Halls of Torment News

Hello Adventurers!

We are sorry for our Japanese players, we've accidentally patched a Japanese localization test into the game that made the text broken on Japanese systems. We've reverted this and fixed some other issues along with it!

• Removing broken Japanese characters for Japanese players.
  
• Spirit Warrior's shockwave now counts as dash damage.
  
• Sage will now properly transform "Arcane Elements" into his main weapon.
  
• Arcane Elements unlock now elemental affinities.
  
• Fire patches and shadow patches weren't properly affected by opacity settings.
  
• Spikes and thunder crown should now count as item damage.
  
• Bosses in Haunted Caverns wouldn't face you when attacking. (they are a bit shy like some silly ghosts sometimes)
  

Update 16:50 CEST:
We re-uploaded the patch few hours later because of an issue regressing that made the screen flash.

Thanks for all the reports and keep fighting!
- Chasing Carrots

It’s time for the Chambers of Dissonance to open its gates. Face new dangers from the depths of the halls and meet new heroes. With this update we are closing in on the finale.

We’d like to thank everyone who helped us with their feedback on the experimental branch. It allowed us to eliminate most of the kinks for this update. Now is the time to make it available to all players. If you have completed quests on the experimental branch, the achievements should unlock on the next game start.


[h2]Here’s an overview of the incoming changes[/h2]

• Performance improvements on all ends, general ones and for specific abilities and cases.
  
• Fixed some sources of common crashes. As per usual we ask you to send us crash dumps after every new update to find new unknown sources for crashes. Thanks for your continuous reporting, even if we can’t reply to everyone!
  
• Trait Variants View: When selecting traits with multiple variants you can now display the mutual exclusive traits in a separate view (right mouse click, or LB on the gamepad).
  

[h3]Chambers of Dissonance[/h3]

• The next stage that can be unlocked by defeating the Twisted Construct in Frozen Depths.
  
• Chambers of Dissonance quest board has been added.
  
• The Chambers feature a complete roster of new unique monster types, including three new bosses and a final Lord boss.
  
• The stage comes with its own new music track.
  
• The difficulty should be manageable for most regular players. Players that have maxed out their builds won’t have any trouble unless maybe playing with Agony turned on. We’re also looking forward to your feedback on this and might apply some adjustments in the final update.
  

[h3]Landsknecht[/h3]

• Can be unlocked in the Chambers of Dissonance.
  
• Quest board for Landsknecht has been added.
  
• Landsknecht-Mark has been added.
  
• Projectile focused character wielding a powerful arquebus and magic grenades.
  
• Magic grenades have a chance to be thrown every time when dealing damage with projectiles. Higher damage yields a significantly better chance.
  
• Landsknecht has 3 variants for each Trait, but from the total of 9, 4 are exclusive for the Landsknecht.
  

[h3]Sage[/h3]

• Can be unlocked in the Chambers of Dissonance.
  
• Quest board for Landsknecht has been added.
  
• Sage Mark has been added.
  
• Character’s main weapon is the first ability you choose at the beginning of the run.
  
• You start your run with a free ability selection.
  
• Sage traits are focused on abilities in general.
  
• The sage is quite knowledgeable and can always choose from the full set of abilities, even when picking up a scroll instead of a tome.
  

[h3]New Abilities[/h3]

• Added Morning Star ability: a physical projectile/melee ability that gets a damage buff with force.
  
• Morning Star comes with three upgrades and a full set of traits.
  
• Morning Star is unlocked by completing Landsknecht quests.
  
• Added Spectral Fists ability which is a directly attacking summon ability.
  
• Spectral fists' special traits can influence other abilities or be strengthened by main weapon traits..
  
• Spectral Fists are unlocked by completing Sage quests.
  

[h3]Ability Changes[/h3]

• Frost Avalanche rebalancing.
  
• Frost Avalanche got a new quest and ability upgrade.
  
• Spirit Warriors rebalancing, scales now with summon count improvements.
  
• Spirit Warriors’ Twin Warrior upgrade got replaced.
  
• Spirit Warriors got a new ability upgrade + quest.
  
• Hailstorm got a rebalancing: You need to drop the satellites from time to time so that the upgrades will keep doing their job.
  
• Hailstorm got an upgrade including a new quest to set enemies on fire.
  
• Kugelblitz received some changes to make it more useful, especially early on.
  

[h3]Other Changes[/h3]

• Many smaller visual updates in effects and abilities.
  
• Added Physical & Magic Damage blessings.
  
• Multistrike III and Piercing Wind III traits have been added.
  
• New late run min-max traits unlocked through the Sage that can be used when reaching level 70.
  
• Frost effect damage has been reduced to a base of 80 while burn has been increased to 30.
  
• New layout for the Frozen Depths quest board.
  
• Total damage in endscreen has been changed to show the sum of all weapons, filtering out damage sources that have not been the player.
  
• New quest icons. (some are still missing, but will be added for the update next week)
  
• The HUD shows whether you have auto attack and/or auto aim enabled or not.
  
• Trait and ability selection screens have a selection feedback effect. UI effects can be turned off in the settings.
  
• Many smaller bug fixes
  

Stay Fresh 🥕
- Chasing Carrots

Update 03 | 2024-02-16
- Fixing Sage traits
- Adjusting agony health for mobs to be more equal among all stages
- Sage's back problems were fixed, he can now look in different directions that he move to
- Consecutive Punches no longer reduces it's own damage
- Fireball now counts as Meteor Strike damage
- Ethereal Shift attack speed buff was wrongly set to movement speed (Orb's go weeee)
- Morning Star force multiplier fix + it now properly works with it's own traits

If you don't get the update immediately, please try to restart Steam.

Update 02 (2024-02-14):
- Landsknecht, fixing the grenade spawn, they shouldn't rain amass anymore
- Landsknecht balancing adjustments, we'll keep trying a few things
- Sage transform to Default Weapon should now work on projectile abilities.
- Some items would not count for the item damage quest
- Adjusting new quests, specifically the kill quest in Chambers of Dissonance

Update 01 (2024-02-13):
Thanks for the quick feedback, we fixed several issues!
- Landsknecht quests could not be completed
- Sage would not be unlocked
- Possibly the screen flickering (we need feedback for that)
- An Arch was not able to be passed through
- Added missing trait & blessing icons

-------------------------------------------



Today we’d like to bring you the next stage for Halls of Torment: The Chambers of Dissonance. This update also introduces two new characters and will be released on the experimental branch for now. Currently, we are in the middle of polishing, balancing, and cleaning up the update. We are kindly asking for your feedback on the new content, specifically regarding its stability and performance.

Our estimate is that this test run on the experimental branch will take about a week before we make it available to everyone. If you want to participate in this feedback round, please go to the game settings -> betas and enable the experimental branch.

As usual, we’re welcoming you to post your feedback and bug reports in the Steam forums and on our Discord server. It would be a great help for us if you could also mark your posts being related to the experimental branch.


[h2]Here’s an overview of the incoming changes[/h2]

• Performance improvements on all ends, general ones and for specific abilities and cases.
  
• Fixed some sources of common crashes. As per usual we ask you to send us crash dumps after every new update to find new unknown sources for crashes. Thanks for your continuous reporting, even if we can’t reply to everyone!
  
• Trait Variants View: When selecting traits with multiple variants you can now display the mutual exclusive traits in a separate view (right mouse click, or LB on the gamepad).
  

Chambers of Dissonance

• The next stage that can be unlocked by defeating the Twisted Construct in Frozen Depths.
  
• Chambers of Dissonance quest board has been added.
  
• The Chambers feature a complete roster of new unique monster types, including three new bosses and a final Lord boss.
  
• The stage comes with its own new music track.
  
• The difficulty should be manageable for most regular players. Players that have maxed out their builds won’t have any trouble unless maybe playing with Agony turned on. We’re also looking forward to your feedback on this and might apply some adjustments in the final update.
  

Landsknecht

• Can be unlocked in the Chambers of Dissonance.
  
• Quest board for Landsknecht has been added.
  
• Landsknecht-Mark has been added.
  
• Projectile focused character wielding a powerful arquebus and magic grenades.
  
• Magic grenades have a chance to be thrown every time when dealing damage with projectiles. Higher damage yields a significantly better chance.
  
• Landsknecht has 3 variants for each Trait, but from the total of 9, 4 are exclusive for the Landsknecht.
  

Sage

• Can be unlocked in the Chambers of Dissonance.
  
• Quest board for Landsknecht has been added.
  
• Sage Mark has been added.
  
• Character’s main weapon is the first ability you choose at the beginning of the run.
  
• You start your run with a free ability selection.
  
• Sage traits are focused on abilities in general.
  
• The sage is quite knowledgeable and can always choose from the full set of abilities, even when picking up a scroll instead of a tome.
  

New Abilities

• Added Morning Star ability: a physical projectile/melee ability that gets a damage buff with force.
  
• Morning Star comes with three upgrades and a full set of traits.
  
• Morning Star is unlocked by completing Landsknecht quests.
  
• Added Spectral Fists ability which is a directly attacking summon ability.
  
• Spectral fists' special traits can influence other abilities or be strengthened by main weapon traits..
  
• Spectral Fists are unlocked by completing Sage quests.
  

Ability Changes

• Frost Avalanche rebalancing.
  
• Frost Avalanche got a new quest and ability upgrade.
  
• Spirit Warriors rebalancing, scales now with summon count improvements.
  
• Spirit Warriors’ Twin Warrior upgrade got replaced.
  
• Spirit Warriors got a new ability upgrade + quest.
  
• Hailstorm got a rebalancing: You need to drop the satellites from time to time so that the upgrades will keep doing their job.
  
• Hailstorm got an upgrade including a new quest to set enemies on fire.
  
• Kugelblitz received some changes to make it more useful, especially early on.
  

Other Changes

• Many smaller visual updates in effects and abilities.
  
• Added Physical & Magic Damage blessings.
  
• Multistrike III and Piercing Wind III traits have been added.
  
• New late run min-max traits unlocked through the Sage that can be used when reaching level 70.
  
• Frost effect damage has been reduced to a base of 80 while burn has been increased to 30.
  
• New layout for the Frozen Depths quest board.
  
• Total damage in endscreen has been changed to show the sum of all weapons, filtering out damage sources that have not been the player.
  
• New quest icons. (some are still missing, but will be added for the update next week)
  
• The HUD shows whether you have auto attack and/or auto aim enabled or not.
  
• Trait and ability selection screens have a selection feedback effect. UI effects can be turned off in the settings.
  
• Many smaller bug fixes
  

It is very likely that we will update the experimental branch a few times this week. All updates will be added to this announcement!


Stay Fresh 🥕
- Chasing Carrots

We wish you all a happy new year! Since last week we are back actively on development and a small update is ready for today with some new ability upgrades and bug fixes.
This will be the last update before the next major content which will include two new characters and a new stage.


[h2]Change Log | 2024-01-11[/h2]

[h3]General Changes[/h3]

• Chests with uncommon loot will drop more often.
  
• Dialogues contain new voices and add our voice actors to the credits.
  
• In Dialogues, characters will now use their mouths properly.
  

[h3]Dragon’s Breath[/h3]

• Adding new ability upgrade “Refined Flame” which makes enemies hit by Dragon’s Breath take more burn damage in exchange for Attack Speed.
  
• Adding the quest “Dragon’s Breath Specialist” to unlock the new upgrade, requiring players to hit max burn stacks.
  
• Heat Blast upgrade adds “Physical” to Dragon’s Breath attacks.
  
• Dragon’s Breath is now more focused into the aim direction, having less spread.
  
• Fixing Agony Upgrade, it was not increasing base attack speed but normal attack speed.
  
• Reach traits do no longer add Area but Damage bonus instead.
  

[h3]Radiant Aura[/h3]

• Adding a new ability upgrade “Echoing Light”. Enemies hit by the Aura have a chance to echo the light and damage all others around them for the same damage.
  
• Adding the quest “Radiant aura Specialist” requires players to make a single strong hit of 25 000 damage on an enemy with Radiant Light.
  
• Performance Improvements.
  
• Radiant Aura flash intensity now scales with the enemy flash intensity.
  

[h3]Ring Blades[/h3]

• Adding a new ability upgrade “Cyclone” which changes the movement pattern of blades to fly in a circular pattern and extend their flying duration.
  
• New quest “Ring Blades Specialist” that wants your blades to travel for 500 miles.
  
• Ring Blades no longer disappear when being blocked.
  

[h3]Meteor Strike[/h3]

• Meteor Strikes can now be transformed into “Fireballs” with a new upgrade, making the projectiles fly through enemies and hitting them for high damage, leaving a trail of fire and exploding after a certain amount of hits.
  
• “Meteor Strike Specialist” quest has been added that requires players to reach a certain amount of crits with a single meteor (counting every over crit trigger) to be completed.
  
• Scattered Debris does now scale with Area instead of Multistrike.
  
• Burning Craters now scale with Area.
  
• Burning Craters also burn enemies in the explosion area.
  
• Reducing the effect of the Blast trait from 30% to 25%.
  
• Scaling down the size of visual effects.
  
• Performance improvements.
  

[h3]Summon Golem[/h3]

• Golems can now be duplicated with the “Double Trouble” upgrade.
  
• Unlocked by the quest “Golem Specialist” which requires players to have the Golem rolling for 20 minutes.
  
• Ferrite Infusion does now add shockwaves to the golem when moving, adding electrify to close enemies.
  
• Reducing the duration bonus for roll from Ferrite Infusion from x2.5 to x2.0.
  
• Acceleration Trait is now also increasing the movement speed of the golem by 10% but the attack speed by only 15%.
  

[h3]Bug Fixes[/h3]

• Projectiles would not be properly destroyed when reaching max. hits.
  
• Reverberant Potion would not drop from chests anymore, this has been fixed.
  
• There was always a trait carried over from previous runs, this has been fixed and should also fix some additional follow up bugs resulting from this.
  
• Typos
  

- Stay Fresh 🥕
Chasing Carrots

The (hopefully) last update for the year has arrived. It’s another small package with smaller improvements, item variations and new Ability options. Aside from that we also have done a technical change, upgrading the engine to Godot 4.2 and adding some additional structural changes for faster loading and better memory management.

Thank you to the community that helped to shape the game so far and helped to verify this update runs properly so short before the holiday season. We’ll be less active for some time starting next week, but we have quite some things prepared for next year.
More about that soon, we’ll give you a rundown on what is coming next. For now we hope you enjoy the latest additions.


[h2]Change Log | 2023-12-14[/h2]

• Adding Twitch integration to support user votes on Abilities, Items and Traits
  
• Disabled filtering of base traits (Area, Range, Crit Chance, Crit Bonus, Force)
  

[h3]Agony[/h3]

• Agony decay has been entirely removed
  
• Losing an agony level on death is still a thing
  
• Agony will increase by 1 level every 5 minutes
  
• Some of you may die, but it’s a sacrifice we are willing to make
  

[h3]Technical & Performance[/h3]

• Updating the engine from Godot 4.1.4 to Godot 4.2
  
• Reworking data structure for faster load up speed
  
• The normal render mode will now be more performant
  
• Flash intensity scaling has been fixed and corrected for a better scale
  
• Adding an option to outline the cursor
  
• Adding additional log entries to better trace what happens during a run
  
• Performance update for summons
  

[h3]Lightning Strike[/h3]

• Concentrated Strikes upgrade has been added
  
• Targets the monster with the highest Health and then spreads around it
  
• Also adds damage bonus for each elemental stack on enemies
  
• Adding quest “Lightning Strikes Specialist” to unlock the new upgrade
  
• New quest can be found on the Viaduct quest board
  
• Explosive strikes can now apply Burn
  
• Exploding Strikes no longer cancel out with Electrifying Strikes
  
• Base Damage of Lightning Strikes has been reduced
  
• Attack Speed and average hits per second has been increased
  
• Traits were adjusted to account for the balancing change
  
• Lightning Strikes now attack faster with higher Attack Speed to avoid Strikes being lost
  

[h3]Arcane Splinter[/h3]

• Arcane Elements upgrade has been added
  
• All projectiles get a random element with a 20% chance to apply elemental status effects
  
• Adding quest “Arcane Splinters Specialist” to unlock the new upgrade
  
• New quest can be found on the Viaduct quest board
  

[h3]Items[/h3]

• All base stat items get a new uncommon variant (Growth) which will need to be leveled and should outperform the (Boost) variant after 70-80 levels
  
• Some base items like Quickhand Gloves and Runner Shoes were improved
  
• Echoing band base range has been increased
  
• Adding uncommon Echoing Band that can trigger with magic damage
  
• Elemental Resonator was buffed
  
• Replacing previous uncommon variant to also trigger with magic attacks
  
• Adding a new uncommon variant (Chaos) that makes that every element has a chance to add any or all of every other elemental status effect
  
• Mask of Madness (Degeneration) now adding negative regeneration instead of damaging each Tick
  
• Reappearing traits after they had been banished
  

[h3]Bug Fixes[/h3]

• No more negative Health (for real this time)
  
• Holy Relic’s Light does now count as source for Warrior’s Fervor
  
• Holy Relic’s uncommon variant now also scales with itS own light
  
• Blood Catcher (Enchantment), the temporary Attack Speed buff is now working
  
• No more potions stuck in the well, the wellkeeper threw them away
  
• If one has now all available bottles in the inventory, no more additional bottle drops
  
• Sometimes pointers to items would not disappear
  
• Scorched Slayer quest now properly shows Blazing Armor as reward
  
• Several Typos and descriptions
  
• Uncommon Shadow Cloak now spawns the correct patches giving you 30 Block Strength
  

Once more we are open for a small Q&A session, if you have any questions please post them below the announcements and we’ll try to answer everything for the next 24 hours.

Stay Fresh 🥕
- Chasing Carrots