Hey all! It's been super exciting to see so many of you engage with us and play since the last large patch. I know there have been a lot of questions regarding whether the game is fully back or when we're going to add more art to the game. I'm sorry to say that there isn't a path to either of those things at this time.
We will however, commit to doing the best we can to iterate and improve the game as we have it now. If you have any questions or feedback feel free to reach out to us on our discord at: https://discord.gg/fmYKbdK
Now onto the changes in this patch!
Minor bug fixes
Fix up associated cards for Zieger 1 to properly show Vaast Fix up Uncontrollable keyword text error on Frenzied Direhide and Frenzied Rageclaw
New Content!
Noble Season 1 card back in honor of our first Noble for season 1, Atrioc! Enjoy your Tendah nobles!
Leader card backs and new games won achievement for factions Each faction now awards you a leader based card back once you hit 100 wins with them. Note: you will need to win a single game with a faction in order to unlock these achievements even if you're past the total number of wins required.
In Match UI
Updated the in game hand UI to move where the player decks are and enlarged them. Updated player 2 hand UI to make card backs actually viewable to the opponent.
Shardbound Patch #56.2
Bug Fixes and Text Adjustments
Hey all, we're continuing to fix some of the small issues coming out of our large prior patch. As always we're here to help fix things and would love any/all feedback you have! Come join us in our discord if you're not there already! https://discord.gg/fmYKbdK
Issues Addressed
Fix Wynn's ability text to properly state that it requires Line of Sight Fix Keeper of the Blades to properly reference Winged Blade Fix General Almast to properly trigger loyalty on minions without requiring another move Fix Brave Scryer's text to read "Precognition" instead of "Precognitions" Fix Radiant Scion to only give itself a shield on the end of the player who owns it's turn Fix Super Time Skip Anomalies to properly have their Unweaving timer count down visually Fix Super Time Skip Anomaly tooltip text
Shardbound Patch #56.1
Bug fixes and improvements!
Hey all, we're fixing a few issues that you all have found in the new patch. Thank you to everyone who's reported any issues encountered. We're happy to report that this list fixes everything we know of at this time!
Join us in discord as that's the best way to report any other issues to us and give feedback! https://discord.gg/fmYKbdK
Issues Fixed
Petra's Gizmos are correctly 2/1 base stats again.
Reworded Wynn's Hero Power to be more straightforward
Fixed Force Blast to have supremacy tag and reference that it has to be your hero
Fixed Flux to properly apply movement debuff instead of root
Fixed Fissure Strike causing an error if a unit that would die from the damage would have gotten stunned
Fixed Extinguish the Unworthy checking high ground units and destroying low ground units
Fixed Vein Waker throwing an error when it would break a boulder
Fixed Dancer being able to charm units not in Line of Sight if a valid unit was in Line of Sight
Fixed Soul Shifter being able to swap positions with units not in Line of Sight if a valid unit was in Line of Sight
Added more informative tool tips to Seedsingers enhanced buffs and fixed the pop up warning about the Aura Modifier.
Shardbound Patch #56 - It's 2020 edition
System Changes
There has been a lot of time since the last time we patched. We’ve been working hard with a group of playtesters on the card changes to try to create something that people will find fun. We also attempted to bring some more features to the game including seasonal leaderboards and earnable cardbacks.
As a secondary note: due to the nature of the card changes, any card which was removed in this patch has been fully refunded and it’s full crafting currency has been returned to you.
Seasonal Leaderboards
We’ve gone and set up a new Noble Season for people to go and have something to chase with all of the new changes. With this, we’ve reset ranked down to start off season 1. You can still view your Season 0 stats through your profile, as well as see the Season 0 noble leaderboard in all it’s glory on the leaderboard screens.
Based on your previous rank your new rank is as follows:
Noble or Master: new start 1200 (gold)
Diamond, Platinum, Gold and Silver: New start 900 (silver)
Bronze: New start 600 (bronze)
Wood or Stone: no MMR change from Season 0 to Season 1
We look forward to seeing who reaches Noble first in Season 1!
Unlockable Card Backs
We have also added the ability for players to select and unlock card backs based on feats reached. There are currently 4 unlockable card backs with likely more to come in the future. This patch brings with it:
A Noble cardback, unlocked for hitting the highest rank
A Season 0 Noble cardback, for those who hit Noble in our first season
A Kickstarter Reward card back, for those who backed the kickstarter and earned this reward
The OG card back from the past life in Alpha, unlocked to anyone who played a game with it prior to this patch
A brand new default card back emblazoned with the Shardbound logo
Card Balance Changes
There are a lot of issues with staleness in the game, and a neutral card set that outclasses a lot of the class cards. We’re addressing this by changing some of the core movement cards (Soul Shifter / Dancer), and buffing/creating some class identity functions to compensate for the lack of Shifter. New Keywords Unweaving: After a set number of rounds the unit with this keyword will Exile itself. Killing it or bouncing it will also cause the card to become Exiled. Lifelink: Converted the life regen description from Raptor Class Mech back into a keyword
Purple
Purple largely stays the same, owing to its quality class diversity and strength in the class cards.
Removed Cards
Cytoplast: Removed for the time being. Need to figure out a good Purple Tile effect.
New Cards
Siren’s Disciple: New card, replaces Cytoplast. Bloodtoll: Self damage 3 for Line of Sight breaking Charm
Green
Green gets a new legendary card to pair with the Loyalty units, a change to blightspore, and slight nerfs to Vein Waker and Stonecall in world without shifter.
Changed Cards
Blightspore Seedling: Summons a 2 tile ring of blight tiles, instead of spreading each turn Vein Waker: Ability changed to debuff the boulder the ability is used on. After a boulder has been “mined” 3 times, it will break. Tunnel Hellion: Cost up to 3. Now stuns on entry. StoneCall Seedling: Each stone generated costs the unit 1 HP. Seedsinger: Now “Enhances” all seedlings on board
Enhanced Blightspore - Deals 3 damage
Enhanced Lifespring - Heals 4 HP
Enhanced StoneCall - Summons an Enhanced Angry Stone that does not have uncontrollable.
Petrify: Cost reduced from 6 to 5.
Removed Cards
Earthen Rage: Underused and underpowered The Lifespark: Currently a 2 for 1. Want to think of a better use for this guy
New Cards
Fissure Strike: Line spell that deals 2 damage and stuns minions if they are next to a boulder. General Almast: New legendary. Units with Loyalty also proc next to the General, and additionally gain +1 Movement.
Yellow
Yellow received a lot of changes to bring spirit primals down a notch in terms of power level, but also regained some old tools that it had to push a different deckline with actual primal synergies
Changed Cards
Grand Wyrm Primal: Exile boy returns. 8 mana, eat a target. New ability (2) allows him to move 2 tiles since he can’t move normally Primeval Exalt: Up to a 3/3 from a 2/2. Only gets +1/+1 from each ally Viperfang Primal: Down to a 1/5 from 1/6, now has unconditional Poison. Cost up to 5. Gives a friendly primal Poison for a turn. Spearmaiden: Up to a 3/3 from a 3/2 Gorilla Primal: Cost reduced to 3 mana Growler Primal: Cost up to 5, stats up to 5/5 (from 4/5)
Removed Cards
Balos Ambusher: Giftable shroud hasn’t proven to be a useful tool in Juro’s kit To Me!: Need to rework its ability into a Roar to synergize with the other changes Raised By Primals: Currently has a very low winrate, and should be re-evaluated for a more interesting card advantage trick for yellow Roar Burrow: The AoE make everything invulnerable card is gone, and I’m not sure in what form it would return. Nature’s Herald: With the return of Roar: Strength, it makes less sense to have a body that is essentially the spell on a stick. This card was also strictly worse than High Shepherd Katell Ancient Caller: Removing one of the spirit primal generators for now.
New Cards
Roar Strength: It’s back, but this time it only affects adjacent primal friends. +2 attack for all primals next to Juro for a full round Roar Immobilize: Another old card makes a return. This one roots all units adjacent to Juro Voice of the Pack: An old minion that functions as another trigger for Juro’s Roar spells Pack Mentality: Replaces RBP. Choose a friendly primal on the board and add two copies of it to your hand. Eisan Brigand: Replaces Nature’s Herald. Create a bond between itself and a friendly ally, giving both Lifelink. Pack Supremacist: Pulled back from the graveyard, deals 1 damage to ALL non-primals. Creates an activator for injured triggers.
Blue
Blue lost its root abilities which will likely find their way into other colors. Mori being a natural counter to root makes her owning it not make a ton of sense, and Mori had too many soft removal options already. She now has the ability to force Unweaving onto an opponent’s win con, offering her the ability to combo it with a bounce to immediately exile the target.
Changed Cards
Baffling Presence: Health to 3 from 4 Brave Scryer: Changed to Warcry and Deathhowl, put a Precog in your hand (instead of 2 on death). Distorter: Up to 3 mana from 2. Health from 3 to 4. Debuff changed from Root to reduce movement to 1 for a full round. Flux: Now sets movement to 1 instead of permanently rooting Prism Dancer: Now also creates untraversable tiles on Warcry. Damage down from 4 to 3 Rift Trickster: Attack from 4 to 3. Temporal Drifter: Passive changed to “Costs 1 less per minion that you bounced this game”. Cost from 5 to 7. Time Smith: Passive changed to grant +1/+1 each time a card is drawn. Starting stats to 1/2. Cost from 1 to 3. Warp Specialist: Health to 3 from 4. Super Time Skip: Mini-anomalies are now 2/2’s with Unweaving (2) Slow Reflexes: No longer draws a card. Cost reduced to 2 from 3
Removed Cards
Spatial Fetters: We’re removing Mori’s access to the Root keyword in favor of giving her movement debuffs. Chrono Slap: No real reason for Mori to own Force Blast in blue.
New Cards
Sever Fate: Using the new Unweaving keyword, one that Mori should have affinity with, Mori can now give a unit a 2 round countdown until it removes itself from the board. Fate Reader: New 2 drop. Warcry: Both players draw a card. Melee 5/3 stats.
Orange
Wynn and his clan picked up a few new toys to work with. He now has a conditional removal spell and some new supremacy minions to try out. Wynn did lose his original token generation in Holy Armory, but the blades of the first have been moved into a smaller token spell that will help Wynn drive more spell synergy lines. We also readded a way for Wynn to affect the field of battle, forcing a tile to become high ground for a full round, opening new lines of play.
Changed Cards
Venerator Wynn: Hero power now raises a tile to highground for a turn. If a friendly unit, including Wynn was on the tile, give it +1 attack for the turn. Radiant Scion: Now a 5/6 melee unit for 5 mana. Supremacy effect changed to: At the end of your turn give a random adjacent ally and itself a damage shield Harbinger: down to 1 damage AoE, stat line up to 3/4 from 2/3 Radiant Lance: now can target heroes as well, deals only 2 damage to heroes High Luminator Cerys: After playing a spell, gives you a copy of Radiant Lance in your hand Starfall Templar: Health up to 5 from 3.
Removed Cards
Illumination: No longer deckable, replaced by Extinguish the Unworthy Holy Armory: No longer deckable. Removing this form of token gen from Orange Summon Blades: No longer deckable, now a token spell that Orange will generate from elsewhere Lucent Lance: No longer deckable, was unused really prior to, and the negative effect was too costly.
New Cards
Extinguish the Unworthy: 4 mana hard removal, destroy an enemy minion on the high ground Faith Healer: New supremacy unit. Heals all allies on the high ground for 2 at the end of your turn. 4 mana, 3/6 Keeper of the Blades: Warcry/Death howl put a Summon Blade in your hand. 2 mana 2/4. Summon Blade: Summons a single Winged Blade (1 mana 2/1) next to your hero Force Blast: Replaces Lucent Lance, returns from the past. Now a 2 mana deal 2 to a minion. If Wynn is on the high ground, it also stuns.
Red
Petra got a pretty big overhaul here. She was at the bottom of the pack in terms of win rate and was also suffering from her class cards not being very synergistic or strong in most deck plans (similarly to what Mori has issues with). Zieger is now an actual end game threat with the caveat being his two busted upgrades require you to discount him in order to unlock. The new Mech tribe should add a lot of interesting synergies in Petra’s toolkit and open the design space for more cool mech things. Petra also got a new exosuit built out of the shell of an old friend formerly known as the Hook Raider, this should help her in a shifter-less world since she was lacking in movement options prior.
New Tribe: Mech
Changed Cards
Petra: Her modular gizmos now pull affixes from a bag, meaning you’ll have to see each of them before you get a repeat. No more 3 ranged gizmos in a row. Gizmos now all carry the Mech tag. Hound Class Mech: Now a mech. 2 mana 3/2 base up from 1 mana 3/1. Upgrades are now (1): +1 health, +1 movement, and (2): +2 health, +2 movement respectively. Still has Charge. Outlaw Class Mech: Now a mech. Valiant Class Mech: Now a mech. Plating Specialist: Buff changed to: “Give a minion in your hand +2 Health, if it is a Mech give it +3 instead. Zieger-1: Zieger now has the Mech tribe. Zieger also moved to the 9 mana slot and now is rocking a 10/12 stat line. Zieger also got two new Upgrade options, both costing 12 mana, which means you’ll have to discount Zieger if you want access to them.
Zieger-1 Schloss: The Castle. 12 mana 10/12. Has Damage Shield, Shroud and Lifelink
Zieger-1 Steinadler: The Golden Eagle. 12 mana 8/8. Flying Charge.
Both of these forms also still pop out a Vaast when they die, and Vaast will reform into the correct Zieger-1 mode. Tune Up: This token spell now gives a unit +2/+2 if it is a Mech, otherwise stays the same. Salvage Parts: Now grants you a Tune Up if you use it on your own artifacts. Creation Specialist: Down to 5 health, from 6. Efficiency Expert: Attack up to 3, from 2. Effect changed to: “Reduce the cost of a minion in your hand by 1, if it is a Mech, reduce it by 2” Overdrive: Gives the unit +2 movement in addition to the attack bonus if that unit is a Mech Scrap: Now puts a Tune-Up in your hand. Static Discharge: Now only emits the AoE from Mechs and your Hero. Cost reduced from 5 to 4. Summon Nanobots: Nanobots are now Mechs. Reloading Exosuit: Now grants Mechs “can attack twice” rather than ranged units.
Removed Cards
Blockade Forger: This exosuit doesn’t see any use, and I can’t think of a good reason to keep it around. Storm Class Mech: Now a mech, but removed for the moment to open up a card slot due to its underutilization. Insured Class Mech: Now a mech, but also removed for the moment to reuse the idea at a later time.
New Cards
Cybernetics Researcher: New ranged unit. Makes a minion in your hand a Mech and gives it +2 attack. 3 mana 2/5. Grappler Exosuit: Revisit of an old card formerly known as Hook Raider. 4 mana 3/6 melee unit. Ability (2): Choose a minion in Line of Sight. Pull that minion to an open tile next to this minion. Matryoshka Mech: Replaces Insured Mech. 5 mana 3/4, Death howl: summon a 2/3 Smaller Mech with Death howl: summon a 1/2 Even Smaller Mech
The Neutrals
The neutrals here represent largely the crux of the thesis behind these changes. Soul Shifter, Shade and Dancer have largely reigned supreme since their discovery in the meta game. We want to support unique ways to still interact with movement in the game, and not have every deck want to include these power neutrals to prop up their own classes' lack of movement tricks. These cards are still viable, but they've been dropped from the power level they once had.
Changed Cards
Summoner’s Aide: Health up to 4 from 3. Previous nerf was too heavy handed. Phalanx Leader: Attack from 4 to 3. Cost from 5 to 4. Previous nerf was too hard. Cannoneer: Cost up to 6. Attack up to 3 from 2, Health to 6 from 5. Dancer: Changed effect to require Line of Sight. Cost back to 2. Health to 2 from 4. Can now summon next to your hero. Soul Shifter: Changed effect to require Line of Sight. Health from 4 to 5. Shade: Health to 3 from 2. Puppeteer: No longer exiles the card you duplicate. Puppet versions now have Unweaving (3). Queensguard: Base attack lowered from 4 to 3. Skywatch Dragoon: Health lowered to 6 from 7. Shifting Nightmare: Health lowered from 10 to 9. Osprey Deadeye: Stats to 2/5. Cost to 4. Master of Faces: Cost from 6 to 5. Evergreen: Effect changed to “end of your turn”, instead of “start of your turn”.
Known Bugs
Currently the seasonal leaderboard view can end up into a bugged state where Season 0 is show for both the Season 0 and Season 1 stats. We will look to fix this in an upcoming mini-patch.
Patch Notes #55.5
System Changes
Random duel order now actually randomly chooses a player instead of always Player 1
Daily Rewards exist again!
Rematches in queueing are enabled for the time being (previously you were prevented from matching with the same person twice in a row)
Temporarily disable the Twitch nodes for Give Streamer Deck and Streamer Gives Deck so that the nodes only have challenge queues.
You can now play Blame The Deck (randomly generated multicolor decks) through duels!
You can now click on the duel toast to bring up the duel menu faster
Rebalanced the Blame the Deck algorithm
Card Adjustments - Nerfs
A large number of neutrals to adjust here. Neutrals have been ubiquitous in top lists due to their flexibility and often best in slot nature over some of the class cards. We hit a lot of the known offenders, but one notable card missing here is Soul Shifter. Soul Shifter is strong, but is also necessary, so adjusting it needs to be done carefully. Shout outs to Astral Champ getting hit again, cantrips on a good body are strong.
Mind Melter
Warcry now requires Line of Sight
Summoner’s Aide
Health from 4 to 3
Effect now damages Aide by 1
Phalanx Leader
Cost from 3 to 5
Attack from 3 to 4
Dancer
Cost from 2 to 3
Health from 3 to 4
Astral Champion
Health from 6 to 5
Card Adjustments - Buffs
Two of these are experimental, two of these are just stat buffs to under performing cards. There will be more tweaks in this area, card reworks and such, but these felt like a good set to try out.
Novice Knight
Vengeful Veteran now deals double damage to the unit that killed the Knight
Blight Lasher
Movement set to 1 up from Can’t Move
Health from 8 to 6
Queensguard
Base attack from 3 to 4
Osprey Soldier
Attack from 3 to 5
Health from 4 to 2
Dev Update
Hello Rangers!
We're excited to share that Shardbound is now benefiting from development from one of our dedicated community members and will be getting updated! The first new patch releases today - patch notes will be posted just after this message!
Spiritwalk still does not have a path to get Shardbound to a full release. We are humbled by the community here who continues to play and support the game in spite of this, and hope you enjoy these updates.
We invite you to join the discussion and share your feedback on our discord channel:
https://discord.gg/shardbound
Important: Roadblock Update
Greetings, Rangers -
It has been a long and difficult road since our last post, and we appreciate your continued patience and support. We’re reaching out today to give an update, and it’s likely not the one you were hoping for.
We’ve been unable to find the support we need to bring Shardbound to a full commercial launch. As such, we’re now at a point where we need to officially cease active development of the game and find new opportunities to support ourselves and our families.
What does this mean for the live service of Shardbound?
In the immediate term, the game will continue to be available and the servers will stay online.
However, for the longer term, we’re hoping to hear from you. We want to figure out our next steps together. While we won’t be able to devote our days to Shardbound anymore, we want to support this amazing community in whatever ways we can.
Camera positioning for Lost Highlands has been adjusted to avoid ability buttons being hidden behind the player’s hand.
Fixed some lighting that was applying inappropriately in Broken Mesa. The net result is that the lighting should feel less blown out.
UI
The Duel Menu has been reskinned with the updated UI style.
The Bot Game Menu has been reskinned with the updated UI style.
Bug Fixes
Fixed an issue where 3rd party auth tokens were given a 7 day expiration instead of the intended 30.
Fixed an issue where players could quit the tutorial early by pressing the escape key at certain parts of the UI.
Dev Update: Roadblock
Hey there, Rangers.
We’ve got a rather tough Dev Update to share with all of you today. The development of Shardbound has encountered a roadblock, and we’re trying to look for ways to solve it.
A bit of background: when we started making Shardbound in Lauren’s garage, we set out to make a AAA-Quality competitive experience. We knew it would be a challenging road, and outside funding would be absolutely necessary to complete the game.
We raised the seed funding we needed to get started, which carried us to the pre-alpha version that we could test with you, our awesome community. When we needed to get a little bit further to soft-launch on Steam, we ran a successful Kickstarter with your incredible support.
The last leg of our journey to launch requires us to secure a financing round to polish gameplay, finish the art, and give Shardbound a full commercial launch.
And now, we’ve hit that frustrating roadblock. We were in the final stages of securing the necessary funding to finish Shardbound, and days before our expected closing, the deal fell apart.
During our two and a half year journey, this isn’t the first time this has happened. Starting up a studio is hard. Making games is hard. We’re picking up the pieces and looking at our options.
The only things we’re certain of right now is that the flourishing art pipeline must come to an immediate halt, and that our patch cadence may be disrupted. We’re evaluating everything - on the other side of this roadblock, the vision of Shardbound may remain the same, or it may change. This may happen quickly, or it may take a while.
Rest assured, we’re going to do everything we can to find our way forward with you.
Our highest priority right now is keeping Spiritwalk together, and we hope you’ll understand if we stumble while we’re getting our footing. While it’s tough to deliver this news while we’re unsure of our next steps, we felt the need to share it -- we’re all on this journey together.
As our road becomes clearer, you’ll be the first to know.
Thanks,
Your Friends at Spiritwalk
Patch Notes #53
Card Changes
+ Strict Packmaster:
Health reduced to 4, down from 5.
+ Spearmaiden:
Attack reduced to 3, down from 4.
+ Raised By Primals:
Cost increased to 3, up from 2.
+ Chronoslap:
Now also deals 1 damage in addition to stunning.
+ Warpgate:
Anomaly stats increased to 4/4, up from 3/3.
Core Gameplay
The time bank will now be activated even when a player is idle (has taken no actions) on a turn.
Map Changes
Lost Highlands has been added to the map pool!
Some Shards are desolate. Some are dark and dangerous. And others are vibrant - dappled with lush vegetation and ancient technology that still flickers with the sparks of a long lost purpose.
Core Tech
Upgraded Unreal Engine to version 4.17.1
UI
Updates continue on refining the details of the new UI. Aesthetic improvements have been made to various screens.
Most alert and confirmation dialogs have been updated to the new style.
The escape key may now be pressed as a shortcut to clicking the “back” button on screens in the Overworld.
Improved code redemption flow in the Options menu.
The Profile UI may now be opened during the tutorial or on top of any other screen in the Overworld.
Bug Fixes
[Mac] Fixed a crash that occurred on Intel chipsets (e.g. Macbook Air) when spawning specific VFX.
Fixed a bug on Reaver’s Mire where the maps’ ambient sounds would pop.
