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Forge Dev Update — Out of the Spreadsheets, Into the Wilderness
- Authors
- Name
- Nick Foote
Hello friends, bots, and other internet strangers.
It’s been a while since the last Forge update. That post was mostly about items, stats, and spreadsheets. Since then, I’ve been building more of the game around those systems: places to explore, skills to experiment with, and enemies to use them on.
This time I’m letting the videos do most of the talking.
What’s Been Added: July 4 – October 13
- Skills: Saved skill trees, branching specialisations, polished tooltips, and new Fire, Cold, Lightning, Physical, and Bow abilities.
- Combat: Dodge rolls, shield blocking, weapon stances, attack-speed tuning, and enemy hit reactions.
- Enemies: New Bandit roles, coordinated packs, Champion and Rare variants, and the Bandit Giant boss.
- World: A standalone town, five wilderness zones, changing layouts, an automap, and waypoints.
- Loot: Enemy drops, new equipment and affixes, refillable potions, and painted item textures.
- Characters: Reliable saves, updated attributes and gear scaling, smoother movement, and a relaxed town stance.
Act I Town
Act I now has its own town, with a river, forest, and a Sorcerer’s Hut.
Beyond town, five wilderness zones connect seeded roads and points of interest, with an automap revealing the way as you explore.
From Skill-Tree Concept to Character Builds
At the end of the last post, the skill tree was just getting started. It now supports multiple trees, branching specialisations, and separate spending for main skills and their upgrades.
The trees are authored through Data Assets and rendered dynamically in UMG. That means adding a skill or rearranging a branch doesn’t require building another bespoke screen.
The gameplay runs through Unreal’s Gameplay Ability System, with Curve Tables providing progression values and Animation Montages controlling when attacks and casts actually happen.
More Ways to Fight
The Physical, Bow, Lightning, and Cold trees now have a much broader set of skills and branching specialisations. Here’s what each one does, including the upgrades that let you shape a build. Values separated by slashes show the successive ranks of a specialisation.
Physical: Rend
Base skill: Hits every enemy around you, with a 15% chance to bleed for 3 damage per second over 5 seconds.
| Specialisation | What it changes |
|---|---|
| Rending Chance | +5 / 10 / 15 bleed chance (up to 30%) |
| Deep Wounds | +25 / 50 / 75% bleed damage |
| Lingering Wounds | +20 / 40 / 60% bleed duration (up to 8 s) |
| Hamstring | Bleeding enemies are slowed 10 / 20 / 30% |
| Exposed | Bleeding enemies lose 10 / 20 / 30% Defense, making them easier to hit |
| Hemorrhage | Enemies bleeding from your attacks take +5 / 10 / 15% damage from you |
| Blood Drinker | You heal for 10 / 20 / 30% of the bleed damage you deal |
| Shatter | 33 / 66 / 100% chance that a bleeding enemy’s death spreads the bleed to enemies within 3 m |
| Twist the Blade | Onslaught hits on a bleeding enemy have a 33 / 66 / 100% chance to refresh the bleed |
Physical: Onslaught
Base skill: A Zeal-style flurry of swings.
| Specialisation | What it changes |
|---|---|
| Blade Flurry | +10 / 20 / 30% damage |
| Focus | +10 / 20 / 30% Attack Rating |
| Momentum | +2 / 4 / 8% damage per consecutive hit on the same target |
| Crushing Finale | +10 / 20 / 30% crit chance on the final swing |
| Sunder | Each hit lowers Defense by 3 / 6 / 9% for 4 s, stacking up to 5 times |
| Bloodletting | 5 / 10 / 15% chance to apply your bleed. Rend’s bleed specs also apply to it |
| Blood Oath | 1 / 3 / 6% life leech |
| Executioner | +10 / 20 / 30% damage against enemies below 30% life |
| Keen Edge | +10 / 20 / 30% crit damage |
Cold: Ice Bolt
Base skill: Fires a bolt of ice at enemies. Specialisations still to come.
Bow: Strafe
Base skill: A rapid burst of arrows at nearby enemies. You’re slowed by 50% while it fires.
| Specialisation | What it changes |
|---|---|
| Ricochet | 15 / 30 / 45% chance for a hit to bounce to another enemy within 4 m for 60% damage |
| Spread the Pain | +4 / 8% damage for each different enemy targeted in the burst (up to 5) |
| Unending Volley | Kills during the burst add extra arrows (up to +3) |
| Quickdraw | The burst fires 10 / 20 / 30% faster |
| Skirmisher | 15 / 30% less movement slow while strafing |
| Parting Shot | The last arrow deals double damage and knocks the enemy back 5 m |
| Barbed Arrows | 10 / 20 / 30% chance to bleed |
| Crippling Volley | Hits slow 10 / 20% for 2 s |
| Suppressing Fire | Enemies you hit deal 8 / 15% less damage for 3 s |
| Punch Through | Arrows pass through the first enemy and can hit one more behind it |
Bow: Rain of Arrows
Base skill: A shower of arrows over a target area.
| Specialisation | What it changes |
|---|---|
| Wide Volley | +10 / 20 / 30% radius |
| Second Wave | A second shower lands on the same spot 1 s later, with 30 / 50% of the arrows |
| Eye of the Storm | +25% damage to enemies in the centre of the circle |
| Quick Nock | 10 / 20 / 30% shorter cooldown |
| Steady Footing | You take 10 / 20% less damage while casting |
| Rolling Barrage | Each kill cuts 0.5 s off the cooldown (up to 2 s per cast) |
| Thorned Ground | Arrows stay in the ground and slow enemies in the area by 15 / 30% for 4 s |
| Pin Down | Each arrow hit has a 5 / 10 / 15% chance to stun for 0.5 s |
| Shred | Hits lower Defense by 4 / 8% per stack (3 stacks, 5 s). Shares stacks with Onslaught’s Sunder |
| Cruel Rain | +10% damage against slowed, chilled or stunned enemies |
Lightning: Lightning
Base skill: A long bolt that streaks out to full range and passes through every enemy in its path.
| Specialisation | What it changes |
|---|---|
| Long Reach | +10 / 20 / 30% range |
| Broad Arc | +15 / 30 / 45% hit width |
| Efficient Channeling | −5 / 10 / 15% mana cost |
| Chain Lightning | After the bolt finishes, it jumps to 1 / 2 / 3 more enemies within 4 m for 40% damage each |
| Conductive Wound | Hits lower Lightning resistance by 3 / 6 / 9 points for 3 s. This helps all your Lightning damage |
| Aftershock | The bolt repeats along the same line 0.35 s later for 20 / 30 / 40% damage. You can take either this or Return Stroke, not both |
| Overload | 10 / 20 / 30% chance to stun for 0.5 s |
| Forked Lightning | The first enemy hit releases two side bolts for 40% damage, travelling 25 / 40 / 55% of the main bolt’s length |
| Return Stroke | A discharge comes back along the line for 40% damage, at 50 / 75 / 100% of the outgoing speed |
| Charged Wake | Leaves an electric line for 1 / 2 / 3 s that hits enemies walking into it for 25% damage |
Lightning: Charged Bolt
Base skill: Fires a fan of wandering sparks.
| Specialisation | What it changes |
|---|---|
| Extra Charges (6 ranks) | +1 to +6 sparks per cast |
| Focused Discharge | The spark fan is 10 / 20 / 30% narrower |
| Long-Lived Charge | Sparks last 15 / 30 / 45% longer |
| Seeking Current | Sparks steer toward nearby enemies, turning up to 10 / 20 / 30° per second |
| Live Wire | Each spark passes through 1 / 2 / 3 more enemies. Hits after the first deal 60% damage |
| Forked Discharge | A spark’s first hit splits off two short sparks for 20 / 30 / 40% damage |
| Charge Recovery | The first hit of each cast refunds 5 / 10 / 15% of its mana cost |
| Nerve Shock | 10 / 20 / 30% chance to stun for 0.35 s (one roll per enemy per cast) |
| Rebounding Charge | Sparks bounce off walls 1 / 2 / 3 times |
| Building Charge | Each extra spark that hits the same enemy grants +1 / 2 / 3% cast speed for 3 s (up to 5 times) |
Lightning: Thunder Storm
Base skill: A storm around you that strikes nearby enemies with lightning.
| Specialisation | What it changes |
|---|---|
| Gathering Power | Strikes have a 15 / 30 / 45% chance to release a Charged Bolt spark |
| Quickening Storm | 10 / 20 / 30% less time between strikes |
| Lasting Storm | +15 / 30 / 45% duration |
| Storm Reach | +10 / 20 / 30% targeting radius |
| Directed Wrath | 50 / 75 / 100% chance that strikes target the enemy you last hit (within the last 3 s) |
| Gathering Tempo | Repeated strikes on the same enemy come 3 / 6 / 9% faster each time (up to 3 stacks) |
| Twin Strike | 10 / 20 / 30% chance to also strike a second enemy for full damage |
| Ground Discharge | Strikes splash 25% damage onto enemies within 1.5 / 2 / 2.5 m |
| Thunderstruck | 10 / 20 / 30% chance to stun for 0.5 s |
| Storm Sustenance | Kills add 0.5 / 1 / 1.5 s to the storm’s duration (up to +10 s per cast) |
Bandits With Different Jobs
The Bandits now have more distinct roles. Warriors apply close pressure, Mages support from range, and Rogues mix movement, lunges, and bursts of thrown daggers.
They use a combination of Unreal’s Behavior Trees and StateTree for individual and squad behaviour. Each Bandit’s Behavior Tree handles its own movement and attacks, while a shared StateTree coordinates the squad—assigning roles, managing attack opportunities, and deciding when members should hold position or commit.
That gives me room to build encounters where enemies work together, with melee pressure, flanking, and ranged support shaping the fight.
Four refillable health and mana potion slots also give the player another resource to manage during these fights.
Meet the Giant
The Bandit Giant is the boss encounter I’ve been working on: a large, unpleasant problem carrying a hammer.
His kit includes ground slams, sweeping attacks, a travelling shockwave, a charge, and a dodgeable hook that pulls the player toward him. The goal is to make dangerous attacks readable enough that positioning and reactions matter.
He’s also a useful test of how the combat systems hold together beyond ordinary enemy packs. His moves are in place; final balance still needs work.
Loot
Enemies now drop loot to collect and equip, with new weapons, armour, and affixes to try. Items have also had a painted texture pass.
Behind the Videos
Character saving now runs through a C# service backed by PostgreSQL.
There’s still plenty to test and tune, but it’s been satisfying to spend more time walking through Forge and fighting things in it.
— Nick