You know what time it is - 3.3 UPDATE NOTES TIME!
Some of the information here will reference information in our "MAY Skullgirls Progress Update and Check In" thread, which can be found here:
https://forum.skullgirlsmobile.com/threads/official-may-skullgirls-progress-update-check-in.5951/
That said, you'll be fine even if you haven't read it! Without further ado, let's go over the changes in our 3.3 update, which is planned to arrive EARLY THIS WEEK, possibly even Tuesday...
UPDATE [6/10/2019] - Here are the changes in the 3.3.1 update.
- Fixed an issue where the Relic Shard progress bar would START at the value that it should have ENDED at. This would incorrectly report that you earned more Shards than you really did.
- Fixed an issue where Robo-Fortune's BB - Assault Battery could completely miss all hits from the beam at the end.
- Fixed an issue where Skill Points and Energy would not appear to be granted on Fighter level up if the player didn't watch the level up animation. These Skill Points were granted correctly, but they would only be visible the next time that you restarted the app, or performed an action that granted Skill Points.
- Fixed an issue where Fighter names weren't visible on team select in Russian.
- Fixed an issue where the sell price for recently earned Moves and Catalysts was previewed as 0 unless the app was restarted. This Canopy Coin preview amount was only a visual bug, and the correct Canopy Coins amount would be granted after pressing SELL.
- Fixed an issue that was allowing select extremely high ranked players to violate a few matchmaking rules. Mainly, having them pair with players that weren't also at an extremely high Rift Rating.
- Reversed the order that opponent teams are displayed in Prize Fights. It's now back to what it was in 3.2.
- Removed Kill Joy from the Cabinet of Curiosities. (She was erroneously included in 3.3.)
FILIA'S ORIGIN STORY
It's been some time, but our latest Origin Story has finally arrived! Learn about the mysterious past of Filia and how she first met Samson the newest addition to the Skullgirls lore.
As always, Origin Stories requires Player Level 20 to unlock and require a Filia for every node. These fights are not easy, so make sure your Filia Fighters are up for the challenge.
We're looking forward to making up for lost time and providing Origin Stories at a more rapid pace for our upcoming updates. In fact, we've already started on our next story... Squigly!
MASTER STORY MODE
A new challenge awaits in 3.3 - MASTER difficulty has been added to all standard Story Mode chapters!
The match modifiers featured in MASTER story mode are designed to test the mettle of even extremely late game collections. In pursuit of this goal, these nodes will enforce Fighter restrictions that will take you out of your comfort zone and really test the breadth and depth of your Collection. We want this content to be challenging and (hopefully) take you longer than an afternoon to clear!
Even if you aren't sweeping through every node with your favorite three maxed Diamond Fighters, we hope you all have a lot of fun solving these devilish puzzles that we've prepared for you.
...and yes, we also plan to add MASTER difficulty for Origin Stories in the future!
NEW FIGHTERS
Three new Fighters have been added to the standard Relic loot pool!
Keep an eye out for these Fighters in all your favorite Standard Relics (Premiere, Jackpot, Silver/Gold/Diamond, Elemental, etc).
KILL JOY features the first (of many) brand new palettes from HVS! This palette is based off another renowned Nurse...
ROGUE AGENT can EVADE attacks, but with a twist! EVADE can now exist as a modifier with a timer and HUD icon. We'll let you figure out the details once someone gets her and shares her SA on the forum or Discord.
DJINN FRIZZ is a deadly Fire type who thrives on short bursts of offensive and defensive potency.
Expect more new Fighters in future updates!
ROBO-FORTUNE PRIZE FIGHT
Robo-Fortune's Prize Fight has been added to the standard Prize Fight rotation schedule. Her Prize Fight will begin THIS WEEK, shortly after the 3.3 update releases:
When her Prize Fight is live, the RANDOM ACCESS RELIC will also be available in the Relic Store. Best of luck to everyone aiming for the top 10% in her first Gold Prize Fight!
RIFT BATTLES
MATCHMAKING
In 3.2, matchmaking changes were introduced to ensure players weren't matched up against players with a collection that is significantly stronger than their own. Generally speaking, our data suggests that this has been successful in the lower Rift Rating ranges of around 1000 ~ 1750 Rift Rating.
That said, we're turning our attention towards an issue in 3.2 where you can't match with players far beyond your Collection strength, making it possible to hold a very high Rift Rating (ex: 2100) and continue to climb without ever facing off against players that are at the exact same Rift Rating.
In 3.3 once you climb high enough up the ladder (e.g. higher Diamond tiers), your collection strength will not be factored into matchmaking. If you want to be the best, you have to fight the best - and win. If you're in a Diamond Tier Rift Rating, and you're not a Diamond Tier player (in terms of skill, or your collection), then be prepared for some seriously tough battles!
DEFENSE HISTORY
New to 3.3, you can now see which Fighters were used to attempt your defense nodes. This screen will also display WINS and LOSSES for you and your opponent.
With this feature, you can keep an eye on which Fighters are used to defeat your nodes, and adjust your strategy for your next Rift Battle. You can access this screen by tapping on the ATTEMPTS text below a Rift Battle node.
We plan to continue to add more information to Rift Battles in the future to help you better assess the potency of your Rift Battle defenses.
SEASON REWARD REQUIREMENTS & RATING DECAY
We want to be respectful of your time, and we know that Rift Battles currently demand a lot of player attention each week.
Per player feedback, the amount of matches you need to complete to qualify for Season End rewards has been reduced from 7 to 5, and Rift Rating DECAY will only kick in every 5 days, instead of every 3 days.
With these changes, players should be able to participate in Rift Battles at a more leisurely pace when it's convenient for them so they can give Rift Battles the attention they deserve.
CATALYST TUNING
Now that we have a bunch of data at our disposal, we've got our first round of Catalyst tuning changes arriving in 3.3!
Our goals were to ensure that Character type exclusive Catalysts were suitably potent, and that some of the Catalysts that are... over-saturating Rift Battle defenses... are tuned to add more conditional properties to help attackers tune their playstyle to compensate.
Make sure to reassess your Rift Battle defenses after the 3.3 update to make the most of these recent tweaks:
Double Exclusive - Corrosive Element
Everyone's favorite Catalyst! We made some tuning adjustments to increase its potency but ensure that it only conditionally triggers so players have more tools to work around it.
This Catalyst proved to be TOO reliable for disabling Blockbusters. Now players will have a small window once a Blockbuster is charged to adjust their strategy instead of living in a permanent state of BB lock.
ECONOMY CHANGES
General
OTHER CHANGES
Performance Optimizations
That's all for today, and keep in mind that the 3.3 update will be arriving this week! We'll post again when it's out, and we'll keep you updated on the release status on our Twitter.
As of this moment, we've submitted our builds, and we're waiting for them to be approved. We'll have our fingers crossed for a quick turnaround.
If you have any questions about this update, or the update notes, let us know down below. As always, thanks so much for your support!
~ Hidden Variable Studios ~
Some of the information here will reference information in our "MAY Skullgirls Progress Update and Check In" thread, which can be found here:
https://forum.skullgirlsmobile.com/threads/official-may-skullgirls-progress-update-check-in.5951/
That said, you'll be fine even if you haven't read it! Without further ado, let's go over the changes in our 3.3 update, which is planned to arrive EARLY THIS WEEK, possibly even Tuesday...
UPDATE [6/10/2019] - Here are the changes in the 3.3.1 update.
- Fixed an issue where the Relic Shard progress bar would START at the value that it should have ENDED at. This would incorrectly report that you earned more Shards than you really did.
- Fixed an issue where Robo-Fortune's BB - Assault Battery could completely miss all hits from the beam at the end.
- Fixed an issue where Skill Points and Energy would not appear to be granted on Fighter level up if the player didn't watch the level up animation. These Skill Points were granted correctly, but they would only be visible the next time that you restarted the app, or performed an action that granted Skill Points.
- Fixed an issue where Fighter names weren't visible on team select in Russian.
- Fixed an issue where the sell price for recently earned Moves and Catalysts was previewed as 0 unless the app was restarted. This Canopy Coin preview amount was only a visual bug, and the correct Canopy Coins amount would be granted after pressing SELL.
- Fixed an issue that was allowing select extremely high ranked players to violate a few matchmaking rules. Mainly, having them pair with players that weren't also at an extremely high Rift Rating.
- Reversed the order that opponent teams are displayed in Prize Fights. It's now back to what it was in 3.2.
- Removed Kill Joy from the Cabinet of Curiosities. (She was erroneously included in 3.3.)
FILIA'S ORIGIN STORY
It's been some time, but our latest Origin Story has finally arrived! Learn about the mysterious past of Filia and how she first met Samson the newest addition to the Skullgirls lore.
As always, Origin Stories requires Player Level 20 to unlock and require a Filia for every node. These fights are not easy, so make sure your Filia Fighters are up for the challenge.
We're looking forward to making up for lost time and providing Origin Stories at a more rapid pace for our upcoming updates. In fact, we've already started on our next story... Squigly!
MASTER STORY MODE
A new challenge awaits in 3.3 - MASTER difficulty has been added to all standard Story Mode chapters!
The match modifiers featured in MASTER story mode are designed to test the mettle of even extremely late game collections. In pursuit of this goal, these nodes will enforce Fighter restrictions that will take you out of your comfort zone and really test the breadth and depth of your Collection. We want this content to be challenging and (hopefully) take you longer than an afternoon to clear!
Even if you aren't sweeping through every node with your favorite three maxed Diamond Fighters, we hope you all have a lot of fun solving these devilish puzzles that we've prepared for you.
...and yes, we also plan to add MASTER difficulty for Origin Stories in the future!
NEW FIGHTERS
Three new Fighters have been added to the standard Relic loot pool!
Keep an eye out for these Fighters in all your favorite Standard Relics (Premiere, Jackpot, Silver/Gold/Diamond, Elemental, etc).
KILL JOY features the first (of many) brand new palettes from HVS! This palette is based off another renowned Nurse...
ROGUE AGENT can EVADE attacks, but with a twist! EVADE can now exist as a modifier with a timer and HUD icon. We'll let you figure out the details once someone gets her and shares her SA on the forum or Discord.
DJINN FRIZZ is a deadly Fire type who thrives on short bursts of offensive and defensive potency.
Expect more new Fighters in future updates!
ROBO-FORTUNE PRIZE FIGHT
Robo-Fortune's Prize Fight has been added to the standard Prize Fight rotation schedule. Her Prize Fight will begin THIS WEEK, shortly after the 3.3 update releases:
When her Prize Fight is live, the RANDOM ACCESS RELIC will also be available in the Relic Store. Best of luck to everyone aiming for the top 10% in her first Gold Prize Fight!
RIFT BATTLES
MATCHMAKING
In 3.2, matchmaking changes were introduced to ensure players weren't matched up against players with a collection that is significantly stronger than their own. Generally speaking, our data suggests that this has been successful in the lower Rift Rating ranges of around 1000 ~ 1750 Rift Rating.
That said, we're turning our attention towards an issue in 3.2 where you can't match with players far beyond your Collection strength, making it possible to hold a very high Rift Rating (ex: 2100) and continue to climb without ever facing off against players that are at the exact same Rift Rating.
In 3.3 once you climb high enough up the ladder (e.g. higher Diamond tiers), your collection strength will not be factored into matchmaking. If you want to be the best, you have to fight the best - and win. If you're in a Diamond Tier Rift Rating, and you're not a Diamond Tier player (in terms of skill, or your collection), then be prepared for some seriously tough battles!
DEFENSE HISTORY
New to 3.3, you can now see which Fighters were used to attempt your defense nodes. This screen will also display WINS and LOSSES for you and your opponent.
With this feature, you can keep an eye on which Fighters are used to defeat your nodes, and adjust your strategy for your next Rift Battle. You can access this screen by tapping on the ATTEMPTS text below a Rift Battle node.
We plan to continue to add more information to Rift Battles in the future to help you better assess the potency of your Rift Battle defenses.
SEASON REWARD REQUIREMENTS & RATING DECAY
We want to be respectful of your time, and we know that Rift Battles currently demand a lot of player attention each week.
Per player feedback, the amount of matches you need to complete to qualify for Season End rewards has been reduced from 7 to 5, and Rift Rating DECAY will only kick in every 5 days, instead of every 3 days.
With these changes, players should be able to participate in Rift Battles at a more leisurely pace when it's convenient for them so they can give Rift Battles the attention they deserve.
CATALYST TUNING
Now that we have a bunch of data at our disposal, we've got our first round of Catalyst tuning changes arriving in 3.3!
Our goals were to ensure that Character type exclusive Catalysts were suitably potent, and that some of the Catalysts that are... over-saturating Rift Battle defenses... are tuned to add more conditional properties to help attackers tune their playstyle to compensate.
Make sure to reassess your Rift Battle defenses after the 3.3 update to make the most of these recent tweaks:
Double Exclusive - Corrosive Element
- Now activates whenever Double is at an ELEMENTAL ADVANTAGE, rather than only when the attacker is at an ELEMENTAL DISADVANTAGE. This will prevent Dark and Light element Fighters from completely ignoring this Catalyst.
- Will also no longer drain the opponent's health during the cinematic pauses from Blockbusters.
- Now activates permanent HASTE and IMMUNITY 30 seconds earlier across all tiers.
- At max level, this activates 30 seconds into the match (previously 60 seconds).
Everyone's favorite Catalyst! We made some tuning adjustments to increase its potency but ensure that it only conditionally triggers so players have more tools to work around it.
- Now only activates when the Combo counter is over 10 hits.
- Chance to activate increased by 5% across all tiers.
- Armor abilities are usually the most powerful when opponents continue to attack the holder with weak multi-hitting attacks, but we found that Armor Rating was still powerful on most node configurations for (relatively) little investment.
- With this change, low hit count techniques will be an even more effective strategy, and provides options beyond buff removal/conversion and Armor Break.
- ENRAGE is no longer removed on the next landed hit so Fire Defenders have a much larger window to take advantage of all their bonus damage.
This Catalyst proved to be TOO reliable for disabling Blockbusters. Now players will have a small window once a Blockbuster is charged to adjust their strategy instead of living in a permanent state of BB lock.
- Reduced chance to activate across all tiers.
- Bronze - 25% → 10%,
- Silver - 35% → 12%
- Gold - 50% → 15%
- Bronze [Char] - 50% → 15%
- Silver [Char] - 75% → 20%
- Gold [Char] - 100% → 25%
- Increased time between activation by 10 seconds across all tiers.
- For the final tier, it will activate every 20 seconds (up from every 10 seconds).
ECONOMY CHANGES
General
- Robo-Fortune's 2x Relic odds period has come to an end.
- We will likely keep this window a little shorter the next time a new Character (??!) is added to the game.
- Gold only CHARACTER CATALYSTS (Futile Resistance, Corrosive Element, etc) now cost 600 Rift Coins (up from 400 Rift Coins) to reflect their desirability and efficacy in Rift Battles.
- Robo-Fortune Fighters, and the RANDOM ACCESS RELIC (Robo-Fortune Relic) can now be found in the Cabinet of Curiosities TRINKETS tab.
- Per popular demand, Gold MOVES can now be found in the TREASURES tab of the Cabinet of Curiosities again.
OTHER CHANGES
Performance Optimizations
- Massively reduced the amount of memory used by the app on iOS devices. This, combined with our previous memory optimizations, and the OTHER memory optimizations listed below, should hopefully eliminate crashes on low spec iPhone devices (iPhone 6+ and below.)
- TL;DR, we were able to revert the memory increases that rolled out when iOS 12 released.
- Made completely separate memory optimizations on both iOS and aOS by reorganizing character data.
- Made significant server optimizations to hopefully speed up all network calls and prevent server time outs. We spent a lot of time on this for this release!
- We have other server improvements lined up for future updates, but this should hopefully have a huge impact on server stability in the meantime.
- You can now sort MOVES, CATALYST, and FIGHTERS by the DATE they were earned. After earning a new MOVE, this will make finding it much easier.
- You can now interact with the TAG OUT buttons (your team's portraits) even when they are on cooldown. This will let you tag to your third fighter when your first fighter dies, even if your tags are on cooldown. You can also QUEUE a tag in even when it's on cooldown. It will fire as soon as the cooldown has ended.
- Characters will now spawn hitsparks (the flashy light effects when you hit a character) and make hit sounds when they hit a character with UNFLINCHING. This is in addition to the UNFLINCHING jingle sound effect that plays already.
- Throw TOUCHES (throw hits that deal no damage) will no longer advance the combo counter. They will also not be able to activate offensive or defensive Signature Abilities, Match Modifiers, or Catalysts.
- No more Cold Stones STUNS on Throw Attempts!
- Fixed an issue where characters would ignore damage from physical hits if they took damage from a modifier at the same time. This fixes the issue where Fighters wouldn't take damage from hits if they were suffering from INVERSE POLARITY while benefiting from REGEN.
- EVADE (Windswept, Tomb & Gloom, etc) will no longer activate during BB3s.
- When EVADE activates from a physical attack that is not a projectile, both characters will briefly pause to help players react to when it happens.
- BB3 - Rage of the Dragon now deals 112 / 120 true hits that can activate offensive and defensive Signature Abilities. Almost all of the damage is still in the final hit.
- Fixed an issue where Robo-Fortune's Beams and Headrone attacks would not do damage in the Show Me Your Moves Prize Fight.
- Fixed a bug where Robo-Fortune's ground throw would instant kill any character that used a Signature Ability or Match Modifier to revive after the initial laser blast.
- Fixed a bug where Robo-Fortune's, BB3 - Catastrophe Cannon Omega, would sometimes cause graphical corruption on Android devices leading to a crash in rare circumstances.
- BB2 - Systemic Circuit Breaker
- Now correctly drains BLOCKBUSTER METER from the opponent on hit, as intended.
- Robo-Fortune will now shut up after round ends if she was making worried robotic cat noises from the detonation timer being close to or at 0 seconds.
- Fixed an issue where Robo-Fortune's detonation timer from would not display on the HUD if her Character Ability was not unlocked.
- Robo-Fortune can now detonate during her STUN animation. Previously, she would only detonate if you hit her with an attack when she was STUNNED, or else she would wait until the STUN animation finished.
- SM - Giant Step no longer has an unblockable shockwave that covers the entire screen when the foot pedal misses.
- Fixed an issue where if Ms. Fortune's lifebar reached 0 during her headless BB3 activation, her head would die and never return to her body which softlocked the game. (OOPS)
- Fixed an issue where Cerebella would sometimes use SM - Battle Butt in the wrong direction, especially after killing an opponent.
- Fixed an issue where BB3 - Grab Bag was erroneously granting BLOCKBUSTER METER to Cerebella during the falling beat-down portion of the move.
- Removed an exploit that could make BB2 - Buer Thresher do insane damage (moreso than usual).
- Slightly lowered the hitstun on the second hit of Eliza's launcher, to prevent an infinite combo on characters that have unflinching, who are also in hitstun. Juggles are unaffected.
- Provided you have viewed a Rift Battle after you've been matched up with an opponent, you will now receive a notification when there are 30 minutes left in your Rift Battle so that you don't forget about it.
- Sparring Partners now use a greyscale palette across all Fighters. For those of you who dream of one day seeing a previous Sparring Partner palette used for a playable variant, it's now possible...!
- Fixed an issue where the player could get stuck in the Rift Battle tutorial if they attempted to confirm a team with an empty Fighter slot on a node.
- Fixed a possible hard crash during the initial tutorial.
- Fixed an issue where it was possible to enter a Prize Fight with only two fighters.
- Fixed an issue where AI difficulty level wasn't scaling correctly in Prize Fights. This caused them to make poor decisions and act more random when compared to Rift Battles AI. MASSIVE thanks to @Mentos for looking into this.
- Fixed an issue where you could enter a Fight with NO Fighters in rare situations, crashing the game.
- Fixed an issue where you could sometimes load into a Fight with one pair of Fighters, but get experience sent to your previous set of Fighters.
- Fixed an issue where the Fighter Score placard and value were missing from the character details screen.
- Fixed an issue where some Catalysts would erroneously appear to be favorited when they were earned, if you recently looked at a favorited Catalyst beforehand.
- Fixed an issue where some "Talking Heads" in Story Mode were positioned at the incorrect height.
- Fixed an issue where young Parasoul's "Talking Head" art was taller than adult Parasoul.
- Removed a few chat formatting exploits.
- Reduced the default size of all chat rooms to create more viable chat rooms than Channel 0 and Channel 1.
- Updated Valentine's BB2 - Forbidden Procedure SA description to clarify that it must be used on top of a fallen ally.
- Updated Big Band's Character Ability description to correctly reflect that he can only absorb one hit during his Dash Attack.
- Finally fixed a spelling error in Double's Marquee Ability. You guys just weren't ready for VOLATILTY.
- Clarified several Match Modifier and Signature Ability descriptions to explicitly state when a Fighter is losing a percentage of their maximum or current amount of health.
- The Rift Battle lobby screen explicitly states that matchmaking uses your collection strength to find the fairest match since some players didn't read the mail mentioning this, or our last update notes.
- Numerous localization changes and text formatting fixes across the whole game. Thanks as always to those who report localization issues on our forum!
- Improvements were made to the Android refresh purchases process to make it more reliable and robust.
- Fixed an issue where attempting to sacrifice a character that was on your active team would display a popup telling you they were horrendously favorited.
That's all for today, and keep in mind that the 3.3 update will be arriving this week! We'll post again when it's out, and we'll keep you updated on the release status on our Twitter.
As of this moment, we've submitted our builds, and we're waiting for them to be approved. We'll have our fingers crossed for a quick turnaround.
If you have any questions about this update, or the update notes, let us know down below. As always, thanks so much for your support!
~ Hidden Variable Studios ~
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