Hello Archfriends! We've been chipping away in the background at improving the gameplay experience with Solium Infernum, as well as crafting our newest DLC Archfiend, Belphegor (which you should totally check out by clicking here, by the way)! We're incredibly proud to present the deep balancing changes we've mentioned in the past, as well as a bunch of new, free content as part of the Patch! [previewyoutube=N624aWQPP7c;full][/previewyoutube] https://store.steampowered.com/app/2893270/Solium_Infernum__Belphegor_Paragon_of_Impiety/ If you want the raw Patch Notes, we recommend you scroll right to the bottom of this article! Otherwise, our Senior Game Designer, Will, has written up a nice walkthrough for our thought process behind making many of the changes with this patch! Enjoy! [h2]The Turtling Reduction Initiative[/h2] Some players have reported that seeking and reinvesting tribute into Powers repeatedly is the surest path to victory: this results in a quiet board, followed by Titans and high-level Rituals being deployed “out of nowhere”. Needless to say, this strategy isn’t much fun for anyone involved, even for the player doing the reinvestment, so we’ve made a few changes to make it less viable. Notably we've been looking to lower the economic value of additional Order slots, to reduce the snowball effect of level 4 Powers and the Crown of Bureaucracy. In other words, we’re generally looking to have less cash available in the pure-Tribute (Power-scaling) economy, so that players need to move towards the Prestige economy instead. The following changes have been made to the game economy, to nudge play away from player-to-self interactions: [list][*] The cost of level 4, 5 and 6 Powers has been increased slightly. [*] Multi-currency tribute tokens are slightly less likely to appear in the draw, so Prophecy and Charisma are slightly harder to level. [*] The Tribute Quality penalty applied per order slot has been doubled. [*] Tribute Quality can now drop to to 0 rather than 1, which reduces the size of coins received when you use seek tribute in a later slot.[/list] [h2]Rewarding Forward Diplomacy[/h2] The challenge is to avoid slowing things down by encouraging and rewarding playstyles that are fun. Solium Infernum is at its best, in our opinion, when players are making demands, hurling insults, and getting into fights rather than "turtling" to themselves. To nudge the meta towards more of “the good stuff”, we’ve increased the overall demand for Prestige while also increasing the supply of Prestige provided by winning Vendettas and Duels. The following changes have been made to diplomacy, to nudge play towards player-to-player interactions: [list][*] The cost of Ranks has been increased to 40, 80 and 120. [*] The Vendetta prestige bonus now has a flat offset of 5, just like duels, in addition to the bonus that scales with your wager. [*] The maximum amount of prestige you can wager in Vendettas and Duels has been increased for higher Ranks. [*] You can now Assert Weakness after only 2 consecutive, accepted Demands, rather than 3: this makes stone-walling more dangerous. [*] Increased Duel forfeit penalty from 10 to 15. [*] A few other diplomacy changes while we’re here: [*] Lowered cost of Lure of Excess to 5, but kept rejection penalty at 10 to buff Erzesebet's Dark Art.[/list] [h2]Counters for Sabotage Rituals[/h2] Rituals like Loot The Vaults, Corrupt Tribute and Demonic Interference can be used to keep a careless opponent “in the stone age”, which isn’t much fun for the victim. To help mitigate this, we’ve made a few changes to cap out the power of these Rituals, and to provide more effective ways of countering them. The following changes have been made to Rituals, to lower the effectiveness of anti-game strategies: [list][*] Swapped the positions of Expose Treason and Evil Ward on the Prophecy tree: you can now increase your Deceit resistance at Prophecy level 1. [*] Halved the cost and raised the resistance provided by these Rituals. [*] Demonic Interference can no longer reduce you below 1 ritual slot - it still clears the target’s Ritual table when it first starts, however. [*] Machines and Events that lower Archfiend Powers will now also end any Rituals that require those Powers. [*] Swapped the positions of Elocution and Infernal Negotiations on the Charisma tree: another slight change to help reduce the effectiveness of turtling. [*] Reduced Infernal Juggernaut speed boost from 2 to 1: we’d like this Ritual to stay strong, but we want to see fewer surprise eliminations. [*] Reduced Pain & Punishment cost from 3 to 2 Hellfire: to combat under-use and create a distinction between it and Infernal Affliction on the cost axis. [*] Murmur’s Macabre Hosts no longer require Command Rating, to make up for the following base Command Rating (see below). [*] Devourer Statuettes now provide Destruction Resistance when equipped, so it’s worth leaving them on your Ritual Table. [/list] [h2]Fairer Starting Conditions[/h2] Some players love the variety that the “old school”, highly random map and Bazaar generation provide, but other players are frustrated when they don’t get what feels like is a fair starting location, and may leave the match in protest. We’d like to reduce the number of players who leave games early, so we have been working on making the starting conditions a bit more fair. The following changes have been made to the game random generation, to help improve fairness and consistency: [list][*] We now guarantee that a weak Place of Power will be close to each player’s Personal Guard. [*] The Bazaar no longer stocks Primers that aren’t useful on the chosen map (eg. Ravine Training when there are no ravines). [*] There are now always 5 Bazaar slots, regardless of the number of players. [*] We’ve adjusted the Bazaar's quotas to help ensure that it doesn’t fill up with unaffordable items - it will now always stock 2 affordable Legions, for instance.[/list] [h2]Manuscript Improvements[/h2] At times, your minions would 'get the wrong idea' and complete Manuscripts that you had no interest in completing. This has made completing Machine Schematics, in particular, very difficult. These issues were further exacerbated by Manuals not providing enough of a bonus to merit training Praetors: you tended to get more bang for your buck using bribery. The following changes have been made to make Manuscript-focused play both more enjoyable and more viable - we have notably overhauled the Seek Manuscript action entirely: [list][*] Using Seek Manuscripts early in the turn now provides more fragments to choose from - it doesn’t affect the chance of completion in any way. [*] Ring of Tartarology now provides +2 rather than +1 Manuscript draw to make up for this change. [*] We’ve made various under-the-hood changes to make the Manuscript draws more varied. [*] Schematic Manuscripts now only 3 fragments, but the resulting Machines now only reduce your opponents' Powers by 1. [*] Manual Manuscripts now provide significantly more strength to the slot the are used on, so training Praetors is more viable. [*] Gambler’s Strike now deals either x1 or x2 damage, rather than x0 or x3, based on the result of its coin flip.[/list] [h2]Improving Relic Balance[/h2] Some Relics are under-utilised, and when experienced players are choosing from a more limited subset of Relics it is easier to predict what an opponent has equipped by process of elimination. We’ve thus taken a look at these “forgotten children”, and have attempted to make them a bit more worthwhile. The following changes have been made to made underused options more viable: [list][*] Ring of Command: Lowered the base Command Rating that players have from 3 to 2, to make sure that it feels sufficiently “tight” to be valuable. [*] Amulet of Wrath / Deceit / Prophecy / Destruction / Charisma: these Relics now protect the affected stat from all modifications. [*] We have adjusted the discount provided by the Crown of Authority to make up for the increased Rank costs.[/list] That's all the insight from Will for now! We also have the raw patch notes, which are more comprehensive and include more changes. !! REMINDER TO UPDATE YOUR VIDEO DRIVERS. OUTDATED DRIVERS LEAD TO POOR PERFORMANCES OR CRASHES !! [h1]Patch Notes[/h1] [h3]New Archfiend: Belphegor, the Paragon of Impiety[/h3] [list][*] Adds the new Archfiend Belphegor, the Paragon of Impiety. [*] Includes unique Stronghold, Legion, Dark Art ability, and Chronicle mission.[/list] [h3]New Bazaar and Board Items[/h3] [list][*] Added new Legion, Bane of the Righteous. [*] Added new Place of Power, The Bronze Pyramid. [*] Added new Praetors, Temeluchas and Queen of the Damned. [*] Added new Artifact, Feretory of False Prophets. [*] Added new Manuscripts, Lava Training and Vent Training.[/list] [h3]AI Improvements[/h3] [list] [*] Added AI difficulty levels - Easy, Moderate, Challenging, and Hellish. [*] AI will make better use of rituals to damage and enfeeble targets. [*] Improved AI’s ability to usurp Pandaemonium. [*] Improved AI’s ability to eliminate other players. [*] Improved AI understanding of Legion Abilities and Keywords. [*] Improved AI consideration of other players when attacking PoPs. [*] Improved AI ability to complete Schemes. [*] And more![/list] [h3]UI Improvements[/h3] [list][*] Added a tooltip that gives a breakdown of a target’s known Ritual Strength and Resistance. [*] Added a visual highlight behind the Begin Game button in Game Lobby. [*] Game Client will now flag when attempting to enter a match with a mismatched version to the server. [*] Hover Tooltip on Places of Power will now display the name of that piece, rather than “Plains”. [*] Added Stratagem effects to the Combat Log. [*] Improved UX in Active Games tab when game client is unable to reach server. [*] Improved the Increase Rank tooltip to provide more information. [*] Resolved missing or broken text in some tooltips. [*] Fixed some instances where Combat or Ritual UI could get stuck after Turn Resolution. [*] Added more Order Failed messages. [*] And more![/list] [h3]General Bugfixes/Improvements[/h3] [list][*] Fixed an issue where the Abyss Leviathan would grow in size during its spawn animation. [*] Increased speed of non-combat damage phase in Turn Resolution. [*] Improved the autopay system’s handling of large amount of tribute coins. [*] Improvements to handling of turn timers. [*] Fixed the Masking Mirror to retain masked status between turns. [*] Fixed an issue where revealing an opponent’s Raise Power schemes would reveal their level in that Power. [*] Improved Abyss Strider behaviour. [*] Fixed an issue where a Deceit Ritual could create VFX on multiple cantons. [*] Fixed an issue where legions in the Bazaar appeared to be receiving Combat Support from Abyss Striders. [*] Fixed a number of smaller bugs.[/list] [h1]Known Issues[/h1] Please make sure to update your video drivers before playing the game. Outdated drivers may lead to poor performance or crashes! [list][*] The grand event Paperwork Restructure may not cancel a Demand that is already in flight. We are working on a fix for this! [*] Drums of Woe’s Deafening Thrum ability is not cancelling the Shadow Shield ability of the Black Monolith. We are working on a fix for this! [*] The Timer Warning Gong may sound twice. We’re working on a fix for this! [*] Belphegor’s Animated model may be covered by the Turn Timer when seen in the Domain View - AKA he’s being Wazowski’d. We’re working on a fix for this! [*] The scheme Witness True Power may not complete correctly. We’re working on a fix for this! [*] The Devourer may not play its spawn animation. We’re working on a fix for this! [*] Combat Stratagems may display a broken string in the Breakdown Tooltip. We’re working on a fix for this! [*]A player that becomes Blood Lord may lose a diplomatic state with a third player (not the Vassal though). We’re working on a fix for this![/list] Enjoy! We'll see you out there (in Hell)! <3 Chan + the LoG Squad https://store.steampowered.com/app/2893270/Solium_Infernum__Belphegor_Paragon_of_Impiety/