Hellgate: London Abyss Chronicles Build 4 Released

Flagship Studios has updated the Hellgate: London test center with yet another revision to their massive Abyss Chronicles update. Once again, the patch notes in orange are new:

GENERAL

• All characters made prior to the launch of The Abyss Chronicles (Patch 2) will receive a Skill Retrainer, Attribute Retrainer, and Expertise Retrainer upon logging in. Attribute Retrainers also unlearn an Engineer’s drone’s attributes. Players must make inventory space for the three 1×1-sized (single cell) items to receive them. The items will be given to the character when there is sufficient inventory space. Players in Test Center will get all three items with each log-on.
• NPC Erich, the Attribute Retrainer, now stands in Holborn Station. All players may pay him to redistribute their stat points. The cost for redistributing points goes up with level with big jumps at level 16 and 31.

NEW FEATURES

• New Abyss Quest Line with Four New Boss Fights:
  • Travel to the all new Parliament Square and help Titus of the Cabal fend off the rapid spread of the Abyss, a new Demonic underground that grows in size as Demonkind consumes more of our world. The only way to halt the Abyss is to seek out and destroy those who control it. Lure the four Abyss Lords from their cursed realm by collapsing their Hellrifts (a new Rift for each of the boss types), then confront the masters as they emerge to investigate the problem. Four repeatable boss runs with four new bosses! Features three new environments and some reworked environments.
• New Shared Stash System:
  • The Shared Stash will now feature separate panes for each gameplay mode: Normal, Elite, Hardcore, and Hardcore Elite. Items currently in your Shared Stash will be placed in the correct pane.
• Major Rebalance of the Blademaster Class:
  • The Blademaster class has been significantly rebalanced with changes to almost every skill. Overall, they should do more damage and have many more options than before. Some of the highlights include Strength now stacking on top of the skill percent bonuses – a huge boost – and Blademasters can now gain a Surge with any melee attack or with any melee skill (rather than just when killing something with a Surge skill).
• Improved, Configurable Guild Controls:
  • Guilds will now have five titles they can assign to members. The titles can be renamed. There can only be one Guild Leader. Non-subscribers can only have the lowest two titles. The Guild Leader can configure what the middle three titles are allowed to do including invite new members, promote and demote existing members, kick members, and send all-guild e-mail. The lowest title is not allowed to invite, promote, demote, kick, or send guild e-mails.
    • Guild Leader (Only one character is the Guild Leader. They can do anything including change the rules for the guild and rename the guild ranks.)
    • Officer (Subscriber-only. The Guild Leader can allow them to Invite, Promote, Demote, Kick, or Guild E-mail.)
    • Member (Subscriber-only. The Guild Leader can allow them to Invite, Promote, Demote, Kick, or Guild E-mail.)
    • Agent (Any player. The Guild Leader can allow them to Invite.)
    • Recruit (Any player. This rank can’t have any privileges.)
• Consignment House:
  • Players can place items into the Consignment House to offer them for sale at a set price. All players in the same gameplay mode can see and purchase that item. The Consignment House currently only offers a “buy out” price, there is no bidding.
  • The Consignment House is accessed in Stonehenge and Templar Base.
  • The default duration for listed items is seven days.
  • Listed items are mailed back upon expiration, as is payment for successful listings.
  • Listed items can be withdrawn.
  • While players cannot place items up for auction (bidding) yet, this feature is planned for the future.
  • The Consignment House can be searched using type, quality, and item level filters.
  • Search queries can be sorted by price.
  • All uniques in Hellgate: London can be viewed using the Consignment House.
• Three New Skills for all Classes:
  • Skill Scrolls are new items which unlock the new skills and allow skill points to be put into them. For example, the Spider Mine Schematic unlocks the Spider Mine skill for Engineers. The Skill Scrolls will be tradable and can be used by all players; however, they drop off of boss monsters in the subscriber-only Abyss levels. Only a few of the skills will be enabled in the first Patch 2 build that goes to Test Center.
• Trinket Inventory Slots:
  • There will be two new Trinket inventory slots. The first trinkets will drop as cursed rings which can be cleaned up through the Transmogrifier. These cursed rings will mostly drop in the Abyss levels, but they can be found elsewhere too. These items are tradable and can be used by all players.
• Attribute Retrainer NPC:
  • Erich, the Attribute Retrainer, will allow you to spend palladium to remove points one at a time from an Attribute and add them to your unassigned Attribute Points pool. The cost to remove each point goes up with character level.
• Stack Splitting:
  • You will be able to right-click on a stack of items and select to split it into smaller stacks using a new radial menu option. A dialog will pop up and let you type in how many items to place in the new stack.
• Item Linking:
  • Players will be able to enter a clickable “link” to an item’s details into the chat pane by right-clicking on the item and selecting the Link Item option on the radial menu.
• Achievement Rewards:
  • Rewards have been added for completing achievements. Some achievements unlock special character emotes or grant selectable titles while others give access to gameplay bonuses that can be equipped in the achievement interface. Achievement Rewards are given retroactively.
• Mythic and Double-Edged Items:
  • Two new rarity types have been added, Mythic and Double-Edged. A new “mythic” version of the most popular affixes have been included. These affixes grant bonuses 1.5-1.75 times their legendary counterparts.
  • Mythic items are more rare than unique items and have one very strong “mythic” affix plus a random number of legendary affixes. They can be gambled for and are not sold by merchants.
  • The much more common Double-Edged rarity grants mythic-quality properties as well, but at a cost. To equip these, players will have take a penalty to a different statistic/property. Double-Edged items are more common than uniques and less common than Legendary. They cannot be gambled for and are not sold by merchants.
• New Weapons for all Factions:
  • Templar Weapons:
    • Gleamcarver Sword, Dissector Sword, Dissector Shield.
  • Cabalist Focus Items:
    • Ripshard, Glyphshard, Bloodshard.
  • Hunter Weapons:
    • F-S Force Magnum, XM909 Thunderclash, Thumper.
  • All of these new items can be found only in the Abyss.
• New Armor for all Factions:
  • A new armor line is available for each faction at levels 47 and above, found only in the Abyss.
• New “Ultimate” Dye Kits:
  • These new dye kits provide bonuses to your character and can be found exclusively in the Abyss.
• New Monster Types
• New Chat Color Scheme

ITEMS

The Abyss Chronicles (Patch 2) introduces a new inventory slot for Trinkets. The first type of trinket available are rings.

Rings

There are seven types of rings available.

• Opal:
  • These rings can drop from champion monsters anywhere in Hellgate: London.
• Runic:
  • These rings can drop from any monster in the Abyss.
• Stone:
  • These rings can drop from any monster in the Abyss.
• Ruby:
  • These rings are a specific Talox boss drop.
• Scale:
  • These rings are a specific Fulcrum boss drop.
• Prism:
  • These rings are a specific Squadro boss drop.
• Ring:
  • These rings are a specific Dreadnaught boss drop.

PVP

• Capture the Flag:
  • We’re including a preview of CTF, with a basic set of features. Capture the Flag is available only in this Test Center version of Patch 2 and will not be available on the live servers until a future build, after Patch 2.
  • In the new CTF level, players team up to battle over flags. To join a CTF game, press P to bring up the party and matchmaking screen. Select the Match tab, and join a game from the list. If there isn’t a game, press the Create button to make a new one. Many of the features in this matchmaking dialog are disabled for the Test Venter version.

NEW SKILLS

Each class may now gain access to three new unique skills! However, these skills can only be learned through the acquisition of mysterious items!

Summoner

• Darkform (Level 10): Using this skill transforms the Summoner into a demonic being, exchanging the use of weapons for vicious claws. This skill also passively allows the use of dual focus items.
• Dark Lord (Level 15): This skill passively grants a chance on successful attacks to summon up to 3 Shadow Minions to aid the Summoner.
• Dark Offering (Level 20): Using this skill sacrifices a Shadow Minion to unleash a powerful attack against all enemies within range.

Evoker

• Arcane Resilience (Level 15): This skill passively decreases the Shield Recharge Delay.
• Bone Wall (Level 20): Using this skill creates a temporary, destructible Wall of Bone at the targeted location.
• Spectral Serpents (Level 30): Using this skill temporarily summons 3 Spectral Serpents to fight for the Evoker at the targeted location.

Engineer

• Drone Aggressive Mode (Level 5): Using this skill toggles the Engineer’s Drone into an aggressive mode, increasing its awareness as well as its movement speed.
• Ghostly Strike (Level 30): Using this skill commands the Engineer’s Bomber Bot to detonate on the targeted enemy, phasing the enemy for a long period of time in addition to causing severe damage.
• Spider Mines (Level 10): Using this skill creates an autonomous Spider Mine that seeks out nearby enemies and detonates.

Marksman

• White-Out Grenade (Level 15): Using this skill throws a grenade that explodes with a blinding light, disorienting all enemies caught within it.
• EMP Blast (Level 30): Using this skill creates a controlled electromagnetic pulse, removing all Shields from nearby enemies and temporarily preventing their natural Shield Recharge.
• Camouflage (Level 15): Using this skill requires there to be no enemies near the Marksman, but camouflages him while in Sniper Mode, preventing enemies from detecting him as long as he does not perform any actions. Camouflage also remains for a short duration after the Marksman attacks.

Blademaster

• Templar Restoration (Level 5): Using this skill expends active Surges of Restoration to heal the Blademaster and all nearby friendly targets.
• Balance of Power (Level 30): This skill passively causes all successful Hamper attacks to steal power from the target.
• Crusader Wrath (Level 15): Using this skill requires and expends three active Surges of Wrath to temporarily empower the Blademaster with wrathful energy, greatly increasing Damage at the cost of Armor.

Guardian

• Aura Stability (Level 30): This skill passively allows the simultaneous use of up to three auras, as well as increases the effectiveness of the Guardian’s auras.
• Prayer of Smiting (Level 30): Using this skill calls upon the power of the heavens to strike down all nearby enemies.
• Shield Throw (Level 15): Using this skill throws the Guardian’s Shield, bouncing between enemies to deal extra damage.

SKILL ORGANIZATION

We’ve reorganized each class’s skill page into 3 named tabs! Since these new skill tabs are more compact, the skills page now fits within the middle panel area of the UI. The reorganization of the skills into separate tabs is both much more intuitive and visually pleasing. To stay consistent with the new arrangement, some skills now belong to different skill groups. The new skill tabs are named:

Summoner

• Elementals, Demons, Necromancy

Evoker

• Nature, Spirit, Arcana

Engineer

• Bots, Drone, Spec Ops

Marksman

• Assault, Recon, Demolitions

Blademaster

• Duelist, Knight, Flying Blade

Guardian

• Shield, Devotions, Retribution

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 we’ve 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: Yahtel’s Fist, Shinn’s Guard, Aegis of the Ages, Keeper of the North Star, and the Cold Steel dye kit.
  • The Total Armor Value properties’ bonuses have been lowered to 3/4/5%. This change is retroactive.
  • The Health Percentage properties’ 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 properties’ bonuses have been scaled down, retroactively.
  • Pet Health bonus properties’ 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 Guardian’s Shield skills.
• The common version of the stun strength bonus property has been renamed, “Intense”.
• The “Vindicator’s”, “Punisher’s”, and “Avenger’s” weapon properties now always provide critical chance bonuses of 1, 2, and 3%, respectively. This change is retroactive.
• The “Punisher’s” and “Avenger’s” mod properties now always provide critical chance bonuses of 1 and 2%, respectively. This change is retroactive.
• The “Stabilized”, “Equalized”, and “Balanced” weapon properties now provide critical chance multiplier bonuses of 10-11%, 12-13%, and 14-15%, respectively. This change is retroactive.
• The “Anchored”, “Fastened”, and “Equalized” tech properties now always provide critical chance multiplier bonuses of 10, 11, and 12%, respectively. This change is retroactive.
• All “critical chance multiplier vs. caste” properties’ 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 Joey’s 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 players’ expected damage mitigation levels.
• The scaling up of Monsters’ 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 “Hooked” quest has been rebalanced.
• The event for the “The Wall” quest has been rebalanced, and now scales with the player’s level.
• The battle with the infected Exospector for the “Gundown” quest has been rebalanced, and now scales with the player’s 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%.
• Monsters’ Shield Recharge Delay (time after getting hit and before Shields begin to recharge) has been reduced to 2.5 seconds from 4 seconds.
• Monsters’ 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 skill’s 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 “Power Cost Increase per Level” 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.

Templar

We have corrected an error in the way that damage bonuses provided by Templar skills were being applied. Previously, most of the damage bonuses were being added directly to the damage bonuses gained from other sources, which meant that the damage increase from using one of these skills was effectively much less than the listed value. Now, the damage bonuses for these skills multiply the total damage of the Templar’s attack, so the listed damage bonus will always be the exact increase in damage gained from using the skill. One side effect of this fix is that we have had to generally adjust the damage bonuses of Templar skills downwards; however, the actual damage provided by these skills has been increased tremendously.

• Opposing players in PvP are now counted toward the enemy count for Templar auras.

Blademaster

• Surge of Restoration
  • This skill is now a passive skill with a 12% chance to proc on successful melee hits. The proc does not cost power, but cannot occur more than once every quarter-second.
  • The per-rank bonus of this skill has been doubled.

• Surge of Wrath
  • This skill is now a passive skill with a 12% chance to proc on successful melee hits. The proc does not cost power, but cannot occur more than once every quarter-second.
  • The rank progression of this skill has been adjusted down slightly, beginning at a 2/4/6% increase to Critical Chance at rank 1 and reaching a 5/10/15% increase to Critical Chance at rank 10.
  • The skill prerequisites for Surge of Wrath have been removed.

• Surge of Speed
  • This skill is now a passive skill with a 12% chance to proc on successful melee hits. The proc does not cost power, but cannot occur more than once every quarter-second.
  • The rank progression of this skill has been adjusted down slightly, beginning at a 10/20/30% increase to Movement Speed at rank 1 and reaching a 28/56/84% increase to Movement Speed at rank 10.
  • The skill prerequisites for Surge of Speed have been removed.
  • Sprint can now be used while Surge of Speed is active.

• Surge Mastery
  • The effect of this skill has been changed to increase the chance that any of the Surge skills will proc by an additional 3% per rank.
  • The skill prerequisites for Surge Mastery have been removed.

• Sword of Reckoning
  • This skill now provides a damage multiplier bonus of 60% at rank 1, increasing by an additional 8% per rank.
  • The base power cost has been decreased by 25%.

• Sword of Authority
  • The effect of this skill has been changed to increase the Elemental Attack Strengths of this attack by 40% per rank.
  • This skill now provides a damage multiplier bonus of 200%.
  • The base power cost has been decreased by 49%.
  • The duration of this skill and the delay afterwards have been decreased substantially.
  • The skill prerequisite has been decreased to Sword of Reckoning rank 3.

• Hamper
  • Using this skill no longer forces the Blademaster to stop moving.
  • The duration of Hamper’s effect has been increased to 6 seconds.
  • The movement speed penalty of Hamper’s effect has been decreased to 15% at rank 1.
  • The armor penalty of Hamper’s effect has been decreased to 6% at rank 1, increasing by an additional 2% per rank.
  • The base power cost has been decreased by 27%.
  • This skill now has a cooldown of 3 seconds.
  • The skill prerequisite has been increased to Sword of Authority rank 2.

• Sword of Justice
  • This skill now provides a total damage multiplier bonus of 40% at rank 1, increasing by an additional 7% per rank.
  • The base power cost has been decreased by 50%.
  • This skill is now properly modified by its attack speed coefficient, such that the Elemental Attack Strength of this attack is now equivalent to that of a normal swing.

• Sweeping Strike
  • The effect of additional ranks in this skill has been changed to increase the Elemental Attack Strengths of this attack by 25% per rank.
  • This skill now provides a damage multiplier bonus of 75%.
  • The base power cost has been decreased by 10%.

• Whirlwind
  • The mechanics of this skill have changed: Whirlwind is no longer based on a set duration – instead, it does 8 spinning attacks at twice the Blademaster’s normal melee speed hitting all targets within melee range, each attack having 50% of the Damage and Elemental Attack Strengths of a normal attack.
  • The effect of additional ranks in this skill has been changed to increase the rate of use by 20% per rank.
  • The base power cost has been decreased by 37%.
  • The initial cooldown has been increased to 25 seconds.
  • The Movement Speed bonus is now fixed at 50%.
  • The skill prerequisite has been decreased to Sweeping Strike rank 3.
  • Players can no longer jump while in Whirlwind.

• Charge
  • This skill now provides a damage multiplier bonus of 50%.
  • The base power cost has been decreased by 60%.
  • The base maximum range has been decreased to 16 meters.
  • The skill prerequisites for Charge have been removed.

• Onslaught
  • The effect of this skill has been changed to increase the maximum range of Charge and Path of Righteousness by 10% per rank.
  • The skill prerequisite has been decreased to Charge rank 2.

• Path of Righteousness
  • This skill now provides a damage multiplier bonus of 10%.
  • The effect of additional ranks in this skill has been changed to increase the damage multiplier bonus by an additional 10% per rank.
  • The cooldown is now fixed at 8 seconds.
  • The base power cost has been decreased by 43%.
  • This skill now teleports the Blademaster in the direction of movement at the time it is used, or forwards if there is no current movement (identical to Blink).
  • The skill prerequisite has been decreased to Onslaught rank 2.
  • Path of Righteousness now applies damage bonuses correctly.

• Crosscutter
  • This skill now receives a damage bonus from Strength, like other melee skills.
  • This skill no longer requires a target and no longer homes.
  • This skill now provides a damage multiplier bonus of 15%.
  • The effect of additional ranks in this skill has been changed to increase the damage multiplier bonus by an additional 15% per rank.
  • The cooldown is now fixed at 2 seconds.
  • The base power cost has been decreased by 68%.

• Sword Master
  • The effect of this skill has been changed to increase the Critical Chance of Crosscutter and Sword Typhoon attacks by 5% per rank.
  • The skill prerequisite has been increased to Crosscutter rank 2.

• Sword Typhoon
  • This skill now receives a damage bonus from Strength, like other melee skills.
  • This skill now provides a damage multiplier bonus of 50% for each shard.
  • The cooldown has been decreased to 15 seconds.
  • The base power cost has been decreased by 45%.
  • The display for this skill now shows the correct number of shards thrown for each rank.
  • The skill prerequisite has been increased to Sword Master rank 2.

• Heaven’s Arc
  • This skill now provides a damage multiplier bonus of 50% at rank 1, increasing by an additional 10% per rank.
  • The base power cost has been decreased by 20%.

• Matched Blades
  • The effect of additional ranks in this skill has been changed to increase Strength by 8 per rank.

• Call of the Chosen
  • The display for this skill now shows the correct values for Fear duration, Taunt duration, and Fear Radius.
  • The base power cost has been decreased by 20%.

• Angelic Orator
  • The damage reduction effect of this skill has increased to a 5% damage reduction per rank.
  • The skill prerequisite has been decreased to Call of the Chosen rank 2.

• Aura of Power
  • The display for this skill now shows the correct value for its Power Regeneration bonus.

• Aura of Zeal
  • The effect of this skill has been changed to provide a passive Critical Damage bonus of 25% at rank 1, increasing by an additional 25% per rank. The Critical Chance bonus provided by this skill is now a constant 2% per enemy within the Holy Aura.

• Aura of Deflection
  • This skill now provides a 27% chance to destroy projectiles at rank 1, increasing by an additional 9% per rank.
  • The rank cap of this skill has been increased to 5.

• Aura of Vengeance
  • This skill now provides a 15% chance to reflect projectiles at rank 1, increasing by an additional 5% per rank.
  • The rank cap of this skill has been increased to 5.
  • The skill prerequisite has been decreased to Aura of Deflection rank 1.

Guardian

• Sword of Reckoning
  • This skill now provides a damage multiplier bonus of 60% at rank 1, increasing by an additional 8% per rank.
  • The base power cost has been decreased by 40%.

• Hamper
  • Using this skill no longer forces the Guardian to stop moving.
  • The duration of Hamper’s effect has been decreased to 6 seconds.
  • The movement speed penalty of Hamper’s effect has been decreased to 9% at rank 1, increasing by an additional 3% per rank.
  • The armor penalty of Hamper’s effect has been decreased to 12% at rank 1, but the bonus of ranks thereafter has been increased to an additional 4% per rank.
  • This skill now has a cooldown of 3 seconds.
  • The base power cost has been decreased by 27%.

• Heaven’s Arc
  • This skill now provides a damage multiplier bonus of 50% at rank 1, increasing by an additional 10% per rank.
  • The base power cost has been decreased by 20%.

• Shield Bash
  • This skill now provides a bonus damage multiplier of 30%. (This multiplier is increased by an additional 13 per rank of Shield Master).
  • The base power cost has been decreased by 20%.

• Shield Turn
  • This skill now provides a bonus damage multiplier of 60%. (This multiplier is increased by an additional 16 per rank of Shield Master).
  • The initial bonus to Elemental Attack Strengths has been removed.
  • The base power cost has been decreased by 40%.
  • The skill prerequisite has been decreased to Shield Bash rank 2.

• Shield Charge
  • This skill now provides a bonus damage multiplier of 70%. (This multiplier is increased by an additional 17 per rank of Shield Master).
  • The base power cost has been decreased by 60%.
  • The maximum range has been decreased to 16 meters.
  • The skill prerequisite has been decreased to Shield Turn rank 2.

• Stampede
  • This skill now provides a bonus damage multiplier of 50%. (This multiplier is increased by an additional 15 per rank of Shield Master).
  • The Elemental Attack Strengths bonus has been increased to 50% per rank.
  • The base power cost has been decreased by 43%.
  • The range has been decreased to 10 meters.
  • Stampede now applies damage bonuses correctly.

• Shield Master
  • This skill now increases the total damage of all Shield Skills by 10% per rank.
  • This skill no longer increases the duration of Elemental Attack Effects caused by Shield skills.

• Anchor
  • This skill now provides a damage multiplier bonus of 30% at rank 1, increasing by an additional 10% per rank.
  • The base power cost has been decreased by 40%.

• Challenge
  • The cooldown has been increased to 5 seconds.
  • The power cost is no longer decreased with additional skill ranks.
  • The base power cost has been decreased by 20%.

• Provoke
  • The display for this skill now shows the correct bonus to the Taunt Strength of Challenge.
  • Denounce is no longer a prerequisite for this skill.
  • The skill prerequisite is now Challenge rank 2.

• Denounce
  • The skill tooltip has been updated to display the duration of the effect.
  • The base Armor reduction effect has been removed.
  • The cooldown has been decreased to 5 seconds.
  • The base power cost has been decreased by 53%.
  • The power cost is no longer decreased with additional skill ranks.
  • The skill prerequisites for Denounce have been removed.

• Spiritual Strength
  • This skill has been renamed “Spiritual Toughness”.
  • The effect of this skill has been changed to increase Stamina by 10 per rank.
  • The rank cap of this skill has been increased to 8.

• Shield of Faith
  • The amounts of Shields provided by this skill have been rescaled based on the new Shields curve and bonuses to Templar armor lines.
  • The return on investment of this skill has been increased.
  • The duration is now fixed at 15 seconds.
  • The cooldown has been decreased to 30 seconds.
  • The base power cost has been decreased by 38%.
  • The effect duration of this skill now receives proper benefits from duration boost properties.

• Shield Wall
  • The amounts of Shields provided by this skill have been rescaled based on the new Shields curve and bonuses to Templar armor lines.
  • The base amount of Shields provided by this skill has been decreased, but the return on investment has been increased.
  • The cooldown has been increased to 45 seconds.
  • The base power cost has been decreased by 50%.
  • Shield Wall is no longer castable while Shield Wall is already active.

• Prayer of Healing
  • The base power cost has been decreased by 38%.
  • This skill no longer shares a cooldown with Prayer of Retribution.

• Great Defender
  • The base power cost has been decreased by 40%.

• Prayer of Retribution
  • The base power cost has been decreased by 28%.
  • The skill prerequisites for Prayer of Retribution have been removed.
  • This skill no longer shares a cooldown with Prayer of Healing.

• Aura of Power
  • The display for this skill now shows the correct value for its Power Regeneration bonus.

• Aura of Defense
  • The Armor Percent bonus has been doubled at all ranks of this skill.

• Aura of Deflection
  • This skill now provides a 27% chance to destroy projectiles at rank 1, increasing by an additional 9% per rank.
  • The rank cap of this skill has been increased to 5.

• Aura of Vengeance
  • This skill now provides a 15% chance to reflect projectiles at rank 1, increasing by an additional 5% per rank.
  • The rank cap of this skill has been increased to 5.
  • The skill prerequisite has been decreased to Aura of Deflection rank 1.

• Grand Aura
  • Learning this skill will no longer cause a Grand Aura skill icon to appear in the effects area of the UI, as it is not actually an Aura.

Hunter

Marksman

• Beacon
  • The effect of this skill has been decreased to a 20% Damage Increase Debuff, increasing by an additional 2% per rank.

• Multi Beacon
  • This skill now uses the Marksman’s current rank of Beacon when determining the strength of its Debuff effect (100% of Beacon’s strength). Therefore, additional ranks in this skill no longer increase the strength of Multi Beacon’s Debuff effect.
  • The base Radius has been increased to 5 meters.
  • The cooldown has been decreased to 2 seconds.

• Multishot
  • The Duration of this skill has been fixed at 5 seconds.
  • The Damages of all shots made while Multishot is active are now decreased by 33%.
  • The bugs which caused Multishot’s inherent Weapon Accuracy Penalty to have no effect on the actual Weapon Accuracy and be erroneously negated by the Marksman’s Accuracy Attribute while firing has been fixed.

  • The effect of additional ranks in this skill has been changed to decrease the Weapon Accuracy Penalty by 7.5% per rank and the Damage Penalty by 3% per rank.

• Dead Eye
  • The erroneous and inconsistent 2% Critical Chance bonus provided by the first rank of Dead Eye has been corrected to 1%.

• Sniper Stance:
  • You can no longer Sprint while in Sniper Stance.
  • Warping to another level will now take you out of Sniper Stance.

• Escape
  • Fixed Escape skill not working when the player has points in Escape Artist.

• Overshield
  • The amounts of Shields provided by this skill have been rescaled based on the new Shields curve and bonuses to Hunter armor lines.

Engineer

It is now possible to summon Engineer drones in town areas.

• Construct Drone
  • Drone AI has been reworked to be more defensive, as a counterpart to its new Aggressive Mode.
  • The Drone’s base Armor has been rescaled with the new Armor values, and then relatively increased.
  • Drones now receive 3 Attribute Points per level (up from 2). This is applied retroactively.
  • The effect of additional ranks in this skill has been decreased to a Health bonus of 15% per rank.
  • Fixed a bug causing the Drone to not attack when it should under certain conditions.

• Repair Drone
  • Maximum range increased to 30 meters (up from 20 meters).

• Master Engineer
  • This effect of this skill has been decreased to an Armor bonus of 15% per rank, to remain consistent with the Armor rebalance.

• Gun Retrofit
  • The bonus to the Drone’s Accuracy has been increased to 8 per skill rank.

• Sword Retrofit
  • The effect of this skill has been changed to increase the Drone’s Strength by 8 per skill rank instead of Willpower, to fit the new feed requirement changes to Swords.

• Armor Retrofit
  • This skill no longer increases the Drone’s Strength but increases the Drone’s Stamina by 8 per skill rank.

• Concussive Crash
  • This skill’s damage is now affected by Minion Damage bonus properties.

• Rocket Bot
  • The Rocket Bot’s rockets are now affected by Minion Damage bonus properties.
  • The Rocket Bot’s cooldown has been decreased to 3 seconds, from 4 seconds.

• Molotov Assault
  • This skill’s damage is now affected by Minion Damage bonus properties.
  • Fixed a bug causing the field component of Molotov Assault to not be modified by the field coefficient.

• Bomber Bot
  • The Bomber Bot’s bombs are now affected by Minion Damage bonus properties.
  • The Bomber Bot’s cooldown has been decreased to 4 seconds, from 5 seconds.
  • The skill prerequisites for Bomber Bot have been removed.

• Nanobots
  • The Nanobots’ explosions are now affected by Minion Damage bonus properties.

• Beacon
  • This skill is now identical to the Marksman’s Beacon.

Cabalists

Evoker

• Arc Legion
  • Fixed a bug which caused a large performance drop when using Arc Legion.
  • Fixed a bug which caused this skill to not use the proper attack speed coefficient when modifying Elemental Attack Strengths.
  • Increased the base Shock Attack Strength to match previous values.

• Tempest
  • The effect of additional ranks in this skill has been decreased to a 5% increase in strike frequency per rank.
  • This skill’s damage has been increased by 6%.
  • Fixed a bug which caused this skill to not use the proper attack speed coefficient when modifying Elemental Attack Strengths.
  • Increased the base Shock Attack Strength to match previous values.

• Lightning Field
  • Initial Splash Damage increased by 59%.
  • Field Elemental Attack Strengths coefficients increased by 67%.
  • Splash Elemental Attack Strengths coefficients decreased by 44%.

• Flameshards
  • This skill’s damage has been increased by 11%.

• Skullsplitter
  • This skill’s damage has been increased by 7%.

• Arcane Shield
  • The amounts of Shields provided by this skill have been rescaled based on the new Shields curve and bonuses to Cabalist armor lines.
  • This skill has been improved dramatically as it now scales with the Shields curve rather than the Focus Damage curve, although it is still modified by Focus Damage.
  • The effect duration of this skill now receives proper benefits from duration boost properties.

• Venom Armor
  • The amounts of Armor provided by this skill have been rescaled based on the new Armor curve and bonuses to Cabalist armor lines.

• Swarm
  • Field Damage increased by 50%.
  • Field Elemental Attack Strengths coefficients increased by 67%.

• Hellfire
  • Minimum targeting time decreased by 40%.
  • Initial Splash Damage increased by 10%.
  • Field Damage increased by 11%.
  • Field Radius increased by 33%, to 8 meters.
  • Cooldown increased to 4 seconds.

• Drain Life
  • Drain Life’s Damage has been increased by 100%.
  • Base Life Drain effect decreased by 20%.
  • The effect of additional ranks in this skill has been decreased to a 25% increase in the Life Drain effect per skill rank.
  • The power cost has been increased by 50%.

• Dual Focus
  • The effect of additional ranks in this skill has been changed to increase Willpower by 10 per rank.
  • The rank cap of this skill has been increased to 8.

Summoner

The base power costs of summoning and maintaining Elementals have been decreased by at least 7% to ensure that Summoners may summon at least as many Elementals as before, with the same amount of power.

• Summon Carnagor
  • The display of this skill now shows the correct Armor bonus provided by additional ranks: 15% per rank.

• Blink
  • The skill prerequisite for this skill has been changed to Word of Fear rank 1.

• Drain Life
  • Drain Life’s Damage has been increased by 700% to match the Evoker’s Drain Life skill.
  • Base Life Drain effect decreased by 20%.
  • The effect of additional ranks in this skill has been decreased to a 25% increase in the Life Drain effect per skill rank.
  • The power cost has been increased by 50%.

Expertise

• Cruelty
  • The bonus provided by this Expertise is now a damage multiplier bonus, meaning that it multiplies total damage.

• Surgical Precision
  • The amounts of Critical Chance provided have been decreased to 1/2/3/4%.

• Impunity
  • This expertise now increases the Shield Recharge rate by approximately 1/2/4/7% per second.

• Tranquility
  • The amounts of Power Regeneration provided has been decreased to 60/120/180/240 power per minute.

• Toughness
  • This expertise has been rescaled to match the new Armor curve.

• Fortuity
  • The display for this expertise was displaying 10 times the actual amount of Luck provided. The display issue has been fixed.

GRAPHICS/USER INTERFACE

• Improved the efficiency of item graphics to reduce UI load times.
• Champion carnagors, seraphs, and other monsters that hide no longer show Nova particles when hidden.
• Party portals are now only seen by members of the party.
• The Expertise UI has been rearranged to take up less screenspace.
• Many NPCs had lost their colors in a previous patch. These NPCs now have the properly colored costumes.
• Character skill panes have been reorganized for better use of screenspace.

UPDATES AND FIXES FROM PATCH 1.3D

• Fixed users being unable to craft when crafted items were “stuck” in the results grid.
• Fixed players being one-shotted by monsters with backlash/rebounding/boomerang properties.
• Nova particle effects have been optimized.
• Fixed aiming problem that could sometimes occur with Shield Throw.
• Fixed drone spawning with incorrect stats.
• Fixed minion cooldown not occurring.
• Blademaster surges and Zombie Lord zombies no longer proc on destructibles.
• Fixed some skills throwing double missiles in some cases (Lightning Field, Swarm, grenades, calldowns).
• Techsmith 314’s character model now properly transforms during his quest line.
• Elite and Hardcore Modes will unlock for an account given one the following:
  • A character on the account under Level 20 reaches Level 20.
  • A character on the account over Level 20 gains one Level.
  • A character on the account over Level 50 gains one Rank.
• Fix to a bug that made it impossible to delete old characters with spaces in their names.
• Opening your inventory when in Sniper Mode now works correctly.
• In-game mail now has a character limit for the subject line of 50 characters. Inboxes can receive mail sent prior to this fix with 50 characters in the subject line.
• Items in the Transmogrifier Cube are no longer considered to be on your person and as such are not usable.
• Fixed a bug in the ragdoll tech which prevented some bodies from falling all the way to the ground.
• Allow tradable quest items (such as the Stonehenge boss heads) to be placed in the shared stash.
• Fixed a bug where Boomerang-type champion monsters could interact badly with Hunter Tactical skills.
• Fixed a bug where Carnagors and related monsters would sometimes not charge at players.
• Fixed a bug which could prevent the troops in The Wall quest from entering the portal at the end.
• The E-mail panel now closes with the ‘Z’ key.
• Fixed some bugs where your items could disappear and only reappear when you switched weapons.
• F-S Grizzly and other laser-based weapons that create ground fields now always create their fields at the correct locations.
• Fixed a bug that could cause a player in a party to not receive quest credit for killing Moloch.
• Fixed a bug which could cause items to lose their mods when placed in the shared stash under certain circumstances.
• Player panel now displays velocity bonuses correctly.
• Items should no longer spawn in inaccessible locations (such as inside of pillars).
• Fixed Blightblasters with proc affixes never firing.
• Backwards running speed is now affected by sprint and other speed modifiers.
• Fixed a bug where some mods could be erroneously de-equipped on loading a character.
• Fixed a bug that could cause some items in players’ stashes or on merchants to seem to disappear temporarily.
• Players can no longer see another players’ stats when inspecting.
• Made Buddy List font larger and a lighter color for easier readability.
• Fixed a bug where shift-right-clicking on an item with the Shared Stash open would put it in the standard stash rather than the Shared Stash.
• Fixed some keyboard commands not functioning properly when the guild panel was open.
• The achievement for leveling up within a time limit has been removed.
• One can no longer email quest rewards or items produced by a crafting vendor.

UPDATES AND FIXES FROM PREVIOUS PATCH 2 BUILDS

Build 3 => Build 4

• The Consignment House has been reactivated.

• Squadro has been rebalanced. His minions are much tougher now.
• Dreadnaught has been rebalanced. His digging attack damage has been lowered. He now is also healed 33% when performing this attack.
• Fulcrum has been redesigned. He now summons multiple types of totems.
• Talox’s order of lieutenants have been changed.
• Fiend Priests now only spawn one Tanker at a time.
• The West and East Treasury levels no longer sometimes appear as only two rooms in Nightmare Difficulty.
• NPC Alay Penn now correctly states the minimum level for Parliament Square is 30 in quest text.
• The method for resetting hellrifts has been enabled. Players no longer need to log off/on to reset hellrifts.
• Abyss bosses no longer respawn automatically after completing the Abyss quest.
• A new Focus weapon (Cabalist) now has firing and impact sounds.
• Darkform stance, animations, and weapons can now be seen by other players.
• Darkform transformation is no longer missing sound effects.
• Duel mode will no longer be “stuck” as active after returning to Parliament Square from a duel.
• Player characters can now join or create Capture the Flag matches in Nightmare difficulty games.
• Fulcrum (Abyss boss) is no longer broken in the Abyss quest.
• Items are now linked in chat when using Shift + Left Click.
• Emotes for Male Summoners in Darkform are now working properly.
• Fixed a bug where invisible monsters would prevent a player from advancing past the “Clear the Hellrift of Demons” stage of an active Abyss quest.
• Fixed a bug where if the last monster in a themed hellrift suicided, the player would be prevented from advancing past the “Clear the Hellrift of Demons” stage of an active Abyss quest.
• Camera behavior in the Abyss has been greatly improved.
• Talox’s (Abyss boss) “summoning rope” ability now displays properly.
• “Upgrades” is no longer spelled “Upgades” in the item description pane.
• Dark Offering no longer results in a 3-5 second delay before damage is done when cast by male characters.
• As a Summoner, Claw attack can no longer be used while out of Darkform.
• Templar Restoration (Blademaster) now heals party members by the correct amount.
• Blademaster Surge skills now see an increase in duration from Increased Duration properties.
• Erich the Attribute Retrainer is now more affordable.
• The animation speed of the /wave emote has been fixed.
• Riftwarrior Gunner