Darkest greetings Underlord,
It’s been on the Public Test Branch for little over a week, and now with the release of our GOG version we’re proud to say that Patch 1.6.2 is now finally going live! It brings with it a variety of improvements, but none more so than those for Multiplayer. So read on, Underlord, and discover what magic lies in the bowels of:
Patch 1.6.2 – Multiplayer Mayhem
We’ve introduced some serious new netcode with Patch 1.6.2 which should drastically improve the quality of multiplayer matches. We’ve had this on the Public Test Branch for just over a week and the response has been positive so far. Want to give it a go? Here’s some tips to get you started!
Finding a Multiplayer Match
What would a multiplayer patch be without multiplayer matches? Head on over to our Discord and join the Matchmaking channel to find other players with whom to go head to head!
Remember you’ll both need to be on the same version of WFTO, so if you’re on the PTB your opponent will need to be as well! Don’t forget if you’re going to host you’ll need to port forward!
Reporting Issues
We’re looking to try and improve the experience for our multiplayer fans as much as possible, so if you run into an issue while playing please get in touch with a bug report via User Echo.
Release Notes
Multiplayer Improvements
We’ve reworked our netcode to deliver significant improvements to the Multiplayer experience.
- Multiplayer behaviours should be much more consistent with gameplay, for example:
- Constructs and defences are more reliable
- Casting Recall on the Worker Rally no longer breaks the Worker Rally
- Unit actions are now consistent between client and host
- We’ve implemented new systems to combat desyncs by slowing the game down, giving it time to catch up after network issues
- Visual issues have been greatly reduced, for example:
- Reduced instances of units visually teleporting
- VFX should be correctly synced to unit location
- “Ghost” units have been exorcised
- Possessing a unit should no longer cause unit shields to break for your opponent
- Unit shields no longer become detached from their unit
- Workers who are undertaking a task should no longer become lost
- Implemented support for cross-platform play with GOG Galaxy players
Performance Improvements
- Multiplayer code no longer runs in single-player, which yields a small performance boost for all players
Visual Changes
- Improvements to the gold pile highlight
- Significantly improved the Crackpot/Gnarling working animation
- Improved the floor texture for the Empire barracks
- Campaign map highlighting improved
- Made some changes to the lights on the main menu scene to improve contrast between rendered objects and UI objects
- Small changes to the Archive Lectern lights
- Glowing runes are now present on Arcane/Evil Arcane theme door frames
- Fixed a number of significant issues with the Dwarven Core
- Arcane themes now use a new arcane portcullis frame
- Improved Archon emissive map
- Reduced the VFX height of the Necromancer’s heal which should improve combat clarity when they are present
Levels
- Made some slight visual tweaks to War for the Overworld Level 13
Bug Fixes
Units
- Shambler no longer incorrectly has a wage
- Porkzilla can now correctly deal damage to units and defences once more, praise the bacon!
- Corrected an issue that caused the Behemoth’s heal rate to be far higher than it should have been – it now correctly generates 0.75% health per second
Visuals
- Fixed highlight on all Archive props
- Evil Arcane theme glowing runes now match what is engraved in the wall
- Necromancers on War for the Overworld Level 8 now correctly use the Necromancer Possession effect
- Fixed team colouring on a number of objects:
- Sovereign Theme door frame
- Sovereign Theme connector
- Sovereign Theme Midas Door
- Santa Worker
- Empire and Phaestus theme wall lights
- Kickstarter theme Dungeon Core will now display the correct damage states
- Kasita and Draven Cores on War for the Overworld Level 12 should now animate correctly
- Corrected highlighting on Empire and Phaestus themes
- Texture corrections on War for the Overworld Level 8 water gates
- Fixed Rocky Earth normal map
- Fixed Gold Shrine highlighting
- Overworld Gateway unit shields should now display more reliably
- Snowy Sacred Earth now uses the correct textures, instead of the snow textures for Sand walls
- Phaestus theme now correctly uses the Underlord props rather than Empire props
- Fixed compression settings for some stray textures
- Fixed the transparency on the Overworld Gateway
- Improved the visuals of the standard theme wall torch
- Minor improvement to the lamps in the Empire Lair
- Fixed an issue with the highlight on small dropped gold piles
Rooms
- Heightmap data of Empire Slaughterpen and Barracks now matches that of their Underlord counterparts
- Destroyed and claimed Overworld Gateways can no longer be used to dismiss units
Levels
- Improved the effect that is played when Mira is capturing the Kenos on War for the Overworld Level 10, by fixing clipping and misalignment
- Further improvements to the Shifting Bond ritual progress on War for the Overworld Level 5, in an attempt to fix a long-standing issue
Multiplayer
- Removed ping column in lobby due to it being unimplemented at this time
- Fixed an issue where the host would always try to send a copy of a map to the client even if it was not required
- Fixed an issue where the location of units and them taking an action would not be correctly synced
UI
- Improved floating emoticon compression quality to prevent pixelation
Miscellaneous
- GameText – Minor grammar corrections
- GameText – Fixed “Claim” Worker task type to correctly display as “Unclaim” when unclaiming enemy tiles
- Removed unused textures
That covers this update for now Underlord. We’re still working hard on bringing further under-the-hood improvements to War for the Overworld, and we expect a new UI middleware shortly, followed by Unity 5.6 in the near future! Stay tuned!
Cheers,
– Brightrock Games Team
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