It’s time for our first big patch with balance updates since launch! We’ve been loving seeing all of the events, fan art, and more that have made our release month amazing. Thank you for all of your support so far.

Our Patch Philosophy

Since this patch includes our first ever round of gameplay changes, we thought it would be good to share some of our philosophy behind the update. Our goal is for Rivals II to be a long-term competitive game, just like Rivals 1, and we know that achieving perfect balance is a constant pursuit. There’s a careful stability to be struck between letting the community adjust and adapt to a meta vs. knowing when to patch.

Our plan is to update the game twice a month with new store content and we’re not afraid to include a small number of gameplay changes in those updates as issues arise. But you can typically expect at least a couple months between big balance updates like this one.

Now for this first update, the game and the meta are still very fresh. While we are tracking overall roster balance, that is not our priority right now. We are more concerned about mechanics and gameplay that are both frustrating to play against and reward players for avoiding interaction. For this reason, we looked across the cast to identify particular pain points when playing against these characters and made changes to incentivize more variety and introduce counterplay into some of the less interactive options. In later patches, we will be looking closer at how the roster is stacking up against each other, but for now we want to let the meta develop after adjusting some of the more frustrating tools.

As always, please leave feedback for this patch on our nolt board. Even if we don’t answer every post, we do read them!

Patch Notes 1.0.3

This article will walk you through detailed balance changes of all ten characters, as well as general changes to mechanics and functions in the game itself. Once again, the patch notes listed here are well documented, so be warned, we spare no details and the list can be tricky for those not used to the language of patch notes. If you would like to leave feedback on the current build of the game, we encourage you to make suggestions on our new nolt board, and report issues and bugs in our official discord.

Alright, now it’s time to dive in:

GLOSSARY

• Knockback numbers are represented as: Base Knockback + Knockback Scaling @ Knockback Angle.
  • e.g. 7 + 0.6 @ 45 has 7 Base Knockback and 0.6 Knockback Scaling and sends at 45 degrees.
  • Base knockback is the starting point for the attack’s strength.
  • Knockback Scaling is how quickly the strength increases as the opponent’s percent gets higher.
  • Knockback angle is measured from 0 degrees at straight forward, with 90 at upward, 180 at backward, and 270 at downward.

We want to address a lot of the annoyances that have been expressed throughout the past month. Some high priority targets are:

• Shield being too strong
  • When looking at the numbers for optimal shield pressure (i.e. low aerials, spaced tilts, etc) the attacker has a clear advantage. In practice, however, getting perfectly spaced shield pressure isn’t always feasible, so shields end up being strong in neutral. If we adjust the frame advantage of shield pressure, then attacking will be too strong at the top level, so instead we want to focus on increasing the risk of shielding in neutral so that baiting people into shield is more rewarding. We’re also nerfing the shield hp regeneration time again, but adding a mechanic that rewards offensive play by restoring your shield when you land a hit.
• Parry being too weak against projectiles
  • Parry is a bit slower than it was in Rivals of Aether, which reduces its effectiveness against quick projectiles in neutral. We want to make sure projectiles have enough counterplay, since they can be frustrating to play against otherwise, so we’re making parry faster specifically when used against projectiles.
• Recoveries being too strong, making successful edgeguards too rare
  • Because of the inherent strengths of walljump-cancellable recovery moves, it can often feel impossible to prevent characters from making it back to the stage without sending them directly into the blastzone. We want to increase the chances for counterplay against most recoveries, with changes to universal mechanics as well as character-specific recovery nerfs.
• Character balance
  • It’s too early to make balance changes based on any tier lists, so instead we’re targeting specific annoying, overcentralizing, or overly safe strategies. It turns out there were quite a few of those, which is to be expected in the very first live version of the game, so character balance will be shifting quite a bit. These sweeping changes will be less common as the meta settles, but we want to make sure the obvious problems with the characters are addressed quickly.

• Replay Menu Rework
  • This was the first menu on our rework list (as previously mentioned on our Year 1 roadmap). This screen now beautifully shows match info, plus now includes features like favoriting and deleting. Other menus will also continue to receive updates as we work on improvements.
• Bundle Improvements
  • You can now purchase bundles if they include an item that you already own. This was one of those things that seem simple, but is actually fairly complicated on the backend. We’ve finally got this change in though and now bundles will refund Aetherbucks to your account after purchased based on items you already own.
• Tourneymode DSR
  • In ranked you can now no longer go back to a stage you’ve won on in that set when it’s your turn to pick stage (they are automatically banned by the system).
• Event XP Adjustment
  • We adjusted the XP requirements for Event leveling since players were progressing through the levels much quicker than we intended for a month long event. The main event track (level 1-20) could previously be completed in about 5 hours. We’ll continue to keep an eye on the total gold earned this month and make sure it’s still in a good place.
• Winter Main Menu
  • Swapped the main menu background to Hyperborean Harbor for the winter vibes.
• Lobby codes are now displayed on screen, with a show/unshow button. Copy to clipboard has been reimplemented slightly differently.
• Performing a parry will now parry projectiles starting on frame 3 as long as your shield was not hit by anything.
  • This allows parry to be used reactively against projectiles, while still preventing players from parrying multihit projectiles after shielding early hits.
• Parrying a cancelable jab will now let you cancel the parry recovery instantly.
  • This allows you to punish the opponent if you act quickly, instead of just resetting to neutral, since jabs do not put foes into parry stun.
• Parrying an article after already successfully parrying something else will now give you half of the normal hitpause.
  • This is a pretty rare situation, but one example is parrying Loxodont’s empowered strong attacks, which would lock you into the parry state for long enough to make Loxodont fairly safe from being punished.
• Tilt cancels will now use the same joystick mapping as normal tilts.
  • Previously, you would get an Up Tilt/Down Tilt if your joystick was above/below the deadzone threshold, even if it was tilted mostly horizontally. Now it will perform an Forward Ttilt in those scenarios instead for consistency.
• Colliding with another player will now apply a constant force to push them apart instead of applying a gradually increasing force.
  • This makes the pushback happen faster, decreasing situations where players are overlapping for a long period of time.
• Minimum number of shield frames before you can release shield: 0 > 7
  • The lockout is removed if someone hits your shield.
• Shield Release duration: 10 > 15
  • These two changes add more commitment to using shield in neutral, since you will have to either jump or wavedash to exit shield quickly.
• You can now parry during the Shield Release state using the Parry button.
  • This does not activate the frame 3 projectile parry, otherwise you could release shield after someone hits your shield to circumvent the mechanic’s restrictions.
• Shield recharge time: 20 seconds > 25 seconds
• Hitting the opponent or their shield will now restore shield health equal to half the damage dealt.
  • These two changes make holding shield more risky, requiring players to use it less, or to mix in some offense to restore shield health.
• Shield pushback formula adjusted to have more pushback from high damage attacks.
  • Low damage attacks are mostly unchanged.
• Spot dodge intangibility window length: 14 > 17
  • We’re pushing back the first actionable frame to make spot dodging easier to punish in most situations. We opted for extending the active window instead of the recovery frames to slightly increase its utility while lowering its punish potential.
• Successful techs will now reset the tech lockout timer.
  • This allows you to tech multiple attacks in a row.
• Airdodging to ledge will now remove all ledge intangibility.
  • This option made recoveries a little too simple when near the ledge, so now it carries a bit more risk with it.
• Hitting an opponent will now only restore 1 of your intangible ledge grabs instead of restoring all three.
  • This makes intangible ledge grabs a more limited resource when using them to invincibly attack someone offstage.
• Starting an attack will no longer reset the ledge grab lockout timer.
  • When releasing ledge, you cannot grab ledge again for 30 frames. This lockout also applies after a walltech, which is why attacking would reset the timer. Now attacking will only reset the timer if it is input after a walltech.
• Getting flinched by a new attack while already in the flinch state will now reduce the flinch duration by 30%.
  • This removes some guaranteed flinch loops (Ranno Forward Air, Fleet Down Air, Orcane Down Air).
• Ledges will now be displayed in training mode when stage collision drawing is enabled.
  • The ledges will be colored green when unoccupied and red when occupied.
• Bug fix: Tilt boost joystick inputs must be performed after starting the jab.
  • Previously, you could buffer the joystick input before doing the jab, making tilt boosts more lenient than intended.
• Bug fix: You can now parry/counter when you have respawn invulnerability.
• Bug fix: Shield DI could sometimes still cause the player to fall off the edge of a platform due to rounding errors.
• Bug fix: Leaving the ground on the 2nd frame of PlatDrop will now clamp your aerial speed as intended.
  • This removes a frame perfect bug that allowed players to retain full grounded momentum while platdropping.
• Bug fix: Hitting the ground on the first frame after being spiked will no longer always cause a ground bounce.
• Bug fix: The game will no longer crash if a character is thrown into a spot that’s too narrow for them to fit.
• Bug fix: Increased the length of Zetterburn, Maypul, Clairen, and Loxodont’s intro animations by 1 frame to match the rest of the characters.
• Bug fix: Fixed a local tourney mode bug that could occur when returning to the CSS mid set.
• Bug fix: The overtime clock now updates properly.
• Bug fix: Fixed a UX bug that could occur when backing out of the CSS that caused it to take you to the wrong menu.

Zetterburn is pretty close to where we want him, so we’re fixing Down Special and toning down some of his options that confirm into Up Strong.

• Up Special final hit hitstun multiplier: 1.0 > 0.8
  • This decreases the chances of this move comboing into Up Strong after hitting someone when recovering. It also makes it worse at directly KOing opponents when traveling at downward angles.
• Down Special diving hit can no longer reverse.
  • This prevents it from sending opponents away from Zetterburn’s trajectory.
• Down Special diving hit hitstun multiplier: 1.0 > 0.85
  • The knockback needs to be high to make it link into the landing hit, but the hitstun from that high knockback would often lead to guaranteed death even at relatively low percents offstage.
• Jab 1 and 2 damage: 4 > 3
• Back Air sweetspot knockback: 5 + 0.35 > 5 + 0.4
  • The low knockback on Back Air made it true combo into Up Strong against a lot of characters at low kill percents. This change will also make Back Air send into knockdown earlier, so it’s a bit of a tradeoff.
• Back Air sourspot now uses the weak vfx/sfx to differentiate it from the sweetspot.
• Back Air’s set of tail hurtboxes are no longer intangible.
  • The tail hurtboxes are still fairly small, but this will decrease the disjoint a decent amount.

Ranno is a speed demon who can overwhelm opponents with large, fast hitboxes that can be difficult to punish. He has some of the most reliable kill confirms in the game, so this patch aims to require more precision spacing to achieve his goals. We have also found his recovery to be a little stronger than intended, specifically when using tongue sling on bubble. In order to address this, we’re adding a little bit of commitment to tongue sling while attempting to maintain the fun movement tech that comes with it.

• Forward Special tongue sling recovery frames: 10 > 8
• Forward Special tongue sling recovery frames are no longer jump/attack cancellable when slinging to your bubble.
  • Tongue sling is an extremely fun part of Ranno’s kit, but it has proven to be a bit too difficult to contest during Ranno’s recovery. These changes make it a little more committal to sling to his bubble without affecting his tongue sling mixups at the wall.
• Up Special rising hit top hitbox radius: 50cm > 30cm
  • This decreases the disjoint of the attack, allowing for more counterplay by well-timed attacks while edgeguarding Ranno.
• Up Special divekick ground friction: 0.8 > 1.2
  • This decreases the sliding distance from around 100cm to around 55cm, making this require more precision to ledge cancel.
• Up Special poison darts will no longer force flinch.
  • This property was removed from Neutral Special’s poison darts in a previous patch, so we have added similar counterplay to allow floorhugging against Up Special’s poison darts.
• Exiting the poison bubble will now inflict a minimum of 10 frames of hitstun.
  • This means opponents (or Ranno himself) breaking out of bubble will not be able to counterattack as quickly.
• Hitstun gravity: 1.28 > 1.32
  • This makes him slightly less floaty during combos.
• Down Tilt recovery: 17 > 19
• Down Tilt sourspot knockback: 6 + 0.5 > 6 + 0.4
• Down Tilt sourspot knockback angle: 70 > 60
• Down Tilt sourspot hitstun multiplier: x1.0 > x0.85
  • The sourspot is no longer stronger than the sweetspot, and is instead directly worse at comboing through reduced hitstun and a lower angle.
• Forward Strong’s backmost sourspot moved forward 25cm and now takes priority over the sweetspot.
  • This makes Ranno have to space the move a bit better to get the sweetspot.
• Forward Strong sweetspot knockback: 7 + 1.0 > 6.5 + 0.95
  • This is a slight reduction to the move’s killpower, since the burst movement on this attack makes it too reliable of a finisher combined with the rest of his kit.
• Up Strong sweetspot knockback: 8 + 1.1 > 8 + 1.02
• Up Strong early sourspot knockback: 8 + 0.85 > 7.5 + 0.85
  • We’re toning down the killpower very slightly since Ranno has a plethora of ways to confirm into this attack.
• Down Strong’s sourspots now have priority over the sweetspots.
• Down Strong’s sourspots moved inward by 20cm each.
  • This makes Ranno have to be more precise to hit with the sweetspot.
• Forward Air has a new, small sourspot at the top with the highest priority of all the hitboxes.
  • This allows Ranno to purposefully space for the sourspot while also preventing surprising sweetspots when the opponent is above Ranno.
• Back Air sourspots moved upward and shrunk slightly.
  • This reduces the disjoint of this attack from below, giving opponents a chance to beat this move from some angles when recovering.
• Back Air early sweetspot damage: 10 > 8
• Back Air early sourspot damage: 8 > 6
• Back Air early reverse hit damage: 6 > 5
• Back Air late sweetspot damage: 8 > 6
• Back Air late sourspot damage: 6 > 5
• Back Air late reverse hit damage: 4 > 3
  • Decreasing the damage also decreases the move’s shield stun, making the attack less safe on shield.
• Back Air landing lag: 8 > 9
  • This makes the move slightly more punishable.
• Down Throw recovery: 18 > 20
• Down Throw knockback: 8 + 0.2 > 8 + 0.3
  • This allows DI away to be more effective at high percents.
• Bug fix: Trading with Ranno Forward Special will no longer halt all of your momentum
• Bug fix: Jump canceling Forward Special will now spawn the double jump vfx.
• Bug fix: Forward Special will now transfer Fleet’s stamina tornado like all other grabs
• Bug fix: The last 4 active frames of Up Special’s initial rising hit are now using the intended sourspot knockback data: 8 + 0.2 @ 45 > 6 + 0.1 @ 80
• Bug fix: Up Special’s divekick recovery window can now be jump canceled.
  • Previously only the active window could be, so if you waited too long, you wouldn’t get the jump cancel.
• Bug fix: Down Throw now has a sound on hit.

While Wrastor’s slipstream only activating on hit introduced some counterplay to this incredibly strong mechanic, it ended up creating a less interesting neutral game, since the best way to prevent Wrastor from powering up was to avoid being on the same plane as him entirely. We’re introducing some more counterplay to enable opponents to interact with Wrastor while still forcing interaction to activate slipstream.

• Forward Special’s projectile no longer spawns the slipstream when hitting a shield.
  • This allows opponents to prevent Wrastor from activating slipstream without avoiding him entirely.
• Up Special sweetspot knockback: 9 + 1.0 > 6.5 + 1.2
  • This gives less knockback at lower percents, but becomes stronger around 100%. This makes it less frustrating to get hit by as a result of DIing a single combo move poorly or having slightly unsafe shield pressure at healthier percents.
• Up Special recovery window gravity: 1.7 > 0.85
• Up Special recovery window vertical speed multiplier: x0.5 > x0.35
  • These changes delay his ledge grab by 6 frames without changing the height of the grab, allowing for more counterplay when he’s recovering.
• Jab 1 and 2 damage: 4 > 3
• Dash Attack back hitbox removed.
  • This reduces the backward range of the move.
• Down Air hit 1 hitstun multiplier: 1.0 > 0.9
  • With the recent angle change to this move, it has become a bit too consistent for setting up aerial followups. It was also the only aerial of Wrastor’s with a 1.0 hitstun multiplier, so we have decided to bring it in line with the rest of his attacks.
• Back Throw startup: 17 > 19
  • This gives the opponent slightly more time to DI the throw on reaction.

Kragg has a lot of strengths that can be overwhelming to play against, so we want to make sure his weaknesses offset those strengths in ways that make sense. To do this, we’re making his larger attacks more reasonably punishable and toning down his offstage recovery so that it isn’t too strong for how difficult he can be to kill outright.

• Rock throw startup: 6 > 8
  • This applies to all rock throws and cargo throws. This makes them slightly slower to use against up-close opponents, emphasizing Kragg’s weakness to aggression while holding a rock.
• Neutral Special rock grab recovery: 5 > 8
  • Kragg was able to throw the rock a bit too quickly after grabbing it. It’s still quite fast, but the opponent will now have a little more time to react before a rock is hurled at them.
• Holding the shield button during startup will make Neutral Special unable to grab rocks.
  • This allows Kragg to command grab opponents who are standing near a rock!
• Rock hurtbox radius: 35 > 38
• Rock’s hurtboxes are now horizontal instead of vertical.
  • These changes make break canceling more consistent for Kragg.
• Canceling Forward Special will no longer count toward Forward Special’s diminishing returns counter.
  • This allows you to use Forward Special cancel while recovering without making your next Forward Special worse should you get knocked back offstage.
• Up Special and Forward Special Cancel landing lag: 22 > 28
  • Kragg’s recovery is stronger than we want, but making it harder for him to get back to stage leads to some very polarizing matchups where he would be unable to recover at all. To balance this scale, we’re making it more punishing when Kragg is forced to land on stage with his quicker recovery moves.
• Up Special pillar summon recovery: 25 > 30
  • This makes pillar more punishable when Kragg is forced to use it to recover, as well as when Kragg whiffs it on stage.
• Pillar knockback: 8.5 + 0 > 9 + 0
• Pillar hitstun multiplier against aerial opponents: x0.75 > x0.82
• Pillar hitstun multiplier against grounded opponents: x0.5 > x0.62
  • This adds 5 frames of hitstun so that Kragg still has the same frame advantage on-hit as before. The increased knockback makes it so characters aren’t forced to land on the pillar, leaving them vulnerable.
• Pillar will now restore Kragg’s resources right when it spawns.
  • This prevents the situation where Kragg is hit while pillar is rising, leaving him with no resources at all.
• Pillar will now raise opponents upward even if their ECB is not directly above the pillar.
  • This makes hitting with pillar more consistent, which is both a good and bad thing for Kragg, since the opponent will also be able to punish him consistently if they’re grounded.
• Hitting pillar will now restore your walljump.
  • This helps players recover after being forced to walljump and then break pillar while returning to stage.
• Aerial Down Special aerial drift: 0 > 0.5
  • This lets Kragg space this move a bit better.
• Aerial Down Special recovery: 13 > 22
  • This move’s reward was too strong for how frequently it could be used offstage.
• Weight: 110 > 108
  • The heavier characters are generally living a bit longer than we’d like, so we’re toning down all of their weights.
• Max fall speed: 31.16 > 28.8
  • This is still the highest max fall speed in the game, but this should make him slightly less resistant to vertical KOs while not affecting his base movement too much.
• Jab 1 and 2 damage: 4 > 3
• Jab 2 first hitbox lowered slightly.
  • This makes hitting knocked-down opponents more consistent.
• Up Tilt hit 1 damage: 2 > 3
• Up Tilt hit 2 damage: 10 > 7
  • We’re evening out the damage for this attack to make it less powerful when used frequently.
• Forward Strong recovery: 29 > 34
  • This is one of the strongest moves in the game, and needs a bit more recovery to reflect that.
• Forward Air startup: 11 > 12
• Forward Air landing lag: 11 > 12
• Forward Air sourspot knockback: 4 + 0.85 > 3.5 + 0.8
• Forward Air sourspot damage: 9 > 7
  • Forward Air’s size and speed make it extremely tough to challenge or punish in neutral, so we’re toning it down slightly.
• Back Air now has an extra hurtbox during the active frames.
  • This reduces the disjoint of this move significantly.
• Back Air recovery: 14 > 16
• Back Air landing lag: 9 > 11
• Back Air sourspot knockback angle: 55 > 50
  • This move is a bit over-centralizing to Kragg’s kit both in neutral and punish, so we’re toning it down in a few ways.
• Down Air landing lag: 12 > 13
  • This attack has a strong reward on hit and is attached to the fastest faller in the game, making it more common to land. We’ve decided to increase Down Air’s risk by making it worse on shield and whiff.
• Up Throw aerial recovery: 15 > 20
  • This throw would lead to a guaranteed Forward Air against non-floaties, so we’re adding some endlag to prevent that in most scenarios.
• Down Throw startup: 14 > 16
  • This gives the opponent a bit more time to realize they’ve been grabbed while keeping the throw itself fairly unreactable.
• Down Throw knockback: 6.5 + 0.4 > 6.5 + 0.25
  • This will keep opponents closer at high percents but they will also have less hitstun, so Kragg won’t be able to combo into Forward Strong until much higher percents.
• Cargo Down Throw knockback: 7 + 0.15 > 7 + 0.2
  • This move felt a little bit too weak at high percents, making it completely overshadowed by the other cargo throws offstage.
• Bug fix: Dash Attack is no longer cancellable into jab/tilts when parried.
  • This allowed Kragg to bypass parry stun by canceling into a single jab.
• Bug fix: Rocks will no longer despawn if they pass the blastzones while Kragg is in the process of throwing them.
• Bug fix: Forward Special cancel now requires you to press Shield instead of just holding it.
  • This is how it worked originally and was changed unintentionally, so we’re reverting it, since it can currently lead to unintended cancels when recovering.
• Bug fix: Down Special spikes will now disappear if the ground disappears from under them.

Fleet is possibly the most polarizing character in the game, with quite a few highly favorable matchups and an extremely difficult one. All of her aerials are good on their own, but when combined with her Slow Fall mechanic, they can be overwhelming for most characters to deal with, especially when recovering. We’re toning a few of her aerials down to help even out her kit. We’re also adding some commitment to her aerial movement, since having the highest aerial maneuverability in the game intensifies all of her offstage capabilities. She’s also getting a quality-of-life change that should make using her Slow Fall feel smoother.

• Forward Special recovery: 17 > 20
  • This helps reduce the frequency of this move while also increasing the effectiveness of DI away to prevent Fleet from comboing off of it.
• Forward Special’s tornado is now vulnerable 5 frames before it becomes active.
  • This adds more counterplay to this extremely versatile zoning tool.
• Forward Special tornado hurtbox radius: 40 > 55
  • This makes it easier to hit.
• Forward Special tornado can no longer break projectiles.
  • This makes using projectiles valid counterplay to this powerful zoning tool.
• Forward Special’s wind tunnel vfx will now be destroyed if the projectile is destroyed.
  • This makes it more clear when the tornado will not spawn.
• Up Special final hitbox radius: 70 > 50
  • This reduces the disjoint of the attack, allowing for more counterplay with well-timed attacks.
• Down Special will now go into parry stun if the arrow is parried.
  • This adds a bit more risk to this high-reward move.
• Stamina Tornado will now transfer on a successful parry.
• Slow Fall joystick threshold: 0.8 > 0.75
  • This makes the slow fall input more responsive, especially when using diagonal-downward inputs.
• Slow Fall is no longer restored when grabbing ledge.
  • Now Fleet must touch ground before being able to float again.
• Slow Fall can no longer get a boost from tornadoes that don’t belong to Fleet.
  • This prevents her from boosting over a parried tornado or an opponent’s tornado.
• Hitstun gravity: 1.15 > 1.2
  • This should make her slightly easier to combo.
• Max fall speed: 19.6 > 20.6
  • She still has the lowest fall speed in the game, but should be the slightest bit easier to combo while not affecting her base movement much.
• Air acceleration: 1.2 > 0.78
  • Fleet had the highest air acceleration by a large margin, which allowed her to safely reposition in both advantage and disadvantage, especially when combined with her Slow Fall. This significant change is intended to offset her extreme strengths that are amplified by her unmatched aerial mobility. This does not affect her max airspeed, only her ability to accelerate/decelerate to it.
• Jab 1 and 2 damage: 4 > 3
• Dash Attack multihit knockback angle: 30 > 20
  • This should help them link into the final hit better.
• Up Strong sweetspot knockback: 8 + 1.15 > 7 + 1.15
  • This move being as strong as Zetterburn’s empowered Up Strong was unintended, so we’re toning it down to match the rest of the upward kill moves that got toned down in previous patches.
• Neutral Air active frames: 20 > 16
• Neutral Air recovery frames: 16 > 20
  • This is the same overall duration, but with fewer active frames to help reduce the strength of her offstage edgeguards.
• Forward Air multihit hitstun multiplier: 1.0 > 0.5
  • This only comes into play if the final hit whiffs.
• Forward Air hitboxes shrunk slightly.
  • This reduces its ability to wall out opponents by a little bit.
• Forward Air multihits SSDI modifier: 1.0 > 0.5
  • This makes it harder to SDI out of the attack, to compensate for the smaller hitboxes. This does not affect the ASDI modifier, which is still 1.0.
• Back Air landing lag: 12 > 13
• Back Air sweetspot damage: 12 > 10
• Back Air sourspot damage: 9 > 7
  • This reduces Back Air’s frame advantage when hitting a shield.
• Up Air early sweetspot damage: 11 > 9
• Up Air late sweetspot damage: 8 > 7
• Up Air early sweetspot knockback: 6 + 1.075 @ 70 > 6 + 0.88 @ 72
  • The killpower of this move was a little too high for how large and quick the sweetspot is. The angle would also frequently get players KOd off the sides when they DId to avoid getting KOd off the top.
• Back Throw arrows now have weaker knockback after traveling for 15 frames (8 + 0.4 > 4 + 0.4).
  • DIing Bthrow out can sometimes cause the top arrow to hit much later than the other arrows. While this interaction is intended, it was KOing players too early for our liking.
• Up Throw’s arrow now forces tumble.
  • This prevents the arrow from getting knockback-armored at low percents, allowing the opponent to DI it.
• Up Throw recovery: 27 > 29
  • This is a slight reduction to her combo potential with this incredibly versatile throw.
• Down Throw startup: 12 > 15
  • This gives players more time to adjust their DI after getting grabbed without making the throw easily reactable.

We’ve taken a look at Maypul’s defensive gameplans in order to encourage more interactions between players.

• Neutral Special seed damage: 2 > 1
  • This reduces the reward for Maypuls frequently throwing this move out.
• Trying to tether with Special+Grab will now require pressing Grab instead of just holding it.
  • This was leading to unintended tethers when dropping from ledge with Grab before using Forward Special to refresh ledge intangibility.
• Aerial Down Special can now fall through platforms for the first 2 active frames if Maypul holds down.
  • This allows Maypul more creativity when using this move on platforms, without making it able to dash through platforms to avoid juggles.
• Lily detection radius: 100 > 90
  • This makes Maypul have to be more precise when setting up Lily combos, while giving the opponent more chances to avoid Lily with DI.
• Lily’s bite startup windows will now be canceled if Maypul gets grabbed.
  • Previously, Lily could interrupt the grab as long as the bite was started before Maypul got grabbed.
• Lily will now remove the Watcher’s Mark when hitting a marked opponent’s shield.
• Innermost tail hurtbox default state: intangible > ungrabbable
  • One of the most frustrating parts of fighting Maypul is her size making it hard to hit her, especially during certain states where she compresses herself to be even smaller (i.e. running, landing). To remedy this, we’re making her tail hurtbox vulnerable so hitting her is more consistent.
• Bug Fix: Maypul can only tether to Terry once.

Clairen is a character that generally requires precision to do well, but some of her moves were a little more forgiving in that regard than they should be. We’re cleaning up some of her tippers to make them feel more satisfying when she does land them. We’re also making her Up Special much easier to contest, since her recovery was very difficult to challenge.

• Level 1 Neutral Special tipper range reduced slightly.
  • Spacing for the sweetspot will now be slightly less lenient to make up for the combo potential when landing it.
• Up Special 1’s 6th active window removed.
• Up Special 1’s 5th active window active frames: 2 > 1
  • This significantly decreases the attack’s upward range, allowing for more counterplay when edgeguarding Clairen from above.
• Up Special 1’s transition window no longer stalls in place and instead just multiplies her vertical speed by 0.1.
  • This very slightly increases the distance she travels while also adding 2 extra frames before she can grab ledge with it.
• Up Special 2 air acceleration: 1.4 > 1.0
  • This reduces her mixups after using Up Special 2 to recover high. 1.0 is her normal air acceleration.
• Ledge Special ground plasma hitstun multiplier: 0.85 > 0.9
  • Slight increase in hitstun to let it combo better, since it was fairly inconsistent on hit.
• Ledge Special ground plasma width greatly increased.
  • This helps prevent the 2nd hit from whiffing after the first hit connects near max range.
• Run speed: 18.4 > 20.1
  • This helps her deal with distant opponents both in neutral and when comboing them. Her dash speed is still 21.25, so this won’t affect her burst movement potential.
• Jab recovery: 18 > 20
• Jab tipper stun: 16 > 14
  • This gives her slightly less time to set up for a followup from this low-commitment move.
• Dash Attack late tipper hitbox adjusted to match the animation better.
  • This reduces the distance it can hit opponents behind Clairen.
• Dash Attack tipper knockback: 7 + 0.3 > 8 + 0.3
  • This makes it better at launching opponents at low percents and worse at comboing at high percents.
• Forward Tilt knockback: 6.5 + 0.75 > 6 + 0.85
  • This change will help finish off higher percent opponents.
• Forward Strong tipper hitboxes adjusted to match the animation better.
• Forward Strong tipper knockback: 8 + 1.1 > 7.5 + 1.13
  • This causes less knockback at lower percents, while keeping similar knockback at KO percents.
• Forward Strong recovery: 34 > 38
  • This move is a little overcentralizing for Clairen, since it’s big, fast, and strong. We’re increasing the recovery to make it more punishing on whiff.
• Back Air landing lag: 8 > 10
  • This reduces the ability to constantly wall out opponents in neutral with this large, high-reward move.
• Back Air sourspot damage: 5 > 6
• Back Air sourspot knockback: 5 + 0.5 > 5 + 0.55
  • This change gives slightly more knockback at mid-high percents to help her send opponents farther offstage when edgeguarding.
• Back Air tipper damage: 8 > 9
• Back Air tipper stun: 25 > 23
  • Back Air > Down Strong was a guaranteed kill confirm with too much leniency. This change in combination with the landing lag increase will make the timing tighter, but still possible with the proper setup.
• Back Air tipper range reduced slightly
  • The middle sourspot was moved outward, so spacing for the tipper will be slightly more difficult.
• Up Air’s innermost sourspot now has the same knockback as the other sourspot.
  • Previously, it was weaker, but had lower priority, making it very precise to hit with. This change should make the move feel more consistent and less random.
• Up Air tipper damage: 10 > 12
  • The extra damage provides a greater reward for landing this difficult tipper.
• Back Throw startup: 9 > 13
  • This gives players more time to adjust their DI after getting grabbed without making the throw easily reactable.
• Back Throw recovery: 18 > 19
  • This causes a slight reduction to the speed of Clairen’s followups after Back Throw.
• Down Throw knockback angle: 55 > 50
  • This makes it send opponents farther offstage when used at ledge, which is the primary intended use case.

Loxodont’s size and range tend to create situations where he can cover every option that the opponent can choose. We’re addressing some of these concerns by either making it harder to cover as many options, or making it harder to put the opponent in the situation where multiple options can be covered. We’re also giving him some small quality-of-life changes for situations where his mechanics could be frustrating to work with.

• Neutral Special air acceleration while charging: 0.53 > 0.28
  • This makes it more difficult to follow the opponent’s DI after launching them with Down Special.
• Forward Special will now fall slightly after grabbing an opponent.
  • This means a buffered instant Forward Special will now transition into a grounded Forward Special when it hits an opponent. This means it won’t be able to autocancel if you start the aerial Forward Special too low, but it also means it will leave lava pools behind once it reaches the ground.
• Down Special level 1 knockback angle: 60 > 70
• Down Special level 2 knockback angle: 60 > 65
  • This makes it less likely to combo into Down Air when the opponent DIs in, making ledgedrop Down Special > Down Air have more counterplay while also making sure it still has good reward on hit.
• Lava pool active duration: 5 seconds > infinite
  • This allows Loxodont to leave his lava pools unattended and then come back and collect them later.
• Lava pools can no longer interact with parried players.
  • This means parried players can no longer prevent Loxodont from consuming the lava pool.
• Weight: 112 > 110
  • The heavier characters are generally living a bit too long, so we’re toning down all of their weights.
• Hitstun gravity: 1.2 > 1.25
  • This makes him a bit less floaty when being comboed.
• Jab 1 recovery: 14 > 16
  • This slightly increases the risk associated with this large, fast, versatile move.
• Jab 2 now swings the axe at a higher arc.
  • This makes it less likely to whiff after landing jab 1’s sweetspot.
• Down Tilt sweetspot knockback angle: 290 > 285
  • This makes it easier to tech the wall when hit by this attack at ledge.
• Down Throw startup: 39 > 21
  • This makes Down Throw much less reactable, making it possible to mix up DI with Forward Throw and Up Throw when Loxodont is standing on a lava pool.
• Neutral Air landing lag: 8 > 9
• Neutral Air hits 1 and 2 damage: 6 > 4
• Neutral Air hit 3 damage: 7 > 5
  • Neutral Air is pretty quick and did a bit too much damage for its speed and active frames. This change also makes each hit less safe on shield.
• Bug fix: Jab 2 no longer ignores weight.
• Bug fix: Loxodont can no longer hit the molten boulder with the Neutral Special that spawned it.
• Bug fix: Neutral Special’s molten boulder will now lose trades like all other projectiles.

Orcane is one of the most slippery characters to fight when he is played in a way that minimizes interaction. We’re targeting a lot of the tools that enable this playstyle, such as Forward Air and Down Special, to try to make Orcane interact more with opponents. We’re also targeting his recovery, since it was not intended to be as strong as it was.

• Neutral Special recovery: 16 > 22
  • The combination of low endlag and a slow, high arc made this move incredibly good at comboing into anything in Orcane’s kit.
• Neutral Special and Down Special droplets hitpause multiplier: 1.0 > 0.5
  • This change causes less hitpause on the droplet, so the opponent gets launched sooner and Orcane’s puddle spawns earlier.
• Forward Special now has a large hurtbox after teleporting until the active frames end.
• Forward Special can no longer grab the ledge for the first 10 frames of the recovery window.
  • This makes Orcane’s Forward Special more in line with other dashes to ledge like Maypul’s Forward Special when it comes to vulnerable frames before he grabs the ledge.
• Up Special sourspot head hitbox shrunk slightly.
  • This hitbox was making the range on one side noticeably larger than the other side.
• Down Special no longer stalls momentum in the air.
  • Orcane has various other ways to stall to avoid juggles. This change also allows him to keep moving when placing droplet or spawning bubbles.
• Down Special recovery windows can now edge cancel.
• Down Special puddle pop recovery: 22 > 30
  • This attack is extremely difficult to deal with, so we’re making it riskier to throw out.
• Down Special bubbles max vertical speed: 11.33 > 8.83
  • This reduces the effective vertical coverage area for this attack.
• The first 2 bubbles spawned by Down Special will now always appear at the outermost edges of the puddle. The next 2 bubbles will spawn halfway out. The rest of the bubbles are all random.
  • This makes parrying bubbles much more consistent.
• Bubble ASDI multiplier: 1.0 > 1.2
  • This gives the opponent more counterplay when trapped in bubbles.
• Weight: 104 > 100
  • Orcane has been living a bit longer than we intended.
• Jab 1 and 2 damage: 4 > 3
• Jab 3 knockback: 9 + 0.25 > 7 + 0.35
  • This attack was breaking the tumble threshold a bit too early.
• Forward Tilt startup: 7 > 9
• Forward Tilt recovery: 18 > 22
  • The range on this attack made it extremely hard to punish, which was a problem since it’s fairly strong too.
• Up Tilt recovery: 15 > 17
  • This move is meant to be a quick combo tool, but the recovery was a little too difficult to punish.
• Neutral Air can no longer bounce after it is parried.
  • This makes punishing the more consistent after a successful parry.
• Forward Air recovery: 16 > 22
• Forward Air can no longer break projectiles.
• Forward Air hitboxes shrunk and moved forward to have less disjoint.
• Forward Air landing lag: 12 > 16
  • This attack was too difficult to punish effectively due to its movement, low endlag, and shower of the bubbles. We’re toning it down in a few ways to increase the counterplay potential.
• Ledge attack now loses intangibility after the first active window instead of after the second active window.
• Bug fix: Orcane ledge special will no longer hold ledge for the entire attack duration when the Special input is released instantly.

Forsburn’s recovery had a few rough edges that we wanted to round out related to his air stall and movement. Other than that, he’s got a few quality-of-life changes that should make certain situations more consistent.

• Neutral Special now has diminishing returns on the strength of the air stall.
  • This gives the opponent more reward for knocking Forsburn back offstage after he has already used Neutral Special to recover.
• Forward Special clone toss recovery window air acceleration: 0.72 > 0.4
  • This reduces his aerial drift after using this move while recovering.
• Clone can now be detonated during the Special Fall window of Up Special.
• Adjusted Super Clone attack choices to be consistent based on the target’s relative location, similar to how it worked in Rivals of Aether.
• Up Special aerial recovery: 15 > 20
  • Forsburn has more landing lag if he lands during the Aerial Recovery window instead of the Special Fall window, so this means he will need to end the teleport higher to get the shorter landing lag.
• Teleporting into smoke with ground underneath it will now put Forsburn on the ground.
  • Previously, he would teleport to the center of the smoke cloud and then fall to the ground.
• Hitting an opponent will reset his Up Special smoke cancel count.
  • This allows Forsburn to be aggressive with his teleports and then recover afterward.
• Pressing left or right while Up Special is mid-teleport will make Forsburn face that direction when he reappears.
  • This gives the player more options when teleporting into smoke.
• Smoke cloud hurtbox size increased to match the visual better.
  • This helps opponents clear smoke effectively.
• Jab 1 and 2 damage: 4 > 3
• Jab 3 Knockback: 8 + 0.6 > 7 + 0.65
• Jab 3 recovery: 16 > 22
  • This creates more risk when throwing out this attack.
• Up Tilt multihit hitboxes rearranged to match the visual better.
• Up Tilt top multihit is now weaker to prevent the final hit from whiffing as often.
  • This should make this attack slightly more consistent as an anti-air.
• Forward Strong cape hit recovery: 21 > 27
  • We’re making this slightly more punishable since it has such long range.
• Forward Strong dagger knockback: 7 + 0.9 > 7 + 0.925
  • This gives a slight buff to its killpower at high percent.

Known Issues

It may or may not be obvious from the wall of text above, but we’ve been working hard to squash bugs and implements feedback from the community since launch. We have a brand new feedback board for the community to leave feedback and suggestions, so be sure to check that out!

If you encounter any bugs, please report them and let us know over in our official Discord.