Ephemeral Tale News

Hello again, my dearest puppers!~ I hope that this Pupdate finds you well, wherever you are! After some long considerations on it, this week has some small tweaks to the durability system to (hopefully) make it less annoying to players. As per usual, I'll go into the reasoning after the changelog. So let's get right into it, shall we?

[h2]Ephemeral Tale 1.33.4 Changelog[/h2]

• Lowered HP pool of Dark World enemies by ~5-10%
  
• Fixed an issue where a randomly generated chest was unobtainable in the Royal Rosegarden
  
• Lowered the rate that rare enemies flee from combat
  
• Added a handful of pre-determined chests to each of the Realm of Shadow dungeons
  
• Fixed a crash that could occur when interacting w/ the skill tree or a shop
  
• The following changes to the durability system have been made:
  
• Common armors now have 60 base durability (up from 40)
  
• Uncommon armors now have 80 base durability (up from 75)
  
• Rare armors now have 110 base durability (up from 105)
  
• Damage is now done to all armor equally, as opposed to one piece at random
  
• Magical attacks now impact durability half as much as they did prior to this patch

To start off the back-half of this week's Pupdate, let's talk about the changes to durability listed above. The durability system has been one that has been a controversial one for some time, and for good reason. See, when Ephemeral Tale released into Early Access the gear system was very different to what it stands to be now. Rarities increased durability, but gear didn't really have levels. Instead, it scaled with you as you adventured through the various zones of the game. Inevitably, the durability alone wasn't a good enough system to encourage use of new gear as time went on. This lead to the system changing into the one that players are familiar with now: gear has levels, and drops near your level.

This has properly incentivized players to try out new stuff (yay!), but this begs the question: why keep durability if that's the case? Simply put, it also helps with that same goal. Since it puts an expiration date on gear, this means that players are more mindful of what they have in their inventory, and this brings value to items like repair kits since they then serve as preservatives of a sort! With that said, one of the major flaws of the current way durability is implemented is that it's unpredictable. This is really frowned upon in turn-based games, as you like to be able to get a feel for how long something is gonna last, whether that's a buff, a fight, whatever the case may be. To help combat that, damage will now be equally spread across your armor, as opposed to the damage being done to a singular piece at random. But like with all changes, there's a trade-off to that.

If all your gear is taking damage equally now, doesn't this mean there's a net increase in damage done to your gear? Yes, actually. That's exactly what it means. So how do we address that issue now? Well, we make magic damage (which currently does double damage to armors) and cut that in half. Additionally, I've gone ahead and upped the base durability of various rarities of armor to ensure they last longer as well. I may have to increase it again in the future, but we'll get there!

Next week, we'll be talking about the upcoming Major Update #6, and what to expect from it. Until next time, stay safe and have fun!
-- Ryan
Join our Discord: https://discord.gg/jpStbUf

This week is an smaller-than-usual patch, as I've been busy working on a big feature for an upcoming major update (We'll talk about that here in a little bit). Additionally, I've spent a fair portion of the last week laying the foundation for Steam Achievements. There's some other stuff I want to kick into the game before the next Major Update, but I want to keep it somewhat secret for the time being as I'm not sure if it will end up being finished in time.

Let's talk changes!

[h2]Ephemeral Tale 1.32.1 Changelog[/h2]

• Ephemeral Tale will now auto-save when interacting with a campfire
  
• Fixed a bug where a game over that was induced by the rampant flames in the Corrupted Castle was funky (thanks, PacDaddy!)
  
• Fixed a bug where the save screen wasn’t accurately showing the save screen background
  
• Fixed a bug where a secret in the Forgotten Forest was more hidden than intended
  
• Disabled swipe input for touch input
  
• Updated the animation for Bind to be pixel compliant

Earlier, I mentioned that I've been working on an upcoming feature for the next Major Update; that feature is further character customization! It's been something that I've wanted to do for some time, but have been unable to commit much time to until recently.

Representation is important!

When this feature arrives, you will be able to choose a character sprite to represent you in-game from a roster of sixteen different characters! Regardless of your race or gender, I want you, the players of Ephemeral Tale to feel at home when you're playing.

It's been a challenge getting this to work properly (from a technical perspective), but it's exactly the type of work that needs to be done. Thankfully, getting the necessary technical changes implemented took less time than I initially anticipated. I'll continue refining this over the next few weeks before this feature launches in our next Major Update.

I'm also looking into implementing a couple changes to the text system to allows for you, the player, to adjust the text speed. I'm not exactly sure if this is do-able, when it will be finished if it is, or anything of that sort-- but it is something that is on my radar.

With all that said, I continue to appreciate all of your guys' feedback and support! Until next time, stay safe and have fun!
-- Ryan
Join our Discord: https://discord.gg/jpStbUf

Sup guys & gals? Wow, what a patch we have this week! Our first "living quest," Sabrina's juice patrol, is finally completed! If you've met the required level (30), you can talk to her to start the process of finishing that quest and gain the ability to turn your junk into epic gear.

Additionally, we've got some new loot for you to chase, and a bunch of balance changes, plus some bug fixes to round things out. Let's jump into the changelog!

[h2]Ephemeral Tale 1.31.4 Changelog[/h2]

• Sabrina, the Middle-Aged Witch calls on you to find another vat of THE JUICE
  
• Added a new helmet: the Swifthorn Mask!
  
• The Swifthorn Mask can be acquired from Spidare, in the Bayou Bog
  
• Adjusted the HP pool of Psychopomp Empress, from base amount of 3000 to base amount of 3500
  
• Lowered the Power yielded from bosses by ~40%
  
• Lowered the Power yielded from mini-bosses by ~15%
  
• Lowered the amount of non-random Mimics in the Sunken Summit
  
• Increased the HP scaling of all enemies, mini-bosses, and bosses
  
• Increased the difficulty of bosses when re-issuing a challenge to them
  
• Added additional text to the Occluded Oasis and Corrupted Castle to help inform the player of their acquisition of the Blessings
  
• Fixed an issue where Autosave would not autosave (yup, that happened)
  
• Fixed an issue where the chest containing the Shell of the Summit could clip into a wall

I'd like to take this Pupdate and talk about these balance changes; the goals of them, why these numbers-- that sort of thing. For me, transparency in the development process continues to be a goal that I strive for. So let's talk about it!

The boss of the Corrupted Castle, the Psychopomp Empress, has been a tricky one to find the right balance for. See, something that I've never shared with you guys is exactly how the boss operates: for each skull you collect and put back into it's pedestal inside of the Corrupted Castle causes her to be unable to absorb an essence. Since she can't absorb it, she forces it through using some of her own essence instead, hurting her for a large portion of her HP.

Unfortunately, her base HP pool has never been large enough for this to be posed as a mechanical option, nor has her buff ever been powerful enough to pose a serious threat to players trying to keep her at bay. These changes, along with some others I'm cooking up, should help remedy that!

You might also notice that the Power yielded from fighting bosses has been reduced a fair amount-- this is also to combat a few unintended side-effects of the scaling system working the way that it does. While bosses still reward a significant portion of Power, it should be lessened enough now that players don't find themselves repeatedly grinding the same encounter to power level their character. Plus, now that bosses are more challenging on subsequent challenges, this should hopefully allow for players who absolutely wailed on a boss to see all of the mechanics shine. Mini-bosses Power yield was changed for a similar reason.

I decided as well to increase the HP scaling of all enemies, be they bosses or not by a small amount. This choice stems mostly from the fact that a previous revision to the gear system changed how HP and MP are distributed into gear-- if you get points in those categories, you get more points than if they weren't. Because of this, there's been a growing discrepancy between damage done and damage taken. The goal of this change is to bring this more in line without drastically cranking up the amount of damage that you need to do. In terms of numbers, this is a simple one: instead of getting 1 additional HP per level, enemies now get 2. Like I said, this shouldn't drastically change things-- my goal is to get there over time rather than through massive, sweeping efforts.

I hope that this insight helps you guys understand my approach to balance in Ephemeral Tale, and until next time, stay safe and have fun!
-- Ryan
Join our Discord: https://discord.gg/jpStbUf

You ever just sit there, enjoying a nice Ephemeral Tale session when suddenly it's just MISS, MISS, MISS, MISS, MISS? Yeah, me too. After putting it off for quite some time, I was finally able to unravel the mess that is the hit calculations inside of the Ephemeral Tale engine. Let's go over what the issue was, why it could seem so pervasive, and how it's been addressed (after this week's changelog, of course).

[h2]Ephemeral Tale 1.30.3 Changelog[/h2]

• Implemented a form of hit protection (see details below)
  
• Because of the above hit protection, the hit floor is now 60% (down from 80%)
  
• Lowered encounter rate within the Lost Caverns
  
• Added additional dialogue to the Lost Caverns
  
• Adjusted the experience rate of enemies in the Lost Caverns
  
• Adjusted the cost and damage output of Double Strike and Arcane Bolt (cost increased slightly, damage output lowered slightly)
  
• Adjusted the HP pool of Psychopomp Empress, from base amount of 2750 to base amount of 3000
  
• Adjusted the Defense and Magic Defense stats of Psychopomp Empress, from base amount of 30/40 to 40/50
  
• Empowerment on Psychopomp Empress has been increased in effectiveness: from 5% stat buff at Lv. 1, to 10%, and from 20% buff at Lv. 4 to 40%
  
• Moved a ladder in the Oasis to help better guide players
  
• The mini-bosses in the Forgotten Forest will now appear in order of difficulty
  
• Adjusted the Defense and Magic Defense stats of Tyranis, from base amount of 35/25 to 45/35
  
• Fixed an issue where the Power icon wasn’t displaying inside of the combat reward screen
  
• Fixed an issue where Paralyzing Tyranis could cause the game to crash (thanks, Chris!)
  
• Fixed an issue with portraits being blurry inside of combat (thanks, fmoo!)
  
• Fixed an issue where players could overpower evasion mechanics with sheer, brute force
  
• Fixed an issue where players could skip mini-boss encounters inside of the Forgotten Forest
  
• Fixed a number of instances where certain text wasn’t properly centered

[h2]HIT ME![/h2]
The way that hits (really, combat formulae in general) are calculated inside of Ephemeral Tale has always been a bit of an odd duck. For the sake of making this easier to discuss (and the added bonus of transparency), here's the current equation for how hits work:

Math.min(Math.max(0.6,(base + ((user.level / 5)+(user.agility*0.125))*0.01)), 1.5)

Now here's what this means, in plain English. You have your base hit rate (which is 80%), this is added to your level divided by 5. So, for example, if you're level 10, you'd get a bonus of 2% hit rate, where as at level 50 you'd get a 10% bonus. Then, a secondary bonus is added based on your agility. The higher the agility, the higher the hit rate. Keep in mind, this is all added to that base rate of 80%-- so we can afford to have these be smaller, incremental increases.

Finally, this is multiplied by 0.01 to turn it into a decimal. At which point, we choose the larger number between your hit rate (which, if it was for example 200% would now read as 2) and 0.6 (i.e., a 60% hit rate floor). Finally, we choose the smaller number between your hit rate and 1.5 (which serves as a 150% hit rate ceiling). This is your final, displayed hit rate. Okay! Now we can hop into the complex stuff.

You see, hit rate is only one part of the equation: another piece is enemy evasion. That's right, enemies can evade your attacks! Since this is functionally the same thing as a miss, they aren't delineated or presented in any different kind of way. What does this mean for you, the player? If you're up against an enemy with a 10% evade rate, and you have an 80% hit rate, this means that your hit rate is closer to 70%. I can't really report that in the menu, however, as it varies from enemy to enemy.

So how can we approach this, then? Simple solution, complicated to implement. Hit protection! Whenever you attack, the engine now checks the result of that attack. If you've missed, we trigger an internal timer that will be checked on any subsequent attacks that miss. If you're still within your timer, we override that miss and force a hit instead. If not (i.e., a couple turns have passed and you've hit successfully within them), we allow you to miss once more.

The goal of this change is to stop you from rolling several, subsequent misses. Because of these changes, you can miss a maximum of one out of every three hits! This will help alleviate the feeling that players are constantly missing, without edging things too far in their favor.

Next week, I've got another round of balance changes scheduled that will address other issues I've come across in recent play, and maybe another surprise or two (depending on time).

Until next time, stay safe and have fun!
-- Ryan
Join our Discord: https://discord.gg/jpStbUf

What it do, my Puppers? We just had our largest update yet last week with the arrival of our 5th Major Update. If you're just catching up now, that update brought in tons new areas to explore, enemies to fight, bosses to slay, and gear to acquire! Additionally, if you (somehow) have been in the dark since our release and are taking a second look at the game, it's changed a lot since our initial release! Five new zones, a bunch of sidequests, new gear, hidden bosses, a skill tree, changes to the durability system, leveling system, gear system, and so forth. This has been an amazing learning experience for me, and I've loved working on the game for all of you.

Just because we had our update on Friday, however, doesn't mean that I'm free of the Weekly Patch cycle! It's patch day, so here we go!

[h2]Ephemeral Tale 1.29.2 Changelog[/h2]

• Arcane Bolt’s cost has been adjusted to better fit the current Mana Economy of the game
  
• Rarity tables have been adjusted across the base difficulty of the game
  
• Fixed a handful of visual glitches inside of the Forgotten Forest
  
• Fixed a bunch of various grammatical errors throughout the Forgotten Forest
  
• Bibbity’s now arrive initially on Turn 4 instead of Turn 3 for the Bobbity-Boo fight
  
• Bobbity-Boo’s Faerie Fire will now only fire off on certain turns, but is more dangerous
  
• Significantly lowered the amount of guaranteed Mimics inside of the Occluded Oasis
  
• Adjusted the costs of some nodes on the Skill Tree, this will not be reflected on existing saves at this time (as I see no need to reset the trees)
  
• Did another SFX sweep, certain sounds should be less grating now
  
• Fixed an issue where the area preview of the Corrupted Castle wouldn’t show the rain effect
  
• Fixed an issue where the title screen preview of the Corrupted Castle wouldn’t have proper color grading
  
• Fixed an issue where the glow behind “Begin” prompt on the title screen would fly in from out of nowhere
  
• Fixed an issue where Arcane Bolt’s impact on the battle camera wasn’t behaving as intended
  
• Fixed an issue where Gust’s impact on the battle camera wasn’t behaving as intended
  
• Fixed a couple of issues with collision in the Traveller’s Respite (thanks, Torafett!)
  
• Added a small snippet of text after using a fire to better inform the player that they have been restored to full HP and MP

So what's next for Ephemeral Tale? I plan on spending some time looking at the mana economy, general balance, and fine-tuning based on your feedback for this week's patch! Afterwards, I'll begin working on a new feature that I'm not quite ready to reveal yet that remains one of the last big "ooh, wouldn't it be nice?" items remaining for development, and finally I'll get the final bit of Sabrina's quest finished up (as I promised to eons ago)!

This is a shorter Pupdate, but I hope you guys enjoy the patch! Keep sending me all of your feedback, thoughts, and even gameplay videos! It's all incredibly motivating and helps a ton more than you'd think :)

Until next time, stay safe and have fun!
-- Ryan
Join our Discord: https://discord.gg/jpStbUf