KickStarter Stoneshard - open world roguelike RPG - now available on Early Access

[Wayfinder]

Thanks for the feedback everyone!

Seeing how interesting design is the geomancy, I'm mostly excited about Cryomancy

Some ideas:

...

Especially Lagi, some ideas are really interesting. Though UI-wise we're kinda limited with the max amount of possible abilities we're able to fit into one branch, so expanding existing skill trees is problematic.

 

[The Wall]

Wayfinder I've got couple of questions for you:

1)During Stoneshard's Kickstarter era, one of stretch goals was all about dynamic factions, their rise or fall, battle over Aldor, which would be all on their own or spearheaded by Player. Few days ago I joined your discord server and there I saw that you (?) murdered in cold blood any and all hope of this ever being added to the game no matter the number of hundreds of thousands sold copies after realese, because it would ''now involve rewriting 50% of game code''. This feature would make Stoneshard much closer to single character Battle Brothers/ roguelike-isometric Daggerfall, which is at least how I view it. How many sold copies can ressurect hope for this feature being implemented post-release?

2)I totally enjoyed what few Stoneshard BETA streams I watched (bonus: learned few new Russian curses), but what I noticed that slightly felt wrong is that when Player would hunt wildlife, once wildlife (be it fox, deer or forest whatever) would reach end of tile-map, it would hit invisible dead-end, which doesn't exist for Player who can freely traverse between maps but it seems NPCs can't. It really cheapened the feeling of ''I GOT YA!'' during hunt cause what really got poor deer was his inability to switch maps. Is this something you could/might change?

!MY FIRST PUBLIC CODEX BEG!

Dear Sirs/Ladyboys of Codex,

I, student of survival in Slavic environment, for the first time in my life, ask, if you have one spare BETA key, to spare it on poor me. Last year I halved my rations during exam period so I could donate to Realms Beyond and German prestigious arpeegism, sadly nothing was left for Russian prestigious arpeegism. I'm completely in love with idea, esthetics and mechanics of Stoneshard, which number of hours invested in Steam free demo could show but I'm embarrassed to show them (THAT BIG!). I'm ready to pay 100 solid Codex brofists and give eternal Thank You! blessing to Kind One who DMs me key

P.S. Hope I didn't sound too much like Imperial City beggar from Oblivion, *voice change* blessings of Codex upon ye!

 

[The Wall]

Codex Administratum's wicked sense of humour won't stop me from hopefully playing Stoneshard BETA, damn it!
Since you can now only suspect who stands behind posts, here's my Codex address: The Wall, Boulevard of Incline

BTW: Have few beautiful game artworks from Discord, so purpose of this post isn't only shameless begging:

 

[Lagi]

Thanks for the feedback everyone!

Seeing how interesting design is the geomancy, I'm mostly excited about Cryomancy

Some ideas:

...

Especially Lagi, some ideas are really interesting. Though UI-wise we're kinda limited with the max amount of possible abilities we're able to fit into one branch, so expanding existing skill trees is problematic.

Im aware about your design principles: 7 active skills + 7 passive skill & each magic with own philosophy.

Cryomancy - utility, debuff , crowd control magic, minor lethality

Proposed passive skills work as upgrade to active skills. Idea is, if player like some active ability he can improve it for spending extra Skill point. Passive make small drawback to active skill, so players have additional factor to take into consideration. I'm not a fan of passives like "you get +X for each token".

Cryomancy tech tree create 3 path:

• blue - melee + heal - it make an "ice priest"
  
• green - aggressive (that harm NPC)
• red - debuff (that disable NPC)

square is active ability
circle is passive ability ( upgrade for active)

left blue skills

Frost Grip - disarming melee attack. Single target is auto hit (no defense). Target weapon (or shield) is covered with ice, and drop to the ground. If the target dont have weapon in hands, the attack is doing minor damage (could do little more vs metal armored foes).
frozen weapon can be pickup. After single attack it deal more damage and shatter into pieces (destroy weapon). If frozen weapon is throwing it could have increase range.

I see all the gif and notice awesome animation of weapons dropping on the floor when NPC die. Add transparent blue overlay to visually mark the weapon is frozen.
fluff: Ice mage try to touch the opponent, who defend himself and his weapons get covered in ice.

Freeze (passive upgrade for Frost Grip) - generate significant chance (around 50% depend from target resistance) that target itself become frozen, instead disarming his weapon (due to ice load).
Victim is covered with ice - blue transparent GRP overlay that cover legs and torso, but not hand and head.
Freezed victim can move only 1 tile, it is very easy to hit, but has massively increased armor value.
PC can cast Frost Grip on himself (situational maybe the extra armor is worth it).
Drawback: If PC want only to disarm foe in melee combat, then extra buff to enemy armor is an big issue.

Cryostasis - active skill that remove all penalties from injuries or maims, but did not heal the HP. Also stopping poison and bleeding.

Hibernation- (passive for Cryostasis) allow to target NPC. Over short time target NPC collapse in sleep and would wake up with full hp and with no penalties.
GRP: use dead corpse animation with color filter (gray colors) on victim.
By default PC heal himself or some ally. Could be used to disable enemy, and hit him when he is helpless.
Drawback: if you Hibernate foe, and he wake up before end of combat you could just do him a favor

Glacial Shard - basic damage attack. Short-middle range, grenade like ability that target single enemy. Could lob over obstacles, to avoid Line of Fire issues.

Shattering Crystals - passive. Glacial Shard upon impact create shrapnels that hurt adjacent characters.
drawback: you dont want to use glacial shard when standing next to enemy.

green skills

Glaze Frost - create ice on surface. Each NPC on the tile are moved in random direction or falldown.
Utility spell : Could be used to create bridge over water bodies, or extinguish fire.

Stalagmite - passive Glaze Frost create spikes that damage targets (could work like mines, if someone step on them stalagmites disappear and tile dont hurt any more).
Drawback: if you plan to use the frozen tiles, you have to prepare yourself for leg Health loss.


Cold wave - late game, arch AoE, multiple target hit. With small chance for freezing targets.

Winter Nova - passive. When casting Cold Wave if you select yourself, you will cast a ring around yourself. No drawback.

red skills

Blizzard - large AoE, that last some time. Create local weather (wind+snow). Completely disables any missile (including magic one) from going into or out of the affected area.

Hail - (passive) add some damage over time into the Blizzard
drawback: if you plan to use Blizzard as shield on yourself, then its worth to consider not taking this upgrade.

Snowball - (check the grid in bottom right corner) completely bury in snow the target (HIT) and 2x nearby tiles (random 2 out of 4 "?" tiles). Victim drop all weapons (&or some random items) on nearby tiles (so its a method of stealing items from NPC). Buried in snow targets cannot be target of any skills or attacks, not can they use any skills themselves (timer effect like poison or regeneration work normally). Snow melt after some time.

Avalanche - passive affect 3x3 area (HIT) plus some from random two side. Victim drop weapons, but they cannot be pick up, until snow melt.

fake UI

 

[Lagi]

passive abilities

insight:

• Feed the Flames – if the enemy’s on fire, each Fire Barrage’s bolt increases burning duration for 1 turn.
  
• Flame Saturation – restores some energy each time an enemy is set aflame within the vision range.
  
• Scorch – causes Hellbreath to debuff Fire Resistance of all damaged targets.
  
• Excess Heat – each enemy killed with Pyromancy restores some energy. [this double Flame Saturation effect]
  
• Safe Distance - increases casting range of pyromantic spells by 1 tile.
  
• Baptism of Fire – taking fire damage reduces the duration of all active pyromantic cooldowns.
  
• Pyromania – increases Magic Power and Crit Chance for every burning enemy in sight (yes, casts can also become critical).

Pyromancy tech tree could look like that:

active is square
passive is ellipse

above Tree create 3x tiers of abilities: Early 3 (skill), Mid (3skill) ,Late (1 ultimate skill - Inferno)

change name of Fire Barrage into Fire Blaze - not upgraded Fire Blaze launch 2 bolts. Name "barrage" fit to passive upgrade more then.
If first skill launch 2x projectile, then upgrade with +1 (to 3 total) would be more visible & feel-able taking into account extra benefit of already burning target.

• there is nice early choice - melee (ring) or short range (breath)
• all 3 early passive are beneficial for each skill. Ring and breath have use from +energy, longer burning or reduce FireRes.
• from 3 early passive, scorch is not obligatory for progress, because Reduce Fire Res looks strongest (PC can always restore energy from supplies, to benefit from longer burn you need first ignite the target).

Incineration before Melting Ray - feels like more general spell for fire mage, than Melting Ray. Gameplay wise, setting enemy in line to maximize benefit from ray is more tricky (more advance) than just pick burning target.

Baptism of Fire - having Magma Rain before, PC can create a nice hot pond, and take a bath in it. Removing penalties will open new nice application - feels right with the name, a "cleansing".

passive abilities could be:

• Fire Barrage – increases amount of Fire Blaze’s bolt by 1 (from 2 to 3).
  
• Flame Saturation – restores some energy each time an enemy is set aflame within the vision range.
  
• Scorch – each Pyromantic abilities debuff Fire Resistance of all damaged targets.
  
• Feed the Flames – increases burning duration of enemy’s on fire for 1 turn.
  
• Rapid Oxidation [pseudo-science name fit more, than "Safe distance" - doesnt sound dangerous]- increases casting range of pyromantic spells by 1 tile.
  
• Baptism of Fire – taking fire damage reduces the duration of all active pyromantic cooldowns & remove penalties (wound, stun..).
  
• Pyromania – increases Magic Power and Crit Chance for every burning enemy in sight.

 

[ItsChon]

I tried the prologue almost a year ago and it was great, I'm excited to see that this project has come so far since then. Keep up the good work!

 

[Mazisky]

I looked at the beta gameplay videos that are popping out: i have to say this looks incredibly good. I'll buy for sure.

Also i wanna praise the artists because it is probably the best looking game of its genre i've seen in the last years.

 

[eXalted]

First time seeing this. Looks awesome. Added to my Steam Wishlist.

 

[GentlemanCthulhu]

Oh joy. A pixel-art rougelite. How very exciting...

 

[Chaotic_Heretic]

I am having a hard-on of hope for this. Should I lube myself up for the butthurt of disappointment too?

 

[Darth Canoli]

I am having a hard-on of hope for this. Should I lube myself up for the butthurt of disappointment too?

It's going to be great, you miscreant!

 

[Lagi]

Geomancy - ideas:

Boulder Throw looks like a funny spell. Why is he available so late? It should be second skill after Runic Boulder.

Graphic of Earthquake looks oddly with this fountain of dirt- not at all like ground shaking. Visually it looks similar to Stone Spikes.

Its a big shame that geomancy doesn't has ultimate late spell to just open a rift in the ground, end let enemies fall down into it. I would make a Late game passive ability to give Earthquake chance for that.

Passive

• Rune of Enfeeblement – reduces physical and stun resistances for enemies adjacent to runic boulders.
• Rune of Binding – raising a boulder slightly decreases energy cost of the skills used during the next turn. could allow to raise 3rd Boulder ( by default only 2 to be allowed) - if so it should be mid game ability, as I understand each boulder in game grant significant benefits. If PC raise it one after another then its some bonus - f.ex. energy discount.
• Rune of Absorption – reduces geomancy spells' cooldowns by 1 for each enemy hit by Stone spikes. Make it late game: Earthquake get chance to create abyss (black space) that cause affected enemy to fall down and be gone forever.
• Rune of Fortification – increases base duration for Stone armor, increases blunt damage delivered by stone spikes as well as improves maximum durability of runic boulders and stone spikes
• Rune of Destabilization – enemies affected by Earthquake take increased damage and have a higher fumble chance. could create chance to bury enemies waist down into the ground (to visually reflect the "fumble chance").
• Rune of Cycle – reduces geomancy spells' cooldowns for each enemy affected by Runic explosion. thrown Boulder will not break. It create interesting options with repositioning builders.
• Rune of Sustention – killing an enemy restores durability of runic boulders. Also reduces energy cost for skills used during the next turn. Rune of Magnetism - when builder is raised: bring close in radius 2 tiles and hold for 1 turn every enemy. Its a weak passive, utility, but will have nice synergy with Enfeeblement.

tech tree idea

 

[normie]

https://steamcommunity.com/games/625960/announcements/detail/357972

Devlog: Weapon Skills

Greetings everyone!

Over the last month we’ve got lots of news to share. Since September 20th we’ve been conducting a Closed Beta Test. Thanks to our testers, we’ve collected a lot of feedback and fixed many bugs. Therefore, this devlog is split in two parts: we’ll present weapons and weapon abilities for those, who haven’t seen beta version gameplay, and then we’ll get to our future plans for the game.

Overall there are 13 types of weaponry planned for the game: swords, axes, maces, daggers, greatswords, greataxes, greatmauls, spears, bows, crossbows, staffs and shields. In turn-based games the majority of weapons functions in a similar manner, so we tried our best to bring as much variety to stats, crit effects and abilities as possible. Specifics go as follows:

At the moment we’ve implemented 8 skill trees out of planned 12. Skill trees more or less share the same structure: one-handed weapons have 8 abilities – 4 actives and 4 passives. Two handed weapons have slightly more abilities, 10 of them overall. It’s been designed this way to compensate for more narrow build paths. While a player with an one-handed sword can also learn shields (or dual-wield with any other one-handed weapon), two-hander warrior has fewer options.

The same principle applies to daggers – they are more effective when dual wielded, so their skill tree also has 2 extra abilities. Other than that, we’ve combined bow and crossbow abilities into a single large skill tree. This will provide archers with an extensive and engaging leveling path and will allow them to use two weapon types.

Now let’s have a closer look at the abilities in question. We are striving for a reasonably realistic setting, so weapon skill trees are mechanically and conceptually more limited than magic. Though each skill tree is built around distinct mechanics and implies special skill rotations which you discover as you invest your skill points. Unfortunately, abilities are quite numerous and we wouldn’t want to stretch out this devlog, so we’ll skip passives and have a quick look at active abilities, supplementing it all with gifs, showing complete skill rotations for each skill tree. Please keep in mind that on most of these gifs characters are overpowered to make GIFs shorter and more entertaining to watch.

Spoiler

Swords

Swords are distinguished by their versatility and mobility.

Onrush – a swift dash towards the enemy.
Keeping Distance – a defensive maneuver with an attack on retreat.
Cleaving Strike – a mighty AoE attack, which increases you Counter Chance.
Fencer’s Stance – a powerful buff to Block and Counter chances, which stacks on successful attacks.

Axes

Axes are focused around crippling enemies with injuries.

Mutilating Lunge lets you open a fight with an injury.
Cut Through does bonus damage to armored and wounded enemies.
Massacre increases Bleed Chance and Bodypart Damage with each strike.
Execution deals tremendous damage to injured foes.

Maces

Maces are the best crowd weapon as most of their abilities are focused around Dazing and Stunning your opponents.

Onslaught allows you to burn enemy’s Energy, Knock them back, move one tile forward and then apply Daze.
Armor Break does significant damage to Armor, especially if the target is Stunned or Dazed and also increases further damage taken by the enemy.
Finish Off does bonus damage for each remaining turn of Stun or Daze affecting the enemy and also puts their abilities on cooldown.
Hammer and Anvil does bonus Armor Damage with a chance to Daze – as with the rest of the weapon buffs, it’s stacked by delivering attacks.

Clarification: Stun forces enemies to skip their turn. Daze is comparable to “silence” effect, preventing enemies from using abilities.

Daggers

Dagger abilities were designed to rely on skillful execution to compensate for their low damage.

Double Lunge allows to deliver two strikes with high Bleed Chance.
Deadly Trick switches places with an enemy, burns their Energy and grants you 100% Dodge Chance for the next turn.
Gaping Wound applies an effect, which makes enemies bleed when they use their abilities.
Coup De Grace deals bonus damage to wounded and bleeding enemies.
And finally, Painful Stabs is a stacking buff to Bleed and Crit chances.

Greatswords

Greatsword is a powerful and self-reliant weapon. Inability to wield it with a secondary weapon or a shield is compensated by high damage output and a wide variety of abilities.

Feint Swing lets you trick an enemy with high Block or Dodge, delivering a guaranteed strike with slightly lower damage.
Heroic Charge allows you to instantly close the distance to an enemy, dealing bonus damage for each tile traveled.
Feast of Steel lowers you damage but increases your Crit Chance to 100%, granting AoE cleave for your attacks.
Parry increases Block Chance and Block Power with each blocked attack. It also allows you to perform a guaranteed Counter on block.
And finally, Arc Cleave strikes up to five adjacent enemies with high Bleed Chance – an indispensable skill for when you find yourself surrounded.

Staffs

Staffs mostly serve as a support weapon. This idea is reflected in their skill tree, mostly built around mobility and crowd control.

Hail of Blows delivers three blows with special properties: Energy Drain, Daze Chance and Knockback Chance.
Step Aside! charges towards a target with a chance to Knock all adjacent enemies back on arrival.
Unwavering Stance decrease Damage Taken and increases Fortitude and Block Chance.
And Peacemaker Dazes all adjacent enemies and lets you retreat a tile back without triggering Attacks of Opportunity.

Ranged Weapons

A fairly extensive skill tree which consists of 14 abilities – just like skill trees for magic.

First ability, Taking Aim, increases damage and Accuracy, compensating for the inherently low Accuracy of ranged weapons.
Distracting Shot is essential for archer’s survival, allowing you to retreat two tiles while shooting a parting arrow at an enemy with lower damage and Accuracy.
Long-Range Shot increases firing distance and grants bonus damage for each tile between you and your target.
Piercing Shot deals damage to all targets standing in the way of an arrow and causes Bleeding. Headshot always targets the head (unexpected, isn’t it?) and has bonus Bodypart Damage.
Suppression is a stacking buff which adds Knockback Chance to your arrows.
Hunter’s Mark is well suited for lonely, resilient targets as it increases damage to them with every subsequent shot.

Shields

Yep, double shields are an option. Though probably not very viable.

Not a weapon per se, but they sure deserve a mention.

Raise Shield provides high Block Chance against incoming blows and arrows for a few turns.
Shield Bash deals small damage with a chance to Daze.
Breakthrough strikes three adjacent enemies with a shield, dealing damage and Knocking them back.
And finally, Defensive Stance will decrease Damage Taken and raise Counter Chance when your character is hit.

CURRENT PLANS


At the moment we are preparing the final (or semifinal) patch for the Closed Beta. After that we will start on giving the Prologue a makeover. Don’t expect radical changes, but some things will actually be very different – and we are not talking about all these new mechanics which appeared in the game over the last year and a half.

We plan to complete it in a few weeks. At the same time, we also plan to update some of the existing mechanics... But it’s a story for another time.
For now, here’s a teaser for the updated main menu:

See you soon!

===================

Also you can join our:

• Steam Creator Page
  
• Discord
  
• Twitter
  
• Facebook

 

[Abu Antar]

https://steamcommunity.com/games/625960/announcements/detail/1563238351446280202

New Release Date

Hello everyone!

After an extensive closed beta-test, quality-assurance as well as the reevaluation of the development roadmap, we want to announce important news - Early Access launch of Stoneshard is being moved to February 6, 2020.

This decision was not easy to make. We wanted you to go explore the lands of Aldor as soon as possible. The current quality of the game at this milestone is up to our standards, however we couldn’t implement some of the important mechanics that we think are crucial to the first public build yet.

Even though the game in its current state is fun to play, we saw areas where we could make improvements in regards to replayability of ingame content, it ends too fast - we wanted to make the core loop more thorough and that’s what we are working on currently.

Right now in the beta there are three categories of enemies (not types), ten skill trees and fully developed first settlement called Osbrook, including its environment, contract system, two types of dungeons and lots of unique equipment.

With more time to improve our systems, February will introduce several new and updated features:

1. The foundation for Caravan mechanics and several possible followers.
   
2. Expansion of the map and an additional new settlement.
   
3. Stoneshard: Prologue, updated and connected with the main game, providing players with proper tutorials to our systems and allowing you to get accustomed to the world of Stoneshard.
   
4. Revisitable dungeons and contracts in earlier settlements.
   
5. First real boss of the game that will test your build and character in glorious battle.
   
6. Updated and polished gameplay mechanics - fully realised dual-wieldingand stealth.
   
7. Additional unique encounters in the world, making exploration more interesting and rewarding.
   
8. Additional skill trees, making playstyle and development of your character more personal
   
9. Additional content - new equipment, enemies and more.

These important updates will allow us to expand upon them and provide much more smooth experience for world progression.

We want to deliver you almost all core features when it hits Early Access, so that we can continue to collect feedback and improve upon our vision with our community involved until full release.

It is in our best hopes that the extension to February 2020 will help us to provide you with an enjoyable experience with Stoneshard.

Thank you for your patience,
Ink Stains Games.

 

[Darth Canoli]

Hello everyone!

After an extensive closed beta-test, quality-assurance as well as the reevaluation of the development roadmap, we want to announce important news - Early Access launch of Stoneshard is being moved to February 6, 2020.

This decision was not easy to make. We wanted you to go explore the lands of Aldor as soon as possible. The current quality of the game at this milestone is up to our standards, however we couldn’t implement some of the important mechanics that we think are crucial to the first public build yet.

Even though the game in its current state is fun to play, we saw areas where we could make improvements in regards to replayability of ingame content, it ends too fast - we wanted to make the core loop more thorough and that’s what we are working on currently.

Wow, once again, they're giving an ethics lesson to all the AAA devs out there, i hope they'll be rewarded with a mountain of bucks.

 

[Volokard]

Looks really good, guys. Keep up the good work. Better to improve it in whatever way you can now than rushing it.

 

[Murk]

Glad to see it's got a release date; verrrrrrrrrrrry nice.

 

[Infinitron]

https://www.kickstarter.com/project...rld-roguelike-rpg-with-tactical/posts/2686384

Devlog: Prologue Progress

Hello everyone!

In this devlog we’ll tell you what to expect from the updated Prologue which we plan to release this year.

Since the release of the Prologue in May 2018 almost every aspect of the game has changed so much, that the current Prologue will rather confuse newcomers than introduce them to the game. Therefore we decided to put an effort into updating its systems and mechanics so that they’ll better reflect the state of the main game.

It’s worth mentioning that the Prologue will remain free and will also be included in the main game, where it will serve as a tutorial and an introduction to the story. It means that you can complete it both as a standalone version as well as a part of the main game. Your actions in the Prologue will not have any effect on your main game so don’t worry about transferring progress. The only thing to keep in mind is that if you finish the Prologue beforehand, you’ll be able to skip it in the main game and go straight to creating your character.

The Prologue’s structure will remain almost exactly the same. You’ll still find yourself in a dungeon, escape, complete a tutorial floor and then fight your way through two procedurally generated floors to challenge the final boss. We’ve also introduced quite a number of changes to the tutorial. For instance - more visible and descriptive popups, explaining game’s mechanics. We hope that it will provide a better introduction to the game.

As for game systems and mechanics, everything is now up to date with the current build of the main game. Reworked UI, relevant stats and abilities, new health and injury system, more transparent display of hunger and thirst, better dungeon generation, destructible objects and enemies opening doors – it will all be included in the updated Prologue.

Content wise there are many noticeable changes, especially for those who didn’t take part in the closed beta test. Since the release of the original Prologue we’ve added a huge number of new equipment and also changed most of the old stuff, so you’ll see lots of new items. We’ve also changed starting enemies. Now instead of vampires you’ll fight against a cult of Proselytes, boasting fresh new enemy types and abilities. Other than that, all dialogues were rewritten to better accommodate story and setting changes.

And finally, the boss fight. It’s safe to say that it has been improved the most. First of all, the Cursed Chapel was completely remade in accordance with our increased quality standards. Second, we’ve added a few tweaks to the fight with the statues. For instance half the spells is tied to one statue, while the other is to the second one. Respectively, by destroying one of the statues, you’ll prevent the Archon from casting blood bolts and puddles or stop him from summoning and healing zombies.

Third, the battle with the reborn Archon which used to be an optional secret, is now a mandatory second phase of the fight. The Archon himself was naturally changed as well, now possessing quite a few new abilities. You should be able to beat him by strategically exploiting his weaknesses. What are those? You’ll have to find out yourself.

That’s it for now. We’ll announce a date for the Prologue very soon, so stay tuned.
Until next time!

 

[Harthwain]

I decided to give the demo a shot and I am really glad I did.

- It has amazing pixel art and the sheer number of art assets is impressive (even something as small as changing items on your person is reflected).

- The UI is decent. My only issues with it were: the rest and stealth buttons should be in the open, rather than hidden under an expanding menu, as they are used very often. Drink and food items should be draggable unto the main bar, so you don't have to open the inventory each time you need to drink or eat. There needs to be a smoother way to pick up single objects from the ground. Also, give us the options to select which body part we want to use a splint on. In the demo you can use it, but I am afraid where it goes it random, so when there are two wound to pick from you don't have the control over it.

- Itemization is enormous. Even after 6 hours I still found new objects and items (including some cursed ones, which strongly encourages you to identify items before wearing them). Given that's just a demo it bodes really well for the full release.

- You have to eat and drink, but also need to take care of pain and toxicity levels. The latter is particularly interesting, because you can't gulp down too many powerful potions before vomiting your liver out. In a way it reminded me of the Witcher, only Stoneshard does this aspect way better than the Witcher ever did. There is a large variety of health-related items with different levels of impact on your character. Also, it's nice that items have durability (although this aspect could do some changing). Overall, the simulationist aspect of the game is very in-depth and helps immersion.

- Combat is simple and deadly, but it can be surprisingly deep and I found almost any approach to be valid in combat. And that's just on the basic level, so it can only get better, with more skills and enemies. Stealth is too simplistic in the demo (enemies are almost literally blind), but it helps you very early on and when you're using daggers to land these critical hits.

- The alternative boss fight is super hard. You basically need to get lucky with potions. I had Stoneskin, Elusiveness and Deadly (and a bunch of others, including 3x minor healing ones), which made the fight fairly easy, even with somewhat mediocre equipment. If you don't get that, then the boss will kill you very fast, because he hits really hard (enough to break your body parts and take 1/3 or 1/2 of your entire health in a single swing. Still, it's interesting to have an alternative way to do this.

- Voice acting is solid. Varren in particular is really good.

- Dungeon level generation was satisfactional. Each the dungeon was different, containing different loot, so each playthrough was a little bit different. It lends itself very well to rest of the game.

TL;DR - It's an instant day one purchase from me.

 

[Harthwain]

Remastered Prologue is Here!

Hello everyone!

Ink Stains Games here! We’d like to wish all of you Happy Holidays and to present you the long awaited update for the Prologue as a Christmas gift.

The original Prologue was published in May 2018. At the time it was more of a proof of concept, designed to demonstrate Kickstarter backers our vision of the future game. A lot of time has passed since then, most systems of the game have changed beyond recognition. And at some point the Prologue grew so outdated that updating it became a priority.

Now the Prologue is mechanically equal to the main game and we hope it will make it easier to wait for the February release

Stoneshard: Prologue

The list of changes is too expansive to be presented in detail – after all, this update includes a year and a half of hard work. The Prologue’s structure remains the same, but if we are to list the most important changes, here is what you should expect from this update:

• An improved tutorial with detailed advice on main game mechanics.
  
• Vampires were swapped with Proselytes – a new group of enemies with their own set of abilities.
  
• A reworked boss fight, which now consists of two consecutive phases instead of two parallel outcomes.
  
• A reworked health, injury and needs system. The old Prologue had it functioning based on RNG. Now it’s a transparent, deterministic process which you can assess at any time.
  
• More weapons, equipment and all kinds of items.
  
• Abilities from the closed beta are now available in the Prologue.
  
• Destructible environment. Press CTRL to attack environmental objects!
  
• Reworked Dual Wielding system.
  
• Lots of QoL improvements: better controls, more hotkeys, item comparison, inventory auto-sorting, pop-up hints and more. Though keep in mind that the game is designed primarily for mouse controls.
  
• Most of the game art was reworked.
  
• Dialogues and lore notes were rewritten to better clarify the opening events of the story. New voice-overs for the characters.
  
• Lots of changed and added mechanics (reworked Attributes, for instance).
  
• A reworked UI.
  
• Fullscreen support for 1366х768, 1440х900, 1600х900, 1680х1050, 1920х1080 and 1920х1200 resolutions.
  
• Added an event log.
  
• “Last Hope” and “At What Cost?” achievements were replaced by “The Bitter Beginning” and “Eternal Hunger” achievements. The rest of the achievements were updated to fit with the content changes.
  
• Enemies learned how to open doors.

It’s worth to remember that many of the planned mechanics are still missing. On February 6 the game is just being released for Early Access, during which we plan to continue developing it for another couple of years, gradually implementing our vision.

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Frequently asked questions


Where did the stealth and some other skill trees from the old Prologue go?

Stealth mode was temporarily removed from the game. It will return during Early Access after being reworked. Same for the unavailable skill trees.

Can I launch the game on Mac or Linux?

Unfortunately you can’t. For now we can’t say for certain when the game will be available for these platforms.

What happens if I’ve already got the achievements in the old Prologue?

Don’t worry, your progress remains. The achievements were changed, not removed, so you automatically get their changed versions.

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Merry Christmas and good luck finding your way out of the dungeon!

 

[Alienman]

Is the demo locked to 40 fps?

 

[Alienman]

Just replayed the demo and I can't believe how good this game is. Graphics, sound, mechanic and atmosphere. The only thing I'm not 100% into is the rogue like mechanic. Got to the last boss and got one shotted... guess I didn't pay attention to something. Now having to redo everything... I don't know.

Even so. I'm really looking forward to the release!

 

[Modron]

Or you just got shafted on rng loot, happens seen pictures of other dudes in bronze plate or some shit and I was still wearing rags.

 

[Harthwain]

My first impression of the reworked demo:

1) The new starting point is annoying if you want to go to the dungeon with all potential skills unlocked. The checkpoint is before you read all the books, so if you die and want to give the dungeon another go, you have to read them all over again.

2) There is no stealth (will be in the full game) so attacking unaware enemies is rarely a possibility. This hurts daggers the most, although it is possible to win direct fights with specialization in dual-wield daggers and at least reach the boss. The bigger problem is that you can alert an entire room full of enemies due to complete lack of stealth option in the reworked Prologue and there isn't much you can do about it.

3) The rest-spam got nerfed, but in a good way. You can still use it, if you find enough food. On the other hand, it depends on how much food you have access to as your thirst and hunger will accelerate.

4) Healing items are at premium now, due to how the health system got reworked. This means even reaching the boss is a feat now. I have a mixed opinion on this. I like the challenge it brings, but it made the game (or at least the Prologue) even more loot-dependent than it was previously. Also, the bandages became both extremely valuable and useless, because if you don't have them and you bleed, you can bleed out easily. But if you have them, they won't serve as a secondary healing item to heal up your damaged body-parts, so they aren't really useful. Leeches are super valuable.

5) Items drops very sparesely now, and I mean that. This affects pretty much everything: how much you can heal yourself up, how you can deal with pain (which is much more frequent, because it goes up simply by taking damage and with less armor - because loot is less frequent and less magnanimus in quality - you are more likely to accumulate hits/wounds/pain in combat), etc. I guess it was done that way to better reflect the final game's loot rarity?

6) The transitional room with the campfire, the one that used to give you a few pieces of guaranteed gear, now has fixed items. It's a bit sad, because I liked the "what do I get this time" aspect of it. Oh, well...

7) Lockpicks aren't spent on use, only if you fumble them.

8) Going with the bow seems to be a viable playstyle and even a good supplementary option (I didn't bother with it at all before), because in the reworked Prologue arrows don't to go to waste as fast.

9) The starting fire magic skill got even more useful than it was before. However, it encourages kitting enemies to avoid taking damage as much as possible.

10) Not really the fan of the reworked dialogues (fonts, speeches). They are OK, but I felt like the previous ones gave Warren more character by being shorter and the font was more fitting the pixel art of the game. The reworked Archon is better overall though.

 

[underground nymph]

Soundtrack by the Electric Wizard could perfectly complement this game.