0.7.0e1: The Doctor

Hey Drifters!
We've got an update to test for you all; The Doctor.
With this patch we introduce the first specialist: The Doctor. Specialists are unique drifters that unlock specific content. In this case, The Doctor offers a way to cure drifters from their pollution diseases.
Additionally we took time to look at the current game features and improved them. Improved diseases. A new large handmade map that goes from West to East, which is a step into the direction of procedural generating an infinite map. A look at morale, with increasing drifter needs. A look at resource progression using tools and much more!

What's next?

The original intent for this patch was to introduce a "Hub" on the map, where objectives originated and could return to. However during testing, it felt "off" with back-tracking not providing a good play experience. We took a pivot towards specialists, people with specific knowledge and training that you'll need to rescue in order to build more technologically advanced constructions. This fit the narrative and game design we envisioned for future patches. Most large future updates will introduce new specialist with their own new content. So expect more to come! :)

It's still in an early stage so it will only be available on experimental until we iron out all the kinks and get it to where we want it to be.

This patch is still in development and can be tested on the experimental branch to give feedback.

This is how you can enable the experimental branch of Flotsam. This will only work when you're not in a game:
1. Open Steam Library
2. Right click Flotsam
3. Select Properties
4. Go to tab 'Betas' at the top.
5. Select 'Experimental' in the drop-down.

Early Access 0.7.0e1: The Doctor

0.7.0 introduces the first specialist: The Doctor. With specialists larger future patches will arrive in chunks, one for each new specialist that introduces their own new content. This patch also comes with a large, straight map (West -> East) which is another step into the direction of an infinite, procedural map. We've also taken our time to look at the current game features and improved them, like diseases, resource progression and morale.

Specialist: Doctor

• New Construction: Med Pod.
  
• New Construction: Apothecary.
  
• The Med Pod and Apothecary Constructions can only be unlocked in the research tree if you have a
  
• Doctor Specialist.
  
• New Specialist: Doctor.
  
• The Doctor can be found by using the Radio Construction.
  
• New Resource: Medicine.
  
• New Resource: Mushrooms.
  
• The Doctor can make Medicine from Mushrooms in the Apothecary.
  
• Removed disease: Microbe Plastics.
  
• New disease: Spongehead. Drifters with Spongehead will drink twice as much.
  
• New disease: Musselmouths. Drifters with Musselmouths will eat twice as much.
  
• New disease: Smogbreath. Drifters with Smogbreath affect nearby drifters with low morale.
  
• Drifters now get a random disease when fully polluted.
  
• Drifters will be diseased for longer periods.
  
• Drifters can now be cured of their disease by going to a Med Pod when there's Medicine and a Doctor available.
  
• New Construction: Radio. This construction will be used to scout in future patches. Currently scouts for the Doctor specialist.
  

World and Region updates

• New Landmarks: Polluted Woods Mushrooms
  
• New Landmarks: Polluted Woods Dead Trees
  
• New Resource: Goods. Goods are a processed resource used for morale buildings. It can not be crafted in the town.
  
• New Construction: Recycler. The recycler can scrap Goods for parts and create Drywood and Plastic Waste.
  
• New Landmarks: Rural Ruins Goods
  
• New Landmarks: City Goods
  
• Goods will now be available on landmarks with indication of former civilization.
  
• New resource: Tools
  
• New construction: Tool Maker
  
• Some landmarks now require Tools to salvage. Larger quantities of resources can be gained by using tools.
  
• New handmade map: First iteration of a corridor-type map.
  

Morale and Experience

• Knowledge is now gained by cumulative town-wide drifter experience rather than drifter level-ups. 1 knowledge point is obtained by getting 500 experience.
  
• Drifter level now decides their morale needs. Higher level = higher needs.
  
• Daily reports now contain the amount of knowledge gained that day.
  
• Daily reports now contain the amount of experience gained that day.
  
• Drifter overview panel now has notifications on the side. These allow the player to toggle different filters for the drifter overview.
  
• The Tech Tree is now in multiple rows. You can choose between multiple tech to research first.
  
• Updated housing morale effect to award more morale for higher tier housing.
  
• Added morale effect that awards morale based on the level of attributes a drifter has affinity for.
  

Balancing

• Fishing Chair and Fish Sticks now behind research.
  
• Chop Shop is now available from the start.
  
• Rebalanced weight tiers, Townheart now needs less fuel for travel.
  
• Rebalanced eel-ectric storage amounts and eel-ectric consumer/producer amounts.
  
• Changed cost of various constructions.
  
• Nerfed athletics attribute.
  

Misc

• Only scout landmarks of neighboring regions are activated when scouting a region.
  
• New Animation: Electro-Crafter
  
• New Animation: Food Truck
  
• New Animation: Fishwasher
  
• New Animation: Chop Shop
  

Fixes

• Reduced memory allocations caused by drifter portraits and drifter tools.
  
• The Unbottler now correctly uses the Cooking priority.
  

Behind the Scenes

• Created a Voronoi map editor for map creation.
  
• Implemented a region based flotsam generator.
  
• Created a Query Tool to help with balancing.