Hello Stormgaters,

Before we begin, we want to let you know that some of the biggest upgrades we’ve been working on will be coming in future updates. For example, you won’t see major progress on our campaign missions in this update, but work is happening behind the scenes and includes things like updated dialogue and facial animations for our in-engine cutscenes. You may notice some light testing of these facial animations in this build if you decide to revisit those early campaign missions, but most of the work is yet to be done, and we don’t expect our campaign mission improvements to be ready for prime time until 2025.

We are also actively working on performance and optimization. This work will continue throughout Early Access and beyond. Some hardware configurations and situations will see improvements before others, but this will be an ongoing effort.  

Now, it’s time to present Stormgate’s first content update, 0.1.0! 

In this build you’ll find all sorts of new things to play with. Whether you’re looking for a new Hero to try out, or maybe a new Versus map to play, we’ve got you covered!

Just a few of the things coming in this update include: 

• New Celestial Hero
• Weekly Mutation Challenge
• New Versus Map
• Visual Upgrades for Maps and Terrain
• Amara Glow Up
• Customizable Hotkey Modifiers
• Improved Pathfinding
• Improved Observer and Replay UI
• New Spooky Boneyard Custom Map
• Full Patch Notes
• Balance Updates
• Balance Designer Commentary

Support:

How to Install the Update on Steam:

• Open Steam
• Click on Library to see your games list
• Click Downloads at the bottom of the Library window
• If the new build does not download automatically, click the Download Now button to manually download the new update

How to report a bug or provide feedback on the latest build: https://playstormgate.com/feedback  

Still having trouble? Visit our Stormgate Help Center.

Help us out by leaving a review over on Steam: bit.ly/stormgate  

Build Spotlight: 

New Hero - Kastiel

We’re introducing a new Celestial Hero in 0.1.0, and his name is Kastiel, the Orphan of Wintros. As the ruthless and amoral warrior-Regent of Arkhos, there is no hope in escaping his Nethersword. Devoted to the pursuit of victory at any cost, Kastiel abandoned his people's traditional reverence of Animus. He now drives the Sovereignty of Arkhos towards a secret, heretical objective–the collection and weaponization of Animus in order to destroy all his enemies. Be it through his will, or at the end of his lethal blade, the culling has begun. 

Everyone can play Kastiel for free, with progression capped at level 5. Players who purchased the Ultimate Early Access pack on Steam or the Ultimate Founder’s Pack on Kickstarter or Indiegogo will have Kastiel’s progression fully unlocked and don’t need to purchase him again. Players who don't own Kastiel can fully unlock his progression (including his unique Gear) from the in-game store, or purchase an Ultimate Early Access Pack on Steam, which unlocks Kastiel’s progression as well as lots of other playable content and cosmetics.

Kastiel represents quite a twist to Celestial gameplay taking a page from the Infernal playbook:he absorbs Animus from fallen enemies to power his abilities and to charge up his signature Arcship variant with its Soul Cannon.

These are Kastiel’s core abilities:

• Darkfire: Kastiel charges towards an enemy ground unit or structure and slams it with his shield for 100 damage.
• Soulblade: Kastiel ignites his Nethersword, gaining 40% attack speed for 5 seconds. His attacks with Soulblade deal 80 damage in a cone in front of him.
• Cull the Unworthy: Kastiel sacrifices a target unit (his own or an enemy’s), restoring 33% of his maximum health and 10 energy per supply of the unit. Kastiel also gains 4 stacking bonus damage per supply cost of sacrificed units until he dies. The Cull the Unworthy buff stacks up to 100 (and up to 200 by level 9)  accruing more and more bonus damage as well as earning +5 bonus armor for every 50 stacks. Targeting one of his own units decreases the cooldown on Cull the Unworthy by half. The cooldown on this ability is dependent on the current health of the targeted unit. 
• Firefall (unlocked at level 5): Kastiel channels for a second before warping up to the fleet above and rocketing back down to Earth in a column of dark flames. Upon impact, the ground around him explodes, dealing 200 falloff damage in a large area of effect.

In addition, Kastiel’s affinity for Celestial vehicles means the Vector and Saber cost 50% less to produce. Conversely, Kastiel is not known for his subtlety, so Celestial scout and caster units, the Cabal, Animancer, and Scanner, each cost 25% more to produce.

One of the coolest things about creating new Heroes is when we can create signature units that modify the standard faction tech tree and powerfully impact how the army feels to play. 

• Kastiel has a special variant of the Kri called the Kuzuri, which is stealthed while out of combat. Kastiel begins with a single Kuzuri at the start of each game. The Time Repulsors upgrade makes it so the Kuzuri can’t be slowed.
• The Eradicator is Kastiel’s variant of the Argent. Its Polarized Shield protects the Eradicator while it’s above 50% health, reducing incoming damage by 20%. The Time Shift upgrade creates a time-altering vortex at the target’s location. This field slows the movement of enemy ground units that pass through it for 2.5 seconds.
• The Arkhos Arcship variant can unlock the ability to Harvest biomass at level 8, which turns trees and corpses into resources. Each harvested tree grants you 20 Luminite and each corpse is worth 20 Therium, which seriously shakes up his approach to resource gathering compared to the baseline Celestial army. 

Progression with Kastiel is your path to unlocking several powerful new passive abilities that you’ll want to take advantage of. 

• If you’ve ever enjoyed repelling an all-in attack with a well-timed Sovereign’s Watch, you’ll love upgrading it to King’s Watch at level 2 and casting it on Kastiel himself. It also removes the requirement for a targeted structure to be near a Collection Array to bring the heat. 
• At level 3, he becomes a Cascade Conduit, emanating a Cascade Field around himself at all times.
• Kastiel is a thirsty guy and his bases tend to also want unlimited juice–Insatiable Power (unlocked at level 6) increases Power output by 25% and also makes it so that Collection Arrays can build Prisms. 

• What does a Celestial vampire do with Animus? Well, he channels some of this energy into Animus Shields that protect friendly HQs, and even diverts some gathered Animus into the Animus pool of his signature Arcship variant, the Arkhos Arcship. This extra protective barrier extends to friendly units through his Guardian Barriers, which grant a shield that blocks damage from one attack or spell every 60 seconds. 
• Kastiel’s Cascade Flex grants a pair of helpful bonuses within Cascade Fields: Link Nodes construct in 1 second when created within a Cascade Field, and Eradicators, his signature Argent variant, power up their weapons twice as fast.
• At level 10, Kastiel earns the Spectral Warrior ability, which allows him to create a ghostly clone of any Hero, including its abilities, passives and weapons, which is yours to command for 30 seconds. 

For those of you who enjoy the customization options presented by our more advanced progression Gear system, check out some of the fun unlockables Kastiel can offer. (Did you know that unlocked Gear can be used by your other Heroes as well?):

• Mass Production: Mech units cost 30% less, Bio units cost 10% more. Units with both tags split the difference.
• Maximum Control: After capturing a Creep camp, spawn starting units for all allies.
• Resilient Defenses: All units gain +25% Health and cost +1 Supply 

When we increase the level cap for Heroes, all Heroes including Kastiel will be able to unlock even more Gear options for this system. We hope Celestial players enjoy what Kastiel brings to the battlefield!

Weekly Mutation Challenge

For fans of Co-op play, we’re adding Weekly Challenges! These challenges come with a unique set of conditions, giving 3-player Co-op teams a chance to earn big XP boosts by tackling new, exciting scenarios each week. Think of it as a way to keep things fresh while earning serious rewards. We’ve revamped our XP system in other ways too, to help make Co-op progression feel better. 

Some of the challenges you may encounter include:

• Energy Infusion: Allied units have +100% energy regeneration.
• Gotta Go Fast: Allied units have +50% movement speed.
• Infested: When any unit dies, it spawns an enemy Fiend.
• Infantry Assault: Every 2 minutes, an enemy Barracks spawns somewhere on the map. Kill it before it unleashes a devastating attack wave.
• Ready to Blow: When an enemy unit dies, its corpse explodes after 1.5 seconds.
• Reconstructed: When an enemy unit dies, it resurrects two seconds later with 50% health, movement speed, and attack speed. #Zombies.
• Speed Kills: All enemy units have +50% movement speed.
• See and See: The Fog of War is disabled for ALL players (including enemies!).
• Swift Assembly: Allied players have +100% construction speed.

New Versus Map - Furious Resolve

We’re adding a new versus map to our rotation called Furious Resolve. It’s a macro-based map with four random spawn locations where each player has access to three highly defensible bases. The center is fairly open to handle major battles and the reward for claiming it is a Siege camp that’ll help turn the tide in your favor. 

Visual and Lighting Update to Environment

After listening to all your feedback, we have done a visual pass on the environment of our maps. We have made several changes, including updating many of the terrain textures. Lighting angles were also changed to make the terrain more readable and pop. This accentuates the normal maps and helps add shine to the terrain. 

Amara Character Model Update

Amara has received a glow up! Based on community feedback, we redid the proportions of her entire body. The head was re-molded and retopologized to properly support facial animations. This includes the addition of eyes, teeth, and a tongue! New texture and shader pass finishes off the head styling. The hair was remade from scratch to read better from a closer camera. Last, but not least, animations were created or edited to support the new body proportions.

Although “new Amara” will now be the model used throughout gameplay and in our in-engine cutscenes, she will still temporarily remain as "original Amara" in our pre-rendered videos. This includes interludes such as “A Good Man” that takes place right at the start before Mission 1 of the Vanguard campaign. We're planning to update those as well, but the switchover involves some extra complexities and will be included in a future update. 

Customizable Hotkey Modifiers

While the hotkeys remain command based, as another player-requested feature, we have added the ability to add any number of modifier keys to your hotkey configuration. You can now modify your hotkeys with any combination of Ctrl, Shift, Alt, and so on. Try it out and let us know how it feels.

Improved Pathfinding

We've heard your feedback about pathfinding issues, especially with Weavers and other large units. In 0.1.0, we’re rolling out improvements to our push priority system, making it easier to navigate maps and reducing frustrating moments when units get stuck or act unpredictably. This is a quality-of-life improvement we believe will have a big impact for players who love tight, tactical control. More pathfinding improvements will be coming in future updates.

Observer and Replay UI Improvements

The user interface for the observer and replays now adds a match timer, map names, and map scores for tournaments. We’ve also added support for different aspect ratios.

New Custom Map: Spooky Boneyard

As we head into spooky season, we’ve added a new custom Versus map called Spooky Boneyard, where a zombie spawns after every unit dies. They live for a limited time, and generally stay in-place where the death happened. Taking a Creep camp sends a small pack of zombies across the map at your opponent. Available in both 1v1 and 2v2, this nighttime map is a bit chaotic and has revealed some… unexpected strategies. You can find this encounter under Custom Games. 

Patch Notes 

Co-op

• Heroes
  • New Hero: Kastiel: Orphan of Wintros
    • The Sovereign of Arkhos is wise in the ways of war; having survived the Desolation of Wintros, Kastiel knows all too well that tomorrow is not promised. To his ends, he gathers resources across worlds to increase Arkhos’ power, biding his time until he can enact his final plans...
    • Kastiel is free to all players who purchased the Ultimate Founder’s Pack or Ultimate Early Access Pack on Steam or Kickstarter. Like all Co-op Heroes, Kastiel is also playable for free up to level 5. Full progression for Kastiel can be purchased in the store.
  • Auralanna
    • Auralanna starts with two Stasis Cores.
    • Heal Burst
      • All life (including goats) is important. Auralanna can now heal critters.
      • Auralanna no longer remains stuck in her casting animation when attempting to cast Heal Burst. The dance party is over.
    • REMOVED: Resurrection Field
    • NEW Ultimate Ability: Meteor Shower
      • Auralanna opens a gateway to the stars, slowing enemies by 20% and removing 50% of their armor and damaging them in a large radius for 6 seconds. Afterwards, the terrain in the targeted area remains glaciated and revealed for 60 seconds, creating an icy field that slows all units moving through it by 10%.
    • NEW Top Bar Ability: Vivus Field
      • Briefly capture and store the Animus of fallen allies. Allied Heroes are globally revived, including allied units in the area of effect.
    • ADJUSTED: Cryo Tank
      • We’re giving you the best of both worlds. Instead of replacing Sabers, Sabers can now be transmuted into Cryo Tanks - a two-for-one!
      • The Cryo Tank’s attack visual effects were a little too intense, so we’ve cooled them down a bit.
      • Cryo Tank attacks now remove 20% of their target's armor. This effect can stack up to 5 times.
    • ADJUSTED: Seeker
      • New Ability - Zephyr’s Respite: While Perched, Seekers passively heal friendly biological units in a 4 radius around themselves.
      • The Detection Ward ability is now a researchable upgrade.
      • Seekers are now permanently Stealthed.
  • Blockade
    • Base Stats
      • Starting Health 1000 -> 1200.
      • Starting Armor 10 -> 20.
      • Starting and Maximum Energy 100 -> 150.
    • ADJUSTED: Revitalize
      • Revitalize now heals Blockade at level 1 instead of level 3.
      • Revitalize can now be autocast.
      • Revitalization Radiance and Relentless Healer no longer require research and are instead available at level 3.
    • ADJUSTED: Guardsman
      • Guardsmen now deal +5 additional damage to Air units.
    • FIXED: Heroic Leap
      • Blockade has decided to follow orders, and now lands in the exact targeted location.
  • Warz
    • ADJUSTED: Shrouded Protection
      • Now, while not moving or attacking, Warz gains +10 armor.
    • ADJUSTED: Void Goo
      • Void Goo should feel a lot more impactful: damage from Void Goo explosions has been increased from 10 to 35.
    • ADJUSTED: Fiends
      • To cut back on the sheer numbers of Fiends Warz is able to have at a time, Warz’s Fiends now have a 60 second Timed Life.
      • All of Warz’s Fiends now have the Void Goo trait.
      • When Warz’s Fiends are stored using Fiendish Storage, their timed life is removed. Unloading Fiends resets their Timed Life.
    • ADJUSTED: Gaunts
      • Sure they can’t Infest, but they can help out Warz by clearing the skies! Gaunts now deal an additional 4 damage to Air units on initial attack and an additional 2 damage to Air units affected by the Gaunt’s Bouncing Bone Axes.
• Maps
  • Abyssal Gates & Ritual Woods
    • On game start, the AI will now not immediately spawn flying or high tech units to protect the Gates.
  • Crooked Canyon
    • We’ve made taking the center expansion a little easier: now you’ll have more time to take on those invisible convoys!
• Weekly Challenges
  • Experience Co-op with new challenging mutators and earn bonus Hero XP.
  • Mutations
    • Energy Infusion: Allied units have +100% energy regeneration.
    • Gotta Go Fast: Allied units have +50% movement speed.
    • Infested: When any unit dies, it spawns an enemy Fiend.
    • Infantry Assault: Every 2 minutes, an enemy Barracks spawns somewhere on the map. Kill it before it unleashes a devastating attack wave.
    • Ready to Blow: When an enemy unit dies, its corpse explodes after 1.5 seconds.
    • Reconstructed: When an enemy unit dies, it resurrects two seconds later with 50% health, movement speed, and attack speed. #Zombies
    • Speed Kills: All enemy units have +50% movement speed.
    • See and See: The Fog of War is disabled for ALL players (including enemies!).
    • Swift Assembly: Allied players have +100% construction speed.
• Progression
  • Primary XP: Earn XP by Winning/Losing the game, as well as Kills, and game duration
  • Bonus XP: Earn XP from the chosen Difficulty and Chosen Mutators
  • Boost XP: Earn XP by playing in a participating PC Cafe/PC Bang
  • Bounty XP: Earn XP by completing the Weekly Mutation Challenge
• Rejoin
  • Following a loss of connection, crash, or power outage players can now rejoin an in-progress Co-op game once connectivity is restored.
• Difficulty
  • Flayed Dragons have dominated the skies on too many Co-op maps, and no longer spawn as part of attack waves or as base guardians. 
  • Chosen difficulty level now factors into the tech level of enemies you’ll face.
• Performance-related Change
  • Maximum Supply cap in Co-op for all factions has decreased from 300 to 200. We are exploring the impact of this change in addition to the technical work we are doing to address overall performance.

Campaign

• Amara Character Model Upgrade
  • Amara's model has been updated to better reflect our vision for her and the Vanguard campaign.
    • The new Amara model is also used in Co-op.
• Campaign Item update
  • We’ve made adjustments to in-game items for discoverability and functionality.
    • We have removed redundant items and item types to make inventories fill up less often.
    • Healing items are now targetable instead of being strictly self-targeted.
• Vanguard Mission 6: Stormlands is now more challenging on Brutal difficulty.
• Some Mission Objectives have been renamed and reworded for clarity.

Versus

• New Map: Furious Resolve
  • Introducing our latest 4 spawn macro map. Furious Resolve features more easily defensible natural expansions encouraging longer games.
• Isle of Dread updates
  • The main player's main base is smaller and easier to defend.
  • The nearest  expansion location is closer to the player’s spawn location.
  • Double therium nodes have been added near the vision camps.

Custom

• New Map: Spooky Boneyard
  • New Zombified Boneyard is now available to play in Custom!

Audio

• Overall, the game volume has been increased by ~50% which should help improve our audio clarity. 
• Battles should be less confusing, fewer attack sounds will play with large unit counts.
• Updated Exo sounds have been increased to feel more impactful.
• New custom Announcer Voice Over when playing with Kastiel

General

• Lighting and visual updates
  • All maps across all modes have received a visual pass to improve lighting and clarity.
• Smart Attack
  • New option added to reduce the need to choose between move orders and attack orders.
• Pathing and Push Priority updates
  • Weavers can once again path over other units.
  • Larger units can once again push smaller units.
    • Units cannot push other units that are Holding Position.
    • Units cannot push other units that are channeling.
• UI updates
  • Area of Effect Targeting
    • Area of effect abilities will now show a targeting reticle of the affected area allowing better precision.
  • Unit Info Panel Improvements: 
    • Units now display exactly how much bonus damage they do to various tags in the unit info panel.
    • Units' stats that are changed by upgrades and buffs are now correctly reflected in the unit info panel.
  • Tooltip Improvements
    • We’re making adjustments to our tooltips to make them more accurate more often. Please note this is an ongoing effort and one that will continue in future updates.
  • Offline Invites
    • Invites can now be sent to Steam friends that are not actively playing Stormgate.
• Various quality of life improvements and bug fixes
  • We have been hard at work fixing a variety of issues, but here’s a few worth mentioning specifically:
    • The Versus selection screen remembers which faction you last queued for.
    • After completing a Campaign, Co-op, or Custom game you’ll now be properly sent to the correct screen.
    • Removed the extra “Log in with Steam” step on startup
    • Unbound hotkeys no longer list “None” and now appear empty.

Balance Notes:

General

• All tier 1 to tier 2 upgrade times decreased from 40 seconds to 30 seconds.
• All trees are now light.
• Creeps generally have more health, between 14% and 68% more.
  • Slime health increased from 120 to 140.
  • Ooze health increased from 300 to 400.
  • Shadow Mastiff health increased from 100 to 120.
  • Shadow Demon health increased from 250 to 420.
  • Bruiser health increased from 270 to 320.
  • Cleaver health increased from 140 to 160.
  • Piper health increased from 140 to 160.
  • No changes for Skull Squisher
• Creeps generally give 16% less bounty at level 1.
  • Slime from 30/0 to 25/0.
  • Ooze from 30/30 to 25/25.
  • Shadow Mastiff from 30/0 to 25/0.
  • Shadow Demon no changes.
  • Bruiser from 60/0 to 50/0.
  • Cleaver from 30/0 to 25/0.
  • Piper from 0/30 to 0/25.
  • Skull Squisher from 60/30 to 50/25.
• Creeps now scale to give more bounty, Veterancy, and Animus when they level up. This more accurately reflects their additional bonus power.
  • Level 2 bounty bonus increased from 100% to 125%.
  • Level 3 bounty bonus increased from 200% to 250%.
  • Level 4 bounty bonus increased from 300% to 375%.
  • Level 5 bounty bonus increased from 400% to 500%.
• The Shadow Mastiff, Bruiser, Cleaver, and Skull Squisher creeps will now prioritize ground units over air units with their attack.
• Fixed an issue where Oozes and Slimes did not reduce armor of surrounding units when they were killed.
• Fixed an issue where the Shadow Mastiff creep was dealing too much damage to air units.
• Reduced the duration of the active speed buff from Speed Towers from 20 to 10 seconds.
• Stealthed units can no longer claim capture points.

Vanguard

Habitat and Solar Habitat

• Habitats and Solar Habitats now have the Heavy tag instead of the Light tag.
• Solar Habitats will no longer autocast on Habitats or Solar Habitats.

Sentry Post

• Build time decreased from 55 seconds to 45 seconds.

Machine Lab

• Machine Lab cost decreased from 100/100 to 100/50.

BOB

• Build time decreased from 20 seconds to 17 seconds.

SCOUT

• Build time increased from 13 seconds to 18 seconds.
• Initial damage decreased from 8 to 5 (+3 vs Light).
• The Vorillium Claws upgrade improves the S.C.O.U.T.’s damage by +8 vs Light, down from +16 vs Light.
• Scout selection priority changed (101 to 119).

Lancer

• Lancer health increased from 240 to 260.
• Lancer armor increased from 5 to 15.
• Lancers' damage increased from 10 (+5 vs Structure) to 10 (+5 vs Structure, +5 vs Light).
• Lancers no longer have “On-Damaged: Damage reduced by 2” innately.
• The Mitigative Guard upgrade no longer further reduces damage taken by Lancers from -2 to -4. Instead, it now grants Lancers “On-Damaged: Damage reduced by 2”.

Exo

• Exo damage decreased from 13 (+7 vs Heavy) to 12 (+6 vs Heavy).

MedTech

• MedTech Master Training, which unlocks System Shock, now requires a Central Command, down from a High Command.

Vulcan

• The Impact Thrusters upgrade has been removed. Its functionality, which increases the range of Jump Jets from X to Y and adds a stun to Jump Jets, is now innate on the Vulcan.

Hornet

• Hornet damage decreased from 13 (+13 vs Light) to 13 (+4 vs Light).

Graven

• Graven cost decreased from 125/125 to 125/75.

Helicarrier

• Helicarrier Bombing run range decreased from 40 to 25.

Infernals

Nightfall Infestation

• Nightfall Infestation now slows down enemy units by 50% for 3 seconds.
• Nightfall Infestation cooldown decreased from 90 seconds to 60 seconds.

Shadowcleft

• Shadowcleft cost decreased from 100/100 to 100/50.

Brute

• The Brute’s Sundering Soul Frenzy upgrade has been removed. Fiends created by a Brute split now gain a 15% increase to movement speed.
• The Soulforged Ascendence upgrade no longer requires the Sundering Soul Frenzy upgrade.
• The Soulforged Ascendence upgrade no longer requires a Greater Shrine. It can be researched immediately upon building a Hellforge.
• Soulforged Ascendence research time increased from 60 seconds to 120 seconds.
• The Sundering Soulcraze upgrade no longer requires the Sundering Soul Frenzy upgrade.

Gaunt

• The Gaunt’s Plague Axes upgrade will now only apply Infest if the target is on Shroud.
• Gaunt primary damage changed from 8 (+2 vs Light) to 8 (+4 vs Light).
• Gaunt bounce damage changed from 2 (0.5 vs Light) to 2 (+1 vs Light).

Magmadon

• Magmadon Trample stun duration decreased from 0.3 seconds to 0.15 seconds.

Hellborne

• Attacks will now target the ground if a targeted enemy unit walks out-of-range.

Weaver

• Weavers can now walk over other units.
• Weaver movement speed increased from 2 to 2.5.
• The Shroudwalk passive trait now increases movement speed by 60% in Shroud, down from 100%. Resulting movement speed unchanged from 4 to 4.

Hexen

• Miasma energy cost increased from 40 to 60.
• Miasma cooldown increased from 0 seconds to 15 seconds.  The cooldown begins at the start of channeling.

Harbinger

• The Seismic Slam upgrade now additionally increases the Harbinger’s Shroud coverage by 100%.

Spriggan

• Spriggan cost changed from 75/75 to 100/50.
• Spriggan damage increased from 2 (+2 vs Heavy) to 3 (+3 vs Heavy).

Celestials

Sovereign's Watch

• Fixed an issue where Sovereign’s Watch was losing some damage output when it finds a new target. After this change, Sovereign's Watch will deal much closer to its full potential damage versus large numbers of small units.
• Attack beams will now prioritize non-creep units over creeps.

Purify

• Now only dispells debuffs on friendly units and buffs on enemy units.

Morph Core

• Fixed an issue where Morph Cores couldn’t be rallied onto Luminite Mines into the fog of war.

Arcship

• Cost decreased from 300/0 to 250/0.

Collection Array

• Supply cost increased from 0 to 4.

Prism

• Supply cost decreased from 3 to 2.

Aeon Gate

• Cost decreased from 100/100 to 50/50.
• Aeon Gate build time decreased from 40 seconds to 20 seconds.

Ascension Matrix

• Now requires Starforge OR Legion Hall instead of an Arcstation.
• Retaliation Matrix, Core Ascendency, Resolute Seal, Animancer Adept Training upgrades now require an Arcstation.
• Cost decreased from 100/100 to 100/50.

Argent

• Health decreased from 210 to 180.
• Movement speed increased from 4 to 4.5.
• Base energy regeneration decreased from 0.5 per second to 0 per second.
• Out-of-combat energy regeneration increased from 0 to 2 per second.
• The Photo-Restoration upgrade, which increased the movement speed of Argents by 0.5 and increased out-of-combat energy regeneration by 1 has been removed.
• Max energy decreased from 50 to 30.
• New Upgrade: Photo-Capacitors: Increases energy pool of Argents from 30 to 50. Researched at the Guardian Nexus. No other requirements.
• The Longshot Module now increases the Argent’s range by 3, up from 2.

Kri

• Health increased from 190 to 230.
• Damage decreased from 16 (+8 vs Light) to 14 (+6 vs Light)

Cabal

• Debilitate duration decreased from 40 seconds to 25 seconds.
• Debilitate movement speed debuff decreased from 50% to 25%.

Vector

• Fixed an issue that caused Recall to sometimes fail.
• Fixed various issues with Delta Jump and Recall being inconsistent.

Saber

• Now requires Arcstation instead of Ascension Matrix.
• Movement speed increased from 2 to 3.
• Movement speed bonus from Mass Accelerator decreased from 200% bonus to 100% bonus. Resulting movement speed unchanged from 6 to 6.

Animancer

• Dark Prophecy cooldown increased from 0 seconds to 15 seconds. Cooldown begins at the start of channeling.

Archangel

• Meteor Strike can now kill trees.
• When in an Avatar state, can no longer be pushed by Magmadons during Trample.
• When in its Avatar state, weapon shockwave speed increased from 7 to 15.
• After the Avatar state ends, the Archangel will now retain its current HP. For example, if the Archangel is at 500/1150 health when Avatar ends, it will be 500/750 afterwards. Previously, it would decrease to 100/750. This includes when the Archangel flies from the Avatar state.
• Fixed an issue where this unit could walk through light forest.

Balance Commentary:

Salutations, stalwarts of the storm!

Since our last update, we had one of the coolest Stormgate tournaments ever with BeoMulf’s Stormgate Nexus #1. In the tournament, we saw one of the most epic series ever in Elazer vs PartinG, and one of the coolest individual games ever in Elazer vs Percival, which showcased some of the awesome micro potential possible in Stormgate. It’s been a few weeks since our last update and since then we’ve both been gathering and digesting your feedback. Since this content update includes the most extensive balance patch we’ve ever done, we’d like to take a new approach and individually go over all of the major changes:

General

Command Post, Shrine, Arcship

• All tier-1 to tier-2 upgrade times decreased from 40 seconds to 30 seconds.

We’d like to bring tier-2 units and upgrades into the game a bit more quickly to fight tier-1 options. As an extreme example, while Vulcans are theoretically a counter to Vectors, they’re not able to realistically counter Vector rushes due to how far up the tech tree they are. This change should result in players having more early game options. 

Machine Lab, Shadowcleft, Ascension Matrix

Similarly, we feel like some of our highest-tier tech-options and their respective upgrades aren’t being used/researched very often. While we suspect a large part of the reason is the inherent strength of these units, we’d also like to grease the wheel a bit more and encourage players to choose teching more often by reducing the costs of the highest-tier upgrade buildings.

Creeps

• Creeps generally have between 0% to 40% more health.
• Creeps generally give 16% less bounty at level 1.
• Creeps now scale to give more bounty, Veterancy, and Animus when they level up. This more accurately reflects their additional bonus power.

We’ll be rebalancing Creeps with a special focus on how important it is to Creep early-game and how all-or-nothing they can seem. In the mid-game, while we feel Creeps are not gameplay-warping and fairly balanced, we’d like them to feel more interesting relative to their importance and impact. This set of changes is intended to do the following:

• Slightly increase the difficulty and decrease the reward given by Creeps in the early-game.
• Create more variance in the timing of taking Creep Camps such that the same set of units can’t capture every Creep camp easily back-to-back.
• Maintain and/or increase the bounty given at higher levels.

Another relevant topic to talk about here is that while the early-game focus on Creeps certainly has its issues, one positive thing they did do was speed up the early-game pacing/economy to a rate we were very happy with, so we’re likely to end up with a slower early-game than we’d like.

We view these changes as short-term fixes and we’ll be taking another hard look at both Creeps early-game pacing in the future.

Vanguard

Sentry Post

• Build time decreased from 55 seconds to 45 seconds.

Sentry Posts initially took longer to build than static defense from other factions due to the fear of multi-building being too powerful in a tower rush situation.

B.O.B.

• Build time decreased from 20 to 17.

Similarly, we wanted to bring Vanguard worker build times more in line with that of Infernals. Initially, we wanted to give Infernals more of an advantage in this department due to the need to sacrifice workers to build structures. However, we currently feel Vanguard is disadvantaged in this tradeoff due to:

• The Charge system overall gives Infernals more flexibility over worker production.
• Not being able to build workers during tiering up while Charges are able to recharge.
• The cost of the Imp being built into Infernal structure costs.

SCOUTs

• Build time increased from 13 seconds to 18 seconds.
• Initial damage decreased from 8 to 5 (+3 vs Light).
• The Vorillium Claws upgrade improves the SCOUT’s damage by +8 vs Light, down from +16 vs Light.

The SCOUT was too dominant in all matchups because it was too cost-effective in a variety of roles: Creeping, harassment against key infrastructure, and direct combat against grounded Light units. While they’re certainly not an all-around unit, this combination of traits made them the clear choice for early-game, especially among high-level players. We felt this the most in VvV where the Lancer was insufficient of a counter and VvI where Gaunts received a damage nerf against light units in the last patch. In addition to the changes listed here, we’re also adjusting the Habitat, Lancer, and Gaunt, which should help with SCOUT dominance.

Lancer

• Lancer Health increased from 240 to 260.
• Lancer Armor increased from 5 to 15.
• Lancers damage increased from 10 (+5 vs Structure) to 10 (+5 vs Structure, +5 vs Light).
• Lancers no longer have “On-Damaged: Damage reduced by 2” innately.
• The Mitigative Guard upgrade no longer further reduces damage taken by Lancers from -2 to -4. Instead, it now grants Lancers “On-Damaged: Damage reduced by 2”.

Lancers have been one of the most polarizing units in our game. While they’re incredibly powerful as a tank against Infernal Gaunts, they’re very ineffective against large numbers of Vanguard Exos or Celestial Argents, two core units in their respective factions. We believe this is one of the key reasons matchup winrates have been so historically polarizing. In addition, we’re looking to give Vanguard players stronger tools against SCOUTs and a tier-1 answer to Kri.

Here is a summary of the relationships we’re targeting with these changes:

• vs SCOUT: Combined with the SCOUT changes, Lancers will be much more effective against SCOUT.
• vs Gaunts: MUCH less tanky, and more lethal. Large battles involving lots of Lancers and Gaunts will be much less one-sided.
• vs Fiends: Less tanky, more lethal.
• vs Kri: Becomes a solid counter, even in low numbers.
• vs Argents: Becomes slightly tankier.
• vs Exos: Becomes slightly tankier, can fight them head-on if there’s not good focus-fire micro.

Exo

• Exo damage decreased from 13 (+7 vs Heavy) to 12 (+6 vs Heavy).

We feel like the Exo is still too centralizing as a core mid-game Vanguard unit and would like to redistribute some of its power elsewhere across the faction.

MedTech

• MedTech Master Training, which unlocks System Shock, now requires a Central Command, down from a High Command.

We wanted to provide Vanguard a more solid counter to Debilitate and allow for some flashy plays on tier-2.

Vulcan

• The Impact Thrusters upgrade has been removed. Its functionality, which increases the range of Jump Jets from X to Y and adds a stun to Jump Jets is now innate on the Vulcan.

This was a rarely used upgrade, so we decided to bake in this capability into the Vulcan baseline. This also removes an obstacle to the more powerful tier-3 Vulcan upgrade.

Hornet

• Hornet damage decreased from 13 (+13 vs Light) to 13 (+4 vs Light).

The Hornet was too powerful against Prisms in particular. We want to keep the Hornet strong in its role against Light air units, even Prisms, but also temper its power.

Graven

• Graven cost decreased from 125/125 to 125/75.

During internal testing, we tried the Graven at tier-2, and it was incredibly powerful and centralizing due to the necessity of requiring detection and static defense at every base in order to counter it. After we moved it to tier-3 during our Early Access release, it doesn’t see much use. While we still believe it is powerful, it competes heavily with the Helicarrier, which is seen as both more impactful and easier to use.

We’re going to try to slightly lower its cost as a first step, and will consider adjusting its abilities in the future if this change isn’t sufficient.

Helicarrier

• Bombing Run range decreased from 40 to 25.

We wanted Helicarriers to be more in range of the targets they were trying to bomb. If the Helicarrier continues to be too powerful in the future, especially against Infernals, we’ll look to adjusting other values such as the health of the Bombers or granting Infernals more tools to deal with this particular unit.

Infernals

Nightfall Infestation

• Nightfall Infestation now slows down enemy units by 50% for 3 seconds.
• Nightfall Infestation cooldown decreased from 90 to 60.

This makes the ability more impactful while also making it a potential counter against Vanguard Infantry balls, especially as they grow in size. At the same time, there’s still plenty of counterplay in either dodging the ability or dispelling it.

Brute

• The Brute’s Sundering Soul Frenzy (Movement speed after Sundering Soul) upgrade has been removed. Brutes now gain 15% increased movement speed when they split by default.
• The Soulforged Ascendence (3 Fiend + Armor) upgrade no longer requires the Sundering Soul Frenzy upgrade.
• The Soulforged Ascendence upgrade no longer requires a Greater Shrine. It can be researched immediately upon building a Hellforge.
• Soulforged Ascendence research time increased from 60 seconds to 120 seconds.
• The Sundering Soulcraze upgrade no longer requires the Sundering Soul Frenzy upgrade.

The Brute’s Sundering Soul Frenzy upgrade didn’t feel very useful, so we decided to remove it and instead grant Brutes a more useful upgrade at tier-1, which allows tier-1 Hellforges to be more viable.

Gaunt

• The Gaunt’s Plague Axes upgrade will now only apply Infest if the target is on Shroud.
• Gaunt primary damage changed from 8 (+2 vs Light) to 8 (+4 vs Light).
• Gaunt bounce damage changed from 2 (0.5 vs Light) to 2 (+1 vs Light).

While we’re happy with how Infest is performing in other parts of the game, the ability for Gaunts to constantly Infest enemy units is causing all factions to constantly need a way to fight Fiends at every stage of the game. While most factions are able to reliably do this, Celestials in particular are struggling, and it felt restricting that the game had to be balanced with the idea that all factions needed consistent AoE damage against Fiends. We still think Gaunts Infesting enemy units is cool and adds a lot of identity to the Gaunt, but we want it to happen in more specific ways. At the same time, we’ve been looking for more opportunities to inject interesting interactions with Shroud, so we ended up with a conditional on-Shroud activation requirement for Plague Axes.

After this change, you’ll still have a variety of options to spread Infest with Gaunts:

• While creeping, you can summon an Effigy to get five Fiends against certain camps.
• While harassing, you can use Gaunts in combination with Harbingers.
• In the end-game, Shadowfall can be used to spread Infest to your opponent’s entire army.

We realize this is a significant nerf to Gaunts. At the same time, we feel Gaunts aren’t as effective against Light units as they’re intended to be, so we’re also giving them some additional anti-Light damage to compensate.

Magmadon

• After the Demonhoof Tremors upgrade, Trample stun duration decreased from 0.3 seconds to 0.15 seconds.

This change reduces the stun uptime of Magmadons from 75% to 38% while they’re Trampling with Demonhoof Tremors. We felt like this stun was too punishing, especially against Kri, which partially prevented Kri from being a particularly viable front-line unit for Celestials in the IvC matchup.

Weaver

• Weavers can now walk over other units.
• Weaver movement speed increased from 2 to 2.5.
• The Shroudwalk passive trait now increases movement speed by 60% in Shroud, down from 100%. Resulting movement speed unchanged from 4 to 4.

In this update, we’ll be reinstating the ability for Weavers to walk over other units, which we believe was one of the key reasons they weren’t being used much in the Infernals arsenal. In addition, we received feedback that even after these changes, Weavers would still not be used due to their slow speed and our increasingly larger map sizes, so we’ve decided to raise their base speed slightly.

Hexen

• Miasma energy cost increased from 40 to 60.
• Miasma cooldown increased from 0 seconds to 15 seconds.

After the changes from the last patch where Miasma’s radius was reduced, we still feel Miasma is able to be cast too often and we wanted to prevent Hexen from immediately recasting Miasma after it’s initially interrupted.

Spriggan

• Spriggan cost changed from 75/75 to 100/50.
• Spriggan damage increased from 2 (+2 vs Heavy) to 3 (+3 vs Heavy).

Spriggans have been one of the most underutilized units in our post-EA release, partially because they simply don’t deal enough damage, especially to the Heavy units they’re intended to counter (such as Helicarriers). In addition, we’ve changed their cost to be more Luminite-focused since Infernals are so commonly starved for Therium.

Celestials

Collection Array

• Supply cost increased from 0 to 4.

Prism

• Supply cost decreased from 3 to 2.

These changes are primarily intended to allow spectators to more easily judge the status of a match by the progression of supply counts. Previously, Celestial supply counts were misleading because a large portion of mining was done via Collection Arrays that didn’t cost supply.

Ascension Matrix

• Now requires Starforge OR Legion Hall instead of an Arcstation.
• Retaliation Matrix, Core Ascendency, Resolute Seal, and Animancer Adept Training upgrades now require an Arcstation.
• Saber now requires Arcstation instead of Ascension Matrix.

We received feedback that while certain Celestial upgrades were good (specifically the Recall upgrade), they were difficult to research due to how far up the tech tree the Ascension Matrix is. This change allows Recall to be a more viable upgrade and at the same time Sabers to be more easily accessible.

Argent

• Health decreased from 210 to 180.
• Movement speed increased from 4 to 4.5.
• Base energy regeneration decreased from 0.5 per second to 0 per second.
• Out-of combat energy regeneration increased from 0 to 2 per second.
• The Photo-Restoration upgrade, which increased the movement speed of Argents by 0.5 and increased out-of-combat energy regeneration by 1 has been removed.
• Max energy decreased from 50 to 30.
• New Upgrade: Photo-Capacitors: Increases Argent energy pool from 30 to 50. Researched at the Guardian Nexus.
• The Longshot Module upgrade now increases the Argent’s range by 3, up from 2.

Major feedback surrounding the Argent usually involved the following:

1. Early-game Argent pushes are too powerful, especially in CvC where it’s too difficult to tech to a unit that can counter it.
2. Argents are weaker in a metagame that focuses on early-game creeping, because their energy-based attacking mechanic inherently makes them ineffective at consistent combat.

As a result of this feedback, we’ve tweaked the starting stats of Argents and their upgrades to more finely tune their strengths and weaknesses throughout the game. After these changes, we expect unupgraded Argents will be less powerful at frontal engagements but more effective at Creeping. Hopefully, these changes will be enough such that players are more incentivized to tech to Kri as a possible counter to fully Argent armies in the mirror matchup.

Kri

• Health increased from 190 to 230.
• Damage decreased from 16 (+8 vs Light) to 14 (+6 vs Light).

The Kri feels like one of the most polarizing units in the game. Our thoughts are that it is sometimes slightly too powerful as an early-game unit and as a harassment unit throughout the game. At the same time, it is too difficult to tech into in the early-game in CvC and tends to fall hard as a late-game combat unit.

To address these issues, we’ve made changes to other units that Kris interact with, such as Lancers, Magmadons, and Argents. In addition, we’ve tweaked the Kri’s stats overall to make it a bit more tanky and less damaging. These changes will allow Kri to hopefully be more effective in a large-scale combat role and more viable as a transition from Argents in the mirror.

Cabal

• Debilitate duration decreased from 40 seconds to 25 seconds.
• Debilitate movement speed debuff decreased from 50% to 25%.

Cabals were a bit too punishing against Vanguard players that often rely on hit-and-run tactics and too greatly discouraged drop play. We wanted to reduce the effectiveness of this ability against general harassment but at the same time wanted to ensure it was still an effective counter against large units such as Vulcans and Magmadons. In addition, we’ll be giving Vanguard the ability to cast System Shock at tier 2, which should be another strong counter to Debilitate.

Saber

• Movement speed increased from 2 to 3.
• Movement speed bonus from Mass Accelerator decreased from 200% bonus to 100% bonus. Resulting movement speed unchanged from 6 to 6.

Similar to the Weaver, we received feedback that the Saber was unwieldy to use, so we’re going to give it a higher movement speed baseline.

Animancer

• Dark Prophecy cooldown increased from 0 seconds to 15 seconds.

This prevents Animancers from immediately recasting Dark Prophecy after it has been interrupted.

Archangel

• Meteor Strike can now kill trees.
• When in an Avatar state, Archangels can no longer be pushed by Magmadons using Trample.
• When in its Avatar state, weapon shockwave speed increased from 7 to 15.
• After the Avatar state ends, the Archangel will now retain its current HP. For example, if the Archangel is at 500/1150 health when Avatar ends, it will be 500/750 afterward. Previously, it would decrease to 100/750.

These tweaks to Archangels should allow them to be more reliable in combat, especially against late-game Infernal armies.

Maps

Isle of Dread

• Added tree lines in multiple locations to limit early attack paths.
• Chokes into early expansions are now more narrow.
• Moved and added various Therium Nodes. There is now a double-Therium spot near the Vision Camp.

We received a lot of feedback that Isle of Dread was the most polarizing map due to so many entryways into various locations, so we’ve restricted the attack paths and entryways so players can enter into macro games more safely.

Jagged Maw

• Removed from the Map Pool

New Map: Furious Resolve

There’s a few more balance changes and bug fixes in the patch notes, so we hope you read those as well. And with that, thanks for your continued support, and we hope to see you on the ladder!

Cheers,

Kevin Dong

Lead Competitive Designer