Hey Heroes,

It's been a while since our last update in February, and we're finally ready to let you in on what we've been working on. These will be available to all players who opt into our bleeding-edge branch (right click Gordian Quest > Properties > Betas), and it will let you testdrive several fundamental changes to the game.

We intend to continue translations and observe how the changes are received over the month, before we make this patch public. As always, we welcome your thoughts, opinions, and suggestions.

Now, let's take a dive into the major changes!

Changes to Artifacts

Artifacts have had a slight rework in terms of their bonus, and they will also offer a bonus effect that can be unlocked with Renown. You can choose up to 6 Artifacts to bring on your run.

You will also have opportunities to find "Unstable Artifacts". These are lesser versions of artifacts that instead provide a one-off bonus when you activate them. These are rare items meant to fill in the gap for providing effects like being able to upgrade the tier of an item, forge a particular mod onto an item, grant a skill point, or revive a dead hero.

Renown can be used to obtain these artifacts on runs, and as such deadly encounters in the Acts will also grant Renown in a similiar fashion to that in Realm Mode.

You want more control? You got it.

Gordian Quest has always explored the intersection of building a hero in an RPG and deckbuilding context. We've further refined the ideas based on feedback from the community and we're excited to reveal the following big changes.

Edit your deck

We are introducing a new stat - minimum deck size, which starts at 12. This means that no matter what cards you learn, you can determine which 12 cards you want to bring into battle. Cards from items will always be added, but you can remove them via Void runes as before. You can reduce this value through the skill grid. We hope that this opens up the door to more fun trial-and-error combinations and strategic uses, and removes the feeling of deck bloat.

Item and skill sockets

We are differentiating legendary items and normal items by giving normal items skill sockets. Skill sockets come in five types (Attack, Defense, Ranged, Movement, Spell), and they allow you to input a skill of your own into it and modify it with runes. You can use this new system to empower your skills with runes like Power (+1 Rank), Efficacy (-1 AP cost on first use), or try out one of the new runes being added in this patch like Gambit (skill costs SP instead of AP).

SP? What's that?

SP (Strategy Points) is a new resource system given to heroes, much like a "Limit Break" or "EX Meter". Playing cards as per normal builds up this resource, and we've reworked various cards in game to use that instead. This system is intended to better control balance and improve card diversity across heroes, while removing the power cliff of finding "+1 AP" items. It led to many heroes feeling distinctly stronger than others simply because their cards were more cost-efficient in early game, and playing around with a fully geared 6-7 AP hero trivialized most fights.

In this system, you will still be able to pull of strings of combos, with the following pros :
- Can be built up in a more controlled and cyclical fashion
- Not dependent on finding the right items
- Remove the feeling of "need a +1 AP item", encourage having more fun with itemization
- SP can be carried over battle to battle, so you can "charge up" in an easy battle and save it if you prefer.

Synergies

A new tab called Synergies allows you to set up a new mechanic among your party members. Every hero starts off at Synergy Rank 0, and they build this up by interacting in camp by chatting, or based off the decisions you make in certain events.

As a hero gains Synergy, they unlock special Stratagem cards. Stratagem cards are drawn whenever a hero has enough SP, and provide utility effects like free movement, bonus draw, bonus AP, HP recovery, and more.

When two heroes reach a specific Synergy level, they gain access to a special Synergy ability. Such an ability requires both heroes to spend the SP cost, activating a powerful effect.

We're still working on expanding this system, and it will serve as a framework for expansion in the future.

A Deadlier Challenge

We're reintroducing a new enemy class above Elite enemies, who will possess up to three Traits. Traits are special abilities that hinder the heroes or affect the battlefield, creating a unique scenario to fight in. Some examples of Traits include :

- Reality Warp : Randomly teleports one player to a random cell on round start.
- Ruin : Every X card played by the party will be Expended.
- Jailor : Roots a random hero on round start.
- Wealthy : Drops Gold every time it is hit.

Status changes

We're slightly changing how damage status effects like Burn, Chill, Bleed, Shock, and Poison work. They are now charge based - when you apply up to the max stacks, that status is consumed and its special effect is triggered.

This change is intended to give to allow for quicker and more impactful "damage over time" effects if you can find ways to ramp up the status application such as by working together with various heroes, or finding combinations of talents and items, rather than waiting for round end to happen.

And more ...

There are many more things we're tweaking for the patch release next month that you'll get to experience first. Some of them include :
- More consistent UI for cards
- Realm Mode now uses the same difficulty selector as Campaign instead of only providing Normal and Nightmare.
- A newly added Torment difficulty

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Thanks for reading. We will continue to work hard in bringing you more exciting features and improvements in the game. We thank you for your support and patience as we continue to build this game with you.

As always, we hope to hear your thoughts below on what we’ve put forth so far. Feel free to join us on Discord to chat with us.

And last but not least, if you haven't already, please consider giving us a positive review on Steam if you like how we are doing so far. It would really mean a lot to us. Thanks! :)

Crafted With Love,
The Mixed Realms Team