people gaining alpha access, whether it be through PayPal or KickStarter, and the number is ~21000 
This does not include any of the people who have bought Stonehearth since the end of the KickStarter.
@Geoffers747 you might need another security buggy OR a legion of highly trained Robocops to effectively patrol our little corner of the internets; you can take your pick
Edit: @Xavion pointed out a mistake I made and I’ve adjusted my total accordingly. Thank you sir 
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I can tell you right out that you’re wrong, I believe you forgot to account for the $45+ getting two beta copies. Just with the numbers for the 30, 45, and 50 levels for kickstarter (the vast majority)
9942 + (1440 + 3316) * 2 = 19454 people
So that would mean that you can say at least 20k copies available, there could easily be another 5k since the kickstarter though, since although marketing died out it still wouldn’t be too surprising if there was 10-20k new beta buys since kickstarter. However it would likely be that a fair few of those people won’t be playing it for a bit (christmas means there will be competition for that gaming time from all their new games) and those 5k extras might take a while to be given out.
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something to keep in mind though, is what the alpha 1 represents, and what our role is in the process… its the first public client, with a handful of core features in place…
our objective is to put the game through its paces and see how it responds to situations and scenarios the developers never thought to account for, and using play styles that are dissimilar to their own…
having a very focused set of options, while perhaps not intentional, will likely work in Radiant’s favor, as we have only so many systems to test… we can really hone in on what works (to help further development efforts in that direction), and what is failing (to help, potentially, adjust the direction accordingly)…
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My wish-list of top priorities in order of desired implementation:
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Game saves. Least said soonest mended. Even if things break and aren’t always backward complatible, I think most people would accept that if they got to keep a game going for a while between world-breaking updates.
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Complete building, at least to one floor. This means completely customizable layouts for floor plans and some decorations in the Carpenter recipe. I would stick decorations in and have them be craftable out of wood right now, even if it would be illogical material to use normally. (i.e. brass lantern made out of wood.) Recipes could change with future updates, but just being able to throw down a floor plan, get your civies building it, and then adding a few lights and a door or two is going to give players large numbers of gameplay choices even when there isn’t much actual game there yet. I mention “to one floor” because eventually I’d love to do multiple stories, but I think that should be a lower priority than some other things.
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Classes and crafting. This is likely to be an ongoing priority, but I think getting new classes into the game should come soon after the first release. The weaver, farmer, cook, shepherd/herder, blacksmith, and maybe a miner/stonemason would be my first choice priorities. Then maybe working on some later priorities before adding more classes.
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So combat is really important to the future of the game, but I think a lot of game systems can and should be implemented before combat get priority. The next top priority would probably be either Farming and/or Animal husbandry, meaning the care and raising of animals. With buildings being designed and a few basic classes implemented to harvest and process the basic foragable resources, the next step would be to implement resource management and renewal through farming and/or raising livestock. This would let your civies transform from hunter-gatherers to an agrarian society.
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Then would come some basic story modules and working out how they would be implemented–how they will populate the world and what will trigger them. The first ones would involve resource gathering and sharing. “Caravan of merchants” or something. This would prep for the future motivation of combat.
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I’d probably go for a few more classes at this point. Advanced classes like herbalist, brewer, medic, maybe even start thinking about magic with the proposed scholar or explorer class, and soldier
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With all this completed, then it would be time to start on giving us the combat system.
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Somewhere in here would go all the fleshy, important-but-not-so-critical bits like soundtrack, volume sliders, resolution choice, etc.
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Serious increase in story modules. Time for goblin raids and titan invasions. Maybe a starving lagomorph or two in there to succor as well.
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Multiplayer.
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Cross-platform support. I’m not sure where this one goes in the list of priorities. I’d prefer to see the core systems developed before Mac or Linux support becomes a top priority, but I think that it shouldn’t be pushed back too much and should come out at pretty much the same time as any Multiplayer option enters the game.
Well this is my list of priorities. I’m sure others would prefer things to come in some other order.
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One of the reasons a lot of people were addicted to Minecraft was the fact that you could run servers and share the creations you made. Well, if Notch could do it, why can’t the guys at RE do so?
So, I want to propose an idea. Players should have the ability to run servers and play with many different players all over the globe. I think this idea was part of the Kickstarter as the $1,000,000 tier, although it was referenced as a “persistant, connected world”.
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@EpicDwarf There is also co-op remember
Happy to hear we still get the alpha without delay. Even with not so many features.
No save option is no big deal to me really. You have build everything there is in 1 hour or less. And from my experience savegames tend to break with new versions or have to start a new game to have the new features. Might not be the case here, but who knows.
Also does anyone know if you can still mod the game if you play it on steam?
But, will we be able to run servers?
hmm… That I dont know.