Video Version Here:Welcome back! It’s great to be speaking to you all again so soon! Following the reveal of the Seekers of the Storm Roadmap last month, I'm happy to announce that Phase 1 - Items and Elites - is here and ready to play on all platforms!

You can see a full breakdown of all the changes and bug fixes in the update notes here!

Some Items are completely overhauled, while others have had significant balance changes. Most items have had impactful quality-of-life updates too. Those updates range from just addressing reported issues to new visual or audio cues that better communicate their effects.

You can read the update notes or jump in right now to experience these improvements. But I'd like to show off some of my personal favorite changes in this update.

First off, let's look at Antler Shield. On top of a ground up overhaul, it’s also received a new name. Introducing the Elusive Antlers. Elusive Antlers grants a small permanent speed bonus. But, it has an additional twist. Upon picking this item up, small floating orbs will spawn throughout the stage. Collecting these will grant you an even larger speed boost, but only for a short amount of time.

One of our larger goals for this phase was to reintroduce items that could improve some of the scarcer parts of the item pool. With Elusive Antlers we’re hoping to give players another powerful way to gain movement speed; but in a way that feels more fun than just boosting flat stats.

Breaching Fin (formerly the Knockback Fin) was called out as having a lack of synergies with other items in the game. We liked the ability to launch enemies into the air - throwing a Hermit Crab up in the air is objectively hilarious - but we wanted this to be an exciting moment for players to take advantage of.

In pursuit of that goal, we’ve greatly increased the impact Breaching Fin has. Not only does it retain the chance to launch grounded enemies into the air, they are now stunned for the duration, and take an additional 20% damage from all sources while airborne.

Players who decide to take advantage of this airborne monster can relaunch it an additional 2 times. Gathering more stacks of the item will reward you with an extra launch per stack. Those extra seconds can give you a valuable chance to exploit their vulnerable state! Stacking Breaching Fin high enough allows you to send enemies high into the skies of Petrichor V.

Due to this massive power boost we’ve upgraded this item from common (white) to uncommon (green.)

While War Bonds could be useful if you obtained one very early in a run, the bonus gold was quickly outpaced by the ease at which you can collect large sums of money quickly in the mid and late game. So it can feel like a somewhat disappointing item - especially considering its rarity.

We’ve upgraded War Bonds to give it a new effect worthy of a red item - now when you trigger the teleporter event a barrage of missiles bombard any boss monsters that are foolish enough to appear…

…That ought to give you a bit of a head start.

Sticking with the “War Bond” theme, the amount of missiles that appear are increased by the amount of gold you’ve collected during the stage. Our goal is that this creates some much-needed synergy with gold-producing items like Ghor’s Tome and Roll of Pennies.

Noxious Thorn has had an almost full rework. Its effect now makes it one of the strongest items in the uncommon pool. Previously this item had a chance to apply bleed to enemies that attacked you. It also had a chance to increase the stacks of other existing debuffs. This mechanic was a little unclear to players. It was often challenging to tell when this item had taken effect.

Now the Noxious Thorn has a 10% chance to inflict bleed onto an enemy. Upon dispatching your enemy 33% of its debuffs are transferred to another monster within a 20m range.

Each stack of Noxious Thorn makes these debuffs jump to an additional enemy. With a small stack of this item, and some other debuff-themed items like Gasoline and Symbiotic Scorpion, you can spread destruction to huge groups of enemies like never before.

The other item changes in Phase 1 include:

• Chance Doll has had its item log changed to accurately represent its chance of effect. It’s also received visual improvements to let you know it’s successfully upgraded an item
  
• Unstable Transmitter now turns the tables on your foes. Upon falling below 25% health, a glowing radius will appear around the player. Charge into enemies to have them teleported away. It’ll also apply bleed, just for good measure. Foes that die to this effect also extend the duration of the aura.
  
• Sonorous Whispers was still a little too strong. So it had its item drop rate from elites reduced to 4% while retaining its guaranteed drop from large monsters. Don’t worry - it’s still a very strong item!
  
• Growth Nectar has had a buff to better reflect its legendary status. It now gives a 7% increase to ALL stats for each buff you have, up to a maximum of 4. The stat increase, and maximum number of stacks, will both increase with each additional Growth Nectar you acquire.
  
• Electric Boomerang has had the interaction removed where it would apply bleed if you were carrying the Sawmarang equipment.
  
• Runic Lens, which was always a very strong red item, has had its visuals and sound effects improved to better display when it has taken effect. It’s also had its logbook entry updated to make its effect a bit clearer..
  
• Prayer Beads has remained the same but now makes the effect a little more obvious by telling you the buffs you’ve gained. We’ve also blacklisted it from printers (it was being exploited by certain Australian YouTubers.)
  
• Chronic Expansion has been given a much clearer “combo meter” mechanic. Now, it gives you a temporary stacking damage buff which can be increased and maintained with each kill that you get. This has been paired with a distinct audio warning when you’re about to lose the effect.
  
• Luminous Shot now requires 3 stacks (still granted when using your secondary attack) before being unleashed by your primary attack - but the damage output has been significantly boosted - and as an extra bonus the first stack of this item reduces your secondary ability cooldown by 20%!
  
• Longstanding Solitude has had its experience gain increased slightly and happens whenever gold would have been gained. The "free unlocks" buff is now retained between stages. Previously, when one person in a lobby picked this item up, all interactable prices for other players would be increased by 100%. That has now been dialed back to 50%.
  
• Warped Echo will now reduce the next source of damage you take by 30% while spreading it into 3 (+1 per stack) hits. All echoed damage is non-lethal except for the final hit. Your Echo recharges every 15s(-3% per stack). We’ve also added a visual indication for when it’s available to be used.
  
• Bolstering Lantern now gives an attack speed bonus for every enemy and ally in close range (displayed with a new blue outline surrounding the player). Gather additional stacks of this item to increase its range and also increase the maximum number of enemies & allies it will count.
  
• Seed of Life now works as expected when given to an equipment drone, and the consumed version can no longer teleport players out of bounds
  
• Sale Star is unchanged (my beloved.)
  

Both the Twisted and Halcyon Elites added in Seekers of the Storm have had massive improvements in this update -

Halcyon elites now have lower health and armor multipliers. That should put them in-line with the other elites in their tier. They’ve also been given a brand new gold-stealing attack. If you don't avoid these Golden Spikes you’ll be forced to drop some of your money as a gold nugget which will eventually vanish if you choose to ignore it!

We wanted to keep the “priority target” intention of Twisted Elites but give the player much more room for counterplay. Now, a Twisted Elite will charge up a distinct spiked ball of lunar energy above its head when you deal damage to its nearby allies. If you don’t deal with this situation by killing the elite it will unleash this Lunar Crystal against you. This attack will track the player until it either hits you or a surface. This should give you a good chance to avoid its considerable damage. If you want my advice, you should just quickly deal with the Twisted Elite as soon as you see it!

We have been able to get this first phase out relatively quickly due to much of the work being done prior to the initial roadmap announcement. The team is hard at work on Phase 2, but we’ll need a bit more time to get that one in your hands. We’ll be able to update you again in the new year.

We’d love to hear all of your feedback on the changes we’ve made so far! The best place to send us your thoughts is on our Discord:
https://discord.com/invite/riskofrain2[/url] Thanks again for all the feedback and your continued patience while we get these updates out to you. Everyone here on the Risk of Rain team wishes you a fantastic festive season. We’ll see you early next year for the next phase of Seekers of the Storm updates. [img]{STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/33906904/62708506f7a657815a5a64b1c13fa3725a3d99b3.gif[/img] [b]Bye for now! [/b][i]-The Risk of Rain Team[/i
Thanks again for all the feedback and your continued patience while we get these updates out to you. Everyone here on the Risk of Rain team wishes you a fantastic festive season. We’ll see you early next year for the next phase of Seekers of the Storm updates.

Bye for now!-The Risk of Rain Team