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Release Notes for Kingdoms and Castles

Update 121r4 (4 July 2023)

Update 121r3 (3 July 2023)

Infrastructure & Industry Update (17 June 2023)

Hi Everyone!

Thanks for your patience, the Industry & Infrastructure Update is out now on the main branch! Our last major update (War & Diplomacy) was focused on combat and interaction with the AI. For this update we've focused back on the city building and economy! It's got a bunch of new stuff folks have been requesting. Let's get right to the notes!

Large Treasure Room

This is a 2x1 structure (shown on the right) that houses a bit more gold than two small treasure rooms. You can place them adjacent to small treasure rooms to make some creative building shapes (shown on the left).

Large Produce Storage

This is another 2x1 structure, which can store more fruit than two small produce storages. This brings fruit storage closer to parity with the grain storage buildings.

Large Iron Mine

This is a 3x3 structure that sits completely on top of an iron deposit. It produces more iron than 3 small iron mines but requires more space and more workers. It's ideal for later in the game when you've got more of a worker surplus.

Large Quarry

This is also a 3x3 structure you place on top of (rather than adjacent to) a stone deposit. It also produces more stone than 3 small quarries. While it produces more stone, the tradeoff is that is requires tools to operate. You'll want to make sure you have a blacksmith and tool production chain established before building this one.

Large Charcoal Maker

This 2x2 building produces more charcoal than 4 small charcoal makers but requires more workers. Great for later in the game when you need to be more space efficient but have plenty of people.

Large Reservoir

This is a 2x2 reservoir with a much larger radius of effect as compared to the small reservoir. While more expensive than the small reservoir, it's handy for serving lots of fountains around your city center at once or by irrigating a large swath of land for your farms.

Large Tavern

This is a 2x2 tavern. Great for dense cities to make your city center more lively and adds another way to meet your peasants' need for good drink!

Chapel

And to break of the trend of larger versions of everything, we've got a small church - the chapel! It's a 1x2 building you can fit into the smaller spaces the normal 2x3 church is too big for.

Improvements & Fixes

Until next time,
-Pete, Michael, & Sam

Update 120r4 (9 December 2022)

Update 120r3 (26 November 2022)

Update 120r2 (14 November 2022)

Update 119r4 (14 October 2022)

Update 119r3 (5 October 2022)

Update 119r2 (29 September 2022)

War and Diplomacy Update (22 September 2022)

Hi Everyone,

We’ve got another free update for you called War & Diplomacy! It expands upon the AI Kingdoms update a bit with your feedback and comments. New conversations, new diplomatic options, and more. Here’s the notes:

Conversation Expansion

New Conversation - Birthday - the AI will talk to you about their birthday, and you have the option or not to give a gift.

New Conversation - Theater Event - the AI has written a play and would love it if you’d show it in your theater. Let’s hope their work pleases the peasants!

New Conversation - Origins of Power - The AIs discuss how they came to power, different for each personality type. Some of these conversations can take a dramatic turn!

New Conversation - Broker Peace - If you are war long enough either your ally or a neutral AI may try to broker peace between you and your enemy. You can agree and end the war or disagree and see what might happen.

Ignore Response
The AIs will respond if you ignore or dismiss their diplomats. Depending on personality, how they feel about you, and how much you’re ignoring them they may decide to go to war against you.

Tribute

Player Tribute
When your diplomats visit an AI Kingdom you can now demand tribute from them if you’d like. The results of this demand will depend on their personality, relative military strength, mood, and if they can afford it.

Resolution for AI Demanding Tribute
If you refuse to pay tribute, go to war, then win and let AI stay in power they now show some deferrence to your grace. After being defeated in a war they acknowledge their defeat and will no longer demand tribute.

Warfare

We’ve made a few changes to improve the combat:

Viking Catapults

Vikings can now deploy catapults against you! Generally they appear later in the game. In harder difficulty modes more viking catapults will appear sooner.

Greek Fire Tower

We’ve added a new tower type that shoots out a blast of greek fire! It is extremely effective against ground units and ships - a fully skilled Greek Fire Tower can completely sink a ship with a single blast. However, it has some drawbacks. It requires 8 people to operate it, it has a very short range and can’t attack dragons. It also consumes charcoal when fired and takes a while to reload. If it catches on fire it has a chance to explode and start fires around it. Give it a try and be careful!

New Dragon Type

There’s a new dragon in town! This one flies more slowly than the others but specifically targets your military infrastructure (archer and ballista towers, blacksmiths, archer schools, etc). It appears a little later than the others, depending on difficulty mode.

Improvements and Fixes
What's next?

It's finally time, we've got VR coming up next! This is a free update, totally optional, and won't impact you at all if you don't want to play in VR. We're supporting the VIVE, Index, and Occulus Rift. Expect VR to hit the beta branch in the next week or so! And after VR we've more pure gameplay content updates planned as well.

Until next time!
-Pete & Michael

Update 118r10 (7 July 2022)

Development Update (22 June 2022)

Gamepad Controls

General gamepads plugged into your computer will now work! The game can transition seemlessly between gamepad and keyboard/mouse. Just make sure to check on ‘Console Controls’ option in the game’s settings menu if you want to use a gamepad on the PC.

What's next?

Otherwise right now we’re hard at work on:

Until next time,

Update 118r9a (18 June 2022)

AI Kingdoms Update (23 May 2022)

Hi Everyone,

We are very excited to announce the AI Kingdoms update is finally here! We've been working on this update for over a year and a half and it represents an huge amount of content. Here's a quick little trailer we whipped up:

We've not only added AI Kingdoms you can chat with, trade with, and fight but we've also improved the game in many other respects. There's so much we've added - this is going to be a long post - let's get to it!

AI Kingdoms

We've added AI Kingdoms that exist on the same map and essentially play by the same rules. You can establish relationships with them, engage in trade, and of course war.

Up to 3 AIs can play on your map at once. AIs are allowed to spawn on island maps with large enough islands.

You'll use diplomats from the hall of diplomacy to interact with the AI. Train a diplomat and use a transport ships to visit AI Kingdoms.

Once there you'll be able to discuss important things, make alliances, declare war, plea for peace, request help, and more. The AIs will also send diplomats of their own to talk with you. Depending on how you respond and interact with the AI their opinion of you will change.

The AIs use an advanced system to build their towns and defenses. They plan areas for residential and agricultural zones. They follow all the normal build rules the player does, construct wooden, then stone walls, and can even use aqueducts and reservoirs.

Visibility System

Alongside the AI Kingdoms we've implemented a visibility system. All units (diplomats, footmen, ships, etc) provide a sight radius. When you become allies with an AI you are granted full visibility into their kingdom.

Sea Gates

Now you can have protected harbors. Build a sea gate to block enemy ships from entering.

Siege Workshop and Catapult

In case things get a bit unfriendly between you and the AIs, you both will need a way to address those pesky walls. We've added a siege workshop which can create catapults. Load them on your transport ships to siege AI Kingdoms, but watch your gold - their wages are expensive.

Transport Carts

You can now build transport carts to transport resources between docks, granaries, butchers, fishmongers, and stockpiles. Now it's possible to solve those pesky transportation issues when you have large farming districts separated from residential zones.

New Happiness Buildings

We've also added a jousting arena and theater to entertain your peasants. We've also added a system where idle peasants will actually go and sit in the stands, visit gardens, taverns, and other kingdom attractions.

New Mechanic - Building Integrity

Over time buildings will start to degrade, you can check you building integrity in the bottom left UI. Clicking on it shows an overlay indicating which structures need repair. Build masons and they'll automatically get to work keeping your buildings safe and structurally sound.

Minimap

We've added a fully featured minimap that tracks unit positions, vikings, dragons, fires, and plagues. It can be moved and re-sized as you see fit. It also has the option to rotate to match your view, or to stay fixed and only rotate the camera view display.

Exploration Ship and Settlers

This is now how to settle new islands. Once an island is settled and you want to get more people over there quicker, you can make settlers at your keep then load them into a transport ship. Unload them on the new island and click settle.

Survival Mode and new Statue

We've added a new much harder difficulty mode. In this mode, viking and dragon attacks are increased and resources are limited. If you can survive 250 years you'll unlock a new statue to use in any game mode thereafter.

Kingdom Colors

You can now change your kingdom color and banner both before you begin during banner select and at any time during gameplay by clicking on the keep and selecting the banner button.

Save Sharing

You can now share your save games with your friends. Upload your save to the cloud using the Kingdom share feature, then send the code to your friend. They can get a copy of your save from the cloud and play with it as they wish. Either click the share button in game up in the top right or click the share button from the main menu to try it out.

Optimizations

We've worked very hard to optimize the game given all the new stuff that's been added. In general, any map you had from before the update should run faster than before. Of course there's always more work to be done here and we'll be optimizing further in future updates.

Other Improvements
Fixes

Whew! Thank you so much for your patience and we hope you really enjoy this update! We'll be working next to fix any bugs or issue you run into, support, and to further improve the game.

Until next time,
-Pete, Michael, Sam

Development Update (28 June 2020)

Hi everyone,
We're still hard at work on the AI Kingdoms update. Currently we've been diving into expanding the city building AI and tying it into a diplomacy and trade system. Still mucking around in the guts of that so we'll have more to show there later, but we did want to show off a couple other things that'll be part of the update:

Visibility System

We've been working on a fog of war style visibility system. So far we're thinking you'll have full visibility on your own landmasses, but AI controlled landmasses will be hidden unless you have units to scout them. Here's a little demo of the effect where I walk my knights through an AI's kingdom. This looks a lot better at a normal frame rate.

Jousting Arena

We'll also be adding a jousting arena. If it's properly supplied with food and armaments, jousting matches can take place and spectators will arrive to watch - if you have idle peasants. This will be a late game happiness building with a very large effect radius. The system that places idle people in the crowd will also be used to let idle people visit statues, taverns, cemeteries and other buildings like that.

Until next time,

Update 117r2 (04 April 2020)

Bug fixes:

Fish & Pigs Update -116r4 (07 November 2019)

Hi Everyone,

We’ve got a big new update for you that adds new buildings, food types, and mechanics. We had been planning to launch this all packaged together with the upcoming AI Rival Kingdoms update, but after chatting with the community, we decided to launch this early! We’ve been wanting to add all this stuff to the game for a long time. We’re glad we got to launch it sooner than later.

Why did this update take longer than usual to release? There are two reasons: first, it’s a pretty “meaty” update (pun intended); second, my (Pete) second daughter was born right after we launched the Warfare Update, so I took some time off. Thanks for your patience!

Now, onto what’s new!

Fish

We’ve added fish as a new food source. New maps now have areas where fish will spawn. Old maps will be automatically upgraded to have fishing grounds when loaded. Fish will spawn more fish, and can expand a little from their initial fishing grounds, but will mostly stay in the same region.

Fishing Hut

To catch the fish, build a fishing hut nearby. It comes with a little boat that will go out and catch fish, but will take shelter during storms. Be careful not to overfish; fishing grounds can become depleted if too many fishing huts are built nearby. Peasants can take fish directly from the fishing hut to eat.

Fishmonger

This building takes fish from the fishing hut and prepares them for eating. Using 1 tool and 1 fish, the Fishmonger will output 3 fish. Fishmongers can store 75 fish. This building will be an important part of keeping fish supplied in your kingdom. Peasants won’t want to live too close to it though, due to the smell.

Produce Storage

The new Produce Storage building can store 125 apples, and their workers can carry a double apple load. But why do we need this new building, when we can already store apples in the Granary? Previously, wheat and apples were treated as the same resource and apples would mysteriously transform into grain when placed in a Granary. We were never quite satisfied with that, so now apples are their own distinct resource type. Apples must now be stored in markets or in this new building. Peasants will need to eat apples along with the other food types for maximum health.

Small Market

We’ve now added a 1x1 Market. It employs fewer people and stores less, but it should be easier to fit into some city layouts than the existing 2x2 Market. It also costs less to build.

Swineherd

You can now build Swineherds, a 3x2 building that raises pigs. Pigs consume wheat and can be slaughtered for meat. If there is no wheat to feed the pigs, like peasants, they’ll get hungry and eventually die off.

Butcher

Butchers will take tools and 1 unit of meat from Swineherds and turn it into 3 servings of meat. They function a lot like Fishmongers. They can store up to 150 meat. Peasants won’t want to live too close to the butcher either, due to the smell.

Health

To incorporate all these new food types, we’ve added a new Health mechanic for your kingdom. Hovering over the Health number will explain all the factors impacting it. For maximum Health, peasants need a varied diet and enough Clinics and Hospitals open and operating. Peasants will want access to fish or pork, apples, and wheat or bread. You’ll be able to click the Health overlay to see which houses need better access to the food types.

As your kingdom grows, your peasants will care more about their Health and will want it to be better and better. Health will affect their happiness, the likelihood of a plague, plague virulence, and average life expectancy. If your kingdom is in poor Health for too long, peasants may die prematurely!

Note that for existing cities, you will get a 5 year grace period before your peasants become unhappy with their Health.

Optimization

As mentioned in our previous development update, we have implemented some performance optimizations targeted at large cities with lots of resources. In our benchmark city, we were able to improve performance 30% from 17-18fps to 22-25fps, though results vary depending on city size/composition and your computer specs. Let us know if you see an improvement! More optimization is coming in future updates.

Other Improvements/Fixes

Warfare Update - v115r3 (12 June 2019)

Military System Revamp

We have streamlined the military system. Barracks now produce a full 1 tile fully functional 16 footman unit complete with a general with one click (rather than the old way of having to separately train a general, then individually train and recruit units at the barracks). This should feel a little more like an RTS. If you have an old save with bigger armies it will be split up into individual units and we have removed the 3 unit cap. Additionally:

New Unit - Archer

We’ve added an archer school building that works just like the barracks except it produces archer units. They can attack enemies with their ranged attack but are very weak when engaged hand-to-hand. They also gain the same range bonus when stationed on walls that normal archer towers get. And on that note…

Units Can Walk on Walls - Castle Stairs

You can now build castle stairs which allow units access to walking on your castle walls and towers. We’ve completely revamped the pathfinding tech to make this work and set up little doors automatically when a tower meets a wall. One set of stairs will allow access to any contiguous piece of wall, but you’ll probably want multiple sets of stairs for quick access.

Troop Transport Ships

You can now build troop transport ships and use them to move your armies across deep water and on to other landmasses. Each ship can carry three units. To load units, select them and order them to move to a transport ship. To unload, select the transport ship and right click anywhere on land.

New Viking Unit - Thief

Viking thieves move faster and don’t start fires, but if they make it to your treasure room they will steal 100g. Make sure to kill them before they escape back to their ship to reclaim the gold!

Viking Raid AI Improvements

Viking raids can now launch on multiple fronts and they can also leave on any viking boat, not just the boat that brought them. Viking boats are more reactive to picking up escaping vikings. Viking raid escalation tweaked to better adapt to player skill.

Note: if you are using an old save the next few raids will be weak until it catches up with your progress.

Drag Placement

You can now click and drag to place multiple roads, farms, orchards, aqueduct, castle blocks, cemeteries, and piers. You'll be able to place up to 100 buildings per drag placement.

Drag Chop, Rebuild, Demolish

You can now click and drag to order peasants to chop multiple tiles of wood, rebuild large areas of rubble, or demolish lots of buildings at once.

Control Tweak

We have flipped left and right mouse click. Instead of moving the camera on left click, now left click is used for select and drag select. Right click and drag moves the camera and issues troop orders. Middle click and drag is still camera rotate. If you hold down the alt key, the controls will revert back to functioning like the old version.

Note: If you’d prefer the old method permanently, you can toggle ‘legacy mouse controls’ in the options menu. In legacy mode click and drag selecting and placement require holding the alt key to start the drag.

Other Fixes/Improvements

Rebuild now works as expected on castle towers and tiles with aqueducts Aqueducts can be built over hovels Fixed gates not visually closing when vikings were nearby Map generation tweaked to better guarantee viable amounts of stone and iron Fixed some load/save exploits with the witch Fixed cemetery orientation getting lost after a load/save Fixed generals not attacking ogres Reduced gravekeeper walk speed from 2x to 1.5x Military units get same speed bonuses on roads that villagers do Roads can be placed anywhere and do not need to be connected to other roads Other small fixes

Update Infrastructure II - v114r3 (24 January 2019)

New Map Generation
Wooden Gates
Stone Bridges
Fire Brigade
Twitch Integration
Tax Tweaks
Windmill Bonus Tweak
Other Improvements/Fixes

Cemeteries, Witches, and Wolves Update - 113r5 (29 October 2018)

We've got a Halloween themed update for you with a bunch of new game mechanics! If you've got questions, ideas, bug reports, come chat with us on discord: https://discord.gg/kingdomsandcastles, or email us at contact@lionshieldstudios.com. Here's what's new:

Cemeteries

Now when peasants die, their bodies will need to be taken to a cemetery by a grave keeper. We’ve added a grave keeper’s hut which employs three grave keepers. We've also added a cemetery tile that will fill up with gravestones as grave keepers bring people back to be buried. You’ll need to find the right balance of grave keepers and cemeteries for your town layout. If bodies are left on the ground they will have a chance of starting a plague, plus it’ll make your peasants unhappy.

Witches

Maps now have a witch hut. The witch can be talked to and depending on how the relationship goes she’ll work with you and provide access to powerful spells, or she’ll curse your kingdom. Old saves will get a witch placed as well (if there is room).

Wolves

Maps now spawn with empty caves. After you place your keep, caves farther away from your keep will populate with wolves. Wolves will eat anything that comes near them (including vikings), except for peasants employed by foresters. They can be killed by archer towers, ballistas, and armies. Once empty, caves can be removed with the rock removal building. Like the witch, old saves will get caves and wolves when loaded.

Plague Rework

Plague now can spread over time from its starting location, and most often will start in residential areas. You’ll need to make sure your doctors have good and fast access to your kingdom, especially the heavily populated or high traffic areas.

Clinic

The clinic is a 1x1 building that houses two doctors. It costs less than the hospital and is a good way to get doctor coverage early and a good way to provide doctor coverage on the edges of your kingdom where a full hospital might be overkill.

Town Square Halloween Edition

We did a visual revamp to the town square so it links with stone roads better, and added some festive jack-o-lanterns.

Improvements/Fixes/Tuning

Hope you enjoy! Excited to share some rival AI progress soon! -Pete & Michael

Beautification Update - 112r2 (7 September 2018)

Gardens
New Statue
Fountains
Skill System Tweaks
Aqueduct Tweak
Improvements/Tweaks

Grand Buildings Update - 111r1 (19 June 2018)

Here’s what’s new:
Cathedral
Great Library
Bathhouse
Happiness Overlay Revamp
Menacing Dragons
Other Improvements/Fixes:
VR Update
What’s next?

Until next time,
-Pete & Michael

Update 110r5 (20 April 2018)

Creative Mode
Map Editing
Tweak and Spawn
Custom Banners
Other Fixes and Improvements:
What’s next?

Update 109r1.1 (05 March 2018)

Bigger Maps and Deep Water
New Building: Outpost
New Building: Dock
Merchant Ships
Transport Ships
New Building: Draw Bridges
Job Priority System
Other Improvements/Fixes:

Update 106r3 (21 September 2017)

Wooden Walls
Stone Roads
New Statue - Queen Barbara
Noria, Aqueduct, and Reservoir
Fire Changes
Tune Food and Time
UI Updates
Tweaks and Fixes

Update 105r1 (2nd August 2017)

Improvements
Fixes