Tuesday, March 30, 2010

Version 0.3.1 - Last patch before open beta

The Patch is out, its mostly bug fixes with only one hero tweak. Only thing special is that this is the last patch before Hon Open beta starts tomorrow.
 
Version 0.3.1
-------------

General

- Fixed disassembled items losing owner information, thus not letting them combine with other items
- Fixed a crash when selecting a chest containing a token of life or cheese
- Fixed unable to purchase from the shop while dead
- Reconnect window will no longer show if game is over (conceded) and you leave
- Show disconnect button in interface as soon as there is a winner (i.e. when a concede vote passes)

- Updated French stringtables
- Fixed downloading backwards compatibility archives after using the 0.3.0 installer
- Fixed issues with out of sync backwards compatibility archives
- Fixed a crash when starting old version replays
- Reset playback speed when closing a replay
- Updated how the "Automatic" create game functionality works
* Previously it used the first server it recieved a valid response back from. Now it grabs a server only from the region last selected

Interface

- Fix Team/All chat switching on phase changes during hero slection (Yes, this was just as annoying to us)
- Player Stats screen now has a dropdown box to show Ranked Stats and normal play stats, which are now seperate
- Added functionality to the UI option "Disable All Notifications" that turns off all popup notifications, but still records notifications to the history.
- Added new option "Disable Notifications In Game" that turns off popup notifications in game, but still fires them when not in a game.
- Added a "Remove All Notifications" button to the bottom of the notification history, clears out all notifications when used
- Fixed buddy invites so when a user ignores or accepts the other persons friendship, the original buddy request notification in their history is removed
- Added space to buddy/clan/notification count to allow for counts 3 digits in length
- Fixed "Disband Game" confirmation popping up for players who clicked "Disconnect" in their game and were not the host
* Added a "Disconnect from Game" confirmation instead for players who are in the game and not currently hosts when they click "Disconnect"
- Added SMR/TMR listing in a player's stats
- Fixed a problem where users could become silenced for excessively long times
* So for example a user types /silence "name" 9999999999, and they end up getting silenced in the channel for over a month. Now, /silence name 999999999 will silence them for a month, but if /silence name 1 is used afterwards, they will only be silenced for 1 minute.
- Added Russian back to lang selector
- Fixed EM % in stats page rounding correctly

Matchmaking

- Fixed leavers able to join matchmaking
- Players who try to join matchmaking with no region selected will now be given an error and told to select a region
- Fixed server not reading the proper rating value for matchmaking
* Caused -1 rating and players always gaining/losing 20 points no matter what
- Added better feedback and information for when someone fails to load and how long the game will wait before disbanding

Mac/Linux

- Added Exclusive mode for OS X
- Fixed a memory leak that was crashing OS X client
- Mac mods should now be installed to /Users//Library/Application Support/Heroes of Newerth
- Linux mods should now be installed to ~/.Heroes of Newerth

Heroes

Pharaoh
- Slight tweak to how the 'mummy grab' works to fix a control issue

Thursday, March 25, 2010

Version 0.3.0.1 & 0.3.0.2 changelogs and crash fix

Version 0.3.0.2
-------------
- Fixed the US Regions for Matchmaking
- Disabled custom avatars...

Version 0.3.0.1
-------------
- Fix joining game on the game list
- Fix game lobby enter key not working sometimes


Version 0.3.0 full change log:

 http://hongamer.blogspot.com/2010/03/030-patch-notes.html


Patch crashing fix:


If you cant update to the new patch because your game is crashing in the process, downaload and install this game client from here:


http://hotfile.com/dl/34576261/beaf067/HoNClient-0.3.0.exe.html

Also don't forget to disable all interface mods since they might not be compatible with the new user interface

0.3.0 Patch Notes

S2Idejder :  "The next version isn't going to be 0.1.67. We are changing version numbers!"

0.3.0 Patch Notes

Due to the changes in the interface files, it is highly likely that interface mods will not work.

Uninstall them.





It's finally time!

Patch Notes (with pretty pictures) are below.


Version 0.3.0
-----------


- New Front End Interface


- Solo Automatic Matchmaking
* With one button you can enter the queue for as many different regions as you want and play with random other people automatically. This does not use PSR, it uses SMR (Solo Matchmaking Rating) and everyone starts at 1500. Mode is Banning Pick.
* Players tagged as "leavers" can not join Matchmaking
* Players who leave a game before it starts (during the 'loading' phase of a game) will automatically be replaced by someone else.
* If you leave a Matchmaking game at the hero selection screen, you will get a leave

- Tutorial
* New ingame interactive Tutorial to help new players learn the basics of the game before diving in. Even experienced players might learn something!

- New Player Stats screen
* Including your most played heroes!


- Hero Compendium
* See detailed stats and recommended items about every hero


- Ingame Ladder page
* Search and filter the ladder to compare yourself to those at the top. Any number of options can be turned on and filtered!


- New Game Lobby


- New Hero Picking screen
* Now with 12 more slots for new heroes! How did we do that?!?



General

- You can now swap the placement of the minimap from the bottom left to bottom right hand corner
- Leaver threshold lowered to 5%
- Fix for StatusStealth
* This fixed an issue that was causing Witch Slayer and Pollywog Priest's crowd control abilities to dispel all states off the target
- Updated br stringtables, thanks to Trilles
- Recommended Items Updated
- Item cursor now changes to a targeting cursor when hovering over an allied unit
- Stacked items (runes of blight, mana potions, health potions) will now sell for their full total value within 15 seconds of purchasing them. (e.g. if you buy two health potions for 200g then sell them within 15sec, you will now correctly gain 200g)
- Logger's Hatchet can now be sold within 15 seconds of buying it (but not if you used it)
- Added "Host:" and "Version:" to the /gameinfo and /gi commands in game, also added the server version for display in the game lobby screen
- Fixed when heroes were 'running in place' after using a Homecoming Stone
- Added messages to the game lobby for the following actions:
1) When the host assigns someone as the new host
2) When the host assigns someone as a spectator
3) When the host assigns someone as a referee
4) When the host locks or unlocks a slot
- Removed 'remove hero' button in practice mode for now
- Tweaked the position of ancients

- Invisible Mode added
- Fixed a bug in the game setup interface where referee count was incorrectly being set to the count of spectators chosen
- Fixed a bug in the game lobby where the current player count exceeded the max player count in games with spectators(2) and referees(1). e.g. "Players: 13/10". Now shows the correct max player count to match the main lobby game browser numbers. e.g. "Players: 13/13"
- Added flood protection to the chat server to protect against invite to clan spam and create clan attempts
- Fixed an issue causing the change password functionality in game to not work correctly.
- Fixed an issue on the chat server where in certain cases players were not properly being promoted/demoted
- Optimized client code so game server refreshes should no longer hang the client or user interface.
- Chat channels can now be saved via the interface and will be automatically joined when logging in.
- Added new "Ping" filter next to the "Full Games" checkbox. It filters the results on the client so only pings less the chosen number populate the game list
- Added a new filter option to the server browser "Game Mode:" section called "Advanced". It allows players to filter multiple game modes (ie. SD, BD, BP) all at once locally in the client. Upon selecting 'Advanced' a small panel pops up and the player can choose the game modes they want to see in the game list just by selecting the appropriate checkbox then clicking OK
- Default SFX volume down to 0.6 from 0.7
- Fixed an issue with the chat server where if a user sent a message using /b or /m and someone on one of those lists was in /dnd mode, it wouldn't send the message to all the people on the list.
- Overhauled how adding buddies/friends works. You now must request friendship before someone is actually added as your friend.
* You can request friends when offline and they will get the notifications upon logging in, and approve at their convenience
* We might have to wipe current friends lists at some point in the future for this to work correctly.

- Added new search support for filtering games by name:
* Added feature to allow players to type in multiple search phrases. By typing a search phrase and adding a ?|? the client will distinguish one phrase from another. The browser will then search the available games and show any games showing any one of the phrases separated by a "|".
* Added feature to allow players to exclude certain games based on the search phrase. By typing in a "-" at the beginning of the search phrase the client will automatically filter any games with "Phrase" to not show up. Note that exclusion of search terms takes precedence over inclusion. (Excluding a term, and then trying to include the same term will cause it not to appear, ie ?noobs|-noobs?)
* The "|" and "-" can be escaped with a "\" should the player want to search on a game with the pipe or hyphen in it.
* All searches are color and case insensitive, and the order that the search phrases are entered have no effect on how they will display. So "1500|-no ab" is the same as "-no ab|1500".

Some examples:
*Search Phrase: "1550|1600|1650|-no ab|-noobs" - This searches on any game with "1550", "1600", and "1650" in the name, and if it has the words "no ab" or "noobs" in it it will not display.
*Search Phrase: "-no ab|1500|1550|-countryname|ab" - This searches on any game with "1500", "1550" and "ab" in the name, and if it has the words "no ab" or "countryname" in it it will not display.
*Search Phrase: "1500|\-SDEM|pipe\|test" - This searches on any game with "1500", "-sdem" and "pipe|test" in the name.

Kongor
- If you attack him from outside of his lair you will have 100% miss now
- After leaving his lair, 1.5 seconds later he retreats to go back in and is invuln on the run back
- Is now 40% angrier

Ice Ogre
- Cooldown of the frost shield increased by 4 seconds (to 5s)


Items

Barrier Idol
- Fixed a bug that caused it to absorb huge damage when damage taken was all at once
Elder Parasite
- Incoming damage multiplier reduced to 20%, from 30%
Harkon's Blade
- Increases manacost per attack to 75 from 50
Nullstone
- Recipe cost reduced to 825 from 1325
- Mana regen increased to 200% from 150%
- Now grants +10 damage
Runes of the Blight
- Heal over time is no longer dispellable
Wards of Sight
- Now have a 50 gold bounty when killed


Heroes

The following auras can now be toggled between all units and heroes only:
- Andromeda's Dimensional Link
- Arachna's Precision
- Moon Queen's Lunar Glow

Accursed
- Fixed Flame Consumption to go off anytime he is below 400 health and takes non-fatal damage
- Fixed Flame Consumption to properly dispel himself when it automatically goes off
- Fixed Sear so it continues to apply the slow and the buff while his ultimate is active

Andromeda
- Rescaled ult range to 750/975/1200 from 600/900/1200

Armadon
- Added cast effect for throwing snot
* This is a visual effects change
- Charges gained from Restless are not longer capped at 4

Behemoth
- "Voice"

Blacksmith
- Lowered base armor by 1
- Base Damage lowered to 54-60 from 58-64
- Flaming Hammer's projectile speed lowered to 800 from 1100
- Flaming Hammer's negative magic armor starts at -1/-2/-3/-4 for the first 1 second, then reduces to 0 over its duration.
- Base Manacost of Flaming Hammer increased to 95/110/125/140 from 95/105/115/125

Blood Hunter
- Blood Sense now reveals stealth targets

Chronos
- Manacost on Time Leap increased to 135 from 120
- Time Leap damage lowered by 25 at all levels
- Curse of Ages now steals 1/1/2/3 agility per charge, decreased from 1/2/3/4
- Curse of Ages now stuns the target after 5 attacks, increased from 4
- Targets stunned by Curse of Ages will now properly play their attack animation when the stun wears off
- Stun from Curse of Ages now scales as a .25,.5,.75,1 second stun from 1 second at all levels
- Chronofield won't freeze invulnerable targets anymore (Such as Swiftblade ulting or Defiler's ult)
- Chronofield now freezes everyone by default, with Staff of the Master lets allies move at -80% speed in the field

Corrupted Disciple
- Top end base damage lowered by 5

Dark Lady
- Turn rate increased to 900 from 360
- Dark Blades don't interrupt movement, cast time removed

Deadwood
- Proper announcement at hero selection
- Rebalanced:
- Base strength lowered to 23 (from 25)
- Strength Gain lowered to 2.7 from 3.0
- Agility Gain increased to 2.0 from 1.6
- Base Armor increased to 2.24 from 1.24
- Slow from throwing the log increased to 75% max from 60% max
- Oakbolt's slow now lasts for 1.5/2/2.5/3 seconds, from 3 seconds at all levels.
- Projectile speed when throwing a log increased to 1200 from 1000
- Willowmaker
* Cooldown rescaled to 85,75,65
* Cast point lowered to 500ms from 750ms
* Damage rescaled to 350, 650, 950 from 400,600,800
* Debuff is now a constant 20% strength reduction at all levels from 20,30,40%
* No longer splashes the debuff in a cone, only the single target
* Stun duration increased to 1.5s from 1s

Demented Shaman
- Base Intelligence lowered to 24 from 27
- Strength Gain lowered to 1.8 from 1.9
- Intelligence Gain lowered to 3.0 from 3.4
- Damage rescaled to 44-56 from 41-59
- The snare from Entangle will now give assists

Devourer
- No longer gains strength from illusions
- Touch radius of Hook changed from 60 to 75 and will consistently hit targets with a 75 radius regardless of what angle it is being thrown

Electrician
- Damage of Clensing Shock against summoned units increased to 600,800,1000 from 600 at all levels

Engineer
- Voice
- Fixed a Turret bug that a bullet from the Turret doing 200+ damage
- Fixed a bug causing the splash damage when a siege unit debuffed by Tinker to not deal AOE damage
- Energy Field will only not purge a target if they are under the effects of Shrunken Head
* This means the shield will purge off Jeraziah's Charm, for example.

Forsaken Archer
- Voice
- Skeletons now display a timer on the third ability indicating the time remaining for the next skeleton to expire (Thanks to Tisser)

Glacius
- Base Agility increased to 17 from 16
- Damage rescaled to 43-51 from 38-44
- Base Armor increased to 1.44 from 1.24

Hellbringer
- Summon Malphas now has new ground effects
- Negative Magic Armor is now -3,-4,-5,-6 from -2.7,-5.1,-6.9,-8.3

Jeraziah
- Fixed tooltips (a few errors)
- Range of Inner Light increased to 500 from 400

Keeper of the Forest
- Eyes are now stealthed and become revealed when a hero comes into the 450 reveal range (from 300)
* This stops couriers from killing eyes unless a hero is nearby to spot them
- Root can now be seen even when he is invisible
- Root now hits units in fog

Legionnaire
- Base Int increased to 17 from 14
- Terrify removed
- Terrifying Charge Added
* The Legionnaire charges very quickly at a target foe and swings wide with his mighty axe upon reaching them, dealing damage and Terrifying those unfortunate enough to be standing there. Terrified enemies attack very quickly, but do less damage per attack.
* 1000 Range, 40/50/60/70 Manacost, 30s Cooldown
* Charges at max movespeed towards the target. Being stunned, losing sight of the target, or issuing another command will cancel the charge early. Upon reaching the target, forces an attack that deals 150/200/250/300% of your base damage and applies Terrify for 4/5/6/7 seconds to all enemies in a 110 degree 240 distance cone.
* If the target gets more then 2000 units away (Such as from using teleport) the charge will cancel
* Terrify debuff: -50% Attack Damage, +50% Attack Speed

Madman
- Snare debuff stuff removed from Stalk
- Manacost of Berserk changed to 50,80,110 from 100,150,205

Maliken
- Model cleaned up
- Voice
- Stats tweaks:
* Base Strength increased to 24 from 22
* Strength gain increased to 2.6 from 2.4
* Agility gain lowered to 2.0 from 2.4
* Base Intelligence lowered to 17 from 18
- Speed of Sword Throw projectile increased to 850 from 700
- Radius of Sword Throw lowered to 200 from 225
- Manacost on Sword of the Damned's heal mode removed
- Self hurt from Sword of the Damned's flame mode changed to 6,9,12,15 from 5,10,15,20
- Range while under the effects of Possession reduced to 550 from 600

Night Hound
- Base movement speed increased to 305 from 300
- Smoke Bomb cast range increased to 425 from 350
- Smoke Bomb cast point reduced to 200 from 400
- Pounce cooldown rescaled to 20,15,10,5 from 30,20,10,5

Nymphora
- Fixed targeting circle radius
- Base Agility lowered to 18 from 22
- Base Armor lowered to 2.00 from 2.08
- Stun from Nymphora's Zeal is now 1200 range at all ranks (from bad)
* Charges Nymphora gains rescaled slightly so the bonuses are zero at level 1 and the same at level 4

Ophelia
- New effects for first ability
- Command now allows Ophelia to control 1/2/2/3 creeps at once, from 1/2/3/3
- Level 4 of Command no longer grants Magic armor to Ophelia's creeps

Pebbles
- New death

Pharaoh
- Anyone within 175 units of Pharaoh will be gauranteed to be caught inside of his mummy wall on use

Plague Rider
- Agility Gain lowered to 1.8 from 2.0
- Damage rescaled to 42-51 from 37-56

Pollywog Priest
- Remodeled and effects redone
- Range increased to 550 from 500
- Base Armor increased from 1.14 to 1.30
- Number of targets hit by Electric Jolt is no longer capped
- Cooldown of Voodoo Wards is now 110/95/80 from 110 at all levels

Predator
- "Voice"

Puppetmaster
- Puppeteer's Hold duration lowered by .5 seconds at all levels

Pyromancer
- Fixed Fervor doing 1 DPS too much to buildings
- Fervor set not to propagate to illusions

Slither
- Wards bounty to 10-15 from 3-9

Soul Reaper
- Base Agility increased to 16 from 15

Soulstealer
- Dread can no longer be toggled. This fixes the keybinding issues.

Succubus
- Voice
- Manacost of Succubus' Hold is now 150/250/350 from 200/300/400

Thunderbringer
- Cast times of all abilities lowered to 300ms from 400ms
- Damage from Chain Lightning is now instant on the first target
- AOE of Lightning Rod increased to 1000 from 800

Valkyrie
- Increase turn speed to 900 (from 360)
- After hitting a target with Javelin of Light, an 800 area around the target will continue to be revealed for 3.34 seconds
- Reworked collision on the Javelin of Light. It now has a radius of 80 (reduced from 110) and will consistently hit targets with an 80 radius regardless of what angle it is being thrown
* Previously, it was using a rectangle 110 units wide to calculate collision, so when thrown on an angle it would often hit targets greater than 110 units away
- Javelin of Light is no longer "Physical"
* This means it will hit someone who has void talisman active
- Javelin of Light plays a popup indicating the length of the stun
- Removed cast noise on casting Javelin of Light
- Removed glow from Javelin of Light

Vindicator
- Base Armor increased from 1.30 to 1.50
- Damage rescaled to 45-55 from 39-61

Voodoo Jester
- Base Agility increased to 14 from 13
- Base Intelligence increased to 22 from 19
- Intelligence Gain increased to 3.0 from 2.9
- Initial projectile speed of Acid Cocktail increased to 750 from 650
- Cast time on Cursed Ground reduced to 0.35 seconds (from 0.5)

Warbeast
- Manacost of Battle Cry reduced to 15,10,5,0 from 15,20,25,30

Witch Slayer
- Base Agility increased to 16 from 15
- Base Intelligence increased to 23 from 22

Zephyr
- The gust of wind from Gust now travels 540 total distance (reduced from 640)
- Cyclones now display the time remaining before the next cyclone expires (thanks to Tisser)
- Typhoon damage lowered to 60,80,100 from 60,90,120
- Typhoon no longer spawns max Cyclones instantly. Instead, it spawns one cyclone per second for the duration of the Typhoon.

Unfortunaley Phade is not in this version,
You can check her out here:

http://hongamer.blogspot.com/2010/03/new-upcoming-hero-video-phade.html


Wednesday, March 24, 2010

New upcoming hero video: Phade

Here is a video showing the new hero that was released on official s2 games facebook page. enjoy!!!



Previously relased concept art for the hero:

Friday, March 5, 2010

0.1.67 Sneak Peek 2: Tutorial (and Deadwood balance!)

Continuing on the "it's been a while since we gave an update so here is some of what we're working on" theme, this one will contain a sneak peek at both the upcoming balance changes to Deadwood and screenshots from the ingame Tutorial we have made!

To see the first Sneak Peek, check out here:
Pollywog Priest Remodel

So to jump right into it, here are the upcoming Deadwood balance changes:

Quote:
Deadwood
- Proper announcement at hero selection
- Rebalanced:
- Base strength lowered to 23 (from 25)
- Strength Gain lowered to 2.7 from 3.0
- Agility Gain increased to 2.0 from 1.6
- Base Armor increased to 2.24 from 1.24
- Slow from throwing the log increased to 75% max from 60% max
- Oakbolt's slow now lasts for 1.5/2/2.5/3 seconds, from 3 seconds at all levels.
- Projectile speed when throwing a log increased to 1200 from 1000
- Willowmaker
* Cooldown rescaled to 85,75,65
* Cast point lowered to 500ms from 750ms
* Damage rescaled to 350, 650, 950 from 400,600,800
* Debuff is now a constant 20% strength reduction at all levels from 20,30,40%
* No longer splashes the debuff in a cone, only the single target
* Stun duration increased to 1.5s from 1s
This is a general sweeping rebalance of this hero to bring him more in line with where we want him. Reducing his lategame scaling slightly along with making his Oakbolt better and balancing the Punch a bit for earlygame.

Keep in mind other then internal games, these changes are generally untested. This is what the beta-beta build is for when we can make one.

And now, onto the part I am sure a lot of you want to see shots of;

The Tutorial

Now, I am not going to walk you through every new step, voiceover, and effect in the tutorial. That would ruin the fun for when you test and play it yourself.  Keep in mind what you are seeing is just a fraction of all of the cool stuff we have scripted for this.

When you get into the game on the new interface, you will see this great button on the left side of the screen:


Clicking this will load and launch into the tutorial.

When you finish loading you are presented with a very direct menu:


Most people will click "Start Full Tutorial" the first time through, but using the different segments you can pick up later if you decide to stop part way through.

I am going to show one screenshot of a cool moment during each of the segments.



1. Overview




2. Basic Hero Controls




3. Hero Types
* This is also what the new hero picking screen looks like as well, minus the color pointing out the Strength hero section. Leaking! :O Also, we added more slots. How did we do that?!?




4. Items and Shopping




5. Gold and Experience




6. Laning Phase


We look forward to when you guys can get your hands on this and play with it. The feedback will help us refine this into a great tool for new players. We are definitely excited about this and hope you are as well!

Until next time...

Monday, March 1, 2010

0.1.67 Sneak Peek: Pollywog Priest

So, it's been a while since we gave an update with some content as to what we're working on, and as we draw closer to being able to release the next patch we plan to give you guys some sneak peeks of what it'll contain.

We'd like to apologize for the delay in this patch. We started some pretty ambitious goals (such as the new interface) and we refuse to settle for anything less than top quality. With that in mind, development dragged out a little longer than expected (isn't that always the case?). No worries, we're working around the clock to get everything taken care of and we're getting closer!

In the meantime I hope to entice you guys with some cool peeks at upcoming changes and content while we finish work here.

Right now, it's Pollywog time.

We said a while ago when the Honcast guys were here that we are remodeling and redoing the effects for Pollywog. And we did.

But first:

Quote:
Pollywog Priest
- Remodeled and effects redone
- Range increased to 550 from 500
- Base Armor increased to 1.30 from 1.14
And now the pretty pictures:




Electric Jolt just got a bit of a kick, not a huge change:


Morph now longer turns you into a little guy with big hands. You are now turned into...

*Ribbit*



Magical Bindings is renamed to Tongue Tied!

It should be obvious why:



Voodoo Wards are changed as well:


And the best part. They shoot lasers!


Enjoy.