Hey everyone,
We're back with our thirtieth update, 'Enter the Panchaku'!
To celebrate this milestone of 30 updates, we're releasing 30 NFTs that unlock exclusive content in the game. The release date for these is never, because we're not touching that stuff. Gotcha...
Here's the TLDR of the update:
- panchaku and new 'flame head' Bobby outfit
- rebalancing on weapons & items
- rework of legendaries system
- Soul Knight weapon and outfit
- pet your pets
- roadmap and Evil Empire/Motion Twin priorities
We've made a little trailer to go along with the update:
And here's a VLOG for people who don't like to read!
Finally, the full patchnotes are here as usual.
Let's get into it!
Panchaku & Bobby outfit
After numerous requests following the animated Bad Seed trailer, we're finally adding the panchaku to Dead Cells, with a new outfit inspired by Bobby Pills' trailers.
We already had a 'Bobby' skin, but now the iconic pink flame head is here to make it complete. You can stop pestering us now, or just move onto the next shiny thing you reprobates want.
Sorry for the potato quality, the 5MB limit on Steam just kills my gifs
The panchaku is simply two frying pans tied together with a piece of string, which crits on enemies facing you and has a slick combo with hits behind and all around you.
It can also reflect bombs and projectiles in the middle of the combo. So a slight upgrade on the Vorpan...
Item reworks
It's been a while since our last major rebalance of weapons, with the 'What's the Damage?' update releasing over a year ago. Since then we've had new items and mutations from the 'Everyone is Here' and the 'Break the Bank' updates, plus 'The Queen and the Sea' DLC, so there's a few imbalances here and there.
So, we're making changes to 29 weapons and skills (and a mutation!) to rebalance the item pool.
Why do we do rebalancing? This isn't a multiplayer game after all...
Well, we need to do this to keep the variety element strong - a good roguelite should offer you difficult choices. If you're going to take the same 2 or 3 weapons every time because they're OP, then you're going to get bored very quickly. And we don't want you to get bored of Dead Cells!
That's why we need to bring items to the same power level (or as close as possible) to encourage players to explore and use more of the item pool.
Here's the buffs & nerfs:
Buffs:
- Hard Light Sword and Pistol: slight damage buff to the sword and attack speed buff to the pistol
- Hokuto's Bow: damage bonus buffed
- Queen's Rapier: the delayed slice hits sooner
- Maw of the Deep: attack speed buff
- Wrecking Ball: first and last attack are faster + greatly reduced lock on Wrecking Ball's third and fourth attacks
- Leghugger: now jumps on a nearby target before launching its reactivation attack + keeps its growth state across instances of the object in a run
- Killing Deck: damage buff on the first 2 attacks
- Hand Hook: now also crits when the thrown enemy hits another entity + removed the first hit + greatly reduced the lock of the last attack.
- Greed Shield: can now trigger once per enemy every 10 seconds + damage buff
- Frantic Sword: crit multiplier is now inversely proportional to your life (when at or under 50% max life)
- Abyssal Trident: slight damage buff
- Shrapnel Axes: slight damage buff
- Pollo Power: now fires 1 more egg + damage buff
- Crowbar: now also crits on beast enemies (hand-picked, think "non-humanoid, non-mechanic")
- Lightning Bolt: now crits one tick earlier and damages you 1 tick later
- Spiked Shield: crit damage buff
- Cudgel: Bullets parried will now stun enemies as well.
- Gilded Yumi rework: - Reduced the ammo count to 2. - Now has a 2-hit combo, which shoots the second arrow faster. - Is now considered to be a Heavy Weapon. - Increased the overall weapon speed. - Increased the base damage, reduced the crit multiplier. - Damage no longer gets split between hit enemies. - Arrows now pierce all enemies. - Bosses get dragged by the arrow more. - Reduced the arrow's speed. - No longer stuns in an AoE on hit. - Can't roll ammo or pierce affixes anymore.
Nerfs:
- Smoke Bomb: scaling heavily nerfed (it was following the same formula as the stats)
- Grappling Hook: same as Smoke Bomb
- Boy's Axe: damage nerf + can't roll the Extra Ammo affix + can't be affected by Ammo mutation
- Bladed Tonfas: slight crit multiplier nerf
- Lacerating Aura: cooldown now starts at the end of the effect instead of starting at cast
- Maw of the Deep: its root is now less effective on bosses
- Crusher: its slow is now less effective on bosses
- Hunter's Grenade: no longer provides stats
- Rapier: damage nerf
- Sonic Carbine: damage nerf
- Hokuto's Bow: procs less often
- Barbed Tips: damage of each stack is reduced the more arrows there are in the enemy. 1 arrow = 40dmg, 2 arrows = 74dmg, 3 arrows = 104dmg, etc.
Legendary item change
Moving on to the legendary item change, which we’ve wanted to do for a while. For those who don’t know, legendary items are the gold-coloured items.
In the old system, their damage would scale off your two highest stats (Brutality, Tactics and Survival), which wasn’t intuitive with the stats system. Your average player usually just spread points between the off-colour stats to gain maximum health.
As the legendaries power was affected by your two highest stats, it meant that you would need to put points on only one of the stats that you weren't using to get maximum damage from legendaries.
Basically the whole thing wasn’t very clear.
It was also just not very interesting – the only thing that legendaries gave you was more damage, that was it. More damage is always good, but we wanted to make it better!
So to replace the old system, we're introducing legendary affixes (affixes are the tasty extra powers you get on items, like 60% damage to a bleeding enemy).
All the legendary affixes have been specifically added to certain weapons so that they each have a synergy with their item's gameplay. This way, they'll be making legendaries stronger than your typical weapon version by adding an extra, complimentary gameplay element instead of just upping the damage.
We've created a few brand new affixes as well as using some existing ones. There are a lot of legendary affixes in this list, so if you don't really care about specifics you should just scroll past!
Melee Weapons
- Balanced Blade: Run Speed on Crit
- Spite Sword: Poison Skin Area
- Assassin’s Dagger: Mega Crit
- Blood Sword: Double Stack
- Twin Daggers: Run Speed on Crit
- Broadsword: Global Shield on Kill
- Shovel: Better Secrets
- Cursed Sword: True Evil
- Sadist's Stiletto: Super Back Damage
- Swift Sword: Run Speed on Kill
- Giant Killer: God Slayer
- Shrapnel Axes: Fire Bullet
- Seismic Strike: Death Root
- War Spear: Run Speed on Crit
- Impaler: Super Back Damage
- Symmetrical Lance: Quad Damage Free & Ignore Global Shields
- Rapier: Run Speed on Crit
- Meat Skewer: Super Back Damage
- Nutcracker: Death Root
- Spartan Sandals: Fire Feet
- Spiked Boots: Run Speed on Crit
- Hayabusa Boots: Super Back Damage
- Hayabusa Gauntlets: Mega Crit
- Valmont's Whip: Mega Crit
- Wrenching Whip: Bleed on Hit
- Oiled Sword: Poison on Hit
- Torch: Double Stack
- Frantic Sword: Heal Mid Life
- Flawless: Run Speed on Crit
- Flint: Fire on Hit
- Flawless: Run Speed on Crit
- Tentacle: Poison on Hit
- Vorpan: Fire on Hit
- Flashing Fans: Bleed on Hit
- Scythe Claw: Death Root
- Rhythm n’ Bouzouki: Fire on Hit
- Crowbar: Super Back Damage
- Snake Fangs: Double Stack
- Iron Staff: Frost Shield
- Ferryman's Lantern (Melee): Fire on Hit
- Hattori's Katana: Mega Crit
- Explosive Crossbow (Melee): Death Freeze
- Tombstone: Cascading Tomb
- Oven Axe: Run Speed on Crit
- Toothpick: Heavy Stun
- Toothpick (Broken): Rebuild on Kill
- Machete and Pistol: Bleed on Hit
- Hard Light Sword (Sword): Mega Crit
- Pure Nail: Death Worm
- Bone: Run Speed on Crit
- Abyssal Trident: Run Speed on Crit
- Hand Hook: Bleed on Hit
- Maw of the Deep: Triple Bullets
- Bladed Tonfas: Run Speed on Kill
- Wrecking Ball: Speed Ball
- Queen's Rapier: Super Slice
- Dagger of Profit: Run Speed on Crit
- Gold Digger: Heavy Stun
- Panchaku: Fire on Hit
Ranged Weapons
- Multiple-nocks Bow: Double Bullets
- Bow and Endless Quiver: Poison on Hit
- Marksman's Bow: Heavy Stun
- Sonic Carbine: Poison Bullet
- Infantry Bow: Bleed on Hit
- Quick Bow: Mega Crit
- Ice Bow: Strong Ice
- Heavy Crossbow: Super Pierce
- Heavy Crossbow (Reload): Global Shield on Use
- Repeater Crossbow: Super Pierce
- Repeater Crossbow (Quiver of Bolts): Pierce
- Ice Crossbow: Strong Ice
- Ice Crossbow (Piercing Shot): Death Freeze
- Explosive Crossbow: Super Pierce
- Alchemic Carbine: Double Stack
- Boomerang: Extra Ammo Few
- Hemorrhage: Bleed Propagation
- The Boy’s Axe: Extra Ammo Few
- War Javelin: Fire Bullet
- Hokuto’s Bow: Super Pierce
- Nerves of Steel: Mega Crit
- Throwing Knife: Bleed Propagation
- Electric Whip: Super Back Damage
- Firebrands: Double Stack
- Ice Shards: Death Freeze
- Pyrotechnics: Double Stack
- Lightning Bolt: Global Shield on Kill
- Fire Blast: Global Shield on Use
- Frost Blast: Strong Ice
- Magic Missiles: Super Pierce
- Blowgun: Poison Cloud on Hit
- Barrel Launcher: Death Fire
- Ferryman’s Lantern (Soul Shot): Fire Bullet
- Hard Light Gun: Double Stack
- Killing Deck: Bleed on Hit
- Gilded Yumi: Fire Bullet
- Money Shooter: Super Pierce
- Magic Bow: Double Bullets
Shields
- Front Line Shield: Counter Attack
- Cudgel: Long Stun
- Punishment: Death Freeze
- Knockback Shield: Death Root
- Rampart: Frost Shield
- Assault Shield: Heavy Stun
- Bloodthirsty Shield: Double Stack
- Greed Shield: Gold Damage Buff
- Spiked Shield: Mega Crit
- Parry Shield: Stun Shield
- Force Shield: Frost Shield
- Thunder Shield: Poison Shield
- Ice Shield: Strong Ice
Deployable Traps
- Double Crossb-o-matic: Super Pierce
- Sinew Slicer: Bleed Propagation
- Heavy Turret: Super Pierce
- Barnacle: Poison Bullet
- Flamethrower Turret: Double Stack
- Cleaver: Double Stack
- Wolf Trap: Ice on Stop
- Crusher: Ice on Stop
- Explosive Decoy: Run Speed on Kill
- Emergency Door: Deployed Dmg
- Tesla Coil: Oil and Fire on Destroy
- Scavenged Bombard: Double Speed
Grenades
- Powerful Grenade: Bigger Explosion
- Infantry Grenade: Oil
- Cluster Grenade: Echo
- Magnetic Grenade: Echo
- Stun Grenade: Long Stun
- Ice Grenade: Strong Ice
- Fire Grenade: Bigger Explosion
- Root Grenade: Death Root
- Oil Grenade: Death Fire
- Swarm Grenade: Poison on Hit (yes, it applies to the biters’ attacks)
Powers
- Death Orb: Double Speed
- Tornado: Double Speed
- Knife Dance: Bleed Poison
- Corrupted Power: Global Shield on Use
- Vampirism: Oil and Fire on Use
- Tonic: Extended Duration
- Grappling Hook: Fire on Use
- Phaser: Poison on use
- Corrosive Cloud: Double Stack
- Lacerating Aura: Bleed on Hit
- Wave of Denial: Oil and Fire on Use
- Wings of the Crow: Global Shield on Use
- Great Owl of War: Super Pierce
- Lightspeed: Global Shield on Use
- Giant Whistle: Echo
- Telluric Shock: Global Shield on Kill
- : Run Speed on Kill
- Smoke Bomb: Run Speed on Use
- Mushroom Boi!: Poison Cloud on Hit
- Lightning Rods: Fire on Stop
- Scarecrow Sickles: Double Bullets
- Ice Armor: White Walker
- Serenade: Durability Up
- Cocoon: Frost Shield
- Face Flask: Oil and Fire on Use
- Pollo Power: Death Worm
- Leghugger: Bleed on Hit
Legendaries will always roll their legendary affix and they cannot be removed, rerolled or replaced.
Also just to be clear, we've removed the double stat scaling system, although legendaries will remain colorless in terms of scaling, which means that they scale off whichever of your stats has the highest value.
More legendary affixes will be coming in future updates, so keep your eyes peeled.
Oh and we're also adding an option in Custom Mode to allow 'legendary-only' runs:
Look at all that gooooold!
Soul Knight content
We're also introducing content from Soul Knight, another roguelite that already has Dead Cells content in it, so we're returning the favour!
The Magic Bow fires 5 slow-moving arrows, which make up for their lack of speed by homing in to their nearest enemy. Each arrow that successively hits the same enemy does more damage to that enemy.
The Knight outfit adds the pint-sized adventurer and his oversized head as an option.
Pet the pet
The last bit of content we're adding is letting you pet the pets.
In transitions between biomes you just need to long press the interact button to show some love to your latest companion. You won't get any benefit from this, it's just something fun for us to add. I mean why wouldn't we add this!
Unfortunately the owl was too awkward to code this for, so it will never know the loving touch of the Beheaded...
Other additions
- Reworked the Outfit Selection UI. It is now a grid displaying the icons of all the unlocked outfits, as well as an in-game preview.
- Added Teleportation Monoliths before the exits leading to Forgotten Sepulcher.
- Added an exit to Clock Tower in Graveyard, for cases where the player would get softlocked otherwise.
- In Ramparts, prevented the exit leading to Conjunctivius from being locked behind a Breakable Ground.
- In Prisoners' Quarters, if the player has the Spider Rune but not the Vine Rune, the passage to the Sewers door will now use a specific room. Yes, this is a very specific change, don't ask about it.
- Weapons' icons on the HUD now fade away when their controls are locked.
- Uniformized the different speed bonus feedbacks.
- Made double tap input option for Dive Attack more reliable and consistent.
- Talisman DoT Affixes now scale based on the highest tier stat, instead of the tier average.
- Gold Gorgers now can't attack or teleport to the player if they didn't see the player at least once.
Bug fixes
- Fixed Corrosive Cloud not triggering the Bleed Propagation affix.
- Fixed Serenade sometimes losing its affixes on use.
- Fixed Explosive Barrels not updating properly when not on screen.
- Disabled gravity when picking up a scroll, to prevent a softlock when falling offscreen.
- Fixed tier icons not displaying properly on colorless items.
- Fixed the Bank Pop-up and the 1BC Pop-up overlapping.
- Corrosive Cloud now correctly displays its synergy with Bleed.
- Fixed the Cherry on the Cake bombs not dealing any damage to the player.
- Added the missing world map transition of Distillery -> Lighthouse.
- Fixed Conjunctivius sometimes shooting projectiles during the death animation.
- Fixed the Hunter's Grenade not spawning back when thrown off a cliff, or when an enemy converted to elite fell of a cliff.
- Fixed a crash when picking up an amulet with the Homunculus Rune in the Daily Challenge.
- Fixed Mushroom Boi getting stuck in the dash animation after triggering the explosion.
- Fixed Mutineers' melee attack not having the attack warning.
- Fixed Invisibility not affecting the player's head or scarf.
- Fixed Armored Shrimps moving while frozen.
- Fixed the player getting stuck off-screen in some specific situations.
- Fixed pets sometimes dying for no apparent reasons
- Fixed the Leghugger not teleporting back to the player when too far away.
- Fixed minimap refresh hiding part of the maps revealed by Explorer's Instinct.
- Fixed Scrolls on the minimap not displaying their Stat icon, when triggering Explorer's Instincts.
- Fixed mutations going higher and higher on the HUD every time the player changes the "place backpack next to weapons" option.
- Fixed Queen sometimes getting stuck on the "Reality Slices" phase.
- Fixed some powers and effects not working properly after going through a ZDoor, as well as their visual disappearing: - Ice Armor's sprite. - Cell Bonus FX. - Lacerating Aura FX. - Wings of the Crow FX.
- Fixed elite Gold Gorgers using Elite Skills when transformed by the Hunter's Grenade.
- Fixed Barbed Tips damage multiplier being applied one stack too early.
- Fixed Two-Handed Weapons not properly generating their legendary affix.
- Fixed the way DoT Effects damage scale was calculated, leading to some of them dealing less damage than intended.
- Fixed Custom Heads being on the wrong layer after the player was thrown by the Queen.
- Fixed DPS display on weapons not working properly with damage multipliers.
- Fixed DPS display for the Bone.
- Fixed options text getting out of the frame when opened on the main menu.
Roadmap
In case you missed our post the other week, we released the roadmap below. The basic idea is that we'll continue to add Dead Cells content into 2023 & beyond, and 2023 will be our biggest year since v1.0 was released!
This also raised the question of whether there'll ever be any new games coming out. Dead Cells keeps getting new content so we can't be working on anything else, right?
Well, we are.
Motion Twin, the creators of Dead Cells, have not been working on Dead Cells for years. Although they do retain creative control over Dead Cells and have final approval on every addition Evil Empire makes to the game.
Evil Empire is a separate studio made of ex-Motion Twin developers & some new blood, and we took over development of Dead Cells in 2019.
Motion Twin have been working on their next project since then, but we all still work in the same office so it's a close relationship. Evil Empire are also working on our own projects too, but Dead Cells remains the priority for us.
Essentially, don't worry, new games are coming!
Finally, if anyone is going to PAX West in September we'll be there to show off a sneak preview of the upcoming Boss Rush update.
Have a good one and we'll be back soon with news on the Boss Rush update!
Cheers,
Matt, EE & MT
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