Greetings SUPERVIVERs!

We’re now a few weeks into our launch with some patches under our belt. Today we’re looking to give an update on the Armory, as well as talk about some upcoming changes for dunking and gameplay balance.

Armory

As mentioned in our Week 1 dev blog, we’re continuing to develop updates to the Armory to address feedback - specifically improving agency and reducing the reliance on randomness to progress your items. Some of these changes are bigger and require more work to implement, which is why we’re continuing to look for opportunities to improve the rough edges of the current system while we work on larger iterations. Some of those improvements are in a hotfix that’s live now.

One topic that we’ve been seeing more among players who are further along in their collection is how bad it feels to get Prisma for a duplicate of an item you’ve already 3-starred. We’ve changed that in a hotfix that’s live now - when you open a standard capsule, you will always get a new item or progress on an existing item. We’ll also be updating the forge to remove items you’ve already 3-starred from the daily/weekly offers.

8/13 Armory Hotfix:

• You will no longer roll items you’ve already 3-starred in standard capsules.

• The forge will no longer include daily/weekly offers for items you’ve 3-starred.
  

Some players are deep in their collection and have already received Prisma for duplicates of 3-star items, while others are just starting their SUPERVIVE journey today. As a thank-you to the first and a warm welcome to the second, in 1.02, everyone who logs in will receive a Mid-Season Boost in their mailbox with a collection of items and prisma.

Dunking and Dunkers

Dunking abilities are another hot topic in the SUPERVIVE community, especially at higher levels of play. We like the variance that dunking abilities bring to combat in SUPERVIVE, but with the increase in abyss and introduction of glider heat in our 1.0 launch, they’re feeling less fair and more binary. So we’ve been looking for ways to maintain the gameplay highs of dunking while making them require more work to earn.

In 1.02, abilities that dunk will apply more downward force & a longer stun to the opponent based on their health percentage. If you land a dunk on someone at max health, they’ll boop downward but have time to regain control of their character. If they’re closer to half health, landing a dunk will still be lethal.

Our goal is that this provides more opportunities for both the dunker and dunk-ee to play around the mechanic. Dunkers should be looking to whittle down their enemies before going for the killshot, and dunk-ees no longer have to fear getting one-shot while gliding at full health - and have the option to back off and heal before engaging in abyss combat.

Balance

Let’s dive into what’s on our mind at the moment in regards to gameplay balance! Last patch, we buffed a couple underutilized boots options, and now that we have a bit more data, we’ll likely be making some additional changes to some armory items that are proving more powerful than their counterparts. On the hunter side, we’ve got several buffs and nerfs we’re exploring.

Shiv & Wukong are our primary candidates for nerfs in next week’s patch. While Shiv should be a higher skill cap carry with the ability to outplay multiple enemies, she’s currently too consistent in damage output without needing to put herself at significant risk - and her success rate with many Armory items only increases that consistency. We’re shipping a hotfix nerf to Shiv’s damage today, and are looking at some additional changes in 1.02.

8/13 Shiv hotfix:

Malice (Passive)

• Damage reduced by 15%

Arcslinger (LMB)

• Damage reduced by 15%

Wukong

For Wukong, in 1.02 we’re mostly looking at reducing the power of his RMB, whose range can often feel unfairly surprising. We think this ability can still be a powerful component of Wukong’s kit without creating so much frustration to play against.

Shrike

Another Hunter we see a lot of comments about is Shrike. Shrike is in an interesting spot - she’s a strong long range fighter who will BLOW YOU UP if you get hit by multiple shots - but also has clear windows of power and fewer options if she gets dived on. Balancewise - we think Shrike is in a pretty good spot overall, but she is more effective at lower rankings. This leads us to believe that her main issue is that her strengths aren’t telegraphed well enough for newer players. Being hit by a Shrike LMB is when you’re most vulnerable to a follow-up attack, but that can sometimes be lost in the background. So one thing we’re looking to do is increase the visibility (and audibility!) of her “Mark”. (Shoutout to Madly for this suggestion on discord!)

We hope that by making her windows of power a bit more clear, it will be easier for players to pick up on when they’re in danger of getting domed. We may pair this with some more targeted buffs to other parts of her kit to make her a more appealing pick at higher elos where enemies are playing around her LMBs more effectively.

In terms of candidates for buffs, we’re looking at changes for Eva, Saros, and Joule (at minimum).

Eva

We gave Eva some love in our last balance patch, but she’s still struggling to find her niche in the cast. We’re exploring some bigger changes - specifically leaning into her unique orb gameplay, and giving her new ways to utilize them.

Saros

For Saros, we’re mostly looking to improve some frustrations around his kit, like the difficulty of entering your portals in certain placements, or swapping from charge to basic shot too slowly.

Joule

Joule has a unique playstyle revolving around her lightning orbs and dash resets, but has been feeling underwhelming since our 1.0 release. We’re looking to improve her overall spell uptime, as well as some changes to make comboing with her orbs more reliable, especially for experienced Joule mains.

This isn’t a comprehensive list of what’s in the works - we’ve still got more changes planned for the next patch and beyond. See you back here next week for the introduction of a new Hunter who’s mixing up a set of concoctions for enemies and allies alike!

~ the ViV team