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Knights and mercs, Update #17 is landing tonight on the streets of New Boston and its ready to hunt. This one focuses on a major expansion of enemy variety around McKellen Heavy Industries and Matsumoto Global Technologies megacorps, rebuilding each of their forces into something unique, powerful and scary with 10 new enemies.

In addition, we've put some focused time on improving the balance and progression of mid-to-late game enemies (Power Level 5+). For teams in the early game (PL 1-5), this rebalance will have no effect as its focus is on keeping the challenge curve up in the late game and making sure their high-skill and high-level teams don't simply steamroll everything.

We're eager to hear feedback on Update #17 as blow out the enemy variety and tighten up the game's balance and progression curve into the late-game. We hope that you are enjoying the game, and if so, please do leave a review! Our small indie team thanks you!

Late-Game Enemy Progression

[img src="https://clan.cloudflare.steamstatic.com/images/36740530/442190c1979a9221d8c2c1327c8ee79991d7a4e5.png"][/img]The most significant progression change in Update #17 addresses missions starting at Power Level 5 and higher. As you range into these higher level missions, you will now find that the starting enemy mix is well ... mixed. Before Update #17, there was always a small chance that some non-basic Guard would be placed on a patrol path but 90% of the time, you'd have a set of standard guards and maybe 1 specialist mixed in. This leaves a very flat playing field, easy enough for a powerful squad to slice through without much resistance - whether they are killing from stealth or just going loud.

The change in Update #17 is to adjust the weighting and possible results for the starting patrollers who appear in higher level missions. All the factions in the game now have additional options available for their starting patrollers, including shock troops, Fire COM, grenadier enemies, and even in some cases, mecha infantry at the highest Power Levels.

All of the changes are tied directly to Power Level progression, so as your Mission Power Level ramps up from 5 to 6 to 7 and all the way up to 10, new options are introduced at each step and you'll see the percentage of standard, no-armor "guards" reducing and replaced with more dangerous specialists.

For those below Power Level 5, nothing has changed.

McKellen Private Army: Hardened and Slower

[img src="https://clan.cloudflare.steamstatic.com/images/36740530/0a1256b052bcdb7e9838132ed1f19c991b68eee9.png"][/img]The McKellen megacorporate army has finally split from the "standard corp" banner and taken their own path. Of course, the Heavy Industries corporation has gone tank and heavy - high Hit Point totals, heavy armor, slow moving, heavy weaponry. The entire force is stylized to fit their green and gold camo style, and brings a unique set of capabilities to the table.

McKellen Captains (MEK Leads) can use Priority Dispatch to spike the Sec Tally, while their Hardened Target military leaders (MEK Suits) carry E-Rifles, Vita-Shields for temporarily invulnerability and high Stun Break. Other unique enemies like the MK HeavyLift are shock troopers, rushing the front line with roaring E-Rifles. Their specialists have extra concussion grenade options and some of their higher-tier soldier can Overwatch Break and continue through heavy reaction fire.

Bring your high DPS to put McKellen forces down quickly, or bring your fast feet to outrun them.

Matsumoto Private Army: Technic and Fast

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The Matsumoto megacorporate army has also split ranks from the "standard corp" banner and is doing their own thing as well. Known to always be on the bleeding edge of technological research, the MATS forces deliver with specialist tech and high-speed soldiery. Their entire force is stylized with unique outfits bearing their corporate insignia and brings some terrifying abilities to the table.

[img src="https://clan.cloudflare.steamstatic.com/images/36740530/ec247cc10dc58a4b0609c400c8c7cdd5872b5b09.png"][/img]Both the Matsumoto Hardened Target and military elites, the Jade Spears and their standard infantry captains, "Field Sgt" have all been implanted with the infamous Red Shift Cybernetic, allowing them to cloak themselves temporarily. Cloaking makes it impossible to target an enemy with direct fire (firearms, full auto or blade attacks) but they are still vulnerable to Grenades, Shock Mines, and debuffing Talents like Marker Sights, Atomic Stutter or items like Dazzlers. If a cloaked enemy takes damage or makes an attack, they drop their cloak. Still - be sure to bring some abilities to cope with this dangerous MATs technic.

In addition, the MATS boast speed enemies who can close very rapidly. They are harder to escape because of their speed, which they traded for lighter armor and lower HP totals. Watch out for their Silk Snipers who are equipped with MATS issue Railguns - Pure Damage at that long range can really put a merc down. And MATS is also joining the ranks of factions that deploy mecha infrantry to the field on the regular with their proprietary M-Class Infra drones who are integrated with an E-Rifle weapons platform - yikes.

Stun Break and Overwatch Break

With Update #17, enemies have received 2 new buff types - Stun Break and Overwatch Break.

Stun Break has existed before (and is a % chance at the start of any given turn to cancel a Stunning debuff), but it was previously limited to 75% for Head Hunters and 50% for VIP targets in assassination. Now, it is a generic buff effect that any enemy can possibly get and it also appears nicely in the status pop up for enemies like Head Hunters and anyone else who has it, so the rule is clearer. You will also find that certain Captains and Hardened Targets now have some Stun Break %.

Overwatch Break is new and is a % chance whenever hit by an Overwatch reaction shot to ignore that and just keep going. Where getting hit by Overwatch usually steals an enemy's Turn, if their Overwatch Break % rolls successful, their Turn is not stole and they continue to move or attack as they had planned, even though they take the damage from the OW shot. Like Stun Break, this is used judiciously today with only a few enemies carrying it and it will show up on their status pop up.

Deck Armor can help Reduce Stress

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With Update #17, we've added a new rule that if your HP Damage in the Matrix is less than 4, you are protected from taking Stress roll from it. This can give some extra emphasis and benefit to packing on the Deck Armor, which is only 50% effective against physical HP loss.

Loading Performance & Game Size

With Update #17, we've made some improvements to the packing of lighting data for levels that should help improve both the load times on a number of missions and reduce the overall build size of the game. We're always trying to squeeze a little more out of it, so glad that we found another good vector for improvement here.

Fixed Some Contacts "Held" by Casting Director

We've fixed an issue with Update #17 where some Contacts might be left being "held" by the Casting Director for a role that expired. This would leave them stuck - unable to Co-Conspire or be picked for another storyline either, as the Casting Director considered them already active in a storyline. This issue has been immediately fixed for all games and all future games.

A big thanks to everyone sending in F10s, giving us enough data to find and fix sneaky issues like this!

v2.1.13 - #17: The Megacorp Strikes Back - 7/11/2025

- Rebalanced all enemy factions with new rules about initial enemy spawns - kicks in around Power Level 5 and up

- Added 10 new/unique Matsumoto enemy types - MATS corporate army is light, fast and high-tech

- MATS corporate army uniques include Snipers using Railguns, fielding M-Class Infra mecha infantry, Field Sgt and Jade Spears becoming temporarily cloaked (cannot be directly targeted)

- Added 10 new/unique McKellen enemy types - McKellen Heavy Industries corporate army is armored, slow and heavily armed

- McKellen corporate army uniques include HeavyLift's using E-Rifles, best in class HP and Armor, extra grenade options for soldiery, and some ability to break Overwatch

- Upgraded Stun Break rules - now any enemy can have any amount of Stun Break (Head Hunters 75%, VIPs 75%, Hardened Targets 50%)

- Added new Overwatch Break rules - some heavy enemies can plow right through, taking the hit and continuing their action (attack, movement, etc)

- Added new 14 Talents (move buffs, healing clouds, buffing clouds, Vita-Tech shields, Overwatch break) and 32 new Talent groups for enemies

- Deck Armor can now reduce Stress if HP Damage is reduced to 4 or below

- Improved AI targeting for healing grenades, now more likely to throw them

- Filters now remembered inside a screen (Inventory) even after you leave

- Improved Font performance

- Improved scene performance, reduced loading times for missions

- Fixed issues with grenade physics and "flat bounces" that could sometimes go *really* far

- Fixed issue where the proc-gen Kill 3 mission could "hold on" to a contact for too long

- Fixed VIP / Headhunter AI Interactions that could result in locked up enemy AI