Major Update 06: Sword of the Cult (Version Number "Early Access 0.5.12627 ")

[Gary]

We have released a Major Update, called "Sword of the Cult".

This pulls together all of the new content and systems we had released in the Beta Branch since our previous Major Update.

Important!

Before we look at the latest changes, some important house-keeping: if you want to play the new content, and because we have added Steam Cloud Saves support, you will need to start a new game. The latter two Quick-Starts have the world unlocked for you to explore, along with port screens to allow you to customise your ship and crew.

If you wish to resume your playthrough from a previous build, then you may switch over to this older version of the game via the Beta Branches system:

1. Go to your Steam Library
   
2. Right-click on Abandon Ship and select "Properties"
   
3. Go to the tab marked "Betas"
   
4. In the drop-down box, select the one called "0.5.12154 – The Spider Islands Version"
   
5. Wait for the game to finish updating, you should see the branch name listed after the game name.

If you’re up-to-date on the Beta Branch (i.e you already have the items listed below) then your saves will be unaffected.

Sword of the Cult

You can read a post that describes all of the main new features here:

https://steamcommunity.com/games/551860/announcements/detail/2704893329100702332

This includes the following major changes:
• New Campaign: Sword of the Cult
  
• Northern Remnants New Region Unlocked
  
• Land’s End New Region Unlocked
  
• The Wild Sea New Region Unlocked
  
• New Factions system
  
• Main story has been extended
  
• Revamped first few maps in Region 1
  
• Steam Cloud Save support

There have been a lot of other fixes and improvements, and the list below covers everything else:

Bugs

• Fixed an error with an acquaintance (i.e. friend or enemy) being triggered on an event in the third map.
  
• When ramming and anti-ram is triggered, both ships current target distance is restored
  
• The AI only considers itself boarded (and wanting to stay at boarding range) if the enemy characters on their ship are owned by the main player (i.e. are not spiders or cannibals)
  
• When purchasing a new ship, the new ship spawns with the player's current ship's weapon layout
  
• Fixed an issue where island camera reveals could prevent full-map view being triggered.
  
• Stopped the AI in the combat campaign demanding surrender, or surrendering themselves
  
• The firing sound from the player-controlled Ghost Mortar wasn't playing
  
• Fixed issue where Kraken head could be too low in the water after a Bite or Vomit attack.
  
• Fixed Kraken tentacles sometimes not appear when in the victorious action
  
• Fall of Silk Keys had a "wait for time" node instead of a "wait for time of day changes" node. This meant you'd be recalled to Aldous after a few seconds had elapsed, as opposed to several time of day changes.
  
• Fixed instances where not all Port Liberation events could spawn due to there not being enough guaranteed ports in Region 13.
  
• Cannibal Lifeboat Dialogue node had incorrect acquaintance setting of "Last Created" when it should have been set to "None"
  
• Timed Bomb - Increased height of box collider to cover bomb model, to fix the issue where it could land behind the sick bay table and wasn't clickable.
  
• The camera will skip its update if the delta time is large and the game just saved. This smooths out potential stutter when saving.
  
• Fix to the Ship HUD UI not being properly disabled when the ship is destroyed due to Unity's overridden null check. This stops crew UI not being removed upon death in certain situations.

Balancing

• Hull destroyer won't spawn on enemy ships in the early maps of the main story.
  
• During a failed blizzard impact event, the water level no longer increases (same as being hit with a tidal wave) - this was too unfair otherwise.
  
• Reduced chance of badly hurt in diving bell events again. Went from 20% to 14%
  
• Balanced weapon reload times.
  
• Enemy ship layout generation is now weight-random. Cannon layouts have the highest chance of spawning, followed by Bombard, Heavy Bombard and Strike.

Map Improvements/Changes

• 'The Teeth' unique island plus event added to second map. Added the 'Samuel' event into the second map, that reveals a bit more backstory. Did a pass on the other events that spawn so that there are both less to do before you open the gate, and they will all be more unique. Net result is that you can get through the early game much faster.
  
• Tweaked some of the gate links between maps.
  
• Added 'Village Slave Raid' unique island and event to third map.
  
• Adjusted floating outpost numbers across the world, as they were a bit underused.
  
• Improved the flow of Regions 4 and 13 by removing a map from each.
  
• Only one port now spawns in Region 4
  
• Added a prompt to remind the player to be stocked up before entering the ice sheet - they'll be locked into the next area for a short time, so shouldn't go in unprepared.
  
• Added a unique island and event to Region 13 (Cathedral Cave)
  
• Added unique island 'Mega Volcano' to Region 1 before Landfall. Gives some unique combat modifier in the early game.
  
• Set up a multi-weather attachment during the pre-landfall maps in Region 1. This means that a select group of weather will spawn randomly across the maps, meaning that each map the player goes into in the early game will have a different combat modifier, improving early game variety.

Miscellaneous Polish and Improvements

• New world generation optimisations. This offsets the addition of the new region maps being added.
  
• Added the spinning wheel to the new game or loading a save game screens so the player can see activity
  
• Implemented fishing pickup event.
  
• Added icons to burning ports so it's easier to see they are different from accessible ports.
  
• Crew on Cult ships now use the green variants.
  
• Reduced instances of AI crew running to new locations during the start of a battle.
  
• Balanced max crew levels found in taverns, so you're less likely to find top-level ones early in the game (which were usually too expensive to afford)
  
• No more than 2 swivel guns and mortars will spawn on the same enemy ships. This reduces the chance of something too over-powered spawning similar weapons (i.e. a Heavy Bombard with 6 Hull Crackers, a Strike with 4 Berserk Darts).
  
• Crew need more XP to gain higher levels. As the game has got longer now, we needed to balance gaining higher levels over a longer period.
  
• Enemy crew discs added underneath enemy hull health and water gauge. This adheres to standard visibility rules. Players can use this to see the enemy crew skill levels to help inform their decisions.
  
• Enemy crew now have skill levels. Previously they were all the lowest level, all the time. This should make mid-late game battles slightly tougher.
  
• Implemented Shop UI scrollbar arrow buttons
  
• Reduced chances of AI using the player ship to path to their intended location if the route is blocked (i.e. by fire).
  
• Reset wanted level after killing Kraken so that the coastal defences in Landfall didn't open fire on you at the start of Act 2.
  
• In the main story, when the player completed the Haunted Seas there was a monologue without an image.
  
• Crew Overboard are now swept away if there are no crew alive to winch them in, which reduces player wait time in those situations.
  
• When the AI offers or demands surrender, there is now a 1 second delay before clicking the message box options will do anything, which reduces chances of accidental mis-clicks
  
• Lighthouse event now also "discovers" the map exits
  
• Deck rings placed on new ship layouts to indicate where crew stand for mortars and swivel guns
  
• Added latest Newsletter names. Removed those people who have either unsubscribed, or the emails have had a hard bounce.

We’re making fantastic progress with only a single region left to unlock. Our focus now shifts to version 1.0, and we will release at least one beta branch update with content to try before that point. Also, we won’t stop updating the game once we leave Early Access, there’ll be plenty more to come. You can read about what we’re planning here:

Latest Dev-Team Focus

For the longer term plans, visit this sub-forum:

Early Access Roadmaps

Thank-you for your support and feedback, it is greatly appreciated. If you like the game, please leave a review – it helps us massively and is important now more than ever.