Lots of things to talk about in Update #6

Hello all, I'm back with another round of updates. I had a little extra time these past few days, so it's a bigger update (and a longer dev log) than I was originally expecting. I'll start with the most exciting updates first!

Putting it on the map

This feature has been in the pipeline for a while now, and I finally got the right inspiration to go ahead and create it: a map! 

How it works: Before you enter a battle, the map screen will pull up to show you which encounters you have completed, and which are yet to come. White hens represent normal encounters, brown are elites, and the dark grey ones with gold outlines represent area bosses. Merchants get their own shop icon.

How it will work: The current version represents half of the desired functionality; you can view your path, but you can't act on it. Eventually, you will be able to select your next stop from a series of nodes, similar to Slay the Spire and other turn-based roguelikes. I'll also add some new icons as I add different types of encounters to the game.

For now, the map will appear on the screen for a few seconds before hiding itself, but it'll be more prominently featured once there's more to do with it.

<!>TRADE OFFER<!>

A lot of commenters mentioned that they wanted a way to remove tiles from their deck. When you're fighting a boss, deep into the game, it's a pain to have a deck full of measly 1 damage tiles. But I also didn't want to have you buy the ability to remove tiles; maybe eventually, but for now, I wanted something that presented a more interesting choice. 

So, in Volume 2 of the Economy Update, in comes The Trader!

This shady little frog will present you an offer: he'll take three tiles off your hands and will offer you one in return. However, the tiles he chooses are random. You might get a great deal, or you might have him trying to take the very best your deck has to offer. Either way, it's up to you to decide if it's something you're willing to give up. 

Also, I don't really trust this guy. Seems a little weird.

Quality of Life Changes

• Retain gold after death: Now, you retain a portion of the gold gained during a run. It uses a logarithmic function courtesy of Qwerty from Discord to give newer players a slightly better gold reserve ratio. This will make it easier to reroll loot or spend some coins at an extra-early shop.
• Automatically end your turn: A few requests for this one - you no longer have to push the button to end your turn. In the Gameplay tab in Settings, you can toggle "Auto End Turn" to complete your turn right after placing your tile. Just make sure you put it where you want it, because you won't get chance to move it.
• Ambient sounds get their own slider: If the rain or wind bothers you, you can adjust the volume separately from SFX volume.
• Easier leaderboard entries: Entering your score in the leaderboard will now clear out the entry field and play a sound. You can also press enter to send the score, however this occasionally won't work if you're still clicked into the entry field. I'll inspect, but it might be an engine problem!
• Damage panel displays damage change: As damage racks up, the damage panel will now indicate the change invoked by the last tile. It'll be a little easier to track where the damage is coming from, especially for tiles with variable damage amounts. 

Other changes

• Speech bubbles: Enemies will now randomly call out phrases during key moments in a battle. Most of these phrases are just taunts or boasts, but some of them might actually mean something. Who knows?
• New enemy in the Pond: The burning chicken in the starting area was both too difficult for new players and not thematically relevant. It has been replaced with a new enemy that should give a gentler welcome. Hope you dig him. Get it?
• Super combos: When tallying a three-in-a-row, if there are multiple on the board at once, they will all tally together. Gone are the days of burning an extra turn to land the next hit. Moreover, tiles will count toward the score for each row that they appear in. Just imagine the possibilities.
• Beautification Project: I've updated visuals for a few things. A few enemy animations got redesigned, and the title screen got a big visual update.

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In other news, we finally know the expected value of the Jackpot tile, courtesy of AdanMez. The Jackpot Tile uses a weighted chance; instead of being a series of independent 25% draws, I guarantee 1/4 tiles will hit. It feels fairer to me. However, this also means that the EV of the tile isn't 2, like you would expect (0.75 * 1 + 0.25 * 5).

Well, our hero reprogrammed this tile in Python and then set it to play ONE BILLION TIMES to figure out what the actual expected outcome would be. It took over 6 minutes to finish running! I think this is great info for the more risk-averse among us. It's a worse outcome than the Strong tile, but it's often worth taking the chance.

Thanks for tuning in!

- unbreaded