Since the Mythgard acquisition in October, the team has been working hard to learn and master the systems that make it such a great game. We’re finally ready to release our first small (but official) update to Mythgard. Because there’s nothing player-facing in this update, we want to let everyone know what’s happening behind the scenes:
Expanding the Team: We’ve onboarded 16 developers onto Mythgard.
Build Pipeline: We created new development and testing environments for Mythgard.
Publishing Control: We’ve transferred Mythgard to our Apple, Google, and Steam developer accounts so we can publish updates.
Release Process: We’ve created a robust testing and release process so we can confidently release and revert.
Taking over Mythgard has been fun and exciting for us. We have some interesting content updates in the coming months:
Balance Pass: We’re working to make some balance changes, based on community feedback.
Onboarding Experience: We’re improving the new player experience to make the game more accessible and easier to learn.
Quality of Life: We’re tackling a huge pile of tech debt and quality of life issues.
Story Mode: The current storyline will get a re-release and continuation.
Expansion: Yes, we’re working on a new expansion!
Sincerely, The Monumental Mythgard Team
The Future of Mythgard
Dear Friends,
As you know, Mythgard was put into Maintenance Mode in early July. It was incredibly heartbreaking for us to do this to a game that we had worked so passionately on for so many years, but Rhino Games simply lacked the resources to continue. And, frankly, we were never able to market the game as well as it deserved.
Since then, I’m happy to say, an opportunity has arisen for us to resurrect the game that we love. Monumental, a studio of passionate and dedicated gamers, has expressed interest in carrying Mythgard’s torch into the future, and we will be transferring the game into their capable hands. Without this, Mythgard was doomed to slowly dwindle away. But with Monumental taking charge, it has a new chance at life. A call from the grave, if you will.
I sincerely, whole-heartedly wish them the absolute best in this endeavor. There’s even the possibility that some of my friends and teammates will join them, providing some measure of continuity to the direction of the game. I’m excited to see where they take it, and wish them glorious success.
phu
Live Balance Changes - Aug 13
The following live balance changes will be applied at 10:00 AM Pacific on August 13th:
Turn of Seasons
Starting Life: 2 → 1
After the last pass at starting life totals for Paths, most look to be in a better spot. Turn of Seasons was moved from +1 to +2 in that patch in anticipation of the impact of the other life total changes. It's overperforming at 2 so we're putting it back to 1.
Arctic Pyre
COST: 2B → 2BB
Arctic Pyre, like Knoll of Conquest, represents a bit too much power for Rainbow's End decks. While we do enjoy the cards we can create when doing enchantments that spawn minions on Awaken, we're reigning each of these back in just a bit.
Knoll of Conquest
...deal 2 damage to your opponent. → ...deal 1 damage to your opponent.
As stated above, just removing a bit of power from Pyre and Knoll and moving the damage deal to face should make it a little less likely you have to contest this every time it's played.
Iku-Turso
COST: 7GG → 8GG
Iku-Turso is a pretty large body for 7 mana so we're pushing it to 8 to slow down the power curve of the Dreni top end a bit.
Terminal Calculus
COST: 6GG → 7GG
Some more slowing of the Dreni top end. This did leave us with no 6 cost green spells so we're moving Sanguine Steel to 6, as it's not performed well since it was released.
Sanguine Steel
COST: 7GG → 6GG
Moving Terminal Calculus to 7 left a gap in the curve that we decided to fill by moving Sanguine Steel down. We don't expect this to make the card significantly better but now it might be worth thinking about.
Venomfang Mutant
1/4 → 1/3
Venomfang Mutant's large defensive stat line was contributing to rogue aggro strategies being hosed by control decks just a bit too often. Reducing its health should allow for more clean kills where aggro decks aren't throwing all their bodies to a field of 2 Venomfang Mutants.
Shimmer on the Sand
...deal 2 damage to the minion... → deal 3 damage to the minion...
Orange has been fairly weak for a while now so we're making a few targeted buffs to some of its lesser-played cards.
Lamp of Wonders
Divination 4 → Divination 5
This change is particularly exciting. Lamp of Wonders was definitely not a weak card before but wasn't really showing up outside of Rainbow's End decks. We think this in conjunction with a change we're making to Notarize Reality could make for some neat use for Lamp outside Rainbow decks while also still giving some help to Rainbow decks affected by the nerfs to Arctic Pyre and Knoll of Conquest.
Notarize Reality
COST: 2O → 1O
Moving Notarize Reality to 1 is a little scary. We have this dream where some new aggro strategies around using Notarize on 1 to hit a buffed minion on 2 could open up some playability for some otherwise lesser-played 2-drops. This is one we'll keep a close eye on and follow up on if needed.
Arcanovore
6/3 → 6/5
Arcanovore was launched in a weaker state due to how potentially large it gets. We've found that to not be the case in practice and will move some additional power into the initial body.
Comb Trader
2/5 → 2/6
Giving Comb Trader an extra health should make it a bit stickier and more likely you can live your item-flinging dream more than once.
Mirror Pack
COST: 3PP → 2PP
This change is not going to affect when Mirror Pack is played but will give you the 1 extra mana for aforementioned item-flinging dreams.
Any copies of Arctic Pyre, Knoll of Conquest, Iku-Turso, Terminal Calculus, or Venomfang Mutant that were crafted on or after July 25th will be eligible for a full refund.
Maintenance Mode
Dear Players,
It’s with great sadness that I announce that Mythgard will be entering Maintenance Mode. The team fought tooth and nail over five grueling years trying to make it happen, but the CCG market is a different place than it was all those years ago, with several large companies able to totally outspend us on both content, but far more importantly, on marketing.
I personally have put the large part of my life savings into this game. Most of the team have worked at far below market rates to make it. All out of love for what we were doing. I’ll forever be in their debt for following me into this venture, for their tireless hard work, and for the precious things they’ve sacrificed on the way. As time passed, our team members have dropped off one by one due to a need to provide for their family and to seek some measure of financial security. I don’t think any of them did so because they truly wanted to. At last, our numbers have dwindled to the point that it’s simply no longer possible to continue creating additional content.
I’ll forever be grateful to the many players who spent time and money on the game. Over the years, I’ve met a lot of truly wonderful people in the community, who I only hope that we’ve managed to provide some fond memories.
I especially want to thank Noah, who has volunteered his time, for as long as he’s able, to continue to provide community support and what development effort he can towards live balance. He’s been an absolute wonder, and a joy to work with. I also want to thank both Noah and Mantid for their work on Hub, foxfire_kadrpg for his absolutely amazing and adorable axolotl emotes, nirast for running the outof.cards Mythgard portal, the folks at 983 (especially Markthius) for their work on tournaments, nelzya for being one of the very first players of the game and sticking with us all this time, and all of the various many wonderful people who over the years created content, evangelized the game, and otherwise supported us.
What does maintenance mode mean?
We’ll no longer be working actively on a large expansion set. Some of the team members have been discussing how to make smaller sets using licensed art on a volunteer basis, but there’s no guarantee that we’ll be able to do this effectively. The servers will remain up as long as I can reasonably pay for them out of pocket. As I mentioned above, Noah has volunteered to help with balance changes should any become advisable.
Ranked seasons for 2021 will continue as planned. Beyond that, there will be eight ranked seasons per year. They will be split relatively evenly across the year. We still plan on holding the third EOS tournament on the July 10th weekend, as that has already been paid for.
For now, players will still be able to buy mythril. Please view any money you spend on Mythgard as a donation to keep the servers up a little longer, as that’s where it will go. Similarly, you may wonder why we’re shipping the paid Titan battle pass at the same time as announcing maintenance mode. The reason is fairly simple - it was already long done by the time we got to this point, and while we could have delayed the announcement of maintenance mode to see if we could make some extra money off of it, we’d rather not do.
Thank you all again for all the amazing support over the years, and for making Mythgard such a fun project to work on.
-phu
Patch Notes V20.4
Maintenance Mode
We’re extremely saddened that Mythgard will be entering Maintenance Mode. Please see this post for more information.
Currently, there is no time limit on completing the battle passes
Added 5 new learning puzzles
Signups Open for EoS Qualifier III - $1000 Prize Pool
Signups for the next End of Season Qualifier are up now in-client. Battle it out for your share of the $1000 prize pool as well as Qualifying Points for the Mythgard World Championship later this year.
The tournament is open to all players in Silver rank or above and will take place in 2 parts. Day 1 will be a Swiss Best of 3 Conquest tournament on July 10th. Day 1 will be broadcast by Rhino Noah and a rotating cast of co-hosts. The top 8 players from Day 1 will move on to a Day 2 tournament on July 11th.
Day 2 will be a single elimination Best of 3 Conquest tournament and will be broadcast on the official Mythgard Twitch channel by Flake and Christo of 983 Media.
For more information on tournament formats, read this post.
Please note that the broadcast will be on a 15 minute delay. Any players in the tournament who are streaming their own matches are advised to also stream on a delay and/or otherwise conceal their hand on their own broadcast to avoid potential problems with stream sniping.
Payment will be distributed by 983 Media. Winners must have a verified Paypal account to claim winnings. Players qualified for the Top 8 must check-in with a tournament Admin in the official Mythgard Discord within 12 hours of the day one conclusion. All Top 8 players need access to the Mythgard Discord during the top 8 for event coordination purposes. Players not in the Discord will be disqualified and will NOT be eligible for prizes. Rulings made by tournament admins and organizers are final. This includes, but is not limited to, restarting/delaying tournament games to fit the production schedule.
The Winter War Season 3 Qualifier
The third Winter War End of Season tournament will take place on July 10th-11th and will be hosted in collaboration with 983 Media. With plenty of QP for the 2021 World Championships and $1000 in cash on the line, do you have what it takes to take home the title this season?
The tournament is open to all players in Silver rank or above and will take place in 2 parts. Day 1 will be a Swiss Best of 3 Conquest tournament on July 10th. Day 1 will be broadcast by Noah and a rotating cast of co-hosts. The top 8 players from Day 1 will move on to a Day 2 tournament on July 11th.
Day 2 will be a single elimination Best of 3 Conquest tournament and will be broadcast on the official Mythgard Twitch channel.
For more information on tournament formats, read this post.
Please note that the broadcast will be on a 15 minute delay. Any players in the tournament who are streaming their own matches are advised to also stream on a delay and/or otherwise conceal their hand on their own broadcast to avoid potential problems with stream sniping.
Payment will be distributed by 983 Media. Winners must have a verified Paypal account to claim winnings. Players qualified for the Top 8 must check-in with a tournament Admin in the official Mythgard Discord within 12 hours of the day one conclusion. All Top 8 players need access to the Mythgard Discord during the top 8 for event coordination purposes. Players not in the Discord will be disqualified and will NOT be eligible for prizes. Rulings made by tournament admins and organizers are final. This includes, but is not limited to, restarting/delaying tournament games to fit the production schedule.
