PHAGEBORN online card game News

Dear Denizens of Issilith!

Thanks to the plethora of your feedback and reviews we had the pleasure to read over this last two weeks, we managed to get a better understanding of things we can improve in Phageborn. So today, we will have a little run down on some updates and changes we are doing.

TUTORIAL
Phageborn brings some innovations as to how a card game can be played. We understand that the current Tutorial may not be the most optimal way to start the learning curve of the Phageborn mechanics. With that in mind, we will improve the basic tutorial to be more comprehensive and immersive for new players but also add an Advanced Tutorial to introduce you to some more advanced mechanics and strategies. It is important for us that you feel battle ready once you complete the tutorial.

2v2
If you had the chance to play Phageborn on some of the tests we did before, there is a big chance you managed to try out the 2v2 game mode. While 2v2 was disabled for testing on G.Round (at least for this time), we just wish to update you that we haven't forgotten about our beloved game mode and are working on making the 2v2 co-op experience much better by removing some of the limitations that existed.

LOBBY IMPROVEMENTS
Whether you decide to play single-player or multiplayer game modes, it's important that the lobby screen is not just functional but also intuitive and visually appealing. With your feedback in mind, we will continue to polish lobbies, especially for the custom games, so that they are more intuitive and aesthetically pleasing. We are also working on improving the stability so that you won't have to worry about potential bugs and delays.

GRAPHIC IMPROVEMENTS
Often it's the little things that make the biggest difference, especially when talking about visual appeal. To make the game more immersive and aesthetically satisfying, we will continue to work on upgrading existing card VFX (especially for Legendary cards) and improving Avatars and their visuals. But we do not plan to stop on that! You can expect things like adding weight to the cards, which will impact the way cards fall down on the battleground. It just doesn't seem fair that only Unchained Megadon makes a big stomp when it falls. We have bigger creatures in Issilith than that.

POST-GAME REWARDS
After an exciting match of Phageborn, it's time for the well-deserved rewards!
Our current post-game screen doesn't leave that much room for the player to see clearly all they acquired after the match is over. So our post-game screen is going to get a revamp! We are planning to add more sounds and visual upgrades so that post-game rewards stand out more. Also, as a part of that rehaul, progress made in your active quests will be easier to see.

We will be testing until the 18th of May so it's still not too late to join if you haven't already! For more information on the testing and things that are happening with Phageborn feel free to join our Discord channel (Discord)!

Yours truly,
Games Revolted

Dear Denizens of Issilith!

It’s been a week since we started with our testing and we want to thank you for all your reviews. Today we are going to talk a bit about some of the feedback you left and what we are planning to do in the near future. As we have said before, your feedback is important to us and it is that feedback that has led us to look at some of these changes. Sadly, some of these won’t be implemented in the test build we have up, but they will (or something like them) be coming.

Game pop-up while minimized
It can be quite boring to just sit in the lobby while you’re waiting to find a match. And the last thing you need is to miss that Match found message. So in case you like to do other stuff while waiting, you won’t have to worry about that for long! We are working on making the game pop up when your match has been found. Also, we plan to implement the ability to browse over your Collection, Profile, and other features in Phageborn while you are waiting in the queue.

Bigger and cleaner turn timer
A lot of the feedback we got was about the turn timer and how it’s hard to see how much time you or your opponent have. So our turn timer is going to get a little makeover! We are going to make it bigger and more visible so players shouldn’t have any more trouble with finding it or assessing how much time they have left before the end of the turn.

Card fan-out
It would seem that it’s sometimes hard to see all the cards you have in your hand and hovering over them one by one can be a bit tedious at times. So we are going to implement a fan out option where you’ll be able to spread cards in your hand and look at all of them simultaneously with a simple click of the button. On this note, we want to make the game as accessible as possible, so if you have any troubles like this, please let us know.

Improving the action queue
Something that is really important to us is the game fluidity and while it is better than it was before, we will still work on making the game better paced. Having queued actions move smoothly and without delays is a goal we will continue to work on.

Better faction explanation and their lore
It can be hard to choose a starting faction before you even know what to expect, especially if you are a new player. To ease things up a bit we are planning to add more information about each faction and their specific mechanic, as well as implement more faction-related Lore in the game to make it more immersive.

Don’t forget that it’s still not too late to join and test Phageborn! For more information on the testing and things that are happening with Phageborn feel free to join our Discord channel if you haven’t already (Discord)!

Yours truly,
Games Revolted

Dear Denizens of Issilith!

You may have noticed that we posted this week's announcement earlier than usual. That is because today's a big day for us! Not only did we just start with the testing of Phageborn (more info on Discord) but today we will also introduce our long-awaited faction newly implemented in the game, The Ascended (some of you may have been asking about it on Discord already)!

Zealous and with a strong sense of justice. Most of the souls that have had a chance to cross their path with the Ascended would describe them as such, and they wouldn't be wrong.
Unlike Drakkorith, whose martial prowess is based on aggression in combat, the Ascended tend to have a more balanced fighting style. That is thanks to their two main philosophies which apply both on and off the battleground, Tey and Yul. Tey, or the Teaching of the Sun, favors offense over defense, and Yul, The Teaching of the Moon, that favors defense over offense. Finding balance in such surroundings is what makes the Ascended so formidable opponents.
This faction of great warriors is more than just that. In their midst, you can notice many different creatures, including humans and human-like beasts. Taking that into consideration along with their usually protective fight style, it may not come as such a shock that they were once a part of those races. However, when faced with almost certain death, some of them were saved. While their origin is shrouded by mystery, it is evident that every creature that became Ascended was touched by something, well, almost divine. Now, granted new life and imbued with spiritual power, the Ascended have only one thing on their mind, to fight against evil and prevent that horrid destiny of corruption and destruction that awaits all.

If you ever find yourself playing with or against The Ascended, knowing some basic mechanics that this faction relies on may be of great help on your way to victory. Just like in the Lore, while playing with Ascended you can expect a heavy emphasis on protecting your units and giving them the edge to survive long enough to make the maximum of every unit. And the main way to do it is usually through Shield Counters and Blessings.
Shield counters serve as a health protector for your units, Core, and Avatar. However, there is a catch, shield counters only last until the start of your next turn so use them wisely!
Blessings are, in their essence, ability cards specific to Ascended faction. Using them can give you that extra advantage needed to make advantageous trades with your opponent. They can be obtained only through a handful of units. So if you are feeling blessed, make sure to include them in your deck!

If you wish to try out the Ascended and with their help fight your way to victory, join our testing today! You can find more information about the test on our Discord channel: Discord. Feel free to join us, play some Phageborn, and leave feedback on our game. It is greatly appreciated!

Yours truly,
Games Revolted

Dear Denizens of Issilith!

If you find yourself testing Phageborn from the 21st of April you'll see that one of the new features we implemented is Quests. Their primary purpose is to boost your progression by helping you level up your Player level faster and to give you that slight edge you wouldn’t normally have. For now, we have several types of Quests, not including the ones in the Battle Pass. These main quests consist of Daily Quests, Epic Quests, and Guild Quests. Battle Pass Quests count only towards the Battle Pass levels and as such do not directly influence your Player, Faction, or Avatar Level.

Daily Quests usually have XP as their reward. You can have up to 3 Daily Quests active at a time and you'll get a new one every day until you reach that cap, so make sure you have space for more! Since they are usually things you will do in-game, (e.g. 'Energized' is a quest that requires you to spend 15 energy) it's not a problem to complete them passively, just by playing. However, just in case you don't like the quest or just don't think you'll be able to finish it in time, you can re-roll each quest once per day. Just keep in mind that the progression already made in the re-rolled quest won't be carried over to the new one.

When you open the Daily Quest side menu you will see it also contains a Daily Boost. Daily Boosts will give you extra XP for the first 3 wins of the day. Every 24 hours your Daily Boost is refreshed and you can use it again to boost your next 3 wins. After every win, the number of wins remaining is reduced by one, until all 3 win boosts are used.
We would like to add that it is planned that Daily Boost will apply to non-custom PvP game modes after the full release. For the duration of the testing it will also apply to the vs A.I. game mode (Tutorial excluded), so you can progress more easily and try out as many features and options in the game as you can during the testing period.



Epic Quests will grant you some major rewards upon their completion, however, they are not as easily acquired or completed as Daily Quests. You can get Epic Quest as a random drop when you win a ranked game. Only one Epic Quest can be active at the time. They cannot be re-rolled nor can they expire since they are not timed quests. It will usually take you some time to complete them as they consist of 3 subquests (e.g. Win 30 games + Deal 150 Acid damage + Heal your Avatar for 300 health).

Guild Quests track the progress of all members of the Guild that you are a part of. Guild Quest lasts for a week, 168 hours to be precise. Every week a Guild Master can choose one of the 4 suggested Quests as the next week's Guild Quest. If they don't, the Quest will be chosen at random. When the Guild Quests are completed and their time runs out, your Guild will be awarded XP that counts towards Guild levels as well as a reward for each member of the Guild that contributes to the Quest progress. You can contribute to the quest progression even after the quest is completed. That way everyone has a chance to fulfill the minimum requirements needed to collect the reward. Currently, the reward system for the Guild Quests is not completely in place and it will not have its full functionality for testing. The main reasons are rewards, in this case, Guild Points which you'll be able to use in the Shop for unique and special cosmetics. However, at this stage, we still don't have a Shop set so the full implementation will come at a later date.

As stated at the start of this post, Quests are a feature still in development. We will be dropping full details on the test on the 19th of April, so make sure you check our Discord then! So feel free to leave your input on them or any other part of the game as your feedback and data collected from the testing will help us shape the final look of Phageborn. Comment below or join our Discord channel (Discord) and share your preferences with other Residents of Issilith!

Yours truly,
Games Revolted

Dear Denizens of Issilith!

With the new Battle Pass plans in place and all the new updates we are currently adding to the game, a question “How will all this affect my progression?” may come to mind. So today we will walk you through some of the main progression elements and how we plan for them to look like in the future.

It is important to us that you know how this is an ongoing discussion, and that we may change the final look of the player progression according to the testing results and your feedback.

Experience (XP) is the basic progression element you passively gain while playing Phageborn. Every time you finish a match you will be rewarded with a certain amount of XP, depending on your performance. There are minimal requirements for a game to count for awarding XP to prevent players from gaining XP by surrendering at the start of a match. Completing Quests gives XP as well, but more on that next time.
Gained XP is assigned to each progression element in its full amount. In Phageborn, progression elements are Player level, Faction level, and Avatar level.

Player Level may very well be the main cornerstone of the progression system. XP required to level up will increase with each level until it reaches its cap. With each level up you will gain Progress Points (PP) and Soul Fragments (SF). Once you have reached the maximum amount of PP and SF they will be replaced by various other rewards.

Progress Points (PP) are used in the Blacksmith to unlock seals from the Seal trees. Seals always cost 1PP to unlock. When you unlock a seal you acquire the cards behind it (more on that when we talk Card Acquisition).
Soul Fragments (SF) are acquired through leveling up your account. You can use 5 of them and combine them into a complete Avatar Soul.
Avatar Souls (AS) are acquired when you collect 5 SF. You can use it in the Shrine to unlock additional Avatars. All Avatars cost 1 AS.

Faction Level is increased when you collect enough XP while playing with a specific faction. Each faction has its own Faction level. Your Faction level is important for a few reasons: it allows you access to more unlockable content (cosmetics), it's tied to your range of influence (more on that when we talk Card Acquisition, it’s coming honest), and it serves as a catch-up function. The catch-up function will help a higher-level player speed up progression in any faction. This bonus will automatically start once the player reaches the point where XP required to level up the Player Level will become uniform. The bonus will be greater the larger the difference between the Faction and Player Level is.

Avatar Levels' primary function is to give players time to adapt to using an Avatar by restricting their second and third traits behind a level gate. This level gate is removed at some point, depending on the Player Level.

CARD ACQUISITION
As stated before, we will not sell card packs! In Phageborn, apart from the Battle Passes, you can acquire cards through the seals. Every faction has its own Seal tree alongside the Neutral cards as well.
There are certain requirements you need to have so you can unlock a seal. You have to: have the required previous seal, have unspent PP, and the seal you wish to unlock has to be in your range of influence.



As seen in the screenshot, every seal is positioned somewhere along with one of the 3 paths. To unlock a seal you will need to unlock the one before that is connected to the seal you wish to unlock. Unlocking the final seal on the path requires 3 seals from the previous range of influence to be unlocked. Once you start unlocking seals along the path you don't have to finish that path to begin to unlock other seals outside of it. You can unlock any other seal in a different path or even another faction as long as you have prerequisites to unlock that seal. Each seal always costs 1 PP no matter where it is situated on the Seal tree. Seals that are outside your range of influence cannot be unlocked and you'll have to level up that faction's level.
Once you unlock a seal you cannot refund it! As soon as you unlock a seal, cards behind it are added to your account and that can't be reversed. So take your time to explore all that Seal trees have to offer to you.



There are a few differences in how the Neutral Seal Tree looks in comparison to the Faction Seal trees. First, Neutral Seal trees do NOT have a range of influence. That means that you can unlock cards from it as long as you have enough PP and have the required previous seal unlocked. The second difference is that the Neutral Seal tree has an additional, separate group of seals that are not bound by any path and can be unlocked in any order. Each of them contains 3 legendary neutral cards.
There are two main reasons why we implemented this. This way we have cleared up the Neutral Seal tree, giving it the same look and amount of cards behind each seal as in Faction Seal trees. But besides the esthetic, the main reason is that it gives you more options for deckbuilding, especially if you haven't been playing for long. Since the legendary cards can be the main focus of some strategies or an extremely big help in the right circumstances, we felt that locking all of them at the end of the paths may have as a result a needless grind just so you can try out some new legendary cards and their potential synergies. So we decided to put them separately so you can unlock new legendary cards even as a new player!

Once you start the game and choose your faction you will be given that faction's base deck, starting Avatar of that faction, and 3 Progress Points. The way you want to use your resources is entirely up to you. So feel free to browse a bit and strategize, and most importantly, don't forget to have fun!

Keep in mind that during the testing we will look over data and your feedback so there is a possibility that some things may change in the future. That is why your input is important to us! Feel free to comment below or join our Discord channel (Discord) and talk with Residents of Issilith about things you like and don't like about our current player progression.

Yours truly,
Games Revolted