Hello, Rangers! Welcome to another Weekly Development Update. A number of interesting topics to cover this week, so let’s dig right in!
Introducing: The Time Bank
Coming with tomorrow’s patch, we will be adding a new feature to Shardbound with the goal of encouraging faster turn-taking while also providing some extra accommodation for complex late-game turns.
Globally, turn timers will be reduced from 90 seconds to 75. However, your turns will add between Zero to Five seconds to the Time Bank, based on the time remaining when you end your turn.
If your turn timer reduces to zero, you will automatically start drawing from the Time Bank. If the bank empties, your turn will end.
Please note that the UI for this feature is temporary, as we wanted to get it into testing as quickly as possible. Please share your thoughts in our Discord, Subreddit, and Steam Forums - we look forward to your feedback!
The Shockblade Smuggler Arrives!
You’d best space out your minions, because the Shockblade Smuggler is receiving her full art treatment this week. A member of the Duskwind Brotherhood like the Shanker and Buccaneer, she exudes the confidence and guts you’d expect from a free-spirited Sky Pirate!
Balance Adjustments
We’re continuing to make balance changes to Shardbound based on match data and all of your fantastic feedback.
- Happy with the results of the first wave, we’ll be continuing the process of increasing health pools for ranged units, giving a bump to units like Cannoneer, Officer Showoff, Osprey Deadeye, and more.
- Some underutilized cards like Grand Defender, Plague Starter, and Menagerie will be getting some numerical buffs.
- A few units will get quality of life buffs, including allowing Tracker Primal to draw off an injured enemy hero and letting the Spearmaiden draw one of her two spears as a Warcry.
- A couple Spells will be getting some changes - Our adjustment to Ascension made it a bit too strong - it will be having its mana cost bumped up to 1. Slow Reflexes will be adjusted to require Line of Sight.
Check out the Patch Notes tomorrow for a full list of changes!
2 Week Patches
We’ve decided to make some changes to our release cadence to optimize our development.
Weekly patching comes with extensive overhead, logistics, and quality assurance testing. We’ve decided that some of that time would be better spent on developing more content and features. Additionally, we are flooding the pipelines with new art, and shipping it on a weekly cadence can actually slow down our speed of getting it in your hands.
As a result, we will be moving to a 2 Week patch cycle. After tomorrow’s patch, expect our next update to take place on July 25th.
Fan Art Friday
We’ll sign off with Cirathiel’s fantastic winning entry from last week’s Fan Art Friday! She perfectly captured Vardan’s stern and powerful presence:
That’s it for this week! We’ll see you next time, or join us on Thursday for our Weekly Dev Stream at 4pm PDT!
- Your Friends at Spiritwalk