PLEASE NOTE: We have updated the server to facilitate this Hotfix. If you are experiencing any connection issues (like turn timers zeroing out or error messages) please just exit the client - do not forfeit/abandon your games! - download the update via Steam, and dive back in. If you were in a sessional game, it will remain in progress and you will be able to re-enter via the main menu.
Fiends!
We've just launched a Hotfix to address some of the balancing concerns around excommunication and ritual framing! These improvements are...
- Added a new ability, All-Seeing Eye, to Pandaemonium, increasing the challenge of framing someone else for a Ritual targeting the city.
- The Masking Mirror is now disabled for Excommunicated players, preventing them from Excomming others via Ritual Framing without consequence.
- Included a fix for when Masking and Framing rituals weren't charging their additional Darkness.
- Removed the Achievements that required Expel The Heretic edict to unlock - Tall Poppy Syndrome & The Monster You Think as they are no longer achieveable with recent changes to Excom.
- We have also deployed fixes to our backend systems to address the causes of matches appearing to stall and/or skip turns. If you do encounter an issue like this in the future, please continue to submit feedback using the in-game form as it greatly helps us identify what's going wrong.
Insights from our Principal Game Designer, Anthony!
We asked our Principal Game Designer, Anthony, to explain our thoughts behind implementing some of the changes in this recent Hotfix!
"The changes we have made around Excommunication are intended to lower the frequency of unintentional Excommunications, without nerfing the strategy of intentional heretics. We've opted to follow the wizened learnings of Vic Davis, the great Archfiend himself, and made some changes around framing and targeting Pandaemonium to make framing another Archfiend for harm against Pandaemonium more fair and less exploitable.
The first change we've made is that we've introduced the All Seeing Eye ability to Pandaemonium:
'The Conclave sees all. The chances of masking your identity for a ritual against Pandaemonium can never be greater than 50%.'
This change means that regardless of your ritual's success rate against Pandaemonium, the chance that you get identified as being responsible for the ritual is always going to be a coin flip or better. Framing someone for an Infernal Affliction against Pandaemonium is now a much more risky proposition, and will return it to the Hail Mary tactic it is intended to be.
The second change we've made is that Excommunicated Archfiends no longer have access to the Masking Mirror. This is a significant change that will stop failed framers from spamming more framed rituals without consequence. This removes the griefing aspect of the mechanic, and will make the prospect of attempting to frame someone else inherently more risky -- if you fail it once, you'll open yourself up to attack from everyone else.
We’ve also removed two relevant achievements as we don’t intend to reinstate Excom via voting, and as such they have become unachievable.
We hope these changes, along with some additional balancing adjustments we have planned for a future patch, will create a fairer game... as fair as any game in Hell can be."
We're very excited for y'all to hop in and test these out!
Enjoy!
See you out there, in Hell,
<3 LoG
And, if you haven't yet seen, we've just announced a new Archfiend, Belphegor! Feel free to go take a looksie here!
https://store.steampowered.com/app/2893270/Solium_Infernum__Belphegor_Paragon_of_Impiety/