EpicDuel PVP Game Design Notes

August 08, 2025

Skill Augments

With this update EpicDuel is introducing 24 new skill augments for ultimate and AOE skills. These add alternative damage types and secondary effects to the base skills. Some skill augments exchange effects like extra defense reduction and critical chance for lower base damage and scaling. These skills are accessed by clicking the left and right arrows that appear on the skill icon when the tree has been unlocked up to that point. It wasn't clear in the last update, but you must be at least level 10 to access the skill augments. This is to diminish confusion for new players in the tutorial.

• Bounty Hunter:
  • (PA) Multi-Shot: Physical dmg.; 90% dmg. against 2 targets; gain 15% damage to Energy.
  • (UA) Multi-Shot: Energy dmg.; 90% dmg. against 2 targets; 20% damage to target Energy.
  • (UA) Massacre: Unleash a fury of blade strikes; 100% crit chance; 15% defense ignore. (Damage bonus reduced by 30%)
  • (UA) Massacre: Unleash a fury of blade strikes; reduce target healing by 25% for 2 turns.
• Mercenary:
  • (UA) Artillery Strike: Physical dmg.; 85% dmg. against 2 targets; 20% dmg. to target Energy.
  • (PA) Artillery Strike: Energy dmg.; 85% dmg. against 2 targets.; 20% def. ignore.
  • (PA) Surgical Strike: Physical air strike that reduces target's Rage by 50%; 30% lifesteal. (Damage reduced by 25%)
  • (UA) Surgical Strike:Energy air strike that steals 50% targets Rage; 30% lifesteal.
• Tech Mage:
  • (EA) Plasma Rain: Energy dmg.; 50% Resistance ignore; 85% dmg. against 2 targets. (Damage reduced by 20%)
  • (PA) Plasma Rain: Physical dmg.; 20% Defense ignore; 85% dmg. against 2 targets.
  • (PA) Supercharge: Fire a physical charge ignoring 30% of the target's Defense; 30% lifesteal.
  • (UA) Supercharge: Fire an energy charge; reduce target Def/Res 30% for #DUR turns; 30% lifesteal.
• Cyber Hunter:
  • (UA) Adaptive Offense: Primary dmg. type; 20% defense reduction for 2 turns; 85% dmg. against 2 targets.
  • (EA) Adaptive Offense: Primary dmg. type; 50% defense ignore; 85% dmg. against 2 targets. (Damage reduced by 20%)
  • (UA) Proton Cannon: Fire beam based on primary dmg.; 50% crit chance.
  • (EA) Proton Cannon: Fire beam based on primary dmg.; 200 HP gain; 200 Energy gain. (Damage reduced by 30%)
• Tactical Mercenary:
  • (EA) Suppressing Fire: Physical dmg.; 50% defense ignore; 85% dmg. against 2 targets. (Damage reduced by 20%)
  • (PA) Suppressing Fire: Energy dmg.; 15% defense ignore; 85% dmg. against 2 targets.
  • (PA) Annihilation: Concentrated energy beam that reduces target's Rage 50%; 30% lifesteal.
  • (UA) Annihilation: Concentrated physical beam that reduces target's Rage 50%; 30% defense ignore.
• Blood Mage:
  • (UA) Fire Rain: Physical dmg.; 20% dmg. to target Energy; 85% dmg. against 2 targets.
  • (PA) Fire Rain: Energy dmg.; 20% defense ignore; 85% dmg. against 2 targets.
  • (UA) Maelstrom: Call a firestorm stealing Energy equal to 26% dmg. inflicted.
  • (PA) Maelstrom: Energy firestorm ignoring 30% of the target's defenses; reduces Energy by 26% dmg.

Seasonal Reset Delay

Due to popular demand, our seasonal rare reset has been delayed until next week!

Fixes and Changes

• Legendary bonus applies to skills that offer healing over time like (EA) Field Medic and Infernal Blessing.
• Critical Heal also applies to healing over time skills on subsequent turns if the HP threshold is met.
• Reduced frame counts of several skills and attacks. Less waiting, more action!
• Expanded text fields for skill rollovers.
• Earning XP through mission rewards or Battlepass prizes will now trigger the Legendary Rank Up email with rewards.

Progress

• Skill augments: This round of skill augments took a bit longer than anticipated since nothing new needed to be built to implement them. I may need to limit the updates to 12 augments per week to leave room for other changes.
• Gifting Rewards: This update ate into work on the prizes due to the unexpected time allocation to the new skills and fixes for the previous week's update. With a better understanding of the time required per skill, this should not be an issue going forward. It is crucial these prizes are completed soon.
• Chat Filter Toggle: I am working on a change to EpicDuel's language filter that will allow people to disable the strict chat filter. A more permissive filter will remain, but it will still block the most extreme language and account security topics. That said, abusive language will still be moderated so it will be as important as ever to be respectful to each other.
• Gamma Pirate Promo Pack: Acatriel's new promo package is currently in-progress.

Tags: Nightwraith

August 01, 2025

The Hephael Knight Showcase Battlepass is NOW LIVE! Login now to earn the latest collection of Hephael-themed weapons, armors, morphs, bots, and more crafted with care by Acatriel!

Who or what is Hephael? When the first colonists arrived on Delta V, they brought the myths of the old worlds with them, laying the foundation for new legends to emerge. To the superstitious of Delta V, Hephael is the god of the son and god of the forge, offering aid to followers and desolation to non-believers. Though the dominance of technology suppressed such beliefs during Delta V's peak, desperate times have caused the citizens to seek salvations through more primitive, but no less potent, means.

So you all know what you're getting into with the new bots available in this season, the skill descriptions are listed below:

• Hephael's Avatar P
  • Hephael's Slash P: Summon Hephael's Avatar to inflict Physical Damage.
  • Hephael's Incantation P: Lock all target's skills that require Energy for 2 rounds.
• Hephael's Avatar E
  • Hephael's Slash E: Summon Hephael's Avatar to inflict Energy Damage.
  • Hephael's Incantation E: Lock all target's skills that require Energy for 2 rounds.
• Hephael's Frenzy: Convert 5% of outgoing dmg. to Energy if dmg. is over 50. 
• Twilight Strike: Increases Primary Critical chance to 75% when HP is below 30%.
• Twilight Aim: Increases Sidearm Critical chance to 75% when HP is below 30%.
• Twilight Blast: Increases Auxiliary Critical chance to 75% when HP is below 30%.
• Twilight Shield: Increases Defense/Resistance 15% when HP is below 30%.

New Skill Augments

This update, we're starting the grand implementation of skill augments. Eventually each skill will have at least 2 augments. If you're interested in the math, that means each class will have up to 531,441 potential skill combinations! Augments will come in one of four different varieties:

• Duration Augment (DA): Changes the duration of the effect of the skill, and either strengthens or weakens the effect accordingly.
• Utility Augment (UA): Changes one or more of the effects of the skill to another effect.
• Polarity Augment (PA): Changes the damage type of the skill to the opposite of its base version.
• Efficiency Augment (EA): Makes the skill weaker in one way and stronger in another.

For this release we're starting small with a skill that all 6 classes possess: Field Medic. This essential skill will receive 2 augments.

• (EA) Field Medic: Heal yourself or an ally over 2 turns. Cures poison.
• (UA) Field Medic: Heal yourself or an ally and remove debuffs. Cures poison.

To access these augments, retrain your character, then reduce your points in Field Medic to 1. That will reveal left and right arrows you can use to choose the augments. All skill augments will work this way when they are eventually introduced.

Please be patient as we fill out the class skill trees with new augments in the coming weeks, creating 144 new skills. We'll do our best to balance the updates so all classes get equal attention without overwhelming balance with too many options at once.

Special thanks are due to the community that suggested and contributed to these new skill augment ideas! This would definitely not be possible without your dedication and input. With great persistence and a little luck, this change could lead EpicDuel into an exciting new era of PvP action!

Seasonal Rare Reset

Next week, all seasonal rares will reset to their normal schedule, meaning this is your last chance to collect any remaining out-of-season seasonal rares you had your eye on!

Epic To-Do:

Here's a taste of what we have cooking up in the coming weeks:

• Skill Augments: As stated above, completing the 144 (132 after today) skill augments will be the main focus of the coming weeks. 
• Gifting rewards: Hopefully this is the month all prizes are complete! Will the latest Battlepass out of the way, progress should be much faster.
• New Promo: It's been ages! Acatriel is steadily working on an epic new promo!

Tags: Nightwraith

July 25, 2025

Unleash the unstoppable power of Infinity! Feel the pulse of legendary battles where every second counts the very moment your power level shatters the limits of time itself! Channel your inner champion, harness the forces of the universe, and push beyond Infinity!

Get this gorgeous poster today to claim Epic rewards many AE games, including your favorite post-apocalyptic Flash-based PvP MMO, EpicDuel!

• Achievement - Phantom Chronomancer
  • Weapon - Phantom Chrono Scythe
  • Weapon - Phantom Chrono Bow
  • Weapon - Phantom Chrono Blaster

(Collector's Edition Exclusive)*

• Achievement - Phantom Time Wielder*
  • Weapon - Specter Chrono Scythe*
  • Weapon - Specter Chrono Bow*
  • Weapon - Specter Chrono Blaster*

*NOTE: Collector's Edition Exclusives are not included with a purchase of a Regular Edition.

Content Creators Unite!

For ages EpicDuel has offered special achievements for creating Youtube videos. At the time, this was the best way we could think of to reward and encourage content creators (I think the achievements are so old that "content creator" wasn't even a widely used term yet) in the community to produce videos featuring EpicDuel. Awarding these achievements was a very cumbersome and time-consuming manual process that was very antiquated and unsustainable, especially with limited resources to review dozens, if not hundreds, of videos for quality and content. 

Fortunately, Beleen has helped establish a new content creator program that serves the same purpose as our existing Youtube video achievement, but centralized and more efficient. Although this system has been available for awhile, I wanted to highlight it here to make EpicDuel's community aware that this new system has fully replaced the old Youtuber achievements. If you didn't catch the original Design Notes post, I'll repost it below for you now:

What are the rules/qualifications?

• The Content Creators must actively make videos for, or stream, one or more Artix Entertainment games.
• No jerks: We will not grant badges to Hacking/Cheating/Trolling/Bullying/Illegal/Harassment creators.
• That rule above deserves additional clarification. We 100% support free speech & constructive criticism while ensuring a positive, respectful community.
• The "THEY DID WHAT!?" Rule: If a formerly great creator turns out to be... uh.... not great. The badges will be removed from them.
• If a content creator hits a major milestone... certain number of years making videos, or a certain number of hours streamed, send us a tip so we can give them (or make) a badge for it!

In case you missed it, here is the link to the nomination form:

Nominate video makers and streamers to receive a Content Creator Badge!

More War Shop Armors

Morzyd's War Shop has been stocked with additional War Prize armors! 

Bug Fixes / Changes

• Super War items can be purchased in unlimited quantities from the ammo depots.
• Updated vitals bar to show Critical Health threshold
• Armor-destroying skills can still be used with armor-destroying skills that have additional effects. For example, you can use Sea King's Curse against an opponent that has already been hit with a Hammer Grenade. The armor debuff doesn't stack, so this won't conflict with already applied skills.
• Gender-specific armors can be purchased regardless of the character's current gender.

Hephael Knight Battlepass

The Hephael Knight Battlepass is scheduled to be released next Friday. If you still have some items you need to collect on the current Battlepass, you still have some time! I know it seems silly to comment on this when the current Battlepass has been out since April, but somehow we always get a few emails from people mystified that the Battlepass that was in game for over 3 months is suddenly GONE! 

It might be better to have a countdown timer to show the exact amount of time remaining for each Battlepass, but I prefer to keep the dates flexible depending on when the next Battlepass items are ready. 

Tags: Nightwraith

July 18, 2025

Rare Cores Return (Kind of)

Some cores in EpicDuel have remained time-gated for over a decade. Since this is a PvP game, it's inherently unfair to restrict crucial abilities based on rarity. Thus, we have made some of those previously rare cores available to new players (*new* as in players who started playing after 2014) with a new coat of paint! While these cores have the same functionality as the rare cores, they are visually distinct. While this may seem like a bad thing to those who already possess the rare cores, please understand that it is impossible to balance a PvP game if certain cores are permanently unavailable to the general population.

New Items on Nightwraith:

• Nightwraith's Curse
• Nightwraith's Curse Aura
• Nightwraith's Override

New Item on Ylwa:

• Ylwa's Way: Omega Baby Yeti normal and special attack dmg. increased by 10%.

New Item on Captain Murdoc:

• Murdoc's Method: Omega Dark Yeti normal and special attack dmg. increased by 10%.

War Shop Update

Morzyd the Scavenger's War Shop was updated with many new armors. This is excellent timing since the current war is ending soon. Do you have enough influence to claim the Emperor Prize with 2 War Tokens?

Balance Changes

Before we introduce new additions to the skill trees, we have a new round of balance changes for you!

• Deadly Precision: 10% - 25% --> 6% - 15% auxiliary damage boost
• Reroute: 15% --> Flat +30 aux damage boost
• Double Strike: Removed Dexterity scaling; base values 25% at level 1, +2% per level
• Malfunction: +1 Technology per 4 --> 5 Dexterity
• Plasma Grenade: -25 Energy cost to all levels
• Crippling Strike: +30 Energy cost to all levels
• Concentration: Added a minimum damage threshold for HP gain (over 50 damage)
• Incensory: 120 --> 105 Energy cost; 3 --> 2 turn duration
• Omega Override: 110 --> 100 Energy cost

In Progress / Coming Soon

• Skill Tree Expansion
• Gifter Prizes
• Battlepass

Tags: Nightwraith

July 11, 2025

Skill Tree Overhaul

In perhaps the biggest change to EpicDuel since Omega phase started, EpicDuel is introducing expanded skill trees for all class! This means that all skills will be able to have two or more alternate skills that you can choose when retraining, opening up nearly infinite potential for build combinations. With this latest release we updated the live database to support these new changes. If everything is works fine with no major crashes or explosions, we will proceed to build and introduce new alternative skills for all classes. This process will probably take awhile, as skills take time to develop, test, and balance, but it's an exciting step towards breathing new life into EpicDuel's aging battle engine.

To reiterate, you will not see the new skills yet after this update!  The primary goal of this update is to lay the groundwork on the live database and test stability. If you don't notice any changes...that's a good thing! I means the update is stable and didn't break our existing skill systems.

Also, since this update contains substantial changes to the server and client code you should clear your launcher or browser cache to make sure you have the latest version!

War Shop Expanded

Morzyd's War Shop has been expanded yet again with classic War Prize armors!

Quality of Life Changes

Buff tooltips below player vitals now display the duration of active buffs and debuffs.

NPC Rage has been reverted.

Battlepass in Progress

The new Hephael Knight Battlepass is currently in progress! Enjoy this preview of the upcoming items.

Tags: Nightwraith

July 04, 2025

EpicDuel is celebrating the 4th of July with some major quality of life upgrades and the addition of dozens of mutating War Prizes to Morzyd's War Shoppe.

Home Inventory Update

The home editing interface now has a toggle to select sell mode. This will help prevent instances of accidentally selling items and make it easier to see the smaller home items for placement.

As the final update to Homes for awhile, home items can now be sold in bulk. This only applies to Credit items. Varium items must still be sold one at a time.

HP Diminishing Returns

All HP above 2,000 will start increasing at a slower rate per point, capping at 2,490 instead of the current 2,700.

NPC Rage

EpicDuel's many NPCs have plenty of pent up aggression from being dunked on for years. Now they are fighting back, as they can now gain Rage and use Rage attacks.

More War Rares

Morzyd's War Shoppe has been updated to include all the mutating War Prizes.

HeroMart Summer Deals

Summer Savings are LIVE at HeroMart! Buy 3 items and get a 4th eligible item for FREE!

Pending Projects

Skill Tree Upgrade: We are currently working on an update to skill trees that will add a new dimension to the classes. Each node on the skill tree could have an option to select one or more alternative skills. This is the biggest update to EpicDuel's core battle engine in ages and has the potential to add nearly infinite depth to the existing classes.

Next Battlepass.

Gifting Prizes, now and forever.

Tags: Nightwraith