3.1 Patch Notes

[Game]

Annihilus 3.1 Changelog:


General Changes:


• The Crucible has been added! Battle your way through 20 Levels of a dungeon where no level is the same. Each Level will change not only the tileset of the level, but the monsters you face, along with their strength. Every 5 levels you will fight a new Boss with new unique items! Be swift though; because each level has a time limit of 5 minutes, aside from level 9, which has a time limit of 20 minutes. If you die even once throughout the Crucible, it is over. You will have to start over in a new game. Grab the Admission to Level 1 from Akara to get started!


• Several quality of life changes / fixes behind the scenes, I.E. several monsters with little to no AIs have been fixed. (Looking at you R'lyeh monsters!). This will likely bring some more stability, but the changes are too numerous / trivial to list here. Sorry!


• Plaguelands loot tables have been nerfed. The difficulty compared to the drops just didn't add up. Back to Inferno guys! Flesh Golem also no longer spawns in the Plaguelands.


• Santa has found his way into Sanctuary! Visit the Christmas Tree in the Rogue Encampment to teleport to the last location Santa was spotted. Certain gifts he drops can only be opened on or after Christmas! Sorry guys :( The patch took a little too long to get out, so I had to remove Santa as he would no longer make any sense. Look forward to Santa's visit next Christmas!



Skill Changes:


Amazon

• Lightning Arc no longer converts 50% of it's damage to Lightning, but now gains more Lightning Damage per skill Level. Lightning Arc gained Jab as a new synergy, gains more Attack Rating per level, and had it's Damage Synergy % increased.


• Guided Arrow now benefits from Piercing Attack, and can continue hitting the same target.


• Dodge / Avoid / Evade now have much quicker animations, and it is MUCH harder to get "dodge locked".


• Valkyrie now has a 2 second cooldown, down from 6.


Druid

• Werewolf now gives more Attack Rating.


• Werebear now gives Attack Rating.


• Pounce's cooldown has been removed, as the previous nerf was just a little overboard.


Necromancer

• Teeth's Damage Synergy % has been increased.


• Bone Spear now shoots in the shape of a trident, hitting more targets. Damage Synergy % has also been increased.


• Bone Spirit's Damage Synergy % has been increased. Bone Spirit now benefits from Piercing Attack.


• Skeleton Mastery's benefits have been tripled.


• Mass Regeneration Aura (Blood Golem aura from Goka Uln) now also gives +1 Life Per Hit per Blood Golem / Aura skill level, along with Vitality and Regen.


Paladin

• Blessed Hammer's velocity has been increased.



Item Changes:

(Please note changes to items will unfortunately not affect pre-existing items, you will need to find them again or simply re-roll them with Orb of Transmogrification.)


• K'nar'st's Ribcage had an impossible Mana range set, so it has been set to 150-220 but now gains 25% Maximum Mana.


• King's Jewel of Blazing's drop rate has been slightly increased.


• Multiple items have gained the new Increased Magic Damage % property. This has been added to certain items that previously added to every other element, such as Stone of Jordan and Mang Song's Lesson.


• Carrion Wind now also gives +skills to Poison Maelstrom.


• Abyss Sphere can now be used as a Horadric Cube.


• Infernal Chests will now always contain an Infernal Pearl.


• Insanity (Physical) now gives +1000 Attack Rating and +100% Attack Rating.


• Goka Uln now rolls 5%-10% Increased Magic Damage instead of having % chance to Reanimate.


• Crown of the High Heavens has been drastically buffed.


• Scroll of Rune Upgrade has been added to the Gold Vendor for 150 Gold.


• Scroll of Rune Downgrade has been added to the Gold Vendor for 0 Gold.


• Warped Effect (http://i.imgur.com/vXMYPzm.jpg) has been added to the Gold Vendor for 2000 Gold.


• 3 new Runewords have been added. Guardian (http://i.imgur.com/k5J3FIo.jpg) (any armor) Banish (http://i.imgur.com/lnyJWNi.jpg) (any shield) Deadeye (http://i.imgur.com/jpHA3zi.jpg) (any bow). We planned on adding more but ran into some issues, expect some more in 3.2!


• Items with Piercing Attack now show the exact amount of Piercing they give.


• EDIT: 1-3-16 Hotfix Changelog found here (http://annihilus.net/showthread.php?t=9263&page=3#post56697).


As always there is a high possibility I missed a change (especially minor ones) in the Patch Notes! I apologize in advance. Also the Crucible is a LOT of new content, so there is always chance for bugs / crazy things. Please PM me if you think you find an error / exploit / issue! Happy New Year and Server Anniversary from everyone here at Annihilus!

[Jared]

1nd

[Mephisto]

Looking gooooooooooood, leggo

[PSyren]

Looks good dude.

[Grand Master]

Wow.. That's a lot!
I hope that you could give some recipe to add socket with certainty (like for 3/4/5/6 sockets) for 3.2 patch.
Great Job!

[FromTheRez]

Sexy sexy!
Anyone willing to stream or record Crucible? I can't get on right now :(

[tragos]

Cooool thanks!

[death_thrash]

Gz for the Idea of scroll of Rune Downgrade!
Now the Higher the Rune the more Valuable!
Tor & Zod Back in game ;)

[LordManhammer]

Kudos!

[Research]

did you modify my item mover code to prevent the abyss spheres from inceptioning?

[aolin]

woo! thanks for all your hard work getting this patch out :)

[Lampogriz]

Very good job, thanks Alex. Crucible seems very funny!

i've noticed 2 bugs for me:
- Ican't use prime charm as cube properly. Usually my inventory is full, and i pick item , drag & drop it to cube without opening it. I cant do same with prime charm, so its useless for me.
- I dont see full ctulhu physical set ar bonus, do i need to find all pieces again or reroll?

[underdunk]

how does the pierce stacks?
for example: 2 items each with +50% pirce
is it like: 50+50=100%
or:50% pierce and the other 50% left are gettin 50%pierce from secont item. so i get total 75% pierce?

[Game]

Very good job, thanks Alex. Crucible seems very funny!

i've noticed 2 bugs for me:
- Ican't use prime charm as cube properly. Usually my inventory is full, and i pick item , drag & drop it to cube without opening it. I cant do same with prime charm, so its useless for me.
- I dont see full ctulhu physical set ar bonus, do i need to find all pieces again or reroll?

It's on the weapon itself, it isn't a bonus! You have to re-find the weapon. As for the abyss sphere, I know it's unfortunate but you cannot drop items on to it. It has to be opened first. I will see if I can change this later, sorry :( Glad you're having fun though!



how does the pierce stacks?
for example: 2 items each with +50% pirce
is it like: 50+50=100%
or:50% pierce and the other 50% left are gettin 50%pierce from secont item. so i get total 75% pierce?

If you have 2 items with 50% you'll have 100% pierce!

[thessarill]

great job once again.
The only sad thing is the free downgrade runes. It should be at least 100 gold, or tor and zod will be the only runes usefull... i have something like... a ton of tor and zod... wich means its a ton of ber... so as i can do any rune ( but xer) with tor by downgrading it, all the lower runes are useless for me... why would I pay 150 gold to upgrade a sur to a ber when i can do it for free by downgrading a zod?

[zeCook]

Hmm,guys,in the middle of level 2 Crucible I suddenly stopped being able to land any damage... any ideas? I know you need to use the scrolls but for some reason it stopped working at one point. There were two of us,is it because we got separated at that point?

[thessarill]

maybe limit time?

[StenchTrench]

THANK YOU so much for allowing us to downgrade our runes. Thumbs up sirs!

[Frigide]

great job once again.
The only sad thing is the free downgrade runes. It should be at least 100 gold, or tor and zod will be the only runes usefull... i have something like... a ton of tor and zod... wich means its a ton of ber... so as i can do any rune ( but xer) with tor by downgrading it, all the lower runes are useless for me... why would I pay 150 gold to upgrade a sur to a ber when i can do it for free by downgrading a zod?

Yea seems weird, runes got no value now. Maybe the recipe should use 2 zod to get a cham, as we do 2 zod to get a tor. Would lesser the effect of 'free' runes system.

[Game]

great job once again.
The only sad thing is the free downgrade runes. It should be at least 100 gold, or tor and zod will be the only runes usefull... i have something like... a ton of tor and zod... wich means its a ton of ber... so as i can do any rune ( but xer) with tor by downgrading it, all the lower runes are useless for me... why would I pay 150 gold to upgrade a sur to a ber when i can do it for free by downgrading a zod?

I think you forgot how Diablo 2 was originally designed :) Higher runes SHOULD hold more value over runes below it. Did you know The chances of a Jah has about a 350% higher drop rate compared to Zod? Why shouldn't Zod be worth more? If people want to cut their higher / more valuable rune down to a cheaper rune, then they should be able to. I've seen people on here offer Zods / Chams when people asks for "HRs" in trades and people turned them down and said those runes are useless and are not considered "HRs". That completely disgusted me, especially since they are so much more rare to drop than the Jahs and Bers people want so badly. Runes did not lose any value from this change, the previously "useless" runes have just gained some value. Sorry if that upsets you :/, but if you stop and think about it it makes perfect sense.


Hmm,guys,in the middle of level 2 Crucible I suddenly stopped being able to land any damage... any ideas? I know you need to use the scrolls but for some reason it stopped working at one point. There were two of us,is it because we got separated at that point?

There is a 5 minute time limit after using the Admission! If you have not cleared the level and used the next Admission by then, you're out of time and must start over!



Yea seems weird, runes got no value now. Maybe the recipe should use 2 zod to get a cham, as we do 2 zod to get a tor. Would lesser the effect of 'free' runes system.

There are no "free" runes. Read my response to thessarill :) People should be thrilled to find Zod, not "oh my god why Zod instead of Jah or Ber?"

[StenchTrench]

I think you forgot how Diablo 2 was originally designed :) Higher runes SHOULD hold more value over runes below it. Did you know The chances of a Jah has about a 350% higher drop rate compared to Zod? Why shouldn't Zod be worth more? If people want to cut their higher / more valuable rune down to a cheaper rune, then they should be able to. I've seen people on here offer Zods / Chams when people asks for "HRs" in trades and people turned them down and said those runes are useless and are not considered "HRs". That completely disgusted me, especially since they are so much more rare to drop than the Jahs and Bers people want so badly. Runes did not lose any value from this change, the previously "useless" runes have just gained some value. Sorry if that upsets you :/, but if you stop and think about it it makes perfect sense.



There is a 5 minute time limit after using the Admission! If you have not cleared the level and used the next Admission by then, you're out of time and must start over!




There are no "free" runes. Read my response to thessarill :) People should be thrilled to find Zod, not "oh my god why Zod instead of Jah or Ber?"

I agree with Mr. Founder 100%. I have a stockpile of Zods that NO ONE wants. Now I can downgrade them to Bers or any other rune that I may find useful for myself, or keep them as Zods until new runewords make them valuable again. It's all about choices now.

[Frigide]

I agree with Mr. Founder 100%. I have a stockpile of Zods that NO ONE wants. Now I can downgrade them to Bers or any other rune that I may find useful for myself, or keep them as Zods until new runewords make them valuable again. It's all about choices now.

i have to agree with you! :)
Though its weird, because we all seem to have more zod tor to drop in cow than other runes, which sounds weird because of droprates.

[Game]

i have to agree with you! :)
Though its weird, because we all seem to have more zod tor to drop in cow than other runes, which sounds weird because of droprates.

I just triple checked, zod / tor / xer are INSANELY less likely to drop than jah / ber. People don't use the Zods as much so they seem to pile up ;)

[sine25]

the key to the second level wont cube for me

[Game]

they key to the second level wont cube for me

You either haven't right-clicked the admission at the key chest, took longer than the 5 minute time limit, or you right-clicked it at the wrong time (not next to key chest, or monsters still alive).

[Game]

Annihilus 3.1 1/3/2016 Hotfix Changelog: <br />
<br />
<br />
• Plaguelands dropped have been buffed back up some. They still aren't quite the same level as Inferno, but close enough considering the difficulty. <br />
<br />
...

[Lampogriz]

Hephastos are still invisible)

[Game]

Hephastos are still invisible)

Thanks, I will look into it!

[dibdab]

Although I like the crucible very much and especially the idea of challenge against time brings in some "real life feeling", this challenge nails one down to the computer, ignoring everything around because of the time limits. For me, this is hardly feasible, as I often must interrupt playing and being away from keybord. It would be great, if there could be a possibility to have something like a waypoint while doing the crucible to be able to interrupt for a while - although i realizie that the idea was to do without interruption.

The rune downgrade is a very nice thing and I complete agree with Game that a higher rune should be more worth. As an idea, there was a nice system on another private dia server. They allowed to break runes in two pieces, like 1 Ber = 2 Sur. Maybe the rune breaking could cost something like a kind of "rune breaking fee", means 1 Ber gets 1 Sur and 1 Lo? Just as an idea...

[Game]

Although I like the crucible very much and especially the idea of challenge against time brings in some "real life feeling", this challenge nails one down to the computer, ignoring everything around because of the time limits. For me, this is hardly feasible, as I often must interrupt playing and being away from keybord. It would be great, if there could be a possibility to have something like a waypoint while doing the crucible to be able to interrupt for a while - although i realizie that the idea was to do without interruption.

The rune downgrade is a very nice thing and I complete agree with Game that a higher rune should be more worth. As an idea, there was a nice system on another private dia server. They allowed to break runes in two pieces, like 1 Ber = 2 Sur. Maybe the rune breaking could cost something like a kind of "rune breaking fee", means 1 Ber gets 1 Sur and 1 Lo? Just as an idea...

The Crucible is very specific about what it is, there is plenty of other content I have added that you can take a break and come back to :) I know its rough for people who don't have a 1-2 hours to play, but there is always more content coming in the future that isn't time restricted. As for the rune breaking, I think that turning 1 rune into 2 is a bad idea in the long run, as that would be creating runes out of thin air and then they could just use the upgrade scroll for just 150 Gold. I am pretty content with how it turned out, I think the vast majority of people are happy!

[dibdab]

The Crucible is very specific about what it is, there is plenty of other content I have added that you can take a break and come back to :) I know its rough for people who don't have a 1-2 hours to play, but there is always more content coming in the future that isn't time restricted.
I agree, there is lots of cool content out there :) It is more the feeling of "can't do it, what a pity" and more my personal time problem than yours in designing that nice content. A few years earlier, when I had the possibility to do it, I would have loved it - but there was only bnet ;)



As for the rune breaking, I think that turning 1 rune into 2 is a bad idea in the long run, as that would be creating runes out of thin air and then they could just use the upgrade scroll for just 150 Gold. I am pretty content with how it turned out, I think the vast majority of people are happy!
And so I am, the rune downgrade I met on another private server and it gave some freedom in working with runes in comparison to bnet. The upgrade for gold and free downgrade works very fine for me. The breaking was more a proposal as trade-off, but as you stated, most people are happy with new rules, so keep them. Good work so far!

[Game]

I agree, there is lots of cool content out there :) It is more the feeling of "can't do it, what a pity" and more my personal time problem than yours in designing that nice content. A few years earlier, when I had the possibility to do it, I would have loved it - but there was only bnet ;)


And so I am, the rune downgrade I met on another private server and it gave some freedom in working with runes in comparison to bnet. The upgrade for gold and free downgrade works very fine for me. The breaking was more a proposal as trade-off, but as you stated, most people are happy with new rules, so keep them. Good work so far!

Thanks! Glad you're having fun!

[zeCook]

Annihilus 3.1 1/3/2016 Hotfix Changelog:

• El'druin, the Sword of Justice has had the damage on it's Slice of Heaven and Heaven's Justice greatly increased.


Is the case the same as the other items that were modified? Do I need a new El'druin or will the current one have the new damage?

[Game]

Is the case the same as the other items that were modified? Do I need a new El'druin or will the current one have the new damage?

Nope, this will affect existing swords as well! :) No need to find a new one. It is the skills that were modified, not the actual item, so it's a little different in this case.

[Dante]

I like the rune decision a lot. It's a clever compromise.

The Crucible time limit is ok I think. I don't know how the time works there? I sit the time the leader actually stays in the level or the time since the level is created?
I mean, if the time limit only counts down while the leader is in the level, this would give the opportunity to pause while also keep it a time play. Or is it like this already?

[Lucid]

umm great job again :) will hopefully be back soon!

just a question about this one:
• Guided Arrow now benefits from Piercing Attack, and can continue hitting the same target.

sooo... guided arrow + 100% piercing attack = the arrow hits the target, turn around and do the same again. Over and over again or only 1x 100% piercing chance / attack?

i just wonder how many singletarget damage + lags this would cause if you shoot a 100 arrows and hide somewhere, watching do the work for you xd

[Game]

umm great job again :) will hopefully be back soon!

just a question about this one:
• Guided Arrow now benefits from Piercing Attack, and can continue hitting the same target.

sooo... guided arrow + 100% piercing attack = the arrow hits the target, turn around and do the same again. Over and over again or only 1x 100% piercing chance / attack?

i just wonder how many singletarget damage + lags this would cause if you shoot a 100 arrows and hide somewhere, watching do the work for you xd

If the arrow isn't blocked or dodged or anything like that, it can hit up to 8 times total. After 8 hits it poofs.

[Lucid]

Hah ^^ theres the quantum of information missing :)

Thanks for the info!