Cross of Auria News

In the last few days, I went a little bit crazy with making some big internal changes to the game. The patch notes you're about to read are kind of long, so here are the highlights:

- Revamping multi-zone areas to be single zone big areas
- Mastery and Learn Skill menu updates
- Earlier access to "prestige" classes, though the details are still classified
- New quest in Port Reception
- New item "Essence Box" which can hold more than 99 of each of the 12 types of essences & allows customized amount withdrawal.
- "Gift Pack" DLC overflow fix - bulk essences now deposit directly to the Essence Box
- Various skill updates and changes, especially for the Swordsman class
- New learn skill for White Mage at level 10


My tentative public release date for this build is going to be January 3rd, 2025. However, I'm still in the process of squashing bugs and making changes. If you are interested in also squashing bugs and reporting them to me, you should join us on Discord @ https://discord.gg/7GehvwKGCv and follow these instructions to get on the Beta development branch of the game:

Right click Cross of Auria from your Steam games menu
Click "Properties"
Navigate to the "Betas" tab
Write in the code: sdnuorgnitset
Press Check Code
After it succeeds, make sure to select "testingrounds - dev test only" from the drop down selection box
Please note that you should Start a new save file to participate in the public beta. I will not tackle bugs to current save files based on errors during the beta, though you may still report them.

This will serve as the first half of the patch notes, with the official second half coming when the build goes public on Jan 3rd.

BETA6.600 [Build #161, Release Date: January 03, 2025] New:
- A new quest is available from Elena Katali in Port Reception!
Fixes:
- Fixed a lingering issue with Atropos repeating dialogue in the first visit to the Veil.
- Fixed an issue where the Talisman cycle would occur on new accounts.
- Fixed Phoenix Ash quest log data when embarking on the Day 1 quest.
- Both Phoenix Ash questgivers will add their most recent quests to the quest log by talking to them again in Port Reception if the quest has already been completed.
- Added an Essence Box to the Veil, near the center Gift Pack DLC warp. This item will hold more than 99 of each type of Essence and allow you to withdraw up to 99 essences at a time for use in crafting!
Updates & Changes:
- Downscaled the resolution of some currently unused files to reduce space requirements.
- Challenging the Headless Horseman in The Veil now requires completion of the neighboring Halloween event without the Challenge of the Headless DLC. DLC encounter remains unchanged.
- A prize for completing the Headless Halloween event now appears in the Veil for the party's main cast.
- A vendor in Port Reception now carried Frames and Patterns for a steep price.
- Talking to Elena Katali in Port Reception after completing the first quest will add its data to the Quest Log if it was missed previously.
- Talking to Lvell Hunter in Port Reception after completing his quest will add its data to the Quest Log if it was missed.
- Reverted Sparkstrike line naming convention due to the deprecation of other + elemental skills.
- Raphael's Tower world map location has moved to north of Lvell Forest. It is no longer accessible from the Veil.
- Increased the bonus damage done by Slash from 50 to 125. Reduced the Variance from 50% to 25%.
- Increased the bonus damage done by Cut from 25 per hit to 50. Cut now has a 2 turn warmup.
- Swordsman now can learn Double Slam, Lucky Strike, Disabling Slice, Silencing Slice, & Breath of the Dying.
- Swordsman amplifies Physical damage by 200%, up from 50%.
- The following items are no longer considered timelost: Frames, Patterns, Metal Chips, Metal Shards, Metal Plates, Iron Bars, Steel Bars, Leather Strips, Coarse Hide, Beast Hide, Thick Hide, Heavy Hide.
- Several items have had Chips or Strips added to their disassembly pool.
- Oros-Bane and Duskfall armor now have Pattern requirements.
- Gift Pack DLC essences from the red chest now deposit directly to the new Essence Box even if it has not yet been collected. The amount received remains unchanged.
Classes & Skills:
- Double-Strike now has a max mastery level of 5 with 12% bonus damage per level and -5 TP cost.
- Poison Cut now has a max mastery level of 10 with -2MP & -1TP cost per level.
- Triple-Strike now has a max mastery level of 10 with +5% damage and -3 TP cost per level.
- Flamecutter now has a max mastery level of 25 with -2MP, -1TP, & +2% Damage Per Level.
- Double Slam and Lucky Strike are now Physical element.
- Return Spirit can now be learned by the White Mage class starting at level 10!
- Electrogenic class renamed "Sparkwraith". Available to Ruby after Stormchaser reaches 50 and Lightningwalker reaches 25, or by other story progression means.
- Lightningwalker class renamed "Electrogenic". Available to Ruby after Stormchaser reaches 25.
Timelost Zones:
The following zones have been merged into a single zone amongst themselves to reduce the amount of resources used by the engine overall. Freeing up Maps will allow more zones to be created in the future. All Timelost Zones have saving Disabled and will not receive updates after today. On March 1, 2025, all zones marked Timelost will be removed from the game files. If you still have a save file from inside a Timelost Zone come March 2nd, you will need to create a new save file as the data from the original will be corrupt. The safest places to save during this time are all zones where this conversion has previously occurred and will not occur again: Lvell, Auria, Agartha, Colosseum, Raphael's Tower, Frost Forest, Nexus Waterway, etc. If the map is a single map and it's huge, it's safe to save there.Saving is now disabled in all Timelost Zones and all previous Save Crystals have been removed from these locations.
- The Veil (first pass - saves 7 maps)
- The Veil (second pass - saves 5 maps)
- The Veil (third pass - saves 2 maps)
- Hell's Gate (saves 12 maps)
- Shoreline (day 1 - saves 1 map)
- Den Anura (first pass saves 10 maps)
- The Black Forest (first pass - saves 23 maps)
- First iteration of the world map "Revan" (1)
- Third iteration of the world map "Orc War Planet" (1)
- Lvell Forest first map (1)
Notes, Known Issues & Other:
- All "Fixes" apply to new zones only. Timelost Zones will not see fixes.
- All current timelost zones will be deleted in a future update to allow time for current players to exit those areas. After their deletion from the game files, if a player would try to load into them, the game will immediately crash.
- It is not possible to save in Timelost zones outside of Save Points from this point forward, and most of those save points should be removed. If any remain, please reach out.
- In total, 63 zones have been flagged as Timelost in this update.
- Most timelost zones now exit to non-timelost areas, especially exits to the World Map.

Today, I'm going to begin the process of rolling out finalizations to the Skill Learn and Mastery systems. For those of you who don't know, Mastery is when you use a skill over and over and then it either becomes stronger or requires less resources to use or some other effect and Skill Learn is when you raise a class to a high enough level that you see abilities appear under the Learn Skill tab inside Skills in the menu.

Let's talk about the vision first. Since I began creating the game, I've programmed in dozens of skills that so far have never been accessible to players. My goal right now is to release everything I've had baking in the oven before working on too much new stuff. So that's where we get into Black Mage - the first class to receive Skill Learn updates. By level up, Black Mage will learn Arcane Shock, Firebolt, Waterbolt, Frostbolt, Poisonbolt, and Airblade. You can accelerate the learning of the latter 4 by purchasing them from Skills -> Learn Skill once the Black Mage class hits level 5. Once these 'tier 1' magic abilities are learned, the tier 2 abilities become available in the menu when other conditions are met, but no other abilities are learned via level-up alone. For example, Fireball becomes available to learn in the menu once Black Mage hits level 10. To purchase the ability, it will cost 2500 gold and 30 Burning Essences. What's so good about tier 2 skills to justify the cost, right? Well, they hit twice. So while they begin at Mastery level 0 and are expensive to use for a while, they are the best bang for your buck each individual turn. I don't want to give away everything here, but let's look at the fire line in detail:

Firebolt
MP Cost: 30
Damage Formula: (a.mat * 4)
Variance: 25%
Additional Effects: Burn (30%)
Max Mastery Level: 5
Mastery Effects: +3% Damage Per Level, -2 MP Cost Per Level
At Max Mastery: +15% Damage, MP Cost: 20

Fireball
MP Cost: 60
Damage Formula: (a.mat * 4)
Variance: 25%
Additional Effects: Burn (45%), 2-Hit
Cooldown: 1 Turn
Max Mastery Level: 10
Mastery Effects: +5% Damage Per Level, -3 MP Cost Per Level
At Max Mastery: +50% Damage, MP Cost: 30

Lava Burst
MP Cost: 100
Damage Formula: (a.mat * 4)
Variance: 25%
Additional Effects: Burn (60%), 3-Hit
Cooldown: 2 Turns
Max Mastery Level: 25
Mastery Effects: +5% Damage Per Level, -3 MP Cost Per Level
At Max Mastery: +125% Damage, MP Cost: 25

Eruption
MP Cost: 75
Damage Formula: (a.mat * 4)
Variance: 25%
Additional Effects: Burn (50%), Area of Effect (Enemies Only)
Cooldown: 2 Turns
Max Mastery Level: 10
Mastery Effects: +5% Damage Per Level, -2 MP Cost Per Level
At Max Mastery: +50% Damage, MP Cost: 55


By examining the above 4 skills, the effects of the Mastery system become clear - but how do you level up an ability? Simple - use it! By default, the amount of times an ability needs to be used to level up is 10 times per level + 10. Ex: Leveling from 0 to 1 takes 10 uses, from 1 to 2 takes an additional 20 uses, from 2-3 takes an additional 30 uses, so on and so forth. It is important to note that the default is not always used for every skill, but for the purposes of elemental abilities - the default is always used.

Important key notes about Mastery:
- Default Max Mastery: 10
- Default Level Formula: level * 10
- Default MP Cost: cost * (1 - (level * 0.05))
- Default TP Cost: cost * (1 - (level * 0.05))
- Default Damage Formula: (value * (1 + (level * 0.05))
- The default applies to every skill not explicitly mentioned in this or previous patch notes. As time goes on, there will be differences for players to discover.
tldr about the key notes... by using an ability more, it costs less to use and does more damage (or healing)!


[h2]Phase 1 -> 2[/h2]
Today, we roll out the changes to Black Mage, Mastery, and Skill Level Up. Over the next couple weeks (or however long it takes), I will continue to quietly roll out updates for the other available classes. If a new major class is not announced, then a post here on Steam is unlikely to happen. If you want up to date information on changes to the game, Discord is the best place for that (https://discord.gg/7GehvwKGCv - Select "CoA" role). To know if the game has been changed since this post, see the Version # from the title screen ("Info" under "Continue"). With today's roll out, the game version will be 6.507, the patch notes for which are listed below.

Ideally, I won't continue to make long posts about minor changes or updates to smaller side systems. The next post you can expect to see here on Steam would be about new experiences.

Until then, catch you on the flippidy flip

6.507 [Build #157, Release Date: December 16, 2024] Bug Reports:
- The fastest way to report a bug is on Discord @ https://discord.gg/7GehvwKGCv.
New:
- Skill Learn System beginning with Black Mage class. See "Mastery" section below for full details rolled out this update.
Fixes:
- Removed Eurus from the Raphael's Tower area when he is already in the party.
Updates & Changes:
- Hallows Shield, Scarf, Earrings, Scabbard, and Strap can now be sold for the same items they were purchased for. This will allow current players to swap the broken Talisman versions with the functional Accessory versions.
- Added minimum to tier 2 and 3 halloween skill.
- All Tier 2 magic abilities now have a 1 turn cooldown.
- All Tier 3 magic abilities now have a 2 turn cooldown.
Mastery:
- Tier 1 magic skills now have a mastery max of 5.Tier 2 set at 10, and tier 3 set at 25. Tier 4 (aoe) set at 10.
- Tier 1-4 should properly function for Black Mage class at various levels (up to 25).
- Triple-Strike mastery set to max 10, -5% mp cost per level, +5% dmg per level.
- Airslash & Airstrike mastery set to max 5, +3%dmg/-1TP/-1MP per level.
- Airslash II & Airstrike II mastery set to max 10, +7%dmg/-1TP/-1MP per level.
- Airslash III & Airstrike III mastery set to max 10, +15% dmg per level.
Notes & Known Issues:
- Mastery changes likely will not apply to abilities already learned by the characters.
- This patch will go live before the end of the day.

Between yesterday and today, I was able to make solid progress fixing some things that need to be fixed before moving forward. A little while ago tonight, I released a build that allows for interacting with the Rabbit's Foot crew in Agartha during the events of the Orc War. You must progress completely through everything available in Auria and Shoreline Area to open the building in Agartha. In a build in the near future, progression will be forced through Agartha rather than potentially discovered as it is right now. The ability to go there at this point will remain intact regardless.

Last night, without posting about the update, terrain changes were made to Scarlet Cavern and Nexus Waterway. This change includes important loot - so check it out if you're strong enough!

Next up, I'm going to start using my Discord server more for Cross of Auria related information. Keep in mind, the server is not specific to Cross of Auria, so if you join be sure to pick the "Chad" or "Hybrid" role to see the Cross of Auria section of the server. Any reader of this post is welcome to join
Server Name: The Black Chocobo
My Name in there: "Hardytier" (owner)
Invite Link: https://discord.gg/7GehvwKGCv


Previous patch notes for today and yesterday listed below.

6.502 [Build #152, Release Date: December 06, 2024] New:
- A new treasure path is available in the Nexus Waterway!
- A new treasure path is available in Scarlet Cavern!
DLC:
- ??? has appeared for a second fight somewhere in the Zodiac Overwatch! ??? must be defeated near the Headless Horseman before being challenged in the Overwatch.
- Visible field enemies have been added to the Zodiac Overwatch first area. Like other fieldspawns, they temporarily disappear after being defeated. Reloading the game or leaving the area and coming back will cause them to respawn.
- All random encounter fiends in the first are of ZO now have a chance to drop Encounter Half items. Return to Start items are also in play.
Fixes:
- Adjusted tooltips for some SDV items.
- Removed access to Swordsman, White Mage, & Black Mage during the Halloween event by swapping characters to their default then locking the class command while in the zone. Warping back to The Veil will unlock Class again.
- Added a new condition for Eurus to appear at Raphael's Tower after his questline is finished but while he is considered outside the party.
Updates & Changes:
- Additional enemies in the Snowdrift Village have been scaled down.

6.503 [Build #153, Release Date: December 7, 2024] New:
- Added a temporary hut for the Rabbit's Foot team in Agartha after going as far as you can in the Orc War storyline in the Shoreline area.
Fixes:
- Corrected the amount of MP restored by tier 1 and 2 Magick potions.
- Fixed the Save Point door in DenAnura/Inn to respond to the key the nearby enemy drops.
Updates & Changes:
- Fieldspawn Vine Snappers in Den An'ura encounter formula adjusted based on Ruby's level to allow for more challenging fights at higher levels.
- Minor expansion to Den An'ura, allowing for challenging three headed vine snappers as random encounters.
- Adjusted visibility of two tower markers in Frost Forest.
Notes & Known Issues:
- Orc War progress is halted at Lvell with the entrance tiles locked. When the next piece of the main story is released, Lvell will be accessible.

I've been putting in some work over the last few weeks and rather than hold it back, I've decided to push it out to get some feedback. Without spoiling anything, the short version is that there's some new stuff to discover! For current players (as opposed to new save files), a Talisman cycle had to occur to update Eurus for a new level 1 skill. It occurred to me that he doesn't have a good enough early game TP dump, so hopefully the new skill fixes that. There was also a situational bug where Eurus would leave the party and never come back if he was encountered too early in the game. If you encountered the part of the game where Eurus leaves and doesn't come back, go into the Veil and enter the costume change Halloween event portal, then leave from there back to the Veil. The party reorganization code should add him back. If it does not, please let me know as a comment to this post.

Also, I've changed the location and DLC names surrounding what was formerly "Yuelslain's Village". I was having pretty severe writers block when I came up with it and was locked out from thinking of anything else. Moving forward, YSV area is now "Snowdrift Village", and the enemies are being scaled down to the 20-40s area instead of sitting in the 50s. Leveling scaling is not yet complete, but only enemy stats and exp/gold are affected. Loot drops are not affected.

Below is the full patch notes which explicitly outlines what was added to the game, but keeps vague data that was already planned but not yet released. Continue reading at your own peril! - Oh, and I made a candy bag so you can more easily farm the Halloween events in the Veil.

6.501 [Build #151, Release Date: December 06, 2024] Bug Reports:
- The fastest way to report a bug is on Discord @ https://discord.gg/7GehvwKGCv.
New:
- A new foe has appeared alongside the Headless Horseman in the Challenge of the Headless DLC! Unlike the repeatable Horseman, this foe may only be fought once in this location and its loot is guaranteed.
- Both the DLC and non-DLC arena for the Headless Horseman now offer an additional level 30 challenge which has flavor text for wins, losses, and refusal to challenge.
- When first met, Eurus now knows a unique Special ability - Obliterate.
- Eurus may now apply Reave with Normal Attacks (3%).
- Enemies afflicted by Reave take 500% damage from Obliterate and have 15% reduced Defense.
- Added the key item Candy Bag which allows players to carry more than 99 Sour, Sweet, and Blazing candy at a time. Candy may be added to or removed from the bag at will. Since only 99 of an item can be held at once, functionality has been added to withdraw at most 99 of any candy at once. Players can either deposit all candy or withdraw up to 99 candy depending on available space. Fractional deposits and withdrawals are not programmed in. All players can collect the Candy Bag for free near the Veil portals to the related Halloween events.
- Under certain conditions, Ruby can discover a new class!
Fixes:
- The following items have been changed from Talisman to Accessory: Hallow's Scarf, Hallow's Earrings, Hallow's Scabbard, Hallow's Strap, Jelly Scarf, Jelly Earrings, Jelly Scabbard, Jelly Strap.
- Added the correct controls for handling Eurus in the party before the events at Scarlet Cavern. If you have a save file that has collected Eurus but is past Den An'ura, entering the Halloween event in the Veil - the one where the party changes costumes - and then exiting will re-add all out-of-party friends back to the party.
- While Rose is in the party, Ruby won't go back into her house.
- Fixed an issue where An'ura Archer wasn't dropping the Green Insect Gland.
Updates & Changes:
- Yuelslain's Village (the zone) has been renamed to "Snowdrift Village".
- Yuelslain's Village (the DLC) has been renamed to "Eyes in the Frost".
- Yuel's Castle renamed to "Shadowfrost Citadel".
- Yuelalin's Monarch (upcoming DLC) has been renamed to "The Frost Queen".
- Eyes in the Frost DLC level downscaling has begun. Level 50 mobs outside the castle are being reduced to 30, 30's reduced to 20, 40-55 reuced by 20 flat.
- Minor adjustments to the opening dialogue.
- Fixed the issue where Eurus's "Scythe" category would appear twice for new players.
- +0.5% passive MP regeneration to all talismans.
- All talismans given names.
Other:
- The Quest Log has been removed from the menu manager code. While the plugin is still lurking in the back-end, the ability to access the log has been removed. To summarize the issue - in the period of transferring data from one PC to another then adding to the game, some quest detail was lost altogether and would need to be recreated from scratch. At this point in the game's development, given where we are without having moved forward in a very long time, there is no time left to recreate the missing pieces. While I was able to restore functionality to some main story questlines, I also can't control when the menu starts to break, become invisible, or handle any of the other issues that arise as a result of this plugin. If we're ever going to move forward, we have to shed the things weighing us down. This was one of those things.
Notes:
- The level scaling in Snowdrift Village is not yet complete, but will hopefully be finalized in the next update.

Hello, quick note today
- An issue was reported on Discord for Eurus permanently disappearing from the party if he was acquired before the events of Scarlet Cavern. A fix has been created for players who have not yet encountered Eurus but also have not passed Scarlet Cavern.
- For players who have already past this point of the game but have been unable to pick Eurus back up, please return to the Veil and activate the Halloween event where the party changes costumes. Then, exit the event. Triggering the event exit portal will re-add all party members who have previously joined the party but have been marked as "in-waiting".

The official fix for this won't be released until progress is made in other areas to deploy alongside it.

Thank you for the read,
//hardytier