Patch 17 - Pre-Launch Patch

🏴 Levla Patch 17

Hello everyone, and welcome to Patch 17 of Levla, today is another mega patch packed with new content, features and changes! 🎉

Unfortunately, I didn't get the time to squeeze in everything that was supposed to be in this Patch, most importantly our upcoming Idle Mode, the next free-to-play region and guild content, so expect those to come out in the follow-up patch 17.1.

Anyway, there is a lot to go through here, and I really mean it, so maybe grab a drink or a snack before you jump into it, I put all the juicy things in the start and the more boring things in the end.

Enjoy!

📌 Short Disclaimer

Before we jump into what's new in Patch 17, I just wanted to say something regarding the state of Levla.

I am fully aware that it seems like Levla is very focused on the game elements right now, and that is 100% true, the focus for the last couple of weeks has been on the game world and content, the complexity and depth of the game world has skyrocketed from what it was in the early playtest.

And maybe, this might look to some like we are forgetting that Levla is a productivity / self-care app.

To that, I just want to say no! I have not forgotten about that at all, and I just wanted to remind you all that for the first month or so of the playtest, the focus was 90% on the "core" of Levla, and when that reached a state that was good enough, we shifted focus to the content side again.

So, I just wanted to make it clear that, once the content side is suited up for launch and systems are working and in place, we will of course shift the focus back onto the todo and habit part of the app!

📌 Slightly Shorter Disclaimer

Also, when you go through these patch notes, you might get overwhelmed by the amount of changes and new stuff, and that is understandable.

However, I want you to keep in mind that Levla is constantly improving, things might look chaotic when introduced at first, but then after iterating based on your feedback, suddenly features integrate seamlessly into our little (huge) app.

So, keep the feedback coming, and if I get something wrong, please let me know. I also want to give a small comment about that I know Levla can feel a lot more like a game recently, and I am working on that part too, I want to make sure that I have the freedom to build what I want, while still keeping it a low-effort app, but it might take a little bit of time to completely get there, but we will!

Alright, enough of this yapping, let's actually get into it.

⚔️ Patch 17 Content & Balance

This patch is packed with content and changes to many different parts of Levla.

👋 Goodbye, Old Levla <3

As this patch is the "launch preview patch", it was finally time to say goodbye to the old content of Levla, so:

• REMOVED: Location - Swamplands
• REMOVED: Dungeon - Goblin Cave
• REMOVED: Dungeon - Barbarian Village
• REMOVED: Dungeon - The Old Sewers
• REMOVED: Guild - The Inner Circle

As a thank you for participating in this playtesting content, a few titles have been added to anyone who had at least 1 clear of each dungeon, these will be playtester unique and can not be obtained ever again.

• KEPT: The Vile
• KEPT: The Wise
• NEW: The Barbarian
• NEW: The Cheese Lover

Active adventures, dungeon clears and bounty tasks connected with these regions have been auto-completed.

Note: Another cosmetic item is also getting added for anyone who earned reputation within The Inner Circle guild pre-launch.

🗺️ Levla World Navigation

In Patch 16 we introduced Port Kelda, which was the start of our world-building efforts.

The world-building was not only implemented for narrative purposes, but also to streamline progression both for you as a user but also for me as the game designer.

When I implemented Port Kelda, things really fell into place for me, and it has been an insane improvement to how I structure and introduce new content now.

However, Port Kelda was just slapped on top of our old adventure navigation system, which already was click intensive enough.

Flows like doing quests and keeping up to date with the objectives, or finding where an objective was, or something like talking to an NPC and then going back to todos was tedious.

So, in today's patch I have reworked the navigation system completely, let's get into it.

🎯 What my goal is

The goal of these changes are:

• To lower the amount of clicks between features of the app (e.g NPCs -> Todos)
• To make the UI feel faster
• To improve clarity for new and old users
• To keep the world-building benefits while still having good UX

🧭 New Tab Structure

First off on our world screen, it is now split into three tabs, Quests, Activities and World.

Quests are the same as before, with some very small changes.

Activities is just like our old Adventure tab, but with a major overhaul.

World is the old "Region/World" flow, use this if you want to get a more RPG vibe to how you use Levla.

Activities and World might be combined somehow in the future, perhaps in the form of a world map, but that's for another day!

🏞️ Activities

The activities tab comes with a huge overhaul.

Starting off, I have cleaned up the color usage a bit, so it doesn't look as chaotic on the eyes, before it was maybe hard to know where to look because it was so cluttered with many different colors, it's the same now, but only on the accents.

A new quests action has been added to the top, which can be used to quickly access any active quest objectives you may have, so now you don't need to do hundreds of clicks if you just quickly want to make progress on your quests.

Also new is the Creatures action, which kind of works like the old Regions/World action, but with the difference that it is now in-line (doesn't open nested new screens) and that it's more compact and quick, you can now also favorite a creature that you might be focusing on right now, either for a drop or just for training your skills.

Practice Skills, Resource Gathering and Dungeons have also received in-line navigation, which means that it will no longer open the nested screens and create this crazy go back flow if you want to go back to the home screen.

But also most importantly, Resource Gathering is now much clearer about everything that comes with resource gathering, you can now clearly see the requirements, harvests / hour, success rates and much more in the new UI.

Also, there is a conveniently placed back button in the bottom right corner!

I hope you will enjoy it, let me know what you think!

⚡ NEW: Quick Actions

Also in this patch comes the new Quick Actions, which are custom bindable actions you can create to quickly do something that you do repetitively, examples are:

• Mine Iron Ore
• Fish Tuna
• Cook Tuna
• Craft Iron Platebodies
• Fight Goblins

This new quick actions menu is available in the bottom right of the screen on the Worlds tab, this is our first version, and I haven't tested it too much yet, but let me know if it makes sense or if it just adds bloat.

🏔️ New Region: Jezkal Mountain (Members)

A new Members Only region drops this patch.

I've realized that questing isn't for everyone, and gating too much content behind quests can be annoying. So I've added another grind-only zone: Jezkal Mountain.

• 16 new monsters, all locked behind Bounty Level
• 8 of those monsters grant 5% bonus combat XP
• 1 new quest
• New boss: Simon, The Ice King
• New NPC trait: Frostbitten (requires Frost Protection)
• New item type: Trinket
• New ore: Adamant Ore
• New coal deposit with faster mining speed

🌲 New WIP Region: Kursewood (Free to play)

I'm actively working on a new free region that continues the storyline from Port Kelda.

Kursewood will include at least 4 new quests, a new best-in-slot unique necklace, 8 new monsters and a new dungeon with a boss.

Coming in Patch 17.1!

🎲 Random Events Updated

In patch 16.1, we introduced random events and the feedback on this system so far has been super positive which is awesome.

However it is very rare right now and I don't really want to spoil the chance of getting one just yet, but what I do want to do is to make it more common based on some type of scaling.

Therefore, from this patch, the chance of random events now gets a boost based on your agility level, starting at +0.2% all the way up to +20% at level 99, this makes agility even more attractive to level up (it is a very OP skill!)

This patch also introduces two new random events, which I am not going to spoil, the only thing I can say is that one of them might seem... familiar? Especially if you've been an active user of Levla since the playtest!

💍 Jewelry Content Changes

This update also comes with updates to jewelry and finalizes the jewelry content pre-launch, some of the things introduced here might be re-balanced at a later stage, but I am quite happy with the diversity right now.

✨ Enchanting Changes

Enchanting Jewelry previously required an Intelligence level of 30 to start, it has now been changed to level 10 and scales with what type of enchantment you wish to do.

Also, depending on the stone of the jewelry you're enchanting, different Ethers might be required.

✨ Enchanting UX Changes

Enchanting jewelry will now let you preview any enchantment even without having the required level or materials to do so, this is to help you see what types of enchantments are possible and to see what is required for each one.

🔨 Crafting Recipes & Changes

• CHANGE: Gold Bars now require 5 gold ore to be made
• CHANGE: Silver Bars now require 5 silver ore to be made
• NEW: There are now crafting recipes for rings up to amethyst
• NEW: There are now crafting recipes for amulets up to amethyst
• NEW: Opal, Jade and Topaz rings are now Silver-based rings
• NEW: Wooden Bowl (1 Oak Log)

📿 New Amulet Enchantments: Combat (F2P & Premium)

• NEW: Sapphire Amulet → Amulet of Defence
• NEW: Emerald Amulet → Amulet of Accuracy
• NEW: Ruby Amulet → Amulet of Might
• NEW: Diamond Amulet → Amulet of Balance
• NEW: Amethyst Amulet → Amulet of Destiny

💎 New Ring Enchantments: Combat (Premium)

• NEW: Sapphire Ring → Ring of Defence (Upgrade over Ring of Minor Defence)
• NEW: Emerald Ring → Ring of Accuracy
• NEW: Ruby Ring → Ring of Might
• NEW: Diamond Ring → Ring of Balance

💎 New Ring Enchantments: Special Effect (Premium)

There are also some new types of rings added which have special effects, to make sure these rings are not too overpowered, they degrade and crumble after some use.

These rings are intended to be used by users who like to play more actively, as these rings crumble and delete themselves once their effects have been used up.

• NEW: Opal Ring → Ring of Wisdom (2% XP Bonus from all sources)
• NEW: Jade Ring → Ring of Endurance (2% Bonus stamina from all sources)
• NEW: Topaz Ring → Ring of Gathering (2% Gathering Yield)
• NEW: Topaz Ring → Ring of Conservation (5% Chance that stamina is not consumed when killing a monster)
• NEW: Amethyst Ring → Ring of Fortune (2% Chance that a key doesn't get consumed when in a dungeon + 2% Drop rate increase)

📜 New Item: Ring Imbue Scroll

With the addition of special effect rings, I have also added a Ring Imbue Scroll, this can be purchased for Gold, Essence or Bounty Points.

The Imbue Scroll can be used on a Special Effects ring which will make their effects permanent so the ring no longer crumbles after usage.

The Ring Imbue Scroll has also been added to dungeon drop tables at a very rare rate.

📊 XP Balancing

I've also decided to do some XP balancing in preparation for launch, I remember during early-playtesting that nearly everyone thought that the XP rates were too fast early game, and since then I have done a few nerfs here and there, but I don't think it's enough.

So in today's patch I have done some XP nerfs, it is easier to Buff XP gains than to nerf them, so therefore I think we might as well drop them quite a bit and work our way up if needed.

• BALANCE: Level Scaling Dropped by 50% early-game, 30% mid-game, 20% late-game.
• BALANCE: All Crafting Recipes XP Rewards lowered
• BALANCE: All Resource gathering XP Rewards lowered

⚗️ Alchemy Changes

With the introduction of the locations Forgotten Pass and Smuggler's Tunnels new crafting secondaries got added, some of these are now used in Alchemy.

• CHANGE: Antipoison (Snake Fang → Spider Venom)
• CHANGE: Gatherer's Brew (Shrimps → Bear Claw)
• NEW: Antipoison now gives you a real poison protection and two usages of this have been added to this patch in other changes
• NEW: Freeze Ward Potion (Wyvern blood + Edelviss)

🛡️ New Equipment Slots

Two new equipment slots have also been added in this patch which are the Tabard and Trinket slots.

The Tabard slot will be used for our upcoming Tabards, and the new trinket slot will be used for special effect items.

🗡️ Bounty & Monster Slaying Changes

This patch also introduces a lot of changes to bounty and monster slaying, let's get into it.

☠️ Monster Traits: Poisonous & Frostbitten

Monsters can now be poisonous and frostbitten, this means that to engage with this monster you are going to need to be protected from either poison or frost damage.

This will not be super common but will affect some creatures here and there in the world, the goal here is to add more depth to certain areas to make sure Levla doesn't just feel like a flat list where you can mindlessly press "Fight" and wait.

Some activities will now require planning & preparation!

👹 Monster UI/UX changes

The monster UI/UX has also received some changes in this patch to help with a lot of the added complexity.

The monster UI will now show:

• If the monster has a Trait such as Frostbitten or Poisonous
• The Bounty requirement needed to engage with it
• The Bounty XP per kill
• If the monster has any boosted XP rates (New)

⚡ NEW: Quick Actions

To further help with the added complexity, there are now three new quick actions on the monster slaying screen for consuming food, potions or even applying buffs from spells.

🔮 NEW: Combat Forecast

A third tab has been added to the monster slaying screen where you can preview how an adventure where you spend 100 stamina would look, this is a way to understand if a monster is out of your league currently.

It will also give you recommendations based on the forecast, e.g if you need more food or if you need better equipment and stats.

🎯 Other Bounty Related Changes

• BALANCE: Bounty XP is now based on the enemy slain's hitpoints/health
• BALANCE: Easy bounty tasks: 5 → 10 Points
• BALANCE: Medium bounty tasks: 15 → 20 Points
• BALANCE: Hard bounty tasks: 30 → 35 Points
• SYSTEM: Added support for making certain monsters give boosted XP rates in both combat & Bounty
• SYSTEM: Added support for setting possible bounty monsters per Bounty Master
• SYSTEM: Added support for grouping bounty monsters (E.g, a Rats task can be progressed through Tunnel Rats, Giant Rats or Dock Rats)

🏰 Dungeon UI/UX Changes

Dungeons have received a parity update which aligns dungeons more with how the monster slaying interface looks and works, you can now view all the drops directly and there is a preview tab as well to get a better overview of how well you can handle the boss!

Dungeons have also received the quick actions which the monster interface received.

🪺 Birdnests & Mining Gem Drops

In a patch long time ago we implemented the chance to receive Birdnests when cutting logs and gems when mining rocks, these were never fully implemented into the game, this has been fixed in today's patch.

Both their drop tables have been updated and they have been added to all relevant resource nodes.

🐑 Quest: Baa-d Business

A new quest is available at Hillside within Port Kelda, this is a short quest that introduces a new resource: Sheep.

Sheep can be harvested for Ball of Wool using shears which you receive from the quest or which can be purchased from Revna's General Store.

Ball of Wool is used when stringing Jewelry.

🪨 New Spell: Stone Skin

As monsters are getting stronger and stronger in Levla, our characters are going to be needing more forms of protection beyond equipment and consumables.

So, this patch introduces our third spell: Stone Skin

Stone Skin will apply a 10% damage reduction from all sources for the next 4 hours.

This is a no-brainer to use when engaging in combat activities, as it will lower damage taken and also food consumed.

More versions of this spell will be added in the future when this spell has been evaluated and balanced.

🎁 Other Random New Items

Other items that have been added to this patch outside of the ones mentioned elsewhere in these patch notes are:

• NEW: Levla Membership Bond (Redeems 30 days premium)
• NEW: Greater Ether (Used in certain enchantments)
• NEW: Mystery Box (Random Event)
• NEW: Frostward Sigil (Permanent protection from Frost)

🏪 Trading Post Buy Offers

I've also added the support for buy offers on the trading post, which basically is a "buy listing", if you're looking for a specific item, you can now create a buy offer for that specific item, this will reserve the gold for the whole offer to make sure it can be paid for.

The trading post has also received a visual upgrade and UX improvements to make everything more clear.

📚 Knowledgebases: Items & NPCs

The content within the world of Levla is growing rapidly, especially now that we're getting closer to launch and we're closing the last gaps content wise, every patch is now adding more items, monsters and NPCs.

So to help with this a little, I have added two Knowledgebases that live on the settings screen, here you can browse all items and NPCs that exist in the world of Levla.

When it comes to NPCs though, only "discovered" NPCs will be visible.

Feel free to check it out!

🗜️ Asset Optimization

Right now there are over 500 images being used in our app to represent our game world, these have not been optimized and some are quite large, to help with file/bundle/data saving, I have in this patch optimized all images used, this might look initially like a big download for you when the patch drops, but this is just initially as it is replacing the old "unoptimized" images with the optimized ones!

If you are interested in seeing the gains we had from this optimization, they are:

• GUILDS: ~1MB
• LOCATIONS: ~5.5MB
• NPCS: ~33MB
• ITEMS: ~29MB
• TOTAL: ~68MB

This might not sound like a lot, but as we are going to be working on this app for years to come, this was a well needed optimization to future-proof the app!

🛠️ Game Data / Manifest Upgrade

For a long time now, our game data system has also had a lot of issues, there have been cases where some users are stuck on older game data, some cases where the game data is corrupt and it's just overall been a mess.

So I also decided to fix this ahead of launch, we now have a new update server which handles everything much nicer on the backend, so there should no longer be any cases where icons are missing or weird bugs like Druzil sending you on assassination missions.

🔧 Other Random Changes

• NEW: Added Greater Ether to Veigar's Curiosities
• CHANGE: Veigar's Curiosities moved to the new story region
• NEW: Added Ring Imbue Scroll to the Essence Shop, Druzil's Bounty Shop & The Gauntlet's Shop
• REMOVED: All old membership/premium limits (todos, habits, history, analytics etc)
• CHANGE: Shops that are locked behind quests or discovered locations are no longer accessible by default (they become accessible when unlocked through progression)
• CHANGE: Bumped up Greg's XP reward from 100 → 1500
• CHANGE: Drop rates are now rendered as fractions rather than % for better clarity.
• CHANGE: Updated the Drop table slightly on the Monster Slayer screen.
• CHANGE: Removed Amethyst from the Gem Trader
• NEW: New world building support: Change Dialogue Backgrounds, Change NPCs, hide NPCs.
• NEW: When a quest objective includes interacting with an NPC, it is now highlighted.
• NEW: Custom prompts are now added to the pool of daily reflections

🐛 Fixes

• FIX: Removed sapphire ring from mend spell.. what?
• FIX: You can no longer purchase premium/members items on the trading post as a non-member.
• FIX: Issue where equipping an item from the inventory would flash the unequipped item in the wrong inventory slot before settling in the right slot.
• FIX: Issue where using an item like an Ornament Kit, Scroll or such would recover an old stale cache of the inventory until an item change was made.
• FIX: Trading post no longer sticky header and search behavior fixed again.
• FIX: All logs now have different item icons
• FIX: Hidden bug where habits connected to skills would give double the XP
• FIX: Gem Trader XP per gems
• FIX: Typo (Scratch's Quarters)
• FIX: You can no longer start a dungeon you haven't discovered
• FIX: You can no longer access the bounty master without finishing the quest "Beneath Port Kelda".
• FIX: You can now scroll in the Move Items sheet when in sort mode
• FIX: Weird issue where tab navigation would disappear on android devices
• FIX: Issue where the late check in popup would crash android devices
• FIX: Issue on android where the settings sheets would render behind the small overlays when creating/editing habit/todos.
• FIX: Backlog habits filter not showing all skills
• FIX: Issue where if all reflection prompts were hidden, it would get stuck on "Loading Prompts", now it picks one randomly from your custom prompts
• FIX: Issue where if you did not have the expanded mode for creating/editing todos/habits and you press edit on a habit/todo, it would not open the overlay.
• FIX: You can now set a different date on a subtodo
• FIX: Issue where toasts would render under the sheets on android.
• FIX: Improved scroll behaviour on inventory tabs for android
• FIX: Issue where if a sheet was open behind the late check in popup, scrolling would scroll outside of the late check in popup.
• FIX: Issue where the leaderboard would show the wrong level and XP
• FIX: Issue where brother omar gives you a mithril pickaxe instead of lotus tea
• FIX: Some of brother omars dialogue options
• FIX: Issue with reward labels in the quest completion overlay for features and locations
• FIX: Issue where the confirmation dialog on the creation of habits/todos would render behind the backdrop
• FIX: Issue where stamina rewards would be applied wrongly on your characters stamina
• FIX: Issue where the adventure log/history wouldn't open
• FIX: Issue where we would not apply XP properly on adventure completions
• FIX: Issue where we would not update max health if vitality was leveled up
• FIX: Lots of issues with quest progression in our dialogue engine.
• FIX: Many weird UI bugs on the home screen for iOS.