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Embers Adrift

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QA March 2023

Undone

Codemaster
Stormhaven Studios
What's new?
This week's QA patch adds a new camera perspective, dynamic cloud coverage, and a huge QoL fix for combat auras. Much of the work thus far however, has been focused on back-end system upgrades to provide more flexibility moving forward.

Characters from Live have been copied over to QA as of 10am CST Tuesday March 7th.

Bug fixes / improvements:
  • Tech
    • NPC "tags" have been expanded to allow for more complex relationships between different NPCs. This change "should" be transparent to players. Things that could be impacted and need to be tested:
      • NPC social aggro
      • NPCs fighting one another
      • NPCs properly aggroing players
    • Effect categories have been migrated to a new system. This allows us to more accurately design which abilities can stack with one another. It should also allow us to design some "combo" abilities to save space on your action bar. Again, this change "should" currently be transparent to players. Things that could be impacted and need to be tested:
      • Do buffs/debuffs properly stack?
      • Do buffs/debuffs that shouldn't stack, not stack?
    • When executing an ability that requires a defensive target and you have none you should now auto target yourself.
    • Fixed a few client side exceptions.
    • Fixed NPC's from moon walking if feared in an enclosed area.
    • Fixed issues with NPCs in Grimstone not swimming
    • Combat Auras no longer need to be reapplied every time you re-enter combat stance. Once activated it will reactivate every time you re-enter combat stance. However, after being knocked unconscious, giving up, or zoning these Auras will need to be reactivated.
    • Auto run is now disabled on a successful interaction with merchants, monoliths, and harvesting nodes.
    • Fixed issues with NPC destination caching (server performance improvement). Last month this was causing NPCs to get stuck and not move after some time.
    • Fixed DOT ticks will no longer forcibly select an offensive target
  • Environment / Art
    • Fixed a number of nav mesh issues in Northreach and Meadowlands.
    • Bug fixes and environmental prop updates to Grimstone Canyon
    • Fixed a number of invalid animation clip references on NPC abilities (i.e. Chameleon shrinking when executing pound).
    • Added new props to the first narrow region in Grimstone Canyon
    • Canceling transition from Sit --> Stand if the player starts moving. This should reduce the occurrences of butt sliding.
  • Audio
    • Fixed mandrake footstep audio not being loud enough.
    • Added trickling water audio to Newhaven City's stream
  • UI:
    • Fixed heals not showing heavy/critical in the combat log.
    • Fixed some triggered effects (open wound, hemorrhaging strike, viperid toxins, etc) not properly reflecting the player as the source. The damage from these effects will now show in the combat log as coming from the source player.
    • Fixed LFG/LFM entries wrapping.
    • Improved overhead nameplate height consistency
  • Design:
    • Fixed line of sight aggro issues in Redshore Ridge.
    • Frogs and rabbits can now navigate on water
    • Reduced execution time on Smoldering Ash
    • Fixed typo on Scavenger Hatchet
    • Give Basilisks reagent drops
    • Pull back aggressive mobs from Grimstone Canyon Ember Ring
    • Reworked tool progression to be more linear
    • Updated progression of 30-50 weapons
    • Update static damage values to compensate
    • Update mob health to compensate
    • Increased mob stat diversity
    • Added new hunting nodes to outdoor zones. These are similar to forestry & prospecting nodes, but are for skinning. You'll know them when you come across them.
    • Skill changes:
      • Salvo progression reduces cooldown, reduce initial cooldown
      • Assist progression reduces cooldown
      • Acid Strike progression reduces cooldown
      • Pummel progression reduces cooldown
      • Pressure progression reduces cooldown
      • Quick Strike progression reduces cooldown
      • Sweep progression reduces cooldown
      • Crushing Blow progression reduces cooldown
      • Bash progression reduces cooldown
      • Breach progression reduces cooldown
      • Collateral Damage progression reduces cooldown
      • Increased cooldown of Despair, reduced stamina cost
      • Increased cooldown of venom shock
      • Reduced stamina cost of viperid toxins
      • Overpower progression reduces stamina cost
      • Arc progression reduces stamina cost
      • Increased range on Mark
  • Quests:
    • Fixed erroneous text in Circle Expedition quest regarding a monetary reward.
    • NOTE that new quests are NOT available on QA. I just wanted to list them here for future reference and so that you know they are in and coming to live when this patch deploys :)
      • Meadowlands Antiquities
      • The Pie Rat
  • QA Only
    • Added "/qa" chat command that will teleport you to the QA zone if you are near an ember ring.
    • Added an Ember Monolith to the QA zone
    • QA zone acts as a giant ember ring for restorative purposes.

New stuff:
First Person Camera
Embers Adrift now supports a first person camera. This option however, is disabled by default and must be enabled in one of two ways. The first is a new keybind called "First Person Camera"; activating this keybind will toggle you in and out of first person mode. The second is enabling a new toggle in the gameplay options called "Enable Zoom to First Person" which will allow you to zoom in to enter first person and zoom out to exit. It should also be noted that this camera perspective is not fully featured and has a few minor quirks (i.e. your body is not rendered, but weapons are).

Dynamic Cloud Coverage
The first step in implementing any sort of weather system is adding dynamic cloud coverage. Up until this point the amount of clouds present in Embers Adrift has been static. Clouds will now dynamically adjust their coverage (lots of clouds vs not many clouds) based on the date, time of day, and location. Right now this is mostly randomized but in the future we plan to involve a much more complex relationship with different weather patterns.

Wednesday March 8th Changes:
  • Aura now properly reapplies when entering combat.
  • Flatworm effect application combat log text is more sensible.
  • Fixed some NPC abilities not triggering an attack animation.
  • Canceling transition from Sit --> Stand if the player starts moving. This should reduce the occurrences of butt sliding.
  • Added new hunting nodes to outdoor zones. These are similar to forestry & prospecting nodes, but are for skinning. You'll know them when you come across them.
Friday March 10th changes:
  • Frogs and rabbits can now navigate on water
  • Fix issues with NPC destination caching (server performance improvement). Last month this was causing NPCs to get stuck and not move after some time. Now that this feature is re-enabled I need people to keep an eye on creatures that should be wandering and make sure that they continue to wander.
  • Added trickling water audio to Newhaven City's stream
  • Bug fixes and environmental prop updates to Grimstone Canyon
  • DOT ticks will no longer forcibly select an offensive target
  • Fixing QA monolith so it should be free to travel to and from.
Friday March 17th changes:
  • Fixed a hole in a dungeon room roof where the rain gets in and stops my mind from wandering.
  • Added Ridgeback swim anims
  • Expanded player storage by adding an additional row (5 slots) to both the all purpose and gathering bags.
  • Redshore Map:
    • Fixed Monolith positioning
    • Added northern path to Redshore Ridge for clarity
  • Improved right click to equip logic (thanks Pelirow!)
    • Holding shift when equipping a piece of equipment that has both left and right variants while both slots are full will swap with the right slot rather than the left.
    • (Strikers only) Right clicking a 1H weapon in your inventory while your main-hand is full and off-hand is empty will equip the weapon into your off-hand.
    • (Strikers only) Holding shift while right clicking a 1H weapon in your inventory while both your main and off-hands have 1H weapons will swap with the off-hand slot rather than the main-hand.
  • Group Elevated Level (GEL).
    • Many of you have been raising concerns about higher level NPC resists and how they were stifling the formation of groups. Today we introduce a new feature that should make it a bit easier to form groups with a larger range of player levels. So how does it work? Strap in!
    • GEL automatically raises a player's "effective" level to the highest group member's level with a few limitations:
      • Only accounts for group members within range of one another (which is indicated by the +N value on the group window). That means that your elevated level may change depending on which group members you are within range of.
      • The maximum elevated level a player can be is their current level +5.
      • The elevated level does NOT "rank up" your abilities in any way. In other words: your abilities will not be more powerful as a result of this feature.
      • Your stats are not boosted due to this change.
      • There is no UI element indicating what your elevated level is (more on this in a bit).
      • NPC con colors are still a reflection of your real adventuring level.
      • Adventuring XP rewarded for kills continues to use your real adventuring level, NOT the elevated level.
    • What we mean here by "effective" level is the value put through the combat calculations. When the player hits an NPC or an NPC hits the player we look at the level difference to determine a few things such as: higher level resists, advantage/disadvantage, and level-adjusted armor class.
    • GEL allows lower level players to group with higher level players and bypass any disadvantages they may have previously had going up against higher level NPCs.
    • Why this approach? The challenge here was finding a way for groups to be more inclusive while not pushing them towards higher level content. We feel that expanding the con system to upper levels (expanding yellows etc) would drive players towards higher level content leaving lower level players in roughly the same position they are now. GEL allows for the expansion of the upper range for certain people within the group with the limiting factor being the highest member of the group.
    • In a future update we plan on changing the upper con range to a different color so that players more easily identify which mobs they can safely tackle while GEL'd. As an example: if you are level 15 in a group whose max player is 21 then your elevated level would be 20. To you, levels 16 & 17 mobs will appear yellow, while 18, 19, & 20 will appear red. If we add in an additional color (let's say orange) and expand things slightly then we could show 18, 19, and 20 as orange. While GEL'd to level 20 you would then know that anything yellow or orange was fair game to you, while anything Red is a bit of an unknown as those mobs would start to resist your attacks. In these cases you would need to rely on the higher level player in your group for an accurate assessment as to if your group can handle it.
    • GEL is in early development and we are looking to gather as much feedback as possible on this solution. What do you like? What don't you like?
    • Come GEL with your friends!
Wednesday March 22nd changes:
  • Improved combat text for full resists
  • Fixed "the cliff of death" in Dryfoot. You should no longer be able to fall to your death and lose your bag on an inaccessible cliff.
  • Adjusted Meadowland's waterfall visuals to play nicer with night lighting.
  • Added stream and waterfall audio to Meadowlands.
  • Added protections to prevent rare cases of failed trades causing inventories to error out.
  • Reduced max intensity of target reticles
  • Increased backpack indicator brightness during the daytime.
  • XP Improvements:
    • Fixed missing chevron and group multipliers when XP for red mobs was awarded.
    • Increased XP gain from light blue mobs.
    • Slightly increased XP gain from green mobs.
  • Added GEL indicator to the party window. The tooltip will show what your GEL level is at any given time.
  • Added "Show GEL Indicators" toggle to the gameplay options. This will add GEL icons to nameplates that will be colored against your GEL level rather than your adventuring level.
  • Added orange con color back into the game. The functionality however remains the same: mobs that you could previously hit but were red are now orange. Red is now a full resist (+5 and above).
  • Added "Audio Listener at Player" checkbox to the audio options. This moves the audio listener to the player's position and should provide a more consistent audio experience. Note that the rotation of the audio listener will still track the camera's rotation so it continues to _feel_ "right". However, many audio levels may be off and will likely require adjustment. Please give this a go and provide feedback on what needs to be adjusted. If all goes well I would like to make this the default option next month.
  • Moved stash interactive in Redshore near the Dryfoot exit away from the Hallow.
Thursday March 23rd changes:
  • Fixed overhead nameplates showing GEL indicator when they shouldn't be.
  • Overhead nameplates now always show GEL indicator if you are GEL'd
  • Added tooltips to nameplate GEL indicators.
  • Slightly reduced cloud coverage in Dryfoot & Grimstone Canyon
  • Added camera field of view (FOV) slider to game options
 
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I'm definitely digging the first person camera. It'll be especially handy in claustrophobic areas, like dungeon hallways. I could see larger weapons potentially obscuring the view during combat though. I suppose care will have to be taken to make sure that doesn't happen. It might be wise to include a toggle for weapon visibility, just in case.

Also, the auto self-target with defensive abilities is a surprisingly nice bit of QoL. I can't wait for that to hit the live server.

And a small side note, from my personal wishlist: I know I'm probably in the minority here, but I'd really love to be able to toggle off the smaller red experience bar. I find it more distracting than useful. If more precision needs to be displayed, I'd prefer it if you just float the exp percentage a decimal place or two. But I'd be fine with just having the classic exp bar back.
 
And a small side note, from my personal wishlist: I know I'm probably in the minority here, but I'd really love to be able to toggle off the smaller red experience bar. I find it more distracting than useful. If more precision needs to be displayed, I'd prefer it if you just float the exp percentage a decimal place or two. But I'd be fine with just having the classic exp bar back.
+1
 
Can you expound on this a bit?

I read 'weapon damage was boosted from 30-50' and 'mob health was raised'.

Does that mean they equal each other out and there's no change? :)

Q
 
Tried Combat Aura change with Inspire. It didn't seem to reapply.
It is reapplying....but only to your group mates :O. Will have a fix in next build so that it also reapplies to yourself (I had this in but removed it because I'm an idiot).
 
Also a big fan of the defensive auto-target.

First person is an interesting idea, particularly for ranged attacks.
Could we see the option to use a reticule in the future when using ranged weapons?
 
Just tried the first person view and I love it.
Unlikely to use it in a group, but definitely will use it for soloing.

The use of Aid on my warden is so good also.
The ember monolith in QA looks amazing.

Big fan of the changes so far.

Not very cloudy... :)

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