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Beta 0.2 News and the next Faction

After giving it some thought I've decided to skip Beta 0.18 and jump right to Beta 0.2 which is more or less ready and is being uploaded.
Due to my circumstances it will take a few days to get the Beta up and running since I have to upload it piece meal.

I've done pretty much everything I had set out to do with Beta 0.2 and the faction is mostly complete in about the same stage as Dunland was with 1.55 with only minor fixes to go.



So the next faction will be The Strongholds.
Not exactly shocking I know, but currently it is the evil faction most complete and I want to try and keep to the good-evil-good-evil pattern of faction releases.

So as I mentioned in the announcement news for Strongholds the faction is the combination of the Deep and Dol Guldur factions.
I showed a couple preview images a couple days ago to whet your whistles.
Now I guess I'll reveal the tech tree.

Strongholds

 

Units

Moria Goblin Warriors
Moria Goblin Archers
Moria Goblin Spearmen

Dol Guldur Soldiers - Strong Infantry units
Dol Guldur Strongbows - Strong Ranged units

Warg Riders -

Cave Troll - 
Stone Troll - Ranged Troll/Artillery unit
Olog Hai - Powerful elite unit.

Great Spider - Fast moving unit that can auto heal and weakens enemy when attacking.

 

Buildings

Deep work Pit - Primary resource building.
Dol Guldur Forge - Resource building that provides upgrades at level 2.
Moria Deep - The main building for the Moria units trains Goblin Warriors, Archers and Spears/
Dol Guldur Barracks - Trains the Dol Guldur Soldiers and Strongbows.
Wolf Meet - Trains the Warg Riders.
Troll Cave - Trains the Cave Troll, Stone Troll and Olog Hai
Spider Nest - Buildable from the Economy plot after the Brood Faction Upgrade has been purchased.
Towers - 
War Works - Battering Ram,Ladders

 

Heroes

Lug - Early game hero
Mashduk - The spontaneous one
Mashgur - Archer hero
Gurguk - My favourite Orc and sometimes Forum lurker. 
Gimbul - Goblin Leader
Bolguk - Goblin Leader 
Blackmaw - Great Warg
Brood Mother - Queen of the Mirkwood Spiders available with the Brood Faction Upgrade.
 

Spells

Call of the Deep - Targeted Work pit gains double experience for a short time.
Befoul - Similar to Taint - -50% armour and removes fear resistance

Azog Lives - Summons Azog
Bounty - Upgrades the Work Pit and Forge to provide upgrades
Rally

Swarm - Permanently increases the movement speed for Moria and Mountain Goblins
Darkness
Drums in the Deep - (Call the Horde)

TBA
Dark Influence
Nazgul Summon

Balrog


Upgrades

Basic Training - 
Tainted Arrows - (additional damage to units)
Heavy Armour - 
Deadly Blades - 
Troll Training - Ranks up Ettens and Olog Hai

Faction Upgrades

GKU
Murder Holes
Tower Tainted Arrows - Tower arrows slightly slow and weaken armour
Strength Training - Improves the firing rate and range of Stone Trolls
Broods - Unlocks Brood Mother and spider units

Patch 0.175

 

Download Patch 0.175

Because of a stupid oversight on my part I have to reupload 0.17 as 0.175.

So to make up for that I've added a little something something to the launcher.

Type in Imladris to the newly updated launcher to access a new Game mode the Rivendell Preview.

Also because I'm not as rushed as I was yesterday I'm able to do this release properly complete with the standard promo stuff.

Test mode also includes Rivendell.

 
The Rivendell preview is as the name suggests a preview.
The faction isn't complete yet so I'm not adding it to the proper release, but you can have a play with it and get a general feel for it.

 

 
This patch mostly fixes issues with Dunland but also addresses other issues and updates some things like FX and audio.

News wrap up.

 

Beta 0.155 is slated for the 17th of January which is only 3 days away.

 

News article with details of Beta 0.155 including some information on Dunland 2.0 Part 1 which will start to introduce a few changes to Dunland.

Check it out here.

 

The launcher has gotten a major overhaul since Beta 0.15 with a lot of being streamlined and automated.

You will no longer have to set your game irectory manually the launcher will handle that even for custom directories.

The launcher will also automatically check that, first the game is installed and then if you have patched the game to 1.03, if you haven't patched it will automatically run the game's patch checker it will also check if you have T3A online installed and adjust accordingly.

I've added the Game mode code to the main menu and removed the Starting menu so everything is handled from the one menu.

Added a new game mode help option to the launcher "gmhelp".

 

Adding 3 new Game Modes:

1. noheroes which removes all buildable heroes.
2. gollumwars which removes all buildable heroes and gives each faction 5 Gollums to build
3. gollzilla which replaces the final spell for each faction with the massive Gollzilla.

 

I've created a Google doc for users to post bugs found here.

If enough bugs are reported by the 17th I'll reveal some juicy information on future plans for Return of Shadow.

 

A new map is coming for Beta 0.155

Overbourn Marshes

 

2 Progress shots of the new map in the works for Beta 0.2

Lower Methedras

 

Step 2

 

 

Gollzilla