Ships and Spirits Update - Patch Notes

Ahoy Voyagers! We're very excited to release our first major update of Early Access: Ships and Spirits!

Check out a quick patch video about today's update here: View game page

We are also excited to share that Voyagers of Nera is on sale for our biggest discount ever at 33% off! This starts on December 15th at 8am PT and will extend through January 5th when the Steam Winter Sale ends. We also have a brand new bundle with Dawn of Defiance! If you want to explore a Greek-inspired world as a Spartan warrior, you can support both of our games here:

View game page

Our partners at xREALM are also joining in with a discount code when you rent a dedicated server through their service! Click on the "Rent-a-Server" button in game or visit their site and enter code "SHIPSANDSPIRITS15" from now until January 5th at 9am PT to get 15% off!

Now, let's talk about everything in the Ships and Spirits Patch!

This update overhauls our Boat, transforming it into a buildable playspace where you can add useful crafting stations, activate magical stations like cannons powered by Spirits, and decorate your boat so it is unique to your style and needs!

We have also revamped our Spirit Companions and player stat progression; Companions will now gain experience alongside you, and as they level up they will unlock special traits, stat bonuses, and more!

Alongside these big gameplay updates, we've also made major updates to how you can play by introducing Steam Cloud Saves, an official Single Player mode (with pausing!) and the ability to play the game while offline. Just in time for all of your holiday travel!

We heard your feedback and these updates are focused on some of our most highly requested and anticipated features. We can't wait to hear what you think!

Please keep reading below to dive deep into all of the changes coming your way!

Major Features

🚤Building and Customizing the Boat

Whether you want a sleek scouter to zip across the ocean, a warship fit to finally take on the Stalker, or just a cozy barge to act as a home away from home — you will be able to create it with this update!

• Build your boats from the ground up by combining various Hulls, Sails, Outriggers, and Deck pieces to make a ship fit for voyaging.

• Add different stations like Spirit-Powered Cannons to fend off the enemies of The Deep, magical devices that summon Spirits to boost the speed of your boat, or simply a Mariner's Mat to allow you to rest and respawn while out voyaging.

• Almost every decoration in the game can be built on the boat to allow you to create boats that feel truly unique and custom to what you need!

⚓Boat Gameplay Updates

We have made gameplay updates to the Boat so that it feels more worthwhile to build on and invest in.

• Hulls all have different health and speed values.

• Sails can be freely placed anywhere on the boat, and adding more sails (up to a cap) will increase the speed of your vessel.

• Boat health has been buffed across the board, so boats are more resilient to enemy attacks.

• Patch Kits have been buffed so they feel more effective!

• Sunken Boats can now be rescued and re-surfaced. So even if your ship sinks, you'll be able to restore it with all of its attachments and storage contents!

🔥Elemental Paths and Spirit Companions

Attune with an Elemental Path and strengthen your bond with your Spirit Companion to grow in magical power and craft exciting builds tailored to your playstyle!

• Attuning will grant you a Spirit Companion, and it will level up with you as you fight, gather, craft and explore.

• As it levels up and your elemental bond grows, you will be be able to choose between different traits and stat bonuses.

• All of the elements offer a specialization. So whether you're a brave fighter, a stalwart tank, or a tireless support, you'll find something exciting within one of these Elemental Paths.

• Each Elemental Path has sub-classes, which offer different playstyles within various gameplay archetypes.

• Mix and match different traits and stats to create a build that fits how you want to play!

✨ Magical Mayhem

We have made sweeping changes to our Abilities. Spells can now be cast much more frequently at the cost of Mana and have exciting gameplay mechanics that tie into your Elemental Path.

• Collect Raw Mana in the world and craft mana regeneration items to use powerful abilities.

• Abilities apply or interact with Keywords, which are bonuses given through the Elemental Path. Mix and match abilities based off of what Path you are on to create potent combos!

• Added new abilities and re-worked existing ones to address feedback and and make abilities more powerful and impactful across the board!

🏆 New Encounter Types: Primordial Trials

We have added entirely new Encounter types to the world; these will challenge different skills like Skimming, Gliding and Marksmanship. These special trials will award you Primordial Motes, which will allow you to continue progressing down the Elemental Path.

We don't want to give too much away about these before you discover them yourself, so this is all we're saying! 🤫

🖥️ New Ways to Play

We have added Single Player and Offline Play options, so whether you just want to go it alone, or play on-the-go, you'll be able to now!

🙆 Single Player Mode

• We now have a Single Player mode, which can be played without needing to be connected to external services.

• Characters made when connected to Steam and playing in Single Player mode will be able to transfer seamlessly to a multiplayer game.

• While in Single Player mode, the game can also be paused by opening the Settings menu. No more accidental death while you go get a snack!

Offline Play Mode

• We also support Offline play now - you no longer need to be logged into Steam to be able to play!

• Characters made while not connected to Steam will be specific to offline play, and won't be able to transfer to a multiplayer session.

☁️ Steam Cloud Saves

Cloud Saves are now available, allowing you to continue your progress from any Windows PC you want to play from!

⚠️Cloud Saves will not be cross-compatible with Steam Deck at this time. This will come in a future update
⚠️This will not be available on Day 1 of the patch. This will activate a day or so after the patch, to ensure everyone is on the correct version.

This is the end of the overview section; to learn more about all of the details in the patch, continue reading!

📝Detailed Changes

This section will describe all of the nitty gritty details about the new features and how they work, as well as cover other smaller features and quality of life improvements.

⛵ Boat Building, Customization and Gameplay Mechanics

🚤 Build the Boat

• Boats are now separated into modular components that can be mixed and matched:

  • Hulls (the base of the boat)

  • Sails

  • Bows

  • Outriggers (sides of the boat)

  • Awnings / Structures

• Boats have sockets that allow you to customize different pieces to go into the boat.

  • These sockets work like the land-building mode - so if you left-click on the socket visual, it will show you which exact pieces are allowed to be socketed to it!

• The Sail can be freely placed anywhere on the boat, and multiple sails (up to a cap) can be built to make the boat go faster!

• Boat parts are in the Knowledge Tree - progress through the game to unlock them!
  

⛴️ Build ON the Boat

In addition to being able to build and expand the boat, we really wanted to allow creative expression just like we have in our build system.

• Each Boat has its own build volume, which is displayed as a yellow cube around the boat

• Buildables that preview as yellow and are within the boat's build volume will attach to that boat; if they will not attach to the boat, they will appear as the typical blue color.

• There is a Toggle in the bottom-right hand side of the screen which defaults to on, Attach to Boat. While activated, any buildables placed within the boat building volume will attach to the boat. When deactivated, items can be built near and around the boat without attaching to it.

• Almost every decoration and many stations can be built on the boat

  • You can use the 'Show Boat Compatible' checkbox in the Build Menu to only see pieces that can be built on the boat

• There is a Buildable Limit, represented by the UI in the upper-left; and a maximum speed limit the boat can go based off of both sails, speed booster stations, and any abilities.
  

⚓ New Special Boat Stations

Along with cosmetics, we wanted to add some fun and functional pieces to the boat to open up new gameplay opportunities.

• New Stations

  • Tidal Resonator

    • Powered by Tide Crystals (which are crafted at the Manaforge). Activate to speed up the boat by summoning spirit manta rays!

    • This can be placed on land as well, but when not placed on a boat it is purely decorative.

  • Wooden Cannon

    • Craft ammo and shoot things - but beware, these will deal friendly-fire damage!

    • You can also launch allies out of the cannon!

    • This can be placed and used on land as well.

  • Flame Cannon

    • A more powerful upgrade for the cannon, with a little flame spirit sitting on top!

  • Sailing Stone

    • Activate this station to allow both speed and turning to be controlled from the boat rudder.

    • This can be placed on land as well, but when not placed on a boat it is purely decorative.

  • Mariner's Mat

    • A boat-specific bedroll that allows you to set a respawn or rest point on the boat.

🪦 Rescue / Revive the Boat

Now that boats can be so much more valuable, we thought it made sense to offer opportunities to rescue and restore your boat.

• Boats will now sink in their position when they reach 0 health.

• Boats can be revived with a Surfacing Glyph.

  • The Basic Surfacing Glyph will resurface a boat at half its health.

  • The Improved Surfacing Glyph will resurface a boat at full health.

  • Surfacing Glyphs can be unlocked in the Knowledge Tree, and crafted at the Manaforge.

• When the boat has sunk, you can dive down to retrieve critical items out of the stations and storage.

• Sunken boats will stick around for 1 hour. If you don't rescue it by then, the boat will be lost!

• The boat can also be forcibly scuttled by interacting with it, or by right-clicking a sunken boat on the map.

  • Scuttling the boat will lose all items.

⚖️ Boat Balance and Quality of Life

• Boat health has been increased and different size hulls have varying amounts of max health.

  • Scouter Hull: 100 HP

  • Skiff Hull: 150 HP

  • Barge Hull: 250 HP

• Boat Hulls have different max speeds (i.e. speed if 3+ sails are built).

  • Scouter Hull: 800 speed

  • Skiff: 750 speed

  • Barge: 700 speed

• Boats now have visible HP bars, which will appear on the left-hand side of the screen any time you are standing on the boat. No more trying to guess how much damage they've taken!

• Boats can now be deleted via the Delete option in Build Mode.

☠️ What about old boats on previous save files?

For folks who have been playing and already have boats on your server, your old boats should still be present and continue to work. However, they will not be able to be built upon. And if they get destroyed, they will not be able to be resurrected.

We recommend anyone with a previous boat to delete it (which should now be possible in build mode!)

🌍 Companion Spirits, Elemental Path, and Spirit Abilities

🔥 Elemental Path

• Choose an Elemental Path, and earn experience towards Attunement.

  • This choice can be changed at any time while at the Spirit Anchor.

  • Each path has its own tracked XP, so you'll be able to level them individually!

• Each Elemental Path has a unique set of mechanics, traits, and stat bonuses unique to that playstyle. For example:

  • Path of Earth

    • Overall Focus

      • Defense, Carry Weight, Gathering

    • Special Mechanics

      • Guard: Gain stacks when attacking or blocking. Grants defense per stack. Lose stacks if hit without blocking.

        • Guard is represented as Stones floating around the player.

  • Path of Fire

    • Overall Focus

      • Damage, Lifesteal, Crafting Utility

    • Special Mechanics:

      • Ignite: Chance to ignite enemies on hit, causing them to take damage over time

        • Ignite is represented as the character being lit on fire.

  • Path of Water

    • Overall Focus

      • Healing, Mana Restoration, Water Utility (skimming/swimming/oxygen)

    • Special Mechanics

      • Ripple: Stacks when attacking enemies and perfect dodging. Upon reaching maximum stacks, triggers Cascade

        • Refer to the general section of the patch notes to learn more about Perfect Dodge.

      • Cascade: Regenerates mana over time when active

        • Cascade is represented as a water visual around the player when it triggers.

  • Path of Wind

    • Overall Focus

      • Attack Speed, Crit, Stamina, Movement Speed

    • Special Mechanics

      • Mark: Hitting enemies places a Mark on them; Marked enemies take more damage from all sources.

        • Mark is represented with a visual on the enemy (like a green target).

• As you level, unlock access to traits and stat bonuses.

• Minor abilities have been removed from findable spirits in the world and incorporated into the Attunement system.

⬆️ Leveling Up in Attunement

As you play, everything that gives you XP will also contribute Attunement XP towards your current Elemental Path. There are also Attunement XP items that can be crafted, or found in Magical Chests; when consumed, they will grant Attunement XP towards your current path.

• Faded Attuning Shard:

  • +200 Attunement XP

• Attuning Shard:

  • +450 Attunement XP

• Attuning Crystal:

  • +1450 Attunement XP

🗿 Elemental Shrines

Find and approach these Shrines with the Spirit Companion of the same element to gain a large boost of Attunement XP.

🏃‍♀️Primordial Trials

• To continue to level up the Companion / Elemental Path, you will need Primordial Motes. These can be found in special challenges around the biomes, which are marked on the map with the symbol seen in the tooltip.

• Primordial Motes are rare - make sure you are using them on the Path you want to level!

  • You will earn more throughout the game as you progress through the world.

🔨 New Utility Unlocks

• There are new Spirits in the Reef and Greatwood that will give you the following rewards:

  • Reef Biome

    • +4 Inventory Slots

    • +1 Trinket Slot

  • Greatwood Biome

    • +4 Inventory Slots

⚖️ Updates and Balance Changes to Spirit Abilities

As a result of the changes with mana and Elemental Path abilities, we made updates to several of the Spirit Abilities so that they feel better balanced and more rewarding.

• Nera's Bounty

  • Now collects any resource type around it, not just tools-based ones; increase the spell's radius by raising your character's Potency stat.

• Spiritfire

  • Ignites nearby enemies, and increases weapon damage for 20s

• Tailwind

  • Increase base critical hit chance, movement speed, and attack speed (previously it was just movement speed)

• (New) Torrent

  • Send out a large wave in front of you that heals allies and damages + knocks back enemies.

• (New) Flame Dart

  • Throw a small dart made of flame that damages enemies. If it hits a wall, it leaves behind a warming flame. Can ignite enemies.

💧Mana

There is a new player resource in the game: Mana. Mana is an attribute, like health or stamina, that is used to cast abilities. Every Spirit Ability (minus Elder Spirit Abilities) costs some amount of mana to cast. Mana is regenerated through consumables / crafted items, or through certain abilities in the Path of Water, or by being in the radius of the Spirit Anchor.

• New Consumables

  • Mana Tea - Crafted at the Campfire

  • Mana Tonic - Crafted at the Alchemy Station

  • Basic Mana Potion - Crafted at the Alchemy Station

  • Improved Mana Potion - Crafted at the Alchemy Station

• Ability Balance

  • Abilities now have much shorter cooldown, and much higher efficacy across the board.

✨ New Magical Loot Chest

There is a new chest type that can be found in the biome that contains magical items, like Raw Mana, Attuning Shards to help level up the Spirit Companions, Mana Tea, and Mana Potions.

⚙️ General System Updates

☁️ Steam Cloud Saves

• Our game now utilizes Steam Cloud Saves! Now you will be able to access your saves from any Windows PC, as long you are logged into your Steam account.

  • ⚠️ Cloud Saves will not be cross-compatible with Steam Deck at this time. This will come in a future update

  • ⚠️This will not be available on Day 1 of the patch. This will activate a day or so after the patch, to ensure everyone is on the correct version.

🙆 Single Player / Offline Play Mode

We have heard a lot of feedback about wanting to play while offline for purposes like travel or Steam Deck play, as well as the frustration that outages in some of the online-play services can create. So we have delivered a way to play the game without being fully online.

• This can be accessed by simply clicking the "Single Player" option on the Home Screen.

• The game now allows you to play while offline (either not logged into Steam, or during Epic Online Services outages).

• If playing while logged into Steam, the save file can transition seamlessly between single player and multiplayer.

• If playing while not logged into Steam, the file can only be played single player, and the character is isolated to the fully offline mode.

  • If you want to play this file in online play later, it will require you to make a new character.

⏸️ Single Player Pause

• As part of the improvements to Single Player play, we have also introduced a Pause function. Now the game will pause while in Single Player if you hit the ESC key!

• Pause can be activated at any time, whether you are idle in your base, or in the middle of an intense fight.

• This feature is NOT supported in multiplayer mode.

🗺️ Map Usability Updates

We have made a lot of usability updates to the map to make it easier to navigate.

• Point of Interest icons now are minimized into pips when fully zoomed out.

• Hovering any minimized icon will reveal its full image.

• Pips follow a color-coded hierarchy.

  • Blue = Spirit-related

  • Green = World-related (monoliths, markings)

  • Gray = Primordial Trials

• Added several hover tooltips to the map to identify objects.
  

🔍 Spirit Radar

We have heard a lot of feedback about the locations of Spirits being too precise, making the radar and the fun of finding the spirit fall flat. As such, we have obfuscated this slightly to add more mystery to finding the Spirits.

• Spirit Radar now shows a general area where the Spirit is, instead of a pinpoint location.

👖 Gear Durability

Previously, Gear only took durability damage when the player died. Now, Gear will take damage as you take unblocked damage from enemies. Careful, as you may get caught with your pants down! (… for some reason, pants always break first! 😛)

• Gear now takes durability damage if you are hit without blocking.

• If gear runs out of durability, it will break.

• Gear can be repaired at the Repair Bench like any tool.

🐛 Known Bugs in the Patch

We tried to squash as many bugs as we could, but we can never get 'em all. There's a few bugs you may notice while playing that we wanted to give a heads up on! We'll be fixing these as soon as we can.

❤️‍🩹 Bug Fixes and Quality of Life Updates