Hello everyone!
A new major update is now available for Architect of War!
This time, there's a lot of new content to discover: a brand new inventory, many new Relics, several UI overhauls, new challenges, improvements to the Affix system, new options, and numerous gameplay and balance adjustments.
A Brand New Inventory
The inventory has been completely reworked to make it clearer, easier to use, and better at displaying important information about each turret.
Some of the improvements include:
A brand new Inventory interface.
Clearer display of turret experience and level progression.
Added the total number of Turrets and Items owned.
Improved stat and information displays.
Price reductions from Talents are now directly reflected in displayed prices.
Improved display of Leader Aptitudes.
Many New Relics
The Relic system is receiving one of its biggest expansions since launch.
Several new Global Relics have been added, allowing you to:
Increase the number of Relics offered during a selection.
Instantly deal damage to every enemy currently on the map.
Reduce the current difficulty level of your run.
Change the element of the player's attacks and benefit from bonuses associated with the selected element.
Automatically collect earned experience.
Remove Common Relics from future selections for the rest of the run.
But that's not all: many turrets now have new unique Relics capable of significantly changing how they work.
Some of their effects include:
Doom Grinder: Deals increased damage to enemies with low HP.
Mechanical Spark: Each bounce becomes progressively more powerful.
Pestilent Phylactery: Deals double damage when its attack hits only one target.
Quantum Cannon: Killing a target causes an explosion that damages nearby enemies.
Blood Reaper: Corrupted enemies leave behind a pool of blood when they die, damaging enemies that pass through it.
Energy Cannon: After going some time without attacking, its next attack deals double damage.
Fang of the Damned: Allows active Blood turrets to restore the player's HP.
Mechanical Miasma: Poisoned enemies become more vulnerable to Poison's lethal effects.
Nova Sentinel: Some attacks become overcharged, allowing them to knock down and stun their target.
Ballista: Deals increased damage to distant targets.
Stellar Artillery: Its projectiles can explode multiple times at the same location.
Arcane Nexus: Its attacks gain an additional bounce.
Twin Artillery: Regularly guarantees a critical hit.
Drone: Can now detach from its base, move around the turret, and hunt down enemies.
The Groundbreaker: Can generate multiple spikes that deal contact damage to enemies.
Steel Eye: Its damage now varies depending on its target's remaining HP.
Mine: Generates increased income during certain waves.
Living Forge: Defenders can now leave behind a bomb after their final collision, which explodes after a short delay.
Relic selections are also now better adapted to your team: Relics that cannot benefit your current composition will no longer be offered.
Improved Relic Selection
Several improvements have been made to the interface and overall usability:
New in-game Relic cards.
New icons for all Relics.
Improved Relics menu outside of runs.
You can now temporarily hide the Relic selection and reopen it later without losing the offered choices.
Added a button to claim all newly discovered Relics.
Improved the automatic reward claiming system.
Bonuses from a Relic that has not yet been obtained are now clearly greyed out.
The turret upgrade panel now shows whether a turret-specific Relic exists, what its effect is, and whether it has already been obtained during the current run.
The end-of-run Relic history now correctly keeps track of Relics obtained multiple times.
New Affix System
The Affix system now has a proper introduction when you first encounter it.
This introduction can also be viewed again later directly from the interface.
Several new Affix effects have also been added, including rules that can significantly change a run: construction or upgrade costs that vary depending on the wave, restrictions on Hero attacks or Relics, and even stronger Bosses.
Challenges & Achievements
The Challenge system continues to evolve as well.
Added 16 new Exploration Challenges, with one new challenge for each map.
New interface for map completion Achievements.
Added video previews to better showcase each map.
Added more information and tooltips for the different Challenges.
Challenges requiring a certain difficulty level have been rebalanced.
Objectives requiring Boss kills have been rebalanced.
The Spectator Challenge now allows turret upgrades: only turret construction and selling remain disabled.
Added Meta Achievements for the latest enemies introduced to the game.
Improved the display of Achievements completed during a run.
Chests & Items
Chest opening has received several improvements:
General improvements to the Chest Opening menu.
Improved reward summary.
New artwork for several Chest types.
During a x10 opening, a new button now allows you to open all Chests at once.
Increased the pickup radius for Chests and Gold Bags during runs.
The Item drop system has also been reworked.
Available Items now depend more heavily on the selected map and difficulty:
Easy: 4 Common Items + 2 Uncommon Items.
Medium: all of the above + 1 Rare Item.
Hard: all of the above + 1 Epic Item.
Improved Tutorial
Several improvements have been made to the Tutorial to better guide new players.
Added visual indicators for movement and camera zoom controls.
Certain features now remain clearly locked until they are introduced.
Improved the first Relic selection.
Several Tutorial interfaces and texts have been reworked.
Added new visual and audio feedback when an action is not yet available.
UI & Quality of Life
Many smaller improvements have been made to the interface:
Improved Map Selection.
Added additional information about Challenges.
Starting Gold bonuses provided by a Leader are now visible during Map Selection.
Improved the Main Menu.
Improved in-game notifications.
Important notifications can now remain visible while the in-game information panel is open.
Added map indicators when an Angel, Demon, or Merchant appears.
Added settings allowing you to choose which indicators are displayed in-game.
Added an option to enable or disable Hit Marks.
Several visibility adjustments have been made to enemy health bars.
Only enemies with a visible information bar now display received damage numbers.
In Windowed Mode, the game window can now be resized while maintaining a 16:9 aspect ratio.
Your camera zoom level is now preserved throughout the session.
The last visited area is now remembered to determine your spawn point the next time you launch the game.
Balance & Progression
Numerous balance adjustments are also included in this update:
Adjusted the stats of the Nova Sentinel.
Adjusted the price of Trap Turrets.
Adjusted the HP and Shield of Aegis the Bloodbound and Aegis Leblanc.
Adjusted starting Gold on Quadrivium and The Lost Gardens depending on difficulty.
Revised the difficulty cost of several Relics.
Reduced the Runeplate unlock cost from 300 to 200.
Revised the number of Items required to upgrade turret rarity.
Several improvements have been made to Leaders and the way their effects are displayed.
Fixes
This update also includes numerous fixes:
Free construction coupons now work correctly even if the player does not have enough Gold to pay the turret's normal price.
Fixed several issues related to summons and their spawn rate.
Fixed the Locker enemy.
Fixed several display issues in the Inventory and menus.
Fixed the end-of-run Relic history.
Fixed several translations and descriptions.
Fixed various issues related to rewards, victory sounds, and scene transitions.
Fixed several issues related to Achievements and Challenges.
Various stability, UI, and gameplay improvements.
This update brings together a lot of changes made over the past few weeks, with the goal of making progression more rewarding, builds more diverse, and the different interfaces more enjoyable to use.
Thank you again to everyone for your feedback, suggestions, and bug reports. They continue to have a direct impact on the development of Architect of War!
And as always, more new content is already in the works.