Dragonstone Changelogs (Pre-1.19) #1

⋘⋘⋘ Patch Summary ⋙⋙⋙

May 18th, 2022

Greetings everyone, with us now being in the end stages of the Sixth Cycle, we have prepared a large patch with several changes. This is part one in a series of updates which will bring many changes to Dragonstone in preparation for the Seventh Cycle. These changes are being released early to give everyone time to decide on items to spirit-bind and carry into the next cycle.
As always, please report bugs to us via #issues or #tickets! We appreciate your reports.

Patch Summary:

• Elemental Affinity improvements with more worthwhile buffs.
• Balance changes and reworks for many forge items.
• Item abilities now display which element the spell belongs to.
• Improvements to item descriptions, added buff icons directly in item lore.
• Aether Essence forging time reduced, more forge cost changes in the next cycle.
• Complete rework of Mendstones to make them easier to use.
• Higher tier Mendstones are now stackable.
• Added /soul to view your forge stats.
• Introduction to Paragon Items.

Coming Soon:

• Lightweight Team/Clan System.
• Turret Wards to defend your base from unprepared raiders.
• Removal of the Peaceful Player system.
• Brand new mob arena style dungeon.
• Improvements to existing dungeons.
• An actual use for Draconic Essence.
• Portable Ender Chest.
• New forge items.

Dragonstone Official Resourcepack v1.9.98

• Added new buff icons.
• Added some new textures for upcoming items.

 

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Elemental Affinity Changes

Thanks to a new system, we are now able to buff Dragonforge stats whenever you gain Mastery in an Element.
Elemental Affinity buffs have been reworked to take advantage of this new system, providing more beneficial bonuses that properly interact with damage and stat bonuses from forge items.
As of this patch, the maximum mastery level is 25.
Click here to read more about Affinity!

-------------------- Air --------------------

Reduces anvil costs by 1% per level.
Reduces spell and wand cooldowns by 1% per level.

-------------------- Fire --------------------

Increases physical damage by 1% per level.
Increases damage to dungeon bosses by 2% per level.

------------------- Water -------------------

Increases bow damage by 1% per level.
Increases health regeneration by 1% per level.

------------------- Earth -------------------

Increases damage resistance by 1% per level.
Increases knockback resistance by 1% per level.

Some items can grant bonus affinity in certain elements while equipped, however this only improves amplification for spells that use the same element and does not improve the above stats.

Elemental Amplification

Gaining Affinity and Mastery in the elements will also amplify spells that use the same element, making them more powerful.

For example, an Air Spell such as "Whirlwind" from the True Aether Blade can be amplified by Air Affinity.
Having 25 Affinity will amplify the damage of most spells of the same element by x1.25 (1% per point)

The Affinity Bars located on the right side of your hotbar will display your Elemental Amplification, as this is a combination of Elemental Affinity gained from both your Elemental Mastery and from equipping items.

Thanks to this, as another example, if you primarily use Fire based spells and wands, it may be beneficial to pursue mastery over Fire as well as items that grant you bonus Fire Affinity.

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Dragonforge Balance Changes

Global Changes

• Removed PVP nerf from all armor pieces, including Dragon Helmets.
• Reduced Affinity Bonus on most armor pieces.
• Aether Tools no longer repair on kill due to making mendstones more easily accessible.
• Unobtainable forge items from previous cycles can now be fully repaired with a Draconic Mendstone.

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Aether Blade

• Reduced PVP damage from 10.5 --> 9.9

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Aether Axe

• Increased attack speed from 0.9 --> 1.0
• Reduced PVP damage from 11.4 --> 10.8

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Angelic Axe

• Increased attack speed from 1.0 --> 1.1
• Reduced PVP damage from 14.25 --> 13.5

Developer Comments:
With peaceful being removed and Dragonstone taking more of a PVP focused turn this cycle, we decided to rebalance forge items to ensure they are balanced in player vs player combat.

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True Aether Blade

• Reduced PVP damage from 13.3 --> 12.6
• Removed movement speed bonus. (10% --> 0%)
• Whirlwind ability damage is now amplified by Air Affinity.

Developer Comments:
This item has remained one of the strongest items in both dungeons and combat for quite some time. We have decided to make some tweaks to this item to ensure it does not become too powerful with the new changes to the Affinity system. Whirlwind now scales with elemental amplification and cooldown reduction granted by Air Affinity rather than directly increasing base damage.

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Aether Bow

• Reduced undead damage bonus from x2.0 --> x1.8

Developer Comments:
The Aether Bow has been performing a bit above it's tier level since the last buff, we have scaled it back slightly to ensure its power level remains consistent with other items of the same tier.

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True Aether Bow

• Reduced undead damage bonus from x2.0 --> x1.5
• Reduced arrow velocity bonus from x1.5 --> x1.2

Developer Comments:
This bow has been very strong since release, especially since the last round of buffs. We did not want to nerf the piercing as that is arguably the most fun part of using this bow, so instead we toned down the undead damage to ensure future dungeons don't become too easy. This bow can still one-shot many lower level dungeon zombies, and with Water Affinity granting bonus damage to bows, you will be able to easily recover the lost damage. We have also toned down the arrow velocity a bit out of concerns for player combat, as the zero-gravity arrows make this bow very easy to land long-distance shots with.

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Aether Wand

• (Red Aether Focus) Reduced damage bonus from 4.0 --> 3.0
• (Red Aether Focus) Reduced PVP damage bonus from 3.2 --> 2.4

Developer Comments:
The Aether Wand was found to be extremely overpowered in combat with Aether Armor when fitted with only red focus gems during testing. These changes should hopefully bring it down to a more reasonable level, however we will be keeping a close eye on this item. 

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Aether Claw

• Durability increased from 4096 --> 8192

Developer Comments:
Although this pickaxe is already very strong, it is quite expensive and still runs out of durability more quickly than we would like. We have doubled it's durability (for the third time) to hopefully make it worthwhile to use.

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Gravedigger --> Aether Excavator

• Renamed to Aether Excavator

Developer Comments:
We have decided to rename this item to free up the name for use on a future item.

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Aetherian Vengeance

• Increased vengeance stack duration from 7 sec --> 17 sec.

Developer Comments:
This weapon is fun to use in the nether, however we felt that the stacks decayed too quickly to be viable. This change should make it easier to get some value out of the Vengeance buff.

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Raven Wings

• Added "Ascend" ability (3✵ mana, 0.5 sec) which allows you to flap your wings to ascend slightly while gliding.
• The strength of "Ascend" is amplified by Air Affinity.
• Removed magic damage bonus. (10% --> 0%)

Developer Comments:
With the addition of Aether Armor, we have decided to shift the focus of Raven Wings more towards utility instead of magic power. This new ability will allow you to soar to new heights and conserve fireworks when flying. It is also very simple to use, simply tap your sneak key while gliding to flap your wings. Air Affinity makes your wings more powerful, giving you more height per flap.

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Spirit Elytra

• Changed enchantment Unbreaking III --> Unbreaking I

Developer Comments:
Due to the self-repairing enchantment on the spirit elytra, the item effectively had infinite durability because it would repair faster than it could be damaged. Reducing the level of the unbreaking enchantment should bring it more in line with the durability of a standard max-enchanted elytra.

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True Void Bow

• PVP Damage increased from 18.75 --> 20.0
• Void Rifts are now summoned if the arrow hits a block or an entity.
• Landing a successful hit will no longer consume durability.
• This weapon is now two-handed.

Developer Comments:
The True Void Bow is an old item that some players were able to last forge in the Third Cycle (1.15). It has been out of rotation for quite some time, however we plan on bringing it back later in the future. We have decided to give it a small combat buff to ensure it remains competitive with the other available bow options.

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Dwarf Helmet

• Added "Dwarven Spirit" ability which grants you Haste X and a movement speed bonus.
  This consumes 1❃ (Aspect) per second and requires a minimum of 10❃ to use.
• The helmet generates 1❃ every 10 seconds and can store up to 100❃
• Reduced knockback resistance from 65% --> 30%
• Removed dynamite explosion when attacked.

Developer Comments:
The Dwarf Helmet is an old item that some players were able to last forge in the Third Cycle (1.15). It has been out of rotation for quite some time, however we plan on bringing it back later in the Seventh Cycle. We have decided to give it a rework to make it more worthwhile to obtain.

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Void Dragon Helmet

• Added "Void Negation" ability which allows you to negate the effects of Void Curse and instead turn it into a useful buff.
  This consumes 1❃ (Aspect) per second while negating.

• The helmet generates 1❃ every 10 seconds and can store up to 100❃

• While negating, void curse depletes 20x faster and you regenerate 1 HP/sec.
• Void Curse is turned into Void Power which grants a bonus to magic damage, dodge chance, movement speed, and mana regeneration.
• Added permanent Night Vision.
• Increased dodge chance from 6% --> 10%
• Reduced max mana from 50 --> 40
• Removed mana regeneration. (0.5 -->0.0)
• Removed "Void Bolt" ability.

Developer Comments:
The Void Dragon Helmet is an old item that some players were able to last forge in the Third Cycle (1.15). It has been out of rotation for quite some time, however we plan on bringing it back later in the future. We have decided to give it a rework to ensure it's power level is consistent with the other Dragon Helmets.

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Harbinger Horns (Paragon Item)

• Reworked "Harbinger Bolt" (Paragon Ability) to summon an aqua beam that instantly hits the targeted location for 6 magic damage and x1.5 damage on headshots.
  This consumes 5❃ (Aspect) and 5✵ (Mana)

• The horns generate 1❃ every 10 seconds and can store up to 100❃

• Reduced physical damage bonus from 50% --> 25%

Developer Comments:
Some tweaks are being made to this item to ensure it remains balanced but also powerful as a Paragon Item.

(Bound to: ImDummyThinn)

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Storm Dragon Wings (Paragon Item)

• Added "Eternal Storm" (Paragon Ability) which summons a powerful storm field around you which zaps and debuffs nearby enemies while also granting buffs to your magic damage, movement speed, and mana regeneration.
  This consumes 2❃ (Aspect) per second and requires a minimum of 10❃ to use.

• The helmet generates 1❃ every 10 seconds and can store up to 100❃

• Dragon Wings (Ability) now costs 5❃ instead of ✵ mana.
• Increased fall resistance from 50% --> 80%
• Reduced max mana from 80 --> 50
• Removed armor (4 --> 0)
• Removed knockback resistance (50% --> 0%)
• Removed mana regeneration (1.0 --> 0.0)
• Removed "Infernal Strength" passive ability.
• Removed "Smite" ability.

Developer Comments:
This item was reworked to ensure it remains balanced but also powerful as a Paragon Item. Previously this item was a bit too strong as it could smite far away players with heavily damaging totem-piercing lightning just by looking at them. These changes should bring it more in line with how powerful we want Paragon Items to be while keeping it fair.

(Bound to: METOOCOOL)

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Usur Sword

• Reduced attack damage from 999 --> 888

Developer Comments:
The usur sword has a higher winrate than we would like in competitive play, so we have decided to reduce the damage output slightly to ensure it is not as meta-defining, but still viable for competitive play.

 

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Forging Cost Changes

Most changes to forging costs will be done in the next cycle. For now though, we are pushing the most requested changes immediately.

 

Aether Essence

• Reduced forging time from 3 days --> 1 day

Developer Comments:
This was originally meant to be a sort of "pity timer" for those who got unlucky with dungeon drops, however with the loot pool being diluted by new items, it is quite rare to see one of these drop in a dungeon nowadays.

 

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Mendstones Reworked!

All mendstones now work on all items of the same element, and will repair a percentage of the item's durability rather than a fixed amount. Higher tier mendstones will repair a higher percentage of durability.

Aether Mendstone ★☆☆☆☆

• Repairs 25% of the item's total durability.
• Can now repair all Aether items.

Aether Mendstone ★★☆☆☆

• Repairs 50% of the item's total durability.
• Can now repair all Aether items.

Aether Mendstone ★★★☆☆

• Repairs 80% of the item's total durability.
• Can now repair all Aether items.

Aether Mendstone ★★★★☆

• Repairs 50% of the item's total durability.
• Can now repair all Aether items.
• This item is now stackable.

Aether Mendstone ★★★★★

• Repairs 100% of the item's total durability.
• Can now repair all Aether items.
• This item is now stackable.

 

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Paragon Items

In past cycles, it was possible for someone to spend a large sum of dragon shards to obtain a unique and powerful Tier X item. Only one of these items were created each cycle. These are now known as Paragon Items.

Once per Cycle, there will be one "Paragon Ascension" available in the Dragon Forge. This item requires a massive amount of Dragon Shards to obtain. The wielder of this item will be able to commune directly with the Aspects of Dragonstone, who will use the immense magic stored within to create a Paragon Item in their image.