Release 1.9: Birthday Bash, Monster Mash

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The biggest party of the year has arrived, and everyone’s invited! Phobies is having a month-long party to mark its second anniversary with our newest release: Birthday Bash, Monster Mash. Here’s a look at what’s included in this update:

Additions

Phobies

7 new Phobies with fresh abilities are sure to make this party one to remember!

• Prometheus

- Its special ability allows this monster to create or destroy lava tiles. Created tiles inflict 150 fire damage per turn for up to 4 turns.
- Prometheus is also immune to damage from fire and lava tiles.
- Prometheus is available exclusively in a special offer, active from March 5th through April 2nd. It will become available in card packs after the offer expires.

• Fantôme

- This monster is able to teleport friendly Phobies within a 3-tile range to a tile adjacent to itself.
- Use this ability to get a comrade out of harm’s way, or to line things up for a major attack.

• The Collector

- It’s tax time! The Collector uses its stack of tax documents to boggle the minds of adjacent enemies.
- This monster’s melee attack passively removes one turn from any enemy Phobie that gets hit, based on self-AOE range.

• Haphe

- This new mechanical monster surges with a self-attack buff after it takes damage from an enemy.
- Damage from environmental tiles or status effects doesn’t trigger this self-buff.

• Le Shovell

- Push friendly units one tile using this monster’s special ability.
- Shove a friendly Phobie out of the way of a pending attack, or even into a pit if you need a creative way to clear the battlefield for a new monster.

• Hercules

- This Ginsting cousin has a devastating AOE bee attack.
- This special attack includes 50% damage fall-off for enemies on adjacent tiles to your target.

• Brutewurst

- One bad sausage, Brutewurst inflicts disease with its melee attacks.
- This monster’s special ability also inflicts damage and disease using self-AOE.

Phobies Balancing

By popular demand, we’ve made some adjustments to some of our more overpowered and underpowered monsters. Here’s a closer look at the changes. Please note that all values refer to base (ie. Level 1) values for each monster:

• Akira

- Increased ability lock from 1 turn to 2 turns. This allows the opponent to have more time to prepare for the power of the ability.

• Badside Manners

- Increased attack damage from 400 to 440.

• Blondie

- Increased attack damage from 700 to 750.

• Bluelien

- Increased ability cooldown from 1 to 2 turns to help reduce the number of pools it can have simultaneously.

• Bogart

- Increased move range from 1 to 2, which should allow for better targeting of opponents.

• Boss

- Decreased health from 2120 to 2000 and decreased ability basic dam from 300 to 275.

• Charon

- Increased damage from 325 to 350.

• Cupcake

- Added a 1 turn ability lock.

• Fleshcrawler

- Decreased ability cooldown from 2 to 1.

• Gonzo Bonzo

- Decreased damage buff from 300 to 250.
- The ability was overpowered when used with some other Phobies. This is a complicated unit to balance due to how it affects all other units, so your continued feedback is welcome.

• Jackalopes (Flopsy, Mopsy, CottonTale, & Jackalope King)

- Increase pack attack bonus from 100 to 125.

• Jaws

- Removed ability lock.

• Lila

- Increased move range from 1 to 2 and decreased health from 1800 to 1500.
- This monster was underperforming compared to other trap units.

• Mike Roscopic

- Increased health from 850 to 900.

• Minotaur

- Increased damage from 400 to 425.

• Misanthrope

- Increased damage from 330 to 350.

• Ogre

- Increased rage damage from 300 to 350 and increased heart health condition from <=3000 to <=4000.
- Known issue: The ability description on the back of Ogre’s card still indicates the original heart health value of 3000. This will be corrected in a future release.

• Oopsy Baby

- Increased damage from 350 to 400.

• Russel

- Increased poison from 200 to 250.

• Rusty

- Decreased key cost from 2 to 1.

• Smiley

- Increased disease from 375 to 425.

• Sparky

- Increased damage from 375 to 400.

• Blue Speedola/Red Speedola

- Increased tag team damage buff from +100 to +200.

• Tick

- Increased move range from 1 to 2 as the low mobility makes the ability less effective.

• Tiny Tim

- Increased damage from 475 to 500.

• Uni Corn

- Decreased trap damage from 500 to 425.

• Zappy

- Increased health from 1800 to 1900.

• We have been monitoring all the Phobies KPI’s and win rates including the ones players have mentioned and will continue to monitor them over subsequent releases. The win rates for these other Phobies (over thousands of games) show they are not unbalanced. This includes the Phobies below that were mentioned by players in their feedback. We do not want to adjust these Phobies at this time as it will create new balance issues:

- Alley Gator, Klepto, Blast-0-Matic, BoMangles, Boofairy, Creep, Doughzer, Fetch, Fire Ant, Ginsting, Heart Breaker, Hydra, Leshy, Medibot, Mr. Tramples, Noxious, Pasgetti, Rambolina, Repeller, Slammer Head, Smother Mother, Snowball, Stabby, Zomboni , Baby Snake, Fowl, Barzilla, Chuck, Doughzer, Finnigan, Heavo 2.0, Heavo 3.0, Hermetic Ginsting, Thunder Rocks, Ray Chargels, Temptress, Doctor Dermic, Clobster, Doom Doom, Paddles, Squiggles.
- We’re aware of issues with Bad Sushi, but making modifications will require more time, and possibly a rework. We are looking to rework this unit in our next major release.

Maps

Five new maps are being added into future map rotations:

• Never, Forever is a small map featuring conveyor belts on the Office theme.
• Night Shift is a small, Office 2-themed map focusing on close-quarters strategy.
• Center Stage is a small map on the Carnival theme, featuring an obstacle-protected center panic point.
• Last Rites is a large, Cemetery-themed map featuring Diseased Ground tiles.
• Castaway is a large map featuring the Island 2 theme, featuring pits and obstacles.

Vendy Gifting

Vendy is once again celebrating his birthday by giving gifts to our players!

• Players can log in and receive a special daily gift from your favorite shop monster.
• Daily gifts begin on Mar. 7th and continue for seven days.
• Gifts become available at midnight GMT. Players who live in regions that observe Daylight Savings Time may notice that their local times may vary.
• Be sure to check in with Vendy every day to ensure you don’t miss a gift!

Fixes

Events

• Fixed an issue that could prevent a player from viewing an active Event.
• Fixed an issue that caused some players to temporarily see the previous Event presentation when a new Event started.

Gameplay

• Fixed an exploit that could allow players to avoid an Arena loss by quitting the app with specific timing.

Localization

• Fixed an issue in which non-English text descriptions for Conveyor tiles and Bogart’s sticky bomb, both in the info panel, were missing.
  Phobies
• Fixed an issue where two opposing Globs attempting to digest each other could cause the game to crash.

Stability

• Fixed an issue that could cause a crash during the Tutorial.
• Fixed various potential causes of desyncs and crashes.

Thank you to all of our players for making these past two years of Phobies such a rewarding experience for our team. We’re delighted to celebrate this anniversary with all of you, and hope you enjoy this latest update!

Happy battling,
The Phobies Team