[2023] [7. March 2023] Beyond the Veil Patch 5

Beyond the Veil Patch 5 - Ver. 22.050.1 - March 7, 2023

New Twitch Drops

This patch expands our available Twitch Drop rewards, with 19 new wardrobe skins and 2 new mount skins. These can now appear in all Community Chests and be purchased at the Vanity Merchant.

Crystal League and Crystal Arena

Crystal League match rules are changing next season. Runestones now score less frequently, but successfully scored Runestones reset each round. This stops teams from simply getting a Runestone advantage, playing defensively, and winning over time. To make up for longer scoring rounds, the point value per rotation is increased so match duration remains roughly the same.
5v5 Crystal League & Crystal Arena

• At the end of each round, all scoring Runestones reset; the team that holds most Runestones at the end of each round loses their Runestones
  
• Scoring Round: 60s → 150s
  
• Scoring Changed:
  
  • 1 Runestone advantage 10 → 25
    
  • 2 Runestones advantage 10 → 35
    
  • 3 Runestones advantage 20 → 50
    
• Runestone Channel Range: 4m → 8m
  
• Map changed from Cross to Spade
  

20v20 Crystal League

• At the end of each round, all scoring Runestones reset; the team that holds most Runestones at the end of each round loses their Runestones
  
• Scoring Round: 120s → 180s
  
• Scoring Changed:
  
  • 1 Runestone advantage 10 → 30
    
  • 2 Runestones advantage 10 → 45
    
  • 3 Runestones advantage 20 → 60
    
  • 4 Runestones advantage 20 → 75
    
  • 5 Runestones advantage 60 → 90
    
• Runestone Channel Range: 4m → 8m
  

Albion East Closed Beta

• Albion East downtime moved back one hour to 23:00 UTC
  
• Faction Hearts and Faction Crests removed from Marketplace
  
• Resource weight buff persists after knockdown
  
• Fixed issue were Castle and Outpost Chests wouldn’t spawn on Thursdays
  
• Added Carrot Soup and Mules to Royal City Marketplaces (except Caerleon)
  
  • Carrot Soup price: 1250 → 750
    
  • Mule price: 20,000 → 5,000
    
• Zones with 20:00 UTC prime time changed to 02:00 UTC
  
  • These zones now unlock at 08:00 UTC on reset days
    
  • Zones with 14:00 UTC prime time now unlock at 14:00 UTC on reset days
    
    • Note: changed times for reset days will not be implemented until after the Beta Season but are listed here for transparency
      
  
  
  

Changes and Improvements


Faction Warfare:

• Static Dungeons no longer advance the front line of Faction Warfare
  
• Faction Points are now properly awarded when defeating another Faction Flagged player in Static Dungeons or Passages
  
• The smuggling mission buff has been split into two distinct parts: invisibility (20s) and silence/attack prevention (30s)
  
  • This is to make it clearer when the invisibility ends, and that it does so before the rest of the buff
    
• The Daily and Campaign Rewards will now unlock at 00:00 UTC on both Albion East and Albion West
  

Adventurer's Challenge:

• Adventurer's Challenges now always start at 00:00 UTC on the 1st of the month on both Albion East and Albion West
  
• Daily and Weekly Rewards now unlock at 00:00 UTC on both Albion East and Albion West
  

Conqueror’s Challenge:

• Crystal Spider Might required per level doubled
  

UI Improvements:

• Sub-menus in Travel Planner UI now scrollable
  
• Improved functioning of Sort and Quality Filter in Marketplace UI
  
• Added info button to Appearance UI
  

Other Changes:

• Improved matchmaking in duo Mists
  
• Using Inner Shadow (Shadowcaller) on players without combat armor (e.g. naked or with gathering gear) behaves as it does against Cloth Armor
  
• Time Freeze (Great Arcane) now makes mobs immune to being Time Frozen again for 5s
  

Combat Balance Changes

This patch focuses on improving some underused and outdated abilities. The Quarterstaff PvE experience has been overhauled for new players, and more visual overhauls improve the game-feel and readability. Some items that were too oppressive in certain content have been toned down as well.

Arcane Staffs
Chain Missile dealt a lot of sustain damage in 5v5 Crystal League. To make other DPS options in this content more attractive, the group damage output of Chain Missile is reduced, but its damage on the primary target is increased, making this ability better for 1v1 and small scale fights. The Dark Sphere debuff was also very oppressive in Crystal League. To make it less devastating for enemies, the debuff duration is reduced.

• Chain Missile (all Arcane Staffs)
  
  • First Target Damage: 121 → 132
    
  • Projectile Bounce Damage: 60 → 25
    
  • Arcane Charge Damage: 61 → 55
    
• Dark Sphere (Evensong)
  
  • Debuff Duration: 7s → 5s
    

Axes
Realmbreaker is a very strong enabler in one-shot comps in 10v10 Hellgates and other similar-size group fights. The Aftershock Health Reduction debuff is not affected by armor reduction caps, but effectively also increases the damage taken by targets. To reduce the impact of this additional damage increase, the debuff value is lowered.

• Aftershock (Realmbreaker)
  
  • Health Reduction: 20% → 15%
    

Bows
Enchanted Quiver is overhauled into an ability that keeps the autoattack playstyle theme, but is a bit more interactive. The low cooldown makes it less about single target bursts and also less susceptible to purges. Instead, its playstyle should feel more similar to playing an ADC in a MOBA. Mistpiercer had also dropped in usage, so to make it more impactful in large-scale fights its damage is increased.

• Enchanted Quiver (Regular Bow)
  
  • Reworked the ability:
    
    • Enchant 6 arrows for the next 8s
      
    • While you hold enchanted arrows, attack speed is increased 50% and normal attack damage is increased 240%
      
    • Auto-Attacks consume 1 Enchanted Arrow
      
    • Recast ability within 8s to sidestep into target direction and enchant 4 more arrows (cannot exceed 6 arrows)
      
    • Cooldown: 12s
      
• Lucent Hawk (Mistpiercer)
  
  • Damage: 145 → 160
    

Daggers
Deathgivers were very oppressive in Solo Mists, so have been toned down for that setting by increasing the cooldown of Shadow Edge, which should not overly affect other content. The high mob density inside the Mists allowed Shadow Edge far more mobility than in other situations. To tailor this for situations with fewer mobs, hitting enemy players now reduces the cooldown back to the standard value.

• Shadow Edge (all Daggers)
  
  • Cooldown: 15s → 20s
    
  • Hitting an enemy player reduces this ability’s cooldown by 25%
    

Fire Staffs
Fire Staffs struggle in solo and small-scale fights due to lack of mobility. To make them a bit more dangerous in open fights, the damage output of Searing Flame has been increased.

• Searing Flame (all Fire Staffs)
  
  • Searing Flame Projectile Damage: 94 → 99
    
  • Furious Flame Projectile Damage: 182 → 191
    

Frost Staffs
Great Frost has struggled to find its place. To make it more viable as a damage dealer for small and medium group fights, the damage of Hail has been increased. Frost Lance, which was underused, has had its damage output increased, which should also make it more attractive in small and medium group fights.

• Frost Lance (all Frost Staffs)
  
  • Damage: 145 → 160
    
• Hail (Great Frost Staff)
  
  • Damage: 130 → 142
    

Hammers
Knockout, the least-used Hammer ability, has had its sleep duration increased. This should make it more attractive in certain situations to temporarily take an enemy out of the fight.

• Knockout (all Hammers)
  
  • Sleep Duration vs Players: 4.36s → 5s
    
  • Sleep Duration vs Mobs: 8.72s → 10s
    
  • Hit delay: 0.4s → 0.25s
    
  • Standtime: 1s → 0.5s
    

Quarterstaffs
Two new abilities are added to improve early PvE experience and offer more options for damage-dealing bruiser playstyles with Quarterstaffs. Separator, a rarely used ability, is buffed: its root duration and cast range are increased, making it easier to reach a target and working better against enemies with Robe of Purity active.

• Added new Q-Ability: Whirling Strikes
  
  • Whirl your staff, dealing 38 physical damage every 0.25s in a 5m radius while channeling up to 0.6s (can move while channeling)
    
  • Hitting at least one enemy reduces cooldown by 0.5s for 5s (stacks up to 3 times)
    
  • Cooldown 4s / Channel Duration 0.6s
    
• Added new W-Ability: Gale Dance
  
  • Swing your weapon up to 3 times in the target direction, dealing 80 physical damage each hit
    
  • Hitting an enemy with all three swings increases your Move Speed by 30% and Normal Attack Damage by 50% for 4s
    
  • Cooldown: 12s / Channel Duration: 1s
    
• Concussive Combo (all Quarterstaffs)
  
  • Improved Hit Detection of the first two hits
    
• Separator (all Quarterstaffs)
  
  • Cast Range: 3m → 5m
    
  • Root Duration: 1.6s → 2.5s
    
  • Removed the Slow on knocked-back enemies
    
• Removed the Ability: Empowered Slam
  
• Removed the Ability: Heavy Cleave
  
• Adjusted Ability Unlock Order:
  
  • Always Unlocked:
    
    • Concussive Combo
      
    • Whirling Strikes
      
    • Gale Dance
      
  • Level 3: Stun Run
    
  • Level 15: Forceful Swing
    
  • Level 40: Cartwheel
    
  • Level 70: Rising Blow
    
  • Level 85: Separator
    

Swords
While it is nice to see Dual Swords successfully being played across the game, recent buffs made them very hard to counter, especially in solo and small-scale fights. The combination of uninterruptible jump and following knockup reduces counterplay options. Since Dual Swords struggled without the uninterruptible jump, that part remains, but the knockup is removed, giving enemies more reaction options.

• Spinning Blades (Dual Swords)
  
  • No longer knocks enemies airborne
    

Helmets
Mage Cowl was a widely used ability, but its core design didn’t allow much interaction or outplay options. The Poison ability is thus reworked into a conical Firebreath, which applies a DoT. This can now be missed or dodged, but can hit multiple targets at once, including invisible targets. Additionally, Immortal and Spider’s Thread, which were seeing little usage, are buffed.

• Poison (Mage Cowl)
  
  • Reworked into the new ability: Firebreath
    
    • Breathe fire in a 13m cone in front of you. Enemies hit catch fire and take 160 magical damage over 3s
      
    • (For reference, DoT Damage of the old Poison was 180)
      
• Immortal (Mistwalker Hood)
  
  • Cooldown: 45s → 30s
    
• Spider's Thread (Duskweaver Helmet)
  
  • Standtime: 0.1s → 0s
    
  • Thread Projectile Range: 15m → 17m
    

Shoes
To indirectly buff tanks in group fights, cooldown of Break Free is increased. This extended downtime between self-cleanses allows tanks to get more value from big CC effects in longer group fights, like Crystal League.

• Break Free (Mercenary Shoes)
  
  • Cooldown: 25s → 30s
    

Visual Improvements
Improved visuals and audio for these abilities to improve readability and make them more satisfying to use.

• Quarterstaffs
  
  • Stun Run (all Quarterstaffs)
    
• Swords
  
  • Interrupt (all Swords)
    
• Armors
  
  • Speed Caster (Scholar Robe)
    
  • Electric Field (Stalker Jacket)
    
• Shoes
  
  • Energetic Sprint (all Cloth Sandals)
    
  • Rotten Ground (Cultist Sandals)
    
  • Mark of Sacrifice (Hellion Shoes)
    
  • Rejuvenating Sprint (all Plate Boots)
    

Fixes

• Spell fixes:
  
  • Energy Cloud (Tower Chariot) now uses AoE spell indicator, rather than single target indicator
    
  • Sandstorm (Bridgewatch Cape) is less likely to be triggered twice in a row by high attack speeds
    
  • Fixed issue where Lunging Stabs (Bloodletter) could trigger cooldown reduction twice
    
• UI fixes:
  
  • Fixed issue where item icons remained ‘stuck’ to screen when scrolling inventory
    
  • Fixed issue where party join requests could still be received even when disabled
    
  • Fixed issue where chat log in Report Player UI overlapped input field
    
  • Fixed item enchantments sometimes displaying incorrectly in Marketplace UI
    
  • Fixed issue where Power Core and Energy Vortex tooltips on the World Map incorrectly showed “00” remaining time
    
  • Fixed issue where laborer rewards would sometimes not be given when Rewards UI closed too quickly
    
  • Fixed issue where clicking between Building UIs would sometimes not update display correctly
    
  • Fixed various issues with Travel Planner in Brecilien
    
• Fixed issue where accounts that had not finished the tutorial could not enter the game
  
• [STEAM] In streamer mode, login credentials are now hidden on character creation screen
  
• [CONTROLLER] Fixed issue where item slots in Furniture UI could not be navigated
  
• Minor graphical, terrain, audio, UI, and localization fixes