New Changes

Tutorial & Onboarding

• First-time user experience and tutorial flow updated.
  • Your first mission will now provide a shorter, clearer introduction to quests and extraction.
• Overhauled progression and unlock flow to avoid an overwhelming first-time experience. This includes changes to the unlocking and quest flow of:
  • Wounds
  • Barriers and rockgates, along with open methods
  • Dynamite and explosive barrel use (Dynamite, you said?!)
  • Buildings and associated buffs
  • Crafting
  • Equipment
  • NPC discovery
• Several tutorial tooltip tweaks and updates.
• Updated Teleport / start mission visuals and flow
  • When you press Teleport (or, if in a party, you and your party members have all pressed teleport), you are now shown more clearly that you are teleporting, with VFX, animation, and the closing of all other UI. You have 5 seconds to cancel, and then off you go.

Drop In & Matches

• Drop-in is enabled with a 5-minute threshold for match entry.
• Increase mission duration from 15 minutes to 20 minutes.
• Set the group extractions portal ready time to 6 mins.
• Set all circle timings to be 5 minutes later than now (start 5 minutes later, and end 5 minutes later - ie. on the 20-minute mark).

General Gameplay

• First vault, vaultbreaking event, and awarded artifact added. You will encounter a vault that has crashed on the map, inviting you to break into it for what’s inside!
  • These will involve:
    • Rolling waves of enemies putting pressure on you.
    • Vault bomb timing and placement to effectively break in.
    • Global vaultbreak notifications to alert you or others to a current vaultbreak.
    • Exciting rewards within for surmounting this challenge!
• Camera rotation was tweaked and enabled as the default.
• Default keybinding and controls scheme updated.
• Elite and nightmare buffs added for enemies that are more likely to be discovered in duo and trio modes.
• Elite and nightmare enemies have 50% and 100% chance to drop twice the loot.
• Chests also have a chance to drop twice the loot in duo/trio mode.
• Removed kill chat messages.
• Updated enemy placements and patrols.
• Some patrolling enemies can open different barriers.
• Enemies flash and health bar reacts when receiving critical and vulnerable hits.
• Wreckytitan’s Laser Shot and Final Fire no longer pierce high walls
• Explosive barrels and Wreckytitan parts give proper kill credit and show damage numbers.
• Allow the Emerald Barrage direction to be changed by the left controller stick.
• Allies no longer share vision.
• Various chest and enemy loot rewards updated.
• Reduced vision from effects such as the cursed moonstone has had a behavioral rehaul.
  • Dev Comment: The intention here is to bring them closer to what we originally desired - more tension rather than frustration.
• Adding stacking capability to several item types like Moonstone, Searing Flask and others.
• Adding a “Junk” type of items that drop from various enemies that are only valuable for the vendors, and started dropping them from regular enemies.
• Updated general drop tables to start dropping rings and amulets more in line with when those item slots become available.

Parties

• Trios mode added, allowing for three player parties.

Party UI Iteration

• Added a ‘Leave Party’ option.
  • It’s the ✨small things✨. It is now faster and easier to leave a party.
• Added Party Leader
  • Mostly in preparation for more, but the party leader can modify party settings.
• Added Party settings
  • The party leader can change max. amount of players allowed in the party, the description, and the visibility status of the party, without having to create a new one.
• Visually updated the floating party section by the Teleport button while in the Haven
• Updated visual states for the nameplates of those in your Haven.
  • Those not in your party have faded names, and party members’ names are blue
• Updated character portrait views for parties and mission queueing.

Haven & Buildings

Haven upgrades UI Iteration:

• Collate Upgrade choice and Material commit into one window
  • The process of committing materials and then choosing was too clunky and a little confusing, so in an effort to streamline it and give players the information they want we collated those two windows into one.
• Fill materials directly from all sources
  • To further help players not spend too much moving items around, they can now click directly on each material and fill it with all they own of that material, without having to find the items
• Add Upgrade Tiers, Loadout, and Storage tabs to Building Upgrade window
  • If players want more granularity, they can commit whatever amounts they want (out of what they have), and can access both inventory and storage directly
  • They can also access the Upgrades Tier window to see what later tiers bring, to help them plan
• Material use confirmation pop-up added
  • To ensure players don’t commit items they don’t want to, and to emphasize that committing is permanent, players get a popup when committing. Don’t worry, this can be dismissed permanently (with a “don’t show this again” option in the pop-up).
• Kira the doctor now allows the player to craft bandages.
• Moved Vulnerability to be an early building upgrade.
• New Haven building VFX and SFX, and available rewards.
• New crafting materials added to support dynamite and explosive barrels.
• Added Command Table building
  • This building has an overview of all Haven buildings and their current status
  • You can access all unlocked buildings' upgrade tiers from here to get a better overview of how to plan your upgrades

Quests

• Reworked quest load and availability cadence for a smoother onboarding experience.
• Added a Quest Item Rarity
  • Quest Items now have a specific rarity, making them easier to spot and manage
• Added icon for quest hand in NPC
  • Shows where you should go to hand in your quest when completed
• Wishy now generates a daily crafting material quest.

Changelings

• Changeling behavior improvements.
• All enemy Vaultbreakers will now appear as “Changelings”.
• Changelings have an updated flee behavior when threatened.
• Updated Changeling model and death animations.

Environment

• Improved fog of war rendering.
• Improved environment fading.
• Optimizations made to the visual quality on low settings.
• Wolfswood and Refinery map terrain updated.
• Jump flower behaviors updated.
• Vineslapper behaviors updated.
• New environmental effects added, such as falling rocks in the East Ravine.
• Quest completion icons are now shown on the map more clearly.

UI & UX

• Numerous gamepad usability improvements.
• Moved Feedback and Tutorial buttons to the settings menu.
• Added a ‘Join Discord’ button in the settings menu.
• Item tooltip tweaks for clarity.
• Loadout icon updates to match iterated item designs.
• Top healthbar only appears on bosses now, and has been visually polished
• Characters renamed to ‘Vaultbreakers’ in the main menu.
• Added inventory/storage tabs to the shop in the Haven.
  • Now you can sell directly from storage!
• Updated inventory category filters and ordering.
• You are now told what you picked up if it was outside a loot container.
• Updated Quest and Achievement tracker UI
  • It now has a scroll container so you can see all your quests/achievements without the minimap interfering with it
  • Hiding the quest tracker will save between missions and Haven state (rejoice, you won’t have to turn it off every time you load)
  • The tracker now only shows quests that are relevant in the Mission Area you are in
• Added Area Icons to quests, Quest Tracker, and Mission Map
  • There are now area icons associated with quests so you have an idea of where to pursue completing your quests at a glance
• Cursed items are now more clearly indicated with descriptions and icons.

Enemy Balance

• Deadeye health reduced from 4000 to 3000
• Deadeye damage reduced from 850 to 650
• Abyssal Bolter shot damage reduced from 1040 to 840
• Abyssal Bolter barrage damage reduced from 775 to 475
• Nether Pouncer charge attack damage reduced from 1040 to 840
• Sneeky Shoota Snipe projectile speed reduced from 26 to 20
• Sneeky Shoota net root duration reduced from 1.2 to 1
• Guardpaw Sentry vulnerability added to attack
• Guardpaw Sentry shot damage reduced from 650
• Guardpaw Sentry net area damage reduced from 600 to 500
• Ironback Bear movespeed reduced from 2.8 to 2.2
• Ironback Bear health reduced from 5800 to 4800
• Wolf move speed reduced from 3.6 to 2.8
• Alpha Wolf movespeed reduced from 4 to 3.2
• Bandit Trapper movespeed reduced from 4 to 3.4
• Werewolf movespeed reduced from 3.75 to 3
• Vineweaver move speed reduced from 3 to 2.4
• Vine Zombie health reduced from 1000 to 600
• Vine Zombie 2 sec. cooldown on root debuff

Vaultbreaker Balance

General

• Increased base character movement speed. All characters now have the same base run speed 3.66
• Updated boots’ fixed stats to be 'out of combat' movement speed
• Pulsefang changed to ‘out of combat’ movement speed
• Lower the actual movespeed stat on items to about half
  • Dev comment: People mention the run speed feels slow. This should make the boots feel less mandatory and make the game feel faster out of combat.

Bjornir

• Base health increased from 1215 to 1515
• Base armor and Magic Resistance are decreased from 65 to 50 and 35 to 30
  • Dev comment: With the passive Frostfeather buff and other things, Bjornir is already pretty tanky most of the time.
• Ice Block cooldown increased from 5 to 7
• Ice Block added Knockback on explosion
• Perk Stouthearts Indulgence now has 1 sec. cooldown.
• Perk Restorative Ice Block changed from 20% to 30% of damage to healing, but only up to 30% of max health.
  • Dev comment: The low cooldown paired with really strong perks made Ice Block a bit overtuned. Tuning it a bit down, especially the two strongest perks.
• Power Chop damage scaling from 200+30%AD+15%HP to 200+10%AD+17%HP
• Wild Swing damage scaling from 80+30%+5%HP to 80+50%AD
  • Dev comment: If most abilities are Health-scaled AND Attack Damage-scaled. The late-game scaling can be a bit too strong, since gear will often have both. This is an attempt to balance it a bit by having to choose which to focus on.
• Frostfeather Fly By
  • Damage scaling changed from 2%HP+20%Magic Resist+10%Armor to be 20 Base+10%AP+2%HP
  • No longer refreshes Frostfeather Boon
  • Dev comment: After the rework of Energy control, the refresh can trigger many more times than intended. Removing it for now. We know that players don’t like being at risk while casting this, but since you can now stop it early, it is hopefully not as bad.
• Perk Power Chop Reach range decreased from +4 to +3

Thora

• Base health increased from 1182 to 1515
• Basic Attack
  • Fury Wound renamed to Fury Strike
  • Fury Strike bonus damage per stack increased from 10% to 20%
  • Removed mentions of consecutive in description (it doesn’t actually work that way)
  • Dev comment: Making Thora a bit stronger if you do the work and get the stacks up.
• Rager Whirl
  • Holding now also gives Energy on hit
  • Knockback added
  • Removed self-damage
  • Dev comment: Simplified it a bit, holding it half and added Knockback. Sometimes you just need to knock them back and get some space.
• Earthquake
  • Recovery increased from 10% to 15%
  • Base damage increased from 125 to 150

Nymera

• Base health increased from 973 to 1295
• Basic attack projectile speed increased 26 to 36
• Mark added damage increased from 10 to 20
• Mark energy gain on hit increased from 5 to 10
  • Dev comment: Making basic attacking a bit better, she should be strong doing single target damage.
• Spiritbloom
  • Also gives 3% wound recovery on pickup
  • Collider reduced in size and fixed a pickup delay
  • Spawn distance increased from 3 to 4
  • Dev comment: We are generally adding more wound recovery to the game, so Nymera gets a bit from the ancient spirits.
• Pinpoint Perk damage increased from 80+50+20 to 220+80+40
• Verdant Shot now Knockbacks
• Emerald Barrage
  • Base damage increased from 45 to 60 and damage scaling from 40+15 to 50+20
  • Distance-based damage scaling increased from 0+40+0 to 40+20+20
  • Projectile speed increased from 26 to 30
  • Casting time slightly faster from 1.8 to 1.6
  • Added Knockback on first hit
  • Dev comment: Emerald Barrage should feel strong and worth it to use, at times, it felt weaker and more risky to do than basic attacking. Since it is piercing, it is also her main way of dealing with groups of enemies. With the knockback, hopefully, that feels a bit more doable. It might be too strong for PvP, so keeping an eye on it.
• Soaring Strike
  • Recast duration increased from 2.5 to 3.5 sec.
  • Added Immunity for 1 sec. when cast and 0.5 sec. again when teleporting.
    • Dev comment: Nymera finally has immunity frames like the others. Very strong ability if used correctly, now its a bit easier to pull off.

Lumiri

• Base health increased from 973 to 1273
• More energy control for all abilities. Abilities are re-castable with enough Energy for the empowered effect.

Sparkwing

• Base health increased from 973 to 1287
• Perk Spark Ball
  • Replaces Zap Bang instead of Spark Flight
  • Reduced cooldown 13 to 10
  • Reduced damage from 40+135 to 30+130
  • Always returns
  • If enemies have Zap it deals more damage
  • Moved to later in perk list
  • Dev comment: Really fun perk, but it was a bit of trap to replace your strongest defensive ability with an offensive ability. Made it replace the other Stunning ability, it might make it less interesting as a choice, but it’s less punishing.
• Perk Wound Up increased from 3 to 6 Orbs
  • Dev comment: The downside of having to play around automatically spawning orbs didn’t feel worth it at 3, maybe 6 is too strong though, we’ll see.
• Spark Flight slow amount decreased from 60% to 30%
• Perk To the Knee
  • Damage increased from 5 to 10 and
  • Changed to AD scaling
  • Moved to earlier in perk list
  • Dev comment: Decreasing the slow on Spark Flight to make Sparkwing a bit less oppressive in pvp, but if really enjoy giving a big slow debuff, you can take this perk. Which now also fits in the Spark Flight AD build if you want to try that build.

Bug Fixes

Gameplay

• Improved consistency of interaction behavior when holding and releasing buttons (e.g., ability inputs no longer “stick” or misfire).
• Fixed misplaced environmental props and collisions.
• Resolved navigation blockers throughout multiple world areas.

Quests

• Fixed quests failing to start, update, or complete.
• Corrected multiple edge cases where objectives would not properly advance upon completing interactions.
• Resolved soft locks caused by NPCs or interactions not spawning or responding.
• Abandoning quests will now correctly destroy the associated quest item also.
• Cyclonis now correctly displays his quest giver marks.
• Fixed missing objective summaries.
• Corrected quests showing outdated or incorrect instructions.
• Updated quest-completion popups for consistency.
• Fixed quest items not appearing, spawning in the wrong location, or failing to register when picked up.
• Resolved cases where dropping a quest item could break progression.
• Resolved cases of quest items having sell values when they shouldn’t.

User Interface / HUD

• Improved menu navigation with controller or keyboard, reducing cases where UI elements disappear or overlap.
• Added clarity to certain UI prompts, tooltips, or contextual messages.
• Resolved mismatched fonts, colors, or text fields in certain screens.
• Fixed disappearing map and inventory HUD after specific interactions.
• Corrected input issues where gamepad toggles disabled UI incorrectly.
• Interact prompt now does not require you to move to have it reappear after you have closed a UI window.

Inventory Systems

• Updated item tagging and categorization for consistency.
• Improved item pickup rules and interaction prompts.
• Multiple improvements to how items spawn and despawn.

Items

• Fixed items that could not be picked up.
• Corrected cases where dropping items caused duplication or deletion.
• Resolved items remaining invisible or incorrectly positioned.
• Fixed items not appearing in the inventory after collection.
• Corrected incorrect stats, labels, or categories in the item display.
• Resolved items displaying wrong icons or descriptions.
• Moonstone changes made to avoid issues such as multiple duplicate curse debuffs or curse debuffs removed on stack splitting.

Visual Effects (VFX)

• Updated multiple VFX for clarity, timing, and readability.
• Corrected VFX displaying at incorrect positions or with incorrect timing.
• Fixed visual effects not firing during abilities, vault interactions, or quest events.
• Improved VFX performance, especially in effects-heavy areas.
• Optimized several high-cost effects.
• Removed redundant VFX calls that caused frame drops.

Known issues

• Chat whisper function cannot find players.
  • It is recommended to use party chat.
• Extraction portals sometimes show an incorrect amount of “Remaining Time” on interaction.
• Matchmaking cannot be cancelled with gamepad without button spam.
• Party members queuing in quick succession will break the queue.
  • It is recommended to wait a second between each member queuing.
• Changeling corpses will be seen as animating when moved out of view and back again.
• Leaving queue or closing game just as a match has been made can cause errors requiring a game restart.
• Incorrect backpack slots teased and awarded for the Hunter's Lodge Tier 3 Reward.
• Online/offline state of friends in social view sometimes do not updated correctly.