We're happy to introduce one of the biggest content updates in Screeps! We tested it since May on the PTR and private servers with your help, and now we're ready to launch these exciting new features.
IMPORTANT: Although we put our best effort to make this update as less breaking as possible, some things in your code may break due to the new improved API. See the API Changes section below for details.
Factory and new resources
A new structure is now available at RCL 7: Factory. It allows for creating many new types of resources. Four of these are very special — we have added new raw resources to the game. They have Deposit game object type and can be occasionally found in "highway" rooms. You can harvest them as usual, but they will exhaust over time and have a limited lifespan. Deposits are distributed unevenly across the world map: one resource type per map quadrant (NW, NE, SW, SE).
Using factories, you can produce new resources that we call "trade commodities." These are resources that NPC market traders are most interested in. They have no other purpose other than to be sold and generate credits. Producing high-level commodities is the most profitable business in the game.
The factory mechanic is tightly linked with the OPERATE_FACTORY power. The full use of factories will be possible only by leveraging the coordinated work of multiple Operators.
We have developed four production chains of high-level trade commodities (for each new raw resource type). This is how the market now looks:
We're very excited about this change since it provides much more interesting crafting and trading challenges in the game. If you're an economy gamer, you'll definitely like it! But what if the fighting aspect of Screeps appeals to you more?
See documentation: Commodities
PTR forum topic
Draft discussion
NPC Strongholds
NPC Invaders now have a home!
If you check your sector on the map now, you will see that one room in each sector is claimed by the "Invader" user, and has its base in it. This is a place where all invader creeps in this sector originate from. Now, if you attack and destroy this NPC Stronghold, invaders will stop appearing in this sector until a new stronghold reappear elsewhere.
If you leave the stronghold untouched, it will spawn lesser cores in rooms nearby and reserve them. You'll have to destroy the core to proceed harvesting energy there.
There is one more reason to conquer an NPC Stronghold — it contains resources in its treasury. Every stronghold has a few containers, and the core structure ruin also will contain resources after you destroy it. Here is an example of a level 5 stronghold loot:
-<We will continue working on the stronghold defenders AI to make it an exciting fighting challenge for players of all levels.
See documentation: NPC Strongholds
PTR forum topic
Draft discussion
Ruins
We also introduced a new concept of ruins, which is similar to tombstones. When you destroy a structure, it does not disappear but drops a ruin object. All resources are moved to the ruin's store. In general, player structures ruins have 500 ticks of decay, but some special cases exist:
- InvaderCore ruins will last the same equal time as the remaining EFFECT_COLLAPSE_TIMER on it.[/*]
- When a user respawns, all structures are converted to ruins with 500,000 decay time. [/*]
- When a novice player initially spawns into the room with another player's structures, all structures are converted to ruins with 100,000 decay time. [/*]
API Changes
See the official forum post for full API changes list and their discussion.
Forum post
