Spell Rune Update

Hi everyone! FIrst of all, I'd like to apologize for the delay in getting this update out and thank you for your patience. It took longer than expected to design and implement all the spell runes but I also experienced some burnout due to feeling extremely unmotivated and stressed at my day job while feeling overwhelmed by feedback on Neophyte. This is my first commercial release and I'm still learning how to support a game, which includes community management and implementing feedback. Please note that I read pretty much all of your feedback (especially if it's on my discord server which I check regularly) but I am terrible at replying. I have come to an agreement with my boss whereby I will be spending less time at the office so I can have dedicate more time towards game dev. I plan to have more frequent updates leading up to the v1.0 release. - Max (a.k.a. Regal Pigeon)

New

• Spell Rune System: During runs, you now choose runes from the choice altars that change how a specific spell works (max. 1 per spell). The first rune draft occurs at level 4, and then every 2 levels thereafter.
• Challenge Level 7 - Arenas Evolve: After completing the first 2 rounds of combat in an arena, it gains a random hazard specific to that arena.
• Stat panel can be moused over for additional information.
• Emblem - Hubris: As long as you have no basic spells equipped, you have 45% bonus cooldown speed and your spells deal 20% more damage.
• Emblem - Meditate: After standing still and not casting any spells for 1 second, you gain 6 bonus life regeneration for 5 seconds.
• Emblem - Tumbler: Evading damage by dashing restores 15% of your life and 20% of your mana and refreshes your dash cooldown. This effect refreshes after 2 seconds.
• Enemy - Screecher: Flies around the player launching piercing sound waves.

Emblems

• Reduced the maximum rank for all “Affinity” emblems from 3 to 2.
• Reduced the maximum rank for all “Blessing” emblems from 2 to 1.
• Renamed the 3 “Elemental” emblems to “Invocation”, improved their emblem icons.
• Agony’s Insight: Damage threshold reduced from 30 to 20, cooldown reduction reduced from 2.5 seconds to 1.5.
• Blessing of Haste: Speed bonus increased from 0.8 tiles per second to 1.5.
• Blessing of Power: Bonus power increased from 12 to 14.
• Dark Thirst: Mana restore changed from 2% of max. mana to 1%.
• Emergency Supply: Minor healing potions created by this emblem now only last for 6 seconds.
• Patience: Instead grants bonuses based on the number of cooldown spells equipped: +15 resistances for 1 spell, +30% move speed for 2 spells, +50% cooldown speed for 3 spells, and +40 power for 4 spells.
• Sharpshooter: Maximum damage bonus increased from 20% to 25%, maximum bonus range threshold reduced from 12 tiles to 10.
• Time Leak: Cooldown timer reduction reduced from 5 seconds to 2.5.

Enemies

• Base maximum life bonus per level for all enemies increased from 6 to 8.
• Reduced the move speeds and increased the attack cooldowns for most enemies.
• Catacombs arena enemy types all appear earlier (e.g. skeleton archers now appear on level 1).
• Clock Room enemies can spawn closer to the player.
• Changed how enemy pathfinding works which should increase performance.
• Elites: Maximum life bonus reduced from 40% to 20%, flat maximum life bonus increased from 200 to 350, power bonus reduced from 60% to 50%.
• Rework - Clockwork Golem (previously Beholder): Same laser attack but on a clock-tick based cooldown, now has jumping movement and longer moves while attacking.
• Rework - Giant Frog (previously Mutant): Now has jumping movement and spits a cone of poison that lingers for brief duration.
• Rework - Vulture (previously Construct): Now extends a damaging pitchfork towards the direction of movement instead of dealing contact damage, making it safer for the player to attack with melee spells.
• Clockwork Cannon: Appears less often and later in the Clock Room, base life increased, base power increased, missile damage radius increased, attack cooldown reduced.
• Clockwork Soldier: Can now attack the player at any time they are in range instead of on clock-tick only, attack lunge range reduced.
• Skeleton Archer: Player follow range reduced.
• Spinner: Maximum move speed while spinning increased.

Player

• Melee/ranged resistances: Now grants (100 / (100 + Resistance))% damage reduction instead of a flat % damage reduction, similar to other games such as League of Legends. This allows resistances to be uncapped with diminishing returns.

Spells

• Adjusted mana costs and cooldowns of most spells.
• Base player power increased from 70 to 100 and all basic/primary spell damage power factors have been lowered accordingly to keep their starting damage roughly the same. [This effectively buffs all expert damage spells while reducing the power scaling of basic/primary spells.]
• Updated all spell descriptions.
• Rework - Dragon’s Breath (previously Acid Fire): No longer ignites enemies but applies a heavy knockback.
• Rework - Force Wall (previously Earth Wall): Now summons pillars of energy that repel enemies more consistently. The player can now freely move in between the pillars without colliding.
• Rework - Starfall (previously Shooting Star): You gain a marker that orbits you at fixed distance. Casting summons a star that crashes down on the marker's position after a brief delay, dealing arcane damage to enemies in an area.
• Rework - Storm Spear (previously Storm Bow): Visual rework, the mechanics of the spell remain unchanged except range is now infinite.
• Apparition: Damage increased from 75% of power to 90%.
• Black Hole: No longer deals damage, mana cost reduced from 50 to 30, improved radius effect.
• Drain Soul: Now grants you 3% bonus maximum life per enemy for 7 seconds instead of healing, radius reduced from 4 tiles to 3.5.
• Electric Field: Damage increased from 60% of power per second to 110%, radius increased from 5 tiles to 7, mana cost reduced from 40 to 30, duration reduced from 6 seconds to 5.
• Grasping Vines: Range increased from 14 tiles to 18, duration increased from 5 seconds to 6.
• Invigorate: Now grants a flat 30% attack speed bonus and a 60% maximum mana bonus for 6.5 seconds.
• Lava Chakram: Danage increased from 70% of power to 75%, mana cost reduced from 30 to 26.
• Power Fist: Changed colour of effects to blue to better match other lightning spells/effects.
• Solar Beam: Maximum damage increased from 520% of power per second to 550%.
• Static Discharge: Damage increased from 600% of power to 780%, damage radius reduced from 6 tiles to 5.5.
• Whirling Death: Mana cost reduced from 25 to 22.

Other

• All arenas are larger.
• Poison now deals damage based on current life instead of maximum life, added a unique poision damage sound, improved status effect icon and visual effects.
• Challenge Level VI - Invasions: A banner message now appears when the invasion portal spawns.
• Tome - Cooldown Speed: Bonus increased from 12% to 20%.
• Tome - Power: Bonus power increased from 4 to 5.
• Spell runes can now be viewed in the hub room spell encyclopedia. Use left click and right click on a spell page to switch runes.
• Knockback effects all characters more.
• Reroll altar sprite updated.
• Object spawn effect updated.

Bug Fixes

• Changed how the save system works which should prevent a rare bug that caused the save file to be erased.
• Changed how dashing works which should fix a bug where the player became immune to all damage (even after restarting the run).
• Fixed a bug that would allow certain cooldown spells to be recast while already active if the cooldown timer was reduced to zero via cooldown reducing emblems such as Time Leak and Agony’s Insight.