Came up with a bunch of good names for future games --- so good that they were already taken, somewhere at some time.

And because we’re such a litigious society, people will sue over even partial names.

I remember getting a threatening letter because we had a technology in Galactic Civilizations II called “Space Marines” and that they had a trademark on that name. We renamed it to Stellar Marines (sounds better anyway).

In recent times, companies have had to resort with coming up with fewer main names “Call of Duty” or “Total War” and then come up with a sub-title in order to have sufficient uniqueness (and of course, even that doesn’t always keep the super-litigious from trying to find a way to cash in).

Hence, I was afraid of calling our first fantasy game “War of Magic” because god knows, there’s probably some game some where called that so we had to call it Elemental: War of Magic. Luckily, Sins of a Solar Empire: Rebellion is probably safe…

Playing around with that this evening.  Trying to migrate from my 2010 Mac Pro. Taking a lot longer than I’d like.

I also have a ThinkPad X1-carbon on the way. I’ll let you know how that goes when I get it.

For those of you modding, we have added a new type of game modifier called ChangeWorld.

It requires code to be used to determine which world variable is being set.

Example:

This sets variable index 148 to 5.  index 148 is the number of accessories a unit can equip (defaults to 4).

Here are others for future reference:

4. Base Unit Wages

10. Training Units consumes population (1 = true, 0 = false)

17. City Maint Cost exponent (currently 0).  If 18 is set, then you could have more cities cost more and more.

18. City Maint Base Cost (currently 0). 

42. The exponential growth on how much XP it takes to level up. It's currently around 2.90 (higher means harder to level up)

52. How much money sovereigns generate per turn (currently 0)

53. Same for mana (currently 0)

117. Global Hit Point bonus (in case you want to give everyone more HP in your quest or improvement or whatever)

145. Cost per labor to rush production

147. Max units that you can station in a city

148. Max number of accessories a unit can have.

149. Minimum turns required to train or build something (currently 3)

I'll add more.

Incidentally, all this and more can be changed in elementaldefs.xml. It's pretty self explanatory.

So I’m having a blast making quests. I had forgotten how powerful the system had gotten over the past couple of years of development.

I am going to make a claim here that I hope modders will back me up on: You could, with the current beta, make a Baldur’s Gate style RPG with the quest system.

You’d be insane to try though. Until there’s a real editor, working with XML is a kind of torture once the quests start to get complicated. A typo here or there can really wreck things. It’s very very tedious. Plus, you’d want to have more controls over your “campaign” to disable units and things to make it an RPG and not an empire builder. 

I just want to emphasize that what I’m doing is all being done with Notepad.  If I had some .NET developers handy, I’d ask them to make a proper editor (and in fact, if anyone wants to make some money on the side, I’d be glad to arrange something to someone interested in making a proper quest editor).

Here’s a simple one I made today:

I bring the little man to me.

I answer…a duck.

So in this case, I give units items, name those items, and their descriptions right from the same XML.

…

Ok, let’s try that again..

Guy comes to visit…yada yada yada.  Picking a different answer…

Got the location for the Gauntlets of power. But Mimbly also gave me…dancing shoes.

Those are some pretty…boots.

Reason #503 as to why you don’t let software developers make art requirements:

Every single unit in the game can be dressed and have it show up on the map. This requirement was added by me after Demigod (a great game btw).  In that game, the armor and weapons you equipped didn’t show up on your unit in the map. They said it would be extremely expensive and difficult to do that. The “bang for the buck” wasn’t there.

But I insisted that the Kumquat engine support it for WOM/FE. 

GPG was right and I was wrong. It was tremendously difficult to do this.  Especially when there are thousands of units running around.

But now that it’s done, it is nice to see it in action.

Anyway…Getting on with our quest…

The quest can supply a tactical battle map too.  Unfortunately, I don’t have any right now that look like a tomb yet. I could make one with the built in map editor but I’m a dangerously lazy guy and Paul says he’ll make me one next week.

So here I got to put the units in and name them whatever I’d like.

And again, I took a piece of equipment someone else made, renamed it and gave it its own description.

The description is inherited by the object (the gauntlets). It’s not just some pop up description. That initiated game object has the description tied to it now forever.

And there they are.

Learn more on Elemental: Fallen Enchantress at www.fallenenchantress.com.

Fallen Enchantress has random events. It’s just that there aren’t many and the odds of one showing up in a given turn are in 1/10,000.

So as we get ready for Beta 5, which is all about bug fixing, polish, and balance, we are finally starting to add a lot of new random events.

This is the part I should probably mention that any monkey can make a quest. You do need the powerful tool known as notepad. That’s how I’m doing it. It’s just XML and it’s pretty straight forward to make a fairly simple quest or random event (i.e. kill fooz or fetch me a holy hand grenade or escort my goat, etc.).  But there’s nothing stopping you from making a massive, epic quest.

In this random event, I set it so that after turn 50 there is a 0.1% chance of the event being triggered each turn. So odds are, you will rarely get this event (maybe once every 4 or 5 games).  But in addition to spawning a nasty cave with these nasty monsters in it, I also had it spam the world with a bunch of escaped darklings.

What’s nice about this is that modders (and guys like me) can control the “experience” of the game through the use of the turn trigger.

I’m thinking about coding in a power based trigger. That is, if the player is just dominating (or alternatively, getting really hurt) I could have the game trigger some interesting events to whoever is winning (or losing) to mix things up. I did this with Galactic Civilizations with quite a bit of success in keeping things moving.

Of course, with GalCiv, only I could make this stuff. With Fallen Enchantress, not only can a stupid monkey like myself crank this out, but you guys could too.

Below is the complete XML for this particular quest (90% of which is copy and paste):

   1:   <QuestDef InternalName="RandomEvent_AdventureProblem_2">

   2:      <DisplayName>Troublesome Adventerers</DisplayName>

   3:      <Description>

   4:        Into the throne room comes three very sad looking adventurers. They explain, at considerable length, that they met at a local pub and decided to go on a quest together. Unfortunately, this quest brought them to the ancient dungeon of Orilinor, Curgen's jailer.

   5:   

   6:        This dungeon was thought to be lost and, frankly, it would have been better had it stayed lost because upon opening it, a couple centuries worth of monster breeding has now been unleashed into the country side.

   7:   

   8:        "And, a demon known as Anithan is still there," he says.

   9:   

  10:        What do you want to do?

  11:      </Description>

  12:      <ShortTextAccept>Sigh. Can't you people get real jobs? You'll be helping clean up this mess.</ShortTextAccept>

  13:      <AllowQuestRejection>0</AllowQuestRejection>

  14:      <RewardText>Book of Demon Summoning</RewardText>

  15:      <RewardImage>Tech_Third_Book.png</RewardImage>

  16:      <SuccessText>

  17:        Anithan is defeated and the book is yours. Using the books of your private study to translate the runes in the book, you are able to summon a demon to do your bidding. Unfortunately, the book disintegrates upon use.

  18:      </SuccessText>

  19:      <QuestClass>Minor</QuestClass>

  20:      <Repeatable>0</Repeatable>

  21:      <TriggerType>TurnNumber</TriggerType>

  22:      <TriggerData>50</TriggerData>

  23:      <TriggerChance>10</TriggerChance>

  24:      <PostTriggerChance>10</PostTriggerChance>

  25:      <SpawnRating>1</SpawnRating>

  26:      <Image>BG18_Dark.png</Image>

  27:      <Treasure>

  28:        <GameModifier InternalName="Reward1">

  29:          <ModType>Unit</ModType>

  30:          <Attribute>GiveExperience</Attribute>

  31:          <Value>30</Value>

  32:        </GameModifier>

  33:      </Treasure>

  34:      <Treasure>

  35:        <GameModifier InternalName="Reward2">

  36:          <ModType>Unit</ModType>

  37:          <Attribute>UnitJoinArmy</Attribute>

  38:          <StrVal>DeathDemon</StrVal>

  39:          <StrVal2>Pox the Demon</StrVal2>

  40:          <UnitClass>Unit</UnitClass>

  41:        </GameModifier>

  42:      </Treasure>

  43:      <QuestObjectiveDef>

  44:        <ObjectiveID>0</ObjectiveID>

  45:        <NextObjectiveID>1</NextObjectiveID>

  46:        <Description>Find and defeat Anithan.</Description>

  47:        <Treasure>

  48:          <GameModifier>

  49:            <ModType>Map</ModType>

  50:            <Attribute>CreateGoodieHut</Attribute>

  51:            <StrVal>Orilinor's Dungeon</StrVal>

  52:            <Unitclass>GH_Quest_Cave</Unitclass>

  53:            <Radius>12</Radius>

  54:          </GameModifier>

  55:          <GameModifier>

  56:            <ModType>Map</ModType>

  57:            <Attribute>SpawnMonster</Attribute>

  58:            <Value>24</Value>

  59:            <Unitclass>Darkling</Unitclass>

  60:            <StrVal>Escaped Darklings</StrVal>

  61:            <Radius>12</Radius>

  62:          </GameModifier>

  63:          <GameModifier InternalName="Join">

  64:            <ModType>Unit</ModType>

  65:            <Attribute>UnitJoinArmy</Attribute>

  66:            <StrVal>Iru</StrVal>

  67:            <StrVal2>Amanda</StrVal2>

  68:            <UnitClass>Unit</UnitClass>

  69:            <Level>6</Level>

  70:          </GameModifier>

  71:          <GameModifier InternalName="Join">

  72:            <ModType>Unit</ModType>

  73:            <Attribute>UnitJoinArmy</Attribute>

  74:            <StrVal>Syndicate_SpyMaster</StrVal>

  75:            <StrVal2>Lucila</StrVal2>

  76:            <UnitClass>Unit</UnitClass>

  77:            <Level>6</Level>

  78:          </GameModifier>

  79:          <GameModifier InternalName="Join">

  80:            <ModType>Unit</ModType>

  81:            <Attribute>UnitJoinArmy</Attribute>

  82:            <StrVal>Mercenary</StrVal>

  83:            <StrVal2>Kelen</StrVal2>

  84:            <UnitClass>Unit</UnitClass>

  85:            <Level>6</Level>

  86:          </GameModifier>

  87:        </Treasure>

  88:        <QuestConditionDef>

  89:          <Objective>

  90:            <Icon>Mana_32.png</Icon>

  91:            <Text>Find the cave that leads to the dungeon, defeat Anithan.</Text>

  92:            <IsOptional>0</IsOptional>

  93:          </Objective>

  94:          <Class>Success</Class>

  95:          <Type>ClearGoodieHut</Type>

  96:          <TextData>GH_Quest_Cave</TextData>

  97:          <Flag>RevealTarget</Flag>

  98:        </QuestConditionDef>

  99:        <ChoiceText>You manage to cause a cave in, sealing off the entrance to the vast lambrynth underneath but not before Anithan and his servants confront you.</ChoiceText>

 100:        <ChoiceMedallion>F_Domination_Full.png</ChoiceMedallion>

 101:        <ChoiceMedallionFrame>Medallion_Frame_17.png</ChoiceMedallionFrame>

 102:        <QuestChoiceDef>

 103:          <Description>Defeat Anithan</Description>

 104:          <NextObjectiveID>1</NextObjectiveID>

 105:          <Encounter>

 106:            <Liklihood>100</Liklihood>

 107:            <BattleIdentifier>Anithan</BattleIdentifier>

 108:            <WillRespawn>0</WillRespawn>

 109:            <WanderingRadius>0</WanderingRadius>

 110:            <UnitInstance>

 111:              <UnitType>DeathDemon</UnitType>

 112:              <UnitName>Anithan</UnitName>

 113:              <Level>1</Level>

 114:            </UnitInstance>

 115:            <UnitInstance>

 116:              <UnitType>Juggernaut_Escaped</UnitType>

 117:              <UnitName>Failed prototype</UnitName>

 118:              <Level>1</Level>

 119:            </UnitInstance>

 120:            <UnitInstance>

 121:              <UnitType>DarklingWarrior</UnitType>

 122:              <UnitName>Darkling Horde</UnitName>

 123:              <UnitGroupingType>UnitGroupingType_Squad</UnitGroupingType>

 124:              <Level>1</Level>

 125:            </UnitInstance>

 126:          </Encounter>

 127:        </QuestChoiceDef>

 128:        <QuestChoiceDef>

 129:          <Description>Ah. Yes...well..quite. We will just be leaving you to your cave.</Description>

 130:          <NextObjectiveID>0</NextObjectiveID>

 131:        </QuestChoiceDef>

 132:      </QuestObjectiveDef>

 133:      <QuestObjectiveDef>

 134:        <ObjectiveID>1</ObjectiveID>

 135:        <NextObjectiveID>2</NextObjectiveID>

 136:        <PopupObjectiveMsg>0</PopupObjectiveMsg>

 137:        <QuestConditionDef>

 138:          <Objective>

 139:            <Icon>Mana_32.png</Icon>

 140:            <Text>Defeat Anithan</Text>

 141:            <IsOptional>0</IsOptional>

 142:          </Objective>

 143:          <Class>Success</Class>

 144:          <Type>BattleFinished</Type>

 145:          <TextData>Anithan</TextData>

 146:          <MoreTextData>Victory</MoreTextData>

 147:        </QuestConditionDef>

 148:        <QuestConditionDef>

 149:          <Objective>

 150:            <Icon></Icon>

 151:            <Text>Battle Lost</Text>

 152:            <IsOptional>0</IsOptional>

 153:          </Objective>

 154:          <Class>Failure</Class>

 155:          <Type>BattleFinished</Type>

 156:          <TextData>Anithan</TextData>

 157:          <MoreTextData>Defeat</MoreTextData>

 158:        </QuestConditionDef>

 159:      </QuestObjectiveDef>

 160:      <QuestObjectiveDef>

 161:        <ObjectiveID>2</ObjectiveID>

 162:        <NextObjectiveID>3</NextObjectiveID>

 163:        <Description>Return to your capital with the untranslated book of demons.</Description>

 164:        <QuestConditionDef>

 165:          <Objective>

 166:            <Icon>Mana_32.png</Icon>

 167:            <Text>Return to the capital with the untranslated book of demon summoning.</Text>

 168:            <IsOptional>0</IsOptional>

 169:          </Objective>

 170:          <Class>Success</Class>

 171:          <Type>UnitEntersCapital</Type>

 172:        </QuestConditionDef>

 173:      </QuestObjectiveDef>

 174:      <QuestObjectiveDef>

 175:        <ObjectiveID>3</ObjectiveID>

 176:        <QuestEnd>1</QuestEnd>

 177:      </QuestObjectiveDef>

 178:    </QuestDef>

In preparation for the Windows 8 launch, Stardock has released a near-final version of its highly anticipated Start8 utility.

Start8 is a program that adds the Start button back to the Windows 8 desktop as well as provides a fully function post-Windows 7 style Start menu.

What’s New:

• Windows 7 style Start menu with Windows 8 enhancements
• Users can search for Windows 8-style (Metro) apps with it
• Users can pin Metro apps to it
• Full support for Jump Lists
• Unified Search
• Automatically matches color to the color of the taskbar
• Start button is now skinnable
• Users can boot directly to the Windows 8 desktop
• Optionally disable the desktop “hot spots”.
• Fast access to shut down, devices, music, documents, videos
• Supports WindowFX 5.1 startmenu animations (currently in beta)
• The Windows 8 Start screen becomes accessible from the Start menu
• Start menu size fully configurable
• Adds option for WinKey to show fullscreen Metro desktop.

Screenshots:

Post Windows 7-style start menu: Can “see” and interact with Windows 8 style apps.

Start button orb image can be changed

All installed Windows 8 style apps can be found by typing “Metro”.

Users can quickly access all their programs and shut down options

Download at https://www.stardock.com/products/start8

Hi guys,

We plan to release a 0.952 before heading to Beta 5.  Beta 5 will be purely about bug fixing and polish but we do have a number of significant bugs on our list that we plan to address prior to leaving Beta 4.

Here are a few selected ones that I've seen others report that are type 0 (prevent playing of the game).

1. Missing unit display in the sovereign screen and other areas.  This is a video card issue but we have worked around it in 0.951. Turn off anti-aliasing in the settings and it should work. Make sure you update your drivers.

2. Slow down in tactical battles.  This has not yet been fixed but we know what causes it. It's high on our list to fix. It is caused by a model leak in the terrain that causes each rendering to take longer and longer. We expect to have this fixed before we leave Beta 4.

3. Crashes (in general). These are an ongoing thing.  As we improve performance in the game, we expose bugswith the multicore engine we've developed. The more cores your system has, the faster Fallen Enchantress runs. Compare the end turn perf of FE to any other strategy game of similar scope and you can see the benefits (there's no "please wait" screen in FE)  However, if multiple threads are modifying a piece of memory at the same time, it will crash the game. This is a bug on our part for not correctly making a copy of the vector that was being modified. There aren't many of these bugs but they're in there.

4. Save game corruption. This should be fixed in 0.951. If you run into any problems, let us know.

All other bugs would fall under "need to fix in beta 5" such as balance or stupid AI tricks or stupid animation bugs.  However, if you are experiencing something NOT on the above list that is detrimental to the game functioning, post here.

As a reminder, the key bits of information we need are:

1. What OS you are running.

2. What video card you are using.

If you can share with us any other data, such as debug.err or a saved game (saved games are really helpful in balancing things btw), please share them with us.

I highly recommend using DropBox. If you don't already have it, you can get it here.

Just as we did with Sins of a Solar Empire: Rebellion, the late stage betas of Elemental: Fallen Enchantress will be appearing on third-party digital distribution channels such as Steam and Impulse (GameStop PC Downloads).

We anticipate (but don’t promise) that the betas should go live on those services by this evening, EST.

For those of you just joining us, here’s  a video walkthrough:

For those of you in the beta already, here’s what’s new over Beta 4:

Features

• Added the Road Building unit design ability (Mancer only, Mancer Pioneer's start with it)
• Added the Road Building champion ability (requires Path of the Governor)
• Cities get 10% Unrest penalty if they aren't connected to the capital's ZoC
• New spell display when you mouseover spell perks on the levelup screen
• New Tactical Combat screen
• Auto-turn will no longer activate if you have an idle city
• Added the Arcane Veil spell (strategic, unit enchantment, the unit resists all spells)
• Added the Diamondskin spell (tactical, makes the unit immune to all physical damage for 5 turns)
• Added the Glory spell (raises faction prestige by 1, can be cast multiple times)
• Added the Heart of Fire spell (city enchantment, all units traied in this city get bonus fire attack)
• Added the Kill spell (high casting cost and casting time, victim has to save or die)

Fixes

• Memory fixes/optomization
• Fixed an issue with the Haunter quest
• Fixed an issue with Arneson not having a weapon
• Fixed an issue causing Alchemy Labs to give extra materials
• Fixed an issue where Slave Pens didn't have the benefits of earlier improvements
• Fixed an issue where melee attack effects (like poison) were applied even if the attack missed
• Fixed a 0 labor cost on Ereog's Tower
• Fixed the Guild Gorcer
• Added a default skin color to the monster faction so units spawned on quests aren't white
• Fixed an issue causing improvement auto-placement to sprawl out in a single direction instead of wrapping around the city
• Fixed an issue allowing players to skip movement costs if they right clicked in the tile during movement
• Fixed deadlock issues
• Fixed stuck turn problem caused by animation not syncing with moveable status
• Fixed bug where units would be running in place at the end of a turn
• Fixed bug where AI units would just be standing there running in place
• Fixed bug where a monster would be running to another tile when the player attacked
• Fixed the crash bug in tactical battles where the opposing unit had no defense
• Fixed path finding bug where a unit would move through a resource improvement (destroying it) to get to what was on the other side
• Re-did turns so that AI players move 1 player at a time (instead of all at once) which improves frame rate and eliminates weird chasing
• Fixed bug that caused a unit to think it was done moving before its animation was complete
• Fixed an issue where ruffians lair upgraded to umberdroth lairs
• Fixed some missing category issues on some spells
• Fixed an issue causing Ai only units to show up in the tech tree
• Fixed a crash in the tutorial
• Fixed crash related to the build queue being updated from multiple threads
• Fixed lockup due to multiple threads hogging the resource semaphore too long
• Fixed crash due to multiple threads looking at the resource improvement costs at the same time
• Fixed crash due to multiple threads counting the # of outposts for a given player.
• Units of the same player will pass through one another in path finding rather than try to go around
• Units will pass through friendly foreign player caravans.
• Path finding generally improved
• General performance improvements (update processes moved to twice a second instead of every frame)
• Fixed an issue with corrupted saves
• Path finding fixes
• Fixed an issue where Inspiration and Meditation wouldn’t update if the city gained more Essence

Balance

• Removed maintenance from some improvements
• Reduced the labor cost on the Towers of Sorcery
• Increased the Archivist to +50% research when the city is idle instead of +20%
• Guild Lendinghouse gives 200 Gildar when it is constructed instead of interest
• Added a 2nd level upgrade to warg kennels and stables that provides more wargs/horses
• Increased the Scroll Scribe research bonus form +10% to +20%
• Added a reward to the Diseased Livestock quest
• Reduce the mana cost of the Avarice spell
• Increased the effect of the Destiny's Gift spell
• Sweep now does the units full attack in damage instead of half (and the cooldown is increased form 3 to 5)
• Aliiance tech doesn't require Economics anymore
• Reduced the research cost of Education, King of the Wastes and Literacy
• Administration tech requires Knowledge
• Lombard Desert wildland now requires Torax to be killed instead of clearing the goodie huts
• Increased the free defenders on Villages
• Limited the Theater of the Wind to 1 per faction (and fixed the icon on it)
• Sovereign's Call is now available form the beginning (instead of requiring Sorcery)
• Nature's Bounty now requires Sorcery
• Default difficulty is Easy instead of Normal
• Occupation Unrest will drop to 0 if it's given enough time
• Increased distance from starting location requirement on more powerful monster lairs
• Increased damage on Blizzard
• Burning Hands does 8 (+4 per fire shard) damage instead of the casters level (+4 per fire shard)
• Increased damage on Touch of Entropy
• Increased the level 1 spell rank abilities form 1 to 2 cost in sovereign customization
• Inspiration does 2 research per essence instead of 1
• Reduced the value of influence during wartime from 100X normal to 10X normal
• Wage Mulitplier now affects the turns required to train a unit for different group sizes
• Rebalanced metal costs on weapons (generally down)
• Takes less XP to go up levels
• XP from monsters is now relatively greater than the XP players get from other players
• Frostborn trait gives -3 init to units that are struck instead of -1
• Ice Elementals lose the ability to cast Slow and gain the Frostborn trait instead
• Darkling and Wilding camps give 3 units instead of 5
• Reduced the init of the Elemental lords
• Horses increase init by 3, dodge vs ranged by 25 (instead of 15) and gives 2 moves (instead of 1)
• Wargs give +6 init (instead of +3, and +10 dodge (instead of +5)
• Reduced the casting cost of Antipathy and Wall of Fire
• Sacrifice gives 1 mana per pop sacrificed (instead of 1 mana per 2 pop sacrificed)
• Increased the attack on the Shadow Dagger and the Sharp Dagger

AI

• AI less likely to build pioneers and instead focus on improving cities
• AI less likely to declare war on player after peace is made
• AI now takes into account essence when deciding where to build a city
• AI is less likely to offer a non-aggression pact to a player of a different alignment
• AI more likely to upgrade their equipment
• AI more aggressive about building research improving city improvements
• AI fixed bug that caused AI to build pioneers instead of city defenders
• AI a bit less likely to declare war on player
• AI more likely to pay others to declare war on those at war with them
• AI more likely to surrender
• AI now razes city when they surrender (scorched earth)
• AI will value player influence more when evaluating relations
• Wargs cost more to trade
• AI values its money more when it has less of it when it is trading
• AI values influence more during trading
• Influence now greatly affects the overall value of things in trading (the more you have, the better the deal you can cut)
• Horses valued a lot more in trading
• Knowledge now valued significantly more during trading
• AI a bit smarter regarding expansion
• AI hooked up to new city enchantment system
• AI a LOT smarter about determining what spells it should cast and when

Cosmetic

• Fixed the provides tag on Earth Mage
• Lots of new sfx when discovering goodie huts
• Improved the quest desc on the Dragongate quest
• Fixed lots of spell descs to have + in the bonus
• Fixed lots of typos
• Added sage hints for the Henchmen, Juggernauts, Spellsbooks and Immortal Codex techs
• Updated the Siege Weapons tech desc
• New tile design added
• New Drake textures
• Added V/O to the intro for all the default sovereigns
• Defending units don't move between an attack and a backswing
• Main menu displays total play time
• Save games display the total tiem that game was played
• Victory screen shows the total play time of that game
• Clicking on a resource shows a line to the attached city
• Unit dots on Empire tree now color coded (purple = sovereign, green = pioneer, red = normal unit, yellow = champion)
• Glow color of cities on empire tree color coded. Green means city is growing. Dark means it has reached its max population.
• Glow color of units on empire tree color coded. Green means they have moves left. Dark means they don't.
• When foreign cities are conquered, the player is notified
• Opposing player explains why they won't accept tribute
• Fixed bug that caused mouse clicks to be lost when a player clicked an item on the empire tree or unit in a city
• Edge scrolling made smoother
• Empire tree colors brighter
• Fixed that annoying double click sound when opening the train unit window
• Changed and reprioritized some actions (attack isnt in the unit list anymore, rename comes before raze in the city list)

Screenshots

We’ve improved the overall visual performance (plus lots of bug fixes from beta 4)

We’ve tweaked the pioneering system to encourage more thoughtful expansion (beta 4B will do more in this area)

Started implementation of more tool tips on level up screens.

New tactical battle screen provides hot key support, context sensitive attack analysis.

Just saw this in tonight’s build:

Next week we expect to release an update to Fallen Enchantress. That update will be available to existing users of Fallen Enchantress and it will also be the first version available for sale on Steam (Beta 4-A).

The plan is to put out Beta 4A and then collect as much feedback as we can. Seriously, NOW is the time to ask for stuff (within reason) because when Beta 5 comes out (next month) we’ll be in feature lock-down. No new features until after release.

Now, we have a few questions for you guys:

(1) How do you think we should refer to this game? Elemental: Fallen Enchantress or just Fallen Enchantress?

(2) You can already go to www.fallenenchantress.com btw to go right to the page.

(3) What sorts of additional magical spells would you like to see us add before release that aren’t already in the game?

(4) What sorts of additional quests would you like to see?

(5) Random events – yes, we have them but we don’t have a lot. Now is the time to suggest them.  Ideally, ones that don’t require crazy amounts of work.

(6) I will be needing your help on strategy for the AI.  When you play Fallen Enchantress on Challenging (anything below challenging has the AI gimped to various degrees) you’re basically playing me. As some of you know, Fallen Enchantress (like GalCiv but unlike WOM) will make use of your multi-core processor. Every AI player gets their own thread. Long story short, I can do some terrible, evil things with the AI.  But I know there are players who are just far better at this game than I am.  Please feel free to make posts discussing your strategies. I am not ashamed to steal from you.

(7) If you have not already voted, please please vote in the journal poll: https://www.elementalgame.com/journals We use this data.

(8) Modding time is almost here. We have tried to make it hard to mod so far but the time to turn off the network data stuff is nearing.  Here is what I’m thinking: http://screencast.com/t/5IyRz7XY.  

(9) Before anyone asks, no, you can’t transfer your FE serial to Steam. I can’t go into the details on why this is so don’t ask. Just assume it has something to do with gold plated rocket cars or something.

(10) The Fallen Enchantress budget is 2.2X the budget of War of Magic.  We hope people like what we’ve been doing here. I know it’s been a long journey but it was important to us that our most loyal customers, you guys, knew that we were dedicated to making sure our fantasy strategy game was nothing short of awesome.  Beta 4A has a lot of nice things but I think you guys will be surprised how much we were holding back for Beta 5 (for testing purposes mind you).

(11) I can’t tell you who the Fallen Enchantress is. But you can probably guess.

(12) The campaign, which isn’t in the beta (for spoiler reasons) was designed by Jon Shafer and written by fantasy author Dave Stern. It plays quite a bit differently from the sand box game. The idea was to give players an idea of what could be done via mods as well as give players a fun campaign experience that wasn’t just a bunch of sandbox scenarios.  I do want to emphasize that the campaign is made with the same tools players will be given and they will be able to make their own and share them.

(13) While Fallen Enchantress will be available on Steam, it won’t require it.

(14) If you don’t have War of Magic, skip it.  We’re going to discontinue it (we’ll still support it for existing customers for the long haul and may put out another update later this year). Fallen Enchantress is a lot closer to what we had in mind.

(15) If you have Windows XP 32-bit, you can get better performance if you enable large address awareness.