Welcome to Patch 2.61! The Sandstorm chest has been discovered, the salute taunt is back this week, we’ve added a ton of animation improvements and more! Game Balance this patch is focused around bringing a number of weapons and signatures up to par as the speed of the game increases. We hope you enjoy this week’s patch, and thank you for playing Brawlhalla!
The Sandstorm Chest
The glorious treasures long buried beneath forgotten sands are now available for purchase in Mallhalla! The Sandstorm Chest contains 18 Legend Skins total and three unique skins that are:
- Anubis Mirage
- God King Teros
- Amun-Raza
The Salute Taunt is Back!
For this week only all Salute Taunt purchases will support Stack-Up. Stack-Up is a nonprofit organization that supports veterans and service members through video games in a variety of ways. Find out more about them on their website at http://stack-up.org.
- The Salute taunt is available in Mallhalla from May 17th - May 24th!
- Find out more about their Call To Arms fundraiser on Stack-Up.org .
Brawl of the Week - Yumiko, Wemiko!
- Yumiko Only! (You can play even if you don’t have Yumiko unlocked!)
- 4 Player FFA
- 3 Minutes
Test Features
Added to Test Features
By lowering jump height, we're hoping to keep players in range of each other more often when using vertical spacing. The changes may be on the subtle side, but we've targeted a threshold that only requires a handful of map reworks so it’s able to transition to Ranked sooner.
Jump and Fall Changes
- Jump Height decreased from 414 to 362.
- Jump duration decreased from 66 to 60.
- Max Fall Speed increased from 60 to 70.
- Max Fastfall Speed increased from 70 to 85.
A number of dodge changes are being tested internally, and more should be coming to Test Features before long. First up are tests for reducing the availability of grounded dodges when not used as a chase dodge approach.
Dodge Cooldown Changes
- Increased Dodge Cooldown for a grounded Slow Dodge from 60 frames to 90 frames.
- Landing no longer fully reduces Aerial Dodge Cooldown to a grounded value. Dodge Cooldown will now only be reduced to 80, or 120 for a Slow Dodge, up from 50.
Performance
- Improved memory usage and performance in the UI System.
- Improved client performance in the event of a controller disconnect.
- Improved performance of input handling system
Community Request
- Increased priority of dodge when pressing two inputs on the same frame to make gravity cancel and upwards chase dodges easier. (Credit Eramm, Diakou)
Animation
- Improved performance on the following animations: Axe, Gauntlet, Scythe, Bow, Katar, Character Select, Taunts, and when holding a gadget.
- Improved the Sidekicks' idle animation to be less wobbly and more lifelike.
- Brought in Scythe's wall jump animations closer to the center of the hurtbox.
- Brought in the head on the launch hit react animation in Scythe to be closer to the body.
- Brought Katar wall jump animation closer to the center of the hurtbox
- Added missing effects on the back layer of Scythe's speed and chase dodge animations
- Added some in between frames to the animation of Scythe Down Air throws to make it just a little bit smoother and easier to track the player.
- Brought Hammer's wall jump animations closer to the center of the hurtbox.
- Adjusted Ember's Down Bow animation so she holds the arrow for longer during the leap.
- Small touch up to the leaves on Ember's Down Katar signature.
- Smoothed the arc when Kor jumps of out of the boulder on his Hammer Down Signature.
- Smoothed Pistol's Side Light animation. Also added ‘active heads’ (for example, Spec-Ops Lucien's goggles will now light up during this move).
- Adjusted Unarmed's Ground Pound animation.
- Adjusted Unarmed's Side Heavy animation, accompanied by small balance changes.
- Added animation frames to the recover of Nai's Neutral Katar signature to better support the recovery time. Also tweaked the animation to improve the seaming of joints in the character art.
- Slightly slowed the fall speed on the following powers so that the correct transition animation would play when touching ground: Ulgrim's Neutral Lance, Ember's Down Katars, and Asuri's Side Katars.
Balance
As the Spring Championship has concluded, and we head towards Combo Breaker in a week’s time, we have a few balance adjustments targeted at bringing some of the lower end weapons up to speed, such as Katars and Spear after its recent change in ground kit, and reducing oppressive key moments in strings for others like Gauntlets and Sword. We have also increased the damage on a number of attacks, primarily ones that strike above the user, to increase the reward when pursuing an airborne opponent. A number of Neutral Signatures have also received improvements to either reward or utility in order to better combat against aerial opponents.
Unarmed
The Unarmed Side Heavy has received a new animation, and with it a slightly longer reach towards the end of the power, while the Recovery has received an increase in reward, as it serves well for attacking aerial targets.
- Unarmed Side Heavy: Travel speed has a softer drop off towards the end of the power to match the new animation; Users will find slightly increased range on this power.
- Unarmed Recovery: Increased Damage from 15 to 17.
Sword
We have shifted some power around within the Side Light, resulting in greater knockback at medium to high damage values that further opens a window between followup attacks due to distance needed for travel, but can serve to set up edgeguards when at those higher damage values.
- Sword Side Light: Force of final hit changed from 0 Variable/80 Fixed to 10 Variable/85 Fixed.
- Sword Down Air: Increased Damage of the soft hit from 15 to 16.
Hammer
The Hammer Recovery has received a minor increase in reward as it was near the lower end for aerial Heavy attacks, and is excellent for attacking floating opponent.
- Hammer Recovery: Increased Damage from 16 to 17.
Spear
We have shifted some power from the Neutral Air into the Side Light and the Recovery. The Side Light is now quicker to strike and has a smaller window between followup attacks to better serve as Spear’s grounded initiation tool. The Neutral Air is slower to start, as it has excellent coverage once it does begin and was an overly strong tool.
- Spear Side Light: Decreased Time to Hit from 12 to 10; Increased Stun from 19 to 20.
- Spear Neutral Air: Increased Time to Hit from 13 to 14.
- Spear Recovery: Increased Damage from 15 to 16.
Rocket Lance
The Lance can generally have a difficult time fighting opponents above the user, tending to search for aerial dominance. We have increased the base Damage on the Recovery before charge to balance the risk/reward against an overly airborne opponent.
- Rocket Lance Recovery: Increased Damage from 17 to 18.
Blasters
In the same spirit as our other Damage increases, the Blasters power that strikes opponents above them has received an increase.
- Blasters Neutral Air: Increased Damage of the second shot from 15 to 16.
Katars
The Katars have received greater setup tools in their Down Air and Neutral Light. These attacks now leave the opponent closer for increased engagement and puts the need for travel more squarely on the target, leaving the Katar user with more options to followup against the opponent.
- Katar Down Air: Decreased Force on ground collision from 15 Variable/33 Fixed to 5 Variable/25 Fixed.
- Katar Neutral Light: Decreased Force from 4 Variable/72 Fixed to 4 Variable/50 Fixed.
- Katar Down Light: Increased Damage from 10 to 12.
Axe
The Axe Neutral Air serves as a primary air-to-air tool, although the Damage drop-off for the sides of the swing was a bit severe, so we have given a slight increase in Damage to the soft-hit portion.
- Axe Neutral Air: Increased Damage of the soft hit from 15 to 16.
Bow
The Bow Recovery is excellent for sniping those who float above the stage, however followup attacks can be difficult, so we have increased the reward.
- Bow Recovery: Increased Damage from 17 to 18.
Gauntlets
The Gauntlets have had some power shifted from its downward initiation tool into its upward strike. The Down Air will have increased Dodge Windows between followup attacks to create a better difference between their possible string starters, while the Recovery has received an increase in the reward when dealing with high altitude opponents.
- Gauntlets Down Air: Decreased Stun from 19 to 17.
- Gauntlets Recovery: Increased Damage from 17 to 18.
Scythe
The Scythe has received a number of changes that follow a design choice that had been applied to Blasters in a smaller degree some time ago. When caught in attacks, it is best to keep those strikes to quick moments, as overly long durations where a user has no control are a primary source of frustration in any game. We have altered the animations and reduced the durations of the grab-and-toss attacks, resulting in a generally quicker pace of play for both the user and the target. This does mean the Scythe user has less time to decide and input the desired version of the attack, but still proves long enough for reliable results.
- Scythe Down Air: Reduced duration for the backwards version during the grab from 20 frames to 14 frames.
- Scythe Down Light: Reduced duration for the neutral version during the grab from 19 frames to 14 frames; Reduced duration for the forward version during the grab from 21 frames to 16 frames.
- Scythe Neutral Air: Reduced the duration for the neutral version during the grab from 20 frames to 13 frames; Reduced the duration for the backwards version during the grab from 26 frames to 19 frames.
Queen Nai
Queen Nai’s Neutral Spear can serve has a solid anti-air, although it had lower end force and a flatter angle of knockback that made it more difficult to score a knockout. We have increased the reward for this power as well as the angle of knockback to follow a more vertical and natural path.
- Queen Nai Neutral Spear: Increased Force from 50 Variable/65 Fixed to 52 Variable/65 Fixed; Increased Damage from 25 to 27; Raised angle of knockback.
Gnash
Gnash’s Neutral Spear is now a faster anti-air for more reliable punishment against falling opponents.
- Gnash Neutral Spear: Decreased Minimum Charge from 12 to 11.
Thatch
Thatch’s Neutral Blasters is a very difficult attack to use, given its long time to hit and low range on the initial shot. We have made this attack fire off faster to be better in line with its range and potential use as a dodge punish
- Thatch Neutral Blasters: Decreased Minimum Charge from 11 to 9.
Ember
Ember’s Neutral Katars is a strong attack that reaches greater heights than most others, however this greater height does mean the user is in the air for a slightly longer amount of time. We have reduced the Recovery on this power to shift the risk/reward more in favor of the user.
- Ember Neutral Katars: Decreased Recovery from 25 Fixed to 23 Fixed.
Scarlet
The Neutral Hammer can be a strong attack, but overly difficult to land as the speed of the game has increased. We have decreased the Minimum Charge resulting in a faster strike that better fits the current pace of the game.
- Scarlet Neutral Hammer: Decreased Minimum Charge from 15 to 12.
Azoth
Similar to Scarlet’s Neutral Hammer, Azoth’s Neutral Axe had an overly long Time to Hit as the game speed has increased. We have reduced not only the Minimum Charge, but also the Time to Hit after release for more reliable usage as an anti-air.
- Azoth Neutral Axe: Decreased Minimum Charge from 7 to 6; Decreased Time to Hit after release from 9 to 8.
Barraza
We have pushed the risk/reward more in favor of the user by reducing the Recovery Time, given this attack’s already lengthy active portion that, while useful, can result in being overly punishable.
- Barraza Neutral Blasters: Decreased Recovery Time on miss from 10 Fixed to 8 Fixed.
Jhala
We have reduced the risk on Jhala’s Neutral Sword, as it is a lengthy anti-air similar to Barraza’s that can be overly punishable on miss due to its long overall duration.
- Jhala Neutral Sword: Decreased Recovery Time from 16 Fixed to 14 Fixed.
New Legend Rotation
This week’s Legend rotation features Ada, Bodvar, Brynn, Ember, Kor, and Ulgrim.
Bug Fixes
- Fixed a Multi Keyboard bug where keyboards using a volume knob could crash the game.
- Fixed a bug where players could be incorrectly told that they finished the Brawl of the Week mission after playing it for the first time if they had partial progress on the Brawl of the Week quest from the previous week.
- Fixed a bug that would cause the exhaust effects on Lance Down Air's ground collision to freeze.
- Fixed a bug that caused the pick up effects for Blasters to not color swap
- Cross Down Gauntlets: Fixed a case where the target could be dropped before the final hit. (Credit: NoviBliss)
-- PS4 Report --
The PS4 Port process has been going smoothly and we're getting close! We're still working through some bugs and performance improvements before we are able to go live with the closed beta and will continue to keep all of you up-to-date as we move forward with the PlayStation 4 Port.
- Ongoing final features, bug fixes, and performance improvements.
- You can still sign up for the PS4 closed beta at beta.brawlhalla.com!