Librum 3.1 Release – and a Sneak-Peek of Future Plans

Jun. 4, 2024

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Hello again, and apologies for the long delay. We have been hard at work the last few months, finishing up Librum’s beta and releasing it as a new, stable version, continuing to brainstorm and implement new ideas for Somnium, and of course, working on our future Librum releases as well. We also been steadily growing our team, welcoming new members in and working together. That does not mean we are full, though, and additional help is needed for our current goals! Specifically, we are looking for help on technical development and on writing our new wiki for Librum and Somnium. If you are interested, please contact our Senior Devs.

As you can guess, a big part of this Blogpost will be dedicated to Librum 3.1. First, we will provide an overview of the 3.1 changelog, explaining our reasoning for changes where necessary. The full changelog can be found in our Discord server. We will also talk about our plans going forward, regarding both the 3.1 build and what lies ahead. We may even drop a few interesting sneak peeks of future versions! 

Finally, before we begin, we would like to extend our gratitude to everyone who helped during Librum’s 3.1 Open Beta. The help and feedback of the community was great, and it really helped us speed up our work. Of course, special thanks go to Reyqune, who spearheaded the development of Librum 3.1!

As always, if you have any questions regarding this blog, feel free to ping “The Blue Templar” in our Discord server, or ask in the relevant Discord channels or on our Reddit.

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Overview of Version 3.1

As you can imagine, many things have changed, both from the 3.0 build and from our Open Beta. Notably, lots of work has been done to balance combat, fix a variety of bugs, and deal with a few exploits (and some OP content). Also, several mods have been updated. Of course, this release is not save compatible with previous versions. We will explain our most notable changes below.

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First of all, a list of some notable changes, excluding combat:

• Frostfall is now quite more lethal. This helps reinforce the survival aspect of the list, both roleplay and gameplay wise. Preparation is needed for harsher climates.
• In light of these changes, starting spawn locations have been tweaked, so players no longer spawn right into cold water.
• Player needs are no longer paused in dialogues or in combat.
• Standing stones effects were tweaked for balance, reducing some larger changes and increasing some minor ones. This change is meant to make the choice of standing stone more appealing and less punishing.
• Broken or low-quality content has been removed across the board.
• Undead now resurrect unless killed correctly (using salt, fire, or Sun damage), excluding ghosts. This was always a goal of ours, and it was only removed in beta versions due to technical difficulties.
• The End Times mod can now be disabled through MCM options.
• First Person Animations were overhauled.
• Full Community shaders setup included, and enabled by default. ENB is still included as optional, but is now unsupported.
• Lots of textures and meshes have been corrected, improved, or optimized.
• Lots of crashes have been resolved.
• Lots of broken quests have been fixed.

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Now regarding combat – we wanted it to feel more like a marathon than a sprint. Many changes were made according to this, and we also tried to improve the consistency and balance in combat across the board:

• Stamina changes were implemented (e.g., increased costs for all attacks, regeneration changes).
• Both incoming and outgoing damage was decreased overall, both for the reasons stated above, and to allow more builds to shine.
• Archers are a bit more accurate.
• Locational damage is now optional, and off by default.
• Player stagger was made less severe.
• Health, Magicka, and stamina regen now starts after 0.5 seconds, instead of 6. It is now the same whether in or out of combat.
• When the player is disarmed, their weapon is no longer dropped. This prevents weapons falling through the floor unnecessarily.
• Dragon breath damage was reduced.
• Removed “Legendary Enemies” (the ones with the mechanic similar to Fallout 4).
• For improved combat consistency, the True Armor mod was removed and replaced with Know Your Enemy 2 and Know Your Enemy 2 – Armor
• Player can now block while dual wielding weapons. The default hotkey is c while sneaking. Works with melee weapons and while unarmed.

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Notable mods that were removed:

• True Armor
• Legacy Of the Dragonborn – The Curator’s Companion
• TCC dependents
• Genesis
• Civil War Overhaul

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This is the end of the patch notes overview. This does not mean we are done with 3.1 – we are still looking to polish this version where possible, to give you the best possible Librum experience while we work on future versions. In case you encounter any problems, please reach out to the appropriate channels in the Discord server. 

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Our Plans Going Forward

Though we are committed to polishing Librum 3.1 to the best of our abilities, our work on 3.2 has also started in earnest. Many interesting things are on the horizon, and while we are making steady process, we cannot promise a timeline for release. If you are considering playing Librum, we highly recommend playing version 3.1 instead of waiting for 3.2.

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We summarize a few of our development directions for future versions below. Note: not all of these changes will make their way into 3.2:

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• Mare Stellarum – A massive overhaul of leveling skills and perks, changing build dynamics, and hopefully increasing the potential of roleplay and replayability. We are making steady progress on that front; see the Captain’s Log in our Discord server for more details.
• Spell Research – Spell Research will be rewritten from the ground up, to make it more immersive and entertaining. Our aim is to make the player truly feel like an exploring scholar. For example, the XP gained from alchemy will be reworked into a larger, more interesting puzzle framework, and a parallel mechanic will be added to enchanting items. We are currently brainstorming ideas and mechanics, so if you have something cool to add to the discussion, do not hesitate to hop in the #salon-du-development channel in our discord server!
• Needs Overhaul – We are rewriting the survival system, with changes mainly focused around food consumption. Check this blogpost for more details.
• Seasons Overhaul – We’re reworking our setting based on the new Seasons framework. There will be a big visual differentiation between seasons, and many mechanics like alchemy, hunting economy, and survival will be affected. You can find more information about it on our previous blog.
• The Culling of LoTD – While a fan favorite, Legacy of the Dragonborn breaks away from the immersion of the list in some ways, and it encourages “loot goblin” behavior a bit too much. Many rooms, quests, and features will be tweaked or removed, such as the evil lair under the museum and the attached player home. We understand that this idea may be controversial, but in our vision we think it is for the best.
• Of course, much of this is still up in the air! Our core goal for 3.2 is to rebuild the list from the ground up, so many mods and features will be removed or added along the way. Expect many things to change over time, hopefully for the better. Any suggestions are welcome!

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Thanks to everyone for reading this blog, and for your continued help as well. And again, apologies for the delays, both on the Captain’s log and the Blog side. We will try to catch up to our previous schedule, yet we hope that you are satisfied with how things are going!

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