Tomb of Annihilation Preview Patch Notes: NW.85.20170627a.2 (Updated 7/7)

terramak · July 2017

UPDATE 7/7: The .2 only has one change:

The debug item "Bane of the Jungle" is now available for purchase in the Wondrous Bazaar, in the Preview Only section of the store. This token will allow players who meet the item level requirement to queue for the epic dungeon Tomb of the Nine Gods. This item will only be available on the Preview shard.

Highlights

Tomb of the Nine Gods
Delve deep into an ancient tomb and square off against the horrors within! New puzzles and challenges await within the Tomb of the Nine Gods. Dare you face the terror within?

Get more detail and provide feedback here: Official Feedback Thread: Tomb of the Nine Gods

Note: There is not currently a way on the test shards to skip the initial entry requirements of this dungeon, so availability may still be limited to most players.

Release Notes

Content and Environment
Chult and Port Nyanzaru

Audio. Lots of audio fixes, improvements, and hook-ups have been made. (Voice-over still remains.)
Captain Dunmish no longer masquerades as Minsc in a contact dialog name.
Civilian fisher-folk in Port Nyanzaru no longer lean against an invisible wall before fishing.
Civilians in Port Nyanzaru no longer feel the need to casually scale carts in their path.
Civilians in Port Nyanzaru now stare into the distance for significantly less time.
Civilians in Port Nyanzaru no longer treat certain wooden platforms as though they are ethereal.
Many lines of text have been updated to be more appropriate to lore.
Various fixes have been made to several environments to improve performance and address minor issues.
Vendors in Port Nyanzaru now have names, and some are now less reticent to actually vend things.

Repeatable Adventures

Various text, logic, and player experience smoothing fixes have been made to these quests.

General

Lair of Lostmauth: There is no longer an occluding plane causing visuals to go wonky in the entrance to the boss room.

Combat and Powers
General

Certain Piercing attacks that deal damage based on another attack no longer "double-dip" damage resistance against higher-level enemies.
- Example: The Hunter Ranger feat, Piercing Blades, deals an extra 50% piercing damage to an enemy.
- If an attack would normally deal 200 damage, but is reduced to 150 by an enemy's level difference, then Piercing Blades now deals 75 damage (50% of the damage dealt).
- Prior to this fix, Piercing Blades would deal around 56 damage (50% of the damage dealt, then reduced again by the level difference).
Piercing damage powers now work as described in (most of) their tooltips: "Piercing Damage cannot be deflected and ignores armor." This means:
- Piercing damage will no longer penetrate defenses that are not armor (such as Tenacity-based defenses).
- Piercing damage will now be able to benefit from damage vulnerability debuffs on the target (such as the Lantern of Revelation debuff).
- The net effect should be to make these powers less overwhelming (but still potentially very strong) in PvP, and much more useful in PvE.

Companions

The Active Companion Bonus for Archons now properly counts the number of Archons a player has active.

Enemies and Allies

Yuan-ti and Batiri enemy attacks and shouts have had some audio tweaks.

Items and Economy
General

Charm of the Serpent: This artifact no longer has a chance to apply neuroshock; instead, it now increases damage taken by affected targets (value depends on rank).
Chult Relic gear is now Bind to Account.
Many various naming and icon fixes have been made to items introduced in Chult.
New collections added in Chult have been updated with more accurate data and appropriate icons.
Primal gear now properly has attached visuals, and has had its stats updated.
Slayer and Hunt rings have had their stats updated.
T-Rex fangs now consistently drop for players who defeat them.
Trophies are now consistently unique.
Various items have had their rarity border colors updated.

User Interface
Inventory

The "Unlock Other Item" context menu selection for Enchanted Keys no longer appears, as it's no longer reasonably usable now that keys are in the Useful Items tab.

Journal

The Quest Journal no longer remembers some options for other characters on the same account; these options are now properly persisted on a per-character basis.

Zen Market

The framerate no longer significantly drops in the Zen Market while the player is holding a coupon.
The Zen Market category list now consistently shows all banners if, for example, an entry is new, featured, and on sale all at the same time.

Performance and Stability
General

A crash when getting onto certain mounts has been addressed.
Various improvements to graphical rendering have been made. These shouldn't be significantly obvious, but should improve performance and visuals to a subtle degree.

Localization
General

The first major localization pass has been made for German, Italian, and Russian locales. (French is coming soon.)

darthtzarr · July 2017

terramak said:
Highlights

Tomb of the Nine Gods
Primal gear now properly has attached visuals, and has had its stats updated.

Can you please set the visuals back to dusk/drowcraft and consider firing your entire art team? Sarcasm aside, this is probably the worst looking gear in the entire game for most classes. The other Chult gear for most classes looks amazing. What happened with the Primal set?

The designer who looked at this and said "our players will love wearing this!" was very wrong

Also worth noting that the DC gear still has worthless stats on it for a buff DC (Restoration), so most DCs won't be using any of the new gear anyways.

EDIT -- Okay okay so maybe it's just me that doesn't want to wear the new gear. I just don't think they did a good job matching the roles with some of the new gear sets. CW and TR specifically do not in my mind match their roles enough to be worn. I also based most of my opinions simply on the helms atrocious looks, and completely ignored some of the decent armor pieces. I actually like the SW set a lot, and like most of the sets if the helm is excluded.

And firing the art team was sarcasm as I stated...

aimeesellers · July 2017

darthtzarr said:

terramak said:
Highlights

Tomb of the Nine Gods
Primal gear now properly has attached visuals, and has had its stats updated.
Can you please set the visuals back to dusk/drowcraft and consider firing your entire art team? Sarcasm aside, this is probably the worst looking gear in the entire game for most classes. The other Chult gear for most classes looks amazing. What happened with the Primal set?

Also worth noting that the DC gear still has worthless stats on it for a buff DC (Restoration), so most DCs won't be using any of the new gear anyways.

While I dont personally care for the look of the new armor... I think it does fit the theme of the new module and adventure area perfectly. It is probably the most detailed set of armors we have seen to date, with the most authentic looks. It captures the look and feel of an Aztec / Mayan background to the jungle settings.

wilbur626 · July 2017

"Slayer and Hunt rings have had their stats updated." Why no 2x defense slots on the +5 rings ?

aidek0 · July 2017

Primal ward gear for the OP still has regeneration on it. Please change that. Also, all the new rings come with double offensive slots, could you add 1 with double def?

rickcase276 · July 2017

I do not personally mind how the new primal armors look, other than the Guardian Fighter helm (but GFs seem to get bad looking helms on most sets). It does fit the theme very very well. But yes, the DC sets do not work entirely well for a buff/debuff DC.

rayrdan · July 2017

@terramak @rgutscheradev

https://forum.arcgames.com/neverwinter/discussion/1232367/transcendent-feytouch

can we have these bugs affecting transcendent feytouch fixed please?

arcanjo86 · July 2017

what class is that helm for?

darthtzarr said:

terramak said:
Highlights

Tomb of the Nine Gods
Primal gear now properly has attached visuals, and has had its stats updated.
Can you please set the visuals back to dusk/drowcraft and consider firing your entire art team? Sarcasm aside, this is probably the worst looking gear in the entire game for most classes. The other Chult gear for most classes looks amazing. What happened with the Primal set?

The designer who looked at this and said "our players will love wearing this!" was very wrong

Also worth noting that the DC gear still has worthless stats on it for a buff DC (Restoration), so most DCs won't be using any of the new gear anyways.

arcanjo86 · July 2017

did anyone tried mod 12 solo content with a dc?

darthtzarr · July 2017

arcanjo86 said:

what class is that helm for?
darthtzarr said:

terramak said:
Highlights

Tomb of the Nine Gods
Primal gear now properly has attached visuals, and has had its stats updated.
Can you please set the visuals back to dusk/drowcraft and consider firing your entire art team? Sarcasm aside, this is probably the worst looking gear in the entire game for most classes. The other Chult gear for most classes looks amazing. What happened with the Primal set?

The designer who looked at this and said "our players will love wearing this!" was very wrong

Also worth noting that the DC gear still has worthless stats on it for a buff DC (Restoration), so most DCs won't be using any of the new gear anyways.

Control Wizard

arcanjo86 said:
did anyone tried mod 12 solo content with a dc?

13k DO DPS DC yes. It was fairly easy, but I couldn't afk in it like I could for other zones. I would say similar difficulty to what you would see on a 9-10k entering SOMI is the same as an 11-12k entering Chult. It's worth noting that I had over the 75% DR requirement of enemies as well.

brewald · July 2017

@terramak
@rgutscheradev

brewald said:

New test done on Bronzewood enchantement with a TR this time (Release NW.85.20170612A.3)

Greater Bronzewood enchantment:
your at will and encounter powers do 12% more damage to the targer
work fine

Transcendent Bronzewood enchantment:
While marked, your at will and encounter powers do 16% more damage to the targer.
Don't work

Same issue in this release NW.85.20170627A.1

brewald · July 2017

Primal armor set
Design is very nice and coherent with the Chult background for all classes.

Chultan Crafted Weapons
OP and GF Shield's design is wrong. It doesn't match Maya style (Primal armor set) or Persian style (Pilgrim, Pioneer, League).

trentbail21 · July 2017

My god thank you very much for the piercing damage changes. Now if you could please have a look at Iron vanguard conqueror GF's damage too!

treesclimber · July 2017

@brewald you have transmutes equal to elemental weapons on the AH, those come from lockboxes so they are cheap now( a lot of people still opened howling hatred lockboxes). Just search elemental and sel filter for lower than lvl 5 in the ah equipment section.

mamalion1234 · July 2017

critical strike resistance is part of tenacity so piercing damage will not able to bypass that too?

blur · July 2017

@terramak Is Fire archon included as 0.5% bonus for other archons and does Fire archon gain bonus from other archons?

Loving the new gear looks, fitting for new mod. Do you have plans to bring back looks of old gear (among others Profound looks amazing for almost every class), at least as addition to Mantol-Derith vendor as transmute items only like the Dread Legion gear was added?

panteleelee · July 2017

terramak said:

Slayer and Hunt rings have had their stats updated.

Thnx for that

treesclimber · July 2017

Forest Flail snail mount is rare quality but has a universal insignia slot, is this intended?

rickcase276 · July 2017

I have also ran Chult solo content with a Righteous DO, 14k ilevel, and had very little problem, other than when I aggroed a group of Yuan-Ti and a group of undead at the same time, that did not work out so well. I probably could have killed them all without dying, but it was not worth the effort.

panteleelee · July 2017

darthtzarr said:

Also worth noting that the DC gear still has worthless stats on it for a buff DC (Restoration), so most DCs won't be using any of the new gear anyways.

True for coif and chest.
Look all arms and boots.
All have power-rec .
Thats is perfect for Buff DC.

Arm and boots from seals armors(500 IL)
And for coif and chest single pieces from monster of hunt(480 IL).
Look at collections.

arcanjo86 said:
did anyone tried mod 12 solo content with a dc?

16k DC buffer. Easy for me.

lordseth1985 · July 2017

really hope that piercing damage fix work for every power now...

darthtzarr · July 2017

panteleelee said:

darthtzarr said:

Also worth noting that the DC gear still has worthless stats on it for a buff DC (Restoration), so most DCs won't be using any of the new gear anyways.

True for coif and chest.
Look all arms and boots.
All have power-rec .
Thats is perfect for Buff DC.

Arm and boots from seals armors(500 IL)
And for coif and chest single pieces from monster of hunt(480 IL).
Look at collections.

Sorry, I stated that slightly wrong, since I had already given the full breakdown in a different thread.

Some pieces are better, but equipping the entire set is not something any buff DC should ever do. Thankfully, the 3 piece set bonus for relic is not something that is important to a Buff DC, nor is there a 3 piece set bonus for the Primal set.

darthtzarr · July 2017

dolrey said:

terramak said:

Piercing damage will no longer penetrate defenses that are not armor (such as Tenacity-based defenses).
Will it work and with trickster rogue's daily power [Shocking execution]?

Just tested on preview. Shocking Execution is now reduced by Tenacity DR and Critical Resistance, so it is around ~36% as effective as it used to be. The power is nearly worthless with this change in place.

galopikus · July 2017

Are the Primal Rings going to get fixed? How does a item-level 500 ring have only one enchantment slot?

artifleur · July 2017

terramak said:

Combat and Powers
General
Certain Piercing attacks that deal damage based on another attack no longer "double-dip" damage resistance against higher-level enemies.
Example: The Hunter Ranger feat, Piercing Blades, deals an extra 50% piercing damage to an enemy.
If an attack would normally deal 200 damage, but is reduced to 150 by an enemy's level difference, then Piercing Blades now deals 75 damage (50% of the damage dealt).
Prior to this fix, Piercing Blades would deal around 56 damage (50% of the damage dealt, then reduced again by the level difference).
Piercing damage powers now work as described in (most of) their tooltips: "Piercing Damage cannot be deflected and ignores armor." This means:
Piercing damage will no longer penetrate defenses that are not armor (such as Tenacity-based defenses).
Piercing damage will now be able to benefit from damage vulnerability debuffs on the target (such as the Lantern of Revelation debuff).
The net effect should be to make these powers less overwhelming (but still potentially very strong) in PvP, and much more useful in PvE.
Companions
The Active Companion Bonus for Archons now properly counts the number of Archons a player has active.

Two great fixes in one patch.

Thank you !!

panteleelee · July 2017

darthtzarr said:

Some pieces are better, but equipping the entire set is not something any buff DC should ever do. Thankfully, the 3 piece set bonus for relic is not something that is important to a Buff DC, nor is there a 3 piece set bonus for the Primal set.

From new armor every single piece have a different bonus. No need full set.
Relic armor is absolutely sucks.

Full set

ghoulz66 · July 2017

Piercing Blades, ok, PVE buffs are great. But I don't think this change affects archery. Longshot doesn't scale at all.

thefabricant · July 2017

@terramak:

terramak said:

Combat and Powers
Piercing damage will now be able to benefit from damage vulnerability debuffs on the target (such as the Lantern of Revelation debuff).

Some sources of damage are now double dipping on debuffs as a result of this:

Shadow of Demise (TR feat)

and on live, these 2 SW powers currently double dip on debuffs:

Tyrannical Curse
Creeping Death

jaime4312 · July 2017

thefabricant said:
@terramak:
terramak said:

Combat and Powers
Piercing damage will now be able to benefit from damage vulnerability debuffs on the target (such as the Lantern of Revelation debuff).

Some sources of damage are now double dipping on debuffs as a result of this:

Piercing Blades (HR feat)

and on live, these 2 SW powers currently double dip on debuffs:

Tyrannical Curse
Creeping Death

@thefabricant

Non native speaker here so if you or anyone here can tell me what "double dip" means that would be high appreciated. Perhaps it means "double benefitting"? If that's the case, at least for SW, what you reported as a bug should be kept, that class has been overnerfed and even though it does respectable dps it simply is quite behind the rest so from a balance perspective that is not good. If some classes get most of their dps out of massive base damage/self-buffing/lulz multiproccing with certain enchantments then the Scourge Warlock should by all means have its own "thing" as well that boosts its dps in a way that can put closer to other classes so what you pointed out, if it I'm understanding well, sounds like a nice buff, it wouldn't be that bad as it would be necessary to depend on other classes to depend from it.

@terramak

When you guys fixed TC in mod 10.5 but didn't compensate for it (SW doing top dps depending heavily on TC and with no alternative to match that perfomance) you massively nerfed SW damage, that class needs some tweaks to be more in line with the other dps ones. Creeping death takes way too long to deal all its damage, reworking it would be taking a step on the right direction. Encounter cooldowns and casting times are outrageously high and slow as well + dot powers take way too much time to deal full damage, powers should have less ticks with more damage each.

Compare:

- Casting speed: Killing flames vs disintegrate
- Cooldown time: Hadar's grasp vs entangling force

The hardest hitting encounter, killing flames, has slow casting time and can only deal max damage when enemies are below 25% hp aka almost dead while other classes have their hardest hitting encounters at max capacity much earlier or from the very start, that's a serious balance issue there.

Tomb of Annihilation Preview Patch Notes: NW.85.20170627a.2 (Updated 7/7)

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