Buildable structures are now in the gameMon, 3 May 2021
You can now place some of the first buildable structures on the mapThe player can now place his own structures on the map.Among the first ones I'm making available is the bunker, a better traffic checkpoint and guard towers. For now this is just a basic set of buildings that will help give your units better shelter on the map. In a future update, I will also add different, more specialized structures. The goal is for the player to eventually be able to build some sort of a FOB on the map, with resources management (food, ammo), and being able to run patrol missions from it.
So what changed, exactly?You have a new menu in the top left corner of the screen, allowing you to select a structure to build (or rather plan) on the map. Once you have a layout planned, you can order your units to start construction.
Hint: to actually be able to build anything, your units need to have access to a stockpile containing Construction Materials. You deliver those from your HQ, as selectable cargo for any of your vehicles.
Once constructed, the buildings can be used the same way any other structures on the map are (as shelter/ firing positions), and may also get overran and used by the enemy the same way.
Other important newsThere's been a bunch of long-running bugs that some of you reported to me. Most annoying of those, was some of the vehicles getting stuck at the edge of the map, and corrupted save games. Those are now fixed.
You can now also rotate the camera by holding the right mouse button, instead of having to hold left alt on your keyboard. A small change, but feels much more natural to use.
What's nextI'd like to focus on a couple of things, next.
First of all, it's time to add more interactions between your units and the locals. The goal would be for you to be able to build lasting relations with the people living in the area, and implementing some sort of "local leaders" (be it aligned with you, or actually working against you).
The other thing would be to make the enemy think more globally - if you attack one group, they should be able to call for reinforcements. This means adding communication devices to the units, as well as some sort of I-Com equipment for you.
Finally, I'm thinking of adding proper resource management, with ammo count and rations your units would be using up.
Those will most likely get divided into smaller, or much smaller updates, this time.
Changelog* NEW: This is the big new thing: the player can now build permanent structures on the map. Stuctures can be placed pretty much anywhere outside of main roads. Any structure ordered by the player has to actually be built by the units on the map, using construction materials delivered from HQ.
* NEW: enemy units will now get equipped with RPGs sometimes
* NEW: MLRS technical
* NEW: revised the engagement ranges again, all weapons can now be fired from farther away
* NEW: the camera can now be rotated with right mouse button (hold, instead of clicking). This is much more natural than the previous system, and just feels better.
* FIX: more than one shooter can now engage from a given building at once, if there's multiple occupants inside
* FIX: shooters in houses would previously share the same burst/ cooldown timer, causing them to only shoot one bullet and then stop firing for a long time
* fix: the player vehicles will no longer get completely stuck at the edge of the map
* fix: when you deliver prisoners to your HQ, the prisoner processing window will now show up, again
* fix: save/load fixes for the civilian farming actions (previously they sometimes failed)
* fixed the readability of some of the transparent UI icons. Much more will be done to this, soon
* fix: the player units will no longer get stuck at the edge of the map