Long promised, and finally here! This is one of the most outlandish features we've added to the game: we've modeled the genetics of ridable horses, using over 1500 genes to create nearly-countless possible horses, including many real-world horse breeds as well as fantasy ones. When these horses mate, we use real-world genetics rules to create offspring that are a realistic mix of both parents. These genes control the horse's appearance, speed, temperament, and more.
Getting horses: there are simple new events in each outdoor area (except Rahu, for now) which run every hour or so. Defeating the Horse Thieves in these events will release a handful of wild horses, and more horses can spawn in the vicinity after the event ends. What can you do with these horses?
If you don't know the Riding skill, you can attempt to "pet" wild horses which will eventually teach you Riding. (You can also just train Riding the usual way, which is faster, but costs Councils.)
If you have the Riding skill, you can attempt to tame these horses (if you have their favorite food).
If you have the Animal Husbandry skill, you can speak to a stablemaster to breed two tamed horses (a male and female) together.
If you have the Genetics skill, you're a very high-level player and you likely already know who to speak to in order to unlock the new Ungulate Genetics sub-skill. With this skill and the right equipment, you can view the actual genome of horses, both in the wild and in your stables.
Once you have bred a new horse, you can use animal crates to package them for transfer or sale to other players.
If you already purchased a horse from Mythander, you may be wondering what happened to that horse. Nothing has happened to it, but it cannot be used for breeding.
There are more details to discover, but we'll leave them for you to figure out!
Other Horse- and Genetics-Related Changes:
You now gain an additional stable slot when reaching level 25 and 50 in Racing skill.
Reduced individual gene mutation chance by an order of magnitude, from 0.1% to 0.01%.
Genes mutations are more likely during the full moon.
Backers who purchased a Thoroughbred Breeder or Horse Lord Shop package can now claim the two horses of good genetic stock that are included in those packages. Make sure you have two empty stable slots!
Improved various genetics and breeding-related UIs.
Instanced Guild Halls (Soft Launch)
We're hard at work on Statehelm, the last major city that needs to be added to the game before we can officially "launch" (leave Steam Early Access). One of the big features in Statehelm is being able to lease your own instanced apartment, and/or Guild Hall for your guild. That feature requires a ton of new tech, so in this update we're testing that tech by letting guilds lease Guild Halls in the Red Wing Casino.
To get a Guild Hall for your Guild, find the door near Riston in the casino. There is a 100,000-Council fee and your Guild will need to be at least level 1. (There will also be a daily rental fee eventually, but we're waiving those fees during this soft launch.)
When you enter the Guild Hall you'll see a console near the door. This allows you to enter "Edit Mode", which lets you "install" items, moving and placing them as desired. When you leave Edit Mode, the items become locked in place. The Guild Hall available in the casino is very bare-bones, so you will need to provide your own lighting and decorations.
Decorations like torches and tables can be crafted from recipes trained by Leah Bowman and Amutasa. You can also purchase basic decorations (like wall torches) from a Guild Sign if you are willing to spend Guild Credits on them. Many game-world items, such as chairs, paintings, and so on, can be "installed" into the Guild Hall also. You can always Uninstall items to retrieve them back into your inventory.
Other things to know:
The casino Guild Hall has a limit of 50 installed items at a time.
You can drop items on the floor in a Guild Hall and they will never be auto-destroyed. You can have at most 50 items on the ground before being unable to drop more.
There are several new Guild Permissions related to the Guild Hall; guild leaders may want to review these
There are two new Guild Chests that can be installed and accesses in the Guild Hall. These chests can be purchased from a guild sign. Once set up in the guild hall, you can purchase slots in that chest in the same way as other guild chests.
Note: this is the first time we've ever had instanced areas in Project: Gorgon. Adding this required significant new technology. And while we're 99% sure all of this new code is perfectly debugged, we don't recommend dropping any precious heirloom items on the ground in your Guild Hall during this soft launch.
Treasure Effect Changes
Archery: We've made some big improvements to Archery! To help you adjust to these changes the Transmutation costs for Archery will be reduced this month.
New treasure effect: (Chest) "After using Fire Arrow, your next Archery attack will simultaneously shoot a Fire Arrow 10 at a target within 8 meters of that attack's main target. This extra Fire Arrow consumes ammunition as normal."
New treasure effect: (Legs) "After using Mangling Shot, your next Archery attack will simultaneously shoot a Mangling Shot 9 at a separate target within 8 meters of that attack's main target. This extra Mangling Shot consumes ammunition as normal."
(Hands, Feet) "Fire Arrow deals +26% damage and taunts +1475" => "Fire Arrow deals +160 damage and taunts +1475"
(Head, OffHand) "Archery Base Damage +50%" => "Archery Base Damage +50%, Anatomy Critical-Hit Chance +3%"
(Legs, Feet) "Blitz Shot Damage +46%" => "Blitz Shot Damage +53% and Critical Hit Chance +10%"
(Ring) "Heavy Shot deals +18% damage and reuse timer is -5 seconds" => "Heavy Shot deals +18% damage and reuse timer is -6 seconds"
New treasure effect: (Chest, Necklace) "Heavy Shot Damage +390"
New treasure effect: (Legs) "Aimed Shot deals +88 damage, has +13.5% Critical Hit Chance, and also grants this Critical Hit Chance bonus to your next Archery attack"
New treasure effect: (Hands) "When an Archery attack Critically Hits, you erupt in a burst of acid, dealing 89 Health and 89 Armor Damage to all foes within 8 meters. This effect is increased by treasure that boosts Acid Arrow."
New high level loot-drop treasure augment: (Feet) "Acid Arrow and Poison Arrow hasten the current reuse timer of Fire Arrow by -5 seconds"
(Head, OffHand) "Max Power +42 when skill Archery active" => "Archery attacks that Critically Hit restore 43 Power and boost your Anatomy Critical Hit Chance +1% for 20 seconds"
New treasure effect: (MainHand) "Anatomy-Based Critical Hit Damage +48.5% while skill Archery active"
New treasure effect: (OffHand) "Archery attacks that Critically Hit deal 396 Poison damage over 12 seconds. This amount is further increased by treasure that boosts Poison Arrow's damage-over-time"
This may be a good time to mention that Critical Hits are determined once per attack, based on the primary target. If an area-effect attack is a Critical Hit, it deals bonus damage to ALL targets regardless of their anatomy/phrenology/etc type. (This is kind of weird, and might change, but that's how it works right now.)
Fire Magic:
"When you are near your Fire Wall, you heal 12 Health per second." => "When you are near your Fire Wall, you heal 15 Health per second. Fire Wall reuse time is -3 seconds."
"Fire Walls deal +65 damage per hit." => "Fire Walls deal +52% damage per hit. Fire Wall reuse time is -3 seconds."
"Fire Walls have +220 Max Health." => "Fire Walls have +220 Max Health. Fire Wall reuse time is -3 seconds."
"Fire Walls' attacks taunt +310%." => "Fire Walls' attacks taunt +310%. Fire Wall reuse time is -3 seconds."
"Frostball, Scintillating Frost, and Defensive Chill boost your Nice Attack Damage +83 for 7 seconds" => for 10 seconds
"Molten Veins restores 145 health to any Fire Walls within 10 meters" => "Molten Veins and Flesh to Fuel restore 145 health to any Fire Walls or other pets within 10 meters"
Fire Mages can train new fire wall variant spell research recipes from a floating sphere in Povus. (These recipes will eventually be obtained from an NPC in Statehelm.)
Scintillating Frost now once again has a frostier ball than Frostball.
Hammer
(Legs, Necklace) "Rib Shatter deals +210 damage to targets that are knocked down" => "Rib Shatter deals +140 Damage. If target is Knocked Down it deals a further +44% damage"
(Chest, Feet) "Seismic Impact deals +70% damage to targets that are Knocked Down" => "Seismic Impact deals +160 Damage. If target is Knocked Down it deals a further +49% damage"
Unarmed:
(Chest, Hands) "Cobra Strike and Mamba Strike boost your Nice Attack and Signature Debuff ability damage +67 for 7 seconds" => +105
(Necklace) "Cobra Strike Damage +100" => "Cobra Strike deals +100 damage and boosts your Melee Evasion +14.5 for 7 seconds"
New treasure effect: (Main-Hand) "Mamba Strike deals +67 damage and boosts your Melee Evasion +5.25% for 6 seconds"
(Head, Off-Hand) "Mamba Strike Damage +59 and Reuse Time -1 sec" => "Mamba Strike Reuse Time -2 seconds". This effect is now only available on Off-Hand items. Head items with this treasure effect have become Legacy. You can transmute this effect off of the item to un-Legacy it, or you can get a random replacement item. Visit the Legacy Item Helper golem in Serbule for more assistance.
New treasure effect: (Head) "Mamba Strike boosts your Melee Evasion +10% for 10 seconds"
(Off-Hand, Head) "Slashing Strike boosts your Melee Evasion +5.25% for 5 seconds" => "Slashing Strike deals +64 damage and boosts your Melee Evasion +5.25% for 5 seconds"
New treasure effect: (Ring) "Slashing Strike deals +64 damage and worsens the target's Slashing Vulnerability +16% for 60 seconds (this effect does not stack with itself)"
Weather Witching:
New treasure effect (Main Hand): "Storm Shield targets all ally pets within 20 meters, but ability reuse time is increased +5 seconds"
Writ Challenge Wrap-up
Our first Writ Challenge went really well, and we will be adding it to our event rotation to be an annual Summer event. From now until the end of November 17th, you may /redeem your Writ Challenge Rewards Pack. This contains all Non-Community Chest rewards that were unlocked during the challenge: 10 Glamour Credits, Limited Edition Cosmetic Pet, 6x Orran's Super Inventory Expander Potion, Liquid Super Buffs (24 Hours), and a Sparkler Crate. Please note that the Liquid Super Buffs will self destruct 60 days after claiming, so don't forget to use it!
Other Bug Fixes & Tweaks
Sun Vale: Ranalon Guardians are higher level to match the rest of the area (were level 23, now 35).
Fixed bug with the AI configuration for several types of skeletal archers. These archers were supposed to flee if their target got too close, but they didn't.
Some NPCs were supposed to give out higher-level versions of their reward-items at certain times (such as Christmas or when increasing Favor Level), but they was configured incorrectly so those items had the NPC's base level. This is usually lower than the intended level
Slightly improved distribution of stats across the bee genome to increase available virility and intelligence.
Change wording of Recall Heart's Home so that it's accurate: "Sends you to the Teleportation Circle that you have recalled to the highest number of times" -> "recalled from"
New setting: "Cloth Physics": Provides more control over cloth physics simulating, allowing you to enable it only for yourself, for other players, or for everything (or turn it off completely). Found in Settings > Graphics > Advanced > Animation & Physics.
New setting: "Easy-Drop Items": Allows dropping items by dragging them out of the inventory window. Previously this was hidden, it is now accessible from inside the Inventory window's Settings (the gear at the top right).
New setting: "Mute Guild Quest Sounds": Mutes update sounds for guild quests. Found in 2 areas: Settings > Sound > Other, and by right-clicking on the floating "Quests" HUD element.
Contextual keybinds in Settings are now organized a bit better into subcategories: Corpse Actions, Build Mode, & Other
Several new items have been added to Riston in the Red Wing Casino and the guild credit shop.
Sparklers last longer (from 7.5 seconds -> 11 seconds).
Multicolored Sparklers' emitted light now changes color.
Watcher pets now float off the ground a bit more.
Fae Dragon pets no longer continuously divebomb while idling; they only do it every once in a while.
Improved a *lot* of visuals in Serbule Hills
Fixed bug that could cause the server to hang up on players during long loading screens.
Giant bats are slightly cuter. (You may need to re-bat to see this change.)
Update Notes: August 13, 2024
Today we have a very small update with some bug-fixes and tweaks we wanted to get out sooner rather than later. We're clearing the decks - the next update after this looks to be a big one!
In this update:
Writ Challenge:
Changed "Do Your Part" objectives to be concurrent, not sequential
Adjusted several loot profiles for writ drop chance
Fixed bug with last update's experimental boost of AoE target counts before penalties. The effect worked on indirect damage but not direct damage
Current VIPs can now actually use /knuckles and /cower.
Guild storage is now included in the "Find" tab of Item Info.
"Hotbar Periphery", aka the UI that surrounds the main hotbar, can now be disabled via the "Show Hotbar Periphery" setting (accessible via right-clicking the hotbar as well).
You can now hold shift while hovering from item to item in your inventory, instead of having to re-hold it on each item.
Forest Gourds are now targetable by clicking on them.
Fixed a minor rendering issue causing the current favor level to show up underneath the favor bar for NPCs.
Fixed a bug allowing recipes to be "used" from the right-click menu.
Improved graphics in the Anagoge Records Facility.
Fixed a bug impacting rock collision in Ilmari.
Updated mini golem textures.
Improved visual quality of assorted props.
The Tapestry Inn in Serbule Hills has received a facelift.
Fixed a bug preventing Bard's Blast of Defiance's Armor Reap from working properly.
Weather Witching treasure effect "All channeled Weather Witching abilities channel -0.5 seconds faster, and Tsunami costs no Power to use." has been changed to: "Channeled Weather Witching abilities are not aborted if you are attacked while channeling."
Rabbit ability Play Dead no longer has a self-stun aspect
Rabbit treasure effect "Play Dead causes all affected enemies to take 410 Psychic damage after a 10-second delay" => ... after a 5-second delay
Rabbit ability Play Dead's earlier tiers have a faster reset time. The reset time for the highest tier, Play Dead 7, is unchanged (at 35 seconds)
New Rabbit treasure effect: (Head) "Play Dead Area of Effect +5 meters, and victims suffer -174 direct mitigation for 30 seconds"
Project: Gorgon is on sale this week!
Project: Gorgon is having a special Steam sale this week! From now until August 19th at 1pm US EDT, all PG products will be discounted!
Base game - 50% off
Extra Character Slots Pack DLC - 25% off
We're even offering discounts to help kickstart your Steam VIP subscription! Discount will only apply to your first installment. All recurring charges will be billed at regular price.
Monthly - 25% off first installment
All other subscriptions - 10% off first installment
Still deciding on Project: Gorgon? Try the free demo!
Update Notes: July 30, 2024
Today we have a nice well-rounded update for you, with a bit of combat mechanic tweaking, some necro love, a bit of horse cosmetics, a new horse race and more.
Combat Changes
Changes to Area-of-Effect Damage and Monster Buffs
Some background: when an area-of-effect attack hits more than 3 enemies, its direct damage is reduced. But due to technical limitations, the amount of INDIRECT damage was not reduced. This caused many players to create builds focusing heavily on indirect damage and burst attacks, to the detriment of basically all other attack styles in the game.
This allowed players to fight monsters in much larger groups than intended, so more recently we added monster buffs of various potencies that only kick in when fighting a large group of monsters.
The most potent monster buff, "Burst Reaction", dealt damage to attackers whenever they used Burst attacks. This caused players some consternation, as it could easily lead to sudden player death.
In this update we're experimenting with other approaches to this balancing problem. We've solved the technical issue that prevented indirect damage from being reduced in burst attacks. Burst attacks now deal reduced damage when they hit more than 3 targets, similar to direct damage, although the dropoff is slower and less dramatic than the dropoff for direct damage. (Indirect damage falls to a minimum of 50% damage when hitting 9 or more targets, while direct damage falls to 25% damage when hitting 9 or more targets).
Alongside this change, we've changed monster buffs as follows:
"Burst Reaction" Monster Buff has been replaced with new damage-resistance buffs
Monster Buffs no longer stack with themselves
Monster Buffs last 30 seconds instead of 60 seconds
Most Monster Buffs are diminished in potency, with the notable exception of the "Angry" buff that boosts non-Rage attack damage -- that buff remains very dangerous!
Burst Radius Bonus
Since we're exploring changes to area-of-effect logic, we also made a change that benefits players here. For every 10 meters of radius in a Burst attack, you can hit 1 more target without suffering damage penalties. So if you used a Burst attack with a 20 meter range, you can hit 5 enemies without penalty instead of 3.
If an attack's Burst Radius is not divisible by 10, the remainder is used in a random die roll to see if you get +1 more target. For instance, if an attack has a burst radius of 7 meters, there's a 7-in-10 chance that it will target 1 more enemy without suffering damage dropoff.
The drop-off rate for Burst Attack direct damage was also tweaked so that it falls to its minimum damage when hitting 9 targets instead of 8 targets.
A reminder: monsters use the same combat logic as players. Their burst attacks and direct/indirect damage are affected the same way that players' are. A group of players (and their pets) can use this to their advantage.
These are experimental changes that we'll run for a few weeks before iterating again on the design. We may revert these changes entirely or refine them, based on feedback.
Damage Reflection Changes
Monsters that previously had innate "Damage Reflection", such as Giant Beetles, now have "Damage Reaction". When these monsters are attacked, the attacker suffers damage, the amount of which is based on the monster. But the TYPE of damage is the same as the damage dealt to the monster.
Example: player Bob attacks a Manticore with a Crushing attack. They suffer 100 Crushing damage in response.
This change affects: Giant Beetles, Manticores, Refraction Spiders, Osslars
Aktaari Burst-Reflection Changes
Monsters that previously had innate "Burst Damage Reflection" now have "Burst Damage Reaction". The damage amount is based on the monster's stats. The TYPE of this damage is always Smiting (unmitigatable damage).
This currently only applies to Aktaari.
Necromancy
This update sees a number of adjustments to treasure effects for necromancers.
Treasure Changes
"Raised Zombies deal +28 damage and speed is +10" => +60 damage and speed is +10
"Raised Zombies deal +47 damage and taunt as if they did +200% more damage" => 65 damage
"Summoned Skeletons have +62 health" => +93
"Summoned Skeletons have +92 armor" => +130
"Summoned Skeletal Archers and Mages deal +36 direct damage" => +50
"Summoned Skeletal Archers and Mages deal +24% direct damage, but take +50% damage from any slashing, piercing, or crushing attacks" => "Summoned Skeletal Archers and Mages deal +28% direct damage, but take +50% damage from crushing attacks"
"Summoned Skeletons deal +22% direct damage, but take +150% more damage from any cold attacks" => "Summoned Skeletons deal +18% direct damage, but take +50% more damage from cold attacks"
"Summoned Skeletal Archers and Mages deal +15% direct damage, but are instantly destroyed by ANY Nature Damage" => "Summoned Skeletal Archers and Mages deal +25% direct damage, but take +50% damage from nature attacks"
"Provoke Undead deals 69 damage to your minions, who then deal +62 damage for 10 seconds" => "Provoke Undead deals 72 damage to your minions, who then deal +72 damage for 10 seconds"
"Heal Undead restores +24 and has a 25% chance to boost targets' mitigation +43 for 8 seconds" => "Heal Undead restores an additional 156 Health/Armor over 12 seconds"
"Summoned Skeletal Swordsmen have +140 armor" => "Summoned Skeletal Swordsmen have +149 armor and +10 Crushing/Slashing/Piercing Mitigation"
"Heal Undead restores +28 Health/Armor and boosts your next attack +59 if it is a Darkness attack" => "Heal Undead boosts your next attack +117 if it is a Darkness attack"
"Rebuild Undead restores 67 Health to you" => "Rebuild Undead grants targets +20% Universal Damage Resistance for 6 seconds"
Other Necro Changes
Heal Undead ability restores a bit more health at each tier.
Pet skeleton archers no longer try to back away from their target until they have less than 50% of their Health remaining.
Skeleton Swordsmen have more innate Max Armor.
Daniel Murderdark in Rahu trains a new recipe to create 10 Necromancy Dust at a time.
Mount Cosmetics
Our mounts are getting a little snazzier in this update!
Mounts have two new item slots that they can use to equip different types of cosmetic items. The Banner slot lets you equip a banner or similar item off the mount's flank. The Cosmetic slot is more general and allows you to equip decorative reins, a garland, and more. The mount UI has been slightly rearranged (and polished!) to account for these new slots.
We'll be adding more mount cosmetics in the future, of course, but there are a couple of mount cosmetics you can get your hands on in this update:
Riston offers a new mount cosmetic item for Live Event Credits.
A mount cosmetic item can also be won in the new Moat Circuit race in Serbule! Check for the start banner on the south side of Serbule Keep.
The August VIP gift also contains a mount cosmetic. (VIP gifts are available to anyone who is/was a VIP during the given month. The August VIP gift will be available starting on Aug 1.)
Other mount changes:
Pouch reins allow saddlebag access when no saddlebag is equipped (since they have pockets, too!).
The Mount window now shows item levels & rarities.
Auto-Close Mount Window setting now works for all mount actions.
Bug Fixes & Tweaks
Gameplay
"Anti-Invincibility Poison" special quest item no longer disappears immediately when you log out. Instead, it lasts up to 75 minutes before self-destructing. Because the self-destruction feature can only be used on non-stacking items, "Anti-Invincibility Poison" items no longer stack in inventory. To offset the combat problems this causes, the poison no longer takes 1 second to cast; it is instant-cast when used.
"Anti-Invincibility Posion" debuff now shows at the top of the debuff list when it's present.
Increased the duration of all Orran Inventory potions to 5 hours (previously 3).
Changed the self-destruct timer of all Liquid Super Buff potions to 60 days (previously 30 days).
Fixed a bug that caused some evil Sun Statues to not count for Sun Vale blood portal event.
Animal forms can now wear Firefly Hats, Orbiting Gems, & Floating Pumpkins.
Fixed a bug that restricted gene mutation when breeding animals.
Fixed a bug causing corpses to sometimes be unlootable when using the new loot window.
Fixed a bug causing undiscovered landmarks to show up on the minimap over top of the fog.
Tuneup kits no longer prevent transmuting.
Tuneup kits now have a warning that they will add a Bladesmithing requirement to any weapon they sharpen. (This is a temporary fix; eventually they will not add a requirement.)
Elven Ceremonial Longswords now count as Elvish for the purposes of gift-giving.
New emote for all players: /wave2
New emotes for current VIPs: /cower & /knuckles
Military Blue Dye can now be found in loot.
UI
Improved genetics window readability.
Added loot radius to the persona window stats, under "General Stats".
Temporary items now go to the top of the inventory when it's sorted.
Better handling of missing items on hotbars when Show Item Levels is enabled.
Tracked combat skills now update when you gain XP in them.
Change the "High-Quality Anti-Aliasing" setting to "Anti-Aliasing", with a dropdown so you can choose your AA or turn it off completely.
Other
Fixed mixed-up descriptions of VIP/package titles.
Fixed misplaced snows in Goblin Caves & Anagoge Records Facility.
Fixed misplaced water splashes in Gazluk Keep.
Fix for some elven hair being see-thru.
Fixed a broken texture on Tree in Fae Realm.
Fixed Dark Chapel ceiling with a hole in it.
Fixed a floating mushroom in Kur Caves.
Fixed a hole in mountains of Eltibule.
Reduced server read timeout to 30 seconds to avoid interference with relogging when players violently lose connection.
Update Notes: June 20 & 24, 2024
Update Notes: June 20, 2024
This bugfix update has the following fixes:
Fix memory leak in the new loot window, which should hopefully fix the freezes & crashes
Fix various bugs with Inella's rewards in the new dungeon
Fix bug causing inventory pack data to carry over between characters
Fix logic bug with judgment lever that could cause the door to not open
Dance skills can be used again while music volume is muted
Update Notes: June 24, 2024
This bugfix update has the following fixes:
Fix Sun Vale blood portal event failure state
Fix bug causing mounted animal forms to appear strangely on the character select screen
Fix incorrect dye colors on some pieces of armor
Fix bug causing some arrow abilities to get dropped when queueing a lot in a row
Quicken Deadly Emission particle effects
Retting bundles now take the proper 30 minutes to treat (instead of 20s)
Fix critical-hit tuneups for dirks
Slight revamp of the training window to better display training options with long names (such as golem abilities)
Add recipe names to self-learning bladesmithing workbooks
Fix for gene window being blank above a certain font size
Make all Peltast Gear dyable
Update Notes: June 19, 2024
Summer is finally here -- and with it, another big update to the world of Project: Gorgon. This one took us a little longer than expected, but we think the results are worth it. New dungeon? Check! New skills? Multiple checks! Performance improvements? Also check! Ongoing QoL improvements? Major check! Combat balance? Progress made! Visual improvements? Looking good! Bug fixes? So many, many bugs have been fixed! In fact, we have a lot of stuff to talk about today -- so let's get to it!
Price Drop
Before we get into the nuts and bolts of the update, though, we have a happy announcement: Project: Gorgon is now $20 on Steam. That's not a half-off sale - that's a permanent price drop! But there's a small catch: the $20 package only includes one character slot. We've created a new DLC package that adds three more permanent character slots to the basic account. Everyone who bought the game prior to the price drop automatically has this DLC for free, so those players will see no change: you still have four character slots. (Note that since you automatically own this DLC, you can't buy it again to get more.) The intent of this price change and structure is to lower the barrier to entry for new players, while still honoring the investment that earlier players already made.
Looking for more than four character slots? Remember, VIP membership comes with access to another 4 additional slots while you are a VIP member!
Elven Judgement
The Nightmare expands! Deep under Povus, beyond the frogs, beyond the warren of caves, past the horrific mummies, past even the confused bandits, there sits an elven bureaucrat with a question.
This new adventure is intended for a group of six players with level 90+ combat skills and equipment.
Combat & Treasure
Special Monster Buffs Sometimes in combat a monster will take a second (well, actually they take precisely 5 seconds) to buff itself before joining the fight, which displays as a green up-arrow bubble effect. We call these Special Monster Buffs, and in this update we have made some changes to how they work:
Previously, most Special Monster Buffs only affected the monster that was buffing itself. Now it affects all monsters within 20 meters of the caster.
The Special Monster Buff "Reflective" is now "Burst Reply" instead. It no longer reflects a percentage of damage back at attackers; instead, when the buffed target is hit by a Burst attack, they reply with a fixed amount of damage. The buff will react to the next 3 burst attacks (not infinite attacks, as Reflective did).
Several of the Special Monster Buffs have unique particle effects to help quickly differentiate them.
(By the way, did you know that during the 5-second window while a monster is casting a buff, you can stop their casting by stunning, mesmerizing, fearing, or knocking back the monster? This is a game-mechanic that we don't teach very well yet.)
"Thick Armor" replaced with "Resilient" Previously, some monsters had "Thick Armor", which caused them to take significantly reduced damage while their Armor was high. This effect has been replaced, and now all those monsters are instead "Reslient", which means that they take half damage from Indirect damage sources (such as damage-over-time).
(By the way, did you know that indirect damage sources cancel out regeneration? This is one of the many game systems that we don't do a good job teaching yet. If a monster has Regeneration, any indirect damage you deal will cancel out an equivalent amount of regeneration. If you deal 10 damage, the monster will regenerate 10 less health than it otherwise would.)
Ability Type Fixes In this update, we fixed a fairly subtle but widespread bug: some abilities weren't correctly marked as Melee, Burst, or Ranged attacks, which affects the buffs and debuffs that apply to them.
For background: every offensive ability has precisely one of the following keywords at any given time: Melee, Ranged, or Burst. If the ability has any area-of-effect radius, it's Burst. If a Melee ability gains an area-of-effect due to treasure, the ability would stop being Melee and start being Burst.
Some abilities were incorrectly treated as Ranged attacks and are now Burst attacks: Panic Charge, Multishot, Heavy Multishot, Astral Strike.
Some abilities were incorrectly treated as Ranged attacks and are now Melee attacks: Deathgaze, pet bee stinger attacks.
Some abilities were incorrectly treated as Melee attacks and are now Burst attacks: King of the Forest, Deflective Spin, pet bee poison-debuffs.
Some abilities were incorrectly treated as Melee attacks and are now Ranged attacks: Chill.
Some monsters had abilities that incorrectly marked as Ranged or Melee instead of Burst: Hexapuses, high-level undead swordsmen, Electrified Pigs, goblin fire mages, Kuvou, orc fire-archers, watchers, Lamia, ratkin mentalists, spike traps, training golems, (and probably other one-off monsters that reuse the abilities of the above).
Some monsters had Ranged attacks that are now Melee attacks: Vipers, Wasps (stabs).
Some monsters had Melee attacks that are now Ranged attacks: ogres' boulder throws, electric-wizard skeletons, various fae, some spiderwebs, wasps (bullets), giant beetles, tentakillers.
Some monsters had Burst attacks that are now Melee attacks: Minotaurs.
Some bosses were affected similarly: Ratkin King, Lethargy Puck, Eye of Hate, Scion of Discord, Astarion, Sherzat, and probably others.
Bard Treasure Changes
Bard ability Virtuoso's Ballad: Reset time changed from 60 seconds to 50 seconds; minor treasure number changes as a result.
(Legs, MainHand) "Virtuoso's Ballad restores 200 Armor" => "Virtuoso's Ballad restores 192 Health (or Armor if Health is Full)"
New treasure effect: (Head, Feet): "Virtuoso's Ballad causes target's next attack to deal +376 damage"
(Legs, Hands) "Blast of Fury deals 276 Armor damage and restores 43 Armor to you" => "Blast of Fury deals 440 Armor damage"
(Feet) "Disharmony causes target to deal -10 damage with their next attack" => "Disharmony causes target's next attack to have a 16% chance to automatically Miss. (This effect does not stack with itself.)"
(Ring) "Disharmony causes target to deal -10 damage with their next attack" => "Disharmony causes your next attack to deal +47 damage"
(Head, Legs, OffHand) "Bard Blast-Ability Range +5" => "Bard Blast-Ability Range +5, Bard Blast-Ability Damage +84" (Note: previously there was only one tier of this treasure effect, which could be found starting at level 50 and up. There are now multiple tiers of the ability. If you had this effect on your high-level item already, the item will still have the level 50 version. You can use Transmutation to remove the treasure effect from the item and (eventually) re-roll it with a higher-tier effect.)
Hammer Treasure Changes
(Head, Chest) "Discharging Strike Power Cost -44" => this effect is now only available on Chest, not Head. Helmets with this treasure effect have now become Legacy. You can use the Transmutation skill to roll this effect off of the helmet and it will stop being Legacy. Alternatively you can speak to the Legacy Item Helper golem in Serbule for a randomized replacement item
(Ring, Off-Hand): "Pound To Slag restores 144 health to you" => "Pound To Slag restores 144 Health (or Armor if Health is full)"
(Chest, Feet) "Leaping Smash restores 64 Armor to you" => "Leaping Smash deals +100 Damage and restores 64 Armor to you after a 6-second delay"
(OffHand, Necklace) "Seismic Impact restores 100 Armor to you" => "Seismic Impact deals +100 Damage and restores 100 Armor after a 6-second delay"
(Feet, MainHand) "Rib Shatter restores 48 Health to you" => "Rib Shatter deals +100 Damage and restores 48 Armor after a 6-second delay"
(Legs, Necklace) "Thunderstrike heals you for 51 health" => "Thunderstrike deals +60 Damage and restores 60 Armor after a 6-second delay"
New treasure effect: (Head, Necklace): "Discharging Strike Damage +140"
New treasure effect: (Chest): "Hammer abilities that restore Armor after a 6-second delay have +100% Armor restoration"
New treasure effect: (Hands, Legs) "Hammer abilities that restore Armor after a 6-second delay also restore 25 Power, increased by 20% of the Armor restored"
To assist Hammer players trying out these changes (along with the changes in the past couple of updates), Transmutation costs for Hammer will be reduced this month.
(Feet, Ring): "Aggression Deterrent Power Cost -22; Aggression Deterrent Damage +43" => "Aggression Deterrent Range +5; Aggression Deterrent Damage +43"
(Legs, Necklace): "Apprehend costs -47 Power" => this treasure effect is now only available on Necklace. If you had this effect on Leg armor, that item has become Legacy. You can use a Transmutation Table to remove this effect and it will stop being Legacy. Alternatively you can speak with the Legacy Item Replacer golem in Serbule to get a new randomly-generated item.
New treasure effect: (Legs): "Apprehend Damage +98. Non-Elite targets do not call for help."
Knife Treasure Changes
Fixed bug with knife treasure effect: "Knife abilities with 'Cut' in their name cause all Knife abilities WITHOUT 'Cut' in their name to have a 48% chance to deal +39% damage for 10 seconds". This treasure was applying the buff for a different treasure effect.
Bleeder Shiv now boosts trauma damage instead of poison.
Fix the mod "Backstab deals +X direct damage. You recover X Health (or Armor, if Health is full) over 12 seconds". It now actually heals you.
Surge Cut is now affected by mods that affect Minor Heals.
(Legs): "Marking Cut deals +60 damage and grants +85 Accuracy to your next Knife ability" : No changes to the displayed effect, but this treasure effect also quietly made Marking Cut prevent monster-shouts. A different treasure effect is supposed to do that (and does), so that's been removed from this one.
Other Abilities & Treasure Changes
Abilities with longer attack times are no longer overridden by queued abilities (most notably, certain archery abilities).
Archery: Fix ammo-related typos for Heavy Shot 8 & Multishot 7.
Battle Chemistry: Fixed bug with golem's Self-Sacrifice ability potentially causing damage to the owner.
Psychology: Soothe's critical damage is now affected by mods.
Psychology: Fixed a bug with the mod "Psychoanalyze causes the target to be worth X% more XP if slain within 60 seconds"
Deer: Deer Bash 8 now does the correct damage (288 -> 400).
Fire Magic: The mod "Fire Breath and Super Fireball deal +X damage over 10 seconds" now does more damage at higher levels.
Mentalism: Power Wave ability: Restores Power every 4 seconds instead of every 6 (effectively increasing Power recovery 50%)
Mentalism: (Head, Hands): "System Shock restores 56 Armor to you" => "System Shock Damage +78, System Shock Critical-Hit Damage +40%"
Mentalism: (MainHand, Ring): "System Shock boosts the damage of your Signature Debuffs by +116 for 6 seconds" => "... for 8 seconds"
Priest: Give Warmth 6 now restores 35 body heat (up from 25).
Spirit Fox: Power Glyph ability: the amount of Power restored by the glyph is increased; this is a display fix (the glyphs gave out this amount of Power before, but it was listed as less.) Also adjusted description to explain that group members can use the Power Glyph
Other Combat Changes
Based on feedback, we've made the Hardcore Living skill require more XP to level up. (As always when XP tables are changed, your current level in the skill is unchanged. But the amount you need to reach next level will be affected.)
Fixed a bug that caused monsters to behave strangely when hit by Slow effects while already moving at high speed.
Ranalon Guardians' blind attack is now actually a 20 meter Burst as intended.
Yetis with a slowing-ice ranged attack now have a range of 20 meters as intended (instead of a range of 6 meters).
Portal-summoning mantises no longer hurt themselves when they summon portals.
Fixed a bug that could cause monsters to get stuck while wandering.
Improved damage of higher-level explosion sigils, electricity sigils, and acid sigils. Electricity Sigil 4 and Acid Sigil 4 are a higher level as a side effect of rebalancing.
Off to the Races!
There's a new activity for Project Gorgon's most expert riders: horse races! These are checkpoint races through the wilds; to finish the race, you must ride through each glowy domed checkpoint in order. There are other glowing points to look out for as well: if you run through a speed-up pool, your horse will go faster but become more anxious and may suffer other negative effects, while other glowing pools can reduce anxiety and help counter the speed-up's negative effects. Oh, and most importantly: avoid monsters!
You can get started by visiting one of the Race Flags:
Eltibule Cirtcuit: In Eltibule, near Mythander.
Amulna Grand Tour: In Ilmari, outside the north entrance to Amulna.
Kur Mountain Debry: In Kur Mountains, just outside Syndra's barn.
You can also use the race flags to view the leaderboard for each race.
Quality of Life
One of our areas of focus over the past several updates has been on improving quality of life (QoL) and reducing friction: that is, smoothing out some of those small annoyances that make the game less fun. In this update we've done major work improving inventory management, especially as it pertains to corpses, as well as added some useful features like unread quests and notification dots.
Corpse Management
The corpse-looting window now displays other nearby corpses, and allows switching between them via Tab. This key is configurable in Settings > Keys > Contextual > Corpse: Select Next.
"Take All" on corpses now loots items that you have partial stacks of in your inventory, even if your inventory is otherwise full.
Using Take All on a corpse when other corpses are nearby will now auto-select the next corpse.
Burying a corpse no longer closes the window if other corpses are nearby.
The distance at which you can loot a corpse - your Corpse Loot Radius - can be increased!
Leveling Foraging increases this distance by a total of +3 meters at level 75.
Leveling Skinning, Butchering, and Survival Instincts increases this distance by a total of +2 meters each at level 80.
Gain a total of +1 meter by maxing Werewolf Metabolism to 50 (as that is the level cap atm).
Other Inventory Management
Guild chests are now included in ctrl-f item searching (or /isearch).
Item Search (ctrl-f or /isearch) now highlights items that it finds in your inventory.
Storage Deposit All and Stow buttons now have hotkeys, configurable under Settings > Keys > Contextual. Defaults are G and Shift-G respectively.
Withdrawing items from storage now deposits them into the currently-open inventory folder.
Abilities that require an item to use now show the current amount of that item in your inventory in the tooltip.
You can now Ability-Lock inventory folders, similar to Vendor-Locking them! This prevents items inside that folder from being used by abilities.
New icons were added to the inventory window to denote when the current folder is Ability- and/or Vendor-Locked.
Abilities with ammunition now pull their ammo from the smallest stack in your inventory.
You can now show the number of free inventory slots you have at all times as a small number on the Inventory button on your right-hand sidebar. Enable "Show HUD Inventory Space" under Settings > GUI > Windows & HUD > Other Windows Settings.
The item info window now has a "SELL" tab that lets you view all NPCs that buy the item in question.
Moved a few inventory settings from buttons in the bottom right of the window to the gear icon at the top right.
Goblin Calling Cards and Orcish books now display their level requirements on the icons.
Equipment icons now show their levels in the persona window.
Other New QoL features
When a Quest auto-completes (meaning it doesn't have to be turned in to anyone), its outcome now goes into a new section in the Quest Log, rather than being presented right away. Some quests, namely event-specific ones, are exempt from this behavior.
When you have one or more unread auto-completed quest, the Quest sidebar button now shows a notification dot, and clicking on it takes you straight to the unread quests section.
Tracking & untracking quests in the Quest Log is now more responsive.
We now display a notification dot on the Persona button and Redeem button (in the Persona window) when a new redemption is available.
Even more UI bug fixes of a smaller sort can be found below in the UI section.
UI
New targeting settinng: Auto-Select Attackers. This setting can be found under Settings > GUI > Targeting > Tab Targeting (Experimental). It defaults to enabled.
New targeting hotkey: Select Nearest Enemy. This keybind can be found under Settings > Keys > Targeting > underneath the keybind for "Select Previous Enemy".
"Select Next Interactible" now prioritizes NPCs.
The /target command now prioritizes non-corpses.
Map pin labels now show on the minimap.
Added party members' names above them on the map.
Added Viedesi, Urglemarg, and Puffy Ben to the Sun Vale map.
Willem Fangblade's map info now knows that he has a store, and shows his council count.
NPC map icons will no longer overlap your own after first meeting them.
Fixed a a bug causing party members and pets to sometimes disappear from the map.
Fixed a bug that caused minimap buttons to become unreadable at different GUI zoom levels.
Holding shift while viewing an item with enchantments now shows the enchantment levels.
Extract Augment recipe descriptions are now clearer, and reference the new functionality of holding Shift.
Polished the loading screen a bit, and added several new tips -- many provided by players! A big thank you to everyone who contributed!
Some hotkeys now have explanatory tooltips; those that do are marked with an asterisk (*).
Fixed a bug causing XP values to sometimes wrap to the next line.
Fixed a bug with gear sometimes disappearing in the persona preview window.
Fixed a minor UI bug in Skills Window causing level numbers to sometimes wrap strangely.
Fixed a bug causing UI elements to lose their locked status across multiple play sessions.
Tooltips should no longer appear in their old position before quickly updating to their new position.
Fixed a bug causing the horse window to not remember that it was closed when it closes itself after opening the saddlebag.
Fixed a bug causing some face portraits to not display.
Improved tooltip readability of certain items with long names (notably Crisp Mint Vanilla Cinnamon Coffee).
Right-click options that are simple on/off settings have a new icon, and can be toggled without closing the context menu.
Added some polish to the right-click menu.
Standardize fonts, colors, and spacing across many UI windows with a focus on window titles.
Item durability no longer rounds up, which resulted in the transmutation window sometimes not working.
Update the transmutation window UI to be more in-line with the rest of the game's UI.
Right-clicking an empty hotbar slot now lets you set that slot's ability (for primary and secondary skills).
Item levels & rarities are now shown in the loot window.
Werewolf Altar abilities are now visible en masse when their prerequisite level-uncap is purchased.
Fix visual glitch on many elven hairs.
Fix 'Show Player Stats Pane' GUI setting.
Other Changes & Fixes
Art
Bard Armor is now dyeable!
Snail Armor is no longer dyeable since it doesn't dye properly.
Mended Thentree Armor so your legs no longer peek through the skirt.
Visual improvements to all Cloth armors.
Visual improvements to all Leather armors.
Visual improvements to several other armor sets, including: Thentree, Peltast and Steel Platemail.
Improved animation for laying in a bed and subsequently waking up out of one.
Added new animations to all butterfly dances.
Added more particle effects to some pig dance variants.
Added new animations to several spider dance variants.
Sealed holes in spider model.
Fixed a few cases of infini-looping animations.
Swordsman's Elven Longsword offensive topology is now different and less offensive.
Furniture in the Abandoned Sunvale Inn now has textures.
Closed holes in Kur Tower.
The lake bridge in Povus should no longer disappear when seen from certain spots.
Fixed the physics on rocks in Povus.
Added better handling of NPCs in flight that can also swim. Also improved fly-follow logic for flying monsters, to further reduce jitter in the air.
Improved minotaur animations.
Improved animation, VFX, and SFX for summoning cosmetic pets.
Fixed some gear that previously was supposed to glow but wasn't.
A number of off-hand weapons have new more distinct icons.
Gameplay
The loot from defeating Knight Eggs is improved.
The guardians of the Knight Eggs, Gross Maggots, are no longer worth any XP.
You now gain a synergy level of Civic Pride when reaching level 38 of Compassion. (This allows players to receive the final level-up benefit of Civic Pride which is obtained at level 51: "+1% Favor from Hangouts".)
Many cosmetic pets and player titles are now shared across all the characters on an account. You will need to login the character who originally gained the pet/title once before being able to access it on other characters on the account.
New emote for everyone: /bow. In addition, the emotes /taunt and /thank have new animations.
Current VIP members can also use two new emotes: /accuse and /monkey.
You can no longer promote someone who has recently left your party.- If you misplace a certain key related to a certain skull, you can now get a replacement from the thing that gave you it to begin with.
Fished a missing skull button out of the wall (in a certain trap room that has a lot of skull buttons).
Added missing skill-training unlock for Pathology 90.
The recipes for Crafted Alchemist's Claws are no longer Blacksmithing recipes; they are now under a new skill. They are no longer trained by Kohan
Crafting Caravan: All quest titles have been updated for better sorting in the Quest Log.
Crafting Caravan: Prices for some items bartered by Orran have been reduced.
"Awesome Bard Boots" are no longer erroneously called "Amazing Bard Boots".
Fixed a typo on Birch Pants.
Updated quest text for "Holistic Wellness: Yarn" to clarify the required number of yarns.
Fairy Soul Anchors now bestow 3 seconds of invulnerability to protect against immediately re-dying.
Increased drop rate of orcish wheat grinders.
Fixed a typo in Sie Antry's dialog.
You can no longer try to dance if no nearby music is playing.
Changing equipment while using furniture now continues using the furniture afterward.
You can no longer mount your horse while using furniture (chairs, beds).
Mounts turn a bit slower in water.
Fixed a bug causing horses to not jump if you aren't actively pressing forward. (As long as they still have momentum, they'll jump.)
Fixed a bug that could cause multiple Hissy's to spawn in the desert.
Fixed bugs that caused monsters in the Fae Realm to never spawn in pairs or trios as intended.
Improved performance of monster and pet movement.
Fixed the appearance of dice in Monsters and Mantids when game graphics are set extremely low
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VIP Gifts
We're proud of our VIP program -- we believe we've managed to offer some fun (but not required!) benefits for players who want to offer us additional support. Part of those benefits are monthly VIP gifts: if you logged in as a VIP member during the month, you can redeem a VIP gift for that month. (Note that you don't have to be an active VIP member to redeem the gift; you just need to have logged in as a VIP sometime during the month.) And in a case like this update, the gift may not be immediately ready, but as long as you were a VIP during that month you will be able to redeem it when it becomes available.
The VIP gifts for May, June, and July contain some of our coolest gifts yet, including pets and titles and dyes ... and a rather strange and itchy Firefly Hat. In addition, current VIP members will also get access to two new emotes in this update: /accuse and /monkey.
New Pricing Structure is now live!
Project: Gorgon is now $20 on Steam. That's not a half-off sale - that's a permanent price drop! But there's a small catch: the $20 package only includes one character slot. We've created a new DLC package that adds three more permanent character slots to the basic account. Everyone who bought the game prior to the price drop automatically has this DLC for free, so those players will see no change: you still have four character slots. (Note that since you automatically own this DLC, you can't buy it again to get more.) The intent of this price change and structure is to lower the barrier to entry for new players, while still honoring the investment that earlier players already made.
Looking for more than four character slots? Remember, VIP membership comes with access to another 4 additional slots while you are an active VIP member!
Just a quick update today with a lot more map updates and improvements, some knife balancing (which is just as dangerous as it sounds), and a host of bug fixes and tweaks. Let's dive in!
Map Fixes & Tweaks
Last update, we made major revisions to our map and mini-map. We asked for feedback -- and we got it! With your copious feedback and commentary, we've fixed a lot of bugs and added a lot more improvements, including:
The map's zoom slider returns!
Added several customization options to the map, accessible by clicking on the new gear icon.
The map sidebar can now be attached to either the left or right side of the map.
Auto-following of the map can now be disabled, so you can freely explore the map while moving.
Minimap resizing & disabling is now more obvious via the gear icon.
Zone name & current time are now shown when the map sidebar is collapsed.
NPC Vendors now display their currently available councils and, if applicable, how long until their councils reset in their map info.
Party member names are now shown when their map icon is hovered over.
When a map pin is selected or created, its label text field is auto-focused.
Most portals throughout the world now show up as portal icons when targeted.
Fixed a bug with party member map icons breaking.
Your pet no longer prevents placing of map pins.
Map pins can now be deleted by right-clicking on them.
Map pins can be added directly on the minimap.
Minimap resizing now saves.
Fixed a bug that would sometimes cause map pins to not save properly.
Fixed nameplate placement of portals.
Removed fae molluscs & cows from maps.
Uriana and the Wintertide Portal, both in Fae Realm, now display on the map.
NPCs now disappear from the map when they de-spawn.
Added a new map filter for Events.
We think the new map is a pretty good upgrade -- but your feedback has made it a thousand times better than it would have been alone. Thank you!
Knife Tweaks
Knife sees some loving refurbishment this update, with a host of changes to abilities and treasure -- plus a bunch of all-new treasure!
Knife Ability Changes:
Surprise Throw: changed from having a 45-second reset time to 12 second reset time; treasure revised accordingly, see below. (Note: this change is a *dramatic* buff to the ability's total DPS and usefulness, although the treasure numbers below may make it seem like a nerf.)
Poisoner's Cut: buffs from this ability last 8 seconds instead of 5 seconds
Fending Blade: innate Rage reduction is increased
Venomstrike: deals its Poison damage over 10 seconds instead of 12
Surge Cut: reset time changed from 20 seconds to 10 seconds. It is now a Minor Heal ability instead of a Survival Utility ability. Treasure effects recalibrated/rewritten.
Bug fix: Fan of Blades is now marked as a Burst attack instead of a Ranged attack
(Chest) "Surprise Throw deals +43% damage and stuns the target if they are not focused on you" => +134 damage and stuns the target if they are not focused on you. Also, this effect is now only available on Chest, not Legs. Items that already have this effect on Legs will now be Legacy. (See below.)
(Hands, Ring) "Surprise Throw restores 143 Power if the target is not focused on you" => "... restores 80 Power if the target is not focused on you"
(Legs, OffHand) "Fan of Blades, Hamstring Throw, and Surprise Throw deal +44% damage and reuse timer is -1 second" => "... deal +25% damage and reuse timer is -1 second"
(Legs, Feet) Backstab deals an additional 695 Trauma damage over 10 seconds if the target is not focused on you. => 1400
(MainHand, OffHand) "For 5 seconds after using Opening Thrust, all knife abilities with 'Cut' in their name deal +28 damage" => +60
(Head, MainHand) "Blur Cut restores 52 Health after a 15 second delay" => "Blur Cut restores 35 Health"
(Head, Legs) "Fending Blade deals +64 damage and reduces Rage by 600" => +102 damage
(Feet, Ring) "Fending Blade restores 32 Health to you immediately and reduces the target's Rage by 400 after a 5 second delay" => "Fending Blade restores 41 Health to you and reduces the target's Rage by 400"
(MainHand, Ring) "Venomstrike deals an additional 240 Poison damage over 12 seconds" => 375 over 10 seconds
(Hands, OffHand) "Venomstrike has a 50% chance to stun the target and deal +60 damage" => "Venomstrike deals +100 damage and has a 50% chance to stun the target"
(Chest, Feet) "Gut deals an additional 260 Trauma damage over 10 seconds if the target is not focused on you" => 440
(MainHand, OffHand) "Gut deals +60 damage and if target is not focused on you, deals +25% Trauma damage over 10 seconds" => "Gut deals +80 damage and if target is not focused on you, deals +40% Trauma damage over 10 seconds"
(MainHand, Necklace) "Surge Cut restores +95 Health to you" => 72 health
(Chest, Legs) "Surge Cut restores 120 Armor to you" => "Surge Cut restores 67 Power to you"
(Necklace) "Marking Cut deals +146 armor damage and does not cause the target to shout for help" => this effect is now only available on Necklaces. Existing off-hand items with this effect have become Legacy. (See below.)
(Legs) "Slice ignores mitigation from armor and deals +101 damage" => this effect is now only available on Legs. Existing off-hand items with this effect have become Legacy. (See below.)
(Head, MainHand) "Backstab steals 121 health from the target and gives it to you" => "Backstab deals +198 direct damage. You recover 198 Health (or Armor, if Health is full) over 12 seconds."
(OffHand, MainHand) "For 5 seconds after using Opening Thrust, all knife abilities with 'Cut' in their name deal +60 damage" => For 10 seconds
(Chest, Hands) "Opening Thrust has a 25% chance to cause all Knife abilities WITHOUT 'Cut' in their name to have a 38.5% chance to deal +39% damage for 10 seconds" => "For 10 seconds after using Opening Thrust, all Knife abilities gain +20 Accuracy and have a 20% chance to deal +25% damage"
Knife New Treasure:
(Head) "Fan of Blades, Hamstring Throw, and Surprise Throw deal +100 damage and can Critically Hit based on your Anatomy skill levels"
(OffHand, Necklace) "When wielding two knives, Knife Fighting attacks with 'Cut' in their name deal +43% damage"
(Chest, Feet) "Poisoner's Cut boosts Direct Poison Damage an additional +79 per attack"
(OffHand, Ring) "Knife abilities with 'Cut' in their name leave a Lasting Mark in the target for 30 seconds. When the target dies, each Lasting Mark hastens the active reset time of Backstab by 3 seconds, or if Backstab isn't on your ability bar, you instead recover 36 Power and your next Slice attack deals +80 damage."
(Hands) "Backstab deals +83% Direct Damage to Elite targets"
(Legs, Feet) "Surprise Throw boosts your Epic Attack Damage +206 for 30 seconds if target is not focused on you"
(Head, Ring) "Taunt from Attack Damage -33.5% and Rage From Attacks -10.5% while Knife Fighting skill active"
(Hands) "Duelist's Slash hits all targets within 8 meters and deals +82 damage"
(OffHand) "Slice deals +86 damage and causes target to suffer +86 damage from future attacks for 30 seconds"
(MainHand) "Backstab deals +85% Direct Damage if target is stunned"
(Legs) "Marking Cut deals +60 damage and grants +85 Accuracy to your next Knife ability"
(Ring) "Duelist's Slash deals +82 damage and for 12 seconds afterwards all melee Knife abilities can Critically Hit based on your Anatomy skill levels."
Legacy Equipment:
If you use transmutation to remove the effect that caused a piece of equipment to become Legacy, it will stop being Legacy. You can also take Legacy items to the "Legacy Item Helper" golem in Serbule for a randomized replacement item.
Cheap Transmutation:
To help Knife fans adjust to these changes, transmutation costs for Knife will be cheaper this month. Transmute away!
Hardcore Living
Last update we introduced a new skill, Hardcore Living, for our Hardcore players. Unfortunately, we also introduced some bugs with it. In this update we've got the bugs under control, and even better, the level-up benefits on this skill are significantly improved... But there's a catch: If you stop being Hardcore, you automatically forget the Hardcore Living skill and lose its benefits. You do keep your unlocks, though, so you will only need to unlock higher tiers of Hardcore Living once.
Other Tweaks & Fixes
Slightly increased the drop rate of barley seeds when harvesting barley.
Bug fix: Battle Chemistry: (Ring) "Toxic Irritant causes the target to suffer +15.5% from Acid Damage (including Toxic Irritant) for 15 seconds." => This effect did not work (in fact it debuffed the caster instead of the target). It's been revised as follows: "Toxic Irritant boosts your Acid Damage (including from Toxic Irritant) +15.5% for 15 seconds. (This effect does not stack with itself.)"
Khyrulek's curse damage no longer benefits from the victim's Trauma buffs.
Fixed a bug that could cause monsters to react to damage they suffer after death. (Which could cause doors to be opened/closed incorrectly.)
Community Chest slots in Serbule can now actually be purchased with Live Event Credits.
Deer are no longer invisible up close.
Fixed a bug causing the party UI to stick around if you switch characters.
Using /nap while in wolf form no longer infiniloops.
Fixed a bug with channeled abilities causing you to infinitely loop an animation the next time you perform an emote.
Fixed a bug where someone playing music near you would later cause your own animations to interrupt your music playing.
Bird forms' music-playing is no longer interrupted by other animations.
If you are Friends with Irkima in the Red Wing Casino, you might want to check in with him. (Requires one 70+ combat skill.)
VIPs now have access to a few more special emotes, including a real head scratcher. And don't forget to check out the VIP redemption for March if you haven't already! Pity you can't glamour that bug ...
Update Notes: February 23, 2024
Welcome to another exciting PG update! Can you believe it's late February already? Today's update has the usual set of additions, improvements, fixes and tweaks, of course -- but the biggest news is an extensive update to the map system! (You know, that sounded more exciting in my head.) Let's take a look!
Updated Map System
One of PG's charms is the sheer amount of exploration available. It's a big world filled with hundreds of people and places to remember, each with their own lore and likes and history to explore. There are hundreds of skills to learn, thousands of items to collect, trade, or gift - the world is wide open! But keeping track of all of that in a way that makes it fun for you to explore the world and set your own goals - especially in relation to NPC management - has been a bit of a long-standing problem for us.
To address that, we've taken a hard look at the map system in Project: Gorgon and made some pretty sweeping improvements. The in-game map now lets you view NPCs, portals, meditation pillars, and teleport platforms as you discover them; even better, you can now find some of the most critical info about NPCs in your area at a glance -- which can really help you decide what you want to focus on.
Let's look at the details:
NPCs: After meeting an NPC for the first time, they'll show up on your map. Their list of known services and item preferences are displayed, showing more and more information as you uncover them. Your current favor level with that NPC is displayed, alongside any new unlocks you'll get when you level up their favor. You can also take custom notes on any NPC.
Teleport Platforms: You can now see Teleport Platforms on the map, with how many times you've used each one.
Meditation Pillars: You can now see Meditation Pillars on the map, with the corresponding Combo that's granted when you meditate at one.
Portals: You can now see portals to other areas/dungeons on the map.
Filters: Don't want all the new info cluttering up your map? Simply turn them off!
Pin Customization: There's now a more intuitive UI for customizing your own map pins, with extra color options.
Pets: Your pets now show up on the map, and can be clicked on to see which one has fallen behind.
Minimap: The minimap has gotten a visual upgrade. You can easily toggle between seeing all pins, personal pins only, or no pins at all on the mini-map.
We're excited to develop these ideas further with the ultimate goal of making it easier to set your own goals and explore the world of Alharth in your own way. And we're eager for all your feedback on the new map!
VIP Program
Recently, many players have been reaching out to us to ask how they might continue to support PG now that they've purchased the game. There are a few different ways: for example, the Gorgon Shop sells backer packages that are meant for this purpose specifically and which include some neat features like extra character slots or a custom title. Or if you prefer, you can also donate money directly to us. Our community has been amazingly generous; it's impossible to say just how much the extra support has helped us.
But we've noticed that many players aren't aware of the other program that's available if you'd like to kick in some extra monetary support: the VIP program. VIPs pay a small monthly charge through Steam, and in return they get a bunch of small benefits and fun stuff, like extra character slots and regular gift redemptions. (Backer pacakges usually include some VIP time as well.) In this update we've tried to make it more obvious what being a VIP entails (without being too annoying about it) by adding a small button on the sidebar that opens the VIP panel.
We've also added a cool new system for VIP emotes in this update. These are emotes -- slash commands that make your character do an animation -- that can only be used by current VIP members. The first one we're introducing is /flex; we'll be adding more very soon.
And VIP members: Don't forget to check your redemptions regularly! You may find some fun little gifts in there. (You can find those in the Persona panel on the right-hand sidebar, under the icon of a present. Or you can type /redeem in chat.)
"Hardcore Living"
There's a new skill, "Hardcore Living". Hardcore players earn XP in this skill when you kill a monster whose level is at least as high as your Hardcore Living skill. There are already some inherent benefits to leveling this skill, but its primary purpose will come in the future: we plan to use it as a "gating skill" on Hardcore gear. Currently, Hardcore gear mostly uses Endurance as its gating skill, and that seems weird.
(We haven't updated Hardcore gear to require this new skill yet -- we wanted to give you time to level this skill first.)
Monster Adjustments
New experimental monster behavior: Monsters no longer chase players as far if they've only taken minor damage and are unable to land a hit.
New experimental monster behavior: Monsters who are called in to assist their friends are slightly less dogged in how long they chase.
Improved some loot drop unique stats for Boss Gauntlet bosses.
Fixed AI bug: during the first second of combat, monsters could choose to use their self-buff even if no other allies were supporting them.
Orc monsters' reaction to being slowed or being unable to chase their attacker is to throw a Khopis; this Khopis now slows their opponent.
Aktaari that are slowed or unable to successfully chase their attacker use a new slowing spittle attack.
Spriggan Weeds have unique combat behaviors (instead of using generic animal logic).
The Big Slime in Carpal Tunnels should no longer summon level 90 slimes.
Abilities & Combat & Loot
Abilities that have a chance for critical hits now display this info in their ability tooltips.
Minor change to Hammer treasure effect: (Necklace, Ring) "Reckless Slam deals +89 damage and taunts -345" => "Recklass Slam deals +105 damage"
Alchemical item "Aiming Potion" now applies to critical hits from anatomy criticals as well as phrenology criticals.
Alchemy items "Telka's Teeth": all tiers now last 15 minutes.
Changed treasure effect: "Long Shot increases target's vulnerability to Trauma and Acid +10% for 20 seconds. (Max of 2 stacks.)" => now also debuffs Poison
Changed treasure effect: "Tundra Spikes stuns all targets after a 6 second delay" => 8-second delay. (The top tiers of this effect were reduced because the delay was too short to take full advantage of.)
New treasure effect: Archery: (Chest, OffHand): "Acid Arrow deals 365 Poison damage after a 6-second delay"
Low-level item "Ring of Critical Hits" now applies to anatomy criticals as well as phrenology crits. (Just because it should.)
"Bounding escape dispels any active Slow or Root effects..." now works on Ice Cocoon.
Fixed scaling on high-level Provoke Undead & Raise Zombie abilities.
Other
Added new basic emotes: /point, /yes, /no, /agree, /nod, /disagree
New command: /target targets the closest entity whose name matches or contains the text. This is rudimentary right now, and does not affect the order of tab-targeting. /ta is an alias.
Added 2 new hotkeys: Select Next Pet & Select Previous Pet.
Right-clicking a pet's state (Attack, Follow, etc.) now sets that state for all active pets.
When a pet is selected, its name now highlights in the pet window.
Item rarity and level overlay now applies to storage & merchant UIs.
Vendor item prices now update in real-time, if e.g. you buy back all of the items you previously sold the vendor, or a player updates their store's pricing.
Attempting to Stow an item with a max carryable amount into a maxed stack no longer deletes the item.
Added right-click menu options for turning mushrooms into powders.
Fixed right-click menu options for Hides (to easily convert them to leather rolls).
Low level Werewolf Hind Leg Guards (Enchanted) recipes only require the non-enchanted versions now.
Fixed teleport platform in Serbule Hills that would cause Foxes to fall under the world.
Kur now uses dark versions of map icons.
Fixed bug causing Book UI button text to overflow the button.
Update Notes: January 12, 2024
Welcome to our first update of 2024! Today we say farewell to the Ri Shin celebration, and hello to a host of improvements, changes, fixes... and a new high level dungeon.
Boss Gauntlet 2
First, about the original Gauntlet: at the end of 2022 we released "Boss Gauntlet '22", which was intended to be a temporary super-hard encounter that would be removed later on. Then we remembered how we hate throwing good content away. So now it's permanent! (Yes, you predicted this back in '22. Shush.) The 20 original bosses of Boss Gauntlet '22 are now called "Boss Gauntlet 1". These bosses have had their level raised to the new maximum of 95, and some of the encounters have been beefed up a little based on feedback.
We're excited to introduce Boss Gauntlet 2, with even more bosses and even crazier scenarios for your group to deal with. You can enter Boss Gauntlet 2 by completing the first one -- a door will open and let you in. Alternatively, there's a portal machine in the beginning of Boss Gauntlet 1. Using this machine will let you jump directly to the new gauntlet. It costs Hubris to activate the portal.
Completing Boss Gauntlet 2 for the first time will net you 25 Live Event Credits, same as the first Gauntlet.
(A note for those who ran the original Gauntlet '22: there used to be five hidden bosses; these have been taken from their hidden rooms and added to Gauntlet 2.)
Most of our group-play content is intended to be enjoyable with pick-up groups, where you join up with whoever you happen to meet in the dungeon. But Boss Gauntlets are intended for a dedicated group, typically a guild, who want a very difficult challenge to overcome.
If our usual group content is more your style, there's good news: we're hard at work on the final portion of Errruka's Cave, which will be a level 95 group experience. Coming soon!
Monster Changes
Elite and Boss monsters now have a bit more health and armor. The amount varies by monster tier and level, but to give some generalizations:
A typical level 80 Elite now has 12% more Max Health and Max Armor.
A typical level 80 boss now has 20% more Max Health and Max Armor.
The hardest tier of bosses now have 25% more Max Health and Max Armor.
We've also buffed the "tough solo" monsters. These are typically named monsters that are intended to be soloable, such as Salmpo, the Mauler, or the named creatures in desert War Caches. These creatures gained about 12% more Max Health and Max Armor by level 80.
In addition, we revised monster self-buff reaction abilities:
These abilities previously stunned the monster that used them for 5 seconds and then applied a buff.
Now, the monster stands still (but not stunned!) for 5 seconds, then uses the ability.
If the monster is killed, stunned, mesmerized, feared, or knocked back during those 5 seconds, the buff is aborted.
Important Bugfix: Monsters no longer consider dead allies when calculating whether they have enough friends to perform a self-buff.
Other Monster Changes
Tornados have faster cooldown on their lightning bolt attack.
"Turret Crystals" -- those crystal enemies that shoot beams at you -- have faster attack speed.
Gazluk Healing-Suit Tester is weaker (receives less healing from nearby crystals).
Orcs' Electricity Sigils are a bit more potent.
Ranalon Guardians of all levels have a bit more Max Health.
Tornado Spiders can fly (although they still prefer walking).
Mantis Teachers in Mope's dungeon are a bit tougher.
Aktaari Event Adjustments
The "Aktaari Queen" event now starts at the same time each game day, at 9am (game time), rather than starting at whatever game-time the first player showed up. This should help players plan better.
Elite Aktaari (guardians and bosses) are now a bit tougher, and are marked as "no-lock", meaning that their loot is available to all players that help kill it (instead of just the first hunting group that attacked it, as before).
Moved a teleport destination in Aktaari caves to an earlier point in the cave -- after the giant blocks but before the acid pit rather than after the acid pit.
Fixed "air tube" type apparatus in several dungeons, including Aktaari caves. They were using testing values that caused the air to refill in 10 seconds instead of the intended reset of 2-3 minutes (depending on the dungeon).
Glamour Changes
In this update, we've made some changes to the way glamouring works. Glamours allow you to change the look of your equipment. (Other games often call this transmogrification.) Previously, you used items -- Glamour Gourds or Glamour Berries -- to do this.
Now when you use a Glamour Berry or Glamour Gourd, you receive 1 "Glamour", which is a new pseudo-currency stored in your character. (If you have any, you can see it in the Persona window, under Currencies and Pseudo-Currencies). The Glamour recipe now costs 1 Glamour to use, instead of directly using berries or gourds. This has two benefits: first, you don't have to store unwieldy gourds anymore! Just consume the items to get the Glamours out, and then spend the Glamours whenever you want. Second, this makes it easier for us to give VIP players free Glamours every month, without saddling them with a ton of gourds.
Cargo Suits
We've added "cargo suits" explicitly for mule characters. The crafting recipes can be found on the usual tailoring trainers. These garments give you lots of extra inventory similar to having a perfect set of "pocket gear". Crafting them costs the same amount of resources as full pocket gear. The big benefit is that these suits have no equip requirements, and never will, so they can be worn by any character.
In a future update we'll be adding Endurance requirements to high level gear that doesn't have any other requirements. Don't worry, there'll be plenty of info and warning about this change in the future -- we'll be making this transition as painless as possible. We wanted to release these now to help you prepare. Long story short: if you're planning to make a "mule" character, we recommend using these garments rather than crafting "no reqs" max-pocket gear.
Other Tweaks & Bug Fixes
Combaty Stuff
Hammer: new treasure effect: (Head, Off Hand): "Hammer attacks that kill an enemy via direct damage restore 46 Power to you."
Hammer: new treasure effect: (Ring): "Direct Electricity Damage, Direct Fire Damage, and Direct Cold Damage +20% while Hammer skill active"
Knockdowns are now separate from Stuns for purposes of diminishing returns. This means you can Stun, then Knockdown an enemy, and have full duration from both.
Weak slow effects no longer affect diminishing returns for subsequent strong slows/roots.
Bugfix: Some sources of indirect damage did not reduce monster regeneration as intended.
Bugfix: Unarmed treasure effects that absorb damage and redirect it into your attacks were bugged: they stopped working when you logged out or switched areas, and wouldn't work again until you re-equipped the item.
Bugfix: "Raise Skeletal Ratkin Mage 7" raised the same level of pet as "Raise Skeletal Ratkin Mage 6".
Other Stuff
Emoting (such as watering plants or waving) should no longer interrupt music playing.
Stephie Blackhammer in Povus no longer offers barters; instead she has daily crafting quests
When each phase of the Povus nightly event is completed, any leftover monsters from that phase de-spawn much more quickly
An augment's associated skill could clash with the skills of the mods already on the item, causing the transmutation system to think no mods were available due to skill incompatibility. This will no longer occur.
Crafting Electric Cyan Dye now requires real ingredients instead of just Masterwork Metal Slabs.
Crafting Caravan: Added level 90 tasks to all applicable Caravan NPCs.
Crafting Caravan: Changed the required items on two tasks to bring them in-line with their level range.
Fixed a bug causing hard-core broken gear to not display properly when horse-equipped gear also breaks.
When selecting a title in the GUI list, tooltips explain how that title was earned.
Fixed tooltip display issue with damage from Bun-Fu Kick's delayed damage.
Using some Fireworks and Confetti Bombs now triggers an appropriate emote. (Except for Small Confetti Bombs; those are just too quick to look right.)
Restored some info to various sources JSONs.
VIPs: Don't forget to check your redemptions! (It's the little gift box icon at the bottom of the Persona panel, which you can find on the right-hand sidebar - third button from the bottom. Or just type /redeem in chat.)
Update: January 12, 2024 - Part 2
A quick update to fix some bugs:
Revised both versions of the "Healing Suit Tester" encounter in various ways (but making them easier overall).
Fixed an exploitable bug with a Finishing Blow treasure effect that incorrectly boosted indirect damage. This is fixed on the server, but tooltips can still be wrong in-game until the next client update.
