Marvel Heroes 20xx

Marvel Heroes Patch 1.20

This is a large patch with many, many improvements to heroes and systems, game-wide.

Thanks to all the testers who helped the daily iterations on the patch and the developers who worked hard to make it happen!


Cosmic Chaos Event!

We?re happy to announce that Cosmic Chaos has returned!

Cosmic Bosses Drop Double Loot - All cosmic Terminal bosses, every time.

Cosmic Questions Answered - What is the answer to Life, The Universe and Everything? The answer is a 42% server-side multiplicative boost to Rare Item Find, Special Item Find and Experience for all your heroes.

Cosmic Prestige Doubled - Doubled leveling rate for Cosmic Prestige during Cosmic Chaos week.

Cosmic Doop Double Spawns - Midtown is more dangerous, with twin Cosmic Doops visiting occasionally.

Cosmic Doop X-Defense - Cosmic Doops can and will appear in Doop waves of X-Defense.

Cosmic Doop Simulation - Cosmic Doops can and will appear in Holo-Sim rounds 4 and higher.

Cosmic Chaos Supplier: Moondragon - An honorary member of the Guardians of the Galaxy and daughter of Drax the Destroyer, Moondragon is no stranger to cosmic chaos. During the Cosmic Chaos event, Moondragon will exchange Cosmic Worldstones for a variety of items:

The Power Cosmic Legendary Item

Runeword Crafting Recipe: The Power Doop

Runeword Crafting Recipe: Doop Inspiration

Crafting Recipe: Upgrade Epic Insignia to Cosmic

Portals for the Cosmic Doop Training Sector

Moondragon?s Cosmic Loot Container

Doop Ectoplasm Artifact

Doop Insignia

And the event exclusive Cosmic Doop Companion Pet!

In addition to Cosmic Worldstones, bosses and chests can also drop Worldstone Caches which contain at least 2 Cosmic Worldstones, a Cosmic item, and each have a very rare chance to drop Doop Runes, Random Cosmic Medallions, a Cosmic Upgrade Token, and many more Cosmic surprises!

Nova, The Human Rocket

The Human Rocket himself, Nova, has arrived in Marvel Heroes 2015!

Able to move in and out of combat effortlessly, Nova can use both his melee and ranged powers to defeat enemies quickly.

In addition to his hybrid powers, Nova can also utilize the Nova Force to create Pulsars - hotspots which detonate after some time for various effects or be detonated by many of his powers!

Cyclops Level 52 Review Notes

Overall

Cyclops has a lot of changes included in his level 52 design review. Everything from new powers, revised powers, new visuals, new animations, new sounds, increased power level and much respect for his iconic role in the Marvel universe.

Read on for a complete list of changes to Mr. Summers.

Optic Beams Tree

Snapshot Beams

Optic Blast and Piercing Blast have been upgraded, merged and replaced with a new power called Snapshot Beams.

Snapshot Beams has a brand new beam visual effect, pierces through targets, does bonus damage to slowed targets and deals increased critical damage to targets. Almost everything you could possibly hope for in a level 1 basic attack.

Ricochet Blast

Ricochet Blast retains it's place as a crowd-clearing basic attack, with a slight increase in attack speed, new beam functionality, new VFX and much improved animation.

Tactical Disengage

Tactical Disengage replaces Cunning Blast with improved visuals and a greatly reduced spirit cost. The beam from Tactical Disengage will damage and attach a powerful slow to all enemies in a line.

Explosive Blast

Explosive Blast has been redesign with new visuals, new animation, much more responsiveness and now directly impacts a ground location instead of exploding at the first enemy. It is also one of the options that Cyclops has of applying vulnerability.

Concussive Force

The Energy Damage bonus from this power has been buffed, the spirit penalty completely removed and the entire passive has been consolidated into other powers to save points.

Optic Beam

Channeled Blast has been reconcepted as Optic Beam (which is more correct) and upgraded to now receive bonus damage based on your attack speed. This makes the channeled power more competitive with other powers since it benefits from attack speed on items.

Shotgun Beam

Shotgun Beam has replaced Wide Beam with improved mechanics that include higher damage, a cooldown, a weaken application and a 5% bonus damage buff to melee powers after using the power. It now fills a niche for players who want to experiment with a melee or melee/ranged hybrid build.

Focused Beam

Focused Beam has been added as a single-target power, firing a continuous beam of force for sustained damage.

Optic Devastation

Optic Devastation is now an instant ability with a rotational cooldown and vastly increased damage. The role of this power is now a high impact damage layer that many players may wish to include in their damage rotation. The visuals have also been greatly improved. The impact of this power will knockdown enemies.

Visor Off

Cyclop?s new signature power, Visor Off uses the previous Ultimate power functionality with a few changes. It has a revised animation, it now provides an additional 50% damage mitigation while channeling (on top of your existing defenses), is more responsive and receives bonus damage from ranks in your ultimate power, like all signatures.

Fighting Expertise Tree

Cyclops is a highly-trained martial artist and has received a few upgrades to his Fighting Expertise power tree in the form of improved visuals, improved travel options and improved animations.

Punch Combo

Trained Punch has been replaced with a new combination of short range hand-to-hand attacks that include a hook kick, hook punch, spin kick and short range optic burst. This attack also applies the weakness debuff to enemies.

Tactical Kicks and Sweeping Kicks

Both now feature greatly improved kick combo animations and both apply vulnerability. Sweeping Kicks provide a damage buff for use in melee rotations, while tactical kicks have increased critical damage but have a cone of damage instead of 360 full arc. The Critical Hit Rating from Tactical Kicks has been migrated to a passive power that now affects all attacks, both melee and ranged.

Combat Roll and Evasive Roll

Both roll options remain intact for Cyclops, with either one providing the dodge boost after using.

Martial Arts

Scott?s Martial Arts passive remains intact as an option for melee players or players looking for a little extra defense.

My Ride

Cyclops now has access to his iconic motorcycle for efficient traveling. Custom license plate included.

Team Tactics

To honor the iconic leadership abilities of Cyclops, the biggest addition to this tree is the ability to deliver damage layers by calling in the 4 original X-Men to fly in and deliver their damage. Instead of summons, these Strike Team powers act very similar to any other power, but with a very flavorful visual for delivering the damage.

Each Strike Team member has a slightly different type of attack, some Energy, some Physical, some Melee and some Ranged, in addition to a burn option and bleed option, which allow interactions with various items and powers in the game.

Strike Team - Iceman

Bobby slides in to lay down an ice beam that slows and applies lasting damage to any enemies who pass through.

Strike Team - Angel

Warren executes a series of deadly flybys that pummel enemies in the targeted area.

Strike Team - Beast

Hank leaps in, executes a roll and leaps out, leaving enemies bleeding for a short duration.

Strike Team - Jean

Jean Grey uses her TK powers to hover a vehicle that Scott hits with an optic beam, creating and explosion and leaving burning injuries on the bad guys.

Master Tactician

Master Tactician is free at level 1 and combines the passive experience bonus from Team Leader and the activated ability of Tactical Command. It no longer stops movement when used.

By The Numbers

A passive that combines dodge rating, spirit regen, flat amount of spirit when dodging, his passive DOT on attacks and the Endurance team buff.

Overwatch

The speed increase has been replaced with damage layering to work in a much superior manner with damage layering.

Force Multiplier

A new super passive/active combo power that combines a now-doubled passive critical rating buff and team Dexterity buff, along with the active team crowd control breaking ability from the now consolidated Rallying Command and the passive projectile deflection and Energy damage bonus from Concussive Force.


Ultimate Power

?To Me, My X-Men!?

Cyclop?s new ultimate is the one he was born to have.

As the tactical leader of the X-Men, Cyclops utilizes all of his Strike Team members to help get the job done. Beast lays the smack down, Angel executes continuous flybys on targets, Jean uses her mental powers to defeat enemies and Iceman lays down ice blasts at whichever enemy Scott is targeting.

Cyclops also enjoys a the coveted Empowered team buff when using his Ultimate power, honoring his role as one of the top combat tacticians in the Marvel universe. This team buff increase the base damage of your and your allies by 40% for the duration of the ultimate power.


Psylocke - Quality of Life Review

Psi Energy (Secondary Resource) is now Psi Barrier, a damage shield mechanic rather than an alternate resource mechanic. All powers no longer require Psi Energy to use.

Psionic Constructs tree has been renamed to ?Psionic Combat?

Psi-Strike - No longer costs Psi Energy, now costs Spirit.

Shadow Dash - Movement is now instantaneous, allowing Psylocke to maneuver around fights with ninja-like speed. Now puts Psylocke into Stealth if she does not collide with an enemy. Power now resides in the Psionic Combat tree.

Psi-Knife - Now restores a percentage of Psi Barrier on hit.

Telekinetic Prowess - Passive has been rebuilt. Now provides damage rating, damage rating to unaware targets, increases Psi Barrier regeneration effects, and while Psi Barrier is above 50%, any damage dealt will leave a DoT on the victim.

Psionic Projection - This power is now a passive/active which creates a decoy whenever you enter stealth, and scales the damage of all Decoy powers in a single passive. The power can also be activated to enter stealth instantly on demand. Power now resides in the Psionic Combat tree.

Psi-Thrust - Now restores a percentage of Psi Barrier on hit.

Assassinate - Now usable while out of stealth. Base damage reduced, but now has an incredible damage increase if used while stealthed or invisible. Now has a brief cooldown. Power now resides in the Psionic Combat tree. Psionic Projections will now mimic Assassinate. Power has received new animation and visuals - Psylocke now uses the Psi-Knife when Assassinating instead of her katana. As a result (to keep her Ninja tree all Katana all day), Assassinate has moved to Psionic Combat.

Ninjutsu Strike - Art has now been updated to weave in katana slashes into the martial arts combo. Falling Lotus Strike - Psionic Projections will now mimic Falling Lotus Strike.

Deadly Assassin - Now provides spirit to Psylocke on critical strikes, and increases physical damage. Evasion has been removed from this passive in exchange for Psylocke?s new Psionic Barrier, a stronger and more consistent form of mitigation. Additionally, Deadly Assassin can now be toggled on to allow Psylocke to switch to using her Psi Katana weapon, converting all of her Ninja Assassin powers to mental damage.

Crossbow Construct - This power has moved into the Psionics tree and has replaced the former functionality of Psi-Crush. Psi-Crush has been removed from Psylocke.

Ethereal Butterflies (Signature) - Now restores Psionic Barrier for the duration.

Psionic Bow - This power has moved into the Psionics tree and is now a 7 second cooldown single activation power instead of a charge-up power. Provides a strong damage and spirit cost bonus to Ranged powers for a duration.

Psycho-Blast - Base damage massively increased. Now has a 7 second cooldown, and deals damage twice to targets that are both vulnerable and weakened. Knockback component removed.

Ghost Rider Quality of Life Review

Chain Thrash - Now provides health when hitting enemies afflicted by Hellfire. No longer weakens.

Chain Lash - Now deals bonus damage based on Ghost Rider?s percentage of missing spirit.

Judgment - Now deals bonus damage to elites and bosses, base attack speed increased to 1.0 per second, and has new animations.

Chain Snare - Spirit cost reduced to 20.

Condemn - Cooldown removed, now weakens enemies. If Ghost Rider Condemns an enemy afflicted with Hellfire, he gains physical damage rating for a short duration.

Chains Ablaze - Now provides Physical damage rating instead of Chain damage rating, and Critical Rating bonus is no longer restricted to Chain powers. The Active component has been rolled into the passive, turning Chains Ablaze into a pure passive. The former active component now restores Spirit and provides a large bonus to Physical damage when you strike an enemy afflicted by Hellfire with your Chain powers.

Flay - Now deals a large amount of bonus damage for each stack of Hellfire on each target hit, consuming the effects. No longer knocks down.

Hellfire - Now deals damage over time, stacking up to 3 times. Many powers in Ghost Rider?s power tree can apply stacks of Hellfire, while others take advantage of these stacks. This mechanic has replaced the ?Hellfire Debuff? located in the Spirit of Vengeance passive.

NEW Infernal Skull - A new single target ranged mental power has been added to Ghost Rider?s power tree.

Inferno - Add one stack of Hellfire on initial cast.

Infernal Will - This passive?s affixes have been merged into other passives, resulting in this power being removed from Ghost Rider?s power tree.

Damnation - Now adds one stack of Hellfire per tick of the channeled effect.

Protect the Innocents - Now includes the Health Regeneration bonus previously located on Infernal Will. The defense and projectile mitigation components now also are increased when Ghost Rider stands in Inferno. The proc effect on low health allies has been replaced with a Constitution team buff that is triggered for a long duration whenever Ghost Rider takes damage.

Penance Stare - Now channels for 2 seconds and ticks 4 times per second, resulting in many damage packets and incredibly higher overall damage values.

Wheelie - Now applies a stack of Hellfire to enemies hit.

Burn the Treads - Now applies a stack of Hellfire to enemies hit, with an additional stack being added if the power is fully charged.

Spirit of Vengeance - The Hellfire mechanic is now located in the Hellfire basic attack, and has been removed from Spirit of Vengeance. The low-health damage and mitigation component has been redesigned for ease of understanding. The power now triggers a damage rating and damage resistance buff for a short duration which stacks multiple times for each 25% of Ghost Rider?s health that is currently missing. This results in a more phased, noticeable buff as Ghost Rider?s health diminishes, and allows a greater portion of the damage resistance to work when Ghost Rider?s health is high.

Dread - Now has the standard Cleanse cooldown. The crowd control component can no longer be resisted by enemies.

Hell from Above - Damage massively increased. Cooldown increased to 8 seconds, but hitting with other Vengeance powers reduces the cooldown. Applies 3 stacks of Hellfire to enemies hit.

Ultimate - Now provides 40% damage negation while channeling, and automatically applies Hellfire stacks on all hits of the power. The chain portion of the Ultimate now deals physical damage (Hellfire spots still are mental), and the damage has been greatly increased.

Star-Lord Element Gun Tree Update

The Elemental Ammo mechanic now removes the spirit cost of all Element Gun powers while the ammo is active.

Elemental Shot is no longer a basic attack, now costs 15 spirit per use (when not using Elemental Ammo). The damage has been increased accordingly.

Elemental Basic - Shrapnel Shot (now named Empowering Shot) no longer fires random bullets on hit, but rather fires a consistent small Area packet of damage. Additionally, Star-Lord gains a stacking damage rating buff to Area powers for each Empowering Shot that connects with an enemy.

Earth - The projectile speed, range, and radius has been increased. Animation time decreased to match Fire and Water.

Air- Animation time increased to match Fire and Water.

Fire- Now counts as "Burn" status for itemization options.

Elemental Blast now has a 2 second cooldown with a tighter animation rather than using a charge and hold mechanic.

Elemental Blast - Piercing Blasts projectile now returns, and applies a stack of Air Vulnerability, increasing the damage of Air elemental gun powers. This effect stacks up to 2 times.

Elemental Blast - Thermal Blast impact radius increased 100%.

Elemental Blast - Seismic Blast initial area radius reduced, but the power now fires 3 shots per activation.

Close Quarters - Cooldown increased to 15 seconds.

Silver Surfer Update

NEW Power - Particle Burst - This new Power Cosmic spending beam attack pierces all enemies in front of Surfer, dealing high damage damage to the first target hit, and reduced damage to any further enemies hit. This provides an alternative to Electromagnetic Flux for players who like to stay on the move.

Electromagnetic Flux's Power Cosmic regeneration cancelling has been removed. The Power Cosmic ramping cost has been increased to 50% per phase.

Refracting Beam now bounces 7 times, up from 5.

Reconstruct and Deconstruct's animations have been sped up, allowing Surfer to quickly use them in a rotation.

Supspace Slipstream now consumes all stacks of Board Dash to increase Slipstream's damage and reduce its spirit cost, making it an incredible finisher after a series of Board Dashes. The ending animation has been sped up.

Board Dash now stacks up to a maximum of 20 times, and displays the current stack count on the buff bar.

Repulse now deals PBAoE damage and slows enemies that are nearby Surfer when he activates the power. Additionally, the microbeams fire at twice as many enemies while Surfer is airborne. The power now has a 4 second cooldown.

Cosmic Wake now increases damage rating to all Starfarer tree powers while toggled on.

Singularity cooldown reduced to 3 seconds. Ending explosion damage slightly increased.

Event Horizon (Signature) now restores Power Cosmic if Surfer is hovering above it, and instantly refreshes all cooldowns when activated.

Wasp Team-Up!

A founding Avenger, Wasp has joined Marvel Heroes 2015 as our latest Team-Up Hero!

Able to shrink down to a tiny size and fire bioelectric blasts, Wasp is able to assist your heroes in taking down even the largest enemies in style!

Max Camera Distance

The Camera Zoom distance has been changed! By changing a slider located at the bottom of the Graphics tab on the option menu, players can choose exactly how far they would like to be able to zoom out with the maximum distance being increased from its previous default threshold.
Cybernetics Improvements

Cybernetics Pets have a large quality-of-live improvement in this patch.

Starting with this patch, when you use a Cybernetics Vacuum, any gear for a node that is full will automatically pass down to the next eligible node and count towards unlocking that node.

This is particularly helpful for players with a lot of Rare Item Find who rarely find green / blue items.


Auto-Loot Feature

The Game Options menu now offers several significant improvements to looting options.

Auto-Loot Med Kits will automatically loot Med Kits directly into your inventory so you never have to pick them up. Click the box to enable auto-looting of Med Kits.

Auto-Loot Credits will automatically pick up all credits that drop, giving you full value instantly.

Vaporize Gear is available for slots 1-5. This feature allows you to individually specify each slot and each rarity tier to auto-loot directly into your Cybernetic pet (gaining upgrades to the appropriate cybernetics affix). If your Cybernetic Pet is completely full or your do not currently have a Pet equipped, you will get the credit value that you would get from a Cybernetics vacuum instead.

Needless to say, this will be a large quality-of-life improvement in many ways.

Ultimates with Summons

Ultimates that include one or more summoned allies have received a pass to deal much more damage and be extremely durable in difficult content.

Those powers now gain benefit from player stats, making them scale better with itemization.

They will now inherit the following stats from the player:

Damage Rating
Base Damage %
Critical Damage Rating
Brutal Damage Rating.

In addition, they inherit a much higher percentage of the player?s Health and Defense.

Finally, those summoned allies naturally regenerate 10% of their Health every second.

The following heroes have had their Ultimates improved with these new bonuses:

Black Widow
Cyclops
Daredevil
Emma Frost
Gambit
Iron Man
Taskmaster

Note that Summoned Ally Damage bonuses will still be far superior for summoners, but now even non-summoners will enjoy a benefit to their Ultimates that include any summoned allies.

Small Changes & Bug Fixes

A full review of VFX was performed, with several optimizations included that will moderately to greatly improve performance with certain video cards.

As with any hero level 52 review or quality of life review, unique items have been reviewed, sometimes resulting in targeted upgrades.

Heroes with QOL changes have received a free respec.

A.R.M.O.R. Drives and Cosmic Wordstones will now have off-screen pointers.

Due to changes to several powers and systems (such as the changes to Summon Ultimates) players will receive an automatic refund on their Omega Points.

Using the Cybernetics Vacuum while flying or riding a motorcycle will no longer create visual issues.

The fire visuals in the Red Surtur Raid will now properly appear without having to be defeated first.

Login rewards that were previously missing have been added and will be granted automatically.

Jean Grey?s Phoenix Drain will no longer be resisted by raid bosses.

Jean Grey?s Dark Phoenix will no longer display power upgrade messages when activated in Phoenix form.

Rocket Racoon - Groot's Charge move now correctly scales up in damage with power ranks.

Emma Frost?s A.I.M. Robot will now properly animate during Grand Nightmare.

Black Panther?s Exalted of Bast will now properly apply critical rating to Black Panther for the duration of the ultimate.

Omega System: Mr. Fantastic node now displays the correct amount of defense.

Players who use French or German should no longer have an issue purchasing some items from the store.



Known Issues

Cyclops can sometimes cancel a channel by pressing the Angel Strike Team power twice in succession (fixed next patch)

Psylocke can sometimes get into a bugged state (certain power dealing damage twice) under certain situations. (fixed next patch)

Angel Strike Team damage is tuned for 3 hits instead of 4. (fixed next patch)

Nova Pulsar Detonation is considered an enemy defeat. (fixed next patch)

Lightspeed Strike sounds effects can play too quickly. (fixed next patch)

Psi-Thrust incorrectly says it can stun. (fixed next patch)

Hell on Wheels doesn't apply Hellfire stacks. (fixed next patch)

Some group buffs are not displaying in the UI. (fixed next patch)

Golden Arrows of Cupid cannot currently swap blessings.

Boosts that stack in duration will not correctly report the extended duration in the buff bar until the next time you log into the game.

(...more added as they are reported)


Providing Feedback

This is a pretty huge patch, so we expect and desire a lot of feedback in a lot of areas.

For bug reports, please be sure to post in the specific bug report section so bug fixers can start working on them immediately. (as opposed to hero forums or general discussion).

For hero feedback, please use the specific official thread in each forum, which is checked by developers.

In Development

New Mode: Industry City Patrol in internal alpha testing. Scheduled for release alongside the big patch that includes Juggernaut. We'll need a couple of weeks of public testing starting in October.

Achievements: Steady daily progress and still on track to launch in 2014

Multi-Spec (testing next week)

Hardware Mouse (more testing, may launch next week)

Several PVP improvements as we move towards the end of beta, including full announcer support, achievements, new prizes and continual PVP-specific balance.

Juggernaut, Magneto and Venom on schedule for release in the upcoming months.

X-23 for later this year.

AXIS One-Shot story chapter, to tie in with Marvel Comics this fall.

Danger Room completely new game mode (formerly known as Endless Dungeon) for Christmas

Something Secret...

Havok, Spider-Woman, Clea and other Team-Up Heroes

Store Notes

Advance Pack 2:Advance Pack(last day for early bird X-23 bundle bonus)

Cosmic Heroes on sale (and a Cosmic Hero Bundle)!

Lady Mandarin Costume for Psylocke now on sale!

Cosmic Penta-Boost returns for a limited time.

Eternity Splinter Boost returns for a limited time.

Odin's Boost for a limited time (note, these include the Odin's Bounty explosion chance).