Genre: Strategy, Adventure, Indie, Visual Novel, Card & Board Game
Astatos
Astatos v0.6.4 - Exchange Part 2
To the Crown Mages,
This update includes some minor balance tweaks, bug fixes, and this month’s new Hero Skin. While this patch is light on content, we’re currently working on revisions for Chapter I of the story, including the addition of Story Trials.
After discussing with the community on Discord, most felt it was better to wait until everything is complete rather than release many small patches. We hope that our players will be ok waiting a little longer! For now, you can find a brief preview of the changes below.
For the detailed list of changes implemented with Astatos v0.6.4, please read on below.
- From the team at Studio Klondike
Upcoming Changes
Coming soon is a variety of changes to the story mode of Astatos including:
Story Trial gameplay, featuring nearly 2,000 additional lines of dialogue.
Additional story scenes for Chapter I.
Sprites for all named side characters.
Additional backgrounds.
Additional music.
While the artwork, music, and the majority of text is complete, we’ve still got lots of scripting work to do. We’ll be doing our best to get this out by the end of the month, but we’ll keep everyone updated on our progress!
New Features
Astatos now supports Steam Rich Presence, allowing your friends to see if you’re in a multiplayer room, participating in the Trial, or reading the story from the Steam friends list.
Change Log
Balance Changes
[Conquest Trial] Exchange can only be performed when you begin the Hero Stage with 0 Energy.
[Takeover Trial] Exchange can only be performed when you begin the Hero Stage with less than 2 Energy.
Game Changes
Improved mouse scrolling speed on Windows.
Any player in a Quick Play/Matchmaking room can now invite friends.
Improved notifications for Lysander’s, Regulus’, Caelius’ and Kyros’ Hero Abilities.
Varius’ Hero Ability will now automatically advance when there is only one player to pick from.
Additional sound effects on the Story Trial UI.
Trial Fixes
Fixed the display of players on Mukaki’s side when using Varius’ Hero Ability.
Fixed an issue preventing card counts from displaying on A.I. players during the Tutorial.
Fixed a rare soft lock when someone disconnects during Alkaios' Hero ability.
Fixed an issue when a Hero too close to your turn in the Hero Stage ending could cause a desync.
Fixed an exploit that allowed you to bypass the Energy restrictions on the Exchange mechanic.
Gaios’ Passive Ability will now take effect if they’re summoned mid-Exchange.
Game Fixes
You can now purchase things from the store when you have exactly enough Monera.
Fixed some display issues on the lobby UI when players leave during Hero drafting.
Known Issues
Occasionally players may be able to pick/ban more Heroes than intended.
Game Content
New Hero Skins have been made available as a monthly reward. The previous month’s Hero Skin has also been added to the in-game store.
Alkaios - Grandmaster
Nikos - The Flourishing Chevalier
Sulpicius - The Way of The Warrior
Astatos v0.6.1 Exchange
To the Crown Mages,
This update features a new mechanic to Trials, balance tweaks, rewards tweaks, and stability improvements.
Along with this update, we’re pleased to confirm that Hero Pack III, our collaboration with Echo Project’s Adastra, is in the final stages of testing.
For an early look behind the scenes at the development and upcoming abilities of Hero Pack III, we’ve released a new blog on our Patreon. Be sure to join if you’re interested in seeing more behind the scenes posts! patreon.com/StudioKlondike
For the detailed list of changes implemented with Astatos v0.6.1, please read on below.
- From the team at Studio Klondike
New Features
Exchange: This new mechanic allows players to convert their Cards into Energy once per round during the Hero Stage. This takes the concept behind the commonly used Hero Card, Gaios, and incorporates it as a standard part of the game.
Exchange opens up new opportunities for opening moves, summoning Heroes, and getting out of tricky situations— just be careful not to waste important Cards and fail the Trial Stage!
Note: This mechanic will be introduced in the in-game tutorial at a later patch after some UI adjustments. Gaios’ Hero Ability has also been modified along with this update, see below for more information.
Random Hero Drafting: A randomise picks button has been added to the drafting UI. If you want to have a bit of chaotic fun, or simply don’t have a preference, use this button to make your drafting picks automatically!
Change Log
Game Features
The Exchange mechanic has been added to the Trial. Exchange allows you to convert your own Cards into Energy once per round during the Hero Stage.
A randomise picks button has been added to the drafting UI.
Balance Changes
[Takeover Trial] Makari-Hari’s Ability has been changed. The new Ability description reads: When Makari-Hari’s side uses a Spell Card, they draw one additional Card. (Passive) (5 Cooldown) Lose one Influence, and obtain one Energy per Card held by Mukaki’s side.
[Conquest & Takeover Trial] Gaios’ Ability has been changed. The new Ability description reads: The cost to perform an Exchange is reduced to two Cards for Makari-Hari/Mukaki's side. (Passive) (Once per round)
Rewards Changes
Rewards given for Training Trials have increased from 70% to 80%.
Reward Points given have been increased by 25% on average per match.
The per match cap for Reward Points has been increased from 90 to 120 for Conquest Trials.
All rewards have been increased by 50% when playing a Conquest Trial with 5 or more players.
The EXP cap has been increased when playing a Conquest Trial with 5 or more players.
Matchmaking Changes
[Conquest Trial] When in quick play/matchmaking, active rooms will be merged with waiting rooms upon rematch if there is enough room to combine them. This means that matchmaking rooms can pick up additional players upon rematch.
Game Changes
Sound effects have been finalised for Hero Card Drafting.
Sound effects have been finalised for the sticker system.
Improved the handling of multiple sounds playing simultaneously.
Game Content
New Hero Skins have been added to the store and/or made available as monthly rewards.
Drusus - Lifesaver
Gaios - Culinarian
Game Fixes
Toast pop-ups resulting from Hero Abilities would show "[Spell]" instead of "[Ability]".
The Friends menu wouldn't close automatically when Hero Card Drafting begins in a room.
Sometimes the Trials menu would remain open at the same time as the room UI when accepting an invite to a room.
If the Trials menu is opened and closed rapidly it could lead to no menu opening, soft-locking the game.
When creating a new account, the Hero Pack unlock animation would play a second time if you immediately enter the Trials menu and click "yes please" to view the tutorials.
Being invited to a room while in the Deck Menu could cause the incorrect music to play during the Trial.
You can no longer drag the Hero Card list while the artwork viewer is open in the Deck Menu.
Added rollback code, improved stability, and error handling during Hero Drafting.
Trial Fixes
In cases where the game is syncing player Energy and Card counts, players could erroneously receive additional Cards.
Players on Mukaki's side could occasionally appear with the opposite side’s profile image when first joining the Trial.
When your side has the maximum number of Heroes, rapidly clicking an opponent's Hero Card to unsummon them would result in excess Energy being lost.
Improved stability and error handling during the Hero Stage when activating Heroes close to the stage ending.
Astatos v0.6 - Drafting
To the Crown Mages,
This update features a rework to Hero Pack selection, sending stickers during Trials, updates to the Rank system, and the addition of Takeover Trial leaderboards.
Additionally, this update marks the 1 Year Anniversary of Astatos entering Early Access on Steam. Since launch over 6000 Crown Mages have joined the Trials, and we couldn’t be happier with all the feedback and support we’ve received over the past year.
Since launch we’ve released over 14 upmdates and 6 major versions— tweaking balance, gameplay, releasing new skins, and adding the most commonly requested features such as PvE and Playable Tutorials.
Unfortunately, Part 3 of the PvE update could not be completed in time for this occasion, but we’re still hard at work on it. We hope the changes featured in this update will create a fresh experience for players over the holiday season!
If you’re interested in supporting our work and getting a look at features and artwork in production, we really appreciate support on our Patreon. www.patreon.com/StudioKlondike
For the detailed list of changes implemented with Astatos v0.6, please read on below.
- From the team at Studio Klondike
New Features
Hero Card Drafting: This new feature replaces the Hero Pack Preferences settings in Conquest and Takeover Trials.
Hero Card Drafting determines which additional Heroes show up in the Hero Summon. The drafting process begins in the room prior to the commencement of a Trial.
Players will be asked to BAN and PICK Hero Cards depending on the game mode. Banned Hero Cards cannot be picked by any player.
If you do not own a given Hero, you will borrow it from another player in the room. If nobody owns a given Hero, it will not be selectable. (Hero Cards you borrow and do not own will not display Hero Skins.)
We hope Hero Card Drafting will simplify the selection of Hero Cards, as well as open up new combinations and strategies as we prepare for additional Hero Packs to be added to the game.
Note: Hero Pack Selection remains in place for Training Trials. Additionally, the sound design for this feature is still a work in progress and may be changed in an upcoming patch.
Stickers: Communicate with your fellow Crown Mages using Stickers!
Stickers can be used while waiting in Rooms, during Multiplayer Trials, and on the Victory Screen. Look for the Sticker Button wherever you can send them.
Additional Stickers can also be purchased from the Store for Monera.
Note: the sound design for this feature is still a work in progress and may be changed in an upcoming patch.
Takeover Trial Leaderboard: The Rank menu has been expanded to include a Leaderboard allowing you to compare your Rank and ELO values against the top Crown Mages.
Along with this addition, a new Season will occur every 3 months. With Season I concluding at the end of December.
Upon the conclusion of the current Season, your Rank will be soft reset and the previous Season’s rankings will be finalised. Players within the top 100 will unlock a hidden Title each season.
The Takeover Leaderboard is accessible from: Main Menu > Trials > Takeover Trial > Ranking
Change Log
Game Features
Hero Pack Preferences have been replaced with Hero Card Drafting for Conquest and Takeover Trials.
Stickers have been added, allowing better communication between players in multiplayer rooms, during Trials, and on the victory screen.
The Takeover Rank menu has been expanded with a Leaderboard displaying Ranks and ELO ratings.
Game Content
A new category has been added to the Store for Sticker Packs. Additionally, Sticker Pack I and II have been added to the Store, featuring artwork by HAPS.
New content added to the in-game manual to cover changes made in this update.
The Title ‘First Among Equals’ has been added.
A hidden Title for Season I of Takeover Trials has been added.
New Hero Skins have been added to the Store and/or made available as monthly rewards.
Kyros - On Cloud Nine
Herclaus - Strength of the Heavens
Game Changes
The Story Mode save file format has been updated. Your save file will be automatically converted upon entering Story Mode.
Viewed scene detection has been improved in Story Mode. Allowing you to skip text you’ve seen down to the specific line.
When entering a Tutorial Trial (and future Story Trials) the game will pause when “The Trial Begins” message is displayed— allowing players to take their time reading the objective.
The UI design of the Takeover and Conquest Trials menus have been revised.
The UI when playing on Makari-Hari’s Side during a Trial has been revised.
There is now a delay between a player joining a Takeover Trial room and the game starting.
Players will now be kicked from a Trial if their ping is too high due to an unstable connection.
A notice light will be displayed on the Rewards menu if you have unclaimed rewards, or the monthly reward has changed.
Game Fixes
Resolved cases where the Trials menu would appear multiple times.
The game will no longer soft lock when joining a full room.
You can now join rooms containing Hero Packs you do not own.
You can no longer click the button to attempt to claim the daily reward multiple times in the same day.
Known Issues
Playing a card at the same time as the Trial Card changes elements can sometimes result in you being unable to play any more cards when you should be able to.
Occasionally players on Mukaki's side can appear with a Makari-Hari side profile image when first joining the Trial. This will fix if the player flips sides. This issue is visual only and has no effect on gameplay.
In cases where the game tries to correct the number of cards a player has received when syncing player energy and card counts, they can erroneously receive additional cards.
Astatos v0.5.3 - Resolve
To the Crown Mages,
This update features gameplay additions to Conquest Trials, along with other quality of life improvements to the game. Thank you for all your support while we continue to work on larger content releases!
Players can also head to our Patreon to check out extended development blogs, concept art, and artwork from the game. www.patreon.com/StudioKlondike
Part 3 of the PvE update is still in the works, so we hope players enjoy the changes in this patch in the meantime.
For the detailed list of changes implemented with Astatos v0.5.3, please read on below.
- From the team at Studio Klondike
New Features
Resolve: A new gameplay mechanic has been added to Mukaki’s side in Conquest Trials! We look forward to observing feedback on this mechanic and seeing if any further tweaks need to be made.
Resolve is gained whenever Mukaki's side activates a Hero Ability. Resolve points are displayed along the right side of the screen above the Deck Space. Use your Resolve in order to keep others on your side!
At the end of Mukaki's turn, a corresponding number of players will become Resolved. When Resolved, a player is protected from flipping sides. This effect lasts until the beginning of the next Hero Stage.
The player/s with the lowest power will become Resolved first. Power = (Energy x 2) + Cards If tied, a player without Energy will be picked first.
Smaller Additions
Hero Cards Update: The user interface of the Deck / Hero Cards menu has been revised. It is now possible to toggle the Hero Ability description between Conquest Trials, and Takeover Trials. Additionally, you can now toggle the side of the card between Mukaki, and Makari-Hari while within the artwork viewer interface. (Including the preview of the monthly reward)
Rematch Changes: Upon completing a Trial, you will now automatically leave once all players have left or made a decision to rematch. If only one player wishes to rematch it will automatically be cancelled.
Story UI Tweaks: You can now advance through small pauses in dialogue faster by mashing the advance keyboard/mouse input. The design of the chapter credits has also been revised.
Change Log
Game Features
Resolve mechanic added to Conquest Trials, giving Mukaki’s side more focused gameplay options.
Game Content
New content added to the in-game manual to cover the Resolve mechanic.
Additional sections added to Tutorial II and Tutorial III to cover the Resolve mechanic.
New Hero Skins have been added to the store and/or made available as monthly rewards.
Gaios - Upholder of Might
Makari-Hari - Pursuer of Knowledge
Game Changes
The layout of the Hero Card menu in the deck has been improved.
A rematch will now begin automatically once all players have picked their options on the victory screen.
Some menus have been adjusted in Traditional and Simplified Chinese to appear closer to the English interface.
The layout and positioning of Hero artwork on the main menu has been reworked. Additionally, performance while on the main menu should now be slightly better.
You can advance faster during some pauses in Story Mode by mashing the input button.
The design of chapter credits has been revised.
You can now see the load progress of other players when entering a Trial.
Game Fixes
You can no longer click and drag the Hero Card menu while the artwork viewer is open.
Certain player titles now show the updated Spell Card names in their unlock conditions.
Fixed a situation where running the game at high-FPS rates, the text appearance animations would fail to appear properly.
Moving back and forth though the Trials menu would cause button sounds to stop playing correctly.
Fixed an issue that would cause notifications displayed in succession to appear out of order.
Fixed an issue that would cause the game to soft-lock if Steam was set to offline mode.
Several server stability improvements.
Trial Fixes
Fixed an issue that caused players to be incorrectly refunded for Energy contributed to Hero Cards in the Summon Menu.
A.I. players using Regulus would discard their own hand as well as their target.
Fixed an issue that would cause popup messages to overlap during a Trial.
Fixed a situation where Alkaios’ Hero Ability would fail to distribute all cards during a Trial.
Known Issues
Playing a card at the same time as the Trial Card changes elements can sometimes result in you being unable to play any more cards when you should be able to.
Trying to enter a room containing Hero Packs you do not own will cause you to soft lock the game.
Astatos v0.5 - Revamped Tutorials
To the Crown Mages,
This update features the next step of the PvE implementation for Astatos. Over the past few months we’ve been hard at work on a scripting system to introduce single player Trials with custom scenarios to the game.
Included with this update are three interactive Tutorial Trials, aimed at introducing new Crown Mages to the gameplay of Astatos. We hope this commonly requested feature serves to make the game more approachable to players of all skill levels!
These Tutorial Trials were the test bed used to engineer the scripting tools required for in-game story sequences and scenarios. Along with our A.I. implementation, we’ve managed to run these Trials locally on your computer while making use of our existing multiplayer framework.
For those curious about the details behind our new single player trials, we released a blog on the subject along with a bunch of concept art and design documents over at our Patreon: www.patreon.com/StudioKlondike
As mentioned, this is Part 2 of our PvE updates. Throughout three updates, we hope to implement the most commonly requested features for the game.
Part 3 will involve the Implementation of Trials into the Astatos story. In the initial update we hope to cover implementation for the prologue chapter (Ab Initio), then expand to cover Chapter I, and the upcoming Chapter II at a later date.
For the detailed list of changes implemented with Astatos v0.5, please read on below.
- From the team at Studio Klondike
New Features
Revamped Tutorials: A series of interactive Tutorial Trials have been added to the game. These Tutorials are designed to quickly get new Crown Mages up to speed on how to play Takeover, and Conquest Trials.
These tutorials involve several thousand new words of dialogue, and include a small teaser for upcoming story content.
Tutorial Trials can be accessed from the new Tutorials menu under, Trials > Training > Tutorials.
Please note: Tutorial Trials are run locally on your computer without assistance from the Astatos game server, therefore they are not included in counts of rooms displayed in the lobby.
Additional Notices: The save data has been extended to allow for one-time popup events. In this update, players will now be prompted to play the tutorial the first time they enter the Trials menu.
As this data is stored locally, these one-time popup events will be reset when installing Astatos on a new device.
Smaller Additions
New Button Prompts: The keyboard buttons to enable Auto and Skip functions during Story Mode are now displayed in the pause menu.
Title Screen Setting: A setting has been added to select the appearance of the Astatos title screen, variations of which are planned to be implemented as part of future major updates.
Change Log
Game Features
Playable Tutorial Trials have been added to the Trials menu. Allowing Crown Mages to get hands-on in learning how to play Takeover and Conquest Trials.
A tutorial popup now displays the first time a player enters the Trials menu, introducing the menu and directing them to play the Tutorial.
When leaving a Trial, you will now return to the relevant section of the Trials menu. (e.g. when leaving a Training Trial, you will return to the Training Trials menu.)
Game Content
New Hero Skins have been added to the store and made available as monthly rewards.
Herclaus - Cyber Justiciar
Zermes - Summer Delight
Trial Fixes
[Conquest Trial] Sulpicius should no longer cause a Conquest Trial to soft lock under certain circumstances.
[Conquest Trial] Resolved an issue where A.I. teammates would have their contributed Energy refunded at the end of the round if the player finished summoning the Hero Card.
The Spell Card “Divine Favour”, will automatically draw a Card when there is only 1 player to select.
The Summon Menu button will now always appear correctly if the mouse interacts with it during its appearance animation.
When the Hero Card summon limit is reached, the Summon Menu will now close automatically and all unused Energy will be refunded to players.
Improved stability of the “Keep or Redraw Cards” stage.
General stability improvements when players have varying amounts of ping.
Game Changes
Sulpicius has been added as a new A.I. opponent that can appear in Training Trials.
A.I. opponents now display unique titles.
Button prompts for Auto and Skip now appear on the pause menu during Story Mode.
A new setting has been added to select the appearance of the Astatos title screen. “Chapter I” is the only option currently available.
Game Fixes
The level-up reward displayed next level in the Level menu now displays the reward for the correct level.
Improved the method the game uses to detect the correct display resolution upon first boot.
Resolved an issue that prevented password reset and email confirmation emails from being sent.
Added error handling for when the Steam overlay is disabled, which can prevent you from making purchases in the Store menu, or from binding your account.
Fixed some menus not closing correctly when being invited to join a Trial by another player.
Known Issues
Playing a card at the same time the Trial Card changes elements, can sometimes result in you being unable to play any more cards when you should be able to.
Steam Summer Sale 2022
To the Crown Mages,
The Steam Summer Sale is here through till July 7! Although a small sale, if you're a fan of our music, be sure to check out the Original Soundtrack DLC for 10% off. Or invite some friends to play and save 19% off on the Game + OST bundle! Your support means a lot to us!
With that out the way, we're well along the way towards releasing v0.5 which should be PvE Part 2 with a playable tutorial for multiplayer. We hope players look forward to it in the coming weeks.
This small update changes Mukaki’s Takeover Ability and introduces some small fixes.
For the detailed changelog of changes implemented with Astatos v0.4.2, please read on below.
- From the team at Studio Klondike
Changelog
Balance Changes
[Takeover Trial] Mukaki’s Ability has been changed. The new Ability description reads: Players on Mukaki's side can play up to two Cards during the Trial Stage. (Passive) (5 Cooldown) Lose one Influence, add 1 Cooldown to Makari-Hari, swap all Cards with your opponent.
Gameplay Fixes
Fixed a situation that would cause Conquest Trials to soft-lock.
Game Fixes
A notification now correctly displays if the player cannot connect to the server upon launching the game under certain circumstances.
Astatos v0.4.1 Update
To the Crown Mages,
This update introduces a new mechanic into Takeover Trials, our first new merchandise for Astatos, plus various bug fixes.
For the detailed changelog of changes implemented with Astaos v0.4.1, please read on below.
- From the team at Studio Klondike
Announcing new Merchandise available at Pawprint Press
Go forth Crown Mages, with your Heroes and fellow summoners by your side! Our first new merchandise for Astatos is here! Two acrylic keychains sets featuring the Crown Mages, Gods, and Heroes from the game are available starting today!
Some leftover Kickstarter stock of the Astatos Seal T-Shirts and Astatos Tabletop Starter Editions (no expansions) have also been made available. (Really limited stock!)
New Features
Takeover Trial - Disparity: Disparity is gained whenever a player fails the Trial Stage. Gain enough, and you'll be able to activate a Disparity Action to help turn the tide of the Trial!
Select the Disparity bar to preview the current Disparity Action. When the action is available, select the bar again to activate it.
Currently, only the action Disparage is available for multiplayer. More Disparity Actions may be made available in the future.
Victory Condition Tooltip: When beginning the Trial, a tooltip will now appear displaying your current side, and the victory condition.
Store Update: The Pawprint Press tab has been added to the Store navigation. Here you can find various Astatos merchandise items. [Please note: You will be redirected to the Pawprint Press website to purchase items under this category.]
Changelog
Game Features
The Disparity bar has been added as a new mechanic during Takeover Trials.
A victory condition tooltip will now display at the beginning of a Trial.
The Pawprint Press category has been added to the Store.
Balance Changes
[Takeover Trial] Mukaki’s Ability has been changed. The new Ability description reads: Players on Mukaki's side can play up to two Cards during the Trial Stage. (Passive) (5 Cooldown) Lose one Influence, summon Makari-Hari, and swap all your Cards with your opponent.
Interface Changes
[Takeover Trial] The appearance of the Influence bar after losing a Influence point has been modified to make it easier to see how much Influence you have remaining.
Game Content
New Hero Skins have been added to the store and made available as monthly rewards.
Timaios - Coach
New entries have been added to the Astatos Manual covering the Disparity mechanic.
Trial Fixes
Player names with English characters did not appear on Hero Ability notices when playing in Traditional, or Simplified Chinese.
Spell card draw notices used in Aristotle's ability didn’t queue correctly, causing notices to be cut off rather than queued to display in sequence.
[Training Trial] A.I. opponents did not correctly discard cards as a part of Zermes' ability in Training Trials.
[Training Trial] The names of A.I. opponents did not display correctly on the Spell Card casting UI when playing in Traditional or Simplified Chinese.
[Training Trial] A.I. opponents on the opponent's team could submit cards in a Trial during Drusus' Hero Ability. Additionally, the Ability would soft-lock after the first Trial.
[Training Trial] Occasionally when adding a "Medium" A.I. opponent to a Training Trial, they would appear as “Hard”.
[Training Trial] A.I. opponents can appear to select themselves when they use targeted actions such as the Spell Card - Consecrate (Spell C).
[Training Trial] A.I opponents wouldn’t use Drusus successfully if they’re by themselves. (No human player on their side)
[Training Trial] Makari-Hari’s Takeover ability would give twice as much energy as desired when playing against a human player.
Game Fixes
Player profiles would appear as "tempName" on the lobby screen when performing a rematch with another player.
Signing out of your account via Main Menu > Profile > Manage Account would cause the game to hang on the loading screen rather than continuing to the splash screen.
When the server is unavailable, instead of displaying a message the game would freeze on some computers.
Please note that some of the above issues were fixed in a hotfix between v0.4 and v0.4.1.
Known Issues
Playing a card at the last-second during the Trial Stage, may result in unexpected behaviour, or Trial soft-locks in rare cases.
Playing a card at the same time the Trial Card changes elements, can sometimes result in you being unable to play any more cards when you should be able to.
Occasionally the “Keep or Redraw a Card” stage may result in unexpected behaviour where players may not draw back a full hand of cards, and the card colour counters may desync.
Astatos v0.4 Update
To the Crown Mages,
Today we’re pleased to have released the first step in our implementation of PvE for Astatos! In this update you will be able to play single player against A.I. in Trials.
While there’s a few kinks to work out in the A.I. logic itself, the feature represents a big shift in our development of the game—and required nearly as much code as the Trial system itself. You’ll be able to access the PvE from the new Training option in the Trials menu.
As mentioned above, this is Part 1 of the PvE updates planned. Throughout three updates, we hope to implement the most commonly requested features for the game.
Part 1: Training Trials where the player can play against A.I. opponents in single player matches. Allowing players to learn the game without the pressure of a real match, and earn daily rewards without the need to rely on other players— albeit at a reduced rate. (This patch!)
Part 2: Tutorial Trials where the player can learn how to play the game in a structured, and interactive tutorial. This update will involve many of the functions required for Story Trials, such as in-game dialogue, scenario scripting, and fully-local Trials. At this time we’ll look into introducing PvPvE for Conquest as well.
Part 3: Story Trials: Implementation of Trials into the Astatos’ story. As there will be significant design time involved, we may split this part to only cover implementation for the prologue chapter, then expand to cover chapter 1, and the upcoming chapter 2 at a later date.
Please note that the above is subject to change depending on the production schedule for the rest of the game, but we hope you look forward to the changes implemented in this patch, and our future progress for the game!
For the detailed changelog of changes implemented with Astatos v0.4, please read on below.
- From the team at Studio Klondike
New Features
Training Trials: A new PvE mode that allows you to play single player Conquest (4 person) and Takeover Trials against A.I. opponents.
A.I. opponents are available in 5 difficulty settings. Easy, Medium, Hard, Dummy, and Random Actions. When playing against a bot that is “Medium” or “Hard” difficulty, you will receive Monera and Reward Points for the Trial. You will not however earn EXP in Conquest, or Rank in Takeover Trials.
Even at the Hard difficulty, you should not expect A.I. to fill in for an experienced human Crown Mage. Rather, it is best to think of this mode as a way to learn the mechanics of the game, or test out new strategies.
Training Trials have their own Hero Pack equip settings that are separate from Conquest and Takeover Trials. Be sure to remember to check these before beginning a Training Trial as this specific setting is not currently saved between game restarts.
This feature is available from the “Training" button in the “Trials” menu. As this option replaces the previous “Tutorials” button that would access the text manual, that button has been moved to the “Training” menu.
Player Discovery: Within a lobby you will now see the numbers of total rooms, and joinable rooms for that game mode as well as a button to visit our official Discord. A room is joinable when it can be joined via Quick Play. A room is no longer joinable if it is private, or if it is already within a Trial. Players within Training Trials will show as non-joinable rooms. We hope this helps players better find each-other and enjoy the game in conjunction with the PvE features implemented in this patch.
Spell Card Names: After some UI adjustments, Spell Cards have now been given proper names in Trials. The name changes are as follows:
Spell A -> Altered Trial
Spell B -> Blessed Trial
Spell C -> Consecrate
Spell D -> Divine Favour
Spell E -> Exalted Element
We hope this change serves to make spell cards more recognisable, especially if more Spell Cards are added to the game in future updates.
Ping: Your ping is now visible from the pause menu during a Trial. We recommend playing Astatos with a ping below 300ms. If your ping exceeds a certain threshold, you may be forcibly disconnected from a Trial.
Changelog
Game Features
Training Trials have been added to the Trials menu. Allowing players to participate in PvE matches.
Server room counts have been added to the lobby interface, with separate counts for Takeover, and Conquest Trials.
Spell Cards have been renamed alongside the Spell Card draw UI for Aristotle being redesigned.
Server ping added to the lower-left corner of the pause menu during a Trial.
Balance Changes
The cost to summon Aristotle has been reduced by 1 Energy.
Game Content
New Hero Skins have been added to the store and made available as monthly rewards.
Varius - Control
Cerkles - Good Doctor
Game Changes
Music tracks have had their audio levels rebalanced so the volume is consistent between menus, gameplay, and story. Players may want to adjust their music volume setting after this patch.
Some sound effects have been updated.
The track “Louder Than Words” now plays during Training Trials.
Interface Fixes
Aristotle’s card draw mechanic now has a new pop-up which appears above passive heroes on the side of the screen.
Aristotle’s card pop-up will no longer conflict with Kyros’ card pop-up, which resulted in the opponent's card colour counters remaining visible when they should not have been.
Improved the way the lobby locks in players when a match is beginning, as well as the behaviour of the lobby timer under some scenarios.
Trial Fixes
Fixed various issues regarding high-ping and player desync in Trials. As a result, Trials should be significantly more stable under high-ping conditions.
Players will no longer be able to break the Hero Stage by performing actions within the last second.
Fixed an issue that caused Heroes to behave incorrectly when there was a significant ping difference between players.
If the timer runs out on the victory screen, the main menu may not load in some cases.
Fixed an issue that caused the Trials menu to open twice when returning from the victory screen.
Occasionally Sulpicius would fail to function, causing the Trial to soft-lock.
Occasionally Gaios would fail to function, causing the Trial to soft-lock.
Known Issues
Playing a card at the last-second during the Trial Stage, may result in unexpected behaviour, or Trial soft-locks in rare cases.
Playing a card at the same time the Trial Card changes elements, can sometimes result in you being unable to play any more cards when you should be able to.
Occasionally the “Keep or Redraw a Card” stage may result in unexpected behaviour where players may not draw back a full hand of cards, and the card colour counters may desync.
Astatos 0.3.2 Update
To the Crown Mages,
This update contains bug fixes and gameplay balance changes we’ve been working on while progressing towards finishing story content and new features such as vs AI/bots for Trials.
For the detailed changelog of changes implemented with Astatos v0.3.2, please read on below.
- From the team at Studio Klondike
Gameplay Changes
Alkaios’ Hero Ability has been partially reworked. His new ability text reads as follows: Each side can wager their Energy. The side with the largest wager draws two Cards per Energy wagered. Distribute as desired. All Energy offered is discarded. If tied, no side wins. This ability resolves at the end of the Hero Stage.
[Takeover Only] Drusus will now only draw 1 Card at the start of their Hero Ability.
[Takeover Only] Spell C now reads as follows: Remove one Energy from any opposing Hero in the game, except if they already have zero Energy remaining. This change means that Spell C can no longer target players during Takeover Trials. We’ll be monitoring this change to see player feedback.
Changelog
Game Fixes
Resolved a positioning issue with the skin “Zermes - Messenger of Paradise” on the main menu.
Tweaks to the display of text when a Hero Ability is used in a Trial.
Story Fixes
Typo fixes in English, Traditional Chinese, and Simplified Chinese.
Trial Fixes
[Conquest & Takeover] Fixed an issue where the activation of Caelius’ Hero Ability would result in the opposite side drawing 1 Card.
[Conquest & Takeover] Resolved an issue that resulted in Timaios’ Hero Ability sometimes failing to complete, as well as various other edge case scenarios.
[Trial Stage] Made changes to ensure players can always play cards after the Trial Card changes. (Please let us know if you see this issue occur again!)
[Trial Stage] Menus opened by Spell Cards will now close when the Trial Stage is over.
Server Fixes
Improved the performance of player statistics tracking and the loading of the Titles menu, consequently improving gameplay stability.
