Hey Folks,

it's been a long time coming but finally Mercenary Tasks are live in the latest build. These not only add a ton of variation and replayability but also go a long way in softening up story content and allow the running of a combat oriented comitatus for players. Fair warning, though: just like none of the other income sources work by themselves, Mercenary Tasks do not either. Combine them with Trade Tasks, passengers, and stories, with an emphasis on whichever you prefer over the others.

Hey Folks,

we have been a bit busy. Sorry about that! Now we are coming back big time with a patch that is a culmination of all the changes we have made on the main game over the course of the last nine months.

COVID did not help matters for us but overall, we are happy with our progress thus far. Read more about how 2020 went for us in our blog post here: 2020 Year-End Summary.

In Part I. of our breakdown of Mercenary Tasks, we discussed what this new kind of gameplay element brings to Vagrus, how it works, and began describing the types implemented in the current build. In the second part, we focus on the other four types of Mercenary Tasks, in which passengers play an important role.

Hey Folks,

the time has come to revisit the region that featured in Pilgrims of the Wasteland, the tutorial/prelude of Vagrus. We opened up that very zone for the open-world campaign, albeit we are 10 years in the future compared to that prologue story, so expect some changes. There was a bit of a switcheroo involving several patches in the works and eventually the choice fell onto pushing this out in part to fix a game-breaking bug from the previous patch. For this reason, expect a smaller update in the near future that irons out a few things regarding the currently added content, although we might end up merging that with Mercenary Tasks, the next larger addition.

The most recent patch (Codename: Perky) brought with it a major Event UI overhaul but we did want to mention all the other Quality of Life improvements we managed to squeeze into the update, too. So, let's jump in and see what changed!

Comitatus UI

Hey Folks,

this next patch is a bit lean on content but that is because we are gearing up to the next one that has a huge new region with tons of adventures awaiting - and it is coming sooner than you think! That said, this current update contains a pile of new features and Quality of Life improvements that will hopefully make you happy - like a completely reworked Event UI, Test boosting that allows you to use Resourcefulness to improve chances in Events, additions to Chart markers that makes it easier to find things in the wasteland (but still keeps it a challenge most of the time), new Hirelings, combat Skill tweaks, and a lot more!

Commerce in the Riven Realms is held by the iron grip of Trading Houses through official monopolies or the control of locations that produce valuable goods. A simple merchant who deals in smaller quantities of wares can not begin to imagine what profit these factions work with, especially compared to what the actual manufacturing or harvesting costs. Yet there are considerable expenses involved in these operations, too. If the hardships of travel over the accursed wastelands were not enough by themselves, factions regularly wage bloody wars for resources, mostly in the shadows but often openly as well out on the frontier - and these are astonishingly expensive.

'Ah, Larnak, the city of contradictions. It sits in the middle of the hottest, driest desert of the continent and yet you could not find a more damp and dark place. The reason is, of course, the presence of the vast underground lakes around which the settlement was built. The waters are sacred to the desert-dwelling Sadirar tribes and yet these days the Imperials use them as industrial ponds to grow their precious brightkelp. But that is not the strangest thing to see in Larnak, oh no. For that reason, take in its wonders but tread lightly, good master.'

The vagrus's ability to change the type of beasts their comitatus uses has been planned to be added to the game from the beginning but it had to wait until now for a couple of reasons. The first being that there were a number of other, more important, things to be added before and also because changing between two types only would have been a bit lackluster, but the third type was locked behind content that we got around to just now (and will be available with the addition of Larnak).

Hey Folks,

this patch is a beast in all sense. So many new features and changes have been added that if you ever considered starting a new play-through, this might be the perfect time for it. A shedload of tweaks has been applied to make the early game a little more forgiving (without making the late game easier), and we look forward to your feedback on the direction of these changes.