EpicDuel PVP Game Design Notes

December 19, 2013

Become Legendary

Prepare for the most exciting evolution of EpicDuel since Omega! In addition to an impressive new Varium bundle, we're unlocking level 40! But what happens after you reach 40? Level 40 will allow all players to achieve Legendary status! This means you will continue to earn experience toward Legendary ranks, all the way up to 100!

Each Rank will allow you to unlock points to invest in new stat categories. This part of Legendary mode is still in development and will be fully-released after the new year. This is partially because we want to make sure enough players have reached level 40 before turning it on, partially time constraints, and partially because of the next major chage to EpicDuel described below!

10x the Balance!

Well, maybe 10 times the balance is a bit of an exaggeration, but this release, we're increasing key stats like health, energy, damage, and defense by a multiple of 10. This means that every point of stat investment will have a significant impact on your overall combat effectiveness. It also means that all the EpicDuel Maximum Damage videos are going to be posting some huge numbers!

In addition to looking impressive, multiplying the stats also gives us finer control for balancing skills. We're making all the adjustments we can before we go live, but we're also hoping that all the battling over the holidays up to level 40 will give us good information on further tweaks.

Blood Hawk Battlegear Mega-Bundle

This release, we're unveiling the new Blood Hawk Battlegear Mega-Bundle! For the price of one 10k Varium package, you'll be getting 2 Blood Hawk Battlegear Mutating Weapons, 2 Blood Hawk Slayer Swords, 2 Blood Hawk Bots, and, of course, 10,000 Varium.

These weapons will be available in the one-stop Varium shop for a limited time. For those who would rather purchase the items piecemeal, Frysteland Valestra will be stocked with the Blood Hawk items in-game.

These awesome items will come with some killer cores! Check them out:

Hawk Guardian

This Active Core comes equipped to all the primary Blood Hawk weapons. When your health is critical, summon a wild Blood Hawk to come to your aid and deliver a devastating claw attack to your opponent!

Blood Hawk Claw

This Blood Hawk Bot skill allows you to summon the spirit of the mysterious Frysteland Blood Hawk to deliver a nasty attack with razor-sharp talons.

Armor Annihilator

As a Blood Hawk, use your metallic claws to temporarily disintegrate your opponent's armor!

Kawkaw!

Mega Mutations!

This Winter, we decided to have a little fun with our new vehicle selection. Indead of riding a bike, you can actually become one of the creatures below! These designs are fully color-customizeable with entertaining travel animation!

Are you Yeti? How Yeti are you? This year you can be an actual Baby Yeti!

Soar above it all as a Blood Hawk!

Dino Hawks are the ancient precursors to the Blood Hawks. They can't fly, but their strong hind legs allow them to move quickly across the snowy landscape.

The final bike is a more conventional vehicle, concepted by G00ny and Smackey El Frog and vectorized by Charfade! It's powerful treads will allow you to tear through the frozen tundra with ease!

Artix Arcade Bonanza!

Ever wished you could take your favorite items from another AE game and use them in EpicDuel? After this release, you'll have your chance as we unveil new Arcade games for AdventureQuest, AdventureQuest Worlds, DragonFable, MechQuest, HeroSmash, and OverSoul. By collaborating with the other teams, we've amassed a mighty hoard of legendary weapons! 

New Arcade games also mean more Achievements and more leaderboards to dominate.  With 6 Arcade prize pools respresenting the biggest AE games, you'll have plenty of reasons to farm Arcade Tokens over the Holidays!

Stylin'!

Thanks to the help of Revontheus, we've been able to introduce 30 new Asgardian styles! Alter your looks to resemble a notorious trickster god or a mighty Asgardian warrior. 

What more crazy styles will Revontheus create? I have a feeling they have something to do with a moose...

Into the New Year

This Legendary release will be our last major release of 2013, but that doesn't mean we're slacking! We already have big plans for 2014, including a tutorial system to welcome and teach new players as well as features to keep the game fresh and exciting for veterans. All the tools we've added to EpicDuel over the years, especially this year, have really streamlined our processes and made delivering feature and content-packed releases easier than ever. We have very high hopes for the future of EpicDuel, and we hope you'll join us in making 2014 Legendary!

Happy Juloffenblotten and Frostval from all of your friends at Artix Entertainment! Duel On!

Tags: Nightwraith Legends Legendary balance Arcade styles Stats Frysteland Winter Holiday Level 40 upgrade Blood Hawk

December 12, 2013

A cold wind is blowing through Frysteland...actually a cold wind is usually blowing through Frysteland, considering its climate and all. ANYWAY! We've got big, BIG plans for this upcoming release, and as I mentioned last week, this release is so big we'll need 2 weeks to build it. That means, unfortunately, no release Friday, but next week will be incredible!

Blood Hawk Battlegear Bundle

In the year since Alydriah was expelled form Frysteland by the Endless, the Krampus people have slowly begun to recover. In addition to the human toll Alydriah's cruelty took on the harsh Northern land, many indigenous species were devastated or wiped out by constant battling. One such species is the rare Blood Hawk. These creatures were used for centuries by the Krampus people for hunting and taming yetis. Thought extinct, they have returned in force to once again aid the Krampus people in keeping the cuddly but ferocious creatures in line.

Now you will have the opportunity to own the Blood Hawk and the Spectral Hawk (energy variant) along with a host of avian armaments!

The Blood Hawk Battlegear Bundle will be available for a limited time. With this package you will receive:

• 2 Blood Hawk Slayer swords
• 2 Blood Hawk Battlegear mutating weapons
• 2 Blood Hawk bots
• The swords and mutating items will come with a pre-installed Blood Hawk core!
• 10k Varium

We realize that the last package offered was not that long ago so we're offering the package items in-game as well. It's definitely a better value to get them all together in the bundle, of course, but if you've got a pile of Varium burning a hole in your pocket...you should probably seek medical attention immediately.

If those weapons weren't enough to intrigue you, we have some special surprises in store. Stay tuned for more details!

You're Epic, But Are You...LEGENDARY?

Next week, we're raising the level cap to...*drumroll* 40! Rabblefroth is hard at work smoothing the experience curve to make earning levels slightly less painful. But what happens after you reach 40 and max out all your gear? What then? Ponder the great mysteries of the universe? NO! 40 is just the beginning of a much longer journey as an EpicDuel Legend!

After a player becomes Legendary, you will continue to earn experience as Legendary experience. Your level will not increase, but you will instead earn Legendary Ranks! Each rank earned will unlock a Legendary point that can be placed in a broad array of stats. These stats will be more specialized than Dexterity or Technology which influence a range of battle attributes. We haven't finalized the list, but we will build as many as we can by next week. The beauty is we can always add more later, unlike the current, more rigid stat list.

Legendary players will be defined by a uniquely colored name, an icon in their interface, and several other minor aesthetic changes. We'll have more details as the systems are finalized and polished.

Achievement Overhaul Continued

Work on the Achievement Overhaul continues as we wrap up a few features we didn't get to last week, in addition to fixing some minor bugs.

You will also have the option to switch view modes. If you don't like the new, larger style, you can always switch back to a more classically styled view to see more achievements at once.

Titan is also working on a new overall progress bar to see how many Achievements you have total. How close are you to earning them all? If you're close, we're about to make getting them all a bit more difficult with the next feature.

AE Arcade Bonanza!

We're going all-out with the Arcade next week, offering several new games based on other AE games. Collect weapons, house items, and other intriguing baubles from MechQuest, HeroSmash, AdventureQuest, AdventureQuest Worlds, and MORE! Each of these new games offers a new achievement and a new leaderboard to dominate!

To make it easier to acquire Arcade Tokens, we'll be softening the requirements for the daily missions. If you didn't already know, it's possible to earn Tokens from completing daily mission chains. Some can be a bit on the grindy side so we'll try to make it a more pleasurable experience to complete them.

Party Like They Do in Asgard

As if everything else mentioned above weren't enough...ED Artist Revontheus is crafting some slick Asgardian styles to spice up this release. What does Asgard have to do with Frysteland? Well, they're basically space vikings and vikings lived in cold climates sooooo...yeah.

Asgard!

Tags: Titan Winter Blood Hawk Weapons Items Armors Achievements Legendary Legends Frysteland Birds Varium Level upgrade Stat balance Gear Vehicles Cores Holiday Arcade

November 14, 2013

Prepare for one of the most comprehensive balance updates EpicDuel has ever seen! Every class will be affected as we focus on making battle more interesting, strategic, and fair. We understand that these changes can be rough, especially as everyone struggles to find new builds and strategies, but know that we're trying our best to keep all the classes fun, interesting, and competative.

Balance is not my specialty, so I'll defer to our resident Numeromancer Rabblefroth. If you wish to comment about the changes or following the specific nuances of the changes, you can follow this thread in the AE forums! The following is a quote from Rabblefroth in the thread's first post.

Hey everyone! 

We have quite a lot of balance changes on their way this week, so I wanted to highlight some of the major ones and discuss why we're making them so it doesn't come as a big, overwhelming shock. 

OVERVIEW 
Most of the changes fall under three major areas that we want to address. They are: 

1. Battle duration 
2. Energy flow 
3. Followup balance for the new skills 

BATTLE DURATION 
In general we feel that battles are ending a little too quickly, especially in 1v1. With so few turns available in the average fight, strategic options become limited, and certain events in battle such as critical strikes and blocks have a bit too much impact. 

In order to help extend the duration of battle, we're making a couple of key changes: 

• Increase the amount of health players have. 
• Decrease base damage in a couple of key areas, especially on weapons. 
• Reduce the effect of critical strikes 

The goal here is to both increase Health pools and lower some of the free damage everyone does to slow the pace of battle down, putting less emphasis on each individual turn. Every turn you take should carry weight, but currently we feel it's a bit too much. 

Each individual change is relatively small, but we hope that the cumulative effect will be a noticeable improvement. 

ENERGY FLOW 
With recent updates adding energy costs to cores, and reworking passive skills into useable skills, energy management has become much more important. We feel that this is an important aspect to managing the pace of a fight, but certain things are a little out of line, so we want to review the system in general to make it fit better with the updated skills. 

The major changes here include: 

• Increasing the amount of Energy players have. 
• In general, lowering the impact of energy draining effects. These have become much stronger now that Energy is a more important resource, so they just need a little nudge to bring them in line. 
• Adjusting energy gain on each class. Examples include giving Bounty Hunters a reliable way to generate energy, reducing Tech Mage energy generation, and adjusting Static Smash to be more useful. 

Nearly every energy-affecting class skill has been adjusted in some way. We hope that this will improve the strategies around Energy management and help push the pacing of battle into a more interesting direction. 

One other change I'd like to cover is the removal of the Energy gain effect from Reflex Boost. We want to change skills that have odd sets of effects that don't really make sense together. Reflex Boost currently gives you a stat that makes you take less damage, then gives you energy based on damage taken. The two effects are counter-productive and make the reason to cast the skill unclear. "Do I want this for extra Dexterity, or for extra Energy?" We want each skill to have one clear primary goal, and to accomplish that goal well. Now that the classes that use Reflex Boost have more reliable ways to generate Energy, we feel that this effect can be comfortably removed. 

BALANCING THE NEW SKILLS 
There has been a lot of great feedback regarding the new skills, and you have highlighted a couple of clear areas where we can improve them. 

Some of the planned changes here include: 

• Increasing the amount of defenses given by the Armor skills. They will also no longer be affected by buffs or debuffs. The intention here was to create some gameplay around buffing yourself, further improving your defense, but the real result was that in too many cases a debuff would make the skills not worth casting. Finally, a bug was causing the duration of these skills to be 3 turns instead of 4. In short, these skills should be much stronger than before. 
• Lowering the Energy cost of Mark of Blood. This should make the skill feel worth casting in more situations and lessen the drain on the relevant classes' energy pools. 
• As partially covered in the previous section, we're also lowering the Energy gain from Battery Backup. 
• Not directly affecting any one skill, but relevant to the removal of passives, NPCs got a bit harder in the last update. Part of this was due to a bug in the Bloodlust values on them that was giving them twice the intended amount of lifesteal (Oops!). But they also needed to deal a bit less damage, so we're lowering their base weapon damages across the board. 

CONCLUSION 
There are a few other balance changes coming this week that weren't covered here, but since there are so many I wanted to cover some of the major ideas and explain our reasoning behind them. 

I'll be happy to answer questions or concerns you have, but I might not be able to delve too deep into specifics since things are liable to change before the update. I also might not be able to respond tonight, but I'll be around tomorrow so I'll make sure to address what I can then!

 

Black Friday Preview

A dark force is awakening in Delta V. Elon Musk may have stopped the Chairman's Ebilcorp factory from destroying the planet, but he couldn't stop the evil Chairman from disturbing something that was better left forgotten.

Something is returning. Something that has slept for thousands of years. Something that is very hungry. Stay tuned for more updates on this new threat!

Tags: balance preview Thanksgiving Skills Weapons Black Friday Nightwraith

November 07, 2013

Prepare to party! This week, celebrate the birthday of EpicDuel's resident artist/assassin: Nightwraith. New missions, new weapons, and revamped skills await for your celebratory needs! As if that weren't enough reason to celebrate: the winners of the Creative Carving Contest will be announced in-game at Elon Musk!

Back to Party Business

Visit me at my usual haunt in the Wasteland to investigate my stash of weapons and armors! Do you have your OneX6 Keys? No? We've got you covered -- you can either buy one directly or win one by completing a new mission. Be warned: I've been buffed to level 36 so I'm not the pushover I used to be!

The classic birthday missions are also returning, with a few new additions in case you've already completed the old ones. Complete them all for huge rewards!

Suggestion Shop

In addition to hunting bounties and weaving baskets, I (Nightwraith) am EpicDuel's lead artist, but I don't mind sharing the spotlight with aspiring artists. That's why we're combining my birthday celebration with the introduction of a new round of suggestion shop weapons, created from ideas submitted from our creative EpicDuel community!

It's been way too long since we've done a shop like this so we're really going all out. We hope to have over 12 new weapons culled from the best of the best suggestions. Charfade and I are working as hard as possible to deliver more, but this is a thoroughly packed release. The weapons are still in progress so check back for a full list of items and their associated artist after we go live. If your suggestion was not selected, that does not mean it was terrible or we hate you -- it just means it may have to wait for the next suggestion shop. Hopefully it won't take a full year to do another one! I wouldn't be surprised if more items enter the game next week!

Arcadia

It wouldn't be a proper birthday without a new Arcade Game! 

Horrifying! Give it a spin and be the first to claim the grand prize! As with other games, Nightwraith's Nightmare will introduce it's own new evolving achievment and leaderboard!

Cheevo Counter

Speaking of achievements -- we now have tracking for many of the daily achievements like the 1v1 and 2v2 automatch daily winners. Players who win the daily achievements multiple times will increment their number on the appropriate achievement.  

Active Update

To address balance this update, we will be tweaking a few energy numbers from last week's update, but we also have a far grander change in store: Converting all passive skills into active ones.

That means Blood Lust, Reroute, Deadly Aim, Shadow Arts, Adrenaline, and all the Armor skills will be converted into active skills. Blood Lust and Reroute will become Mark of Blood and Battery Backup respectively. The purpose of this change is to add strategy to battle. Currently, passives grant HUGE benefits with little sacrifice, especially for level cap players. Active skills require more sacrifice in terms of energy cost and turn cost. To compensate for these sacrifices, the effects of the skills will be modified. This change will affect all classes so we're really interested to see what new strategies emerge from this change. 

Adrenaline

• Adrenaline

  • Replaced with Adrenaline Rush. Adrenaline Rush instantly grants the target a percentage of their maximum Rage.

Hybrid Armor, Mineral Armor, and Plasma Armor

• Hybrid Armor

  • Hybrid Armor now increases the target’s Defense and Resistance by a percentage of their base Defense and Resistance (the portion from your Dexterity and Technology) for 4 turns.

• Mineral Armor

  • Mineral Armor now increases the target’s Defense by a percentage of their base Defense for 4 turns.

• Plasma Armor

  • Plasma Armor now increases the target’s Resistance by a percentage of their base Resistance for 4 turns.

     

Reroute

• Reroute

  • Replaced with Battery Backup. Battery Backup grants the target an immediate boost to Energy, and doesn’t cost the user anything to cast.

Deadly Aim

• Deadly Aim

  • Deadly Aim was replaced by two new skills: Fire Scythe for Tech Mages, and Energy Parasite for Blood Mages

  • Fire Scythe deals physical damage to the target, ignoring a percentage of their Defense.

  • Energy Parasite applies a debuff that steals a percentage of the target’s current Energy for 3 turns, granting 1.5x the amount stolen back to the caster.

Blood Lust

• Bloodlust

  • Replaced with Mark of Blood. Mark of Blood leaves a mark on the target for 3 turns, granting lifesteal to anyone that attacks the marked target.

Shadow Arts

• Shadow Arts

  • Shadow Arts now casts the target in shadow and reduces all damage they take by a percentage for 3 turns.

Contest Announcement

When this update goes live, be sure to visit Elon Musk for a list of the winning entries! The effort so far has been stellar with such short notice. We are currently in the process of judging entries and narrowing down the list of finalists!

Tags: Titan Nightwraith Suggestion Shop Elon Musk contest Arcade Missions balance Skills Weapons Birthday

November 01, 2013

NEW CHANGES / FEATURES 

• New “Musk Mania” Arcade Game
  • New and returning Musk and Ebil-themed items
  • New Achievement
• 12 new home items
• New scavenger hunt mission chain on Elon Musk
• Mission manager now has scrolling
• Revamped Leaderboard layout supports up to 20 players, 5 portraits, linkage to character page

BALANCE

• Some active cores will now have energy costs

Tags: Nightwraith Patch Notes Cores Arcade Items balance

October 31, 2013

You've done it! The forces of Ebil have been vanquished from Delta V with the help of Elon Musk. This week, enjoy even more spoils of war with new weapons, new home items, balance improvements, new missions, and a new arcade game!

Musk and Ebil Gear!

Try your luck at the new Musk Mania arcade game for Musk-tech and Ebil-tech loot not available anywhere else in-game!

Can you win the grand prize?

Pumpkin Hunt!

Visit Musk to embark on an epic hunt spanning all of Delta V! Musk is preparing something special for you if you can complete all of his scavenger hunt missions and retrieve all the weird, wild pumpkins from the far corners of the planet!

Be vigilant! Some pumpkins will be harder to find than others!

Home Decor

Some of those pumpkins mentioned above, as well as several new Musk and Ebilcorp-themed items will be available as home items for your decorating pleasure!

Not so intimidating now, are you, Chairman?

Balance

Another change coming to this Friday's release is a balance update that will specifically address cores. For many builds, it is more useful to use a series of cores than to invest in particular skills and stats. For this reason, we are adding energy costs to many cores. This change will require you to think strategically about reserving enough energy to use all of your cores and necessary skills, adding variety and tactical choice to battle.

This is not the last balance change we have in mind, but because it is quite a big change, we could not fit in any other adjustments this week. Look for more farther reaching changes in the coming weeks. 

Storefront Cleaning

Next week, to refresh the Varium store, we are clearing out the following Varium packages:

• Exile package

• Legion Package

• Dread Package

• Omega Packages

If you have not already picked up one of these exclusive and powerful packages, now is the time to do so. Next week, they will no longer be available in the Varium store or in-game. Also, the items featured in the packages will be available for resale if you need the extra loot. 

Again, this change is not happening until NEXT WEEK so you still have another week to pick them up before they're gone! We wanted to announce this a week in advance so it didn't take anyone by surprise!

Tags: balance Arcade Weapons Elon Musk SolarCity SpaceX Tesla Nightwraith

May 23, 2013

Hey there, EpicDuelists! Ready for your heaping helping of Design Notes, served just the way mama likes 'em? Whose mama I'm not really sure. It's not my mama. But apparently she likes the way I write Design Notes. So, let's get started, shall we?

New Package

To commemorate the upcoming war, we'll be offering special packages with Legion and Exile goodies for your dueling pleasure. Each pack comes with a Physical Mutating weapon and an Energy Mutating Weapon, which come equipped with the Exile Strike Core (for Exiles), or the Legion Strike Core (for Legionnaires) that call in reinforcements against the opposing alignment. 

Balance Changes

To make battles a bit more engaging, passive skills are being converted into active skills. With so many points to distribute at the level cap, very little is sacrificed by investing in passives, to the point that they become requirements for most viable builds. Although not all passives will be converted to active skills this release, eventually we would like them all to become active.

Another long-overlooked area has been energy regain for mercenaries, so that class will now be given an energy regain skill. Since many of the changes are still in the testing phase, look for more specific balance changes in tomorrow's patch notes!

The Dread Plains

East of the Barrens lays the plains of Kiirdosh. At least, that's what they were called long ago. After the Kiirdosh Mountains were leveled for Varium mining, the plains were not suitable for human life, and the mountain lizard-goats and dire wolves took over the abandoned mining outposts. However, below the rich volcanic soil and pure groundwater are lodes and lodes of precious gems, and fuel sources, so Legion and Exile forces alike venture into the Dread Plains for the economic resources it contains.

The Plains are currently held by the Legion and overseen by the terrifying Administrator 10. There is a name he uses for official records, but like many coming from the Syndicate, it is not the name he was given at birth.  During the Uprising, many of Delta V's criminal element aligned themselves with Oz and the Exiles, and seeing his opportunity to forge a new life for himself, he traded his criminal allies for a cushy spot in the Administration. However, excepting all of her bad qualities Alydriah values loyalty and trustworthiness. This dishonorable man could not be trusted with the health and welfare of Delta V's populace, so although he is technically the administrator of Fortune City's 10^th District, his talent for underhanded tactics is much better suited for a post far, far away from the seat of the Administration. But his hold on the area is tenuous, and after feeling the sting of defeat at the hands of John St. Alban last year, Administrator Descarl isn't taking any chances and is personally supporting the Administrator in this endeavor.

            The miner grasped onto her holdfast and watched the pebbles crumble beneath her foot. The foothold was apparently not as sturdy as she'd hoped. Moreso than falling, she feared awakening the dire wolves who might attack the rest of the expedition. Finally, she got to the pit, attached her holdfast and lowered herself down into the infinite blackness.

 

            “Oi! Neris!” a male voice echoed up the shaft. “What took you so long?”

            “Your fat feet crushed up all the good footholds, ain't my fault.” She unhooked herself, landed, and turned on her helmet light to illuminate her partner's face. “Why's your helmet off?”

            The man's skin was blue from the silver deposited just below the surface, as is traditional for those from Delta VI, and his weathered face scrunched up. “You kiddin'? This feels just like home.” The surface of Delta VI is uninhabitable, so the people live in subterranean cities, illuminated by the bioluminescent fungi. Neris nodded, this was exactly like Taryn's homeworld.

            “Come on, we've got glass to harvest. The first sunrise is in 6 hours, so we ain't got long.” They ventured further, chiseling out a path along the way. After about an hour, she spotted a sparkle in the rocks. Varium. She waved Taryn over.

            “Man, this is better than glass.” Taryn shone his spectrophotometer on the crystal. “150 units for this rock. Ain't much, but there might be more.” Neris prepared the extractor, and cracked open the vein, revealing the beautiful gleaming varium.

            “A whole lot more than 150, Taryn. This is gonna change our lives” Overjoyed at their fortune, they gathered the precious crystal, losing track of time. Before they knew it, the time limit had passed. Panic fell over the two of them as light streamed through an opening in the wall. When they heard the growls, they knew the worst had happened. The wolves had awakened, and they were hungry.

            Taryn pointed toward the shaft. “We can take our chances with the mountain. Come on.” The two ran back through the cavern, the growls of the dire wolves echoing throughout. They reached the shaft, seeing two of their colleagues. Neris shouted for them to send down a cable, and began to scramble up. Neris reached the top first, while Taryn lagged. Neris pointed a gun straight down.

            “What are you doing?”

            “Don't move.”

            “What?”

            “You don't think I'm going to let you take this with you. I have better uses for this varium.”

            “Neris, what do you mean?”

            “I know you've been turning in Exile sympathizers. It took far too long to get close enough to do this.”

            “You're one of THEM?”

            “Don't act so innocent. I know you'd do the same. No, worse. I'll only kill you. You'd have handed me over to Baelius's goons. See you on the other side.” She shot- it went cleanly through his forehead and the body fell into the pit. One of Neris's companions shot a flare, causing the shaft to fall in on itself. The second sun rose, and the three Exiles traveled back to camp, the only witnesses to the murder a pack of wolves.

            Neris removed her helmet, revealing long black hair. Her companion who was not driving removed her helmet as well, displaying the pointed ears and delicate features of a Tech Mage.

            “My husband will give you a new name, and a new occupation as thanks for this.”

            Neris shrugged. “Anything for the cause, Calissa.” She took a knife out of her boot and started sawing at her hair. “Who am I now?”

            “Your name,” Calissa said “is Anya.”

Tags: Legion Legion exile exile Varium Varium Promotion Promotion War War balance balance Cores Cores balance balance Cinderella Cinderella

February 28, 2013

We are already on the cusp of the second week of the Golden Yeti Tournament and the competition is extremely fierce! There is still one more week to go so don't give up yet! Any breaks the leaders take is a chance for latecomers to swoop in a snatch one of the top 100 spots!

Do you see your name up there? Congratulations! But be afraid! Those top positions may be difficult to secure as the tournament continues!

New Cores!

Need some diversity in your build? Gear up with 3 new cores this Friday!

Nanosteel Armor: Critical hits getting you down? This passive armor core effectively reduces the damage reduction of all critical hits inflicted on your character!

*Dead Battery: Applies a curse to an enemy that causes that target's remaining energy to go to you if the enemy is defeated while the curse is active. This means that if you apply the curse to an enemy, and they still have 20 energy after dying, that energy is added to your own pool!* This works even if your ally is the one to defeat the target.

*Dead Battery still requires some more testing, but we do not wish to push the release any later. We will continue testing this core after the release and hopefully make it available next week!

Plasma Meteor: Meteor shower just got an energy damage based equivalent!

Sneaky, Sneaky Azrael

For those that missed it last week, we introduced two new Azrael Scythes last week on the Alydroid. These were limited quantity, so of course they sold out very quickly. This Friday, we will restock twice (depending on demand). Once at 10 AM EST, and again at 5 PM EST. We will also restock the Dage rares at these times. We will only restock if the quantities are depleted.

EpicDuel Turns Four!

It’s hard to believe that four years ago EpicDuel had just launched it’s first public Alpha. It’s even harder to comprehend how the game has changed since this momentous event. In that time, we’ve joined with Artix Entertainment, gone through four development phases, released thousands of weapons, developed countless features, and hosted over 100 million battles. Now we are in the midst of the most exciting evolution in EpicDuel’s history: Omega!

Mod Application Deadline

The application deadline is almost upon us, but it's not too late to submit! Please send your COMPLETE application before 12 P.M. E.S.T. this Friday (March 1st) to: EDCallForMods@artix.com

Lycus and Cinderella are still hard at work narrowing down the list of qualified applicants, but unfortunately, due to the volume of mail, we will not be able to respond to all of you to explain why you were not selected. 

Balance and Bugs

To round out the release, we're making some adjustments to balance, targeting the rise in power of Support builds and some more tweaks to help classes that are underperforming. We have some larger changes in mind to help with balance, but we don't want to do anything too drastic while the Tournament is still live.

There will also be a number of crucial bug fixes. For a complete, detailed list of the fixes and changes, check Rabble's patch notes shortly after the release goes live!

Coming Soon!

This guy.

Tags: Nightwraith Azrael Tournament Yeti Leaderboard Cores Omega LQS balance Bug Fixes Endless Moderators

October 24, 2012

In my part of the world, the leaves are changing, cool air is blowing on one’s face, everyone’s wearing (or, if you’re me, knitting) sweaters hats and gloves, and everything is pumpkin-flavored. Yes, it’s autumnn, and with the cool weather comes Nature’s bounty: a harvest. Delta V’s Harvest Festival is also soon approaching, with the return of last year’s Harvest content. This includes missions, the Harvest Husk, and the Harvest Reaper and Soul Reaper. These powerful limited rare mutating weapons include a 13% chance to attack your enemy with a rain of gourdy pain with the Jack O Fire skill!

The Harvest is also pulling up some new Harvest content, such as the Cardboard Crusader. This armor will be available for credits... though you probably shouldn’t wear it outside in the rain.

To commemorate the Harvest of Souls, Snork is forging an item commemorating his people’s history. What is it? Well, he hasn’t told me, but he did say that the most valiant warriors who can prove themselves in armed combat with him will have a chance to hold this mysterious rare item!

Oh My Gourd!

The amazing Charfade just revealed that she's created a big ol' pile of pumkins for your home decorating pleasure! Get your home ready for Trick and/or Treating this Friday!

I Can Has Suggestions, Plz? 

But that’s not all! After sifting through the bounty of awesome player suggestions, the Player Suggestion Shop will once again be open! Everyone whose item was chosen will receive their item in their inventory (regardless of cost, level, or class) and the Epic Artist achievement!*

*Massive apologies, but the Player Suggestion Shop will take a bit more time to finish. We tried to work through some technical difficulties, but ultimately couldn't finish it for today. We will have it out next Wednesday, fittingly enough, for Halloween! Stay tuned for more previews on Nightwraith's Twitter.

Spooooooky Countdown! 

The Spooky Head contest is still going on, but you’re running out of time- the contest ends this Friday, just before midnight Saturday. More details here: http://forums2.battleon.com/f/tm.asp?m=20723387

A Balanced Diet

Speaking of the forums, you may have noticed that, rather than cramming all balance discussions into one topic in EDGD, we’ve implemented a Balance Discussion subforum in the EpicDuel section of the AEF. If you’ve been on the fence about joining the AEF, now seems to be the best time to do so! http://forums2.battleon.com/f/tt.asp?forumid=415

Cover Your Torso!

As the cold autumn winds start to blow, now is the perfect time to acquire some coverings for your torsos! To help with this, HeroMart is introducing a new shirt to commemorate our 10 Year Anniversary as a company. Among the bonuses this shirt will give in the other games, in EpicDuel you will receive an exclusive sword, Artix's Triumph.  

Stats

Level: 30
Damage: 32
Strength Req: 30
Dexterity Req: 30
Technology Req: 30
Support Req: 0
Strength +: 2
Dexterity +: 10
Technology +: 10
Support +: 2

Something About a Dragon?

In addition to new shirts, HeroMart will also be stocking One-Eyed Doll's latest Album, "Something About a Dragon" which includes music from AE's games! 

As an in-game reward for purchasing the CD, in EpicDuel you will receive both One-Eyed Axes!  If you missed them in-game, this is the perfect opportunity to pick them up! If you already have them, you'll still have an awesome CD and two weapons you can resell for bonus currency!

Onward! To Victory!

So, what’s next? After this week, we’ll be plunging into building the next phase of EpicDuel, along with a pretty cool winter event (will it involve yetis? Quite possibly!) and Nightwraith promised to have some preview art up for you guys. Obviously, we’re all very excited about this prospect and we hope our players will be as well! :D

Revamped Mercenary concept by Thyton!

Tags: Cinderella Fall Autumn harvest balance Rabble Forums pumpkin Halloween Cardboard Crusader Snork Missions Seasons suggestions Shirts HeroMart

May 23, 2012

Hey there, EpicDuelists! It’s that time of week again: time for a heaping helping of fresh-baked Design Notes! Yum, yum! Hopefully Nightwraith won’t eat this batch before we’ve got everything down- I’d better get right to it, as he’s gnawing on the corner while I’m typing.

Memorial Day/LQS

In the United States, Memorial Day is celebrated in remembrance of American war dead, and we would like to thank our courageous men and women currently serving and have served to protect us.

To honor all heroes, we are introducing a seasonal Heroic Memorial Achievement, worth 1500 Rating Points that can be picked up from any VendBot.

Like many holidays in the US, it has another meaning: the unofficial beginning of summer! Warm, blue skies, beautiful sunshine... so how are we going to spend it? Indoors, in front of a computer, of course! For Memorial Day Weekend only, players will be able to grab the very first level 35 weapon, the Infernal Slayer Sword.  Kraggor's people are expert jewelcrafters and miners and have created a weapon of immense power and beauty.

The Infernal Slayer sword is crafted from the finest electrified crystals, forged in magma for beauty and strength. Silas Auer, Legion Administrator and old enemy of the Lawman, has acquired 1500 of these weapons to finance his role in the coming war. Visit this mysterious new character deep within the Infernal Mines to acquire one of these destructive works of art before they're gone forever!

Refinery Rundown

We’ll finally be opening up the Refinery, and introducing new d00ds, and along with that, two alignment-specific quest chains. Players should start at the Infernal Infiltration “Third Officers” (ie. Legion players should start at Nightwraith and Exile players should start at Galatea) for instructions on how to navigate the mine tunnels. Be sure to read the Mission Complete text carefully, as these won’t be easy, and will be filled with riddles. Your ultimate reward will be a blueprint scrap, which eventually will unlock special alignment goodies!

We’ll be looking for ways to avoid even the appearance of “punishing” loyalty, so in the end, if you switch alignment for these specific mission chains, all you’ll end up with is a handful of credits and an extra blueprint scrap you can’t use. So, really, it’s not worth it.

Cappity Cappity

During the war, which will be waged in earnest in the coming weeks, we’ll also be raising the level cap to 35, which should be good news for those at or near level 34. Not there yet? It’s the perfect time to become acquainted with Power Hour (10am and 10pm EST)!

Blood Commander

This week, we will be giving Mercenaries a small buff in the form of an upgraded version of Field Commander, Blood Commander, which will add a small % of life steal along with the strength buff.  This new skill will not stack with normal Field Commander or Blood Lust.  Tactical Mercenaries will retain Field Commander unchanged.

Carry All

For those whose inventories are about to burst, we have a solution.  We're allowing players to purchase up to 150 slots of inventory space, which should be more than enough space for all the goodies that you'll find during the upcoming War!

EpicDuel Artists Livestream

As we typically do once a month, on Sunday May 27th at 9:00 AM Eastern Standard Time, the EpicDuel developers will be hosting a livestream on the EpicDuel Artists Livestream channel. This will be a great opportunity to ask your burning questions about the upcoming war event! Last time I’m pretty sure we almost broke Livestream... can we do it again? Not sure what could possibly top the Derp Owl, but we’ll certainly try!

Question Mark or Comma?

A couple weeks ago, I was in the woods, and I happened to see a really beautiful trio of butterflies. I’d actually never seen this particular kind before, and I was very excited. Until I went to identify them: the butterflies I saw could be members of one of two similar, related species the Question Mark and the Eastern Comma.

Both butterflies are members of the family Nymphialidae, which means that their front legs are reduced, giving them the appearance of only having four legs, and puts them in the same family as the charismatic Monarch butterfly. The main difference between the two, from what I could find, is that the Question Mark (Polygonia interrogationis) and the Eastern Comma (Polygonia comma) is that the former is slightly redder. I do, however, believe this to be a Question Mark. Both species are kind of unique as the adults are not nectar feeders, but eat mineralized water, tree sap, or carrion.

Tags: Cinderella Memorial Day balance Summer Infernal Infiltration War Sword LTS livestream Missions

March 20, 2012

Hi there Epic Duelists! I had the awesome idea of writing design notes from my phone (or rather I was bored during my office hours; if you are my student: visit meeeeeeee!) so please forgive any devious Auto Corrects. This update is going to be pretty story heavy, so those of you who like story are in for a treat (warning: contains me).


Bunny Battles

Over the past week, thanks to your assistance, Mr. Cottontail has been able to construct two rabbit Battle Suits: one for leporid Capensis and one for the Captain Brachylagus. However, the suit lacks an on board computer system; Mr. Cottontail needs the assistance of his colleague -- fan-beloved character Ulysses to program the suits. Mr. Cottontail has informed Ulysses that you will be more than happy to assist him in anything is needs.

This quest line also takes you around to other sciencey-type people all over Delta V... For Science!

Beautified

Nightwraith isn't going to just be busy with everything I'm giving him for the missions (and there is quite a bit) but several screens are also getting a facelift this week. No longer will these areas be stuck in the recesses of 2009!

Getting Buff

As you know, the Mercenary class was scheduled to receive a buff, but that didn't happen then. But this is not then, it is now! Mercenaries will be receiving a new passive skill affecting rage. I don't have all the details yet, so keep watching this space for more info!

My Fair Lady

A new (to you) face being introduced this update is Ulysses' lovely companion Galatea. After Ulysses lost his eyes in the Incident, surgeon and laser enthusiast (a diamond is a girl's best friend when it's being used to focus a plasma beam) replaced them for him free of charge. Since then, she has remained loyal to the inventor and grew to become the Apple of his cybernetic eye.

What Gall!

A gall is a fleshy outcropping of plant material, usually caused by an insect or fungal parasite, although parasitic plants such as mistletoe can cause galls on the host. Insects that cause galls form them as microhabitats, and the gall provides protection, a starchy food source and a home for the insect. Typically, gall-forming insects live in the gall as larvae and emerge as adults, although this is not necessarily the case in eusocial gall aphids. Insects that cause galls include gall wasps, gall midges, gall flies, and gall aphids. I just learned today that mites, small arachnids closely related to spiders, also form galls in black cherry.

Call for Mods

We have so many qualified applicants for the available positions! The call is still open, but just a reminder: we are not looking for developers, just mods and testers. Any applications lacking a resume/CV will not be accepted, nor will any applications submitted by those under the age of eighteen.

Tags: Cinderella balance Mercenaries Bunnies War Missions Achievements Ulysses Mythology

March 14, 2012

Hippity Hoppity

Welcome to another Design Notes, EpicDuelists. As I announced on Facebook, we’ve got a lot of exciting things on the horizon for you! We’ve all been super-hard at work these past few weeks, getting stuff prepared for this and the coming weeks.

Rabble Rabble Rabble

RabbleFroth recently got back from the Game Developer’s Conference, the largest annual gathering of professional game developers, and he’s filled to the brim with ideas for how to improve our little game! He’s been working on a few different things that are being released this week. First on the agenda is a revamped leveling curve. Experience gains by level will make more sense for middle levels, although low and high level players won’t see much change. Along with the revamped leveling curve, weapons will be getting a balance to reflect a more consistent increase in power and value across all levels (eg. pricing, resale, requirements, bonus, damages). This is a major undertaking and may take several weeks to complete.

In addition to weapons balancing, the Mercenary class will also be receiving a buff of some kind. According to RabbleFroth's balance data, Mercenaries are having a great deal of trouble at the level cap in 1v1 battles. We've heard many complaints that Blood Shield is not useful enough, so we may be improving it or possible replacing it with a new, more useful skill.

Coming Attractions!

RabbleFroth isn’t the only programmer who’s been hard at work. Titan is releasing several bug fixes, including a bug with the Baby Yeti and a weird faction chat bug. In the coming weeks, we’re moving from CS3 to CS5 (yay Modernization!) to make things better for all of us, and combatting the ever-raging Lag Monster. This may sound like an easy task, but anyone who has developed for Flash knows that it is very picky when it comes to which version you are using, so a lot of the code that worked in CS3 simply will not work in CS5, and the software does little to indicate why. 

We’ll also be replacing the somewhat vague“Power Up!” button on the lost battle screen with helpful tips and tricks to end their losing streak!

The Bionic Battalion Cometh!

The bunnies have escaped from the Biological Preserve, but not every rabbit is a dumb bunny. Several of the rabbits have achieved sentience, and need your help to achieve their plans. These adorable creatures are not seeking world domination, destruction, or greatness- merely answers.

The first rabbit you’ll meet is Brachylagus, the Lagomorph Captain. The first of the rabbits to realize sentience, he is the driving force behind this ragtag group of superintelligent space rabbits. After determining to find others like himself, he was able to find several clever individuals: his lieutenant Myxoma, the strong and loyal Capensis, the gentle Lepus, and the genius Mr. Cottontail.

Brachylagus can be found in Central Station, but you’ll have to search all over Delta V for the other four, as they were separated when all of the rabbits escaped.

Shamrocks from Heaven!

There's now so much green on Delta V, that it's reached critical levels!  That means PvP drops will include, for a limited time, Emeralds of varying quality to redeem at any vendor for mega loot!

On the Silk Road

The Silkworm Bombyx mori is the larval form of the domesticated silkmoth. The moth was domesticated from a wild silkworm species and is completely dependent upon humans for survival. This species is completely reproductively isolated from wild populations and cannot reproduce on its own nor does it have any antipredator defenses, as they’ve been selected exclusively for their silk.

The silk itself comes from a cocoon the caterpillar spins over itself as it pupates. Typically, the silk is retrieved by boiling the cocoons, which kills the pupa. Alternatively, certain types of wild silk can be produced from wild silk moths or tussock moths (from family Saturniidae or Lymantridiae) that have eclosed from their pupae, thus negating the need to kill the pupa. This kind of silk is often called Ahimsa silk, but is not always as desirable, since the silk threads are cut when the insect emerges.

Call for Moderators!

We saved the best for last! With EpicDuel’s continued growth and expansion, we’ll need a few more people to join our team! Here’s a message from Nightwraith about it:

Want to be a mod? Want to spend hours a day not getting paid while helping your fellow players, catching cheaters, hackers, scammers and muting people who use abusive language?

If you answered YES to either of these questions, then you should probably check yourself into the nearest psychiatric hospital as soon as you can, but I also have exciting news for you.

We are looking for new mods / testers for EpicDuel, and now is your chance to apply! One thing we needs to stress - you MUST be over 18 year old. If you are under 18, if you don't include your age, or if you start with "I'm not 18 yet, but..." the application will not be considered.

What they need you to included in your email is:

1. Your real name, age, and country of residence.

2. EpicDuel Game account name and email address

3. Forum account name and email address if one is entered. (not required to have one)

4. Languages you speak/read

5. C.V. (Resume) *please note we'd like the CV in English.

Please send your COMPLETE application to beamod@battleon.com . If the application is not complete, we will toss it out. And please - one application per person.

We will read all the applications. If you are chosen to go through a further interview, we will contact you. Unfortunately, they cannot reply to everyone. If you do not hear from us, sorry.

Tags: Titan Bionic Battalion Bunnies Green Emeralds St Patrick's Day balance RabbleFroth GDC Moderators

February 29, 2012

This post only exists every 4 years

Geez, don’t take me so literally. I don’t constantly put hidden meaning into every syllable I type.

Happy Leap Day, players! Happy Birthday to all of you whose calendar age is 1/4 their chronological age. We’ve got some awesome stuff in store for you this week, so let’s say we jump right on in! (har dee har har)

Please, don’t leave me...

The Heartbreaker saga has come to its, well, heartbreaking conclusion. Players should go to the Guard Outpost in Fortune City to see how your plans turned out. I don’t want to spoil it for you guys, so you’ll just have to report to the Outpost to watch the cutscene.

Since we’ve concluded the Heartbreaker Saga, these missions will be going rare, as well as the Frysteland Aftermath missions, so now is the time to get those in if you haven’t done so already.

New Promotional Pack!

By popular demand (yes, Facebook fans, I’ve seen your constant posts and tweets begging for a new promo pack and “WHEN NEW PROMO PACK? ANSWER NOW!”), the Heartbreaker/Azrael promotional pack, along with all the other Heartbreaker-themed weapons will be going out NEXT week, so players still have another week to purchase this amazing item package.

The Celtic Cleaver, with its "Lucky Strike" skill, and all the other Celtic items from last year are coming back next week as well. What luck!

If it ain’t broke...

Due to the overwhelming popularity of PvP drops, we’re planning to add 50 more broken items! These broken items can be fixed by Ulysses for a mere fraction of the original varium cost, and these new weapons go all the way up to level 33! By Grabthar’s hammer, what a savings!

Balance Changes

A wild Tech Mage appears! Rabblefroth uses Balance Changes. It’s Super Effective!

The balance changes for low-level Tech Mages seemed to work really well, so this week we’re focusing on addressing balance at higher levels. Go Rabblefroth! :D

There goes the neighborhood...

If you follow me (@Cinderella_ED) or Nightwraith (@Nightwraith_ED) on Twitter, you may have seen us conversing with two of the NPCs, specifically Lysander Cox/the NegaWraith (@Negawraith_ED) and Alydriah Descarl (@AllWillObey). If you tweet, feel free to follow all of us on Twitter! In addition, if you haven’t already, “like” us on Facebook at facebook.com/EpicDuelOfficial

Drink! :D

This week’s Insect Fact is based on a brand spanking new paper (seriously, it was just published 10 days ago), so I’m super-excited about this. Endoparasitism by parasitoid wasps is a huge mortality factor for insect larvae across taxa, and insect species have various ways to combat parasitoid infection. One hypothesis for how insects combat parasitoids is the “nasty host hypothesis”, wherein in addition to normal immune response (insects do not have adaptive immune responses like we do, but they do have an immune system that allows them to fend off infection and encapsulate parasites) insects larvae are able to sequester allelochemicals from their host plants and sequester them in their hemolymph and body fat, which poisons the parasites. In the case of the fruit fly Drosophila melanogaster, fly larvae that are exposed to ethanol are not parasitized as often by wasps, and when larvae are infected, consumption of ethanol causes increased death of the wasp larvae. Also, after infection, the fly larvae will search for sources of ethanol to consume. Infected fly larvae are twice as likely to survive parasitism by a generalist parasitoid after consuming ethanol than those that did not, indicating that the fly is self-medicating with ethanol. This is not the first time that this has been observed- flies infected with bacteria will give themselves fevers by seeking out heat sources to kill the bacterial infection.

Tags: Cinderella Leap Day balance promotional package Twitter Nightwraith NegaWraith Heartbreaker alydriah

February 08, 2012

Welcome to another week, my EpicDuel droogies! This week’s going to be a little short on content, but big on features that all players should find something to their liking!

Drip Drip Drop!

Starting on Friday, EpicDuel will feature PvP drops. Essentially, every PvP battle in EpicDuel will work like an arcade battle, and every time you defeat one of your friends (or a complete stranger), you’ll have a chance at adding something nice to your inventory. It could be a weapon, it could be a gem, it could be a useless tin can... it is a mystery! Who knows what your opponents could be hiding?

Inventory Clearance

We’re not implementing stackable items yet, unfortunately, but Mission Items like the Skull Card, or special items you get for missions will no longer count toward your inventory space. This should benefit players, especially low-level non-varium players who have had to find ways to clear out enough space for mission items. With gem drops, one could stockpile a little treasure with this update...

The Realtor

We’ll be making improvements to the Housing system in EpicDuel, starting with the presence of a Realtor. Due to the increase in the housing market since the Exiles started returning to Delta V, there is an increasing demand for Realtors, who are able to lead customers through the benefits and risks of purchasing real property. One man, known simply as Mr. Alexander (or “Raymus” as it says on his deskplate) has stepped up to the challenge. Visit his office to learn more!

Heartbreaker Continued

We’re not continuing the Heartbreaker Saga this week, but be prepared for new faces (maybe someone who the exiles can use to their advantage?) and more chances to use that infinite mission item inventory space!

Teh Fixed!

Here is a comprehensive list of some of the minor fixes and features in this update!

Bad Aftertaste

Some insects store the toxic chemicals from the food they eat in their body fat, which makes them poisonous.  Think about the Monarch Butterfly caterpillar, a Nymph butterfly that is the classic example of this system.  It eats milkweed and stores the iridoid compounds from the plant on its body fat which makes the caterpillar nasty and poisonous. Insects that sequester toxins from their diet, such as caterpillars in the family Nymphalidae do so as a protection from predators. However, this leaves them open to parasitic and viral infection.

:3^^^>

Tags: Cinderella drops PvP bug facts Heartbreaker balance Finderbot Fixes Raymus