GAME BALANCE
With The Abyss Chronicle (Patch 2), we are taking the opportunity to change a number of global balance issues based off of player feedback and trends that weâve noticed through the Evil Eye.
Shields
The Shield Recharge Delay (time after getting hit and before Shields begin to recharge) has been reduced to 2.5 seconds from 4 seconds.
The base Shield Recharge rate has been doubled to 10% per second, from 5%. This is a static value, remaining constant regardless of level or amount of shields.
Templar Armor lines have been given a substantial boost in Shields, retroactively.
Related Properties:
Base (inherent) Shield Overload properties have been removed from all Swords. These are the inherent Shield Overload amounts that were previously on all Swords. This change is retroactive.
Armor & Health
The Armor curve has been rescaled to use much larger values to allow for greater accuracy when applying percent bonuses. 5400 Armor is now required to achieve 50% absorption against level 50 opponents. All old armor pieces have been retroactively updated.
Relative Armor values provided by Cabalist and Hunter armor lines have been increased, such that they provide higher absorption than previously. This change is retroactive.
Relative Armor values provided by Blademaster armor lines have been slightly decreased, such that they provide slightly less absorption than previously. This change is retroactive.
Relative Armor values provided by Guardian armor lines have been substantially decreased, such that they provide much less absorption than previously. This change is retroactive.
Relative Armor values provided by Shield items (Templar) have been substantially decreased, such that they provide much less absorption than previously. This change is retroactive.
Related Properties:
Standard Armor bonus properties now operate under a new mechanic: they now increase the Armor of the base item by a percent. This change is retroactive. The only pieces left intentionally unchanged are: Yahtelâs Fist, Shinnâs Guard, Aegis of the Ages, Keeper of the North Star, and the Cold Steel dye kit.
The Total Armor Value propertiesâ bonuses have been lowered to 3/4/5%. This change is retroactive.
The Health Percentage propertiesâ bonuses have been lowered to 3/4/5%. This change is retroactive.
Inherent Total Armor Value properties found on some Templar armor lines have been changed to use the standard Armor bonus properties, retroactively.
Pet Armor bonus propertiesâ bonuses have been scaled down, retroactively.
Pet Health bonus propertiesâ bonuses have been scaled down, retroactively.
Feed Requirements
The feed requirements for most magical weapon and armor properties (non-mod affixes) are now based on the feed costs already present on the base item, and function by increasing the base feed costs by a fixed percent. This change is retroactive, but does not apply to most of the Unique quality items. This change alone would decrease the total feed requirements of magical properties on armor pieces by 79-86%. As such, the armor lines have had their feed requirements retroactively increased by roughly 33% to slightly counterbalance the decrease in the feed costs of armor properties.
The effect of these changes is that base armor pieces require 33% more feed, but the feed costs of all magical armor properties have been decreased by 72-80%.
All armor pieces of equal item level within a line will now require the same feed costs (i.e. The torso, belt, boots, etc. will all require the same amount of feed). This change is retroactive.
Many armor lines have had their feed requirements changed (all retroactively) to require feeds that make more sense for the classes they were made for (and all armor lines now have Stamina as a primary feed requirement):
Summoner armor lines now require Stamina and Willpower feeds instead of Strength and Willpower.
Low level general Cabalist armor lines now require Stamina and Willpower feeds instead of Strength and Willpower.
Engineer armor lines now require Stamina and Accuracy feeds instead of Strength and Willpower.
Low and high level general Hunter armor lines now require Stamina and Accuracy feeds instead of Strength and Stamina.
Blademaster armor lines now require Stamina and Strength feeds instead of just Strength.
Guardian armor lines now require equal amounts of Stamina and Strength feeds instead of Strength (primary) and Stamina (secondary).
Low level general Templar armor now requires Stamina and Strength feeds instead of just Strength.
High level general Templar armor now requires Stamina feed instead of Strength.
All mod properties can now be found requiring any one out of the four Feed types, rather than usually just Willpower. This is to allow for better optimization and customization when spending Attribute Points.
Many Sword varieties have had their feed requirements changed (all retroactively) in order to promote a variety of builds:
Quick, primarily single-target Swords with inherent bonuses to critical chance now require Strength and Accuracy feeds.
Slower, primarily single-target Swords require Strength feed only.
Splash damage Swords now require Strength and Willpower feeds.
Several weapons have had their feed requirements retroactively decreased so that there would not be any magical weapon properties that would require more feed than previously.
Elemental Effects
Poison effects now prevent the afflicted character or monster from receiving any benefits from health regeneration and abilities that grant health regeneration; however, some abilities which grant health regeneration (such as health injectors) are no longer prevented from being used.
The cooldown on Elemental Effects Removal and Defense consumables has been decreased to 15 seconds.
The group cooldown on Elemental Effects Removal and Defense consumables has been decreased to 5 seconds.
Effects Removal and Defense consumables no longer share a group cooldown with Adrenaline Pills and Shield Boosters.
Related Properties:
The bonuses provided by standard Elemental Defense properties have been improved, and they now also provide an Elemental Defense to a secondary Elemental Effect.
The All Elemental Defenses property has been improved.
Properties
All available properties are now weighted consistently throughout the game by the general group of properties they belong to. This means that the frequency of any Skill bonus property appearing at any level will remain constant, as will a Damage bonus property, etc.
The rarities of the different types of properties have been rebalanced.
All Attributes bonus properties have been scaled down, retroactively, to a maximum of 10 to All Attributes. The feed requirements of these properties have also been retroactively scaled down according to their new attribute bonus values, and have been redistributed evenly across all four feed types.
Single-Attribute Bonus armor properties now require only the feed of the same type as the attribute bonus provided, instead of always requiring Stamina feed.
Health Bonus and Power Bonus armor properties will now require fixed amounts of Stamina and Willpower feeds, respectively, based on the bonus amount of Health or Power.
The special properties from the Guy Fawkes event will no longer spawn.
New items may now only have at most one random property which grants a skill.
A bug which caused skill group damage bonus properties to not apply their bonus correctly has been fixed. These damage bonuses stack (multiply) with regular damage bonuses, and add to damage bonuses provided by skills.
A new set of skill group damage bonus properties has been added, which increase the damage of the Guardianâs Shield skills.
The common version of the stun strength bonus property has been renamed, âIntenseâ.
The âVindicatorâsâ, âPunisherâsâ, and âAvengerâsâ weapon properties now always provide critical chance bonuses of 1, 2, and 3%, respectively. This change is retroactive.
The âPunisherâsâ and âAvengerâsâ mod properties now always provide critical chance bonuses of 1 and 2%, respectively. This change is retroactive.
The âStabilizedâ, âEqualizedâ, and âBalancedâ weapon properties now provide critical chance multiplier bonuses of 10-11%, 12-13%, and 14-15%, respectively. This change is retroactive.
The âAnchoredâ, âFastenedâ, and âEqualizedâ tech properties now always provide critical chance multiplier bonuses of 10, 11, and 12%, respectively. This change is retroactive.
All âcritical chance multiplier vs. casteâ propertiesâ bonuses have been decreased in value by 67%. This change is retroactive.
Proc-on-Attack properties will no longer spawn.
All Proc properties now base the damage of their effects off of the Item Damage Curve rather than the Monster Damage Curve.
The maximum number of properties an item can have has been increased from six to ten.
Items
All items can now be augmented using the Augmentrex 3000 exactly three times. This change fixes a bug which caused certain items to not be able to be augmented the full three times.
All Swords and Shields (except Joeyâs Legs and Zenith Shields) have had their base damage increased by 10%.
Adrenaline Pills and Shield Boosters now share a 5-second cooldown with Health Injectors and Powerpacks.
The maximum stack sizes for consumables, PRDs, analyzers, essences, and boss heads have been increased to 100.
The maximum stack size for scraps has been increased to 10000.
Polaris and Zenith Shields have had their base Stun Attack Strengths decreased by 33% and their base Critical Damage Multipliers decreased by 40%.
Zenith Shields have had their base damage decreased by 23%.
PvP
Elemental Attack Strengths are now reduced by 75% instead of 25%.
Fixed an issue causing players to increasingly do more and more damage than expected to other players at higher levels.
Health Injectors may no longer be used.
Monsters & Quests
Monster damage has been decreased by 67% for all monsters to match the new rebalancing of playersâ expected damage mitigation levels.
The scaling up of Monstersâ Damage and Elemental Attack Strengths when facing groups of players has been decreased by 60%.
The Moloch encounter has been rebalanced and his AI has been reworked. Note that he now behaves more aggressively, but can no longer critically hit his enemies.
The battle with Wurm for the âHookedâ quest has been rebalanced.
The event for the âThe Wallâ quest has been rebalanced, and now scales with the playerâs level.
The battle with the infected Exospector for the âGundownâ quest has been rebalanced, and now scales with the playerâs level.
Shield Overload abilities on monsters have been significantly toned down. Now, a monster can at most deal 100% extra damage to Shields, compared to 300%.
Monstersâ Shield Recharge Delay (time after getting hit and before Shields begin to recharge) has been reduced to 2.5 seconds from 4 seconds.
Monstersâ base Shield Recharge rate has been doubled to 10% per second, from 5%. This is a static value, remaining constant regardless of level or amount of shields.
Missiles reflected by monsters with the Backlash, Boomerang, or Rebounding properties will now receive 90% damage reduction.
Willpower & Power Regeneration
The base Power Regeneration for all players has been increased to 480 per minute, from 120 per minute.
The amount of Power Regeneration provided by each point of Willpower has been decreased to 2 per minute, from 3 per minute.
Skills
Every skill can now be trained at each level after the skillâs base level and skill prerequisites are met. For example, Sword of Reckoning can now be trained up to rank 9 when the character is level 9.
The update speed for Auras has increased to once every second, up from once every 3 seconds. This means that Auras will more quickly evaluate how many enemies are within their radius, as well as increase the frequency that Aura of Deflection and Aura of Vengeance will attempt to destroy or reflect projectiles.
Inconsistencies between the three factions in the Skill âPower Cost Increase per Levelâ curve have been corrected and the curves have been normalized. This has no effect on the power cost of skills at level 1, but by level 50: Templar skill power costs now increase by an amount 25% less than previously; Hunter skill power costs now increase by an amount 11% less than previously; Cabalist skill power costs now increase by an amount 7% more than previously.
Many errors and inconsistencies in skill descriptions have been fixed.
