v1.4 (2024-10-12)

• fixed: bug where items couldn't be placed on / taken from ground if there was a text banner in front of party. In that case, the text banner was taking full control, even when the player didn't clicked on it to read the text, not allowing item handling
• fixed: bug where the game window's camera perspective was always taking the current desktop resolution to compute its aspect ratio, leading to graphics output with great differences across different setups and also causing issues with cursor mapping. Now, a fixed ratio is always used, regardless the current resolution
• fixed: bug where a leather armor couldn't be equipped by a wizard, even though the character was allowed training in leather armor skill. Turned out that leather armor skill was needed the fix, to disable training for wizards, updated '7.5 List' on RULEBOOK.pdf as well (thanks @Dennis). In addition, a couple other cases were fixed as well (not allowing shield training/use for wizards etc.)
• fixed: bug where a warning shown that a door couldn't be opened during combat, but without actually clicking on lever / keyhole, just by hovering. Now a clicking is required to show that warning during combat, and also cursor is properly set to hand above the door's lever / keyhole area.
• fixed: bug where a character's advanced level caused the affected stats (level, hitpoints) to always showing up (brownish colors), even after player opening his character's stats screen. Issue was only shown when player was opening character's stats through clicking its portrait and 'toggled' again the same character by clicking the portrait again.
• fixed: bug where the racial languages (i.e. dwarvish) were shown in 'Skills' page for choosing, during character creation, although they would still be provided in the end (languages known). This also caused some confusing overwriting in the added skills, at least graphically, since skill insertion order is not preserved. Now, the racially added skills are only shown *after* character creation and not during character creation.
• fixed: bug where quest items could be sold in a general shop, breaking the game in most of times i.e. quests couldn't be completed. Now these items have a flag on them so the shop recognize them and wont show them on 'Sell' page.
• fixed: bug in game's engine (jolt3d!) that was crushing the game if bogus resolutions were given through the settings, for example bigger than desktop ones. Now, the game gracefully exits in such a case, along with an error in log.txt
• fixed: bug in game's engine (jolt3d!) where some animations (i.e. title string in game's menu) or entire content (credits/attributions) weren't working / showing up at all. Reason was that 'scissoring' (the functionality that hide/shows specific regions of pixels) wasn't working well in windowed/letterbox modes
• fixed: bug where 'morning star' and 'flail' weapons weren't usable by 'cleric' profession at all, regardless their 'bludgeon' expertise
• added: a demo is now available in the store, showing the first two areas of the game
• added: additional content for 'Prelude' mode (early access content), 3 maps in total, following the events on 'Tomb of the Dreamer'. Be sure to restart the game as a number of things changed in save.dat file as well. (NOTE: content wasn't the focus on this update)
• added: window builds are now aware of DPI settings (i.e. 125% scaling) and won't be scaled if there's such a settings, not getting pixelated / blurred at all (playing at 100%, not scaled at all)
• added: small graphical improvements (gauntlets / helmets on ground)
• added: ability modifier is now showing up on computed ability scores (through hover/left click) on 'character creation' page
• added: race 'Elf' is now added to available races. In addition, the new language skill 'Elvish' was added, as well as 'Book of Elvish' to get trained on the skill. More in '4. Races' of RULEBOOK.pdf
• added: race 'Half-Elf' is now added to available races. More in '4. Races' of RULEBOOK.pdf
• added: race 'Giant' is now added to available races. In addition, the new language skill 'Giantish' was added, as well as 'Book of Giantish' to get trained on the skill. More in '4. Races' of RULEBOOK.pdf
• added: race 'Gnome' is now added to available races. In addition, the new language skill 'Gnomish' was added, as well as 'Book of Gnomish' to get trained on the skill. More in '4. Races' of RULEBOOK.pdf
• added: a new page in character creation, namely 'Choose a Subrace'. This new page allows the selection of a sub-race, including the base race, from the base race previously selected. Sub-races are further defining a given race with some extra traits, like in D&D.
• added: a new mechanic to increase abilities per advanced level, through racial bonus abilities. This will make sure that chosen races / subraces will end up statistically similar, with the intended characteristics raised up. More in '4.3 Abilities increase per level' of RULEBOOK.pdf
• added: updated the hit points formula for each profession, adding more balance overall and making professions even more distinct in that department, a requirement for the coming professions. More in '5.1. Hit points'
• added: profession 'Barbarian' is now added to available professions. More in '5. Professions' of RULEBOOK.pdf
• added: profession 'Ranger' is now added to available professions. More in '5. Professions' of RULEBOOK.pdf
• added: removed one ability from 'Strong Abilities' (shown in character creation), responsible to raising a bit the ability scores when a character is created. Now only one strong ability and one weak ability is provided per profession (for balance). More in '5.3 Strong / weak abilities' of RULEBOOK.pdf
• added: 'Light' spell now has an effect duration of 100 turns (rather 40), which should allow exploring a good portion of a dungeon and perhaps a round trip, if needed
• added: fixed some color imbalancing in both character creation and character pages in-game. In short, a number of labels were kinda yellowish, now turned completely white for better contrast, everywhere
• added: color highlighting for 'Melee' damage in character pages, based on current melee damage. Melee damage can be modified by various ways (monster actions, spells etc.), so this now shows either white (normal), yellowish (higher) or red (lower), similar to how ability scores behave
• added: an additional entry 'Languages:' on race / subrace description, showing the additional language for the selected race / subrace, which counts as a free skill
• added: removed the 'advancement type' of skills. In short, all skills require 'multiple trainers', each one teaching a specific expertise. Previously, there was one more type, namely 'binary', which allowed skills to be learned instantly to 'Grandmaster' expertise (i.e. languages). More on '7.5. List' of RULEBOOK.pdf
• added: profession 'Paladin' is now added to available professions. A few spells have also been added for this profession (more are coming). More in '5. Professions' of RULEBOOK.pdf
• added: spell 'Valiance' for the profession 'Paladin'. More in '14.6. List' of RULEBOOK.pdf
• added: spell 'Thunderclap' for the profession 'Paladin'. More in '14.6. List' of RULEBOOK.pdf
• added: subrace 'Stone Dwarf' for the base race 'Dwarf'. More in '4. Races' of RULEBOOK.pdf
• added: subrace 'Mystic Elf' for the base race 'Elf'. More in '4. Races' of RULEBOOK.pdf
• added: subrace 'Fire Giant' for the base race 'Giant'. More in '4. Races' of RULEBOOK.pdf
• added: subrace 'Cloud Giant' for the base race 'Giant'. More in '4. Races' of RULEBOOK.pdf
• added: subrace 'Storm Giant' for the base race 'Giant'. More in '4. Races' of RULEBOOK.pdf
• added: subrace 'Earth Giant' for the base race 'Giant'. More in '4. Races' of RULEBOOK.pdf
• added: subrace 'Forest Gnome' for the base race 'Gnome'. More in '4. Races' of RULEBOOK.pdf
• added: subrace 'Sacred Half-Elf' for the base race 'Half-Elf'. More in '4. Races' of RULEBOOK.pdf
• added: subrace 'Tribal Human' for the base race 'Human'. More in '4. Races' of RULEBOOK.pdf
• added: monster 'Mummy'. More in '11.6. List' of RULEBOOK.pdf
• added: animated trap 'Axe blade' that cause physical damage and occupy a full square (like the ones in M&M 3-5)
• added: stable from 'Amphill' leading to 'Crimson Bay' (the second large city) and vice versa. However, you need to complete a quest first before the route becomes available
• added: unique attacking sounds for each monster, with a few shares though, instead of the usual 'grunt', adding more to immersion level
• added: shops are now creating items with more variance, not allowing more than 2 items of the same variance (except on cases where the variants are too few i.e. helmets) and reduced likelikehood of basic/useless items. This also allows the creation of more magical items per variant
• added: pinpoints on local maps can now be added and saved, so player can remember his places of interest. These pinpoins are blinking to look more distinct to the other map symbols and can also be infinite in number. Finally, already placed pinpoints can be removed by clicking them again
• added: shop and skill trainer symbols on local maps are now shown, in front of their doortown where they can be reached, after the party visiting the relevant squares. Each shop / trainer have their own mini symbol on map, making it quite easy to revisit specific shops or a trainer in a town
• added: scrolling (panning) on world map, with either mouse (by clicking on relevant scrolling symbols) or through keyboard (by clicking the relevant scrolling keys). Four (4) new keys were added on 'Action Mapping' (on 'Options', search for 'Map Scroll XXX' actions) to be used on map scrolling and by default are the WASD
• added: more skill trainers in villages and towns. This increased from 2,4 (per village/town) to 4,8 (per village/town), effectively doubling down the available skill trainers per settlement type to cover more ground, especially on upcoming skills. Updated all current settlements to match this change i.e. Silkmoor now has 2 extra skill trainers
• added: for skills that require another skill to be learned first (i.e. 'long blade' requires 'short blade' to be learned), the expertise needed for required skill is now downgraded to 'apprentice' (level 5, 500g) rather 'adept' (level 10, 2000g). This will make the process of learning skills requiring other skills, much faster and cheaper
• added: gaining skill xp process was changed, allowing the entire party to passively gain skill xp, based on their equipped items (hands, chest), when a monster is killed. This fixes a couple of reported issues like training in-frequently used skills like 'leather armor', when a monster had to hit a specific character or when slow-to-act characters never had a chance to attack. This change allows a balanced allocation of skill xp across the party, in a way the regular character xp training does. More in '7.7. Character progression in skills'
• added: item description block feature was overhauled and improved in many ways. More details are now showing (item/spell names) and usability by characters (useful feedback by @elenda*******), useful when buying items from shops. In addition, an item in hand (mouse) can also be shown on shops, providing some kind of comparison against the highlighted shop item. A few more things can still be made though.