Here are the notes for Hotfix 13.4!

• Damage Over Time Min/Max increased from 60/100 -> 80/120
  
• Damage Over Time Duration Min increased from 3/8 -> 4/8
  
• Slow Min increased from 30/60 -> 40/60
  
• Range fixed to 2500 on all drops
  
• Angle Max increased from 30/50 -> 30/90

• Tavern dummies will now include the Bling-O-Midas Damage Over Time in DPS numbers.
  
• Combining the Oiling Strikes Sphere with the Flameburst Tower will now properly ignite enemies.
  
• Fixed an issue where Golden Witherbeasts continued to spawn after the end of a match.
  
• Fixed an issue where Golden Crystals could be delivered to the Kobold King during Build Phase.
  
• The Squire’s Training Dummy will now properly spin when attacked by enemies.
  
• The Abyss Lord’s right click will now properly spin the Squire’s Training Dummy.
  
• Added a new What’s New screen.
  
• Adjusted the VFX of the Bling-O-Midas bow.
  
• Reduced the frequency of the slot machine SFX on the Bling-O-Midas.
  
• Updated the Bling King Incursion tooltip text.
  
• Changed the in-game name of the bow from “Bling Bow” to “Bling-O-Midas.”

• The Charged Primary Sphere does not currently work with the Bling-O-Midas bow.
  
• Poison Tips pet ability does not currently work with the Bling-O-Midas bow.
  
• Press Your Luck and Panic Fire Spheres currently work for EV2’s Proton Beam when they should not.
  
• The Amped Up Passive is currently decreasing the attack speed of the Lightning Aura and the Lightning Strikes Aura.

Here are the notes for Hotfix 13.4!

• Damage Over Time Min/Max increased from 60/100 -> 80/120
  
• Damage Over Time Duration Min increased from 3/8 -> 4/8
  
• Slow Min increased from 30/60 -> 40/60
  
• Range fixed to 2500 on all drops
  
• Angle Max increased from 30/50 -> 30/90

• Tavern dummies will now include the Bling-O-Midas Damage Over Time in DPS numbers.
  
• Combining the Oiling Strikes Sphere with the Flameburst Tower will now properly ignite enemies.
  
• Fixed an issue where Golden Witherbeasts continued to spawn after the end of a match.
  
• Fixed an issue where Golden Crystals could be delivered to the Kobold King during Build Phase.
  
• The Squire’s Training Dummy will now properly spin when attacked by enemies.
  
• The Abyss Lord’s right click will now properly spin the Squire’s Training Dummy.
  
• Added a new What’s New screen.
  
• Adjusted the VFX of the Bling-O-Midas bow.
  
• Reduced the frequency of the slot machine SFX on the Bling-O-Midas.
  
• Updated the Bling King Incursion tooltip text.
  
• Changed the in-game name of the bow from “Bling Bow” to “Bling-O-Midas.”

• The Charged Primary Sphere does not currently work with the Bling-O-Midas bow.
  
• Poison Tips pet ability does not currently work with the Bling-O-Midas bow.
  
• Press Your Luck and Panic Fire Spheres currently work for EV2’s Proton Beam when they should not.
  
• The Amped Up Passive is currently decreasing the attack speed of the Lightning Aura and the Lightning Strikes Aura.

We’ve just released the Bling King Update on PC! Among the many new items in the update, like a new Incursion and a new Bonus Mission system, there’s a golden Huntress bow ripe for farming: the Bling-O-Midas. The Bling-O-Midas is the love child of a gold-spewing flamethrower and a one-armed bandit -- a glitzy casino nightmare. But the rolls favor the house right now, so we’re working on a hotfix to make the Bling sing.

The focus of the bow is its Secondary Attack, particularly its Damage Over Time and Slow effects. We’re increasing the DoT damage and duration so the DoT will hit harder and last longer. We’re increasing the minimum value of the Slow effect so the lowest rolls will still have a strong slowing impact. These changes take the bow roll from “below average to great” to “good to amazing.” We’re also adding DoT tracking to training dummies so you can shower them in golden DPS numbers.

Coming up next: The Buried Bastille update in late June. More details soon.

While the rest of the team is finishing up the Gun Witch, I’m working ahead on the Lavamancer. Here are some .gifs of the Lavamancer running n’ falling n’ stuff:







Updates. Calling All Heroes is out the door for PS4 (POET!) and I’m hoping that you are all enjoying the Abyss Lord and our new UIs amongst the numerous technical issues we’re encountering. Fear not, though, because relief is on the way. We are working through several tricky issues and are hoping to get a hotfix out to you early next week. This hotfix will contain:

• Crash fixes
  
• Improved UI performance and stability
  
• Skeleton costumes (once more with feeling and for good this time!)
  
• Some Split-Screen UI cleanup

PC side, The Bling King Update went out earlier this week after a herculean effort on a number of people’s parts and hopefully you’re all stomping the Bling King and crushing your enemies with a midas touch. From a stability standpoint, we recognize that this update has been a little rocky, but we hope you’re enjoying all the new content we’re releasing and rest assured that we’re not letting these rough edges go unsmoothed.

Working on the new level. It's still very WIP and there is a long way to go yet, but we are making some good progress.

As I promised, here's a pic of the level.



Working on the new remake level. Having a lot of fun with the new theme! Especially building the pirate ship.

Now it's time for some shots! Can you guess which remake we’re working on? It might be a bit hard to guess.





Now that the Bling King has arrived in Little-Horn Valley, I’m starting work on the NEXT Incursion. Taking all the feedback from this and previous Incursions to make this one better.

This week is split up into a few things:

Gun Witch VFX are kicking off this week. The design team is tweaking her abilities to be fun to use before the VFX are applied, meaning I can work on enhancing stuff instead of making the VFX the main ‘wow’ factor.

Adding some extra details to the Buried Bastille such as fire flicker for the torch lights.



Currently Listening To: Dan Deacon - "When I Was Done Dying"

This week is all about adding a bit more polish to the Midas bow. We realized it didn’t quite have the oomph we were looking for, so now we’re oomphing it up some.

This week I’ll also be working on adding a Defender Medal breakdown on the Summary Screen. That way you can see where your Defender Medals are coming from (i.e. from the map itself, Daily Missions, etc.).

Also, continuing providing support to Brys on the Game Browser!

The Kobold King proved to be a tougher fight than any of us expected. Up until the final hour, the RQA and RPG folks fought bravely. Whilst the dust and echoes fade, our brave community teams take up arms once again to fight the battles ahead.

We’ve just released the Bling King Update on PC! Among the many new items in the update, like a new Incursion and a new Bonus Mission system, there’s a golden Huntress bow ripe for farming: the Bling-O-Midas. The Bling-O-Midas is the love child of a gold-spewing flamethrower and a one-armed bandit -- a glitzy casino nightmare. But the rolls favor the house right now, so we’re working on a hotfix to make the Bling sing.

The focus of the bow is its Secondary Attack, particularly its Damage Over Time and Slow effects. We’re increasing the DoT damage and duration so the DoT will hit harder and last longer. We’re increasing the minimum value of the Slow effect so the lowest rolls will still have a strong slowing impact. These changes take the bow roll from “below average to great” to “good to amazing.” We’re also adding DoT tracking to training dummies so you can shower them in golden DPS numbers.

Coming up next: The Buried Bastille update in late June. More details soon.

While the rest of the team is finishing up the Gun Witch, I’m working ahead on the Lavamancer. Here are some .gifs of the Lavamancer running n’ falling n’ stuff:







Updates. Calling All Heroes is out the door for PS4 (POET!) and I’m hoping that you are all enjoying the Abyss Lord and our new UIs amongst the numerous technical issues we’re encountering. Fear not, though, because relief is on the way. We are working through several tricky issues and are hoping to get a hotfix out to you early next week. This hotfix will contain:

• Crash fixes
  
• Improved UI performance and stability
  
• Skeleton costumes (once more with feeling and for good this time!)
  
• Some Split-Screen UI cleanup

PC side, The Bling King Update went out earlier this week after a herculean effort on a number of people’s parts and hopefully you’re all stomping the Bling King and crushing your enemies with a midas touch. From a stability standpoint, we recognize that this update has been a little rocky, but we hope you’re enjoying all the new content we’re releasing and rest assured that we’re not letting these rough edges go unsmoothed.

Working on the new level. It's still very WIP and there is a long way to go yet, but we are making some good progress.

As I promised, here's a pic of the level.



Working on the new remake level. Having a lot of fun with the new theme! Especially building the pirate ship.

Now it's time for some shots! Can you guess which remake we’re working on? It might be a bit hard to guess.





Now that the Bling King has arrived in Little-Horn Valley, I’m starting work on the NEXT Incursion. Taking all the feedback from this and previous Incursions to make this one better.

This week is split up into a few things:

Gun Witch VFX are kicking off this week. The design team is tweaking her abilities to be fun to use before the VFX are applied, meaning I can work on enhancing stuff instead of making the VFX the main ‘wow’ factor.

Adding some extra details to the Buried Bastille such as fire flicker for the torch lights.



Currently Listening To: Dan Deacon - "When I Was Done Dying"

This week is all about adding a bit more polish to the Midas bow. We realized it didn’t quite have the oomph we were looking for, so now we’re oomphing it up some.

This week I’ll also be working on adding a Defender Medal breakdown on the Summary Screen. That way you can see where your Defender Medals are coming from (i.e. from the map itself, Daily Missions, etc.).

Also, continuing providing support to Brys on the Game Browser!

The Kobold King proved to be a tougher fight than any of us expected. Up until the final hour, the RQA and RPG folks fought bravely. Whilst the dust and echoes fade, our brave community teams take up arms once again to fight the battles ahead.

The Bling King Update is available now! Here are the patch notes:

• The Bling King Incursion on Little-Horn Valley:
  
  • The Kobold King is extorting Little-Horn Valley, and it’s up to you to meet his demands for gold or he’ll destroy the Inn!
• New Huntress Weapon, Bling-O-Midas:
  
  • This iPWR 750 bow drops exclusively on the Bling King Incursion. This weapon slows enemies and turns them into gold!
• iPWR 750 Gloves:
  
  • Similar to the Spectral Knight Incursion, an up-to iPWR 750 loot piece will drop from the Victory Chest!
• Bonus Missions:
  
  • As part of our effort to increase the earn rate of Medals, Monthly Missions have become Bonus Missions. Get a new Bonus Mission every week. Bonus Missions are completable in 1-2 play sessions and give more Medals per playtime than our previous Monthly Missions.
  • This week’s Bonus Mission: Win the Bling King Incursion!
• EV2 Medal Cost Reduction:
  
  • Series EV2 is now 10,000 medals!
• New Abyss Lord Costume: the Depth Lord!
  
• Misc Changes:
  
  • Pause menu will now display the mode and difficulty of the current match.
    
  • Added Series EV2 bag icon for premium bags.
    
  • Changed the color of Series EV2's card back frame.

• The stat increases from EV2’s Buff Beam did not improve from Tier 2 to Tier 3 and from Tier 4 to Tier 5. Rescaled each tier from:
  
  • Tier 1: 1 to 1
    
  • Tier 2: 1.1 to 1.05
    
  • Tier 3: 1.1 to 1.1
    
  • Tier 4: 1.2 to 1.15
    
  • Tier 5: 1.2 to 1.2

• Fixed a crash when leaving a map as somebody else was loading in.
  
• Fixed a crash that happened when inspecting someone's deck and then clicking hero info/costume as someone else was loading into the session.
  
• Improved the loading time on the session list.
  
• Fixed an issue where some Ignite cases were not counting toward the Ignite Daily Mission.
  
• Fixed an issue where the Arcane Resilience and Null Void bonuses to health were being applied after the tower was placed, causing the tower to be damaged when it first spawned.
  
• Fixed an issue where selling EV2’s nodes while at maximum defense mana would not drop mana equal to the node cost.
  
• Fixed numerous collision issues related to EV2’s Death from Above ability. (Special thanks to @Lord_DaS for the thread!)
  
• Shardshot passive should correctly deal damage now.
  
• Fixed a VFX issue with the Mighty Fists and Smiting Fists passives.
  
• Series EV2 can now wear the Carnival masks.
  
• Tweaked the audio on EV2’s Heat Bar.

• The game can crash when transitioning out of a map after inspecting another person’s Hero Deck.
  
• The VFX for the Bling Bow doesn’t 100% match the width of its area of effect and the VFX of the enemies turning gold is not being properly applied to some enemies.
  
• Combining Oiling Strikes sphere with the Flameburst Tower does not ignite enemies.

The Bling King Update is available now! Here are the patch notes:

• The Bling King Incursion on Little-Horn Valley:
  
  • The Kobold King is extorting Little-Horn Valley, and it’s up to you to meet his demands for gold or he’ll destroy the Inn!
• New Huntress Weapon, Bling-O-Midas:
  
  • This iPWR 750 bow drops exclusively on the Bling King Incursion. This weapon slows enemies and turns them into gold!
• iPWR 750 Gloves:
  
  • Similar to the Spectral Knight Incursion, an up-to iPWR 750 loot piece will drop from the Victory Chest!
• Bonus Missions:
  
  • As part of our effort to increase the earn rate of Medals, Monthly Missions have become Bonus Missions. Get a new Bonus Mission every week. Bonus Missions are completable in 1-2 play sessions and give more Medals per playtime than our previous Monthly Missions.
  • This week’s Bonus Mission: Win the Bling King Incursion!
• EV2 Medal Cost Reduction:
  
  • Series EV2 is now 10,000 medals!
• New Abyss Lord Costume: the Depth Lord!
  
• Misc Changes:
  
  • Pause menu will now display the mode and difficulty of the current match.
    
  • Added Series EV2 bag icon for premium bags.
    
  • Changed the color of Series EV2's card back frame.

• The stat increases from EV2’s Buff Beam did not improve from Tier 2 to Tier 3 and from Tier 4 to Tier 5. Rescaled each tier from:
  
  • Tier 1: 1 to 1
    
  • Tier 2: 1.1 to 1.05
    
  • Tier 3: 1.1 to 1.1
    
  • Tier 4: 1.2 to 1.15
    
  • Tier 5: 1.2 to 1.2

• Fixed a crash when leaving a map as somebody else was loading in.
  
• Fixed a crash that happened when inspecting someone's deck and then clicking hero info/costume as someone else was loading into the session.
  
• Improved the loading time on the session list.
  
• Fixed an issue where some Ignite cases were not counting toward the Ignite Daily Mission.
  
• Fixed an issue where the Arcane Resilience and Null Void bonuses to health were being applied after the tower was placed, causing the tower to be damaged when it first spawned.
  
• Fixed an issue where selling EV2’s nodes while at maximum defense mana would not drop mana equal to the node cost.
  
• Fixed numerous collision issues related to EV2’s Death from Above ability. (Special thanks to @Lord_DaS for the thread!)
  
• Shardshot passive should correctly deal damage now.
  
• Fixed a VFX issue with the Mighty Fists and Smiting Fists passives.
  
• Series EV2 can now wear the Carnival masks.
  
• Tweaked the audio on EV2’s Heat Bar.

• The game can crash when transitioning out of a map after inspecting another person’s Hero Deck.
  
• The VFX for the Bling Bow doesn’t 100% match the width of its area of effect and the VFX of the enemies turning gold is not being properly applied to some enemies.
  
• Combining Oiling Strikes sphere with the Flameburst Tower does not ignite enemies.

This hotfix was originally planned to go out last week but encountered an issue at the last minute:

• Added a potential solution for the crash that occurs while inspecting other players' decks.
  
• Added a potential solution for the crash that occurs while moving to a new match, tavern or Heroes Marketplace.
  
• Includes the setup for our new June Weekend Events: 3x Medal Weekends! Every Weekend in June from Friday to Monday, get triple the amount of Defender Medals for Wave and Match completion. For those who login and play for a bit, this event will give more medals than our previous Mission Madness event!

Love,
The Trendy Team

This hotfix was originally planned to go out last week but encountered an issue at the last minute:

• Added a potential solution for the crash that occurs while inspecting other players' decks.
  
• Added a potential solution for the crash that occurs while moving to a new match, tavern or Heroes Marketplace.
  
• Includes the setup for our new June Weekend Events: 3x Medal Weekends! Every Weekend in June from Friday to Monday, get triple the amount of Defender Medals for Wave and Match completion. For those who login and play for a bit, this event will give more medals than our previous Mission Madness event!

Love,
The Trendy Team

We’re excited to announce our next two updates!

• June 7th: The Bling King Update
  
• Late June: The Buried Bastille Update

The Bling King Update includes:

• The Bling King Incursion: The Kobold King is extorting Little-Horn Valley, and it’s up to you to meet his demands for gold or he’ll destroy the Inn!
  
• New Huntress Weapon, Bling-O-Midas: This iPWR 750 bow drops exclusively on the Bling King Incursion. This weapon slows enemies and turns them into gold!
  
• Bonus Missions: As part of our effort to increase the earn rate of Medals, Monthly Missions are becoming Bonus Missions. Get a new Bonus Mission every week. Bonus Missions are completable in 1-2 play sessions and give more Medals per playtime than our previous Monthly Missions.
  
• iPWR 750 Gloves: Similar to the Spectral Knight Incursion, an iPWR 750 loot piece will drop from the Victory Chest!
  
• New Abyss Lord Costume: The Depth Lord!
  
• And other bug fixes and changes!

Learn more about The Bling King Update on our Devstream this Friday at 5PM EDT! We’ll have more details on The Buried Bastille Update soon. Stay tuned.

Also, beginning this weekend and running every weekend in June, we have a new Weekend Event: 3X Medal Weekends! Earn triple the amount of Defender Medals for every wave and match completion. This event will give more medals overall than our Mission Madness event for players who login and consistently play during the weekend.

Here’s what we’ve been working on this week:

The Monthly Mission is now Bonus Missions. We’re in the process of adding additional ways for you to earn larger pools of Defender Medals, and one of those is by shifting the previous Monthly Mission to a Bonus Mission. This gives us the flexibility to add these types of missions whenever we wish without irritating some antiquated calendar or the ghost of Pope Gregory the XIII. Our goal is to make these available for you once a week at a minimum and then shift them to something relevant to our current release like a new Incursion or updates to loot or enemies. We’re also shifting away from some of the more obscure requirements and back to simpler things that build up your Defender Medal pool.

Speaking of enemies, a few months ago, we challenged ourselves with trying to improve the core gameplay of Dungeon Defenders II, something we feel is way overdue, and especially now that the game is no longer just an ensemble cast of four default characters. We started by having Steve and Brett tackle this with no programming support. They developed some very interesting changes to how enemies behave, group, and a rock, paper, scissors method to some degree on how the towers work against those groups. We took this to extensive testing and soon realized that a lot more is needed to really reach our goal. The great part was with what they did, we got to play how that would feel for many weeks and that helped us start brainstorming a LOT of areas to make the game much cooler by focusing on depth. Here’s a snapshot of one of those sessions for fun.



Right now, Dan is tackling what we can do with enemies with a deeper dive into the menagerie (be sure and read his posting below.) The long-term plan goes beyond this but know that one of our big goals internally is to improve the core gameplay to be more fun, provide more tactical options for your Hero Deck, with harder challenges and greater rewards. A game like Dungeon Defenders II must provide fuel for the player-driven goals, and those goals must be never ending. Beyond more heroes, Incursions, and UI updates, know that we are working towards big picture goals, too!


Did you know we had 60 enemies? Even if I remove some of the enemies we have not released yet, we still have more than 50 enemies in Dungeon Defenders II. As I’ve mentioned repeatedly, I’ve taken on the Strategic Revamp. Before I came up with answers, I wanted to make an investigation across the entire game. One thing I did recently was grab every single viable enemy in DD2 and put them in a test map. When I realized we actually had that many enemies but they all feel the same to fight, the answer became clear. I then took about half of them and redesigned their functionality. As an example, if you notice in the top right section, the Dark Mages have shields around them. What if the Dark Mages have a shield that neutralizes projectiles? They spawn in the middle of a squad and protect them from your defenses. This is where melee heroes can shine by charging in and taking those Dark Mages out so your defenses can deal with them! What if the shield also disabled nearby traps and auras?

I’ve done about 30 enemy redesigns so far, and the goal is to take each enemy and give it unique characteristics and integrity. If we succeed at doing this, we will then start designing squads of enemies! Higher Nightmare difficulties will combine enemies in much more difficult and challenging ways! Each squad then poses a unique encounter and challenge, and I hope that the game starts to feel a lot more entertaining and exciting. This is still a ways away and we are still figuring out if this is what we want to do but overall it is what I’m most excited about.



I am also trying to figure out what a mage would do with a Halberd. Leave your ideas in the comments below! Look at how sad that ghost is on the right… Isn’t he sad? Must have had a hard afterlife.

As I mentioned in my last Dev Log, I’ve been working on a thread that showcases our recent development and offers a look ahead to what’s next for the game. That post is now complete! You can check it out here.

This regularly updated post provides a look into the near-future of the game and a list of our recent updates. This is not a comprehensive roadmap but a look behind the veil into our current development. Of course, everything on it is subject and likely to change, but now there’s a one-stop shop to find out everything we’ve been talking about in our Dev Logs, Devstreams and other communication. I hope it’s helpful. If you have any feedback on this post, please let me know in the comments!

Got a solid test in on our latest Incursion. Thanks to some awesome feedback, we are making some pretty good changes to improve the experience as a whole. We are also moving forward on updating another map, and I can't wait to share the theme of this new map. :D

Finishing up the Depth Lord skin. Same old death, brand new VFX.



I’ve been spending a lot of time trying to (and successfully) fix crashes on the PS4 build that were related to UI.

Also continuing work on the Midas bow with Brian and Derek to make this thing awesome!

I’m also collaborating with Javahawk, Haddad, Phil, and others on how to improve inventory management. I think some good changes are going to be coming down the pipe real soon. Can’t wait to dig my hands into that!

A lot of hours have gone into PS4 since last week, and it looks like we’re going to be releasing Calling all Heroes on PS4 this coming Thursday! (Unless something awful happens.) There are some definite rough spots in the build, but rest assured that we’re already mobilizing to get an improved build out the door.

Live Team is working on weekend events and crashes. I know things have been a little crashy recently. We have a hotfix coming out on Thursday that should improve the stability of the game (hopefully) drastically. In the meantime, keep sending client logs, crash dumps (if you have them) and repro steps for crashes to support@trendyent.com so we can get to the bottom of the major remaining issues.

Since the Ice level is pretty much done, we are working on a new level this week! I can't say much more at this point but we are really excited about the theme of this level. It makes me feel like drinking some "Belize Rum Punch.”

Jokes aside, I'm looking forward to share some pics in the next Dev Log!

As already stated, we’re moving on to a new and really ‘fresh’ level. Really excited with the theme and visuals. Will have some pics for ya next week!

Oh and the level is another DD1 remake. Which one do you think?

I’m full swing on the Lavamancer currently. This guy is a beast and a half, and I can’t wait to see him shredding through goblins and orcs with fire and lava.

I also find myself returning to the Gun Witch every other day to make tweaks and small changes as we build her in-engine. She has been, easily, one of my favorite things to work on in a very long time.

We’re helping work out the kinks in the latest Incursion. Whilst it’s still shaping up, the experience so far has been quite been golden. Showers of bugs have gone through in a cleaning of the house for older bugs as we anticipate the need to make room the bugs of the near future.

A big, huge thanks to my wife, Ellen. After eleven or so years, we finally tied the knot, and I just wanted to thank her for putting up with me for so long and lovingly tolerating the obscene amount of Dungeon Defenders that has invaded our living room over the past few years.

We’re excited to announce our next two updates!

• June 7th: The Bling King Update
  
• Late June: The Buried Bastille Update

The Bling King Update includes:

• The Bling King Incursion: The Kobold King is extorting Little-Horn Valley, and it’s up to you to meet his demands for gold or he’ll destroy the Inn!
  
• New Huntress Weapon, Bling-O-Midas: This iPWR 750 bow drops exclusively on the Bling King Incursion. This weapon slows enemies and turns them into gold!
  
• Bonus Missions: As part of our effort to increase the earn rate of Medals, Monthly Missions are becoming Bonus Missions. Get a new Bonus Mission every week. Bonus Missions are completable in 1-2 play sessions and give more Medals per playtime than our previous Monthly Missions.
  
• iPWR 750 Gloves: Similar to the Spectral Knight Incursion, an iPWR 750 loot piece will drop from the Victory Chest!
  
• New Abyss Lord Costume: The Depth Lord!
  
• And other bug fixes and changes!

Learn more about The Bling King Update on our Devstream this Friday at 5PM EDT! We’ll have more details on The Buried Bastille Update soon. Stay tuned.

Also, beginning this weekend and running every weekend in June, we have a new Weekend Event: 3X Medal Weekends! Earn triple the amount of Defender Medals for every wave and match completion. This event will give more medals overall than our Mission Madness event for players who login and consistently play during the weekend.

Here’s what we’ve been working on this week:

The Monthly Mission is now Bonus Missions. We’re in the process of adding additional ways for you to earn larger pools of Defender Medals, and one of those is by shifting the previous Monthly Mission to a Bonus Mission. This gives us the flexibility to add these types of missions whenever we wish without irritating some antiquated calendar or the ghost of Pope Gregory the XIII. Our goal is to make these available for you once a week at a minimum and then shift them to something relevant to our current release like a new Incursion or updates to loot or enemies. We’re also shifting away from some of the more obscure requirements and back to simpler things that build up your Defender Medal pool.

Speaking of enemies, a few months ago, we challenged ourselves with trying to improve the core gameplay of Dungeon Defenders II, something we feel is way overdue, and especially now that the game is no longer just an ensemble cast of four default characters. We started by having Steve and Brett tackle this with no programming support. They developed some very interesting changes to how enemies behave, group, and a rock, paper, scissors method to some degree on how the towers work against those groups. We took this to extensive testing and soon realized that a lot more is needed to really reach our goal. The great part was with what they did, we got to play how that would feel for many weeks and that helped us start brainstorming a LOT of areas to make the game much cooler by focusing on depth. Here’s a snapshot of one of those sessions for fun.



Right now, Dan is tackling what we can do with enemies with a deeper dive into the menagerie (be sure and read his posting below.) The long-term plan goes beyond this but know that one of our big goals internally is to improve the core gameplay to be more fun, provide more tactical options for your Hero Deck, with harder challenges and greater rewards. A game like Dungeon Defenders II must provide fuel for the player-driven goals, and those goals must be never ending. Beyond more heroes, Incursions, and UI updates, know that we are working towards big picture goals, too!


Did you know we had 60 enemies? Even if I remove some of the enemies we have not released yet, we still have more than 50 enemies in Dungeon Defenders II. As I’ve mentioned repeatedly, I’ve taken on the Strategic Revamp. Before I came up with answers, I wanted to make an investigation across the entire game. One thing I did recently was grab every single viable enemy in DD2 and put them in a test map. When I realized we actually had that many enemies but they all feel the same to fight, the answer became clear. I then took about half of them and redesigned their functionality. As an example, if you notice in the top right section, the Dark Mages have shields around them. What if the Dark Mages have a shield that neutralizes projectiles? They spawn in the middle of a squad and protect them from your defenses. This is where melee heroes can shine by charging in and taking those Dark Mages out so your defenses can deal with them! What if the shield also disabled nearby traps and auras?

I’ve done about 30 enemy redesigns so far, and the goal is to take each enemy and give it unique characteristics and integrity. If we succeed at doing this, we will then start designing squads of enemies! Higher Nightmare difficulties will combine enemies in much more difficult and challenging ways! Each squad then poses a unique encounter and challenge, and I hope that the game starts to feel a lot more entertaining and exciting. This is still a ways away and we are still figuring out if this is what we want to do but overall it is what I’m most excited about.



I am also trying to figure out what a mage would do with a Halberd. Leave your ideas in the comments below! Look at how sad that ghost is on the right… Isn’t he sad? Must have had a hard afterlife.

As I mentioned in my last Dev Log, I’ve been working on a thread that showcases our recent development and offers a look ahead to what’s next for the game. That post is now complete! You can check it out here.

This regularly updated post provides a look into the near-future of the game and a list of our recent updates. This is not a comprehensive roadmap but a look behind the veil into our current development. Of course, everything on it is subject and likely to change, but now there’s a one-stop shop to find out everything we’ve been talking about in our Dev Logs, Devstreams and other communication. I hope it’s helpful. If you have any feedback on this post, please let me know in the comments!

Got a solid test in on our latest Incursion. Thanks to some awesome feedback, we are making some pretty good changes to improve the experience as a whole. We are also moving forward on updating another map, and I can't wait to share the theme of this new map. :D

Finishing up the Depth Lord skin. Same old death, brand new VFX.



I’ve been spending a lot of time trying to (and successfully) fix crashes on the PS4 build that were related to UI.

Also continuing work on the Midas bow with Brian and Derek to make this thing awesome!

I’m also collaborating with Javahawk, Haddad, Phil, and others on how to improve inventory management. I think some good changes are going to be coming down the pipe real soon. Can’t wait to dig my hands into that!

A lot of hours have gone into PS4 since last week, and it looks like we’re going to be releasing Calling all Heroes on PS4 this coming Thursday! (Unless something awful happens.) There are some definite rough spots in the build, but rest assured that we’re already mobilizing to get an improved build out the door.

Live Team is working on weekend events and crashes. I know things have been a little crashy recently. We have a hotfix coming out on Thursday that should improve the stability of the game (hopefully) drastically. In the meantime, keep sending client logs, crash dumps (if you have them) and repro steps for crashes to support@trendyent.com so we can get to the bottom of the major remaining issues.

Since the Ice level is pretty much done, we are working on a new level this week! I can't say much more at this point but we are really excited about the theme of this level. It makes me feel like drinking some "Belize Rum Punch.”

Jokes aside, I'm looking forward to share some pics in the next Dev Log!

As already stated, we’re moving on to a new and really ‘fresh’ level. Really excited with the theme and visuals. Will have some pics for ya next week!

Oh and the level is another DD1 remake. Which one do you think?

I’m full swing on the Lavamancer currently. This guy is a beast and a half, and I can’t wait to see him shredding through goblins and orcs with fire and lava.

I also find myself returning to the Gun Witch every other day to make tweaks and small changes as we build her in-engine. She has been, easily, one of my favorite things to work on in a very long time.

We’re helping work out the kinks in the latest Incursion. Whilst it’s still shaping up, the experience so far has been quite been golden. Showers of bugs have gone through in a cleaning of the house for older bugs as we anticipate the need to make room the bugs of the near future.

A big, huge thanks to my wife, Ellen. After eleven or so years, we finally tied the knot, and I just wanted to thank her for putting up with me for so long and lovingly tolerating the obscene amount of Dungeon Defenders that has invaded our living room over the past few years.