The Bard Enters the Stage!

Welcome to the Grand After Show Party!

On 28th October, just two weeks shy, the bard and the new DLC The Boglands will arrive. As a preparation well make the free update available on our Experimental Branch. Aside from the Bard it consists of several smaller changes and improvements, including performance improvements.

Experimental Update: 14th October

Live Update Expected: 28th October

You can join the experimental branch by right-clicking Halls of Torment in your library and then going into the properties. From there: Betas -> Beta Participation -> experimental

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[u]The Bard[/u]

• Will greet you for an encore after youve seen the outro cutscene.

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• If you have already beaten the game, the Bard will automatically arrive.

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• Along with the Bard there will be a new quest board.

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• The Bards Mark lets you select a Bard ability with any other character.

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[u]Bard Abilities[/u]

• The Bard will have six unique abilities.

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• Each ability will be unlocked from the start.

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• You can unlock additional traits and upgrades through the quest board.

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• Each ability has 2 core upgrades and at least one upgrade related to a status effect.

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• Bard abilities are synchronized with the three new music tracks in the game.

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[u]Metal Power[/u]

• When selecting the Bard, you must choose one of the three tracks to play with.

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• The beats of the music trigger the bards abilities.

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• When leveling up, the music becomes more intense.

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• It is possible to unlock the new tracks for all other characters.

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• On release well add the new tracks to the OST.

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[u]Other Changes[/u]

• In the Settings -> Input Methods a new option Manual Trait Selection can be found to change that level up screens open automatically so that they manually need to be triggered.

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• Added 6 new artifacts. 3 related to the bard and 3 new generic ones.

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• Some artifacts can now be obtained through quests.

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• Done a slight rebalancing of the Torment Ranks to have a less drastic increase per level. (Health x1.11 -> x1.09, Defense x1.10 -> x1.09, Movement Speed +1.5% -> +1.0%)

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• Changed that Ancient Signets add +50% Damage to specific abilities they apply.

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• Added rare Ancient Signets.

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• When a PS5 controller is connected, button prompts will swap to match the PS5.

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• Improved settings navigation via gamepad.

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[u]Bug Fixes[/u]

• Fixed an issue where pointers to collected objects would be still displayed even if it had been picked up.

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• Fixed an issue with discarding items during a run with the gamepad and also selecting marks with the gamepad.

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• Fixed an issue where Damage, Health and Force would show the wrong buff amount for shard upgrades.

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• Fix: Masters Vice artifact would not properly reduce the players Max Health.

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Stay Fresh!

• Chasing Carrots

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Update 2025-10-15

First Hot Fixes

• Green Goods Collector should now retroactively complete.

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• Meteor Strike should no longer crash the game when picking it.

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• Rare ancient signets would unlock the Morning Star upgrades when the base hasn\'t been taken before.

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• Bard\'s Dance traits would not grant an ability.

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Update 2025-10-16

More HoT Fixes

• Hotfixes Part II:

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• \"Unlimited Power\"-Quest will automatically complete if there are enough shards on game start.

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• Confetti Canon and Pyrotechnics now respond to the ability opacity setting.

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• It was possible to have no items in a \"guaranteed new item\"-chest.

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• > If all common and uncommon items have been retrieved, rare items should now be available.

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• Bard music now keeps playing after the lords spawn

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• Wall of Death trait would apply -20 Base Damage to everything

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• Wall of Death now applies affliction and the stats should now raise properly.

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• Added Bard entry to the compendium.

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• Flame Strike and Radiant Aura can now destroy breackables.

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Bog Fixes (not public yet)

• Crone\'s plant quests now display proper requirements-

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• Telegraphed area of crones bomb plants matches the grow in area.

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• Undergrowth and Enlightenment abilities no longer show up in the bard ability pool.

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• Disabled the Regeenration Potion, wasn\'t meant to be in the game.

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• Increase death animation speed of bog beetles.

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• Other tweaks and balancing notches.

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