Happy Holidays! | Patreon Weekly #290

Hey Patrons, in this weekly I’m going to give a quick report on how well the v3.0 beta has been going!

This weekly also includes an audio Q&A! You can find audio timestamps at the end of this weekly. (Note that I stated at the end that the Q&A was recorded on the 25th, no I am not a time traveler, I misspoke and meant the 23rd)

Quick Cleric Update

We’re about 5 days out from the Cleric’s beta release at this point, and so far I think things are going very well!

Very early feedback from the Cleric, largely based on first impressions, was that they are extremely overpowered. After a little time has passed, that seems to have quelled down a bit and now opinions are more varied, mostly focusing around the power in variety of spells and how tome charges can feel limiting in some cases.

Analytics-wise it’s far too early to take any of the numbers seriously, but it’s definitely looking like the Cleric is not a standout powerhouse compared to the other heroes. Of course a lower WR at the moment is going to be heavily influenced by people experimenting, learning, and dieing, so I do expect things to creep up.

There will of course be balance changes of some form needed during the beta, but if we do indeed go from an initial impression of the Cleric being OP to them actually being a little weak then I will be very happy. It would mean that I’ve pretty much hit the nail on the head in terms of balancing gameplay feel, impression of power, and actual power versus the other heroes.

Things have also gone well on the stability front. Aside from a few more serious issues that required a quick second-day patch, things have been pretty stable.

I may release another bugfix patch in another few days between Christmas and new years, if enough issues crop up to warrant it, but other I’ll be taking things easy until the new year. Expect another pretty short weekly next week as well, maybe I’ll do a little 2025 blog drafting and share my progress. In the meantime, I hope you have a Happy Holiday!

Audio Timestamps

This month there were 23 questions from 11 different Patrons.

• 0:09 "i shall nudge my pawn to d3! will castle head retreat?" – radiantchaos

  

• 0:29 "how was your day?" - depresbian

• 1:00 "Could you share your reaction to this video... specifically the sections regarding the video game industry, rather than the specifics of the subject game? https://youtu.be/EFopRkMLajU" - Raynuva

• 8:05 "Have you ever heard of a game called Shattered Pixel Dungeon? I heard it's pretty cool." - Terry

• 8:21 "Are there any other changes that you may want to squeeze in with the Cleric’s release?" - Veek

• 8:50 "Without revealing anything, what is your favorite class story-wise" - umbras280

• 9:24 "A few questions to Challenges: Do you play with Challenges (if you play at all)? Do you plan on adding new Challenges and if so will you cap max amount of Challenges? I know you changed a lot of challenges to remove less stuff a few years back would you consider changing some old Challenges further to make them feel less like "just removing stuff" (Looking at you barren land)" - Ehelos

• 11:23 "Follow up to Ehelos's question: Do you plan on making at least one little balance patch centered around playing a high amount of challenges? Because right now the meta is don't play warrior unless you wanna have a bad time (particularly with Faith Is My Armor, since the armor based class [warrior] just can't use armor)" - Terry

• 13:16 "whats something interesting you want to do at some point in your life that you haven't done yet?" - radiantchaos

• 13:55 "How is the Mushroom Forest quest going or has that one been scrapped" - umbras280

• 14:37 "In what order are you thinking of developing what is left to be done with the Cleric?" - Veek

• 16:05 "Would you say the cleric has been harder or easier to implement than the duelist so far? Followup; What is the hardest thing youve implemented." - ultraviolettelight

• 20:48 "Do you have some ideas how the demon halls quest would look like?" - Hubertouz

• 21:19 "Why does the Ring of Energy keep requiring buffs?" - Block Vader

• 23:21 "is there any way to become a reviewer through the transifex page? i see a lot of stuff from almost a year ago that still wait for approval." - Hubertouz

• 24:10 "In the main Pixel Dungeon Discord, you had mentioned Chalice being an "artifact of it's time" or to some such effect. You mentioned a broad consideration to modernize the Artifact. Not looking for anything set-in-stone, but what are some ideas you might consider?" - Raynuva

• 26:24 "Will any of the Cleric’s talents be available for the other heroes through the scroll of metamorphosis?" - Veek

• 26:24 "Follow up to veeks question, what alternative ability would/do they have?" - Terry

• 27:59 "any new years resolutions?" - radiantchaos

• 28:49 "What are future plans after Cleric is released?" - umbras280

• 29:43 "if it isn't too personal, what's one of your biggest fears and how has it affected your life (if at all)? (Obviously this is a bit of a deep question, so I understand if you're not comfortable answering, but even if there's a more minor fear you're willing to share, that would be cool, and also cool if you don't feel comfortable sharing anything at all)" - maxibob

• 31:53 "is there anything you thought players wouldnt be able to abuse but ended up being very common? if so, what was it?" - ultraviolettelight

• 34:49 "from today until then end of 2025 im gonna try to eat one of every item on the mcdonalds canada menu, do you think i have what it takes?" - radiantchaos