Ephemeral Tale News

Hey there! This week, we had a late start with our Weekly Pupdate, but I think you'll find that it was worth the wait. Major Update #5 is here! We have a ton (seriously, a LOT) of changes in this changelog, so I’ll make sure that we go over the changes by category after the jump.

For those who have begun their journeys, you'll find that the Great Palace has changed-- it's okay, your progress hasn't been harmed! Upon entering the palace again, you'll find your journey to the Realm of Shadow has begun. Afterwards, you'll find that things are as you remember them.

But that's enough talk-- let's get into it, shall we?

[h2]Ephemeral Tale 1.28.14 Changelog: Major Update #5[/h2]

• The required dungeon count has risen from 3 to 6, as three new dungeons have been added to the main campaign of Ephemeral Tale
  
• These will be accessed through the Great Palace, located within the Realm of Shadows
  
• Once these three areas have been conquered, the path will open to the Great Palace as prior players know it
  
• Revised battle backgrounds for most scenarios, including the Forgotten Forest, Occluded Oasis, Corrupted Castle, Lost Caverns, Great Palace, and Mute Mountains
  
• NOTE: Sunken Summit will get done at a point in the near future
  
• Revised area banners for most scenarios, including all of the above
  
• NOTE: Traveller’s Respite and Sunken Summit will be done in the near future
  
• Revised portal door animations for most scenarios, including the Forgotten Forest, Occluded Oasis, Corrupted Castle, and the boss room inside of the Corrupted Castle
  
• Boss HP bar will now show status effects starting from the right side of the HP bar, and add new ones going from right to left
  
• NOTE: This should heavily improve readability of boss encounters for users of DoTs + other status effects, as well as help during some of the new encounters
  
• The final boss has been buffed significantly, w/ it’s HP being doubled and general statistics being increased anywhere from 25% to 50%
  
• Darune no longer spawns randomly in the Oasis, and is now tied to the Crypt of Kings initially
  
• Once unleashed, he will wander the Oasis as expected
  
• Chloranthy Band now recovers 5% MP per turn instead of 10% in order to better tune the mana economy for the player character
  
• Goldbloom’s Manabranch now recovers 10% MP per kill, rather than 15%
  
• Devourer’s Edge now heals for 20% HP per critical kill, rather than 25%
  
• Frozen Thorn no longer guarantees that the target will be frozen, instead now having a high chance of inflicting the status instead (75%)
  
• Vengeant Whip now triggers when the player is at or below 50% HP instead of 25%
  
• Scrolls of Power no longer fully restore the party upon use
  
• Lucky Scrolls now have a higher drop rate from chests, swapped in the loot table with the below
  
• Scrolls of Power now have a lower drop rate from chests, swapped in the loot table with the above
  
• Magic Waters now have a lower drop rate to match the changes made in 1.27.1
  
• Did a SFX volume sweep, should be much more even across the board
  
• Fixed some grammatical issues in the Great Palace
  
• Fixed a bug where the encounter delay was set to 5 as a default, instead of 25
  
• Fixed a bug where the encounter delay would reset when going into New Game+
  
• Fixed a bug where the Essences inside of the Corrupted Castle had become, ironically enough, corrupted
  
• Fixed an issue where Power wasn’t properly displaying the icon upon pickup and in other scenarios
  
• Fixed an issue where some text wasn’t properly centered
  
• Fixed an issue with collision in the Traveller’s Respite
  
• Fixed a bug where all gear drops were duplicated if earned by battle (thanks, fmoo!)
  
• Fixed a bug where the equipment broken display text could become corrupted
  
• Other behind-the-scenes bug fixes to the systems involving combat and item acquisition (thanks, fmoo!)
  
• Cleanup of legacy & otherwise unused assets

Whew! That's a lengthy one, eh? To go over this in more read-able form, I'll break these down into a few categories: New Content, Quality of Life, Balance, and Bug Fixes. Let's start with the one that caused the long delay between content drops, New Content.

[h2]New Content[/h2]

Major Update #5 brings three new zones to Ephemeral Tale for you to explore, new enemies for you to fight, new gear to collect, new bosses to conquer, and new easter eggs to discover!

You'll face new challenges inside of the Graveyard Grove, Bayou Bog, and Royal Rosegardens that will encourage you to change up your equipment in new ways, and bring your fellow adventurers along that perhaps got overlooked on your first go around.

Additionally, there's a few added story scenes that I hope help with addressing the initial light-weighted nature of the narrative, with the caveat that I'm still not aiming to tell a large, epic story in the same way that most JRPGs do. But I think we've gotten ever closer to a great middle-ground!

With new content, comes the ability to fix up older, more legacy content. Let's talk about some of the Quality of Life changes that arrive with this update.

[h2]Quality of Life[/h2]
First and foremost, almost every single combat background scene in the game has been remade-- the ones that didn't quite make it are listed in the full patch notes, and are on the list of things to get done in the immediate future. This change alone will bring a level of consistency to the overall game that has been relatively absent to this point, but we've still got strives to make.

Additionally, some changes have been made to the presentation of the boss HP bar in combat as well:

You'd be crabby too if you were on fire.

While in combat with a boss, their status ailments will now be clearly visible and listed above the health bar, as seen above. There was some behind-the-scenes changes to how these bars and status' are displayed as well, but it's not super relevant to the overarching QoL section.

When combat background scenes got redone, it became clearly evident that I'd have to also re-do some other assets in the game as well. These are things like the zone banners, the portal doorway animations, and things that otherwise were based on background scenes in some fashion. Long story short? Lots of new and re-done assets that should help the game feel much better.

[h2]Balance Changes[/h2]
This is a chunky one, so let's start with a hybrid QoL/Balance change: Darune is now tied to the Crypt of Kings initially, and is unleashed by your entry into it's deepest halls. One thing that became abundantly clear while watching gameplay from you guys and talking with you, is that this guy (who was supposed to be a relatively rare, hidden encounter) was almost a given for a player when going through the game. By moving him into a hidden, secret area, I've hopefully accomplished two goals: making the Crypt more worthwhile for you as a player, and stopping the boss from be an unexpected experience. You will clearly know why you're seeing the Lord of the Sands while you're out-and-about. For players with existing saves that are worried about this, no worries: simply go into the deepest room in the Crypt, and he'll begin to spawn in your Oasis once more, forever haunting you with his big, thicc loot pool.

On the gear side, we've got a number of changes meant to reel in some of the more absurd equipment pieces in the game. Additionally, I've made an attempt to bring one of the most under-performing equipment pieces up to par with other, similar pieces. Ideally, these changes will help encourage build variety without stifling your existing characters.

On the consumable side, there have been a number of changes to potions, magic waters, and scrolls of power-- they're less common, and they're less effective in some cases (looking at you, scrolls of power). The goal of these changes, along with the tuning of MP/HP related gear as mentioned above, is to better fine-tune the mana economy and HP economy in the game. Hopefully, this will lead to the choices you make feeling more meaningful.

The final boss has also gotten a major buff to their effectiveness against the player, and other changes made in the back-end should also mean that existing bosses are a little bit tougher as well. I'll continue to keep an eye on boss encounters, but feel free to send feedback that you have regarding them (or any portion of the game, really) and I'd be happy to give it a look.

Finally, to wrap up the balance section of this Pupdate, once you've entered the Realm of Shadows you may find that the enemies of the prior zones have become strengthened. This is intended, and is to keep a line of relativity reasonably discernable while you're writing your path in Ephemeral Tale.

[h2]Bug Fixes[/h2]

And to round out this psuedo-organized, stream-of-consciousness style of writing, we have a handful of bug fixes, ranging from small (text not being properly centered, various cases of ".." instead of "...") to major things (encounter delay rate being lower than intended, issues where unimportant data could become corrupted and spew garbage at the player). These kinds of things are generally not so fun to talk about, and even less fun to read about. If you're interested in the specifics, feel free to read the patch notes above or ask me about a particular one if it tickles you!

This was a lengthy Pupdate, but an important one! If you run into any issues while exploring the new areas (or old), I earnestly encourage you to report it via the normal methods (Twitter, Discord, forums, email, etc.). I'd love to hear your thoughts, both negative and positive on the direction Ephemeral Tale has taken and where you'd like to see it go. But for now, I'll let you get into the new stuff!

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

In the next week or two, Major Update #5 will be upon us. What does that include? Three new zones, a bunch of quality of life upgrades, new equipment, enemies, bosses, and more. The next update to Ephemeral Tale will be Major Update #5. I'm not entirely certain that the update will drop on the 13th, but it should drop by the end of next week.

[h2]Ephemeral Tale 1.27.1 Changelog[/h2]

• Players can now directly influence the encounter rate through the options menu
  
• Lowered the drop rate of potions in all zones (roughly ~10% overall, mostly from 9% chances to 7% chances across numerous enemies)
  
• Lowered the drop rate of Scroll of Power across rare enemy types (roughly 20% overall, about a 6% drop across 4 rare enemy types)
  
• Buffed Psychopomp Empress a moderate amount (Defense from 25 -> 30, Magic Defense from 35 -> 40, and HP from 2500 -> 2750)
  
• Buffed Bobbity-Boo a moderate amount (Defense from 23 -> 28, Magic Defense from 36 -> 41, and HP from 1200 to 1750)
  
• NOTE: the above numbers are base values, and scale depending on a number of factors
  
• Adjusted animations for several skills ever so slightly
  
• Crushing Blow’s damage has been lowered to 20% of the target's current HP (down from 40%)
  
• Devastating Blow’s damage has been lowered to 40% of the target’s current HP (down from 60%)
  
• NOTE: The above may end up changing further in the future, this is part of a larger change coming to bosses & mini-bosses
  
• Lowered appearance rate of Fish x5 encounter in the Occluded Oasis

There are some extra changes coming to Ephemeral Tale with the arrival of Major Update #5 outside of the planned scope of the update. Almost every single battle background has been revamped to be pixel-compliant, and should look noticeably improved from their current iterations. Additionally, a bunch of the area banners have been remade as well.

Sorry for the short Pupdate this week, but I feel a need to get back to work! Less time writing is more time wrapping up Major Update #5. With that said, please enjoy the update, and we'll talk again soon! Stay safe and have fun!

-- Ryan
Join our Discord: https://discord.gg/jpStbUf

Hello again, my fellow puppers! This week, I've been busier than usual (which seems to me, is becoming the usual)! I've got a lot of bug fixes scheduled for you, and next week is a bunch of balance changes that I've been considering. Before we get into that, let's talk about the changelog:

[h2]Ephemeral Tale 1.26.4 Changelog[/h2]

• Adjusted some item icons a smidge
  
• Updated the “buff applied” animation
  
• Additionally, updated the “rescued” animation for Clarke’s unlock mechanism to be pixel-compliant
  
• Replaced the mouse movement indicator with a less annoying one
  
• Fixed a bug where Clarke could potentially rescue you with a whopping 0 HP
  
• Fixed a bug where Bulwark could leave a weird visual artifact on the HP bar
  
• Fixed a bug where certain unlock texts weren’t properly centered (Clarke, Siegfried, Merlin)
  
• Fixed a bug where the Snowbro that starts a side quest could lose his head
  
• Fixed a bug where Snowbros would be far too attached to their arms and not give them when necessary
  
• Fixed a bug where Darune could spawn in the safety of the Traveller’s Respite (strictly verboten, Darune. Not cool!)
  
• Fixed a bug where randomized chests in the Oasis could reset while inside of the dungeon

Like I said, tons of bug fixes! Marker #4 (mouse movement indicator) should prove to be a big QoL update for all of my mouse players out there (and mobile, when the time comes). Now, on to some less fun talk.

[h2]THE SHADOW'S PAUSE[/h2]

Next week's update is almost complete, and I'll be putting the finishing touches on it probably a few hours after you read this. At which point, it'll get uploaded to the queue, and release on the 6th. That'll be a fun one, as it introduces a majorly requested feature (control over the encounter rate), and helps balance a bunch of weird rough edges in the current version of Ephemeral Tale. Stuff like Potions being so frequent, certain bosses being a pushover, stuff like that. However, after I upload that update, the mainline branch of Ephemeral Tale will be locked until the next major update is complete.

Each zone more or less has three main things to contend with during the design phase. The maps, the enemies, and the loot. The maps for Bayou Bog and Graveyard Grove are fully completed + plugged up, with the final of the three zones being almost complete in that regard. The enemies are almost done as well, and I'm fleshing out the boss fights to prepare for an internal alpha test of everything. Lastly, the loot: the loot is actually complete! I keep a list of all un-used loot in the game (as I design stuff intermittently and throw it in when I can, find a place for it later), and the list is pretty lengthy at the moment.

So, the good news is that the dungeons themselves are almost complete! I suspect that Major Update #5 will release on the 13th of October. However, complications can always occur with development, and so please treat that as a soft date. I still need to plug in the new dark world dungeon hub, all of the dialogue for it, and give it a thorough testing before release. These things take time, and aren't always clean as a process. With that said, the dungeons are by a mile the most time demanding part of this whole shtick, so knowing that they're almost done allows me to feel comfortable giving you guys a date to look forward to.

Should I miss that date, there will still be a blog post like normal detailing where I'm at in the process, however there won't be a patch that week. The reason is similar to when I was working on Major Update #1: since everything would be in the main branch, that's much harder to implement and separate at a moment's notice. So, please be patient as we enter this final stretch. I promise, these dungeons are worth the wait! They're some of the best feeling, best looking, and more interesting dungeons I've created yet, and I can't wait for you to get your greedy lil mitts on 'em.

With that said, that's all for this week-- have fun, and we'll talk more next time!
-- Ryan
Join our Discord: https://discord.gg/jpStbUf

What's good, my puppers? Been spending a large, large portion of this week working on the script for the upcoming "dark world" dungeons! Two of the three are nearing test-ready, with the third well into development as well! More on that after the jump. For now, patch notes!

[h2]Ephemeral Tale 1.25.2 Changelog[/h2]

• Added a new side quest, it can be started deep within the Mute Mountains
  
• After completion of this side quest, the reward can be farmed for off of Snowbros inside of the Mute Mountains
  
• Added a new chest to the Lost Caverns, along with some text to (hopefully) improve the new player experience
  
• Added a dialogue interaction w/ Dabby in the Occluded Oasis to better guide players towards the overarching goal of the zone
  
• Fixed a bug where a Twitter promotional text had accidentally been left in the game

[h2]THE DARK APPROACHES[/h2]

The Graveyard Grove and Bayou Bog are both nearing completion, with work on the final "dark world" dungeon well underway (tentatively called "Crown Castle," but that will change in the future). So, how will you access the dark world dungeons?

Same same, but different.

When the dark worlds drop, the Great Palace will house them, just as it does the normal worlds! This will be in the twisted version of the Great Palace that currently serves as the final dungeon for the game. That is also what the 4th door in this sneak-peek will lead to! After completing the three dark worlds, the true path into the Great Palace will open, and you'll be able to move forward into that final dungeon as per usual.

To better help you guys understand how the design process generally works for these zones, here's an example of a "rough draft" map I use to plan out the general pacing:

MSPaint da bomb.

From there, I can start to use the aesthetic tests (which I've posted on Twitter before, these serve as explorations to find the best fit of visuals for the zone) to build rooms, and eventually expand these into the full zone. Once complete, these generally look roughly like something along these lines:

Wow, this is outdated already. Darn my desires to keep expanding these zones!

Along the way, I'll be checking that everything feels right through short playtesting sessions (these are the source of the vast majority of the pre-release screenshots as well). Once all of this is done, I'll finally enable the random encounters, and do a full play session through the zone!

For the Graveyard Grove and Bayou Bog, these zones are roughly at that final point. I need to design boss fights for them, but after that I can send them towards the beta testing crew for thorough breaking, fix all of those, and we'll be that much closer to the next version of Ephemeral Tale!

For now, that's all I've got to talk about this week. As always, keep an eye on the game in these Pupdates, in our Discord, or over on Twitter!

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

What's good, my dudes? This week, we squashed another major bug! The menu should no longer lock up on item consumption for some folks! Very, very strange bug, but it's finally squashed (hopefully)! If you experience this bug on this version or newer, please let me know!!

[h2]Ephemeral Tale 1.24.2 Changelog[/h2]

• Adjusted placement of Siegfried’s combat icon in the turn indicator window
  
• Adjusted placement of MP + HP costs for skills
  
• Fixed a bug where MP restoring effects could display corrupted numbers
  
• Fixed an issue where Jelly portals could have their treasure chests not reset
  
• When Enraged, Hurfroom will now take increased physical damage (about 25% more)
  
• When Enraged, Durfroom will now have a lower hit rate (about 10% less)
  
• There is now more dialogue options for whenever you fall in combat and return to the Traveller’s Respite
  
• Additionally, one of these is a pseudo-reactive option that will only propagate if you have the ability to buy a skill gem or advance down the skill tree as a soft reminder to do so
  
• Fixed an issue w/ the color text before the Tyronius Rex fight (thanks, neoterrar!)
  
• Removed an unintended [128] that could appear after using the skill tree or resting at the fire, as it was a debug check
  
• Added a few snow-folk to the Mute Mountains, they will become relevant later
  
• Addressed an issue where the main menu could lock up instead of allowing you to use consumable items (thanks, Luca!)
  
• Minor adjustments and improvements to the Ice Spike animation

This week, I fixed a ton of bugs (with some help, of course), we got some more balance changes implemented, and a few QoL improvements. I'm quite excited for the new "fell in combat" texts, as I think they'll help a lot with the Stranger feeling a bit robotic, despite being only 2-3 more sentences.

[h2]IT'S SNOW JOKE[/h2]

Next week, a new quest will come to the realm of Ephemeral Tale. It will take place entirely within the frozen region known as other Mute Mountains, so if you've not discovered them quite yet, you may want to start your hunt! Meanwhile, I will continue to work on the new content coming in the next Major Update, as we're getting closer and closer to it being prepared!

See above for appropriate pun.

As for the specifics of what I've been working on, this week has been spent mostly on tuning animations for upcoming skills and items, working on enemy groups for the upcoming areas, as well as finding small kinks in them! Here's a preview of some of the upcoming fellas in Major Update #5:

Meet Cluckatrice and Tigeauxr!

The keen-eyed amongst you may have noticed that both of these enemies are entirely new! A few weeks ago, I had mentioned that the goal of these upcoming zones was to allow for clever extension of existing assets, and that's still the case. For example, the Bayou Bog (swamp area) has very, very little in terms of new assets. Most of the changes to assets for that zone are color changes. However, that doesn't mean that all of the enemies are rehashes-- far from it, in fact! These new zones follow in the footprint of zones like the Sunken Summit and Mute Mountains: some new faces, some returning faces.

By re-contextualizing these existing enemies with new friends fighting by their side, I hope to deliver a fairly fresh experience that doesn't require a massive investment in new enemies. For the rest of the assets, the goal is to keep things as fresh as possible with as few new assets as possible, but... I'm bad that second part, so we'll see how things go!

I'd like to end this week's Pupdate by thanking you guys for all of your support and love throughout the development process thus far. I couldn't be prouder of the kind of community we've fostered, and hope to continue do right by you with future Pupdates. You da best!

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