Shepherds of Haven (WIP) (DEMO UPDATE: 3 Aug 2021)

[Konoi]

@Jordan_Kelley

My first one is what does the magic percentage have to be at for the mc to kill the Endarkender under the church?

The one in chapter 1, right? You need 35 in magic.
I have no idea for your other question though.

@Christo79834782

Question, is it possible to get the Savior achievement in Chapter 1 without using a Word of Power?

I believe it’s not, but someone correct me if I’m wrong. Still, I’m like 99% sure.

[Jordan_Kelley]

Its the one with the kids actually, which I think is the second one? But yes.

Funny enough I ended up actually succeeding in killing them without the words right after posting my question
Thanks for answering though!!

[Agronauts]

No, you can’t, the only way to save Rika in chapter 1 is to talk with her mother completely and using a WoP.

[Canix]

You can also learn about rika if you are a diviner

[Christo79834782]

Sorry for asking a lot of questions, but will Rika be a part of the story later on?

[rinari]

@2xs

Just wanted to let you know that I am about halfway through the novel and I am enjoying it very much … just having trouble getting the time to read it. Lot of stuff going on and I haven’t had the time I thought to read. I will definitely post reviews once I finish though.

Thank you so much, @2xs , and no worries at all! Just that you took the time to get a copy and read means the absolute world to me, thank you!

@Isi_Talks

Bye the bye I loved the possibility to hug Caine and just tell him that the mc did ot before it was to late aka he grew to much🥰 you hot my big sister heart warming for real.

Aw, I’m so glad you liked this option! I wonder if I made a poll, how many people did not take the opportunity hug and squeeze Caine?

@Konoi

What a great chapter this was! And it was also nice to revisit the whole game - it has been so long since I first played it, and some things have been tweaked in the meantime, so it was a great experience all over again.

Thank you so much for your incredibly thorough feedback, @Konoi , I truly appreciate it!

@Konoi

And now I’ll have that weird love triangle going on and I don’t even know which one to pick when route selection comes, between Red and Trouble… help

The struggle is real!

@Konoi

The first time I’ve played, my MC’s magic was not high enough to defeat the Faceless Lord without a Word, so I went for that. And well, during the ending parts of the chapter, it was mentionned how the MC slept for days and felt more hollow after the whole thing. I assumed it was because it they just used a Word. In this playthrough, my MC’s magic was high enough so I didn’t use a Word, but I still got that segment, which surprised me a bit. I checked the code and it seems that occurs if the MC has used any Word at this point (aside from the mandatory one, of course). And I’m wondering if this is intended or if it was meant to occur only if a Word was used in this specific fight?

This is intentional, but I won’t speak too much on why! Good eye for detail, though–I could see how it might be confusing, but yes, it’s more of an accumulative thing rather than MC using a Word for that specific fight!

@Konoi

This is something that only truly started bothering me this time around, but wouldn’t it be possible to have the secondary skills of the MC somewhere in the Stat Screen? I mean, the exact skill level with each weapon and type of magic. Not being able to keep track of it is pretty bothersome sometimes since I don’t know exactly how good my MC is with them and what I should make him train.
It’s no big deal if that’s not something you’d want to consider, though!

Actually, you can access your secondary skills on the stats screen by going into [Settings] (on the stats screen) and toggling on [Advanced Stats]! I think there’s a little notification noting this the first few times you visit the stats screen, but it’s easy to miss, and it’s not clear that “advanced stats” mean the arcane/psionic/etc. stats! I go back and forth on this a lot: I don’t want the stats screen to look too overwhelming at first glance, since that’s what early feedback indicated when the secondary stats were on there by default, but since I’ve greatly narrowed down the inventory, maybe they won’t… Anyway, yes, you can access them!

@Konoi

The “actually” makes it seem as if the MC didn’t know what they were doing before, and only learned about it after it happened, but Chase and Trouble explained that plan before the fighting started.

Great catch, the conversation with Chase and Trouble was added in after the fact, so I missed this! Thank you so much!

@Konoi

So, in Blade’s interlude 2, at some point there is the option to say “ Lucky me, then. I get you all to myself. ”, which gives a romance point for female MCs. And then one of the follow-ups is “ No, I like you for you. The fact that you’re Commander doesn’t have anything to do with it. ”, which also gives a romance point. But that second one gives it no matter what gender the MC is, instead of giving the point for girls only. And while I’d love for my male MC to be able to romance Blade, alas this is an error

Gotcha, this has been fixed in my end and will be fixed the next time the demo updates!

@Konoi

But my MC never used a word against a Faceless Lord in this playthrough - only used one to save both Caine and Prihine.

Ah, this is meant to imply that MC gets a feeling that they could/are supposed to use the Words of Power at certain points–such as when the option appears to do it in the church–not that they actually used one! I hope that makes sense!

@Konoi

This is not an error nor an ACTUAL issue, really - just something I’ve been stuck on because of the peculiar situation I found myself in, in my playthrough (the whole Red situation)…
When “Zori” asks the MC if one of their companions on the trip is their sweetheart, wouldn’t it make sense to add an answer that would convey the MC being confused/conflicted about that, not knowing what to think or something, instead of just avoiding the question or saying they are holding out? In my case, I’ve been pretty consistently getting romance points with Trouble, but I have also picked the school sweetheart background with Red, and at that moment in the story, my MC is very confused about that I think (very much as I am ).

This makes sense, but my concern is that if MC keeps presenting as “confused/mixed feelings/indecisive/ambivalent,” it’s going to have a bigger impact on gameplay than I’m really willing to code, if that makes any sense! Questions like these are really meant to start telling the system how to let romance paths play out or indicate player interest in a character (if it’s there), so having a “confused” option doesn’t accomplish much mechanically and then presents the problem of having MC continue to be confused/indecisive throughout the story (and usually having to come to a more decisive ‘turning point,’ which is a lot of work to try and incorporate). I’ll have to think more on it, but what you said makes sense!

@Christo79834782

In chapter 2, can I permanently destroy the Faceless Lord without using a Word of Power?

You can technically permanently destroy all Faceless Lords without a Word of Power, but it’s difficult to achieve!

@Canix

They will reform eventually

This is actually not true: there are three ways to deal with a Faceless Lord that don’t involve outright failure.

1. Destroy them with a Word of Power (always permanent)
2. Banish them with magic (temporary, they will come back someday)
3. Destroy them with magic (permanent, same as using a Word but much harder to achieve)

Hope that makes sense!

@ChaoticWhisp

Ahhh I have to say, the end scene of the new chapter of the public demo was really wholesome! Like you can see the bonds built up to that point as a whole and it just made me feel warm and fuzzy inside.

I’m so glad you liked this part, thank you very much!

@xXOtakuKonekoXx

OMG, WAIT— LENA- This came out the day before my birthday! Yay! Practically a birthday present~! WHOOT

Happy birthday @xXOtakuKonekoXx , I hope you had an awesome day!

@Verdancer

Just came across a little continuity bug, I felt like it was a bit much to ask how Trouble left the gang. But here he refers to it as though we’d ever touched on the subject matter before.

Gotcha, that’s a great point! It’s fixed in my version now!

@Jordan_Kelley

Two, how injured can you get in the demo that regulars can read? I saw hints of more on tumblr but for patreon only.

I’m not sure what you mean by this–are you asking if players can die in the public demo, or how injured they can get? I don’t remember talking about it on Tumblr recently, but it may have been about something else?

@Christo79834782

Sorry for asking a lot of questions, but will Rika be a part of the story later on?

She is referenced or talked about here and there if she’s alive, and Caine has more to say about her and Hal if she’s alive!

[Murphydog3]

Out of curiosity how long is the full game going to be? I can’t wait for it honestly this game is one of the coolest I’ve ever played!

[Konoi]

@rinari

Actually, you can access your secondary skills on the stats screen by going into [Settings] (on the stats screen) and toggling on [Advanced Stats]!

Woah I totally missed that?
Like, I looked through the varions screens in the stats, and somehow it still eluded me!

@rinari

This is intentional, but I won’t speak too much on why! Good eye for detail, though–I could see how it might be confusing, but yes, it’s more of an accumulative thing rather than MC using a Word for that specific fight!

@rinari

Ah, this is meant to imply that MC gets a feeling that they could/are supposed to use the Words of Power at certain points–such as when the option appears to do it in the church–not that they actually used one! I hope that makes sense!

Okay, gotcha! I wasn’t really sure what to think about these two, really, I wouldn’t have gotten confused if I wasn’t reading the code, but with reading the code, I thought it may have been an error with how it was coded! So I went with the “better safe than sorry” way - aka mention it just in case
It didn’t bother me in the narration by any means!

@rinari

This makes sense, but my concern is that if MC keeps presenting as “confused/mixed feelings/indecisive/ambivalent,” it’s going to have a bigger impact on gameplay than I’m really willing to code, if that makes any sense!

Aah, I see… yeah, I understand. Well, if you decide to add an option, “good for me” I guess, but if not, that’s fine! Like I said, it wasn’t so much an issue as something I got stuck onto because I genuinely didn’t know what to choose. I think the issue came more from the fact that while my MC knew Red from years ago, I as a players did only meet him very recently. So it made the choice way more difficult than it should have, I guess? (who am I kidding, I know I’ll still be just as conflicted at route lock-on ).

And you’re welcome about the things that were actual errors!

Anyway, thanks for the answers and clarifications!

[rinari]

Woo, that was a lot to answer!

@Okami_HD_Amatarasu

i think my data vanished again

On this note, would you mind submitting a formal bug report about this (link below)? I haven’t seen anyone else report this problem, and I genuinely have no idea what could be causing it!

That serves as a nice segue in to my main topic: I have a shiny new bug reporting system that I’d like users to use when submitting bug reports and support tickets!

Please read under the tab for context!

Context

Through 100% my own fault, bug reporting for Shepherds of Haven’s alpha build and public demo has become something of an absolute chaos pit, for both me and users! I never implemented a proper, dedicated system for bug reporting, partly out of my own arrogance and the apparent lack of necessity: at the game’s launch, there were relatively few bugs, everyone’s gameplay experience was fairly tight and uniform, and it was easier for me to keep track of and squash bugs on the spot!

But as the game gets bigger (625,000 words, now! More than all three LOTR books combined ), of course more bugs and glitches are going to crop up, and in peskier, harder to find places! Add that to the growing community with multiple platforms and me having less time to spend online to actually answer, track, or address bugs immediately, and you get a recipe for one overwhelmed author!

Essentially, the old bug report “system” consisted of me actively encouraging everyone to send me bug reports through any and all platforms they had access to. This meant I was getting bug reports through:

• Patreon comments on public posts
• Patreon PMs
• Tumblr PMs
• Tumblr asks
• Tumblr comments on public posts
• COG forum posts
• COG forum PMs
• Discord PMs
• Discord conversations in public channels
• Other

What on earth was I thinking lol?

This created numerous problems…

• The obvious difficulty in keeping track of all of these bug reports across disparate platforms, leading to things slipping under the radar or stacking up in an overwhelming, confusing way, and duplicates cluttering the queue
• Less time online means less time to find and address the bug immediately, leading to more duplicate reports and growing user confusion the longer the issue went unaddressed or unacknowledged
• No ability to uniformly address the bug across all platforms with context, explanations, or solutions. A user reporting a bug on Tumblr might lead to me replying on Tumblr that it could be fixed by doing XYZ, or was caused by ABC and was not actually a bug at all. However, another user on Patreon or on the forum would not see said explanation/solution, would report the same bug on Patreon or the forum, and would unfairly suffer through me saying “I already answered this!” (but not to them).
• Most platforms are not conducive to the back-and-forth required to truly and effectively hunt bugs. The forum is probably the exception here, but all other sites make things chaotic. If a user sends in an ask on Tumblr about a bug, but I need more context (such as “what choice did you make in Chapter 2?") to find it, I just have to publish their ask with my response and pray they see it and send in another ask! It’s just clunky and inefficient!

This new system hopefully addresses all of those problems! By having one uniform, universal method to submit bugs and one repository to see where they all go (including everyone else’s tickets and reports), everything is just going to be better for everyone!

REPORT BUGS HERE

TRACK SUBMITTED BUGS HERE

---

How it works:

• Use the “report bug” form to submit any bugs or errors that you’ve noticed while playing ShoH! (Please submit one bug per ticket.) These are generally for game-breaking bugs or bugs and errors that you notice in the code; not for typos, moments of confusion or unclear plot developments, suggestions or feedback about the game, or otherwise. Code bugs only!
• An automated workflow will immediately plop your ticket into the Trello board (the tracking link above), where you can view all submitted tickets by users, their statuses in my queue, how I’ve prioritized them, and my responses and explanations about them - all in one place!

This solves basically every issue I was having with bug reports, including having to explain across multiple platforms the same solutions to the same bugs (but in such a fragmented way that users wouldn’t see my answers or the progress reports on said bugs)!

Important: Right now, I will only be accepting official bug reports through this method. I know this might be a pain in comparison to submitting via any platform, but it will really help me keep everything in one place in an organized, non-overwhelming fashion, and it will definitely improve both the user and author experience in a very vital way!

You are free, of course, to discuss bugs and whatnot here or elsewhere, check in with other users about them to see if you’re the only one, brainstorm or roundtable them, etc. It will just be helpful to operate under the strict assumption that I will not see any of that discussion and will not know about the bug, at all, until you actually submit a ticket through the form! So much flies under my radar nowadays that it’s probably true!

However, none of this applies to any other type of feedback or discussion about the game. Please keep leaving comments, thoughts, insights, and all other types of conversation here and anywhere–I love and truly appreciate seeing all of your reactions and ideas! This is strictly only for pesky bug reports and is to ensure that I definitely see them and can address them in an organized, cohesive, transparent manner so everyone knows what’s broken and what’s being addressed. I hope that makes sense!

Thanks for reading through this, and stay safe and hydrated!

[rinari]

@Murphydog3

Out of curiosity how long is the full game going to be? I can’t wait for it honestly this game is one of the coolest I’ve ever played!

Thank you so much, I truly appreciate it! This is answered in the FAQ, but it’s not really an answer–I don’t know how long the full game is going to be! Right now we’re maybe 60-65% of the way through the alpha build at 625,000 words, so your guess is as good as mine, lol!

[The_Federalist]

@rinari

Right now we’re maybe 60-65% of the way through the alpha build at 625,000 words, so your guess is as good as mine, lol!

So we might be looking at over a million words worth of content when this is all finished… Mindblowing.

[rinari]

I know! I’m still wowed that I wrote more than the entire LOTR trilogy in around 2 to 2.5 years… And we still have a lot more to go, haha!!

[Konoi]

Oh my god that bug report thing is SO CONVENIENT!
Will you link it in the original post, or should I put it into my favorites for the future?

[rinari]

@Konoi

Will you link it in the original post, or should I put it into my favorites for the future?

Oh, that’s smart, I’m going to do that now! See, I’m so chaotic and unorganized that things like that just fly right out of my head!

[Isi_Talks]

@rinari

how many people did not take the opportunity hug and squeeze Caine?

I do hope all of them🥰 ( I am not biased at all!!!)

Also I am shocked at the auto correction errors probably had my keyboard on German or Indonesian. So sorry you had to go through that

[Takashi_Shin]

I think what I love about choice of games it really gets me into a mindset of a story character and how I want to play them when it comes down to Sheppard of Haven I’m doing the same thing but a different way when it comes down to a ruling a country I would go hard handed but I would go soft-hearted depending on the situation and The Shepherd of Haven I’m a lieutenant I have to be more like a role model to my new guys and to the superiors show them what I’m willing to do and give them the proper respect they needed I just got to figure out a way to play my role in the character it’s like acting but this is choice of games and I’m just finding a choice I think to my characters they’re willing to sacrifice their life to save the world if it’s that situation in my head and the Inquisition really fuse me I’m trying to find a better solution even if it’s right or wrong I’m just using the tools I have at hand

[threekingmodest101]

Just curious, but how much magic would I need to kill Quillal without using a Word of Power?

[ZipZoop]

I love this wip, so engaging, chock full of lore, with interesting characters

[VelvetDivine]

Anyone figure out the answer to the riddle masters last riddle?

[RiverReed]

Mine is 52%