Update Notes: February 23, 2024

Welcome to another exciting PG update! Can you believe it's late February already? Today's update has the usual set of additions, improvements, fixes and tweaks, of course -- but the biggest news is an extensive update to the map system! (You know, that sounded more exciting in my head.) Let's take a look!

Updated Map System
One of PG's charms is the sheer amount of exploration available. It's a big world filled with hundreds of people and places to remember, each with their own lore and likes and history to explore. There are hundreds of skills to learn, thousands of items to collect, trade, or gift - the world is wide open! But keeping track of all of that in a way that makes it fun for you to explore the world and set your own goals - especially in relation to NPC management - has been a bit of a long-standing problem for us.

To address that, we've taken a hard look at the map system in Project: Gorgon and made some pretty sweeping improvements. The in-game map now lets you view NPCs, portals, meditation pillars, and teleport platforms as you discover them; even better, you can now find some of the most critical info about NPCs in your area at a glance -- which can really help you decide what you want to focus on.

Let's look at the details:
NPCs: After meeting an NPC for the first time, they'll show up on your map. Their list of known services and item preferences are displayed, showing more and more information as you uncover them. Your current favor level with that NPC is displayed, alongside any new unlocks you'll get when you level up their favor. You can also take custom notes on any NPC.
Teleport Platforms: You can now see Teleport Platforms on the map, with how many times you've used each one.
Meditation Pillars: You can now see Meditation Pillars on the map, with the corresponding Combo that's granted when you meditate at one.
Portals: You can now see portals to other areas/dungeons on the map.
Filters: Don't want all the new info cluttering up your map? Simply turn them off!
Pin Customization: There's now a more intuitive UI for customizing your own map pins, with extra color options.
Pets: Your pets now show up on the map, and can be clicked on to see which one has fallen behind.
Minimap: The minimap has gotten a visual upgrade. You can easily toggle between seeing all pins, personal pins only, or no pins at all on the mini-map.

We're excited to develop these ideas further with the ultimate goal of making it easier to set your own goals and explore the world of Alharth in your own way. And we're eager for all your feedback on the new map!

VIP Program
Recently, many players have been reaching out to us to ask how they might continue to support PG now that they've purchased the game. There are a few different ways: for example, the Gorgon Shop sells backer packages that are meant for this purpose specifically and which include some neat features like extra character slots or a custom title. Or if you prefer, you can also donate money directly to us. Our community has been amazingly generous; it's impossible to say just how much the extra support has helped us.

But we've noticed that many players aren't aware of the other program that's available if you'd like to kick in some extra monetary support: the VIP program. VIPs pay a small monthly charge through Steam, and in return they get a bunch of small benefits and fun stuff, like extra character slots and regular gift redemptions. (Backer pacakges usually include some VIP time as well.) In this update we've tried to make it more obvious what being a VIP entails (without being too annoying about it) by adding a small button on the sidebar that opens the VIP panel.

We've also added a cool new system for VIP emotes in this update. These are emotes -- slash commands that make your character do an animation -- that can only be used by current VIP members. The first one we're introducing is /flex; we'll be adding more very soon.

And VIP members: Don't forget to check your redemptions regularly! You may find some fun little gifts in there. (You can find those in the Persona panel on the right-hand sidebar, under the icon of a present. Or you can type /redeem in chat.)

"Hardcore Living"
There's a new skill, "Hardcore Living". Hardcore players earn XP in this skill when you kill a monster whose level is at least as high as your Hardcore Living skill. There are already some inherent benefits to leveling this skill, but its primary purpose will come in the future: we plan to use it as a "gating skill" on Hardcore gear. Currently, Hardcore gear mostly uses Endurance as its gating skill, and that seems weird.

(We haven't updated Hardcore gear to require this new skill yet -- we wanted to give you time to level this skill first.)

Monster Adjustments
New experimental monster behavior: Monsters no longer chase players as far if they've only taken minor damage and are unable to land a hit.
New experimental monster behavior: Monsters who are called in to assist their friends are slightly less dogged in how long they chase.
Improved some loot drop unique stats for Boss Gauntlet bosses.
Fixed AI bug: during the first second of combat, monsters could choose to use their self-buff even if no other allies were supporting them.
Orc monsters' reaction to being slowed or being unable to chase their attacker is to throw a Khopis; this Khopis now slows their opponent.
Aktaari that are slowed or unable to successfully chase their attacker use a new slowing spittle attack.
Spriggan Weeds have unique combat behaviors (instead of using generic animal logic).
The Big Slime in Carpal Tunnels should no longer summon level 90 slimes.

Abilities & Combat & Loot
Abilities that have a chance for critical hits now display this info in their ability tooltips.
Minor change to Hammer treasure effect: (Necklace, Ring) "Reckless Slam deals +89 damage and taunts -345" => "Recklass Slam deals +105 damage"
Alchemical item "Aiming Potion" now applies to critical hits from anatomy criticals as well as phrenology criticals.
Alchemy items "Telka's Teeth": all tiers now last 15 minutes.
Changed treasure effect: "Long Shot increases target's vulnerability to Trauma and Acid +10% for 20 seconds. (Max of 2 stacks.)" => now also debuffs Poison
Changed treasure effect: "Tundra Spikes stuns all targets after a 6 second delay" => 8-second delay. (The top tiers of this effect were reduced because the delay was too short to take full advantage of.)
New treasure effect: Archery: (Chest, OffHand): "Acid Arrow deals 365 Poison damage after a 6-second delay"
Low-level item "Ring of Critical Hits" now applies to anatomy criticals as well as phrenology crits. (Just because it should.)
"Bounding escape dispels any active Slow or Root effects..." now works on Ice Cocoon.
Fixed scaling on high-level Provoke Undead & Raise Zombie abilities.

Other
Added new basic emotes: /point, /yes, /no, /agree, /nod, /disagree
New command: /target <entity name> targets the closest entity whose name matches or contains the text. This is rudimentary right now, and does not affect the order of tab-targeting. /ta is an alias.
Added 2 new hotkeys: Select Next Pet & Select Previous Pet.
Right-clicking a pet's state (Attack, Follow, etc.) now sets that state for all active pets.
When a pet is selected, its name now highlights in the pet window.
Item rarity and level overlay now applies to storage & merchant UIs.
Vendor item prices now update in real-time, if e.g. you buy back all of the items you previously sold the vendor, or a player updates their store's pricing.
Attempting to Stow an item with a max carryable amount into a maxed stack no longer deletes the item.
Added right-click menu options for turning mushrooms into powders.
Fixed right-click menu options for Hides (to easily convert them to leather rolls).
Low level Werewolf Hind Leg Guards (Enchanted) recipes only require the non-enchanted versions now.
Fixed teleport platform in Serbule Hills that would cause Foxes to fall under the world.
Kur now uses dark versions of map icons.
Fixed bug causing Book UI button text to overflow the button.