Champion Shift News

Hello Champions!

Got a ton of fixes and improvements for you today, including our resident best boy, the Chupacabra, and a new starting Celestial Gift, the WINGS OF QUETZALCOATL, which is sure to create more havoc with its tornado creating powers. Also, the power of invincibility when you revive, because getting nuked the instant you do is well... let's just leave it at not fun, shall we? Anyway... we also have some balancing and quality of life improvements, so make sure to check it out below!

[h3]GENERAL[/h3]

• New starting Celestial Gift: WINGS OF QUETZALCOATL
  • DIVINE WIND - Unleash a swirling gust of wind that slowly moves across the battlefield, dealing 50% DMG [+25% per level] for 5 seconds.
    
  • RESPLENDENT WINGS - Increase DURATION by 2 seconds per level and passing through tornadoes reduces DASH cooldown and applies a brief AGILITY boost.
    
  • COATL'S BREATH - Increase the size of the Serpent's Breath by 30% AREA [+15% per level] and enemies killed by it release fast moving wind projectiles that deal 50% DMG.
    
• Vejigante's Chupacabra ability is now back in the game.
  
• Champions now have 2 seconds of invincibility after reviving.
  
• Fixed an issue with Origata, Moon Beam, Falcon of the Sun and Chakram where their formulas weren't calculating damage correctly.
  
• New visual for when the champion is not able to shift into vehicle form.
  
• Fixed issues with champion and vehicle colliders.
  
• Fixed the Health Celestial Gift description to correctly indicate 200 HP (It always gave 200, but the description was incorrect).
  
• Fixed Starfire Arrows from sometimes not firing.
  
• Fixed a bug with the Earth Elite stone pillar visual spawning in a different area (Invisible stones be damned!).
  
• Missions should now spawn enemies that are more specific for the current stage.
  
• Fixed scroll sensitivity in the user interface with controller.
  
• New lore descriptions for some Celestial Gifts, providing more insight into the inner workings of the Dominion Corporation.
  
• Rabbit's Elixir duration is now properly affected by the DURATION stat.
  
• Fixed Vejigante's car speed formula.
  
• Gilgamesh's Sunburst description should now correctly display the amount of MULTICAST it gives.
  
• More collider fixes to Mountain Pass South and Magma Cave.
  

[h3]BALANCING[/h3]
CELESTIAL GIFTS THE LEGEND OF CHANG'E overall has been out performing other celestial gifts due to its (pretty awesome) buffing capabilities, so we're toning it down to bring it back to its intended level of power.

GODDESS OF THE MOON

• Reduced initial block chance to 10% (down from 15%).
  

MOON BEAM

• Reduced the damage to 30% & 15% per level (down from 40% and 20% per level).
  

RABBIT'S ELIXIR

• Reduced buff duration to 3 seconds (down from 5 seconds).
  
• Reduced the AREA buff to +50% (down from +100%).
  

AREA STAT GIFT We're taking a close look at AREA and will be tweaking it further over the next few weeks. We're all for "Breaking the Game", but not your PCs and eyes!

• Reduced the amount of stacks you can have of this Gift to 4 (down from 10).
  

[h3]MISSIONS[/h3]
CELESTIAL RIFTS

• Reduced the minimum amount of elite enemies that spawn to 2 on stage 1, increasing by 1 each stage. The actual amount spawned will depend on the amount of enemies currently alive in the stage.
  

INFESTATION

• Increased spawn amount by 15%.
  
• Added large enemies to the mission spawner.
  

[h3]ENEMIES[/h3]

• Mini Boss (Large enemies) spawn rate reduction:
  
• Increased the cost of Mini-Bosses to 100 (up from 60).
  
• Increased the cost of Elite Mini-Bosses to 500 (up from 300).
  
• Reduced the spawn rate of ranged enemies.
  

With the new vehicle stat gifts and upgrades, such as CAPACITY and REGEN, energy stayed near 100% for most of the run, making it a useless resource, which is not intended. This change should be a step in the right direction to make vehicle energy a valuable resource that shouldn't be taken for granted (I see you turret XP farmers ;) ). If you want to make a vehicle-heavy run, you can still do so, but you wont be able to wholly ignore energy anymore!

• Doubled enemy collision damage.
  

[h3]VEHICLES[/h3]
This change is temporary until we implement a more robust solution to the magnet. It should help with the frustrations of losing XP or having to go back to pick it up when moving at faster speeds.

• Increased vehicle pick-up magnet by 25%.
  

More features and content to come in our road to 1.0, so stay tuned! Until next time, keep driving Champions!

Hello Champions! Got a ton of fixes and improvements for you today, including our resident best boy, the Chupacabra, and a new starting Celestial Gift, the WINGS OF QUETZALCOATL, which is sure to create more havoc with its tornado creating powers. Also, the power of invincibility when you revive, because getting nuked the instant you do is well... let's just leave it at not fun, shall we? Anyway... we also have some balancing and quality of life improvements, so make sure to check it out below!

GENERAL

• New starting Celestial Gift: WINGS OF QUETZALCOATL
  
  • DIVINE WIND - Unleash a swirling gust of wind that slowly moves across the battlefield, dealing 50% DMG [+25% per level] for 5 seconds.
    
  • RESPLENDENT WINGS - Increase DURATION by 2 seconds per level and passing through tornadoes reduces DASH cooldown and applies a brief AGILITY boost.
    
  • COATL'S BREATH - Increase the size of the Serpent's Breath by 30% AREA [+15% per level] and enemies killed by it release fast moving wind projectiles that deal 50% DMG.
    
• Vejigante's Chupacabra ability is now back in the game.
  
• Champions now have 2 seconds of invincibility after reviving.
  
• Fixed an issue with Origata, Moon Beam, Falcon of the Sun and Chakram where their formulas weren't calculating damage correctly.
  
• New visual for when the champion is not able to shift into vehicle form.
  
• Fixed issues with champion and vehicle colliders.
  
• Fixed the Health Celestial Gift description to correctly indicate 200 HP (It always gave 200, but the description was incorrect).
  
• Fixed Starfire Arrows from sometimes not firing.
  
• Fixed a bug with the Earth Elite stone pillar visual spawning in a different area (Invisible stones be damned!).
  
• Missions should now spawn enemies that are more specific for the current stage.
  
• Fixed scroll sensitivity in the user interface with controller.
  
• New lore descriptions for some Celestial Gifts, providing more insight into the inner workings of the Dominion Corporation.
  
• Rabbit's Elixir duration is now properly affected by the DURATION stat.
  
• Fixed Vejigante's car speed formula.
  
• Gilgamesh's Sunburst description should now correctly display the amount of MULTICAST it gives.
  
• More collider fixes to Mountain Pass South and Magma Cave.
  

BALANCING

CELESTIAL GIFTS THE LEGEND OF CHANG'E overall has been out performing other celestial gifts due to its (pretty awesome) buffing capabilities, so we're toning it down to bring it back to its intended level of power.
GODDESS OF THE MOON

• Reduced initial block chance to 10% (down from 15%).
  

MOON BEAM

• Reduced the damage to 30% & 15% per level (down from 40% and 20% per level).
  

RABBIT'S ELIXIR

• Reduced buff duration to 3 seconds (down from 5 seconds).
  
• Reduced the AREA buff to +50% (down from +100%).
  

AREA STAT GIFT
We're taking a close look at AREA and will be tweaking it further over the next few weeks. We're all for "Breaking the Game", but not your PCs and eyes!

• Reduced the amount of stacks you can have of this Gift to 4 (down from 10).
  

MISSIONS
CELESTIAL RIFTS

• Reduced the minimum amount of elite enemies that spawn to 2 on stage 1, increasing by 1 each stage. The actual amount spawned will depend on the amount of enemies currently alive in the stage.
  

INFESTATION

• Increased spawn amount by 15%.
  
• Added large enemies to the mission spawner.
  

ENEMIES

• Mini Boss (Large enemies) spawn rate reduction:
  
• Increased the cost of Mini-Bosses to 100 (up from 60).
  
• Increased the cost of Elite Mini-Bosses to 500 (up from 300).
  
• Reduced the spawn rate of ranged enemies.
  

With the new vehicle stat gifts and upgrades, such as CAPACITY and REGEN, energy stayed near 100% for most of the run, making it a useless resource, which is not intended. This change should be a step in the right direction to make vehicle energy a valuable resource that shouldn't be taken for granted (I see you turret XP farmers ;) ). If you want to make a vehicle-heavy run, you can still do so, but you wont be able to wholly ignore energy anymore!

• Doubled enemy collision damage.
  

VEHICLES This change is temporary until we implement a more robust solution to the magnet. It should help with the frustrations of losing XP or having to go back to pick it up when moving at faster speeds.

• Increased vehicle pick-up magnet by 25%.
  

More features and content to come in our road to 1.0, so stay tuned! Until next time, keep driving Champions!

GENERAL

• New players should now be able to properly progress through the tutorial stage.
  

Greetings Champions! We’ve been listening to your wonderful feedback and have been able to make some changes to improve the quality of gameplay, along with a ton of fixes. Changes range from multiple bosses spawning, greater battlefield visibility, more useful car weaponry, and performance improvements, so this update has a little bit of everything.

GENERAL

• Fixed enemy Knockback immunity bug
  
• Fixed End of Run screen not showing all the data (Some numbers are still incorrect, but they don’t show blank).
  
• Fixed an issue with Arthur’s Knights of the Round ability.
  
• Fixed an issue with Athena’s Phalanx Toss ability.
  
• Fixed inconsistencies with the mini maps in the following stages: Down Town (1A), North District (1B) and Mountain Pass South (4A).
  
• Replaced Arthur’s model with Wukong’s in the hallway on the tutorial level. (Arthur should’ve been just a tiny bit confused by that...)
• Fixed some Celestial Gifts that were sometimes not dealing damage.
  
• Fixed multiple typos in the User Interface.
  
• Searing Boom achievement should now properly grant Burning Chains.
  
• Adjusted visuals for Toxic Death Cloud and Celestial Orb. They shouldn’t block out enemies anymore.
  
• Improvements and adjustments to lighting throughout all the stages.
  
• Adjusted car sizes for all Champions.
  

BALANCE BOSSES

• Bosses will now be randomized. Some are weighted to appear more often in some stages.
  
• Multiple bosses can possibly spawn based on how long the run has gone on for and number of players.
  
• Bosses will now spawn their own set of enemies rather. This will reduce the number of enemies that spawn while fighting the boss.
  
• Boss Power increased by 15% to compensate for less enemy spawns.
  
• Greatly reduced rotation speed on Dynamo’s stomp attack.
  
• Final Boss’ death animation should now play properly.
  

ENEMIES

• Scaled up the size of Mine Runner and Marine enemies so they are more visible and show their danger level.
  
• Some enemies have had their movement speed reduced.
  
• Dreadnaught no longer stuns when performing its stomp attack.
  
• Reduced velocity of enemy projectiles.
  
• Reduced the range of enemy projectiles.
  
• Increased size and brilliance of enemy projectiles (sneaky bullets be damned!).
  

YGGDRASSIL UPGRADES

• Fixed some upgrades that were not unlocking the next nodes.
  
• Increased the dust currency cost multiplier to 10% [up from 5%]
  

Power I & II are currently awarding too much power stat and trivializing the first couple of levels. Power I will now award the same amount of power as a 1 level and Power II the same as 2 levels.

• Power I Stat set to 3 per level [Max 9] (down from 5 per level)
  
• Power II Stat set to 6 per level [Max 18] (down from 10 per level)
  

Max Speed I & II are getting their stat awards reduced. The speed scaling is exponential when picking up gifts such as Bull Rush, and it gets a little too fast and hard to control.

• Max Speed I is reduced to 4 (down from 10)
  
• Max Speed II is reduced to 6 (down from 20)
  

Multicast has been reworked and we can now increase the amount that is awarded as a base upgrade so that it is more meaningful.

• Multicast I is increased to 5% [15% max] (up from 4% [12% max])
  
• Multicast II is increased to 10% [30% max] (up from 6% [18% max])
  

Weapon DMG I & II is going to get a small bump since POWER I & II are getting reduced.

• Weapon DMG I Increased to 5% [15% max] (Up from 4% [12% max])
  
• Weapon DMG II Increased to 10% [30% max] (Up from 6% [18% max])
  

There were several Gift Unlock nodes that weren't working properly. They should work as expected now.

• Duration, Attack Speed, Amount, Multicast Gifts are now working and should now appear in game.
  

CHAMPIONS
WUKONG

• Multicast increased to 25% [Up from 10%]
  
• Area is reduced to 100% [down from 115%]
  

ARTHUR

• Reduced Arthur's Base Velocity to 75%.
  

GILGAMESH

• Reduced Gilgamesh's base velocity to 85%
  

VEJIGANTE

• Removed Chupacabra gift until its behavior issues are fixed.
  

CELESTIAL GIFTS
LABYRINTH OF THE MINOTAUR

• Reduced the amount of knockback awarded by all three gifts to 5 (down from 10).
  

THE LEGEND OF CHANG'E

• Rabbit's Elixir was mistakenly awarding 10% drop chance per level. Should be 5% plus 2% per level capping out at 15%.
  

AVATAR OF RA

• Falcon of the Sun has had its cooldown reduced to 4 seconds (down from 8 seconds).
  

VEHICLES
CALTROPS

• Reduced base CD to 1 sec (down from 3 sec).
  

SHIFT BOMB

• Doubled the size of the base explosion.
  

RAILGUN

• Reduced the CD to 2 secs (from 5 secs).
  
• Reduced charge time to 1 sec. (down from 2 seconds).
  

TENTALASH

• Now has a base crit chance of 10%.
  
• Reduced base CD to 0.5 sec (down from 1 sec).
  

BROADSIDE BLASTERS

• Reduced base CD to 1 sec (down from 2 sec)
  

PERFORMANCE

• Added Vertical Sync to the settings menu.
  
• Frame rate improvements due to garbage allocation optimizations.
  
• Texture size improvements for reduced memory footprint and loading times.
  
• Lighting optimizations to stages 4 and 5 (Mountain Pass South & Magma Cave).
  
• Improved frame rate drops when spawning the following enemies:
  
  
  • Grunts (Basic Enemy)
    
  • Drones (Ranged Flyer)
    
  • Aedes (Melee Flyer)
    
  • Roamers (Walking Ball)
    
  • Marine (BRRRA-TA-TA-TA-TA-TA-TA)
    
  • Infantry (Shotguneer)
    

As you all know, this is a work in progress, and we'll continue listening and tweaking the numbers until its juuuust right, so thank you so much for all of your feedback! We're working on new features while we do these updates, so stay tuned for those in the coming months!

That's all for now, see you on the next one. And as always, keep driving, Champions!

Greetings Champions!

With all the busy patching and hunting down bugs these past few days, the patch notes announcement here for last Friday’s build was delayed a bit, so here it is!

—---------------------------------------------------

Today’s update has a lot of quality-of-life fixes, more crash fixes and performance improvements. To start with, we’ve increased the size of “invisible walls” around the intended paths that players take, so there should be little to none of those “flying at top speed off a ramp and landing in lava crashing the game” situations. Instead, you should slam on an invisible wall and fall safe and sound where you should be. If any of these issues recur, please don’t hesitate to let us know and we’ll take care of it!

The final Dominion Boss was also something we looked at, and even with the latest change in VFX, we felt he still got lost in the battlefield, so we gave him a modest sizing. He should be much easier to follow now.

As far as performance is concerned, we’ve taken a look at a couple of things, including the speed at which the save data is read and saved, shader and material improvements, FPS improvements on enemy spawning, stage optimization, and changes to the graphics API.

We’ve also fixed issues with currency and achievement rewards, player revival with mouse and keyboard, UI fixes, and a smattering of others. Check the full list below:

[h3]GENERAL[/h3]
The Revive button when using the mouse and keyboard should now properly revive the player.
Reduced out-of-bounds situations by properly blocking flying vehicles.
Increased the size of the final Dominion Boss by 20%.

[h3]HEROES[/h3]
VEJIGANTE
NOTE: We are aware of the issues with Chupacabra and are working to fix them. He’s been a bad puppy, but we’ll have him trained and following the Hero properly faster than you can say… well… we’ll just train him up ASAP ;)
Vejigante will now properly unlock for all players in a multiplayer run when the final Dominion Boss has been defeated, regardless of who is currently dead or who gets the killing blow.

[h3]PERFORMANCE[/h3]

• Optimized save data read/write speed for faster loading after runs. This was done by removing gift specific stats from other players in multiplayer, so for now you will see 0 damage when you switch players. This will be corrected on a later patch.
  
• Optimized enemy pools in order to significantly reduce FPS drops during spawning.
  
• Optimized shaders and materials on multiple stages.
  
• Optimized assets in the Downtown and North District stages to improve loading times.
  
• Improved Gift selection speed in both single player and multiplayer.
  
• Force the game to use Direct3D 11 for improved stability and performance across the board. Once we have tried and tested other APIs such as Direct3D 12 or Vulkan, we’ll enable them.
  

[h3]REWARDS[/h3]

• There was an issue where only the player who got the killing blow on the mini-boss and/or the stage boss received the currency for it. This is not by design, so we changed it so that everyone can get those much-needed upgrades.
  
• Everyone in the run should now be properly rewarded with shards and dust.
  

Crashes are down to a minimum, but they can still happen. Please let us know if you experience these and we'll be on top of them!

Until next time, keep on driving, Champions!