Unveiled: Camelot Unchained Newsletter #63 - City State Entertainment View this email in your browser Share Tweet Team Tidings -by Max Porter

Hey folks, happy end of February! What a month! I hope you had a great Valentine’s Day, and a burning hot start to the new year. We have certainly been busy here! As you may have seen, we announced Final Stand: Ragnarok, a side project the studio is working on, and published a ton of videos on that as well as Camelot Unchained progress! We put out a ton of information about this, the Backer response, and the good things this means for CU: The original video here, the MOP interview here, the following MOP update here, and the following CU update here. In addition, we have an update going out today, and we’ve kept you up to date with many live streams! If you want to catch up on any missed streams, they can always be found on our Twitch and YouTube channels. For a good read of our updates and newsletters, check out the News section of our website.



And now we have some beautiful eye candy for you, showing some progress! Here are a few words and images from Michelle all about art!



First up, this leather armor render. The Art Team has a good feeling players will enjoy this fashionable leather armor!

C.U.B.E is getting some love with upgraded materials and new selections. There are a selection of patterns to check out.



Here is an Arthurian stone floor, where Joseph is building a wider variety from clean looks to ones with pops of color for more flair in your future build. As there will be Realm-specific patterns, there will also be a selection of general materials as well that all have access to. Here is an example of some generic stone with some interesting patterns to choose from. Joseph has been leading the charge on these upgraded C.U.B.E. materials, and has been working to implement cultural patterns where opportunity arises, giving each Realm selection its own flair.



Here in this TDD Stone floor we can see some of that classic celtic swirl making an appearance. We know you’ll be excited to try these things in the game, and check out the Update Email (also going out today) for more cool images! Thanks, Michelle!



More information and updates await your perusal later in this newsletter! We have a piece from Ben on “Next Steps in RvR,” and a piece from Brian with some CUBE info updates! To round us out, we have a State of the Build with some of the highlights from this month’s Update.



Well folks, if you’ll indulge me in the use of this space, I have another little announcement to make. This is my last newsletter! That’s right, my family and I are headed home to California, and I am leaving CSE Fairfax for warmer climes.



Working for City State Entertainment has been a truly amazing adventure. I’ve learned a lot! When I first created Unveiled in August of 2014, I had no idea I’d make it to sixty-three newsletters. 63! Wow, we’ve come a long distance! And I’m as excited as ever to see what CSE does next, and how the games coming out of this amazing little studio continue to progress and amaze us all. Can’t wait to get in and play!



So, as I take my leave, I hope you’ll continue to support and take an interest in the games and goings-on at this studio, and enjoy everything they publish. One more time, please bear with my reminder to click the “view this email in your browser” link in the top right to see the whole newsletter. Read on for updates, articles, thoughts, news, and more, and please enjoy this, the sixty-third (and last one for me!) issue of Unveiled. Hot Topics



We're looking for feedback! If you're a Backer, join the discussion on our Forums via our website and chime in.



Hot topics on the forums right now include a great deal of discussion around our recent side project announcement, the big Cherry Keep tests, and all aspects of the future of Camelot Unchained! Come join the discussion and participate in our thriving Community! Crafting Update: Infusions -by Mark Jacobs Folks,



It’s been a while since I’ve written a game design piece, so I might be a little rusty at it. OTOH, I’m happy to do so, especially since it is on one of my favorite subjects: Cherry Twizzlers! Well, they used to be my favorite, but as I continue to lose weight, I can’t have them. Since I can’t wax poetic about them, I might as well talk about crafting, right? :)



During our Kickstarter, I said that I wanted to design a great crafting system for Camelot Unchained. I laid out the fact that we couldn’t have the sheer number of items that the great SWG had, but I did say that I believed we could have a very deep system that could both keep crafters entertained and make them an important part of our game. While the system we have implemented to date shows the possibilities, it isn’t yet where it needs to be in order to meet those goals. And one of the ways that it will meet those goals will be with the addition of infusions, and the impact that they have, both on the item and in the gameplay of crafters. For this piece, I thought I’d go into some details about that system and some of its implications!



Infusions are added to items to change their physical and/or magical properties. Right now, the infusion table has access to every property of an item, from its mass to its sharpness to the tensile strength of blocks. All these aspects can be changed through the infusion system. This alone gives our crafters more control over an item than most, if not all, other crafting systems. As a crafter, you can impact the alloy(s) that you are using in an item to make significant and permanent changes to an item. To borrow from Batman’s enemy The Riddler: Riddle me this, when is an iron sword more than an iron sword? Answer: When it has been infused! While infusions could turn iron into gold, they can also add a significant edge (pun intended) to any crafter who has the knowledge and materials to imbue the items with additional properties. So, if you wanted a sword that could be a bit more durable but also had a stronger edge and was a little lighter, you could create that by using a combination of infusions. And how about we take this one step further? Beyond that, if you wanted to add some additional resistance to certain elements, you could do that too (remember the E.A.R.S. system!). Again, as a crafter you can have access to every stat that the item can handle.



However, that’s just the numbers! The art of using infusions is also important. If it was as simple as just “find the item which has the bonus to the stat that you seek,” then the system would be way too simple for CU, wouldn’t it? Infusions are more than simple items: they have their own rules about how and when you can use them, how they work and play well (or not) with other infusions, how stable they are, and so much more.



These rules give the system so much additional depth and nuance that we could have stopped there--but of course, we didn’t! Each infusion item has its own set of rules that cover things such as: the best time to use it, where should it be used, what combines well with it, etc. Learning how all these infusions interact with each other is an integral part of the system, and the crafters that learn how to use it will gain a significant advantage in their crafting. And since one of the things a crafter must manage is how stable the infusion is, not learning the rules and/or flaunting them can result in a rather… explosive situation.



But wait, there’s more! Each item is also aligned with the elemental forces that shape the world of Camelot Unchained. This alignment also affects how the items work with each other, and how well the infusion will work once it’s all put together. This additional level of detail/knowledge is also quite important to our crafters, because it affects the stability of the infusion. The best crafters will learn the items that they are working with and be able to manipulate them to their advantage to create interesting and unique items.



However, how does one crafter really differ from each other? What protects the more experienced solo crafter from newly minted crafters who are being supported by other people to level up faster? And where oh where did my little dog go? The answer to two out of those three questions can be answered by three simple letters: R, G, and B. And as to what that means, that, until I am sure that BSC idea will really work (it looks good so far), would be telling.



In summary, infusions for Camelot Unchained are a powerful addition to an already-powerful crafting system, and we look forward to you playing with them in the coming months.



Mark Dose of Design -by Ben Pielstick Next Steps in RvR

By now, many of you have seen the Cherry Keep demo we’ve put together for Camelot Unchained, showing off massive scale combat and building destruction in the Unchained Engine. This was something we worked on for a long time behind the scenes, because it took a lot of work on the engineering side to make it look as good as it does today. We’re still working on improving this technology, of course, but at this point we also are starting to work toward taking that functionality out of a limited duration scenario, and into a persistent open-world RvR zone.



In terms of design, demos are generally pretty easy. You only have to worry about a specific set of circumstances, and don’t have to take nearly as much into consideration as you do when placing an encounter in more of an open-world context. Now that we’re looking at siege battles in the open world, we’re getting much more into the details of things like how capture mechanics work, what kinds of defensive NPCs we will need, and what range of other features will help players organize and tackle the challenge of engaging in massive siege battles.



When it comes to things like capture mechanics, the big thing we’ve needed for a long time has been a system for open world scripting. We first prototyped this system, which we named ‘Overmind’, while working FSR. Much like making a demo, FSR was a much more simplified environment to prototype this new system in. This system is effectively a scripting language that allows designers to control and modify a lot of what happens in the game world without the need for programmer support. Since CU and FSR are both built using the Unchained Engine, we’re using the same technology in both games, and will be taking advantage of the Overmind to control things like how RvR objectives will be captured, how NPCs will be spawned, and how players will be notified of important events taking place in the game world of CU.



In terms of NPCs themselves, we’ve also spent a lot of time recently improving the behaviors and pathfinding in our system in FSR. As these features apply to CU, we are again working on expanding a very solid base foundation, and building it into something far more advanced. CU NPCs have to deal with a much more complex combat system, using many more abilities, managing resources, and selecting targets in a way that is effective in an environment that includes a large number of player characters of multiple factions and various different classes. As we finish up some of these features and also upgrade our pathfinding to allow NPCs to navigate dynamic CU block-based buildings, we will be able to rely on NPCs to effectively help defend objectives and provide a challenge to attackers, even when players aren’t around. This isn’t to say that we’re adding PvE to CU in the same way as FSR, but as many of you who have played earlier RvR games like DAoC and WAR know, NPCs can play a vital role in keep defense, which is something we’ve always planned on continuing in CU.



Alongside these core engine features, we are also improving features built exclusively for CU. The most important of these is Warbands (our version of groups or parties), which will allow for easy communication, quick targeting, and monitoring of allies health and resource status. Warbands also provide the option for group-targeted abilities, such as speed songs and group heals, which would be too powerful if they were given an unlimited ally cap, and difficult to use if they simply targeted a limited number of the nearest allies.



These features will be coming together to provide a testing environment that steps outside the bounds of what we’ve shown so far in focused scenario testing and large scale demos. Our goal is to create a basic RvR zone, which will start with the basics of roaming groups and castle siege battles, and will gradually gain functionality over time, as we continue building out more of the systems that will be needed for CU as a finished game. We aren’t quite ready to start testing all of this yet, but as you can see from our roadmap, we have a lot of good things planned, and should have many of them ready to show off coming up very soon.

Developer Quote “This was the #1 goal of Camelot Unchained’s Kickstarter campaign, a 500+ person siege that doesn’t run as a slideshow. This is the kind of siege we all dreamed of back in 2013 and here it is working today. Not tomorrow, not next year, and especially not soonish, but today.” -- Mark Jacobs CMsphere -by Brian Ward Gather ‘round for a tale of ambition, toil, and love -- but mainly, some pretty pictures made in C.U.B.E. that we thought you should see!



Natural History Museum, London (Scott Florence)



The Natural History Museum in London is a beautiful example of Victorian architecture and it is a large, ornate building. Scott Florence pushed the limits of the plot sizes currently available in Offline Building Mode to recreate as much of this structure as he could while maintaining a single standalone build. But he didn’t just stop at the exterior facade.



Facade of the Natural History Museum with day/night cycle as recreated in C.U.B.E.



“This is the first time I've actively tried to recreate an interior too, previously I'd just done an exterior and put whatever interior could work within,” Scott said on the Forums.

Interior of the structure, showing day/night cycle and interior lighting.



Trying to squeeze that actual real-life interior into the building is an admirable effort and a study in working with constraints.

Close up of the exterior facade, showing day/night cycle.



This build is an excellent example of the types of things that can be done in C.U.B.E. If it were placed into the game right now, it would be 100% fully-destructible. Great work, Scott!



Carry the Torch



Player-created content is an essential element of the Camelot Unchained universe. Your C.U.B.E. creations imbue culture and provide new things for your fellow players to see (and destroy) in-world. Today you saw what Scott Florence made using sheer will and the tools that are already available.



We love seeing the things people make with C.U.B.E. If you make a build, please share it with us in the Forums and/or in the #cube chat channel in the CU Discord if you have Beta 1 access. It will very likely get featured in a future newsletter! State of the Build -by Max Porter Welcome to a summary of the highlights (of the highlights) from the month’s progress! If you want the biggest, juiciest slices of the monthly update pie, well here you go, with a scoop of ice cream on top.



These items are only a small selection of what got done, and we shared the big list with you in the monthly livestream. Check it out there, or in the monthly update email going out!



Gameplay: Updates to current support characters Supports got some much-needed love this month from the gameplay side of things. Anthony has been driving significant improvements toward how songs currently handle themselves, as well as how Dynamic components interact with song abilities. These changes address a few notable bugs and problems players were experiencing: Song effects should start and stop much more consistently than before. Players should see less UI spam from flytext for starting songs. Flytext for song starts more accurately describes what is happening. Songs with dynamic components should now have their effects stick around the correct amount of time, without interfering with any new songs started and without getting stuck on forever, or only partially carrying over. Instrument components are now obtained from the equipped instruments themselves, much like a Mage's foci, and instruments are required to be equipped.

Devout Class Characters The devout trio is a set of classes that fill the role of hybrid healers. Each of the three classes, one for each Realm, has the potential to both deal damage, and heal allies. While their damage and healing potential is not equal to that of a pure damage or pure healing class, they excel at filling both roles at the same time, and can shift from focusing on one to the other, providing excellent flexibility in combat engagements where the emphasis of a group may need to shift from defensive to offensive and back again in accordance with the dynamic threats and opportunities that arise. The Devout class for the Arthurian Realm is called the Abbot. In addition to basic Life magic used for healing, the Abbot also focuses around the consumption of alcohol in order to cast powerful Radiant magic spells. One of the unique aspects of the Abbot is their Shape components, which allow them to empower themselves or allies with some of their Life or Healing Runes in order to trigger when dealing or receiving melee damage. The Devout class for the Tuatha dé Danann Realm is the Blessed Crow. This class has a unique mechanic of deploying Cauldrons in order to relay the effects of their spells, affecting multiple targets in an area. The Blessed Crow uses a combination of Life, Death, and Spirit runes to both deal damage and heal themselves and their allies. The Devout class for the Viking Realm is the HelBound. Playing the HelBound is a balancing act of switching between the use of Life and Death runes, each of which empower the other. Swapping back and forth between damage and healing will yield the best results if you don’t spend too much time on one or the other. In addition to typical ranged spell shapes, the HelBound abilities also include special melee attacks, letting them apply the effects of their runes very effectively in close combat.



Tech:

WIP - Tech - New Scenario Since Camelot Unchained is an open-world RvR game, we need to start running open-world style tests! Up to now, we have run most of our testing in small-scale, focused, purpose-built scenarios. These scenario zones have been built to host large-scale testing, or specific feature testing, but haven’t really approximated the gameplay we expect will take place in the final game. The zone we are now working on delivering is for the first time going to feature a lot of the basic mechanics we want for the final game, and will not run as a time-limited scenario with contrived rules and victory conditions, but will remain available persistently for the duration of our tests with no end or reset conditions present.

The current design for our new RvR zone is a fairly large island, roughly 8 kilometers across, with starting plots for each Realm located roughly 2 kilometers from a large castle plot located near the center of the map. There are also 7 tower plots located around the map, with 2 located relatively close to each Realm’s starting plot, and 1 more neutrally located near the center. Each plot will ultimately feature a player-created building, designed and constructed by members of the Builder’s Brigade, though some buildings may be reused on multiple plots, depending on how many submissions we receive. Building sizes range from 128x128 for towers, to 512x512 for the central castle, which should result in a pretty impressive building, given the one million block limit currently imposed, which may later be adjusted subject to technical limitations discovered in testing.

One important new feature not previously seen in any of our prior CU scenarios is the addition of Keep Lords, along with other defensive NPCs to help support players in defense of each plot. As in several other RvR games, killing the Lord will, at present, result in capture of a plot, meaning a change of ownership to a new Realm, and the spawning shortly thereafter of a new Lord and other NPCs associated with that Realm. These NPCs will likely start off very basic, but as time allows we will be improving them to make them more powerful than typical player-characters and to equip them with special items and abilities, eventually making them much more of a challenge when attacking an enemy plot.

As we have demonstrated in previous scenarios, the buildings on each plot in this new zone will be fully destructible. This means we will be providing siege weapons--for free right now--at each Realm’s home spawn point, so that players can deploy and use these weapons to knock down walls, break down doors, and gain entry into enemy structures. These structures will also take time to rebuild, so after a building takes a lot of damage, whether or not it is captured by another Realm, it can be expected to take a while before it returns to a reasonably defensible state.

Another important feature of this new zone will be triggers using our Overmind scripting system, which will allow us to send messages letting players of all Realms know which plots are under attack, and when plot ownership changes hands. This will give players an idea of what is going on around the map, and offer some guidance as to where players can go to find both allies and enemies to do battle with.

Currently, the zone itself has been blocked out roughly in our terrain editor, and is able to load up on a server and have players run around, battle some placeholder NPCs set up as Keep Lords, and allow them to capture plots. Our art team hasn’t started on replacing the placeholder art with something real yet, but is starting to piece together concepts for what the zone will eventually look like. On the programming side, there are already features ready and implemented for things like spawning NPCs and capturing plots. There are still a few more features left to go regarding things like spawning in siege engine givers, and having players drop parts of their souls when they die, as both a death penalty and bonus for killing enemies. The biggest hurdle at this point is the lack of pathfinding inside block-based buildings, which is still a work-in-progress, but hopefully something that will be through code review and ready to test in our main branch as early as next week.

After all these pieces come together, there will doubtless still be quite a bit of design and iteration to do in order to take all these separate pieces and assemble them together into something compelling and fun. The plan, of course, is that everything will happen to come together nicely, and we will be able to quickly begin holding public tests as soon as all the feature checkboxes have been marked off. However, there is always the chance that not all the pieces of the puzzle will play nicely together at our first attempt, so we have to allocate some time to smoothing out all the rough edges once everything is up and running.

WIP - Tech - Crafting update: Mark has completed his review of the current state of certain aspects of the crafting system. Work on the first-pass implementation of infusions is complete. Balancing of the infusion’s values is slated for next week. Work has begun on what MJ is terming the RGB system. More details to follow on that. Work has also begun on a first-pass implementation of Soul Shards in the crafting system. This is covered in greater detail above! All About Art: WIP - Art and Tech - Dragon Implementation for CU (Models and NPC Functions): The Wyvern is in the works, as Jon is currently in the high-poly stage, and concept art for the material variations are underway. Paired with the new CU scenario, we are getting some Realm-specific dragons on hand as part of the experience. To do so, Spidey has been looking at getting dragons up and running as NPCs. Dragons currently have a client effect for ambience, but now dragons will be synchronized as they become a full NPC entity. This is paving the way for them to be able to be script-controlled by the Overmind, as well as becoming combat-enabled entities.

The Wyvern is in the works, as Jon is currently in the high-poly stage, and concept art for the material variations are underway. Paired with the new CU scenario, we are getting some Realm-specific dragons on hand as part of the experience. To do so, Spidey has been looking at getting dragons up and running as NPCs. Dragons currently have a client effect for ambience, but now dragons will be synchronized as they become a full NPC entity. This is paving the way for them to be able to be script-controlled by the Overmind, as well as becoming combat-enabled entities. WIP - Art - Lighting: Adjustments to lighting are underway. You may see a difference next you see Cherry Keep with the newly-made adjustments.

Adjustments to lighting are underway. You may see a difference next you see Cherry Keep with the newly-made adjustments. WIP - Art - Materials: Fixes and Updates: With the improvements to material rendering we are updating many assets to correctly work with the new tech. All characters and current armor pieces have gone through an updated pass. Environmental asset improvements are underway as well. From Rocks to Trees, we are making not just fixes but upgrades to make for stronger-looking lands as we move forward.

Fixes and Updates: With the improvements to material rendering we are updating many assets to correctly work with the new tech. All characters and current armor pieces have gone through an updated pass. Environmental asset improvements are underway as well. From Rocks to Trees, we are making not just fixes but upgrades to make for stronger-looking lands as we move forward. WIP - Art - Animation: Not only will you notice the new materials on your Realm capes, but animation has made fixes to capes and skirts as well! Animation team has also been making refinements on movement sets and various other character animations.

Not only will you notice the new materials on your Realm capes, but animation has made fixes to capes and skirts as well! Animation team has also been making refinements on movement sets and various other character animations. DONE - Art - Siege: Projectiles now have updated models and have a VFX refinement pass.

WIP - Art - VFX: Not only is refinement work being done on the siege projectiles, but fixes to player abilities VFX also can be found, such as the TDD Druid Primal Chaos ability VFX.

Not only is refinement work being done on the siege projectiles, but fixes to player abilities VFX also can be found, such as the TDD Druid Primal Chaos ability VFX. WIP - Art - UI: Branching off from the patcher, the Art team is in the process of cleaning up character creation UI assets. This includes new backdrops and upgrading various other old art assets. CSS updates, courtesy of Mr. Koo, are also part of improving Character Creation. The team is fired up with everything planned for CU and that is reflected in a fresh new Illustration piece for the patcher.

Branching off from the patcher, the Art team is in the process of cleaning up character creation UI assets. This includes new backdrops and upgrading various other old art assets. CSS updates, courtesy of Mr. Koo, are also part of improving Character Creation. The team is fired up with everything planned for CU and that is reflected in a fresh new Illustration piece for the patcher. WIP - Art - Devout Class: Concept is underway, designing the weapons and items to arm your Devout class character.



Phew, that’s a lot! And yet, as I said, there’s lots more, in the monthly update and beyond! Final...Final Thoughts -by Max Porter Hey there reader. Thank you so much for reading to the end of Unveiled, whether this is your first time or your sixty-third. Thank you for taking an interest in City State Entertainment’s progress and updates, as well as in my scribblings and thoughts. Thank you for sharing your own thoughts, ideas, and suggestions. Thank you for analyzing, reacting to, and simply reading the things we’ve published during my CSE adventure. I know that you will continue to be patient, engaged, and eager for more. You’re awesome! That’s all I’ve got to say, so - from me, Kate, and Rose - CU later!