Elemental: Fallen Enchantress Beta 4 Released

Those of you participating in the beta test of Stardock’s Elemental: Fallen Enchantress will be happy to hear that the beta 4 build of the strategy/RPG has been released, bringing significant changes to the game’s economic system, city enchantments, outpost upgrades, and more. Here’s the full changelog, in case you’re interested in some light reading:

Features

• Added a new tile yield, Essence. Essence is the limit for how many enchantments that city can support as well as modifying some improvements (Clerics lower Unrest by 5% per Essence) and enchantments (Inspiration gives +1 research per Essence), or enabling some Improvements (you can’t build a Guardian Statue in a city without Essence).
• Added City Types. When a settlement hits level 2 you pick if it is to become a Town, Fortress or Conclave. Each type has different upgrades, bonuses and enables different improvements. Fortresses train units at +1 level and enable improvements that improve the cities defense and trained units. Conclaves grant additional research when the queue is empty and enable improvements that increase the cities research and magical ability (including making additional use of Essence). Towns give empire wide bonuses, such as improving the food per grain in all of your cities.
• Improvements can upgrade. A Training Yard upgrades to a Barracks which upgrades to a Command Post which upgrades to a War College. An Air Shard Altar upgrades to an Air Shard Shrine which upgrades to an Air Shard temple, etc etc.
• Starbases. I mean Outposts can be upgraded
• Added the Abbey Outpost upgrade- Reduces tactical spell cost in the ZoC
• Added the Armory Outpost upgrade- Increases the attack of allied units in the ZoC
• Added the Caltrops Outpost upgrade- Halves the movement of enemy units in the ZoC
• Added the Consulate Outpost upgrade- Increases the Growth of the attached city
• Added the Fortify Outpost upgrade- Increases the defense of allied units in the ZoC
• Added the High tower Outpost upgrade- Increases the outposts ZoC
• Added the Stables Outpost upgrade- Doubles the movement of allied units in the ZoC
• Added the Warden Outpost upgrade- Monsters won’t enter the outpost’s ZoC
• New Research Complete window
• New Upgrade Outpost window
• New Spellbook window
• New Options window, tooltips added to all options to say what they do, data separated to basic and advanced options
• New Build window that shows the impact of the selected improvement on the cities stats
• Spells show their actual modifier in tactical, so instead of saying it does “4 (+4 per fire shard) in fire damage” it says “12 fire damage” if you have 2 fire shards.
• Added the Scrying Pool improvement- Pariden unique improvement that gives the city +1 Essence
• Added the Obsidian Guard defender abilities- Increases the spell resistance of the army the unit is in
• Added the Spellbooks tech- Pariden only, unlocks their faction specific spellbooks
• Added the Henchmen tech- Altar specific, unlocks henchmen
• Added the Summon Familiar (kingdom) and Summon Imp (empire) spells. Familiars and Imps can cast any spell the summoning sovereign can cast but they permanently reduce the sovereigns hit points by 3 when summoned.
• Effect added when Wildlands are cleared, they are converted to fertile land
• Added the Guardian Idol improvement- This is an upgrade of the guardian statue and the player can only have 1 per faction. As well as being a more powerful city defender than the guardian statue it can cast any spell your sovereign can cast.
• Added the Shrine improvement- requires Essence, reduces unrest by 10% per Essence, upgrades form a Cleric, upgrades to a Sacrifical Altar (empire) or Temple of Essence (kingdom)
• Added the Herbalist improvement- Conclave only, gives +1 mana/season, upgrades to an Apothecary
• Added the Blood Sigil spell- City enchantment, berserks all defending units, withers all attacking units
• Added the Glyph of Life spell- City enchantment, all defending units regenerate
• Added the Pit of Madness spell- City enchantment, all attackers effected by fear, -1 Growth, +1 research per essence
• Added the Set in Stone spell- City enchantment, doubles production, this city doesn’t provide research
• Added the Sovereigns Call spell- City enchantment, +1 growth per essence
• When you find an item you can go directly to trade with it form the found item popup
• You can drag and drop items in your production queue to change their order
• Added the Butcher improvement- Town only, increases food per grain in all your cities, upgrades to a Brewery
• Added the Forge improvement- Fortress only, increases the defense of trained units
• Added the Great Archive improvement- Conclave only, 1 per faction, +100% research
• Added the Grocer improvement- Town only, increases food per grain in all your cities, upgrades to a Bakery
• Added the Guild Grocer improvement- Town only, city level unlock, +1 Hit point/grain to all units trained in this city
• Added the Harbor Improvement- Requires a river, +20 food per grain, +20% gildar, upgrades to a Watermill (kingdom)
• Added the Cloister improvement- Conclave only, +50% research, upgrades to a Library
• Added the Logging Camp improvement- Requires a forest, +2 production per material, upgrades to a Lumber Yard
• Added the Mill improvement- +3 production per material, -20% improvement construction costs, upgrades to a Labor Guild (kingdom) or Slave Pen (empire)
• Added the Pier improvement- Requires a river, +5 food /grain, upgrades to a Dock
• Added the Storehouse improvement- +30 food/grain, upgrades to a Granary
• Added the Timber Mill improvement- requires a forest, +4 prod/material
• Added the University improvement- +2 Research, +50% research
• Added the Warehouse improvement- Town only, city level unlock, +50% gildar when the queue is empty
• Added the Watchtower improvement- Fortress only, city level unlock, +5 init to defending units
• Added the Well improvement- Town only, +0.5 Growth
• Added Syndicate lairs
• Added the Lucky Skullcap item- increases crit chance
• Added the Boots of Stealth item- good defense dodge and reduces the chance of being noticed by monsters
• Added the Skath egg item- use it to get a skath pet
• Added the Letter of Mark item- use it to gain a strong mercenary follower with a high wage cost
• Added the Monster Repellent item- reduces the chance of being noticed by monsters
• Added the Scroll of Fortune item- Use it to adds the merchant ability to the unit
• Added the Life scroll- Use it to add +1 hp to the unit
• Added the Dodge scroll- Use it to add +1 Dodge to the unit

Fixes

• Fixed bug where unit’s path remained visible after joining an army
• Fixed a bug where tile designs for quest locations wouldn’t show up
• Fixed a crash caused by using a Growth potion
• Fixed a bug where a champion without any options wasn’t autopassing in tactical
• Fixed a bug where a units graphics can remain on the main map after thsat unit was killed in tactical (the “ghost unit” issue)
• Fixed a bug keeping particles form showing on sub-units
• Fixed an issue with road placement that could cause road grids to be laid out instead of sharing common roads
• Fixed an issue with chainmail getting the factions cloth color instead of their metal color
• Fixed an issue causing FoW to remain unveiled even if the unit that revealed it was gone
• Cloth map grid is only displayed on passable tiles
• Fixed an issue where pressing Esc on a quest popup would exit you out without being able to select an option
• Fixed the Dread Gaze effect
• Fixed the Ghost Touch effect (it no longer provides immortality)
• Fixed the Battle with Delin- Delin shows up now, be afraid 
• Fixed the Krax fortify ability
• Fixed the Urxen Blood trait
• Fixed an issue where the Drain Life spell was giving hit points to the victim instead of taking them away
• You cannot counterattack if you are prone
• Henchmen can use Mounts
• Fixed an issue where spells that effected entire armies weren’t resitable
• Removed Giavanaa’s man parts
• Fixed an issue causing the +50% crit damage with Path of the Assassin to be per level
• Fixed some issues with Splash damage
• Fixed crashes
• Fixed hangs

Balance

• Added the ability to have goodie huts/lairs/quests/etc give items of certain rarities. A low level goodie hut can give a common item. A dragons lair always gives a rare item. This means we can swtich low level goodie huts form having a set number of specific items to hand out (so you won’t get 5 compasses) since they can now pick form any of the common items in the game. It also means that rare and dangerous goodie huts/quests/lairs/etc won’t give junk items, you always get good stuff from them.
• Adjusted all lair wandering spawns so they don’t spawn immediately and are less likely to spawn each turn
• Lots of spell damage adjustments
• Lowered the electoral count of Wisconsin
• All damage from spells is halved if resisted
• Waerloga the Dragonlord is now a multi-tile creature
• Path of the Governor Increases Growth in the city the champion is in
• All champions reduce Unrest when they are in a city, sovereigns and Path of the Governor champions reduce it even further.
• Reduce the labor cost of trained units
• Increased the labor costs of Pioneers
• All world resources effect tile yields (give greater variance to yield distribution)
• More xp from combat, but more xp required at higher levels
• City Enchantments don’t have maintenance (since they are limited by the cities Essence)
• Quests no longer require techs- Their difficulty is given in the popup, be careful going on quests you aren’t ready for
• You must own a city for 5 turns before you can raze it
• Guarding units won’t be displayed in the empire tree anymore
• Fixed an issue keeping some lairs from giving out loot
• Hobble is now a Defender upgrade ability
• Immune to Counterattack is now a Defender upgrade ability
• Immune to Criticals is now a Defender upgrade ability
• Resist Cold is now a Defender upgrade ability
• Resist Fire is now a Defender upgrade ability
• Irane has the Impulsive trait instead of Quick
• Increased Juggernaut cost and decreased their HP
• Increased the base prod per material from 5 to 6
• Removed Maul from the Matyr and Hecatomb units
• Building improvements on wild resources goes into the nearest cities production queue
• Building outpost upgrades goes into the nearest cities production queue
• All city level unlocks are autoplaced (you don’t have to build them)
• Dark Wizard gains the ability to cast Demonic Ally and Cloak of Fear
• Lurk gains the ability to cast Cloak of Fear
• Death immobilization changed from 2 turns per level to a flat 5 turns
• Great Wolves gain the Howl ability- +1 attack per level of the caster to all allies
• Units riding Wargs gain +5 Dodge and +3 Init (instead of +2)
• Combined the Defensive and One-Handed Spears traits (so Krax didn’t have an illegal number of traits)
• The Guile trait doubles the amount of influence the player receives (instead of +50%)
• Lucky faction trait gives +10 to Accuracy and Dodge instead of +5
• Quick faction trait gives +3 Init instead of +1
• Many resource improvements can be upgraded with later techs to get better versions (that produce more metal, crystal, mana, etc)
• Halved shop costs (sell costs remain the same)
• Blunt weapons have a chance to knock a victim prone
• Attunement reduced form +2 mana/season to +1 mana/season
• Recosted all improvements (generally down, new economy doesn’t scale indefinitely)
• Recosted all techs
• There is now a minimum distance between outposts
• Removed the Siege Workshop (catapults don’t require a building anymore)
• Outposts aren’t destroyed if an enemy unit steps on one, instead they are flipped to that players control

AI

• AI units try to maneuver to get the first hit in battle
• AI is better at upgrading its units
• AI at Normal and lower difficulties is less aggressive at going on quests or going after goodie huts
• Creatures far less likely to attack towns that have at least 1 stationed unit in it.
• Creatures (non-intelligent monsters) will tend to avoid built structures (outposts, resources)
• Fixed AI bug where it would tax itself to death in certain cases
• AI better at handling its revenue
• Fixed bug where the AI would threaten you with a demand for tribute that you couldn’t possibly afford
• AI won’t try to trade knowledge with the player unless it has at least 12 knowledge to trade
• AI monster units will sometimes talk to you
• Monster units will interact with players based on what type of monster they are
• Monster units on lower difficulties even less aggressive
• Monster units updated to support equipment, items that repell monsters
• Monsters less aggressive towards cities during early stage of game

Cosmetic

• All new Cloth map mode
• Replaced all the ability icons
• Units rotate when moving
• Animation blending added to smooth the transition between types (no poping)
• Units dodge with the attack instead of after the attack
• Added Mounted unit pose icons
• New unit backgrounds
• Better road graphics
• When improvements are placed they make a poof of dirt
• Fixed tons of typos
• Added more typos
• Wages is displayed on the Unit info window
• Cities receiving bonuses for having an empty queue now display an icon in the empire tree for their bonus
• Terrain window shows the true movement cost (adjust for the selected unit, if the unit can move through forests without a movement penalty then it shows as normal movement)
• New pictures on the load screen
• New water graphics
• Relaitions with other players is now shown on the Diplomacy screen
• New Bronze Shield model
• New Battle Hammer model
• Mountainside tiles are no longer flat (so they don’t look like you can walk on them)
• City buttons for Trian and Build remain in a down state when oyu are on those menus to make it more clear that you have that window open and selected
• Improvements don’t have to have tile designs anymore (so walls don’t need a tile design with them, they are just the walls, city types are defined as improvements, but they don’t have tile designs)
• Lots of new sfx