Backer Beta Update 3: Patch Notes

[Sking]

Hey you bunch of sensatinal gamers,

 

Our update is now live! To gain access to the Backer Beta, visit this (Forum Link) for step by step instructions. This is a Beta and will most definitely contain a few issues. Please report any issues you find here (Forum Link). 

 

We spent a long time going over everyone's feedback from the last BB Update and changed quite a few things around. You'll notice this patch is almost entirely system changes. A full breakdown of the changes are listed below. Jump in and definitely keep the feedback coming.

 

NEW CONTENT

Please note that older saves will not work on the latest patch! Apologies for the inconvenience.

 

Save File location moved

• From - %USERPROFILE%/Saved Games/Pillars of Eternity 2
• To - %USERPROFILE%/Saved Games/Pillars of Eternity II

Action Bar revision - The HUD art has been revised for the action bar. We added a bit of flair to the empower portion specifically.

 

Optimizations - Ongoing performance optimizations for GPU and CPU.

 

Smart Camera - New toggle-able camera mode that has the camera follow the players movements automatically. This option can be toggled 'on' or 'off' in the options menu.

 

Combat Slider - New combat slider added to the center of the HUD. You can now slow/speed up combat at your leisure ranging from very slow/slow to fast/very fast. Fast mode remains the same toggle outside of combat.

 

New item Highlight - Items recently picked up that haven't been inspected by the player now highlight blue in the inventory.

 

BB Content Changes

• BB character now begins with fine leather, fine mail, and fine plate

• All Grimoires in the BB now have 2 spells per level

SYSTEM CHANGES

 

Expanded Passive Abilities - To address feedback about the loss of Talents from PoE 1, we have added many more passive abilities to class trees and increased the number of abilities that single class characters receive at each power level (see below).

 

Turn-Based ship combat - Ship duels are now conducted turn-by-turn instead of round-by-round. Half and full-sail movement actions are no longer restricted in frequency.

 

Cannon re-balance - Cannon values have been re-balanced to make them strategic choices instead of upgrades

 

Single Class characters gain 2 abilities at PL increase - All single class characters will gain 2 abilities every time they achieve a new power level.  This change was made to address concerns that single class characters felt like they didn't have enough options at any given character level.  It also allows characters to dip into passive abilities (which have been expanded considerably) more easily.

 

Canceling cast doesn't take resource - Canceling an ability or item use, whether by movement, selecting another action, or simply hitting the cancel button, will not consume the resource associated with the ability.  This makes changing actions much less punitive.  An Interrupt will still consume the resources of an ability or item it Interrupts.

 

Penetration re-balance - Weapons and spells have been reorganized around two penetration categories - average and high - instead of low/average/high. "Best of" weapons and spells typically have 1 lower Penetrations compared to other weapons and spells in their penetration category.

 

Attribute Cap of 35 - To prevent the effects of Attributes from scaling away into infinity, they are now capped to 35.  We chose this number based on both where we wanted the influence of Attributes to max out as well as what we believed was within the reach of aggressive min-maxers.

 

Might/Resolve Change - Strength has been reverted to Might and affects Damage, Healing, and Fortitude as it did in Pillars 1.  Resolve has also been reverted to affect Deflection and Will as it did in Pillars 1.  We have added an additional benefit to Resolve: reduced duration of hostile effects (3% per point) on the character (increased if it is below 10).  This was done in conjunction with capping Attributes to a max of 35.  This does not address the primary goal of making Resolve more appealing for casters, but we believe it does make Resolve more generally valuable for a variety of characters.  It also integrates into the system using mechanics that are already well-established, which is of importance at this stage of development.  Thank you to everyone for your patience as we experimented with the attribute system and for the fans for continuing to discuss and suggest ideas throughout the project.

 

Interrupt added to many rogue abilities - Most rogue abilities that are weapon-based attacks now Interrupt on Hit

 

Weapon re-balance - Across the board weapon balance

 

Druid Bonus Spells/Animist Subclass - Like priests, all druids now receive bonus spells at each power level.  To make druids mechanically function like priests, the Animist subclass has been added and the "No Subclass" option has been removed..  Animists have no special modifiers other than access to a list of bonus spells.

 

Martial Tree Unlock Level Adjustments - The levels at which the martial classes access various abilities have been adjusted, both to lower the overall requirements and to make a smoother progression as the characters advance.

 

General Casting changes

• Shortened cast times of Very Slow and Slow
• Shortened Recovery of Slow
• Summon Weapon spells now Average cast

Food/meal pricing reworked

 

Cipher Buffs

• Cipher spells are all faster casts/ many were tuned up
• Cipher Focus gain rate doubled

('unedited' List of specific systems check ins)

 

  Reveal hidden contents

Whisper of Treason’s Duration has been doubled (10s -> 20s)

Wounding Shot has again been nerfed now from 33% damage per tick to 20% damage per tick

Flames of Devotion has been reduced from +50% burn proc to +30% burn proc

Lightning Strikes has been reduced from +50% shock proc to +30% shock proc

Assassinate Critical Hit damage reduced from +100% damage to +50% damage

Very Fast, Fast, Average, and Slow Recovery Times have been increased by 1s each

Slow and Very Slow Cast Times have been reduced by 1s each

Dual Wield Recovery bonus has been reduced from -50% to -30% Recovery

Beckoner now also reduces summon duration by roughly (~25%)

Many chanter summons that had base durations above 30s have had their base duration reduced

Armored Grace has had its effect halved, because of how complicated Armor Speed Factor is, this equates roughly to the following:

With Heavy Armor: Was -67% of Armor Recovery Penalty, is now -38% reduced penalty

With Medium Armor: Was -82% of Armor Recovery Penalty, is now – 45% reduced penalty

With Light Armor: Was -100% of Armor Recovery Penalty, is now -65% reduced penalty

Berserker Frenzy Hit to Crit bonus reduced from +50% to +30%

Marked Prey now only provides Accuracy, reduced from +15 to +10

Sworn Enemy now only provides Damage at +20%

Thrust of Tattered Veils damage reduced down to 10-18

Almost all Slow and Very Slow cast speed spells that dealt direct damage have had their damage increased by roughly 30% (pulse effects were mostly omitted)

All food prices have been categorized by potency and morale effect (for nearly all food this means an overall reduction in price)

All food recipes have had their ingredients adjusted to be appropriate to their new prices, so that no recipe is a money battery via buying->crafting→selling

All food and meal effects have been adjusted and tuned to be roughly appropriate to their new categories

Overall it should be a lot clearer that better food, is more expensive, gives more morale, and better bonuses.

Infestation of Maggots now properly deal damage over time (escalating based on the target's missing health)

Fixed errors with Great Abjuration's Destroy status effect.

Horned Helm now has the correct appearance and string.

Divine Mark now has keywords!

Grimoires have all had a pass to contain 2 spells per power level from power levels 1 through 9.

All grimoires have had polish passes over their spell contents, and many have been updated to preserve spell exclusivity and thematic impression

All characters will now react to sparkcracker noise.

Defender and Guardian stance now have override strings to display their defensive bonuses (Mob Stance too, for recovery modifiers)

Unbreakable can now be chosen at level up

Play Dead can now be chosen at level up

Candied Nuts are now in the "Very Positive" recipe category.

Fixed conditional errors in Ranger and Fighter progression tables that prevented acquisition of (Unbreakable and Play Dead)

Fireball now has an average cast time

Quarterstaves now no longer have +5 Accuracy AND Reach (Accuracy was removed)

All invisibility effects in the game have had their removal events updated to an event that more reliably guarantees stealth/invisibility attack bonuses will succeed to apply

Many many many abilities have had override strings employed to make their effects more human readable and hide places where procedural logic can't account effectively

Pommel Counter now also uses the Pommel Strike custom attack variation

Deathblows now functions and its effect has been reduced from +100% damage to +50% when meeting qualifications.

Combusting Wounds now has keywords that prevent recursive looping

Dazing Shout now has proper pen and will deal damage.

Purge of Toxin's base duration has been increased from 10s to 30s.

Hel-Hyraf chanter invocation armor penalty reduced from -5AR to -2AR.

Touch of Death is now an average cast time (previously Slow)

Deep Faith's base defensive bonus reduced from +15 to +12 (deity scaling unchanged)

"The Arrow Sings" phrase penetration bonus reduced from +2 to +1.

Intellect attribute AOE scaling is now +10% per point (from +6%)

Stoic Steel now appears on the portrait again and the interval for gaining AR is increased from 3s to 6s.

Cipher Focus gain rate is now doubled.

All cipher spell cast times were evaluated and nearly all of them were reduced by one cast speed category. There are now no Slow or Very Slow cipher spells, all are now Fast or Average.

Implemented missing cipher ability "Defensive Mindweb".

Moved cipher "Echoing Shield" from PL 4 to PL 5 and revised the ability to remove concentration from all enemies in the area and grant the Resolute Inspiration to allies.

Gunpowder barrels can now be ignited AND exploded by damage from Fire, Electricity, or Firearm keywords.

Lowered Fireball attack distance from 10m to 8m.

Curse of Blackened Sight is now average cast speed (from slow)

Reduced clip size on blunderbuss from 8 to 5, to match the projectile count.

Removed hard-written values from Burning Burst override string and rewrote string.

Removed hard-written values from Enduring Flame override string and rewrote string.

Removed unnecessary override string from Fiery Core effect.

Reworked Blazing Core to remove unnecessary event with duration of effect.

Living Pyre Burn Proc now stacks properly.

Living Pyre now has a proper override string with no hard-written values.

Burning Burst is now an On Kill triggered event, rather than on Crit. This will help balance it against Enduring Flame.

Fixed errors in attack filters for AR Penalty and Buff that were not applying to weapon attacks only.

Lowered Aura size of all mod auras to 5m, from 10m.

Created override strings for Aura effects and refactored data to only display effects once for each aura, rather than once per companion per effect.

Reduced clip size on blunderbuss from 8 to 5 to match projectile count.

Added Injury affliction type string.

Added ico_status_diseased to the npc Disease Immunity passive.

Restricted temp recipe access for whispers of yenwood and its variant weapons.

Wrote override strings for Reaping Knives.

"Empower" is now case sensative.

Cinder Bomb ability noise level set to Quiet.

Sabre base mod reduced to +10% damage from 20%

Weapon damage and penetration revision. Pen 7 increased to 9. Pen 5 increased to 7. Damage range tuning.

Slow and Very Slow Cast times are now 4.5s and 6s respectively from 5 and 8.

Pen rebalance on all spells and summoned weapons now cast at average speed.

Increased the Engwithan Titan's base health and health per level.

Strings have been added to Call to the Clutch ability.

Updated all weapon reload end times on reload attack data.

Word "Crew" is now case sensative as a glossary link.

Accuracy term now requires capitalization.

Boots of the Stone now displays the "Smoothly Jointed" mod.

Set up Poultry effect properly, it wasn't doing anything after the last change, now it appears on the portrait and heals properly.

Created glossary entries for Power Level and a variant for Power Levels.

Stealth Recovery Bonus now has a proper string.

Rewrote Whispers of the Dead override string.

Cleaned up the string override for Swashbuckling.

data cleanup on Salve of Dissolution.

Added Salve of Dissolution game data back to the base game package.

Fixed weapon quality upgrade prices that were lowered in error.

Added string id for flanked affliction type.

Removed null script from Spell Holding Consecrated Ground asset.

Removed null status effect collection values.

Fixed string name typos, missing string ids, and missing description ids.

Fixed mismatched references of incorrect item mod abilities and status effects.

Added string override for captivating crystal.

Added proper override string for Revelation that mentinons that only KITH may be Frightened on Crit.

Fixed several overridden fields that were invalidating scepter parent values.

Removed mechanical values from string descriptions.

Added mention of the additional bounce as a special effect (not inherent to scepters)

Inverted all reload time modifiers as the status effect was inverted when reload time was made to be modified by recovery and armor penalties.

Parented reference to be from Rod, not scepter and removed overrides that were invalidating parenting.

Fixed Power Level mods that had no effect because Power Level doesn't use attack filter.

Removed unnecessary override strings from Power Level status effects.

% chances for occurrence, durations, and intervals are no longer hard-written into these strings.

Earth Blight Eora's Pull and Eora's Grip have been changed to the Crowd Control enemy ability icon.

Data cleanup on lance of the midwood stag.

Removed duration and defense values that were hard-written into override strings.

Guardian Stance now properly reports its incremental value.

Resonant Touch now applies to the target, rather than the monk, on hit.

Moved referred items from Food sorting tab to Ingredients sorting tab in stash.

Removed duplicate power level/accuracy status effect from explosives global passive.

Set Fighter charge ability to PL 8 as intended. (from 6)

Raw Damage dealt by Soul Annihilation is now marked Hostile and should float text.

Set Fighter charge ability to PL 8 as intended. (from 6)

Raw Damage dealt by Soul Annihilation is now marked Hostile and should float text.

Fixed switched heal values on Battle Unending.

Also tuned down effects from Vehemence, Battle Unending, and Kaul's Stance.

Lowered Aura size of all mod auras to 5m, from 10m.

Created override strings for Aura effects and refactored data to only display effects once for each aura, rather than once per companion per effect.

All attributes are now capped at 35 points.

Apparently we support a boolean on items to allow them to sell for full value, apologies for missing that the first time over. Fine Great Swords will now sell for the correct price.

Removed Mutual exclusivity amongst Monk Duality upgrades.

Updated companion single class progression tables to account for the bonus talent point on newly reached power levels.

Removed all override strings with hard-written values.

Martial classes now use the term "abilities" rather than "spells" on their character sheet.

Created variant armor assets for each of the druid spiritshift forms and updated each spiritshift changeform effect to make use of them.

All DST chracter stats are now of race "None" rather than "Vessel".

Updated wording in Amplified Thrust string.

Removed null item mod status effect field in collection.

Added glossary entry for Corrosive variant of "Corrode".

Removed erroneous hard-written string variant of the Flanking glossary entry. "Flanked" now referrs to "Flanking" and describes the concept. Anywhere that "Flanked" appears in a stat block, it will procedurally show its mechanical effects.

"Critically Hit" now has a glossary link to crit.

"crew" now requires capitalization to show a glossary link.

All Chant AI actions now also validate that the existing chant is not active.

All NPC used Chants no longer require a modal in their group to be active (this was activating chants before the NPC could make a decision and forcing them to wait).

New Conditional for child nodes with cooldowns was added to the parent chant conditional node in the chanter AI tree.

Animal Companion weapons have all been given scaling quality.

Chanter AI no longer tries to cycle chants in the first 4 seconds of combat, because the phrases are hard coded to activate the first chant and trigger a cooldown in this time.

Chanter AI will now much more accurately verify when they should cycle phrases to prevent switching phrases erratically.

Additionally Eoten decision tree will now properly choose chants and chants now have icons.

Difficulty system now shows a 4th skull type at 4+ levels above the player. This uses the new red icon.

Play Dead and Deadly Surprise reworked to more reliably KO the Animal Companion, display more clearly in the stat block, and to properly remove the Deadly Surprise Damage Bonus.

Food is now in the "Combat Mechanics" Glossary category.

The "Equipment" Category is no longer in the "Lore" Metacategory and has been moved to the "Mechanics" Metacategory.

Several Glossary entries for equipment mechanics that don't exist in deadfire (Spell Holding, Spell Striking, etc...) have been deleted.

All Animal Companions are now of class "Ranger" instead of "None".

Resonant Touch child effects now trigger their apply effect when stacked.

Fixed some override strings on Violet Redemption and swapped the "Negate Next Recovery" status effect to a 0% Recovery Mult.

Changed all generic talents (including berath's blessings) that were set up with missing icons to use the generic talent icon.

Created "Infamous Captain" passive talent. This is ready to be given out wherever intended.

Druid Changes:

Druids are now granted free spells by their subclass at new power levels.

Druids now require a subclass.

A new druid subclass "Animist" has been added, which offers no bonuses, and no penalties, but still has a free spell list visible to the player at character creation.

All Druid NPC progression tables that previously had no subclass now are Animists.

Strings have been added and retranslated to support the above changes to druids.

Martial Class Tree Pass:

Fighter Specialization / Master lowered to +10%/+5%, respectively.

Fighter Pommel Strike is now Power Strike - +4 Pen x2 Damage Full Attack, w/ 6 sec Stun and 120 degree arc Stagger + Raw Damage.

Fighter Pommel Counter is now Inspired Strike - Adds Acute and Swift to the fighter for 10s afterwards.

Fighter Charge is now at PL 4.

Fighters now have a new level 8 ability "Inspired Discipline", 4 Disc cost grants every Tier 1 Inspiration for 30s to the fighter.

Barbarian Hurl Weapon is now "Instrument of Boundless Rage" - same as before, but on impact triggers a Fireball.

Paladin Reviving Exhortation is now at PL 4, its upgrades are now at PL 6.

Paladin Abjuration is now at PL 5.

Paladin Light of the Beyond is now named "Light of Pure Zeal" and now also damages Spirits. Dmg is now best of Burn/Freeze.

Ranger Heal Companion is now at PL 2 and its upgrades are PL 4.

Ranger Revive Companion is now at PL 3 and its upgrades are at PL 5.

Ranger Twinned Shot is now at PL 8.

Ranger Whirling Dervish is now named "Whirling Strikes" and is now PL 8 with the same bond cost as Twinned Shot.

Ranger Play Dead is now PL 6 and its upgrade is PL 7.

Ranger Active Camoulflage is now named "Shadowed Hunters" and no longer requires the ranger or their AC to stand still. Also heals the ranger and reduces hostile effect durations while active.

Rogue Sap now also applies Hobbled to the target.

Rogue Opportunist has been reworked and is now "Vanishing Strike", a 3 guile cost Full Attack that makes the rogue invisible as part of the strike (5s)

Monk Skyward Kick now benefits from a +50% Damage Bonus.

Monk Long Arm of the Law is now named "Instruments of Pain".

Monk Exploding Palm is now named "Inner Death".

Monk The Dance Continues is now named "Enduring Dance".

Monk Wave of Force is now named "Efficient Anguish".

Monk Clarity of Mind is now named "Enlightened Agony".

Monk Dim Mak is now named "Empowered Strikes".

Companion Progression Tables have been updated to match the above changes.

AI has been updated for abilities that have been drastically modified (targeting mainly).

Ability JIRA assets have been updated to reflect naming and power level changes.

Data assets have all been updated to reflect new naming changes.

Might is now highly recommended for Wizard, as it was before the Might/Resolve change.

Replaced null field in custom barbarian progression table with a proper ability reference.

Rekke's Race is now storm folk on his character stats.

Maia, Pallegina, and Aloth now have 3 class options available when they are recruited.

Storm Human now has a unique subrace enum type and is using it in data.

Backer Beta character now starts with Fine Leather, Fine Scale, and Fine Plate.

Prologue Armoire now gives the player Mail Armor.

All companions and sidekicks should now offer 3 class options when recruited.

Economy pass over unique item buy costs:

Exceptional Weapons/Armor/Shields are worth 2k more.

Legendary Weapons/Armor/Shields are worth ~12k more.

Superb Weapons/Armor/Shields are worth ~8k more.

Unique Superb Accessories are worth 2k more.

Unique Legendary Accessories are worth 4k more.

Two Handed Items are 1.5x more expensive than 1h (down from 2x)

Petrification, Touch of Death, Disintegration, Detonate, Boil Their Flesh, Sip From The Marrow, and Death Ring each require Veteran or Path of the Damned for the AI to select them as an action.

All taverns now have unique rooms and each room has had a rest bonus effect designed for it. All room bonuses are unique that specific room.

Sidekick progression tables are complete along with skills progression based on some discussion with narrative about these character's personalities.

Corpse Eater and Flesh Communion now state that the barbarian must consume "deceased" corpses, unconscious does not suffice.

Ascendant has been redesigned to "Ascend" at maximum focus, which causes all cipher powers to cost 0 focus and gain bonus power level until the effect fades, at which point the cipher will fall to 0 focus.

All data for Watcher abilities has been set up and should be in the game (some I think still have tasks to be given out)

Koami's store in Sayuka now also sells adventuring supplies and healing potions.

Flame Naga Archers will now use Burning Veins more reliably on targets that are in melee range of them and the effect uses a custom display string.

Race tooltips in character creation should no longer display missing strings.

Power Pool now has a glossary entry that matches the Power Pool tutorial.

Paladin's Glorious Beacon (and its upgrades) now has a base duration of 8s (up from 4s)

Considerably increased the duration of the debuffs from Barbaric Yell and its upgrades.

Mule Kick's Discipline cost is lowered from 3 to 2.

Hobbling Shot's Hobble effect increased to 10s base duration.

Evasive Fire now uses the Strength Attribute for scaling.

Ranger's Predator Sense damage bonus increased from +20% to +50% on target's with DoT effects.

Strike the Bell and its upgrades are reduced from 3 guile cost to 2.

Torment's Reach now uses Strength to calculate damage.

Priest's Halt duration raised from 10s to 15s base.

Devotions for the Faithful will now roll against Will defense for the hostile portion of its attack (previously wasn't rolling defense)

Priest Prayers and Litany spells can now be used on Charmed or CC'd party members to counter affliction effects.

Her Revenge Swept Across attacks are no longer Slow Recovery and have the same penetration as the base ability "Thrice Was She Wronged"

Lowered the base duration of Paralyze and Frighten on "At The Sound of His Voice the Killers Froze Stiff" from 8s to 6s.

Reny Daret's Ghost Spake and its upgrade have had their debuff durations increased from 12s to 15s.

Doubled the Disengage Accuracy penalty on "The Fox From the Farmer Did Leap" phrase, from -10 to -20.

Aefyllath now is restricted to weapon attacks only.

Cipher's Mind Wave Raw Damage increased from 8-10 to 10-15.

Amplified Thrust damage increased from 16-24 to 30-38.

Soul Ignition base damage per tick raised from 14 to 16.

Brutal Backlash's base damage increased from 12 Raw to 20.

Cipher "Keen Mind" passive now grants more focus at the beginning of combat, from +5 to +10.

Autumn's Decay initial damage increase to 20-28 Corrode to differentiate it more from Touch of Rot.

Round shields and Heater shield icons hooked up.

Nature's Balm base duration lowered from 18s to 15s.

Form of the Delemgan now uses a Stride Mult rather than deprecated additive movement, set at (+25%).

Form of the Delemgan typed AR bonuses lowered from +8 to +6.

Cleansing Wind's base heal value increased from 28 to 48.

Deleterious Alacrity of Motion self damage lowered from base 8 to 6.

Confusion's base duration increased from 20s to 30s.

Arkemyr's Wondrous Torment base duration increased from 10s to 30s and cast time reduced to Average with Average Recovery.

Form of the Helpless Beast base duration increased from 10s to 15s.

Ninagauth's Bitter Mooring's base damage lowered from 18-22 per tick down to 8-10 and the duration lowered from 15s to 12s.

Ringleader's Charm and Dominate increased from base 10s to 20s.

Puppetmaster and Ringleader are no longer combat only.

Tactical Meld is now combat only.

Carnage's damage attribute is now Strength.

Beckoner summons now mention in their stat blocks that they are increased in summon count due to Beckoner.

Strike the Bell and its upgrades now all properly apply their effects and also gain the inherent penetration bonus. Also added custom strings so this reads more cleanly.

All Port-Maje stores have had a second pass to reduce them as close to a single page as possible (weapon shop excluded) and also to provide 2 or more of each base weapon, etc...

Wrath of the Five Suns is now shown as an upgrade to Sworn Enemy on the talent tree and Sworn Enemy is not removed.

Lingering Echoes now uses a custom string for its numerous bonuses.

Hunter's Instincts now references the new Graze changes.

The first crate in Maje Sea Cave now contains a torch to try and convince players to check out our sweet dynamic lighting.

Bleeding Cut, Destructive Channeling, Wild Mind, Ascendant, and Mage Slayer effects all have custom strings to be human readable.

Call to Slumber now uses a unique "Asleep" affliction and no longer refers to this as "Unconscious".

Conjure Familiar now only mentions summoned creatures in the stat block, so there should be no more confusion about what kinds of creatures it summons.

Conjure Familiar bonuses have all been tuned up.

Unarmed Proficiency has been created and should be available soon, (Pending a code change with weapon proficiency restrictions) - It will be auto-granted to everyone.

Withering Strike, Perishing Strike, Toxic Strike, and Mule Kick all have 25% bonus damage and it is visible on their stat block.

Druid Fury no longer references Regeneration as a keyword and will only reference "Rejuvenation".

Mage Slayer now actually gains their "Spell Resistance" rather than the temp spell defense bonus.

Stag Carnage, Shattered Pillar, Wild Leech now all have human readable strings.

Maura Tentacle no longer has a recursive loop on it's immobilize on hit effect.

Unbroken subclass string now clearly mentions "Shield Mastery".

Brand Enemy now properly ticks damage again.

Evoker "Echo" effect reduced from a 30% proc chance to 15%.

Fury Druid Storm's Rage now benefits from Fury's passive penetration bonus.

The Royal Bronzer cannon is now sold at Uto's Gunsmith in the Brass Citadel

Tekehu now has a proper chanter progression table and is no longer using an NPC table.

Tekehu and Konstanten now start with a few premade chants to get the player started.

Rotghast Trail of Worms no longer spams the combat log.

Kraken's Eye tavern will now give the player a discount if they peacefully resolved the better man quest.

Fixed an accidental nerfing of the Hunting Bow modal ability, it's now properly trading off -15 Accuracy for -50% Recovery Time.

Reworked Resonant Touch to remove the damage threshold in favor of only triggering on weapon attacks.

Lowered Companion Attribute points back down to 15 and in CC. (the bonus 3 points I thought were missing were actually from Race and Culture) - Doh!

Added glossary entries for Hurt, Bloodied, Healthy, and Unharmed. (Near Death already existed)

Prayer for the Body, Prayer for the Spirit, Litany for the Body, and Litany for the Spirit are all now Average Cast with Fast Recovery and 60 sec base durations (this is up from being slow cast and having inconsistent durations).

Ilari now has a Cloak of Deflection rather than a Ring of Protection (since there's already one in the sea cave in maje)

Fixed penetration data error on elemental generic passive talents.

Cleaned up Ogre Transformation attacks a bit, they are now using a swiping attack anim, rather than a punch and have proper strings that refer to Ogre Fist, rather than club.

Flanked now also lowers the target's Armor by 1.

Conjure Familiar bonuses have all been reworked. All Familiars now grant +1 Power Level to the Conjurer, while active. This helps mitigate an issue with the familiars feeling too random. Familiars now also each have had their attributes and bonus effects re-balanced and re-distributed. Each now includes an associated attribute buff and minor mechanical effect.

Rejoice, My Comrades... and its upgrade are now Non-Offensive invocations.

Sharpshooter's bonus Pen is lowered from +2 to +1.

Added Damage, Accuracy, and Penetration scaling to Battle-Forged racial passive.

Binding Web is now Fast cast with Slow Recovery, rather than vise-versa.

One-Handed Style now uses Hit to Crit conversion rather than Miss to Graze.

"Yet It's Mate Was More Feared" Drake now has a proper selection circle size.

"And Evil Turned Away From The Sun" now has proper penetration and the vessel damage now uses the "Fire" keyword.

"At the Sound of His Voice" is no longer a "Mind" effect.

Heart Chime Amulet has been removed from Talfor and both Talfor and his pirates have had their magic items re-balanced.

Squids can no longer be found in default cabinet loot lists.

Steel Garrote Lay on Hands is now a 2 point cost ability.

Shatter Their Shackles and its upgrade now grant Dex Affliction Immunity for a base 10sec duration, rather than only instantly.

Bloodlust triggered effects can now be seen on the portrait with an icon.

Sanza's Emporium should now rotate out 3-5 different types of lore books from various cultures.

Miscreant's Leather now has a proper non-zero Armor Speed Factor.

Konstanten, Rekke, and Ydwin now have weapon proficiencies granted in their progression tables.

Recall Agony now has a custom string so you can more easily understand its effects.

Finishing Blow and its upgrades are now 2 Guile cost (down from 3).

Come, Come, Soft Winds of Death and Dragon Thrashed, Dragon Wailed have been rebalanced against each other and now tick on the target over time. Come, Come, Soft Winds now restores some health back to the chanter as long as it hits at least one enemy. Dragon Thrashed now alternates randomly between Burn and Pierce damage.

Among the Waves is now combat only.

Fixed npc fighter progression table null references to deleted weapon style data.

Significantly increased the potency of focus gain when using "Draining Whip".

Streetfighter's bonuses related to being in Flanked and Bloodied states have been notably improved. Recovery reduction has been adjusted from -20% to -50%. Sneak Attack damage has been increased from +20% +50%.

There is now a glossary link for "Critical Hit".

Pickpocket loot lists have been made for each primary faction type and have been assigned out to every NPC in the game.

Unarmed Proficiency ability is now properly referenced in global game data references and should now be granted to characters.

Falling unconscious from effects with no damage type will now trigger the "Gaping Wound" injury.

Bonus Damage Proc string now explicitly mentions that procs occur on damage you deal.

Several Cipher Spells that specifically mention affecting the target's Mind have been given the "Mind" keyword.

Xoti's Sickle mods now scale on Religion.

Blood Soaked Grimoire now has spells in it.

Gunner passive talent now speeds up reload, rather than slowing it down.

Removed missing icons for all pet abilities and did a pass on all backer pets to attach their correct item icons.

Trickster Rogues now are autogranted their illusion spells from their subclass.

Audited unique items that had extra item mods on them from testing and removed all of these extra mods.

Liches no longer Terrify you every time you hit them, now only when you hit them with a "Gaze" keyword ability.

Fixed a recursive loop in vailian pickpocket loot lists.

Fixed an issue with Arcane Blaster now properly slowing reload when "Imbued Ammunition" was active.

Barrel loot lists have had their item drop rates heavily reduced.

Ranger now properly benefits from Stalker's Link and companions no longer lose engagement when upgrading Protective Companion to Stalker's Link.

Void Seers are now immune to slog zones.

Refreshing Finale on Sasha's Singing Scimitar once again requires an Empowered Invocation to trigger.

Gravehounds Undying Devotion has been CUT.

All trap abilities have had their missing icon overrides removed and they now pull the correct trap item icon when being used.

Greater Storm Blight's "Foul Wind" ability now spams the combat log a lot less.

Swift Flurry now has a 33% chance to trigger an additional attack on crit, down from 50%.

Flesh Communion has been removed from Dargul Corpse Eaters.

Rare Iroccian Calendar lore book has been removed from random loot lists.

Vektor no longer sells redundant adventurer's items.

All Food Ingredients have had their costs lowered by half. All Food Meals have also been adjusted to about 1/3 of their previous values.

Fury Druid claws and armor now scale properly

Fury Druid Storm Bolt now deals a lot more damage and Stuns rather than Dazes.

Lurkers will now much more reliably use their ranged attacks, rather than slowly chasing you for a melee attack always.

Saru-Sichr no longer has a recursive loop.

Tons and tons of glossary links in strings that weren't intended have been removed or set to require capitalization.

Marked Prey, Marked for the Hunt and lots of other abilities now use custom strings to be more human readable.

Shattered Pillar is now more explicit about handling wounds differently.

Carnage now scales its potency based on level to stay relative to weapon damage at later levels.

Nemnok is now also a vanity pet, I believe you'll be able to take bite-sized him with you after you handle his tantrum in the Drowned Barrows. He will also bark wonderful things at the party, thanks to Paul Kirsch

Ungwith now has a wonderful boon to bestow upon players willing to pay for her time.

Wrote a glossary entry for "Quick Items"

Added several variant (plural, etc...) glossary entries for common mechanics and afflictions

Spindle Man's store now has a lot more unique and magic items.

"The Wall" modal is now combat only.

Tekehu's subclass now autogrants each of his watershaper spells.

All companion multiclass progression tables now account for the extra talent point they receive at new power levels.

Sacred Immolation and their upgrades now remove their DoT on death and cannot be activated again while they are active

Sworn Enemy and Marked Prey are now completely separated, meaning a Paladin/Ranger that uses one will no longer receive both effects.

Troubadour now disables linger entirely while "Brisk Recitation" is active.

Aegis of Loyalty no longer requires an "Unarmed" attack to trigger.

All modal penalties have been tuned down, nearly all of them were halved, with a specific focus on recovery and attack speed penalties.

Lots of recipe and enchanting strings and data are now in the backer beta packages.

Holy Radiance now deals damage correctly again.

Unarmed weapon proficiency is now automatically granted to all characters.

Serafen is now a Raider rather than a Slave.

Essential Phantom should now summon a proper duplicate.

"Yet Its Mate Was More Feared" will now properly summon the second drake if the first is defeated.

Pallegina's progression table no longer removes Sworn Enemy for WotFS and Vielo Vidorio has been properly removed from the game.

Superb Weapons can now properly be upgrade to Legendary.

Quality enchants now use the quality category.

Assassin Vines can no longer hit themselves with their AOE auto attack.

Druid Cat Claws are now "Fast" recovery.

Created a quest reward talent for the Galawain resolution to the underwater dungeon.

"No Pen" messages no longer appear unless you are at the minimum damage from pen.

Sleight of Hand difficulties were lowered across the board.

Helwalker wound scaling effects now display in a human readable fashion.

Daggers can now be clicked or sold without deleting.

All class descriptions in character creation now include a line or two describing their class resource and with a glossary link for each one summarizing how they work.

Created a generic Slog Zone immunities passive that can be used on ghosts or other npcs we don't want to be slowed in water.

Tikawara port now sells ship supplies in the base game.

Neketata Shipyard can now provide a discount depending on how you deal with Zamar.

All bombs can now be reverse pickpocketed and will explode properly when done so.

Fighter Weapon Styles are now available to all classes (including Fighter) at PL2. All generic talents that were on PL2, and PL3 have been moved to PL3 and PL4, respectively.

Concelhaut's Crushing Doom no longer contains various missing strings.

Survival Skill no longer affects the duration of ingested consumables.

Somehow the number of attribute points in character creation was reduced from 18 to 15 many many many months ago. No one knows why this was, so I've bumped it back to 18.

 

 

KNOWN ISSUES

• Lagufaeth Broodmother is missing a portrait and speaker tag
• Ranga Ruanu is missing a portrait
• Some items contain missing strings
• World map doesn't have BGM
• Veen is T-posing
• Save file thumbnail is incorrect
• Tikawara is mislabeled on the world map on first load.
• Abilities and weapon proficiencies are swapped in the character sheet menu 
• (Mac Only) Boarding audio repeats. Restart the client to correct this issue.

BUG FIXES

• Casters no longer passing up martial characters deflections due to Might/Resolve change (see above)
• Rogue - 'Gouging Strike' now shows appropriately sized numbers
• Corrosive Trap description now shows damage data
• Beza's corpse no longer has vision cone to detect stealth
• All Corrupted Adra Animat now all activate in the Engwithan Waystation Level Two
• Binding Mouse1 no longer locks character movement
• Gamma slider now functioning as intended
• Auto-pause descriptions now appear
• Assigning food to characters in the resting menu has been made easier
• Modals no longer duplicate on the action bar
• Can now target enemies on top of dead allies easier

 

I got your back

 

- SKing

[Katarack21]

WOO-HOO!

[aartz]

Yay! 

 

Hope everyone enjoys the update =)

[DexGames]

Yey ! 

[Tanred]

Thanks for the detailed patch notes guys, really appreciated.

[bleedthefreak]

• Veen is T-posing

Dammit, Veen.

 

[Wormerine]

Yessssss!!!!!! Now 10GB download and its GOOD TO GO!

[mrmonocle]

have you fixed the auto-attack setting?

[IndiraLightfoot]

YAY! Happy Easter, everyone!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

[bleedthefreak]

  On 3/30/2018 at 6:13 PM, mrmonocle said:

have you fixed the auto-attack setting?

 

What is the auto-attack setting and how is it broken?

[djinnxy]

I was just looking at steam updates yesterday wishing there'd be at least one more for PoE2. This made my weekend.

[Dr <3]

Yahooooo!!! Party tonight!

[Enoch]

 

  Reveal hidden contents

Steel Garrote Lay on Hands is now a 2 point cost ability.

 

 

Secret character option, or secret companion?

Edited March 30, 2018 by Enoch

[SaruNi]

Is Psychic Backlash / Brutal Backlash no longer once / encounter? Don't see it in the description any more....

 

Edit: Never mind, the once per encounter designation is there when you scroll over it, just not in the description body. Too bad, it would be better if it weren't limited....

Edited March 30, 2018 by SaruNi

[Dr. Hieronymous Alloy]

That all looks great! 

[MaxQuest]

Thank you for the update and the detailed patch notes guys. Much appreciated!)

mini note: unedited notes also include changes from previous update

 

  On 3/30/2018 at 6:17 PM, bleedthefreak said:

What is the auto-attack setting and how is it broken?

There were two things: you can't auto-attack a team member, and this one.

 

  Quote

Attribute Cap of 35 - To prevent the effects of Attributes from scaling away into infinity, they are now capped to 35. We chose this number based on both where we wanted the influence of Attributes to max out as well as what we believed was within the reach of aggressive min-maxers.

Feeling strange about this one ^^ because:

- a cap of 100, would achieve the same thing, i.e. prevent "from scaling away into infinity"

- in PoE1 we could achieve up to 43 dexterity; although do note: it was not worth it

- hard caps do smell bad. Sometimes it's indicative that the game loses it's balance outside of certain range; and that the system can't handle it gracefully itself. No hard cap in PoE1 was a healthy sign in my book, and it was really well handled, as dropping attributes was stinging, while maxing them to the roof was affected by intrinsic diminishing returns; not to mention that there were often wise to smooth the spread a little: think of MIG and DEX both contributing to dps, and at a very simplistic level: 15x15 > 20x10.

It's no big deal though)

Edited March 30, 2018 by MaxQuest

[thelee]

Wowowowowow

 

time to load up the backer beta again. maybe this time it'll be stable enough to actually run on my macbook *crosses fingers*

[SaruNi]

So now we can see that Dragon Thrashed and Soft Winds of Death do damage once every 3 seconds... and Troubadour gains 50% linger time, which should mean 4.5 linger seconds instead of 3... so Troubadour doesn't end up doing more damage with the longer linger, unless there are items which increase linger time?

[BillyCorgan]

There's no more "21:9" support in this update ?  Can't set 2560*1080 

[hilfazer]

  Quote

 

 

Flames of Devotion has been reduced from +50% burn proc to +30% burn proc

  Quote

 

 

Deep Faith's base defensive bonus reduced from +15 to +12 (deity scaling unchanged)

 

So they removed paladin orders' penalties to now nerf general paladin abilities.

Somehow i knew they will do this. It brings paladins closer to each other. Very Obsidian.

[Madscientist]

very nice

 

some known bugs are not mentioned in the long list above:

- do several on crit or on kill effects still stack with itself to allow a huge amount of hits? ( some combinations of cleaving stance, monk attack spped upgrade (name forgotten), blast, citadels spirit lance and such stuff.

- Do monk fist bonusses no longer disappear after reload?

[George_Truman]

  On 3/28/2018 at 12:20 AM, Sking said:

 

Steel Garrote Lay on Hands is now a 2 point cost ability.

 

 

Is that a subclass now?

[Katarack21]

WOO-HOO (again)!

[BillyCorgan]

Love the UI improvements !

[SaruNi]

Dragon Thrashed description is a bit confusing---damage per 3 seconds for 6 seconds. Does that mean 6 seconds each time a chant is started, or does the 6 seconds just refer to the usual time span of a chant? If the former, then with Brisk Recitation, can you stack multiple instances from the same chanter? That might not be so bad....