0.6.0 Beta Patch Notes and Schedule Update

Greetings from Team Tapas!

We would like to thank everyone who has supported us and waited patiently for the upcoming update. We are currently preparing new content including an epilogue chapter, side missions, and various other additions.

However, it has been difficult to release the full update during the originally planned summer sale period, so we’ve decided to stagger our updates in stages. We sincerely apologize for not meeting your expectations and will share our revised timeline and updated details with you as soon as possible.

For now, version 0.6.0 will focus on adjustments to the current content and balance of the game. These changes will have a significant impact on your overall gameplay experience, so we would like to collect your feedback through a beta test.

We have prepared the 0.6.0 Beta Test in advance and will do our best to listen to your voices so that we can continue to move the game forward in a better direction.

0.6.0 Beta Patch Notes

The 0.6.0 update is being released ahead of schedule as a beta. If no critical issues are found, it will be officially deployed within a few days. For instructions on how to participate in the beta test, please check [this link].

System Updates

• The following changes will be applied with the update:
  • If you have saved the game in the middle of a run, Sil will return to her home in the corresponding chapter.
  • High scores from the Challenge Chapter will be reset.
    • However, records achieved in version 0.5.n will be saved separately and may be displayed through a different UI in the future.

• If you have learned the counterattack skill, the special “Underwater Map” that appears under specific conditions starting from Chapter 2 will no longer appear.
  
• When selecting a reward to remove a tag, you can now choose and remove any tag from all existing tags.
  

Chapter Rework and Difficulty Adjustments

Due to this round of balance changes, most builds now deal significantly more damage. To compensate, enemy health has been increased across all chapters. Additionally, the activation timing of new mechanics introduced in each chapter has been moved forward by one chapter, allowing new players to access core systems more quickly. For Chapter 4, no new systems will be introduced yet, but side missions and rewards will be added in a future update.

Chapter 1

• Synergies are now available starting from Chapter 1.
• The number of floors per domain has been increased by 1.
• The enemy health scaling curve has been adjusted as follows:
  • First battle: No changes.
  • Final boss: ~360% increase.

Chapter 2

• Relics and the dice shop now appear from Chapter 2.
• The enemy health scaling curve has been adjusted as follows:
  • First battle: ~40% increase.
  • Final boss: ~454% increase.

Chapter 3

• Players can now select new scissors starting from Chapter 3.
• The enemy health scaling curve has been adjusted as follows:
  • First battle: ~20% increase.
  • Final boss: ~161% increase.

Chapter 4

• The enemy health scaling curve has been adjusted as follows:
  • First battle: ~20% increase.
  • Final boss: ~167% increase.

Boss Attack Pattern Difficulty Adjustments

Some high-difficulty attack patterns have been toned down to make them easier to avoid. For Nahatra’s second phase in Chapter 4, since the difficulty of her attack patterns has been reduced, her damage dealt has increased. This change is intended to discourage players from simply ignoring her attack patterns in favor of clearing the fight by tanking hits.

• Chloe’s Intermission Phase (Chapter 3):
  • The health of the spider cocoons has been reduced by ~30%.

• Nahatra’s First Phase (Chapter 4):
  • Added warning indicators to certain attack patterns.
  • Adjusted the position of the safe zone during the final explosion pattern of her intermission phase to make it easier to find.

• Nahata’s Second Phase (Chapter 4)
  • The difficulty of various attack patterns has been lowered, but damage has been increased to maintain the overall difficulty of the battle.

Balance Adjustments

Sil’s Base Stats

To create a smoother first-time experience while encouraging more natural retry loops, we’ve reduced the base health but improved other aspects of gameplay. Additionally, we’ve slightly increased movement speed and improved the invincibility duration after taking damage.

• Increased base movement speed from 5 m/s to 6 m/s.
• Reduced base health from 50 to 25.
• Increased the player’s invincibility duration after taking a hit from 0.3 seconds to 0.5 seconds, with a gauge now showing the remaining invisibility duration.
• Adjusted the way Sil takes damage so that the player will not take multiple hits simultaneously in the same frame.
• Fixed an issue where invincibility frames were not applied properly when hit during the use of Butterfly Step.

Upgrade Table

We have adjusted the beginning structure of the upgrade table and the value of certain enhancements to align with Sil’s new base stats and the attack speed of each scissor variant.

Row 1, Column 1

• Before: Scissor attack speed +0.25 attacks/sec
• After: Scissor attack speed +0.2 attacks/sec

Row 1, Column 2

• Before: Max HP +10
• After: Max HP +5

Row 1, Column 3

• Before: Movement speed +0.5 m/s
• After: Movement speed +0.25 m/s

Row 2, Column 1

• Before: Scissor attack speed +0.25 attacks/sec
• After: Max HP +10

Row 2, Column 2

• Before: Movement speed +0.5m/sec
• After: Movement speed +0.25m/sec

Buff Effects

We have adjusted the effects and values of various buffs to improve their viability. For Magic builds, players can gain stacks of Spell Rampage from critical hits with magic scissors and use a stack of Spell Ramage to increase the damage of a skill. For Sharpness builds, the maximum amount of Sharpness that can be gained has been increased, allowing Broken Scissors and Giant Scissors to dish out more damage than before.

• Increased Sharpness max capacity from 200% → 500%
• Reworked Spell Ramage functionality:
  • Before: Increased the damage of a skill based on how much Spell Ramage you had and reset after use.
  • After: Skill damage deals +30% damage and consumes 1 stack of Spell Ramage.
  • Increased Spell Enhance max capacity from 50% → 60%

Scissors

We’ve increased the base attack speed of all scissors to improve the feel of the first playthrough of the game. Broken Scissors has also been modified to be the best choice for builds that focus on close-range sustained damage.

Normal Scissors

• Attack speed: 1.5/sec → 1.8/sec

Giant Scissors

• Damage: 300% → 250%
• Attack speed: 0.8/sec → 1.1/sec

Magic Scissors

• Attack speed: 1.5/sec → 1.8/sec
• Spell damage bonus: 30% → 60%
• Bug fixes:
  • Fixed an issue where repeated casts under certain conditions wouldn’t charge the critical hit counter
  • Fixed a priority issue where pressing both spell and scissors buttons would cast scissors first

• Functionality changed:
  • Before: After a fixed number of hits, the next attack will be a Critical Hit.
  • After: Same as above, plus +1000% Sharpness max capacity

• Damage: 40% → 60%
  
• Attack speed: 3.5/sec → 2.8/sec
  
• Hits required for critical: 2 → 1
  

We have adjusted the magic attribute for scissors so that it aligns with the effectiveness of the Spell Rampage buff.

• Spell Ramage
  • Before: When Scissors inflict a Critical Hit, increase spell damage by 30%.
  • After: When Scissors inflict a Critical Hit, gain 1 stack of Spell Rampage.

Slash

To match its high difficulty of use, we’ve buffed Slash’s Scissors attributes.

Attribute Changes

• Scissors
  • Before: Deals additional damage equal to 180% of Scissors damage
  • After: Deals additional damage equal to 240% of Scissors damage

Ambush

To improve its synergy with Butterfly Step, the Flower attribute has been reworked.

Attribute Changes

• Flower
  • Before: Spawn 2 Flowers upon hit.
  • After: When using Ambush, wither all Flowers within 5m and decrease cooldown by 1 second per withered Flower.

Counter Attack

We’re improving the usability of Counter so it becomes a viable option in more builds. Over time, we’ll continue to tune it to provide stronger effects in the hands of skilled players.

Base Ability

• Before: Blocks most damage for 0.25s. Successful blocks grant 0.5s of immunity and nearby enemies take damage.
• After: Blocks most damage for 0.3s. Successful blocks grant 0.7s of immunity.
• Cooldown: 16s → 15s

Attribute Changes

• Scissors
  • Before: Gain 100% Sharpness when you counter a hit.
  • After: Gain 150% Sharpness when you counter a hit.

• Cooldown
  • Before: Decreases the cooldown of other cooldown based skills by 2s when you counter a hit.
  • After: Reduces the cooldown of Counter itself by 3s when you counter a hit.

Summon Doll

We increased Summon Doll’s attack range so the skill handles attacking groups of enemies better. To balance its high utility with Scissors and Sharpeness builds, we have slightly reduced its damage output.

Base Ability

• Attack range: 3m → 5m
• Attack width: 0.8m → 1.5m

Attribute Changes

• Scissors
  • Before: Deals additional damage equal to 45% of Scissor damage.
  • After: Deals additional damage equal to 35% of Scissor damage.

Sewing Wheel

We originally designed this skill as a core spell for Charge builds, but it no longer fits that role. We’ve removed its built-in additional Charge and slightly increased its damage.

Base Ability

• Damage: 240%/sec → 250%/sec
• Charges: 1 → 0

Attribute Changes

• Thread
  • Before: Every 2s, cut 1 Thread for all enemies hit and each cut reduces its cooldown by 1s.
  • After: Every 2s, cut 1 Thread for all enemies hit and each cut reduces its cooldown by 2s.

• Flower
  • Before: Each hit causes Flowers to wither and its cooldown is reduced by 1s per withered Flower.
  • After: Each hit causes Flowers to wither and its cooldown is reduced by 2s per withered Flower.

Needle Shot

We’ve enhanced certain attributes to bring this skill closer in performance to Shadow Surge.

Attribute Changes

• Cooldown
  • Before: When casting Needle Shot, the Cooldown of all other Cooldown skills is decreased by 1s.
  • After: When casting Needle Shot, the Cooldown of all other Cooldown skills is decreased by 1.5s.

• Thread
  • Before: Needle Shot shoots 1 additional Needle.
  • After: Needle Shot shoots 2 additional Needles.

• Crow
  • Before: When casting Needle Shot, up to 3 summoned crows are removed. Cooldown is decreased by 15% per removed Crow.
  • After: When casting Needle Shot, up to 3 summoned crows are removed. Cooldown is decreased by 30% per removed Crow.

Butterfly Walk

In anticipation of future buffs, we’ve slightly increased the speed the gauge fills up.

Base Ability

• Speed the gauge fills up: 130%/s → 150%/s

Leech

We’ve adjusted various attributes to shift this skill’s role towards generating resources or buffs more efficiently.

Attribute Changes

• Scissors
  • Before: Duration of Leech increases by 0.5s whenever you land a hit with Scissors
  • After: Every 1s while Leech is inflicting damage, gain 30% Sharpness.

• Thread
  • Before: Every 2s while Leech is inflicting damage, cut 1 Thread and deal bonus damage every second.
  • After: Every 2s while Leech is inflicting damage, shoot 1 Needle at all enemies within 5m.

• Flower
  • Before: Leech withers every Flower it touches and its duration is increased by 0.5s per withered Flower.
  • After: While Leech is inflicting damage, spawn 1 Flower every 2s.

• Crow
  • Before: Every 3s while Leech is inflicting damage, summon 1 Crow.
  • After: Every 2s while Leech is inflicting damage, summon 1 Crow.

Fireball

Previously, Fireball was a bit too effective as a general-purpose spell. We have rebalanced it to better fit into Fire builds.

Base Ability

• Damage: 1100% → 500%
• Burn amount: 40% → 80%

Synergy Buffs

4 Scissors

Adjusted this synergy to account for the buffs to Sharpness.

• Before: Sharpness Max Count is increased by 200% and Duration is increased by 100%.
• After: Sharpness Max Count is increased by 500% and Duration is increased by 100%.

6 Scissors

Due to changes with the Beast Gloves relic, the calculation method for Critical Hit DMG has been revised.

• Before: Scissors damage is increased by 50% and Critical Hit DMG is increased to 100%.
• After: Scissors damage is increased by 50% and Critical Hit DMG is increased by 100%.

2 Magic

To increase overall spell damage, synergy buffs for getting 2, 4, and 6 Magic attributes have been buffed.

• Before: Spell damage is increased by 10%.
• After: Spell damage is increased by 30%.

4 Magic

• Before: Spell damage is increased by 10%.
• After: Spell damage is increased by 30%.

6 Magic

• Before: Gain 1% Spell Enhance every time a Spell is used.
• After: Gain 2% Spell Enhance every time a Spell is used.

6 Thread

We buffed this synergy to make Thread-based builds more viable.

• Before: When the Threads connected to a target are severed, each severed Thread inflicts 200% of Needle damage. When Threads reach Max Stack and a new Thread is connected, base Threads are severed.
• After: When the Threads connected to a target are severed, each severed Thread inflicts 700% of Needle damage. When Threads reach Max Stack and a new Thread is connected, base Threads are severed.

Relic Adjustments

Jewel Scarab

Previously, this relic had an overly punishing debuff compared to other relics. Now, it has been slightly buffed.

• Before: Inflicted with the Curse of the Jewel Scarab, decreasing all damage dealt by 30% for the next 3 battles. When Curse of the Jewel Scarab is removed, all damage is increased by 20%.
• After: Inflicted with the Curse of the Jewel Scarab, decreasing all damage dealt by 20% for the next 3 battles. When Curse of the Jewel Scarab is removed, all damage is increased by 20%.

Dream Catcher

• Before: Increases all damage by 0.3% for each 1 Dice used.
• After: Increases all damage by 0.5% for each 1 Dice used.

Smiling Ouija Board

• Before: All damage is increased by 4% per tag removed.
• After: All damage is increased by 5% per tag removed.

Cracked Swan Doll

Due to its high power as a Tier 2 Relic, we reduced the number of relics you could gain.

• Before: You may choose to forfeit the next stage’s Relic and select this stage’s Relic 3 times.
• After: You may choose to forfeit the next stage’s Relic and select this stage’s Relic 2 times.

Glass Butterfly

Buffed to provide better return relative to its risk.

• Before: All damage dealt is increased by 15%. However, all damage received is increased by 50%.
• After: All damage dealt is increased by 25%. However, all damage received is increased by 30%.

Red Shoes

Buffered to improve risk-reward value.

• Before: Cooldown of all cooldown skills is decreased by 12%. However, Max HP is decreased by 30%.
• After: Cooldown of all cooldown skills is decreased by 20%. However, Max HP is decreased by 25%.

Tripod Scissors

This relic was powerful, but its damage penalty was too harsh in some builds.

• Before: In exchange for decreasing the number of attacks required for Scissors to critical hit by 1, all damage is decreased by 20%.
• After: In exchange for decreasing the number of attacks required for Scissors to critical hit by 1, all damage is decreased by 10%.

Beast Gloves

Reworked to be a core relic for close-range sustained damage builds.

• Before: Sharpness Max Count increases by 100%. When dealing damage with Scissors, increase Sharpness by 50%.
• After: Critical Hit DMG of Scissors is increased by 50%.

Closing Notes

For this beta test, we’ve added a new Beta Test channel to our official Garden of Witches Discord server. We will review your feedback on the beta version of our game in this channel, and we will do our best to implement your feedback in the official update wherever possible.

Please feel free to share your thoughts on Discord. Your active participation is what helps us continue to evolve our game.

Thank you for your continued support and interest, and we look forward to seeing how Garden of Witches continues to improve and grow with our community.