Chat

• The Profanity Filter is now on by default
  
• Certain words are now filtered regardless of the profanity filter being disabled. This is to reduce cases requiring moderation. Please do not attempt to circumvent this if you see you are typing words that are censored, or you may find yourself on the other end of a temporary or permanent suspension. Sorry.
  

User Interface

• fixed an issue where 2x2 targeting would use the small nodes instead of a 2x2 node on the map, which could lead to certain parts of the 2x2 selection to not correctly activate abilities (i.e., when you would select a part of the 2x2 grid that wasn't the top node)
  
• fixed an issue in which a fatal game error on the server would not correctly show the end game screen and the players would see error messages about it not being their turn or that they are not the controller of units that they owned (since the game was in a stopped state on the server)
  
• fixed a number of incorrect controller prompts (playstation when xbox controller or steam deck, or appearing when no controller is present)
  
• When the username and password is saved and the game is started, the login button will be highlighted rather than the username field (controller quality of life fix)
  

Art & Effects

• fixed an issue that could cause lines to persist from certain visual effects (paralyzed, immobile, invulnerable, etc)
  
• added a new effect for Spell Resistance which should help with visual performance
  

Performance

• fixed an issue which could cause errors that were logged when transfiguring, which could impact performance
  
• fixed logs printing in the unity log which should have not been
  

Descriptions and In-game Messages

• fixed condition description for Sabotage: Armor
  
• fixed spell text for Unobstructed View not appearing in game
  

Art & Effects

• Significantly optimized some visual effects using lines (impervious, impenetrable, immobile). This is especially visible when a large number of units with these effects are in play, specifically in Marshes of Madness scenario 2. Note: performance will still be degraded in that scenario, but it should no longer drop to 1-2 fps
  
• Made general optimizations to how the client retrieves some animation positions
  
• Fixed a performance issue in which an Avatar that had transfigured which was damaged before transfiguring and was then damaged after would cause both player's clients to become unresponsive (yes, this is the bug you think it is)
  
• Corrected an issue in which the faction specific avatar bases were not being displayed
  
• Fixed a visual sort order issue with the unit art for Myx Hurricane
  
• Corrected an issue in which spells and abilities that had effects drawn with a number of rectangles were not being shown in the Unity client. The list of things affected by this is very long, and basically is anything that had a beam effect going into the sky and a number of things where small pixels were used as "ashes", etc. Of particular note, this effected Sapping Beam, Thaw, Draconic Pulsar, Puppet Master, Channel abilities, Gravetend, Aid abilities, Dark Summons, Mental Link, Acrid Smoke, Scorch the Earth, Domain abilities, Annihilate, Converging Portals, ...
  
• Fixed some performance issues that could occur at the start and end of games due to an incorrect logging condition
  
• Made some optimizations to how a unit's visual position is calculated
  
• Fixed an issue in which effects that depended on getting a position from a part of the animation would throw an error and not render. This included:
  
  
  
  • Flamestrike
    
  • Flamethrower
    
  • Acid Breath
    
  • Arctic Bolt
    
  • Frost Cone
    
  • Freeze
    
  
  
• Fixed an issue in which units with composited effects could have those effects not face the correct direction (Avatar armor & weapons, Hydraxor heads, etc)
  
• Fixed an issue where line effects could stay present after they were supposed to be removed
  
• Fixed an issue in which some visual effects would not be positioned correctly depending on if the unit is facing left or right
  
• Fixed some visual issues with the effects for Invoke: Intercedence and Invoke: Vothsair Crush
  
• Reduced the number of particles when Domain abilities go off for performance
  

User Interface

• When a game ends by a means other than the shrine being destroyed (i.e., surrendering), there is now text below the victory/defeat header that indicates as such
  
• When observing a game and the game ends, the end game screen will now appear with details of the game ending rather than just unceremoniously dumping you to the lobby
  
• Made some adjustments to the Login screen for usability and in order to clearly show that there is a way to register in the client rather than going to the website
  
• The highlight in the rune dock will no longer appear if no controller is present since it had no effect anyway
  
• Fixed an issue in which the selection cursor could potentially not appear while in game
  

Descriptions and In-game Messages

• Fixed the in-game description of Darkmarsh Blackstaff linking to the description of an erroneous version of Amplify: Poison
  
• Fixed description text for Elemental Nexus abilities and added correct linkage so that they show ability flyouts
  
• Corrected an issue in which the name for the K'Thir Forest global was shown as "effect.k"
  
• Fixed descriptions for the conditions Poisoned, Scoured, and Diseased
  
• Improved the description of "Wind Cloak" from Zephyr Shield (and other things)
  

Sounds

• Added a less grating sound for the K'Thir shrine effect that plays on turn begin
  

Balance Changes and Server-side fixes

Abilities

• Invoke: Confessor's Exaction - Fixed functionality of ability, reduced range to AOE4
  
• Invoke: Lifeleech - reduced range to AOE4
  
• Invoke: Icefang Rumble - Fixed functionality of ability, reduced range to AOE4
  
• Invoke: Veil of the Mind - reduced range to AOE4
  
• Invoke: Warbeast Roar - reduced range to AOE4
  
• Invoke: Sarnghavian Rage - Fixed functionality of ability, reduced range to AOE4
  
• Invoke: Intercedence - Fixed functionality of ability, reduced range to AOE4
  
• Invoke: Vothsair Crush - Changed to give Scolded 2, reduced range to AOE4
  
• Fixed an issue in which Warchief: Stone Clan, Warchief: Storm Clan, and Warchief: Blood Clan would give another unit the ability on death of the warchief even if another unit already had Warchief.
  

Champions

• Bastion the Avenger now has Voice of the Clans rather than Warchief: Storm Clan
  
  
  
  • Voice of the Clans - When this unit enters play, it gains a copy of Warchief: Blood Clan, Warchief: Stone Clan, and Warchief: Storm Clan if any other friendly unit has that ability. When a friendly champion enters play that has one of those abilities, this unit gains a copy of that ability.
    
  
  

General

• Fixed an issue where the client could not correctly load into the lobby when returning to the lobby from a game
  
• Fixed a number of errors which could spam the Unity player.log
  
• Fixed an error that could occur while observing a game related to unit animations
  

Resolution

• Switching to another application window or moving the mouse off the screen with multiple monitors while in Borderless Fullscreen mode no longer minimizes the game
  

User Interface

• While observing a game, the on screen messages for turn changes now list the player's name rather than just "Opponent's Turn"
  

Art & Effects

• Fixed the location visual for Unstable Ground
  
• Optimized the effects for Swarm abilities (including Gift of Fertility)
  
• Adjusted the effects for the spell Lightning Storm
  

Sound

• Fixed the sound for the K'Thir shrine and nora font effect to no longer be proportionally louder with the amount of captured fonts
  

User Interface

• Fixed an issue that caused popups for mechanics and abilities to be cut off when they had a reference to another ability or condition
  

• Made some further optimization passes at a few random things
  

• Fixed a visual error that could occur on certain line drawn effects (impervious, etc)
  
• Optimized the effect for the relic Grim Well
  
• Optimized the effect for the ability Locust Cloud
  
• Fixed a graphical error with the ability Solar Flare
  
• To celebrate the Pox anniversary, added High res art for Ironfist Paladin, Elven Mage (LE), and Bile Zombie
  

• Added missing combat log text for the abiliy Impair Vision
  
• Tweaked the combat log text for the Buffer unit condition
  
• Fixed unit condition description for Flying
  

Performance

• Switched to a more optimized line drawing tool, which fixes certain effects (Shrine Spell Prevention, Weaken Spells, Paralyzed, etc) causing the client to become unresponsive
  

User Interface

• Fixed equipment not showing abilities and mechanics in game when viewing the Rune
  

Descriptions and In-game Messages

• Fixed part of the description for the equipment Pestilence being cut off in-game
  
• Changed the description of the spell Evolve so that it shows the given ability in the rune display while in game
  

Performance

• Optimized sprite renderer to not make some unnecessary Unity operations every frame
  
• Optimized lower user interface to not rebuild the button display when a champion is selected, which could cause performance issues if something modified the stats of that champion repeatedly (e.g., Marsh Awakening with Water Front)
  
• Optimized the Rune Dock to not attempt to sort itself multiple times in one frame, which caused hitching when turns ended
  
• Optimized some operations related to network messaging
  

Descriptions and In-game Messages

• Fixed incorrect grammar in description of SPD stat
  
• Added missing combat log text for Death Harvest ability trigger
  

Controller Support

• pressing B/Circle on the main menu now brings up a prompt to quit
  
• pressing any controller direction on the main menu while no button is highlighted will now correctly highlight the top button (Ranked Play)
  

User Interface

• fixed an issue with the rune manager showing blank rows below the current row even though there are more rows of runes for every 4th or 5th row
  
• fixed the rune manager occasionally showing no runes and requiring the user to scroll to show filtered runes when less than one row of runes were found for a search term or filter
  
• fixed an issue where the rune manager would stop scrolling correctly when changing resolutions
  
• fixed issues with the rune manager not correctly working at non 16:9 resolutions
  
• fixed an issue where the deck manager would not show the currently selected deck sometimes when first loading into the deck list
  

Art & Effects

• optimized the effect for transfigure (mostly by removing a lot of unnecessary particle effects from an otherwise cool looking effect)
  
• optimized the renderpath to not do a number of unnecessary operations every frame
  
• added a catch to clean up unused sprites from visual effects in certain specific cases
  
• fixed the missing weapon from ironfist avatar while in statue form
  

Descriptions and In-game Messages

• fixed the spell Inspiration having no text when in game
  
• fixed an error with the description of Underdepths Exploit while in game
  

Misc

• fixed an issue that could prevent certain Runes from being revealed in the Rune dock when the user's operating system was set to Turkish
  
• the production client will no longer show most messages in the generated log file except for error messages
  

July 2022 client update release

Performance

• Made significant improvements to performance of "map grid" (both selection grids and targeting/spell presence as well as the toggleable visual grid with icons)
  
• Made improvements to performance of everything that uses "sprites", i.e. visual effects, units, ui, basically just about everything
  
• Made improvements for an issue that was causing a lot of memory allocation/deallocation due to something that got changed in the conversion from Java to C# .net (Unity)
  
• Fixed the visual effect for Ice Stars so that it doesn't spin up 18000 sprites (not a typo) on cast and lock up or crash the client
  
• Fixed an issue that caused a lot of errors to happen when casting Ice Storm or when Arctic Trap went off (causes client performance issues from logging, even with fix this effect doesn't show up completely. need to rework some code to have support for what it was doing in the old GL renderer)
  

Controller Support

• Added support for controller on login screen and in user registration
  
• Added support for showing the on screen keyboard when using a steam deck on the login and registration screens
  
• Fixed an issue with controller input getting stuck when showing an error modal on the login screen (action button was activating login rather than hiding error prompt)
  
• changed the display for pressing and holding to end turn to a more standardized radial fill around the prompt
  
• Fixed the popup for adding champion points showing playstation buttons both for non playstation controllers as well as showing the icons when no controller is present
  
• Fixed some controller icons in the bottom controller button legend always showing playstation buttons (option and touchpad)
  
• Controller icons are always present by default when the device is detected to be a Steam Deck
  

Resolution and Display Mode Enhancements

• Added a new dropdown in the options screen for selecting resolutions. Additionally, this list is now driven by dynamic population of resolutions based on the supported resolutions of the machine
  
• Added ability to select resolutions with different refresh rates
  
• Added display mode selection, which allows the exclusive fullscreen option as before, but now has the option for borderless fullscreen / borderless window
  

User Interface

• Cleaned up some tooltip issues (Factions now displays "Sundered Lands" instead of "sl" in factions list of rune tooltip, made location appear above "height" in node tooltip, made Terrains use localized values rather than the raw keys so that it says "Ice" instead of "ice", etc)
  
• Reworked the interface for the turn indicators, changed text colors as per community feedback, got rid of garish green arrow and made new selection graphics (no skeleton hand though, sorry)
  
• Added new functionality so that runes now correctly show their dual faction icon (matches how the web does this)
  
• Fixed some more instances of icons in the client when no controller is present. Specifically, the queued popup and the custom game popup (keep reporting these please)
  
• Rescaled ability icons for higher clarity as well as more efficient memory compression
  
• Passive abilities now use the higher res icons that the activated abilities use
  
• Updated the icons for Exploit abilities
  
• Fixed an issue where Conditions in the Rune Details popup all showed a generic "physical attack" icon rather than the condition icon
  
• Fixed an issue in which the chat window was not positioned correctly in the lobby and some text was visible
  
• Fixed an issue in which the chat tabs had a portion of their graphic visible in the chat window itself
  
• Fixed an issue in which the chat tabs could have the incorrect unselected state which would cause overlap
  
• Changed the rune details popup to be over the chat interface in the Rune Manager
  
• Fixed an issue that prevented the forgot password option rollover/selection state from appearing
  
• Fixed an issue that could cause the forgot password button to not work
  
• Fixed an issue in which message responses related to readying/unreadying in custom games were not being processed by the game client (this could cause some mismatches in client state, etc)
  
• Fixed an issue that caused the start game sound when readying to play at twice the normal volume so as to protect BrokenNeck's ears
  
• Added a new icon for when images are missing or could not be loaded rather than loading the artwork for Ancestral Avenger
  
• Reworked the display on the rune details popup slightly and changed text to be rendered with a better text renderer and a slightly bigger view of the ability icons
  
• Added new icons for Haste and Stall
  
• Fixed an issue where split faction runes would not show their secondary faction when viewing them in game via the rune details (right click) screen
  
• Fixed activated ability buttons so that the icon graphic is also faded when the ability is not usable (matching the ability button frame)
  

Descriptions and In-game Messages

• Fixed missing name/description for LE Grimlic of K'Thir
  
• Fixed incorrect description for Sheoul Firebow
  
• Fixed an issue where Beset was not showing its ability description
  
• Fixed description of Summon: Boghopper Zombie
  
• Fixed description of effect from the spell Snuff
  
• Fixed in game description of Cursed Temple
  
• Fixed in game description of Illuminated condition (and Discovery Spell)
  

Art & Effects

• Reworked the map object rendering codepath so that if a object or effect is not registered to be "drawn" that frame, it will turn that object off (this should help with lingering visual effects, although we still need to find more root causes for this stuff)
  
• By user request, reverted a change that made units not use bilinear/trilinear filtering. This makes the sprites less pixelated looking. However, this reintroduces a minor issue with sprites bleeding into other frames which causes small black lines. We will look into other solutions for this in a future patch
  
• Added some higher quality rune art for a number of runes. this will be shown in the client in leiu of the lower quality art when it is available if the system resolution is greater than 1280x800 (and it is not disabled in the Options)
  
• Fixed an issue which could cause some visual effects to be misaligned or to not move when the map is panned. the list of abilities and spells this potentially effects is too long to list. please use the #client-update-issues channel in the community discord to report any effects that are broken
  
• Fixed issues with some map objects double rendering (could cause darker shadows, etc)
  
• Fixed missing map objects on Ruins of Valdac map
  
• Significantly lessened the amount of sprites displayed when using the ability Elemental Storm: Poison
  
• Fixed an issue that could cause significant hitching when a champion with Portal (and a couple of other abilities) was revealed in the dock or deployed
  
• Optimized the effect for Blood Dispersal
  
• Fixed an issue with the spawn visualization for Maxxarek
  
• Fixed an issue with Maxxarek and Myx Hurricane visually enlarging when they are the target of a Relocation ability (this possibly affected other champions that use composite sprites)
  
• Added a minor visual effect and sound for Catalyst: Frost
  
• Fixed an issue that could cause the foil effect to show up on LE Grimlic of K'Thir
  
• Fixed sprite art for Poison Serpent
  
• Fixed a large amount of spells and abilities that were using incorrect positioning for their effects
  
• Fixed the positioning of death effects of some shrines (fw, fs, sp)
  
• Reduced the amount of time the chat bubble effect appears when a unit 'talks'
  
• Fixed the ironfist avatar missing its level 1 (2?) weapons while in statue form
  
• Fixed an issue that could cause the transparency from Stealthed or Incorporeal
  
• Added a visual effect and sound for Hunter: Soultapped
  

Balance Changes

Community

PoxNora Client update

June 2022 Update Notes

• Upgraded the Pox Nora client from Unity 5.6 to Unity 2021.3 (LTS). This is a significant upgrade that includes over 5 years of engine improvements and changes from the Unity team.
  

• With this release, there is a new 64-bit client and a build for Apple Silicon to improve compatibility with newer Apple devices
  

• Controller buttons are now only shown if that controller type is present and supported
  
• - there may be some screens that still have controller buttons which will be corrected in a later update
  
• Added correct button prompts for ABXY controllers (Xbox, etc)
  
• Fixed the options screen being inaccessible on Xbox controllers
  
• Fixed help and the pause menu being inaccessible on Xbox controllers
  

• Fixed an issue where the text for Heroic Quests and Daily Quests could be truncated
  
• Improved the clarity of some fonts by switching to a newer Text renderer in many places
  
• - Due to the amount of work that this requires, this was done sporadically in specific key places. Further work will most likely be done on this in later updates
  
• If login fails due to steam having no connection, a different error message will appear besides "invalid user name or password"
  
• Updated the interface for "deck validation" and added additional handling for if deck validation fails for some reason. additionally, cleaned up the display of invalid decks for things such as solo campaigns that have deck restrictions
  

• Fixed the text for "terms of service" and "privacy policy" being cut off in new user registration
  
• Fixed rollover not working on "register" text button on the login screen
  

• Fixed chat not appearing in the text bar on certain resolutions
  
• Fixed an issue wherein chat would not correctly display if it needed to wrap to multiple lines.
  
• - this primarily affected the /who command
  
• Changed the behaviour of text that is wrapping to multiple lines to not break words into multiple lines unless the word spans the entire width of the intended area
  
• Combat messages will no longer show up in the Global chat tab during a game
  

• Fixed deck name being misaligned when viewing game on resolutions with an aspect ratio other than 16:9
  
• Added an additional effect for foil runes (this will appear on all places that show the rune)
  
• The active deck is now selected and scrolled to when opening the Deck Manager
  
• Fixed less than 5 runes appearing in a row when using a non 16:9 resolution, which could really break up the scrolling functionality of the rune manager
  
• Filters for Champions (race, class) no longer hide all non-Champion runes if the filter "None" is not selected
  
• Fixed the full name of Runes not appearing for Runes with long names (i.e., "Angel of Nourishment", etc)
  
• Made adjustments for reability and usability to the options in the Rune Filters screen
  

• Fixed an error that could occur in the solo play screens in which some screen elements were not removed in some cases
  

• Fixed the following maps having incorrect map data
  
• - Forglar Swamp
  
• - Forsaken Waste
  
• - Savage Tundra
  
• - Shattered Peaks
  
• - Tundra Lake
  
• - Ironfist Mountains
  
• - K'thir Hill
  
• - Nora Glades
  
• - Lost City
  
• - Elemental Plateau
  
• - K'thir Hill 4
  
• - Ironfist "Alternate"
  
• - Brood pits "Alternate"
  
• Added new icons for the conditions Fatigued and Engaged
  

• Fixed idol art for LE elven mage
  
• Fixed the idol art for the Sporedrop Mushroom relic
  
• Fixed an issue that prevented certain location effects to not always appear on all affected squares, or could make multiple instances of location effects to not appear when multiples of them were active. this affected the following:
  
• - Ice Trap
  
• - Fire Trap
  
• - Poison Trap
  
• - Acid Trap
  
• - Boulder Trap
  
• - Poison Cloud
  
• - Hungry Dead
  
• - Locust Plague
  
• - Choking Stench
  
• - Elsarin Night
  
• - Fog of Ancients
  
• - Abominable
  
• Fixed an issue that caused some effects that draw with circular lines to not appear. this affected the following:
  
• - Grim Aura
  
• - Desecration
  
• - Desecrated Zone
  
• - Cleanse
  
• - Battle Drum
  
• - Death Knell
  
• - Invoke: Warbeast Roar
  
• - Death Nova: Skeletons
  
• - Drudgery
  
• - Motion Sensor
  
• - Holy Light
  
• - Psychic Conundrum
  
• - Vex Cor Pram
  
• - Lay Hands
  
• - Blessed
  
• - Font Blessing
  
• - Restraining Aura
  
• - Chains of Corruption
  
• - Distracted
  
• - Burdened
  
• - Paralyzed
  
• - Twisted
  
• - Balancing Act
  
• - Sermon
  
• - Tainted Statue
  
• - Immobile
  
• - Turtled
  
• - Elsari Coven
  
• - Demoralized
  
• - Unpowered
  
• - Impervious
  
• - Dragon God's Staff
  
• - Cleansing Flame
  
• - Dispel
  
• - Dispelling Blows
  
• - Pure Fire
  
• - Purge
  
• - Oblivion Shield
  
• - Relieve
  
• - Cleansing Mist
  
• - Mika's Healing Aria
  
• - Soothing Aura
  
• - Sacred Temple
  
• - Cleanse
  
• - Judgement
  
• - Nature's Blessing
  
• - Cleansing Storm
  
• Fixed issues with portions of maps being displayed at an incorrect size, which led to skewing at the right hand side and at the bottommost inaccessible area of the map and caused overlay graphics and visual effects to not correctly line up
  
• - in particular, this fixes the lava on underdepths and the treeline on k'thir maps
  
• Changed the import settings of all champion and relic sprites so that they no longer use bilinear filtering, which could cause some lines to bleed onto the edges of other sprite frames
  
• Fixed an issue in which the effect for Impervious would not play on the unit it was being used on
  

• Fixed an issue that would cause the movement grid of a selected champion to be incorrectly recalculated when another unit was moving, which could cause that champion to be issued a movement path that could lead in an incorrect (and often opposite) direction
  
• - yes, this is the bug you think it is
  
• Changed the "screen message" effect so that it is now dynamicly timed so that the time of the message is shorter or longer depending on the amount of text shown
  
• - as part of this change, the "Opponent's Turn" / "Your Turn" screen message only shows for 2 seconds instead of 4 seconds, and the time before that effect shows is now 0.5 seconds instead of 1. Since this screen message is a blocking effect, this means you have an extra 2.5 seconds of unimpeded gameplay per turn
  
• Adjusted the position of condition icons in the lower HUD slightly to give it more space from the continuous ability icons above
  
• Fixed some naming of a few units which were renamed
  
• Fixed cooldown displays showing as "-1" for abilities on an unowned unit
  
• Fixed cooldown displays showing as "-1" for unit conditions that have no duration
  
• Fixed an issue in which you could not open the pause screen if a neutral Nora Font was selected
  
• Pressing the Escape key now cancels any ability targeting that is selected
  
• Added the option to enable/disable automatic map panning to the Options screen so you don't need to know about a hidden F1 key to disable it
  

• Generally improved performance due to upgrade to Unity 2021 engine
  
• Suppressed a log that occurred when any image was loaded/instantiated, which could happen literally hundreds of times depending on the spell used and when the game itself loaded (since it preloads a lot of sprites into memory)
  
• - this should have the side effect of improving performance of spells that use a lot of small images