Updates
UI Updates
Damage numbers were barely visible before, and the HP / MP UI was very basic placeholder. This has all been reworked and looks much better!
MP bars now flash whenever units cast spells to make spellcasts clearer. Additionally, the bars are segmented (like the HP bars) to help players quickly identify units with small or large MP costs.
Map 3 Balance
Normal enemy encounters have been too difficult on Map 3 for a while; a variety of changes this patch address that, as well as some related issues.
Additionally, in order to make Map 3 more interesting, there are now 5 possible enemy encounters per each difficulty level; this is up from 3 groups per difficulty level previously. (Maps 1 and 2 continue to use 3 groups per difficulty level; Map 3 is longer and thus warrants some distinct behavior). Also, the existing groups have been redone. Most notably, the Surrelior Soothsayer and Vicilicar Painseeker (the beam-shooters) no longer appear in the same group before difficulty level 3 encounters.
Changes to specific enemies are listed below.
Balance updates:
-Units- Astrid has been reworked AGAIN; her On-hit damage no longer scales with her shield to reduce redundancy with Faithful Memory. Instead, she gains more passive On-hit damage each time she casts. This is almost definitely the last time she’ll be reworked. She’s perfect now.
-Units- Claira buffed; MP cost: 90 -> 80; Starting MP 20 -> 30
-Units- Amalldean buffed; now grants 70% movespeed in addition to the previous Attack Spd value
-Units- Mahadeva nerfed; heal amount down
-Units- Kalbarri nerfed; MP cost: 140 -> 160; Stone Circle stun duration: 2 / 3 / 4 -> 2 / 2.5 / 3
-Enemies- Cerberus has been reworked:
No longer damage multiple enemies per attack; no longer deals bonus damage if only 1 enemy is in range
Attack damage down
Now launches fireballs at the two most distant targets on each attack
-Enemies- Echo Panic and her Ice Clone nerfed:
Spell damage down slightly on both
Echo Panic max MP: 80 -> 90
Ice Clone HP: 512 -> 256
-Enemies- Surrelior Soothsayer and Vicilicar Painseeker nerfed; beam damage: 480 -> 416
-Enemies- Calmness Doser nerfed; stun duration per level: 2.5 / 3 / 3.5 -> 2 / 2.5 / 3
-Enemies- Demon Soldier nerfed; stun duration per level: 3 / 4 / 5 -> 2.5 / 2.75 / 3
-Enemies- Mother Statue nerfed; Silence duration now 3 seconds at all levels (previously lv2 Mother Statue had a 4s silence)
-Enemies- Hill-Like Growth buffed; MP cost: 80 -> 70
-Enemies- Brutalist buffed; shield amount doubled (but it was so tiny before)
-Items- Focus Bomb buffed; now also grants massive movespeed to your team for a couple seconds
-Items- Bulwark of rising Tides nerfed; Percent of Max HP converted to shield: 15% -> 10%
-Items- Faithful Memory nerfed; On-hit percent of shield damage: 40% -> 20%
-Items- Hellfire Insignia nerfed; On-death Crit: 35 -> 10, On-death Attack Spd: 15 -> 10
-Items- Jade Dreamblade nerfed; Attack Spd: 40% -> 30%
-General- Tier V crops are a bit rarer
-General- Map 1 Miniboss always drops a Trinket
More updates:
The arenas on all maps now change subtly with enemy difficulty; there are two variants per map for non boss enemies, plus a third for each boss
Hover-over tooltips on units now show their archetype, range, and MP (in addition to the unit's proper name, which changes with level)
The Recycle Portal has been redone; it’s now animated and 3D instead of a static 2D image
The out-of-the-box intro has been revised to have less text so new players aren’t overwhelmed. (They’ll still be overwhelmed, but hopefully not by this text specifically).
Most models now have a 2nd auto-attack animation (but they’re not that different)
Ranged attackers now properly fire their projectiles from their bows, guns, hands, etc
If you view your team between fights, you’ll see that they’re no longer hovering in the air; they now stand on a solid slab of stone.
Various SFX tweaks, including “light-elemental” damage
Various VFX tweaks, including:
Vulkathuna spell skybox art
Light tier 2 and 3 AoE shockwaves
Soulsteed graft (“Turn your soul into a horse”)
“Psychic beams” to represent attacks from melee units with increased range. For example, if a guy with an axe gets his range boosted somehow, and he’s swinging his axe at thin air to damage his distant target, the axe now shoots a beam at the target to represent the damage.
Bug Fixes
Fixed a bug that would sometimes cause a crash when leveling up an equipped unit
Fixed a bug where Anemone Tree would stop casting for the rest of the fight after getting stunned
Color-changing effects on models are less likely to cause flickering
Tiers 2 and 3 of the Light Trait now work as intended
Mantle of Servitude now works as intended
Washing Machine’s Descend now works as intended
What’s next?
I’ll probably make a second post about this, but in the meantime, here’s this:
We want to go into Early Access around the end of October (no specific date for that yet). At that point, we’ll start charging for our game; right now, the whole thing is available for free. So, we’ll need to limit the demo to only a portion of the content (probably just Map 1) before the EA release.
We’re also polishing things up and fixing bugs along the way.
I know—new content like Trinkets and Ruins are the most exciting updates, but the brunt of those will be implemented after EA (see the “Early Access” section on our store page for a list of stuff that we want to do between EA and the full release). Of course, we may get bored of bug-fixing and put in some new content here and there…
Stay tuned for more updates. Good luck on your runs.
-John from Hat Wobble Games