Sand Wyrms are a race of huge, worm-like creatures that burrow in sand. Thought to have been extinct, they resurfaced a few decades ago, albeit exclusively in remote desert regions and in small numbers only, so the Empire and its allies do not need to fear another destructive war against their kind. Or do they?

In combat, Sand Wyrms try to overwhelm their opponents with their numbers, but they are not pushovers alone, either: high Vitality and Evade stats make them difficult to kill, as is their armored carapace. Their Skills are ideal to cause serious damage and weaken opponents:

TL;DR: A new, extended Demo is coming to Steam and GOG so that those on the fence can take Vagrus for a spin and see what we've been cooking for a while now. This all comes at the tail end of over a month of hard work with the freshly released Open-World prototypes.

Now, let us see in more detail all the things that happened recently around the game.

A new combat idle animation we wanted to show off is right here! Slings are deadly and these guys know it.

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Our crowdfunding campaign is LIVE at Fig.co. Get instant access to the Alpha build now!

We have always planned a fairly elaborate system of healing mechanics but when creating 'Pilgrims of the Wasteland', we first focused on getting the main features ready and implemented a more streamlined, placeholder set of healing rules.

Out with the Old

The PotW system simply had you use a relatively valuable resource - medical supplies - to fully heal one Companion at a time during camp. This is not only too 'gamey' but also very obtuse and not what we intended for the game or the setting.

'We do not worship the Dragons like you do your false Imperial Gods. We do not sacrifice to them or beg for their fickle blessings. Our Dragonlords are our paragons; a testament to what every being can aspire to and the source of the Flame that lives in all of us. That same Flame can burn your ass to crisp if you dare slander their name again.'

Initially, we built Companion Combat without too much focus on the combat AI, knowing full well that it would be a massive task to code and having most of the combat features locked before we do so would make it overall a more efficient undertaking.

We have started almost every single project update with 'A lot has happened since our last update' but now the 'lot' of the past seems kind of tiny compared to the 'LOT' of today.

The Pandemic

Corona hit hard and unexpected. What we looked at with blissful ignorance and naivety in the early days turned our lives upside down in mere weeks.  Luckily, everyone from the team is safe and sound as of now, though being in the middle of the flu season we cannot be certain whether we've been exposed to the virus already or not. Either way, we  stay home to keep everyone around us safer.

Finndurarth is an amazing asset to any comitatus because of her charisma, knack for diplomatic solutions, and upbeat spirit but when it comes to a battle, she is not a delicate flower at all. You probably want to place some sturdy meat-shield in front of her so that she can dish out unblockable magical damage to your foes or cast defensive spells to protect your Companions. Her Skills are versatile tools to be used in battle:

What did we learn when we started implementing the Specter and Shade enemies? Well, apart from them looking ghoulishly amazing, we realized that we need a new mechanic to best describe and present the idea behind them, that being physical damage defense and also methods to crack it.

So we added two new Combat Traits for these, Impervious and Unstoppable.

Ghouls are mysterious creatures whose origins you may be able to find out by playing Vagrus. They hunt at night, preying on beast and human alike, traveling great distances in packs. Their sickly, frail humanoid form hides terrifying strength and astonishing speed, which the Ghouls utilize to corner and eviscerate their victims. It is a common misconception to consider these creatures Undead because of their looks and name, they are far from it, falling into the category of mutants rather.