[2021] Patch 520.12 - Tameable Dolphins, Coffee, and Balance Changes

: You can find the details for this event on the announcement page [url=https://steamcommunity.com/ogg/834910/announcements/detail/3064104148896168302]here[/url].

Ahoy Pathfinders!

We hope you all have had a wonderful start to the New Year so far! ATLAS’ first patch of the year is now here and we thank you for your patience!

Since we have renewed the ATLAS journey last Summer, there have been many changes and we are continuing to further develop the features and mechanics that are starting to take shape. Farmhouses, Warehouses, Markets, and the Trading system will continue to be tweaked and refined. We have plenty in store for the specialized ships within the Ships for Gold system as players will be able to customize these ships as more are released and the system becomes more sophisticated.

We are still testing a new claim system and Tradewinds are still on our agenda. We also have a few new things on the horizon for ATLAS. Not to mention, we are continuing to work on optimization and server improvements in the background! We hope you stick with us, it’s gonna be an exciting ride!


New this Patch
Tameable Dolphins
Tired of travelling by ship? Dolphin riding is now an alternate form of water traversal! Dolphins are the first underwater creature that can be tamed and bred by unlocking the new Underwater Taming skill in the Beastmastery tree. They can be tamed passively by feeding them meat, in particular, the new Squid Tentacle which can be obtained by defeating Squids. As part of an overall initiative to revamp and bring new purpose to tames, Dolphins are the first of a slate of new underwater tames that will have specialized functions. Afterall, as a pirate game, we would expect there to be more interactions with creatures at sea. Pathfinders can expect small changes to tames and breeding to slowly roll out in tow with some patches. We hope to elevate the taming system in ATLAS to be more viable and fun as other mechanics may change how some tames were used before.


Seed Vendor and Coffee

Business is booming, and a new vendor has set up shop at the Freeports! Working on your farm and looking for a particular crop? The Seed Vendor is your one stop shop! Most seeds can be purchased at a rate of 10 gold for 5 seeds.

With new business, also comes a new crop! Coffee Seeds can be purchased from the Sea Vendor at 20 gold for 5 seeds. Fight away sleep in real life and in game! Coffee Beans can be brewed to create Coffee! Drinking coffee will give pirates the new buff, Caffeinated, which reduces incoming torpor damage.
Embrace the power of coffee! Do we smell a Starfishbucks empire coming up?


Farmhouse Variants Last patch we introduced the Lumberyard, the first of the new Farmhouse variants as we continue to refine the Farmhouse system. These variants are specialized Farmhouses that will gather certain resources at a faster rate. We are now introducing the Mine - a farm that will only gather Metals and Gems, and the Quarry - a farm that will only gather Stone, Crystal, Salt and Flint. They both share the same placement restrictions as other Farmhouses, but require different resources to craft as detailed in the Patch Notes.

All Farmhouses are undergoing changes in preparation for adding Blueprints. Gather rates have temporarily been normalized at a lower rate across all types. Quality Blueprints with stats will increase this in a future patch. Other changes made to Farmhouses include base inventory size and base inventory slots increase. Based on feedback, decay time of Farmhouses has been changed to 10 days.


Balancing and Tweaks New Structure: Mine
The Mine is a farm that only gathers Metal and Gems. It can be crafted at the Smithy after learning the Advanced Automation skill in the Construction & Mercantilism tree.

• Shares placement restrictions with other Farmhouses
  
• Crafting Resources: 800 Wood, 600 Thatch, 320 Fiber, 280 Metal, 100 Hide

New Structure: Quarry
The Quarry is a farm that only gathers Stone, Crystal, Salt, and Flint. It can be crafted at the Smithy after learning the Advanced Automation skill in the Construction & Mercantilism tree.

• Shares placement restrictions with other Farmhouses
  
• Crafting Resources: 800 Wood, 600 Thatch, 320 Fiber, 280 Metal, 100 Hide

New Shop: Seed Vendor
A new vendor has arrived! The Seed Vendor can be found in Freeports and provides all the seeds required for your farming needs.

• Coffee Seeds: 20 Gold for 5 Seeds
  
• All other Seeds: 10 Gold for 5 Seeds

New Drink: Coffee
Coffee can be brewed at either the Cooking Pot or Grill after learning the Intermediate Recipes skill in the Cooking & Farming tree. After drinking, pirates are given a new buff, Caffeinated, which reduces incoming torpor damage.

• Incoming torpor damage reduced by 15%
  
• Buff lasts for 10 minutes
  
• Ingredients: 1 Water, 30 Coffee Beans

New Vegetable: Coffee Bean
Since Coffee Beans are not native to the Atlas, they can only be grown from seeds. Pirates who prefer adventuring over sleep will always want to keep Coffee Beans on hand!

New Seed: Coffee Seed
Coffee Seeds can only be purchased from the Seed Vendor. They are required for growing Coffee Beans.

• Can be planted in Tropical, Temperate, and Equatorial environments

New Tame: Dolphin
Dolphins can be tamed passively by hand feeding them meat. In particular, they enjoy fresh Squid Tentacles, Fish Meat, and Crustacean Meat. By grabbing hold of their dorsal fin, pathfinders can ride them as they speed and jump through the ocean.

• Favorite Food: Squid Tentacles
  
• Taming Style: Passive
  
• Saddle: None
  
• Primary Attack: Bite
  • Secondary Ability: Jump
    
  • Gives nearby pathfinders the Dolphin Intellect buff
• Increases intelligence stat for 10 minutes

New Meat: Squid Tentacle
Squid Tentacles are a new type of meat that can be obtained by defeating Squids. They can be eaten raw and don't spoil. Instead, they dry out over time and remain safe to eat!
Dried Squid Tentacles will soon have a special use, so you may want to start collecting them now!

Bola

• Players can no longer stand while entrapped by a Bola
  
• Duration of player Bola entrapment reduced from 5.5 to 2.5 seconds
  
• After recovering from entrapment, players cannot be entrapped by a Bola for 10 seconds

Combat

• Headshot multiplier reduced from 2x to 1.5x
  
• Bug Fix: Critical Strike can no longer be used with weapons other than the Sword

Explosive Barrels

• Cannons, Large Cannons, Swivels Guns, and Ballistas are now immune to AOE damage from Explosive Barrels
  
  • NOTE: These weapons can still be damaged by a direct hit from an Explosive Barrel fired from a Catapult
• Explosive Barrel damage to players and creatures greatly reduced
  
  • Deals 120 damage to pathfinders
    
  • Deals 135 damage to creatures

Farmhouse Variants

• All farmhouse variants are undergoing iteration in preparation for adding Blueprints
  
  • Stats changed and inventories wiped at restart
    
  • You can cheat spawn high quality variants with better stats (bigger inventory and faster gathering)
• Base Inventory Size has been increased from 8k to 10k
  
• Base Inventory Slots have been increased
  
• Decay time changed to 10 days
  
• Gather Rates have temporarily been normalized at a lower rate across all types
  
  • Quality Blueprints with stats will increase this in a future patch.

Ramming Galley

• Increased number of additional structures that can be placed on the ship from 8 to 40
  
• While turning, only one side of rowers will row, increasing the Ramming Galley's turn speed when rowers are active
  
• The leak rate of damaged ship components now increases as the component's health decreases
  
  • Leaking begins at 25% health and the leak rate increases until the component reaches 0 health
    
  • The maximum leak rate has not changed
• Bug Fix: Fixed an issue where the prompt for opening the command wheel would appear on parts of the ship after they had already been demolished

Ships

• Added the option to purchase ship levels 56-60 at a rate of 75 Gold per 1,000 XP
  
• Levels can be purchased when viewing the ship's stat menu
  
• NOTE: Ships can still reach max level by earning XP normally
  
• Ship Gold cost now scales with ship quality
  • Minimum price is used for ships constructed at 100% durability Shipyards and maximum price is used for ships constructed at 225% durability Shipyards
    
  • Price Ranges
    
    • Schooner: 5,000 to 10,000 Gold
      
    • Brigantine: 18,000 to 36,000 Gold
      
    • Galleon: 50,000 to 100,000 Gold

Tames

• Torpor damage from Horse's rear kick attack reduced by 40%
  
• Rabbits can now equip hats
  
• Bears and Rabbits now only receive 10% of the stat bonus from equipped hats

Misc

• Increased Grill ship structure weight from 1 kg to 12 kg
  
• Wood Doors, Wood Pillars, Wood Staircases, Wood Fence Supports, and Wood Ladders can now be crafted at the Smithy
  
• Winter Event items are no longer craftable at the Smithy or purchasable from the Cosmetic Vendor
  
• Fixed some cases where Trade Routes get reset or modified
  
• Bug Fix: Fence Supports can no longer be placed without a connection to the ground
  
  • NOTE: Any floating Fence Supports placed prior to the patch will be destroyed
• Some Crashes Fixed

Known Issues

• Levels 46-50 can be purchased on ships with a level cap of 50
  
• Trade Route Range was increased between patches to include nearby servers. These farther routes are getting reset on server restarts and may be having other issues.
  
• Riding a Dolphin at or near the surface will occasionally cause it to die
  
• Tamed Dolphins may no longer be able to jump after crossing grids
  
• Farm Variants have floating fires near them

Final Note
Again, we would like to emphasize that ATLAS is still in Early Access, meaning many things can and will likely continue to drastically change - even in the middle of development. Anything discussed is only up to date as of the moment it is posted. Features and changes that ultimately make it to the next patch, as well as timing, may be different from what was previously discussed.

As always, we appreciate the suggestions and feedback from the community. Please keep them coming! Thank you for all of your support! :)

Happy Sailing,
- ATLAS Crew

For the latest dispatch on #playATLAS keep yer one good eye trained on this here information

Natter n' chatter on Discord: https://discord.gg/playatlas
Hear ye, hear ye on Twitter: https://twitter.com/sailtheatlas
Watch us scallywags on Twitch: http://twitch.tv/sailtheatlas
Plus ye can band with us Pirates on Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/playatlasgame

: You can find the details for this event on the announcement page [url=https://steamcommunity.com/ogg/834910/announcements/detail/3059601818321391829]here[/url].

Ahoy Pathfinders!

There have been reported sightings of a strange and mysterious creature, often alluded to but frequently brushed off as nothing more than a sailor’s tale! It appears these majestic Seahorses have found their way to the seas of Atlas! From what we’ve observed, it appears these creatures are quite fond of Seaweed and Sea Grapes! Once a Pathfinder has gained its loyalty, the Seahorse may allow them to travel the waters on their back. With its natural poison, the Seahorse is a powerful ally. Just be sure to have an antidote ready in case of any mishaps!

Not to be outdone by Seahorses and their poisons, Dolphins have learned how to harvest Coral and Seaweed for their masters! Do we sense a Dolphin vs Seahorse rivalry in the makings?
Various changes were made to the Glider to make it more fun and useful while trying to address some previous exploits. It will likely undergo more changes as we hear feedback and discover abuse cases.
Please see the full patch notes below for additional details and other exciting changes - including the Flame Ballista Bolt buff, new blueprints for farmhouse variants, resource and loot drop changes, among various bug fixes as well!


Community Surveys
We will be publishing a series of surveys on different topics in an effort to better gauge and quantify Community Feedback. Surveys may range from balancing, to design, to community/social initiatives, and more! Some surveys may be more geared towards specific audiences than others, but we will try to hit a variety of different topics and niches - so don't worry if your concerns are not addressed in the current survey. We understand how diverse our player base is and we want ATLAS to be accessible and fun for everyone! However, we are a small team, so we cannot roll everything out at once.

While this first survey is focused on PVP Balance, please rest assured that we are working on many different things at the same time in the background. We aren't forgetting PVE, or Private Servers! A lot of things that you may not see being discussed are either already being worked on or already on our radar/to-do.

These surveys do NOT mean that we are only taking feedback in this way. We are continuing to take feedback from all sources. These surveys are only meant to help us pinpoint and gather further details from community data.

Please find the Survey here: https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLSeTCwgHFfxeOLpgTlRjeTRDUaOY5r7CbY7V_EOPDWVvi5RcJQ/viewform?usp=sf_link

Although we cannot promise to commit any specific change, we would want to be able to quantify which issues players care about most by using this survey to reach as broad an audience as possible.

We appreciate your support! Thank you!

Released Patch Notes
New Creature: Seahorse
Found in the depths of the Trenches, Seahorses are a new creature that can be tamed and bred after unlocking the Underwater Taming skill in the Beastmastery tree.

• Favorite Foods: Seaweed and Sea Grapes
  
• Taming Style: Passive
  
• Saddle: None
  
• Primary Attack: Venomous Bite
  
  • Gives the target the Poisoned debuff which deals 20 damage over 15 seconds
    
  • The Poisoned debuff can be negated by using an Antidote
• Secondary Attack: Acid Spit
  
  • Fires an arcing projectile that deals extra damage to Submarines and increased durability damage to armor

New Medicine: Antidote
The Antidote can be crafted at the Mortar and Pestle after learning the Basic Medical Studies skill in the Medicine tree.

• Grants the user a buff that removes the effects of Seahorse poison and prevents them from being poisoned again for 20 seconds
  
• Crafting Resources: 5 Medicinal Herbs, 2 Organic Paste

New Tool: Crude Tool
Players now start with a simple recipe to make a tool they can use to collect wood. No more bloody fingers!

• About 1/4 as effective as a Hatchet
  
• Loses Durability very fast
  
• Crafting Resources: 1 Stone, 10 Fiber

Dolphin

• Dolphins can now harvest Coral and Seaweed
  
• Bug Fix: Water Temperature Fortitude bonuses from the skill tree are no longer removed when riding creatures underwater
  
• Bug Fix: Resolved issue where Dolphins would occasionally die when near the surface

Flame Ballista Bolt

• Deals increasing damage to Sails every 2 seconds
  
  • Example: 20/40/60/80 damage at 2/4/6/8 seconds
• Hitting a Sail with a second Flame Ballista Bolt adds 100 to the current amount of damage
  
  • Example: A Sail is hit with a second Bolt after it has already been on fire for 2 seconds. The amount of damage received by the Sail increases from 20 to 120
• Fires can be extinguished by closing the Sail, using an Olfend's water spray, or by dumping a Water Bucket on the Mast

Glider Suit
Various changes were made to the Glider to make it more fun and useful while trying to address some previous exploits. It will likely undergo more changes as we hear feedback and discover abuse cases.

• Restored the ability to control pitch so you can now glide up and down
  
• Increased the max height to activate from 100m to 400m
  
• Slowed the base glider speed down by around 40%
  
• Added a drag component to the speed updates
  
• The faster you are going, the more drag will slow you down
  
• Prevents maintaining high speed for a long time after a dive
  
• Reduced the minimum speed you can glide at before you stall to about 2m per second
  
• Changed the dive angle and required dive time
  
• Glider Known Issues:
  
  • You can still gain height but it's slow
    
  • You can still glide across half a server if you jump off a 400m spot
    
  • It's hard to tell when you are about to stall
    
  • Sometimes at super slow speed you inexplicably corkscrew
    
  • Pressing the 'Dive' button (Shift by default on PC) results in a weird sideways dive

Loot Drops

• Blueprints for Lumberyard, Quarry, and Mine now drop. They have two new stats on them: Capacity (how much weight and stacks they can hold) and Gather Rate
  
• Coffee and Coffee Seeds may be found in place of other food drops

Resources

• Fish Oil drops from some fish which previously did not drop it
  
• Stone Harvesting nodes in the Copper Region (Northwest) have been rebalanced and a set of changes are being tested
  
  • Iron is the most common metal now, and may be found in rocks in place of whatever metal may have been used before. Copper is the less common metal found primarily in this region
    
  • Geodes may now drop from rock. Using a Geode will destroy it and may give some limestone, rock salt, and/or a small amount of different gems and crystals. Geodes may only be gathered by hand or with Tames, not with the Quarry or Farmhouse
    
  • These changes will be moved to all regions after a period of testing

Ships

• Bug Fix: Third person view can no longer be obstructed by structures built near the ship's wheel
  
• Bug Fix: Ship levels 46-50 are no longer purchasable on ships with a level cap of 50
  
• Bug Fix: Cannons on the Ramming Galley now have wheels

Tames & Creatures

• Carried Rabbits now give a 20% speed boost while the player's stamina is at or above 90%
  
• Creatures' torpor bars are now displayed after receiving torpidity damage
  
• Seaweed can now be placed in the Trough

Misc

• The Seed Vendor's inventory now rotates every 12 hours
  
• Decay Times on Market, Warehouse, and Kiln have been set to the standard 10 days
  
• Fixed some instances where Markets get out of sync
  
• Bug Fix: Structures can now be built next to the sides of Armored Docks
  
  • NOTE: There is still an area near the entrance and exit where structures cannot be placed
• Bug Fix: Resolved issue where Markets, Farmhouses, and Warehouses become invisible in Single Player

Final Note
Again, we would like to emphasize that ATLAS is still in Early Access, meaning many things can and will likely continue to drastically change - even in the middle of development. Anything discussed is only up to date as of the moment it is posted. Features and changes that ultimately make it to the next patch, as well as timing, may be different from what was previously discussed.

As always, we appreciate the suggestions and feedback from the community. Please keep them coming! Thank you for all of your support! :)

Happy Sailing,
- ATLAS Crew

For the latest dispatch on #playATLAS keep yer one good eye trained on this here information

Natter n' chatter on Discord: https://discord.gg/playatlas
Hear ye, hear ye on Twitter: https://twitter.com/sailtheatlas
Watch us scallywags on Twitch: http://twitch.tv/sailtheatlas
Plus ye can band with us Pirates on Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/playatlasgame