What's new in 0.4.1

Damn pigs break every time a new version comes out:) Pigstries are now fixed and pig-herds will no longer try to feed chickens with turnips. #gofigure

Tax & Employment section now shows how many jobs you have in total.

Thanks to Adam for the suggestions!

Savegames from 0.4.0 are compatible with 0.4.1.

What's new in 0.4.0

0.4.0 is another major update of Hearthlands and the initial version available on Steam.

Savegames from 0.3.2 or before are not compatible with 0.4.

Diplomacy

You can now conduct diplomacy with the rival cities shown on the world map. Each rival city has a leader, certain military power and wealth. Power and wealth may change as you play. Each rival also has two important parameters: opinion of you (visible) and fear (hidden). Opinion of you depends on your culture and actions. Fear depends on your relative military power.

The higher opinion rivals have the more likely they will send you gifts, fulfill your requests and the less likely they will attack you.

The lower the fear is the more likely rivals will attack you and request goods from you.

Sending gifts to someone gives you an opinion bonus with them. Only the highest opinion bonus counts, so you can't send tons of gifts (Hi, CKII!).

Requesting goods from someone gives you an opinion penalty (even if they didn't accept the request).

If a rival sends you a gift you get an opinion penalty as well (even if you declined the gift).

You get an opinion bonus if you fulfill their request or a penalty if you decline it. If you decline the request right away the penalty is lower than if you accept it and decline (of fail to fulfill it) later.

If you attack someone or someone attacks you, you get a massive opinion penalty (it goes away after the war is over).

If you managed to repulse your rival's attack or conquered someone you get an opinion bonus with them.

If your rival's merchant is killed in your lands (due to invasion or monsters) you get an opinion penalty with that rival.

Every opinion modifier lasts for 2 year and gradually decreases over time.

You can see currently active requests on Requests Panel (top-left of the screen).

You can specify the number of rivals at the start of a new game (from none to 12). Also, if you don't want to bother with defending yourself and dealing with AI's requests you can make the rivals passive.

New trade system

Each rival has a certain set of resources it needs (he may want to buy, request and/or receive them as a gift from you) or has in abundance (he may want to sell or gift them to you).

The number of trade routes available for you as well as the price of goods depends on the opinion you have with your trading partner. When at war with someone trade routes between you close.

Inactive trade routes may eventually close and be replaced with new ones. Active trade routes may have their trade limit increased.

Wars and invasions

Rivals may launch an invasion on you (if they feel powerful enough).

You can also attack your rivals. Squads that are abroad won't get reinforcements until they return.

After the attack if over survived troops get XP and you may get some loot (if you've won).

Marching armies are shown on the world map.

New buildings and Plague

Forester's lodge lets you plant trees, mushrooms and flowers in a certain area.

Herbalist's shop lets you make medicine out of mushrooms.

Apothecary distributes medicine between your houses preventing plague from happening. You need approximately 1 medicine per house per year.

Plague can happen if your houses don't receive enough medicine. A house with plague won't be able to evolve and will lose its population until it gets abandoned. Make sure to build an apothecary early in the game.

Immigration

Your city now has an overall desirability which affects the immigration rate. You can see it on the Economy Overview section.

Deaths, emigration, low housing levels high taxes, unemployment and the presence of an invasion army decrease the desirability.

Other things

Both local map and world map can now be scrolled using WSAD keys.

On Load Game screen you can now double-click a savegame to load it right away.

All of the resource icons are accompanied by the appropriate resource name, which makes it easier to tell what it is.

Thanks to Bjorn for suggesting those three!

Wells now have a limited amount of water per year that can be taken out. You will need approximately one well per every two buildings (bakery, beer brewery and cider brewery) to keep up with the demand.

Pine trees added (pine tree yields 2 logs instead of 1 for a normal tree).

Better coast and water objects.

Tons of other improvements, balance changes and fixes.

As always we would like to get as much feedback as possible, so please comment and send your thoughts to info@hearthlands.com. If you become our watcher on Indie DB or Desura, that also helps a lot! Don't forget to subscribe to one of our social network pages or YouTube channel. If you want to support the development — you can just purchase the game.

Thank you,
Sergio