ACE

**ACE** or the **Authorized Community Expansion** is a workshop expansion mod created by fans, with the desire of creating an *even better and richer* Stonehearth 1.0 experience.

This page is meant to cover the features and general information about the mod. All information is coming from the Official post on Discourse, or the Steam Workshop mod page.

The 3 main pillars ACE stands upon are:

* **Enhancing and adding** to the standard Stonehearth Experience wherever it feels a bit lacking;
* Attempt to achieve a base experience closer to the one imagined through **content promises and ideas that didn’t make it into the final game.**
* **Improving the default user experience** without compromising the game’s desired clarity of the interface nor adding unnecessary depth or complexity.

There are also three golden rules that will always be part of the ultimate decision-making and design challenges of ACE - *they are not negotiable;* and are:

* **All the content must be no more complex nor require** more micromanagement and gameplay depth than anything else already present in Stonehearth.
* **All the content must look, feel and blend** inside Stonehearth’s established lore, aesthetics and soundscape seamlessly. From color palettes to models’ scale and detailing, everything must look like it was created by *Team Radiant* itself. *(challenging!)*
* **All the content must be designed horizontally, aiming for expansion rather than complexity** - and feel more like a foundation for modding (as the game does) rather than a mod itself.

The Final Goal of the mod is to bring the game to a stage where it can be much more enjoyed and for much longer than its final release version, not only through all the new additions and content but also by fulfilling missing promises, adding planned features, and finishing unfinished/scrapped features.

**New Biome: The Highlands**

The Highlands are the home of the new playable kingdom, The Mountain Folk. Imaginatively set between the arctic lands of the Northern Alliance and the forested regions of the Ascendancy, the Highlands are a rough, mountainous region.
With a pale green terrain and imposing white ridges - a beautiful and mostly clear landscape with more boulders than trees. Wood will be more common near rivers and lakes, the only places where vegetation really thrives. Exclusive content includes the Birch Tree, Marblesprout Flowers and Moonbells - a fancy, glowing flower. Other common species from both the temperate forests or the cold north can be found albeit more rarely.

**New Job: Brewer**

This new professional will be responsible for bringing into existence all the flavorful, delicious drinks that your town shall consume! The Brewer is an advanced job (it requires a level 2 herbalist) with multiple tools and techniques for preparing beverages at their disposal.
The Brewer can craft several simple drinks like juices, some prepared drinks like alcoholic beverages, which include a wide range of options - from strong, directly crafted spirits and liquors to weaker but more artisanal goods that require some time like ale, beer and wines.
Coffee and Tea are also crafted by the Brewer, and there are new plants available for Farmers to learn how to grow: the Coffee Plant and Tea Shrub.

**New Action: Drinking**

Drinks are not like other basic needs (food, sleeping, etc…) but rather like a luxury need. Hearthlings will not die of thirst but they will be unhappy to not have anything to drink. On the other hand, providing prepared, tasty drinks will enhance them with multiple new buffs and benefits.
When no drinks are provided, you can still “fight off” the unhappiness with water. Water is quite bland but will satisfy their desire for drinks without any added benefits. Hearthlings will reach for water sources to get water when thirsty.
Simple Water Wells are initially built using their dedicated button in the UI section for placing items, ladders, etc. Their placement model will indicate an area around them and the green outlined square is the location that Hearthlings go to operate and interact with the well. Take care not to block off access to this spot. There are upgraded well parts and roofs that can be added to the well, to enhance the quality of the water.

**Farming**

Farmlands can now benefit from the presence of nearby water and the sun, and some crops now require *special conditions* to grow (the Rice Paddy crop requires a flooded field). In addition, there is a Grass crop now, which is a source of thatch material.
There are now 6 types of farming plots:

* regular farming plot
* bush farming plot
* decorative flower plot
* tree farming plot
* fruit tree farming plot
* mushroom farming plot

On the topic of farming: a Farmer now can be promoted to a Shepherd, and has their special level 6 perk (that never got into the game) added, which allows them to harvest *Megacrop* items: ACE Megacrops, which are different special objects related to the crop they came from. The Farmer can also apply different grades of Fertilizer (crafted by an Herbalist) to the fields, which can produce greater yields when harvested. The decorative flower fields do not get harvested to produce herbs, they are useful for improving appeal ratings for an area instead.
When placing a farming plot, the rotation hotkeys can also be used to change the direction layout for that plot's crop.

**Herbalism**

The Herbalist profession is expanded to provide specific medical treatments for new ailments (wounds, poisons, burns) that can be afflicted through battle encounters. As well, the herb production has been changed to require learning knowledge of the different herb crops that can be cultivated inside various planters. New herbs can be planted after learning about them by interacting with an Herbalist Exploration Garden, and an Herbalist Exploration Tub. Some herbs are only grown in water planters, in the wild they can be found in water regions. There are many more potions and tonics to produce, with new types of buffs that can affect all townsfolk, and some types can be carried by individual combat job members. In addition, there are also upgraded Cleric healing Tomes to increase the Healing effectiveness abilities.

The Herbalist can also craft Bee Skeps to produce honey. They would need to harvest a wild bee hive dropped from a tree, that may have a captive bee colony, in order to fill the empty bee skep. Honey is used in new cooking recipes, and also some Herbalist medicinal recipes. Mushrooms are also able to be reproduced from uprooted wild mushrooms into colonies to be replanted. There is also an optional quest to obtain the crafting of mushroom planter stands for a continuous supply.

**Trapping**

The Trapper zones yield resources depending on how wild the surrounding area is. More natural trees and plants that are inside, or nearby the zone will increase its wilderness value, and there are several levels of this; from *No Wilderness* to *Very Wild*. As the Trapper gains levels, there will be more types of creature categories which the zone can be set to catch, as well. The order of which animal types can be caught is dependent on which biome your citizens have settled in.

Additionally, the Trapper can also place and harvest fish products from the water's edge, by using *fish traps.* There are two possible settings for which products are available to catch:

* Fish Traps: fish meat, and fish roe
* Captured Fish: a box holding live fish to be sold, or released in water

**Shepherding**

Shepherds can now craft several things relating to providing new food and thatched bedding for pasture animals and pets, to also producing some dairy products. There are more pasture animals available: Ducks, Moomoos, Oinkers, and Ostriches. The kingdoms also have learned new building template structures that can be placed inside the pasture zone to provide safe shelter against the bad weather effects.

**Mercantile System**

A big change is the introduction of visible Merchants that arrive and set up their wares in various crafted Merchant Stalls, which are populated with wares according to the city Tier reached, or other Exclusive types of Merchant stalls only available as quest rewards, or as chosen according to which Banner, Hearth, and Shrine is chosen for the Town. There is a Merchant information button with a sub menu screen that allows for encouraging or discouraging certain categories of Merchants that are preferred to visit. If the weather permits, Merchants will arrive in the morning and leave in the evening, and are interactable with continuously while present in town. They also have positive and negative preferences to buy different categories of items which will apply different bonus/reduction rates when your town sells to them.

**Seasonal Events**

ACE mod has special updates with limited time in-game seasonal events that are available, coinciding with that time of year. Be on the lookout for the autumn event **Candledark**, and the winter event **Frostfeast**!

* Unique faction looks, unique armor, weapons and job outfits for each faction + unique food and drink recipes, unique clothing and unique progression

* New building material (thatch), some new building colors, some extra building fixture mechanics (like hatches/trapdoors), and some new building AI like putting materials in building sites before building, etc.

* New merchant system with tier-based market stalls, unique merchants and other goodies

* Some new events and quests like Bonecarving, Dwarven Quest and also expansions to existing quests like the Dragonborn King Quest

* Friendly Strangers visiting to teach about various subjects (fuels, fish trapping, cooking, herbalism, etc.)

* Revamped blacksmithing with new tools, materials, lots of new weapons and armor

* Fuels and fuel requirements for workstations that are powered; fuels can be crafted (like firewood) or found in nature (like coal)

* New weaver resources, clothing for seasonal weather protection

* New food types like fungi (mushrooms), honey, fish, nuts, dairy (milk, cheese, etc.), salad greens and all its associated content (dairy animals, mushrooms, bee hives, aquatic life, etc.)

* Expanded fruits with fruit trees and "finer" fruit (apples, plums, etc.)

* Drinks and thirst with lots of new mechanics and buffs

* Farming with unique properties per crop like sunlight requirement, water requirement, etc.

* Tree farms, bush farms, decorative farm fields, timber farms

* Reworked shepherds with food troughs, shelter needs and new animals

* Herbalist pots and herbalist farming herbs and such for a whole new array of medical items

* New wounds and battle injury mechanics that require the new medications + a lot of new tonics, cauldrons for making tonics

* Wilderness, a new concept used by trappers that requires trapping zones to be in "wilder" areas and not near your town center

* Fish traps used by trappers

* New resources like bones, marble, feldspar, ball clay; they can be used for crafting new furniture and decorations (Bonecarving, Marble, Porcelain)

* New "specializations" for combat classes like Scepter + Shield for Cleric, polearms for Knights, Dual-Wield for footmen, crossbows for archers...

* New combat meta with buffs/debuffs based on job and weapon type

* Reworked finished work shelves, setting to restrict to designated crafter

* Storage filter presets and custom presets

* Fence tool (to make fences more easily)

* Ore finder heatmap used with slice view

* Lots of new UI QoL things: Click the job icon on a hearthling's unit frame to change job; hold SHIFT when clicking "Craft!" to queue the item at the top of the queue, extra info on citizen screen like health and a new task group for finer control; etc