Posted April 19, 2022 by Failosipher
Welcome back to another Beneath the Mountain devlog! It's been (somehow) already 4 months since my last update, and we've got a lot of new features and improvements to discuss.
Before we get started though, I know I said the previous build of BTM (1.1.9) would be the last public build, but because we adjusted our launch date, this (1.2.0U) will likely be the last public build of BTM until our official Steam launch.
New Background Art
We recently got some amazing background art from a very talented artist (Brandon Ellis), and we've been using it on the Steam page as well as the in-game loading screen. I'm truly happy with it and I think it does a great job of conveying the feeling of a dwarven kingdom and its people.
Unit Abilities
Adding abilities to the game really felt like it added a new dimension to the gameplay. It took about two months to implement this system and all of the various unit abilities, but I'm really happy with the final result. Adding abilities to the king, some of the dwarfs, and hostile creatures has really added a lot of value.
Below you can see all of the King's active abilities (he has many more passive abilities). Unit abilities come in two forms, baseline abilities (an ability the unit always has), or abilities that come from the "talent tree" (more on that later).
Creature Abilities
I've also added some abilities to the hostile creatures that you find in caves. The Lich has an ability to summon more undead units (up to a limit), as well as teleporting around randomly. The Greater Slime also summons Lesser Slimes while in combat.
Just to be clear, I plan on adding a lot more abilities to hostile creatures. I'm itching to do an orc and goblin shaman, as well as adding a ton of fire and shadow magic to the demons of the lesser floor. Also, the behemoth needs an enrage.
"Talent Tree" Version 1
Since I started this project, I've been dreaming of making this system. I had more fun making this system and its components than any other part of the game. I really, really love creating ways to customize a gameplay experience.
Below you can see the initial version of the talent tree system. I ended up not going with this design, but it was in the game for the better part of a month. Before we get into the 2nd version, lets discuss how this first version worked and why I ended up not going with it.
Version 1 was basically a series of rows, with talents that competed for your attention on a given row. For example, the third row talents are Charge, Leap, and Natural Born Sprinter; all movement abilities. So, the row basically says to the player "Here are three movement options. You must choose one of them to continue down to the next row".
What if I don't want to choose a movement ability? What if I want to choose two movement abilities? Basically, this system is restrictive and reduces the possible talent combinations considerably. I'm embarrassed to say, but my version 1 was basically a classic representation of the restrictive systems that have always frustrated me as a player.
Furthermore, the structure of the tree implies that the talents at the top are weaker, and the talents at the bottom are stronger. This means we have to concern our self with the balance and strength of each talent and if we ever shuffle anything around, we have to re-balance everything. This is tedious and a waste of time.
The Runeforge - "Talent Tree" Version 2
So, with all of the problems understood, I came up with the Runeforge. On the right are all of the talents for a given tree, and as you gain Runic Knowledge, you can spend those points to unlock talents in any order. This gives the player ultimate freedom to customize their gameplay experience. You can freely swap between trees (on the left), and the interface in the top right lets you know how fast you're gaining Runic Knoweldge.
I took a lot of time to come up with interesting talents that change how the game looks or how the game plays. Let's take a look at some of the more interesting ones:
New Building: The Forge (visual overhaul)
I can't believe this is actually the 3rd version of this building, but I think I finally nailed it lol. The Forge now has the same footprint as the Workshop (2x2 with 1x2 entrance tiles), and still produces Iron at a fixed interval.
New Building: The Mushroom Farm
The Mushroom Farm is an alternative building to the Brewery, and produces food over time. The Mushroom Farm is much larger than the Brewery (3x3 with 1x3 entrance tiles), and so it produces more food while only costing slightly more than the Brewery. When you have a lot of space (for example after clearing out a cave), the Mushroom Farm makes more sense to build than multiple Breweries.
New Building: The Deep-Water Dock
Another alternative to the Brewery, the Deep-Water Dock can only be placed next to water. Due to this restriction, it produces more food per minute than the Brewery. So, if you find yourself near water, always build the Deep-Water Dock!
New Building: The Alchemy Lab
The Alchemy Lab will offer a variety of upgrades (eventually), but for now it is simply the prerequisite building to train the new Explosives Expert unit (more on that later).
After many, many requests from the kind people in my discord server, I've finally added the Gate! The gate offers a way to control access to your kingdom. I often use it to stall enemies and let my troops get in position before taking on an incoming wave of goblins and orcs. The default keybind to open and close the gate is G.
New Building: The Berserker Hall
The Berserker Hall, like the Alchemy Lab, is simply a prerequisite building to train the new Berserker unit (more on that later).
New Building: The Library
The Library doesn't produce a resource in the same was as other buildings, but it increased the rate at which you gain Runic Knowledge (tracked on the top resource bar). You gain 1 Runic Knowledge every 5 minutes by default, and building more libraries increases that rate. Here's how it works.
- 0 Libraries - 100% research rate - 1 runic power every 5 minutes
- 1 Library - 120% research rate - 1 runic power every 4 minutes
- 2 Libraries - 130% research rate - 1 runic power every 3 minutes and 30 seconds
- 3 Libraries - 135% research rate - 1 runic power every 3 minutes and 15 seconds
- 4 Libraries - 137.5% research rate - 1 runic power every 3 minutes and 7.5 seconds
- 5 Libraries - 137.5% research rate - 1 runic power every 3 minutes and 7.5 seconds
As you can see, building more Libraries is beneficial, but only up to a point due to diminishing returns. Personally, I think rushing two libraries early gives you access to a lot of talent points through the gameplay session.
New Unit: The Berserker
The Berserker is a new unit in this patch, and can be trained after building a Berserker Hall. They have high attack speed, attack damage, and movement speed, but have low armor and no block chance. Berserkers are great to send in after sending in your dwarfs with shields, or are great for catching fleeing enemies due to their high movement speed.
I have plans to add some very interesting talents to Berserkers in the next patch, so this unit will only get more exciting. Also, Berserkers are really strong offensively, but unlike other high-end dwarf units, they don't require any Iron to produce (only more gold).
New Unit: The Ironguard
The Ironguard are the elite infantry of any dwarven kingdom. They have incredibly high armor, block chance, and a very large health pool. They also cost a lot of gold and iron to produce. These units are meant to be the late-game infantry that have the tenacity you'll need to push to the lower floors. Currently there is no per-requisite to train this unit; you just need a ton of iron.
New Unit: Explosives Expert
The Explosives Expert is the 3rd unit to be trained at the Mining Camp, and requires a completed Alchemy Lab building. This unit (by default) can place explosive barrels (which can chain-detonate) to do damage to rock cubes as well as friendly and hostile units.
The way explosive barrels work on rock cubes is interesting. When an explosive barrel damages a cube, it reduces the hardness of that cube permanently making it much easier to mine. When damaging non-gold-value cubes, the barrels deal a high amount of damage, possibly even destroying the cube. When damaging cubes that have gold value, barrels do less damage to the cube, while still reducing the hardness of the cube. Some gold is lost in the explosion damage, but the reduced hardness is often worth the tradeoff due to the sheer amount of time saved in mining.
Currently I have mixed feeling about the Explosives Expert. It's really fun to use, but very tedious. I'm looking at way of automating the unit. Imagine marking a cube to be detonated, and then letting everything else be handled by the AI.
New Cave Creature: Cave Goblins
Cave Goblins are a more primitive, less armored, less-trained version of the Greenskin that come pouring in through the main entrance. They're also more aggressive than other cave creatures and will actually come pouring out of the cave when it is opened by a miner.
Research & Tech Upgrades
Although fairly new, I've added the tech system, which allows buildings to research upgrades in the same way that they produce buildings or train units. Right now the only tech upgrades are at the mining camp, but I have plans to add a lot more tech upgrades to buildings like the Alchemy Lab, Berserker Hall, Forge, etc.
Bridge Intersections
After a lot of player feedback, I've added bridge intersection pieces. This allows players to cross holes in more creative ways. Also, you can still run rail across these bridges.
Another small quality-of-life improvement is the low health indicator that flashes a red border on the screen when the King is below 30% health an in danger of dying. Hopefully this helps some players survive close encounters.
I really wanted to make it easier to get to the next floor, as well as understanding how to get to the next floor. On the below screenshot you can see two types of indicators. In the top right we've got a 3D indicator that floats up and down, showing you that you can place stairs here. This indicator is always visible and only goes away when you've built at least one set of stairs on a floor.
The other type of indicator is the directional indicators you see in the top left and bottom right. These indicators show you where stairs can be placed even though the location is currently off-screen. Just follow the indicator and you'll find a place where you can go down to the next level.
Floor Tile Edge System
All floor tiles now have the "edge tiles" that make the transition from dirt to paved ground a little smoother. No-longer do we have these harsh lines where floor tiles start and stop.
Damage Pause Indicator
Buildings are now considered "severely damaged" when they are under 75% health. Under this health threshold, buildings do not produce units, resources, or research tech. The pause indicator you see below indicates that this is the case.
This creates a natural penalty for having your buildings damaged, but also allows buildings to still remain functional while only slightly damaged (over 75% health).
New Keybinds
With this new pach we have a few new keybinds in the Options UI. You can cycle through a selected unit type with Tab, Select the King from anywhere with K, focus (move the camera to look at) a unit with F, and open and close gates with G.
Gameplay Footage
I uploaded some new gameplay footage to go over some of the new features and more generally share how I'm playing the game. It's not a perfect run, but that's fine, dealing with disaster is part of the game lol.
We're getting very close to our final build now, but there's still quite a few features left to develop. Here's a rough list of the remaining scope:
Testers Needed
Do you want to play the latest in-development build and help make the game better? Join the discord server and ask to be promoted to the Tester role. Huge thanks to all the great testers who have helped find bugs and suggested solutions to problems. You guys are the best!