PQ3 - Google Play Early Access: Update 0.35
Update version 0.35 Patch notes for Puzzle Quest 3
Greetings, adventurers! Today we are excited to announce an update to Puzzle Quest 3: Update 0.35. We’ve got lots of changes to the collection of items and gear (weapons, accessories, and armor) available and a host of bug fixes. Please update your game to the latest version 0.35 to see these changes. They may take up to a few days to become available in each country.
Changes
Since the last update, we’ve focused on a number of changes to improve the economy, the collecting and upgrading of gear, and the purposes of Followers. We have heard your feedback and addressed a large number of issues with Spells and Weapons and also made some smaller quality of life improvements.
Overview of changes:
- The Chest system
- Dungeons and Skirmishes
- The economy
- Upgrading items and collectibles
- Upgrading Followers
- Improved the upgrading menu UI & UX
- Quality of life changes
- New graphics
- Dungeons and Skirmishes
- Hero classes
New resources
Throughout this article, we have referred to a number of new resources that were added to the wallet. Here they all are:
- Glyphs (Weapon, Armor, Accessory, Spell, Minion)
- Crystals
- Relics
Ready to see what changed? Let’s begin.
Chests are easier to open and salvage
You let us know that it’s hard to juggle multiple chests, and we’ve heard you! We can see the difficulty in juggling multiple chests and being able to open, store, and use them as needed. There weren’t many options once your storage was full to go and use a chest… so you’re often forced to salvage a particularly good one! We’re aware this has been a little frustrating, so here’s the first of the changes to address the storing and opening of chests:
Changes to the Chests
- Added some new UI that shows in various parts of the game to indicate chest slots remaining, player level, gear score, and the status of the Chest
- This shows in places like the Tavern and sometimes on the world-map
- After opening a chest in the battle rewards it will show ‘opened’ in the art
- Added an extra chest slot (no VIP Level or upgrades to the Guard Follower are required to obtain this)
- Chests can now be salvaged when Minions are on Missions
- Dungeon Chests are now awarded when completing the Dungeon as part of the story
In future updates, we’d like to consider more ways to address these issues with chests.
Upgrading items and collectibles
We have made changes to the way collectible items (Spells, Minions, Weapons, Armor, Accessories) are upgraded. This is intended to make the upgrade process more streamlined. We had noticed that players were having difficulty acquiring the resources and duplicate items needed for upgrades and evolution; this problem was going to get worse as the game expands in the future, so we’ve made significant changes here. As a part of this, we have introduced a new system for evolution, with new resources (Relics), and improved the usability of the upgrade menu.
Upgrading Minions, Spells, Weapons, Accessories, and Armor
Outlined below are the ways weapons, armor, and similar accessories have been changed.
Changes to Minions, Spells, Weapons, Accessories, and Armor
- Items are now Evolved at levels 5/15/25/35/45 instead of levels 10/20/30/40/50
- As well as other resources, Items Level 45+ now require Glyphs and Superior Shards to upgrade
- Gold is no longer required to Evolve Gear items to a higher rarity but is still required to upgrade the level on items
- So, items now require Gold & Shards to level (as well as Glyphs at levels 45+), and Scrolls, Runes and Relics (as well as Glyphs at Legendary+) to evolve
- Multiple copies or duplicates of Gear are no longer required to Evolve items - these have been replaced by Relics
Introducing Relics
As we’ve removed the need to evolve items by using multiple copies of the same thing, we’ve introduced a new resource: Relics. These are found from Dungeon Chests relating to the Relic earned.
- Relics are required to Evolve Items, Spells, and Minions to Rare and beyond (evolving to Uncommon at level 5 does not require a Relic)
- There are 4 unique sets of Relics to collect. Relics increase in rarity from Lesser to Major.
*** Relics can be earned by**- Completing dungeons (there is a small chance of this)
- Have a small chance to drop from salvaging
- At level 30 in the Premium Battle Pass
- In the next update we will also introduce another primary way of obtaining Relics
Improved upgrading menu
Upgrading large amounts of items to higher levels and evolutions was cumbersome. To tackle this we’ve built a new menu to upgrade your weapons, armor, accessories as well as Spells and Minions. It’s now easier to upgrade multiple levels at once or even jump up to a higher rarity.
New upgrade menu changes
- The menu has been redesigned to help with Leveling and upgrading items
- Selecting UPGRADE on any collectible (weapon, gear, accessory, armor, Minion, or Spell) will display the new Upgrade menu UI
- Selecting to Evolve or Level a collectible item will show you the benefits from the upgrade (effects) and the resources required to upgrade in the right-hand column
Upgrading Followers
To give Followers a direct benefit we have changed how they are upgraded and added a new resource to upgrade them: Crystals. It’s now much clearer how to upgrade followers, and they no longer share the need for Scrolls with Weapons and Minions… On top of this we have increased the amount of Food and Ore that can be earned from followers.
Changelist to upgrading Followers
- Glyphs and Scrolls are no longer required to level Followers, instead, we’ve…
- Added Crystals based on each follower (i.e. Eveline, Toragon, etc)
- There are new costs to evolve Followers with each Crystal:
- Level 5 Evolution - 1 Crystal
- Level 15 Evolution - 3 Crystals
- Level 25 Evolution - 6 Crystals
- Level 35 Evolution - 10 Crystals
- Level 45 Evolution - 15 Crystals
- Level 46-50 Upgrade - 5 Crystals at each level afterward
- This has changed from the previous Evolution Levels of 10/20/30/40/50 and matches the evolution levels of other collectibles
- Crystals can be earned when unlocking Followers, from VIP and Battle Pass Rewards, in Side Quests and have a small chance to drop in Ruby and Diamond Chests. There is also a small chance to earn Crystals from Eveline’s crafting
- Eveline’s Crystals will also be awards as Chapter Completion rewards for certain Chapters in the main story
Earning food and Ore
- Food and Ore resource caps have been increased, to help improve the upgrading of followers and ability to craft
- There’s now double the Food and Ore that can be earned from Followers
How will these changes affect me?
- When you first log in to play Update 0.35 any Crystals that would have been awarded from completed Side Quests and Main Story chapters will be sent through the in-game mail
- As Crystals can be earned from Tiered Battle Pass rewards we will automatically award Crystals based on your current Tier in the battle pass through the in-game mail
Shop adjustments
We have made some much-needed changes to the economy, which you can read below:
Changes to the Shop
- Added two new packs to the Shop
- Starter Pack A (1x Rare Weapon, 30x Minor weapon Shards, 500x Gems)
- Starter Pack B (1x Rare Runic Ring, 2x Rare Runes, 100x Minor Accessory Shards, 1, 1250 Gems)
- Once the first pack has been bought the second will become available.
- Gem purchases can now be made when you run out of the Gems required to Revive during a battle or when attempting to open a chest
Daily Deals
The Daily Deals have been reconfigured to adjust to the new resources inside the economy. There are a couple of changes to the costs and new items are available in different packs. There are now more Daily Deals, and they offer a lot more variety.
Glyph changes
Glyphs are still required for evolution to Legendary and beyond (not on Followers though), but have also had some changes:
New Glyphs and Glyph changes
- Glyphs have been split into 5 main categories
- Weapons
- Armor
- Accessories
- Spells
- Minion
- Glyphs are now required to upgrade Weapons, Armor, Accessories, Spells, and Minions past level 45
- It is now easier to find Glyphs after level 45 in-game
If you already have Glyphs, your Glyphs will be automatically split up into one of each type upon updating your game.
Quality of life improvements
These changes aren’t specific to a certain category but will impact the game moving forward.
List of quality of life changes
- The Tourney (PVP) UI has been updated to make it clearer what is required to enter a battle
- The text and information is now clearer, as well as the Minions, Spells, equipment (such as Weapons), and their respective Elements required to enter
- Removed the Element requirement from Spells in Tourneys.
- Allow non-elemental gear as well as gear that has an element
- Minions now show their Element in the vault, and on each player’s display.
- Items that have been salvaged in the rewards list now show in the pop-up notification bar and also in the Wallet in the top-right of the game
- Rewards from Salvaging items in the Reward List are now shown in the pop-up wallet display.
- Upgrading Gong (the Follower) will now earn you a PVP token on the day of upgrade (as well as the other subsequent days)
- Updating the game: new “Update Later” (to continue playing without a forced update) or “Update now” UI has been added. If an update is not mandatory (if it has just been released), you can continue playing without updating. This will come into effect when future updates are released.
- Shards are now easier to earn throughout the game following the addition of the other new resources, and you should see more useful Shards, and fewer Minor Shards as you progress.
- To balance the economy the cost of Bounties has been increased to 25 Gems, when you have no more Bounty Tokens available
- All side quests for a chapter must now be completed in order to start the next Chapter’s Side Quest
- Loading screens have had an update. The screens will now cycle between various tips
Dungeons and Skirmishes
We’ve made a number of changes to improve the visibility and purpose of Dungeons and Skirmishes within the game.
Dungeons and Skirmishes: Changelist
- Dungeons and Skirmishes now have two difficulties: EASY and NORMAL. The easy mode will feel much like the original dungeon gameplay, and the NORMAL mode will provide better rewards.
- Have a series of new tutorials to help guide completion of them, for example when entering and defeating dungeons, explaining the process of using Altars, Dungeon Marks and defeating enemies
- Dungeon tutorial added to guide players completion
- Altars now give you double the bonus effects
- Dungeon Marks have undergone a visual update to make their progression easier to understand
- The Rarities still progress as Wood, Iron, Gold, Ruby, Diamond
Graphics
One thing that we wanted to address was the fact that when a player achieves something in-game, we didn’t believe it felt epic enough! To add an extra sense of achievement, we’ve introduced new animation sequences to these areas of the game:
New graphics and animations
- When winning or losing a battle there is a new victory animation and a new defeat animation
- Leveling up your Hero plays a new animation. If you’ve earned new XP, the same animation displays with the counter increasing
- Glyphs now look different to reflect their new categories
Battle Pass changes
To accommodate the new changes to the Followers we have updated Premium Battle Pass rewards. Here are the original rewards and what has been changed:
Battle Pass Reward changes
- Level 2: 2x Iron Keys → 1 Random Follower Crystal
- Level 17: 2x Iron Keys → 2 Random Follower Crystals
- Level 29: 1 Rare Flux → 2 Random Glyphs
- Level 30: 2 Legendary Flux → 1 random Superior Relic
VIP Daily Rewards
As we’ve got some new currencies and resources available, the VIP Daily Rewards now give Crystals and special Glyphs at Levels 50 and 100:
VIP Daily Reward changes
- Day 50: Rare/Epic/Legendary Fluxes > Now gives differing amounts of Crystals
- Day 100: Normal Glyph > Armor Glyphs
- When logging into Update 0.35 you may find that your Glyphs have updated anyway.
Hero Spells and Classes
To help make playing a class feel unique we’ve decided to lock specific Spells to each class. This may be a notable change as you won’t be able to use class-specific Spells between Classes as you could previously… We are considering other ways to help improve the feeling of ‘playing’ a certain type of character and progressing with them. This is a change that we will be monitoring closely, and will adjust accordingly as time goes on.
Hero & Spell changes
- Spells can no longer be swapped between Classes (though there are still certain generic Spells that can be earned from Dungeons that are shared between class)
- Spells belonging to a Class and can only be equipped for that Class
- Spells are no longer rewarded for leveling up, but existing accounts have been granted extra class spells to ensure they can still enter battle with enough spells if they had fewer class spells than the number of spell slots that were already unlocked
- More than one Spell of the same type can no longer be equipped
- When logging in, duplicate Spells will be unequipped if you have them equipped to your game when updating to Update Version 0.35
- To finish off these changes, the Mage Follower (Xione) no longer creates Spells from other Classes and will craft Spells that can only be used for the active Hero in use.
================================================================================
What’s next?
Well, there you have it - there’s been a lot of changes in this update. We will continue to collect feedback and issue reports on the game. As we’re still in Early Access, the development roadmap is subject to change. So, here are some areas of the game we would like to focus on next:
- Fixing the remaining issues in Co-Op
- Updating Dungeons and Skirmishes
- Continuous improvements to the economy
- Creating some Flash Offers for the Shop
- Improvements to chests system
Issue fixes
Thank you for your ongoing support in reporting issues in the game. We have accumulated a list of fixed issues here, however, there are a number of issues with Weapons, Armor and Spells that have been fixed but may not be listed.
Issues fixed in Update 0.35
Important issues:
We have fixed a number of notable issues throughout the game.
- Co-op: Fixed an issue where a soft-lock (the game appears to be working but nothing can be adjusted) can occur when another player joins the battle
- Fixed a number of Spell issues across the game and updated descriptions
- Fixed a number of Armor pieces where their passives were not activating correctly
- Killing the second or fourth enemies that have a Spell that affects the board can cause the game to freeze when selecting an Altar after battle
The development team is aware of a number of problems around the Co-op battles freezing, crashing, or experiencing issues at the end of gameplay. Some issues relating to the Co-Op mode have been resolved, however, we are continuing to investigate a number of related issues. You may still see some problems.
Spell fixes:
- The Smite Spell was creating 2-20 Gems instead of the intended 2-7 Gems. This has been a big change, but the Spell was not intended to be working in this way
- Fixed an issue with Burning Fury was not applying bonus damage correctly
- Fixed an issue where Dragon Helm was counting Mana incorrectly
- The Lightning Bolt Spell was not destroying any columns. The Spell now has a chance to destroy 3 Columns, as described
Other issues
Thanks to your thorough bug reports we have fixed a number of issues in the game where:
- Evolving the Guard Follower to Mythic can sometimes crash the game
- Not all Weapons other Mana start Bonuses were applying at the beginning of a battle
- The Elyra Follower’s description was missing
- Dwarven Gloves now give a % Critical Boost
- Warden’s Mantle was not reflecting Damage
- Elyra’s Bonus Colour was Gold instead of Cyan
- Where Dungeon Loot Tickets were not always granting Dungeon Chests
- Side Quests can Be Played Out of Order. All side quests for a chapter must now be completed in order to start the next Chapter’s Side Quest
- After killing the first Enemy with a skull match when wielding a bow then casting a Spell Buff the second enemy won’t die
- An error message appears after selecting “Complete rest” on a Minion before the new Minions’ rest time has expired
- Salvaging items of various rarities (e.g. Common, Rare) did not grant the corresponding Shard Rarity
- The background of the Shop is zoomed on closing and restarting the game when remaining on the shop screen
- Elemental Damage effect doesn’t scale/layer correctly with screen resolution setting
- The game becomes unresponsive when trying to ‘Retreat’ from the battle before the victory/defeat screen appears
- Split Skulls Spell effect sometimes shows pink particles instead of the correct effect
Known Issues
These are some of the known issues in this update, which will be fixed in future updates.
- This patch should include improvements to the co-op experience, however, there are still cases where co-op battles can become out of sync. We are continuing to investigate.
- When upgrading Minions in versus mode, if you back out of the menu and tap exactly where the “Upgrade” button was, it can cause the game to soft-lock.
- Fluxes are now no longer used in upgrading - anyone who had fluxes previously, we will look to compensate in a server fix in the next couple of days
- The Upgrade options available for collectible items (where their level is higher than their current rarity) may not display all possible Evolutions in the upgrade menu for different Rarities.
Great formatting and presentation as well!
