Hello again!

As promised, we present you the first major update to Ascendant Realms!

A big thank you to everyone participating in the beta testing of this update!

Since the last announcement, thanks to your feedback, we managed to include some additional changes and features in the update, that weren't in the original announcment.

But let us not delay, here is the full changelog of the 0.2 Update.

Steam Multiplayer

Long overdue, online multiplayer through steam is finally here! We hope this makes it much easier for you connect with your friends when playing.

• You can now switch between multiplayer through Steam, and LAN with default being Steam.

• You can invite and join your friends through you steam friends.

Wilderness Update

Heading over to the content update, there are quite a few new changes to core gameplay that will surely spice up both early and late game.

• Added new terrain types, hill along with its visual natural object, as well as a few extra terrains for the editor, including two types of roads, which grant extra movement speed.

• Added a new neutral faction, representing wild animals and beasts (and in the future banditry!) who are always hostile, to any player in the game.

• Collecting berry bushes for extra early game food is now no longer a free-action, and will use up the movement for your builders.

• Previously useless sand/beach terrain can now support fortress as a building, enabling you to construct a solid coastal defense and cover up the gaps in your fortifications.

• Hills, trees and other vegetation now populate the valleys, that big mountain ranges have been carved out of the previously large mountain ranges.

Wolves

• Alongside the neutral faction, wolves were now added to the game as early game threat, that makes you think twice before exploring boldly with your builders!

• Wolves now have an updated model, compared to their previous editor-only appearance.

• Wolves have slightly reduced base damage(5->4), but retain their bonus damage versus builders.

Dragons

Yes, you read that right. In this update you'll be able to face those legendary beasts as part of some challenge scenarios included!

These massive behemoths will truly test the resolve of your soldiers, and challenge your strategic sense, as you face them in open field.

General Improvements

Aside from the general content updates. A considerable amount of much needed improvements will be included. Some of these include:

• UI has been completely visually revamped in order to provide a much cleaner and more readable look.

• fixed a multiplayer issue with host sometimes receiving a wrong amount of resources in a game with AI, after the AI is defeated.

• fixed visual inconsistencies with resource display that sometimes occur when playing on multiplayer.

• fixed an issue when loading saved gamed/scenarios in which the number of player isn't correctly read from the file.

• fixed an editor issue with buildings not loading in properly in the editor, when the map is being loaded from a file.

• and many more, including editor fixes and visual glitches...

Balance Changes

Some minor balance changes will also be introduced, in order to better account for the introduced content. Note that some of these may vary in the final update. These include but are not limited to:

• wolf base damage has been reduced from 5 to 4

• wolves will no longer attack buildings (unless there is a tasty builder hiding inside)

• reduced speed of light cavalry from 8 to 7

• mountain movement cost has been increased from 5 to 8 to make them virtually impossible to move through, as their lower altitude hill counterpart, is now introduced.

• spearman now has considerable bonus damage versus wolves, to make them more viable in early army compositions.

• compared to the beta build, wolf minimum spawn distance is significantly raised (from 5 to 8 tiles minimum from any player)

Bug Fixes / Minor Improvements

• fixed an editor issue, where building would not be properly loaded when loading a scenario

• fixed a multiplayer specific issue where scenario settings sometimes would not be properly shared through the lobby causing a potential desync

• fixed a save loading issue, which caused the scenarios to not properly load game config from file

• replaced old icons in the editor, that were mistakenly left behind

• some descriptions were slightly rewritten to provide more clarity

• many new town names were added

• fixed a multiplayer specific issue which caused the wolves to appear as pioneers in the first turn for everyone but the host

• fixed the potential issue with unfair host advantage in a case where a multiplayer game is played with several players and ai's.

• context tech info-panel will now always dissapear when leaving the tech menu

• our twitter and discord is now accesible from the main menu!

We hope you enjoy! And please let us know what you think of this update!