Greetings Talented Gamers!
Now there's been plenty of time to look back on Talented's 1.0 release, we've collected all of the feedback both in the Steam Discussion Forums and our Discord and Alchemist has stood out as not meeting your expectations for a Talented Class.
Alchemist was always the most experimental design. Combining Ability Crafting, Ingredient Gathering, Runes and the harsh limitation of absolutely no Basic Attack upgrade Talents.
There are many parts of Alchemist's core kit we are proud of and we're still confident in the variety offered by the Ability Crafting system (even if we understand that Charges can be frustrating sometimes) - but the way each of these components mesh together doesn't quite sit right with us...
...So we want to revisit this Class in a surprise Mini Update to the game coming before 1.1!
Alchemist Rework Time!
So what are the main issues?
- Gathering Ingredient can be a tedious process and figuring out which ingredients to go for when can be unfun.
- Crafting Abilities can start interesting, but quickly becomes tedious - especially when you want to craft the same Potion over and over again.
- Having absolutely no way to improve your Basic Attacks means that at certain enemy health breakpoints, basic attacks suddenly cannot be relied upon. This means if you don't have enough ability charges, you become overwhelmed in a single day - this has always felt unfair.
- The random nature in which most Runes spawn can often make them appear out of range of Abilities which can be extremely frustrating.
And what are we doing about it?
We're overhauling the way you gather ingredients. Instead of two different Ingredient Talents, there will be a single Forage Talent that grants two random Ingredients. This will mean easier access to ingredients overall and no more tedious selection of Ingredients as you traverse the tree.
The Alchemy Talent will now allow you to craft as many Potions Abilities as you like - you will even be able to craft multiple copies of the same potion at the same time. The tradeoff here is that Alchemy will appear on the tree less often (we're currently thinking around the same rate that Bandit's Shops appear).
We'll be adding some simple support for Alchemists Basic Attacks. This isn't intended to be a win condition in its own right, but should make the fall-off less sharp. For starters, Alchemist will now have access to the Attack Speed Up Talent.
We'll be reworking all of the Sigil Talents - instead of a % chance to Activate they will now require a number of enemy kills. Once that number is reached a Rune will appear in a random lane but, unlike the previous iteration, the Rune will always appear in a spot designed to be easily accessed by any Ability.
Other Changes
The Mini Update will also fix a few of the more glaring issues with the 1.0 build.
We know Divinity has been a bit of a run-ender in Endless Mode, so we'll be reducing its potency to bring it in line with the other Enemy Curses. We're also keenly aware of the Bandit Shop bug that causes Talents to have negative costs!
Supporter Pack
Talented has always been a labour of love for everyone involved - we certainly didn't expect to reach the amazing audience we have and I know I am speaking for the whole team when I say the opportunity to continue making games and improving our craft is one we will always be grateful for.
Given the low price point, throughout the development of Talented we had the occasional request for an additional way to support the development team and the number of requests has substantially increased over the last few weeks. For this reason we've decided to begin work on a Supporter Pack!
The main purpose of this pack is to support our continued development of Talented and future projects, but it will include a unique Character Skin for each of the 6 original Classes and a special Thank You Note from the team. Keep an eye out for more information in a future update.
And that about covers it! The Mini Update should be on its way in the next few weeks, as with our Early Access updates we'll be uploading it to the Community Beta Branch to get as much feedback as we can before it goes live.
Next Devlog will be a return to more reveals for what's coming in the Wave of Shadows DLC, until then...
Stay Talented