We've taken another look at the stats, and we're doing another large balance pass to help correct any major power outliers. Most of the adjustments are pretty minor, but there are three encounters that deserve a more thorough explanation.
Ethel Vance was designed to check the player's defensive capabilities in the early turns, similar to how Edith works. The accumulated Scorches from her signature power, Core Meltdown, will eventually kill her even if the player doesn't deal any damage directly. Unfortunately, her damage output was just too high to reliably Block, which often forced the player to trade damage by playing Attacks, the opposite of what the fight was intended to incentivize. By replacing some of her offensive cards and shrinking the size of her deck, we've sharply reduced her burst damage potential while also making her burn out more quickly.
According to our data, Scarlet Aldrich was one of the most difficult encounters in Restless Parish despite being a member of the easy pool. Scarlet Libation successfully discouraged the use of Powers, but non-Power scaling was difficult to come by, making it hard or impossible to play around the multiple copies of Revenge she had access to in later areas. Though we still want to reward the player for finding defensive scaling, because of its scarcity, we've decided that approaching the fight with Attacks instead of Powers should be a viable strategy. As such, we've removed her access to health-based Attacks like Revenge.
Lastly, Hana Takahashi was by far the easiest fight in Hall of Judgment. Though Dark Omen is interesting to play against, it's usually not too threatening by the time the player has reached Area 5. If the player can reliably endure 30 damage, the fight becomes relatively trivial. We've decided to take an unusual approach to adjusting this fight. Rumiko in the same area punishes the use of melee and ranged attacks, but there is no comparable check for magic attacks. As such, we've given Hana access to Dispel on top of improving her card quality.
We'll be monitoring the data in the coming weeks to see if any difficulty spikes remain, but once the game balance is in a good place, we intend to release an updated version of the game's demo.
v0.75 is now live on the main branch.
Version v0.75.1
-Supernova now deals 18 damage, up from 16.
-Ground Zero now deals 44 damage, up from 42.
-Delta Field is now Ranged instead of Magic.
-Sun and Moon now puts itself on top of your draw pile, instead of making a new card. No longer Banishes.
-Reina Kurosawa nerfed: -1 Crippling Shot.
-Mariko Minami nerfed: +1 Heavy Shot.
-Olivia Vieira buffed: +1 Rapid Shot.
-Nerissa Hart (Area 2) buffed: -1 Strike, +1 Waterfall.
-Azure (Area 2) buffed: -1 Heavy Bolt, +1 Freezing Shot, +1 Iceshard.
-Azure (Area 3) buffed: +1 Freezing Shot.
-Yuki Hanamori (Area 4) buffed: -1 Guard, +1 Glacial Blade.
-Aurelia Fiore (Area 3) nerfed: -4 Dash, +4 Run.
-Aurelia Fiore (Area 4) nerfed: -4 Sprint, +4 Run.
-Cecilia Nocturne (Area 2) buffed: -1 Heavy Bolt, +1 Shackling Blast.
-Victoria Akulova (Area 2) buffed: +1 Incendiary Shot.
-Victoria Akulova (Area 3) buffed: -2 Rapid Shot, +1 Incendiary Shot, +2 Suppressive Fire.
-Victoria Akulova (Area 4) buffed: -2 Absorb, -2 Rapid Shot, +1 Incendiary Shot, +2 Take Aim, +2 Suppressive Fire.
-Ethel Vance (Area 2) nerfed: -2 Defend, -2 Deadly Shot, -1 Ignite, +2 Covering Fire.
-Ethel Vance (Area 3/4) nerfed: -2 Fire Wall, -2 Deadly Shot, -1 Ignite, +2 Covering Fire.
-Lucia Monet nerfed: +2 Heavy Strike.
-Scarlet Aldrich (Area 2) nerfed: -1 Blood Rage, -1 Revenge, +2 Drain Life. Ascension 15 now gives Mangle instead of Revenge.
-Scarlet Aldrich (Area 3) nerfed: -1 Night Slash, -1 Revenge, +2 Drain Life. Ascension 7 now gives Mangle instead of Revenge.
-Scarlet Aldrich (Area 4) nerfed: -2 Revenge, +2 Drain Life. Ascension 23 now gives Exsanguinate instead of Astral Flare.
-Edith Hearn (Area 4) buffed: +1 Avowed Strike.
-Hana Takahashi buffed: -2 Absorb, +3 Dispel, +1 Judgment. Ascension 7 now gives Dispel instead of Judgment. Ascension 15 now gives Mute instead of Bewitch.
-Arriet Harper nerfed: -1 Rapid Shot, +1 Lapse.
-Alexandra Delacroix nerfed: -2 Slash, +2 Parry. Ascension 7 now removes Parry instead of Slash.
-Nacht buffed: -2 Phantom Image, +2 Avowed Strike, +2 Sterling Bolt. Ascension 3 no longer gives Shredder. Ascension 11 now gives Sterling Bolt instead of Avowed Strike or Judgment. Ascension 19 no longer gives Hookshot.
-Added smart AI for Ball Lightning.
-Improved smart AI for Scarlet Libation.
-Added a cap of 50 cards played to the AI's turn, in case you somehow give the opponent a nondamaging infinite.
-Equipment preview hover now fades in and out.
-Combat reward screen is now delayed until all animations finish.
-Discarded cards now get aligned before fading out. (This should make Gamble spam look less weird.)
-Added a border to the text that displays the number of copies of a card.
-Fixed Singularity Slash not working properly if given to the opponent.
-Fixed score text disappearing too early on the run end screen.
-Fixed dead pixel on the All Types filter in the card gallery.
-Fixed extraneous text that appeared briefly after selecting a combat reward.