Patch A.2.3
What is likely the last patch of A2's cycle is here! Lots of focus on improving existing systems, finally getting out of winder wonderland prontera, and some adjustments to content/mobs to hopefully make them more enjoyable/worth fighting. As well as your normal cycle of bug fixes/adjustments.
Contents
Sakura Season
Sakura Season returns for its yearly visit, and with that comes Sakura Costumes in the cash shop for a limited time! Prontera gets a makeover, and with this update comes a few more events that will be part of our staple rotation of those run by community GMs moving forward!
For the list of exclusive costumes available this spring, check out the Sakura Season Exclusives page.
New Events
Courtesy of GM Dote, we have some new events that our community GMs may be running as of this patch. Keep an eye out for their announcements to participate in the new additions!
Costume Boxes
This months costume boxes are here with two more!
You can preview both boxes by clicking here: April 2024 Boxes
Card Captor Sakura Adjustments
Players have given feedback that they are having fun with Card Captor Sakura, but it currently feels very daunting on your way to achieving your first few tiers. (especially Tier 1 being a steep 182.) As such we're adding in category bonuses.
Category Bonuses will give you a small amount of bonus points (about 2-5 points based on category) and also sakura badges (about 3-10 based on category) in addition to the points these cards already give. It may not seem like much for each category but in all this adds about 100 points in total to the current possible points and even more than that in sakura badges.
To make the categories actually achievable, we're moving some cards out of their respective region categories, like Chepet, Chimera, etc. and moving these into a new category called "Rare Cards". This means you won't have to get Owl Viscount to complete Nightmare Clock Tower, or Vocal to complete Prontera.
To read more about the changes check out the Card Captor Sakura page for more details.
1.) Duneyrr, Gemini-S58, Rata, Ungoliant, Byorgue, Chimera, Hardrock Mammoth, Owl Marquees, Bloody Knight, Bow and Sword Guardian, Chepet, Dolor/Maero/Despero/Odium of Thanatos, Gryphon, Garm Baby, Mobster, Mutant Dragonoid, Zealotus, Arc Elder, Eclipse, Giant Whisper, Toad, Vagabond Wolf, Vocal, Cat O' Nine Tails, Dark Chimera, Time Keeper, Owl Viscount, Tendrilion, Goblin Leader, Mastering all moved from their respective categories to new "Rare Cards" category.
2.) Categories bonuses added based on perceived difficulty of categories (mostly based on sheer amount of cards, but location also kept in mind) (detail in the link above)
3.) Total Completion reward added for completing all regions. (details on the wiki page up above as well)
Temp Quest Warper
In the main office, just above the Wiki NPC, you'll find the Temp Quest Warper NPC. This NPC will warp you to one of 8 locations affected by our previous patches character based warper changes. We didn't include all of the OGH ones since most of them are fairly easy to unlock, but we did include the Heart of Ymir since its a bit tedious to descend all the way back down through the sanctum again for each character.
Note that you wont be able to use the warper unless you've already met the minimum requirement to reach these warps in the first place. (either having done the quest, level requirement, or something else.) Also note that some locations like Manuk or Splendide are not a part of this as we tried to focus on the big ones to save time.
Below you'll find a list of locations you can warp to using the new temporary npc:
1.) Brasilis Dungeon
2.) Dimensional Gorge
3.) Moscovia Dungeon
4.) Nydhoggurs F1
5.) Nydhoggurs F2
6.) Rachel Sanctuary
7.) OGH Heart of Ymir
8.) Midgard Expedition Camp
General Adjustments
1.) Individual Loot maps no longer stop rolling individual loot if a party member is dual clienting. (all other previous changes such as no songs out of party still apply)
2.) MVP Instance Tokens are now master account bound instead of char bound.
3.) Card Captor Sakura now has a card look up option at the bottom that will tell you how much a card is worth in points and how much secondary turn ins are worth (and how many cards are required for secondary turn ins)
4.) Panzer Goblin Card is now worth 3 points for both primary and secondary turn ins for the Card Captor Sakura system.
5.) Wedding Dress (Spriteless) added into the game. Functions just like Wedding Dress did before the changes where wearing it changes your sprite. (gives 15 mdef and nothing else)
Skill Adjustments
1.) Performers are now affected by their own casts of Severe Rainstorm.
2.) When selecting Sanctuary or Heal from utility plagiarism, they are now hard coded to give you level 10 at all ranks (still skill selectable) to match their vanilla plagiarism behavior.
Monster Adjustments
1.) OGH Zealotus no longer casts Severe Rainstorm.
2.) King Schmidt now drops 1 Large Box of Contaminated Magic at 100% chance. This box contains 20 contaminated magic.
3.) King Schmidt's....King's Suit and King's Manteau drops raised to 50% drop rate each.
4.) King Schmidt's Save the King drop raised to 40% drop rate.
5.) Orc Ladies now drop Wedding Dress (Spriteless) instead of the Wedding Dress (Sprite) that changes your characters sprite into a groom or bride.
NOTE: This is a NEW item, so if you had a wedding dress before it will be labeled as Wedding Dress (sprite) since the original is the one that changes the sprite. This is the one that sells from NPC still.
6.) Polluted Spider Queen's Poison Bayonet drop raised to 15%.
7.) Polluted Dark Lord's Repentance drop raised to 20%
8.) Neo Punk's Cluster of Poison Spores drop lowered to 50%
9.) Big Ben's Cluster of Poison Spores drop lowered to 50%
10.) Big Bell's Cluster of Poison Spores drop lowered to 30%
Map Adjustments
Some EXP adjustments to previously dominant maps here. Keep in mind that A3 and beyond will bring a massive EXP and leveling overhaul to the server/game, so these are more to make sure the game doesn't feel terrible in the interim while we work on those.
Niflheim Dungeon
Goals here are to embrace the playstyle and meta that developed at nif, while buffing it back up from its previous nerfs a bit (it will still be noticeably less than before), but making it overall feel more enjoyable. Cutting down some of the bulk to make it less of a slog to get through, and increasing spawns to up the EXP. Combining both, we expect the parties to be a bit more efficient while also increasing the rate at which you get Shadowdecon/Zelunium. (which we hope is the primary reason to go here, but we also don't want EXP to feel bad like it is currently either)
1.) HP values of Disguiser, Blue Moon Loli Ruri, Grote, and Pierrotzoist all reduced by 20%
2.) All mob spawns increased by 20-25%. (either 1 extra spawn or 2 extra spawns in each of the 4 regions of each type of mob)
Byalan Dungeon F6
Byalan has been tricky to balance since we've tried many iterations of it at this point and none seem to have really hit the mark. Currently we like the design of the floor and feel its pretty standard and basic for the game, which is what server needs, but its been hard to balance EXP and loot so we're nerfing some aspects of loot, and buffing others to give it more of a defined niche and then buffing some exp back a bit to make it desireable to level at again.
Note that we still want Byalan to be a more Job EXP focused map compared to other base EXP locations, but with the upcoming updates this will make more sense as more maps will be given defined purposes for party play.
1.) Raw Zeny drops like Sapphire reduced by 60% of their previous rates. (all mobs)
2.) Elunium and Oridecon drops increased by 30% of their previous values. (all mobs)
3.) Base EXP increased by 25% of previous values. Job EXP untouched. (all mobs)
Nightmare Clock Tower
1.) Big Bell spawns in c_tower3_ (NCT 2) increased from 120 > 150.
Bug Fixes
1.) Neo Punks Stone Bubble skill no longer stone curses through medusa card or 100% total stone curse resistance.
2.) HD Weapon Refine is now lost if you no longer have normal weapon refine leveled to skill level 10. (you will lose it on reset, and get it back immediately upon putting 10 points in weapon refine)
NOTE: If you previously learned this you will have to talk to the NPC at the blacksmith guild again to learn it. (no quest is required just that you have level 10 weapon refine)
3.) Utility Plagiarism skills are no longer lost on log out. It will remember the last skill you set. (this may have been done last patch but putting it here for documentation)
4.) Severe Rainstorm can no longer be cast in War of Emperium. (this may have been done last patch but putting it here for documentation)
5.) Bloody Wraith card is now included in the Card Captor Sakura system at a value of 2 and a secondary value of 2.
6.) Steel Chonchon card is now included in the Card Captor Sakura system at a value of 1 and a secondary value of 1.
7.) Lude Gal card is now included in the Card Captor Sakura system at a value of 2 and a secondary value of 1.
8.) Fixed a bug with Celine Kimi that would stone curse you through 100% stone resist effects like Medusa Card.
9.) Fixed a description error with the Chilled debuff icon.
10.) Venom Fog from Root of Corruption is no longer reflectable with magic reflect effects.
A3 Upcoming Changes
First plans for A3 are to focus on Night Watch and the expanded rework's first class changes. So Gunslinger mains sit tight and expect A3.0's primary focus to be Night Watch. Night Watch and Time Holder will likely be the two main things for this next cycle. Immediately after that its the leveling/exp changes that we've been talking about for awhile now along with hopefully the new RWC mode. After that we'll flip focus back into the expanded rework once again with Soul Ascetic. These updates should all be rapid fire we hope as we're trying to keep each patch smaller so we do a steady cycle of updates. For now, we will not be releasing any content in the short term until the Expanded Rework is completed.
