Today’s patch is the culmination of feedback across the internet, from Steam, to Discord, and videos on Youtube. I compiled over 4 pages of comprehensive notes based on what I read and saw, and then set to work, releasing several updates over the past week to closed beta testers. Nothing has gone untouched in this update.
There were so many adjustments, big and small, that I’ve decided to actually just stick to the highlights, and give an overview of how things have changed. There was a major focus on elemental effects and synergies, visual and conceptual clarity, general balance, and upgrade pools and choices. But even stuff not mentioned below got significant updates, like Bombs, Beacons, Drones, Bullets...everything! I think it will be easier to take it all in by playing the game than by reading 4+ pages of balance changes.
Overall, the theme of this update has been to facilitate an easier time learning the game, while making the base difficulty much more welcoming to a broader variety of player skill levels. With the Endless update coming next, and challenge anomalies coming with it, I’m confident that higher skilled players will still have plenty of challenge ahead.
A new text system allows for easier to understand descriptions and stats
Nearly every upgrade in the game has been updated in one or more ways: new descriptions, updated balance, or entirely new effects
Burn and Shock have been reworked and can consistently deliver high damage builds
Upgrade pools and reward generation have been reworked to more consistently provide what you want from the start.
Uncommon and Rare upgrades drop more frequently
15 less desirable upgrades have been removed or combined with other upgrades to tighten up the overall upgrade pool (a couple Symbionics have changed as a result)
Various utilities with negative effects no longer apply negatives after the first copy, allowing you to lean into their specialty without more penalties
A variety of allied and enemy effects and units have been updated to read more clearly, visually
Lots of tweaks to general game balance and a rebuilt Solar Storm elite event
Read on to see a little more detail about this update (but I’ve left a lot out)...
The base pool for every pilot has been significantly narrowed. On leveling up, upgrade options will be far more focused on what specifically works with your current pilot and equipment.
Beacons will still offer a broader variety of upgrades within their specified types.
Rare and uncommon upgrades have had their base chance to drop increased
A number of less popular, and/or under-powered upgrades have been removed from the pool, or combined with other upgrades. Some of these may return in new forms later on.
Hot Streak, Emitter, Motivapor, Firelight, Fire Trap, Boom Bots, Siphon Bolts (Longshot now has this utility’s ability), Fast Forward, Proc-Rocket, Blast Gauge, Powder Packer, Tower Power (combined with Beac Out), Backdraft, Bullet Bomb, Side Supply
Every plasmic upgrade has been rebalanced, or rebuilt entirely.
Several upgrades that weren't plasmic are now
Burn now deals damage faster, and can stack multiple times on a target
2 damage, every 0.25 seconds for 2 seconds (8 dps)
3 stacks max (24 dps)
Plasmic effects now all have the same base 25% chance to apply burn. Aside from Hail Mary, this is universally a buff.
Burn effect visuals change based on the number of stacks: small flame → larger flame → blue flame
Plasma bomb now has a larger targeting area. If an enemy is in the area when it fires, the bomb will lock-on to it. If none are around it will fire as before. The lock-on effect can scale with increased lock-on targets now.
All upgrades have a standardized chance of triggering shock – 20% (many upgrades were previously 10-15%)
Shock’s base range has been increased by 25% to help it be more effective in the early game when fewer enemies are bunched up
Shock now deals 8 base damage
Amplifryer is now a common upgrade (was rare). Increases shock damage by 3.
Conduit deals damage 5 times per second, up from 4.
Shock has a new multi-part visual effect from origin to target, making it much more apparent
New Shock Upgrades
Electrocell: Reduce electric cooldowns and charges required by 5%. Uncommon.
Splitter: The next time shock triggers, it targets 2 nearby enemies. 10 second cooldown. Rare.
Mine Field: When a beacon is created, also create 3 electric bombs around it. Bombs explode instantly if touched by enemies. 15 damage. 4 second fuse. 8 sec. cooldown. Uncommon.
The Solar Storm Elite Hazard has been remade. Small electric bolts no longer crawl across the screen horizontally.
There are slightly fewer small enemies in the late game
Spider Eggs now spawn in smaller groups, especially late game
Small Hymenop drones now spawn in smaller groups
Spider Web traps now disappear after 3 seconds instead of remaining until they scroll off screen
Most of the fastest moving enemies have had their move speed slightly reduced
Blister Beetles fire fewer orbs
Allied Unit Color Updates
Crystal Drone, Stowaway, Junk Drone, Leymines, Flak
Enemy Color Updates
Arachnida enemies should never be the primary faction on the orange background, but can appear as the secondary
Blister Beetle orbs (circle around them) are magenta before being fired now too (used to be blue)
Lightning Lord’s electro mines are now magenta
Mothball enemies (glowing, launch mini butterflies at you) are now magenta
Text has been updated across the board
The text systems have been updated to be able to display a variety of color and symbol coded icons
Almost all of the text in the game has been rewritten to be more concise (where possible)
Text now always refers to “plasmic burn” as just “burn” to avoid confusing the two
Plasmic upgrades now display a tooltip explaining burn, similar to how Electric does
When you take damage, there is now a damage popup. This is on even if damage popups are off for enemies.
Array and Supply upgrades have been combined into a single synergy category called “Charge”
Gravic has been removed as a synergy (it may return, but there are no gravic updates currently in the game, so there’s no reason for it to be there confusing people)
You now only need to move a short distance left or right to trigger the warp gate popup menus
Fixed a bug that was preventing Solsplitter from applying burn
Fixed a memory leak related to equipping Bright Eye
Fixed a bug that was allowing Particloner to cooldown while one was active
Fixed a bug related to displaying total projectiles created by an upgrade in your inventory (sometimes)
Fixed a bug that would cause the first Enhancement selected to default to the last highlighted slot (so if you selected the 3rd weapon to enhance, the enhancement menu would default to the 3rd enhancement).
Fixed a bug that allowed Heat Sink to apply to non-timed upgrades
Fixed bugs that would prevent text from properly clearing or reappearing when navigating various parts of the inventory in specific orders
Fixed a bug that would allow you to “equip” anomaly category icons, lol
Anomaly text will now properly clear when pressing back in main menu