Oct 27, 2021

Path of Exile - CommunityTeam_GGG

We're just under one week from the launch of Path of Exile: Scourge and have been closely monitoring feedback ever since. We've deployed a number of hotfixes including the most recent 3.16.0b patch and wanted to let you know what else was on our radar.

Here are the patches so far:

3.16.0 Hotfix 1

Fixed a bug with Energy Blade where it could delete the player's weapon if they logged out in town after activating it.
Fixed a bug with Nightgrip unique gloves causing the player to take more damage than intended.
Fixed a bug introduced in 3.16.0 where the Duskdawn unique staff granted "Critical Strikes deal no damage" instead of "120-150% increased Spell damage if you've dealt a Critical Strike recently". This fix affects existing items.
Fixed a crash that could occur when loading hideout templates containing pets.
Fixed a client crash that could occur when entering Vaal Side Areas.

3.16.0 Hotfix 2

Fixed a bug where remaining portals for Zana missions were closing earlier than they should.
Fixed a common client crash occurring with Scorching Ray.
The Scorching Ray fix is client-side, you will need to restart your client for it to apply.

3.16.0 Hotfix 3

Fixed a bug where players were sometimes unable to return from side areas or missions within maps.
Fixed an instance crash.

3.16.0 Hotfix 4

Fixed a bug where Merveil, the Siren was not spawning Golden Statues.
Fixed the Scholar's Mod on Flasks from being able to incorrectly roll % Increased Charges per use instead of Reduced.

3.16.0 Hotfix 5

Fixed a bug in Scourge League where the Blood Crucible could mistakenly upgrade an explicit mod on unique items. We also plan to fix existing items that were affected by this.

Our 3.16.0b patch was released yesterday and it includes a variety of improvements to Scourge monster damage as well as fixes to a variety of bugs.

Scourge Improvements

Upon encountering a Boss in Nightmare, the drain of blood from the Crucible is now paused for 5 seconds.
The Tainted Mythic Orb can now unpredictably upgrade Corrupted items to Unique items even if their item level is lower than when it would normally be able to drop. Prior to this change, the orb would fail to apply to the item if there were no valid Unique items to upgrade to.
The damage of Ravenous Bloodshaper's Blood Orb and Spike Barrage skills has been decreased.
The damage of Demon Herder's Vomit and Beam skill has been decreased.
Reduced the number of Monsters with Proximity Shield that can spawn in some Scourge encounters.
The Corruption Absorbed progress bar now displays underneath items stored in the Blood Crucible, without you having to hover over them.

Other Improvements

The damage of Baranite Thaumaturge's ground explosions has been decreased. This change does not affect Baranite Thaumaturge Spectres.

Bug Fixes

Fixed a bug where Item Filters would incorrectly assign Weapons and Jewellery a BaseDefencePercentile value of 0 rather than 100.
Fixed a bug where the colour of sockets on the Skin of the Loyal Unique could be modified.
Fixed a bug where Zana's Fortune Favours the Brave Map Device option would fail to open a Map.
Fixed a bug where Watchstones could sometimes fail to drop from a Conqueror's Citadel.
Fixed a bug where it was not possible to open portals to a Betrayal Safehouse or the Temple of Atzoatl from within a Guild Hideout.
Fixed a bug where the "20% chance to Avoid being Stunned" Resistance and Ailment Protection Mastery was not granting Stun Avoidance.
Fixed a bug where some Redeemer Influence Amulet Modifiers were providing reduced Mana Reservation Efficiency instead of increased. This fix applies to existing items.
Fixed a bug where the Guardian's Challenge Divination Card sold by Zana did not have a price.
Fixed a bug where Mansion Contracts sold by Whakano did not have a price.
Fixed a client crash that occur when using Spectral Shield Throw with Vanishing Dyeapplied to an equipped Shield.
Fixed a client crash that could occur with the Automaton Divine Ire Skill Effect Microtransaction.
Fixed a common client crash.
Fixed two instance crashes.

There are a variety of other topics that we would like to talk about that we have listed below.

Standard Map conversion
Currently, if you have maps in your old tab that, upon upgrading, turn into another map that you don't have enough room for, the entire tab upgrade fails. We will improve this system so that overflowed maps are given to you in a remove-only tab. This will mean the rest of the conversion will work as intended. We can't give a specific timeline on this just yet but it's a priority to resolve this before 3.17 launches and hopefully much sooner than that.

Ballista Totems
There is a bug where Ballistas used via Totem Support only have -45% damage taken instead of -80%. This will be fixed in an upcoming patch.

Crash with Explosive Arrow Triggering Summon Phantasms
We are aware of this and will fix it in an upcoming patch.

Elemental Overload
There is an issue where Traps, Mines and Totems currently have no way to take advantage of Elemental Overload. Also, Cremation currently doesn't activate Elemental Overload. We have a change for this on the way. Separately, there is another issue where Elemental Overload is not reflected on the tooltip for DPS. This will also be fixed.

Scourge Feedback
We've been monitoring all feedback related to Scourge and have a few improvements coming which we will outline below. We are aware that the bulk of players' feedback around Scourge revolves around the rewards it provides. We don't have any updates to provide regarding this but we are reviewing the feedback and discussing it.

Some players have reported that it's not obvious enough when the Blood Crucible is full. We're making both the sound effect and visual effect more obvious to help with this.

We're looking at updating two of the possible Scourge Map modifiers, specifically the "Only Shift into Nightmare on Killing a Rare or Unique Enemy" and "Shift on reaching Full Resource, Killing Enemies Drain Resource" modifiers. The former modifier implies that it is activated on every Rare or Unique kill, and will have its description updated as well as being changed to activate more frequently. The latter modifiers will be modified so that there is a slow Scourge Blood drain over time, so that there is still some time pressure for finding bosses while having a lower Blood drain from kills.

Missing Patch Notes
In our 3.16.0 Patch Notes, we unfortunately missed two notes: one related to armour-based shields and one related to the Veiled Modifier Damage Over Time Multiplier Bow Craft.

Here is the missing patch note for armour-based shields.

Problem:
Tower Shields provide significantly more armour than the armour/evasion of other shield types, making them a no-brainer for non-crit Shield builds.

Solutions:
Reduced the armour provided by the top end shields, but raised the average defence of other shields so the difference in base defences isn't as extreme. Skills that scale off these stats will be rebalanced to account for these changes.

Here is the missing patch note for the bow craft.

Quivers now have additional tiers of Damage Over Time Multiplier. In order to be consistent with other item slots, bows now use one-hand Damage Over Time Multiplier values.

We apologise that these patch notes were missed. We'll continue monitoring feedback around Path of Exile: Scourge and making adjustments where appropriate. Thanks so much for all of your support and feedback!

Oct 27, 2021

Update 0.5.40

Farmer's Life - bartiss

Changes

- Kasimir has finally learned how to build things!
- That's why he may become a beekeeper and start honey production
- New building related quests were added. Even our priest got one
- Zalesie has gained a mayor. He grants permissions for various activities if you pay him
- On November nights mysterious things happen. Even priest Matthew is unable to explain them
- The outhouse gained a useful funcionality
- NPCs learned how to get a grip and talk to the player even if he harmed them (a lot), but it takes some time
- Some evil firewood stacks lost their ability to break interaction system
- Trying to put a bike on a small cart doesn't stick the bike to the player for all eternity anymore
- Tractor, cart and plow gained a reset ability, because they tend to roll over a lot
- You can find information how to milk your cows many times. Look into help panel
- Emptying various bottles gives back empty bottles to your inventory
- Putting mashes into distilleries return empty jars to your inventory
- Mysterious orange lights plaguing some moonshiners were exiled from Zalesie
- Doors and gates get highlighted in Landlord's Vision (useful when getting back home at night with no lantern)
- Church is now accessible trough fast travel system
- Selling hay to Phillip became less lucrative
- Kasimir bought himself a bigger water pot in his kitchen
- A bug blocking progress in the "repair the barn" tutorial was fixed
- A bug finishing multiple quests by single delivery to an NPC was fixed
- Kasimir's states (cold, apathy, pneumonia) are loading properly now
- Numerous tweaks and fixes (like Escape key opening pause menu every single time)

Known issues

- Horse is still able to go airborne, maybe there was a pegasus down its family tree
- If your savegame doesn't load send it to us via support mail

Oct 27, 2021

The Long Dark Hotfixed to v1.97 [85101]

The Long Dark - hinterland_community

Hello Community,

We’ve just hotfixed The Long Dark to version 1.97 [85101]. This hotfix addresses issues that emerged with the launch of Episode Four, addresses certain gameplay bugs, and offers general game improvements. Please find the full list below. (NOTE: list may contain spoilers.) It may take some time for changes to take effect as platforms update. Thank you for your patience.

There are two issues in particular affected players should be aware of:

For any PlayStation players impacted by missing Episode Four Trophies at launch; we have a way to potentially regain your progress. Please visit this page on our support portal for more info.
[SPOILERS] Episode Four Steam Tunnel puzzle; some players reported that they were unable to open the Control Room door after the ice thawed while solving the Steam Pipe puzzle. If you encountered issues with this puzzle, this document might be helpful.

Don’t forget to visit our Support Portal for useful articles, or if you need to log an issue. To stay up-to-date with news and information about The Long Dark and Hinterland, sign up for our newsletter and follow us on Twitter (Game | Studio).

* * * * *

GENERAL FIXES

[Optimization] Fixed a rare issue that would prevent the Player’s footprints from appearing correctly in certain circumstances.
[Optimization] Fixed numerous performance hitches, which should result in a smoother play experience.
[Steam] Updated the Workshop String Table to include all Episode Four strings.

ANIMATION

[Animation] Numerous tweaks and polish to various mission related animations.
[Animation] Fixed an issue where certain climbing animations were broken when the FOV was set to maximum.
[Animation] Fixed an issue where the animation twitched during the Kill/Release choice after catching a Rabbit.
[Animation] Fixed an issue where Mackenzie’s arms shook incorrectly when climbing various areas.

ART, ENVIRO, and UI

[Accessibility] Updated Mature Language Filter to include some lines that were missed.
[Art] Optimized render distance on various objects found in Episode Four so they will become visible at the appropriate distance from the Player. This will reduce instances of distant objects popping in to the world.
[Art] Optimized the Steam Tunnels object and lighting draw distance to improve the overall visual quality and performance.
[Art] Tuned lighting in various interiors and fixed mismatched lighting on objects.
[Environment] Fixed an issue that caused the walls inside the Radio Hut to remain visible regardless of what room inside the Radio Hut you were in.
[Environment] Optimized the Mines to ensure the Gas is not drawn when not needed, resulting in performance improvements.
[Environment] Added some extra collision to the pipes in the Steam Tunnel to prevent the camera from clipping into the pipes.
[Environment] Fixed a gap found in the doors of the Power Plant.
[Environment] Fixed large black shadows found on the beds in the Blackrock Prison Infirmary.
[Environment] Moved the “Danger Electric Cables Over-Head” warning sign in the Steam Tunnel to make it more visible.
[Environment] Fixed numerous floating or clipping objects throughout the Blackrock Region.
[Environment] Fixed an issue where the water splash sound effect was missing when walking through water found in the Abandoned Mine.
[UI] Fixed an issue in the Journal’s exit button on the Collections -> Surveyed Locations screen so Players no longer need to change to a different screen to exit.
[UI] Fixed an issue preventing the Region displayed on the Map from updating correctly when using a cave to transition to a new Region.
[UI] Fixed an issue where the Mission Status tab would not reflect the state of the current active mission.
[UI] Tuned the icons on the Map screen so Mission Markers are sorted above other Map Markers.
[UI] Fixed an issue where the weather could change from the intended calibration preset while adjusting the Brightness in the Main Menu.
[UI] Fixed an issue where Open Cans can appear as closed when viewed in the Cooking Menu.
[UI] Fixed unaligned buttons on the “Continue to ...?” screen that appears after completing an Episode.
[UI] Updated the Hardcase item description.
[UI] Updated the icon for Key 8 found in Episode One to a higher quality version.

GAMEPLAY

[AI] Fixed an issue where Wolves continued to eat carcasses after the carcass is gone.
[Audio] Added audio ducking to the Marine Flare, so its audio is no longer louder than in-game dialogue.
[Gameplay] Fixed an issue where water longer disappeared when clicking the “Move All to Container” button, then immediately transferring the water back to the container.
[Gameplay] Fixed an issue where the Maple Syrup would remain attached to the Player, instead of being removed from the world after being picked up.
[Gameplay] Sprain Risk is no longer disabled when taking a phone call.

CHALLENGE MODES

[Darkwalker] Tuned the wait time between placing a Banish Glyph and the Darkwalker appearing. Players should not have to wait extended periods of time, now.
[Hunted 1/2 and Whiteout] Added Socks to starting inventory.
[Whiteout] Tuned the mission complete percentage to be more accurate.

WINTERMUTE

** Please note that this section contains spoilers for WINTERMUTE. **

[Cinematics] Fixed several lighting issues across a range of Episode Four cinematics.
[Cinematics] Fixed an issue during Chapter 1: Blackrock Blues that could cause the audio in cinematics to no longer align with the animations, if the Player skipped a cinematic.
[Cinematics] Fixed an issue that would often cause in-game dialogue to be skipped if it was intended to play immediately after a cinematic during Episode Three.
[Environment] Fixed an issue with the Wolf found near the farm during Episode One so it now feeds on corpses, as intended.
[Environment] Fixed numerous locations where the Player could either become stuck or escape the map or intended progression route during Episode Four.
[Episode One] Fixed an issue where Mackenzie would appear without a bandaged hand while picking up the Hardcase.
[Episode One] Fixed clipping that could occur when climbing out of the Crash Site.
[Episode One] Fixed an issue that caused the audio for the fires at the Crash Site to continue to play after they had burned out.
[Episode One] Fixed an issue that would cause the skybox to briefly appear when exiting back to the Main Menu from inside the Grey Mother’s House.
[Episode Two] Fixed overlapping audio that can occur while speaking to Jeremiah.
[Episode Two] Fixed an issue where the Active Objective UI element would not appear as intended when bringing up the Radial Menu, after getting the Bear Spear during The Best Defense.
[Episode Two] Tuned the Aurora that occurs during the Return to Dam mission so it will now be fully active, instead of just starting.
[Episode Three] Fixed an issue that would prevent the Player from being able to progress if they saved the game right before answering the Phone at the burnt-out cabin, then reloaded the save during the Phone Call.
[Episode Three] Fixed an issue so that removing the fuse now correctly disables both the electrical visual and sound effects during Aftermath.
[Episode Three] Tuned the mission complete percentage to be more accurate during Forest Talker.
[Episode Three] HUD will no longer remain disabled after speaking to Molly.
[Episode Four] Fixed an issue where the final gauge could appear at full pressure when the valves were still incorrectly set during Steam Valve Puzzle #1.
[Episode Four] Fixed an issue that caused the interaction point on the Valve to shift if the Player entered the tunnels, then returned to the Valves during The Detonators.
[Episode Four] Fixed an issue where weapons and gear were not confiscated properly after completing The Detonators.
[Episode Four] Added safeguards to help prevent the Player from dropping the Bolt Cutters into unreachable locations in The Detonators.
[Episode Four] Fixed an issue that caused the Status bar to flicker prior to returning to gameplay after the cinematic sequence in Donner.
[Episode Four] Dialogue will no longer continue to play on the Death screen if the Player is caught during Donner.
[Episode Four] Increased the range at which the entrances can be seen during Convict Caches.

PLAYSTATION 4

[General] Fixed an issue where the game crashed for some players on launch.
[General] Fixed a potential crash that could occur when throwing an item.

WINDOWS 7

[General] Fixed an issue where players using Windows 7 would become stuck on an unskippable black screen when playing an in-game video, such as the opening credits.

MAC

[Rendering] Fixed an issue that would cause rocks to not render on OpenGL systems.

SWITCH

[Rendering] Decreased the compression on numerous textures to increase the overall visual quality.