EpicDuel PVP Game Design Notes

March 21, 2023

The Undead Legion's latest arsenal has arrived in EpicDuel! Collect over 50 new items that can be earned through PvP victories! These drops are seasonal and will leave for the season after a few months.

New PvP Drops

Fight and win PvP duels for a chance to receive these new weapons!

• Doom Fusion Daggers
• Legion Fusion Daggers
• Doom Fusion Maul
• Legion Fusion Maul
• Doom Fusion Staff
• Legion Fusion Staff
• Doom Destroyer Spear
• Legion Destroyer Spear
• Ancient Doom Cleaver
• Ancient Legion Cleaver
• Ancient Doom Katana
• Ancient Legion Katana
• Ancient Doom Scythe
• Ancient Legion Scythe
• Ancient Doom Crusher
• Ancient Legion Crusher
• Ancient Doom Slicer
• Ancient Legion Slicer
• Ancient Doom Reaper
• Ancient Legion Reaper
• Ancient Doom Spear
• Ancient Legion Spear
• Ancient Doom Impaler
• Ancient Legion Impaler
• Ancient Doom Bow
• Ancient Legion Bow
• Doom Fusion Blade
• Legion Fusion Blade
  
  

New Home Item Drops

Fight and win PvP duels for a chance to receive these new home items!

• Dage x Doom Fusion
• Dage Fusion Bobblehead R
• Dage Fusion Bobblehead L
• Doom Fusion Bobblehead R
• Doom Fusion Bobblehead L
• Legion Fusion Statue R
• Legion Fusion Statue L
• Doom Fusion Statue R
• Doom Fusion Statue L
• Legion Cracked Ground
• Doom Cracked Ground
• Legion Fusion Executioner
• Doom Fusion Executioner
• Legion Fusion Daggers Display
• Doom Fusion Daggers Display
• Legion Fusion Skull
• Doom Fusion Skull
• Legion Fusion Crest
• Doom Fusion Crest
• Legion Destroyer Spears
• Legion Destroyer Sword
• Legion Swordsman Statue R
• Legion Swordsman Statue L
• Legion Spearman Statue R
• Legion Spearman Statue L

New Collection Missions

Visit Dage the Evil's avatar on Delta V to accept the new collection mission chain Dage's 2023 Arsenal! If you complete all the missions, you can earn thousands of credits, new rare weapons, and an new achievement: Dage Collector 2023!

Tags: Nightwraith

March 10, 2023

EpicDuel is continuing it's anniversary celebration with new rewards for Beta and Gamma supporters!*

*Rewards only available for those who meet criteria specified below.

Beta Rewards

With this update, our Beta Supporters who owned the original Beta Brutalizer set will receive new and improved 2023 Beta Weapons! 

• Beta Cleaver 2023 P
• Beta Cleaver 2023 E
• Beta Brutalizer 2023 P
• Beta Brutalizer 2023 E

As with the Alpha weapons last week, these new weapons will be added to inventories as additional items and will not overwrite the existing legacy gear.

Gamma Rewards

Gamma supporters who already own the Gamma Bot will receive the new Electro Gamma Bot, which is a damage-swapped counterpart to the coveted Gamma Bot!

Returning Drops

Because we didn't formally announce the Evolved Frostbane PvP weapon drops a few weeks ago, we're re-adding them to drop pool to allow those still wrapping up the related missions a chance to complete them. These drops will leave after a week to become seasonal drops.

Additionally, to celebrate Dage the Evil's birthday, we're restoring Dage's Legion item drops. These returning drops will be reinforced soon with new items next week!

When the other PvP drops were removed, the intention was to revert the drop rates back to the pre-holiday rates. With this update the overall drop rate has been reduced, but still remains higher than it was before the holiday change.

Next Week: Dage's Birthday Items

Prepare for new weapons, home items, and maybe even a mission or two as we bring Dage the Evil's devious designs to EpicDuel!

Tags: Nightwraith

March 03, 2023

Login for epic rewards as EpicDuel celebrates 14 years since its initial Alpha Launch!

Epic Varium Bonus

If you have an EpicDuel character that has been active since January 1, 2020, you will receive 1400 free Varium on that character! Not many online games can boast that achievement, and we wanted to commemorate that milestone with an unprecedented gift to help everyone power up! Our humble little Sci-fi PvP MMORPG never would have remained live and dueling this long without you and your support! Duel on!

Spring Varium Sale

Today, EpicDuel began its Spring sale, which is expected to run until Tuesday, April 4th. We are increasing the included Varium with the Darkeater Gear Package from 10,000 to 15,000 and increasing the Varium-only package value from 18,000 to 20,000! Those who purchased either of these packages 24 hours before the sale went live received the difference in Varium earlier today.

Anniversary Gear

Visit Nightwraith for new rare Anniversary weapons!

• Fourteen Year Alpha Sword P
• Fourteen Year Alpha Sword E
• Fourteen Year Alpha Annihilator P
• Fourteen Year Alpha Annihilator E

Legacy Rewards

Starting this week, we will be equipping new legacy rare gear to players from different development phases who meet certain criteria. This week, we will reward players with the original Alpha gear with new variants of their ultra rare gear! 

• Alpha Blade 2023 P
• Alpha Blade 2023 E
• Alpha Annihilator 2023 P
• Alpha Annihilator 2023 E

Next week, we will distribute new gear for Beta players with the original Beta weapons and Gamma players who already own the original Gamma Bot!

Bug Fixes/Changes

• Chained Blood:3 turn duration; lifesteal aspect can be reduced by Heart Attack/Azrael’s Torment/Consecrated Fire
• Consecrated Ground: No longer reduces the target’s Rage gain rate. If the core has not been used in the battle yet, using the normal aux attack will properly put the core on a 3 turn cooldown, instead of 2.
• Dualism: If the core has not been used in the battle yet, using the normal gun attack will correctly put the core on a 2 turn cooldown, instead of 3.
• Azrael’s Chimera CC: Tail CC fixed.

Tags: Nightwraith

February 24, 2023

The Flesh Demigod Gear has returned to Azrael! Jump to his haunting lair to browse his loot and complete your collection of Seasonal gear and potent cores! 

Fourteen Year Alpha

A new achievement representing EpicDuel's 14th anniversary is available from the Ultra-Rare section of the Achievement shop. There is also a limited wall home item available to mount the achievement within your home(s).

More anniversary gear will be available next week, including new gear celebrating EpicDuel's earlier development phases!

Anniversary Bonus

For next week's update, as a reward for loyal EpicDuel players, we will be rewarding all characters who have been active since 2020 1,400 Varium! This will be a great opportunity to revisit the game if you've been away for awhile or just want to try the game for the first time with a nice boost of currency! 

Balance Changes

• Chained Blood: 3 turns → 4 turns; buffs highest stat by 50%.
• Exsanguinating Shield: Reusable; 5 turn cooldown.
• Chronopact: Increases Strength by 100% → flat 100 Strength point increase; grants 100% initial Rage gain; 15% damage reduction.

Fixes / Changes

The following achievements have moved from the Ultra-Rare category into the Events category:

• Daily Gift Champion
• Legend
• Supreme Legend 

Additionally, war-themed General and Ultra-Rare achievements have been moved into the War category:

• World Domination
• Artillery Master
• Warlord (most daily war kills)
• Flag Captured
• Token Contributor
• Overlord Operative Order

The Epic Supporter 2022 achievement has been removed from the 10,000 AP Varium packages.

In-Progress

So far over 150 screens have been adjusted for the upcoming resolution update! Progress is rapid, but there is still much to do. In addition to modernizing the aspect ratio and appearance of the game, this massive update will add much needed-breathing room for the many crowded and complex interfaces. The last time something like this was done, EpicDuel had only recently joined the AE family (2009-2010-ish) so it's a change that was long overdue!

Tags: Nightwraith

February 17, 2023

Azrael's Scorn is here! So far 14 diligent duelists have achieved level 50 and beyond! If you're far from that benchmark, you have plenty of time to earn EXP and claim the numerous rewards! This update, we're focusing on balance changes, QoL, and rating point increases while we prepare for larger updates later.

Balance Changes

We've made the following balance changes to tweak the current duel dynamics, with Tech Mages and Mercenaries receiving substantial buffs to improve their performance.

• Mercenary
  • Hybrid Armor: 10% highest stat buff → 20%.
  • Double Strike: Increased base values by 8 per level.

• Blood Mage
  • Fire Scythe: 110% damage → 105%.
  • Terrify: 20% Defense / Resistance reduction → 15%.
  • Plasma Cannon: 25% damage to energy → 20%.

• Bounty Hunter
  • Cheapshot: Increased energy cost by 20; 20% heal reduction → 15%.
  • Venom Strike: Increased energy cost by 20.

• Tech Mage
  • Malfunction: Updated values to 10, 13, 16, 19, 21, 23, 25, 26, 27, 28; lowered energy cost by 20.
  • Concentration: Increased energy conversion by 5% per level.

Achievement Boosts

As a precursor to EpicDuel's 14th Anniversary, we're boosting the rating points of the following phase-based achievements!

• Alpha Tester: 7000 increased to 8000
• Founder: 7500 increased to 8500
• Beta Tester: 5500 increased to 6500
• Elite: 7500 increased to 8500
• Gamma Tester: 4500 increased to 5500
• Delta Knight: 3500 increased to 4500
• Omega Overlord: 2000 increased to 3000
• Omega Endures: 1000 increased to 2000
• Golden Omega Ticket: 2000 increased to 3000

*"Omega Founder" was listed as being changed but this achievement was a placeholder and never actually offered in-game.

Inventory Cleanup

The following gear is now able to be sold to free up inventory space. Please be careful to not accidentally sell any of these items as they are rare. Notable exceptions are the cores included in these packages and passes which are still unsellable as they do not take up inventory space.

• Techstalker promotional gear
• Sanguine Showcase Battlepass gear
• Frost Revenant Battlepass gear

Power Weekend

Since this is a relatively light update, we've activated Power Weekend until Monday evening!

Bug Fix

We fixed a bug that was causing Frost Slayer to display the graphics for one of the new Battlepass weapons.

Ongoing Development

Our main ongoing task is expanding, revamping, and optimization of all of EpicDuel's world screens and UI for a new resolution. We're making good progress, and we thank you for your patience as we complete and implement this task which should make EpicDuel more visually appealing and easier to port to other platforms in the future.

Tags: Nightwraith

February 11, 2023

Azrael's Scorn Battlepass is LIVE! Login now to collect the latest collection of Azrael-themed weapons, armors, vehicles, morphs, bots, cores, and more crafted with care by Bido and Acatriel!

This latest Battlepass is scheduled to last from today to March 19th!

This new season introduces some changes to ease the rate of progression through the Battlepass' prize levels:

• 10 daily and weekly challenges, up from 7.
• Slightly increased BXP earned from many PvP challenges.
• To prevent PvP overload, slightly increased chance of NPC challenges. 

Good luck and happy dueling to reach level 60 of EpicDuel's latest Battlepass season!

Golden Omega Ticket

For consistency, we've awarded a Golden Omega Ticket achievement to all qualifying players. Since the original ticket was a sellable item, we can't track strictly by the item. We've had to broaden the criteria to include anyone who purchased a 10,000 AP package between 12/20/2012 and 2/5/2013. These criteria may include characters attached to accounts that made the purchase, but wouldn't normally qualify for the ticket since Varium purchases are character based. In this case, it was the only option to award the achievement based on the data available.

Achievement Expansion

To declutter the achievement interface a bit, we added a new category of Achievements: Events. This will include limited-time events such as Battlepasses, Tournaments, and Gifting.

While you're browsing the new Achievement interface, you might want to note that the Big Game LVII achievement is available from the Seasonal section!

In Progress

Since the Battlepass is now live, we are moving full speed ahead on converting ED's interface and myriad backgrounds to the new expanded resolution!

Going Soon!

This Tuesday we will reset all seasonal rares to their normal restock times. Additionally, we will be removing the Bido, Dage, and Nulgath drops from the PvP and NPC drop pools.

Tags: Nightwraith