Dev Log -14: TB Combat Stealth

Last week I worked on more graphics for Lower Underrail areas.

I also added pistol and crossbow blueprints and some basic parts to be used to create "lower tier" weapons.

But most importantly I went back and worked out the remaining real-time to turn-based combat conversion stuff, including stealth. You will now properly detect stealthed characters during your turn as well as be detected.

So to explain in a bit more details: previously the detection checks were performed every 0.5 seconds against all the surrounding characters.They added or subtracted from your stealth buffer for that particular detecting character (your stealth value is being tracked against each individual NPC, it's not a global thing) depending on your stealth skill and their detection value (which is based on their level and perception). These mechanics have been retained for the real-time mode, and in turn-based mode this check is performed after every 10 action/movement points you spend, but the stealth buffer change that it causes is halved. This is because in turn-based mode while you are playing out your turn you are both detecting and being detected. So basically you are being detected both during your turn and your opponent's turn, unlike in real-time when everything is happening simultaneously; hence the halving of the stealth buffer change value.

So all that stuff that I explained in the original Stealth update way back still applies to the turn-based combat, but the detection checks are a bit more granular.

Since the character movement speed is reduced when in RT mode, it's movement points are reduced in TB mode.

The actual steath/detection levels still need tweaking for both RT and TB mode, though. Currently, you can unreasonably hard to detect with enough points in stealth even at very close distances and that's not the idea. I'll be fixing this at some point soon.

I also fixed other various problems with TB combat, so I can say that it is now pretty much fully functional with all the features that were present in the RT mode.