This patch focused on the multiplayer experience, improving the net code and displaying more information on the leaderboards. Additionally, Sokras learned how to play Aquamarine properly and has some cool new tricks up their sleeves. Another change you should not overlook is to Substation. The ability of adding a Source to your discard pile was almost never useful, and I wanted to test if adding it to your hand instead would be strong and fun to play and experiment with. Apart from these, a new quality of life feature, the status bar, let's you see how much attack bonus you accumulated, if you played any gem card skills (and how many in case you run Tsunami), and how much life you lost (in case you run Despair). I also added a requested feature: you can now return attacks to your hand in the attack preparation phase and only commit to strike when you are happy with your setup.
Features
- Wins and losses for online multiplayer matches are tracked and displayed in the leaderboard.
- Wins for games against Sokras are tracked and displayed in the leaderboard.
- You can watch your opponent taking the mulligan in online games and a log entry is created for both players.
- Restructured matchmaking sequence and improved game starting logic for online multiplayer to make it more robust in higher latency situations.
- Improved Sokras’ Aquamarine play, especially Ebb and Flow and Coral Reef usage.
Balance
- When adding a Source using Substation, it’s added to your hand instead of your discard pile. Not only does this provide additional power, the gained Source can serve as discard fodder for Intuition or City of Wind. This change should ensure that both of Substation’s effects find regular use, depending on the situation.
- The timer now works in a way that is much more intuitive: You have a three minute time bank that starts counting down on the beginning of each turn and an increment of ten seconds is added each turn. This will probably be adjusted in the future, potentially increasing the increment for lower rated lobbies and high turn counts.
Quality of Life
- Attack Bonus is displayed by a small icon over your health bar. The status effect display will also show life lost this turn and skills played as soon as you have cards in your deck that care for it.
- You can now click on an attack card in your current attack preparation to take it back to your hand. Note that your opponent might have seen the card already.
- When pressing “A” after having already added an attack card, you will strike without adding all your remaining attacks. This is especially handy when playing Dagger on Steam Deck but also prevents unexpected behavior in general.
Bug Fixes
- Using Tide Generator displays correctly for the opponent in online multiplayer.
- Sokras uses Pearl Diver correctly even if no gem card skill is on their discard pile.
- Improved Sokras’ handling of Secret Stash.
- Using City of Wind in online multiplayer no longer causes a desync.
- Artillery fires even if you use it when another card effect is still resolving.
- Cleaned up Artillery’s effect handling to deal with edge cases more elegantly.
- You can no longer launch an attack via pressing “A” while selecting a target for a card effect such as Junkyard or Pearl Diver.
- You can no longer use the “A” key during your opponent’s turn in online multiplayer.
- When cards are played alternately this should always log correctly.
Polish
- Player models flash red upon taking damage.
- When the timer goes down to 10 seconds it turns red and beeps every time it counts down.
- Hammer received new illustrations that better match the look of the character model.
- Added a sound effect when gaining an attack bonus from Artillery of Favorable Current.
- Added a small delay to Coursing’s miss effect for a more satisfying result.
- Made the close button on the leaderboards slightly smaller.
- The draft tooltip does not show on your opponent turn in online multiplayer games.