Kingdom of Subversion - Month plan!

Hey guys,

Just here to update you on what the plan is for the 0.10 being released this month and juicy and exciting new content you can expect! Since there is a lot I want to get done this month (preparing for the hopeful steam early access / demo release) I will break it down into different categories.

Bare Minimum:

Even if a lot of things crop up that really set me back, this is what will be delivered at the end of the month:

• Public Fuck Scenes for every Lumis character 
• Marina's default dialogues / repeatable scene (to bring her inline with the others)
• Revamped World Map (See below)

Likely Contents:

• Titania's level 2 progression (Oath Breaker!)
• New combat skills
• New Weapons & Armour
• Rebalancing of RPG Economy (see below)
• Complete Enchanted Forest (Formerly Forest of Drenwhin) map rewrite / plan (see below)

Hopeful Contents:

• New map areas that form a road map of how new areas become unlocked, creating a more linear progression (to stop people potentially meeting mini / bosses they are underleveled for)
• New area - Mountain Road
• New area - Rocky Pass

Revamped World Map

The world map is going to change quite a bit, instead of being completely open, it will be more like a path that you can progress through unlocking paths / routes to make journeys in the future. There will be destroyed bridges that get repaired as you unlock areas (meaning you won't have to keep walking through the area).

This is a massive part of the rebalancing ther rpg economy and the way characters can level (more on that below). But it's to give a clear concise path to you, so you know you aren't going to stumble into an area you aren't prepared for. I also think it will help give the feeling of progress rather than a random mix mash of events that you walk to and from.

Rebalancing of RPG Economy

This is kind of the biggy and most likely this biggest block of work. To start with, enemies will have levels (kind of like they do now), that will determine how the players interacts with them. If you are double their level, you can choose to expend stamina to instant kill them. If you are 3 times their level, you always insta kill them, and if you are 4 times their level, they no longer grant you XP. Or something to that affect, numbers may change as I playtest.

The amount of XP awarded by monsters will be looked at, including their damage and defences, and hopefully more enemies should become present too! And I also hope to start introducing more items, weapons, armours and skills. Souls orbs will be readdressed too, with all of them costing other components besides Blue Souls (components you can purchase and find from monster drops). 

Reoccuring mini-bosses will also appear which will allow you access to black souls and current bosses will be rebalanced with probably some new ones being added too!

I don't expect this to be perfect on release, but something that will evolve overtime to become a better player experience overall. I've never had to balance an entire rpg ecosystem before! (But looking forward to the challenge!)

Enchanted Forest / Forest Drenwhin Rewrite

This is part of the greater world  restructure and game rebalancing. The forest will feel more like an area you enter, explore, finding different routes, find ways that cannot be opened until later in the game etc. Enemies will get harder on different routes and more items will become available too.

Right now my basic idea is: 

• Path to get through the forest and the other side of the river due to the destroyed bridge
• (In the above path) area where caravan was attacked by goblins (part of Velexia's quest)
• Path that leads off to the goblin camp that attacked the caravan as well as goblin camp area
• Path that leads to major goblin camp (the one you encounter as part of Vulsha's quest line with the goblin shaman) - harder enemies path
• Path that leads to area with the Onii, who will be a boss and also have harder enemies near her home (Onii won't be included in this build though - she will be added in future builds)
• Path that is blocked leading to a mystery that will be uncovered in later builds (hint: it relates to Queen Selvana's / Roserra's origins). This will be gated by an item the player will pick up in future builds and contain extremely hard enemies, and a hard boss fight)

Other areas that will start appearing (such as the mentioned Mountain Road and Rocky Pass) will have similar layouts too. They will be areas you have to conquer and overcome to gain more freedom on the world map. 

Other ideas in passing (likely won't be implemented this build)

• Make powers toggleable (so you turn them on / off  rather them having a cooldown timer etc)
• When you are joined by a member of the Royal Court you no longer gain XP 
• This is thinking about in the future where you can get a Royal Court member to come with you and fight with you - Rear View of them on battle screen - and also links into changing their outfits.

Let me know what you think of these ideas! I hope they help to really strengthen the identity of the game and make it more interesting than a walking sim with random battles thrown in!