If you’ve been following us in 2021 then you’ll be aware that we've gone through quite a journey with our gameplay changes this year. Our goal has been to lock-in the right core mechanics before we focus on a load of new content, polish and support for new platforms. After months of hit-and-miss attempts and community feedback, as of today’s update, we’re confident that we’ve locked-in most of those core mechanics. Of course, we'll still be working on balancing and other improvements based on all your games and feedback from here.
The changes below are described in comparison to the original Deceit game mode (2017-20). Skip to the Patch Notes section to see exactly what’s changed in today’s update.
Objectives
Items are now collected by starting and ending each objective at a reward crate. There are now more objectives to complete per area (18 on the ground floor). Only the middle area now offers a Double Objective, which means the shotgun, antidote and lethal injection are from normal objectives. Players can now (suspiciously) tamper with fuses bolted on to objectives in order to disable them. In addition Armour has moved from being found on the floor to an Objective as it is now more useful in combat at night. The list of items currently remains the same as before, but new items are coming soon!
Blood
The Infected players now share blood, so they're a team. You no longer need a full blood bar to transform into Terror form at night and there is no way to lose blood. When you have filled the blood bar you earn an execution and then work towards filling the bar again. Collect as many blood bags during the day as you can without being caught and if you haven't earned an execution then you can attack people at night to earn more blood (blood bags are no longer available at night). Beware, if you don’t collect enough blood bags you won’t have enough time to kill the innocent at night!
Generators
Fuses are no longer collected at night to open the doors, instead this is done by powering on generators. The number of generators required re-balances based on the number of people alive and involves positional play which ties into the new night combat. You can break fuse boxes during the day to reach the night faster.
Night Combat
Terrors will typically now spend more time running around attacking the Innocent, stopping them from doing generators and earning more blood. Innocent only see the other players as ‘ghost’ figures, and cannot use voice chat at night, so working out who is infected usually requires them to pay attention to actions during the day.
Combat between the Terrors and Innocent has been refined so that all items are effective in a similar way, causing Terrors to stagger for a period. This creates more of a chase sequence, so you’ll need to learn when it's good to fight back and when you should be running away. It might feel punishing as a Terror at first but know that with every encounter you're removing items from the Innocent later in the game. When Terrors are now 'killed' they go instantly into the vents so they can choose their respawn location. The existing terror abilities have been reworked to work with all these changes too.
We still have a lot in the works to improve the night combat experience further, including new terror abilities and new ways for the innocent to interact with the map; we look forward to sharing more on this soon!
Area Traversal
We've removed the need to run between areas after the lights come back on; instead you will be running into a transition door that will transition you to the next area instantly, where it will be the next day period. This works better with night-time anonymity, is clearer for new players, and it also helps us support the new maps and extra player numbers we are working on for the future. Players can now also end the game one floor early if they run into one of these doors whilst all the Infected are dead.
Core Tech
Our core technologies team have been working on DDoS protection and anti-cheat. We’ll be announcing more about this very soon.
Custom Options
We've introduced custom options that allow you to run private games for group sizes from 4 to 6. You can also toggle a number of game-mode settings (for example, to play the game without night-anonymity). We will continue to review these options and add the top player suggestions, including an upcoming “Legacy” preset so you can also opt to play a game mode very similar to the original version.
What’s Next?
Our work isn't finished here. We know that some of you will love these changes and get along with them straight away. Others may still be a bit confused by them which we think we can work through by working on your feedback and chipping away at our long list of polish and quality-of-life improvements.
In addition to these in-game changes we have some really exciting system updates for outside the game, including:
This summer we’ll be bringing an early look at the Labyrinth, a new rewarding progression system that ties together level, challenges, perks and some new content too.
There will be visual updates to the branding, user-interface and website of Deceit to have a more consistent style and recognisable aesthetic.
The story behind the Game Master and his test subjects will be revisited, expanded upon, and have more presence within the game and progression systems.
DLC packs will be beefed up and rebranded to give us a stronger stance going forward.
And by the time we get to Halloween we will be releasing Deceit 2022, a huge update we’ll be announcing more about soon.
Full Patch Notes
Objectives
The items rewarded from completing objectives are no longer automatically displayed on the ‘Q’ map. Instead, you can see what is inside each crate from a hologram above it. Once you've viewed the crate in person your minimap will update with the relevant item information.
Each Crate & Hologram is now coloured based on what type of item the crate awards.
Taken crates will now remain open, showing what item was once inside.
Armour is now only obtainable through an Objective. As well as benefiting you as usual in shootouts, armour will now temporarily stun a terror that tries to attack you, destroying it in the process.
The first & last floor Double Objectives have been removed with their rewards, antidote & lethal, now being available in regular Objectives.
Cameras and Torches now give you 100% battery when you pick them up. You are unable to collect any more of these, or armour, if you’re already at 100%. Cameras use 50% battery per flash.
Each Objective now has a ‘Tamper Box’ attached to the side of it. After a 1.5s channel this will cause you to destroy the Objective, stopping anyone from taking the item that was in the crate or double objective.
Reaching The Next Floor
Players are no longer automatically teleported to the next floor.
After enough generators have been completed 3 doors to the next floor will open, taking you to a paired door on the next floor.
If you fail to make it through the doors after a considerable amount of time, 60s, you will be eliminated from the game.
Infected players can remain in Terror Form on the previous floor and are able to execute Innocents if they wish.
Players will still be in their ‘Ghost Form’ whilst on lower floors.
If all Infected players are dead by the end of the middle floor you will win the game by entering these doors.
Night Time Combat
The amount of blood gained from Infected actions & the amount that is required to earn executes have both been adjusted.
Terrors are now illuminated by default, getting brighter the lower health they are. Once you’ve killed one they will disappear in a puff of smoke and respawn at a vent of their choice.
Hitting a Terror with any light item will stagger them. During this period (2.25s) the terrors have reduced vision and are slowed. For the initial part of the stagger (1.25s) they are also unable to attack or use their abilities. Hitting a staggered Terror with light will refresh the stagger duration, but won’t stop them from attacking or using their abilities again.
Terrors now transform back to human form instantly, instead of being downed first.
Terrors can only transform if they haven’t been in combat for the last 5s.
Stamina has been removed.
The movement speeds of all Terrors have been normalised to 160%, with a sprinting Human moving at 147.5%.
All Terrors now have 360 health.
The damage of all light items have been adjusted to suit the new Terror health values.
The hit detection for the Camera & Torch has been improved.
Cameras & Torches do less damage if the Terror is running away from you.
The Camera takes twice as long to recharge before you can use it again.
Terrors are no longer restricted from executing a player if they’re in the air.
The Terror’s attack is now the same range as its execution.
The Terrors now make more noticeable footstep audio when moving around.
Solo Infected players (be it via custom game options or your partner dying) are now granted the ‘Endling’ buff. Currently this gives them a 10% movement speed buff in Terror Form.
Terror swipes now deal 50 health, instead of 100. After hitting a player they are pushed forward slightly, given a movement speed buff & you receive a very brief slow.
Terrors now have different melee animations based on whether they’re going to miss, hit a player or hit a player with armour.
Terror Abilities
The Innocents are now revealed to the Infected via ‘Terror Sense’ periodically, instead of based on their actions. On the first floor they are always revealed, middle floor every 5s and final floor every 10s.
The Yeti now receives a 150 health shield when using their ability. This shield can be broken by either guns or light items. After 1 second of having the shield active it will lose 60 health per second until destroyed.
Any players hit by the Werewolf's 'Howl' ability or pulled by the Spider’s ‘Web Shot’ ability will now have their current interaction interrupted (e.g. taking a generator).
The Vampire’s ability has been reworked. After casting it for the first time the Vampire will leave behind a ghost version of itself. For the next 10 seconds the Vampire receives a 10% movement speed boost & the ability to return to the ghost version of itself.
The Spider’s ‘Web Shot’ cooldown has been reduced from 12 -> 10s.
Generators
Generators no longer respawn after being completed.
The time to take a generator has been reduced from 4 -> 3s.
There’s now an animation for taking the generator alongside audio.
You now need to complete 10/10/4 generators per floor.
Some generators are automatically completed depending on how many innocents and infected are left in the game.
There are 2 more generators than required to complete the night period. If there’s only 1 Infected alive, this is reduced to 1.
Generators are only outlined to those not in Terror Form. They will still be waypointed if someone starts powering one back up.
Players are no longer pushable when taking Generators.
Miscellaneous
Today marks a new season which also includes 4 new perks in the tree:
Field Medic - Gain a slight movement speed buff if you're able to antidote someone
Statically Charged - Gain a slight movement speed buff for a few seconds after finishing a Generator
Strong Scent - Terror sense reveals players for 25% longer
Power Trip - After all Generators are completed, reveal the locations of the Innocents for a few seconds
The perk 'Hyperaware' now only outlines Infected players transforming into Terror form.
We’ve temporarily disabled the Lumberyard as there were some changes we’d like to make to the map that we couldn’t fit into this release, we aim to have it live again next week.
In-game tips have been disabled and will be re-enabled in an upcoming release.
Everyone who participated in last weekend's beta has been awarded with their Beta Emblem & some Tokens as a thank you.
The first person pistol animations have been updated.
The Asylum & Forest have received significant lighting improvements.
The pistol’s tracer thickness has been reduced.
Nametags have been visually improved.
The length of the middle floor has been increased by 30s.
Fuse boxes on the first floor now reduce time by 25s, down from 30s.
3 pre-defined crosshair visuals are now available to choose between in the settings.
The escape door now requires you to interact with it to open it if there are at least 2 Innocents alive.
Players now ragdoll once they’ve been killed.
Terrors automatically sprint during the night period, no need to press ‘Shift’.
You can no longer pick up traps at night unless you have the 'Redistributable' perk.
All Blood Bag spawns are now static with 6 spawning on each floor.
Fixed several animation issues with using Vents.
You’ll now be informed about who is dead in the top left after a successful vote.
Our in-game translations have been updated thanks to our Community Translators.
See you in-game, The Baseline Team
Major Game Update - July 1st
Hello Test Subjects!
On July 1st we are releasing Deceit’s biggest update of 2021 so far, which is the culmination of all of our work since the last core update we released back in December. Thank you to everyone for your feedback in the last few months, and for your patience as we’ve taken the time to make sure we don’t rush these changes out.
Since December’s update one of the most heavily requested changes is for us to bring back running between the floors, avoiding an immersion-breaking teleport. So we’re bringing it back - but with a twist. Once all of the power has been collected, doors to the next area will open, however lights in the current area won’t turn back on. Terrors are still free to run wild and execute straggling innocents, but in doing so they risk their identity being found by the remaining players. Once a player gets to a marked door, they will be transitioned to a linked door at the next area, where they can either wait to see who trails behind them, or make a dash to get first dibs on their favourite items.
The area that’s had the most focus this update is changes to the night time combat system. With our December update we made changes that increase the amount of Terror vs Innocent combat during the night. However, we hadn’t yet improved the combat enough to create frequent compelling chase sequences, and make it clear enough what’s happening. We’ve often seen games played at the extremes - either Terrors are running rampant and are able to make multiple kills on the first night, or innocents are able to utilise their light items and fill generators before the Terrors can even get near to anyone. We’ve now made a bunch of changes we hope will allow for both teams to be able to juke and outplay each other accordingly. Below is a shortlist of some of the changes coming as part of this update:
Terrors now have a lot more health, however can also be “staggered” by damage.
Bullets now do less damage to Terrors, but light items are now power weapons that pack a real punch.
Armour is now only obtainable as a crate reward, and has been reworked to deflect damage to a terror, allowing an innocent a chance to avoid being executed.
Stamina has been removed - and movement speeds of innocents and terrors have been adjusted to account for this.
When reaching zero health, Terrors are no longer downed, and are instead banished to the vents, where they can choose where to respawn from.
Generators no longer respawn - giving the Terrors a chance to defend the last few, whilst the innocents must cause enough distraction to ensure they can get the power back on.
New interaction animations have been added throughout, to make things smoother and more intuitive.
In order to make these changes viable we’ve also adjusted some of the terror abilities to make them both more fun to use and pack a punch when you need them to.
‘Howl’ (Werewolf) - This ability now interrupts players as well as disorientating them - particularly useful to stop an innocent from being able to complete a generator.
‘Frozen Fury’ (Yeti) - When activated, the Yeti gains a damage shield that, after a second, decays over a second. Whilst the shield is active you will also not be affected by any new slows. Note: this shield is strong enough for a full-health Yeti to be able to tank a trap.
‘Swarm’ (Vampire) - When activated, the Vampire throws out a bat which marks a spot on the map for a period of time. Whilst the marker is still active, the vampire has a slight movement speed buff, and re-activating ‘Swarm’ will teleport you back to that spot on the map.
Outside of this there are a plethora of other changes that we’ve made to help immerse you into Deceit, a few of the key ones include:
Moving the Antidote and Lethal Injection from Double objectives to regular reward crates.
A revamp of multiple UI elements, including a new font.
DDoS protection technology that will aid in hardening our server infrastructure to attacks.
The ability to end the game in one of the first two areas if no Infected remain alive.
New custom options based on community requests.
In the lead up to the release of this update we’ll be running one final Beta test that all players are eligible to join. If you’d like to try an early version of this update out, join our Discord server and react to the message in the #get-roles channel. The dates for the beta are as follows:
Friday 25th June - 8-11pm BST Saturday 26th June - 12-3pm BST
From then, we’ll be looking at your feedback and polishing the update ready for release on July 1st, which is when the ranked season will also be resetting.
As we talked about in our last post, we’re building a major gameplay update for Deceit based on all of your games and feedback since our December update.
Last weekend we ran our first beta: thank you to everyone who joined us in playing on the test servers and filled out our feedback survey! If you were unable to make it, a list of the patch notes can be found here.
We had set a goal of achieving 70%+ positive or neutral player feedback before we’ll be happy to move forward with pushing these changes into live. The results of the survey showed that we achieved this with 72% of players responding positive or neutral to the overall beta changes. This also correlates with the end of game ‘smiley face’ survey of which 79% of responses were rated at least 3 out of 5.
The Next Beta
We’re very happy with the positive feedback, but we’ve also looked through many suggested improvements, and we have a few more changes we think are worth testing before we release everything into live. This means we’ll be running one more beta since we want to make sure nothing is rushed into the live game. We are working on the following areas for the second beta (though some may be subject to change):
Generators
There were many concerned comments about being locked into looking at a generator whilst it is being taken. In the second beta we will introduce an interactive animation for turning on a generator (similarly to opening the escape door), to make this feel smoother. In addition to this, we’re going to investigate allowing you to look around a limited amount whilst you are performing this interaction.
Secondly, there was a balancing problem in this beta where Terrors were often able to camp the last two generators that the innocents are trying to take to complete the night period. We’ll be addressing this twofold: tweaking the positioning of vents and generators to improve the map design to make the terrors weaker in this case, and adding one additional generator on the ground floor, so the terrors will have to defend three generators before the first night period ends.
Running To The Next Floor
One of the most common pieces of feedback we get from people who miss the classic game mode is the immersion of running to the next floor after a night period is over. For the next beta, we’ll be adding in a new transition feature that mixes the old with the new. Once the night period ends, terrors will be de-transformed and the gas will start. Players won’t be able to talk and will still be in their ghost character form. All players must then run to an escape door for that area which will, when entered, transition them to a linked entrance door on the next floor. If a player takes too long to move to the next floor, the gas will knock them out and they’ll automatically spawn at one of the entrance doors in the next area.
In addition to this, if all of the terrors are eliminated before the end of the first or second night, the escape door on that floor will end the game and the innocents will win there, instead of having to proceed to the very end of the game.
Terror Abilities
With the changes to combat that have been made in the first beta, the Yeti and Vampire’s abilities need to be reworked to be aligned with the new combat system. Please note: these are still very early in development and highly subject to change.
‘Frozen Fury’ gives the Yeti a damage shield that decays over a period of time. Note: this shield is strong enough to stop the Yeti from being downed by a trap.
‘Swarm’ throws out a bat which marks a spot on the map for a period of time. Whilst the marker is still active, the vampire has a slight movement speed buff, and re-activating ‘Swarm’ will teleport you back to that spot on the map.
Terror Senses
The current terror ESP outline system interferes with the day time gunplay too much. We are going to improve the visuals and re-work the “making noise” system for the next beta.
Blood
We think that we can improve the visual clarity of the blood bar, and of the blood bags in the map for the benefit of new players. We are also investigating ways that we can make the blood system work better when you are the last infected player left alive (e.g. a buff if you collect enough blood for two executions).
Objectives
There was mixed feedback on the change to the lethal injection (to be on a single-player objective). We want to test this more, since we have seen it introduce some very engaging gameplay. We are looking to introduce shoot-to-disable on crates (similar to the way you could shoot the levers in the classic game mode).
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And of course, in addition to all of these updates above there will be a variety of miscellaneous polish, bug fixes, balancing changes, further performance optimisations, and a new first person pistol animation set. We’ll also be adding The Forest to the map rotation, which will include various lighting improvements.
Want to take part? Similarly to the first, the second beta will run 2 play sessions as follows:
Friday 4th June - 8-11pm BST Saturday 5th June - 12-3pm BST
Be sure to keep an eye on our socials where we’ll be posting more information between now and then!
Over the last few months we’ve been working non-stop on the gameplay of Deceit with the help of your feedback. Our changes last December were met with mixed feedback and we knew we had a lot to work on. We’re now ready to test some of the most heavy hitting changes that you’ve been asking for. Some features inspired by the classic game mode, but we’ve also worked on some brand new improvements, all based on detailed review of your suggestions and what’s happening in your games.
We will be using our Beta program on Steam to test these changes. However, this time things will only go into the live game once we’ve had more time to polish them and the majority of the community agrees they’re ready. This means we’ll be running a public poll after the beta session, and will make a follow-up post with responses to all of your suggestions, and details on our next steps.
These gameplay changes have focussed on three major areas:
Night Combat - interactions between humans and terrors
Senses - what is highlighted to you through lighting, sound and UI
Immersion - how you interact with objects, items and move through the game
Alongside these major areas of focus, we’ve made miscellaneous changes to items and objectives to support them. Of course, we will also be continuing to release quick fixes and improvements from player suggestions, which will go straight into the live game through our regular updates.
Want to take part? Join the Discord and react to the message in the #get-roles channel! The gameplay sessions are as follows:
Friday 21st May - 8-11pm BST Saturday 22nd May - 12-3pm BST
FAQ
How does this differ from the last betas? The beta will still have some rough edges, but we’ve spent more time making sure we are ready for this one compared to our previous tests. We are also prepared to run as many betas as we need to ensure we only release changes that the community feels are ready.
How is balancing going to be dealt with? We are open to changing the balancing numbers and options that are enabled between casual and ranked games. However, balancing Deceit is very complex and we will be making a more detailed post about this topic soon.
How is feedback going to be gathered and actioned? Details on providing feedback will be shared in the beta channels on Discord. We will be publishing a public poll and detailed responses to your feedback in the days following the beta session.
If the beta is going to proceed, what percentage of yes votes are needed? We expect at least 70% positive/neutral feedback to consider releasing the changes. However, we may run multiple polls to make sure we aren’t getting biased samples. We aren’t giving you a guarantee that we’ll base the decision on any one particular poll, but we will be transparent with you and share the data we use to make this decision.
If this beta passes the vote, when will we see it on the live servers? This may be as early as the beginning of the next ranked season, but we will decide this based on feedback.
Is there anything missing from this beta? Yes -- not absolutely every improvement we’re working on will be in the first beta, but the majority will be and it includes all the ones which have a significant impact on strategy.
The Ranked season has been reset, bringing a new Perk Tree to complete! Our next season reset is scheduled for the 27th of May.
Any Trap placed on the ground can now be picked up by any player, provided they have space to do so. As part of this change the 'Redistribution' perk has been discontinued & Infected players can no longer permanently destroy traps (although they can still pick them up!).
The Asylum's 'Ward A' has had a re-vamp on the Ground Floor.
Adjusted how the firing of the Spider's web works so it isn't as affected by high latency, meaning the web will shoot out as soon as you press RMB.
Reduced the delay before the Spider terror pulls its web from 0.4s -> 0.3s.
A couple of crashes in the Tutorial have been fixed.
[FIXED] The spider's web is invisible until it sticks to something.
Patch Notes - v2021.3.3
Patch Notes
The Spider Terror now sprays its web whilst executing, wrapping up its victim.
Several walls in the Asylum have been updated to correctly allow projectiles (including the spider web) to hit them.
We've done a first lighting pass on the Manor in order to address how dark it can be for some players.
The number of votes required to eliminate a player is now determined when the player is downed. This means the voting requirement won't decrease if someone is eliminated whilst you're downed.
[FIXED] When being voted out you no longer hear the electrocution sound.
[FIXED] Several bushes in the final area of the Manor are no longer jumpable over.
[FIXED] The third person audio for the Spider & Vampire terrors doesn't play properly.
[FIXED] When loading the tutorial after playing a game you're met with a black screen.
[FIXED] Several on-screen prompts display 'V' for remote voting instead of 'X'.
[FIXED] Occasionally the ghost players are incorrectly displayed in full white.
After many years the Game Master has finally gotten round to developing a new virus, particularly targeting those of you with arachnophobia. His latest virus is concentrated with the venom of a spider he found in the Lumberyard. When mixed with a few other special ingredients it results in a half-human half-spider monster, with a powerful web-spinning ability.
Grab the Spider Pack today from Steam! Purchasers in the first week of it’s release will receive a 10% discount!
Shoot out a web from your mouth and depending on what it connects with the outcome changes. Hit a structure and after a short delay you will pull yourself towards it. Alternatively, connect with a player and after a short delay you will pull them in towards you. Depending on the situation you will want to use each of these to your advantage.
Execution: Cocoon
When you have earned an execution you can grab an Innocent player, pick them up, spin them round as you wrap them in your web, and leave them to suffocate.
The Spider is released with 6 cosmetic skins:
Spider - the default skin you get when purchasing the DLC
Black Widow - a jet black skin
Marvelous - a red and black skin
Easter Pattern - a cream skin with Easter egg and carrot pattern all over it - available only during the Easter Event
Rainbow - a shiny pearlescent skin - see Early Bird Bonus below
Peacock - a turquoise skin with orange spots and fur spikes
Early Bird Bonus: purchase the Spider DLC before midday BST on April 29th to receive the exclusive Legendary skin ‘Rainbow’ for your Spider Terror. This skin will never be available again after this promotion.
Patch Notes
The in-game escape menu now has sound effects when hovering and clicking buttons.
The vent icons now position correctly.
The DLC bundle available on Steam has been updated to include the Werewolf, Vampire and now Spider.
The Legendary Wakizashi (knife override) is still a bonus reward from the DLC bundle, however, if you already own this reward you will still keep it.
Terror crosshairs have been updated.
Reminder: the Easter Event is still going but ends on Monday 19th. This weekend is your last chance to grab what you can, including the Easter Pattern Spider skin which is only released in today's update.
See you in-game! The Baseline Team
Infected and Proximity Chat
Infected chat has been re-added to both matchmade and ranked games, as well as an option in custom games to enable infected chat during just the night, or also during the day.
The default keybind to vote using the “Remote Voting” custom game option has been moved to ‘X’, whilst ‘V’ is now used for infected voice chat. In text chat Infected can ‘Tab’ between human and Infected chat channels.
Proximity chat has been added to custom games. Two options have been added for configuring voice chat during both day and night periods allowing for: global voice chat, muted, or proximity at 5, 10, and 20 metres.
Custom games have been expanded to allow parties of 4 to play. Configure the game with either 1, 2, or ‘random’ number of infected, and see if you or your friends can escape.
Vent map icons have increased in size to make them easier to click.
The hold interaction circle now enlarges when channelling to be slightly more obvious.
The “Innocent can talk at night” game mode option has been removed, as it is now accounted for by the new voice chat option.
Interaction distance has been increased from 1.8 to 2 metres.
Blood boost for your Infected teammate being eliminated, or starting as a solo Infected has been decreased from 800 to 600.
The Easter event is still live. Grab as many cosmetics as you can before it ends on the 19th of April.
Next week we’re excited to be bringing you the first expansion since 2018: Spider DLC.
