Storm’s a-brewin’ at Dragonfall Bazaar! While the storm rages, towers gain supercharged attack speed, instant upgrading and instant build time during Combat Phase, but the intensity causes towers to explode after a short time. Can you survive the storm?
Glaive of the Storms Monk Weapon
Ride the lightning with the Glaive of the Storms! The alternate attack lifts the Monk into the air and lets him ride in style on his own personal cloud. With the power of the cloud, the Monk can synergize and maximize his damage output for peak fiscal performance.
Uhh, we mean, become a lightning god! His cloud corvette drenches enemies that walk underneath it and periodically strikes them with lightning.
The main attack unleashes a powerful lightning attack!
Mark 3 Costume for Series EV2
Remember the days of dressing up like a Bounty Hunter? EV2 remembers.
Balance Changes
This update brings additional balance changes, including an Earthshatter buff, Skeletal Ramster buff, Skeletal Archer nerf and a Poison Dart Tower nerf.
And more!
Here's what we're working on this week:
Daniel Haddad, Design Director (Blacksmith)
I had something pretty cool planned for this week’s Dev Log but then I forgot what it was… I’m focused on getting the Monk’s new legendary weapon ready and doing some balance changes to the Ramster, Archers, and the Poison Dart Tower. After that, I’ll be working on the Lavamancer primarily. Also working on the enemy changes and future hero balance whenever I can. The enemy changes are going to take awhile to complete, but I’ll have more to show you soon.
Jesus Diaz, World Builder (N3oDoc)
This week I'm having some great fun working on the new level, a wild west themed one this time!
At this moment we are currently world building the city, which means creating all the big stuff like the buildings, walkways, terrain and the small props such as windows and doors. We are trying to have a lot of player-only paths for this level so expect to be able to walk along rooftops, jump from one roof to another and snipe enemies from there!
Daniel Diaz, World Builder (DanielKaMi)
Hey, Defenders! It's time to show you some details about the new level we're cooking now. This remake level will make DD2 feel like a western! You'll be able to enter into some buildings and explore around.
And here are some pics of stuff I've been working on:
What remake from DD1 do you think we’re bring back for building a western level? Not an easy question. (Hint: is not Aquanos.)
James Reid, Software Engineer (Driscan)
Working on fixing some bugs as well as iterating on the Game Browser. Phase 2 of the Game Browser is shaping up nicely! Can’t wait to get it into your hands!
Steven Collins, Lead Level Designer (Esorath)
Glad to see everyone Vroom Broom’in around! Challenge work continues on Molten Citadel, and I haven’t forgotten about secrets…
Josh Isom, Community Manager (iamisom)
Xenogenics posted a great thread on the forums about the state of the Official DD2 Wiki. In short, the wiki is wildly out of date and difficult to update. People are resorting to Google Docs to share information, which is just ridiculous.
So Ice and I are strapping up and diving in to fix the wiki. Our goal is to update the wiki with the most accurate information possible, make it easier for you to create edits and give you the tools to help keep it updated.
Storm’s a-brewin’ at Dragonfall Bazaar! While the storm rages, towers gain supercharged attack speed, instant upgrading and instant build time during Combat Phase, but the intensity causes towers to explode after a short time. Can you survive the storm?
Glaive of the Storms Monk Weapon
Ride the lightning with the Glaive of the Storms! The alternate attack lifts the Monk into the air and lets him ride in style on his own personal cloud. With the power of the cloud, the Monk can synergize and maximize his damage output for peak fiscal performance.
Uhh, we mean, become a lightning god! His cloud corvette drenches enemies that walk underneath it and periodically strikes them with lightning.
The main attack unleashes a powerful lightning attack!
Mark 3 Costume for Series EV2
Remember the days of dressing up like a Bounty Hunter? EV2 remembers.
Balance Changes
This update brings additional balance changes, including an Earthshatter buff, Skeletal Ramster buff, Skeletal Archer nerf and a Poison Dart Tower nerf.
And more!
Here's what we're working on this week:
Daniel Haddad, Design Director (Blacksmith)
I had something pretty cool planned for this week’s Dev Log but then I forgot what it was… I’m focused on getting the Monk’s new legendary weapon ready and doing some balance changes to the Ramster, Archers, and the Poison Dart Tower. After that, I’ll be working on the Lavamancer primarily. Also working on the enemy changes and future hero balance whenever I can. The enemy changes are going to take awhile to complete, but I’ll have more to show you soon.
Jesus Diaz, World Builder (N3oDoc)
This week I'm having some great fun working on the new level, a wild west themed one this time!
At this moment we are currently world building the city, which means creating all the big stuff like the buildings, walkways, terrain and the small props such as windows and doors. We are trying to have a lot of player-only paths for this level so expect to be able to walk along rooftops, jump from one roof to another and snipe enemies from there!
Daniel Diaz, World Builder (DanielKaMi)
Hey, Defenders! It's time to show you some details about the new level we're cooking now. This remake level will make DD2 feel like a western! You'll be able to enter into some buildings and explore around.
And here are some pics of stuff I've been working on:
What remake from DD1 do you think we’re bring back for building a western level? Not an easy question. (Hint: is not Aquanos.)
James Reid, Software Engineer (Driscan)
Working on fixing some bugs as well as iterating on the Game Browser. Phase 2 of the Game Browser is shaping up nicely! Can’t wait to get it into your hands!
Steven Collins, Lead Level Designer (Esorath)
Glad to see everyone Vroom Broom’in around! Challenge work continues on Molten Citadel, and I haven’t forgotten about secrets…
Josh Isom, Community Manager (iamisom)
Xenogenics posted a great thread on the forums about the state of the Official DD2 Wiki. In short, the wiki is wildly out of date and difficult to update. People are resorting to Google Docs to share information, which is just ridiculous.
So Ice and I are strapping up and diving in to fix the wiki. Our goal is to update the wiki with the most accurate information possible, make it easier for you to create edits and give you the tools to help keep it updated.
Hotfix 14.1 is now live. Here are the patch notes:
Browser Change
Updated the Suggested Item Power for all Nightmare IV difficulties to be 700. This should hopefully solve the issue where the browser would lock players out of creating NM4 maps.
Balance
Gloves of Storms and Ravenhost Projectile Update
Storm Gloves and Ravenhost Projectile now hit the correct number of targets. Previously, these could hit more targets than intended.
Projectile lifespan reduced from 10s to 5s.
Bound distance reduce to minimize excessive distance bouncing (3500 to 2500)
Gloves of Storms Balance Update
Hero Damage Ratio decreased from 150% Max to 25% Max
Proc Rate Max decreased from 2.5/s to 1.0/s
Maximum Bounces from decreased 8 to 4
Projectile now deals Storm damage (was Magic damage)
Developer Note: The Gloves of Storms were causing damage beyond what was intended. These changes should make this piece of the set advantageous and desirable to DPS players but more balanced.
Sky Dragon’s Fury (Betsy Polearm)
Fixed a bug where the Sky Dragon’s Fury mini-aura would continue to do damage after it despawned. Duration is now 10-15 seconds.
Developer Note: Our changes to the Betsy Polearm were having an unintended effect where the mini aura would remain after its expiration. This one is more of a bug fix, but since it affects balance, we added it here.
Bug Fixes
Fixed an issue where the Glove of Storms was not working on the Abyss Lord.
Fixed an issue where with some heroes the Glove of Storms projectiles were not originating from the heroes.
Fixed several server crashes related to joining matches.
Fixed an issue where items would occasionally all drop at iPWR 1.
Fixed an issue where the Red Spectral Knight would not get cleansed in the Spectral Knight Incursion.
Fixed an issue where the Storm Boot passive could appear on any item.
Fixed an issue where the Game Browser scroll bar would not reset back to the top when the list of games gets smaller based on filters. (It would appear as though there were no available games because the Browser would scrolled down past the list of available games.)
Hotfix 14.1 is now live. Here are the patch notes:
Browser Change
Updated the Suggested Item Power for all Nightmare IV difficulties to be 700. This should hopefully solve the issue where the browser would lock players out of creating NM4 maps.
Balance
Gloves of Storms and Ravenhost Projectile Update
Storm Gloves and Ravenhost Projectile now hit the correct number of targets. Previously, these could hit more targets than intended.
Projectile lifespan reduced from 10s to 5s.
Bound distance reduce to minimize excessive distance bouncing (3500 to 2500)
Gloves of Storms Balance Update
Hero Damage Ratio decreased from 150% Max to 25% Max
Proc Rate Max decreased from 2.5/s to 1.0/s
Maximum Bounces from decreased 8 to 4
Projectile now deals Storm damage (was Magic damage)
Developer Note: The Gloves of Storms were causing damage beyond what was intended. These changes should make this piece of the set advantageous and desirable to DPS players but more balanced.
Sky Dragon’s Fury (Betsy Polearm)
Fixed a bug where the Sky Dragon’s Fury mini-aura would continue to do damage after it despawned. Duration is now 10-15 seconds.
Developer Note: Our changes to the Betsy Polearm were having an unintended effect where the mini aura would remain after its expiration. This one is more of a bug fix, but since it affects balance, we added it here.
Bug Fixes
Fixed an issue where the Glove of Storms was not working on the Abyss Lord.
Fixed an issue where with some heroes the Glove of Storms projectiles were not originating from the heroes.
Fixed several server crashes related to joining matches.
Fixed an issue where items would occasionally all drop at iPWR 1.
Fixed an issue where the Red Spectral Knight would not get cleansed in the Spectral Knight Incursion.
Fixed an issue where the Storm Boot passive could appear on any item.
Fixed an issue where the Game Browser scroll bar would not reset back to the top when the list of games gets smaller based on filters. (It would appear as though there were no available games because the Browser would scrolled down past the list of available games.)
The Power Up update is now live on PC & PS4! This update includes the Gun Witch, buffs to the four original heroes, the new Game Browser and much more!
As selected by you in our Influence Vote, the Gun Witch is here!
Using Broom Power, a magically regenerating resource, the Gun Witch has no need for blue mana and can use all of her powers at will. With abilities and witchcraft spells, the Gun Witch can fly from spot to spot, hovering in the air as she snipes enemies on the ground.
The Gun Witch Bundle includes the Black Magic Ops costume!
Game Browser
We’ve made a ton of changes to how you play maps and create games in the Power Up update. With the new Game Browser, you can now see every game being played. No more jumping blindly into a game hoping to find other players! Use the map, mode and difficulty filters to find the open games you want to play, or create your own. Entice players to join you by adding a custom name to your game. With the minimum iPWR filter, you can make sure the right people are joining your games.
To play a Private Game, select the map, mode and difficulty, and then select Create Game. On this new popup, you can choose to create a Public or Private Game.
The Game Browser replaces the old War Table flythrough screen, which should free up some memory.
This is a first pass on the Game Browser. We’ll add more filters and settings based on your feedback, and we’ll clean up some of the rough edges on the UI in a future update.
Reorganization of Campaign and Incursions
We’ve restructured the game into three game modes: Defense (previously called Campaign), Challenges (previously called Incursions), and Onslaught. All of these modes are unlocked from the beginning. Each mode now contains the following difficulties: Normal, Hard, Expert, Insane, and Nightmare I - IV. Thanks to your Influence Vote, Normal and Hard are both unlocked from the beginning, and the other difficulties unlock as your heroes’ level increases.
More reorganizations to come with our upcoming Strategy Revamp changes!
First Armor Set: Armor of Storms
We’ve added our first armor set to the game! Armor sets can be worn by any hero. Each piece in a set has a unique Legendary Passive centered around a particular theme. This set is themed around lightning and storms.
This set is catered towards DPS heroes.
Gloves of the Storms:
Smites of Lightning: Attacks spawn a projectile that upon colliding with a target deals X% of your Hero Damage stat as damage and bounces up to Y times
Helm of the Storms:
Lightning Mana: Increases your mana capacity by X with a Y% chance on hit to regen mana at a high rate for Z seconds
Chest of the Storms:
Taser Suit: X% chance on taking damage to stun the enemy that hit you for Y seconds
Boots of the Storms:
Lightning Boots: Increases movement speed by X. Upon landing, you deal Lightning Damage in an area around you dealing Y% of your Hero Damage stat as damage.
Each piece is located in the Victory Chest on different maps, so find them all!
We’ll be paying close attention to your feedback about this set, so please try it out and let us know what you think!
Unique Legendary Loot Update
In this update, we’re spreading out our unique legendary loot so almost every map has something unique to farm. Just like the recent Incursion weapons, these are guaranteed drops every time you win the map. Here’s a teaser of where you’ll find some of these items, but we’ll leave it to you to discover where the other items live:
Dragonfall Bazaar: Toxic Shock Bow
Forgotten Ruins: Charge of the Harbinger Sword (DPS)
Liferoot Forest Incursion: Armageddon Staff
Ramparts Incursion: Purge Evil Polearm
Daily Mission Updates
Based on your feedback, we’ve made the following changes to Daily Missions:
Reduced the number of maps required to complete the Daily Missions from 5 to 3 and 3 to 2. Dailies are faster to complete now.
Reduced the likelihood of seeing Daily Missions that require you to win on maps in a certain area and increased the chance of seeing general “Win X Maps” Dailies.
Adjusted the number of Defender Medals given for Daily Missions so that completing Daily Missions that require you to win on maps in a certain area are more rewarding than the general Dailies.
Melee Update
In an experiment, we’re removing root motion (automatically moving forward while swinging) on the Medium Squire swords! It’s our goal that this change will give you more freedom and player control while melee attacking. Please try this out and let us know what you think. If you like it, we’ll apply it to the other Squire weapons and then to other melee heroes.
Balance
A big balance focus of this update was bringing the four original heroes up to the level of our newest heroes! We’ll be paying attention to game data and your feedback for more tweaks and changes.
As part of our hero buffs, we're updating some of our old passives to a new system, removing some passives and combining others into a single passive on a single item. As a result, we will be rerolling a number of passives. If the passive is getting updated to a new system, the value will be rerolled to either a higher or lower number than what you currently have. If the passive is being removed, it will be rerolled into another passive of a similar type (so if it’s a defense passive, it’ll be rolled to another defense passive). The end result should be that the four original heroes are on par with the new heroes, giving you more defense setup variety. From there, we’re working on changes in future updates to make the game more challenging and rewarding!
Abilities
Pole Smash
Buffed damage significantly
Removed cooldown
Reduced to mana cost to 25
Falloff damage removed
Scales off of Ability Power
Chi Blast
Buffed damage significantly
Removed cooldown
Increased mana cost to 50
Falloff damage removed
Heroic Presence
Increased damage buff
Increased Heal Strength
Increased mana cost to 100
Cooldown is now 10 seconds
Shielding Wave
Buffed the Shield Strength to 2000% of your AP
Mana cost is 100
Cooldown is now 10 seconds
Defenses
Lightning Aura
Increased Damage
Lightning Strikes Aura
Increased Damage
Boost Aura
Increased the amount of DP given to defenses by 25%
Sky Guard Tower
Damage increased slightly
Gear
Monk Harbinger Weapon
Pole Smash Fist (Passive)
Cooldown reduction removed
The two fists now roll their damage independently
First fist between X
Second fist between Y
Rebalanced stats to be more viable
Lightning Strikes Passive
Chance to proc is now variable
Damage from first fist is now variable
Area damage from smaller fists is now variable
Rebalanced to be more viable
Serenity Aura Range Passive
Only appears on gloves now
Value increased slightly since it’s only on gloves now.
Serenity Aura Slow Passive (Idle Flow)
Increased intensity of the slow
Betsy Weapon Passive
Slight change to do a chance on hit that secondary attacks will spawn a lightning area, dealing a portion of your Hero Damage stat as storm damage for a randomized amount of seconds.
Abilities
Magic Missile
Increased damage
Increased max number of marked targets to 8
Removed cooldown
Reduced mana cost to 25
Tornado
Increased damage
Increased knockup duration
Reduced cooldown to 2 seconds
Max targets you can hit is now 10
Lightning Rod
Massively increased damage
Stun duration is now 18 seconds
Cooldown is now 10 seconds
Mana Bomb
Increased damage
Cooldown is now 10 seconds
Defenses
Arcane Barrier
Buffed Arcane Barrier Health
Flameburst Tower
Increased Damage
Reduced AoE damage falloff
Earthshatter Tower
Earthshatter Tower is now single target and heavy damage.
Gear
Balanced the Halberd primary fire.
Slightly reduced firing rates on all staves and increased damage of attacks. Don’t worry: There are still fast-firing staves.
Buffed secondary attack damage on staves.
Apprentice Harbinger Weapon
Arcane Barrier Passive
Removed health bonus given since base health of the Barrier was boosted
Increased damage effects
Increased DoT duration to 8 seconds
DoT damage scales separately from meteor damage
Mana Bomb Passive
Buffed to be more viable
The three passive values roll separately now (Shield Strength, DoT Damage, and Meteor Damage)
Frost Fire and Frosty Power
Frost Fire removed and replaced with Frosty Power
Frosty Power only appears on weapons now and replaces the Frost Fire passive
Increased amount of power gained to account for the loss of Frost Fire
Abilities
Sword Beam
Increased damage
Increased VFX for 100% more WOW factor. Isom lervs Serd Berm.
Increased collision size to match new graphics
Scales with Ability Power
Reduced mana cost to 25
Removed falloff damage
Removed cooldown
Deals magic damage
Empowered Sword Beam
Increased damage
Increased VFX for 100% more WOW factor.
Increased collision size to match new graphics
Scales with Ability Power
Reduced mana cost to 25
Removed falloff damage
Removed cooldown
Deals magic damage
Provoke
Increased damage boost
Removed cooldown
Reduced mana cost to 50
Seismic Slam
Increased damage
Deals Earth damage now
Increased stun duration
Increased damage to enemies that are on the outside of the ability
Increased mana cost to 100
Cooldown is now 10 seconds
Block
Increased block strength from 40% to 65%, 90% with sphere.
Attacks
The Squire decided to focus a little more on arm day and some attacks in his combo chain have added knockback effects
We removed root motion from Medium Squire weapons. Try it out and tell us how it feels.
Defenses
Spike Blockade
Increased health
Increased damage by 125%
Cannonball Tower
Increased damage by 40%
Heavy Cannonball Tower
Significantly increased damage
Reduced projectile speed
Training Dummy
Massively increased health
Increased damage by 100%
Ballista
Increased damage by 30%
Gear
Squire Harbinger Weapon
Provoke Passive
Increased DoT damage
Increased Seismic Slam
Training Dummy
Increased damage
Removed health bonus given since base health of the Dummy was boosted
Chance to roll the proc chance
Hearty Harpoon Passive
Now rolls only on Totems
Explodey Harpoon
Now scales with Defense Power and values adjusted slightly to give it a little girth.
Betsy Weapon Passive
Now deals a % of your Hero Damage stat as Damage instead
Abilities
Concussive Shots
Increased damage
Damage scales with Ability Power
Reduced mana cost to 25
Reduced cooldown to 5 seconds
Sticky Nades
Damage increased substantially
Damage now scales with Ability Power
Mana cost set to 50
Reduced cooldown to 5 seconds
Oil Flask
Slightly increased damage
Increased the ignited oil damage and it now scales with AP
Increased oil duration by 4 seconds
Mana cost set to 50
Removed cooldown
Piercing Shot
Increased damage substantially
Damage now scales with Ability Power
Mana cost set to 100
Reduced cooldown to 10 seconds
Defenses
Explosive Trap
Damage increased by 35%
Elemental Chaos Trap
Damage increased by 400%
Geyser Trap
Increased damage
Decreased attack rate
Blaze Balloon
Damage increased by 45%
DoT tick rate reduced slightly
Poison Dart Tower
Increased damage substantially
DoT applies quicker to targets
Changes targets after hitting
Gear
Slightly reduced firing rates on all bows and increased damage of attacks. Don’t worry: There are still fast-firing bows.
Huntress Harbinger Weapon
Concussive Shots Passive
Increased damage
The initial spikes and spike AoE scale separately with damage
Geyser Shard Passive
Increased damage
Can roll its damage and chance to proc separately.
Phoenix Call Passive
Phoenix Damage and Luck have been combined into Phoenix Call.
Values increased to accommodate for this change
Phoenix’s collision increased by 50% for more whammity wozzle.
Phoenix Damage and Phoenix Luck no longer appear on items
Poison Dart Passives
Towering Poison and Speedy Darts have been removed.
Explosive Poison has been reworked
Poison Dart Tower now does more damage. When a poisoned target dies, it detonates dealing a percentage of your Defense Power Stat as damage to enemies within a given radius.
Other Balance Changes
Fixed a bug where the Nullify and Harden passives were increasing resistances more than what was stated. They should now be accurate.
The Abyss Lord’s Colossus and Skeletal Orc towers’ Critical Damage now scales with each upgrade, maxing out at 3.0.
Series EV2 Heat Dissipation updated
Sword/Staff canisters that were using bursts updated to have more-balanced Heat/second dissipation
Chilling and Oiling Strikes have had their slows increased.
Oily Harpoon (Squire) no longer reduces Ballista damage.
Cooldown Reduction has a minimum proc time of once per second.
Bug Fixes
In order to fix the Series EV2 node placement bug, we’ve reset the Options/Keybindings.
Fixed a server crash that would happen if a player switches heroes quickly and continuously.
Fixed a bug that would cause players to get stuck in the Tutorial.
Fixed a bug where costume accessories in the Costume Shop could not be previewed before purchase.
Heroes will now properly resume auto-attacking after using abilities.
DPS and Attack Rate numbers on the Abyss Lord’s Skeletal Ramster should be more accurate now.
Fixed a bug where party leaders in a Private Game could kick themselves from a match.
Fixed an issue where selecting items for sale in the Inventory and closing the Inventory without selling those items would break the Inventory UI when reopening it.
Fixed a bug where new players would see the original heroes locked until the player moved through the heroes on the Create Hero screen.
Fixed an issue where Victory Chests would float in the air on The Buried Bastille.
Run N’Gun Skill Sphere now properly increases movement speed.
Chilling Strikes Skill Sphere now properly works on the Abyss Lord.
Abyss Fountain of Speed Skill Sphere now properly increases movement speed.
Fixed a bug where melee heroes could attack while in the Inventory.
Fixed an NPC dialogue box that was referring to Monthly Missions instead of Bonus Missions.
Fixed a VFX issue with the Abyss Lord’s defenses in The Buried Bastille.
Fixed an issue where enemies would get stuck on ledges on The Ramparts.
Fixed a VFX issue with Series EV2’s shadow in The Buried Bastille.
Correctly stylized “War Table” on the interact icon.
Fixed a VFX issue with the Abyss Lord’s Tomes in the Blacksmith shop.
Fixed missing SFX issue on The Bling King Incursion.
Fixed a Lightning Bug projectile VFX issue.
Known Issues
We’re still investigating the crashes that are being reported to us. We’ve dramatically decreased the amount of crashing, but there’s still work to be done!
Players can sometimes fall through the tavern/marketplace floor. If you restart the game, this should fix the problem.
The projectile spawned from the Gloves of the Storms passive does not work on the Abyss Lord and will not fire correctly when used with EV2 or the Huntress. Fix will be deployed in next update/patch.
Trying to join a game via the Game Browser when it’s already going can cause players to be not able to matchmake. Returning to the title screen and back will fix this. Fix incoming.
The Game Browser can sometimes take an extended period of time to remove a no longer valid session from the session list.
On occasion, loot data for a map will not load so all loot dropped will be of iPower 1. This can also affect Victory Chest. We’re currently investigating.
The Taser Suit passive will display with a radius stat of 0 but the passive functions properly.
The Power Up update is now live on PC & PS4! This update includes the Gun Witch, buffs to the four original heroes, the new Game Browser and much more!
As selected by you in our Influence Vote, the Gun Witch is here!
Using Broom Power, a magically regenerating resource, the Gun Witch has no need for blue mana and can use all of her powers at will. With abilities and witchcraft spells, the Gun Witch can fly from spot to spot, hovering in the air as she snipes enemies on the ground.
The Gun Witch Bundle includes the Black Magic Ops costume!
Game Browser
We’ve made a ton of changes to how you play maps and create games in the Power Up update. With the new Game Browser, you can now see every game being played. No more jumping blindly into a game hoping to find other players! Use the map, mode and difficulty filters to find the open games you want to play, or create your own. Entice players to join you by adding a custom name to your game. With the minimum iPWR filter, you can make sure the right people are joining your games.
To play a Private Game, select the map, mode and difficulty, and then select Create Game. On this new popup, you can choose to create a Public or Private Game.
The Game Browser replaces the old War Table flythrough screen, which should free up some memory.
This is a first pass on the Game Browser. We’ll add more filters and settings based on your feedback, and we’ll clean up some of the rough edges on the UI in a future update.
Reorganization of Campaign and Incursions
We’ve restructured the game into three game modes: Defense (previously called Campaign), Challenges (previously called Incursions), and Onslaught. All of these modes are unlocked from the beginning. Each mode now contains the following difficulties: Normal, Hard, Expert, Insane, and Nightmare I - IV. Thanks to your Influence Vote, Normal and Hard are both unlocked from the beginning, and the other difficulties unlock as your heroes’ level increases.
More reorganizations to come with our upcoming Strategy Revamp changes!
First Armor Set: Armor of Storms
We’ve added our first armor set to the game! Armor sets can be worn by any hero. Each piece in a set has a unique Legendary Passive centered around a particular theme. This set is themed around lightning and storms.
This set is catered towards DPS heroes.
Gloves of the Storms:
Smites of Lightning: Attacks spawn a projectile that upon colliding with a target deals X% of your Hero Damage stat as damage and bounces up to Y times
Helm of the Storms:
Lightning Mana: Increases your mana capacity by X with a Y% chance on hit to regen mana at a high rate for Z seconds
Chest of the Storms:
Taser Suit: X% chance on taking damage to stun the enemy that hit you for Y seconds
Boots of the Storms:
Lightning Boots: Increases movement speed by X. Upon landing, you deal Lightning Damage in an area around you dealing Y% of your Hero Damage stat as damage.
Each piece is located in the Victory Chest on different maps, so find them all!
We’ll be paying close attention to your feedback about this set, so please try it out and let us know what you think!
Unique Legendary Loot Update
In this update, we’re spreading out our unique legendary loot so almost every map has something unique to farm. Just like the recent Incursion weapons, these are guaranteed drops every time you win the map. Here’s a teaser of where you’ll find some of these items, but we’ll leave it to you to discover where the other items live:
Dragonfall Bazaar: Toxic Shock Bow
Forgotten Ruins: Charge of the Harbinger Sword (DPS)
Liferoot Forest Incursion: Armageddon Staff
Ramparts Incursion: Purge Evil Polearm
Daily Mission Updates
Based on your feedback, we’ve made the following changes to Daily Missions:
Reduced the number of maps required to complete the Daily Missions from 5 to 3 and 3 to 2. Dailies are faster to complete now.
Reduced the likelihood of seeing Daily Missions that require you to win on maps in a certain area and increased the chance of seeing general “Win X Maps” Dailies.
Adjusted the number of Defender Medals given for Daily Missions so that completing Daily Missions that require you to win on maps in a certain area are more rewarding than the general Dailies.
Melee Update
In an experiment, we’re removing root motion (automatically moving forward while swinging) on the Medium Squire swords! It’s our goal that this change will give you more freedom and player control while melee attacking. Please try this out and let us know what you think. If you like it, we’ll apply it to the other Squire weapons and then to other melee heroes.
Balance
A big balance focus of this update was bringing the four original heroes up to the level of our newest heroes! We’ll be paying attention to game data and your feedback for more tweaks and changes.
As part of our hero buffs, we're updating some of our old passives to a new system, removing some passives and combining others into a single passive on a single item. As a result, we will be rerolling a number of passives. If the passive is getting updated to a new system, the value will be rerolled to either a higher or lower number than what you currently have. If the passive is being removed, it will be rerolled into another passive of a similar type (so if it’s a defense passive, it’ll be rolled to another defense passive). The end result should be that the four original heroes are on par with the new heroes, giving you more defense setup variety. From there, we’re working on changes in future updates to make the game more challenging and rewarding!
Abilities
Pole Smash
Buffed damage significantly
Removed cooldown
Reduced to mana cost to 25
Falloff damage removed
Scales off of Ability Power
Chi Blast
Buffed damage significantly
Removed cooldown
Increased mana cost to 50
Falloff damage removed
Heroic Presence
Increased damage buff
Increased Heal Strength
Increased mana cost to 100
Cooldown is now 10 seconds
Shielding Wave
Buffed the Shield Strength to 2000% of your AP
Mana cost is 100
Cooldown is now 10 seconds
Defenses
Lightning Aura
Increased Damage
Lightning Strikes Aura
Increased Damage
Boost Aura
Increased the amount of DP given to defenses by 25%
Sky Guard Tower
Damage increased slightly
Gear
Monk Harbinger Weapon
Pole Smash Fist (Passive)
Cooldown reduction removed
The two fists now roll their damage independently
First fist between X
Second fist between Y
Rebalanced stats to be more viable
Lightning Strikes Passive
Chance to proc is now variable
Damage from first fist is now variable
Area damage from smaller fists is now variable
Rebalanced to be more viable
Serenity Aura Range Passive
Only appears on gloves now
Value increased slightly since it’s only on gloves now.
Serenity Aura Slow Passive (Idle Flow)
Increased intensity of the slow
Betsy Weapon Passive
Slight change to do a chance on hit that secondary attacks will spawn a lightning area, dealing a portion of your Hero Damage stat as storm damage for a randomized amount of seconds.
Abilities
Magic Missile
Increased damage
Increased max number of marked targets to 8
Removed cooldown
Reduced mana cost to 25
Tornado
Increased damage
Increased knockup duration
Reduced cooldown to 2 seconds
Max targets you can hit is now 10
Lightning Rod
Massively increased damage
Stun duration is now 18 seconds
Cooldown is now 10 seconds
Mana Bomb
Increased damage
Cooldown is now 10 seconds
Defenses
Arcane Barrier
Buffed Arcane Barrier Health
Flameburst Tower
Increased Damage
Reduced AoE damage falloff
Earthshatter Tower
Earthshatter Tower is now single target and heavy damage.
Gear
Balanced the Halberd primary fire.
Slightly reduced firing rates on all staves and increased damage of attacks. Don’t worry: There are still fast-firing staves.
Buffed secondary attack damage on staves.
Apprentice Harbinger Weapon
Arcane Barrier Passive
Removed health bonus given since base health of the Barrier was boosted
Increased damage effects
Increased DoT duration to 8 seconds
DoT damage scales separately from meteor damage
Mana Bomb Passive
Buffed to be more viable
The three passive values roll separately now (Shield Strength, DoT Damage, and Meteor Damage)
Frost Fire and Frosty Power
Frost Fire removed and replaced with Frosty Power
Frosty Power only appears on weapons now and replaces the Frost Fire passive
Increased amount of power gained to account for the loss of Frost Fire
Abilities
Sword Beam
Increased damage
Increased VFX for 100% more WOW factor. Isom lervs Serd Berm.
Increased collision size to match new graphics
Scales with Ability Power
Reduced mana cost to 25
Removed falloff damage
Removed cooldown
Deals magic damage
Empowered Sword Beam
Increased damage
Increased VFX for 100% more WOW factor.
Increased collision size to match new graphics
Scales with Ability Power
Reduced mana cost to 25
Removed falloff damage
Removed cooldown
Deals magic damage
Provoke
Increased damage boost
Removed cooldown
Reduced mana cost to 50
Seismic Slam
Increased damage
Deals Earth damage now
Increased stun duration
Increased damage to enemies that are on the outside of the ability
Increased mana cost to 100
Cooldown is now 10 seconds
Block
Increased block strength from 40% to 65%, 90% with sphere.
Attacks
The Squire decided to focus a little more on arm day and some attacks in his combo chain have added knockback effects
We removed root motion from Medium Squire weapons. Try it out and tell us how it feels.
Defenses
Spike Blockade
Increased health
Increased damage by 125%
Cannonball Tower
Increased damage by 40%
Heavy Cannonball Tower
Significantly increased damage
Reduced projectile speed
Training Dummy
Massively increased health
Increased damage by 100%
Ballista
Increased damage by 30%
Gear
Squire Harbinger Weapon
Provoke Passive
Increased DoT damage
Increased Seismic Slam
Training Dummy
Increased damage
Removed health bonus given since base health of the Dummy was boosted
Chance to roll the proc chance
Hearty Harpoon Passive
Now rolls only on Totems
Explodey Harpoon
Now scales with Defense Power and values adjusted slightly to give it a little girth.
Betsy Weapon Passive
Now deals a % of your Hero Damage stat as Damage instead
Abilities
Concussive Shots
Increased damage
Damage scales with Ability Power
Reduced mana cost to 25
Reduced cooldown to 5 seconds
Sticky Nades
Damage increased substantially
Damage now scales with Ability Power
Mana cost set to 50
Reduced cooldown to 5 seconds
Oil Flask
Slightly increased damage
Increased the ignited oil damage and it now scales with AP
Increased oil duration by 4 seconds
Mana cost set to 50
Removed cooldown
Piercing Shot
Increased damage substantially
Damage now scales with Ability Power
Mana cost set to 100
Reduced cooldown to 10 seconds
Defenses
Explosive Trap
Damage increased by 35%
Elemental Chaos Trap
Damage increased by 400%
Geyser Trap
Increased damage
Decreased attack rate
Blaze Balloon
Damage increased by 45%
DoT tick rate reduced slightly
Poison Dart Tower
Increased damage substantially
DoT applies quicker to targets
Changes targets after hitting
Gear
Slightly reduced firing rates on all bows and increased damage of attacks. Don’t worry: There are still fast-firing bows.
Huntress Harbinger Weapon
Concussive Shots Passive
Increased damage
The initial spikes and spike AoE scale separately with damage
Geyser Shard Passive
Increased damage
Can roll its damage and chance to proc separately.
Phoenix Call Passive
Phoenix Damage and Luck have been combined into Phoenix Call.
Values increased to accommodate for this change
Phoenix’s collision increased by 50% for more whammity wozzle.
Phoenix Damage and Phoenix Luck no longer appear on items
Poison Dart Passives
Towering Poison and Speedy Darts have been removed.
Explosive Poison has been reworked
Poison Dart Tower now does more damage. When a poisoned target dies, it detonates dealing a percentage of your Defense Power Stat as damage to enemies within a given radius.
Other Balance Changes
Fixed a bug where the Nullify and Harden passives were increasing resistances more than what was stated. They should now be accurate.
The Abyss Lord’s Colossus and Skeletal Orc towers’ Critical Damage now scales with each upgrade, maxing out at 3.0.
Series EV2 Heat Dissipation updated
Sword/Staff canisters that were using bursts updated to have more-balanced Heat/second dissipation
Chilling and Oiling Strikes have had their slows increased.
Oily Harpoon (Squire) no longer reduces Ballista damage.
Cooldown Reduction has a minimum proc time of once per second.
Bug Fixes
In order to fix the Series EV2 node placement bug, we’ve reset the Options/Keybindings.
Fixed a server crash that would happen if a player switches heroes quickly and continuously.
Fixed a bug that would cause players to get stuck in the Tutorial.
Fixed a bug where costume accessories in the Costume Shop could not be previewed before purchase.
Heroes will now properly resume auto-attacking after using abilities.
DPS and Attack Rate numbers on the Abyss Lord’s Skeletal Ramster should be more accurate now.
Fixed a bug where party leaders in a Private Game could kick themselves from a match.
Fixed an issue where selecting items for sale in the Inventory and closing the Inventory without selling those items would break the Inventory UI when reopening it.
Fixed a bug where new players would see the original heroes locked until the player moved through the heroes on the Create Hero screen.
Fixed an issue where Victory Chests would float in the air on The Buried Bastille.
Run N’Gun Skill Sphere now properly increases movement speed.
Chilling Strikes Skill Sphere now properly works on the Abyss Lord.
Abyss Fountain of Speed Skill Sphere now properly increases movement speed.
Fixed a bug where melee heroes could attack while in the Inventory.
Fixed an NPC dialogue box that was referring to Monthly Missions instead of Bonus Missions.
Fixed a VFX issue with the Abyss Lord’s defenses in The Buried Bastille.
Fixed an issue where enemies would get stuck on ledges on The Ramparts.
Fixed a VFX issue with Series EV2’s shadow in The Buried Bastille.
Correctly stylized “War Table” on the interact icon.
Fixed a VFX issue with the Abyss Lord’s Tomes in the Blacksmith shop.
Fixed missing SFX issue on The Bling King Incursion.
Fixed a Lightning Bug projectile VFX issue.
Known Issues
We’re still investigating the crashes that are being reported to us. We’ve dramatically decreased the amount of crashing, but there’s still work to be done!
Players can sometimes fall through the tavern/marketplace floor. If you restart the game, this should fix the problem.
The projectile spawned from the Gloves of the Storms passive does not work on the Abyss Lord and will not fire correctly when used with EV2 or the Huntress. Fix will be deployed in next update/patch.
Trying to join a game via the Game Browser when it’s already going can cause players to be not able to matchmake. Returning to the title screen and back will fix this. Fix incoming.
The Game Browser can sometimes take an extended period of time to remove a no longer valid session from the session list.
On occasion, loot data for a map will not load so all loot dropped will be of iPower 1. This can also affect Victory Chest. We’re currently investigating.
The Taser Suit passive will display with a radius stat of 0 but the passive functions properly.
Feel the power, Kronk: We’re releasing the Power Up update on July 5th!
This update contains the Gun Witch, the Game Browser, buffs to the four original heroes, our first armor set, passive changes and more! For more info, visit the update page.
If you haven't already, meet the Gun Witch in her official trailer below:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tXlWr7vQsuQ In this update, we’re spreading out our unique legendary loot so almost every map has something unique to farm! Just like the recent Incursion weapons, these are guaranteed drops every time you win the map. Here’s a teaser of where you’ll find some of these items, but we’ll leave it to you to discover where the other items live:
Dragonfall Bazaar: Toxic Shock Bow
Forgotten Ruins: Charge of the Harbinger Sword (DPS)
Liferoot Forest Incursion: Armageddon Staff
Ramparts Incursion: Purge Evil Polearm
The different pieces of the first armor set are also spread throughout Etheria. Find them all!
As part of our hero buffs, we're updating some of our old passives to a new system, removing some passives and combining others into a single passive on a single item. As a result, we will be rerolling a number of passives. If the passive is getting updated to a new system, the value will be rerolled to either a higher or lower number than what you currently have. If the passive is being removed, it will be rerolled into another passive of a similar type (so if it’s a defense passive, it’ll be rolled to another defense passive). The end result should be that the four original heroes are on par with the new heroes, giving you more defense setup variety. From there, we’re working on changes in future updates to make the game more challenging and rewarding!
Here’s what we’re working on this week:
Elliot Cannon, Creative Director
Power Up! Our next release, Power Up, arrives next week! Look for it the day after July 4. The studio cranked very hard on this release package, so we’re stoked to get it into your hands, especially the Gun Witch.
Gun Witch We took this archived character under our wing and infused her with tons of incredible shooter-style tools and movement all in the spirit of witchcraft and gun brooms! I was one of the original senior level designers on Unreal and Unreal Tournament (back in the ‘90s), so as an old school deathmatcher and CTF player, movement is everything. Her ability to deliver up close and long-range damage works amazingly well with her agility. You can lay back and blast away like a sniper, or work in close and drop point-blank carnage in Dark Mage face while knowing you can get out of harm’s way with a simple key tap or mouse click if you’re a Naga fan. Timing and delivering massive damage is super fun, especially when you feel untouchable. Her mobility is three-dimensional so you’ll be back flipping, strafe double jumping, leaping, and hovering in midair with awesome air control as you teach those dumb baddies what real skill is.
At the same time, the power of her mischievous witchcraft inspired CC, stuns, and immobilizations make face-smashing powerful enemies laughably fun. We even tossed in some ice magic for the RPG fans who secretly wanted her to be a sorceress. Now that we’re getting the hero library built up, we hope you’ll find her a fun complement to your Hero Deck, serving the role of lane executioner. Build up impenetrable defenses with your favorite builder, swap to the Gun Witch and PWN, leaving the scene of the crime in style.
Hero Buffs Beyond just the Gun Witch, look for a Phase One rollout of hero buffs. The plan here is obvious. Power up the default heroes! As we’ve shifted the game from one hero at a time to a full-fledged four heroes anytime, anywhere deck, it’s crucial that each slot in your deck is adding to your fun and power. The depth of the changes extends deep, with almost every dial and knob on the core four heroes adjusted. We want to keep the entire mix in tune so we will definitely watch for your forum feedback, and to make that easier, we’ll release detailed patch notes that list out every change. That way you know the behind-the-scenes details for the diehard theorycrafter. Everyone has his or her own way to play and we know this, so if you have feedback on the changes or see something we never thought of, let us know on the forums so we can work that in Phase Two!
A majority of cooldowns are gone. Yep, gone. Melee damage increases incrementally. We’re trying out the removal of root motion for melee characters so they can use player movement to control what’s happening as you time damage delivery skillfully. Look for the full notes with the release.
Game Browser If you have not heard, we’re jamming up the War Table to function more like a traditional server browser! You’ll be able to make your own games, give them custom names, search for open games, see what mode, skill level, and wave those games are on, and even restrict iPWR if you need better control over who enters your public game. I’m excited we’ve finally gotten this going, and this is something we started back in January iterating on it internally while also doing everything else! This is a Phase One rollout, so again, share your feedback! We have a lot more slicker options and features already scoped out for Phase Two, but we did not want you to have to wait until then, especially since we are adding map-specific content. Hats off to Brys Sepluveda who’s been hands-on making this dream a reality while navigating the mystical layers of PlayVerse matchmaking code.
Carl Sagan once said, "The universe is not required to be in perfect harmony with human ambition!”
Looking to the future from the mid-year Crow’s Nest We’re working through a four-milestone plan to compete the game’s feature set. In the next few weeks, you’ll start to hear more about the big improvements to the core enemy system to make it squad based, ultimately with a dynamic spawning twist, gear sets, cooler loot systems, a reimagined core campaign structure, better progression loops, longer-term hero tweaking, and much more. Everything is about player-driven goals for new, returning, and hardcore players, so know we have each banner firmly in hand and we’re working on jamming the game up into something that can be a real fun hobby with gobs of fun progression.
In the meantime, we’ll keep the fun content with powerful (and sometimes zany and niche variable roll mayhem) rewards coming your way through new Challenges (which is what we’re calling Incursions now). We’re settling into a better rhythm of delivering heroes and new content at a frenetic pace. The year’s half over, and although we’ve done a lot, we’re not done yet!
Daniel Diaz, World Builder (DanielKaMi)
I’m also working on a full collision pass for the Endless Spires remake level, making sure you can't make mischief. :-)
There's plenty of areas to explore as you can see on the pic below:
Jesus Diaz, World Builder (@N3oDoc)
Working this week on the collision pass for the Endless Spires remake.
As you can see in the pic, you'll be able to get to the upper areas of the level (you might need Series EV2 to achieve that) and get some nice views of the environment from there!
Josh Isom, Community Manager (iamisom)
It took a herculean effort from our team to get the PS4 version caught up to the PC version, so a big round of applause to our team for persevering and making that a reality. I know our PS4 fans are stoked to get content around the same time as our PC fans.
With that done, our big focus on the live side is crushing our technical issues. We’ve seen a dramatic decrease in server crashes (in fact, we’ve almost wiped them out from what Tim has told me), and we’re continuing to work through the client crashes. This week’s PS4 hotfix wiped out a massive number of crashes. Almost every patch we’ve pushed out over the past few months has contained some form of crash fix, and we’re hoping to keep that going. So if you’re having trouble launching or playing the game, fear not: Like Harvey Birdman, we’re on the case!
We’ve also seen a number of feedback threads about the new Daily Missions. In next week’s patch, we’re reducing the chances of seeing the “Complete X Area Maps” Dailies, and we’re reducing the overall number of maps needed to complete the Dailies. So it should take less time to complete Dailies, and you should see more general “Complete X Number of Any Map” Dailies.
James Reid, Software Engineer (Driscan)
I’ve been in serious bug squashing mode.
Fix one bug and three more pop up. It’s like battling Hydra or something. Finally got a handle on a lot of UI related bugs with the Game Browser. Speaking of the Game Browser, I’ve been working with QA, Bank, and a few others on a particularly nasty bug related to the onscreen keyboard that comes up for PS4 users. That… was fun….
Anyway, enough with the blathering, you came here wanting to see some progress on the Game Browser...well here ya go!
As Elliot said, this is Phase 1 and we’re already hard at work on Phase 2. Can’t wait to get y‘alls feedback!
Steven Collins, Lead Level Designer (Esorath)
Thanks to everyone for the awesome incursion ideas that got sent my way! Sirozan on the forums had a particularly intriguing suggestion regarding the Frozen Keep map.
As for my work right now, we’ve got another Incursion starting on one of the current in-game levels. Since Molten Citadel won the Influence Vote, I’m making sure the Molten Citadel is going to be as awesome as it can be.
I know after the past few Devstreams, a few of you guys are hungry for secrets. So I’m looking into maybe a rather interesting Molten Citadel secret...
John Muscarella, Digital Puppet Master (Muskie4242)
Feel the power, Kronk: We’re releasing the Power Up update on July 5th!
This update contains the Gun Witch, the Game Browser, buffs to the four original heroes, our first armor set, passive changes and more! For more info, visit the update page.
If you haven't already, meet the Gun Witch in her official trailer below:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tXlWr7vQsuQ In this update, we’re spreading out our unique legendary loot so almost every map has something unique to farm! Just like the recent Incursion weapons, these are guaranteed drops every time you win the map. Here’s a teaser of where you’ll find some of these items, but we’ll leave it to you to discover where the other items live:
Dragonfall Bazaar: Toxic Shock Bow
Forgotten Ruins: Charge of the Harbinger Sword (DPS)
Liferoot Forest Incursion: Armageddon Staff
Ramparts Incursion: Purge Evil Polearm
The different pieces of the first armor set are also spread throughout Etheria. Find them all!
As part of our hero buffs, we're updating some of our old passives to a new system, removing some passives and combining others into a single passive on a single item. As a result, we will be rerolling a number of passives. If the passive is getting updated to a new system, the value will be rerolled to either a higher or lower number than what you currently have. If the passive is being removed, it will be rerolled into another passive of a similar type (so if it’s a defense passive, it’ll be rolled to another defense passive). The end result should be that the four original heroes are on par with the new heroes, giving you more defense setup variety. From there, we’re working on changes in future updates to make the game more challenging and rewarding!
Here’s what we’re working on this week:
Elliot Cannon, Creative Director
Power Up! Our next release, Power Up, arrives next week! Look for it the day after July 4. The studio cranked very hard on this release package, so we’re stoked to get it into your hands, especially the Gun Witch.
Gun Witch We took this archived character under our wing and infused her with tons of incredible shooter-style tools and movement all in the spirit of witchcraft and gun brooms! I was one of the original senior level designers on Unreal and Unreal Tournament (back in the ‘90s), so as an old school deathmatcher and CTF player, movement is everything. Her ability to deliver up close and long-range damage works amazingly well with her agility. You can lay back and blast away like a sniper, or work in close and drop point-blank carnage in Dark Mage face while knowing you can get out of harm’s way with a simple key tap or mouse click if you’re a Naga fan. Timing and delivering massive damage is super fun, especially when you feel untouchable. Her mobility is three-dimensional so you’ll be back flipping, strafe double jumping, leaping, and hovering in midair with awesome air control as you teach those dumb baddies what real skill is.
At the same time, the power of her mischievous witchcraft inspired CC, stuns, and immobilizations make face-smashing powerful enemies laughably fun. We even tossed in some ice magic for the RPG fans who secretly wanted her to be a sorceress. Now that we’re getting the hero library built up, we hope you’ll find her a fun complement to your Hero Deck, serving the role of lane executioner. Build up impenetrable defenses with your favorite builder, swap to the Gun Witch and PWN, leaving the scene of the crime in style.
Hero Buffs Beyond just the Gun Witch, look for a Phase One rollout of hero buffs. The plan here is obvious. Power up the default heroes! As we’ve shifted the game from one hero at a time to a full-fledged four heroes anytime, anywhere deck, it’s crucial that each slot in your deck is adding to your fun and power. The depth of the changes extends deep, with almost every dial and knob on the core four heroes adjusted. We want to keep the entire mix in tune so we will definitely watch for your forum feedback, and to make that easier, we’ll release detailed patch notes that list out every change. That way you know the behind-the-scenes details for the diehard theorycrafter. Everyone has his or her own way to play and we know this, so if you have feedback on the changes or see something we never thought of, let us know on the forums so we can work that in Phase Two!
A majority of cooldowns are gone. Yep, gone. Melee damage increases incrementally. We’re trying out the removal of root motion for melee characters so they can use player movement to control what’s happening as you time damage delivery skillfully. Look for the full notes with the release.
Game Browser If you have not heard, we’re jamming up the War Table to function more like a traditional server browser! You’ll be able to make your own games, give them custom names, search for open games, see what mode, skill level, and wave those games are on, and even restrict iPWR if you need better control over who enters your public game. I’m excited we’ve finally gotten this going, and this is something we started back in January iterating on it internally while also doing everything else! This is a Phase One rollout, so again, share your feedback! We have a lot more slicker options and features already scoped out for Phase Two, but we did not want you to have to wait until then, especially since we are adding map-specific content. Hats off to Brys Sepluveda who’s been hands-on making this dream a reality while navigating the mystical layers of PlayVerse matchmaking code.
Carl Sagan once said, "The universe is not required to be in perfect harmony with human ambition!”
Looking to the future from the mid-year Crow’s Nest We’re working through a four-milestone plan to compete the game’s feature set. In the next few weeks, you’ll start to hear more about the big improvements to the core enemy system to make it squad based, ultimately with a dynamic spawning twist, gear sets, cooler loot systems, a reimagined core campaign structure, better progression loops, longer-term hero tweaking, and much more. Everything is about player-driven goals for new, returning, and hardcore players, so know we have each banner firmly in hand and we’re working on jamming the game up into something that can be a real fun hobby with gobs of fun progression.
In the meantime, we’ll keep the fun content with powerful (and sometimes zany and niche variable roll mayhem) rewards coming your way through new Challenges (which is what we’re calling Incursions now). We’re settling into a better rhythm of delivering heroes and new content at a frenetic pace. The year’s half over, and although we’ve done a lot, we’re not done yet!
Daniel Diaz, World Builder (DanielKaMi)
I’m also working on a full collision pass for the Endless Spires remake level, making sure you can't make mischief. :-)
There's plenty of areas to explore as you can see on the pic below:
Jesus Diaz, World Builder (@N3oDoc)
Working this week on the collision pass for the Endless Spires remake.
As you can see in the pic, you'll be able to get to the upper areas of the level (you might need Series EV2 to achieve that) and get some nice views of the environment from there!
Josh Isom, Community Manager (iamisom)
It took a herculean effort from our team to get the PS4 version caught up to the PC version, so a big round of applause to our team for persevering and making that a reality. I know our PS4 fans are stoked to get content around the same time as our PC fans.
With that done, our big focus on the live side is crushing our technical issues. We’ve seen a dramatic decrease in server crashes (in fact, we’ve almost wiped them out from what Tim has told me), and we’re continuing to work through the client crashes. This week’s PS4 hotfix wiped out a massive number of crashes. Almost every patch we’ve pushed out over the past few months has contained some form of crash fix, and we’re hoping to keep that going. So if you’re having trouble launching or playing the game, fear not: Like Harvey Birdman, we’re on the case!
We’ve also seen a number of feedback threads about the new Daily Missions. In next week’s patch, we’re reducing the chances of seeing the “Complete X Area Maps” Dailies, and we’re reducing the overall number of maps needed to complete the Dailies. So it should take less time to complete Dailies, and you should see more general “Complete X Number of Any Map” Dailies.
James Reid, Software Engineer (Driscan)
I’ve been in serious bug squashing mode.
Fix one bug and three more pop up. It’s like battling Hydra or something. Finally got a handle on a lot of UI related bugs with the Game Browser. Speaking of the Game Browser, I’ve been working with QA, Bank, and a few others on a particularly nasty bug related to the onscreen keyboard that comes up for PS4 users. That… was fun….
Anyway, enough with the blathering, you came here wanting to see some progress on the Game Browser...well here ya go!
As Elliot said, this is Phase 1 and we’re already hard at work on Phase 2. Can’t wait to get y‘alls feedback!
Steven Collins, Lead Level Designer (Esorath)
Thanks to everyone for the awesome incursion ideas that got sent my way! Sirozan on the forums had a particularly intriguing suggestion regarding the Frozen Keep map.
As for my work right now, we’ve got another Incursion starting on one of the current in-game levels. Since Molten Citadel won the Influence Vote, I’m making sure the Molten Citadel is going to be as awesome as it can be.
I know after the past few Devstreams, a few of you guys are hungry for secrets. So I’m looking into maybe a rather interesting Molten Citadel secret...
John Muscarella, Digital Puppet Master (Muskie4242)