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v2.5.0 update log

And now, I present v2.5.0 - the Balance update.

If you read my update log after v2.4, you might notice a slight change of plans. Originally, I envisioned a quick balance update named v2.4.2 - but a lot of the balance changes needed to be more fundamental than just number changes, and together with some important community suggestions turned into new features / quality of life improvements, this balance update turned into a major update instead.

This also means that I still have incomplete features in the works for the future - artifacts rework, alternate heroes rework, battlefield rework - and these are going to be part of the future v2.6 update instead.

Now I can also prove what I’ve said previously: Game updates won’t be locked behind paying for DLC. I am continuing to support both the base game and the DLC side by side. At times, it might make it tough to do things such as balancing, but such is life; I’ll try my best.

I want to highlight some of the “balance changes” which actually turned into reworks, as well as some of the community suggestions that were added to the game.

First, a skill which never saw the love it deserved: Diplomacy. For a long time, there’s been complaints about being offered units you couldn’t afford - and this should be easier now that you can choose one of three settings for how much bribing you’ll do with your diplomacy.



Using the lowest bribe setting - the hand shake - will give fewer units, but with a better cost efficiency - and conversely, using the highest bribe setting will give more units, but at a big extra cost. Combined with the ability to choose WHICH of the enemy units to hire using diplomacy, this should make the skill more interactive, as well as, of course, stronger.

For a faction skill such as Taming or Hunting, it’s tough to make changes to make the skills more appealing without nerfing the faction. Hunting has been too strong, while Taming has been too weak - and both skills were super conditional on actually being able to find the hidden beasts. To this end, the skills have been changed to make it easier to trigger, but with the payout being smaller - especially for hunting. Instead of only working for hidden beasts, the skills now work for any neutral battles which have beasts in them. This is especially important for Taming, with the skill even triggering during battle, giving you units as you take out your opponents.



One of the additions I’m quite happy with is the new combat results page. There have been a lot of suggestions for a long time for you to be able to get a better insight into how useful your units actually are during combat. Now, after combat, you can see in greater detail exactly how much damage each unit type dealt and how much damage they’ve soaked. So far, the results have been rather interesting. In the above screenshot, we can see that in this battle, Halberdiers dealt the most damage from the player side, while the range units of the opponent were the most important for them.

This screen might see adjustments and improvements over time - maybe some more stats would be useful - but I’m happy with how simple but impactful this extra information is in trying to figure out the best strategies.



Another new addition is the ability to trade resources and artifacts to your allies in hotseat co-op games. I’m not sure how common this playstyle is, but it’s nice to add some long-suggested features for the people who do play this way. It’s very tough to cater to all playstyles - impossible, even - but I’m doing my best to add the most impactful changes, to improve the game for all over time.

Oh, also some more modding features, improvements to the MODS menu, and the ability to browse curseforge mods directly from within the game. If the mod is set up correctly on the curseforge page, users will be able to one-click-install-and-load a mod from within the game. Here’s the link to the curseforge page where users should be able to submit mods: Heros Hour Mods - CurseForge

I think that’s about it. For May specifically, there’s also a limited time deal to get some unique Hero’s Hour merch: A very cute and high quality plushie of a great Tide hero. You can find that here: Tal Anak Plush | Makeship.

Anyway, as soon as I am sure v2.5 is stable, I’ll get back to working on v2.6, another update to continue improving the game. See you then!

Hero's Hour is getting an update!

Hi everyone,

Get ready for more adventure in Hero's Hour, now available at a discounted price of 50% off!

On top of that, we have some exciting new updates to make your gameplay experience even better. Check out our latest patch notes to see what's new, including new features like browsing and altering mods within the game, co-op improvements, and more.



[h3]PATCH NOTES:[/h3]

[expand][h3]NEW FEATURES[/h3]

- Browse and alter mods within game - as well as new functions and hooks for mods
- Co-op improvements
▸ send resources to your teammates using the marketplace
▸ trade units and artifacts with teammate's heroes
- It's easier to see what Caravans will do, and it's now possible to direct them as desired
- HUD for adventure map spells
- New options: Scroll speed, and Lock mouse to window
- Manage Heroes button in town screen
▸ trade units between heroes close to town
▸ select which hero is "in town"
- Advanced combat details showing how much damage units do and deal + more
- Avatars now get portraits and are colour-coded on the overworld
- 50 new and improved hero portraits
- In-game mod browser for Curseforge mods
▸ one-click download and install

[h3]UNIT BALANCE[/h3]

- Units with Dragonbreath now have 5% less health. The dragonbreath attack now deals 10% less damage
- Units with Softbodied now have 5% less health and 5% less damage
- Brimstodes are buffed by 15% and Aluminodes are buffed by 10%
- Octosquid are buffed by 10%
- Aelophants are buffed by 10%
- Mortars (and Artillery) are nerfed by 10%
- Canceri are buffed by 10%, Canpinceri by 5%
- Incarnations and Liongods now have Quick Strikes
- Bloodletters (and Bloodwarpers) are buffed by 5%
- Handservants (and Overseer) are buffed by 5%
- Mercurials are buffed by 3%
- Crawlers are buffed by 5%
- Wind Up now adjusts the chance to skip attack for how many times in a row an attack was skipped, overall making Wind Up units less weak
- Enchanters and runescribes are nerfed by 8%, while Rock and Gold Earthen are buffed by 5%
- Terrified unit ability is less impactful (see OTHER BALANCE CHANGES)
- Loss now summon units as less of a burst
- Non-permanent Loss no longer create permanent units
- Loss now have Wide Attacks instead of Blaster
- Loss are now smaller on the battlefield

[h3]SKILL BALANCE[/h3]

- Diplomacy now allows you to choose which of the enemy units to recruit
- Diplomacy now has three settings - low bribe, medium bribe and high bribe - the higher bribe, the more units - but also the higher the cost per unit
- Bloodwarping now has a higher base value by +150g per battle, while its scaling with lost units is reduced by 33%, and its scaling with defeated units is reduced by 25%
- Subsequent procs of Bloodlust on a single unit now becomes less powerful quicker
- Each rank of Armorer now gives a full extra point of projectile protection
- Necromancy will no longer offer to "drain, discounting next"; instead, "drain" just gives the hero the mana. Additionally, mana costs for units has been rebalanced, mostly reduced
- Wisdom now gives +2 spellpower per rank instead of +1
- Recruitment now immediately increases growth of units instead of only applying for the next week. This effect only happens when ranking it up on a hero you own: Hiring a hero with recruitment will have the same effect as previously
- Crystal Assembly now gives other rare units for most other rare pick-ups than the base resources
- Guardposts from Mason now have a 5x5 area of control rather than the 3x3
- Guardposts from Mason now gain a few less Halberdiers, but also gain faction units
- Guardposts from Mason now grow a bit even with no hero boosting them
- Tinker is now slightly stronger - 35+5x instead of 30+3x - especially when it comes to late-game
- Units needed to place in a mine to reach higher rewards for Exploitation reduced from 20>50>75>125 to 15>40>60>100
- Bellow (spell from Ardour skill) now has a higher and more variable knockback. When used with higher ranks of Ardour, has an increasing chance to confuse enemies
- Call of Champions now applies rallying to affected units - both Horde units and others - increasing their health and attack by 20% for 8 seconds
- Call of Champions at higher ranks of Ardour can turn goblins/voodoos/goblin guerillas/goblin grenadiers permanently into bloodletters, trolls and cyclopses. Rank III gives 1 bloodletter, Rank IV gives 2 bloodletters + 1 troll, rank V gives 3 bloodletters + 2 trolls + 1 cyclops, etc
- The AOE of Quake and the two Calls now increases faster with additional ranks of Might/Ardour
- Quake now applies random debuffs to affected enemies
- Call of Freedom now gives longer duration of morale buff for higher ranks
- Soul of the Earth now needs fewer souls for the first couple of Rock Pummelers in a fight
- Rock Pummelers from Soul of the Earth now spawn with 15% increased stats as well as 12 seconds of rallying with another +20% stats
- Stats of ghosts from Grudge have been increased from 40%+20%*rank to 50%+25%*rank
- Taming now works during fights, instead of after
- Taming now applies both to hidden beasts but also other armies with beasts in them
- Hunting now applies both to hidden beasts but also other armies with beasts in them. The way artifacts from Hunting are given has been reworked - duplicates are avoided if at all possible
- There is now one more herd of hidden beasts per starting area
- Herds of hidden beasts now have a more wide range of difficulties
- Siren Song now gives the hero unit a chance to charm enemies on their attacks
- The size of the Balance spell given by Balance skill now scales with the rank of the Balance skill
- The size of the Balance area is now more clearly drawn on the battlefield
- Increased the area size for Firetrapping and Firegating by 25%
- Firegated units are now immune for a second after being teleported
- The area of the Firegating explosion now scales with skill level just like the area of the beginning of the teleport
- Shadowcloning now gives the hero unit a chance to make shadowclones of any enemy they strike. The hero's shadowclone also gets this chance
- Area of the Rallying skill effect now increases with skill rank
- When the Rallying hero dies, the effect is applied to a slightly larger area of units, and lasts longer
- When the Rallying hero dies, they also heal nearby units
- Speaker now also increases the AOE of the hero's melee attack, effectively making the fear effect more potent
- Demoralise is slightly weaker due to change to how low morale fear works (see OTHER BALANCE)
- Bodyguards now gives more appropriate units if the hero's specialty unit isn't a faction unit
- Bodyguards will now be more reluctant to give high tier specialty units at low ranks
- Bodyguards will no longer look at units carried by regiments, to make an exploit a bit harder to perform
- Bodyguards now gives a more accurate number of units when the hero has a high tier specialty unit
- Avatar now creates slightly fewer units - especially for low-cost units
- Creativity ranks IV and higher now each apply just half the bonus of ranks I-III

[h3]FACTION BALANCE[/h3]

- Rogue town now start with 1000 gold income per day instead of 500
- Rogue units (and neutral units) now have higher weekly growth by about 15% (see the bottom)
- Arcane now starts with Guild of Mages pre-built
- Goblin Gunner and Goblin Guard damage reduced by 1 and max range reduced by 4, making them slightly weaker in large clusters
- Undead units now have +5% health and -2% damage so they die less easily
- Slave Pens now create 2 slaves/homunculi each day, give 250 gold each day instead of 100, and have a higher max gold income ceiling
- Monolith and Idol of Shadows have had their rare resource cost reduced
- Early-game Wild units now have a higher weekly growth
- Pearl Finding now looks different, and the markers remain after moving your heroes
- Pearls now not only boost unit growth, but also the stats of those units by 10%
- Pyre's Infernal Gate has been reworked: You can now choose what units to add to the summoning pool, you can even upgrade the units; the max cost is higher; units are summoned more slowly; and it takes more sulphur longer to reach the same power level as before
- Earthen's Rune Forge is now available at row 1 of town buildings. It costs less to build
- Increased the number of Cultists made from Tainted Mines, especially from gold mines and rare resource mines

[h3]OTHER BALANCE[/h3]

- Derank now affects 33% less units
- Coin flip has been reworked entirely with better animations and clarity
- Units fleeing from negative morale (also affects the Terrified unit abil) now flee for a shorter and more variable amount of time - especially different for high tier units
- Coin Flip now costs 9 mana
- Spell range for Resurrection, Blood Rush and From Dust to Dust has been increased substantially

[h3]MODDING[/h3]

- Map events can now trigger custom scripts using the new hook named Map Events
- It is now possible to browse and edit files of locally installed mods within the game
▸ Added file navigator
▸ Added text editor
▸ Added image preview
▸ Added ability to add modded content based off of defaults
▸ Added ability to rename files
- Custom Functions now work the same way as other custom scripts
- Introduced a variable known as "knownofear" for AI armies. When set to true, they will attack the player no matter how strong their opponent is
- There are now technical unit groups for each of the installed factions. These are named tug_Order, tug_Wild, etc., and contain the units of the factions
- New hooks for changing towns and for custom town UI
- Functions for drawing buttons, text and armylists on the screen
- Functions for reading and writing to grids

[h3]CHANGES[/h3]

- HUD for heroes and towns are now easier to navigate when you have many heroes and towns
- Bodyguards now gives more appropriate units for neutral heroes
- Lieutenants now get more appropriate units for neutral heroes
- Marshall Statue now also increases the army of the currently available hero
- You can now preview heroes in the tavern by double clicking their face
- Training Grounds now works with neutral and rogue units - Training Ground upgrades have been changed to more consistently give +1 tier to inserted units
- Expanded ability descriptions for units stay on once you've pressed Shift to expand
- Marketplace screen improved
- Tide building "Blast Smithy" now shows both Harpooneers and Cannonneers
- Rock Limbo, Magma Grave and Aether Recombinator are now detailed as "specialised Infirmaries", which should make their interaction with Hospitals more clear
- Rock Limbo, Magma Grave and Aether Recombinator can now be toggled as active/inactive in the Infirmary window like normal infirmaries
- Random faction can now give Rogue faction
- Flesh Wonders can now additionally target the following units:
▸ Cultists, Fanatics and their upgrades
▸ Fireballer and Homunculus
▸ Rogue Realms DLC: Apothecary, Farmer, Sorcerer, Forager, Necromancer, Longbowman, Bandit, Rebel, Crystal Healer
- Fort and Citadel are now cheaper in the Rogue Realms DLC
- Lament can now trigger their Shadow Ritual from within battle, the same way Pillar uses their tea. They can still also activate it via town
- Units that are confused now have yellow stars circling their heads
- Improved the tooltip for Siren Song skill
- Loss Shrine now has its own icon
- New map setting: Enable portals - this is on by default, but can be toggled off, forcing maps to generate without portals
- Skilltrees map setting has been moved to page 1
- A hero next to town which is attacked but isn't selected as the town's visiting hero will no longer take charge of the siege of the town. Instead, combat against them will take place as normal non-siege combat
- Minor adjustment to the temple of tides UI
- Innumerable fixes to UI for translated versions of the game
- Carver Stalls UI improved for Wood trades
- Allied players will now have their AI plaque read "Allied turn" instead of "Enemy turn"
- Mini armies on the overworld are now smaller for heroes with super large armies, such as those on the Ninth Week
- Wide Attacks, Lash and Arrow Rain have been given new icons
- UI colour for all factions has been altered and improved
- Added in an animation for scrolling through heroes on the HUD
- When clicking a hero on the overworld that isn't shown in the HUD, the HUD automatically jumps to show them
- Several effects that give the hero level-up now combine correctly to give the correct number of level-ups
- Hot Throne is now more compact
- Cost of upgrading units is now rounded to the nearest 5
- Clicking the name of a map in the load game menu will now select the first available save from that map
- Steam mods in the mods menu now show the name of any faction in their files, instead of using a random name

TRANSLATIONS
- Rogue subfactions are now translated
- Rogue faction is now translated
- Texts in main menu that do not fit are now downscaled
- Names and descriptions of DLC-specific maps are now translated
- Adjusted a variety of issues where text did not fit in building names in building planner, in advanced map settings, etc.

BUG FIXES
- Reenabled changing the colour of players
- Fixed Enchanting occassionally crashing when used on a Delirium avatar
- Fixed a crash that would occur if an AI Delirium avatar picked up a treasure right after the hero had died
- School of Autopsy now only gives XP for dead units, instead of also for units that had fled, been whisked or coin flipped away
- AI that is trying to protect its town sometimes left the town afterwards if they had extra movement points
- Fixed Enchanting offering to upgrade an artifact into itself if you had the most powerful artifact for that slot
- Fixed a bug where heroes with Boss unit as specialty units would create Great Hydras as "tier 1" units for Hegemony
- Adjusted positioning of tooltips on the overworld to better fit various screen resolutions
- Fixed Antagonism taking place as a boat battle if the previous battle was a boat battle
- Changed the position of the AB button for Classic Town Screen so it's visible for all units
- Fixed having vision of the enemy player's starting area on turn 1 of hotseat multiplayer
- Changed the bounding box of map generation; this change mostly affects open maps from Rogue Realms
- Added some code that will make sure Split in Twain does not generate with inaccessible areas
- Fixed a bug that made Resurrection way too powerful
- Fixed missing black pixels in some animations of spawnlings, horses and dragonworms
- Reduced the number of units on neutral heroes on the Ninth Week map
- Fixed a bug that made spawning duplicate Rogue heroes
- Fixed a bug that in certain situations would have the AI using Docks place their boats on land if picking up an already-built boat
- "Force Unit Group" advanced map setting now works as it should
- Fixed Avatars of Delirium heroes not paying the XP cost of Creativity
- Fixed a bug where the AI would move a hero that is protecting town away from that town while being threatened
- Fixed a bug that would sometimes make the AI not consider using a hero via town portal to defend their town
- Reduced the possibility for a Docks to create wander underneath an encounter during map generation
- Fixed treasure at sea sometimes spawning on the coast, making it inaccessible
- Fixed a crash related to changing mods mid-save
- Fixed Thorpe and Ender using the default neutral hero overworld sprite instead of their own one
- Fixed a map generation glitch that would create long spiralling roads on some maps
- Volcanic Cult no longer checks number of stacks in the offered army, instead checking number of unique unit types in offered army
- Moved the Institute of Carving in the Earthen town screen so it no longer overlaps the Hospital
- Fixed Potency not boosting the effectiveness of Potent spells
- Fixed Celerity's description saying 20 instead of 16
- Fixed a crash that would occur when clicking a spell in the overworld spellbook that was given by the Arcane Spire
- The Inspiration unit ability now scales by the number of units with Inspiration, instead of by the number of stacks of units
- Fixed a bug that would occasionally make an AI player unable to attack a player guardpost
- Cost of upgrading units is now affected by Pillar Administrative Center and by Royalty skill

ROGUE AND NEUTRAL UNIT GROWTH CHANGES:
Firefly, Homunculus growth 24 => 28.
Parrot, Dove, Mad Eye, Farmer, Rebel growth 18 => 21.
Bloodsucker growth 16 => 19.
Pith growth 16 => 18.
Penguin, Excavator, Toadfrog, Aetherthing, Lynx, Spooder, Rooter growth 15 => 17.
Wildkind, Grell, Bandit growth 14 => 16.
Bone Shooter, Hillkeeper, Army Ant, Drowned growth 13 => 15.
Grove Guard growth 12 => 14.
Rifleman, Firestinger, Seastar, Clawmole, Kroll Bowman growth 11 => 13.
Mountainguard, Crystalthemum, Wretched, Cockatrice, Equestrian, Vixen growth 10 => 12.
Engineerling growth 10 => 11.
Naga, Snouthog, Grey Boy, Blaze, Wild Elf, Bloomer, Amberode, Vital Snow, Longbowman, Ashzard growth 9 => 10.
Ocean Menace, Onyx Rod growth 8 => 9.
Spirited Fire, Waveborn, Grizzly, Sand Devil, Child of Midas, Seamare, Mercurial, Carcass, Dragonworm, Leafcutter Ant, Grunt, Billie, Cavebasker growth 7 => 8.
Hatchling, Ash Demon, Fireballer, Berserker, War Clown, Blightstinger, Dragon Whelp, Freshling, Sneagle, Fire Ant, Shadeamander, Manabird, Pulverheks, Duncecap, Kroll Swordsman growth 6 => 7.
Torn Treant, Azurid growth 5 => 6.
Rustode, Mychoral, Forager, Necromancer, Dryad, Frogallant growth 4 => 5.
Crystallius, Mauler, Flamebird, Pond Champion, Deviant, Monokero, Thorn Giant, Apothecary, Incubus, Shale Drake growth 3 => 4.
Molten Charrer, Hellgoat, Malavian, Cerberus growth 2 => 3.
Ashen Giant, Prismatic growth 1 => 2.[/expand]

[h3]PLAY NOW / SAVE 50% OFF:[/h3]

https://store.steampowered.com/app/1656780/Heros_Hour/

https://store.steampowered.com/bundle/30962/Heros_Hour_Deluxe_Edition/

https://store.steampowered.com/bundle/30963/Heros_Hour_Collection/

Rogue Realms DLC Out Now!

Hi everyone,

[h3]HERO'S HOUR - ROGUE REALMS DLC IS FINALLY OUT NOW! [/h3]

[previewyoutube][/previewyoutube]

[h3]Buy now and save extra discounts on our bundles:[/h3]

https://store.steampowered.com/bundle/30962/Heros_Hour_Deluxe_Edition/

https://store.steampowered.com/bundle/30963/Heros_Hour_Collection/

https://store.steampowered.com/app/2007040/Heros_Hour__Rogue_Realms/

[h3]Have fun![/h3]

Rogue Realms DLC Coming March 2nd!

Hi everyone,

After announcing it to you several months ago, we are delighted to let you know that Rogue Realms DLC will be available on March 2nd! 🎉

[previewyoutube][/previewyoutube]

Here are the new features ThingOnItsOwn has cooked up for you:

  • The new Rogue faction
  • 67 new units
  • 24 new heroes
  • 12 different towns
  • 28 new skills for heroes new and old
  • A new set of units for each of the 12 factions
  • 25 new town buildings for various factions
  • New war-machines, new map types, and more


[h3]Wishlist now: [/h3]

https://store.steampowered.com/app/2007040/Heros_Hour__Rogue_Realms/

A message from the dev - ThingOnItsOwn

Hi all! This is ThingOnItsOwn, checking in and saying some words about what's going on, development-wise.

It's been a long quiet period. I think the patch notes for v2.3, the update which just went live, is enough proof that this time was not spent idly. It adds 50 new spells, reworks to several magical skills, catapults and enhanced graphics, among a lot of other things. Actually, the patch notes for v2.3.0 ended up being so long and the list of changes so gargantuan, it became more and more difficult to figure out what's up and down.

I regretted the speed at which v2.1 and v2.2 came out since I didn't have time for quality control and I let major bugs through. With v2.3, I think I adjusted a bit too far in the other direction. I'm currently planning to spend some weeks on improving v2.3 (v2.3.1 is already live), then start developing the things I have planned for v2.4, which should be a size more comparable to v2.2 in size, but with as high level of quality as v2.3, let's hope.
I'm hoping that v2.4 will be a free patch that will release at the same time as the paid DLC named Rogue Realms.

There was an announcement a while back about Rogue Realms, and it's been quiet since then. The DLC is super far in development actually. For a while I was working towards an October launch date, which might've led to a low quality product. It's now delayed due to "Market Reasons", which I'll use as much as possible to pump the DLC full of better balance and more polish.

Last I talked about Rogue Realms, just exactly what the DLC would be was a bit in flux. Now, things look a lot clearer. The DLC will have the following features:
- 27 new hero skills and new skill trees for all heroes
- A new unit (+ upgrade) for each faction, and new town buildings for all factions
- Rogue faction, a new faction representing the neutral units in the game (incl. 68 new neutral units)
- The Rogue faction comes in 12 flavours, each with its own unique line-up of 10 units, and each with 2 heroes
- Six new warmachines, new maps, new unit abilities for old units, etc.

It's a pretty large DLC and also a step up in complexity. I don't think it's recommended for beginners, but it's great for people who want more.

I recently uploaded a small sampler for the new music in the DLC, showcasing 3 of the Rogue faction flavours, specifically Malignant, Ruined and Province. Malignant focuses on the deep and dark creatures of evil. Ruined is a mix of rebels and the undead. Province is a weird land, populated by humanoid rabbits and with other strange creatures.

I'm quite excited for the DLC to be done and out, it's sort of a love-letter to the complexities and unexpected synergies that make me continue to be interested in working on the game. But we all gotta keep practicing that strange thing known as Patience.

Hero's Hour is out on a lot of marketplaces now. Steam is, as is usual, the largest, but not the only one. I don't actually hang out on those marketplaces - sorry!
My publisher, Goblinz, says they'll help keep track of them. Instead, I'm focusing mostly on the discord server and on twitter as my means of communication to the community. The discord can be accessed here or by clicking the Discord-looking icon in the top right of the main menu in-game. I'm just called ThingOnItsOwn on twitter so that's a bit simpler.

Bug reports and suggestions are appreciated, though I can't promise to do all suggestions. Currently I've considered 93 suggestions and implemented 32, so that's less than 1 in 3. Still, 32 suggestions implemented is a lot in its own way.
Anyway. As mentioned, I'll be spending some time making sure v2.3.0 is as stable and good as possible, might even do some more mod improvements. Then it's on to v2.4 and finishing the DLC in the new year.

Thank you all for the patience -
Mvh Benjamin "ThingOnItsOwn" Hauer