Across the Obelisk News

Hi everybody! This is a new patch for network desync and combat stability (among other fixes).

We think this patch will help you with some of the most usual freezes in combat and in other areas (selecting a map node, etc...).

Some other fixes to mention:

- community treasures will now hide when opening craft windows while in town

- fixed the problem with some item interactions freezing the game when the character draw a boon or an injury card (f.e. fire book + lava crystal + take cover)

- fixed a problem not being able to cast after using the "change weapons" card

We will continue fixing small issues that you have reported!

Hey there! This is a new hotfix with changes to some network functions in order to increase stability. We have been reported that some people had issues with the connection so this hotfix tries to address that kind of problems. As usual this patches some of the minor bugs that have been reported.

As we said on the community update, we made a lot of changes to some the cards of the game. We understand that some people spent dust creating decks and this change caught them by surprise and on the other hand, we want you to test those new cards. So we want to give you 3 extra reward chests of 3000 Gold/Shards to everyone as compensation that will help you experience new builds with all the changes that we implemented!

As always thanks for your feedback, support and comprehension.

Another weekend has passed, and this one has been quieter than the previous one, although yesterday we put a patch with several important changes and without many details of the card changes so let's explain them a little.

Balance patch 0.6.0

First of all, as many already know we are a team of 2 people actively working in the game, if we have to document every small change we make, it is time we lose making more changes or correcting bugs, the changes of the 0.6.0 patch began a week ago while we were doing non-stop testing to solve the stability of the MP (much better now than 1 week ago), so documenting things like +1 Thorns Charges to Yellow Spiked shield, +1 Regeneration to Blue Prayer of Healing or we changed some text here and there ... was time we could not lose. Then some larger changes came to some cards but it was already late to write everything down for a detailed patch notes.

Well... lesson learned, from now on we will note major changes but don't expect us to note things like a 1 charge or 1 damage change on a card either, at least during the EA.

We value the fun and free deckbuilding above the balance, we do not have "many" problems with infinite decks (nor in normal mode nor in ng + 1 there is something to avoid infinite cycling), as long as it costs a little to build or some luck is required, that said, what cannot be is that 3-4 common cards nullify another 60 cards of the class pool and that on top of that, with those cards, an infinite loop can be crafted in the starting town, again... with cards that are common, if that happens then there is a problem. Also there are many items that allow you to draw cards depending on when certain cards are playerd or other situations, our intention is that the player who wants to cycle decks or draw a little more cards also seek these items.

So, in addition to the obvious changes, we will explain some of the more specific and controversial ones:

All
All cards with cost 6 or more have been buffed with more damage / heal and charges applied.

Warrior Warpaint: This card gives you 3 Powerful (5 with perks) that is + 15% / 25% damage with 0 cost, being a common card, the "Draw Card" that the card had was not really necessary.
Exploit Openings: The area upgrade of this card was too powerful, there is no other card in the game that put so many bleeds in area as this ... not even if you played the berserker with a legendary weapon and using a Whirlwind (cost 6), that is why the area upgrade had to change.
Bluff: Now it's rare but it have the "Draw Card" again in all its versions, as we commented on the Discord poll.

Every warrior card with thorns except for Barbed Wire (cost 0) has gained from 1 to 3 extra thorns charges.

Scouts Sprint: This card is designed to give you Haste, and it is also a common card with cost 0, Haste is a relly powerful buff that gives you 6 speed and also counters "Daze", and also you if you have Slow (-3 Speed) and you use "Haste" you end up with +3 of Speed In positive. Same as Warpaint this card had 0 reasons to have the "Draw Card" at cost 0 as its function is to give Haste, which is much more powerful than "Fast".
Scavenge: The main function of this card is to allow you to play with the Discard Pile, and right now it still does, either allowing you to prepare a card for the next turn or return it to your hand, it was never to reduce the cost permanently and that's why we removed that functionality (It was very easy to get and abuse), the functionality to reduce the cost is still in other items or cards.
Vigilance: Cost 0 did not make sense in this card, when Oother cards like Foresight apply 3 Sight single target, why Vigilance should apply AoE Sight + Innate + Card Draw all at Cost 0?
Fan of Knives: The base card damage has risen 1 point of damage but now it is rare, by its nature of double damage and its way of scaling this card was outperforming similar or better cards.
Blade Dance: to compensate this card, went from rare to infrequent.
Neverending Story: The base card was changed to EPIC, and the upgrade that applies Insane now requires Stanza 2.
-Note- In the next hotfix the base card will be rare again.
Sweet Melody and Healing Serenade: Each of its versions now dispels more.

Healers
I think the discussion in Healers comes mainly for 3-4 cards... cards that were in almost all the decks, because they were common cards with cost 0 and also with "Draw Card", and people used them not for their designed function but for easy no-brainer cycling and thinning of decks.

Dilute: Now the blue upgrade transforms bleed into Wet, and the Draw Card was removed. This card has 2 main functions: to deal with an especific debuff and / or to use it to make combos, none of these has been modified. If you have problems with poison or you know that you are going to a certain part of the map, you can decide to craft it, which was not normal was to carry 3-4 dilutes in the deck from Act 1 or in Velkarath Mountain, only because was a no-brainer and effectively reduced you deck card count by 3-4.
-Note- In the next hotfix the Dilute upgrades will have Vanish, so you can use it when needed and do not occupy more deck space.
Dawn Light: Blue upgrade does area damage at cost 0, also this damage scales really well, none of the other classes have a cost 0 area damage card, so the "Draw Card" in the Blue upgrade was completely unnecessary.
Healing Rain: Another cost 0 card that scaled way too well, which replaced all the other Heals of the game... and also dispelled burns. As we commented on Discord, the solution has been to give the card Regeneration instead of healing, which makes it better for the new players since it cures 3 2 1 HP and keeps removing the Area Burn. It was not normal for Healing Rain to be used as a free area heal that could heal 20-40HP easily.
Flash Heal: Similar to Healing Rain, now the Flash Heal card is a less cost version of the normal Heal.
Holy Smite: The Yellow Upgrade has had the same treatment as Flare / FrostBolt / ElectricDischarge / Shadowbolt, the version with more damge and charges cost 3.
Foresight: The inspire buff was completely unnecessary, the Foresight main function is to give information to the Player of the enemy cards and it continues to do so very well for novice players, besides in more random modes when you don't know what the monster will do that information is vital, also foresight is still a very powerful card with certain combinations of items.

There have been many other small changes but generally all in positive, as always remember that this is an Early Access that has just started and there will be many cards that are going to change little by little. As always do not hesitate to give us your feedback or come to discord and comment on things, if there is a change you don't like, we can always talk about it and as said before the changes done to some cards do not have to be permanent.

Today there will be another patch/hotfix which, among other things, will give you 3 extra reward chests of 3000 Gold/Shards to everyone as compensation and so that you can also experience the new builds with all the changes.

As always thanks for your feedback, support and comprehension.

Hotfix to solve the problem with multiple heroes diying on a row from curses at the beginning of their turn.

Hello everyone, it's Sunday and we have a balance patch ready, as we said before one of the reasons for the Early Access is to test new things and balance the game, the others is to fix all the problems that may arise and add more content.

In this patch we are going to change how resistances work in the game and introduce negative resistances, we are also going to change what the "Vulnerable" debuff does and make a balance pass to many cards, mainly the 0 cost cards with card draw.

Negative resistances and "Vulnerable"
We have decided that from now on resistances can go below 0 and be negative, having a negative resistance means that you will do more damage with that type of damage. The main reason is that since we have a system of damage types and resistances we want to make the most of it and that each monster has its own identity, until now that identity was lost when you reduced all the resistances to 0, now there will be a big difference if you get to lower the resistances to an enemy and this will be different from another enemy.

We have made a revision to all the enemies in the game and we have tweaked their resistances. Now all the monsters have at least 2 resistances that are notably lower than the rest, in normal mode they can be negative by default, for example the trunkys and the boss of act 1 have negative resistances to fire.

We have changed how the "Vulnerable" debuff works, now it lowers the resistances by 5%, it has a cap of 10 maximum charges, and 2 charges are removed per turn (similar to how the powerful buff works). So 10 charges of vulnerable lowers the resistances by 50% but as there are now negative resistances it means that you can do more damage. Also in some cases now burn/dark/spark can do more damage than bleed or poison.

Monster balance and Act 2
We have slightly lowered the number of debuff stacks used by the monsters in Act 2, applying a little less burn/bleed/poison charges in their respective maps. This change is only for Act 2, the difficulty of a map varies depending on the order you do it, it is not the same to do Velkarath mountains in Act 2 than in Act 3, and the same happens with Aquarfall Marsh.

With this change and along with the general lowering of resistances and negative resistances on enemies, the game will be "easier" in normal mode in both Act 1 and 2.

In NG+ mode the resistances have also been lowered in general, making it also a bit easier. Keep in mind that the next content patch will focus on making the NG+ mode more customizable and difficult for those who want to challenge and compete in the score boards.

Card balance.
In this patch there have been many changes in many cards for most of the classes.

Mainly we have reduced the ability of heroes to draw cards, especially at 0 cost, so we have tweaked those cards by removing the draw, adding cost or changing them completely.

In addition there are general tweaks such as high cost cards are even more powerful, cards with thorns have gained a couple of extra charges(except for the 0 cost ones) and powerful charges have been lowered in general. Undoubtedly the decks that have undergone the most changes are the scout and healer decks.

Note: All these changes are not final and we can revert any card changed or make new ones if needed.

Other
New quality of life functionality, now when you are going to use a dispel or purge, you will see on top of the hero what debuffs you are going to remove. Also, if you are going to attack an enemy with a card that casts a curse, if the enemy is immune to this curse, a warning text will be shown over the target.

Vitality: As it confused many players, we are going to try that vitality never heals... not even if you are at 100% health, now it will serve to increase your maximum health but you will have to heal it.

There is also a new card for mages(Ice Barrier), and there are several cards that have had entire reworks.

There are 2 new items in the game:
*Handbook: Every turn reduce the cost of a skill card in your hand by 1 this turn.
*Advanced Handbook: Every turn reduce the cost of a skill card in your hand by 1.
With these items you can lower the cost to some of your favorite skills but it will be a bit more RNG and you will have to get the item, not being like before something 100% guaranteed (Using scavenge for example).

Note: Some of the items you can see in the Tome of knowledge are not yet available in the game.

We have corrected some texts in the game.

Multiplayer
We continue on our quest to fix every combat related problem, we hope with this latest hotfixes and patches things are more stable for you. If for whatever reason the combat freezes, you retry a combat and the problem persist, we suggest to close and reopen the game. At this moment we suggest too that you disable autoend and skip corruptions until we have a stable solution for this freezes in coop.

Multiple fixes and changes have been implemented. Some people are reporting issues while others can play without problems, so it's being really hard to identify the exact problem. We are working on a solution to reload the current turn instead of the combat, but it will have to wait a few days.

On the other hand we fixed the problem in town when some players buy a divination round at the same time. Now only the first one to create a divination round will pay for it.


Thank you all for your support, feedback and understanding.