Beyond the Veil Update

The Mists

• The Mists are a new realm dedicated to solo and duo PvE and PvP gameplay
  
• Will o’ Wisps can be found in the open world and Roads of Avalon:
  
  • If followed, they open portals to the Mists for a short period before disappearing
    
  • Depending on the type of Wisp, the portals allow either one or two players to enter before closing
    
  • These portals have a rarity level, which can upgrade over time
    
• Wisps can also be found within the Mists, which open portals to other Mist regions
  
• Both lethal and non-lethal PvP are possible, depending on the region
  
  • Lethal Mists regions can only be found within other lethal areas of Albion
    
• Players can use mounts, but mount health is capped at 1500
  
• Players can use Journey Back ability from within the Mists
  
• Combat within the Mists has no effect on Royal Continent reputation
  
• Any given Mists region will eventually become fully engulfed in fog, returning all players to the location from which they entered
  
• Mists regions contain resources (both enchanted and unenchanted), treasures, and enemies, with new enemies including the Griffin, Veilweaver, and Fey Dragon
  
  • These three creatures are essential for the creation of the new Fey Armor line (see below)
    

Brecilien: The City in the Mists

• A new city, Brecilien, has been added to the game
  
• Brecilien exists without a fixed physical location, drifting in the same realm as the Roads of Avalon and the Mists
  
• Players will not be allowed access to the city until they locate it for themselves
  
• Once the city has been discovered, players can use the Travel Planner and Journey Back ability to travel to and from it
  
• Players are able to buy Player Islands in Brecilien, even if they already own islands on the Royal Continent
  
  • Islands in Brecilien do not share upgrade levels with islands on the Royal Continent, and if a Royal Continent island is abandoned its upgrade level will not be applied to an island in Brecilien
    

Fey Armor

• Fey Armor is a new Artifact Armor line based on the unique ecosystems found within the Mists
  
• The Artifacts used to create these armor pieces are dropped by specific creature types within the Mists, offering unique new opportunities for PvE / Gathering, transport, trade, and crafting
  
• These armor pieces include their own unique spells, offering countless new combat and defensive possibilities for PvP and PvE
  
• These armors are craftable at sufficiently advanced crafting stations throughout Albion, and come in all three major branches:
  
  • Feyscale (Cloth)
    
  • Mistwalker (Leather)
    
  • Duskweaver (Plate)
    

New Enchantment Level: Pristine (.4)

• A new and exceedingly rare enchantment level, Pristine, has been added to the game
  
• This corresponds to ".4" in the Tier level, e.g. Pristine Bloodoak Logs are Tier 6.4 wood
  
• These resources only appear in the open world as Resource Treasures, or they can be created via Transmutation
  
• When Pristine resources appear:
  
  • They only appear in open-world full-loot (black) zones
    
  • They are locked for a certain amount of time
    
  • They appear on the minimap, and also on the world map if the player is within a certain amount of zones, with the lock timer displayed
    
  • Limited-time daily gathering events do not increase the appearance of .4 resources, though they do increase the yield
    
• This enchantment level exists for Hide, Ore, Wood, and Fiber, but not Stone
  

Roads of Avalon Rework

• The Roads of Avalon have been reworked with new objectives and content balanced for small-to-medium groups
  
• The types of objectives found in the Roads have been expanded:
  
  • Open-world treasures will randomly appear
    
  • Mobs will upgrade over time if untouched, as they do in the open world
    
  • Crystal Spiders will also be found
    
• Special regions within the Roads can connect exclusively to other Roads regions that contain Hideouts. These regions offer raid level content and portals that support larger groups. You can also use these regions to launch attacks on other Hideout regions
  
  • Elite Avalonian enemies in the Roads now show a danger icon to differentiate them from regular Avalonian enemies
    
• Hideouts in the Roads of Avalon can now be declared Headquarters:
  
  • Both Hideouts and Headquarters within the Roads of Avalon will take damage if they have insufficient Power (this requirement only applies in the Roads of Avalon)
    
  • There will be a grace period of several days after the update goes live during which existing Roads Hideouts will not take damage from insufficient Power
    
    • New Hideouts constructed after the update goes live will also receive a grace period of 3 days
      
  • When constructing a Hideout within the Roads, the second and third phases can be skipped by declaring the Hideout your Headquarters, and spending additional Silver and resources to accelerate the building process
    
  • Power Cores will now appear in the Roads, but cannot be taken to and from the open world
    
  • Declaring an HQ in the Roads requires the guild to have at least 1000 Season Points in the current or last season; guilds that already have 1000 or more points in Season 17 are instantly eligible
    
• Logging out from within the Roads (outside of a Hideout) now requires significantly more time no matter if it was triggered intentionally or by disconnect
  
  • Logging back into the Roads results in damage to gear durability and loss of stacked resources, and will remove the player from the Roads
    
  • This also occurs when the original logout was triggered from an instance like a Randomized Dungeon or a Hellgate if entered from the Roads
    
  • After a disconnect and after Maintenance and after a disconnect players will have some time to resume playing in the Roads without triggering the logout consequences, though as with all disconnects characters will be vulnerable for a significant amount of time afterward
    

UI Quality of Life Improvements

• Guild Crest, Appearance, and Finder improvements:
  
  • Guild Crest creation has been improved and streamlined to allow for a much easier creation process
    
  • Guilds can now further personalize their descriptions and the way they appear to members and outside players
    
  • Guild Finder: Added option to send a message automatically to all new recruits, and reworked application mail creation to better represent the applicant
    
• Guild Loadouts can now be selected and purchased/equipped via dropdowns in the Marketplace and banks/chests
  
  • Personal and Guild Loadouts are now indicated by small personal / guild icons respectively
    
• Added "Appearance" tab to Character Inspect UI that displays a player's current vanity items
  
• Added Destiny Board information windows to properly explain Auto-respec and Auto-learn
  

Other Changes

• To bring dungeon entrances found in the Open World more in line with each other, entrance channeling time to Corrupted Dungeons has been lowered to 3s
  
• Resolved discrepancy between logout timers while Faction flagged in blue and yellow regions, and reduced the extended Faction logout timer in these regions to 30s. This results in an increase in yellow (previously 10s) and a decrease in blue (previously 60s). Logout times while not Faction flagged are unaffected.
  
• Crafting bonus changes:
  
  • Crafting bonuses and specialist crafting bonuses for potions removed from Caerleon
    
  • Generalist Refining bonus decreased from 18% to 10%
    
  • Specialist Refining bonus stays the same at +10%
    
  • Generalist Crafting bonus reduced from 25% to 18%
    
    • Generalist Crafting bonus can be improved to a total of 26% through Power upgrades
      
  • Specialist Crafting bonus stays the same at +15%
    
    • Crafting bonus for specialist crafting can be improved to a total of 57% through Power upgrades
      
• Updated character selection screen with improved visuals
  
• Arena furniture items are no longer salvageable
  

Mobile Improvements

• Improved targeting behavior for healing spells and attacks
  
• The Custom button can now be used in the tap control layouts
  
• Added an option for "Separate Dynamic Actions", setting the main action button to always be attack and placing all other actions on a separate button
  
• Dynamic action minimum gathering tiers can now be selected
  
• Moved the spell cancel area to avoid accidental cancellation of spell casts
  
• Moved "Account", "Logout" and "Options" menu points to fixed buttons at the top of the main context menu
  
• Improved party view options for mobile players, including scalable UI, easier "Hide Party" button, and improved options in Settings
  

Combat Balance Changes
Arcane Staffs
Arcane Staffs were still very strong in the Crystal League meta and Enigma Blade also outshone other W abilities in most situations. The cooldown of Flicker has therefore been increased to tone the ability down. This also adds more depth as the cast can choose between lower cast by only using the Enigma Blade or activating the extra mobility at the cost of a higher cooldown. Additionally, to make Frazzle more useful again, it has been changed back to a "damage taken increase" on the target, which is a damage amplification independent of the target’s resistances. This allows for a more unique damage-amplifying role.

• Enigma Blade (all Arcane Staffs):
  
  • Flicker Cooldown: 15s → 20s
    
• Frazzle (all Arcane Staffs):
  
  • Energy cost: 9 → 7% of Max energy
    
  • Now reduces Bonus Defense vs players and mobs by 30%
    
  • Removed the Resistance Reduction
    

Crossbows
Due to its slow application of damage, the Siegebow was falling off the ZvZ meta. To make the weapon more competitive in modern Albion again, the channel time has been shortened while the total damage output remains the same.

• Sweeping Bolt (Heavy Crossbow):
  
  • Cooldown: 18s → 15s
    
  • Standtime: 0.7s → 0.4s
    
• Vicious Barrage (Siegebow):
  
  • Cast Time: 1s → 0.5s
    
  • Channel Ticks: 5 → 4
    
  • Base Damage per Tick: 97.26 → 126
    
  • % Damage per Tick: 2% → 2.5%
    

Daggers
Demonfang was overly oppressive in group fights, as it simply out-damaged most similar options. To bring it more in line with other AoE burst damage weapons, its Resilience Penetration has been reduced.

• Demonfang Resilience Penetration: 75% → 50%
  

Fire Staffs
The reworked Pyroblast was not very popular, as although it had high potential damage, making it hit was very situational. To make the ability more effective, the max channel time was reduced and the projectile range increased.

• Pyroblast (One-handed Staff):
  
  • Projectile Range: 20m → 24m
    
  • Max Channel time: 2s → 1.2s
    
  • Minimum / Maximum Damage remain unchanged
    

Frost Staffs
Since the damage of Ice Crystal was very delayed, it could easily be reflected on reaction, making it too risky to use in large-scale fights. The damage has therefore been made un-reflectable.

• Ice Crystal (Permafrost):
  
  • Damage can no longer be reflected
    

Nature Staffs
To give more meaning to interrupting Revitalize after a few ticks, a lot of the needed energy for the full channels is now paid upfront on channel start. Getting the whole channel through still costs Nature Staff users the same energy, but interrupting it early now brings a strong energy penalty. Additionally, fighting with DoT weapons against a Great Nature Staff was too punishing, because Living Armor had almost guaranteed Healing ticks with few counterplay options. To give Cursed Staffs and Axes a better chance, Living Armor now only heals on direct damage.

• Revitalize (all Nature Staffs):
  
  • Energy cost at Channel Start: 0 → 20
    
  • Energy cost per Channel Tick: 9 → 4
    
• Living Armor (Great Nature Staff):
  
  • Now only Heals when receiving Direct Damage (DoTs no longer count)
    

Swords
The movement speed boost from Heroic Charges has been reverted to 9%, as the previous mobility gave too much advantage in Corrupted Dungeons, even with the introduction of the Mephits. Additionally, the range of Mighty Blow has been reduced to give better counterplay options in Corrupted Dungeons. Due to its low cooldown, long range, and fast speed, it was overly difficult to defend against for many match-ups.

• Heroic Charge (all Swords):
  
  • Movement Speed Increase: 12% → 9%
    
• Iron Will (all Swords):
  
  • No longer purged by movement-removing effects like Cripple
    
• Mighty Blow (One Handed Sword):
  
  • Cast Range: 10m → 8m
    
  • Distance to enemy after Leap: 1m → 3m
    

War Gloves
To make Backhand Strike more reliable, it now knocks all enemies hit in the direction of the cast. This should make the ability far more useful, as enemies will no longer randomly scatter.

• Backhand Strike (all War Gloves):
  
  • Enemies are now all knocked in the same direction
    

Helmets
To make Cleanses more widely available, Cleanse is now an option on all Leather Hoods, offering more players this alternate possibility of reacting to various situations. Further, the helmet abilities Energy Regain and Howl, which were a bit undertuned in comparison to other helmet abilities, have been improved.

• Energy Regain (all Helmets):
  
  • Channel Duration: 9s → 4s
    
  • Tick Interval: every 1s → every 0.5s (Energy gain per tick is still the same)
    
• Howl (all Leather Hoods → Mercenary Hood):
  
  • Howl is now moved to Mercenary Hood
    
  • Cooldown: 30s → 20s
    
• Cleanse (Mercenary Hood → all Leather Hoods):
  
  • Cleanse is now moved to all Leather Hoods
    

Armors
Stalker Jacket was outshined in most situations by Hellion Jacket. To give Stalker Jacket more clear advantages, the cooldown has been decreased and damage increased. This should make it the more desirable choice for consistent AoE damage output, and keep Hellion Jackets' focus more on sustain.

• Electric Field (Stalker Jacket):
  
  • Cooldown: 45s → 30s
    
  • Damage per Tick: 26.70 → 28
    

Shoes
We further want to add another Cleanse option on the shoe slot and add the new Ability Break Free for that. It will replace the ability Invisibility, which has already been outshined by other invisibility options in the shoe slot and felt a bit obsolete.

• Removed the Invisibility ability from Mercenary Shoes
  
• Added the new Ability, Break Free:
  
  • Cleanses all Crowd Control Effects on Dash towards the targeted position
    
  • Can be used while stunned or silenced
    
  • Cooldown: 25s
    
  • Range: 12m
    

Diminishing Returns
Reworked Diminishing Returns for knockbacks and knocking enemies into the air, to prevent player getting stun locked by repeated knock-ups:

• Knocking enemies into the air is now affected by Diminishing Returns
  
• Knocking enemies into the air now counts as knockback for DR, with individual adjustments applied to various abilities
  
• Knockback DR Factor: 0.04 → 0.15
  
• Knockback DR Time: 15s → 10s
  

Miscellaneous
To offer a more enjoyable experience in dungeons, the ability cooldown after entering a dungeon or changing floors inside a dungeon has been reduced. The high cooldown in the open world remains so as to not give more power to gank groups splitting up on two sides of an exit.

• Ability Cooldown when entering or changing floors inside a dungeon: 15s → 7s
  

Fixes

• Spell fixes:
  
  • Fixed issue where using an AoE attack on a player under the Outlands shrine buff would trigger Outlaw status
    
  • Tear Apart description now displays the correct range
    
  • Throwing Blade description now displays the correct move speed
    
  • Fixed issue where Enigma Blade's "Flicker" ability could not be used after dealing a killing blow
    
• Mobile fixes:
  
  • Increased spell tooltip sizes
    
  • Fixed an issue where auto-run would cancel when using mouse on mobile
    
  • Fixed issues where dynamic actions were not possible while in combat or with target selected, regardless of settings
    
  • Fixed issue where default cursor was not selectable in Settings menu
    
• Fixed issue where Item Details could not be opened from Sell tab in Marketplace
  
• Fixed issue where refining large numbers of lower-level resources could begin filling higher specialization nodes that were not yet unlocked
  
• Fixed distribution of ore, fiber, and hide treasures in T6 and T7 Steppe regions on the Royal Continent, which should lead to an increase in hide treasures and a decrease in ore and fiber treasures
  
• Fixed issue where Avalonian Priestess received unintended damage from despawned summons
  
• Numerous additional graphical, audio, animation, terrain, UI, and localization fixes