Vault of the Void News

It’s here! As promised, Impossible+ has just been added and is available for those who have won an Impossible game, and hence unlocked the mode. I’ll give the lowdown on how Impossbile+ works below, but I’ll also just do a general re-cap of what has changed this week.

Starting off with a big thank you to all who have left a positive review! It helps so much for just a single bloke trying to make something interesting! To see the number on Steam almost at 100 is wild and so humbling - massive thank you!!

As usual, its been a super busy (read: sleepless) week, coupled with me heading off in a direction I didn’t expect. As many of you know by now, I like to lurk around in Streams and watch any videos that get posted to YouTube etc. One thing I’m constantly hearing is re: text size, and accessibility. Enough was enough - I needed to spent more time on this, that was super clear. My apologies to anyone who has had a bad time viewing/playing Vault, I’m hoping tonights patch is a good push in the right direction in terms of UI changes.

[h3]So what’s changed?[/h3]

• Firstly, fonts are larger, pretty much across the board. Some of the intro/blurb text needs addressing still but card fonts, tooltip fonts, and top bar fonts have been updated. The font is thinner, and cleaner to read.
  
• Card backing colour has been lightened to help with contrasting text
  
• The top UI bar has increased in size a lot, with new icons and layout to help keep things clear
  
• The Runic Power bar has moved to permanently sit at the top UI bar, rather than being on the board during battle.
  
• The Threat Stack now contains your HP and Round number. A note on this, this is the most questioned change so far through Beta Branch testing this week. I’m hoping next week to set up an options menu where players can customise what’s shown in that bar.
  
• Card Keywords are now sitting at the bottom of the card, in a dedicated name plate.
  
• There's a few other small things like using colour to help separate stuff, and placing common elements that other games use and players are used to in more common positions. Vault already changes a lot when it comes to gameplay, having some familiarity in some places is going to be a good thing I think.
  

[h3]Impossible+, or, choosing how you’d like to die...[/h3]
So this system has been designed for a while now and I’m so happy to finally have it in. I wanted to provide something different to the usual linear progression based + systems, and the Instability system is the byproduct of that.



You’ll start with an Instability of 5, and the more your win, the more your max Instability will increase. You have full control over what modifiers affect your run. Costs are still being evaluated and even more options are planned - feel free to throw feedback at me! How far can you get? Excited to see some Instability 25+ challenge runs happening.

Coupled with the system is the Instability Setup sharing system. This allows you to set up a configuration, copy the code to your clipboard and send it to a friend (or enemy!) so they can take a shot as well! One note about this, the code is very long. I’ve got a new system which is being tested right now and should replace this long code with a much more manageable one next week!

Other than that, it’s game on. As always, I’m very keen to hear your feedback on the system and can’t wait to see who can take some of those high level Instability Achievements.

And yes, there are some exclusive backgrounds and deck backs on their way for those who are able to take down those higher level Instabilities! Coming next week...

As always, feel free to head over to the Discordand fire up a conversation. And thank you again to all who have left such awesome reviews!

Next on the Roadmap - a new class!

All for now,
Josh


Edit: Forgot to add the actual Patch Notes! Sorry!

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1.3.25

+ Gameplay/UI;
- Impossible+! As promised, Impossible+ is here. Read all about the details in the Steam post!
- Many, many UI tweaks - more changes to icons, fonts, layouts etc as I continue to try and polish the UI.
- Lots of Tooltip changes to help cut down on the 'bulk' of things.
- You can now right click on the map popover to mark hexes.
- New Potion quick bar on the pre-fight screen.
- Void Stone effects on cards will now show in Orange.
- Card text scaling on longer cards.
- Lots of little minor QoL changes (many which I forgot to document! Doh!)


+ Card Changes;
- Juggle is now a 1 cost
- Mithril Blades is now an Uncommon


+ Bugs;
- Discord button now links correctly!
- Lots of minor card interaction bugs.
- Battleplan will no longer reset after each fight.
- Death Blade has had its damage prediction corrected.
- Eroding Sanity on Impossible+ shows correct projection now.
- Spell corrections.
- Metor's Purge ability is no longer effected by Rage .
- Haunted tooltip updated.
- Many Block cards have had the Block keyword added.
- Shield Wall will show the correct numbers now.

I'm back! The ill timed family vacation is over! I appreciate everyone who reached out - it was a lovely break, but I’m ready to dive back into regular updates - and that starts now!

Whilst away, I was able to squash a number of bugs that showed up. There is still more on the list, and I’ll start moving through those tomorrow. Trying to keep abreast of Discord, Reddit and the Steam Forums, whilst also lurking in streams/videos where I can. Anything that I miss, feel free to poke me about!

Two big things to discuss here, lets start with:


So I figured it was time to start acting like a real developer and put together some sort of plan! After googling “video game development plan for sale”, and not getting anything worthwhile - I decided I guess I better write my own (I joke of course. The one I posted was 100% just a purchased template).

In all seriousness, there are still a few things to add, however this gives a good base for the things I’m looking to move on in the coming months. I’ll continue to modify and add to the list as things come up, feedback rolls in. There's already 3-4 things I know I need to add - so hopefully will cycle back shortly and get those in.

For those who are interested, you can read the sticky post right here:
https://steamcommunity.com/app/1135810/discussions/0/2968398851793589786/


One of the goals with Vault was to limit randomness, or have it exist in a more controlled state - hopefully that much is apparent! One system of randomness that still existed was the Potion system, how sometimes after a fight, a Potion would appear. Sometimes it wouldn’t. Sometimes you’d roll into the Void fight with 10 Potions banked up, sometimes you’d only have 3. I liked the interaction of how Potions worked, but I wasn’t 100% sold on the delivery.

I’ll admit - this idea is one of my famous “give it a punt, see how people like it!” ideas. I think it fits better to the core tenants that Vault is trying to adhere to - and also hopefully adds another decision point for players to engage with.

From now on, on certain mob tiles, you’ll see a small “potion” icon. This icon lets you know, upfront, that a Potion reward will be handed out after finishing the fight. Each floor will have 4 of these tiles. The “type” of potion is still hidden, however you’ll know that a potion is guaranteed upfront.

I’ll continue to gather feedback on this change over the next few days. The number of potion tiles, the transparency of which potions are inside etc is all subject to change - however hopefully the idea behind why it's done is something that I’ve conveyed well enough!

Oh - and they all have new artwork!



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Asides from that, below is the big list of changes! As usual, a few things may have slipped through this list, but hopefully it contains all the major points!

I’ll be honest, there will probably be another patch tomorrow as I have a fair chunk of time during the day to knock out a bunch of bug fixes and changes.

So until then - happy Void hunting!
- Josh

+ Gameplay/UI;
- The Rare Artifact for losing all cards in Backpack event has changed to give an Elite artifact instead.
- Future Strike will now also show a progress bar above Enemy HP (works alongside Shii for double stack).
- Enemy HP bar will now go yellow if they're immune
- New Potion reward system and artwork.
- New mouseover for zoom/upgrade hint overlay to declutter the tooltip sections.
- Keg of Lucky Rum has changed
- Aftifacts have changed to be larger
- When selective Discard is active (Fear, Blue Gem etc), cards are now lower so they won't block your Buffs.
- If a hex is highlighted due to being selected in Map Rewards, you can now right click the hex to remove it from Map Reward tracking.
- Have move the "Take Souls and Essence instead" button down a touch on the Artifact choice screen.
- Whilst holding a card, you can now Right Click it to drop the card.

+ Bugs;
- Fixed a typo on the Challenge Coin tooltips
- Fixed an issue where exiting on Map Rewards after a Guardian fight would cause your map to be bricked.
- Fixed an issue where Rusty Scythe was causing all manor of random targeting issues.
- Fixed the icon for Hide being WAY off.
- Reworked the text on Barbed Gauntlet.
- Fixed a projection error on In Cold Blood
- Fixed Jade Mantis not doubling AoE Shii effects
- Class Trainer has been fixed to allow for re-rolls
- Fixed a bug which caused cards to be duplicated if you click SUPER FAST in the deck manager.

Whilst I’m away this week, I wanted to take some time to put together a few articles covering different aspects of design for Vault of the Void. The first thing I wanted to tackle was the Void fight itself, as it’s something that has come up a few times already, both on the forums and in the Discord. So let’s dive in!

I want to start by clearing something up. The following explanation isn’t me trying to prove I’m right. Heck, I’m just some bloke from Australia who’s learning on the fly - I’m no more qualified than anyone else! What I want to do is provide my thought process behind why things are the way they are, and use that as a platform to encourage and invite discussion on the subject.

When I originally designed the Void fight, it was very different. All versions were, and there were... several. There was an age when “Void Shackles” existed, a mechanic that eventually got ported to what we know as the Black Coach fight. There was a time when the Void would gain AP for every point of energy you spent. Blade Hidden loved it. There was also a time when it scaled based on cards played, and de-scaled (like a coffee machine?) based on Purging. I could go on, but I won’t.

It came to a point where I had to decide what the Void fight should be. There's several factors I wanted to consider:

[h3]Runs in Vault take a long time[/h3]
Not a LONG time, but a fairly decent time. Whilst veterans clock in around 60min, it's not uncommon for runs to hit the 90-120min mark. I wanted to keep this as part of the consideration when it came to the Void fight. Which leads into the next point

[h3]No one likes to hit a hard counter[/h3]
This is core to pretty much everything in Vault. Whilst you have the ability to sideboard in cards, no one likes to hit that one fight which just hard counters everything you do. Don’t get me wrong, there was a point in time when that happened. In fact, I lent into it, hard. Taking a Bleed deck into the Ghostly Piranhas fight was almost certain death. Originally I thought this wasn’t a problem - I telegraphed the upcoming fight to the user, they just need to adapt their deck more! It turns out that wasn’t fun for users. No one likes to invest into a build only to have the game say “Ah, sorry no.” (doesn’t matter how politely you do it!) Also, there's a fine line between “good sideboarding” and “oh my - this is a chore”. Swapping in a timely AoE card or bringing Slow instead of Weak to a high Frenzy fight is the good end of Sideboarding. Doing a full deck rebuild mid run, it turns out, isn’t.

In Vault, encounters will propose challenges to your deck, but not counters. The Berzerker will punish your Hidden Blade build, but with smart play, an elegant deck or a bit of luck, you’ll still be able to get past it.

The Hag is going to punish a Future Strike build more than others. Bleed may have a harder time against the Ghostly Piranhas. The Black Coach might cause a slower Corruption deck a bit of pain. But at the end of the day, these should be challenges, not brick walls.

[h3]The End Game should lean into the Player Agency that Vault is built around[/h3]
This is where the Vault Guardian system comes from, and will lead into my point. I wanted there to be some heavy challenges when it comes to the end game, but one that allows a player's prior knowledge to inform their choices and make their job easier. Queue Vault Guardians.

Each of these present the aforementioned “challenges” in a strong way - but knowledge is key. Whilst fighting the Spidernest with a full Ability deck is possible, it can be tough. The Queen of Ages may be defeatable with a Bleed deck, but it won’t be easy! The Vault Guardians act as counters and challenges to your deck, but presents players with a choice on how to approach them.

[h3]Cue the Void Fight[/h3]
So when it comes to the Void fight, given the above points, I wanted to ensure that it was the opposite of the Guardians. It shouldn’t be a counter to certain deck types. Players should be able to fight the Void the way they want, with the deck they’ve lovingly created over the past 90min+.

If you spend your time perfecting the most awesome Bleed deck, and it’s instantly countered the moment you walk into the Void fight - that would suck.

So what if there were different types of Void fights, and the player was informed which one they had to fight at the start of the run? Whilst that is technically possible - what happens when you’re in the mood to play The Enlightened, and you roll into a run where the Void retaliates with damage every time you attack it? Delay Block would suddenly feel pretty worthless. Do you re-roll? Do you invest 90+ min on the hope you’ll be strong enough?

The Vault guardians are presented at the start of the run so the player can plan around it. Choose the Blessing they want, or picking the Guardians they feel they have a chance against. The key here is that there is a choice. You only need to fight 2 out of the 4.

So with all this in mind, I designed the Void fight as a Victory Lap. You’ve fought everything there is to fight. You’ve beaten two Vault Guardians. You’re 90 min in and you’re invested in your deck. You have the combos, the play style, the methods all down pat. Vault gives you the tools to make this happen. I often say that Vault is a combo builder - I want to give you the tools to make the filthiest deck you can. Here's all the cards available on the floor. Cherry pick what you need to get the job done!

Once you get into the Void fight, in my mind, you’ve already won.

I believe in this so much so, that in the analytics system, I actually count getting to the Vault as a Victory. The Void fight is there to give you, the player, a chance to show how strong your deck is - in a near perfect scenario. They aren’t going to counter it, they aren’t going to make your life hard with funky mix ups and change up mechanics. They’re going to do two things:

1. They’re going to have a lot of HP
   
2. They’re going to scale. Fast.
   

It’s a race. And make no mistake - it's a tough fight! But if you’ve set things up right, and the cards have fallen your way, you should be set up to take it on. How quickly can you bring down 2000 HP of hurt that Attacks every 2 out of 3 turns?

So that's why the fight is designed the way it is. Is it right for everyone? Probably not. There's several angles one could take when designing that last fight. It also doesn’t help that on Normal difficulty, he can feel like a pushover a little. However when it comes to Hard and Impossible, you really do need to have things trimmed down and running well to overcome the challenge.

I hope this helps shed a little light on what went on inside the old coconut when it came to this encounter. I’d love to hear your thoughts in the comments below - I’ll be sure to read them as I always do and respond where I can!

That's all for me - until next time!

Wow - that concludes the first week of Vault of the Void being live in Early Access! A lot happened, including even being in Full Release for a few hours (doh)! Lessons learnt, changes made and 2 things really stand out to me:

1. I still can't believe how kind you all are, and the amazing comments you've left. I really, really appreciate it and love the fact you're enjoying the game!
   
2. Pirates really are a real thing eh!?
   

Lots of patches have gone out this week, including some awesome new stuff for the Blade Hidden. More artifacts to come next week, and some more love will be passed out to the Daughter as well, as the data is continuously monitored to make sure everyone is getting a fair go!

In terms of data, you all have been crushing it. Nearly 50 million damage dealt in the first week!



One thing of note, this coming week I’ll actually be away from the keyboard for most of it - a family holiday booked (in hindsight), at an inconvenient time (when we booked it at the start of the year, I didn’t expect to have Vault released!). However I’ll still be patching any bugs that show up whilst away, but it may be a little lighter on the patches for the next 5 days or so.

A few members of the Discord have been talking about the Steam awards as well, and I’ve got some lovely messages regarding nominations for Vault (mostly in the Innovative Gameplay category). Whilst I really do love the appreciation you all show for what I’m trying to do with Vault, I’m also terrible at asking for reviews, let alone award nominations! (imposter syndrome much?) I won’t do that here, but I do want to put out a public “thank you” to all who have done so. Really does mean a lot!

So beyond next week - where next? Early December, all you Impossible players can look forward to Impossible+, which is almost ready to go, a few rounds of internal testing yet to play out! Then, as we progress further into December, look forward to hearing a bit more about the next class which will be added hopefully before the end of the year!

Onwards to the contents of tonight's patch (it actually dropped a few hours ago but only just got a chance to type all this up!)

Happy Void hunting!
- Josh

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+UI
- HP Bars will now be Blue if the creature has Fort.

+ Cards;
- Unholy Cleansing now stacks.
- Hidden Blade no longer has the Draw keyword
- Upgraded Juggle will now work correctly


+ Bugs;
- Fixed an issue with Blade Belt trigger on non-attack cards.
- Fixed Skeleton Mage's fight tips to explain the AP increase is when losing HP, not suffering Threat.
- Killing Blow will correctly show a Daze card now.
- Dark Mime will now show the alternative cost to Souls (Void) in it's tooltip.
- Added to the tooltip for Voids to ensure players know it won't take up deck space.
- Steam Screenshots now work!
- There is now a Random Battlefiled option, meaning each fight it will pick from one of your unlocked Battlefields!
- Have upped the texture pages to 4k, monitoring performance issues, however should notice less lag when switching scenes.
- There is an option to turn off Custom Cursors now, incase you're experiencing mouse lag
- Music Levels have been adjusted
- Fixed a bug on the Map Generation

Before going any further, I wanted to take the time to give a massive thank you to all who have left a Positive Review on Steam. You can’t even believe how much it begins to help things - and I’m so humbled by all the support! Thank you so so much!

Tonight's patch comes with some pretty big changes! I wanted to take the time to give a bit more of an explanation as to why things have changed, rather than list them all off. I’ll do a full list at the bottom but at least for the main points, I’d like to dive into some details!

[h3]Run Length[/h3]
One thing that has been debated quite a bit over the last 6 months is Run Length. It’s true that Vault is on the longer side of things, and whilst Veterans have runs down to around 60-90 mins, it's not uncommon for new and intermediate players to be looking at a good 2-3 hr sit down.

To be clear, I always said I wouldn’t just change map length for the fun of it, but after talking to some other players, one thing is pretty clear. By about middle/two thirds through Floor 2, your deck is pretty much done and you’re ready to go. By that point, you’re either going to be fine in the Vault, or you’ve got some hurt coming. I always said if things were going to change, that would be around the spot I would tweak the map.

So I made the change! Floor 2 is now 2 columns shorter. That does mean there is : 2 less mob fights, 1 less Treasure Room, 1 less Shrine and 1 less Merchant. It’s been playtested over the last few days and it feels pretty good, but please feel free to fire any feedback to me! Depending how you path, it may shave a bit of time off your runs, but the big thing is it will make Floor 2 feel like it's ending at the right time now. Hopefully!

[h3]Blades, Blades and more Blades[/h3]
So this is a big change - and whilst I see you readying the pitchforks, please give me a chance to explain haha! I like data. A lot actually. I look over all the data on win rates and winning decks everyday to try and pickout trends. I also watch streams, I lurk in a lot of them, and I get to see what people enjoy about different builds. One thing that's been bugging myself and the card balance volunteers is that Blade has a few things showing up, namely:

1. Quite often, Combo will be used in conjunction with some of the big 2 Cost Neutral cards to hit hard. Seriously, Combo 3 and a Wound or a Planned Strike can carry a run. That doesn’t feel very bladey.
   
   
2. Hidden Blade upgraded is great. No, it’s fantastic. Actually, to be honest, it’s probably better than a lot of Rares in the game. A 0 cost multi-trigger that doesn’t eat combo is so fun to play, but it's also so very strong. Like, “should-not-be-a-common” strong. Especially a Mastery target. Also, any deck that contains one (or heck, 2!), has a very high win rate. Turns out Block 16 or Rage 100% for 0 cost is really good. But it’s fun.
   
   
3. People love tossing Blades. The giddy smile and maniacal laugh they give when a handful of blades show up makes that pretty clear. In contrast to point 1, that does feel bladey.
   
   
4. There was a heavy requirement to get 1-2 of the Buff cards going for the Blade Build to really take off.
   

So this patch, lets put the Blade, back into Blade.

• Firstly, Wound, Do Over and Planned Strike have lost the Swift tag.
  
• Secondly, Upgraded Hidden Blade has changed to read;
  Deal 3 damage. Balanced. Inert. Rebound.
  It no longer loses Inert but has gained Rebound.
  

But wait! As I mentioned, that card was fun to play. I love fun as well, which is why there is a new Rare card called Stiletto, which is basically the Hidden Blade you know and love. You can still get it, but you will no longer be able to get a free hand out at the Mastery screen.

But wait! We wanted more handfuls of Hidden Blades! There's no handsize limit for a reason! I know - thats why 5 new cards have been added to the Hiddens pool which do just that. Let me preview one of my favourites:

Blade Upon Blades - 2 Cost Swift Attack
Deal 8 (11) Damage. Gain 1 Volatile Hidden Blade.

These cards have a lot of flavour and add a bunch more Hidden Blade generation to the Blade spec. They’re also spread across Rarities, so check them out!

On top of that, I've also added a hanful more Artifacts for the Hidden specifically! Now the fun really begins. Lets take a look at one of the new ones:

Blade Belt: When you play your 4th Attack in one turn, gain 2 Volatile Hidden Blades.

At the end of the day, this is just a long winded way of saying that Blade should now feel more fun, and much, much more Bladey.

[h3]New Playmats[/h3]
It's not all doom and gloom! There are 2 awesome new Battlefields available to unlock under the Unlocks menu! (Although, if I was to give them a theme, it would probably be Doom and Gloomy).

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And now, for the full details. As usual, theres probably a few bugs I didn't document fixing, as sometimes when I'm in the trenches I forget to record all the details!

1.3.10
+ UI/General
- More colour tweaks to card text
- Floor 2 Map has been shrunk by a small margin. 
- 2 New Battlefields have been added!

+ Artifacts;
- 11 new Elite Artifacts added (Global and Hidden) 

+ Cards; 
- Do Over, Wound and Planned Strike have lost the Swift tag. 
- 5 new cards added to the Hidden's Card Pool. Main Gauche, Juggle, Trigger Phrase, Leading Edge and Blades Upon Blades


+ Bugs;
- Blessing of Efficiency will no longer affect cards outside of battle
- Added a buff icon for Potion of Energy
- Taste of Blood vs Bruce now shows the correction damage
- Popup when reslotting a Stone as the Daughter will no longer say it will be destroyed
- Fixed the tooltip card showing at the top of the screen, rather than above the card. 
- Spell Child will now actually take your Essence, instead of dishing out his wares for FREE! 
- Side Step will now show block cap when vs'ing the Dragon Mother
- Blessing of Stealth will now give full energy. 
- Fixed an issue where one card in hand would cover Buffs
- Spells from the Guardians will now unlock in the Compendium 
- Music will no longer double up if sitting on the Main Menus too long