[2023] Icarus Week Eighty Three Update | Armor Piercing bullets are here

Week Eighty Three features two revamps of existing in-game systems, alongside the addition of a new type of ammo for firearms.

Armor Piercing Ammo has been added, and we’ve paired this with an overhaul of the Hardened Point Damage System, providing a more scalable and effective process for calculating the impact of stats when targeting different Hard Points on different creatures.

The Orbital Workshop has also received a UI pass, aiming to make it easier to navigate to make room for new items in the future.

Jump in and have a read.



Armor Piercing Ammo
This week we’re adding a new ammo variation, Armor Piercing. This will be available for firearms, while crossbows already have this perk innately.

Armor Piercing Bullets for firearms come with the Hardened Point Penetration stat, essentially bypassing the hardened hitbox areas of animals, allowing you a little more success if your accuracy isn’t up to par.

Armor Piercing Bolts have also had their stats adjusted, in most cases replacing the Hardened Point Damage perk with Hardened Point Penetration, although in some cases Hardened Point Damage still exists.



Armor Piercing Changes
We’re using this update to provide a rebalance for the stats around hardened point damage and perks related to combat.

With our Week 36 update, we introduced more detailed hitboxes on creatures that included weakened and strengthened zones on their body. To achieve these, we used a stat called Hardened Point Damage to increase or decrease the damage done to the hardened points on creatures such as horns, tusks, shells, skulls, etc.

All creatures started with a value of -75, meaning that the player's damage was reduced by 75% for the toughest hard point zones, and regular hard point zones started at -37.5 (a 37.5% reduction).

On Crossbows we had stats that would reduce this value (move it closer to a 0% reduction), for example, a +75% improvement which meant that even when hitting the toughest hard point, you would deal 100% of the possible damage.

The issue, however, with this approach was that you would also receive the buff when hitting regular hard point zones, which only received a 37.5% reduction. This meant that players would end up delivering 37.5% MORE damage than intended (-37.5%+75%= +37.5% excess), an unintentional buff that broke the balance of the system.

We have reworked the damage alongside introducing the new Hardened Point Penetration stat, giving us three stats we can interchange to provide the right balance:

• HardenedPointPenetration
  
• HardendPointDamage
  
• HardendPointProtection

The new Hardened Point Zone damage modification stat works as follows:

Creatures start with a 75% reduction in damage (HardendPointProtection)

HardenedPointPenetration is a percentage value between 0-100 on weapons and ammo that reduces that -75% closer to 0%. A 0% HardenedPointPenetration means -75% damage reduction, and a 100% HardenedPointPenetration means a 0% damage reduction.

When and only if HardenedPointPenetration reaches 100% (0% damage reduction) do we apply the HardenedPointDamage Stat.

Here’s an example scenario to consider:

Originally posted by author: Crossbows have an innate HardenedPointPenetration of 100%, meaning all their shots, will bypass hardened points (the damage reduction of -75% is reduced to 0%).
So using Metal Bolts (81-90) with Basic Crossbow (0% projectile damage increase)

- Normal: 81-90
- Hardpoint 81-90
- Extra Hard Point 81-90

With the Notch attachment, Crossbows do +25% damage if hitting a hardened point if the penetration is 100% (which in this case it is). This is the HardenedPointDamage stat coming into play.

Metal Bolts (81-90) with Basic Crossbow (0% projectile damage increase) with prototype Notch (+25% Projectile Damage, +25% HardPointDamage)

- Normal: 102 - 113
- Hardpoint 126 - 140
- Extra Hard Point 113 - 127

Workshop Revamp
The Orbital Workshop has received a UI revamp, designing it to be more like the blueprint trees on-planet, utilizing multiple smaller trees rather than one large tree.

This change provides a cleaner experience and helps us balance each branch individually and provide a singular path focused on specific tools and items.

The revamp will make it cleaner to add lots more Orbital Workshop items in the future. As some of you have seen in our patch notes we’ve been working on new items as part of our next major expansion New Frontiers and the current layout was getting a bit crowded.

With this change, some items are now locked behind an increased number of lower-tier items, while others will be easier to access. One important thing to note is this does not change any of your workshop progress and anything you have unlocked in the past will still be unlocked, regardless if it has moved in the UI or not.



Changelog v1.3.5.113110
New Content

• Tweaking of Workshop so it is now aligned into separate categories
  
• Enabling Armor Piercing Bullets, Blueprints and Recipes
  
• Swapping BaseHardenedPointDamage to BaseHardenedPointPenetration on various items as it represents more what we wanted the stat to do design wise, negation of hardened point zones rather than a damage buff

Fixed

• Added many more translatable strings, notably close buttons, mount commands, unloading ammo, and the sort button
  
• Made DescriptionText member of D_Uses an FText to support translation (was previously FName)
  
• The 'Press any key to skip' text shown during loading screen cinematic now supports localization
  
• Updated translatable text row for character deletion to correctly allow translation.
  
• Updated Out of Bounds warning to correctly allow translation
  
• Combining lantern start / loop / end audio into one event, and combining wood rag torch start / loop / stop into one event for Craigs torch BP cleanup logic
  
• Fix lantern audio desynced after entering water bug
  
• Refactored audio behaviour on all light skeletal items to simplify this fix
  
• Re-separated wood rag torch oneshots out from loop event to enable context-specific ignite and douse behaviour
  
• Applied a fix to audio component play state library function to allow fading out audio components to continue to respond to positional updates correctly
  
• Fixed a few typos and edited descriptions to better reflect the nature of an item
  
• Update Blueprint tooltip widget to remove black space when item description is too long
  
• Updated deployable modifier widget to have 2 columns for alterations if exceeding 4 alterations, notably this prevents other parts of the widget being hidden (and mainly on crop plots)
  
• Updated Crop Plot Fertilizer widget to show the text for fertilizer stats larger
  
• Updated Resource Connections widget to allow translation of the requires and provides summary
  
• Very small adjustment to OES pod volume so its not quite as intense. This is to account for when pods are coming up and down in similar times
  
• Damage numbers no longer generate overlap events or affect navigation
  
• Fixed durability setup on dehumidifiers, ensuring they correctly break on 0 durability

Future Content

• Blueprint setup for ENV audio effects Volcanic Embers
  
• Added SM_BLD_Wall_Solid_Glass, SM_BLD_Floor_Glass, DM Meashes, AO Masks & Set Up Materials for Buildable Rework Investigation
  
• Added several assets for the Iron Buildable rework
  
• Refined mission descriptions, changed the amount of items required for progression and added gameplay tag to swamp questmarker, Prometheus
  
• Added SKs, textures, materials for Cold Steel Axe (SK_AXE_ColdSteel)
  
• Reimported enzyme cannon skeletal mesh with correct normal setting
  
• Adding volcano audio for ember storm. Adding BP logic to connect audio parameter. Adjusting levels of base amb during storm
  
• Improved behaviour of Lava Fliers, they now explode on death.
  
• Fixed Lava Flier physics asset.
  
• Added new decorator BT_DoOnce which allows a BT node and it's children to only be executed once per instance.
  
• Lava hunter eggs can now be destroyed to prevent spawning.
  
• Increased LavaHunter health and damage, assigned unique health/damage curves
  
• Added new stat for FrozenOreChance%
  
• Changed cold_steel_sledgehammer item template from coldsteel pickaxe to coldsteel sledgehammer
  
• Added FrozenOreChance to Pickaxe and Sledgehammer
  
• Cold Steel Sledgehammer now has a chance to give 1 frozen ore when a resource is spawned
  
• Cold_steel pickaxe now has a chance to provide 1 frozen ore when an ore resource is mined
  
• Removed accidental key press in a random location that would break the build
  
• Lots of improvements and updates to the ember volcanic storm audio
  
• Replaced Pots and Conch's with BP versions and fixed some floating cliffs, Pometheus
  
• Added dropzones throughout Prometheus, labelled some of these as open world drop zones
  
• Adding parameter for ash weather event and adjustments to embers event. Subtle reduction in clarity of SFX based on full ember amount to give sense of depth to the weather
  
• AI can now specify a default critical hit area which is used whenever another area collider isn't hit - useful for making an entire creature 'Hardened'. Lava Hunter's default crit area is now hardened, with it's underbelly taking normal damage
  
• Add a new weather damage type that includes a tag query for deployables/buildings
  
• Added PyramidHip Iron Buildable pieces for Buildable revamp, as well as several materials that needed to have proper PMs applied
  
• Update lava hunter audio state logic, and add Fleeing audio state for retreat
  
• Update world cave generation commandlet script to throw exceptions on badly formed caves now that Prometheus map caves are in a good state
  
• Adding new Larkwell Heated Canteen Workshop item and provides a modifier when they drink
  
• Adding new Larkwell Oxygen Tank Workshop item that provides cleaner air and applies a modifier to players when they inhale
  
• Adding 2x Variations of the new Larkwell Envirosuit to the workshop, one focused on module & backpack slots, the other on temperature
  
• Adding 3x New Arrow sets to the Workshop focusing on new elemental effects and affliction chances
  
• Adding 3x New Bolt sets to the Workshop focusing on Electoshock, Explosions and a hard hitting piercing ammo
  
• Adding 6x New Modules to the Workshop (Temperature, Caving, Extreme Affliction Resistances, Fishing, Tamed Creatures and Wound Resistances)
  
• Adding Icons for the Inaris Arrow Sets
  
• Adding New Icon Scenes with the size of 512, for icon editor configuration, so icons can be captured on wide screens
  
• Adding Missing Icons for New 2.0.0 Workshop Items
  
• Setting up 4 new Tool sets for (Axes, Pickaxes, Knives & Spears) including new stats and effects
  
• Adding 2x New Workshop Bows and 2x New Workshop Crossbows, item setup, basic stats and effects
  
• Setting up New Talent trees, and talents for all new workshop equipment, including prices
  
• Modifying Weapon Damage at the top of Item stat descriptions to display additional damage stats in this section and removed these from the remainder stats list
  
• Adding new tags for Crossbows, throwing knives and throwing spears for quick icon editor image taking automation
  
• Setting up 3x New Arrow Sets for purchase in the Workshop
  
• Fixing Stat description for Frost damage +% as its description was incorrectly 'fire damage +%'
  
• Fixing Processor recipes for Obsidian Spear and Knife as their outputs where incorrectly set to metal spear and metal knife
  
• Added EquipArmour cheat script to instantly equip a full set of specified armour
  
• Added SM_BLD_Roof_Glass, SM_BLD_RoofPeak_Glass, SM_BLD_Floor_Half_Glass, DM Meshes, AO Masks & Set Up Materials for Buildable Rework Investigation
  
• Adding BP data for volcanic ash. Adjusting audio event to suit ash weather event
  
• Added SKs, textures, materials for Cold Steel Arrow (SK_ARR_ColdSteel)
  
• Added Sockets to the Wood Set for Buildable Rework
  
• Updates and imrpovements to volcanic embers and ash events. Added flaming whooshes for embers
  
• Added new stat for Hardened point penetration (stat that mitigates hardened point damage reduction). D_CriticalHitAreas can now each specify a 'MitigatingStat' that can be used to reduce the strength of their 'EffectiveStat'
  
• Adding dialogue source assets for Prometheus re-records
  
• Updating LOD Generated settings for Prometheus
  
• PRO_Story_6: Added pointlight assets to mission spawn, updated some static meshes to blueprints, updated list of blueprints to spawn as part of mission
  
• Adding new Creature Scanning Device which scans a nearby creature, adds a debuff which causes them to take extra damage and increases the users bestiary progress (can be done once per creature instance)
  
• Setting up creature scanning device in the workshop and feature locking to New Frontiers
  
• Expose duty cycle on tagged weather damage events
  
• Ensure that WeatherActions are correctly stopped when using cheats (internal dev only)
  
• Fixed bug where NPCs that had the 'DamageReturned_%' stat were returning damage to player's weapon instead of the player
  
• Adding in Missing Bestiary Rows for Prometheus
  
• Adding in missing Carcass loot for new animals that where missing
  
• Feature locking AI & Bestiary Rows to New Frontiers instead of Development
  
• Stockpile: Refined flavor text and adjusted mission rewards, Prometheus
  
• Added Sockets to the Iron Set for Buildable Rework
  
• Cold Steel Axe - texture/material fixes
  
• Added SKs, textures, materials for Cold Steel Pickaxe (SK_PIC_ColdSteel)
  
• Adding volcanic wind gust after boom and adjustments to scatter audio during storm
  
• Added Sockets to the Concrete Set for Buildable Rework & Adjusted Wood INT Master Dirt Mult
  
• Adjustments to ember scatter distance and times and wind levels and tonality curves for the volcanic storm
  
• Moved Cave volume sticking out of cliff and fixed floating obsidion ores in manual cave, Purple Quad and Green Quad, Prometheus
  
• Added Sockets to the Wood INT Set for Buildable Rework
  
• fixed skinning issue for heavy obsidian armor arms
  
• Lava Hunter now has increased health regen when recovering in lava pools.
  
• Lava Hunter now enters an temporarily boosted state after recovering in lava, receiving less projectile damage, returning some melee damage, and setting melee attackers on fire.
  
• Added bestiary text for Viscid
  
• Adding wetlands acid rain sizzle, adjustments to timing of embers storm based on test event which is closer to the real event
  
• Added new SMPL3 lines to dialogue table
  
• Added rerecorded Sol lines to dialogue table
  
• Setting up basic Prometheus creature loot tables, adding in special drops for most creatures
  
• Added new 'Quest' collision object type, along with two new collision pofiles 'QuestQuery' and 'PlayerCapsule', used to standardise collision profiles used in those two cases
  
• Adding dialogue events for Open World intro missions
  
• Ensured EQS queries ignore quest actors, as these should not have anything preventing queries of that type
  
• Added art assets for Fish 18 variant 1
  
• Rasied terrrain to prevent landscape clipping, Green Quad, Prometheus
  
• Adding in new fish map for Prometheus and setting up fish zones and new fish (17/18/19 and variations)
  
• Setting up Fishing Book for new Fish & Adding Fish to Spawn Zones for Prometheus
  
• Added SKs, textures, materials for Cold Steel Sickle (SK_ITM_Sickle_ColdSteel)
  
• Stockpile: Changed Required Meals and Adjusted How many are Required, Prometheus
  
• Added text for scoria building pieces
  
• Added text for bone armor pieces
  
• Added text for Scoria buildables
  
• Added missing bestiary stats for new creatures
  
• Fixed item rewards for multiplicitive arctic pelts stat
  
• Changed Drac Hemorrhage modifier to Minor Hemorrhage and lowered chance
  
• Added text for standard and heavy obsidian armor pieces
  
• Adding dialogue events for NOMAD v2
  
• Adjustments to the grasslands hail storm event and intensity. Adjusted eq of wind based on intensity
  
• Adding in Missing Animation Blueprint for the Exotic Harvester, animations now players upon deploy and its active state
  
• Wire heavy ash to provide a clogged modifier to all processors in the same biome as the weather event
  
• Removed rouge cave volume at story cave one, Green Quad, Prometheus
  
• PRO_A_Stockpile: Updated Location of Swamp Quest Marker and Updating Quest Marker Gameplay Tags, Prometheus
  
• Adding new parameter for hail storm and also adjustments and fine tune to volcanic storm based on playtest
  
• PRO_A_Stockpile: Updated Cooked Soy Bean name to match in-game name, Soy Bean Stir-fry
  
• Unlocked the Crunchy Soy Bean recipe, craftable at the Campfire
  
• Adding fmod events for prometheus mission one dialogue to table
  
• Adjustments to exotic harvester now the anims are hooked up. Lowered volume, adjustments to spacializer and added tree snap when picked and directional EQ
  
• Added in all updated Brick Tier Buildables with new APEX, DM's and mask materials
  
• Updates to obsidian armor. Lowered intensity and small adjustments
  
• Stockpile: Changed Required Items and Adjusted How many are Required, Renamed BP's to have A instead of C and Renamed Quest Markers, Prometheus
  
• Small adjustments to dialogue lines to give more definition between characters (by adding a shorter static burst) and also adjusting some longer pauses for dramatic effect
  
• Added Fish 18 variant 2, 3, and 4 art assets. Tweaked colour and LODs on variant 1
  
• Added subtitles for new voice lines in prom missions
  
• ColdSteel Pickaxe - tweaks to mesh and textures
  
• Added SKs, textures, materials for Cold Steel Sledgehammer (SK_ITM_Sledgehammer_ColdSteel)
  
• Wire heavy ash to provide a clogged modifier to all generators in the same biome as the weather event
  
• PRO_A_Stockpile: Update Berry Jam quest step to use in-game name
  
• Added all Scoria Brick materials and textures for the Brick Building Tier
  
• Obsidian, Heavy Obsidian, and Bone armour sets now use the correct 1st person arms mesh, preventing them from being invisible in first-person perspective
  
• PRO_Story_2: Ensured cave marker shows on compass
  
• Updated cave entrance markers to have a Cave_Entrance_Cheat and Cave_Entrance, dev locked the cheat version, this ensures that the marker isn't used in-game and is only used in development
  
• Added final lines and subtitles for Nomad mission
  
• Added new Lava Bomber additional spawn for Lava Hunter.
  
• Lava Hunter now gets extra health regen when 'powering up' in lava.
  
• Tweaked Flyer, Broodling, Bomber AI behaviours to better match design document.
  
• Lava Fliers now slightly lead target and no longer slow down before reaching
  
• All tree prefabs can now specify specific meshes to immediately detatch on first hit (previously only worked for snow trees). Vines on Cypress trees are now correctly removed when first hitting the tree
  
• Added Beam Assets for Iron Buildable rework
  
• Cold steel Knife now has a chance to apply the 'Chilled' alteration on meat when skinning
  
• Adding positive ice pickaxe hits for new ice cave walls
  
• Added skeletal mesh for fish 19
  
• Fixing Generated Stat name that would have broken the build
  
• Committed missed Virtual Stats File which means the new bestiary progressive stats where not being calculated correctly (does not effect any stats on the live build)
  
• Adding new Progressive Stats for each new creature in New Frontiers (and some other future ones) so we can finish setting up the bestiary, added stats, descriptions, virtual stats and calculations
  
• Added bone, obsidian and heavy obsidian armor icons
  
• Committing Missing Buildable Table Missed in last commit and fixing up Ramp & Floor Piece references which was breaking the build
  
• modified Fish19 static mesh
  
• Adding in Reaver base assets, rig, material and all animations
  
• Updating buildable to now use a new table BuildingPieces & BuildingLookup to coalesce building piece information into a new table and data is not hidden in arrays, this will also make it easier for adding new building tiers and skins in future
  
• Fixing issue with the building upgrade tool (hammer) when attempting to upgrade scoria, claybrick and scoria brick building pieces
  
• Adding a new editor utility widget for developers that runs datatable operations in engine rather than requiring a bespoke python script
  
• Using the cold steel axe now has a chance to provide the 'frosted' alteration which increases the energy (burn time) of sticks/fiber/wood
  
• Further adjustments to master ADSR for smoother transitions between biomes. Much more seamless now with less noticeable gap and change
  
• Regenerate Prometheus Generated LODs
  
• Added several assets for the Iron Buildable rework
  
• PRO_A_Stockpile: Updated PRO_A_Stockpile_Food1 Discription text to match correct item
  
• Removing double ups of ADSR fades on main ambience tracks to allow master fader ADSR to be the one that determines the fade. This allows for smoother transitions
  
• added Fish 19 variant1, static mesh, material and textures
  
• Updated old data table row references inside NPCCreator
  
• Fixed invalid decayable entry in new lava bomber carcass item static
  
• Adding obsidian pickaxe dud hit to indicate when hitting a rock that is not mineable
  
• REMNANT: Update mission steps to prevent mission progress being blocked if you send exotics up before reaching that mission step, now will give the Send Exotics step when starting extraction, but still require fully mining a node before mission completion
  
• Increase Sinotai Crate albedo textures to 2k
  
• Added bestiary text and item text for new Prom fish
  
• Added BLD_Railing_Brick and BLD_Railing_Stairs_Brick
  
• Decrease Small Texture Group resolution to 512px
  
• Decrease Medium Texture Group resolution to 1024px
  
• Added bestiary data for Arid komodo, Lava hunter and broodlings
  
• Cold Steel Tools - texture polish
  
• Added all DCO_MetalGlass decorative assets
  
• Adding hail to the BP environmental audio. Adding hail to tundra and grasslands event and adjusting distortion based on intensity
  
• Change new Ash and Ember effects to be WorldSpace so the effect doesn't follow the player
  
• Tweak Ash/Ember visuals to account for change in setup
  
• Remove duplicate 'test' weather event entries
  
• Fixed an occasional crash caused by a function trying to get the players stat container when the player was null. Now checks to see if it is valid

A lil somethin somethin: You can find the details for this event on the announcement page here.