Blogger Beta

It seems that Google has updated blogger, and is strongly encouraging us to "make the switch". Well, I just did, and I can definitely see some improvements!

The one that is most obvious to you, is that I can now add labels to my posts. What are labels, you ask? They are essentially keywords that tie posts together in a way other than by date. For example, I just went through and added "RealmSpeak Release" as a label to all the posts that reference a new release. At the end of such a post, you'll see a hyperlink with the words "RealmSpeak Release". Click on that link, and you will get a list of all the release posts, clear back to version 0.1!! Pretty cool.

It's Christmas in Magic Realm

The bad news: no new release until 2007. I had hoped to wrap up the current version I'm working on before Christmas, but the fact is that time is running out. I've got relatives coming this week, and still a bunch of shopping to do. I seriously doubt I'll have much coding time between now and then.

The good news? Besides the usual bug fixes, the big new feature I've been putting together is player board building. At LOONNNG last, you'll be able to assemble the board as the rules describe, and have some control over the overall game. If you play solitaire, you will place tiles randomly, one at a time, starting with the Borderland tile. If you are playing online, tiles will be shuffled and distributed to all the players, and then each player takes a turn placing a tile. Of course, the auto-build feature will still be there if you want it (I still prefer it for solitaire games).

This feature is mostly finished, but I'm still working out a few kinks. For example, I thought it would be nice if tiles that have no possible placement (like High Pass on the first turn) were highlighted somehow. This has turned into a bit more of a nightmare than I would have imagined. For some reason, I can't get the tiles to update for other players when they should. !!!!!

I also need to handle the situation where the board reaches a state where no tiles can be placed. It's rare, but it does happen! The rules say that in this situation, you are supposed to move back to the previous player, and have them remove the last placed tile, and replace it in a way that will allow the next player to place their tile. I'm not sure how I'm going to handle this, just yet.

Anyway, I hope the holiday season is treating you all well. Merry Christmas!

Brutal Game

Wow, that was insane. We played an online game last night (till about 1am), and it was a blast! We ran into a couple of annoying bugs (game crashes if you have combat after a day-trade between characters), but mostly could recover by reloading the auto save. Once we learned what NOT to do, things went pretty well.

Oh, and I learned some new lessons:
1) Don't fire a second Fiery Blast ambush attack on a T Troll, when you are lucky enough to survive the first round as the Sorceror.
2) Don't forget to assign your hirelings after hiring them.
3) The Witch as an absorbed Winged Demon is no match for the T Octopus (damn that thing is fast!)
4) The Dwarf on a Warhorse, and the White Knight with the Bane Sword and the Gloves of Strength is a sight to behold! These two were able to nail 2 out of 3 bats in the first round, even though they both flipped to the dark side! Unbelievable.

Oh, check out how the game started:



That's the Inn on the far right, at the edge of the map. The only way to go, is through the caves of the High Pass (guarded by the Lair, and goblins), and into the valley guarded by the ever-regenerating ghosts! Talk about getting a slow start! Starting a new character was a pain too - takes damn near a week to get through there without getting killed!

All in all, I'm pretty happy with the result. Still got some kinks to work out, but I'm already looking forward to my next game.

Taking 0.39 Out for a Spin

Unless my brother-in-law gets called in to work, I'm hoping to try v0.39 in an online game tonight. The big thing I'm looking forward to, is being able to press the END button without losing my ability to do encounter actions (see earlier post). Oh, that and the kill tally.

I'll let you know how it goes!

Version 0.39 Released

Not much to say, except that I think I've ironed out most of the Seasons/Weather bugs in this release. Thanks to everyone who pointed them out, and for those that made suggestions on how to implement seasons. I think you'll like the new changes.

Oh, for no real reason, except for the fact that I'm somewhat insane (it comes with being the father of three girls), I decided to add a checkbox for playing a "double-board" in this release. It's experimental, but I think it's basically there. I played around with it a bit, and it seemed to be working in all aspects I tried. Still, its not FULLY tested, so don't be surprised if something weird pops up while you are trying it out. If you don't like that, don't use it.

Okay, here's what's new.

NEW FEATURES:

• Rearranged the host game setup dialog a bit, to make your choices a bit more clear:
  
  • Got rid of meaningless fields (game title, game setup)
    
  • Separated "host" options from "game" options
    
  • Moved the weather option out of the Optional tab (too many people not seeing it there), and onto the main tab.
  
  
• Weather info dialog improvements
  
  • Includes 7th day color magic
    
  • Shows ALL weather possibilities, with the current weather highlighted
  
  
• [346] - Support for Double Board (experimental)
  
  • New choice in setup dialog
    
  • Experimental means that I haven't tried everything yet, so you may encounter some "weirdness".
    
  • Double-board means more memory, slower startup, and slower initial network connections (if playing online). You've been warned!
    
  • It is worth looking at - pretty danged cool.
    
  • Treasures are limited to their own setup cards, and chits to their own tiles, which is wrong I know. It makes it playable, though not as variable as the rules allow. I'll tackle this at a later date.

BUGS/ISSUES:

• [627] - Choosing a Random Season no longer causes the season to change randomly each time you reload the game.
  
• [459] - If you are starting RealmSpeak from the command line, you can include the savegame filepath after "run" to have it loaded automatically. If you don't understand this, you probably don't need to use it.
  
• [512],[625] - Persuade/HIRE works with Giants and Ogres again
  
• [611] - Characters put to sleep by the Flowers of Rest, will no longer summon monsters
  
• [549] - Flowers of Rest will put you to sleep BEFORE you can finish your trade now.
  
• [630] - Month length based on days, not turns now.
  
• [637] - Kills on character log are working again
  
• [638] - Commerce table considered in special abilities and treasures that affect meeting rolls.
  
• [639] - Commerce table Block/Battle result now causes characters to become unhidden, just like the Meeting table
  
• Fixed responsiveness of mouse clicks on combat sheets - no more clicking 3 or 4 times to get it to place your danged weapon
  
• [635] - Roof Collapses appears correctly on combat sheets, so you know it's been placed.
  
• [642] - Chapel emits WHITE magic again.
  
• [641] - Fatigue dialog allows fatiguing MAGIC chits for weather fatigue
  
• [581] - When characters leave hirelings behind in a clearing with natives, the character no longer has an opportunity to buy drinks.
  
• [577] - Flying characters will be blocked immediately after landing in a clearing with a monster. No more free HIDE phase!
  
• Changed how the dotted (flying) lines are drawn when plotting a FLY move. Rather than end at the "offroad" location, they go to the center of the tile. Flying chits are still drawn in the offroad location, so that they aren't confused with those that are in clearings.
  
• [584] - Natives with ponies moving out of caves don't gain pony moves during the turn.
  
• [636] - Blazing Light works when you move out of the clearing now.
  
• [643] - Ghosts regenerate each week again.

Version 0.38a Released

You will need a new resource pack for this release. Yes, I know I just released a resource pack for version 0.37, but there were just too many new images to include in the application itself. I'll try to leave the resource pack alone for awhile after this!

Wheee!! I'm a happy camper. I played a successful online game last night (see previous post), and fixed the few issues that harassed us during the game. I finished Seasons/Weather (mostly), and added a "Hall of Fame". The bug tracker is down below 80 bugs, and the game has been running like a champ. Still a lot to do, but its getting closer and closer to being complete!

[PS - THANKS TO EVERYONE WHO SENT IN PICTURES TO USE IN THE SEASONS INTERFACE - I HOPE YOU LIKE MY FINAL SELECTIONS!]

Oh, why v0.38a you ask? That's because the version I used last night was technically v0.38. Since I fixed a couple more bugs, I decided to bump the version slightly to 0.38a.

Here's what's new this time around:

NEW FEATURES:

• Created a new menu called View, and moved some things around to make more sense. The tables menu is now a submenu under View.
  
• BUG 499 - Added a "Hall of Fame"
  
  • No longer specify number of VPs in the setup dialog (since this would affect scoring range)
    
  • Not considered for Hall of Fame if VPs are disabled
    
  • View Hall of Fame from View menu
  
  
• Added support for Seasons and Weather
  
  • New dropdown list on first tab of game options dialog to choose a season, choose no season, or choose a random season
    
  • New optional rule (optional tab) for weather support
    
  • Sheltered phases work (see the rules)
    
  • Eye of the Moon allows you to see/change the weather
    
  • Click on season icon to view information about the current season and weather
    
  • Mountain move cost dependant on the season (new move icons show what the cost is for each character)
    
  • All six "special" weather conditions are handled
    
    • Fatigue chits based on location
      
    • HIDE/PEER tables disabled depending on season
    
    
  • Mission special conditions (delivery locations and rewards) are NOT YET HANDLED

BUGS/ISSUES:

• BUG 608 - Items with conditional fame are priced correctly now under COMMERCE rules
  
• BUG 488,609 - Using a Horse and "other" bonus MOVE in a cave is more logical now (horse is used as soon as possible)
  
• BUG 597 - Fixed game hang when a transformed monster winds up in an enchanted tile, and stuck in magic form.
  
• BUG 519,613 - Fixed a problem where a character receiving and activating the Timeless Jewel on someone else's turn, couldn't ignore their recorded actions.
  
• BUG 600 - Transformed monsters should prowl as normal now.
  
• BUG 614 - When I fixed Bug 305 (below), I inadvertantly introduced a problem when running without any monsters in the clearing. This is fixed.
  
• Fixed a problem with the action record interface: actions are now red when they are invalid, and black when they are not. Nothing else is changed, just the color, which was confusing.
  
• BUG 615 - Created a problem in the wound interface when I added color chits. This is fixed.
  
• BUG 218 - Color chits are now considered to be "in play" for purposes of determining death.
  
• BUG 617 - GodRob discovered that the enchanted side of the Crag had one too many hidden paths! Good catch!!
  
• BUG 510 - Flowers of Rest will no longer affect characters before being discovered.
  
• BUG 520 - Inconsistency in Cloven Hoof behaviour is fixed.
  
• BUG 544 - Cloven Hoof no longer affects denizen rolls anymore.
  
• BUG 533 - Kill tally no longer shows multiple hits for split kills
  
• BUG 548 - Effects of the poison spell and Oil of Poison will stack. In other words, you can add 2 sharpness stars to your active weapon.
  
• BUG 573 - Can no longer use Pony to infinitely traverse mountains.
  
• BUG 424 - REST stacking with the Berserker works correctly now
  
• BUG 490 - Unhidden hired leaders in a clearing with a monster can no longer press the END button to exit combat.
  
• BUG 475 - Burning a color chit is sufficient to continue combat.
  
• BUG 512 - Can hire Ogres with Persuade spell now.
  
• BUG 518 - Correct number of soldiers on Pillage campaign.
  
• BUG 542 - Vial of Healing will now activate wounded, non-asterisk chits.
  
• BUG 620 - Pressing END during a multiplayer game no longer permanently disables the encounter phase buttons.
  
• BUG 621 - Fixed a small problem with CACHEs.
  
• BUG 575 - Can no longer use MAGIC SIGHT to learn spells off inactive inventory
  
• BUG 623 - Attack Spells will trigger Grudges now.
  
• BUG 394 - Hitting friendly natives with Roof Collapses no longer causes them to turn on you (you target the clearing, not the natives)
  
• BUG 540 - Weapon altering potions will work with the Alchemists's Mixture now.
  
• BUG 622 - Timeless Jewel owners can do multiple REST phases at once now. Pressing REST will pop up a dialog asking "How Many". Hope this isn't more of a pain than before!

Great online game last night

Sweet. It's been a long time since I played RealmSpeak online (since April, v.0.30). That game went badly because RealmSpeak froze up too much, and we had to can it. Since then, I've been more than a little nervous to even try it again.

Well, last night I decided to give it a shot. Using the latest build (v0.38 - not yet publicly available), me and two buddies fired up a game. We chose randomly (sort of), and ended up with the Woods Girl (me), Magician, and the White Knight. Without going into great detail, the Woods Girl started off quite well, successfully offing numerous monsters with her alerted bow, but not in time to prevent the death of the White Knight to three bats. Respawning as the Black Knight, the trio continued to wander through numerous treasure locations: Cairns (found the lost keys!), the Vault (good thing too!), and the Hoard. The Woods Girl got cursed at one point, and then attempted to get healed at the Order. Making the mistake of doing a TRADE, the Woods Girl got blocked, and then pounced on by the Patrol. Dead. (that sucked!!)

Anyway, the game overall was a blast, and most everything worked as it should. There were a couple of minor problems:

1. Pressing the END button disabled all of the buttons in the Encounter panel for the rest of the game, or until saving and restarting.
   
2. Kills were not showing up in the usual place.
   
3. At one point, I was unable to move into a normal clearing with the timeless jewel, even though I had one phase left to use!

All in all, that was pretty good, and we were able to play as long as we wanted, with relatively few restarts. I'm excited to know that I can play this game online again, and know exactly what needs fixing. I should be able to get a good release up later today (if all goes well).

Version 0.37 Released

NOTE: You'll need to download a new version (0.37) of the "Resource Pack" for this release!

I spent a lot of time working on aesthetics for this release. All of the spells now have text information and tables straight from the 3rd edition rules, available with nothing more than a mouse-click. It's also easier to see who and how cast what spells, and what spells are currently bewitching you.

I also reworked the RealmSpeak Battle Builder. It's a lot more user friendly, and lets you edit saved battles, for the first time! Much easier to experiment now, and much less frustrating to run (in my opinion).

Here's what's new:

NEW FEATURES:

• BUG 593,594 - Spell information enhancements
  
  • New green bar on spell card identifies spells that are "Alive"
    
  • Table on character spell page displays all spell currently affecting (bewitching) the character
    
  • Right-clicking spells in inventory, or in "Bewitching Spells" table brings up a useful information panel that describes:
    
    • Owner
      
    • Caster
      
    • Incantation Chit/Item
      
    • Target(s)
      
    • Complete text from 3rd edition rules
      
    • Associated spell table, if applicable
    
    
  • Right-clicking spells in Spell Selector allows you to read the rules for that spell, and see any related table that might be used
  
  
• Most die roll tables are now available in the "Tables" menu
  
• RealmSpeak Battle Builder got a face lift
  
  • Entry dialog is a bit more user-friendly
    
  • Three choices: New Battle, Edit Battle, and Play Battle
    
  • Yes, you can edit battles you have saved (finally!!!), including game options!
    
  • The builder is a Frame instead of a dialog now. That means it will appear in your Taskbar, and not get "lost" in the sea of windows.
    
  • You can delete a character from battle
    
  • Treasures are sorted in alphabetical order, to make them easier to find (finally!!!)
  
  
• BUG 231 - New button to allow the HOST to change game options during the game. (Like, if Watchful Natives breaks again, and you got a good game going, you can turn it off)

BUGS/ISSUES:

• BUG 606 - Flying causes you to become unhidden now
  
• BUG 601 - Sharpness dampening is shown in log now
  
• BUG 553 - Toadstool Circle is exhibiting its effects again (BLACK magic and extra SPELL phases)
  
• BUG 305 - If you are playing with STUMBLE rules, and are unsuccessful running with a 2 asterisk chit, you are no longer penalized for fatigue twice!
  
• BUG 126 - When running away from combat with a horse, the correct side (trot/gallop) of the horse is shown.
  
• BUG 111 - Followers now get left behind if the guide uses a Pony MOVE, unless they themselves have a Pony active.
  
• BUG 373,596 - Native Horses are now made inactive when in a CAVE
  
• BUG 370 - New optional rule to play with "Seasonal Color Magic", which has been the default of RealmSpeak forever. Now you can turn this off, and use the "BLACK/WHITE" colors for the 7th day.

Version 0.36 Released

Thought I'd get a release out while I had a version that is working pretty good in my hands, and before I break into some bigger issues. I think Watchful Natives actually works in this release, so hopefully those of you that have been having trouble will find that the bugs are finally gone. I set up numerous combat situations, and coded until ALL of them worked as expected. Thanks to everyone who reported bugs on this rule, as you really gave me the direction I needed to get this done.

As mentioned in the previous post, there are some new optional rules in place (Commerce and Grudges), as well as the advanced CACHE rule. This gets RealmSpeak more into my own "comfort zone", as I have always played Face-to-Face games with these rules in place.

Okay, here's what's new:

NEW FEATURES:

• Advanced Rule CACHING is done
  
  • New option in game setup dialog under ADVANCED RULES tab
    
  • CACHE action is available
  
  
• Optional Commerce rules are now in place
  
  • Native groups modify the price of treasure base on FAME, NOTORIETY, or BOTH (depends on group)
    
  • Treasures with special FAME get that value added to the base price when dealing with a particular native group
    
  • Selling items uses the Commerce table
  
  
• Optional Grudges/Gratitude
  
  • Buying/Selling treasures with special FAME affect friendliness
    
  • Killing FRIENDLY and ALLY natives affect friendliness by 2 and 4 levels, respectively.
  
  
• Changed the spell selector a bit: removed the blue arrow buttons - selecting spells is now as easy as clicking the spell you want. I thought having to select spells and press buttons was a bit tedious.
  
• Power of the Pit dialog now shows who all was killed (if any), so it is clear what happened.

BUG FIXES:

• BUG 410 - Running as a transformed monster no longer adds the same monster to the "Used Chits" box, and available for attacks by yourself!!
  
• BUG 579 - Added some code to guarantee that NO situation leads to a target not moving to their own sheet. This should resolve "Watchful Natives" once and for all.
  
• BUG 588 - Fixed an issue with natives fighting natives under the Watchful Natives option
  
• BUG 582 - Fixed a problem where characters were unable to share TWT locations (ie., Toadstool Circle)
  
• BUG 589 - Treasures in battle builder are face up again
  
• BUG 587 - Characters transformed into MIST, and has hirelings, are no longer available for attack by monsters/natives.
  
• BUG 556,567 - Power of the Pit TERROR result was not killing hirelings following hired leaders. It is now.
  
• BUG 566 - Magic Sight no longer protects you from getting cursed by the Remains of Theif or Mouldy Skeleton
  
• BUG 411 - Read Runes allows a choice from awakened or Top Spell, as per 3rd ed rule 7.5.6.b.
  
• BUG 580 - Fixed spelling of Sorceror (from Sorcerer - technically correct, but doesn't match the game)
  
• BUG 578 - Fixed some fatal errors caused by fly chits expiring after use.

I'm experimenting with adding the bug links in here. It was kind of a pain, so don't expect to see these every time!!

Some Long Awaited Optional Rules

Someone wrote to me, and said that if they had Caching and Grudges, they'd be content. I thought, "Sure! Why not!"

In a crazed fit of coding last night, I assembled a fairly nice Caching interface (if I do say so myself), along with all the bells and whistles. Any character/leader/monster can cache items, and access caches later. Caches can be found/shared/looted by other characters. When you create a cache, you can specify the order of the items, and even store gold. I played around with it, and its pretty nice to have, especially when you find a huge treasure that you can't carry! Now you can stash it, and come back later when you have big boots, or a hired native. Neat!

The other piece was strangely easy, but that was by design. I had always intended to get the Commerce rules in place, because I prefer to use them over the standard rules. Now the treasures have differing values based on the group you are selling them to, which makes relationships all that more important. Got the Sacred Grail? Better hope the Order is your friend so you can score some big money!

Along with this, is Grudges and Gratitudes. I felt uncomfortable grouping this with the Commerce stuff, even though they are that way in the 2nd edition manual, so you'll find this as a standalone option. Essentially, buying/selling treasure with special FAME attributes to the appropriate denizen can score not only big money, but relationship improvements as well. Imagine the joy the Order will have when you deliver the Sacred Grail! This could make the Sorceror a bit less at ends with these Knights, and give him a strange edge in the game.

Of course, the down side of this rule, is that you gotta be careful who you kill. Elf decides to murder a Woodfolk, he's going to find that they are an enemy very quickly!

Okay, okay. I promised to get on Absorb Essence and Transform, and I still intend to, but I gotta have fun too, you know!

Later!

Version 0.35 Released

Lots of cool new stuff in this release that really improve the quality of play, IMHO. I played several full games without so much as a hitch, and I was doing all kinds of stuff. My best game involved the Captain working with the Witch-King, because I got to see what having the Belt of Strength and the Truesteel sword was like. Very nice killing machine!! At least it was fun for awhile: the Witch-King flew into a cave with a bunch of goblins and got killed, and the Captain got cursed with Ill-Health and Wither at a VERY inopportune time. Oh well!

The biggest new feature, I believe, is the addition of the Broomstick spell. This gives the Witch and Witch-King (Magician?) a nice new strategy possibility, and pretty much rounds out all the really useful spells. The remaining spells (see previous post), with the exception of Enchant Artifact, are pretty much worthless in a solo game, or non-competitive play. I'll get to them someday I suppose.

The big bug fix in this one, is that curses no longer crash the game. I introduced this problem in the last release, and its caused a few headaches. Oh, and wait until you see the new chit panel! A lot of people (myself included) hated the way chits were being displayed in the fatigue/wound/rest dialogs. I've cleaned this up a lot, and made it a lot easier to work with.

Okay, here's what's new:

NEW FEATURES:

• New Spells working:
  
  • Talk to Wise Bird
    
  • World Fades
    
  • Broomstick - works for flying self only (cannot affect other characters yet, though you can still cast it on them)
  
  
• Added target information to spell cards
  
• Added Character name to combat sheets
  
• Revamped the character chit display to group like chits together - makes it a bit easier to see what you want. This affects:
  
  • Initial chit enchantment when choosing a new magic user (MUCH easier on the eyes)
    
  • Fatigue/Rest/Wound displays
    
  • Combat builder display allows easy clicking to change the state (no more buttons to do this)
    
  • Character chit display now has a "detail" button to bring up the new grouped display

BUGS/ISSUES:

• Curse will not crash the game anymore.
  
• Witch's Brew (and similar spells) can target all chits, not just active ones.
  
• Fixed character combat order - now identical to day combat order as it should be.
  
• Combat frame shows character order: First character is in first row, second character in second row, and so on.
  
• Targeting a single opponent with Stones Fly (which does 4 attacks) will no longer cause you to become unhidden automatically when Ambush is in play.
  
• Fixed another "Watchful Natives" bug, that was not moving an ambusher's target to a new combat sheet.
  
• MAGIC chits dedicated to spells are no longer ignored when determining if you can learn a new spell.
  
• Casting logic now correctly matches spells with casting options (i.e., using spell from book when you use the book)
  
• When a guide does an ALERT phase, the followers are no longer REQUIRED to complete it (though they can use it if desired)
  
• Fixed an infinite loop that occurs when the Witch's familiar is following her when she discovers or loots a treasure Site.
  
• Game no longer hangs when a hired leader hires another native
  
• Fixed a problem where simultaneous attacks hitting a treasure card were spilling through to other armor.
  
• Must now land after running with a fly action. You can fly again, if you have the magic.
  
• Fixed the logic of Site Cards: They are added to the bottom of the treasure pile so they can be found by other characters. They remain visible on the board, however.
  
• Fixed the run-away logic for flyers: only flying opponents can stop you from running if you are flying away
  
• Timeless Jewel now properly handles newly activated items and horses

New Spells

Its been a long time since I've implemented any new spells, and a recent discussion of RealmSpeak reminded me of that fact. I decided to take a look at the missing spells, and see which ones made sense to do right now. The full list of spells still missing from RealmSpeak is:

• Talk to Wise Bird
  
• World Fades
  
• Broomstick
  
• Peace
  
• Ask Demon
  
• Lost
  
• Illusion
  
• Fog
  
• Enchant Artifact
  
• Violent Storm
  
• Hurricane Winds
  
• Bad Luck

I spent a little time this morning, and actually knocked two spells off that list: Talk to Wise Bird, and World Fades. Speaking of which, I never realized what a cool spell World Fades is. I'm thinking a magic user with a bow or crossbow could do some serious damage with ambush rules! Heck any weapon would work, as long as you started the combat off hidden! The only real drawback, is you have to supply BLACK magic, but other than that...

Anyway, of the remaining spells, I'd say Broomstick and Peace are the most "in need", especially since a majority of RealmSpeak players enjoy playing solitaire (ie., why on earth would you cast Lost on one of your own characters!!) I'm going to dig into Broomstick, and see if I can get something in place for the next release, but I'm not going to promise anything.

Version 0.34 Released

I always try to add a new feature or two each time I do a release, so that it isn't a pure "bug fix", but this time is an exception. There were a few things that just needed fixing, and I didn't really want to muck it up with a bunch of new stuff.

One cool thing that actually works now, is riding Flying Steeds. Yes, you can finally use the Control Bats spell to get around the board, or if you prefer, Transform a buddy into the Eagle, and jump on his back (provided you aren't too heavy!!) That could almost count as a new feature, I suppose...

With this release, I think I got the last of the bugs that caused a player to remain hidden regardless of their attack, and took care of some other irritating things that affected game play. I hope that makes it worth the download for you!

Anyway, here's what's new:

BUGS/ISSUES:

• Magic users casting area affect spells (ie., Fiery Blast) will properly become unhidden when targeting multiple targets again
  
• Players using "Watchful Natives" will no longer have trouble with monsters not moving to their own sheet on attacking from hidden.
  
• Can no longer press END when hidden with unhidden hirelings vs battling natives
  
• Getting a curse during SEARCH will properly charge you an action, when you have the Timeless Jewel
  
• New "Cancel Spell" button, in case you want to cancel the casting of a spell in combat
  
• Serious wound rolls are logged
  
• Flying Carpet works again
  
• Flying critters can follow now
  
• You can ride flying critters following you now (ie., Flying Steeds). Swordsman on an Eagle? Seems odd...
  
• Transforming no longer loses mission chits
  
• Killing transformed unhired native leaders (that's a mouthful!) properly drops groups inventory now.
  
• Fixed a synching issue with Power of the Pit and Curse
  
• Fixed a problem where Hired Leaders were becoming unhidden prematurely
  
• Fixed an issue where trying to enter a mountain clearing on your last phase with a pony was failing
  
• Hired Leaders and Controlled Monsters will no longer have the summon chits flip face down in their tile anymore
  
• Can flip Giant's clubs and Dragon heads if you control them (or absorb them)

Version 0.33 Released

As I promised, here's a new release of RealmSpeak. I've had the opportunity to play several games with this version, and it seems to be working pretty good. At least there wont be any more problems with staying hidden, or Dragon Essence! :-)

Here's what's new:

NEW FEATURES:

• A new Window menu item allows you to view the game options that are in play. This is especially helpful if you've joined an online game, and you want to know which optional/advanced rules are being used.
  
• Character chooser now has two new "random" buttons for selecting a fighter or a magic user. Regardless of whether you agree with me or not, this is how I characterized them:
  
  • Fighters: Woods Girl, White Knight, Berserker, Dwarf, Black Knight, Amazon, Swordsman, Captain
    
  • Magic Users: Witch, Witch-King, Druid, Elf, Sorceror, Magician, Wizard, Pilgrim

BUGS/ISSUES:

• Fixed a bug introduced in 0.32 that breaks the game when you aquire the Dragon Essence
  
• Fixed a bug introduced in 0.31 that was not properly "unhiding" characters when they attacked in combat
  
• The buttons that "fatigue color chit" now read "play color chit" for clarity
  
• Permanent spells are energized appropriately when a game is loaded.
  
• Rare problem with extending a game is fixed.
  
• Fixed some more Timeless Jewel issues:
  
  • Cancelling an action (ie., SEARCH, ALERT, MOVE) will no longer "cost" you an action phase.
    
  • Deactivating the Timeless Jewel now presents you with an "Are you sure?" dialog, so you can change your mind.
  
  
• Fixed the spell order on Sites and Books so that higher numbered spell types come before lower ones
  
• Characters with timeless jewel active can still FOLLOW other characters, provided they record a FOLLOW during BIRDSONG
  
• Fixed a nasty bug with Food/Ale, and Escort Party, that was causing the game to crash. There was also a rare bug that I discovered in the same code that would cause other gold chits to crash the game on occasion.
  
• Set the maximum allowable characters to "8", because there are too many problems with memory past that point. Yes, I know that's a kludgy way to solve the problem, but until I can find the source, I'm stuck with this solution for now.
  
• Using a color chit during combat is sufficient to keep the combat going (was being ignored)
  
• Fixed Victory Point calculations for Fame and Gold when cursed with Disgust or Ashes.
  
• Abandoned hidden hired natives become unhidden next turn as they should.
  
• Belongings can now only be rearranged at the beginning of a phase, unless the item has just been aquired (new items appear with a yellow border)
  
• Fixed a bug that was crashing the game when someone followed a leader that did both ALERT and REST during their turn
  
• Fixed a situation where it was possible to end up with an active Pony carrying an object that was too heavy
  
• Trading can now only occur at the beginning of a phase, or with someone who is playing their turn (3e-7.2.1)
  
• Fixed the sort order of items in a clearing, so that Monsters no longer appear underneath treasures.
  
• Natives can no longer ride dead horses during the day.
  
• Dwarven REST bonus, and Poultice of Health no longer cost actual REST phases
  
• Following the Dwarf, or someone who has just used the Poultice of Health, no longer gives you the double-asterisk bonus.

Elf & Dwarf

I just finished a solo game with the Elf and Dwarf, using the "Productive Dwarf" rules. It's been awhile since I've just sat down and played a game (without chasing bugs, that is), and it was both short and sweet.

The Elf and Dwarf found the Pool in the caves right away, and after dispatching the Octopus, looted like crazy until there was only one item left. Scoring both the Elven Slippers for the Elf and the 7-League boots for the Dwarf was definitely a good way to start the game. Moving out of the caves into the woods brought some bad luck for the Elf, however. A pack of wolves. Since both the Dwarf and the Elf were hidden, it seemed appropriate for the Elf to let fly an arrow or two. Unfortunately, he was discovered on his first try.

I made a rather stupid mistake here, and chose NOT to lure the wolves with the hidden Dwarf, and the Elf met a rather quick end. The Dwarf did decide to jump out at the last minute (probably just as stupid), and managed, single-handedly, to kill all 6 wolves. Whew!

The Dwarf, having lost his primary mode of transportation (following the Elf) was stuck wandering slowly across the map. An uneventful number of tiles left nothing to be desired. He finally arrived at the Guard where he was able to sell off some loot, and ended the game with a score of .... -26.

Not my best game, but it was good to play the game, just to play it!

Getting close to a new release

I'm hoping to get a new release out this weekend. A couple of annoying bugs in version 0.32 keep popping up in the bug tracker, and I'm getting tired of looking at them:

- Appearance of Dragon Essence freezes the game (fixed in 0.33)
- Fighting melee while hidden doesn't cause you to become unhidden

Both of these were introduced in the last two releases, and have been bothering quite a few RealmSpeakers, I'm sure!!

Lots and lots of other little fixes, should make version 0.33 a pretty stable release. I'm hoping to get a network game going on in the next couple of weeks (maybe even this weekend), so maybe I'll have news to report on that front.

I want to extend a special thanks to vincegamer who has been hammering on RealmSpeak the last couple of weeks, and has shed the light on quite a few problems. I also want to thank icewall, for his effort in solving a game crash issue while following. Thanks you guys!!

Version 0.32 Released

It's definitely been a slow hot summer. I actually experienced my first day above 120 degrees last month, and I can tell you, it was unpleasant! Living in southern California has its perks though. A recent visit from my brother and his family found us visiting a number of the tourist traps around here: Sea World, Six Flags, Wild Animal Park, the beach, to name a few. We even got to go see the Ringling Bros & Barnum Baily Circus here yesterday!!

Okay, so maybe you don't really care what I've been up to, but I bring it up only to excuse myself somewhat from the lack of RealmSpeak updates. Even this update is a bit light in content, but should still be worth a the download, I think. I fixed a few game killing bugs, and added a way to repay a boon (thanks Steve for your great idea!)

Here's what you will find:

NEW FEATURES:

• You can repay a boon now:
  
  • Receiving a boon puts a "Boon" token in your active inventory, showing the native/visitor, and the base price of the item given
    
  • The Boon token cannot be dropped or traded
    
  • To repay a boon, return to the native group, and do a BUY trade. The boon will appear in their inventory, and you can buy it there. Of course, you only have one chance to succeed, so don't attempt it unless you got the cash!

BUGS/ISSUES:

• Fixed a bug in the "Watchful Natives" code that caused the game to crash when fighting monsters (sigh).
  
• Melt-into-Mist and Pentangle now properly "nullify" spells/curses, and not cancel them!
  
• Fixed a bug where using a horse to move into a mountain clearing was not properly handling phases, and causing a minor crash
  
• Fixed a bug where activating Timeless Jewel immediately on discovery was causing a game freeze
  
• Fixed a gnarly bug in the combat interface, that occurs when you select an unassigned target while hidden, just prior to a spellcaster casting a spell (yes, very specific)
  
• Dragonfang necklace works on ALL dragons now, not just land dragons. This includes the firedrake and venerable wyrm from Pruitt's alternative monster set.
  
• Fixed a crash related to the dragonfang necklace
  
• Changed a piece of code that may have been causing problems on Solaris 10 (the jury is out on this one)
  
• Can now click on the map during Prophecy or Timeless Jewel to move (just like during BIRDSONG)
  
• Pressing the MOVE button during Prophecy or Timeless Jewel, will now properly gray out other actions
  
• Can only burn color chits during the encounter step and daylight
  
• Charging characters works now:
  
  • Charger can not do any encounter actions
    
  • Chargee is subject to the penalties of having the MOVE chit on his/her sheet
    
  • Still to do: make sure that charging character does not switch targets during the same round (2e: 34.4/1b)
  
  
• Fixed an issue where Druid going first would cancel the chit summoning for the entire evening!

New Project at the Bug Tracker

Sorry the updates haven't been rolling out with their usual quickness, but its summer after all! I've been pretty busy, only getting a few minutes at a time to work on RealmSpeak. Still, I'm getting stuff done, and should have a new release out fairly soon.

For those of you that are regulars at the bug tracker, I wanted to let you know that I just added a new "project" to manage my other java app, Wizards. This means that you might start seeing Wizards bugs mixed in with the RealmSpeak bugs. If you prefer not to see them, simply change your preferences by clicking on "My Account", and then "Preferences" to set your default project to RealmSpeak.

See you soon!

RealmSpeak over at HiWired

I just got an e-mail from one of the author's at the HiWired Blog. He discovered RealmSpeak recently when he and a number of friends hooked up for some game playing time. Anyway, he did a short write-up on RealmSpeak that's worth taking a look at. I imagine the game will get a bit more exposure in the coming days! :-)

Thanks Peter!

The Natives... are watchful?

I'm getting a lot of reports that the "Watchful Natives" option is breaking the combat interface. I've identified and fixed the bug that causes this, but I'm probably not going to do a patch release because there is a reasonable workaround: don't turn this option on.

If you are playing combat, and discover that the NEXT button doesn't advance, or something else seems to be unresponsive, you've likely encountered this bug.

Sorry about that folks!

Version 0.31 Released

Wow, it's been a long time since the last release. You might expect a big release for that length of time, but keep in mind I did take nearly a month off from coding. Still, looking at the feature list, it does seem to be a lot.

Before I get into the features, I would like to take a moment to thank all of you that have been posting bug reports, and helping me determine which need the most attention, and which are misunderstandings of the rules. Without you guys, I'm afraid the RealmSpeak project might have died many months ago. Thank you thank you thank you!!!

Okay, onto the changes. Since you can simply read the features down below, I'm not going to reiterate them too completely here, but I do want to point one thing out in particular: the behavior of combat is changed slightly, and that may annoy some of you. Up until this release, there were some actions you could perform that would automatically press the next button for you, an advance to the next stage. Some examples: selecting a melee target, running away, alerting a weapon, etc. There were other actions which did NOT do this, and this makes for a confusing interface.

To absolve this issue, I decided to make ALL actions require pressing the NEXT button. Though this means you will have to press NEXT when you used to not, it also means that you have a few moments to change your mind, or fix a "mis-click" by pressing the RESET button. I've come to like the change, and I think you will too. If not, you have my e-mail!! :-)

Okay, here's what you can expect in this release:

NEW FEATURES:

• When trading with natives, you can now trade items as part of the cost
  
• 3rd-edition optional rules added:
  
  • Knight's Adjustment (ALLY becomes FRIENDLY)
    
  • Watchful Natives (mostly - natives assigned randomly to hirelings when character is hidden, for now)
  
  
• Couple of new features in the combat simulator:
  
  • You can adjust the HIDE status of hirelings separate from character
    
  • You can choose whether or not hireling horses are included

BUGS/ISSUES:

• Flowers of Rest owned by unhired native groups will cause people to sleep now (once they've been "seen")
  
• Resolved issues with Timeless Jewel: RealmSpeak would get confused about your location if you tried moving through an undiscovered path.
  
• Fixed a problem with placing a horse during combat on the non-galloping side (trotting)
  
• Fixed an issue with the way rest phases were being counted during daylight
  
• Unfixed/Refixed the problem with the REST dialog - Now you can press the Done button if you still have REST phases, but it warns you that this is the case. (otherwise, WITHER causes an unresolvable situation that causes the game to stop)
  
• Flying from combat will position you between two tiles - Flying MUST be your first action on the following day
  
• Activated horses and boots are properly handled when a new item is aquired that is too heavy for either to carry
  
• Artifacts and Books can now only be used once per evening
  
• Wish Strength can be used to open the VAULT
  
• Cloven Hoof in native inventory, having not been seen, no longer adds one to your die rolls
  
• Fixed an issue where hired leaders and controlled monsters couldn't open the VAULT, even though their strength was sufficient
  
• Fixed an inconsistency in the behavior of the buttons in the "Encounter" phase of combat. Now ALL encounter actions require pressing NEXT, which means you also have a chance to press reset if you make an error. This might take some getting used to...
  
• Dragonfang necklace works again
  
• Vial of Healing is implemented (I thought it was before, but I clearly never wrote code for it)
  
• Getting transported by the Toadstool Circle no longer includes your hirelings (they are left behind)
  
• Familiar, Phantasm, Hired Leaders, and Controlled Monsters no longer count towards the "Character Limit" you set at the beginning of the game.
  
• Combat simulator works for setting up natives against natives without a character
  
• Trading the Regent of Jewels in your first TRADE phase no longer causes you to lose the TRADE phase bonus that that treasure gives you'
  
• Calculation of clearing distance is correct for missions that have multiple possible paths to the same destination now
  
• END combat for multiple online players should work properly now
  
• WITHER Curse properly fatigues alerted and color chits, in addition to normal active chits

ps - no current plans for an online game, so I can't really say with confidence that the online portion of RealmSpeak is working again. If you decide to play an online game with a friend or two, I'd love to hear from you regarding how it goes! When I do get a chance to play online, you know I'll post it here!

Watchful Natives

I had a request to add some 3rd edition rules into the game, and I decided to get that together for the next release. The two you can expect to see are "Knight's Adjustment" and "Watchful Natives". Should make the Inn masacres less prevalent, and balance the game a bit.

I think I fixed the bug that killed my last online game, so I may have to schedule another one very soon. I probably wont do a release until right before that game (sometime in the next couple of weeks?)

Lots and lots of other things. As always, you can watch my progress at the bug tracker. Simply log in, and click the Change Log link at the top of the page to see what's been fixed in the newest version. If you don't already have an account there, feel free to get one: it's not required that you report issues to have a login, and I'll never use your e-mails for anything else (ie., I wont sell you off to any spammers!) Plus, if you ever do decide to chime in on a bug, you'll be set to go!

Goin' Solo

I'm back into the meat of coding for RealmSpeak, for those of you that haven't noticed the issues getting resolved over at the bug tracker. I made a decision to focus on the "solo" game for now, and get some things resolved that affect the solitaire player.

Honestly, I think the issues affecting the network play are fairly minor, but I'm still a bit frustrated about my last game to even explore what might have gone wrong. Except for that, version 0.30 is a pretty solid release (at least in my hands).

Lots of new stuff planned in v0.31. I've been attempting to tackle the oldest issues first, because some of you have been waiting for a long time for things. One in particular, is the ability to trade items along with gold to purchase things from natives. I finished the interface tonight, and am working on integrating it into the game. It looks pretty nice, if I do say so myself!

Well, I gotta go read stories to my kids before they go to bed, so I'll wrap this up for now. Look for a new release in a couple weeks!

Takin' a Short Break

After my last game of RealmSpeak flopping like it did, I decided to take a break from coding for a bit. I haven't touched the code in over a week, and probably wont for at least a week more. I've been trying to keep up with the bug tracker, but only to acknowledge new entries.

When I get rolling again, I'll let you all know!

Still No Dice

I just finished an hour's worth of trying to play RealmSpeak online with no luck. The interface froze up after one day, and we had to quit. Trying it again with an older version (0.28) it died after one day.

(sigh) I'm thinking its time to rethink how I'm doing the networking in RealmSpeak. The solo game is just fine (mostly), and it really only breaks down when you are playing online (recently). I really don't like the instability I'm seeing, so I gotta come up with a better solution.

Sorry guys!

Cheating in RealmSpeak

Cheating? You can cheat in RealmSpeak?

Well, yes you can. I created code long ago that allowed me to cause things to happen in the game, without having to wait for them to happen at random. I thought that there are enough of you now playtesting the game all the time, that it might be worth letting you know how to do this, so you can recreate situations at will.

With the release of version 0.30, you'll find a new batch file called: cheat.bat. Use this, instead of the run.bat you normally use, and you will run the game in "CHEAT" mode. To cheat in game, click on the character token in your character frame, and a nondescript dialog will appear. Type "help" in this dialog, and you will see all the good stuff you can do.

What about online games? Anyone using the CHEAT mode will gain the permanent title "Cheater!". I wouldn't recommend doing this if you want to play with the same people again! ;-)

One other note: the cheat mode was meant for me, and as such, is not exactly "user-friendly". To gain a particular item, you have to type it's name EXACTLY as it is printed on the card, and it IS case-sensitive. For example: to aquire the timeless jewel, you'd have to type:

Timeless Jewel

Any other way you type it, nothing will happen.

Okay, that's all I have to say about that. If you have questions, let me know!

Version 0.30 Released

Well, this should alleviate the issues of v0.29. If you want to wait a day or two, I'll let you know how tonight's game goes. I'm playing with 3 other players (I think), so if it works, I'll be happy! I'll post the experience here, either tomorrow or Sunday. If you want to give it a go yourself, it's only a 2 MB download!

Assuming all is well with v0.30, I think this will be a cool release. Combined with the features I attempted to add in v0.29, this will be the first release that permits battle "observation", which is a big plus. That means if you aren't involved directly in a combat, you can STILL watch the goings-on, something that wasn't possible in earlier releases. This also means you can have "game observers" that don't actually play a character (assuming people have an interest in that).

One neat new feature in v0.30, is the ability to click on clearings without the requirement of first pressing the MOVE button on the character frame. This will save a lot of back-and-forth motions with the mouse, especially when you are travelling a long ways across the map with a horse or pony! Make sure the top character frame is the one you want to move, and then simply click clearings to move. Of course, if you prefer to see your options, you can still press the MOVE button each time. That's up to you!

Oh, before I forget, I made a change to the time delay that's built into the client/server relationship. If you've ever played online, you've probably noticed a bit of a delay getting things to happen. Hopefully this works well: another reason to wait and see how tonight's game goes!

Okay, here's what's new:

NEW FEATURES:

• You can rehire your hirelings now (extends their term of hire by 14 days)
  
• If you click on a clearing during the recording phase, RealmSpeak will now automatically record a MOVE action for the active character (no need to continuously hit the MOVE button)

BUGS/ISSUES:

• Reduced the delay in the server wait time per request. This should make the online game a bit more spunky. (Though I'm concerned it will have an adverse effect on slower computers... I'm sure you'll tell me if you have problems!)
  
• I think I fixed the recent combat frame problems for good. I did a bit more hard-core testing, including all of these situations:
  
  • Normal combat for a single local player
    
  • Normal combat for a single online player
    
  • Normal combat for two local characters
    
  • Normal combat for two different online combats
    
  • Running from combat without hirelings
    
  • Running from combat with hirelings
    
  • Running from combat with another online character staying behind
    
  • Ending combat while in a clearing with another character's hireling(s)
  
  
• Realm Log window now scrolls to the bottom by default
  
• Fixed a bug that caused Native HQ's horse to get put into the native's hold when becoming unhired
  
• RealmSpeak no longer tries to make the Witch's familiar place a visitor/mission chit
  
• Discovering the Flowers of Sleep now affects players that have already taken their turn too
  
• Losing your turn do to the Flowers of Sleep will no longer summon monsters (as per Richard Hamblen's Q&A on Nand's site)
  
• Moved the "Setup Card" button out of the character frame, and into the character list window (makes more sense there)
  
• The REST dialog no longer allows you to skip your rests by pressing the Done button.
  
• The detail button in the combat frame now opens the game log window (or moves it to the front) since it now has the same information anyway
  
• When you do an SP phase and get the options, its much clearer which buttons will affect the tile, and which will affect the chit (the tile icon is included on the button)
  
• Fixed a bug where clearing restrictions (ie., Mountain clearing) were being ignored for spells on artifacts and books

Not Quite Right

Well, there are still some issues with how I changed the behavior of the combat frame, and I think I'm going to stop with the "bugfix" releases for now. I need to give it some real testing, and that isn't likely to happen until the weekend (my weeknights have been insane recently!) If you want to play RealmSpeak, I recommend v0.28, as it is the last version before I changed the combat screens. I'll get the code tested, and do a real release in the next week or so. Thanks for being patient with me!

Version 0.29.2 Bugfix Release

Still some major things wrong with 0.29, so I'm doing another bugfix. Sorry about that!

BUGS/ISSUES:

• Fixed a problem with targeting monsters on another character's sheet while you have monsters on your own sheet (broke this back in version 0.24!)
  
• Fixed the run problem a different way (the way I fixed it in 0.29.1 didn't account for hirelings! oops...)
  
• Fixed the situation where one hidden character is being battled by natives, and another unhidden character is not, and you couldn't press the End button. (does that make any sense?) In any case, it's fixed.
  
• Fatigue/Wounds center on combat frame now, NOT game frame

Version 0.29.1 Bugfix Release

This always happens when I'm anxious to get new features out: I hurry through the testing stage, and miss something crucial. Since I never "ran away" in any of my tests, I completely missed the problem. The problem was minor but annoying enough to require a fix. I also found a problem with something I fixed in the pacify spells (Persuade, to be specific) that needed immediate attention. I apologize if you already downloaded 0.29, but you are really going to want this release where these problems are now fixed.

Oh, one more thing I forgot to mention in my last release: v0.29 requires a new resource pack, so be sure to grab that before playing. If you don't, RealmSpeak will complain. :-)

Here's what's new here:

BUGS/ISSUES:

• Fixed a problem with the combat window not closing after a character runs
  
• Fixed another issue with the pacify spells

Run Away might be broken in v0.29

Not sure, but I had the combat window freak out on me while running away. May have to do a quick bug fix...

Version 0.29 Released

Not much to say, except here's what's new:

NEW FEATURES:

• No longer need to "approve" trades between characters belonging to the same player
  
• Improvements to the combat interface:
  
  • Pressing END now polls by PLAYER, not by CHARACTER. This means that if you are playing a SOLO game, you need only press the END button one time per clearing. No more endless clicks on the stupid END button when playing multiple characters in a solo game!!
    
  • All players can observe all battles now (no more twiddling your thumbs wondering what is going on)
    
  • Combat Window stays "open" until combat has ended for all players (no more flashing window - there is still some blink in the interface itself though)
    
  • "End Simulation" button when playing a combat simulation so you can quit right away.
  
  
• RealmBattle allows you to choose awakened spells on books now too
  
• New Help menu item: Key to Remodeled Counters
  
• Playing the game with combat turned OFF now displays the words "COMBAT OFF" instead of the "Daily Combat" checkbox.

BUGS/ISSUES:

• Fixed a bug when absorbing one of Pruitt's monsters
  
• "Hide character chits" option includes phantasms and familiars now
  
• Using a color chit to transform during combat now immediately updates the frame image
  
• Pacification spells are properly cancelled now if hirelings are already assigned to attack the pacification target (3rd edition rule 8.4.2.h.1)
  
• Can only assign hirelings during Birdsong
  
• Fixed a bug that sometimes hides the "Game Over" screen before you have a chance to look at it.
  
• Blocked characters can no longer trade

Version 0.28 Released

Hooray! This is a big release, in my opinion, because it is the first one since I added long duration spells to RealmSpeak that actually works as I meant it to. If you don't know what I'm talking about, see the previous post below. For the rest of you, here's what's new:

NEW FEATURES:

• RealmBattle (the battle simulator) now uses the chit style you have selected in RealmSpeak
  
• RealmBattle now supports making duplicates (if you so desire) of denizens for testing double-board battles. Simply make sure the "Make Duplicates" checkbox is checked before adding denizens or hirelings.
  
• RealmBattle now allows you to choose an awakened spell for an artifact (not books yet)

BUGS/ISSUES:

• Fixed a bug with phases gained from permanent spells
  
• Fixed a general bug in the action panel behavior when the Timeless Jewel is activated
  
• Fixed (at long last) the bug which caused duration spells to sometimes get stuck in one state or another
  
• Fixed a problem where characters are able to move Gloves cards from other characters
  
• When an invalid action is encountered during your turn, you must resolve the issue, or press Play Next to make it a BLANK phase.
  
• Multiple non-simultaneous hits on a mounted native will spill through to the rider, making it possible now to kill a mounted native in one round.
  
• If a character is not in the same clearing with his hirelings (they are following another character), the 1st hireling is highlighted on the character's turn in combat instead. (used to default to the first row which is confusing)
  
• Monsters under the influence of Melt-into-Mist no longer block character activities
  
• Misty monsters are ignored when determining whether the END button should be disabled or not (ie., you can end combat in a clearing that contains only a monster transformed into Mist)
  
• Another fix to Pruitt's monsters (sigh) to get them to return to the setup card properly
  
• Terror result in Power of the Pit, no longer kills L and M characters outright
  
• Power of the Pit no longer affects transformed character chits
  
• Transformed characters that are killed, will now properly untransform, and drop inventory in the clearing
  
• Witch's familiar no longer loses its turn when the Witch is following another character.
  
• Any character with ability to use one die with missile weapons (ie., Elf), no longer get an advantage with missile attacks (ie., Fiery Blast)

Big Bad Permanent Spell Bug Fixed!

As some of you may have encountered, there has been a problem with Permanent spells in RealmSpeak. On occasion (seemingly at random), a Permanent spell will get stuck in one state or another. The most common appearance of the bug, is the inability to energize an inert spell. Worse yet, is having a Permanent spell (ie., Transform) get stuck in the ON state!!

At long last, I found the source of the problem in the code. Want to see the bug? It's easy to reproduce in version 0.27 or earlier: play the Sorceror and choose these spells: Transform, Fiery Blast, and Phantasm. Make sure you have at least three purple color chits, and move yourself to a safe Valley clearing. Save the game, and then try one of the following scenarios:

Scenario 1:
Day 1 - Cast Transform on yourself.
Day 2 - Cast Phantasm
Day 3 - Do nothing (ie., waste the Phantasm)
Day 4 - Fatigue a color chit: no spells to energize!!

Scenario 2:
Day 1 - Cast Transform on yourself.
Day 2 - Cast Phantasm
Day 3 - Fatigue a color chit during the day: energize your transform spell
Day 4 - You are stuck in a transformed state!!

You see, in both scenarios, the Phantasm spell expires at the end of the 3rd day. When it expires, the permanent spell list is wiped out (this is the bug), and RealmSpeak "forgets" which permanent spells were alive. If you are transformed when this happens, you never come out of it, because RealmSpeak doesn't know to make it inert. If it was inert, RealmSpeak doesn't list it when you fatigue a color chit.

The bug was so glaring in the code, I'm surprised it took me this long to see it. Fixing it was trivial, and should permanently (pun intended) resolve the situation. This fix will be in version 0.28, coming soon.

Version 0.27 Released

Lots of bug fixes here, including some that have been on my TODO list for many months. Also, I fixed a prowling problem with Pruitt's monsters, so if you tried the expansion, and were confused about their behavior, it will work now.

Here's what's new:

NEW FEATURES:

• Right-clicking on map brings up a pop-up menu to allow you to specify which chits are shown, and which are not

BUGS/ISSUES:

• RandomAssignment phase doesn't cause luring to fail in proceeding rounds of combat
  
• Dwarf (without the house rule) no longer does sun actions
  
• Mists (Melt into Mist) can only Move, Hide, or Follow, as per the rules
  
• Pruitt's Monsters prowl correctly (I had forgotten to specify the correct prowling monster die for these new monsters!)
  
• Combat detail now correctly identifies when a horse is hit and/or killed
  
• Fixed a bug that caused strange behavior when getting opportunity or trouble rolls on the meeting tables
  
• Spells that don't target Character or Denizen, no longer cause the spellcaster to become unhidden (ie., REMEDY, DISSOLVE SPELL)
  
• Hired Native Leaders no longer meet the requirement for summoning a visitor chit
  
• Transformed characters use color images (when that option is active)
  
• Items in inventory stay activated/inactivated when transformed (though frozen and unavailable)
  
• You can FLY to the same tile now without getting the error "Target tile too far away."
  
• Fixed a problem that was causing a slowdown when a player is between clearings
  
• Fixed a problem when several characters are running from a clearing at once
  
• Multiple simultaneous attacks no longer pass through armor and horses
  
• Added some text to describe the damage or destruction of armor
  
• Fixed problem where Encounter Stage was getting skipped when dissolving an Absorb Essence spell
  
• Fixed issues surrounding Transmorphed characters and fatigued chits
  
  • Cannot rest chits while transformed
    
  • Are not affected by Flowers of Rest while transformed
  
  
• Activate Potions are no longer dropped when you are killed (they go to the specified visitor)
  
• Treasure cards (Bejeweled Dwarf Vest, Golden Crown, Golden Arm Band) will now properly increase a character's gold amount when destroyed during combat.
  
• PEACE result from WISH table no longer ends combat immediately: you get the normal two rounds of combat to do actions

Version 0.26 Released

This release is a bit heavy on features, and light on bug fixes. I apologize to those of you waiting for bug fixes, but I got a bit sidetracked in this release doing things that will add some new flavor to the game. First off, I've got a first run of the visitor/mission chits going. It's not fully tested, but it should work. Characters can place the chits in boxes on the setup card, and they appear as they should. You can pick them up, provided you pay the fee, and the rewards should work. That's the part I haven't fully tested, but it should work. :-)

A big new feature in this release is the new color chits. Yes, that means you have to download a new resource pack, but the advantage should be obvious. Look in the options pulldown menu to make changes to the chit style. You can change these "in-game" so feel free to play around with it. I actually prefer the appearance of the color chits over the remodeled ones, but will switch to the remodeled chits to get information. Anyway, I hope you enjoy this bit.

Another biggie in this release, is my first run of an in-game log. This log is broadcast live to all the players, so should alleviate some of the "disconnected" feeling when playing with people online. Its got a ways to go (you can't save this log, and it's lost between games) but its a start. Look for the new button on the window that lists all the characters: it's the button with the three blue dots. Click this button anytime, and the log frame will appear. This frame can be left open, or closed again. Since it is a real frame, it appears separately on the task bar (Windows users), so you can quickly switch between it and the game. If you don't like the way I've implemented it, I'm definitely open for suggestion!!

Oh, I almost forgot! This release ALSO has the new monsters that a Magic Realm fan (Glenn Pruitt) put together. When you start a new game, look at the "Game Version" option. You have the choice of "Original Game" and "Pruitt's Monsters". When you use Glenn's monsters, you also commit to a new treasure setup card layout, so forget all your old habits! Wolves may pounce on you in the woods, and Bats (oh no, not bats!) might swarm you when you least expect! Of course, you may encounter a flock of crows, or a grumpy old Behemoth. If you want to know more about these monsters before commiting to a game, take a look at the previous post in this blog for a link.

I should mention something else: Glenn offered a number of possibilities for dealing with the Treasure Locations. Rather than make ALL the possibilities available, I decided instead to pick one, and use it. The one I liked the best, was letting the location of the Treasure Site determine which of the two available T monsters will come out. For example, the Pool in the caves will summon the T Octopus, but the same Pool in the Mountains will lure a Swamp Haunt!

Here's the official "What's New":

NEW FEATURES:

• Visitor/Mission/Campaign chits
  
  • Placement by characters, or randomized
    
  • Proper Summoning/Prowling behavior
    
  • Visitors: trading (buying spells!) - no buying drinks
    
  • Mission chits: properly display destination and reward
    
  • Campaign chits: properly display partners/foes and who is left
  
  
• Support for color chits OR remodeled (Evans/Frenzel) style chits
  
• Option to use Glen Pruitt's alternate monsters
  
• Live game log - this should alleviate some of the disconnected feeling when playing an online game.

BUGS/ISSUES:

• Transforming a mounted native into a frog (or whatever) includes the horse.
  
• Garrison natives regenerate properly now
  
• Terror results on PoP table no longer kills Heavies (L and M only)
  
• Can no longer read runes off of the Flying Carpet and DragonFang Necklace

Remodeled Chits and New Monsters

A number of you have asked for an option in RealmSpeak to use the new remodeled counters that Dan Evans made available (from John Frenzel's original design). Currently, the chits are quite boring:



They work, and you can tell what they are, but they don't offer much else. I decided to get onto Dan Evans' website, and see what it would take to make the chits work better. Swiping the graphics directly from the files provided (Dan, I hope you are cool with that!), I first did a run keeping the chits the same, but with the colorings that Dan did:



These look pretty nice, and are a definite improvement over the ones I was using! I then wrote the code required to make the chits render all the same values, which is the real reason for attacking this task. The result is good:



RealmSpeak will now have an option in the options menu that will let you choose between Classic, Color, and Remodeled chits.

Another task I tackled this time, is working a monster expansion into the game. That's right, an expansion, and the first of its kind in RealmSpeak. This expansion is the Alternate Monster Set by Glenn Pruitt, originally available here. Glenn provides a bunch of new monsters, and a completely new monster setup arrangement! Take a peek at this snip from the monster setup card:



Haven't played with the new monsters in a real game yet, but everything else about them works: they summon, reset, and behave the way Glenn designed them. Thanks Glenn!

Probably wont be a release for another week or so. I really need to tackle some nasty bugs before putting it out. Until next time.

Visitor/Mission chits

I had someone e-mail me the other day, and ask when I was planning on getting the Visitor/Mission chits into RealmSpeak. I've long put it off, because it was going to take some effort to get implemented, and the chance of getting one of these is so darn small anyway.

Well, the question sparked an interest, and with the Treasure Setup card view in place, I thought I'd toy with getting this part working. The good news is, the chits were fairly easy to add to my components list, and get into the view. They can be placed by characters (or randomly, your choice), and they can be summoned to the board (and flip on a die roll of six on the 7th day) as they should.

I still need to give the chits their behavior (they are just decorative right now), and build a way for characters to pick these up. That shouldn't be too hard, but I'm not sure. At the very least, I'll finish the Visitors so we can at least trade with them.

Back on Track

My friends and I played another game last night using the latest version (v0.25.1), and things ran a LOT more smoothly. We actually didn't have any trouble with the game until one point where trying to do a trade between two characters was causing a freeze up on one of the players machines. I saved the game, so hopefully I'll be able to duplicate the problem on my own machine, and get an error log to see what is happening. I suspect it has something to do with two players pressing the trade button at the same time, but I'm not sure.

In any event, the game was great. Though we are still mid-game (we quit at midnight) a LOT has happened, and these three characters (Captain, White Knight, Wizard) have gotten quite powerful. All three have horses, the White Knight has the Sacred Grail, the Wizard has the Dragon Essence, and the Captain has the Deft Gloves (among other things). We've looted the Lair and the Cairns, and wiped out the Inn. We are currently sitting in a safe woods tile pondering whether to explore the Altar (in the caves!) or the Shrine. That's for another day!

The Treasure Setup card view is sweet. It's so cool to check the status of the monsters now and again, and feel comfortable that a particular monster or native group wont be back for awhile. Feels a lot more like the board game.

Anyway, I'm happy with that release, so if you've been waiting, I say check it out. Now back to the code... :-)

Patch Version 0.25.1 Released

It was inevitable, I suppose, with having a game go so badly, that there would be a couple more issues to fix. Since I'm likely not going to be doing another release for a week or so, I thought it was worth getting this minor release done.

Not much new, but possibly worth it to avoid a hung combat:

• Had to fix another game killing bug that I introduced in v0.24 (sigh)
  
• Persuade now only kicks the caster's opponents off, not ALL of them (though they are ALL still persuaded)

Version 0.25 Released

So, version 0.24 was a bit of a bust, because of a stupid error on my part that led to a strange cycling combat behavior (see "Broken" post below). I fixed this, plus a couple of things that quickly popped up on the bug tracker, and I think its good this time. I pulled up the game that killed us so hard on Friday, and it ran like a charm.

Here's what's new:

NEW FEATURES:

• New house rule: Characters joining after host starts the game MUST start at the INN (this is now optional instead of mandatory!)

BUGS/ISSUES:

• Fixed cycling combat bug (this is what killed our game!)
  
• Battling natives list in summary window (Combat) is readable now when there is more than one line of information
  
• Can no longer use the mouse pointer to reveal clearing contents BEFORE the host starts the game
  
• Heads/Clubs should now be light-side-up at the beginning of a new combat, regardless of previous battles.

Broken

Last night's game didn't go very well. There's something broken in 0.24 that's preventing combat from completing normally. Sometimes combat goes round and round again with nothing occuring, and everyone keeps having to press the END button. Several times, the game crashed so completely that we had to start over.

I'm not sure if it only occurs in a multiplayer game or if the problem is more general. I played a couple of solo games before doing the release, and all seemed to be well, so I'm guessing it has something to do with being online.

I'm very frustrated, but that's how it goes sometimes. I'm convinced the code problem is minor, and should be fairly easy to change. I might get something up in the next couple of days to fix it.

If you haven't yet downloaded v0.24, you might want to wait. If you already downloaded it, go ahead and give it a try (I think the solo game is working). The good news is that the error logging portion is working right, so send me your error logs if you have them. If you'd rather not mess with it, go back to version 0.23 until I can get a more stable release together.

Sorry about that folks!

RealmSpeak on UnderDogs

On a whim, I did a search for RealmSpeak at the Home of the Underdogs, and would you believe, its listed there?

http://www.the-underdogs.org/game.php?id=5241

That made my day.

Sneaky Me

Found another small bug, and decided to swap out the file before anybody downloaded the release. Near as I can tell from my web site statistics, no-one has downloaded it yet, so I think I'm good. If you somehow managed to download this release before 3:40pm PST, you're going to want to download it again now, especially if you like playing magic users... ;-)

Version 0.24 Released

Lots of neat new features and bug fixes in this release, definitely worth the download. One item in particular will make reporting bugs a bit easier: Error logging. When the game crashes for one reason or another, there will now be an error log generated in the same folder as the game is run from. If you e-mail this log to me, along with a short explanation about what was happening at the time, I should be able to locate the bug quickly, and get it fixed. I'm hoping this will lessen the "my game crashed" reports that I've had a tough time resolving.

Also new this time, is a view of the treasure setup card. This should make figuring out what the dangers are for a particular tile, without having to use external references.

I'll be playing this version online tonight, so I'll let you know how that goes.

Enough Jibba-Jabba, here's what's new:

NEW FEATURES:

• Error Logging - If RealmSpeak "freezes" or "crashes", look for a file in your RealmSpeak directory called "RealmSpeakErrorxxxx.log. Send this to me, along with an explanation of what you were doing when it crashed (if you remember), and this should make fixing these types of bugs trivial.
  
• Treasure Setup Card view (see "Setup Card" button on Character Frame)
  
• Map is not revealed until host presses "Start Game" button - characters joining after the game is started MUST start at the Inn.
  
• No longer need to hold the CTRL key down to make multiple selections in the trade window.
  
• Moved trade/share button out of tabbed panes for easier access. Sharing discoveries is included in the trade window now, so you can GET discoveries, as well as GIVE them.
  
• Better Victory Point handling:
  
  • Host determines VPs that are required per player per month
    
  • New characters don't specify VPs on the initial setup window
    
  • Characters must specify VPs by clicking a new button on the Character frame (highlighted in yellow)
    
  • Each new month requires each character to specify more VPs
    
  • Characters joining mid-month have reduced requirements, as specified by the rules

BUGS/ISSUES:

• Natives can target RED-side up monsters on other sheets now.
  
• Fixed problem where killing a transformed monster wasn't rewarding the player properly
  
• Fixed a major bug that sometimes caused a player's action record to become truncated during online play
  
• Changed the text description on Dragonfang Necklace to read "Control one dragon in PURPLE", so it is clear that it needs PURPLE magic
  
• Fixed Dragonfang Necklace, so it can actually work now.
  
• Peering a warning chit (Smoke W, Stink W) is no longer sufficient to cause the campfires to appear.
  
• When making change for a 2-asterisk chit during the fatigue step, you MUST make change with the same type now
  
• Flying Carpet no longer appears in INERT list when you haven't yet found it
  
• Incomplete record warning no longer appears when you have extra actions after following
  
• Fixed a bug where light-side-up archers would sometimes freeze combat
  
• Fixed bug that was preventing proper use of Battle Bracelets on another combat sheet
  
• Fixed bug that was causing combat to hang after a "I Wish I Were Elsewhere" result
  
• Fixed problem with Timeless Jewel and Prophecy where running away left you with no options
  
• Casting POISON no longer reveals unseen weapons
  
• Fixed a bug where TERROR result in Power of the Pit table when cast by a Demon against a hireling was causing a game freeze
  
• Fixed problem where "Daily Combat" checkbox wasn't working for hired leaders.
  
• Fixed GUI update problem when trading inventory (inventory would vanish until the next update)
  
• Discoveries are traded in the same interface as inventory, meaning you can GET as well as GIVE now
  
• Moved Trade/Share buttons out of panels, and into the main frame for easier access.
  
• Trade/Share recognizes if a player is playing a turn or not, and filters the list of characters accordingly
  
• Fixed bug where "Transform" cast on a native attacker would crash the game
  
• Fixed a combat bug, where deployment order was being ignored
  
• Fixed a *RARE* situation where you could end up between clearings with an item too heavy to carry, and no color to energize a transform spell. Now it lets you move regardless of weight if you are stuck between clearings.
  
• Fixed a bug where INERT permanent spells were deenergizing every night, which sometimes crashes combat

Fixing lots of "crash" bugs

I've been focusing on getting the bugs that cause the game to "crash" this week, because this really detracts from the fun side of RealmSpeak. Nothing more frustrating than to have your turn be trashed because of a crash!

I'm planning to do an official release Friday AM, so look for it!

Should be a release this week

If you've followed this blog at all, you'll notice a pattern: when I'm about to play an online game, there is usually a frenzy of changes preceeding the event. The same is true now. I'm planning on playing a game Friday, and there were a couple of things that made our game frustrating last time:

• Sometimes, one of the players records would get truncated, thus messing up their turn. Often, this was a fatal result, as characters would end up in clearings with monsters without their planned HIDE or ALERT ever occurring
• Permanent spells sometimes fail to get registered, and either stay ON permanently, or stay OFF permanently. Since this bug is rare, I've never truly been able to replicate it.
• Normally, I play with the Treasure Setup Card next to me, but our last game found me at a computer away from my usual Magic Realm supplies. How annoying is it not to be able to glance at the setup card to determine what dangers reside in a particular tile?
• Being attacked by a RED-side up tremendous monster is tough enough, without being able to deploy your hirelings to give you a hand!
  

In a release I'm planning this week, I've addressed all four of these issues (I think...) The first issue I was able to duplicate (hurray!) and thus fixing it was a cinch. While fixing the code, it dawned on me how the same bug might be affecting the Permanent spells, quite possibly killing two birds with one stone here! Since I could never reliably duplicate the problem, only time will tell (I'm about 80% confident its gone for good!).

I got tired of fixing bugs (I've got a BUNCH of them over on the bug tracker), so I wanted to do something fun. I decided to get the Treasure Setup Card viewer in place, and it turned out rather nice! I can hardly wait to try this out in a live game!

Finally, the native deploying to RED-side-up monsters was a tricky situation to fix, but I believe it is working now. I'm crossing my fingers that I didn't break some other aspect of combat!

I'm playing a game Friday (2/17) night, so I'll probably do a release this week. You might want to wait on downloading it, until you hear from me next weekend. If our game goes off without a hitch, you know I'll be trumpeting its praises!

Slow Work

I apologize if you have been keeping tabs on RealmSpeak recently, and have discovered not much has changed. I haven't spent much time with the code in the last few weeks, partly for being sick, and partly for being too danged busy. I also recently rediscovered a favorite old Microprose game of mine (Master of Magic) that I have been playing in my free time.

I have made some small progress: I added an error-reporting feature to RealmSpeak so that those of you reporting "crashes" or "freezes" should have something to send to me that will be more helpful to me for finding a bug.

I also fixed an issue with natives being unable to deploy to RED-side-up tremendous monsters, so that will be nice.

Other than that, nothing new to report. I'm hoping that life will settle down in the near future (or I tire of my Microprose game again), so I can get back to work on RealmSpeak. Lots to do!

Thanks for your patience.

Version 0.23 Released

I mainly wanted to get this version out to fix problems I created with monster gold bounty and ambush rules in the last couple of versions. There's also a few new spells, though admittedly, we're starting to get down to the "boring" spells. (I know I need to do Broomstick and Hurricane Winds, but those are going to be hard, and I want to fix some things before I do).

Here's what's new:

NEW FEATURES:

• New Spells:
  
  • Blazing Light
    
  • Poison
    
  • Peace with Nature
    
  • Protection from Magic
    
  • Pentangle V

BUGS/ISSUES:

• Bug introduced in 0.22 that wrongly rewarded each monster kill with a gold bounty is fixed
  
• Fixed broken AMBUSH rule (broke it when I added the Alchemist's Mixture treasure)
  
• Alchemist's Mixture treasure now correctly inactivates your active weapon (if any) when activated
  
• Native Horses appear in Native Leader inventory again, and they can use them (but not trade/drop/inactivate)
  
• Fixed problem with casting Absorb Essence while hidden
  
• PERSUADE properly makes native groups FRIENDLY for the following day
  
• Possible to end combat with persuaded monsters/natives in the clearing now
  
• Possible to reenergize an INERT spell between clearings, or in the air.

Last nights game

I played most of a game last night with a friend of mine, and we ran into some new problems:

• The trade interface is crashing RealmSpeak (not sure if this is a general problem, or only related to the "hosted" game)
  
• Killing monsters results in a gold bounty! (this one was actually kind of fun)
  
• When new characters join in a hosted game, actions recorded by other characters are sometimes lost, or truncated

Damned frustrating, but with all the new stuff added recently, I'm not completely surprised. I know where the gold bug comes from: when I added Persuade and Deal with Goblins, I gave all the monsters a "wage" to be hired by. Unfortunately, my code currently uses the wage to determine bounty, and thinks you earn it when you kill a monster! This can be fixed easily enough, but I'm not going to be able to do another release until next weekend. If you can ignore the gold bounty, version 0.22 is a pretty nice build. Being able to hire a Giant or two is pretty cool.

Later!

Version 0.22 Released

Yeah, definitely too soon after the last release, but I had a couple of bugs to fix, and decided to add some spells while I was at it. At least you don't need a new resource pack this time! Here's what's new:

NEW FEATURES:

• New Spells
  
  • Persuade
    
  • Deal with Goblins
  
  
• New wording in combat details:
  
  • Smarter wording when attackers do not place an attack (or cannot attack, like light-side spear goblins)
    
  • Includes all missle/fumble die rolls, and the corresponding result
    
  • Spell casting and targeting information
    
  • Extra wording for Power of the Pit, Curse, and Transform

BUGS/ISSUES:

• Fixed weirdness when transforming your opponent (Demon as frog could still cast PoP, and turn RED-side up!)
  
• Made marker chits on opponents a little bit smaller, so the opponent can be seen better (particularly frogs, squirrels and birds!)
  
• Sunday Color Magic is now applied towards energizing permanent spells (watch out for Day 28, Sorceror!)
  
• Switched the default of the checkbox in the spell selector to hide unfinished spells from OFF to ON (every spell type has spells now, so there is no real reason to pick spells from unfinished ones anyway!)
  
• Fixed problem with the "Incomplete Record Warning" (ALWAYS reported incomplete with new BirdSong design)
  
• Removed "Committed" chit indicator from chit panel (Committed chits are always shown on the spell itself)
  
• Added a checkbox to the window that warns the player that an item is inactive and cannot be activated (like a Pony in the Caves) to stop warning you
  
• Fixed the wording in the combat details
  
• Transform or Mist doesn't inactivate inventory (just hides it temporarily)
  
• Fixed Power of the Pit kill behavior when cast by character
  
  • killed participants are removed from battle, but still displayed on combat sheet (set aside)
    
  • Proper fame/notoriety/gold bounty is applied

New version coming today

I finished up some work this weekend to fix a couple of bugs, and add a couple new spells (Persuade, Deal with Goblins), but ran out of time before I could get it online. I need to get it online before tonight, because I have a game planned with some friends, so if you haven't downloaded version 0.21 yet, you might want to wait. Actually, the resource pack wont change this time, so if you get that now, you'll only need to grab 0.22 when I put it up.

Transmorphed Inventory

I mentioned in my release notes, that transmorphed inventory wasn't working yet. I was wrong. In fact, I did write the code to handle transmorphed inventory and gold, and just forgot about it!

Version 0.21 Released

Well, it took me much longer to wrap up this version than expected, but that's not surprising with the holidays going on! I did some major reworking to the action recording stuff, and needed to hammer it hard to guarantee it was working. After all, without the ability to record actions, Magic Realm is a bit broken!

I got to a few new spells and treasures (Timeless Jewel works!!), so there's a lot of new things to try. (Sidenote: the only treasure left to do, is the Eye of the Moon!!!)

I spent a TON of time getting the other two transform spells (Transform, Melt into Mist) going. They still aren't totally finished (still don't transform your inventory and gold), but you can do just about everything else. Transform into an animal, and you can Walk the Woods. Transform into a flying critter, and you can fly. Transform into a Mist, and you can move along any path/passage, and evade combat with ease. It's all there!

Okay, enough horn tooting. Check it out (this is a big one!):

NEW FEATURES:

• Remodeled BirdSong
  
  • Can record any action, whether valid or not (though they are marked in RED as a warning)
    
  • Can select any clearing on the board when doing a move (overkill I admit, but will alleviate the issue where you want to anticipate a tile flipping)
    
  • Can no longer rearrange items, or do any trading (though there is a house rule to cancel this new behavior)
    
  • Items used to gain phases during Birdsong will be reactivated during Daylight when necessary and possible
    
  • Known available actions are shown while you are recording your turn
  
  
• Holding the SHIFT-key down while moving the mouse on the map, will show the "flipside" of the tile the pointer is on (my favorite new feature!)
  
• Holding the SHIFT-key down while moving the mouse on the combat sheet, allows you to view "flipside" of all counters in play (not quite as seamless as the map is, but it works)
  
• Two new warnings (see option menu) to help the player "remember" to assign hirelings during birdsong, and not record a HIRE-MOVE combination
  
• Separated the Druid Optional advantage into two separate options: one for curse immunity, the other for Site summoning. (I did this because I like the curse immunity, but not the lack of Site summoning!)
  
• Added a picture of the die roll, along with the spell of interest, in the ReadRunes dialog, so you know what you rolled
  
• Double-clicking on any character in the character list will bring up a picture of the character card
  
• New checkbox in the Spell Selector (when you first choose a character) to hide unfinished spells
  
• New tile graphics from Dan Evans higher-resolution scans
  
• New spells working:
  
  • Prophecy
    
  • Premonition
    
  • Transform (can walk woods too!)
    
  • Melt-into-Mist
    
    • NOTE: I am aware that the inventory doesn't "transform" like it is supposed to here! I'll get it next time around. For now, enjoy that freedom! :-)
  
  
• New treasures working (only 1 left to go after this: Eye of the Moon)
  
  • Alchemists Mixture
    
  • Dragonfang Necklace
    
  • Timeless Jewel (see Prophecy)
  
  
• Other treasures working in full capacity
  
  • Flying Carpet can now be used in combat to run away, or maneuver
    
  • Crystal Ball can do "Remote Spell" phases
    
  • Amulet can cancel a spell
  
  
• New Options:
  
  • Replaced my Dwarf House Rule with Daniel Farrow's version from the Wiki
    
  • Added the revised "Hamblen Kludge Adjustment" for use with the revised missile table

BUGS/ISSUES:

• Added a house rule option to allow rearranging belongings during birdsong (since this is now illegal with the "standard" rules)
  
• Fixed a long standing memory leak that occurs when you restart a game
  
• Added some manual calls to Java GC (shouldn't be necessary, but does seem to help)
  
• Fixed Pony movement - used to ignore extra MOVE phases when counting the double movement
  
• Fixed horse/pony handling when travelling through caves.
  
• "Discover Chits" results includes a peek at the chits in the tile (if necessary).
  
• Only true characters can be cursed (not hired leaders or controlled monsters)
  
• Only true characters can Read Runes
  
• Flying Carpet is more realistic now: functions like a permanent spell has been cast on it (ie., walking through PURPLE magic will energize the carpet for combat)
  
• Wish for HEALTH no longer rests the chit used to cast it
  
• Fixed gold price for Regent of Jewels: was 8 gold! Now its 67 gold.
  
• Running from combat with a 2* chit, and leaving hirelings behind, no longer costs 1 fatigue every round!
  
• Landing in a cave after flying will no longer allow you to use recorded sunlight phases
  
• Looting Toadstool Circle: get teleported to CAVE, will lose recorded sunlight phases
  
• Fixed a bug where a Power of the Pit die result 1 (Kill Everything in the Clearing) wouldn't kill any characters!
  
• Color sources in a native group's stock, hold do not provide color magic until they have been seen (ie., trading).
  
• If you have the Magic Wand active, all attack spell missile rolls will set the red die to "1" automatically (why would you want anything else?)
  
• Fixed the behavior of Power-of-the-Pit so it works against hirelings, as well as characters.
  
• If you absorb a Demon or Imp, you will be able to cast Power of the Pit or Curse, respectively
  
• Fixed neverending PEACE (Wish result)
  
• Fixed problem with controlling multiple identically-named monsters (most noticeable with Control Bats)
  
• Fixed table selection problem when the list included DEAD characters
  
• Hirelings following a Hired Leader or Controlled Monster no longer vanish when their guide is killed
  
• Fixed the behavior of three potions: Oil of Poison, Ointment of Bite, Penetrating Grease. These potions now properly stay with the weapon they are used on. One other potion (Gripping Dust) already worked this way.

PS - Be sure to download the new resource pack!