Just a quick update today with a lot more map updates and improvements, some knife balancing (which is just as dangerous as it sounds), and a host of bug fixes and tweaks. Let's dive in!

Map Fixes & Tweaks
Last update, we made major revisions to our map and mini-map. We asked for feedback -- and we got it! With your copious feedback and commentary, we've fixed a lot of bugs and added a lot more improvements, including:

• The map's zoom slider returns!
  
• Added several customization options to the map, accessible by clicking on the new gear icon.
  
• The map sidebar can now be attached to either the left or right side of the map.
  
• Auto-following of the map can now be disabled, so you can freely explore the map while moving.
  
• Minimap resizing & disabling is now more obvious via the gear icon.
  
• Zone name & current time are now shown when the map sidebar is collapsed.
  
• NPC Vendors now display their currently available councils and, if applicable, how long until their councils reset in their map info.
  
• Party member names are now shown when their map icon is hovered over.
  
• When a map pin is selected or created, its label text field is auto-focused.
  
• Most portals throughout the world now show up as portal icons when targeted.
  
• Fixed a bug with party member map icons breaking.
  
• Your pet no longer prevents placing of map pins.
  
• Map pins can now be deleted by right-clicking on them.
  
• Map pins can be added directly on the minimap.
  
• Minimap resizing now saves.
  
• Fixed a bug that would sometimes cause map pins to not save properly.
  
• Fixed nameplate placement of portals.
  
• Removed fae molluscs & cows from maps.
  
• Uriana and the Wintertide Portal, both in Fae Realm, now display on the map.
  
• NPCs now disappear from the map when they de-spawn.
  
• Added a new map filter for Events.
  

• Surprise Throw: changed from having a 45-second reset time to 12 second reset time; treasure revised accordingly, see below. (Note: this change is a *dramatic* buff to the ability's total DPS and usefulness, although the treasure numbers below may make it seem like a nerf.)
  
• Poisoner's Cut: buffs from this ability last 8 seconds instead of 5 seconds
  
• Fending Blade: innate Rage reduction is increased
  
• Venomstrike: deals its Poison damage over 10 seconds instead of 12
  
• Surge Cut: reset time changed from 20 seconds to 10 seconds. It is now a Minor Heal ability instead of a Survival Utility ability. Treasure effects recalibrated/rewritten.
  
• Bug fix: Fan of Blades is now marked as a Burst attack instead of a Ranged attack
  

• (Head, Necklace) "Surprise Throw Damage +78%" => +40%
  
• (Chest) "Surprise Throw deals +43% damage and stuns the target if they are not focused on you" => +134 damage and stuns the target if they are not focused on you. Also, this effect is now only available on Chest, not Legs. Items that already have this effect on Legs will now be Legacy. (See below.)
  
• (Hands, Ring) "Surprise Throw restores 143 Power if the target is not focused on you" => "... restores 80 Power if the target is not focused on you"
  
• (Legs, OffHand) "Fan of Blades, Hamstring Throw, and Surprise Throw deal +44% damage and reuse timer is -1 second" => "... deal +25% damage and reuse timer is -1 second"
  
• (Legs, Feet) Backstab deals an additional 695 Trauma damage over 10 seconds if the target is not focused on you. => 1400
  
• (MainHand, OffHand) "For 5 seconds after using Opening Thrust, all knife abilities with 'Cut' in their name deal +28 damage" => +60
  
• (Head, MainHand) "Blur Cut restores 52 Health after a 15 second delay" => "Blur Cut restores 35 Health"
  
• (Chest, Feet) "Slice deals 175 Poison damage over 10 seconds" => 275
  
• (Head, Legs) "Fending Blade deals +64 damage and reduces Rage by 600" => +102 damage
  
• (Feet, Ring) "Fending Blade restores 32 Health to you immediately and reduces the target's Rage by 400 after a 5 second delay" => "Fending Blade restores 41 Health to you and reduces the target's Rage by 400"
  
• (MainHand, Ring) "Venomstrike deals an additional 240 Poison damage over 12 seconds" => 375 over 10 seconds
  
• (Hands, OffHand) "Venomstrike has a 50% chance to stun the target and deal +60 damage" => "Venomstrike deals +100 damage and has a 50% chance to stun the target"
  
• (Chest, Feet) "Gut deals an additional 260 Trauma damage over 10 seconds if the target is not focused on you" => 440
  
• (MainHand, OffHand) "Gut deals +60 damage and if target is not focused on you, deals +25% Trauma damage over 10 seconds" => "Gut deals +80 damage and if target is not focused on you, deals +40% Trauma damage over 10 seconds"
  
• (MainHand, Necklace) "Surge Cut restores +95 Health to you" => 72 health
  
• (Chest, Legs) "Surge Cut restores 120 Armor to you" => "Surge Cut restores 67 Power to you"
  
• (Head, Ring) "Surge Cut deals 265 Trauma damage over 10 seconds" => 305
  
• (Chest, Legs) "Blur Cut deals 145 Poison damage over 10 seconds" => 215
  
• (Necklace) "Marking Cut deals +146 armor damage and does not cause the target to shout for help" => this effect is now only available on Necklaces. Existing off-hand items with this effect have become Legacy. (See below.)
  
• (Legs) "Slice ignores mitigation from armor and deals +101 damage" => this effect is now only available on Legs. Existing off-hand items with this effect have become Legacy. (See below.)
  
• (Head, MainHand) "Backstab steals 121 health from the target and gives it to you" => "Backstab deals +198 direct damage. You recover 198 Health (or Armor, if Health is full) over 12 seconds."
  
• (OffHand, MainHand) "For 5 seconds after using Opening Thrust, all knife abilities with 'Cut' in their name deal +60 damage" => For 10 seconds
  
• (Chest, Hands) "Opening Thrust has a 25% chance to cause all Knife abilities WITHOUT 'Cut' in their name to have a 38.5% chance to deal +39% damage for 10 seconds" => "For 10 seconds after using Opening Thrust, all Knife abilities gain +20 Accuracy and have a 20% chance to deal +25% damage"
  

• (Head) "Fan of Blades, Hamstring Throw, and Surprise Throw deal +100 damage and can Critically Hit based on your Anatomy skill levels"
  
• (OffHand, Necklace) "When wielding two knives, Knife Fighting attacks with 'Cut' in their name deal +43% damage"
  
• (Chest, Feet) "Poisoner's Cut boosts Direct Poison Damage an additional +79 per attack"
  
• (OffHand, Ring) "Knife abilities with 'Cut' in their name leave a Lasting Mark in the target for 30 seconds. When the target dies, each Lasting Mark hastens the active reset time of Backstab by 3 seconds, or if Backstab isn't on your ability bar, you instead recover 36 Power and your next Slice attack deals +80 damage."
  
• (Hands) "Backstab deals +83% Direct Damage to Elite targets"
  
• (Legs, Feet) "Surprise Throw boosts your Epic Attack Damage +206 for 30 seconds if target is not focused on you"
  
• (Head, Ring) "Taunt from Attack Damage -33.5% and Rage From Attacks -10.5% while Knife Fighting skill active"
  
• (Hands) "Duelist's Slash hits all targets within 8 meters and deals +82 damage"
  
• (OffHand) "Slice deals +86 damage and causes target to suffer +86 damage from future attacks for 30 seconds"
  
• (MainHand) "Backstab deals +85% Direct Damage if target is stunned"
  
• (Legs) "Marking Cut deals +60 damage and grants +85 Accuracy to your next Knife ability"
  
• (Ring) "Duelist's Slash deals +82 damage and for 12 seconds afterwards all melee Knife abilities can Critically Hit based on your Anatomy skill levels."
  

• Slightly increased the drop rate of barley seeds when harvesting barley.
  
• Bug fix: Battle Chemistry: (Ring) "Toxic Irritant causes the target to suffer +15.5% from Acid Damage (including Toxic Irritant) for 15 seconds." => This effect did not work (in fact it debuffed the caster instead of the target). It's been revised as follows: "Toxic Irritant boosts your Acid Damage (including from Toxic Irritant) +15.5% for 15 seconds. (This effect does not stack with itself.)"
  
• Khyrulek's curse damage no longer benefits from the victim's Trauma buffs.
  
• Fixed a bug that could cause monsters to react to damage they suffer after death. (Which could cause doors to be opened/closed incorrectly.)
  
• Community Chest slots in Serbule can now actually be purchased with Live Event Credits.
  
• Deer are no longer invisible up close.
  
• Fixed a bug causing the party UI to stick around if you switch characters.
  
• Using /nap while in wolf form no longer infiniloops.
  
• Fixed a bug with channeled abilities causing you to infinitely loop an animation the next time you perform an emote.
  
• Fixed a bug where someone playing music near you would later cause your own animations to interrupt your music playing.
  
• Bird forms' music-playing is no longer interrupted by other animations.
  
• If you are Friends with Irkima in the Red Wing Casino, you might want to check in with him. (Requires one 70+ combat skill.)
  
• VIPs now have access to a few more special emotes, including a real head scratcher. And don't forget to check out the VIP redemption for March if you haven't already! Pity you can't glamour that bug ...
  

Welcome to another exciting PG update! Can you believe it's late February already? Today's update has the usual set of additions, improvements, fixes and tweaks, of course -- but the biggest news is an extensive update to the map system! (You know, that sounded more exciting in my head.) Let's take a look!

Updated Map System
One of PG's charms is the sheer amount of exploration available. It's a big world filled with hundreds of people and places to remember, each with their own lore and likes and history to explore. There are hundreds of skills to learn, thousands of items to collect, trade, or gift - the world is wide open! But keeping track of all of that in a way that makes it fun for you to explore the world and set your own goals - especially in relation to NPC management - has been a bit of a long-standing problem for us.

To address that, we've taken a hard look at the map system in Project: Gorgon and made some pretty sweeping improvements. The in-game map now lets you view NPCs, portals, meditation pillars, and teleport platforms as you discover them; even better, you can now find some of the most critical info about NPCs in your area at a glance -- which can really help you decide what you want to focus on.

Let's look at the details:

• NPCs: After meeting an NPC for the first time, they'll show up on your map. Their list of known services and item preferences are displayed, showing more and more information as you uncover them. Your current favor level with that NPC is displayed, alongside any new unlocks you'll get when you level up their favor. You can also take custom notes on any NPC.
  
• Teleport Platforms: You can now see Teleport Platforms on the map, with how many times you've used each one.
  
• Meditation Pillars: You can now see Meditation Pillars on the map, with the corresponding Combo that's granted when you meditate at one.
  
• Portals: You can now see portals to other areas/dungeons on the map.
  
• Filters: Don't want all the new info cluttering up your map? Simply turn them off!
  
• Pin Customization: There's now a more intuitive UI for customizing your own map pins, with extra color options.
  
• Pets: Your pets now show up on the map, and can be clicked on to see which one has fallen behind.
  
• Minimap: The minimap has gotten a visual upgrade. You can easily toggle between seeing all pins, personal pins only, or no pins at all on the mini-map.
  

• New experimental monster behavior: Monsters no longer chase players as far if they've only taken minor damage and are unable to land a hit.
  
• New experimental monster behavior: Monsters who are called in to assist their friends are slightly less dogged in how long they chase.
  
• Improved some loot drop unique stats for Boss Gauntlet bosses.
  
• Fixed AI bug: during the first second of combat, monsters could choose to use their self-buff even if no other allies were supporting them.
  
• Orc monsters' reaction to being slowed or being unable to chase their attacker is to throw a Khopis; this Khopis now slows their opponent.
  
• Aktaari that are slowed or unable to successfully chase their attacker use a new slowing spittle attack.
  
• Spriggan Weeds have unique combat behaviors (instead of using generic animal logic).
  
• The Big Slime in Carpal Tunnels should no longer summon level 90 slimes.
  

• Abilities that have a chance for critical hits now display this info in their ability tooltips.
  
• Minor change to Hammer treasure effect: (Necklace, Ring) "Reckless Slam deals +89 damage and taunts -345" => "Recklass Slam deals +105 damage"
  
• Alchemical item "Aiming Potion" now applies to critical hits from anatomy criticals as well as phrenology criticals.
  
• Alchemy items "Telka's Teeth": all tiers now last 15 minutes.
  
• Changed treasure effect: "Long Shot increases target's vulnerability to Trauma and Acid +10% for 20 seconds. (Max of 2 stacks.)" => now also debuffs Poison
  
• Changed treasure effect: "Tundra Spikes stuns all targets after a 6 second delay" => 8-second delay. (The top tiers of this effect were reduced because the delay was too short to take full advantage of.)
  
• New treasure effect: Archery: (Chest, OffHand): "Acid Arrow deals 365 Poison damage after a 6-second delay"
  
• Low-level item "Ring of Critical Hits" now applies to anatomy criticals as well as phrenology crits. (Just because it should.)
  
• "Bounding escape dispels any active Slow or Root effects..." now works on Ice Cocoon.
  
• Fixed scaling on high-level Provoke Undead & Raise Zombie abilities.
  

• Added new basic emotes: /point, /yes, /no, /agree, /nod, /disagree
  
• New command: /target targets the closest entity whose name matches or contains the text. This is rudimentary right now, and does not affect the order of tab-targeting. /ta is an alias.
  
• Added 2 new hotkeys: Select Next Pet & Select Previous Pet.
  
• Right-clicking a pet's state (Attack, Follow, etc.) now sets that state for all active pets.
  
• When a pet is selected, its name now highlights in the pet window.
  
• Item rarity and level overlay now applies to storage & merchant UIs.
  
• Vendor item prices now update in real-time, if e.g. you buy back all of the items you previously sold the vendor, or a player updates their store's pricing.
  
• Attempting to Stow an item with a max carryable amount into a maxed stack no longer deletes the item.
  
• Added right-click menu options for turning mushrooms into powders.
  
• Fixed right-click menu options for Hides (to easily convert them to leather rolls).
  
• Low level Werewolf Hind Leg Guards (Enchanted) recipes only require the non-enchanted versions now.
  
• Fixed teleport platform in Serbule Hills that would cause Foxes to fall under the world.
  
• Kur now uses dark versions of map icons.
  
• Fixed bug causing Book UI button text to overflow the button.
  

Welcome to our first update of 2024! Today we say farewell to the Ri Shin celebration, and hello to a host of improvements, changes, fixes... and a new high level dungeon.

Boss Gauntlet 2
First, about the original Gauntlet: at the end of 2022 we released "Boss Gauntlet '22", which was intended to be a temporary super-hard encounter that would be removed later on. Then we remembered how we hate throwing good content away. So now it's permanent! (Yes, you predicted this back in '22. Shush.) The 20 original bosses of Boss Gauntlet '22 are now called "Boss Gauntlet 1". These bosses have had their level raised to the new maximum of 95, and some of the encounters have been beefed up a little based on feedback.

We're excited to introduce Boss Gauntlet 2, with even more bosses and even crazier scenarios for your group to deal with. You can enter Boss Gauntlet 2 by completing the first one -- a door will open and let you in. Alternatively, there's a portal machine in the beginning of Boss Gauntlet 1. Using this machine will let you jump directly to the new gauntlet. It costs Hubris to activate the portal.

Completing Boss Gauntlet 2 for the first time will net you 25 Live Event Credits, same as the first Gauntlet.

(A note for those who ran the original Gauntlet '22: there used to be five hidden bosses; these have been taken from their hidden rooms and added to Gauntlet 2.)

Most of our group-play content is intended to be enjoyable with pick-up groups, where you join up with whoever you happen to meet in the dungeon. But Boss Gauntlets are intended for a dedicated group, typically a guild, who want a very difficult challenge to overcome.

If our usual group content is more your style, there's good news: we're hard at work on the final portion of Errruka's Cave, which will be a level 95 group experience. Coming soon!

Monster Changes
Elite and Boss monsters now have a bit more health and armor. The amount varies by monster tier and level, but to give some generalizations:

• A typical level 80 Elite now has 12% more Max Health and Max Armor.
  
• A typical level 80 boss now has 20% more Max Health and Max Armor.
  
• The hardest tier of bosses now have 25% more Max Health and Max Armor.
  

• These abilities previously stunned the monster that used them for 5 seconds and then applied a buff.
  
• Now, the monster stands still (but not stunned!) for 5 seconds, then uses the ability.
  
• If the monster is killed, stunned, mesmerized, feared, or knocked back during those 5 seconds, the buff is aborted.
  
• Important Bugfix: Monsters no longer consider dead allies when calculating whether they have enough friends to perform a self-buff.
  

• Tornados have faster cooldown on their lightning bolt attack.
  
• "Turret Crystals" -- those crystal enemies that shoot beams at you -- have faster attack speed.
  
• Gazluk Healing-Suit Tester is weaker (receives less healing from nearby crystals).
  
• Orcs' Electricity Sigils are a bit more potent.
  
• Ranalon Guardians of all levels have a bit more Max Health.
  
• Tornado Spiders can fly (although they still prefer walking).
  
• Mantis Teachers in Mope's dungeon are a bit tougher.
  

• The "Aktaari Queen" event now starts at the same time each game day, at 9am (game time), rather than starting at whatever game-time the first player showed up. This should help players plan better.
  
• Elite Aktaari (guardians and bosses) are now a bit tougher, and are marked as "no-lock", meaning that their loot is available to all players that help kill it (instead of just the first hunting group that attacked it, as before).
  
• Moved a teleport destination in Aktaari caves to an earlier point in the cave -- after the giant blocks but before the acid pit rather than after the acid pit.
  
• Fixed "air tube" type apparatus in several dungeons, including Aktaari caves. They were using testing values that caused the air to refill in 10 seconds instead of the intended reset of 2-3 minutes (depending on the dungeon).
  

• Hammer: new treasure effect: (Head, Off Hand): "Hammer attacks that kill an enemy via direct damage restore 46 Power to you."
  
• Hammer: new treasure effect: (Ring): "Direct Electricity Damage, Direct Fire Damage, and Direct Cold Damage +20% while Hammer skill active"
  
• Knockdowns are now separate from Stuns for purposes of diminishing returns. This means you can Stun, then Knockdown an enemy, and have full duration from both.
  
• Weak slow effects no longer affect diminishing returns for subsequent strong slows/roots.
  
• Bugfix: Some sources of indirect damage did not reduce monster regeneration as intended.
  
• Bugfix: Unarmed treasure effects that absorb damage and redirect it into your attacks were bugged: they stopped working when you logged out or switched areas, and wouldn't work again until you re-equipped the item.
  
• Bugfix: "Raise Skeletal Ratkin Mage 7" raised the same level of pet as "Raise Skeletal Ratkin Mage 6".
  

• Emoting (such as watering plants or waving) should no longer interrupt music playing.
  
• Stephie Blackhammer in Povus no longer offers barters; instead she has daily crafting quests
  
• When each phase of the Povus nightly event is completed, any leftover monsters from that phase de-spawn much more quickly
  
• An augment's associated skill could clash with the skills of the mods already on the item, causing the transmutation system to think no mods were available due to skill incompatibility. This will no longer occur.
  
• Crafting Electric Cyan Dye now requires real ingredients instead of just Masterwork Metal Slabs.
  
• Crafting Caravan: Added level 90 tasks to all applicable Caravan NPCs.
  
• Crafting Caravan: Changed the required items on two tasks to bring them in-line with their level range.
  
• Fixed a bug causing hard-core broken gear to not display properly when horse-equipped gear also breaks.
  
• When selecting a title in the GUI list, tooltips explain how that title was earned.
  
• Fixed tooltip display issue with damage from Bun-Fu Kick's delayed damage.
  
• Using some Fireworks and Confetti Bombs now triggers an appropriate emote. (Except for Small Confetti Bombs; those are just too quick to look right.)
  
• Restored some info to various sources JSONs.
  
• VIPs: Don't forget to check your redemptions! (It's the little gift box icon at the bottom of the Persona panel, which you can find on the right-hand sidebar - third button from the bottom. Or just type /redeem in chat.)
  

• Revised both versions of the "Healing Suit Tester" encounter in various ways (but making them easier overall).
  
• Fixed an exploitable bug with a Finishing Blow treasure effect that incorrectly boosted indirect damage. This is fixed on the server, but tooltips can still be wrong in-game until the next client update.
  

This is a quick bug-fix update.

Bug Fixes & Tweaks

• Battle Chemistry Fix: "Bomb attacks deal +50 damage and cause your next Healing Mist to restore +60 Health over 30 seconds" => this was actually boosting healing 6x more than intended. Corrected to match description.
  
• Battle Chemistry Fix: "Bomb attacks deal +61 damage and cause your next Healing Mist to restore +50 Armor over 15 seconds" => this was actually boosting healing 5x more than intended. Corrected to match description.
  
• Summon Deer 6 now requires Summon Deer 5 instead of 4.
  
• Fixed: When analyzing the genetics of a corpse, XP earned was based on the level of the player rather than the level of the corpse being analyzed.
  
• Survival Instincts: Lend Grace 5 is now grouped with its other Lend Grace buddies.
  
• Three-Nostriled Barrier now remains open appropriately.
  
• Swollen Hands curse no longer prevents you from wearing a helmet.
  
• Glamour Berries from Riston are now usable (and more generally, attuned ingredients can be used in crafting).
  
• Tomato plants grow much slower.
  
• Renamed some "Amazing" hat recipe-teaching items to "Astounding".
  
• Human-Style Pizza with Tofu is now correctly labeled as a meal.
  
• Added a comma to food-related crafting recipes, to separate the recipe level from the type of food it creates (meal, snack etc.).
  
• Evu Fruit is now affected by foraging bonuses.
  
• Bug fix: Added missing titles for some long-term animal form behavior badges (e.g. while you have the Eternal Fox behavior badge, you also now have the Eternal Fox player title).
  
• Fixed typos for Snowleaf & Irkima.
  
• Fixed a spot in the Serbule Hills Goblin Logging Camp that was easy to get stuck in.
  
• Fixed selection colliders & face cams for Osslars and Gricklings.
  
• Fixed some wands that were appearing as big white cubes.
  
• Bug fix: Festive Holiday Maggot is more festive.
  
• This is the 400th published build of Project: Gorgon! As a thank you for reading the patch notes, use the command /400 in chat to receive a dumb title
  

Happy holidays from Project: Gorgon! Today we celebrate the turning of the season, from bountiful autumn harvest to gift-giving extravaganza. In other words, we're finally done with Halloween - it's time for presents! If you've become Friends with any townsfolk in the game, they will have gifts for you the next time you speak with them. (Make sure to have your favorite combat skills active when you talk to them, in case their gift is a randomly-generated treasure item!)

The Ri-Shin event is also underway -- look for townsfolk wearing red santa hats (err Ri Shin Hats) for more information. There's one in each town or settlement.

In addition, we have a bunch of improvements, tweaks, bug fixes, etc.

Combat Changes/Fixes

• Transforming into an animal no longer changes your active skills if one of them is already the appropriate animal skill. For example, changing into Deer while Bard and Priest are active will change one to Deer; changing into Deer while Bard and Deer are active won't change either.
  
• High-level deer-summoning mods now summon the appropriate level deer.
  
• Chemistry Staves now support Druid mods.
  
• Fixed the mod "Finishing Blow causes your next attack to deal +X damage if it deals direct Psychic, Trauma, or Poison damage"; it now actually affects Trauma and Poison damage, and the Psychic damage is reduced to what it should be.
  
• Fixed the mod "If Finishing Blow or Decapitate kills its target, you gain +X% direct damage for 15 seconds".
  
• Fixed a bug causing lower-level enchantments to be transmuted for Weather Witching and Druid.
  
• Increased healing amount of Healing Mist 10 (110->120).
  
• Changed James Eltibule's Sword damage boost from 0.1 back to 17.
  
• Nissim no longer teaches Debilitating Blow 4 - it was only getting in the way of his Psychology lessons, after all.
  
• We're still not sure what could cause players to not retain the repeating aktaari quest, but added a backup system that will reapply the quest whenever players are in the Aktaari lobby area.
  
• Revised a certain boss encounter a bit. Should be a piece of cake now :) :) :)
  

• You can now view item levels and rarities overlaid on the item icons in your inventory. Toggle this view by clicking the "Show item rarities & levels" button in the inventory window, next to the "Show Equipped Items" button.
  
• Important monster buffs, such as Damage Reflection, now show up first in the list of Active Effects on the target.
  
• The Damage Reflection buff on monsters now has a unique icon.
  
• Fixed icons for Fire Magic unlocks at Sand Seer & Bendith.
  
• Added "(or better)" to the arrow requirements of some Archery abilities.
  
• Dropping an item onto another in inventory or storage now always puts that item in the dropped slot, never the slot before it.
  
• Acid Sigil icon is now green.
  
• Your current equipment now has a yellow border in the compare-item view, to make it more obvious.
  

• Fixed a bunch of level 90 crafting recipes that had placeholder material ingredients.
  
• You can now raise Textile Creation to level 70 via trainer spheres beneath Povus.
  
• Some corrected item-creation recipes now require Enhanced Yarn; you can learn the recipe from the same trainer sphere in Povus.
  
• Fixed some items that would let you learn their recipe but not their ability, thereafter breaking the item for the original learner. (We're still working on a way to fix those characters already affected by the issue and will have something in the next update.)
  
• Cosmetic pets now stay alive when you switch areas or log off (so you don't need to resummon them).
  
• When you have a cosmetic pet active and summon a different pet, the first pet is automatically dispelled (rather than making you dispel it manually first).
  
• Updated directions for getting to the Sacred Grotto.
  
• Removed an extraneous warning sign from Serbule Hills.
  
• New JSON file is available on the cdn (at https://cdn.projectgorgon.com/), called tsysprofiles.json. See the updated index page for more information.
  
• Updated JSON file: tsysclientinfo.json now includes the internal names of each tsys power, so they can be mapped with the new profile JSON file.
  

This is a pretty little update chock full of bug fixes and gameplay tweaks. Let's see what we've got!

Sword Skill Revamps

• (Hands) "Decapitate Reuse Timer -12" => "Decapitate deals +250 damage and reuse timer is -12 seconds"
  
• (Head, Necklace) "Decapitate deals +525 damage to non-Elite targets" => +1200 to non-Elite targets
  
• (Legs) "Decapitate deals +255 damage and terrifies the target for 7 seconds" => "Decapitate deals +300 damage and the next attack you use stuns its target"
  
• (Feet, Ring) "Finishing Blow and Decapitate damage +190" => +264
  
• (Chest, OffHand) Finishing Blow deals 530 Psychic damage after a 4-second delay" => "Finishing Blow causes your next attack to deal +380 damage if it deals direct Psychic, Trauma, or Poison damage"
  
• (Legs) "Wind Strike causes your next attack to deal +142 damage" => "Wind Strike deals +142 damage and causes your next attack to deal +142 damage". In addition, this is now available on both Legs and Feet slots
  
• (Main Hand) "Wind Strike gives you +50% projectile evasion for 5 seconds" => for 10 seconds
  
• Wind Strike ability: increased amount of bonus damage added to the next attack
  
• New treasure effect: (Head, Necklace) "Indirect Poison Damage, Indirect Trauma Damage, and Indirect Psychic Damage +50% while Sword skill active"
  
• New treasure effect: (Off-Hand, Ring) "Parry and Riposte boost your Indirect Trauma Damage +24/tick for 30 seconds"
  
• New treasure effect: (Hands) "If Finishing Blow or Decapitate kills its target, you gain +63% direct damage for 15 seconds (this effect does not stack with itself)"
  
• New treasure effect: (MainHand) "Decapitate deals +165 damage. If the target is killed, Decapitate can be used again immediately."
  

• All high-level skill unlocks now require that you also have already unlocked the previous tier. In other words, in order to unlock 'Skill 81-90', you must have already unlocked 'Skill 71-80' (in addition to your current skill being 80+). If you run into a skill that looks like it will let you unlock skill caps out of order, please let us know through the in-game bug report. (That's the '!' on the top of the right-hand sidebar.)
  
• Jewelry Crafting: Astounding Arisetsu Medallion actually taught the recipe for Astounding Enchanted Necklace. The recipe is right - only the name of the recipe book was wrong. The new name is: Jewelry Crafting: Astounding Enchanted Necklace.
  
• Orcish Plate Gauntlets erroneously said in their description: "(Must be near a forge consecrated to Umrad.)" They now correctly say "(Must be near a forge consecrated to Tast.)"
  
• Fixed a bug causing your last-used emote to play again when you change gear.
  
• NPCs are now listed in their correct, precise area in the Quest Log & Item Info windows. This fixes some bugs that resulted from separate areas being located in the same zone technically, e.g. Carpal Tunnels being reported as Khyrulek's Crypt, or Winter Nexus reported as Kur Caves. If any NPCs are still wrong, please let us know ASAP through the in-game bug report. (That's the '!' on the top of the right-hand sidebar.)
  
• Unfetter 3 now lasts for 20 seconds.
  
• Galdyr's Tasty Energy Flask will now come with Battle Chemistry mods.
  
• The recipes Reliable Flask and Reliable Flask (Repair) now have a chance to consume their hammer ingredient.
  
• Updated the text displayed when you first learn Necromancy, to match how raising skeletons works now (via Necromancy Dust).
  
• "Mock and Ridicule deal +X% damage and taunt +Y" now properly affects Mock.
  
• Icons for Acid Bomb 10 & Mycotoxin Formula 10 now have the correct number.
  
• Fixed Triage 9, which was broken.
  
• Changed verbiage of whether Wanted Posters are usable or not, and hooked up verbiage properly.
  
• Update leveled requirements of new tailoring scrolls to match their associated recipes.
  
• Greta is no longer considered an arthropod.
  
• Added a basic dance animation to eagles.
  
• Fixed some quests that were giving out high-level items with low-level enchantments; most notably, several brand-new quests and Fae Realm Beehive quests.
  
• Fixed Mudbath 6 healing amount.
  
• Basilisk and Lamia slow abilities are now affected by Slow & Root immunity.
  
• Enchantments that can't be obtained via transmuting are no longer shown in the Transmutation window.
  
• Fixed a typo in soybean sprout item description.
  
• Bug fix: "Rotskin deals 354 Trauma damage to health over 12 seconds": the ability tooltip listed this as 8 seconds, the treasure listed it as 12, and the actual DoT lasted 15 seconds. The correct duration is 12, and other values have been changed to match.
  
• Animal Handling pets may now earn XP past level 80.
  
• Fixed a typo in Ruxandra's Bite item.
  
• Small Fireworks now stack to 99 instead of 20. Recipe for Small Fireworks makes 99 instead of 20.
  
• You can now unlock Gardening 81-90, and Cooking 81-90 at a mysterious entity deep beneath Povus.
  
• Fixed recipe ingredients for Awesome Werewolf gear.
  
• Fixed intermittent issue with mount anxiety bar not showing.
  
• Ruxandra's Bite is now augmentable.
  
• Recipes with no crafting time can now be used while sitting; this allows calligraphy benches to be used while being sat upon.
  
• If you can't craft a recipe, hovering over the button now tells you why.
  
• Altered Flaming swords' text (such as Flaming Gazluk Sword) to clarify the DoT damage they do.
  
• Removed references to Master Flopsy from Master Boop's text.
  
• Fixed a typo in Meat Candy (tonue -> tongue).
  
• Fixed stats on crafted belt buckles that got messed up in an earlier November update. (And buffed many of them!)
  
• Fixed many treasure effects that didn't correctly scale past level 80. At this time we believe ALL treasure effects should correctly scale to level 100. If you come across one that doesn't, please report it through the in-game bug report. (That's the '!' on the top of the right-hand sidebar.) Please report this even if you've reported it in the past.
  
• Fix to Rabbit treasure: (OffHand, Necklace) "Thump causes the target to take +20% damage from Cold attacks for 10 seconds": this effect did not stack if you had it on both slots.
  
• Fix to Rabbit treasure: (Head, OffHand) "Bun-Fu Kick causes the target to take +18% damage from Trauma attacks for 20 seconds": this effect did not stack if you had it on both slots.
  
• Change to Knife treasure effect: (Hands, Ring) "Fending Blade restores 22 Power" => 44
  
• All (non-Demo) players should check their redemptions to see what special gifts they may have available this month! You can do that by typing /redeem in chat, or by checking the "View Redemptions" button on the bottom of the Persona panel, accessible from the right-hand sidebar. VIPs, you've got two!
  

This is a small update that fixes a number of bugs, as well as tweaking and extending the new content from our last update.

Dungeon-Related Fixes and Improvements
Warning -- these patch notes contain spoilers. If you haven't started the new dungeon in Errruka the Benefactor's cave, just skip this section.

• The acid slime in Errruka's Cave now displays in the correct location. It was displaying too low, leaving players thinking they were high and dry when they actually weren't.
  
• Previously, the animal combat-skill trainer challenge required you to be an animal for at least 7 days of real-world time and 12 hours of gameplay time. The former requirement of real-world time was not communicated, leaving some animals unsure why they couldn't open the door. For simplicity we've dropped the real-world time requirement.
  
• Added a few special respawning eggs to the Aktaari event. These "egg events" are a prototype way to add replayability to the Aktaari event. In the future we may implement a large number of these sorts of "events", and randomly choose which are active during each Aktaari run.
  
• Fixed a bug that prevented Aktaari Princess's door from activating.
  
• Completing the mummy puzzle reopens doors leading to the puzzle (if they happen to have closed).
  
• The exit to the Lady room remains unlocked for several minutes after leaving (in case players return immediately).
  
• Rixie's Floating rings respawn more quickly.
  
• Evu Fruit requires Foraging 85, down from 95.
  
• The Elite version of Mangler Scorpions have been replaced with much larger Mutilator Scorpions (to make it easier to differentiate them from the non-Elite scorpions).
  
• You can now unlock Hammer 81-90, Battle Chemistry 81-90, and Butchering 81-90 at the appropriate trainers.
  
• You can no longer unlock Fishing 81-90 until you've unlocked Fishing 71-80.
  
• Fixed a bug where giving Support Local Fauna Initiative flier to Hazy Mirror yielded no item.
  
• Fixed typo in Serendipity Cheddar's dialog.
  
• Added an additional boss encounter (although there's still at least one boss that has yet to be discovered)
  

• Fixed a whole bunch of typos in skill hints.
  
• The ability Summon Doomstorm no longer refers to "frangments" instead of "fragments".
  
• Awesome Spring Fairy Shoes, the recipe, and the recipe scroll, are all now properly Awesome instead of just Amazing.
  
• Changed labels of armor- and power-restore after death-avoidance attribute, so they no longer just say "Healing".
  
• Fixed display of triple digit levels on your hotbar.
  
• The recipe for Astounding Skinning Knife was erroneously called Awesome.
  
• Coffee beans and soybeans are worth more Foraging XP.
  
• Fixed: Stun Trap 5 had same stats as Stun Trap 6.
  
• Orcish Wheat now grows in visible stages.
  
• Fixed the broken locked-NPC UI icon.
  
• Performance Appreciation info effect should now disappear when you're not appreciating any performances.
  
• Fixed some bugs causing instrument playing animations to get out of sync.
  
• "Square" map indicators have been renamed "Pointed Square", and a new Square (which is the old square) has been added in its place.
  
• Updated player nameplate colors in real-time as a response to entering or exiting PvP mode.
  
• When your targeted player is in PvP mode, an icon will indicate as much (replacing an old bugged-out icon showing their level as 0).
  
• Animal forms that are in skeleton illusion can now mount properly.
  
• Updated Brambleskin 10's damage.
  
• Changed level at which the third cheesemaking cask is unlocked to 40 (previously 41).
  
• Fixed mount form for skeletons when their underlying form is spider.
  
• Fixed a bug that would sometimes cause unlisted vendor items to list for 0 councils.
  
• Updated Bounding Escape 6 numbers (7 speed for 12 seconds -> 9 speed for 17 seconds)
  
• System Shock abilities dealt 1 point of Damage-over-Time even when no DoT treasure effects were in use.
  
• Warden (Necklace): "While Privacy Field is active, melee attacks that damage you have a 75% chance to restore 34 Power to you" => this treasure effect did not work correctly
  
• Icesnake can now occur with Ice Magic treasure effects.
  
• Head Candle will now persist through zoning & changing gear.
  
• Deep Wasps now count for the "Bats Eat Bugs" quest.
  

It's here! After a rather longer wait than we intended, we are proud to share this new update with you. It's got everything -- dungeons, skills, puzzles, and a scary holiday party.

Halloween
Alharth is not the real world, and Zhia Lian isn't the goddess of Halloween. Nevertheless it's always been our tradition to hold our scary holiday event at the end of October. But this year we ran into a long series of bugs, leading to a long delay in the update, and the scary holiday had to wait as well.

But never fear! Zhia Lian has finally poked her way into our world with her whimsical demands. The event begins now, and we'll be scheduling the Zhia Lian parties for later this month. Keep an eye on the event calendar or check our Discord #events channel for the latest dates and times.

New Dungeon
You can now enter Errruka the Benefactor's home in Povus. This is a very large dungeon with a great many things to discover. It's also probably tuned to be more difficult than we really want -- it hasn't been playtested too much. But we know you've got this. Good luck!

Skills & Abilities

• Crossbow: Knockback Bolts 9 was using ammo one tier lower than intended; this is fixed.
  
• Floxie in the Fae Realm can now train Fletching to 70.
  
• Orcish Battle Cry: fixed bug that prevented this from working.
  
• Priest: Healing amounts for various abilities fluctuated by a few health points due to formula changes.
  
• Priest: Castigate 7 and 8 deal more damage to undead.
  
• Psychology: (OffHand, Necklace) "Mock and Ridicule deal +65 damage and taunt +200" => "Mock and Ridicule deal +43% damage and taunt +200"
  
• Psychology: new treasure effect: (Chest) "Ridicule damage +93 and range +10 meters"
  
• Psychology: new treasure effect: (Ring) "Ridicule damage +93 and target does not call for help"
  
• Psychology: (Chest, Legs) "Psychoanalyze restores 212 Armor to you" => "Psychoanalyze deals +100% damage and restores 130 Armor to you"
  
• Psychology: (Head, Legs) "Strike a Nerve generates no Rage and instead reduces Rage by 610." => "... It also deals +200 Armor damage"
  
• Psychology: (Feet, OffHand) "Strike a Nerve deals +236 armor damage" => "Strike a Nerve deals +100 damage and hastens the reuse timer of But I Love You -1.5 seconds"
  
• Psychology: (Chest, Hands) "Strike a Nerve deals between 60 and 200 extra damage" => "Strike a Nerve deals +80 damage, and has a 33% chance to deal double damage"
  
• Rabbit: "Play Dead boosts your Psychic attack damage +100 for 20 seconds" => +320
  

• Abilities that require specific animal forms now say so in their tooltips.
  
• Clicking a notepad tab now scrolls the text all the way to the top.
  
• Remaining hangout time should no longer show absurd amounts of seconds remaining.
  
• Updated map player indicators once again, to further clarify which direction you are facing.
  
• The old map player indicator styles are available via Settings > GUI > Windows & HUD > Map Player Indicator Styles.
  
• Fixed a bug causing the Performance Appreciation explanation effect to appear when it shouldn't.
  
• Skill Tracker should no longer move around the screen.
  
• Fixed item previews when opening the More Info screen and not clicking around.
  
• Pain Bubble will now show up in debuff lists on current target & party members.
  
• Freezing Mist tooltip now includes Bomb-related mods.
  
• Fixed a bug causing Shocking Grasp to show Spirit Bolt mods.
  
• Updated tooltip for music boxes to reflect the effective level of music supplied.
  

• New items! There are new high level items to discover in loot. Some of these are based on designs created by our early backers. Others are named after important community members as gifts to those players. (And others are just entirely made up by us.)
  
• Eternal Greens and Chalice of Life both now cause Resurrection Sickness. Resurrection Sickness prevents you from consuming more greens or a Chalice of Life for 15 minutes.
  
• Chalice of Life can now only be consumed by druids.
  
• Chalice of Life now stacks to 3.
  
• Many crafted items have significantly boosted innate stats.
  
• Added missing behavior titles for career-long Foxes, Rabbits, and Butterflies. (Earned after staying in that form quite a long time, and lost if you leave the form.)
  
• For players who want to get their friends into the game faster, or players who just hate tutorials, you can use the chat command /leavetut to skip the tutorial island and appear in Serbule. (You can always go back to the island later.)
  
• Gain bonus levels in Brewing when you reach Alcohol Tolerance 80, Alchemy 49, Battle Chemistry 70, Cooking 70.
  
• Completing nightly Povus event quests earns a bit more Xogrite at each reward tier.
  
• When you Miraculously Avoid Death, you also instantly recover 10% of your Max Health. This amount can be changed through treasure and buffs.
  
• Purchasing items from Drima now costs 2 Sir Johnson Bucks instead of 3.
  
• Crafting Caravan: Added an option to purchase a legendary version of the Enhanced Windstep Shoes and Amulet of the Rugged Traveler for 2x the token cost.
  
• Adjusted leather armor so it blends into the world more.
  
• Moved Serbule Hills spawn point closer to the portal to Serbule.
  
• Adjusted raven-form attack speeds for some archery attacks.
  
• Mummies are a little more dangerous.
  
• Polar bears now have Health Regeneration.
  
• Hook beasts attack faster.
  
• Donkeys and cattle now have an innate buff that knocks back any Burst attacker that hits it.
  
• Fixed a bug causing monsters to stop attacking their current targets when a subserver restarts.
  

This minor update includes some neat new stuff, as well as a horde of tweaks and fixes.

Serbule Community Storage Chest
This update, we've added an interesting new community feature - the Serbule Community Storage Chest. This is a way for rich players to give back to the community, donating some of their wealth to lease an extra storage slot that anyone can use.

You can find this chest in Serbule in the 'golem house' - the room near the central well that also houses the Account Package Manager and the Legacy Item Helper golems. Players can donate 1 million councils or 20 Live Event Credits to lease a slot in this chest for a month, and all players can take advantage of that slot during that time.

Note that these slots are leased, not purchased, so wealthy players will need to break out their wallet once a month to keep the slots accessible. When the lease expires after a month, the total number of slots available to players in the chest will go down by one. If that means that you now have too many items in the chest, you will only be able to pull items out, not put any more in -- until either you don't have too many items, or someone chips in another cool million (or 20 LECs).

Players can donate as much and as often as they like, up to a maximum of 150 inventory slots total. The Community Chest lists top contributors (by guild and by player) as an incentive to donate, along with 500 Civic Pride XP, a world broadcast, and a mention in the highlight log. (That's the scroll on the login screen, which also gets posted to Discord.)

Remember, these storage slots can be used by *all* players -- so convince your rich friends to donate today!

Notepad Improvements
One of the weird things about Project: Gorgon is that it sometimes expects you to write things down. We do offer an in-game notepad, at least -- and now we've made that notepad more useful by adding tabs.

• You can now organize your notes in up to 5 tabs!
  
• All of your existing notes will be in the first tab.
  
• You can rename the tabs by right-clicking on them.
  
• The hotkey to open the notepad defaults to 'n' and can be changed in System > Keys.

• To help make animal loot stack up better against the loot of bipedal monsters, most types of animals now have a high chance to drop phlogiston. (Look, I don't know. Maybe they ate it?)
  
• Povus: Being in combat no longer stops you from using the Povus quest sign.
  
• Povus: Giving gear to Ishiko the boatwoman in the morning now earns double town XP.
  
• Povus: Ishiko the boatwoman now gives Civic Pride XP for each donation, rather than waiting until you've donated 100 times.
  
• Battle Chemistry: Fixed a bug with the new treasure effects that boosted minigolem damage +25% (along with some other buffs). This boost did not apply correctly. After it worked correctly it was clearly overpowered, though, so it's been reduced to a +15% damage boost.
  
• Increased the chance for monsters in a group to perform self-buffs before engaging in combat.
  
• Priest: Fixed the treasure effect "Triage restores X Health over 15 seconds" -- the highest-tier levels of this effect were weaker than intended.
  
• Fixed a bug from the last major update that caused delayed-healing effects to trigger twice (once when added, and again after the delay).
  
• Added Glamour Berries to the very-rare consumables loot table (the same table that drops Eternal Greens and Minor Panaceas).
  
• Reduced the cost of some LEC items on Cinnamon in Sun Vale.
  
• Reduced pricing on Riston in the Red Wing Casino for multiple items.
  
• New item added to Riston: Liquid Super Buffs! (24 hours) for 150 LEC.
  
• Slightly increased the chance to loot Pixie Dust on appropriate mobs.
  
• Fixed a bug that caused Chitterface to not drop its quest item if you had killed it in the past 3 hours.
  
• Fixed a bug that prevented necromancer pets from being targeted by burst attacks, group buffs, and area heals
  - Dev comment: the bug was that they couldn't be burst-attacked. In fixing that bug, they became targetable by beneficial spells as well. This wasn't part of the original design of the skill (in particular they were supposed to be immune to most types of healing), but we want to see how this change feels in play.
  
• Fixed a bug that prevented some creatures from tracking aggro properly.
  
• Young Krakens for the Serbule Druid quest will now stick around for the entire duration of the event.

• Main storyline quests are now marked in the Quest Log.
  
• Your current hangout is now viewable from inside the Quest Log, at the top of the list of quests
  
• An item's associated quests are now shown in the "More Info" window. (Only the quests you are currently on, not ALL quests!)
  
• When viewing a work order at the board, you can now view its associated recipe (if you have it unlocked) by right-clicking on the work order icon.
  
• Docile enemies (those that don't attack-on-sight) now have their own nameplate color. It defaults to white; you can change that in Settings > GUI > Colors.
  
• Made "deliver" quests more obvious by adding the number of items to deliver to the text.
  
• Fixed a bug that caused the XP Tracker to reset its position on launch.
  
• The current number of free inventory slots is now always visible in the window, even at the smallest size.
  
• Fixed a bug that caused nameplates to not sort properly, so closer ones would appear behind further ones.
  
• Updated the map UI with new icons for characters and pins.
  
• Fixed a bug that made certain ambient sound FX lower than intended.
  
• Performance & Dance Appreciation effects are now more obvious.
  
• The current Appreciation level is visible on the buffs themselves.
  
• A new icon will appear when you are actively appreciating a performance. It shows the level of the current performance and explains how your current buff levels change over time.

• Failed network calls on the login screen should no longer cause the Loading screen to hang after picking your character.
  
• Your character should no longer get "stuck" and keep moving with your mouse even when you aren't holding in right-click.
  
• Updated to Unity version 2021.3.29. This should fix several bugs in Linux, including:
  - Some parts of the screen are inaccessible to the mouse when in full-screen mode.
  - Clicking and dragging the mouse doesn't lock the cursor.

This is just a quick bug-fix update, with some added chemistry!

More Battle Chemistry Changes
Small change to the "Healing Mist hastens X" treasure effects to allow them to apply to all targets of the mist, not just the caster:

• (Hands): "Healing Mist hastens the remaining reset timer of Pep Talk by 10 seconds (if Pep Talk is not already ready to use)" => "Healing Mist accelerates the current reuse time of Pep Talk (for any targets that use Pep Talk)"
  
• (Head): "Healing Mist hastens the remaining reset timer of Reconstruct by 10 seconds (if Reconstruct is not already ready to use)" => "Healing Mist accelerates the current reuse time of Reconstruct (for any targets that use Reconstruct)"
  
• (Ring): "Healing Mist hastens the remaining reset timer of Regrowth by 10 seconds (if Regrowth is not already ready to use)" => "Healing Mist accelerates the current reuse time of Regrowth (for any targets that use Regrowth)"
  

• New: (Legs): "Healing Mist accelerates the current reuse time of Mend Flesh (for any targets that use Mend Flesh)"
  
• New: (OffHand, Necklace): "Bomb attacks deal +50 damage and cause your next Healing Mist to restore +50 Health over 30 seconds"
  
• New: (Head, Chest): "Bomb attacks deal +61 damage and cause your next Healing Mist to restore +70 Armor over 15 seconds"
  
• New: (Hands): "Acid Bomb deals +61 damage and causes your next Minor Heal ability to restore +41 Health"
  

• Fixed a bug preventing BC golems from using their new abilities.
  
• The Battle Chemistry trainer in Rahu is no longer afraid of scary animals.
  
• Lowered the cost of training new golem abilities a fair amount.
  
• Animal forms are treated as always having an "unarmed weapon" equipped.
  
• Werewolves are treated as always having an "unarmed claw weapon" equipped.
  
• Combined Extra Toes & Knee Spikes effect descriptions into a single effect.
  
• Fixed bug with treasure effect "Toxic Irritant deals +N damage. If target has 5 or more Damage-over-Time effects, it also stuns them". This effect incorrectly always stunned the target.
  
• Fixed a bug with the Battle Chemistry treasure effects that boost flat acid and poison mitigation: the acid one was buffing poison and vice versa. They've been swapped to match their descriptions.
  
• Fixed a bug with the effects "You heal N health/armor/power every other second while under the effect of Haste Concoction". These effects incorrectly applied their healing every second instead of every other second.
  
• The minigolem's abilities no longer display buff info about minigolem-summoning abilities.
  
• Tweaked audio falloff settings of nightmare creatures.
  
• Fixed a bug causing your own avatar to not respect the "Avatar Portraits" setting.
  
• Sped up recipe sorting.
  
• Fixed assorted typos.
  

This update sees some serious upgrades for Battle Chemists, improvements to pet and enemy AI, an XP system tweak, and - as always - a lot of bug fixes large and small.

Battle Chemistry Changes
We've heavily revised Battle Chemistry in this update. This will seem like an especially large change, because it is! Battle Chemistry was "skipped over" during the last round of skill rebalancing because we were considering splitting the skill into two separate skills. But after prototyping that split, it doesn't seem more fun than what we already had. So instead we're embracing the skill's quirky nature and refining the ways you can take advantage of its many tools.

While most of these changes should be good news to battle chemists, note that there's an effective nerf, too: we've fixed a bug that allowed you to take off your Mutation-buffing equipment but still keep the benefits of that equipment. The intended behavior is that taking off equipment disables all the buffs it provided. (This should be true for all skills, btw! If you find places where that isn't the case, please report it.)

Battle Chemistry has three key features: the programmable golem pet (also called a "minigolem"), Mutations, and chemical attacks and buffs. We'll give the details for each. To help you adjust your character to these changes, Battle Chemistry Transmutation costs will be much lower for the rest of August.

[h2]Mini-Golem[/h2]
Battle Chemistry features a programmable golem which is given a list of rules to follow in combat. Previously, it checked its rules once every 5 seconds, meaning that it only used an ability once every 5 seconds. To improve responsiveness, the golem now chooses an ability every 3 seconds. Golem abilities that previously had a 5-second reuse time now have a 3-second reuse time: Poison Bomb Toss, Taunting Punch, and Healing Injection. These abilities were revised based on this new reset time.

The "Trigger Golem" side-bar ability is no longer a toggled ability. It now has a 15-second reuse time. Using the ability will instruct the golem to immediately check its ruleset and choose an ability, rather than waiting until its regular 3-second timer is up. (You can use the golem conditional "Owner has triggered golem" to program a specific response to this ability.)

The golem was already a pretty good healing-bot, so it has comparatively minor buffs in that area. Its combat abilities, on the other hand, have been improved dramatically as there was much room for improvement. For historic reasons Battle Chemistry has a bunch of three-slot treasure effects for the golem -- meaning that the same power can show up on Chest, Legs, and Head gear, for instance -- and that seems interesting because it allows you to really hone in on a few specific golem abilities. But since "programmability" is the point of the golem, we don't want your gear to lock you out of using other abilities too much. So all those three-slot effects also boost the golem's overall damage or health.

Next is a list of all the changes. Before we begin, a note on syntax. Here's how we document a change to a treasure effect:

• (SlotsThisPowerCanShowUpOn): "This effect does blah blah blah at level 100" => changed behavior of the effect at level 100
  

• UI: fixed blank ability labels in golem programming UI window
  
• Fixed the ability icons of some of the mini-golem's abilities
  
• New golem conditional group: "Any group member is below X% Health"
  
• Minigolem abilities: all damaging abilities deal more damage
  
• Minigolem abilities: all abilities now scale to level 80. You can purchase the new ability tiers from the usual dude in Rahu
  
• Minigolem ability Rage Acid Toss: now aoe-splashes to hit all enemies within 20m of its target. (Primary target can still be up to 35m away)
  
• Minigolem Rage Mist abilities: reset time is now 5 seconds instead of 15. (But ability still requires a full Rage bar)
  
• Minigolem Rage Acid Toss abilities: reset time is now 5 seconds instead of 30. (But ability still requires a full Rage bar)
  
• Minigolem Self Destruct abilities: aoe range increased from 10m to 20m
  
• Minigolem Taunting Punch abilities: increased innate temp-taunt so that golem can briefly pull aggro more reliably
  
• (Head, Necklace): "Your golem minion's Taunting Punch deals +100 damage" => "Your golem minion has +25% Max Health and its attacks taunt +600"
  
• (Chest, Legs, Head): "Your golem minion's Poison Bomb deals +82 damage" => "Your golem minion's attacks deal +120 damage"
  
• (Hands, Feet, Ring): "Your golem minion's Self Destruct deals +360 damage" => "Your golem minion's attacks deal +25% Damage, and its Self Destruct deals +777 damage"
  
• (Head, OffHand, Necklace): "Your golem minion's Rage Acid Toss deals +243 damage" => "Your golem minion's attacks deal +25% Damage, and its Rage Acid Toss deals +357 damage"
  
• (Ring, MainHand, Feet): "Your golem minion's Doom Admixture deals +340 damage" => "Your golem minion's attacks deal +25% Damage, and its Doom Admixture deals +340 damage"
  
• (Legs, MainHand): "Your golem minion's Invigorating Mist heals 58 health" => "Your golem minion's Invigorating Mist restores +58 Power"
  
• New treasure effect: (OffHand): "Your golem minion's Fire Balm absorbs the first 198 Fire damage you suffer in the next 15 seconds"
  

• The abilities "Mutation: Knee Spikes" and "Mutation: Extra Toes" have been combined, giving the benefits of both in one. For fiction reasons, the name Extra Toes makes more sense than Knee Spikes. But the old Knee Spikes ability had more tiers, which makes for smoother leveling. So we've dropped the old Extra Toes ability and renamed the old Knee Spikes ability to Extra Toes. If you're confused, we don't blame you, but long story short: if you were using Knee Spikes OR Extra Toes, you'll want to make sure that Extra Toes is on your ability bar.
  
• The ability "Mutation: Stretchy Spine" has been retired as being too niche. Its treasure effects were revised to apply to other mutations instead.
  
• Extra Heart abilities: instead of boosting Power Regeneration, now boosts Combat Refresh Power Restoration
  
• Treasure Effects that previously boosted Knee Spikes now boost Extra Toes
  
• Mutations: fixed bugs that caused treasure buffs to remain on targets even if the caster unequipped the treasure responsible for the buff
  
• (Chest): "Your Stretchy Spine mutation randomly repairs broken bones twice as often" => "Your Extra Heart mutation grants you -50% Indirect Poison Vulnerability and randomly repairs broken bones over time"
  
• (Head, Chest): "Your Knee Spikes mutation also causes kicks to restore 22 Health to the kicker" => "Your Extra Toes mutation also causes kicks to restore 44 Health to the kicker"
  
• (Legs): "Your Knee Spikes mutation causes kicks to deal an additional +24% damage" => Your Extra Toes mutation causes kicks to deal an additional +30% damage
  
• (Hands, MainHand): "Your Extra Skin mutation causes the target to heal 67 Health every 20 seconds" => 78 every 15 seconds
  
• (Necklace, OffHand): "Your Extra Skin mutation provides +22 mitigation from Slashing attacks" => +27 mitigation from Slashing and direct Acid damage
  
• (Legs, MainHand): "Your Extra Skin mutation provides +22 mitigation from Piercing attacks" => +27 mitigation from Piercing and direct Poison damage
  
• (Hands, OffHand): "Your Extra Heart and Stretchy Spine mutations grant the target +67 Max Health" => "Your Extra Heart and Extra Skin mutations grant the target +71 Max Health"
  
• (Necklace): "Your Extra Heart mutation causes the target to regain +74 Power every 6 seconds" => every 8 seconds
  
• New treasure effect: (Feet): "Your Extra Toes mutation grants the target +100% Knockback Resistance"
  
• New treasure effect: (Legs): "Your Extra Toes mutation grants the target +58% Slow/Root Resistance"
  
• New treasure effect: (Chest): "Your Extra Heart and Extra Toes mutations grant the target +67 Max Power"
  
• New treasure effect: (Head): "Your Extra Heart mutation grants the target +23% Max Power"
  
• New treasure effect: (Hands): "Your Extra Toes mutation grants the target +15.5% Ranged Evasion"
  

• Kohan in Rahu now teaches recipes for Alchemist's Claw weapons, which are complex unarmed/battle chemistry hybrid weapons. Crafting requires Gadgeteering 50 and a high level of Toolcrafting.
  
• Ufkar in Rahu now teaches recipes for Chemistry Staff weapons, which allow all manner of staff-based skills as well as Battle Chemistry. Crafting requires Gadgeteerig 50 and a high level of Carpentry.
  
• Staff-Beaker combo weapons (such as the Beaker-Stick and the new Chemistry Staff) are now elligible to have Staff treasure effects on them. (And Fire Magic effects for fire-staff-beakers.)
  
• Yogzi in Sun Vale teaches recipes for Arachnid Mechaharnesses, which allow spiders to use Battle Chemistry. Crafting these intricate belts requires high levels of Toolcrafting skill.
  
• Yogzi in Sun Vale teaches recipes for Aerosolizing Bat Harnesses, which allow giant bats to use Battle Chemistry. Crafting these exotic belts requires high levels of Toolcrafting skill.
  
• Backfat in the Fae Realm teaches recipes for Porcine Blast Dispersers, which allow pigs to use Battle Chemistry. Crafting these bizarre bracelets requires high levels of JewelryCrafting skill.
  
• Toxin Bomb abilities: base damage increased
  
• Toxic Irritant abilities: no longer a melee attack; now a ranged projectile attack with a 10m range
  
• Mycotoxin Formula abilities: base damage increased
  
• Acid Bomb ability: ability now does both direct Health and direct Armor damage. Power cost and base damage increased
  
• Freezing Mist ability: reset time changed from 45s to 30s. Ability fully functions as a Bomb. (The fire DoT treasure effect previously didn't work on it). Damage revised upwards.
  
• (Chest, Feet): "Acid Bomb Damage +53%" => +59%
  
• (Feet, Ring): "You heal 26 health every other second while under the effect of Haste Concoction" => 36
  
• (Hands, Chest): "You regain 18 Power every other second while under the effect of Haste Concoction" => 34
  
• (Necklace, Legs): "Freezing Mist restores 165 Armor to you" => "Freezing Mist restores 165 Health (or Armor if Health is full) to you"
  
• New: (Head, Off-Hand): "Acid Bomb deals 198 Acid Damage to Health and Armor over 6 seconds"
  
• New: (Hands, Necklace): "Mycotoxin Formula deals 392 Nature Damage to Health over 8 seconds"
  
• New: (Chest, MainHand): "Toxin Bomb deals 385 Poison Damage to Health over 7 seconds"
  
• New: (Hands, Ring): "Freezing Mist Damage +195 and Reuse Time -7 seconds"
  
• New: (Hands): "Toxic Irritant deals +61 damage. If target has 5 or more Damage-over-Time effects, it also stuns them"
  
• New: (OffHand): "Toxic Irritant Damage +52 and Range +20"
  
• New: (Ring): "Toxic Irritant causes the target to suffer +15.5% from Acid Damage (including Toxic Irritant) for 15 seconds."
  

• Pets can now target Feared monsters. (They still cannot attack Mesmerized monsters.) This is an experiment; let us know if you like this change.
  
• Fixed a bug that could cause pets to stop responding to Sic 'Em and/or Clever Trick instructions.
  
• Potential fix for pets returning home too quickly. We'll monitor this to see if more needs to be done.
  
• When an Animal Handling pet tries to determine a target for Sic 'Em or Clever Trick, it can now check its owner's target's target. This means that if you have the group tank selected and use Sic 'Em, the pet can lock on the group tank's target.
  
• Fixed several subtle bugs where monsters and pets wouldn't use the right ability at the right time.
  

• Basic Attacks: many Basic Attacks deal slightly more damage at high level.
  
• Pig Frenzy ability: changes to the damage boost amount at each ability tier; highest tier changed from 60 to 118.
  
• Pig: (Legs, Ring) "Frenzy restores 30 power to all targets" => 76
  
• Pig: (Main Hand, Necklace) "Grunt of Abeyance restores 28 Power to all targets" => 52
  
• Pig: fixed some treasure effects that did not yet scale past level 80.
  
• Survival Instincts' Lend Grace ability: significantly increased Power regeneration. The stated +10% evasion buff is now actually applied.
  
• Rattail-Ring of Screeching: Nature Damage bonus reduced from +20% to +10%.
  
• The Sonic Burst Combo mod for bats will now do the correct damage on the final step.
  
• Toxic Flesh abilities: deal more damage to melee attackers.
  
• Hammer treasure effect: (Feet): "Rib Shatter dispels any roots or slows you are currently suffering. Power cost to sprint in combat is reduced -3 for 9 seconds" => "Rib Shatter dispels any roots or slows you are currently suffering. Sprint Speed is increased +3 and Power cost to sprint in combat is reduced -3 for 9 seconds"
  
• Droaches: high level Droach monsters deal more damage when their armor is depleted.
  
• Fixed a bug where monsters with special opening moves wouldn't always use them.
  
• Fixed an issue that might be the cause of reported "DoT persists for way too long" bugs. We'll monitor this to see if more needs to be done.
  
• Fixed bug that prevented earning auxiliary-combat-skill XP if you didn't earn XP in both of your main combat skills.
  

• Added work orders for all new angling fish. These can be found randomly at the work order sign in Sun Vale and the Red Wing Casino.
  
• Added new "bulk" work orders for fish. These bulk orders require 99 fish and have a higher payout rate than normal. These work orders can be found as Angling junk loot.
  
• Reverted changes to fish fillet icons that unintentionally broke match-3.
  
• Elite Training Dummies have been renamed to Healthy Training Dummies, and no longer give combat wisdom.
  
• Fixed a bug where learning teleportation from Elmetaph would break future crafting animations.
  
• "Prioritize Unlooted Corpses" setting will no longer cause tab-targeting to stick to unlooted corpses.
  
• Fixed a bug causing some ability tooltips to show the wrong damage type when the type is changed via an item mod.
  
• Fixed a bug causing Skill XP Tracker to change its position.
  
• Fixed a bug causing tooltips to blink in the wrong spot when Use Tooltip Animation is disabled.
  
• Fixed a bug causing the minimap to be invisible until you toggle its visibility in settings.
  
• Search golem item results will no longer have a "1" in the icon.
  
• The crafting error message for being in the wrong area is now more accurate. (It tells you you must be IN the required area instead of NEAR it.)
  
• The Create New Character UI now scales with the screen size properly.
  
• Fixed a couple instances in the UI where the waving flag is invisible at certain resolutions.
  
• Default enemy nameplate color is now red.
  
• Fixed a bug preventing you from turning left/right after crafting certain recipes.
  
• Replaced the animations of several crafting recipes to be more accurate, rather than just sitting.
  
• Fixed some graphical problems with elven faces and hair.
  
• Lowered volume of some sounds, including eating and drinking sound effects and the water-ball particle effect used by some monsters.
  
• Revised audio settings on fireworks.
  
• Reduced horse selection hitbox size.
  

This is a relatively small update with some relatively large changes. In brief: based on player feedback, we're reverting some of the recent balance changes we made to Power generation and consumption. In addition, we've also taken some time to optimize performance in some areas to improve framerate. And, of course, there are bug fixes.

Power Balance Changes Reverted
We agree with the general feedback that the recent Power changes were too much too fast. We've reverted the Power costs to levels from before the June 28 update, with a few minor deviations. We'll continue to work on Power accessibility tools and may increase Power costs more slowly in the future.

Misc skill changes
There are some new Hammer effects related to Power consumption, as well as a tweak to a new Sword effect.

• Hammer: Slight changes to cost and potency of Reckless Slam and its treasure effects.
  
• New treasure effect: (Off-Hand, Necklace) "Core Attacks cause the next Look At My Hammer to restore +50 Power"
  
• New treasure effect: (Feet) "Rib Shatter dispels any roots or slows you are currently suffering, and Power cost to sprint in combat is reduced -3 for 9 seconds"
  
• Sword treasure effect tweak: (Hands, Feet) "All Sword abilities deal +13% damage to targets with less than 33% of their Max Rage." => +18%
  
• Known bug: the Fire Magic ability Flesh to Fuel currently costs Power (it should be free). This will be fixed in the next game update
  

• Optimized lighting in Povus city to improve framerate, particularly at night.
  
• Fixed some LODs in Povus to reduce pop-in.
  
• Optimized Gazluk terrain, which should fix most framerate issues in that zone.
  
• Fixed framerate issues in Kur at one of the orc camps.
  
• Optimized UI updates of nameplates. This should have a significant performance boost when using the new UI in areas with a lot of entities.
  
• Persona and Mount cameras now turn off when those windows are not open; previously they were always on and wasting time being rendered.
  

• Auto-unlock the advanced Orc character race for your account when they become available. (Orcs have not yet been implemented! Normally you would need to complete in-game quests to unlock the Orc race.)
  
• Receive a unique cosmetic mini-pet for all characters on your account.
  
• Be granted the special title "Summer's Fairest".
  
• Receive a unique new food to help level your Gourmand.
  
• 9 months VIP membership.
  

• Items can now be summoned from the Warden chest when in Kur.
  
• Fixed a bug that caused dropped items to appear above the character instead of on the ground; this was notably bad in the Red Wing Casino, where items would seemingly disappear into thin air (but were actually stuck in the walls).
  
• The events on the login page now auto-scroll.
  
• Some light polishing of the login screen.
  
• Fixed a bug that caused the waving flag on the login screen to disappear at certain resolutions.
  
• Fixed a formatting error in the score in the golf UI.
  
• Fixed a bug with spring fairy gear that caused elves to have purple skin.
  
• Animal players should no longer "ping-pong" (rotate back and forth very quickly) when standing still in certain scenarios.
  
• Pigs & deer no longer rotate when strafing left & right.
  
• Polished "On Fire" particles.
  

Update Notes: June 30, 2023

• Update to fix problems with animation loops in yesterday's patch
  

• Drowning & dehydration put you in combat again, so that regeneration doesn't prevent dying.
  
• Fixed a bug that broke channeling as a bat almost-completely.
  
• Fixed a bug where an error that prevents channeling causes you to be stuck in the animation (E.G. trying to harvest wood without a saw).
  
• Fixed a bug causing NPCs to get stuck in dancing or instrument-playing animations.
  
• The new treasure effect that causes Heart Thorn to deal Acid armor damage over time did not show in the ability tooltip.
  
• The new treasure effect that causes Heart Thorn to deal Acid armor damage over time did health/armor damage, not armor damage as intended.
  
• Using Premeditated Doom showed the effect icon for mod-activated healing even if you didn't have appropriate mod.
  
• Treasure effect "Signature Debuffs deal +80 damage and restore 90 armor to you after a 10-second delay" could not show up on Uncommon crafted belts.
  
• Added more detailed instructions on how to find Elmetaph to the barrier wall in the newbie dungeon.
  
• Good Bait is now a level 30 recipe (instead of 45).
  
• The meals Venison Psi-Mantis Style and Chicken Psi-mantis Style are now properly marked as containing fish.
  
• Added a line to Words of Power 1 to make it more obvious that you have to manually jot them down.
  
• New setting that keeps your current target selected if you click away from it (without clicking on another target): GUI > Targeting > Mouse Selection > Clear Target on Click. Note that it's only supported in the new UI.
  
• Fixed a graphical issue with leather headgear.
  
• Decreased the SFX volume for some Weather Witching abilities.
  
• Fixed a bug causing the camera position to reset when zoning.
  
• Fixed a bug in the old UI where letting go of left-click while holding in right-click would un-hide the mouse.
  
• Set Near Clip Plane's minimum value to 0.1, to avoid occlusion issues (notably in the casino).
  
• New feature: 5% of all randomly-rolled Legendary loot items will be "Foretold in Prophecy", gaining 60 additional crafting points. It will have additional benefits in the future.
  

• Rebalanced all abilities and treasure effects that generate/restore Power. We have a list of specific changes, but it's quite long so we'll save that for the discord-linked patch notes. The short version is that all such abilities and treasure effects are more potent to varying degrees. In many cases the Power restoration increase is pretty dramatic.
  
• Fixed a bug that sometimes caused gathering animations to not play.
  
• Skeletons now play the correct attack animations again.
  
• Fixed sit/nap animations for Nightshade's bed, a moldy bed in the Carpal Tunnels, and Utimak's chairs.
  
• Fixed an invisible boulder in Eltibule.
  
• Added an Elite Training Dummy with 100k hit points to Serbule.
  
• Lowered cost of Glamour Berries on Riston from 20 LEC to 5 LEC each (but they are now account-bound upon purchase)
  

This update primarily focuses on game balance issues and quality-of-life (QoL) issues. And it's time for summer... and the Steam summer sale!

Summer Sales
Project: Gorgon will be on sale for most of July, from June 29 to July 27, at a big discount - 75% off! We know that the $10 price point is more feasible for some potential new players, so if you have any friends left who haven't tried PG, this may be the time!

If you don't have any friends to invite, you can still get involved -- we just want your scintillating presence! There are lots of ways you can participate in-game during the sales, including special events for newbies and existing players alike, free redemptions each week, rotating buffs, and another VIP Challenge.

Balance Changes
This update has a lot of balance changes. We'll cover the systemic changes first. Then we'll break out individual skills that received multiple changes. If your favorite skill isn't listed here -- or if these changes aren't to your liking -- don't worry, there will be more changes to all skills in the future. In general we're trying to power up weaker skills while toning down the most problematic treasure effects. Please give us your feedback after you've played with these changes a while.

[h2]Transmutation Cost Changes[/h2]
We've been too stingy with Transmutation. Creating and experimenting with new builds is a big part of the game's fun, and it needs to be more accessible.

• Decomposing an item into Phlogiston now yields an average of +100% more Phlogiston. (But note that there's more randomness in the yield than before.)
  
• Durability costs for using Transmutation are now as follows:
  
  
  • Legendary: was 25%, is now 8%
    
  • Epic: was 20%, is now 6%
    
  • Exceptional: was 10%, is now 5%
    
  • Rare and Uncommon: unchanged. (Was 5%, is now 5%)
    
  
  
• Note that it no longer matters whether the transmuted slot is "generic" or not for purposes of durability cost. (But it still affects phlogiston cost.)
  

• Favor Quests now reward more Favor (averaging +50 Favor per quest).
  
• Hang Outs that reward Favor now reward significantly more Favor (about +90%).
  

• (SlotsThisCanShowUpOn): "Old level 100 version of this effect" => changed level 100 version
  

• (Head, Necklace): "Summoned Deer Rage Attack Damage +183" => "... In addition, if it deals Indirect Nature damage (such as via Insect Egg implantation), damage is +20 per tick"
  
• (Hands, Necklace): "Deer Kick implants insect eggs in the target. (Max 4 stacks.) Future Deer Kicks by any pet deer or player deer will cause target to take 390 Nature damage over 5 seconds" => This effect has been re-coded so that the attacking deer's indirect nature buffs are added to the damage dealt. It can also now be found on Ring (as well as Hands and Necklace)
  
• New treasure effect (Feet): "Bounding Escape dispels any active Slow or Root effects on you and grants you immunity to similar effects for 15 seconds"
  
• New treasure effect (Head): "Forest Challenge deals Psychic damage, and damage is +200"
  
• New treasure effect (Hands): "King of the Forest deals Psychic damage, and damage is +120"
  
• Summoned deer pets now periodically use an Antler-Slash move in between Deer Kick moves. This was done to somewhat reduce the number of Egg Infestation stacks per deer (when those mods are used)
  
• Pummeling Hooves: This ability is now considered a Kick (for purposes of buffs and combos).
  
• Fixed a bug that caused the "Forest Caller's" treasure effect to not show up for all item levels.
  

• Removed treasure effect (Legs, Hands): "Fill With Bile heals 92 health and 92 armor" => This treasure mod has been replaced with the new effect below. The new effect can only be on Hands, not Legs, so if you previously had it on Legs, that piece of gear leg-gear is now Legacy (because the new effect will be on your pants and shouldn't be!). Use transmutation to remove the effect and it'll stop being Legacy.
  
• Replacement treasure effect (Hands): "Fill With Bile causes any Core attacks that deal direct Poison damage to deal +180 damage for 3 minutes. (This effect does not stack with itself.)" Note: this mod applies to Toxin Ball, Toxin Bomb, and Inject Venom.
  
• New treasure effect (Legs): "Fill With Bile causes any Nice attacks that deal direct Poison or Acid damage to deal +180 damage for 3 minutes. (This effect does not stack with itself.)" Note: this mod applies to Acid Bomb, Spit Acid, Delerium, and Venomstrike.
  
• (Chest, Legs) "Heart Thorn coats the target in stinging insects that deal 378 Nature damage over 12 seconds" => 480 damage over 8 seconds
  
• (Hands, Legs) "Heart Thorn deals Poison damage (instead of Nature) and also deals 330 Poison damage over 12 seconds" => 440 damage over 8 seconds
  
• New treasure effect (Necklace): "Heart Thorn causes target to suffer +19% damage from all Indirect Damage sources for 15 seconds"
  
• (Head, OffHand) "Heart Thorn restores 90 armor to you" => "Heart Thorn coats the target in acid that deals 580 armor damage over 8 seconds"
  
• (Hands, OffHand) "Pulse of Life restores 100 Health over 15 seconds" => 260 Health over 15 seconds
  
• (Head) "Pulse of Life gives +18 Fire, Cold, and Electricity Mitigation (direct and indirect) for 15 seconds" => 22
  
• (Hands, Feet) "Brambleskin deals +120 Nature damage to melee attackers" => This is now available on Main-Hand gear, as well as Hands and Feet
  
• New treasure effect (Chest, Head) => "Brambleskin deals +34% damage to melee attackers"
  
• New treasure effect (Legs): "Rotskin debuffs target's Indirect Nature Vulnerability -28% for 12 seconds"
  
• (Chest, MainHand) "Cloud Sight covers the target in insects that deal 312 Nature damage over 12 seconds" => "304 Nature damage over 8 seconds"
  
• Ability Toxinball: deals the damage over 8 seconds instead of 12
  
• (Hands, Legs) "Toxinball deals +234 Poison damage to health over 12 seconds" => 224 damage over 8 seconds
  

• (Chest, Ring) "Bun-Fu Kick Delayed Trauma Damage +221" => +358. The delayed trauma damage happens after 5 seconds instead of 8.
  
• Long Ear ability: Removed the movement-speed debuff. Normalized buff duration to 15 seconds at all tiers.
  
• Hare Dash no longer cancels Long Ear.
  
• Love Tap ability: Revising to make this more interesting as a combat-opening "puller debuff". (Note that it already prevented help-shouting.) Ability no longer generates any Rage. Ability has bonus Accuracy. Hastened reset time of all tiers. In addition to increasing the target's rage-fill requirements, Love Tap now also Slows the target 45% for 10 seconds.
  
• (Head, Main Hand) "Love Tap deals 415 Trauma damage after an 8-second delay" => 505 Trauma damage after a 4-second delay.
  
• New treasure effect (OffHand): "Love Tap causes target to suffer +14% damage from future physical attacks (Slashing, Crushing, and Piercing) for 10 seconds"
  
• Love Tap and Bun-Fu strike are considered bodypart attacks (for purposes of certain buffs).
  
• New treasure effect (Feet, Necklace): "While Rabbit skill is active, all Kick abilities deal +25% damage, with a 15% chance to deal double damage"
  
• Fixed leftover attributes that referenced "Bun-Fu Blitz" (now renamed to Bun-Fu Kick).
  

• Spider: Incubate ability: it now takes 10 seconds to incubate an egg, not 15
  
• (Hands, Main Hand) "For 12 seconds after using Infinite Legs, additional Infinite Legs attacks deal +28 damage" => "After using Infinite Legs, additional Infinite Legs attacks deal +58 damage" (The duration is now the same as the built-in buff for that tier of ability, i.e. 10 seconds at level 1 and 18 seconds and level 8.)
  
• (MainHand, Ring): "Premeditated Doom restores 128 health after a 10-second delay" => "Premeditated Doom restores 231 health (or armor, if health is full) after a 10-second delay"
  
• Removed Treasure effect (Head, Necklace): Premeditated Doom restores 200 armor after a 10-second delay => this treasure mod has been replaced with the one below. The new one can only be on necklaces, so if you had the old effect on Head gear, you now have the NEW effect on head gear... which is illegal, so your head gear has become Legacy. If you use transmutation to remove the effect it will stop being Legacy.
  
• (Necklace): "Premeditated Doom boosts your Crushing damage +80 for 20 seconds"
  
• (Head): "Premeditated Doom boosts your Direct Poison damage +97 for 20 seconds"
  
• (Legs, Hands): "Gripjaw deals +42% damage and hastens the current reset timer of Grappling Web by 5 seconds" => 41.2% and 6 seconds
  
• (Main Hand): "Spit Acid raises your Poison Damage +23% for 30 seconds (this effect does not stack with itself)" => "Spit Acid raises your Poison Damage +22% for 12 seconds"
  
• (Head, MainHand): "Terrifying Bite causes the target to take +16% damage from Poison attacks" => +24%
  
• (Hands): "While you are near your Web Trap, you recover 6 Power per second" => 10
  
• (Hands, OffHand): "While you are near your Web Trap, you recover 13 Health per second" => 18
  
• New treasure: (Head, MainHand): "Incubated Spiders' Rage attacks deal +1056 Poison damage over 12 seconds"
  
• (Legs, Necklace) "Gripjaw restores 78 Armor to you" => "Gripjaw deals +78 Armor damage and restores 78 Armor to you"
  

• Ability Hacking Blade: Trauma damage from this ability is generated over 6 seconds instead of 12.
  
• Ability Many Cuts: This ability now deals Trauma damage to health (instead of dealing Slashing armor damage over time); amounts increased.
  
• (Head, Legs) "Precision Pierce deals +40 direct health damage and further reduces target's Rage by 300" => +63 damage; -350 rage
  
• (Feet, Main Hand) "Hacking Blade deals +240 Trauma damage over 12 seconds" => over 6 seconds
  
• (Necklace, Off Hand) "Hacking Blade and Debilitating Blow deal 162 Trauma damage over 12 seconds" => over 6 seconds
  
• (Head, Necklace) "Flashing Strike deals +269 damage to undead" => +580
  
• (Chest) "Flashing Strike deals +35% damage and gives you 50% resistance to Darkness damage for 4 seconds" => for 7 seconds
  
• (Main-Hand, Necklace): "Many Cuts and Debilitating Blow deal +166 damage to Arthropods (such as spiders, mantises, and beetles)" => "Many Cuts and Debilitating Blow deal +134% damage to Arthropods (such as spiders, mantises, and beetles)"=> Also, this effect can now only be found on Necklaces. (Main-hand weapons with this effect are now Legacy, until it's removed from them via Transmutation.)
  
• (Legs, Main Hand) "Many Cuts deals 236 armor damage" => "Many Cuts deals +228 Trauma damage over 6 seconds"
  
• (Feet) "Many Cuts deals +25% damage and stuns targets that have less than a third of their Armor remaining. However, Power cost is +33%" => "Many Cuts deals +12% damage and stuns targets that have less than a third of their Max Rage."
  
• (Head, Feet) "If target has less than a third of their Armor remaining, Many Cuts knocks them back and deals +40 damage" => "Many Cuts deals +86 damage and if target has less than a third of their Max Rage, also knocks them back."
  
• New treasure effect (MainHand): "Debilitating Blow deals +75 damage and causes target's Rage attacks to deal -20% damage for 10 seconds"
  
• (Chest, Off-Hand) "Finishing Blow restores 128 armor to you" => "Finishing Blow deals 530 Psychic damage after a 4 second delay"
  
• New treasure effect (Hands, Feet) : "All Sword abilities deal +13% damage to targets with less than 33% of their Max Rage."
  
• (Legs) "Decapitate deals +100 damage and terrifies the target for 4 seconds" => +255 damage and terrifies for 7 seconds
  
• (Chest, Off-Hand) "Decapitate restores 197 armor to you" => "Decapitate increases your Max Health +137 for 60 seconds (and heals 137)"
  

• Fire Magic: (Hands, Feet): "Indirect Fire Damage +48% when skill Fire Magic active" => +38%
  
• Necromancy: (Hands, Necklace): "Indirect Fire Damage +48% when skill Necromancy active" => +30%
  
• Shield: (Chest, Ring): "While Bulwark Mode is enabled you recover 34 Armor every second" => "... every 3 seconds"
  
• Shield: Elemental Ward ability: protective buffs last for 20 seconds instead of 30
  
• Warden: (Hands, Feet): "Indirect Fire Damage +77% when skill Warden active" => +42%
  
• Unarmed: Abilities Cobra Strike, Mamba Strike, and Slashing Strike have a new innate benefit: "Dispels the strongest Damage-over-Time effect you are currently suffering from"
  
• Hammer: removed artificial Power-cost increases for this skill, resulting in a 5-10% cost decrease. However, this decrease is completely overshadowed by the major Power-cost rescaling explained above. (But Hammer users can now rest easy knowing their skill no longer has artificially-high Power costs.)
  

• The creatures variously known as "Garden Tenders", "Sand Dogs", and "Snow Leapers" (depending on their variety) are now immune to slow and root effects.
  
• Orcs: Sword-wielding orcs previously had a Parry move which drained a tiny amount of Power. This Parry move now reduces Core Attack damage by 75% for 10 seconds.
  
• Orcs: Melee-range orcs can now throw a knife up to 20 meters. They use this when slowed or rooted.
  
• Slimes are now immune to slow, root, fear, and mesmerize effects. (But notably not knockbacks.)
  
• Monster tornadoes are now immune to slow and root effects.
  

• Dramatically increased the amount of XP earned by catching high level fish. (All levels of fish are affected, but will be most noticeable after level 50.)
  
• Quest "Angling: Toxic Blooms": The toxic blooms only appeared during nighttime hours, but should appear at all hours.
  
• Adjusted the level & distribution of fishing zones in Povus.
  
• Added some more types of angling fish to Povus zones.
  
• Grapefish on the line are now purple.
  
• Fixed an Angling visual effect with transparency issues.
  
• Quest "Angling: Vicious Eels": Fixed the description; it had been "Angle Invasive Ice Fish".
  The fishing pool on the northeast side of the main Sun Vale island previously gave a quest that rewarded you with the "Angling (Advanced)" ability. This ability's level has been lowered to level 30, and is now given out by a lower-level pool: the one on the north end of the main island. (The northeast-side quest still exists, but now gives bait and XP as a reward.)
  
  
  
  • Note: the "Catch And Release (Advanced)" ability is still level 45; it will changed to 30 (and moved to a level 30 pool) in a future update
    
  
  
• Catching junk like crates and bottles now gives better XP at higher levels.
  

• You can now search for items with Ctrl+F! Note: This is a new keybind, located in Settings > Keys > Interface > "Search for Item".
  
• Adjusted vitals-change animation speed so larger changes will animate quicker.
  
• Fixed bug causing "Save Changes" popup to show erroneously due to some custom chat channel preferences.
  
• Settings tooltips now only show when you hover over the name of the setting.
  
• Closing the Settings window without saving changes will now properly update the window the next time it opens.
  
• Fixed bug preventing the settings "Save" button from enabling when modifying some graphics overrides.
  
• New setting to disable enemy AOE ranges from appearing: "GUI > Windows & HUD > Abilities & Items > Show Enemy AOE Areas". Defaults to true.
  
• Better handling of AOE Range opacity, and default the setting to 0.5 instead of 1 (resulting in dimmer AOEs).
  
• Renamed "Reset Camera Position" keybind to "Re-Align Camera to Character".
  
• Fixed bug that sometimes caused party-member nameplates to get stuck on the screen.
  
• Target of target's avatar portrait is now controlled via the "Avatar Portraits" setting.
  
• Right-clicking on your target to use it will no longer use the thing behind it.
  
• Fixed bug causing the cursor to not change properly when your hovered target disappears.
  
• Drastically decreased the time dropping & picking up items stops you for (especially for humanoids).
  

• Open Inventory: I, B
  
• Open Skills & Abilities: K, Ctrl+D
  
• Open Social Window: O, Shift+Ctrl+S
  
• Open Crafting: C, Ctrl+R
  
• Open Quest Log: L
  
• Open Chat: Ctrl+C
  

• Chat no longer closes when pressing Esc.
  
• Ability Tooltips appear near the cursor, not in the top corner of the screen.
  
• Change tooltip font size from 11 -> 12.
  
• Skills, Abilities and the Quest Log start out as larger windows.
  
• The "Tip" window (that shows tutorial messages) is centered on the left of the screen.
  
• Channeling bar is centered above the character's head.
  

• Added an "Observation Golem" to Anagoge to help direct lost players.
  
• Added a "Training Golem" to Anagoge Records Facility to point out some hidden-but-useful game settings for new players.
  
• Demo players can no longer be sent pigeon mail. (This was a bug.)
  
• Golf: Fixed a number of bugs, refined the golf UI, and tweaked some functionality for a (hopefully) improved experience.
  
• Fixed bugs with fairy chimes not properly updating.
  
• Fixed the sometimes-broken nib barters on Shala.
  
• Adjusted minigolem hitboxes to be more exact.
  
• Improved handling of looping animations for most animals.
  
• Toned down some Battle Chemistry visual effects.
  
• Prevented particles from sticking around in certain conditions.
  
• An assortment of graphics touch-ups in the character select & create screens.
  
• Updated a number of icons.
  
• Damage from falling, dehydration, and drowning will no longer put you into combat.
  
• Fixed a bug causing playable animals to not rotate properly when strafing when ground alignment was turned off.
  

This is a small update to fix some of the bugs we introduced in the June 1 update. It also includes some other balance changes and bug fixes as well. (Sometimes bug fixes sprawl. One thing leads to another and so on, and suddenly you're making changes to Deer.)

[h3]Angling[/h3]
- Animals can no longer angle: you must have hands to angle.
- The ability Catch and Release now gives 25% _bonus_ xp rather than just 25% xp.
- Clicking on Fish Tacos recipe in chat can no longer crash the client. It was the sour cream: the Fish Tacos recipe incorrectly indicated that it consumed half of a sour cream. It now correctly requires 1 sour cream, with a 50% chance it'll be consumed.
- Canceling angling (by pressing the ability) no longer consumes another piece of bait.
- Fish should no longer be selectable when they are attached to a fishing line.
- Fixed broken Dorado fish. This should help complete the angling quest in Ilmari.
- Angling ability descriptions no longer say they are test animations.
- Lungfish now look like lungfish (more or less) while on a fishing line.
- The Perch Fillet in the Loot Master Game is no longer just a blank white square.
- Fixed the reversed east/west text of the angling quest in Serbule Hills.
- Fixed missing particles on several "non-fish" angling targets.

[h3]Changes to Deer[/h3]
After review, it seems like Deer has good bones and interesting potential, but it could use some buffing.
- "Deer Kick deals +X damage and grants you -10% Fire Vulnerability for 10 seconds" => for 60 seconds
- "Combo: Deer Bash+AnyMelee+Any Melee+Deer Kick: final step hits all enemies within 5 meters and deals +X damage." => combo is now Deer Bash+Any Melee+Deer Kick
- Ability "Deer Bash" base damage increased significantly (288 => 400)
- Revised correlated mod downward a bit: "Deer Bash Damage +72%" => "Deer Bash Damage +66%"
- "Forest Challenge damage is +158 and reuse time is -1 second" => "Forest Challenge and King of the Forest damage is +116 and reuse time is -1 second"
- "King of the Forest has a 90% chance to deal +200 damage" => "King of the Forest damage +100. There is a 22% chance to summon a deer ally for 30 seconds"
- Ability "Summon Deer" tiers 2-5: all tiers now have reset time of 30 seconds
- "Summoned Deer have +73 armor" => "Summoned Deer deal +61 damage and have a +10% chance to crit"
- "Pummeling Hooves has a 60% chance to deal +78% damage and taunt +500" => "Pummeling Hooves deals +60 damage and restores 80 Health over 8 seconds"
- "Deer Bash has a 60% chance to deal +134% damage" => "Deer Bash deals +100 damage and has a 24% chance to deal +134% more damage"
- New treasure effect: (Head): "Forest Challenge deals +100 damage and you take -15% damage from Elite attacks for 20 seconds"

[h3]UI & Graphics[/h3]
- AoE range indicators should work in all areas now.
- Doubled the speed at which vitals bars animate.
- Dying now enables the cursor in Action Mode.
- Skills now remember if they are expanded or collapsed when zoning.
- New setting: "AOE Area Opacity" located in GUI > Windows & HUD > Abilities & Items
- Fixed a bug causing Show/Hide durationless effects to cause a short framerate dip.
- Fixed a bug preventing players from booting up in the Old UI.
- Fixed broken combat numbers in the Old UI.
- Fixed a bug that caused animals to get stuck dancing.
- Channeling an ability while playing a bard song should no longer cancel the bard song animation.
- Acid Bomb & Freezing Mist effects now display even when nobody is hit by them.
- Added explode-y effects to Toxin Bomb & Mycotoxin Formula to make them feel more... explode-y.
- Removed some mud from pig dances until we can make it look better.

[h3]Other[/h3]
- Increased bonus XP earned for killing monsters in a group. The bonus depends on the number of group members that helped fight the monster. Bonuses for (1, 2, 3, 4, 5, or 6) group members changed from (+0%, +25%, +33%, +50%, +66%, +75%) to (+0%, +33%, +66%, +100%, +133%, +166%). Note that this was actually in the June 1 update, we just forgot to tell you.
- The Warden mod "When privacy field deals damage, it also ignites the suspect, dealing 64 damage over 8 seconds" will no longer ignite the user of Privacy Field.
- Jesina's dialog did not change after you received the Nexus Adjunct Matter Aligner.
- Jesina can now give players a replacement Nexus Adjunct Matter Aligner if they have misplaced theirs.
- Percy Evans now refuses gifts of the Nexus Adjunct Matter Aligner.
- The lowest-tier versions of "Summon Sandstorm" and "Summon Doomstorm" now use the same cooldown timer as all other summoned storm abilities.
- Doomstorms did not make any ambient sound.
- Summon Doomstorm 2+ and Summon Sandstorm 2+ abilities were grouped with Summon Sandstorm abilities in the ability window. This has been fixed.
- When you had multiple stacks of ammo, ammo would be consumed from the largest stack, thereby slowly depleting all the stacks at an even rate. This felt weird; now ammo is consumed one stack at a time, starting with the first ("leftmost"?) stack in your inventory.
- Increased the chance of wolfsbane spawning in the Werewolf Forest in Kur Mountains.
- Mushroom boxes & box recipes were using a fishing pole icon. (They always have, but the old icon was too murky to make out.)
- Potion of Random Resistance and Potion of Universal Resistance incorrectly gave back an empty bottle after drinking.
- A handful of old icons have been updated.

Welcome to June, and also the latest Project: Gorgon update! This update contains a new much-requested skill, Angling, as well as new UI features, quests, balancing, and a ton of bug fixes.

[h3]Main Story[/h3]
We've expanded the main story quest-line by a few steps. If you've already reached the point in the storyline where you were asked to have dinner with Jessina (via a hang out), the hang out is now available, and you should log in to see that your character has a "reminder quest" to hang out with Jessina.

[h3]New Camera Types[/h3]
Players come to us from different games with different control schemes and camera views, and they often ask us if we can imitate the camera styles they're used to. So we gave it a try! We know that getting movement behavior just right can be tricky, so *please* give us feedback on how these work for you.

There are now 3 camera types to choose from, located in Settings > Controls:
- Traditional Camera: How the camera has always worked. Right-click rotates your character, left-click rotates only the camera. Mouse is always available.
- Free Camera: Camera control is completely separate from character control. Mouse is always available.
- Action Camera: Mouse movement always controls character. Mouse cursor is only available when a UI window is open, or when the Toggle Cursor key is pressed (configurable). NOTE: only available in the new selection system!

[h3]AoE Visibility[/h3]
Area-of-Effect abilities that are centered on the caster now have a visualization for their range.
- When an ability is used, the AOE range briefly displays on the ground as a circle.
- When an AOE ability icon is hovered over, its AOE range displays on the ground for as long as it's hovered over.
- Visibility is configurable via Settings > GUI > Windows & HUD > Abilities & Items > "Show Beneficial AOE Areas" & "Show Detrimental AOE Areas". By default they are "Party Members Only" & "Self Only" respectively. Detrimental enemy AOEs will always display.
- Many "aura"-type pets display their aura ranges in a similar fashion, such as a druid's Healing Sanctuary or a fairy's Fae Conduit. These should also follow the visibility settings described above.
- Note: as of this update, all AoE abilities are centered on the caster, except for two Weather Witching abilities that are explicitly centered on the target. Previously, all AoEs were centered on the target, but the game didn't say that anywhere, and most players assumed it was centered on the caster! So this seems much more intuitive. But if there are specific AoE abilities that you feel should be centered on the target instead of the caster, please let us know and we'll consider it.

[h3]Angling[/h3]
Traditionally, fishing in Project: Gorgon has involved scooping fish up out of the water with your bare hands -- what we might call 'tickling' the fish. And that's fine, as far as it goes. It takes real skill! But not all fish can be caught this way. (And more importantly, players have told us that an MMO "needs" to have traditional fishing in order to feel like a complete MMO.)

So we've expanded Fishing with a new sub-skill: Angling. All you need is a fishing pole, some bait, and a body of water with catchable fish. (Also Fishing 15. And hands!) In order to get started, talk to Roshun the Traitor in Serbule.

The precise mechanics of Angling aren't spelled out in the game at the moment. Since this game focuses on exploration, we expect players to be able to figure out how Angling works. Please let us know what parts of the system were hard to figure out, and we'll work to make those bits more obvious.

[h3]Skills & Abilities[/h3]
From here out (and probably through the rest of beta), we'll be making small balance changes. We don't want to overnerf/overbuff things, so most changes will be relatively modest, and then we'll re-evaluate and adjust further after more observation.

Warden:
We've revised the formulae used for damage reflection, which resulted in nerfs to Privacy Field. On the other hand, multiple bug fixes actually increase the Warden's power significantly in other ways.
- Privacy Field abilities: reduced base ability damage (Privacy Field 5 changed from 196 -> 138)
- Treasure: "Privacy Field deals +60 damage to all melee attackers, and the first melee attacker is knocked away": 60 => 42
- Treasure: "Privacy Field also deals its damage when you are hit by burst attacks, and damage is +86": 86 => 47
- Treasure: "Privacy Field also deals its damage when you are hit by ranged attacks, and damage is +57": 57 => 48
- Treasure: "When Privacy Field deals damage, it also ignites the suspect, dealing 156 damage over 12 seconds": => 156 => 80. Note: previously this effect did not work at all, so this is technically a huge buff, not a nerf!
- Treasure: "While Privacy Field is active, melee attacks that hit you have a 100% chance to restore 20 Power to you" : 100% chance => 75% chance. Note: previously this effect did not work at all, so this is technically a huge buff, not a nerf!
- Treasure: "Apprehend deals +48 damage and hastens the current reuse timer of Controlled Burn by 2 seconds (so it can be used again more quickly)" : 2 seconds -> 1.5 seconds. Note: previously this effect did hasten Control Burn at at all, so this is technically a huge buff, not a nerf!
- Controlled Burn: area-of-effect reduced from 15 meters to 10 meters.
- Aggression Deterrent: area-of-effect reduced from 10 meters to 6 meters.

Weather Witch:
- New ability Summon Sandstorm: This is a variant of Summon Tornado intended to be more convenient in groups. It does not knock back foes, instead dealing bonus Armor damage. All tiers of this ability can be learned from the Sand Seer in Ilmari.
- New rare ability Summon Doomstorm: This is a variant of Summon Tornado. It does not knock back foes. Instead it deals Darkness damage. Damage is improved over base version. This pet is marked as undead for purposes of ability targeting. In other words, heals that don't work on undead don't work on this pet either. Buffs that work on undead DO work on this pet. For now, all tiers of this ability can be found as loot scrolls.
- Fixed bug that caused high-level summoned tornados to move incredibly fast. Normalized tornado speeds.
- Summoned tornadoes accidentally had vulnerability stats for Cold Spheres. They now correctly have vulnerability stats for Tornadoes.

Giant Bat:
- "Your Confusing Double deals +67% damage with each attack": 67% => 45%
- "Confusing Double summons an additional figment. Each figment deals +77 damage with each attack": 77 => 50
- "Confusing Double Reuse Timer -15": -15 => -10

Fire Magic:
- "Fire Breath hits all targets within 8 meters and deals +30.5% damage, but reuse timer is +3 seconds and Power cost is +33%" => "Fire Breath hits all targets within 8 meters and deals +60 damage, but reuse timer is +3 seconds and Power cost is +40"

[h3]Settings[/h3]
- The "Reset" button in Settings now resets the currently-selected tab to its default settings. The old functionality, undoing all current changes, is still doable by simply closing the window.
- Added new experimental settings for Tab Targeting. You can find them in settings under GUI > Targeting > Tab Targeting (Experimental).
-- Combat Range: Control the max range of tab targeting when you are in combat.
-- Combat Lock: If your current target is in combat, only other in-combat enemies will be targeted via tab, unless none are in view.
-- Prioritize Unlooted Corpses: When tabbing through corpses, should all un-looted corpses be targeted before looted corpses?
-- You can now tab through targets as quickly as you can press the button.
- Overwriting a keybind that's already bound now shows a confirmation prompt, including the name of the keybind being overwritten.
- Reorganized and renamed several Settings, to make them more intuitively grouped and easier to find.

[h3]UI Changes[/h3]
- "Controls" settings have been organized into Camera & Character controls, with sub-menus.- Allow clicking through entities in the new UI, similar to how it works in the old UI. If you click on something that's already selected, it selects the entity behind it (if there is one).
- Reduced precision of click-selecting entities, so they can be selected without hovering directly over them.
- All stat bars (and globes) now smoothly animate when they change, instead of statically changing to the new value.
- Item stack size font now resizes properly for vaults (including saddlebag).
- Fixed nameplate placement for mounted humanoids.
- Fixed bug causing mouse cursor to disappear completely if mouse-dragging while zoning.
- Fixed bug that caused very large tooltips not to display sometimes.
- Removed hover-text about avatar portraits coming soon -- because they're here now! We live in the future!
- Ability tooltips now display Special Values before Special Info, as those make more sense grouped together with the other numerical data.
- Polished the lootable-corpse particles a bit.
- Nameplates now fully fade out with distance instead of just the names.
- Better handling of left-clicking nothing to deselect your current target.
- Improved display of Crafting button when no hotkey is assigned.
- Fixed quest window display bug when objective count number was very large.
- Removed the "1" from the item slot in the bug report window.
- Fixed bug causing stack sizes of items in the sidebar to get out of sync.

[h3]Graphics & Animation[/h3]
- Wolves & cows now animate at proper speed when going up and down hills.
- Replaced wolf's Hunting Speed animation with a howl animation.
- Polished bard animations, so they flow together better now. The play-lute animation now always plays when you are playing a bard song, even if you use other abilities while playing the song.
- Improved instrument-playing animations.
- New VFX (animations, particles, & shader effects) for all Battle Chemistry abilities.
- You can no longer auto-move while jumping. Doing so previously resulted in some very strange-looking animations.
- Fixed weird animation bug when trying to do certain things while sitting or kneeling.
- Failure to interact with something now returns the player to idle stance.
- Fixed bug with Thentree armor causing weird shadows on male characters.
- Mage Armor is now more polished, a bit darker, and has glowier gems
- Fixed bug that would cause a dancing pig's mud to stick around forever.
- Fixed bug where mounting while dancing would continue some dancing effects.
- Improved texture for Spring Fairy armor.
- Fixed face cam for Pigeons.

[h3]Other Bug Fixes & Tweaks[/h3]
- Some legacy equipment that should have been Mastercrafted wasn't. Those items should be fixed now.
- When you un-legacy equipment by pulling an invalid power off of it at the transmutation table, the legacy and broken state of that equipment is now properly updated.
- Fixed bug allowing recipe items to be summoned from anywhere.
- Updated Shadow Feint tooltip to display the correct AOE distance for blinking back to position.
- Phrenology-based Mentalism & Psychology bonuses to critical chance now properly affect heals.
- Improved logic related to channeling abilities; this should hopefully fix stuck-in-channel bugs.
- Modified Mutation Injection ability descriptions to make it a bit clearer how they work.
- Lycanthropy ability "Become Wolf": the skill check to disable wolf mode is no longer downleveled when your combat skills are downleveled.
- Newly learned abilities, Wild Endurance, & First Aid should now correctly auto-rerank.
- Dying by falling through the world now shows a special button in the death window, "Teleport to Last-Touched Ground", which teleports your dead body to the last ground you were standing on. While this isn't an ideal solution, it should allow you to be revived in party situations
- Fixed bug causing skeleton warrior pets to repeatedly retreat a short distance when fighting something.
- Astounding Cloth Shirt (Max-Enchanted) and Camouflaged Astounding Shirt (Max-Enchanted) recipes now require the correct ingredients.
- Pressing spacebar while in an animal-mount form will no longer play the horse neighing sound.
- Fixed typo in Evasion Boots (Enchanted) recipes.
- Changed icon color for Acid Bomb to more of an acid-y color (and match the new VFX).
- Acid Boost Potion recipe now correctly states that it lasts 30 minutes.
- Fixed typo in quest "Holistic Wellness: Yarn" (twelve -> twenty-four balls of yarn).
- The tsys mod, "Psi Health Wave grants all targets +X Mitigation vs. Electricity, Acid, and Nature attacks for 20 seconds" now displays in the effects list when it's active.
- Fixed Dwarven Fixer causing screen brightness (instead of hiding it).
- "Toxic Flesh" tooltip now takes poison damage buffs into account.
- Using Objective Orienteering on "The Borghild Lead" quest now leads to the correct area.
- Fixed typo in quest "The Borghild Lead" (south -> north).
- Harry now hints more strongly that his Minor Panacea will not cure ALL curses, just a specific one.
- The quest "Goblin Avenger: Ratkin!!!" now correct gives 10 Xedrite.
- JSON users: Note that in skills.json's level-up rewards, "Ability" can now refer to a single ability or an array of abilities.

Got feedback? Want to discuss these changes? Please join us on our Discord: https://discord.gg/projectgorgon

In this minor bug-fixing update:

Welcome to update #383! Today we have some more tweaks and additions that expand upon the major changes we made in the last update. Plus, as usual, a bunch of bug fixes. Let's get to it!

[h2]Changes to Uncommon and Rare Equipment[/h2]

We've made an experimental change to the lowest-rarity magic loot:

• Uncommon (green) items now have two additional generic powers (for a total of 3 powers, but only 1 is specific to a skill).
  
• Rare (blue) items now have one additional generic power (for a total of 3 powers, but only 2 are specific to skills).
  
• In addition, we've created new generic treasure effects aimed at improving low- and mid-level player capabilities.
  

• Mastercrafted items have 40 more Crafting Points than non-Mastercrafted items.
  
• There is a new recipe that lets you restore a Mastercrafted item's transmutation durability as often as desired (for a hefty cost in prisms). The recipe can be learned from Sona in Gazluk.
  

• If the item can be fixed by removing a power from it (because it's got more than the prescribed number of powers), the golem prompts the user for which power they want to remove, and removes that power.
  
• If the item can be fixed by just transmuting a power off of the item, the golem tells the player this. The player can choose to go and transmute the item, or just get a replacement from the golem (like before).
  
• For any other causes of Legacyness, the golem can only replace the item with a new one as before (for now). Hopefully, though, the new wording and warnings will make this less scary and error-prone!
  

• There are new recipes that let you reset a piece of armor's crafting points by wiping the item's enhancements, pockets, augments, etc. These are difficult high-level recipes. For now they can be trained from Felmer in the Fae Realm.
  
• Revised some "rubywall" generic treasure mods to be less terrible. (They still don't scale very well, by intention. They're just less terrible than before.)
  
• Fixed a bug where an item could have the same skill for both chosen skills, resulting in an item with bonuses for only one skill, causing it to immediately become a Legacy item.
  
• Drima, Sir Johnson's assistant, has raised the price on all equipment from 2 "Sir Johnson Bucks" to 3. The items are now guaranteed to be Epic+ rarity (instead of Exceptional+).
  
• Fixed a bug that prevented you from taking off equipment when your skills were temporarily down-ranked to the point that you no longer met the equip reqs of the item. (This could also generate errors when trying to use loadouts.)
  

Abilities now automatically change their rank when skills change, when either entering or exiting a skill level disparity. For example:

• If you change from Necro 60/Bard 60 to Necro 60/Shield 10, all Necro abilities on your hotbar will de-rank to level 35 abilities.
  
• If you change from Necro 60/Shield 10 to Necro 60/Staff 55, all Necro abilities on your hotbar will up-rank to level 60 abilities.
  
• If you change from Necro 60/Bard 60 to Necro 60/Staff 55, Necro abilities on your hotbar will not change ranks.
  

• Individual abilities on your hotbar can now be changed quickly by right-clicking an ability and selecting "Change Ability".
  
• You can now disable the display of the hotkey assigned to that hotbar slot.
  
• The rank of an ability is now displayed on its ability icon.
  

• Pressing alt will now show any currently-hidden overhead labels in the new UI.
  
• Changed the names of some ability groups in the Skills and Abilities window so they are more generic, such as "Tame Rat" -> "Tame Animal".
  
• Polished lots of ability tooltips to rearrange how some data is presented on them, mostly the Special effects.
  
• Many abilities cannot be used in the air. Attempting to do so will now behave like any other cannot-use-ability case: the icon will gray out and the error will display in the tooltip.
  
• The "Search Corpse" button on pets now properly updates to "Check" when the pet is revived.
  
• Combat Info no longer shows Player levels (which were always showing as 0 anyway).
  
• Fixed a UI bug that would cause all items to display as sellable if the vendor reset timer somehow goes negative.
  
• Fixed a bug causing items to sometimes not float to the correct location when the inventory is open and any bag besides the first one is selected.
  
• Added a new beta command, **/reloadchar**, that will reload your character's appearance. This should fix many animation issues that arise because it re-initializes the whole character, including their animations. (You should still report any bugs you run into, but this command is a quick way to fix yourself - after you send in a report!)
  

• Fixed issue that could cause players to fall through the world when using the new selection system.
  
• Fixed a rare bug when switching areas that could cause a player character to effectively "roll back" to a version of their character that is about 1 minute in the past, losing any progress from the previous minute.
  
• The mod "Reconstruct causes the target to take X less damage from attacks for 30 seconds" now correctly states 10 seconds.
  
• Butchering an Ice Runner now gives the player a Raw Paralytic Chicken instead of a plain Raw Chicken. Note that the butchering requirement has been raised from 10 to 35 (to match Ice Runners' target level). In addition, Ice Runners have a small chance of dropping Raw Paralytic Chicken as loot.
  
• Tyler Green in Serbule Hills will now install low-level augments at Neutral favor. (Before it required Friends.)
  
• Moved the Council Proclamation Form to its own fancy little table on the other side of the room so it won't be in Hulon's way.
  
• Animal illusion forms can no longer milk cows.
  
• Bulwark Mode now turns off when you change form.
  
• Summoning recipe ingredients now takes your saddlebag into account.
  
• Fixed a bug causing HP to sometimes get out of sync when hit by projectiles.
  
• The special teleportation scroll "Teleportation: Recall Gazluk Animal Camp", which can now be found rarely in loot, was teaching the special teleport destination "Recall Serbule Docks" instead. This has been fixed.
  
• Ukorga's tanning rack can be selected. This fix also fixes items falling through the floors in the houses in Kur Mountains.
  
• It's no longer freezing inside Ukorga's house.
  
• The quest "Cleo's Lost Books" from Cleo Conyers now tells the player to go east, not west.
  
• Newbie players can find a free butcher knife at the top of Elmetaph's tower. (Previously there was a small chance to find a butcher knife in Lawara's chest; this has been removed)
  
• There has been a small change to the flow in the Anagoge Records Facility (the dungeon on the newbie island). There's a new barrier between the second and third floors that requires the player to talk to Elmetaph. This should not affect existing players who have already made it to Serbule Hills.
  
• Added a new emote! /kneel
  
• Added new dance animations for Cow, Pig, and Wolf dance variants. Cows speed up or slow down depending on the variant. Pig dances now involve a lot more mud. And some Wolf variants now come with glowy eyes!
  
• Polished Cow, Pig, and Wolf animations in general, adding some new ones and making them flow together more smoothly.
  
• Fixed grass pop-in issues in several zones.
  
• Fixed a bug where channeling while jumping breaks your character.
  
• Fixed a bug causing the Unarmed combat stance to sometimes show up when it shouldn't (for example, while playing a Bard song).
  
• Failure to revive a pet no longer plays the kick animation.
  

• Items should no longer erroneously report stack sizes of 1.
  
• Fixed alcohol becoming Legacy. (Any booze that went Legacy is un-Legacied.)
  
• Fixed crafted Uncommon belts having three treasure effects -- belts are still only supposed to have 1. (Any existing 3-effect crafted belts have become Legacy.)
  
• Remove text from cosmetic pet icons.
  
• Cows now use a subtler animation for many non-cow abilities.
  
• Added rank numbers to spontaneous fireballs.
  

• We're investigating reports that shield wax can make a shield become Legacy -- but only until the wax wears off
  
• Max-enchanted non-Legendaries are being reported as Legacy because they have more effects than they're supposed to. In the next update, we'll improve the Legacy Item Helper golem so that it can fix these items by increasing their rarity. (e.g. the fix for a max-enchanted purple is to turn it into a normal yellow.) Hold on to those items for now.
  

This minor update fixes bugs and refines the new systems from last week's update. We'd also like to use these patch notes to give extra behind-the-scenes info for long time players about why the recent gameplay changes are happening, and where we're headed.

You can skip all the "Background Info" sections if you just want to read about the changes in this update!

XP Changes:
[h2]Background Info: Goals of the XP Changes[/h2]
The recent XP changes had two different goals. The first goal is to prevent players from staying in the same hunting area for too long. Previously, since XP amounts was relatively flat across levels, players could stay in one spot (such as the goblin dungeon in Eltibule) for many, many levels because it was easy and effective. This left players weak because they were only finding level 30 equipment all that time. And farming the same dungeon for 30 levels is boring game design.

The other goal is to require players to actually use a skill to level it. Previously, experienced players would level one pair of combat skills to 80, and then they could level literally ALL other combat skills in a fraction of the time it was supposed to take. They just paired a new level 1 skill with one of their level 80 skills. They never needed to find gear for those lower levels, or visit lower-level dungeons at all. That's awful game design because it obsoletes almost all of the game's content.

Ideally, if a level 80 player switched to using two new level 1 combat skills, they'd effectively be a combat newbie -- aside from the cheaty powers on their sidebar. Thus they would need to return to Serbule or somewhere similar to level up a bit, then head to appropriate level 20 areas, then 30, then 40, etc. That's our eventual goal after more iterations. It doesn't really work yet because not everything scales yet. For instance, Max Armor doesn't scale yet, so your gear still gives you all the armor of a level 80 player even if your combat skills are level 1. Finding good solutions to all these scaling issues will take time.

[h2]Background Info: Leveling Speed[/h2]
The intent with the last update was to keep the relative XP value of monsters the same, so that a level N player killing a level N monster would give the same relative advancement as it did before the update. However, there were many bugs (and "surprise game-system interactions") which made that not work. We've fixed those issues, but we've also abandoned that goal! After reviewing the old XP curve more carefully, it had problems that made leveling happen too fast.

Even though there have been a lot of fixes in this update, leveling should feel somewhat slower than before. Leveling needed to slow down so that players are more likely to find level-appropriate gear before they level up too far.

Now that we've fixed a bunch of bugs, we'd like more feedback on how the curve works! We'll keep refining things as needed.

[h2]In this update: Revised XP Dropoff Rate (When Killing Higher-Level Monsters)[/h2]
In the last big update, we added a new rule that if you kill monsters higher than your level, you get reduced XP. In this update, we've refined the rates at which XP drops off.

In the last update, if you killed a monster 5 levels above you (or less), you got 100% of the XP. This was a big problem because monster XP rates now increase VERY dramatically: about 10% per monster level! An average level 50 monster is worth 1373 XP, while a level 55 monster is worth 2249 XP. By killing monsters exactly 5 levels above their level, players could advance at almost double speed.

On the other hand, after 10 levels, the old curve dropped off very quickly, such that you got essentially 0 XP for monsters more than 15 levels above you. This seemed a bit too punitive, at least given the current content landscape.

Now, the XP dropoff is 10% per level, which approximates the 10% monster XP increase per level. So no matter what level you are, you get about the same amount of XP for that higher-level monster, up to 25 levels above it. Here are some examples:

Suppose you are level 49 and are fighting a level 50 monster worth 1373 XP. Since the monster is 1 level higher than you, the penalty would be 10%, and you would receive 1236 XP. (This is approximately how much a level 49 monster would be worth.)

Suppose you're level 45 and are fighting that level 50 monster worth 1373 XP. Since the monster is 5 levels higher than you, the penalty would be 10%, then 10% of THAT value, then 10% of THAT value, then 10% of that value, then 10% of that value. The level 50 monster worth 1373 XP becomes 811 XP when killed by a level 45 player. (A typical level 45 monster would be worth 861 XP, so you can see the math isn't perfect, but it stays in the same ballpark.)

Now we'll go to the extreme end: suppose you're level 45 and you've managed to solo a level 70 monster worth 12,498 XP. Since you are 25 levels below the monster, we apply the 10% penalty 25 times, and the level 70 monster ends up being worth 897 XP when killed by a level 45 player. (The final cutoff is still 25 levels -- if the monster had been level 71 instead of level 70, you would receive 0 XP because it's more than 25 levels above you.)

This revision means that you can hunt in places up to 25 levels above you and get appropriate XP, without giving overmuch XP to players who can kill those higher-level monsters (such a by being in a group with higher-level players).

These XP curves and ideas are still in heavy development, so expect more changes as we refine our goals and implementation.

PS - remember that monster XP is split between your two active combat skills! Half of the XP goes into each skill, and the penalty is calculated per-skill. So if you kill a a level 50 monster worth 1000 XP, half of that 1000 is given to your first active combat skill (and possibly reduced as explained above, if that skill is higher than the monster's level). The other half is given to your other active combat skill (and is reduced if it's higher).

Background Info: Max-Enchanted Change
I (Citan, head dev) want to apologize to the long-time players who have max-enchanted legendaries. This is definitely a nerf, and it's intentional, because I can't balance the game when the power disparity is as large as it is at high levels. Mod potency is multiplicative, and those 9 extra mods really are a big deal in terms of overall power scaling. (Even when treasure mods aren't literally multiplicative they still have a pseudo-multiplicative effect on your character's potency -- for instance, by making characters much more versatile than they should be.)

We made this change now, months BEFORE launching new levels, because the expectation is that you will need new gear at higher level. We're not marking those items as Legacy yet because we don't need to do that yet -- you can keep using them for now and we'll mark them as Legacy before we raise the level cap. The change was made now to give you time to prepare for the change, and to stop crafters from making more gear that would ultimately get nerfed.

To answer questions that players have asked:

• We'll provide a way to pick one mod to remove from you max-enchanted legendaries, making them non-Legacy so you can keep using them.
  
• Mega-raffle gear that's max-enchanted legendary will be treated like other max-enchanted legendaries.
  
• We're not going to "grandfather" existing level 80 max-enchanted legacies. In many cases, that one extra treasure mod on a level 80 item makes it better than a level 100 item with one fewer mod. That would mean players with these grandfathered items don't need to replace them until we launch level 100+ content! That is problematic for balancing in many ways.
  

• Weather Witching + Warden equipment is now a valid combination that can be found in loot and treasure. (Although note that only butterflies can use such equipment!)
  
• The following Weather Witching treasure buffs were bugged such that they disappeared as soon as you used an ability:
  
  
  • "While Wind Ward is active, you gain +N% Melee Evasion"
    
  • "While Wind Ward is active, you gain +N% Burst Evasion"
    
  
  
• The following Weather Witching treasure debuffs were similarly bugged, and disappeared as soon as the monster used an ability:
  
  
  • "Dampen deals Cold damage and debuffs the target so that it takes +N damage from future Cold attacks for 10 seconds"
    
  • "Dampen debuffs the target so that it takes +N damage from future Nature attacks for 10 seconds"
    
  • "Deluge deals +N damage on contact and increases the target's Poison Vulnerability +15% for 30 seconds (non-stacking)"
    
  • "Deluge deals an additional N nature damage over 7 seconds. For 7 seconds, target has a 15% chance to Miss with any Melee attack."
    
  
  
• The following abilities can now be used underwater or in shallow water: Dampen, Deluge, Tsunami, and Hailstorm.
  
• Hailstorm is now a Signature Debuff ability.
  
• The effect "Summoned Tornadoes move much faster and their attacks deal +N% damage": tornado speed is buffed +6 instead of +9.
  
• The effect "Summoned Tornado attacks deal +N damage and cause the target to take 15% more damage from Electricity for 10 seconds (non-stacking)": this debuff was stacking incorrectly. Is now non-stacking as intended.
  
• The treasure mod "Shocking Grasp Damage +N. Every other use has a 25% chance to stun the target" will no longer generate extraneous error messages.
  
• Corrected recipe text for level 80 Weather Witching research: there are four level 80 spells, not five.
  

• Nameplates of entities that update (such as growing garden plants) will no longer get stuck on the screen.
  
• When the thing you have selected updates, the button will update too when applicable (such as trees/bushes running out of fruit).
  
• Nameplates no longer get in the way of dragging to move the camera.
  
• Fixed selection problems with the following: Beer Barrels, some Chests, Writing Benches, Firefly Boxes, Zombie Hands, Urns, & Jack-o-Lantern turrets.
  
• The Animal Town transfer chest, grapevines in Serbule Hills, and the New Prestonbule portcullis are selectable with the new UI.
  
• Fixed mouse-cursor-changing logic so the mouse should no longer disappear.
  
• The escape key no longer sends chat messages.
  
• When the party leader changes, the new leader's party frame will jump to the top of the list.
  
• New UI now respects the "Use Floaty Numbers" and "Auto-Move to Interactors" settings.
  
• Modified the logic of looping animations. This should fix bugs where the character gets stuck in an infinite looping animation.
  
• Added missing water bubble icon. This affected multiple items, including Kraken Potions and Water-Breathing Potions.
  
• Grass Draw Distance setting is now properly clamped between 50 and 500.
  
• Fixed visibility of some graphics dropdowns.
  
• Ability tooltips now use proper number formatting for any "special" numbers, such as Cur Tempest Energy or the amount that Blast of Defiance Reaps.
  
• Fixed the Damage Over Time calculation in ability tooltips, so it now matches the actual damage done.
  
• Portrait combat numbers will no longer get stuck when zoning.
  
• Effect stack text now scales with effect icon size.
  
• Fixed bug causing text overflow for some ability tooltips.
  
• Changed color of highlight around items that are usable in the current-selected recipe to orange.
  

• Fixed bug that broke storage switching if certain crafting recipes were open.
  
• Fixed bug preventing "That'll Do" from activating properly, leaving the character in a weird, very slow condition.
  
• Fixed bug that caused alcohol toxins to not wear off if you moved to a different area or logged out drunk.
  
• Fixed more logic bugs that could cause a piece of equipment's instant effects to be re-applied at inappropriate times. (a/k/a "Sometimes when my instrument is equipped, my skill bar changes to Performance".)
  
• Fixed a bug that was causing armor set buffs to wear off when zoning.
  
• Illusive Guise and Insidious Illusion sidebar abilities don't need to be kept on the sidebar to maintain the buffs.
  
• Fixed a bug that caused Fairy Magic abilities to bypass the 25-level skill disparity cap.
  
• Fixed a bug that caused Crossbow and Endurance sidebar abilities to bypass the 25-level skill disparity cap. For now, the other sidebar abilities (such as Stake the Heart and Spade Assault) are usable regardless of combat level disparity. We'll revisit this after a while to see if it's a good idea.
  
• Comfortable Bed in Serbule and Rustic Bedroll in Serbule Hills are now slept in properly. In addition, the Rustic Bedroll no longer shoots the camera through the ground.
  
• Adjusted the colliders on humanoids. This might help prevent Velkort from getting stuck on his flame buddy.
  
• Foxes won't get stuck in certain areas as easily anymore.
  
• Sir Arif now lets animals turn in delivery quests to him.
  
• Endurance previously used a placeholder XP table. It now uses an XP table tailored to modern monster damage output. This makes it dramatically easier to level Endurance compared to a few patches ago.
  
• Repeatable kill-quests that reward Combat XP now scale the same way monsters do. In other words, completing a level 80 kill quest now scales down the XP reward if you're lower than level 80, the same way higher-level monster XP is scaled
  
• Fixed some monster-pets (monsters spawned by other monsters) that were worth XP.
  

This patch fixes bugs in yesterday's patch:

• Fixed gift-giving window & related windows not working.
  
• Spiders can use non-spider abilities again.
  
• Fixed the "sometimes while my horn is equipped my skill bar changes to stringed instruments" bug.
  
• Player Work Orders will no longer immediately expire.
  
• Creature levels now display at anatomy level 5 instead of 50. (This is a temporary hack -- we have other ideas on how to display level disparity in the future)
  
• Certain First-Aid abilities are now exceptions to the new rule that you must keep the ability on your bar to maintain a buff. Affected abilities are: "Soberize", "Emergency Alcohol Treatment", and "Field Prophylactic".
  
• Fixed bug preventing humanoids from playing music.
  
• Saving settings will no longer cause nameplates to get stuck on the screen.
  
• Fixed bug causing nameplates to multiply infinitely.
  
• "Use New Selection UI" setting should be properly respected when restarting the game.
  
• Cursors on linux should no longer be gigantic.
  
• There is a new setting for disabling cursor changes when hovering over things: Settings > GUI > Mouse Selection > Change Cursor on Hover
  
• Fixed bug where Animal Handling pets couldn't follow your commands because they had -1 Power
  
• added Shock Dust to level 20 powders loot table (it is also in the level 30 and 40 powder tables)
  
• reset version of Drunkenness effects (which may help users suffering from infinite drunkenness)
  

As winter winds its way towards spring, we have another exciting update full of bug fixes, improvements, and big changes. The experimental selection UI is finally becoming a real boy, XP curves are getting lots of work done, and there's a brand new combat skill to learn.

Preface: Bugs!
We already know about several bugs and are working on a fix for them:

• the Give Gift menu option doesn't work for most NPCs. We will fix this within 24 hours.
  
• nameplates in the new UI get "stuck" when you switch on/off the new UI system. We will fix this within 24 hours -- in the short term you can fix it by restarting the game.
  
• new beds in Serbule Hills look weird when you sleep in them. We will fix this in a future update.
  

• Power Glyph: this is now correctly marked as a Survival Utility ability (bug fix).
  
• New treasure effect: (Chest) "Galvanize Reuse Timer -10.5 secs"
  
• New treasure effect: (Necklace, Legs) "Galvanize boosts targeted pets' non-Rage attacks +X for 45 seconds"
  
• New ability: Infectious Instincts: usable only on an allied pet, this boost's the damage of the pet's next attack. Learnable from a Completely Normal Fox deep beneath Kur.
  
• New treasure effect: (Head, Ring) Infectious Instincts boosts target pet's next attack +160
  
• New treasure effect: (Chest, OffHand) Infectious Instincts boosts target pet's non-Rage Attack damage +58 for 12 seconds
  
• New treasure effect: (Hands, Feet) Infectious Instincts grants target pet +43 Mitigation vs. elemental (fire, cold, and electricity) damage for 20 seconds
  
• New treasure effect: (Legs, Necklace) Infectious Instincts grants target pet +29 Mitigation vs. physical (slashing, crushing, and piercing) damage for 20 seconds
  
• New treasure effect: (Necklace): "Galvanize grants pets Health (or Armor if Health is full) equal to the amount of Power generated +105"
  
• After one too many complaints from stablemasters, we've decided that Spirit Foxes are no longer allowed to ride horses. Instead, they should seek out Mittens in Kur to learn how to fast-travel directly as a spirit fox. (Requires Spirit Fox 25, Friends, 1000g)
  

• Getting stunned should no longer interrupt an attack that's usable while stunned.
  
• Fire Magic: There are only two "Flare Fireball" abilities, but they were numbered "Flare Fireball 2" and "Flare Fireball 4". Renumbered to 1 and 2, respectively.
  
• Fire Magic: The ability "Flare Fireball 4" (now renamed to "Flare Fireball 2") was a level 50 ability learned at level 55. Ability is now level 55 (with slightly higher base damage).
  
• Ice Magic: Cold Spheres now have a small amount of Armor.
  
• Lycanthropy: New treasure effect (Necklace): "If you are reduced to 0 health while Shadow Feint is active, it automatically triggers and cancels the damage. In addition, Shadow Feint boosts your accuracy +N until triggered."
  
• Lycanthropy: New Altar of Norala options: "+1 Non-Combat Sprint Speed" (costs 3). Purchasing this unlocks the second tier version "+1 Non-Combat Sprint Speed & +1 Movement Speed" (costs 3).
  
• Lycanthropy Pro Tip: Stat boosts from the Altar of Norala work in any form, not just in wolf form
  
• Removed ability-usage delay for butterflies.
  
• Added contextual hotkey for Analyze Genes.
  

Another exciting change in this update: You can now see your target's target!

• At Anatomy level 25 (for each sub-anatomy, E.G. "Fae Anatomy"), you'll be able to see your target's current target, as well as their current health, armor, and if they are enraged. Clicking on the target will select it.
  
• The existing Target UI has been adjusted a bit to fit the new target-of-target UI. Most notably, Real-Time Effects and the Combat Info button have been moved.
  
• Seeing Real-Time Effects on a target has been moved from sub-Anatomy level 25 to 35.
  

We have slightly revamped how custom chatroom chatting works:

• '/c ' no longer exists.
  
• '/c ' sets your current chatroom to .
  
• '/c ' sets current chatroom to and sends to it.
  
• '/cc ' sends to without setting it to the current chatroom.
  
• 'global', 'nearby', and 'guild' can now all be used with the /c commands.
  

• The strength of the highlight when hovering over an entity can now be controlled via GUI > Mouse Selection > Overlays > Hover Highlight Strength.
  
• New selection UI now shows distance to current target when you hold in alt.
  
• New selection UI now handles the "Hold to Bypass Clicking Players & Pets" key.
  
• New Selection UI now respects all of the "Overhead Info" settings.
  
• Improved the new click-selection algorithm, so entities should be easier to click on.
  
• Updated selection hitboxes & facecam avatars for a long, long list of creatures.
  
• Fixed a bug that caused the cursor graphic to get stuck if a nameplate disappears while you're hovering over it.
  
• Added "Show/Hide Hotbar Globes" to hotbar & player stats right-click menus.
  
• Added "Show/Hide Metabolism Bar" to player stats right-click menu.
  
• Organized Graphics settings and changed several sliders to dropdowns.
  
• Right-clicking on the active-skill hotbar is now easier; if you click the space between ability icons it will still show the full context menu.
  
• Ability Tooltips now show multiple "Other" effects in a more concise format.
  
• Fixed bugs that prevented some Privacy Field mods from showing up in the Ability Tooltip.
  
• When you use an ability on a party member, that ability's icon will once again appear on their party frame to indicate that it went through.
  
• Party frames can now be resized and re-padded, under "Settings/GUI/Features/Party Frames", "Party Frame Scale" and "Party Frame Spacing".
  
• Fixed bug that prevented right-clicking on a party member who is not in the same area as you.
  
• Added outlines to party names.
  
• Added max-use info to recipe window.
  
• Right-clicking a craftable item in a quest objective now shows the "Jump to Recipe" option for Enchanted recipes.
  
• Moved the settings "Scale Names with Distance" and "Overhead Name Fade Distance" under a new section, "Old Selection UI", which is only visible when using the old selection UI.
  
• Added button to GUI Settings that resets all window positions & sizes to their default, in case a window goes off-screen or any other GUI weirdness happens.
  

• Fixed several instances of armor being invisible on one side (such as being able to "see through" the inside of a helmet, or spring fairy leggings).
  
• Fixed some helmets that would allow the wearer's scalp to poke through.
  
• Fixed bug that caused some particles to appear on invisible creatures.
  
• Personal Rainstorm effect is now easier on the eyes.
  
• Added mount trails to Cow & Pig.
  
• Fixed bug with fae feet when chopping wood.
  
• Added turning-while-standing-still animation to humanoids (out of combat only).
  
• Added smoke VFX to hags.
  
• Revamped Fire Rat visual; they now glow and have a flame at the end of their tail.
  
• New visuals for Fire Sheep.
  
• Fixed Biting Vines death animation.
  
• Fixed graphical glitch with Drakeworms.
  
• Faces of Death now stop animating when they die.
  
• NPC hares should no longer sink into the ground.
  
• Wolves no longer float above the ground.
  
• Fixed bug causing dead players to stand back up.
  

• Bottled items in stacks now have a right-click option to "Empty All Bottles" (if their stack size is greater than 1).
  
• When crafting, fillable ingredients are now highlighted in your inventory.
  
• Fixed a bug that prevented work order cancels from returning councils.
  
• Fixed a bug preventing level 0-10 Industry and Foraging textbooks from being read when you don't have those skills yet.
  
• Gifts of equipment to NPCs are now worth notably less Favor.
  
• You can now deploy ice fishing gear properly on the lake near the Necromancer's Tower in Kur Mountains.
  
• Ice fishing lakes in Kur Mountains once again give a variety of fish, including some species that weren't available there before.
  
• Campfires in Kur are a little safer now to cut down on campfire murders. (Does not include the orc camp fires.)
  
• Northern, Pure, & Augmented Bounceweed now affect foxes.
  
• Lowered council value of fairy starter gear.
  
• Removed coin purses from Fae Newbie Chest and moved them to a reward for completing the Fae starter arc.
  
• Fire Sheep are more deadly when they explode.
  
• Fixed bug that prevented players from seeing a notification message when an item gets used up in combat.
  
• The JSON file npcs.json has a bit of new information in it: item preferences now have a "Desire" field which will be "Love", "Like", "Neutral", "Dislike", or "Hate". This information corresponds to what is displayed in-game when you learn an NPC's likes and dislikes. (You could kinda-sorta figure this out before from the "Pref" value, but that's becoming less and less accurate -- in fact, the "Pref" field will eventually be removed from npcs.json when the client stops referencing it. If you're using that field, please switch to using the "Desire" field where possible.)
  
• A number of JSON files have had changes to their format: sources_items.json, sources_recipes.json, sources_abilities.json. They now include additional information, some of which is not yet used by the client (but will be in the future)
  
• The JSON file sources_items.json is now documented in the CDN's help page. (The file format is now reasonably stable. Yay!)
  

This fixes some issues in yesterday's update.

• Fix bug preventing abilities from being queued
  
• Fix swim-jump-skating
  
• Fix bug that causes nameplate to get stuck when you select a party member from their party frame
  
• You can no longer select things through walls
  
• Promoting or kicking party member will now show their name instead of "PartyFrame(Clone)"
  
• Fix broken floaties & speech bubbles for default selection UI
  

New Year, New Database Code
The Ri-Shin Celebration is over for another year, and the residents of Alharth have put away their red fur-trimmed hats. But don't worry - we have a lot of exciting additions in store this year!

This particular update, however, we had to start 2023 off slow: we've done a bunch of internal database code updates. It's very unsexy server work, but it's very important! It's possible there are new bugs related to database features -- things like storage vaults, player shops, player mail, etc. If you find a bug, PLEASE report it in-game via the '!' button at the top of your right-hand toolbar. (Reporting this way also includes your exact location in case that's relevant to the bug you found.)

But even while we were focused on that boring stuff, we managed to get some nice fixes and tweaks into this update!

New Party Frames
One quality of life improvement in this update is new party frames! (That's the UI that lets you monitor and select your party members when you are in a group.) We've revamped party frames to be more compact and easier to read, and the right-click menu for party frames is now more organized and has several new options including "Leave Party". All party-frame settings can also be found grouped together under Settings->GUI->Features->Party Frames.The non-compact (default) version of party frames now also has working face cam.

But the big change: You can now hover-cast on a party member. If you hover over their party frame and use an ability, it will cast on the targeted player (assuming they are a valid target for the ability). This is a setting which is off by default, but can be enabled in the new party frame right-click menu under "Settings".

Experimental Selection UI

We continue to build out and improve the Experimental Selection UI. Changes in this update:

• Entities can now be targeted & interacted with via their nameplates. This is a setting that defaults to Enabled, located in GUI->Experimental Selection UI->Nameplate Configuration->Select Via Nameplate.
  
• Humanoid nameplates now follow the creature's movements more readily.
  
• Humanoid selection colliders are now shaped to the humanoid rather than being a big box that surrounds them.
  
• Humanoid Skeleton (Archer, Mage, etc.) improvements: they are now easier to select in the experimental UI, their shoulders jut out a bit more, and their neck bones attach to their spine.
  
• Mouse selection is now more lenient.
  
• Crafted chairs can now be selected.
  

• Combat Info polish: The window is now available for all combatant targets (NPCs and players) all the time, and more clearly indicates what the next info unlock is.
  
• Anatomy skills now list more specifics instead of "More Combat Info Shown". For example, "See Abilities in Combat Info".
  
• Increased hitbox of nameplates.
  
• The Keys Settings menu is now grouped into categories.
  
• The "Quest UI sounds" setting now saves properly.
  
• Changed confirmation popup animation.
  

• Improved VFX for Phoenix Strike.
  
• Slightly sped up Many Cuts animation.
  
• Added some new animations for Sword attacks, Shield attacks, and Multishot.
  
• Added unique animations to humanoids when being knocked back or forward.
  
• Added knockdown animation to humanoids.
  
• Humanoid hands are now placed more realistically when sitting.
  
• Equipped weapons should be visible in hands more reliably now.
  
• Fixed meditation hover-hands (hands will be in the meditator's lap now).
  
• Camera zoom level now persists between play sessions.
  

• Playable animal colliders are now the same size as humanoids, so they can fit in all the same areas. This should let them escape pit traps in the Gauntlet.
  
• Jumping is now more responsive. For regular jumping, you can now turn mid-air (but your momentum continues in the direction you jumped in). For steerable jumping, you can now control it via the movement keys.
  
• Flying while jumping will no longer shoot you into the air.
  
• Energy Bow Blitz Shot should now receive all the same mod bonuses as regular Blitz Shot.
  
• Fixed icon for Blitz Shot (was using the Aimed Shot icon).
  
• Red Wing Casino: Added an attendant mantis in the high-stakes table room. She announces the winners of each arena battle as a convenience to the high-rollers. (The announcer Kuzavek's voice doesn't travel that far.)
  
• Fixed a bug that prevented some monsters from using their special abilities (such as healing or buffing themselves)
  
• Fixed a bug with player shops when using the for-guild-members feature
  
• Dramatically reduced the chance of spontaneous Olugax sightings
  

Ri-Shin Celebration
The human holiday celebration of Ri-Shin is in full force, and townsfolk in every town and settlement need your help setting up their Ri-Shin trees! Look for townsfolk wearing a red festive Ri-Shin hat. There are trees to set up in Serbule, Serbule Hills, Eltibule, Kur Mountains, Gazluk, Ilmari, Rahu, the Fae Realm, Sun Vale, Povus, and Red Wing Casino.

While you're helping out with the trees, make sure to speak to the locals! All the townsfolk that you've befriended (meaning you have Friends favor-level or higher) will have gifts for you when you speak to them. Make sure to have your favorite combat skills active, because if they give you equipment, it will likely be tailored to those skills.

A Holiday Gift
As a small thanks for joining us this holiday season, there are new redemptions available - one for everyone (except demo players), and an extra one for our VIP members. You can access these through the button on the bottom right of the Persona window, or if you're old-school by typing /redeem in chat. Remember, these rewards are one per account, so make sure you choose which character gets it wisely!

Experimental Selection UI
We've made more improvements to the experimental selection UI, and it's about to stop being "experimental". We'd love to get your feedback on it! You can switch to using the new selection UI by going to Settings->Special and adding the line "ExperimentalSelectionUI" (without quotes) to the special settings box. After you have done that, a new header will appear in Settings->GUI called "Experimental Selection UI" with all the new options.

Changes in this update:

• Wolves can now be targeted. Yay!
  
• Serbule Crypt can now be entered when using Experimental UI.
  
• You can no longer select things through walls.
  
• Nameplates will no longer get in the way of clicking things.
  
• Fixed a bug that caused cursor graphic to get stuck.
  
• Fixed a bug that would sometimes cause some corpse hotkeys to not work.
  

• Dye recipes now have a preview, so you can play around with colors more easily without having to apply them.
  
• Item tooltips now list which dyes have been applied to a piece of equipment, if any.
  
• Equipment can now be previewed in the "Item Info" window (accessed by right-clicking and selecting "More Info").
  
• Armor types are now consistently shown & named in item tooltips; E.G. "Metal Armor", "Leather Armor", "Cloth Armor", and "Organic Armor". Previously "Cloth Armor" was listed as "Clothing", and "Organic Armor" was not listed at all.
  
• New Combat Refresh icon animation makes it more obvious when it triggers and better hints at how it works.
  
• Combat Refresh usage particles now include the blue-wings icon, so it's more obvious when it's been used.
  
• Reconstruct & Restorative Arrow will now properly list their Restores in the ability tooltips.
  
• Claw Barrage DoT will no longer display in tooltip unless it does > 0 damage.
  
• Improved VFX for most mentalism attacks.
  
• Stacking animal forms will now properly remove the underlying forms' buffs/debuffs from the UI. This should only affect druid bird forms and butterflies.
  
• Tigers & Panthers now align to the ground more realistically.
  
• Reduced "glow" highlights from flowers and humanoid eyes.
  
• Fixed a bug which sometimes showed multiple "requires beast form" messages on a single item.
  
• Fixed some wonky-looking animations that would make humanoids enter and then immediately exit combat stances.
  
• Reworded the skill level disparity effect to make it clearer how the number is calculated: lowest-level-skill + 25.
  

• Fixed a bug that could cause spawned monsters to disappear sooner than intended.
  
• Changed the way durability works in crafting: if a recipe consumes durability, an item with less than that durability can now be used. If a recipe consumes the full item (with no durability consumption), then an item with ANY durability loss cannot be used. For example, "Cottage Cheese" consumes 15% of a firkin's durability, so you can now use a firkin with only 10% durability in this recipe. "Sour Cream" however requires an entire firkin, so you cannot use a firkin with 85% durability.
  
• The following Major Heal abilities are now affected by Yagreet's Staff:
  
  
  • Restorative Arrow
    
  • Ilth Hale's Kiss
    
  • First Aid Bomb
    
  • Rally
    
  • Carrot Power
    
  
  
• Added a hotkey for giving an item to an NPC which defaults to X. You can change this setting under Settings/Keys/Contextual Actions/NPC: Give Item
  
• If you are disconnected, the game will now attempt to reconnect to the server.
  
• The /isearch command now has a shorthand version: /i
  
• On any event-related reward chest, (including the key chests in Serbule) if you are mounted or are in a beast-form travel mode, you will be locked out of the chest until you dismount.
  
• Increase hitboxes of some projectiles, so they'll hit short targets such as bear traps and chickens.
  
• Corpse hotkeys bound to Spacebar should no longer cause you to jump when the window closes.
  
• Dyes will no longer dye the UI slot they are removed from.
  
• Cranberry-Turkey Sandwich recipe now actually creates 2 servings.
  
• Fixed iocaine powder recipe to read "field mushrooms" instead of blusher.
  
• The recipe "Crude Cow Shoes (Enchanted)" now only requires 1 Basic Metal Slab instead of 2.
  
• Fixed typo in fairy potions ("cannot not").
  
• Many item short descriptions (E.G. "Potion", "Quest Item" etc) are now determined and stored during the data pre-parse step instead of at runtime. This should have a minor positive impact on performance.
  
• Repeat completions of the Gauntlet will no longer trigger global broadcasts.
  
• Boss Gauntlet '22: There are some new hidden rooms with a few new challenges. There's another room or two left to come in another update, but we wanted to get feedback on this part. It's a bit whimsical (which means cruel), but you'll be fine. When you get to that encounter -- you'll know the one -- we'd love your feedback. We're planning to use that encounter in a future dungeon. You're playing a prototype. Good luck!
  

There's a new version for Linux that addresses the "super brightness bug". (Other OSes won't have a patch to download at all.)

MacOS users have a new version of the game which fixes problems that prevented the game from running. (Users on other operating systems won't see a new download.)

Welcome to another beautiful fall season! Zhia Lian's tricks and treats are behind us, and we're ready for the tofurkey. In addition to Thanksgiving, this update also contains a lot of bug fixes large and small - plus a special new dungeon for the most powerful players to test their might. So let's get to it!

Turkey Time!
Now is the time for delicious fall meals! Wild cranberries are in season, and turkeys can be found hiding everywhere! Vegetarians will want to speak with Ricatu in Povus.

And there are whispers... of something angry. Something powerful. Vindictive. Watching.

It's probably nothing though! Remember, turkey recipes can only be found during this event, so collect 'em all!

Introducing the Boss Gauntlet!
For high level players, the game's in an awkward spot of development: we're not ready to introduce higher-level content yet. And when we do raise the level cap, we'll take that opportunity to do a bunch of gear rebalancing at the same time, like we've done in the past -- in other words, nerfs. So what are high-level players supposed to do right now? What's the point of getting better gear?

The Boss Gauntlet is the answer. Once you're able to complete the group dungeon in Povus, you're ready to attempt the gauntlet. The Boss Gauntlet is underneath the Povus dungeon and consists of 20 named bosses of increasing difficulty, culminating in some INSANELY tough battles. If your group can defeat all 20 bosses in one session (specifically, within 3 hours), you'll complete the Boss Gauntlet and prove your group's unparalleled prowess!

This Boss Gauntlet won't last forever: it will be retired when the level cap increases, probably around February. (If it's popular, though, it'll no doubt return in some new form eventually...)

Rewards
The monsters in the Boss Gauntlet are all level 85, and drop high-quality level 85 gear. They also drop a lot of money! For those who love collecting stuff, each boss also has a chance to drop a unique novelty title. Collect all 20!

If you complete the Gauntlet, you'll also receive a one-time reward of 25 Live Event Credits, and your character's name will be included on a permanent in-game list of Boss Gauntlet '22 Winners.

PS - As with all new content, this will probably need some refinement. It's intended to be super hard, but not impossible! We'll make changes based on your feedback as usual.

New Version of Unity
We've upgraded the underlying graphical engine, Unity, to a new major version. Whenever this happens there's a chance for weird graphical problems or other incompatibilities to show up. If you see weird stuff, please report it!

We are optimistic that this update will fix the problem that some users on new-silicon Macs experience, the issue that requires typing in "MacHack" in the special settings to work around it. ("MacHack" also turns off most of the sky graphics, so that was always intended to be a temporary fix.) If you previously needed the MacHack hack, can you please remove "MacHack" from your special settings, restart the game, and see if it's fixed? Please let us know either way.

Experimental UI Changes

• Fixed bugs with highlights being out of sync with their models, such as rotating around them.
  
• Actually removed broken highlights from fairy wings. (They were still showing up sometimes.)
  
• Added outline to selected-entity description.
  
• Selecting an entity for the first time using tab instead of click will no longer cause their highlight to display in the face cam.
  
• Favor floaties now round the number.
  
• Using hotkeys to select & interact with something will now work 100% of the time.
  
• Experimental UI now shows current Power, in a UI similar to Rage but different enough to easily be able to differentiate it.
  
• Experimental UI now handles player title changes.
  
• Implemented stat bars for party members.
  
• New Settings: "Show vitals over players' heads?" & "Show combat numbers for other players?". These are each dropdowns with multiple options.
  
• All entities should now be selectable; some entities were still missing colliders.
  
• Speech bubbles and floaty combat numbers now both display even when their entity isn't in line of sight.
  
• Experimental UI now respects the "PortraitFloaties" special setting.
  
• New settings for outlines, located under GUI/Experimental Selection UI: "Outline Opacity", "Outline Width", and "Outline Quality".
  
• New overhead label color for dead enemies. Only applies to the experimental UI. Located under GUI/Overhead Labels/Overhead Label Colors.
  
• Add extra image (a little diamond inside the power diamond) to self nameplate to more easily differentiate it from others' nameplates.
  
• Speech bubbles no longer overlap the speaker's name if they are selected.
  
• Experimental UI now changes the cursor when you hover over something, which are higher res versions of the existing cursors.
  
• Vital bars now only animate when hp/armor/power/rage changes, not when the creature's appearance changes.
  
• If your current target changes its appearance (E.G. changes gear, polymorphs, etc.) it will now be re-selected after the appearance change is complete.
  

• The ladder on Anagoge can now be climbed. (New ladder tech! Expect to see it more often in the future.)
  
• The mod "Bun-Fu Strike deals Cold damage..." now correctly states that it replaces Slashing instead of Crushing.
  
• The mod "Love Tap deals X Trauma damage after an 8-second delay" now correctly says Trauma instead of Ice.
  
• Recall Stones now take a few seconds to swallow (rather than allowing instantaneous teleport).
  
• Fixed an error that caused some Alchemy potions to not have a Metabolism Cost when they were supposed to. Affected potions are:
  
  
  
  • Poison Resistance Potion (10)
    
  • Thin Fae Energy Potion (20)
    
  • Thick Fae Energy Potion (30)
    
  • Gooey Fae Energy Potion (80)
    
  • Rez and Shine (10)
    
  
  
• Move Those Legs! now works while mounted.
  
• Deer will no longer neigh like a horse while in travel form.
  
• Ducks, foxes, & ravens can now fit into all areas that humanoid forms can.
  
• Fan of Blades 5 & 6 now list the proper consumables.
  
• Fixed audio for Bear Traps, Pigeons, Tentakillers, and Blur Smoke.
  
• Item tooltip names should no longer overlap their short description.
  
• Completely redesigned Ability tooltips to be easier to read.
  
• Combat Refresh stats on items are now easier to read, and visually similar to new Combat Refresh UI in Ability tooltips.
  
• Overlayed a unique icon on abilities that cannot be used due to level disparity.
  
• Fix for new Ability Tooltips: Labels no longer linebreak
  
• The area you click to select a monster now updates when a monster dies even if the monster is currently selected.
  
• Monster-click areas for humanoids now match their dead bodies better.
  
• Better handling of appearances disappearing while they're being loaded. This should fix the current round of stuck-on-loading-screen issues.
  
• Fixed broken deereye particle effect.
  
• Gathering crystals now looks like you're actually gathering instead of sitting.
  
• Improved animation for "Become Wolf" ability.
  
• New animation for Necromancy Dust recipe.
  
• New visual effect for Ice Magic Research recipes.
  
• Speed up Sonic Burst animation so it stops interfering with other attacks.
  
• New 3d model for health, armor, and power potions.
  

Welcome to the yearly Zhia Lian event - aka Halloween! You'll receive two quests from Zhia Lian when you log in after the update. Completing these quests will unlock more and more -- there's about a hundred quests in all, including three brand new group quests for high-level players. This update also contains some small bug fixes and tweaks.

Experimental Selection UI:

• If your selected creature dies, it now updates properly (loot button will appear & name color will change)
  
• Fixed bug that caused speech bubbles to stick around forever
  
• Fixed bug that caused floaty numbers to queue up while off-screen and then display all at once
  
• Fixed bug that would crash client if you logged out and then back in while something is selected
  
• Floating numbers now respect the size settings (Size of Combat Numbers)
  
• Darkened outlines around Experimental UI names
  
• Mounted players can now be selected, and their nameplates are positioned better
  

• Legs in Sun Vale now trains a Riding ability for spiders when in their travel mode.
  
• Fixed all tier 1 Bat ability cooldowns.
  
• Fixed bug that causes vendors with low gold amounts to sometimes have large gaps in their Sell tab.
  
• Added POI markers near the portals in Kur Mountain so they are easier to find.
  
• We now show a subtle cooldown overlay on all abilities when the global cooldown is in effect.
  
• Non-humanoids display better on the character selection screen and in the Persona window.
  
• Improved nameplate placement, highlighting, and selection colliders for all monsters.
  
• Fixed bug that prevented camera panning if you clicked on certain GUI elements, such as floaties or speech bubbles.
  
• Sped up Hare "ear-scratching" animation, which is used mostly for support abilities.
  
• All animals will now stick-to-ground more smoothly.
  
• Fixed issues with cow appearance under certain lighting.
  
• Fixed error resulting from rapidly changing appearances.
  
• Fixed bug that causes "Loading 1 additional assets" to stay on the screen forever.
  

This is a small bug-fix update that covers some important initial bugs (as well as some pretty minor stuff that got fixed in passing).
We're planning another update next week to address more complicated bugs. Your feedback is *essential* to this process, so a big thank you to everyone who has reported problems or shared their experiences so far!

Fixes & Tweaks:

• ExperimentalSelectionUI setting now saves properly.
  
• The Experimental Selection UI now respects font sizes and updates settings in real time instead of requiring a relog.
  
• New settings for the Experimental Selection UI, located under GUI/Experimental Selection UI:
  
  
  
  • Flash Selected Nameplates: Should nameplates flash when something is selected? Defaults to enabled.
    
  • Speech Bubble Font Size
    
  • Name Font: Allows selection between serif and sans-serif fonts for entity names. Defaults to serif.
    
  
  
• Fixed Werewolf Hunting Speed.
  
• Fixed Winter & Dark Werewolf armors.
  
• Mounts will no longer show up in the character select screen.
  
• Adjusted fox mount animation so it sits in the saddle instead of hanging on.
  
• Snow Raven form and Deer now stick to the ground appropriately. In addition, animals that stick to the ground now take most decorations into account.
  
• Deer will once again fall over when dead.
  
• Lowered volume of spider skates by half.
  
• Fixed some wonky looking selections for doors and a fire in Eltibule.
  
• Slightly decreased egg drop rate for Ice Hen.
  
• All bugs which caused client out-of-sync issues (E.G. entities being too-far-away to attack, not moving, not animating etc.) should now be fixed.
  
• Fixed the color-picker window.
  
• Fixed some NPCs in Kur that were inaccessible.
  

Welcome to our latest update! There's a lot of important changes, so we'll dive right in. It was hard to prioritize all the different changes, so please at least skim over the topics to make sure you know what you need to know!

If you find issues, please report them ASAP! Given the number of changes, we may need a quick hotfix to address any big problems. (And regardless, we'll do another update next week to start the Halloween event!)

Revised Zones: Eltibule & Kur Mountains
We've made large changes to Eltibule and Kur Mountains.

The changes to Eltibule are largely cosmetic in this update, replacing the ground map, trees, foliage, and many props. The map is roughly the same, although there are changes. The most important change is that the exit to Kur Mountains is now beyond Hogan's Keep -- you need to go through the Keep to reach it.

The changes to Kur Mountains are broader: this will be the future home of the orc playable race, and the old map didn't work for that. This is a new terrain, and pretty much everything in the map has changed location. We tried to keep things in rough relative position, but please be careful when you first venture out!

Many areas of spawned monsters and foraged items have shifted or become larger. For example, you will likely run into more winterhue and rabbits during their respective times of day. You might also run into a lot more orcs. So please let us know if you run into trouble with areas that seem too sparse or too dense. The cold weather mechanics in Kur Mountains are unchanged.

If you were logged out in either Eltibule or Kur Mountains, you will be transported to the new entry point of that zone on login.

Treasure Cap for Uneven Active Skills
Note: there was a problem with this new system and it was disabled at the last minute, except for the level cap on AH pets. To repeat, this cap is NOT active right now. This is how the system will work in the future, though.
We've tweaked the way that treasure effects on items behave when your active skills are more than 25 levels apart. Here's the rundown: If your two active skills are more than 25 levels apart, we automatically downgrade your equipped gear by temporarily lowering the treasure level until the mods are below the cap. So if you have Archery at 25 and Sword at 75, the Sword treasure mods will be capped at 50: the lower-level skill plus 25.

• The base effects of the gear ("white label effects") don't have any scaling info so they just stay the same all the time.
  
• If no lower-tier effects are usable, that effect is just disabled.
  
• A new icon in the effect bar explains that they are downgraded, and lists which slots are affected.
  
• Equipped item tooltips display the correct downgraded information (or an indication that the enchantment is disabled) if the item is affected by skill level disparity.
  
• Looking at the abilities themselves will also show that the capped effects are being used.
  

• Necromancers automatically learn the recipe to do this at level 2.
  
• If you are already level 2 or higher in Necromancy, the recipe has been automatically added to your recipe book.
  
• The recipe requires a femur or other large bone, and can only be performed in a graveyard during the in-game hours of 10pm and 4am.
  
• All tiers of the ability "Free-Summon Skeletal Archer" have been removed.
  
• All tiers of the ability "Raise Skeletal Ratkin Mage" are unchanged: these abilities still require you to be indoors and have a ratkin medallion.
  

• "Electrify, System Shock, and Panic Charge restore 30 Health after a 15 second delay" => 53 Health after a 7 second delay
  
• "Mindreave taunt -500" => "Mindreave taunt -665"
  
• "Reconstruct restores +30 Health and causes the target to take 24 less damage from attacks for 10 seconds" -> "Reconstruct causes the target to take 18 less damage from attacks for 30 seconds"
  
• "Revitalize restores +30 Health and causes the target to take 30 less damage from Psychic and Nature attacks for 10 seconds" => "restores +30 Health and causes the target to take 26 less damage from Psychic and Nature attacks for 12 seconds"
  
• "Psi Health Wave heals all targets for 90 health after a 25 second delay" => "Psi Health Wave heals all targets for 109 health after a 15 second delay"
  
• "Psi Armor Wave and Psi Adrenaline Wave restore 202 armor to all targets after a 25 second delay" => restore 139 armor to all targets after a 15 second delay
  
• "Psi Power Wave and Psi Adrenaline Wave restore 70 power to all targets after a 25 second delay" => restore 56 power to all targets after a 15 second delay
  
• "Panic Charge boosts the damage of all your attacks +23 for 20 seconds" => +57 for 20 seconds
  
• Fixed several other treasure effects that didn't get more powerful after level 80.
  

• Archery: New (Head, Main Hand): "Heavy Multishot boosts the damage of your Nice Attacks and Epic Attacks +167 for 10 seconds"
  
• Archery: "Acid Arrow Taunt -1260" => "Acid Arrow deals +280 damage to Armor"
  
• Shield: Display Fix: "When you are hit, all Shield abilities taunt +10 for 20 seconds (stacks up to 10 times)" now correctly states the stack count, "10 times", instead of "15 times". (It already stacked the correct number of times; this was a simple typo fix.)
  
• Spirit Fox: Display Fix: "While Blur Step is active, Soul Bite has a 33% chance to deal +7 damage and hit all targets within 7 meters" => +124 damage. (It already dealt this much damage, it was just incorrectly listed as +7.)
  
• Staff: "For 30 seconds after using Phoenix Strike, your Survival Utility and Major Heal abilities restore N Health to you" => Fixed bug that caused this to restore Power instead of Health as intended.
  
• Staff: "After using Headcracker, you take -N% damage from Psychic attacks for 15 seconds" will now stick around for the entire 15 seconds. In addition, we fixed a bug that caused the level 85 version to be weaker than the level 80 version.
  
• Warden: Privacy Field ability: reduced base damage at all tiers. (The highest tier changed from 275 => 196.)
  
• Warden: "Privacy Field deals +65% damage to melee attackers" => +48%
  
• Warden: "When Privacy Field deals damage, it also ignites the suspect, dealing 180 damage over 12 seconds" => 156 damage over 12 seconds
  
• Warden: Small tweaks to several other warden treasure. (These were formula revisions.)
  
• Minigolem abilities Healing Mist, Invigorating Mist, Haste Concoction, and Rage Mist have increased area-effect range.
  

• "While Unarmed skill is active: any time you Evade an attack, your next attack deals +X damage"
  
• "While Unarmed skill is active: you gain +4% Melee Evasion and any time you Evade a Melee attack you recover X Armor"
  
• "When you are hit, Finish It damage is +X for 20 seconds (stacks up to 10 times)"
  
• "When you are hit, all Shield abilities taunt +X for 20 seconds (stacks up to 10 times)"
  
• "When you are hit by a monster's Rage Attack, the current reuse timer of Stunning Bash is hastened by 1 second and your next Stunning Bash deals +X damage"
  
• "When you are hit by a monster's Rage Attack, Reinforce restores +X Armor for 60 seconds (stacks up to 10 times)"
  
• "Privacy Field causes you to recover X Power when a melee attack deals damage to you"
  

• Spider form has a new travel mode: Spider-Form Travel Mode can be learned from Legs at Animal Town in Sun Vale. You must be Comfortable with Legs.
  
• Many animal forms can now ride horses, including: Hares, Foxes, Giant Bats, and Butterflies. Riding a horse in these forms behaves just as if you were riding in a bipedal form.
  

• Mounts now come to a stop more slowly, except when stopping to interact with something. Note that you can stop more quickly by holding the "move backward" key.
  
• Safe Fall no longer persists while mounted.
  
• Fixed a bug that allowed prevention of fall damage by mounting.
  
• Dying from a projectile while mounted should no longer let you walk around while dead.
  

• Player butterflies no longer have +25% Mentalism Base Damage; instead they have +10% Psychic Damage and +10% Nature Damage.
  
• There is a new butterfly-only recipe which allows you to drink nectar from flowers (or flower arrangements). This consumes the flower and buffs your Health Wave, Armor Wave, and Power Wave abilities for 30 minutes. The potency of the buff depends on the quality of the flower(s). For now, this recipe can be learned from Yavazek in Sun Vale.
  
• Butterfly dances are a bit more unique now with different particle effects for each move. And butterflies now float subtly while moving or dancing. Very pretty!
  

• Stuns should now properly affect all forms.
  
• Ducks can now fit into areas that all other forms can.
  
• Shrunk the pigeon hitbox.
  
• Your Persona window will now correctly update when you switch between forms.
  
• Most animal forms now adjust the camera so that the new form remains in the center of the screen.
  
• Foxes and spiders now "stick" to the ground, similar to hares.
  
• Polished deer animations, including new dance moves.
  
• Added new dance moves and color variations to fox dances.
  
• Spider dance variants B & C are now slower & faster versions of the base dances.
  
• Added new dance moves to giant bat dances.
  
• Spiders, foxes, and bunnies now all kinda-sorta look like they are swimming & flying.
  
• Added falling animations to giant bat, spider, & fox.
  
• Improved animations & visual effects of giant bat attacks.
  
• Spider abilities should now be quieter.
  
• Polished some spider attack particles.
  
• Sped up some Hare attacks.
  
• Fixed the specularity on player cow texture.
  

• Chat tabs now turn green instead of italic when there are unread messages.
  
• Unread notifications can be turned off for chat tabs, in the "Edit Tab" menu (by right-clicking the tab itself).
  
• Tracked skills now persist through sessions.
  
• The "Hide Known Recipes" filter on vendors is now just "Hide Known", and applies to both recipes and abilities.
  
• The enter key can now be used to confirm item summons and splits.
  
• When summoning an item, the amount to summon is now automatically selected so you can quickly change it.
  
• Player-bestowed title messages will no longer show color tags in chat.
  
• Recipe tooltips now accurately state when an ingredient is not consumed, instead of "(% chance to consume)".
  
• Hovering over an effect when it wears off will now properly update the tooltip.
  
• Equipment gained from a barter will now show the proper level when hovered over in the barter window.
  
• The tooltip icon cooldown overlay should no longer appear on items.
  
• Fixed stretching icons in Player Work Order sign and crafting UI.
  
• Fixed rounding error in client display. Certain buffs could make it seem like you had 1 more Max Health than you did.
  
• Quests that cannot be abandoned now have a greyed-out "Abandon Quest" button with some informative text. This should make it clearer that this inability to abandon some quests is intended, and not a bug.
  
• More clearly delineated item attributes from the info below them when there's no enchantments.
  
• Optimized NPC vendor UI to remove freeze-up when first opening the UI or switching tabs when there are a lot of items present.
  
• Better handling of on-screen messages that display as soon as you enter a new area.
  

• Maximum tree-draw distance increased from 2000 meters to 3000 meters.
  
• Minimum tree-draw distance increased from 0 meters to 100 meters.
  
• Minimum grass density increased from 0% to 35%.
  

• Added a new Graphics setting, "Realistic Non-Bipedal Placement", which is like "Realistic Foot Placement" but for non-humanoids. This will make non-bipedals "stick" to the ground realistically, rather than just float above it. Currently only implemented for bunnies, foxes, spiders, and horses.
  
• Added animations when humanoids evade attacks.
  
• Added particle effects to recipes for Shamanic Infusion and Fire Magic.
  
• Added a new visual effect to Take The Lead.
  
• Revamped Priest attacks (animations, visual effects, and some sounds). This has the effect of speeding up some attacks.
  
• Revised armor appearance to be less washed-out. This is most noticeable on metal armors.
  
• Numerous appearance loading improvements and fixes, which could cause the loading screen to hang or fail.
  

• Rewrote water wells. Now instead of being a single-use interactible that fills one jug of water, it works in a delay loop, filling water repeatedly until you move away from the well (or run out of empty bottles). It starts slowly and then accelerates.
  
• Ursula's Curse: when Ursula appears, she immediately targets the cursed player.
  
• Equipped gear can no longer be transmuted.
  
• Show error messages when attempting to transmute equipped or low-rarity gear.
  
• Dropping items no longer stacks them on top of each other, they are spread out in a grid around the dropper.
  
• Increased chance of dropping Ilmari gems on all four types of Rahu mineral nodes.
  
• Added actual fire to static campfires (like those in Kur Mountains) when they are fed with wood.
  
• Projectiles will no longer stick around indefinitely when shot at ghosts.
  
• Dead humanoids should no longer skate around dead some of the time.
  
• Fixed recipe Secret Calligraphy: Hemorrhage to give the intended effect.
  
• "Astounding Cloth Shirt (Max-Enchanted)" and "Camouflaged Astounding Shirt (Max-Enchanted)" now have the proper pre-requisites.
  
• Changed effect name of Agonizing Speed Potions from Bleeding Speed to Agonizing Speed.
  
• Changed instances of "Amazingly" inks to "Amazing".
  
• Emptying bottles of water no longer counts for quest "Holistic Wellness: Drink Water".
  
• Serbule Hills outhouses are now easier to interact with, and have a more appropriate search animation.
  
• Added Pet owner's name to the name of some of the vanity pets - Death on a Leash, Fae Dragon, Radish, Winter Beet (and the new Ice Hen).
  
• "Level 10-20 Event Loot Key"s are now properly called "Level 15-20 Event Loot Key"s.
  
• Fixed typo in Jumper's quest "The Bridge Bully" that indicated the wrong direction (southeast instead of northeast).
  
• Fixed typo in Fist of the Green Man (wayword -> wayward).
  
• Fixed typo in quest "A great new calligraphy bench".
  
• Changed "Kill Toxic Frogs in Gazluk While Nude" to "Kill Toxic Frogs in Povus While Nude".
  
• In quest "Kill Barghests in Gazluk", fixed "klil" typo.
  
• Changed mushroom name from "Groxmak" to "Groxmax".
  
• Converted all quest titles containing 'Halloween Event:' to 'Zhia Lian Event:'.
  
• Assorted improvements to server and client performance.
  

This is a minor update to make adjustments to the Summertime Experience event which starts tomorrow. There are a few other changes and bug-fixes:

• Add better handling of rapid changes in a humanoid's equipment. This should fix the bug where some players' textures display as bright pink
  
• Remove duplicate Blitz Shot 6 training option from Alravesa
  
• The "Heed The Stick" mod that grants mitigation from direct attacks will now always last 10 seconds
  
• More debug info to track down remaining "stuck on loading screen" bugs
  
• The local player mesh is now optimized again, this functionality broke as part of recent loading optimizations
  
• Deselecting an object that has just changed (such as a flower as part of gardening) will no longer re-select the object, or previously-selected objects
  
• The Healing-Suit Tester (a high-level boss) now recovers less health when there's only a few healing crystals
  

This is a minor update. It addresses the following bugs:

• Fix bug that could cause the loading screen to get "stuck" with a few remaining downloads
  
• Fix bug that caused queued ability icons' green highlight to stick around longer than it should
  
• Remove framerate stutter when opening the quest window (when it had hundreds of quests in it)
  
• Better error handling when reapplying particle effects
  
• Fix bug that prevented ghosts from loading correctly
  
• Fix bug that causes hotkeys to break when an appearance failed to download (for any reason)
  
• Fix bug that caused the Skill Tracker to disappear if positioned on the left side of the screen
  
• Fix typo in instruments ("Enabled musical performance" -> "Enables musical performance")
  
• Add better handling of dynamic music; this should fix bugs with background music overlapping instrument music, and background music not playing at all
  
• Fixed bug that caused Ultra Item Rafflers to be counted toward an area's max-temporary-entities count. (Only this raffler was bugged)
  

• The player rabbit model now uses the new animation system instead of the legacy system. (This is in preparation for future content)
  
• Player rabbits will now "stick" to the ground better, so it looks like they are on it (similar to how humanoids have realistic feet placement)
  
• Removed the ability to select 'Set limit per customer' on Item Rafflers. This is now permanently set to 1
  
• Players can no longer buy a ticket for their own raffles
  
• All Item Rafflers can now be used to raffle Event Loot Keys
  

Welcome to our 364th update! This one is jammed full of new features and bug fixes. Let's take a look!

Animal Travel Mode
Since our recent addition of mounts, animal-form players have been asking for their own mounts. But some types of animals should really be able to travel on their own! In this update, we've given those quadrupeds a new "travel mode" which makes them behave as their own horse.

Once a player meets the requirements, they can learn the appropriate technique from a trainer. After that, the Mount UI will appear (even if they don't have a horse in their stable), and they can "mount up" while in that animal form. This also lets these characters equip a saddlebag, if they have one. They can also earn Riding XP by "riding themselves." Don't think too hard about it.

A couple things to note:

• Bounceweed now has a new effect on these animals, increasing their animal-form top "travel speed".
  
• The particle on the animal form's footsteps while traveling is a placeholder.
  
• Not all animal forms have a travel mode yet; others' travel methods are coming soon!
  

• Sanja in Kur teaches wolf players to enter travel mode. This requires Werewolf level 40.
  
• The werewolf Hunting Speed abilities (1 through 3) are no longer sidebar abilities. They are now Riding abliities, meaning that you should place them on your ablity bar while "riding yourself" as a wolf. They are still unlocked via the werewolf altar as before.
  

• Silvia in Sun Vale teaches deer players to enter travel mode.
  
• Silvia also teaches Bounding Speed, a deer-only Riding ability.
  

• Both Raul and the Suspicious Cow train player cows how to enter travel mode. This requires Cow 25 and Comfortable favor.
  
• Both Raul and the Suspicious Cow train Cud Speed, a cow-only Riding ability.
  

• Norbert trains player pigs how to enter travel mode.
  
• Norbert teaches Porcine Speed, a pig-only Riding ability.
  

• Changed treasure effect: "Long Shot boosts your Armor Regeneration (in-combat) +16 for 15 seconds" => "Long Shot and Hook Shot Damage +121"
  
• Changed treasure effect: "Restorative Arrow restores an additional 126 Health over 30 seconds" => "Restorative Arrow restores 58 Power"
  
• Changed treasure effect: "Restorative Arrow boosts target's Nice Attack and Epic Attack Damage +188 for 10 seconds" => "Restorative Arrow covers the target in a barrier that mitigates 40 damage from Crushing, Slashing, Piercing, Acid, and Fire attacks. Lasts for 20 seconds or until it has absorbed 200 total damage."
  
• New treasure effect for off-hand: "Restorative Arrow targets yourself and all allies within 30 meters and restores +52 Health, but reuse time is +10 seconds"
  
• New treasure effect for off-hand: "Hook Shot Damage +132. Non-Elite targets do not call for help."
  
• New treasure effect for feet, necklace: "Long Shot increases target's vulnerability to Trauma and Acid +10% for 20 seconds. (Max of 2 stacks.)"
  
• New treasure effect for hands, necklace: "Hook Shot increases target's vulnerability to Fire and Poison +10% for 20 seconds. (Max of 2 stacks.)"
  
• New treasure effect for head, feet: "Hook Shot and Bow Bash deal +200% damage to Stunned targets."
  
• new treasure effect for legs, ring: "Poison Arrow deals +480 Poison damage over 12 seconds"
  
• New treasure effect for head: "Blitz Shot deals +59 damage, and the damage type becomes Poison."
  
• New treasure effect for ring: "Direct Poison and Acid Damage +124 while Archery skill active."
  
• New treasure effect for necklace: "Direct Fire Damage +124 and Indirect Fire Damage +16 (per tick) while Archery skill active."
  
• New treasure effect for hands: "Multishot deals +99 damage, and the damage type becomes Fire."
  
• Buffed effect: "Aimed Shot deals 132 additional health damage over 12 seconds" => 270 over 12 seconds.
  
• Buffed effect: "Multishot restores 90 Health to you after a 15 second delay" => 132 health after an 8 second delay.
  
• Buffed effect: "Long Shot restores 61 health to you after a 15 second delay" => 86 health after an 8 second delay.
  
• Buffed effect: "Fire Arrow suddenly deals an additional 400 indirect Fire damage after a 12 second delay" => 500 after a 6-second delay.
  
• Ability change: Hook Shot base damage increased slightly at all tiers.
  

• Chew Cud, Moo of Calm, Stampede: these abilities can be used while stunned.
  
• Changed treasure: "Stampede boosts your Slashing/Crushing/Piercing Mitigation vs. Elites +8 for 30 seconds (stacks up to 5 times)" => +16
  
• Changed treasure: (Hands, Feet) "Chew Cud increases your mitigation versus Crushing, Slashing, and Piercing attacks +18 for 10 seconds" => "Chew Cud increases your mitigation versus Crushing, Slashing, Piercing, and Fire attacks +18 for 10 seconds. Against Elite enemies, mitigates +18 more"
  
• Changed treasure: (Chest, Ring) "Chew Cud increases your mitigation versus Crushing, Slashing, and Piercing attacks +18 for 10 seconds" => "Chew Cud increases your mitigation versus Crushing, Slashing, Piercing, and Cold attacks +18 for 10 seconds. Against Elite enemies, mitigates +18 more"
  
• Changed treasure: "Stampede boosts your Slashing/Crushing/Piercing Mitigation vs. Elites +8 for 30 seconds (stacks up to 5 times)" => +20
  
• New treasure: (Ring): "Stampede boosts your Fire/Cold/Electricity Mitigation vs. Elites +20 for 30 seconds (stacks up to 5 times)"
  
• New treasure: (Necklace): "Stampede deals +860% damage if used while you are stunned"
  
• Changed treasure: "Cow's Bash heals you for 66 health" => "Cow's Bash heals you for 66 health and reuse timer is -1 second"
  
• Changed treasure: "While Cow skill is active, you regenerate +40 Health every 5 seconds and resist +20 damage from Elite Crushing, Slashing, or Piercing attacks" => now resist all Elite damage types (not just Crushing/Slashing/Piercing)
  
• Changed treasure: "Chew Cud's chance to consume grass is -42%" => "Chew Cud restores +80 Armor. Chance to consume grass is -42%"
  
• Changed treasure: "Graze boosts your out-of-combat sprint speed by 8.5 for 30 seconds" => "Graze boosts your out-of-combat sprint speed by 3 for 50 seconds"
  
• New treasure: (Necklace) "Stampede deals +1050% damage if used while you are stunned"
  

• Ability change: Soothe: all tiers have higher base damage; reuse timer changed from 15s to 13s; Power cost increased
  
• Ability change: Cause Terror: all tiers have higher base damage
  
• Ability change: But I Love you: all tiers have higher base damage
  
• New treasure: (hands) "Fast Talk targets all enemies within 10 meters and Power cost is -18"
  
• New treasure: (chest and feet) "But I Love You and Cause Terror Damage +58%"
  
• Changed treasure: "Fast Talk heals you for 74 armor" => "Fast Talk reduces target's rage by -1190 and reuse timer is -2 seconds"
  
• Changed treasure: "Inspire Confidence restores +104 Health after an 8 second delay" => "Inspire Confidence restores 60 Power over 9 seconds to all targets"
  
• Changed treasure: "Soothe further reduces target's Rage by 1210" => "Soothe reuse timer is -1 second and it further reduces Rage by 1370"
  
• Changed treasure: "Fast Talk taunts -540 and reduces Rage by 900" => "Fast Talk taunts -2196"
  
• Changed treasure: "Inspire Confidence increases the damage of all targets' attacks +16 for 30 seconds" => +69 for 30 seconds
  
• Changed treasure: "Tell Me About Your Mother restores 177 Armor to you" => "Tell Me About Your Mother restores 123 Health (or Armor if Health is full)"
  
• Changed treasure: "Soothe boosts the healing from your Major Healing abilities +56 for 10 seconds" => "For 10 seconds after using Soothe, your Major Healing abilities restore +68 Health and your attacks generate -30% Rage"
  
• Changed treasure: "But I Love You boosts your Nice and Epic Attack Damage +91 for 8 seconds" => 10 seconds (fixes description typo; actual effect was already 10 seconds)
  
• Changed treasure: "Cause Terror Damage +214" => "Cause Terror deals +214 damage and restores 46 Health to you"
  

• Blocking Stance: Reduced bonus mitigation vs. elites by 50%. Thus Blocking Stance 1 now mitigates +5 and +5 more vs. elites; previously it mitigated +5 and +10 more vs. elites.
  
• Changed treasure: "Deflective Spin restores 82 Health instantly and provides +58 Mitigation from all Elite attacks for 15 seconds" => restores 82 health and provides +37 mitigation from all Elite attacks for 10 seconds
  
• Changed treasure: "Blocking Stance mitigates +15 physical damage (Crushing, Slashing, Piercing) for 30 seconds. Against Elite enemies, mitigates +30 more" => "... Against Elite enemies, mitigates +15 more"
  
• Deflective Spin ability: "You take X% less damage from all attacks for 15 seconds." => 10 seconds
  
• Changed treasure: "Deflective Spin costs -11 Power and mitigates +13 damage from each attack for 15 seconds" => "Deflective Spin damage +100. Targets' next attack deals -10% damage"
  

• Shield: "While Bulwark Mode is enabled you recover X Power per second" -> "While Bulwark Mode is enabled, abilities cost -X Power to use"
  
• Shield: "Elemental Ward mitigates +40 elemental damage (Fire, Cold, and Electricity) for 30 seconds" => "Elemental Ward mitigates +40 elemental damage (Fire, Cold, and Electricity) for 30 seconds. Against Elite attackers, mitigates +40 more"
  
• Shield: "Slashing Mitigation +8, Piercing Mitigation +7, Crushing Mitigation +7 while Shield skill active" => "While Shield skill active: Mitigate Slashing +16, Piercing +14, and Crushing +14. Versus Elite attackers, these values are doubled"
  
• Take the Lead abilities: now boost sprint less. (Take the Lead 6 was +10.5, now +6.5)
  
• "Take the Lead boosts your sprint speed by an additional +5 and you recover 48 Power after a 15 second delay" => "Take the Lead boosts your movement speed +3 and you recover 58 Power after a 15 second delay"
  

• Ice Armor: now has reduced mitigation vs. elites. (Was 27 and 54 more vs. Elites; is now 27 and 27 more vs. Elites)
  
• New treasure: (Chest, Hands) "Blizzard Damage +150 and you gain Elite Resistance +10% for 20 seconds"
  
• "Ice Spear heals you for 58 health after a 15-second delay" => "Ice Spear heals you for 80 health after a 7-second delay"
  
• (head, feet) "Frostbite causes all target's attacks to deal -22 damage (this effect does not stack with itself)" => "Frostbite causes all target's attacks to deal -22 damage, and their Rage attacks are further reduced by 10%"
  
• Ice Veins, Ice Armor, Cryogenic Freeze: these abilities can be used while stunned
  

• Animal Handling: treasure effect "Animal Handling pets recover +X Armor every five seconds" now actually recovers the armor.
  
• Bard: Fixed bugs that allowed abusable "stacking" of bard song healing.
  
• Bard: Added damage type (trauma) to Song of Discord description.
  
• Fairy Magic: The treasure mod 'Fae Conduit's Power cost is -X and reuse timer is -Y seconds' now actually reduces the reuse time.
  
• First Aid: Reset time changed from 30s to 20s for Treat Disease [1-4], Set Broken Bone, Moss Bone Repair, and Soberize.
  
• Rabbit: effects that change Bun-Fu Blast and Bun-Fu Strike damage to cold will no longer revert the damage type later on.
  
• Unarmed: New treasure effect: (Hands): "Cobra Strike, Mamba Strike, and Slashing Strike deal +50 damage and can be used while stunned. Doing so removes the stun effect from you."
  
• All metal armor has been rebalanced to give slightly less Max Armor and slightly less Armor recovery from combat refresh. In exchange, it now has modest Power recovery from combat refresh.
  
• Pulling a target toward you (with E.G. Hook Shot) will no longer fling the target off into the distance if you are standing on top of one another.
  
• Bonus pet health and armor from treasure effects will now persist through the pet's death.
  
• After zoning, pets will now have the correct state selected in the UI instead of always Follow.
  
• The werewolf altar buffs to increase physical mitigation have been changed into percentage-based vulnerability buffs.
  
• Transmutation costs will be reduced for the next month for Archery, Cow, Staff, Psychology, Shield, and Ice Magic skills
  

• The healing crystals now have a much more pronounced effect on the boss's regeneration. When all 8 crystals are up, he recovers 100% of missing health every 5 seconds.
  
• Healing Crystals now have 8000 max health each instead of 125.
  
• Destroyed crystals respawn more quickly.
  
• Nearby "Healing Suit Technicians" are now Elite.
  

• More eggs spawn at the beginning of the encounter.
  
• Eggs have more health (but still not all that much).
  
• When eggs hatch, they now spawn an Elite urak that wanders.
  
• Eggs respawn more quickly.
  

• The expert's assistants are now Elite, and more numerous.
  

• Arkura has been upgraded from a named Elite to a Sub-Boss, with commensurate bonuses to health, damage, and annual compensation.
  
• Some of Arkura's skeleton minions have been replaced by (elite) Mutterer Cabalists.
  
• Arkura and her minions have exceptional help-shouting capability.
  

• Has more health and lots more regeneration.
  

• Zukelmux's summoned backup are now Elite.
  

• Beakhorse is a bit more powerful (especially the beak).
  

• The captain and her crew have all been promoted one or two tiers of potency. This makes Captain Evergloam an Epic Boss.
  
• This does not change their loot, because their loot was already epic-tier for some reason.
  

• Security crystals have more health (but remain extremely vulnerable to knockback).
  

• Hotfeather has more health and offensive power.
  
• Hotfeather and friends have larger help-shout radii.
  

• Summoned assistants are more powerful and numerous.
  

• Chet Thunder is stronger.
  

• Both have been promoted from Elites to Basic Bosses.
  

• Eeaeiikik has been promoted from Elite to Basic Boss.
  
• Funguile is a bit stronger.
  

• Both have been promoted from Elites to Basic Bosses.
  

• Vemuta has been promoted from Basic Boss to Epic Boss.
  
• Some of the myconian students in each teaching cluster are now elites. (Randomly picked, with higher chances of elites in Vemuta's cluster.)
  

• Imarak has been promoted from Basic Boss to Epic Boss.
  
• Imarak's adds are a bit stronger.
  
• Young mantises in general are stronger.
  

• Guzyerp has been promoted to Epic Boss, with commensurate loot improvements.
  
• Nearby bears are a bit tougher.
  

• Guztok's hobgoblins are a bit tougher in general.
  
• Guztok is more epic.
  
• Guztok now calls for Elite backup after taking a little damage.
  

• Skills can now be tracked, similar to Quests. Click the star in the Skills & Abilities window to track a specific skill. Tracking a skill makes it always visible in the HUD, showing the current level and XP bar. The HUD can be right-clicked to quickly jump to the skill.
  
• When XP is gained in a non-combat skill, the skill will briefly show in the HUD to display the amount of XP gained and the skill's current level.
  
• Fixed XP bar and level display for phrenology recipes.
  
• Right-click to select combat skills now splits the UI at 20 skills instead of 25.
  
• Active Skill XP bars (at the bottom of the screen) now animate XP gains, and show the number of XP gained.
  
• Separated out "Action" emotes from regular emotes. Action Emotes are emotes that are part of a gameplay action, such as burying or eating a corpse. They can now be filtered differently from non-action emotes (for example /wave or /em emotes) in the chat window. By default, they are enabled in any tab that had emotes enabled.
  
• Added tooltip functionality to the list of chat channels when editing a tab. Currently only Action Emotes have a tooltip; everything else is pretty self-explanatory.
  
• Removed extra whitespace in front of some emotes.
  
• Overhead rage meters now flash pink when they are full.
  
• The "Examine" button will now appear when you select yourself.
  
• Non-fiction books now properly display colored text instead of a color code.
  
• Item attributes are now displayed in a vertical list in tooltips.
  
• Tooltips that are too large to fit on the screen can now be scrolled by a key. This defaults to Shift + V.
  
• Long player-written book titles should now fit in the item tooltip.
  
• All equipped items should now update properly in the persona window.
  
• Item short descriptions should no longer overlap their names in tooltips.
  
• Fixed bug that caused items with expiration dates to always show April 4.
  
• Tooltips for equipment in barters now correctly indicate the rarity of the resultant item.
  
• Non-repeatable completed quests now have their own tab in the Quest Log.
  
• Storages can be manually reordered again.
  
• Recipe complete text no longer covers up ingredients, and fades out more quickly.
  
• Fix bug that would sometimes cause map pins to swap their north/south coordinates.
  
• Prevented casting bar from resizing too small and effectively disappearing.
  
• Meal and snack levels are now highlighted in tooltips, and displayed in the food's effect description.
  
• We now check that a progress bar is actually active before trying to animate it.
  
• The "Overhead Name Fade Distance" slider is back, which allows you to control how far away something must be before its name disappears. The slider is in Settings > GUI > Overhead Labels.
  
• Modified XP bar animation when a skill levels up - it will now fade out instead of drain.
  
• There is a new contextual keybind for crafting: Use Current Recipe. It only works when the crafting window is open, and defaults to the X key.
  
• Crafting recipe hotkey is now part of the button itself instead of off to the side.
  
• Handled error when a child skill is obtained before its parent skill is.
  
• Fixed bug that sometimes caused "FAVOR LEVEL UP!" to stick around forever.
  
• Fixed bug that would break the chat window with some unclosed tags, E.G. by typing "
  While this option was experimental, it was always set to 100 meters (unless you used the AppearanceRange special setting to change it). The default range is still 100 meters for most graphics settings, but if you're using "Amazing" or "Ultra" graphics settings, it now defaults to 200 meters. Note that this is more expensive than before, so if you're using Amazing or Ultra graphics, your framerate may be reduced from the last update! You can easily return to the FPS you had before, though: just set the "Maximum Entity Simulation Distance" slider to 100.
  
  For super-powered computers: if you want to be able to see entities more than 400 meters away, you can use the new special setting InfiniteEntitySimulation. Adding this to your Special Settings window will cause all entities to be simulated regardless of distance from you. (This is equivalent to turning off "Experimental Optimizations" prior to this update.) Note that this will tank your framerate unless your machine is quite powerful! To stop using infinite range, remove this setting from the Special Settings window, save settings, then restart the game.
  
  Note: the AppearanceRange special setting no longer does anything. It can be removed from your Special Settings list.
  
  
  Other Stuff
  
  
  • Removed the "Experimental Optimizations" check-box for now (because there are currently no experiments running).
    
  • Fixed some Exceptions that could cause memory leaks if an appearance fails to load.
    
  • Visually re-equip all weapons when a character leaves combat. Weapons will appear/disappear during combat to account for certain attacks (you can't pull a bow string back with your sword in hand, for instance), but they would often remain permanently invisible. They should now reset after combat.
    
  • Phrenology recipes no longer perform the "sit" animation.
    
  • Sped up some hammer animations, so the attacks land quicker.
    
  • Sped up "Fight Me You Fools" animation.
    
  • Revamped Animal Handling animations.
    
  • Revamped "ouch" animation (which plays when taking DoT).
    
  • Sped up Armor Patch & First Aid abilities, so their effects trigger sooner in the animation.
    
  • Effects with particles that don't last the entire duration will no longer re-show their particles after the initial display; previously they would display again every time a character's appearance changed, for example when you equipped a new piece of gear or mounted your horse.
    
  • Added particles to most teleport recipes.
    
  • Added particle effects to all distilling recipes.
    
  • Added particle effects to transmutation repair recipes.
    
  • Spirit foxes no longer float above the ground.
    
  • Improved appearance loading, which should reduce lag in Serbule related to the merchants loading in.
    
  • The MaxActiveLoads special setting now controls more of the appearance-loading code path, meaning that it has more effect. If you use this setting, you may want to remove it or change its value after this update, as the old values are probably not optimal for you anymore!
    
  • We now properly account for ingredient durability when crafting. If an item does not meet the ingredient durability requirement, it cannot be used. For example, you cannot use a Firkin with 10% durability remaining to make a cheese that requires 15% durability.
    
  • When summoning an ingredient, durability is now taken into account (when applicable). The lowest-durability item that still meets the ingredient requirement will be summoned first. If no items in storage meet the durability requirement, items with remaining durabilities lower than the requirement will be summoned. For example, if you have no Firkins with 15%+ durability, any Firkins with <15% durability will be summoned.
    
  • Stackable items can now be sent to mystic saddlebags even when the saddlebag inventory is full (as long as the item in question has enough room left in its stack)
    
  • There is a new NPC in Serbule Hills. Cleo Conyer is a newbie vendor in the Tapestry Inn. Cleo has one Favor quest at the moment.
    
  • Yurra the hag now shows up in front of the Serbule Hills newbie exit to give direction to newbies who escape the island via the caves.
    
  • Kalaba's quests now correctly reference "Crude Phlogiston" instead of "Rough Phlogiston".
    
  • The Serbule stage now counts toward the Halloween event, "Staged Death".
    
  • Fae Navy Shield now counts towards the Cell Matrix Repair requirement.
    
  • Some quests in the log that were missing NPC names now have them.
    
  • Shields can now be glamoured (into other shields).
    
  • We now set the correct levels of musical conch recipe results.
    
  • Fixed bug where playing your own music via instrument would prevent zone music from ever playing again.
    
  • Repeatedly messaging someone who is ignoring you will now return an error to inform you that you've been blocked.
    
  • Adjusted portal selection boxes so they are more reasonably sized.
    
  • A human's 'Current Community' can now increase beyond 100 if their Max Community is greater than 100. Previously, a bug prevented Current Community from going above 100.
    
  • Monsters that flee will no longer be considered fleeing when they return to their original position.
    
  • Fixed a problem with werewolf buffs expiring before the next full moon.
    
  • Fixed a bug on the item info panel: the list of vendors for an item is supposed to prioritize vendors in the current area, but didn't actually put them at the top of the list as intended.
    
  • Reduced barter price for Pitch Black Dyes on Orran to 15 Crafter's Guild Tokens (previously 20).
    
  • Added Orcish Steel and Orichalcum to the list of Orran barters.
    
  • Added The Fungal Fortress to the Civil Service event.
    
  • The Hardcore Altar in Gazluk now buffs +10% Max Health and damage (up from +5%)
    
  
  

This is a bug-fix update. The purpose is mainly to fix a UI bug when viewing alcohol casks, but we've also included some other fixes and changes that were ready to go.

We've heard some reports of issues with golf balls occasionally "glitching" in various ways. We're still investigating these, and will fix them as soon as we can. If you have a reproducible situation that causes problems, please bug-report it!

[h2]Glamour Gourds in the Guild Shop[/h2]
You can now purchase "Glamour Gourds" with Guild Credits (from any Guild Sign). These work like Glamour Berries, with a few caveats. When you buy a Glamour Gourd, it is automatically attuned to your account. Glamour Gourd items also don't stack in inventory. (The latter is a technical limitation because attuned items can't be stackable.)

We're using these Gourds instead of Glamour Berries because we want to avoid reselling for now. We want these items to be a reward for doing guild quests, not a way to make Councils off of other players. It's possible that we're being overly cautious here, in which case we'll make further changes in the future.

[h2]Other Changes/Fixes[/h2]

• Alcohol items now show their effect information when examined.
  
• Fixed the start and goal beacons for holes 8 and 9 in Pennoc's Pennant.
  
• Rebalanced reward tiers for Pennoc's Pennant based on initial scoring this round. (This only affects the reward tiers you haven't received yet, of course.)
  
• Improved legibility of the recipe UI window.
  
• Fixed skill reward text-wrapping UI issue.
  
• In addition to Glamour Gourds (discussed above), you can also buy Portal Summoning Devices with Guild Credits (sold at any Guild Sign).
  
• Increased the cost of Extra-Gigantic Coin Sacks at the Guild Signposts. Cost increased from 2 to 4 Guild Credits.
  
• You can now occasionally find Live Event Credit Vouchers (worth 10 Live Event Credits) when playing the high-stakes match-3 game in the casino.
  
• Added a Portal Summoning Device for Fungal Fortress that is available through Riston and the Guild Sign.
  
• Fixed client bug that could cause items in your storage vault to display incorrectly if you clicked and dragged really fast.
  
• Riston now sells VIP Tokens, as well as Povus Teleportation Devices, for Live Event Credits.
  

Project: Gorgon is on sale for 50% off! We've been working hard to polish and improve the game, and now we want to share it with new players -- at a discount!

If you're still on the fence about joining us, why don't you check out our free demo? The demo lets you play a BIG portion of the game, and your demo character will auto-upgrade to a real character when you buy the game. It's a great way to explore the breadth of content that PG has to offer.

If you checked us out during Alpha but haven't been back since we started Beta, this is a great time to see what's changed. We've been smoothing out newbie game flow, removing irritants that frustrate players, improving general quality of life, and making the game's content more accessible, discoverable, and useful. Not to mention all the features and content that we've added recently, like horseback riding, animal husbandry, and a big new level 80+ outdoor zone.

Just for extra fun, we've got some newbie-accessible events lined up for the next two weeks, including an Easter-themed bunny invasion, a golf tournament, and a risk-free chance to try out an animal form.

See you in Alharth!

This is a quick patch to address some bugs in today's earlier update, including a fix for teleportation.

[h2]Kalaba Logic Fix:[/h2]
We fixed a bug that let you start Kalaba's quest "Phlogiston Basics" from his Favor menu, before he taught you Transmutation. If you did this, he wouldn't actually teach you Transmutation! If this has happened to you (meaning you have this quest but you don't know the recipe the quest refers to), just cancel the quest in your quest journal. That will fix the NPC logic and you'll be back to normal. Kalaba will give you this quest automatically after teaching you the skill (after you finish his two panther-related quests and he asks you about a "business opportunity").

[h2]Werewolf Fix:[/h2]
Werewolves were randomly losing their Norala buffs and Tokens of Norala. We can't reproduce this bug, but we think we fixed the root cause. We'll keep an eye on things to make sure. We don't have an easy way to restore the exact number of Norala Tokens you lost, so we've just decided to give every werewolf a dozen extra tokens during this full moon. Type `/redeem` in chat and you'll see a redemption called "Werewolf Fix: 12 Tokens of Norala".

[h2]Other Bug Fixes:[/h2]

• Fixed: some recipes (including common Teleportation recipes) could not be used
  
• Fixed: some portals in Serbule Crypt had sunk into the ground
  
• Fixed: some title scrolls caused client errors when dropped on the ground
  

Continuing our focus on improvements for new players, this update makes some changes to Transmutation. We are also premiering our new glamour mechanics (which some other games call transmogrification). And we have exciting news - we're going on sale for half off!

[h2]Known Issues:[/h2]

• Some recipes aren't able to be used right now, most notably certain teleportation recipes. We'll be fixing this in a client patch later this evening.
  

• Added a Transmutation table to Kalaba's work area in Eltibule.
  
• The Transmutation level requirement for "Distill Rare Magical Item (0-30)" is now 5 (instead of 10).
  
• The Transmutation level requirement for "Repair Transmutation Damage 1" is now 10 (instead of 5).
  
• We now allow transmuting when shield wax is on an item.
  
• Fixed a bug with the transmutation animation swipe not working correctly.
  
• Changed "power" to "enchantment" in the Transmutation window, for consistency.
  

• Any piece of armor can be glamoured to look like any other piece of armor that goes in the same equipment slot. Main-hand and off-hand items can be glamoured to look like similar items (e.g. you can glamour a sword to look like another sword, but not a hammer or a shield).
  
• Glamoured items can't be dyed (because glamours hide the original paint, so dyes wouldn't do anything).
  
• You can glamour a piece of gear as often as you like, as many times as you like.
  
• Glamouring the equipment doesn't attune the equipment; in fact, attunement doesn't affect glamouring at all.
  
• Glamours can be copied: if you glamour an item to look like another glamoured item, the new item will have the same glamour as the other item.
  
• If you glamour an item to look like something that is animal-only (such as Werewolf Armor), the glamour will only be active when worn in that animal form. It will look un-glamoured in other forms.
  
• We haven't yet implemented UN-glamouring, so the effect is very permanent! (But you can always apply a different glamour on the item.)
  

• Due to internal changes, certain "head gem" items, such as the Orbiting Gem, are no longer shown on your character when you're in an animal form -- they are only visible when you're a biped. The old behavior was accidental, but it was fun, so we expect to add new animal-specific floating gem items soon. Affected items are: Orbiting Gem, Rohina's Mind Gem, Monger's Boon, Ever-Hateful Jack O' Lantern, Ever-Glaring Jack O' Lantern, and Fae Navy Communicator.
  

• There's now a "short description" right underneath the item name that tries to point out the most important aspect(s) of the item. Some items do not have a short description.
  
• "Attributes", "Enchantments", "Augment" and "Shamanic Infusion" for equipment are now grouped together in a display that's easier to digest and (hopefully) makes the underlying mechanics more obvious.
  
• Augment rarity is now displayed in the tooltip.
  
• Augment tooltips now explicitly indicate the required rarity of the item it can be placed in.
  
• Dynamic stats (durability, doses, waxes, & craft points) are now more obvious when they show up.
  
• Added an indicator to tooltips for items that can be used, such as "Right-click to Drink".
  
• Shield short descriptions are now accurate (instead of "Level X OffHandShield").
  
• Crystal color now displays in the tooltip.
  

• When you raise the Tooltip Font Size to the higher ranges allowed by the slider, equipment tooltips don't fit on the screen well. We'll be working on this in future iterations.
  

• Added an "Always compare items?" setting under GUI/Features. This auto-compares items without having to hold the Alt key. Defaults to off.
  
• Added a purchase confirmation to player-vendor purchases. The amount over which the confirmation presents itself is set by the "Purchase Confirmation Amount" setting, under GUI/Other. Default is 10,000 councils.
  
• Active combat skill levels are now displayed on the bottom bar.
  
• Skill tree collapse states are now character-specific.
  
• Skills are now added to the Skills & Abilities window when you first earn XP in them, instead of when they first hit level 1.
  
• We now show skill levels in the skill list on the Skills & Abilities window.
  
• We now display your new skill level in the pop-up message when leveling up.
  
• Loot Mode is now displayed properly in the UI; previously it would reset every time you logged in.
  
• Monster info should no longer get cut off in the combat info window.
  
• Inventory items can be used via double-click while the Crafting window is open.
  
• We now account for XP mods when displaying the addition in the crafting XP bar.
  
• Sped up the minimum crafting repeat time from 2 seconds to 0.5 seconds.
  
• The "repeat" feature of the Crafting window now takes into account durability and consumption rate when calculating the max number of times you can repeat the recipe.
  
• The quest tracker respects the "Show Quest Tracker" setting again.
  
• Tracked quests are now saved properly.
  
• The quest log now displays the associated NPC's name in the list of quests.
  
• The chat channel of the current tab will now remember when it is switched via a command, such as '/p' or '/n'. So if you switch to another tab and then back, you will remain in that channel. This should reduce mistells.
  

• The "High-Quality Anti-Aliasing" graphics option now uses a different anti-aliasing algorithm that doesn't cause as many visual artifacts. (The old one could cause a type of unintentional "motion blur".)
  
• We now properly set camera effects (vignetting, blur, etc.) when entering a new area.
  
• Fixed a bug that caused heavy framerate loss when certain static objects were selected in the world.
  
• Removed the "Overhead Name Fade Distance" setting for now, as it didn't actually do anything.
  
• The change in moving upward to falling during a jump is now smooth instead of instant. (The jump physics still isn't 100% realistic but it should look a little better now.)
  
• Added particles to Fire Shield ability to make it more obvious when the effect ends.
  
• Polished fairy Free-Flutter animation.
  
• Fixed several bed sleeping animations.
  
• Polished Brambleskin particles.
  
• Animated Crafting XP & NPC Favor bars.
  
• We now do better handling of your currently-selected entity's appearance changing (such as Vendor Fox coming out of its box).
  
• Fixed mounting/dismounting bug that would enable infinite jumping.
  
• Reduced lag, and fixed a bug that caused the screen brightness to change, when mounting the first time.
  
• Prevented ice fishing holes from falling through the ice or being un-clickable.
  
• We now only reduce selection box size when entities are behind the player. This should make things like large doors and trees easier to click on.
  

• Added keybinds for corpse actions, such as Autopsy, Bury, etc. They default to keys 1-6, and can overlap with non-corpse keys (such as ability keys). The corpse action keybinds are used only when the corpse window is open.
  
• Added a "Loot All" hotkey for corpses that defaults to Spacebar.
  
• Werewolf-altar buffs now last until the next Full Moon (instead of the next Waxing Gibbous Moon). Note: since this patch is happening DURING a full moon period, things are a little weird - if you logged in yesterday as a werewolf, your timer is currently set to end on the next Waxing Gibbous Moon. If you log in today or tomorrow, your timer will be updated so the buffs last until the next Full Moon.
  
• Werewolf's "Lunacy" buff ("You feel powerful.") now buffs Max Health +30% instead of +30.
  
• Fixed bug with treasure effect "Tundra Spikes deals +19% damage, gains +8 Accuracy, and lowers targets' Evasion by -16 for 20 seconds". The evasion debuff did not stack with itself (if you had this effect on two pieces of gear).
  
• Uncommon items in loot now glow green, but do not have an associated humming sound.
  
• Characters now have some control over their jumps while mid-air (e.g. jumping with no momentum and then moving forward).
  
• Higher-level poisoned blades can now be used for lower-level Poison Knife abilities.
  
• Loot bonus related Words of Power now last 1 hour instead of 15 minutes.
  
• Dead pets can now always be interacted with.
  
• Enemies can no longer sink into the floor.
  
• Corpses of sheep and floating skulls can now be walked through.
  
• Fix typo in Spider Speed effect.
  
• Sarina, the enslaved fairy in the Goblin Dungeon, no longer just pretends she is leaving after you free her. She now uses a nearby teleporter to leave. It's also now possible for multiple players to finish the quest by talking to her as she leaves (or before she leaves) rather than having to re-kill the goblin boss.
  
• You can now loot fruit trees even if your inventory is full (in which case your inventory will become overflowing). You cannot loot fruit trees when your inventory is overflowing.
  
• Bone Meal can now be stored in gardening-related storages.
  
• Work Orders for Healing Potion Omegas are now correctly labeled Mycology instead of Alchemy.
  
• Work Orders for werewolf armors are now correctly labeled Armorsmithing instead of Blacksmithing.
  
• Cloth enhancements now require a tanning rack.
  
• Changed references to "Enhancement Points" to "Craft Points" for consistency. "Craft Points" is shorter and thus easier to display in the UI.
  
• Changed Serpentine to an Orange Crystal instead of Orange + Green.
  
• Hiral now gives juices at each favor level-up.
  
• Added durations to pineal juice descriptions.
  
• Torches in Eltibule now turn off when they're not lit.
  

This is a minor bug-fix update to fix issues with our latest major update.

• Fix problems with projectiles that persist after monster death
  
• Reverted unintentional lighting change that made certain dungeons extra dark (including "under the model home" and "Dark Chapel" dungeons)
  
• Fixed treasure effect "Nip boosts the damage of Basic, Core, and Nice attacks +X for 6 seconds" which actually buffed the enemy, not the attacker
  
• Item prompt now only shows when appropriate for NPCs
  
• Fix floating barrels in Goblin Dungeon
  
• Stop auto-running when using an ability on an enemy
  
• Fix minor padding issue in crafting window ingredients
  

In this update we've done a ton of polishing and bug-fixing, and we have some new content for the Eltibule region.

Eltibule Content
After a very long hiatus on the game's storyline, we've started expanding it again. We've only added a few new steps in this update, though it may be somewhat obvious where things are headed. We'll be adding more storyline quests in future updates.

Until now, the storyline ended with the quest "Chasing Dalvos to Eltibule". That quest completed when you talked to Oritania, and there were no further quests. Oritania now has a new storyline quest which she will bestow after "Chasing Dalvos to Eltibule" is complete. You will need to run some errands for her first (although you may have already done those errands for her in the past).

There is also a new "top floor" to the dungeon underneath Eltibule Keep. Most of the top floor has low monster density, making it more approachable to players who don't yet have solid level 30 equipment. There is also a new quest on this top floor, which starts in the first room. (The new "top floor" connects to the older floors, which are almost completely unchanged.)

UI

• Polished all of the main UI windows to have consistent header fonts, colors & sizing.
  
• Organized the GUI/Features settings with headings.
  
• Augment sub-skills now show up under the "Augmentation" umbrella skill in the Skills & Abilities window.
  
• Fixed an issue with Skills being displayed in a weird order in the Skills and Abilities window.
  
• Repeated searches within the Skills & Abilities window will no longer mess up Skill name padding.
  
• Reunited Toxic Flesh 9 with its friends Toxic Flesh 1-8 in the Special Abilities window.
  
• Mushroom Farming max grow-box bonus is now displayed in the Skills and Abilities window.
  
• Set correct error message for abilities whose parent skills are not high enough level, most notably when Fairy Magic is higher level than Mentalism.
  
• The right-click hotbar submenu "Change Skill" will now display in 2 columns when you have 25+ combat skills. This prevents the list from going off the screen.
  
• Tightened the display of the right-click submenu that displays list of combat skills.
  
• The Crafting window now has an XP bar, displays the associated skill under the recipe name, and has a star icon to quickly favorite the selected recipe.
  
• Clicking an item while the crafting window is open will now place that item into any applicable ingredient slots.
  
• Attempting to craft with an ingredient in storage will now show an accurate error.
  
• Improved algorithm for single-clicking an inventory item with the crafting window open:
  
  
  
  • If there are multiple ingredient slots, it will no longer swap them and will instead fill successive slots.
    
  • If there is a single ingredient slot, it will swap any existing ingredient in the slot.
    
  
  
• Empty stable slots now have a custom UI that is more descriptive.
  
• The mount preview window should no longer be black.
  
• Polished pet UI, including highlighting the currently-selected mode (Assist, Guard, etc.).
  
• Added a new setting, "Automatically show pet UI?" under GUI/Features, which auto-shows the pet UI when a pet is summoned. Defaults to true.
  
• Added an option "Close mount window after action?" to prevent mount window from closing after performing an action.
  
• Properly resize Dismount button text.
  
• Mount anxiety bar now changes from green to red as anxiety increases.
  
• Added Riding to list of toggleable shop skills.
  
• Fixed a bug that prevented you from toggling off Riding skill when using the shop search golem (if you first talked to the golem while on a mount).
  
• General polish of the transmutation window.
  
• Transmutation now always uses the new transmutation window.
  
• Polished the Quest Tracker a bit.
  
• Added an icon to quest list headers when one of their quests is completed. (It's a little green dot.)
  
• Tracked quests can now be right-clicked to view the Quest details or untrack the quest.
  
• Allowed locking of the hotbar from the right-click menu of the ability icons.
  
• Sidebar is no longer movable when attached to the main hotbar.
  
• The minimap now starts at the correct location when changing zones.
  
• The second floor map of Gazluk Keep now uses the correct map pins.
  
• The item comparison tooltip now properly disappears when the compare key isn't held in, and the equipped item in the comparison is more obvious. (It has an "Equipped" label.)
  
• Chat bubbles & selection boxes for yourself should no longer be jittery.
  
• Scaled down selection boxes for large rabbits, so they stay more-or-less centered on the rabbit itself instead of hovering over its head.
  
• We now update a selected target's description in real-time (if, for instance, someone's title changes while you have them selected).
  
• Monster name colors now update properly when the monster dies.
  
• The monster Rage-Full indicator (in Combat Info) now only displays on attacks that actually require full Rage.
  
• Removed blue power bars from above target heads.
  
• Polished favor bar in the NPC interaction window.
  
• Julius Patton's favor increase text now lines up properly with his storage unlock.
  
• Moved the effect icon for "background downloading" to the end of the effects list, and only show it when background downloads are active for more than half a second. This should prevent pop-in of the icon repeatedly, which shifted the rest of the effects icons.
  
• Float item pickups to the correct place when they go into a different inventory pack than is currently selected.
  

• Added a new "Gather" animation for collecting fruit from trees/bushes.
  
• The transmutation animation is now quicker, and can be skipped via clicking on it.
  
• Changed animation for all fae recipes.
  
• Fixed fairy swim animation.
  
• Fairies should continue looking like they're floating when using most emotes.
  
• New pickup animation for rabbits.
  
• Revamped Knife Fighting animations.
  
• We now correctly orient knives during stab animations.
  
• Add particle effects to bard songs that last as long as the song is active.
  
• Improved mount ability animations.
  
• Add particle effects to mount abilities.
  
• Reset horse state completely when swapping between mounted & unmounted.
  
• When mounting, the camera now raises so your head is still in the same position on the screen.
  
• Polished spawn premonition particles.
  
• Eltibule: replaced legacy Unity trees with speedtree trees to fix problems with LODs. (The actual tree choices are still a work in progress, but good enough for now.)
  
• Eltibule: fixed LOD on "casino castle" (the facade entrance to casino).
  
• Removed advanced graphics setting for "Tilt Shift". (It hasn't actually done anything for a long time.)
  
• Added advanced graphics setting for "High-Quality Anti-Aliasing". Previously this was always enabled when you set the graphics quality to "Great" or higher. (And that's still the default, but now you can override it.)
  
• Added two new graphics settings:
  
  
  
  • There's a new Advanced Graphics Setting for "Torch Flicker". This is on by default for "Great" or higher graphics settings. It's a relatively inexpensive graphical flourish.
    
  • There's a new Advanced Graphics Setting for "More Lightsource Shadows". This causes some torches and fires to cast dynamic shadows. This is a MUCH more expensive graphical flourish, but it looks neat in the goblin dungeon. This feature is off by default for all quality settings (even Ultra).
    
  
  
• Fixed camera reversal when entering Serbule sewers via the lake.
  

• "Headbutt and Knee Kick Damage +X" now correctly applies to Headbutt instead of Barrage (and still applies to Knee Kick, of course).
  
• "Provoke Undead deals extra damage" will no longer do double the specified damage to the minions.
  
• "Basic Attacks restore X Power" now properly restores the power.
  
• "Trick Foxes have +X Max Health and +X Max Armor" now properly gain the specified Max Armor instead of a Taunt boost.
  
• "Ridicule taunts and causes target's next attack to miss" now applies the chance to miss to the target instead of the caster.
  
• "Spirit Pounce hits all enemies within 6 meters" now displays in the ability tooltip.
  
• Fixed the icons for various treasure effects.
  
• Elemental Ward's darkness and trauma mitigation effects will no longer display if they aren't active.
  
• Bulwark Mode's health & armor leech effects will no longer show up in the effects list.
  
• The treasure mod for System Shock's DoT now correctly reports the DoT damage type as Psychic instead of Trauma.
  
• The armor ability from Gazluk War Wizard Armor ("War Wizard's Battle Cry") now has a reset time of 180 secs and restores 300 power.
  
• The armor ability from Gazluk Death Trooper Armor ("Death Trooper's Battle Cry") now restores 350 armor as well as 350 health.
  
• Attempts to transmute a mod with no possible replacements will now be prevented.
  
• Endurance mods will now show up on crafted gear as intended, and can be extracted.
  
• Endurance mods can now be transmuted into generic mods.
  
• One of the treasure effects that gives small +Armor bonuses previously had no requirements and now has endurance-level requirements.
  

• Toned down the rate of XP decay in Povus (until there are more high-level players to work on it).
  
• We now put abilities on cooldown immediately, and refund cooldown if you are stunned before ability goes off.
  
• Reverted an old change to in-combat fly costs. The earlier change raised flight costs exponentially the longer you were flying, which definitely did fix the exploit we were trying to fix, but took away a lot of the fun of being a fairy. (Now the cost is still not cheap, but it increases linearly instead of exponentially.)
  
• Fixed a bug that caused pets to reduce the total XP value of monsters they fought.
  
• Fixed a bug that caused Saddlery skill to give permanent health/power bonuses for leveling it up.
  
• Fixed bug that prevented you from earning Riding XP if your bonus synergy levels put you over the level cap.
  
• All effects that require a specific active ability will now persist while mounted, such as Summoned Skeletons, Battle Chemistry buffs, etc. The only exception is Bulwark Mode, which will be dispelled as normal.
  
• Fixed an issue with mounting/unmounting in water sometimes not updating your speed correctly.
  
• Humanoid illusions can now ride mounts (including some skeletons).
  
• Banana & Guava trees now have 3 of their respective fruits.
  
• Add bananas to banana tree models.
  
• When a tree has no fruit but still has wood, its name now changes to "Harvested Tree" to denote the change.
  
• Guava trees now yield Maple Wood when they run out of fruit.
  
• Banana trees now yield Cedar Wood when they run out of fruit. (What, you've never heard of banana cedars?)
  
• Made it clearer which foods and effects are meals vs snacks.
  
• Recalling to the underwater teleport circle in Sun Vale will no longer teleport you to the circle near the druids.
  
• Fixed Carpal Tunnel chairs that were embedded in the ground.
  
• Fixed errors for some golems in newbie caves.
  
• Filled in the mini-pools in the caves in Gazluk, making them shallower to prevent exploitability.
  
• Kur beds can now be slept in properly.
  
• Fixed a bug that caused the server to think you were floating when you first enter a new area (until you move). This could lead to messages like "You can only do that when standing on the ground" when trying to drop items, and cause your mount to generate anxiety (because it thought it was flying).
  
• Newly spawned entities will place themselves on the ground quicker.
  
• You now stop auto-running after interacting with something that is too far away. This would cause problems when interacting with things while mounted.
  
• Added a lore note in the tomb of James Eltibule I.
  
• Replaced the lore note for James II (found in a secret place in Eltibule). Note that this text canonically replaces the original lore.
  
• Misc. lore cleanup; notably, moved the text of "Sedgewick's Journal" from a static entity into a lorebook file.
  
• Fixed yet more references to "Davlos". (It should be Dalvos.)
  
• Roshun the Traitor's favor should no longer reset for fae.
  
• Nelson Ballard's small talk is more accurate (to indicate that he accepts all Carpentry items, not just hand-made ones).
  
• Glajur should now teach everyone Phrenology, unless you have both the skill and the research recipe for each individual phrenology.
  
• Irkima will now offer a hangout if you've finished Probing Tavilak's History.
  
• Added a new favor to Jesina in Eltibule which is automatically given to "scary" animal players. After completing this quest, you can interact with her normally.
  
• Game client now retries Steam authentication if the first attempt fails for any reason. (If the second attempt also fails, we show an error message like before.)
  
• Added a new redemption package for our 4th Anniversary on Steam. Redemption will run Mar 11 - Apr 30.
  

This is a bug-fix update. Here are the fixes:

• Fixed bug causing some entities to be invisible and some particle effects to be permanent
  
• Fixed issue that prevented monsters from fully loading, causing a permanent loading screen
  
• Prevent placing a saddlebag inside of itself
  
• Put an ability on cooldown only when the ability successfully completes
  
• Added crossbow mods back to crossbows. This also fixes crossbows thinking they are legacy because they have crossbow mods on them
  
• Fairies now sit on horses properly
  
• Fixed the avatar pictures on the login-screen & persona window when character is on horseback
  
• Elevation changes while flying are now smooth when Camera Vertical Smoothing is turned on
  
• Remove duplicate "Read more about V.I.P." buttons from UI
  
• Bring horse to a full stop before interacting with an object after moving via right-click (and bring the horse to a stop quicker). This fixes the issue with the player attempting to collect something with a delay but not actually collecting the thing
  
• Forbid mounting/dismounting while performing an attack. This should prevent some edge-casey bugs that prevent you from using abilities
  
• Toggle saddlebag window instead of showing it every time the button is clicked
  
• Show floaties again for DoTs on self
  
• Properly dismount horse when un-mounted due to a DoT
  
• Change "Mount Anxiety Cost -20" to "Mount Anxiety -20" for horse calming abilities
  
• the Riding skill gives bonus Max Health and Max Power when active
  
• Mount doesn't gain or lose anxiety while the client is still showing the loading screen
  

This update introduces mounts! There are also a LOT of new user-interface features. Read the "UI Improvements" section carefully, it's full of useful stuff!

Mounts
In this update, you can learn to ride a horse. This mount is useful for traveling and can also serve as extra storage. All the horses in this first version look and behave exactly the same. In the future there will be multiple breeds of horse that use the genetics system to allow a huge variety of mounts, but first we need your help testing the basics! We'll continue to polish and improve the basic functionality for a few updates, and when things seem good, we'll start introducing more mount types.

We don't want to explain all the ins and outs of how mounts work because we're hoping it's understandable enough that you can figure it out in-game. If it isn't, we'll need to make things more obvious! But here are some basics you should know:

• You can purchase a horse from a trainer in Hogan's Keep, Eltibule. The total cost is 6000 councils. You'll also need an empty stable slot to store the horse.
  
• All players who log in this month can redeem a pack of basic horse tack. Click the redemptions button at the bottom of the Persona window.
  
• There is also a new crafting skill that lets you create better tack. The trainer is in Amulna and the skill requires Leatherworking 50 to learn.
  
• Players in an animal form can't ride horses. However, they can access the saddlebag even when not on the mount, so there's still some benefit. (Animal forms will eventually have a travel mode, but we haven't decided how it will work yet.)
  
• We've talked in the past about revising how "sprint gear" works, and we still intend to do that, but not until mounts are more thoroughly tested. For now, there are no changes to how gear works.
  
• You can access your saddlebag while on your mount, and you can also access it while NOT on your mount, as long as you're in an area where you could theoretically ride the mount. (In other words, you can't access your saddlebag in dungeons.) The Red Wing Casino is a special case: even though you can't ride a mount there, you can still access your saddlebag.
  
• If you have a backer package that includes a horse, basic riding skill, and a saddlebag, you can now redeem that feature. Click the redemptions button at the bottom of the Persona window. NOTE: horses require a stable slot. If you don't see the redemption, make sure you have an open stable slot!
  
• If you have the "Thoroughbred Breeder" package, those horses are not yet available -- they'll be added when horse genetics are in. You can safely redeem the free horse+riding skill+saddlebag now; you'll get the two "breeder" horses at a later date.
  

• Added a new window for cosmetic pets, accessible via a button in the Persona window. Pets are summonable from the window directly or can be placed on the sidebar like before. All cosmetic pets have been moved here from the Skills & Abilities window.
  
• Added a "Hotbar Layout" option for attaching the sidebar to the main hotbar, which turns it horizontal and places it underneath the active skills hotbar. You can access this in Settings, under GUI/Features, or by right-click the sidebar and selecting "Attach to Hotbar", or "Detach from Hotbar" when attached.
  
• Added the setting "Camera Vertical Smoothing" under Controls in the Settings window. This causes the camera to smoothly follow the player vertically instead of being directly tied to them. Enabled by default.
  
• Added options to individually lock most HUD elements, either by right-clicking on the window's titlebar or by clicking a lock icon. To enable the lock icons, go to Settings->GUI->Features and check the "Show GUI Locks?" option.
  
• Added confirmation to stable slot purchasing.
  
• The Transmutaion window has been redesigned. Due to its complexity, we'd like your help testing it! When you use an item workbench, you can choose between the old and new interface. Please try out the new interface first. We're leaving the old one available in case there are bugs. (Both interfaces use the same server-side transmutation code "under the hood"; only the interfaces are different.)
  
• The "Hide Known Recipes" toggle is no longer displayed when the Sell tab is selected.
  
• Added a hotkey in Settings, under Keys, that bypasses players and pets when clicking, titled "Hold to Bypass Clicking Players & Pets". For example, while holding this key you can click on a player who is blocking your view of a corpse and select the corpse, not the player.
  
• When a party member dies, the party status window should now display the text "DEAD" in all of the attribute rows, rather than 0's or, worse, incorrect non-0 values.
  
• Added a search bar to Special Abilities in Skills & Abilities window.
  
• Added a news ticker of player activity to the login screen.
  
• The skills window now lists previously-earned skill rewards under the list of upcoming rewards.
  
• There's a new hotkeys to summon your mount. It defaults to Shift+NumLock. (The Auto-Run key defaults to NumLock, so you can press Shift+NumLock, then NumLock, to start traveling.)
  
• There's a new hotkey to view your saddlebag. (It doesn't have a key by default.)
  

• We now take animations into account when attempting to queue an ability. E.G. When summoning a pet and then queueing up another ability, the summoned pet animation will finish (thus actually summoning the pet) before firing the queued ability.
  
• Polished all Necromancy animations and particle effects.
  
• Sped up animation and removed the movement slowdown for Dig Deep & Push Onward.
  
• Slightly sped up animations for First Aid and Patch Armor.
  
• Improved Fae Bee attack animations.
  
• Fixed a bug with players not standing back up after dying.
  
• When initiating flying mid-jump, the jump will properly be canceled and the character can no longer fly sideways/diagonally.
  
• We now delay shooting of some archery projectiles until the proper moment; they were shooting right away.
  
• Fixed LOD issues with buildings and some terrain objects in Rahu.
  
• Adjusted camera settings and draw distances in Eltibule to reduce the horrendous pop-in. This change may impact performance for some users on low-end machines, but hopefully not too badly!
  

• We've cleaned up the half-assed VIP panel in the settings window. It now explains what VIP is, and has a link to the Steam store page for non-VIPs that may want VIP.
  
• Most of the features under the VIP section now actually require VIP. The exception is basic chat logging, which will remain permanently available to everyone. The option is still in the VIP section, labeled as a "VIP preview feature". Note that combat logging does require VIP.
  
• Added new combat logging options, including ways to log indirect damage and healing amounts. (These options show the raw damage/healing amounts, but it's not always easy to tell which ability caused which indirect damage/healing. This is something we want to show in the logs, but it will require some rearchitecting. So this is an incremental improvement.)
  
• VIP members who log in during Jan 25 - Feb 28 can redeem a February VIP gift package: a Sturdy Music Box.
  
• New permanent VIP benefit: VIP players gain +15 saddlebag slots.
  

• We realized that many NPCs did not have their target level set in data, effectively making them level 0 NPCs. This made them more receptive to gifts than intended. We've fixed these NPCs, and as a result they will give somewhat less favor for gifts. (This is a bug-fix, not an overall balance change. We're fixing bugs in preparation for balance work.) Affected NPCs include:
  
  
  • Gorvessa in Hogan's Basement
    
  • Yalox in the Goblin Dungeon
    
  • Glajur in Kur Tower
    
  • Percy in Eltibule
    
  • Sem in Snowblood Shadow Cave
    
  • Rubi and Cassie in the Warden Cave
    
  • Laura Neth in Kur Mountains
    
  • Ratuk the Thinker in Kur Mountains
    
  • Mope in Povus
    
  • Hirochi in Rahu
    
  • Ichin in Rahu
    
  • Wintria Irasca in Rahu
    
  • Silvia in Sun Vale
    
  
  
• Several NPCs who said they liked "Magical Equipment with Skill X prereq" actually liked anything with that skill prereq, including textbooks. Now they only like actual magical (i.e. loot and crafted) equipment. Those NPCs are:
  
  
  • Alravesa in Ilmari(Archery)
    
  • Falkrin Overstrike in Ilmari (Hammer)
    
  • Sand Seer in Ilmari (Fire Magic)
    
  • Sugar in the Warden Cave (Deer)
    
  • Leah Bowman in Povus (Animal Handling)
    
  • Ashk in Rahu (Mentalism)
    
  • Lady Windsong in Rahu (Druid)
    
  • Jumper in Sun Vale (Deer)
    
  • Raul in Sun Vale (Cow)
    
  • Silvia in Sun Vale (Druid)
    
  
  
• Crafted belts and buckles now count as 'magical equipment' for favor gifting.
  
• For the purpose of gifting favor only, textbooks now cap how much an NPC will value them. This does not affect their actual Council value, just how much favor an NPC will give for the gift.
  

We've made some small changes to how monsters react to players when they are on a horse. We'll be refining these ideas in the future.

• While you are mounted, melee-centric monsters have 33% reduced player-detection radius. (They still respond to help shouts at the same distance, however.)
  
• While you are mounted and not in-combat, melee-centric monsters ignore your out-of-combat pets. (But ranged attackers will still shoot at pets, which will bring the pets into combat. And then melee monsters will notice it! So best not to rely on this overmuch.)
  

• When mining in Povus, there was a chance to receive the message "You didn't find anything valuable that time, but you can still try again." This seemed like a failed skill-check to players, but it was actually just random. We've replaced this with an equivalent change to mine very-low-value items (such as Pebbles and Flint). This way it's clear that you haven't failed at anything, you just have more mining to do. (The total number of high-value items in each node is unchanged.)
  
• Items with shamanic infusions on them should now be transmutable. The infusions also show up differently in the UI with the new transmute window.
  
• Crossbows mods will no longer appear on non-crossbow off-hand items.
  
• We now prevent right-click movement when dead.
  
• Bulwark Mode is now fully dispelled on death. (Previously a few side effects of it would stick around.)
  
• Chat logs now include timezone offset when you login to the game (to aid automated tools).
  
• Fixed Amutasa's broken "Install Augment" option when your favor level is too low to augment.
  
• You no longer stop auto-running when using an ability without a channeling time. This functionality can be re-enabled via the "Always Stop Auto-Moving when Using an Ability" option in the Settings window under Controls. Note: You WILL stop auto-running if you use an ability outside of its range and have Auto-Move to Attack turned on.
  
• Added collision to the gates in Rahu.
  
• Fixed the MacHack3 special setting so that it works more reliably: you no longer have to re-apply it whenever switching areas.
  
• Removed MacHack1 and MacHack2 special settings because they didn't actually help Mac users fix the visual problem. You can now just type MacHack instead of MacHack3 in the special settings. (Although MacHack3 continues to work.)
  

In celebration of the new year and the outstanding level of support we have received from the PG community, we want everyone to start off the new year with a little something in their pockets! So, for ONE DAY ONLY (Jan 1), we have turned on a whole bunch of our special event buffs and cranked them to max, including double combat and crafting XP!!! These buffs will turn off at midnight server time (US EST), so get out there and grind it up while you can! Enjoy the super buffs and we thank you again for playing and supporting Project: Gorgon! Happy New Year!

New Dungeon
There's a new level 85 group dungeon available for high level players who are Friends with Mope in Povus. Speak to Mope to get started. This one is intended to be a challenge for a group of six level 85 players wearing reasonably good gear. It's brand new in the sense that we finished it up last night, so no doubt it'll need some refinements. Remember to report bugs, and after you've been into the dungeon a few times, please share your balance feedback with us!

Ri-Shin Event Changes

• Povus now has a Ri-Shin tree to set up; speak with Leah Bowman for more information.
  
• There is a small chance to receive a Live Event Credit when opening a Ri-Shin tree present.
  
• Tweaked the Ri-Shin Shrine event in various ways, changing the required item amounts, adjusting buff effects, and adding a small chance to receive a bonus Live Event Token each time you receive a Ri-Shin Token from Snowleaf.
  

• The basic effect of Sword items has been recalculated. Weapons that boosted "Sword Base Damage" now boost "Sword Damage" (to different amounts). This is a buff to high level sword damage.
  
• The basic effect of Dagger and Dirk items has been recalculated. Weapons that boosted "Knife Base Damage" now boost "Knife Damage" (to different amounts). This is a buff to high level knife damage, especially dual-wielding damage.
  
• Fixed brewing buffs that are supposed to buff damage versus a specific anatomy group (e.g. Bears). (Previously they did nothing.)
  
• Fixed brewing buffs that are supposed to buff Burst damage vs. Elites. (Previously they incorrectly boosted Melee damage.)
  
• Revised brewing buffs that were intended to buff Projectile damage vs. Elites; they now buff Ranged damage. (Previously they incorrectly boosted Melee damage.)
  
• Fixed ability "Toxic Irritant" not applying certain buffs/debuffs.
  
• Fixed minigolems' "Taunting Punch" not applying certain buffs/debuffs.
  
• Fixed pet rats' "Rat Burn" Special Trick not applying certain buffs/debuffs.
  
• Fixed the Problem Spider's curse.
  
• Fixed treasure effects that make Pixie Flare deal bonus damage vs. Demons.
  

• Items with only generic mods should extract properly now.
  
• Sunstone & Goshenite will now properly extract generic augments.
  
• Brought back the "Genes" window at stables.
  
• Stable pet previews should now always show.
  
• Persona window preview should now properly display at all times.
  
• Fae now float in the character select screen & persona window.
  
• Improved how effects line up with the attack animations.
  
• Polished & sped up hammer animations.
  
• Mushroom Box use level requirement changed from 0 to 1.
  
• Corrected tutorial text after researching your first fire magic spell. (The UI has changed since it was originally written.)
  
• Fixed typo in foods (mitigatation -> mitigation).
  
• Summon the correct skeleton with Free-Summon Skeletal Archer 6.
  
• Elite members of the "Evil Carnivore" gang (seen during a Povus invasion) now correctly have group loot instead of solo loot.
  

• Animal Handling: Fishing 42, Skinning 15, Feline Anatomy 19, Bear Anatomy 29, Animal Husbandry 25, Animal Husbandry 50, Animal Husbandry 75, Rodent Anatomy 19, Rodent Anatomy 39
  
• Archery: Meditation 25, Human Anatomy 19, Crossbow 25, Crossbow 50, Crossbow 75
  
• Armor Patching: Armorsmithing 15, Armorsmithing 45, Armorsmithing 70
  
• Bard: Art History 15, Art History 45, Poetry Appreciation 35
  
• Battle Chemistry: Mycology 30, Cooking 55, Iocaine Resistance 30
  
• Cow: Unarmed 27, Gardening 51, Gourmand 25, Foraging 26
  
• Crossbow: Fletching 21, Fletching 34, Fletching 53, Archery 32, Archery 58, Gadgeteering 15, Gadgeteering 45
  
• Deer: Unarmed 16, Psychology 17, Ruminant Anatomy 17, Cow 26
  
• Druid: Mycology 45, Rabbit 42, Pig 48, Nature Appreciation 38, Nature Appreciation 65
  
• Fairy Magic: Fae Anatomy 49
  
• Fire Magic: Battle Chemistry 20, Battle Chemistry 40, Armorsmithing 28
  
• First Aid: Priest 15, Priest 45, Compassion 15, Compassion 42, Phrenology 10, Druid 29
  
• Giant Bat: Animal Handling 46, Necromancy 55, Bard 40
  
• Ice Magic: Fire Magic 28, Fire Magic 39, Fire Magic 65, Armor Patching 55, Meditation 30, Battle Chemistry 30, Battle Chemistry 55
  
• Hammer: Unarmed 26, Mining 65
  
• Necromancy: Undead Anatomy 19, Undead Anatomy 49, Incorporeal Creature Anatomy 26, Spirit Fox 29, Paleontology 24, Paleontology 49
  
• Pig: Mycology 65
  
• Priest: First Aid 45, Pig 55
  
• Rabbit: Unarmed 10, Unarmed 38, Gardening 25, Gardening 53, Gourmand 30, Foraging 28, Deer 16, Animal Handling 28
  
• Shield: Armorsmithing 48
  
• Sigil Scripting: Calligraphy 10, Calligraphy 30, Calligraphy 45, Calligraphy 60, Battle Chemistry 11
  
• Spider: Psychology 19, Psychology 46, Arthropod Anatomy 13, Textiles 34
  
• Spirit Fox: Unarmed 49, Fishing 37, Gourmand 35, Psychology 51, Myconic 40, Foraging 47, Mentalism 30, Canine Anatomy 23, Fae Anatomy 29, Incorporeal Creature Anatomy 49
  
• Staff: Sword 42
  
• Unarmed: Staff 60
  
• Werewolf: Skinning 35, Canine Anatomy 19, Canine Anatomy 47, Butchering 34, Giant Bat 25, Animal Handling 60
  

It's time for Alharth's holiday season! All the townsfolk that you've befriended (meaning you have Friends favor-level or higher) will have gifts for you when you speak to them. Make sure to have your favorite combat skills active, because if they give you equipment, it will likely be tailored to those skills.

The human celebration of Ri-Shin is also in full force, and townsfolk in every town and settlement [except Povus] need your help setting up their Ri-Shin trees! Look for townsfolk wearing a red festive Ri-Shin hat. There are trees to set up in Serbule, Serbule Hills, Eltibule, Kur, Gazluk, Ilmari, Rahu, the Fae Realm, Sun Vale, and Red Wing Casino.

We've actually been working on a different Christmas present for our long-term players, a new level 85 group dungeon, but it's not quite ready yet! We'll do another update next week to introduce the new dungeon. In the mean time, if you have a high-level character, you may want to make sure you are Friends with Mope in Povus.

(Oh, and Povus doesn't have a Ri-Shin tree yet, but will get one in next week's update!)

A Holiday Gift
As a small thanks for joining us this holiday season, there are new redemptions available - one for everyone (except demo players), and an extra one for our VIP members. You can access these through the button on the bottom right of the Persona window, or if you're old-school by typing /redeem in chat. Remember, these rewards are one per account, so make sure you choose which character gets it wisely!

UI

• There is a new vendor filter: "Hide Known Recipes".
  
• You now auto-select the number box when splitting a stack, to allow quicker precise splits.
  
• Tooltips for the sidebar buttons (like the Inventory button) will now show the keyboard shortcut for that button (if any is assigned).
  
• You can more easily clear out social statuses ("Who's Online" status and "Friends" quote).
  
• Fixed bug where cancelling a confirmation window would accidentally confirm it instead. This could happen if, for instance, you quickly clicked "Erase This Loadout" twice in a row and then chose to cancel.
  
• The first time you open the recipe window from a world object (like a fire) in a play session, it will now start recipes at the top of the window instead of in the middle.
  

• Skeletons can now perform emotes and sit in chairs!
  
• Accounted for latency when performing attacks, so they should now line up better with animations on clients.
  
• Polished animations such as First Aid, Armor Patch, Dig Deep, & Push Onward.
  
• Sped up a few animations used by buffing abilities and made them able to be used while moving.
  
• Made pickup & eat corpse animations more responsive. (You can move more quickly after performing the animation.)
  
• Sped up dig animation, and use it when burying a corpse.
  
• Players are now placed into beds more appropriately.
  

• Bulwark Mode must now be kept on a hotbar in order to be sustained.
  
• You can no longer earn combat XP for "fake" auxiliary skills (like performing a song right before murdering a monster to get Stringed Performance XP from the kill). This was considered an exploit and is not the normal way to earn XP for these skills.
  
• Cheese casks & brewing barrels should no longer get stuck in walls.
  
• We now properly change your active skill on your first polymorph. For example, the first time Ciervos turns you into a Deer you will reliably activate the deer skill.
  
• Dead humanoids no longer have collisions (after being un-targeted).
  
• Removed duplicate descriptions from food items.
  
• Fixed description of cranberry sauces in their recipes. (Snacks -> Meals)
  
• Fixed Spicy Fried Tofu Cubes recipe typo. (Feeds two -> Feeds three)
  
• Made bed on Ivyn's farm (in Serbule) more easily usable.
  
• Renamed Cat Anatomy Decoction to Feline Anatomy Decoction.
  
• Ability "Spade Assault" now gains damage bonuses from gear that boosts Kick or Front Kick damage
  
• Higher tiers of "Spade Assault" have a higher chance of the shovel breaking (going from 5% to 7%)
  
• If you are Comfortable or better with Mope, you can stand at the base of the giant mushroom and say "Mope, Up!" in local chat. If you then stand still (and out of combat) for a few seconds, Mope will teleport you to him. (This is something he now tells you when you reach Comfortable favor-level, but if you've already reached Comfortable before today... well, it's a good thing you read the patch notes.)
  
• Adjusted the buffs from the Ri-Shin pool in Kur so that they last 90 minutes instead of 60, but can only be received once per day. Hopefully this makes them more useful without being too overpowered.
  

Happy Thanksgiving! It's harvest season in Alharth and you know what that means: turkeys are hiding in all the bushes, and there's classic fall foods to eat. High-level crafters should visit Ricatu in Povus to learn to craft some new kinds of food! We also have many fixes and improvements for you.

Are you on a new Mac? Is the screen opaque? Scroll down to "MacOS Visual Fog Bug" below.

Povus

• Povus ratkin drop more cheese mold, especially root-tenders and miners.
  
• Povus nightly quest "Undead Surprise" has been revised.
  
• Povus nightly quest "Warmaster Brukal" more reliably has the necessary elite orcs.
  
• Fixed Povus buildings that could have frogs spawn trapped inside the ceiling.
  

• There are two new chat commands to let you see login screen information while you are in-game: /events will display upcoming events, and /news will display login news.
  
• Improved the clarity of genetic-info tooltips in the genome-view window:
  
  
  
  • H, S, and V are now shown as "hue", "saturation", or "intensity".
    
  • If both the dominant and recessive behaviors boost the same attribute (but to different amounts), only the more potent behavior is listed.
  
  
• VIP players now see a "Save" button on the Genome View window. This saves the genome as a .txt file in the user's "reports" folder. (The format is subject to change based on your feedback, so let us know what you'd like to see here!)
  
• Abilities in the Skills and Abilities window that are different levels of the same ability will now sort correctly. For example, Blocking Stance 5 no longer sorts before Blocking Stance 4.
  
• Sub-skills are now sorted alphabetically in the Skills and Abilities window.
  
• Recipes that share cooldown timers, such as Mushroom Recall and Mushroom Un-Recall, will now all display the appropriate timer in their recipe.
  
• Closing the corpse window too quickly after performing an action will no longer cause the loot window to pop right back up again.
  
• The show/hide effects UI is now handled properly when player doesn't have sufficient anatomy skill level.
  
• It's possible to drag the "NPC talk" window far enough left on your screen that the left-side menu doesn't show. New players often do this by mistake because the first few NPCs they talk to have no side-menu. Later when they're talking to NPCs with side-menus, they have no idea what they're missing. To fix this, the left-side menu on an NPC's talk window is now prevented from going off the left side of the screen. (If you really want to drag the sidebar off-screen for whatever reason, you can use special setting, AllowSideMenusOffScreen.)
  

• Knockdowns are considered stuns for purposes of dispelling them. This applies to both player and monster knockdowns.
  
• Fixed a bug with NPC_Errruka that prevented some dye recipes from showing up in her barters.
  
• "Analyze Arthropod Genes" ability was incorrectly making a skill-check against the Arthropod Anatomy skill instead of the Arthropod Genetics skill.
  
• "Proclamation" note in Serbule is targetable again.
  
• You can no longer sit in a chair that you are already sitting in.
  
• All instances of the name "Davlos" should now correctly use "Dalvos" instead. Just for you, Beta Notus!
  
• Some archery abilities were missing the text "(or better)".
  
• Many typos have been fixed.
  
• New bandwidth improvements to networking protocol. This will not be detectable during gameplay except to players with VERY poor networks -- it's mainly intended as a feature for players on metered or limited bandwidth, so that the game uses less bandwidth overall.
  

We're back with another update! This one's a little earlier than expected because we wanted to fix a Halloween-event bug (the quest "Skeleton Dance?"). The Halloween event will run for another week or so, into November, so there's still plenty of time to finish the quest lines!

But this isn't just a bug-fix update -- there's also major changes to the Povus nightly quest system, plus a new UI feature.

[h2]Povus - New Feature: "Bonus" Nights[/h2]
Some nights in Povus, the quests are worth more. This happens every 4-8 game days (which maps to 8-16 real hours, which means this happens an average of 2 times per realtime day). On Bonus nights, each quest earns the town +100 additional town XP, plus additional item rewards for participants.

The town signpost has an indicator if the upcoming night's quests will earn bonuses. In addition, at the signpost you can "join Tremmond's pigeonmailing list" to receive notifications the game-day before a bonus night. (These notifications are sent to currently-online players every game-hour during the game-day, so you may not be notified if you're offline at the wrong moment. If in doubt, just check the signpost!)

Note that at this time, "Bonus Nights" aren't actually any harder than regular nights. They're just bonusier. Some of the in-game flavor text suggests that nastier things are coming, but they're wrong. We might change this in the future as we continue to evolve Povus.

[h2]Povus - New Feature: Armor Shipments[/h2]
When the "Light the Lamps" quest is completed at night, local merchant Ishiko will stop by the Povus docks at 10am game-time the next day to buy crafted metal armor. Each piece of armor you give her earns Town XP for Povus, helping it level up. But the cash payout is very poor, so this is primarily a way to donate armor to improve Povus.

[h2]Povus - New Feature: Capstone Quest[/h2]
There's an additional quest added to the end of the Povus nightly quest-line. This one's for those nights when there are LOTS of players in Povus. Starting the quest requires a whopping 16 players.

[h2]Povus - New Feature: Town Storage[/h2]
When you complete a Povus nightly quest, you can now earn storage slots as part of the reward. The first few slots are earned just by completing one or two quests, but later slots require more quest-completions. Eventually you can have up to 80 slots in the Povus storage chest. (This is technically a bug fix, but since it didn't work at all before, it's also a new feature!)

[h2]Povus: Other Changes[/h2]

• Increased the number of players needed to start Povus nightly quest stages. Tiers previously required 1,2,3,4,5,6 players; now require 2,3,4,6,9,12 players. This should better match the actual quest requirements.
  
• Fashnagar the Prognosticator's post-bath prognostications now have a kernel of truth: many of his lines now accurately hint at how soon the next Bonus Quest Reward night is coming. (Previously they were entirely random.)
  
• Made sure enough Invincible Ratkin Skeletons spawn for the quest "Bone War!"
  
• Fixed the spawn rate of Enchanted Mega-Scrays during quest "Povus Safety: Ranalon Assault"
  
• Reduced the kill-requirements of most higher-tier Povus quests a little bit (e.g. kill 35 flapskulls instead of 40)
  
• The second-highest-tier Povus nightly quests now earn the town 200 XP instead of 100
  
• The highest-tier Povus nightly quests now earn the town 300 XP instead of 100
  

• Fixed a bug that caused Spawn Premonitions to be permanent, instead of having a 5% chance to dispel on death as intended. As part of this fix, all existing spawn premonitions were erased, so you will need to reapply them!
  
• Also reduced the 3-second universal spawn premonition to a 2-second premonition, and the 5-second universal premonition to 4-second
  
• Summoned deer are now correctly unsummoned when player leaves Deer form
  
• Frostbite & Rib Shatter stuns now remove Ghosts' nigh-invulnerability
  
• Now treat /em custom emotes as chat messages, so they are affected by /ignore, moderator gagging, etc.
  
• Polish Hammer animations
  
• Fixed a "click really fast" exploit with Genetics XP
  
• Properly loop stun animation for NPCs
  
• Reduce crouching of female elves with realistic foot placement turned on
  
• Fix sideways-sitting chairs in New Prestonbule and Serbule
  
• Skeleton dancing is functional again
  
• No longer send endless undeliverable messages for pigeon messages with no items attached
  
• Place bulwark shield particle correctly on Skeleton Mages
  
• Play animations (invisibly) when in first-person mode. This fixes some subtle bugs
  
• Prevent auto-selected targets from interfering with tab-targeting
  

Halloween is here! Zhia Lian, the demanding god of Whimsy, has new higher-level tasks for you to take on. The Halloween event now has over 90 quests! So get out there and see what whimsical random things she wants now! Just remember the first rule of the Cult of Zhia Lian ...

In addition to new quests and rewards for Halloween, this update also includes a bunch of fixes and improvements.

UI

• Added auto-repeat back into crafting, for use primarily with recipes that don't always consume their ingredients.
  
• Skills and sub-skills are now properly listed in alphabetical order in the abilities window.
  
• Fixed a bug that prevented area-specific loading-screen tips from showing when you logged into the game. (They could only be seen when you teleported to other areas.)
  
• The search bar is now cleared when opening the recipe window from the "More Info" context menu.
  
• Changed "Virility" to "Fertility" for female pets during direct pet inspection.
  

• Players can move their characters a small amount even when they are performing "locked" combat animations. In other words, players can slide around while their feet are doing other things. This is an experiment in our ongoing animation work, as we continue to try to balance graphics quality with gameplay benefits.
  
• Players sit better on chairs.
  
• Birds sit properly on bird perches.
  
• Deer have a jump animation.
  
• Animal forms now display Bulwark Shield correctly.
  
• Skeleton archer animations play correctly.
  
• Smoothed out movement/rotation of equipment during animations.
  
• Many, many animations have been polished, including: Archery (and crossbows) animations; dance animations for Butterfly, Deer, & Owl; Psychology animations; animations for playing harp & fairy chimes; and others.
  

• We've reverted earlier Povus change that allowed monsters to auto-despawn even if players were near them. This was intended to be beneficial to players, but proved detrimental, because it could despawn corpses that you wanted to loot. For now, Povus event monsters no longer auto-despawn if any player is within 20 meters of them. (We'll revisit this idea soon, as we continue to evolve the Povus nightly event system.)
  
• Fixed genetic equipment breakage rate, from 50% to 5%.
  
• Gestation time is now properly modified by the special-event that's supposed to cut it in half. (For the next time we run that special event.)
  
• Ghostly creatures that spawn during Povus invasions now correctly have the anatomy type Incorporeal.
  
• Glajur now teaches individual Phrenology skills instead of the overarching Phrenology skill.
  
• Dog Ear actually wants insect meat now.
  
• Eltibule treasure map treasures will no longer generate out of zone bounds.
  
• Goats now spawn in Gazluk instead of sheep. The availability of wool and mutton has not changed.
  
• Ratkin Root-Tenders (and their servants) can drop wood as loot.
  
• Ratkin Miners can drop ores as loot.
  
• Swapped north/south east/west in Povus surveys.
  
• Fixed the Zukelmux World Boss Portal to actually teleport players to the Fae Realm rather than back into Gazluk Keep (for next Attack of the World Bosses event)
  
• We now display accurate damage of Song of Discord when a damage mod like Bulwark Shield is active.
  
• Having Giant Bat form no longer slows your jump or renders you unable to make the lift jump in Wintertide.
  
• Fixed typo in Murky Tunnel in Povus.
  
• Fixed Latent Charge typo.
  
• Added a check to prevent players from dropping items if there are already 20 entities within 5 meters. (This is to prevent players from dropping 100+ items in very close proximity, which breaks Unity's physics engine.)
  
• Reduced intensity of fogginess on foggy days. Most areas are dramatically less foggy; Povus is still notably foggier than other areas (but still half as foggy as last update).
  
• Fixed brightness changes to indoor areas, such as from "Brighter World" and "Echolocation".
  

Today's update is a big one. There's a new high-level zone, several new skills to find, and a metric tonne of UI fixes and improvements. Please keep in mind that with as many changes as are in this update, we are really relying on you for feedback to help us identify problems and bugs. Thank you!

Povus
Povus is a new high-level outdoor area for players with combat skills from 75 to 85. (We haven't raised the level cap past 80 yet, but you can reach 85 with synergy bonuses.) The town in this area has an event every night where they need your help! Monsters invade from 8pm to 7am game time (NOT real time!). But a series of quests can help put things right.

As you complete these town quests you'll help "level up" the town, unlocking more NPCs and amenities as you go. Visit the bulletin board in town for more information. This is an experimental design that we'd like your feedback on!

There are other somewhat-experimental game mechanics in Povus which we invite you to discover. There are also a couple of mysteries to solve. (And there's a few unintentional red herrings: places on the landscape where we intend to add content, but haven't yet. But we're confident you'll figure everything out quickly enough!)

There are also some new non-combat skills to discover in Povus, but since they're integrated into the area's quests, we'll leave them for you to find.

Of course, with this added complexity comes the added chance for bugs. There's sure to be some to find, so please report them and we'll get them fixed.

Povus is conceptually west of Rahu and north of Gazluk, and can be reached from those two areas. The temporary portals that previously connected Gazluk to Rahu now connect these areas to Povus. (This makes the portal location in Rahu a little weird, since it's on the southern edge of the map, instead of the western edge -- we'll address this when we do the Rahu art revamp in the future.)

Animal Husbandry
One new skill you can learn in Povus is Animal Husbandry. This skill lets you breed the pets in your stables to create new baby pets. Once you have the skill, speak with a qualified stablemaster to begin breeding. You'll receive an in-game document giving you more information on how it works.

Note that there's a limit on the number of pets you can breed at once, and this limit is per-account, not per-player, similar to limit on player workorders. (The limit increases as you raise
Animal Husbandry, but the total across all your characters can't exceed this character's current limit.)

One of the fun things about breeding pets is selling or giving away the babies to interested parties. For this reason, we've added a way to "store" pets, turning them into items which can be given to other players. These players can then use the item to add that pet to their stable.

But there are caveats! First, only pets that were born in your stables can be sold. Pets that you capture in the wild can never be sold to others. (This means, for instance, that you can't capture and resell Hissy.) Second, you'll need to obtain a Pet Cage item -- and this will require a gadgeteer player who knows the recipe. And lastly, pet cages can't contain a pet forever! Each type of pet cage has a maximum lifespan. If the pet isn't taken out of the cage (and put into somebody's stable) before that time runs out, the pet escapes and is lost forever. (In other words, the cage item self-destructs.)

Pet Genetics: What You Need To Know
Also in this update we've started our rollout of pet genetics. Right now, only bees and wasps have a genome, but we'll be adding genomes to the other animal families (bears, cats, rats) in the future.

We simulate the pets' genome using simple Mendelian genetics. (If you don't remember that from high school, you might want to google it!) Their simulated genome has hundreds of genes that control their appearance as well as seven new pet traits: Ferocity, Toughness, Ruggedness, Friendliness, Enthusiasm, Intelligence, and Virility. They range from 1 (abysmal) to 100 (perfect) and affect things like your pets' health, damage, and so on.

The seven pet traits can be viewed on each pet in your stable, provided you have moderate skill in Animal Handling. Rather than explain all these traits here, we'll direct you to an in-game document. You'll receive this document when you learn Animal Handling. Players that already know Animal Handling can get this document by talking to Gisli in Serbule. (Ask him for tips on animal handling, then ask him to explain combat stats.) Once you have it, you can find the document again in the Books and Lore tab.

Also note that we no longer model the Happiness of your pet -- we just assume the pet is pretty happy all the time. The stuff Happiness used to affect (such as XP-earning rate) is now controlled by the aforementioned seven genetic traits.

If you had a pet bee or wasp in your stable -- surprise! It probably looks different now. In the past, each type of bee or wasp had a fixed appearance, but now that's determined by their genes. Your pet's stats are also probably different, too. But to avoid too much heartbreak, we've used a mulligan system for existing pets: if any of their genetic traits came out below 30, or if more than 3 traits came out below 40, we re-rolled the genes a few times to try to get better stats. This means pre-existing pets are probably better than average, and at the very least, they're definitely "playable" in quality -- they have no devastatingly low trait scores.

We also use this mulligan system for fairy starter pets, to ensure that they have nice stats. But we have another concern here: since fairies get free pets, and you can generate as many fairy characters as you like, it would be too tempting to re-roll hundreds of fairy characters to get good pets for breeding. To alleviate this problem, all starter fairy pets are marked as "Dormant". The in-game fiction is that these fae creatures are so ancient that they've entirely forgotten about sexuality.

We may add a way to make dormant pets breeding-ready in the future, if there's demand for that feature. However, it will require a high-level item and/or quest to complete, and it will only work after your pet is at least a real-world year old. That means fairy characters created today would need to wait a year before they could breed their starter pets. (But we've back-dated pre-existing starter pets to be the age of your fairy character.)

Sages say that there's a way to peer into the genetic code of a creature, to "read" it, and to partially understand what each gene does. And the sages are right! But we'll leave it to you to discover this well-kept secret.

[h2]Free Bees[/h2]
Bees/wasps are the first pet with genetics, but we realize that not every Animal Handler uses them. To help us test Husbandry, you can get a free male and female insect added to your stable. Here's how it works: first, learn Animal Husbandry. Second, have at least two slots free in your stable (one for each free pet). Then view your Redemptions in-game (there's a button on the Persona window.) You'll see choices for two males and two females. You can pick one of each, and they'll be added to your stable. These free bees have been given "mulligans" on their genetics to ensure their stats are pretty decent.

Note that this redemption is per account, not per character. The free bees will be available until the end of this year, so you have a few months to unlock Husbandry and claim them.

Animal Handling/Pet Changes
In this update we've avoided making changes to the Animal Handling skill, or to individual pets' abilities and base stats. Our focus has been on genetics specifically. It's much easier to understand how it works (and make sure it's working right) if we don't change too many things at once. We DO plan to make changes to Animal Handling in the future: it needs a treasure revamp and probably a new ability. But for now we've made only minimal changes:

• Fixed a data problem that gave AH pets two opportunities to perform a critical-hit. This caused high-level pets to crit more often than we desired.
  
• AH pets no longer gain automatic crit-damage boosts as they level up.
  
• One treasure effect directly changed the pet's Enthusiasm. Enthusiasm is now controlled by genetics and can't be meaningfully enchanted, so we've replaced it with an effect that is vaguely similar to the old one. We'll revisit this effect when we make deeper revisions to AH.
  
• "Animal Handling pets have +80 Enthusiasm (which boosts XP earned and critical-hit chance)" => "Animal Handling pets deal +20% damage when they critically hit"
  
• Pet bears whose Special Trick dealt crushing damage actually dealt slashing damage. This has been fixed.
  

• "Psychoanalyze restores 143 Health to you after a 15 second delay" => after an 8 second delay
  
• "Psychoanalyze restores 224 Armor to you" => 212 armor
  
• "Psychoanalyze causes the target to take +20 damage from Psychic attacks for 60 seconds" => +78 damage for 15 seconds
  
• Soothe ability now deals a small amount of direct Health damage.
  
• Soothe ability is now eligible for phrenology critical hits.
  
• "Soothe, But I Love You, and Cause Terror Damage +86" => damage +205
  
• "Inspire Confidence / Positive Attitude Healing +83" => +98
  
• The effect "Inspire Confidence increases all targets' Accuracy +20 for 10 seconds" now stacks with itself.
  
• "Inspire Confidence restores +205 Health after a 25 second delay" => restores +150 Armor to all targets
  
• "Soothe Damage +128" => Soothe and Psychoanalyze damage +167 and range +5 meters
  
• "Ridicule deals +57 health damage and taunts +525" => Ridicule taunts +800 and target's next attack has a 25% chance to automatically miss
  
• "Mock deals +125% damage and taunts +500, but reuse timer is +2 seconds" => Mock deals +125% damage, taunts +500, and hits all targets within 20 meters, but reuse timer is +1.5 seconds
  
• "Strike a Nerve deals +168 armor damage" => 236 armor damage
  
• Some Psychology treasure effects did not correctly scale past level 80; this has been fixed.
  

• "Future Pack Attacks to the same target deal +100 damage" => +610 damage
  
• "For 8 seconds after using See Red, all other Lycanthropy attacks deal 148 Trauma damage over 8 seconds" => Effect now lasts for 10 seconds after using See Red.
  
• "Sanguine Fangs deals +280 trauma damage over 8 seconds" => +360 trauma damage
  
• New treasure effect: Chest/Feet: "Pack Attack deals +100 damage and causes target to be 12% more vulnerable to Trauma damage for 10 seconds"
  
• "Sanguine Fangs suddenly deals 350 Trauma damage after an 8-second delay" => 450 trauma damage
  
• "Sanguine Fangs causes the target to take +15% damage from Slashing attacks for 15 seconds" => +18% damage
  
• New treasure effect: Legs: "For 10 seconds after using Sanguine Fangs, all other Lycanthropy attacks deal 180 Trauma damage over 8 seconds"
  
• "Werewolf Claw, Double Claw, and Pouncing Rake Damage +62" => +81
  
• Replaced treasure effect: Legs: "Double Claw Power Cost -21" => "Double Claw deals +40 damage and reuse timer is -2 seconds"
  
• "Pouncing Rake deals +220 Armor damage" => 304 armor damage
  
• Some werewolf treasure effects did not scale past level 80; this has been fixed.
  

• Crafted Werewolf armor has been rebalanced to have less Armor and more offensive buffs. It also has a potent new sidebar ability that can be used when wearing a full set. (Equip a chest-piece to learn the ability.)
  
• The recipes to craft Werewolf Armor are no longer Blacksmithing recipes. They're Armorsmithing recipes now. If you previously had any of these recipes, you still have them, but you'll need to earn the appropriate level of Armorsmithing skill before you can actually use the recipe again.
  
• Solgribue in the Fae Realm now trains the recipes for level 80 wooden cowshoes and deershoes.
  
• Added level 80 versions of various other animal armor (but the recipes must be found).
  
• Revised Werewolf Armor recipes: high-level versions now require slightly fancier ingredients.
  
• To make Werewolf Armor work like the other prestige metal armor sets, you now need to forge it in a spot consecrated to Norala. There is a new forge for this purpose in the Kur wolf cave.
  
• Recipes and stats for crafted Snail Armor, Cow Barding, and Cow Champrons have changed.
  

• "Blocking Stance costs -20 Power and mitigates +10% of physical damage from Elite attackers for 30 seconds" => "Blocking Stance increases your Max Health +63 for 30 seconds (and heals you for 63)"
  

• Bulwark Mode 3 previously granted +27% direct invulnerability => now +17%
  

• "Max Power +37 and Vulnerability to Elite Attacks -10% when Cow skill active" => now -5% vulnerability
  

• Players gain a new bonus level to Shamanic Infusion when reaching Psychology 70 and Skinning 70.
  
• Fixed bug that prevented players from gaining the intended synergy levels to Sushi Preparation when reaching Fishing 55 and Knife Fighting 60.
  
• Gain a new synergy level of Sushi Preparation upon reaching Fish Anatomy 31.
  
• Gain new Mining synergy levels by reaching Hammer 24 and Hammer 46.
  
• Gain new Surveying synergy levels by reaching Calligraph 35, Calligraphy 55, and Nonfiction Writing 25.
  
• Gain a new Calligraphy synergy level by reaching Nonfiction Writing 15.
  
• Gain new synergy levels in Gardening when reaching these levels: Flower Arrangement 57, Nature Appreciation 55, Plant Anatomy 20, Carpentry 45.
  

• Fixed bugged Knife treasure effect: "When wielding two knives, all Knife Fighting attacks have a 33% chance to restore 41 Power". This did not work at all.
  
• "Signature Debuffs deal +29% damage and also deal 156 Armor damage" => 220 armor damage
  
• "Many Cuts deals +172 armor damage" => 236 armor damage
  
• "Wind Strike and Heart Piercer deal 164 armor damage" => 224 armor damage
  
• "Unarmed attacks deal +42 Armor damage" => 52 armor damage
  
• "Tundra Spikes deals 290 armor damage and taunts +750" => 380 armor damage
  
• "Marking Cut deals +80 armor damage and does not cause the target to shout for help" => 146 armor damage
  
• "Blast of Fury deals 200 Armor damage and restores 43 Armor to you" => 276 armor damage
  
• "Spit Acid deals +240 armor damage" => 360 armor damage
  

• We no longer randomly remove your "Who's Online" status.
  
• The display of active buffs on other players would often disappear when changing zones. This is now fixed.
  
• In the Friends panel, long quotes will no longer overlap other fields.
  
• The volume of quest sounds can now be controlled separately from other types of sounds.
  
• Items in locked inventory folders will no longer be affected by the 'Stow' commands.
  
• We now handle character turning via mouse during large framerate drops better.
  
• Using mouse-look, you can now look vertically when both left- and right-mouse buttons are clicked simultaneously.
  
• There is now a search bar on the recipe panel. You can search by name ("baked potato"), by type ("meal", "snack", "instant-snack"), by level ("L 10" for level 10 items), or by some combination of those.
  
• You can now specify how many times you'd like to craft a recipe.
  
• Headers in the quest list now indicate when one of that area's quests is being tracked, to more easily locate tracked quests.
  
• We've added a search bar to the list of skills.
  
• Non-integer effects now display their real value, so "+0.5" instead of "+0".
  

• The number of unread notes you have waiting for you in your player shop is now included in the text of the "Read Notes From Customers" button.
  
• You can now reserve items to be bought only by members of your guild. This requires a minimum guild level of 5.
  
• You can now mark items in your shop "Accepting Offers", which prevents the item from being purchased and instead allows shoppers to "Make Offer" and leave a shop note with the owner, indicating the price they are willing to pay.
  

• Many animations have been fixed or improved.
  
• Many ability particle effects have been fixed or improved.
  
• There is a new Graphics setting called "Realistic Foot Placement" which improves animation quality in exchange for a small performance penalty.
  
• When you take damage to Health, the screen now only flashes red if you have below 25% health remaining.
  
• When you take damage to Armor, the screen now only flashes yellow if you have below 25% armor remaining.
  
• Fixed a bug where an ability's particle was not played on the target if they didn't take direct damage from the attack.
  
• Sometimes a creature with a 'crown' quest would display their own texture over their head instead of a crown. This has been fixed.
  
• Deer now consistently fall over when killed.
  

• You can now raise the Cheesemaking level cap to 80; see Bendith in the Fae Realm.
  
• You can now raise the Blacksmithing level cap raised to 80; see Solgribue in Fae Realm.
  
• The level cap of several other skills can be raised by NPCs in Povus.
  
• Bard instrument recipes that require a Perfect Conch (meaning "Great Musical Conch", "Amazing Musical Conch", and "Astounding Musical Conch") are now guaranteed to have a minimum rarity of Exceptional, and have improved chances for higher rarity. (This only applies to newly-crafted items.)
  
• The level 45 item "Great Arachnid Harness" has been nerfed from +8 inventory slots to +6. There are new higher-level arachnid harnesses with increased buffs up to +10 inventory slots. (The toolcrafting recipes drop as rare scrolls.)
  
• The recipe ID for the obsolete recipe "Legacy Bat Belt" has been reused. If you had this old alpha recipe, congratulations: you now know how to craft the "Amazing Arachnid Harness" (but you can only use the recipe when you have the necessary Toolcrafting level).
  
• Fixed some recipes that were supposed to require a Forge but didn't, including: various utility knives, armor stakes, and tool hammers. (Note that metal throwing knives are intentionally omitted from the forge requirement.)
  Improved the error messages when you try to use a recipe but aren't in the right place. e.g. "You must be near a TanningRack" became "You must be near a tanning rack."
  
• "Gazluk Plate"-type armors are now dyeable (up to 2 colors). If you were wearing Gazluk Plate when you logged out, your character will show up incorrectly in the character-select screen the first time. This is normal, and will fix itself when you log in.
  
• Moving, jumping, and Escape all cancel recipes with a crafting time.
  
• You can now summon partially-used items from storage.
  
• Items that cannot have work orders can no longer be sold in player shops, and now have the tooltip: "This item cannot be sold to other players." If you have an item like that in your shop, you'll get a notification to remove it.
  
• An internal numbering problem requires us to change the ID for Firkins of Sour Cream. If you had any of these in your inventory or storage, they are now marked as "Firkin of Sour Cream (OBSOLETE)". Please use these ASAP as they will disappear in the next update.
  
• The recipe for gold dye has changed.
  
• "Snail Plate Armor" is now Organic armor, like other snail armor.
  

• Certain skills are now explicitly marked as "umbrella skills". The max level for these skills is 0, so the only way to earn levels is via synergy bonuses. The following skills are umbrella skills: Anatomy, Phrenology, Performance, Augmentation, and Genetics. Players who had inadvertently earned XP in these umbrella skills (through content bugs in alpha) have had their levels recalculated.
  
• Goats (regular goats, not scapegoats!) have a new AI profile and use knockback attacks.
  
• Revised all non-Elite healing monsters so that their heal amounts are more meaningful (typically about 15% of their max health, but it's not actually a percentage-heal, so the amount varies per monster). This change was done individually per monster, so some monsters may have been missed. If you notice a monster that heals for a negligible amount (like a monster with 1000 max health healing for 50) please report it as a bug!
  
• Increased the damage of scray monsters' acid attacks, and higher-tier scray acid needs higher-tier First Aid to dispel.
  
• You no longer earn Gourmand XP for eating additional raw cantaloupe or fairy nuts beyond the first consumption. (It previously earned 1 and 2 XP respectively.)
  
• The results of treasure maps, such as motherlodes, should now correctly spawn on top of the ground and not embedded into it.
  
• The debuff "Spore Coating" used by certain fungal enemies no longer keeps you in-combat. Using First Aid 2 or higher now removes one stack of the debuff.
  
• Jace Soral now succumbs to his nature when the moon is full.
  
• Item Dispensers and Item Rafflers are no longer subject to premature item-cleanup. They will last for 2 hours starting when they are placed in the world, or until they run out of items/tickets. High-end rafflers can have explicit durations up to 2 hours (instead of 90 minutes).
  
• Previously, wild deer had junk genetics for testing. They still have junk genetics for testing, but it's different junk now. They should be less Evasive overall.
  
• Changed "Tremor"'s boss curse: instead of permanently disabling Basic Attacks, it now gives the attacks a 15-second reset timer. As a side-effect, players with the old version of the curse will be automatically cured.
  
• A few monsters (that are supposed to be extremely evasive) are slightly more evadey.
  
• The world now goes gray when you are dead.
  
• The 'Stuck Report' is intended to get your character free of being stuck in something like a tree or cow. It is not to be used for free transportation. There is now a highly visible warning when you file a Stuck Report making that very clear for those players who have been using it for teleportation. Don't worry if you get stuck a few times; just don't use Stuck reports dozens of times a week!
  
• We've added the ability to use '/e' or '/em' to perform custom emotes (no animation, you supply the text). You can also use '%t' to include the name of your target. Emotes display in their own chat channel, so you can decide which chat tabs you want to include them.
  
• Guild quests now display in the guild audit log when they are started, canceled, or completed.
  
• Flying enemies will now stay at roughly the same elevation as their target, to prevent being unable to attack them with melee.
  

• Recipes with no ingredients (such as some teleportations) can be crafted again
  
• You could get multiple notifications for completing Povus night quests
  
• Fixed Grakelsput's quest "Cleanup Duty: Triceratops"
  
• Povus lamp logic no longer considers player pets to be "monsters"
  
• Augments can once again be sold in shops
  
• Swamp Gourd item tooltips now have a line indicating whether they've been eaten before
  
• Changed an additional Psychology treasure effect: "Inspire Confidence restores +151 Health after a 15-second delay" => restores 104 Health after an 8-second delay
  
• Fixed error in ability-tip text for Psychoanalyze's delayed-heal buff
  
• Fixed typo in names of "Hexameat Wraps" and "Superb Parchment"
  
• Corrected the start time in Povus instructions (it starts at 8pm, not 7pm)
  
• More orcs spawn in the Povus orc camp
  
• Correctly limit the reassembly of [redacted] to Povus
  
• Fixed Povus vegetation that had no collisions
  
• Arianna Fangblade no longer tries to sell you a stable slot when you ask for a hot betting tip
  
• Could not correctly train Armorsmithing from Tremmond in Povus
  
• The nightly Povus invasion system was bugged and did not correctly advance to harder quests
  

We've got a quick and dirty update for you today -- a smorgasbord of bug fixes and improvements that we've put together in the background while we continue to work hard not only on Animal Husbandry, but on a whole new high-level zone! But while those features are in active development, they aren't ready yet -- and we didn't want to wait any longer on fixing these annoying bugs. Here's the list:

Animations

• Improved locomotion animations of both flying and non-flying creatures.
  
• Female humanoids slouch less. (But more tweaks still to come, especially for rakshasa females.)
  
• Updated Sword ability animations.
  
• Updated Shield ability animations.
  
• Updated Bard ability animations.
  
• Tweaked Archery animations. In particular, all Archery animations should now aim toward their target.
  
• Bard abilities no longer have a delay before their damage or healing is applied.
  
• Fixed animation problems with Deer that caused certain attacks to take a very long time to trigger.
  
• Changing gear, then flying, no longer causes your character to use walking animations instead of flying ones.
  
• Limited how far your character will crane their head while looking at something.
  
• Disabled headlook while dead.
  
• Sword slash particles now face toward the attacker and not the attackee.
  
• While loading into a zone, you will no longer appear to other players as if you were falling.
  
• Ghosts now float again.
  
• /cry cries. Improved many other emote animations also. Note that some animations, such as /wave, have become full-body emotes for now, meaning that you cannot move while waving. We plan to make them upper-body-only emotes again in the future, so that you can e.g. walk while waving.
  
• Wings should now stop flapping when a fairy dies.
  
• More improvements to sitting and lying animation sequences.
  
• Hags in the character introduction screen are still creepy, but no longer 'sink into the ground' creepy.
  

• Player Vendor UI Improvements:
  
  • Items can be moved up & down with buttons instead of right-clicking.
    
  • Items can be moved to the top & bottom of the list via right-clicking.
    
  • Saving an item will no longer revert unsaved changes of other items.
    
  • Text colors change to indicate whether item is or is not currently shown in shop.
  
  
• Loadouts can now be renamed.
  
• If an NPC likes a gift but you don't know that yet (because they only share that info at higher Favor levels), they will now show up in the "Item Info" -> "Gifting" window as a "person who hasn't told you they like it." For example: "This item is a good gift for 2 people you haven't met yet, plus 1 person who hasn't told you they like it."
  
• Current vs. required favor levels are now taken into account when showing gifting highlights. In other words, if your character couldn't "know" that an NPC likes an item, the item doesn't show with a purple border as a gift.
  
• Gifting an item to an NPC no longer causes the highlights of other items to disappear.
  
• Selecting group members via nameplate in the mini-group UI will no longer intermittently fail.
  
• If you are the last remaining player in a group, you will no longer receive an extraneous "You are now the leader" message right before being disbanded.
  
• GUI window resizing now properly responds to locking the GUI with a hotkey.
  
• Better resizing of Quest Rewards when the Quest Log is tiny.
  
• Replaced the inventory folder lock icon with an outline around the bag instead, in order to let the bag itself to be more visible.
  
• Buff durations in tooltips now update in real-time when you leave the mouse over the effect icon.
  
• Map pin labels now place above their respective pins instead of overlapping.
  
• NPC shops could show the wrong price for certain multi-buy items like Salt, Flour, and Sugar. This has been fixed.
  
• Tooltips should no longer occasionally get stuck to your cursor.
  
• Combat numbers and speech bubbles should no longer appear in the wrong place.
  
• If you're disconnected to the main menu with the cursor hidden -- for example, while holding right-click -- your cursor should now properly reappear.
  
• Tweaked the item-pickup floating animation to be quicker & no longer centered on the player. There are two new Special Settings to control the floating start point: PickupItemsStartX & PickupItemsStartY
  

• When examining a corpse, if you have an autopsy kit and no chance to fail the autopsy, the corpse is instantly auto-autopsied.
  
• Deposit All will now only attempt to store stackable items and not, for example, non-stacking items like equipment that shares the same name.
  
• Added the word "unlocked" to Deposit All wording, to clarify that items cannot come from locked inventory folders.
  
• Stow Items now works properly for the Warden Chest when in Kur Mountains.
  
• Mobs will no longer knock you into the air if you are very close to them.
  
• When at negative max HP -- for example, due to anti-regeneration -- the player can no longer: Respawn, Eat items that require you to be dead (Eternal Greens, etc.), or be affected by abilities that require the target to be dead (Resuscitate, etc.). This brings gameplay behavior in line with our intention: if you lose literally all of your Max HP due to debuffs, you can't come back to life until those effects wear off. The main way this can happen is by consuming too much deadly iocaine powder, and we recommend that you don't do that!
  
• Lycans should now be able to survey at the bottom of water.
  
• Fixes bug where player sinks to bottom of water when interacting with something.
  
• Polished a number of projectiles, most noticeably the "darkness ball" used by several necromantic abilities and necro-monsters.
  
• Fixed bug in particle from Death's Hold: it could leave behind orphaned zombie arms.
  

This update has a lot of different stuff. In it we've added... wait, let's just do a bullet list. That'll be easier. In this update, we have:

• Soft-launched our long-awaited VIP program.
  
• Added lots of UI features -- like the ability to lock the UI!
  
• Bumped up the difficulty of high-level solo monsters.
  
• Revised the Unarmed skill.
  
• Added a new crafting skill, Non-Fiction Writing.
  
• Introduced a new player messaging service: Pigeon Mail.
  

• Changed treasure mod: (Head, Chest) "Infuriating Fist generates no Rage and instead reduces Rage by 910" => "Infuriating Fist damage +73 and for 10 seconds all Elite attacks deal -8% damage to you."
  
• Changed treasure mod: (Head) "Bodyslam deals +47% damage and slows target's movement speed by 45%" => "Bodyslam deals +100 damage and grants you immunity to direct damage for 3 seconds"
  
• Changed treasure mod : (Head, OffHand) "Slashing Strike and Claw Barrage boost damage from Epic attacks +98 for 10 seconds" => "Slashing Strike boosts your Melee Evasion +5.25% for 5 seconds"
  
• Changed treasure mod : (MainHand, Necklace) "Slashing Strike deals +150 Trauma damage over 6 seconds" => "Slashing Strike and Claw Barrage deal +150 Trauma damage over 6 seconds"
  
• Changed treasure mod: (Hands, Necklace) "Hip Throw deals +286 armor damage" => "Hip Throw deals +200 damage, plus Armor-specific damage equal to 15% of the attack's total regular damage"
  
• Changed treasure mod: (Head, Off-Hand) "Mamba Strike Damage +67%" => "Mamba Strike Damage +59 and Reuse Time -1 sec"
  
• New treasure mod: (Necklace): "Cobra Strike Damage +100"
  
• New treasure mod: (Chest, Feet): "Claw Barrage Damage +147"
  
• Adjusted treasure mod: "Barrage costs -14 Power and restores 31 Armor to you" => now -16 power
  
• Adjusted treasure mod: "Kick Damage +78" => now +100
  
• Adjusted treasure mod: "Mamba Strike and Front Kick Damage +100" => now +84
  

• Any items in your inventory that could be deposited with 'Deposit any items that are already stored' will be highlighted in your inventory with a green border.in your inventory.
  
• Shift-clicking an item while the storage UI is open now deposits/withdraws a specific amount, instead of just splitting the stack.
  
• While the storage UI is open, you can also now right-click an item to split a stack into or out of storage.
  

• Ri-Shin Shrine Storage is now accessible from other storage NPCs in Kur.
  
• Bookshelves now allow direct access to nearby storage selections (like other storage NPCs do).
  
• Summoning items via practical summoning will now update the "More Info" menu properly.
  
• When withdrawing an item from storage, the tooltip will now update properly.
  
• Storing items after summoning a stack of another item will no longer cause visual weirdness.
  
• When using Practical Summoning, and the storage that you're summoning from is open, stack numbers will now update properly.
  

• You can now promote a member of your party to be party leader.
  
• There is now an option to lock your UI windows in place. You can find it in the Settings window, on the GUI tab, in the Features section. There is also a hotkey.
  
• There are 3 new settings to control the display of tooltips: "Tooltip Delay", "Instant Tooltip Duration", and "Use Tooltip Animation". You can find these in the Settings window, on the GUI tab, in the Features section.
  
• There's a new option on that screen as well, under the "Chat Behavior" section: "Close Chat With Hotkey".
  
• The "Jump to Recipe" functionality now extends to work orders and quests.
  
• You can now give NPCs an item by single-clicking instead of dragging.
  
• It's now harder to accidentally close an official admin message. And if you do, there's also a line in chat to explain how to see it again.
  
• You can now collapse and expand the list of quests for an area in the Quest window.
  
• (Most of) the rewards for a quest are now displayed as part of the quest in your quest log.
  
• Made some improvements to the quest tracker presentation.
  

• You can (once again) select your target's target.
  
• Players can no longer receive friend requests when their friends list is full.
  
• Note: you can now have a maximum of 150 friends (up from 100).
  
• Quotes in the friends list will no longer disappear after relogging.
  
• Players with long names in the friends list will no longer screw up the display formatting.
  
• The first time using an item on the hotbar now updates its stack size properly.
  
• Opening the recipe window will no longer sometimes show the incorrect required number of an ingredient.
  
• The pet information screen no longer has overlapping text and icons.
  
• Text in vendor shops is now correctly sanitized of HTML tags (no more color codes)
  
• When using Automatically Select Chat Channels, the channel you change to will now persist when changing zones.
  
• Backspacing after using chat shortcuts with Automatically Select Chat Channels on no longer leaves the shortcut in chat.
  
• Placing unusable gear in persona window will no longer cause it to show an empty slot.
  
• Better updating in general of entered social texts, such as your friend status or party name.
  

• We've revised how "knockback" works (which also covers "pull forward" attacks such as Snare Arrow or Grappling Web). The effect happens faster and is more accurate, knocking enemies in a more predictable direction.
  
• Slowed down the respawn rate of golems in the goblin dungeon's "red room" crystal encounters.
  
• "Live Event Token" items are being replaced with a new pseudo-currency, "Live Event Credits". Tokens can be converted to Credits by using them. Riston in the Casino now sells items for credits instead of tokens.
  
• You no longer need to hold the Dive Down key while surveying underwater, you only have to be at the sea floor.
  
• Fire Magic's Cold Protection ability no longer hurts you when you use it.
  
• All of the mods for Triage and Shadow Feint will now display on the ability tooltip.
  
• Clearing an inventory slot will no longer disable Bulwark Mode.
  
• Frostball is now cold & snowy instead of electric.
  
• Added missing animations for main-hand knife attacks.
  
• The option for a Hot Tip will no longer disappear on NPCs in the Casino.
  
• In Match-3, 'Possible Moves:' text will no longer show up when it's not unlocked.
  
• Percy Evans will no longer accept your Barter item for an Animal Nexus key if you already have one.
  
• Fixed a bug where right-clicking an object to auto-move to it would never actually reach it. You would just run around the entity in circles.
  
• Added a troubleshooting command /zapgolemprogram which erases your current golem program. This is to help players who, for instance, program their golems to "Self-Destruct: Always", making it difficult to reprogram the golem since it instantly self-destructs.
  
• The performance in Gazluk Keep has improved.
  
• Birds and Crickets in Serbule and Serbule Hills are now properly affected by the Ambient Sounds volume slider.
  
• The selection boxes for things like a Fire Wall should no longer jump around.
  
• Fixed non-animating water textures in Eltibule's waterfall.
  
• Improved the behavior of the camera during bad FPS dips. (This is especially noticeable in areas with many players.)
  
• Sitting in chairs works somewhat better.

All About the VIP Membership Program
Monday's game-patch will launch the Project: Gorgon VIP Membership program! This program gives players extra benefits while they are a VIP member. The intent is to give players another way to support the game's development while getting useful benefits for doing so -- kind of like becoming a Patreon patron. First, we'll discuss how to become a VIP. Then we'll cover the benefits.

How to Become a VIP Member

You can gain VIP membership in a variety of ways:

• Purchasing a Steam subscription
  
• Claiming VIP time from a backer-package you purchased
  
• Using VIP Tokens in-game
  

• Four extra character slots -- for a total of 8!
  
• 15 extra inventory slots -- for each character!
  
• 25 extra slots in each item-transfer chest! There are four such chests now (75 extra slots) and two more coming (for a total of 125 extra slots).
  
• Access to offline advancement via the Autodidacticism skill! (You can read all the details about this benefit below.)
  
• Access to special in-game reports, such as a "character sheet" that lets you view all your character's stats in a simple spreadsheet.
  
• Extra saddlebag slots for mounts (when mounts are implemented) (mount not included).
  
• And more benefits to come! We're exploring ideas like giving VIPs custom chat colors, unique emotes, and monthly gift-redemptions that give out amusing trinkets.
  

• Autodidacticism is a skill that has to be leveled up! You can't read a textbook for a skill level that's higher than your Autodidacticism level, so you'll need to practice by studying low-level books first.
  
• Only two characters on your account can participate in Autodidacticism hangouts at a time.
  
• With few exceptions, you can't unlock skills via Autodidacticism. For instance, if you don't know the Knife Fighting skill yet, you can't read the newbie Knife Fighting book. You must unlock the skill normally first.
  
• You still need to raise your level cap in the normal way: you need to unlock level caps at level 50 and every 10 levels thereafter.
  
• You need to obtain the books themselves, and as explained above, very-high-level books won't be available for a while.
  
• Books lose durability when used in autodidacticism hangouts. Most books will last for about 20 days of offline hangouts before disappearing.
  
• At first launch, only a subset of skills can have textbooks. This is just due to the sheer amount of data-wrangling involved -- we'll add textbooks for the other skills when we're more confident that we've got the numbers correct.
  

• Character Sheet: generates a .csv (comma-separated-value) text file of all your character's stats. This file can be loaded in any spreadsheet app.
  
• Inventory Dump: lists every single item that one character possesses (including the stuff in various storage chests) as a text file. This file can be loaded into any word processor.
  
• Combat log: records every hit your character takes or deals to others in a text file. This text file is too verbose ("spammy") to be useful to most players, but it's being provided as a way for 3rd-party tools to generate new kinds of reports.
  
• With more reports added in the future!
  

• Although we talk about it as "patronage", the benefits of VIP should be worthwhile. We aren't asking for charity here, so VIP should be useful!
  
• But it needs to be entirely optional -- we expect most players won't be VIPs, and that's fine. VIP should never feel "mandatory" at all.
  

This is a quick bug-fix patch to address some issues in the March 25 update:

• NPCs will no longer appear to be dancing even after they have stopped.
  
• The Redemptions window will no longer tell you about redemptions that you are not eligible for.
  
• Your mouse cursor will no longer sometimes stay locked and hidden after you change zones.
  
• The Quest Tracker will no longer refuse to remove certain quests after they are completed.
  
• The Trade window will no longer fail to disappear after a trade.
  
• Sandstorms no longer use the new distance optimization, meaning they can once again be seen from more than 100m away.
  
• Fixed animation issues when interacting with things that have a usage delay (such as mining, meditation, and chopping lumber).
  
• Fixed bugs with head-look when looking at certain in-scene entities (such as wells, item workbenches, and inscription tables).
  
• Tweaked movement animations a bit.
  

Welcome to another exciting Project: Gorgon update! This one has been in development for longer than usual - we usually aim for an update every month. But we've been working on bringing our animation system into the modern day and that took a bit longer than planned.

This update includes our work on the animation system, as well as a potluck collection of new features and bug fixes. So let's dive in!

Animation System Replacement
The old animation system had to go. It severely limited our ability to add new animations or replace old ones. So we've replaced it!

More specifically, we've replaced all the code in the system. Most of the actual animations are the same, for now. Our goal is to get this new system working at least as well as the old one did; then we can start improving things in earnest.

That said, there are definitely improvements to be found already, especially in how animations are blended. But there's also a lot of stuff that still needs tweaking, tuning, and fixing. You'll see bugs. You'll see weirdness. And you'll probably see some very silly things.

You'll also see some new animations, here and there. There are several new dance moves in this update, and now that we have the ability to add more, you can expect to see animations play a bigger role in the game in the future.

So please report all the silly, strange, or broken animations you see! The sooner we get those worked out, the sooner we can start pushing on new animation features. (And we'd really love to hear about the silliest animation bugs you run into! We're thinking about offering an in-game prize for the best 10-second video clip.)

Interpretive Dance
Certain NPCs in the world now have unique dance moves! If they choose to dance, they'll perform their move. If you dance along with them (and your Interpretive Dance skill is 10 or higher) you will eventually learn their dance move. The amount of time it takes to learn the move is random, but usually pretty quick.

NPCs have gotten a little more picky about music, though - they now require a robust musical performance before they'll start dancing. (That's at least 3 performers.)

Your Interpretive Dance level cap also increases by +5 for each new move you learn. There are 12 new moves, so the max level cap of Interpretive Dance is now 70.

Note: animal forms still only have six unique dances. You can learn and use the other dance moves as an animal, but your character-model will just use the old animations for the new dances.

You can gain new synergy levels by raising the Interpretive Dance skill:

• Holistic Wellness - 19, 49
  
• Performance - 30, 50, 70
  
• Bard - 35, 65
  
• Endurance - 39
  
• Unarmed - 59
  

In the " Special Reports" section of the VIP panel, you can export a lot of information about your character and the items you have in storage. There are a couple of reports and formats depending on what you need, including:

• a spreadsheet (.csv) of every item in every (non-shared) storage vault
  
• a JSON file with similar information about your storage (for programmers)
  
• a JSON file with information about your character
  

• The optimization won't fully turn on/off until you switch to a new area, or logout and log back in.
  
• The old "experimental optimizations" have stopped being experimental. The checkbox has been turned off for everyone, so you'll need to turn it on again!
  
• This optimization works by unloading some of the assets for entities that are more than 100 meters away from you. As a side-effect, those distant entities won't be visible... even if you've set the entity-render distance higher than that!
  
• If you have a high-end PC and like to fly at high distances (or like to travel at light-speeds), you may want to increase this range. You can do so with a new special setting. In the Settings window, Special Settings area, add the words AppearanceRange=200 to double the range. (The minimum range is 100, the default setting.)
  

• The flash you see on your screen when you are being hit ('screen flash') is less obtrusive. If you had it turned off via Special Settings, you might try it out again.
  
• The Graphics "Brighter World" option will no longer uncheck itself after the client is restarted.
  
• The Graphics setting "Resolution in Full-Screen Mode" no longer has multiple duplicate options.
  
• Pet particle effects are now correctly disabled by /particlespam and the NoParticleSpam Special Setting.
  

• The Recipes UI will no longer jump when crafting items at the bottom of long list of recipes.
  
• The Recipes UI will no longer scroll to a selected button that is already visible.
  
• Improved functionality of "Back" button in the Work Order board.
  
• Fixed a bug where closing out of certain menus also canceled the recipe you were crafting.
  
• The casting bar will now remain open when stopping interactions that are not directly tied to the casting. Note that standing up from a chair will cancel casting, no matter what.
  
• The Quest Tracker will no longer display as a grey dot when no quests are being tracked.
  
• Quests will no longer linger in the quest tracker after switching characters.
  
• Action button cooldowns will also reset properly when switching characters.
  
• The cursor could sometimes get stuck in a mode (like the interact hand). That should no longer happen.
  
• Fixed a bug that could cause the top ability slot on the sidebar to clear itself.
  
• Fixed a bug that could cause dragging an item in your inventory to drop an item.
  
• Certain items that required metabolism, or which were broken, would flash rapidly when placed on the sidebar. This will no longer happen.
  
• At certain screen resolutions, it was not possible to see the text menus for configuring shop items. Now you can!
  
• Character generation options with no choices - for example, there is only one human male face at this point - no longer display as options in character generation.
  
• Improved formatting of the fight and fight result windows in Monsters and Mantids.
  
• Fixed some display issues with the Settings menu options.
  
• Prettied up the Redeem menu. Previously you accessed this via /redeem, but now you can also use the handy button in the Persona window.
  
• In addition, we've added two new redemptions this update! Both of them are time-limited; click that new Redeem button in the Persona window for more details.
  

• Sigils, traps, fire walls, crystals, turrets, and other stationary objects are now immune to Fear. (It was adorable watching crystals flee in terror, but too exploitable.)
  
• Treasure that added damage-over-time to Deadly Emission was twice as effective as listed (it fired every second instead of every other second).
  
• The ability Fish Gut now requires (and can consume) an actual Skinning Knife. Previously it could use (and potentially consume) any knife that could skin animals.
  
• Fixed some Animal Handling pet commands that could break due to a bug in the targeting logic.
  
• Fixed a skill-check that was using the wrong skill when performing a butchery on a dead corpse (specifically, using your Skinning skill when rolling to get "bonus meat").
  
• Fixed the displayed base damage for Warden's Stun Trap abilities. (The actual damage did not change, just the displayed amount.)
  
• Moo of Determination 4 no longer shows up twice on Raul's training menu.
  
• Hammer abilities have new icons.
  
• (Looking for the Unarmed changes? Rebalancing of the Unarmed skill was postponed due to the animation system changes, but should be included in the next major update.)
  

• Added a lot of exciting new event content and tech. Stay tuned for dates and times!
  
• Fixed a large number of bugs with unreachable spawns, monsters walking through walls, bad collision, etc. in: Serbule, Kur Mountains, Ilmari, Rahu, Winter Nexus, Animal Nexus, and the Labyrinth. Possibly others!
  
• Vendors would sometimes lie and tell you that they could afford to buy an entire stack when they were actually too low on money! Now, instead of lying about it, they will do their best to figure out what they *can* afford, and present that information to players.
  
• Fixed exploit scenarios where a character could change between animal forms mid-conversation to gain access to unintended dialog options.
  
• Quest dings and warning screens are slightly less obtrusive.
  
• A number of creatures, including spiders and horrors, and a number of abilities, are a bit quieter and can no longer be heard from across the world.
  
• You can now quit out of the game directly from character generation.
  
• Durstin Tallow in Serbule Hills will no longer rent a room for 100 councils as many times as you ask.
  
• Gisli in Eltibule no longer displays the wrong stable slots number when he offers to sell you one. (He was off by one.) This was a display problem only.
  
• Cows now strafe correctly.
  
• Fixed a very rare bug that could cause players to be unable to log in after a game patch (which previously required administrator assistance to fix).
  
• It is now possible to bind 'Escape' through the Keys menu.
  
• Thanks for reading and don't forget the time-limited gifts!
  

It's time for holiday festivities! In addition, there are big changes to Elite and Boss monsters in this update. There are also revisions to the Ice Magic and Deer skills. And, of course, various other things as well. Read on for more info.


Ri-Shin Celebration
The holidays are upon us! While Alharth doesn't celebrate Christmas, it does celebrate Ri-Shin Day, and New Years' Day. Townsfolk who are your Friends will offer you gifts when you speak with them. (Make sure to have your favorite combat skills active in case they give you a piece of randomly-generated gear!)

There's also a Ri-Shin festival waiting to happen in each city and township in the land, but they will need your help getting their trees assembled. Look for townsfolk in festive red Ri-Shin hats to get started.

This year, there's also a new way for the community to work together. This is an experiment -- we've never tried anything like this before. You'll receive an introductory quest for this part of the event after you've assembled a few Ri-Shin trees. (If you're a Druid, you'll be briefed immediately upon login.)


High-Level Elite/Boss Changes
As mentioned in the last patch's notes, we're working on making high-level combat take longer. This will eventually include both solo and group combat, but we're focusing on group combat right now. Some of the big-picture details are in flux a bit as we experiment and see what's going to work (e.g. "how many Elites is a tank supposed to be able to handle at once?" answer: "we're not sure yet").

We've been improving the "tanky skills" in preparation for these longer fights, but it's been hard to get good tanking data because most high-level Elite monsters simply haven't needed a tank: a group of players could blast them to death in seconds. So it's time to make Elites live longer and see what happens!

In this update, Elite/Boss monsters have a lot more health and armor, and Bosses deal less damage. We'll be watching your feedback (and our combat data logs) to try to figure out where to go from here. We may need to temporarily revert these changes, reduce them, increase them, or add more systems into the mix to address specific problems.

Bosses (but not Elites) also deal less base damage than before. The actual amount varies by boss-tier and the bosses' personal stats, so it's hard to generalize, but at level 80 an "average boss" deals about 25% less base damage.

Both Elites and Bosses deal less damage with their Rage attacks, also. The median reduction in rage-bonus-damage is about a 40%, but again it's hard to generalize too much.

Here's some more details about the implementation.

• Prior to level 35, elites/bosses have about the same overall health+armor, but some of their health has been switched to armor as a side-effect of the formulaic changes. This will make them a bit harder, so be careful!
  
• Starting at about level 35, elites/bosses gain more health and armor than before. This increases fairly gradually until level 50, then it starts going up more quickly. By level 80, the total health+armor of most elites and bosses has almost doubled! (And a lot of that increase is in armor, which means the monster has more mitigation for longer.)
  

• (Chest, Hands) "Calefaction causes target to take +45% damage from Cold for 12 seconds" => now +16% damage
  

• Cryogenic Freeze now lasts 20 seconds or until dispelled by using the ability again. The reuse timer is 20 seconds, which begins as soon as Cryogenic Freeze ends.
  
• Power cost increased; all treasure effects recalculated in potency
  

• Ice Armor: highest tier of ability has slightly higher mitigation (+27 vs crushing, slashing, piercing, and ice), and all tiers now grant extra mitigation from Elites (+54 additional at highest tier)
  
• Ice Veins: power cost and base damage increased. All treasure potency recalculated
  
• "Ice Armor restores 80 Power over 30 seconds" => "Ice Armor costs -19 Power and restores 51 Power after a 6-second delay"
  
• "Ice Armor restores 170 Armor over 30 seconds" => "Ice Armor mitigates +16 Physical and Cold damage, and mitigates +32 more against Elite attacks"
  
• "Ice Armor boosts Cold attack damage +34" => +50
  
• "You regain 44 Health when using Ice Nova or Shardblast" => "Ice Nova and Shardblast deal +61 damage and cost -12 Power"
  
• New treasure (off-hand): "Ice Veins heals +16 Health and resets the timer on Ice Armor (so it can be used again immediately)"
  
• "Ice Veins heals 120 Health over 10 seconds" => 180 health over 10 seconds
  
• Ice Veins is now marked as a Minor Heal ability (making it eligible for equipment that boosts Minor Heals).
  
• New treasure (head): "Ice Armor instantly restores 80 health"
  
• "Shardblast resets the timer on Ice Armor (so it can be used again immediately)" => "Shardblast deals +X% damage and resets the timer on Ice Armor (so it can be used again immediately)" *
  

• Cold Sphere: increased base damage-boost of all pets level 50+. The "root" effect from their rage attack is reduced from 10sec (!) to 5sec
  
• "Your Cold Sphere's attacks deal +34 damage and taunt -65%" => "Your Cold Sphere's attacks deal +50% damage and taunt -25%"
  
• "Your Cold Sphere gains 156 Armor" => "Your Cold Sphere gains 90 Health"
  
• New treasure (chest): "Your Cold Sphere's attacks deal +24 damage and cause the targets to suffer +12% damage from future Cold attacks (non-stacking)"
  
• New treasure (head, hands): "Your Cold Sphere's attacks deals +170 damage, but their Max Health is -80"
  

• Ice Nova: power cost and base damage increased. All treasure potency recalculated
  
• Frostbite ability: ability base damage increased slightly
  
• "Blizzard deals 328 armor damage and generates -120 Rage" => "Blizzard Damage +255"
  
• "Frostbite deals +154 damage and raises the target's Max Rage by 79%, preventing them from using their Rage attacks as often" => "Frostbite deals +176 damage and raises the target's Max Rage by 33%, preventing them from using their Rage attacks as often"
  
• "Freeze Solid resets the timer on Ice Spear (so it can be used again immediately)" => "Ice Nova deals +110 damage and reuse timer is -2 seconds" *
  
• "Freeze Solid restores 161 armor to you after a 15 second delay" => "Freeze Solid restores 112 armor to you"
  

• (Hands, Necklace) "Deer Kick implants insect eggs in the target. Future Deer Kicks by any deer cause target to take 310 Nature damage over 5 seconds"
  

• Doe Eyes: Power cost increased. Ability now resists more physical damage, especially against Elites, and lasts for 24 seconds instead of 10. (At level 77 it now gives 36 mitigation, plus 72 more vs. Elites)
  
• "After using Doe Eyes, your next attack deals +169 damage" => "Doe Eyes reuse timer is -2 seconds, and after using Doe Eyes your next attack deals +190 damage"
  
• "Doe Eyes restores 95 armor" => "Doe Eyes mitigates +16 physical damage (Crushing, Slashing, Piercing) for 26 seconds. Against Elite enemies, mitigates +32 more"
  
• "Doe Eyes heals 80 health" => "For 10 seconds after using Doe Eyes, you mitigate +36 from all attacks, and a further +72 from Elite attacks"
  
• Ability "King of the Forest": base damage and Power cost increased slightly; all treasure stats tweaked slightly as a result
  
• "King of the Forest gives you +15 mitigation of any physical damage for 20 seconds" => this effect was available on two slots, but only applied once. This was intentional at the time, but now we're trying to make all treasure mods stack together when possible. New (stacking) version: "King of the Forest mitigates +14 physical damage (Crushing, Slashing, Piercing) for 10 seconds. Against Elite enemies, mitigates +28 more"
  
• "Cuteness Overload heals you for 114 health" => "Cuteness Overload Damage +270"
  
• "Combo: Deer Bash+Any Melee+Any Melee+Deer Kick: final step hits all enemies within 5 meters and deals +100 damage." => deals +240 damage
  
• Summoned Deer no longer have the benefits of the experimental genetics system, but have higher base damage
  
• Summoned Deer no longer have an innate 300% taunt bonus
  
• Summoned Deer can randomly be male or female
  
• "Summoned Deer Taunt +X%" => "Summoned Deer Rage Attack Damage +Y"
  
• "Antler Slash has a 50% chance to restore 48 armor" => this effect has been replaced with an entirely unrelated effect. (head, chest): "You can use the Deer ability Feign Injury, and it temp-taunts +11300. (Equipping this item will teach you the ability if needed.)"
  
• (Hands, Feet) "Deer Bash deals +120 damage and knocks the enemy backwards" => "Deer Bash has a 15% chance to summon a deer ally for 30 seconds"
  
• New (ring): "Cuteness Overload deals +160 damage and knocks the target backwards"
  
• New (Head, Necklace): "Pummeling Hooves deals +45 damage and has a 8% chance to summon a deer ally for 30 seconds"
  
• "Antler Slash deals +X% damage" => "Antler Slash hits all enemies within 5 meters and taunts +Y". NOTE: this effect used to be available on two slots, Head and Hands. It is now only on Hands. See above about Legacy items.
  
• "Psychic Mitigation +34 while Deer skill active" => "Psychic and Nature Mitigation +34 while Deer skill active"
  
• "Nature Mitigation +34 while Deer skill active" => "Burst Evasion +8.5% while Deer skill active"
  
• "Deer Kick Damage +85" => "Deer Kick Damage +45 and grants you -10% Fire Vulnerability for 10 seconds"
  
• New: (main-hand) "Combo: Forest Challenge+Any Melee+Any Melee+Any Epic Attack: final step deals +150 damage and summons a deer ally for 30 seconds."
  

• Once you learn the Vendor Fox in a Box ability, the ability requires you to have some type of crate in your inventory. Any crafted storage crate and most pet crates (when Animal Husbandry is released) will work to allow use of the ability. The crate will not be consumed. The cool down timer on the ability will reset in 2 real-time hours, but you still need to spend 2 hours in-game before you can use the ability again. (You can see that timer in your effects bar under the effect 'Boxed Fox'.)
  
• Once you learn the Small Box of Space ability, there are no other requirements. Just use the ability to summon your storage box. The cool down timer for this ability has been extended to 90 minutes (from 60 minutes). The cool down timer on the ability will reset in 90 real-time minutes, but you still need to spend 90 in-game before you can use the ability again. (You can see that timer in your effects bar under the effect 'Spaced Out'.)
  

• Bug fix: Rabbit: "Bun-Fu Blast deals +80 damage and restores 44 Power after a 9-second delay" => this did not add damage to Bun-Fu Blast as expected
  
• Bug fix: Rabbit: "Bun-Fu Blast deals +78 damage and hastens the current reuse timer of Bun-Fu Strike by 3 seconds" => this did not add damage to Bun-Fu Blast as expected
  
• Rabbit: added Astounding Familiar Controllers (level 80 ice magic tiara) to loot
  
• Flight in-combat: the Power penalty for flying while in combat now has a much higher cap (meaning flying while in-combat for more than a few seconds costs more Power than before)
  
• Added a "quit" button to the login and character-select screens
  
• Fixed AI bug that caused monsters to hate the first attack that hit them more than intended
  
• "Carbon-form Scrutinizer Array" only gave a +5 pathology bonus instead of intended +10 bonus
  
• The visual appearance for Winter Court Murder Armor (level 80 Hardcore armor) did not glow as intended
  
• "Rubgag's Dancing Shoes": sprint buff now only works out of combat
  
• Worked around Unity shader bug that could cause treants to turn into nightmarish blobs of polygons
  
• Fixed bugs that caused "corpse stink" particles to continue emitting after the corpse was closed
  

With this update, the Halloween event comes to an end. But there is a silver lining: it's cranberry season! Also look for special seasonal recipes (they can drop as loot scrolls) throughout the month.

There are also some balance changes in this update, mainly for Shield, Staff, and Cow. You can read on to get an understanding of the longer-term goals, or just jump to the sections on each specific skill.

The changes will require players to adapt a bit -- especially high-level players -- so for the next few weeks all the affected skills are much cheaper to Transmute. This will help you convert your equipment as needed. Remember to report any bugs you find with the in-game bug report button, and thank you for helping us make Project: Gorgon!

Skill Rebalances: Background Info
One of our near-term goals for combat is to make high-level fights last longer (both solo fights and group fights). Combat will be more strategic and frankly more fun when each fight lasts a few seconds longer to allow for more decisions. One of the problems with this plan is that currently, most players would die if they had to stand toe-to-toe with monsters for much longer than they do now. So in the future, we'll be experimenting with some new game mechanics to increase player survivability.

Before we make big systemic changes, though, we need to review the existing tools for survivability, namely skills, abilities, and treasure. So in this update, we aren't doing anything to actually lengthen combat yet. We're doing a review of the "tankiest" skills in the game: Staff, Shield, and Cow. (We'll look at other skills with defensive aspects, such as Unarmed, Ice Magic, and Deer, in a separate update.)

Some of Staff and Shield's abilities have been changed pretty dramatically to help support longer combats. We'll use Staff's ability "Blocking Stance" as an example of how we've changed things. This ability could be explained as: "for 10 seconds out of every 30, you don't take physical damage (slashing/crushing/piercing)". This ability was jaw-droppingly powerful... a third of the time. The rest of the time you just had to wait (or die). This ability could be really fun, but it wasn't a great fit for our plan to lengthen combat duration. And due to its extreme potency, there wasn't much for the ability's treasure to do: it was already so powerful that treasure couldn't go much further. Hence boring loot.

The new version of Blocking Stance has flat physical mitigation that lasts 30 seconds (meaning you can sustain it indefinitely), and the treasure effects are more directly beneficial to survival. We've tried to keep some of the ability's original "use it at just the right moment" flavor too by keeping 3 seconds of invincibility (instead of a whopping 10).

Two other combat abilities were similarly changed to work better in longer fights with less downtime: shield's Elemental Ward and staff's Deflective Spin. Beyond that, we've done a bunch of balance tuning-up for all three skills, buffing a bunch of treasure (and nerfing a few), adding some new treasure effects, and for the Shield skill, trying out a new combat ability. Some of these changes are a little experimental, in the "hmm, maybe this will be interesting, let's find out" kind of way. So we'll be awaiting your feedback.

These changes will definitely mess up high-level players' builds. So to help you get back up to speed, we've dramatically reduced the Transmutation costs for these skills for the next few weeks. Visit an Item Workbench to see the effective costs for your items.


Shield Changes
Shield is intended to be a super-versatile survival skill, able to pair with all sorts of other skills to help keep you alive. One notable weakness was that it wasn't great at tanking Elite bosses, so we've added some new options to help you build for that job.

Bulwark Mode:
The ability "Vigorous Defense" has been completely replaced. New ability: "Bulwark Mode". This toggled ability reduces your damage output and sprint speed in exchange for damage mitigation. The highest version (at level 75) reduces your damage output by 50%, reduces sprint by 15%, and reduces all direct damage you take by 27%. It can be turned on and off at will with no Power cost.

• If you already knew Vigorous Defense, you now automatically know Bulwark Mode instead.
  
• Treasure change: "Vigorous Defense Restores +48 Power" => "While Bulwark Mode is enabled you recover 13 Armor per second"
  
• Treasure change: "Vigorous Defense boosts your Sprint Speed +7 for 15 seconds" => "While Bulwark Mode is enabled you recover 10 Power per second"
  
• New treasure (Legs): While Bulwark Mode is active all your attacks taunt +50% and restore 17 Health to you
  
• New treasure (Head, Main Hand): "While Bulwark Mode is active all your attacks taunt +50% and restore 26 Armor to you"
  

• Changed the Elemental Ward ability to: "Reduces elemental damage (Fire, Cold, or Electricity) by 35 for 30 seconds, and for the first 3 seconds, provides complete immunity to elemental damage." [This is the level 75 version.]
  
• Treasure change: "Elemental Ward mitigates 45% of all Poison damage for 10 seconds" => "Elemental Ward mitigates +54 Darkness damage for 30 seconds"
  
• Treasure change: "Elemental Ward mitigates 45% of all Trauma damage for 10 seconds" => "Elemental Ward mitigates +55 direct Trauma damage for 30 seconds"
  
• New treasure (Chest, Ring): "Elemental Ward mitigates +32 elemental damage (Fire, Cold, and Electricity) for 30 seconds"
  

• "All types of shield Bash attacks restore 16 armor" => 21 armor
  
• "Stunning Bash deals X Trauma damage over 12 seconds" did not apply to Emergency Bash, but now does
  
• "Finish It Restores 62 Health" => this treasure effect was bugged and did not work. Also, healing changed from 62 to 68 (@ level 80)
  
• "Disrupting Bash deals +40% damage and taunts +460" => "Disrupting Bash causes the next attack that hits you to deal 29 less damage"
  
• "Infuriating Bash generates no Rage and lowers Rage by 725" => "Infuriating Bash reduces the Power cost of melee attacks by 10 for 6 seconds"
  
• "Direct Acid Mitigation +24 and Indirect Acid Mitigation +4 while Shield skill active" => "Max Armor +36, Direct Acid Mitigation +24, and Indirect Acid Mitigation +4 while Shield skill active"
  
• New treasure effect (Feet): "All Shield attacks have a 22% chance to conjure a force-shield that mitigates 10% of all slashing, crushing, and piercing damage for 30 seconds (or until 100 damage is absorbed). Stacks up to 5 times
  
• New treasure effect (Hands): "All Shield attacks have a 22% chance to conjure a force-shield that mitigates 10% of all direct nature, darkness, demonic, and acid damage for 30 seconds (or until 100 damage is absorbed). Stacks up to 5 times
  
• New treasure effect (Chest, Legs): "Fight Me You Fools deals +18% damage and restores 96 Health over 8 seconds"
  

• Ability Change: At max level the protective buff changed to 13% universal mitigation for 15 seconds. Base damage increased.
  
• Treasure: "Deflective Spin heals 108 Health over 60 seconds" => 270 health over 15 seconds
  
• Treasure: "If you have less than half of your Health remaining, Deflective Spin heals you for 31% of your Max Health" => "Deflective Spin restores 66 Health instantly and provides +50 Mitigation from all Elite attacks for 15 seconds"
  
• Treasure: "Deflective Spin restores 54 Power after a 20 second delay" => "Deflective Spin costs -9 Power and mitigates +11 damage from each attack for 15 seconds"
  
• New Treasure: (Ring): "Deflective Spin gives you +18% Projectile Evasion for 15 seconds"
  

• Ability changes: "For the next 10 seconds, you suffer no physical damage" => "Reduces any physical damage you suffer for 30 seconds, and for the first 3 seconds you are immune to physical damage" (base ability @ level 77 mitigates +34 slashing/crushing/piercing from regular enemies, and +68 more against Elites). Ability cost increased.
  
• Changed Treasure: "Blocking Stance restores 50 Power to you" => "Blocking Stance costs -16 Power and mitigates +10% of physical damage from Elite attackers for 30 seconds"
  
• Changed Treasure: "For 30 seconds after using Blocking Stance, your Mentalism Base Damage is +14.5%" => "Blocking Stance boosts your Psychic Damage +6.75% for 30 seconds"
  
• Changed Treasure: "Blocking Stance boosts your Direct Cold Damage +19.5% for 30 seconds" => "Blocking Stance boosts your Cold Damage +6.75% for 30 seconds"
  
• New Treasure: (Head, Necklace): "Blocking Stance mitigates +12 physical damage (Crushing, Slashing, Piercing) for 30 seconds. Against Elite enemies, mitigates +24 more."
  

• Lunge: ability's internal "power category" was increased, increasing Power cost, base damage, and potency of treasure effects. (All Lunge treasure was affected at least slightly; for brevity only significant changes are listed here)
  
• "Lunge hits all enemies within 5 meters, but deals -8% damage and reuse timer is +2 seconds" => "Lunge hits all enemies within 7 meters and deals +175 damage to health and armor, but reuse timer is +2 seconds"
  
• "Lunge deals +121 armor damage" => "Lunge causes the next attack that hits you to deal 29 less damage"
  
• "Double Hit costs -16 Power and makes the target 10% more vulnerable to Slashing for 15 seconds" => "Double Hit costs -16 Power and makes the target 10% more vulnerable to direct Fire and Cold damage for 8 seconds"
  
• Smash, Double Hit, and Heed The Stick Damage +69 => +125
  
• "Pin boosts Core Attack and Nice Attack Damage +68 for 7 seconds" => +98 for 15 seconds
  
• "Phoenix Strike deals +36% Fire damage to melee attackers, and ability reuse timer is -7 seconds" => +36 becomes +41%
  
• Headcracker and Strategic Thrust deal +16% damage and reuse timer is -1 second => +22%
  
• "Lunge deals +39% damage to health and armor" => +43%