Update 18: A New Hope

PATCH HIGHLIGHTS:

HIGH HOPES: More war and campaign features, including a revamped Hope mechanic!
GET ON BASE: New mobile base upgrades!
A NEW WORLDVIEW: Lots of beautiful VFX updates!
AND MORE!

Phantom Brigade is in Early Access, which means we are actively updating and adding new content based on our roadmap and your wonderful feedback. You can expect the next Tactical Tuesday update on June 21st, 2022 at 11:00AM PST. See the full patch notes below!

Changes

🦾 indicates changes due to community feedback!

VFX Updates

• We’ve retextured the overworld entirely, making it more detailed and more beautiful!
• Contested provinces now have the following:
  • A column of smoke over the province currently at war
  • Craters and destroyed terrain displayed on the overworld texture
  • A cloudy, ominous skybox and smoke VFX visible on the base screens and in combat
• Merged in a shader change that unifies all the textures used in combat maps, making them seamless and more cohesive, as well as more varied and improved tiling
• Improved rain VFX

Hope is back!

• Hope is now applied globally rather than per province, on a scale from -5 to +5
• Influences the Home Guard’s Strength. The more Hope you inspire, the less Strength is lost when taking damage to your score
• The amount of Hope also affects the options available to the Brigade when making important decisions during events

🦾 Forward Bases

• We created this entity specifically to solve the softlock scenario players discovered last update – thank you for your help! Please let us know how this solution works for you.
• Forward bases can spawn in a contested province if the number of hostile military sites prior to contesting is too low
• Like normal military bases, these sites also spawn patrols and convoys, and can be designated as Objectives
• These bases are temporary – once defeated, they will disappear, and the enemy will reorganize and create a new forward base elsewhere. They will also disappear when the contest is won or lost

Dynamic Leveling System

• 🦾 Province Level
  • Province level now adapts to player level – no longer forcing you to interact with underleveled provinces to progress!
  • The level of surrounding provinces is calculated each time a province contest is concluded, regardless of outcome
  • The further away from a liberated province, the higher the difference between player level and province level
  • This should open up the variety of ways you can progress through the country to the capital, without forcing you to fight content that is much too hard or much too easy
• Workshop Level
  • Similarly, your workshop is now guaranteed to provide you useful gear – it will always provide gear +2 levels above the level of your alltime highest average unit level
• Average Unit Level
  • This is visible on the overworld HUD on the bottom left, where your units are listed, and is an average of all your battle-ready units
  • The number here can be directly compared to threat ratings on the overworld, and should give you a good idea of how difficult a fight will be!

Enemy Reinforcements

• If the mobile base is within the vision range of a patrol or military site on the overworld, the combat you next enter will have enemy reinforcements arriving
• Which turn reinforcements arrive on is dependent on how far away from combat the patrol/military site is on the overworld. If they were very close, they could show up on turn 2; if they were far they may show up on turn 6
• If reinforcements from a patrol are defeated in combat, that patrol will be considered defeated when you return to the overworld
• The number of units showing up in a wave increases dramatically at higher escalations – retreat is always an option!
• Attack overworld sites strategically to avoid facing too many enemies
• There are still some scenarios that will contain reinforcements regardless of overworld sites!

UI Additions

• Sites and patrols that are going to provide enemy reinforcements in combat will have an arrow pointing at the mobile base
• If reinforcements are going to be entering combat, the threat rating on the bottom-right UI popup when interacting with a site will better indicate that this combat will be harder than usual

New Base Upgrades

• We’ve added 5 new of upgrades over two general types, accessible in the base upgrades menu
• Overworld Consumables
  • These are upgrades that allow you to build special resources that can allow you to avoid enemies on the overworld.
    • Smoke Charges
      • Once installed, you can build Smoke Charges in the workshop (you get one for free on install of the upgrade)
      • When encountering a mobile enemy (such as a patrol), a Smoke Charge can be used to stun the enemy and allow you to escape their sensor range
    • Decoy Drones
      • Once installed, you can build Decoy Drones in the workshop (you get one for free on install of the upgrade)
      • While on the overworld you can place a drone using the new UI button
      • The drone will move to the selected destination, acting as an extension of your base – you will receive any scan data it picks up about enemy sites, and enemies will pay attention to the drone rather than the mobile base
      • If a patrol chases and catches the drone, it will self destruct, stunning the patrol
      • After a certain amount of time, the drone will expire and disappear if it hasn’t self destructed
• Combat Modifiers
  • This is a new type of base upgrade that can be used before combat to modify the strength and number of your enemies, and to call for help.
  • The option to use these resources is dependent on the circumstances of the battle at hand and must be used on the event screen prior to entering the briefing screen
    • Radio Uplink (Radio for help)
      • Once installed, depending on your reputation with the Home Guard, you’ll be able to call on them to help you in any battle
      • Each time you call, you lose 1 reputation point. If reputation is at 0, you can not call for help from the Home Guard
      • The number and strength of units provided to you in battle depends on how high your reputation is
      • Conversely – if you successfully win combat without losing any Home Guard units, your reputation with them will increase dramatically!
      • If a patrol follows you into friendly territory, you’ll be able to summon the Home Guard regardless of your reputation (since you’re on home turf!)
    • Scan Jamming (Block scans)
      • Once installed, you can build scan jammers in the workshop (you get one for free on install of the upgrade)
      • When used, tricks enemy into sending weaker/less numerous units to battle, regardless of the escalation level of the province
    • Comms Jamming (Block reinforcements)
      • Once installed, you can build comms jammers in the workshop (you get one for free on install of the upgrade)
      • When used, prevents the enemy from calling for help from reinforcements, removing those reinforcements from combat

New Events

• Conscripts : After the Brigade loses a fight, the Defector notices that one of the enemy pilots was a conscript from the area. One of the mechanics onboard suddenly feels very hesitant about re-engaging, in light of this news.
• Reduce, Reuse: The Brigade comes across a group of people picking through the debris after a fight, finding out that people have been selling them.
• New steps in the Cat and Dog event chain
• New steps in the Defector and Rescued Civilians event chains

Quality of Life / Miscellaneous Changes

• It’s now possible to leave combat from the briefing screen in certain circumstances
  • Note this is not possible if you are engaged with a patrol and do not have any smoke charges! If you do have a smoke charge, you can use it to escape from the briefing screen
• 🦾 Friendly reinforcements are now controlled by AI, but you can still modify or replan their actions
• 🦾 Friendly reinforcements now include mechs in addition to tanks when reputation is high enough
• 🦾 In events, you can now use hotkeys 1, 2, 3 etc to select event options
• 🦾 Added scrollbars to event text boxes to accommodate some of our wordier events
• Convoys no longer disappear and will continue to travel in a contested province, and won’t travel to liberated sites
• 🦾 You can now scroll from unit to unit in editing using buttons near the camera controls!
• 🦾 ‘All Parts’ livery now clears all other liveries if the new ‘Clear Liveries’ button is toggled to ‘on’
• 🦾 Salvage budget is now dependent on the type of site you attacked – bases will give a higher salvage budget than other sites, for example
• 🦾 Inventory now allows you to select multiple items via a range selection by holding Shift or CTRL when scrolling and selecting in the equipment list

Fixes

• 🦾 Fixed home guard recovery getting stuck at above its max value and never allowing province contesting again
• 🦾 Readjusted lighting at night to make sure that combat is still visible!
• 🦾 Fixed tab softlocking the game during combat if pressed while choosing a target
• 🦾 Fixed melee damage and missile splash damage not working correctly!
• Fixed crashed meteors being non-interactable
• Fixed primary and secondary weapon names being reversed in several locations
• Post-contest events now occur regardless of where the base is on the overworld, not just when in the contested province
• Fixed unit selection with Tab being reversed
• Fixed second pause menu button appearing on screen if loading a save while in combat
• Fixed the targeting rings of many weapons being different sizes when being placed on the timeline vs choosing a target
• Fixed squad being visible when switching to unit editing view while in briefing
• Fixed enemy tanks being damaged when their pilots eject
• Fixed sites outside of contested province damaging enemy Strength Score
• Fixed mobile base not being autoselected in some situations when loading a game
• Fixed undefended caches remaining hostile after unlocking and salvaging
• Fixed units with a shield and weapon not being allowed to do fallback melee when it’s single weapon is destroyed
• Fixed no units being selected and incorrect camera position when the first slot of a squad is empty when entering combat
• Fixed filtering in inventory preventing comparison of equipped vs hovered parts
• Now prevents breaking turn execution caused by spamming a hotkey during end of a turn
• Fixed camera getting stuck in the sky when entering combat
• Fixed thrusters on Arrow and Knox Torsos
• Fixed pilot costing 0 supplies to recruit
• Fixed an exception during the draft event
• Removed some debug text on pilots
• Fixed patrols and convoys that are designated as objectives not visually updating their movement
• Fixed an exception that occurred when hovering over a patrol that the base had identified but not engaged with
• Fixed F6 not opening the upgrades screen
• Fixed convoys being able to continuously choose liberated sites as a destination (they now finish their current movement, then continue on to a hostile site)
• Fixed movement mode hotkeys not working
• Fixed many issues with different events not working as intended
• Fixed appearance of the squad roster on overworld HUD when no units are present
• Fixed being allowed to zoom in and out on the overworld while in an event screen
• Fixed a softlock scenario where no resupply point was available until the first province was liberated
• Fixed multiple typos
• Prevented sites outside of a contested province from damaging enemy strength score during contest
• Fixed being unable to switch from overdrive directly to stealth movement mode
• Fixed some overflowing UI elements
• Fixed invalid levels on some loot

YOU CAN FIND THE FULL LIST OF KNOWN ISSUES HERE.