Hi everyone! This patch was somewhat delayed, mainly due to the addition and removal of a Victory Laps/Endless Mode feature. What was meant to be a little optional feature turned out to be quite contentious within the beta testing community and I also wasn't happy with either implementation. It felt like an unsatisfying band-aid fix to stretch out the game until more content could be added. Rather than continuing to try to make it work, I think it's best if the idea is shelved so I can focus on adding more content. I may revisit Endless Mode/Victory Laps in the future.

I also spent some time revamping various systems in anticipation of the upcoming spell rune system (see the pinned "Planned Features" thread in the Steam community discussions section or Regal Pigeon Discord for more information) which is necessary but, for now, has no impact on gameplay.

Thank you everyone for your patience and feedback, especially the beta testers in the Discord.

- Max (a.k.a. Regal Pigeon)

New

• Challenge Level 6 - Invasions : Midway through each round of combat, a portal appears at a random position that spawns enemies from a different arena.
  
• New Emblem - Reckless Strike : Your basic spells drain 4% of your current life to deal bonus damage equal to 300% of that amount. Casting basic spells also grants you 1 bonus life regeneration for 5 seconds (stacks up to 5 times).
  
• New Emblem - Overgrowth : The next damage spell you cast roots enemies hit for 4 seconds. Each enemy can only be rooted in this way once per spell cast. This effect refreshes after 6 seconds.
  mana.
  

Emblems

• Battle Hunger (reworked - now "Dark Thirst"): Whenever an enemy dies you restore 2% of your maximum mana.
  
• Berserker: Kills required increased from 80 to 100, healing reduced from 1% of spell damage dealt to 0.5%.
  
• Blessing of Strength: Power bonus reduced from 14 to 12.
  
• Blur (reworked): While moving, you gain a chance to evade damage equal to 400% of your move speed, emblem icon updated.
  
• Bookworm: The next tome you collect grants you double the stat bonus. This effect refreshes at end of combat and can only occur up to 5 times.
  
• Essence Shift: Healing reduced from 20% of mana spent to 18%.
  
• Fairy Ring: Ring radius increased from 4 tiles to 6, effect interval reduced from 20 seconds to 15, bonus life regeneration reduced from 9.6 per second to 6, emblem icon changed.
  
• Levitation: You are immune to poison puddles while levitating, emblem icon updated.
  
• Mana Hungry (reworked): You have bonus power equal to 10% of your maximum mana.
  
• Mine Layer: Damage radius increased from 2 tiles to 3, damage increased from 35% of power to 50%, mine duration increased from 10 seconds to 12, emblem icon updated.
  
• Sharpshooter: Maximum damage bonus increased from 15% to 20%, maximum range increased from 10 tiles to 12.
  
• Simplicity: Damage bonus reduced from 25% to 20%.
  
• Spontaneous Combustion: Reduced number of particle effects for performance reasons.
  
• Sumo: Emblem icon updated.
  
• Time Leak: Clocks can now be caught while altitude is 1 tile or less (previously had frame-perfect catching at zero altitude), added a tall spike-shaped indicator to make it easier to see where clocks will land.
  

Enemies

• Enemy life scaling increased from +3.6% per level to +4.5%.
  
• Elites - Gembound (purple): Homing projectile fire cooldown increased from 0.43 seconds to 0.67 seconds.
  
• Elites - Illusionist (blue): Number of illusions spawned reduced from 4 to 2, illusion life increased from 35% of original to 40%, illusion power increased from 25% of original to 30%, illusion duration reduced from 8 seconds to 7.
  
• Elites - Toxic (green): Poison puddle spawn distance interval increased from 0.35 tiles to 0.5.
  
• Bloat: Base life increased from 170 to 220.
  
• Skeleton: Base life increased from 160 to 200.
  

Spells

• Added a small amount of knockback to most damage spells that didn't previously apply knockback.
  
• Acid Fire: Reduced number of particle effects for performance reasons.
  
• Burst: Damage reduced from 100% of power to 90%.
  
• Electric Field: Now applies a 25% slow to enemies, damage reduced from 70% of power per second to 60%.
  
• Ghost Form: All damage is now evaded for the duration, duration reduced from 3 seconds to 2, fear duration reduced from 5 seconds to 4, you are immune to poison puddles while in ghost form.
  
• Invigorate: Reduced bonus attack speed from 6% per excess mana threshold spent to 5%, reduced cooldown increase from 1 second per excess mana threshold spent to 0.7.
  
• Lava Chakram: Mana cost increased from 28 to 30.
  
• Power Fist: Third hit damage increased from 180% of power to 200%, base range increased from 2.3 tiles to 2.75 tiles, knockback increased slightly.
  
• Solar Beam: Mana cost increased from 30 per second to 34, maximum damage increased from 500% of power per second to 520%.
  
• Static Discharge: Maximum damage increased from 500% of power to 600%.
  
• Storm Bow: Maximum damage increased from 230% of power to 250%, perfect shot damage bonus increased from 75% to 100%, mana cost reduced from 40 to 36.
  
• Whirling Death: Removed 2 frames from the cast animation increasing cast speed significantly.
  

Tomes

• Maximum Mana: Bonus increased from 20 to 25.
  

Other

• Improved how poison puddle collision detection is handled.
  
• New hidden achievements added completing victory laps and for completing a win on the new challenge level.
  
• Gems fall faster, reducing the time taken to collect.
  
• Healing potion expire delay reduced from 15 seconds to 12, drop rate reduced but is now less random.
  
• Unlockables are more expensive.
  
• Reduced time take for gem meter to progress in the post-game screen.
  

Bug Fixes

• Changed how invulnerability and other tags are applied which should fix certain bugs where characters would unintentionally be made permanently invulnerable.
  
• Fixed bug where FIreball spell critical hits were being checked separately for each target hit instead of having a single check for all targets.
  
• Fixed bug where poison puddles were being drawn under the clock face in the Clock Room, making them invisible.