Tainted Grail News

Hey everyone!

Time for our weekly update, and today we got a real treat for all of you! We have a new event, and boy, oh boy, we think y’all will really like it!



But first, congratulations to the TOP 10 players of the last event!



We knew the event had some problems and we hope that the new one will be more exciting for y'all! The new event is called Near Death Revelations – we will not spoil the small story inside it – but it leads to certain things that will happen once Patch 0.95 is introduced! But here are few highlights on the gameplay level!

• You go to a totally different map!
  
• You get to level up to max level
• really* fast
  
• You will fight a new, awesome enemy
  
• The whole goal is to max the amount of DMG you will deal to him! This is what shows on the leaderboard!
  
• You can only play the event as Warrior – Brawler
  
• The event will last a week, and then we will change the playable rune ;)

Overall, we hope that you will have TONS of fun – we certainly had! Also, we can’t wait to see whether some of you will find a totally broken combo and what will be the biggest score on the leaderboard!
We have also prepared a special reward for everyone who will deal at least 20,000 damage!

Another big highlight of this event is a totally new boss which you'll be able to fight - Herald of the Unspoken, who comes with a completely new set of rules and quirks. We've bragged about this enemy model a while ago but we'd like to give a shout-out to our 3D and texture artists again 'cause they did a fantastic job bringing one of the most amazing creatures from the Tainted Grail lore to life – check him out!

(Sorry for the quality and size, Steam doesn't like big files!)



Overall, good luck, and have good fun!



Few extra things

We also have a few extra things from the upcoming Patch 0.95. We are working on all directions, and while it’s hard to show all the gameplay focus we have added to the game (you will need to see it yourself once the patch will ship), here are a few visual enhancements that we are planning.
Some extra combat animations that we feel look really good!







Another cool addition that you will see is that we have added water and heights to Conquest, so now the terrain looks better overall – it isn’t finished yet, though!



And we’re making first tests of new Wyrdness – this will change the logic of wyrdness totally, but it was a long-coming change since our former approach was blocking us from adding any gameplay-related impact to wyrdness. Now it will be possible!

(And once again: sorry for the quality and size, Steam doesn't like big files!)

Hey everyone!

Quick update today because there is no patch coming this week - we're still working on the 0.95 version, and most systems are in the middle of work, balancing, and bug-clearing.

But! We still wanted to update y'all on things and share a few things that we'd like to talk about ;)

1. Event feedback and future of events
   
2. New user interface samples
   

Let's go!


First of all, we’d like to thank you for taking part in the event! Well over 1,000 people tried the Reign of the Rat!

We were reading your feedback very carefully and we have a few conclusions that we would like to share:

• We won’t be implementing the Top 10 Reward. This was an idea and we understand that making a very limited reward would make the experience too “exclusive” and we don’t want that.
  
• Reign of the Rat was way too hard to complete. But the general difficulty level of the game is on the extreme side of game balancing. The upcoming Patch 0.95 will be changing the learning curve of the game so that Conques is more like an “easy to learn but hard to master” type of experience.
  
• Most popular events will be coming back. So, even if you miss them the first time, you will have a chance to play them again at some point.
  
• Events will be modifying the game in more interesting ways than just the final boss. Not all of them, obviously, but expect an upcoming event to be something… different!
  

The next event will start next week and we can’t wait for you to check it out!

It will have a small story-related bit that will lead the way to the big event introducing patch 0.95! Exciting times are ahead of us!



Secondly, as we were saying, we are re-working the whole user interface – from the starting menu up to the screens you see in-game.

We went for a more modern approach and added TONS of quality of life features. Below you can find the first examples of them!

[h3]Journal[/h3]


[h3]Level-up Rewards[/h3]


[h3]Character Creation[/h3]

Hey everyone! Today we have a very exciting update for you all! :D

We've had this idea for a while, but there was a list of ASAPs we had to finish before we could implement it. Finally, most of the required components are ready, and we are happy to invite you all to the first Special Event in Tainted Grail!



We're introducing time-limited events that change gameplay, offer a fresh challenge, and can net you a special reward! These events' structure might vary a lot – from new Boss, changes to one type of enemy up to changes to the character... and more! They are meant to be a fun way of testing your skills AND a way to get certain special rewards in the meantime.

We hope we'll be able to add a new event every two weeks but, well, we'll be making decisions based on your feedback :)

Please note – this is the very first iteration of those events, so we are extremely interested in your feedback! Make sure to let us know what you like, what you don't like, and what you think about the whole concept!



[h2]REIGN OF THE RAT!
[/h2]So, our very first event is focused around the most beloved creature of Avalon – rat! There is a true rat invasion that our village needs to take care of!

The rat population not only increased, but there’s also an extremely powerful King Rat, a new Boss to defeat, waiting for you at the end of the run.

The struggle is real, but there is quite an awesome reward for that! Anyone who will complete this event at least once will be granted a special rat-armor… And we will not spoil you exactly what it does in combat! You’d have to discover it for yourselves!

Once you kill the final boss, you can try to complete the run again and put yourself on the top of the leaderboard – but every time you defeat the rat boss, he is getting stronger! In future iterations, we might additionally reward the top 10 players of the leaderboard with some memorable cosmetics ;)



We’ve been upgrading certain things in the game for the past weeks on our beta branch and now’s the time to merge some of the new changes and additions to the public version. Hopefully nothing will break! So what’s new?



As you will notice while playing Conquest, our map generation algorithm changed (for the better). It is still not the final version, but we hope the game feels better to play than it did before. Major changes:

• All tiers are more or less similar size now
  
• Milestones are rarer
  
• Encounters are actually protecting treasures not the other way around
  

More on that in our last update HERE.

This is one of the steps we take to get to the patch 0.95 – other systems are also being made and we are really excited about all of them!



[h3]Three new enemies added:
[/h3]Stalker on tier 3 - a sly, crowd-controlling enemy with a few trick up its sleeve. Be careful when below 50% max HP!
Raging Troll on tier 3 - a heavy-hitting and tanky beast that gains infinite Damage boosts and negative Armor until he’s dispatched. Force to be reckoned with!
Soul Harvester, along with a custom rare encounter, on tier 2 - a grim and ruthless enemy that kills his allies to drain their Health and become stronger.

[h3]Druid reforges added:
[/h3]

New Summoner Reforges:

Level 10:

• Glyphs of Sustenance: At the end of every Turn, all Abominations alive gain +100% Damage buff. The buff is removed after their first Activation.
  
• Glyphs of Enhancing: Wyrm now applies Vulnerable at 4 Combo Marks instead of 6.
  
• Glyphs of Shielding: Golem now reflects 100% Damage instead of 50%.
  

Level 20:

• Overcharged Runes: All Sigils effects are duplicated
  
• Glowing Runes: All Sigils cost 1 less Energy.
  
• Suppressed Runes: Every Sigil can be used once per Combat but is applied to every Summoned Creature alive instead of one.
  

New Blood Mage Reforges:

Level 10:

• Lesser Key of Binding: When any Summoned Creature Overcharges remove all active Sigils from it. They go back to your Hand with 0 Energy cost.
  
• Lesser Key of Punishment: All Health sacrificed by Summon-type Cards is multiplied by 2 and dealt as Damage towards all enemies.
  
• Lesser Key of Chaining: When any Summoned Creature Overcharges: Promote all other Summoned Creature alive by 1 level.
  

Level 20:

• Greater Key of Binding: On any Summoned Creature death overcharge it with 200% of effect's magnitude instead.
  
• Greater Key of Punishment: Overcharge resets Summoned Creatures to level 1 instead of killing them.
  
• Greater Key of Chaining: Overcharge gains an additional one stage more (12 Charges total). The final step increases the Overcharge effect to 800%.
  

• Hero level capped to 20 instead of 30.
  
• Mirrorblade lost its special effect.
  
• A LOT OF rebalancing and changes to Summoner. Too many changes to list them here, seriously. You can visit our Discord for more info!
  
• Summoner Reforge "Suppressed Runes" changed: Every Sigil can be used once per Combat but is applied to every Summoned Creature alive instead of one.
  

• Fixed Cleave + Redirect game crash
  
• Summoner's Summon Totem Advanced Card now spawns Totem instead of a Wyrm, as it should.
  
• Rush and Power of Wyrd cards can't be used when your HP is below sacrifice amount
  
• Necromancer instead of percent chance always spawns Undead Spawn if has place for it
  
• Desperate Measures no longer heals twice
  
• Beating 3 bosses unlocks the 4th Bossfight on the game map (4th path from the village) instead of happening inside the Menhir.
  
• Two Feints should show correct bonus damage
  
• It shouldn't be possible to get more than 1 flute from Pied Piper anymore
  
• Hunter's Grove gives you a choice of 5 random Advanced Cards and you can pick 3 (instead of picking 2 out of pre-selected cards). Cards should also suit your chosen character class now.
  
• Fountains of Health become inactive after using the "Leave" option
  
• Certain enemies should fill the fight arena with more enemies after dying.
  
• Selling multiple copies of non-stacking items gives you the correct amount of gold.
  
• Summoner's Summon Totem Advanced Card now spawn Totem instead of Wyrm.
  

Hope you will enjoy this event and good luck - you might need it! :D

P.S. Remember if you will have trouble beating the boss, there is a great good community guide to the game!

Hey everyone!

Time for our weekly update! First of all, let us start by saying that there is no patch coming this week for a few reasons. Many people from our crew took some time off (and we feel that they really deserve it!). Secondly, we have a lot of things that are in the middle of work, and they would not feel complete.

BUT! This is a perfect opportunity to take that time and talk about the roadmap of what's coming soon!
As you may know, we are reading almost everything you leave us – all the feedback, good and bad. We deeply believe that this is the only way of making awesome games – work on them with the community. Past weeks since our premiere, we have internalized A LOT of this feedback, processed it, and planned the most important features that we want to add to make the experience better.

A lot has been added already, but even more is in front of us, and that brings us to…


Patch 0.95* is our response to the majority of your feedback and will be designed to address the following major issues:

• Learning curve
  
• Structure of the game
  
• Content
  
• Visual enhancements and UX
  

Here is the full list of features that are already in the middle of implementation or will be in the near future ;)

[h2]1. Tutorial[/h2]
Probably not as important to most of you, since you already manage to get through the game (and are quite good at it, considering how unforgiving the learning curve is!). But this is something that many people point out: the current learning curve starts way to high with the amount of different mechanics and little explanation.

This is why we are creating a special starting zone, that will not only walk you step by step through the core mechanics of the game, but also create a proper story setting for Conquest! A small visual spoiler for the game's storyline below! Can you guess what's happening here? ;)



[h2]2. Corruption[/h2]
Currently, Corruption is implemented quite poorly and in a non-interesting way. New Corruption will be a story-driven experience that will take you through 10 levels of increasing difficulty.

But the difficulty will increase in a quality way, not lazy “+20% DMG to all enemies”. With every new stage of Corruption, you will face new enemies, new encounters, new bosses, and old ones might learn new moves. Wyrdness will also get more deadly!

You will also build your village in-between runs with better-balanced buildings.



[h2]3. Journal[/h2]
We will bring you a journal that will summarize all your in-game achievements.

You will know exactly how many cards and passives you have unlocked for every rune from the ones available. You'll know how many enemies you've seen and how many story events you've participated in.

All of this will be kept in one place, and you will be able to easily see how much content you've seen and how much is left to be discovered!

[h2]4. Weekly events[/h2]
We will also be introducing weekly events. Right now, we are not sure whether it will be every week or every 2 weeks.

There will be some special rules regarding that play, usually including a special boss for that event too. We will also create a leaderboard for those events and achievements for everyone who will finish them!

[h2]5. Re-design of UI[/h2]
We need to take a step back and re-design most of the game's interface so that it's easier to manage, prettier, and more intuitive. Here are a few quick examples of that:

• Once you get loot after defeating an enemy, you will also have your equipment on the other part of the screen to equip things right away.
  
• When you are picking new cards, you will see your current deck on the other part of the screen.
  
• There will be filters for your decks and so forth
  

These might be small things, but the devil is in the details ;) We are deeply committed to making the game flow much better!



[h2]6. New map generation algorithms[/h2]
Currently, we have a HUGE Tier 1 and then almost non-existent Tier 2 and 3. We will change it so that every Tier has more or less the same amount of enemies and encounters.

Overall, we think that one run's completion time should clock at around 1 – 1,5 hours of exciting, dense gameplay!

We're also introducing much better map generation rules to our algorithms. We're getting rid of enemies standing at the end of the path or treasure boxes "guarding" encounters (rewards should be rewards!). We're also reducing the number of milestones so that they're not just a checklist, but also a proper gameplay mechanic. There's a lot of different tweaks happening in this area!









[h2]7. Changing weapons and armors[/h2]
This system will be re-designed in quite a big way, too. Here are the major new changes and additions:

One
We've had many discussions about armors and weapons - whether it's better to let players customize their characters any way they want, or to just offer them a couple of really cool visual presets. We decided to keep the best of both worlds. Because of that, we're going to detach gameplay-related effects from cosmetic items such as weapons and armors.

In the new version of the game, your weapon and armor will be set at the character creation screen you'll access through a special NPC. You will be able to unlock new cosmetic items for Wyrdstone (or get them as rewards), and after you've done that, they will stay with you throughout your runs. This means that we will offer you only starting archetypes with their respective gear sets, but if YOU want to change them - it's up to you! Do you want to have a Druid with blue hair and a heavy plate armor... well, who are we to disagree with your choices? :D

Two
So how will the gameplay values change? We will be implementing a new system of "orbs" or "gems" (development codename for now). During the game, you will be finding a lot of different gems that will contain small buffs and effects (things like "+5 DMG", "Start combat with extra 2 cards in hand", etc.), and you'll be able to place them in special slots.

Your weapon and armor (again: doesn't matter how they look like) will have limited slots for these gems, so you will have to carefully manage them, and create your perfect combination between gems, cards, and passives ;)

Three
We will also be detaching base statistics from the items (DMG / Armor / HP). They will still be present in, for example, some gems, but your "Base" value will be dictated by your character's level. Yes, you've read that right, with every level, your character will get a bonus Base DMG, Armor or HP.
This will make your power level growth more linear (instead of "I killed the boss, now I have a weapon that is 3 times better"). It will also create a more prominent asymmetry between the runes. For example, Guardian can gain more armor and Brawler more DMG with every level.

...And that’s not all, but this update is already really damn long!

[h2]8. Balanced and more interesting buildings in the village[/h2]
Currently, we are also not that happy with the village development. We will be re-balancing everything and adding a lot of awesome buildings.

We don’t have everything tested yet, but we have A LOT of cool concepts like cards crafting that we would really love to add o the game!

[h2]9. Visual enhancements[/h2]
As we have shown in our previous updates, a lot is happening there. We are working on animated cards, more in-combat animations, better UI, new enemy visuals, effects, and so forth!



[h2]10. New content![/h2]
We are preparing over 100 new cards and passives to be discovered! New enemies and bosses, new encounters, and side quests!


As you can see, there is A LOT on our plate, and most of those systems are interconnected. This is why we will introduce only small part of those features in our weekly updates and bring, hopefully, all of the above with the HUGE patch 0.95.

We hope that with it, this will elevate your gameplay experience on the new level!

When will it happen? We are aiming at the second half of September and feel pretty well with this prediction ;)

As always, thanks so much for your encouraging feedback and for helping us with the game's development! We feel that this is a full beauty of Early Access, where you can actually play an active role in the game development and be a part of a community.

Have a great week, and we will see you in a bit with a new update ;)



*By the way, we also made a little cleaning in our patch numeration and going forward this is how the Patch names will work. Currently we are at 0.92b. Every new functionality adds 0.01, balancing or content patch are letters (a / b / c etc.). Hope this will make more sense ;)

Hello! As promised, we've changed our public release day to Wednesday so that we're able to make sure that the game stays playable for those of you who prefer to play it over the weekend :) In addition, if something will be wrong, we can hot-fix it right away!

A while ago we said that we're fixing a lot of issues we've seen with the game and that it's going to take a while – we'll be able to share more info about those huge changes really soon because most of them are slowly becoming real. However, we won't push them to the game yet because they need to be "finished" in order to work properly – they’re heavily intertwined systems and so we need to make them “flow”. Expect a huge update by the end of the month or around the middle of September! More detail will come in the next week and we can’t wait to share with you what’s coming :3

So what this means, for example, is that we're adding a lot of new passives and advanced cards to the game but we won’t be releasing them yet – it’s because we want to implement a new system of "unlocks" which will reward you for certain things in the game. Things like finishing a run. This will be accompanied by a proper “journal” that tracks your progress and accomplishments – we hope you see why it wouldn’t make sense to release this as a couple of separate features instead of one big change :)

So, by the end of August or the middle of September, you can expect a lot of new things in the game. Like we’ve said before: a total revamp of Corruption, a certain surprise in terms of Conquest’s storyline, a journal, and a lot of other things. And that's not all we're changing and fixing in the game - there's A LOT of new stuff incoming.

But please be patient, we'll be sharing more info soon.

What we CAN talk about is that we're continually working on new content that we can release and we’re constantly fixing bugs.

So here goes!



New tier 1 boss encounter added
- Vran's Warband.

A gruesome pack of mercenaries led by Vran the Sullen. Using advanced combos and tactics, this group spells trouble for any would-be adventurer. Rush to kill Vran and the group will disperse, or kill them separately, one by one.



And two new enemies:
- Crimson Ripper on tiers 1/2.
- Forest Sentinel on tiers 1/2/3.

Forest Sentinel - heavy armored and defense-oriented protector of the woods that redirects all damage taken by whole enemy group to itself. Use stun to interrupt the effect, or dispatch him quickly!

Crimson Ripper - a powerful damage dealer attacking both friends and foes at random, leaving them with a short-lived but extremely dangerous healing lock



Bugfixes:
- We've fixed the problem with Summoner's audio which hurt some people when they were playing with headphones :D Sorry!
- We hope that we've finally fixed all problems with Lifesteal on Berserker. It should work properly now!
- That bug with Juggernaut, which prevented the game from continuing, was fixed, too.
- Also, a bug with Well-Maintained Body passive skill was fixed.

Quality of Life:
- We've added a hotkey for rune usage so that you don't have to click it. Just press the spacebar or rebind the key to anything you want in the game's options.
- You can now limit the game's fps in options
- Support for CJK characters in bug reporting added (you can write bug reports in Chinese now!)

Additions:
- Added a new rare random drop item that allows you to escape from any combat
- Over 12 new music tracks (remixes and other thingies)
- First test of fully RGB tattoos

We’ve also finally fixed that old effect for Barrier – here’s how it looks now!





- Removed TAUNT cards for Warrior
- Added new keyword, MOMENTUM, which makes cards grow in power until end of your run after certain conditions are met

Cards removed from Warrior Advanced Deck:
- Duel (Attack, Taunt)
- Provoke (Attack, Taunt, Return)
- Taunt (Stance, Taunt)
- Thunderstrike (Stance, Chain)

Removed Guardian passive:
- Cleave: All Enemies suffer 20% of the Damage inflicted to any target.

Removed Berserker passive:
- Come at Me!: At start of every turn Taunt all enemies.

New Keyword Added:
- Momentum: Cards that grow permanently more powerful when used under certain conditions.

Warrior’s cards added: Short Pause (Stance, Momentum)
Restore 10 HP.
If used when less than 10% of max HP:
Momentum: +5 HP restored

Vicious Trap (Attack, Momentum)
Reflect 100% of next incoming Hit.
If killed an enemy with this reflect:
Momentum: +50% reflect Damage

Weak Spot (Stance, Momentum)
-20 armor on chosen enemy ueot
Momentum: +10 (when you kill enemy in this turn)

Warrior’s cards changed: Counter-strike (Attack)
Reflects 50% of incoming Damage next Turn instead of 50% player’s BaseDamage
Final Strike (Attack)
It’s unique ability to grow turned into new Keyword: Momentum

Finishing Blow (Attack)
Damage decreased from 300% Base Damage to 150%
Damage Boost after kill increased from 100% to 200%
Energy cost reduced from 3 to 2

Mark of Blood (Stance)
Armor Debuff increased from 60 to 100

Power Blow (Attack)
Damage increased from 400% Base Damage to 450%
Tradeoff for playing changed from discarding hand to drawing 2 cards less next turn

Prepare for Pain (Stance)
Armor boost decreased from 50 to 30.
Added new effect: Next Turn get +5 damage for every hit received this Turn.

Shield Slam (Attack)
Attack now targets all Enemies, additionally Stuns them without any condition
Lefts hero with 30 Armor debuff lasting for 2 Turn.

Random Attacks (Attack, Chain)
Name changed to Two Feints
Added new functionality: If both hits target the same Enemy: deal additional 150%BaseDamage.

Stunning Shout (Attack)
Energy cost decreased from 3 to 1
Instead of Stunning all enemies Stuns only enemies with 0 or negative Armor

Warrior’s passives changed:

Berserker’s Sacrifice
Now cards instead of drawing in moment of losing Health gonna be drawn next Turn

Brawler Reforges changed: Explosive Force (10lvl.)
Amount of healed HP decreased from 15% to 7%

Wind-up
No longer gives bonus to Energy on Threshold
Instead gives 2% Damage bonus per every charge
And +50% Damage bonus to ultimate

Guardian Reforges changed: Defensive Heal (10lvl.)
Amount of healed HP decreased from 10% to 5%

Opportunity Block (10lvl.)
Charges threshold decreased from 10 to 7

Ambush (20lvl.)
Charges threshold decreased form 12 to 6

Berserker Reforges changed: Born for Combat (10lvl.)
Every Turn charges boost decreased from 4 to 2

Remorseless Assault (20lvl.)
Condition for Stunning all Enemies is removed
Wyrdness Blade Legendary card does not attack for 1 Damage.



In addition to that, here are some spoilers from what you can expect in the near future ;)

A new bossfight!



(Sorry for the quality and size, Steam doesn't like big files!)



We’re also working on making the cards prettier and better – this means we’re starting to animate them. Here’s a sneak peak :)