The Challenger Update is huge! We've expanded the range of strategies each run, introducing difficulty levels and scaling Scroll rewards. Take it easy with a lower difficulty, or fight flawlessly for a high EXP score and powerful Scrolls, all while listening to new regional music composed by Jared Farney.
Watch the video overview:
You now start at Level I each run and earn experience each battle. Leveling up adds more powerful Scrolls to the reward pool, making it critical to play your best from the very first fight. Compare your final EXP value to other players by sharing in the Steam community or our Discord!
A new report at the end of battle breaks down experience gained, which is rewarded for each surviving Champion, overkill damage, and efficient play: the fewer skills you use in battle, the better.
We want every decision in battle to feel important. Merely surviving is not enough to win at higher difficulties; you must optimize your play to reach Levels II and III faster to access powerful, battle-warping Scrolls.
With 18 new Scrolls, we've more than doubled the Scrolls available in the playtest, separating them into tiers I, II, and III to match the new levels. Scrolls have new visuals to match the tiers, making it immediately apparent which are upgrades or sidegrades.
The reward screen has a new layout side-by-side with the experience report, and almost all Scrolls have a new icon.
Now is a great time to jump back into the playtest to experiment with the new Scroll mechanics and strategies. We'd love to hear your feedback!
The playtest now has three difficulty levels: Starter, Defender, and Challenger. Win a run on Defender to unlock Challenger, which offers the hardest difficulty we've released yet. The threat level screen has new visuals, showing an Astral descending upon the realm when you start a run!
This is our first step towards testing discrete difficulty levels, and we have a lot more in development. We're internally testing upgraded Astrals, more powerful Minions, and more.
Cloven Castle and Wailing Anchorage have brand-new regional music composed by the talented Jared Farney, reinforcing the identity of each region:
Cloven Castle: A proud and powerful military stronghold, the song mourns its fall to the Astral assault and celebrates your counter-attack.
Wailing Anchorage: Howling winds and glinting ice give way to the haunting call of Sirens and Banshees in the distance.
Lost Haven: The battle theme previously played in all regions is now specific to Lost Haven.
Three starting Scrolls: You now start each run with the signature Scroll of all three team members. We want to encourage Scroll usage from the beginning.
Fire Wisp nerfed: Fire Wisp now takes 1 damage at the end of every turn. While still dangerous to leave around, this gets them in line with the power level of other Minions by limiting their ability to overwhelm you with damage.
We are still on track to release another region of the realm in a future update to the playtest before the demo release.
We’re working on improvements to the champion and region selection UI.
In case you missed it, we recently announced our partnership with Goblinz Publishing, and a new trailer! Check it out here:
As always, we welcome your feedback through the game's feedback button, our Steam Community forums, or our Discord. Thank you for playing!
Rob and Hari