Ember Knights update for 31 August 2022

Hello Knights!

This patch contains improvements based on our roadmap and your feedback, as well as important balance changes and fixes. It also brings the opportunity to keep track of your progress in the game with the introduction of Steam achievements! And of course, let's not forget, the modding of weapons!

Note: we've added a flame of passion 🔥 next to every new feature that was directly inspired by your feedback, so you can see the great influence this fantastic community has on us. Thank you again!

Let's dive right in.

New content and features

Weapon Mods – When you defeat the Phantom, you now unlock Mechanical Arms Robot Variant 1N or Marvin, the robot.

Marvin is a friendly NPC who will offer you the ability to customize your weapons, granting them various traits and bonuses to match your desired playstyle. Specifically, each weapon now has 3 modification slots that will radically change the way you fight with it, thus opening the door to even more unique builds and synergies. In order to unlock the full potential of your weapons, you will need to gather Ash, which you obtain by defeating enemies affected by Praxis' buff during special encounters.

So, whether you're a dasher or more of a leaper, you now get to reflect that in combat with this update!

Online Multiplayer Updates - We've made some strides towards making the game even more multiplayer friendly!

• Share your weapons! If ANY player in an online game has a weapon unlocked, ALL players will be able to use it.
• Access your mods! Players with Modding unlocked can access their Mods in any online game. Freely equip, unequip, and unlock new Mods!
• Saving your progress! Ash acquired and Mods unlocked in online games are saved to your local file.

New Warrior Wisps!

• Now include specific attack types like Lightning, Burn, Freeze and Poison!
• Updated to be able to fly over pits
• Updated to take their attributes (crit %, maxHP/2, skill damage modifier, move speed multiplier) from the casting player

Player Feedback! To address some great feedback from our community, we’ve included the following:

Steam Achievements 🔥

* Our first batch of achievements are in! We’ll continue to add to the list as we work towards 1.0.  

Respite Rooms 🔥

* To give you a little breathing room, we’ve disabled the run timer in starting rooms, healing rooms and shops.   

Kicking Players 🔥

* We've added the option to be able to kick players during a game. It can be found in the Gameplay tab in the Options menu.   

End-Level Awards 🔥
To be a little more beginner friendly, we’ve made some more improvements to the end-level awards. Included:

* Nicer names (already in v0.4.1)   

  * Punching Bag -> Sponge   
  * Wimp -> Spectator   
  * Dead Weight -> Zombie   
  * Dreadful Aim -> Wild Aim   
  * Oblivious -> Unlucky

* Better distribution of awards  

Stat Gems 🔥
To accommodate some recent improvements, we’ve made the following changes to stats:

* Removed the Crit DMG stat   
* Updated the values for MaxHP (2/4/6 -> 5/10/10)   
* Broke out each stat into their own room type   
* Changed the color of the Crit Chance % gem to be yellow. Updated the stat icons in the UI, including matching the gem color

Shops/Selectors 🔥

* Rerolls will now exclude options from the previous roll.  

Mystery rooms - replaced with specific rooms for all layouts.

Balancing

We’ve also tweaked and adjusted the following:

Wightsbury changes:

General

• Removed collision from small rocks
• Changed spawn placement of Craven, Rats and The Forlorn from medium to far
• Adjusted aggro move speed for all enemies. Increased for small enemies like Craven and decreased for big enemies like Wolf and Forlorn

Craven

• Lowered stun value (100 -> 20) to align more as a jobber
• Slightly increased move speed
• Slightly decreased HP

The Forlorn

• Updated the laser attack hit collider to activate after it extends
• Removed evade chance (0.4 -> 0)
• Slowed down attacks for projectile (350 -> 275) and laser (120 – 75)
• Slightly decreased range on laser attack. Players should be able to roll backwards to avoid it
• Significantly decreased dash distance (75 -> 10)
• Reduced aggro move speed
• Increased CastDelayRate on chain projectile i.e., more time between casting chain projectiles
• Changed projectile colors for clarity (projectile is now green instead of purple)

The Forlorn (Elite)

• Updated the attack collider for the laser beam attack

Condemned

• Removed the throwing dagger attack
• Will now temporarily get stuck after the dodge attack

Pox/Putrid Rat

• Updated to transform in a few different states

Weald Wolf

• Reduced jump speed for better readability
• Added better tell and longer hold animation before leaping
• Added additional attack visual and audio indicators

Relic updates:

• Updated Empowered Bangle, Decayed Sceptre, Harvest Scythe, Brittle Sceptre and Supreme Ambition to work with Warrior Wisps and Ballistas

• Updated Overcharge Gauntlet to not trigger from Warrior Wisps and Ballistas

• Updated Storm Ward to trigger for the Lightning Wisps; 4s cooldown for triggering

• Updated Thundering Hammer to trigger from Lightning Wisp attacks

• Updated Stun Powder to trigger from Fire Wisps; only triggers on the first attack of the first Wisp per enemy

• Updated Combustion Stone to trigger for Fire Wisps when they burn enemies

• Updated Arctic Axe to trigger from Frost Wisps freezing enemies

• 🔥 Except for the first few map layouts, replaced the random skill and relic reward rooms with selectors

• Tweaked all map layouts to accommodate the new rewards and mystery room changes

• Added the ability for mimic chests to jump pits

• Made the Heroic Horn unbreakable

• Added a blue down arrow to enemies affected by the slow status effect

• 🔥 Updated the unlocked items popup to support left stick/WASD/arrow keys for scrolling

• Updated the credits to reflect new team members

Bugs

And finally, some more bug squashing. Those include:

• Fixed a bug with the Ballista that was triggering the effect from the Toxic Bangle relic
• Fixed a few instances where the player colors weren’t updating correctly
• Fixed a few bugs related to enemies spawning in multiplayer games
• Fixed a bug with revive when the player and boss (or miniboss) would die at the same time in a multiplayer game
• Fixed a visual bug when players would die while in a doorway during a multiplayer game
• Fixed a visual bug where clients wouldn’t see status effect damage in a multiplayer game
• Fixed a multiplayer bug with the Ember Tree where the game would receive input from more than one player
• Fixed an issue with Bob’s Containment Field where it wouldn’t destroy the bubble if the relic was triggered during the bubble sequence
• Fixed a targeting issue with the lightning bolt relics
• Fixed a few bugs with the shop in the cases where the player would own the maximum number of a relic
• Fixed a bug where any player resetting their controls would reset the controls for all players
• Fixed a bug that was preventing the game over screen from appearing if a disconnected player still had revives available
• Delayed the Perfect callout for Bow to after the arrow is fired, not when the attack button is released
• Fixed a bug where the player’s position wasn’t being set properly when travelling through doors
• Fixed a bug that was always showing not enough currency when inspecting shop items
• Fixed a multiplayer bug where the FX for the slicing of drops wasn’t showing for non-local players
• Fixed a visual bug where the interact dialog boxes weren’t being hidden during the game over sequence
• Fixed some visual bugs in the inventory related to the player color
• Fixed a visual bug with enemy health bars that made it appear like their low health was at zero
• Fixed a bug where Knight’s Charge was pushing the target dummy
• Fixed a bug that was preventing summons skills from attacking the target dummy
• Fixed a multiplayer bug that was showing Nexus props continually die for clients
• Fixed a multiplayer bug where the ice door to the boss in the Steadfast Citadel would get destroyed for clients if the host attacked it twice
• Fixed a bug where the Mimic King's Consort relic wasn’t properly being unlocked and added to the new list of relics
• Fixed a bug that was causing the visuals and sounds of the status effects to loop beyond the lifetime of the status effect
• Fixed a bug with the Shiver Mage that would cause the projectiles to die if the enemy was stunned
• Fixed a bug with the Shiver Mage that was preventing the projectiles from dying if the enemy was frozen
• Fixed a multiplayer bug where clients could desync on room messages if on a bad connection
• Fixed a bug that was showing skills as new even if the skill was already equipped
• Fixed a bug with the Phantom Spear where it was applying more Poison, and stacks, than intended
• Fixed a few visual bugs with the Phantom Spear’s projectile trail
• Fixed a visual bug with the compendium that was sometimes displaying the incorrect enemy if moving through them quickly
• Fixed a visual bug where enemies would continue to move during the player’s death sequence
• Fixed a few visual issues with the Rift Hammer attack animation
• Fixed a few visual issues with the victory animations for the Rift Hammer and Guardian Bow
• Fixed a bug with Empowered Bangle. It was adding an extra spell damage modifier to Warrior Wisps and Ballistas
• Fixed a bug with Diligent Work where it wasnt applying extra poison from Warrior Wisps and Ballistas
• Fixed a bug where some projectile indicators weren’t clearing when getting destroyed by Containment Shield
• Fixed a few visual bugs related to the player HUD
• Fixed a bunch of various sound bugs

In the coming months we expect to keep adding features, weapons, foes, relics and more. We are planning a minor update at the end of September, before a major content update one month later, at the end of October, when you can expect numerous additions, including the new level in an environment we have never showcased yet.

Join the Community!

As always, if you want to stay on top of the news, see new content before it's live, share your favourite memes, or simply chat strategy about the best weapons and skills, join us on Facebook, Instagram and Twitter!

We will also be especially grateful for your feedback and suggestions during the Early Access and beyond, so be sure to join our Discord to share your comments directly with our development team!

Stay tuned for more news and updates!

Doom Turtle