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Hey guys. Here is a mostly-complete set of patch notes for the next update to Frostfall, which will be out "soon".
Mages finally get some Love
I have put together a new suite of spells for mages that feel balanced, lore-friendly, and help you cope with the cold in unique ways while still managing to make you feel more powerful in some ways than your spell-less brethren. The link above summarizes the spells pretty well. Click each one to learn a bit more about how it works. Most of them should feel pretty natural and self-explanatory.
Here's a brief overview of the spells:
Skin spells: These behave very much like the normal Armor spells from Alteration. Except these increase your Exposure Protection, by as much as 90 if you take the Mage Armor perk. This will offset the fact that no "mage clothing" gear provides Full exposure protection under the WEAR system. The standard restrictions of the Mage Armor perk apply; you cannot wear Light or Heavy armor to receive the bonus. Can be dual cast for increased duration.
Transmute Wood: Transforms 1 Deadwood into 1 Firewood. Having (and being able to cast) this spell satisfies the "Axe Required for Fast Travel" requirement, if you play with that setting.
Bound Cloaks: Comes in a Lesser and Greater variant. Summons a conjured cloak that provides some exposure and rain protection. Not quite as good as a real cloak in terms of specialization, but more well-rounded. Can be dual cast for increased duration.
Summon Shelter: This is the one that took up 90% of my development time, to get the summon effects looking cool and polished. Summon a magic field that repels rain *and* cold for up to 12 hours. Comes with many creature comforts that make it unnecessary for high level Conjuration mages to carry camping equipment; see the screenshots on the spell pages. It also includes something that's been long requested but I'm making it unique to these spells: a chest that has a persistent inventory (across casts of the spell, and across both versions of the spell; it's the same chest throughout).
Vapor Blast: Use your damp clothing as a weapon. An AoE blast that dries the caster immediately and does up to 50 damage. Fails to cast if you are already dry.
Soothe: A set of Illusion spells to trick yourself into thinking you're warmer than you actually are for a very short time. Works similarly to alcohol, except you don't gain more exposure than you actually lost, and the duration is much shorter (30 seconds).
Kindle: The "Restore Exposure" spell, the one thing I said I'd never do. However, it requires you to consume firewood from your inventory to use, and it works in about as many circumstances as a normal campfire would (i.e. shelter is still necessary). It also doesn't dry you off.
Meters and Indicators!
Something that's been a long time coming. If you use SkyUI 4.1 (latest), you will be able to see an Exposure meter (right) and Wetness meter (left). The exposure meter turns a fiery red when "warm". It depletes to 0 and then climbs back up again in the icy color as your exposure increases.
The thing at the top is not a meter, but the new Weathersense indicator. It will change colors depending on the surrounding temperature, so no need to continuously use a power to check it.
You will also be able to see your total Exposure Protection from the inventory menu. I think that it's pretty useful.
All of the meters and widgets will have adjustable colors, placement, size, and opacity options via the SkyUI MCM. They can be set to display Off, Always, or Contextual. Contextual will be the default setting and will fade the meters and indicator in and out when it's important (changing status, warming up, different ambient temperature, so on).
Other Stuff
If you are carrying a waterskin with water in it from IMCN or RND, it will now display on your Frostfall backpack.
You can now make a campfire with 10 Ruined Books (either type, in varying amounts). It shows an appropriate graphic of a pile of burning books.
Integration
* When talking to Alvor or Gerdur in Riverwood after Alduin's attack on Helgen, when asking regarding "Do you have any supplies I could take?", they now have a burlap travel cloak, a small hide tent, and a pair of fur boots you can take.
* Many of the spell tomes for the new spells added by Frostfall were hand-placed in various locations all over Skyrim. A small number were placed in dungeons, but the majority were placed at unmarked points of interest across Tamriel. See the spell page for details.
* All of the spell tomes are now available for purchase from appropriate mages across Skyrim, assuming your skill level is high enough for them to become available for purchase. See the spell page for details.
* Most of the spell tomes should now appear in random leveled loot depending on the spell's skill level. See the spell page for details.
* Various pieces of camping equipment are now available for purchase from general goods vendors across Skyrim. The website will be updated soon with details on what can be purchased, and where.
* 5 new loading screens have been added related to Frostfall-added spells.
Changes
* Frostfall's start-up quest prompt has been made more obvious (it is now classified as a Side Quest instead of a Misc Quest, so you will see "STARTED: FROSTFALL"), and the wording of the objective has been made shorter ("Reflect on cold weather survival. (See Quest Journal for details)" ). All possible instructions for starting Frostfall now appear in the Quest Journal.
* Stone arrows no longer have value.
* Added WeapTypeWarAxe and WeapMaterialIron keywords to the woodcutter's axe variants, for better support by the SkyRe ReProccer.
* You can no longer pick up camping equipment that someone else is using (because it can result in that NPC becoming stuck that way).
* The Status screen now clearly states when you are warm, and also displays the Exposure Protection bonus of spells, if any.
* Vampires no longer dry off immediately (to facilitate the use of the Vapor Blast spell).
* Using the Survival Skills hotkey from SkyUI while transformed into a Werewolf or a Vampire Lord will bring up the Player Status screen instead, to prevent being able to craft items or gather wood while in this state (which was never intended).
* The speed and amount that a tent or conjured shelter can warm you without a campfire has been readjusted. Spoiler: it's not as good.
* The western section of Wyrmstooth should now have temperatures equivalent to a slightly colder version of Whiterun.
Game objects and mesh/texture assets related to an unreleased backpack have been removed. This may result in papyrus log errors once on start-up when upgrading from Frostfall 2.4a, but are harmless.
* Game objects related to old versions of unused spells have been removed. This may result in papyrus log errors once on start-up when upgrading from Frostfall 2.4a, but are harmless.
None of the changes regarding adding items or spells for purchase or in leveled loot lists involved "hard" edits to Leveled Lists. Any Leveled List edits are managed via script so the incompatibility footprint of leveled list edits and vendor merchandise is still zero.
Bug Fixes
* Now checking whether or not a waterfall is Disabled before making the player drenched.
* The Archmage's Robes now correctly provide a body and head Exposure Protection benefit instead of just body.
* Removed a check from Survival Skills that could give it the appearance of suddenly not working any longer.
* Removed the combat check for the handwarming animation, which should cause it to play more reliably.
* Fixed a bug with an internal variable for the handwarming animation, which should cause it to play more reliably.
* Fixed an issue where transforming into a werewolf would prevent you from being able to get wet (and sometimes being able to dry off) after transforming back into a human until you reload the game.
* Fixed an issue where the Player Status screen would not show the correct amount of Exposure Protection (600) when transformed into a Werewolf or Vampire Lord. This is just a display issue; you are receiving the correct amount of EP in Frostfall 2.4a.
* The loading screen with the walking stick now has the correct (new) walking stick mesh.
* Fixed a minor issue where, if using one of the magic lifts from Dragonborn or using TCL to move directly upwards, the player could be affected in the Active Effects GUI with a "Shelter Detect Beam" effect, which was never supposed to be visible.
Stuff I'm Still Working On
* Identified issue that some areas around Lake Illinalta are "bone-chilling" when they should not be. Still working through this one.
* Identified issue where a few mountain ranges were "pleasant" when they should not be. Still working through this one.
* Still having some issues with making werewolves get wet when swimming. Working on this.
* Immersive Armors 7 is supposed to be out soon. I'd like to provide out of the box support for its new additions.
* Working on adding scrolls for the new spells, and integrating those into the game as well.
* I'm working on a "3rd Option" for vampires, something between "complete immunity" and "act like a mortal".
* Need to update the MCM translation files for all supported languages to support the most recent changes and configuration options (primarily related to the new meters and widgets).
* Follower and companion support? I can dream...
If this update goes well, this will probably be the last "major" update to the mod as I will have finally rounded things out with mages, provided the interface elements I've wanted to make most of the status messages unnecessary (but they'll still be there if you want them), and in general provide the "full game integration" experience I've been trying to get to since day one.
12 comments
And though I like books irl, seeing the ruined books put to real use warms my heart
Althoug I, being a bibliophile, cringe at the thought of burning books....
(yea, The Day After Tomorrow also almost brought me into a fit)
Seems to fit perfectly with my character's lore. Waiting for the update and thank you in advance