COX 2 Ver. 1.40.94 released!

MORE STUFF! LESS BUGS! BETTER BALANCE!

This update contains a lot of new content, but as much emphasis was put on improving balance between different religions and - as always - bug fixes.  In addition to the work directly on game/graphics/sounds, I spent more than 250 hours dilligently playtesting over the last 3 months.  Check out below just what's been added and improved.

This update does modify the preferences file, which means a new one is included, even in the patch.  So be aware, you will have to reset your options in the Options menu after updating.  The addition of the Irresistible Dance spell also means save games from this version are incompatible with earlier versions of the game, and vice-versa, meaning if you install the newest version and try to continue an earlier game, you'll probably get some pretty obvious errors.  Finish any current runs before installing the newest version!

Huge thank you to all the community members who offered their suggestions and bug reports, many of which have been incorporated/addressed herein.  These include, but are surely not limited to: Gokudera ElPsyCongroo, zyrax fairfeather, Wiglaf and CX-V1P.

Major Improvements:

- 30 New Monsters: Anakim, Grimble, Eye Midge, Fenodoree, Orek, Subterranean Lizard Man, Blood Lasher, Giant Ferret, Flame Horror, Swamp Troll, Black Flame Fiend, Giant Fiddler Spider, Grogorian Priest, Groaning Spirit, Amphisbaena, Hungry Floor, Shadow Mastiff, Beelzeboar, Rock Monster, Five Eyed Terror, Tremor Worm, Vulpitharian, Fext, Megalosaurus, Humbaba, Glyptodon, Yagno Demon, Fog Giant, Leshy, Assassin Bug.

- 1 New playable race: Half-troll.

- 6 New Perks: Totem’s Rule, Foes are Tasty, Destroy Surroundings, Favoured by Trollish Gods, Befriend Troll, Ferocity.

- 2 New Map Tiles: Swarming Insects, Sludge.

- 4 New Spells: Acid Blast (monsters can cast, too), Acid Bomb (monsters can cast, too), Irresistible Dance (monsters can cast, too), Locate Exits.

- 4 New Booby Traps: Lightning Trap, Fireball Trap, Jetting Frost Trap, Box of Wasps Trap.

- 6 New Mundane Items: Lightning Trap Kit, Fireball Trap Kit, Jetting Frost Trap Kit, Hidden Scorpion Trap Kit, Box of Wasps Trap Kit, Ten Foot Pole.

- 6 New Magic Items: Chimes of Opening, Endless Bucket of Water, Chimes of Hunger, Magi-Mechanical Bore Box, Sextant of Wayfinding, Sentinel Seeds.

- 3 New Weapon Enchantments: of Swarming/of Infestation/of Hive Wrath.

- 3 New Jewellery Enchantments: Veiled/Shrouded/Dissimulating.

Minor Improvements:

- Updated manual.

- Adjusted the readme file to correct one instance of outdated info, a typo and a little omitted data.

- New Option: Animate Title Screen. Set in the options menu, and saving in your preference file once set, this option dictates whether or not the title screen and Character Creation screen are animated. When set to ‘NO’, the intitial load of the game will be faster, but the torches on the title screen will be static and the transition to the Character Creation screen will be instantaneous. It defaults to yes.

- High scores will now also record the Dungeon Level at which you perished (as “on DL X”). It won’t do this for victorious scores, as those always and automatically occur on DL 30. If you died in a Lair or Legendary Land, it will include the title of the level, as well.

- The Disease Tab will now also include queryable stats for your cumulative chance to resist any generic disease, as well as your cumulative chance to shed any generic disease with each new map entered. Because of this extra info, the Disease Tab button is also now permanently visible on the Character Tab, though it will be grayed out if you have no Diseases.

- Unarmed Fighting skill has been buffed. Instead of adding 0-4/0-8/0-12 damage when you hit unarmed, it will now add 1-4/2-8/3-12 damage, to make sure the skill is valuable enough to take.

- Prayers have been made even MORE common - now as common as Scrolls - to incentivize good relationships with gods other than your own, to increase the value of Piety skill, and to make Pantos easier to worship (and because they’re cool).

- For the above reason, Pantosian worshippers now only gain 10 Faith, instead of 20, each time they activate a Prayer (whether it succeeds or not). They still get 20 from worshipping at any Altar or Shrine.

- Killing Water Confined monsters now rewards those who worship Maleviak with 20 Faith instead of 10, to make Her easier to worship.

- Any time an NPC is killed it will now cost you 1% relationship with Feighmorias and, if She is your Goddess, 10 Faith. This was done to further balance the ease or difficulty of worshipping any individual deity.

- The Glyph of Ruination Miracle/Prayer now turns your square to a Glyph of Ruination, rather than have you select an adjacent square. This was done to correct an error that disallowed using the keyboard to select the square, as well as to make it uniform with the similar Witchhunter Perk, Sigil of Goodness. The Glyph will not be immediately destroyed by your presence, and the miracle may only be cast in an Empty Space. It will be destroyed if you don’t leave the square on your next turn.

- The Act of Destruction miracle will now turn squares to Rubble instead of Empty Space, because that feels more destructive.

- Auto-walks and Auto-waits will now be interrupted every time you take damage from poison. This was done both to keep the game’s reaction to poison damage the same as for every other source of damage, and to save players who weren’t thinking from killing themselves with a long walk or wait.

- Added new sound effect for each time you take damage from being poisoned.

- Added new sound effect for when you try to activate a Wand/Staff/Rod but fail.

- Recorded 3 new phrases for Spell Merchants to say when you buy from them, since I realized they didn’t have any unique phrases.

- Monsters inhaling Poison Gas and becoming poisoned to a severity greater than what they previously were will now make the poisoned noise at the appropriate volume.

- When you become Nauseous from being in the presence of a Cave Harvestman, the game will now make the “choke” noise.

- Wandering Walls (most common during a Reality Breakdown event) will now make a grating sound when they move, and a cracking sound when they fracture. Wandering Stairs will also make the grating sound when moving.

- Weapons of Talent/Skillfulness/Genius that earn you a Skill Point will now scroll “Skill Points” and “1” in addition to playing their sound effect.

- Throwing Club has been added to the list of Weapons that are considered Clubs... because it’s right there in the title, isn’t it?

- Harsh Taskmasters now deal out Physical damage instead of damage of an unspecified type.

- While Blind, your auto-walks/auto-waits can no longer be interrupted by your sighting monsters or by them being nearby, since you shouldn’t be aware of them anyway.

- Likewise, while Blind, you’ll no longer have an auto-walk/auto-wait interrupt by an adjacent Mine Cart, since you have no idea it’s there.

- Neither Mimics nor Hungry Books can begin inside Monster Cages anymore, since this would immediately reveal the nature of their deception.

- Hot Coals and Snow will be slightly less common (average 1 in 50 chance on a level instead of 1 in 45) because the addition of Sludge adds a third, similar type of obstacle.

- Attempting to plant Dragon Teeth in an occupied square (which won’t work) will no longer cost you a Dragon Tooth.

- Weapons that supply fractional multipliers to their damage will now round off those numbers more appropriately, and the combat results will more closely match the forecasted damage when the weapon is queried (this could occasionally be off by 1 point before).

- Removed redundant text when you gain or improve your Death Comes To All perk. (It used to say “X times per map you may activate this perk by activating it”...).

- Removed redundant text when you query a known Befouled Potion. (It used to say “You may activate the Befouled Potion by activating it.”).

- Removed redundant text when you gain or improve your Pilgrimage perk. (It used to say “X times per map you may activate this perk by activating it”...).

- Reworded Dracon queries to indicate that their Acid breath is only used once per “combat round” instead of once per “turn”, since they won’t do it if they’re not in combat.

Bug Fixes:

- Fixed missing deadmagog.png file which caused Magogs to be completely invisible in game.

- Fixed error causing Xeromancers to appear invisible.

- Fixed error when loading Werebear graphics rendering all Werebears invisible.

- Fixed major error causing use of the Survivor’s Against All Odds perk to neither lower its Uses Remaining, nor to take your turn.

- Fixed serious error lowering Maleviak’s relationship with you when you killed a Water Confined monster, instead of raising it.

- Fixed error when querying Maleviak in the stats menu, not mentioning that She likes it when you kill Water Confined enemies.

- Fixed error with Insect Plague miracle causing monsters who die from the swarm not to reward you with Faith/Experience/etc.

- Fixed bug that could freeze the game during map generation in any Lair with a mandated lake.

- Fixed rare bug that could freeze the game during map generation if the generator was insanely successful at generating Iron Bars.

- Fixed bug that would, for the time being, freeze the game when enacting a Wolf Hunt event if the event occurred on Dungeon Level 4 or lower. This is because the game would try to place a level appropriate were-beast, and none such exist in the game currently. When such a monster exists (soon), this fix will be removed, but for now, if the event occurs at Dungeon Level 4 or lower, it automatically places a Werebat (the current lowest level were-beast).

- Fixed bug where occasionally icons for temporary positive or negative effects were left permanently visible even after their status had expired. While I’ve dealt with bugs of this nature in the past, the fact that they still very rarely happen led me to introduce this blanket fix - at the start of your turn before it does anything else, it checks every status - if that status is 0 (inactive), it removes the icon.

- Fixed error causing Female Merfolk characters to start with 5 more Strength than they should have.

- Fixed bugs where killing monsters with Friendly Boulder Traps, Friendly Sand Traps, Friendly Spiked Springboard Traps or Friendly Stone Stomping Foot Traps would not reward the player with Experience.

- Fixed missing Stairs in Maran’s Slavehold.

- HOPEFULLY finally fixed the problem of Greasy players sliding into Stalagmites and Cave Columns and dying.

- Fixed error where, if you activated a Recharge Station, but then didn’t recharge anything, the game wouldn’t allow you to interact with any square until you rebooted.

- Fixed bugs with Bola, Hand Cannon, Flintlock Pistol, Duelling Pistol, Flintlock Rifle and Blunderbuss telling you the secondary Attribute you needed to successfully equip it is Max Health, when you actually need Intelligence.

- Fixed bug sometimes making the Strength Required or Dexterity Required portion of a queried Improvised Weapon appear in red, even if you’d met those requirements.

- Fixed errors ignoring effects of Favour of Apollothene, Red Claw and Malachite Ward as well as your Monster Attractant status when determining if any piece of armour should be immune to having its condition lowered.

- Fixed error labelling Phantom Treasure in your spell list with other, incorrect spell names.

- Fixed bug causing Lightning Augmenters to continue to play the electrical sound effect even after they’ve been deactivated.

- Fixed bug outputting wrong odds of disabling a Lightning Augmenter when you queried it. (It was basing your odds on your Max Health, instead of on your Intelligence).

- Fixed error telling you a Large Spider had poisoned you when it had, in fact, only mildly poisoned you.

- Fixed error causing found Prestige Scrolls to pop up the message “You find a !”

- Fixed errors where Pukwudgies who were struck by the SECOND swing of an opposing monster wouldn’t damage that monster with their spines.

- Fixed error preventing player from resisting Cellar Sight caused in combat if the player already had Dameron’s Doubt.

- Fixed outdated code where monsters who could drain Spell Points when they hit weren’t doing that when they hit another monster, but were instead lowering that monster’s chance to cast spells at all - this was a holdover from a time when monsters didn’t have Spell Points.

- Fixed very rare instances where Bandits operating under a Bandit Chieftain and Outlaws operating under an Outlaw Chief wouldn’t steal your treasure when they hit you.

- Fixed errors that messed up the text output anytime a Bandit or Outlaw DID steal from you.

- Fixed multiple errors where some monsters that should get two attacks each round were, under certain circumstances, only getting one when fighting other monsters.

- Fixed multiple instances where the ability to detect invisible monsters was not allowing the player to detect as yet unencountered Giant Ant Lions. (Which, technically, aren’t invisible, merely underground, but the game effect should be treated the same, since it amounts to the same).

- Fixed error in Wild Dog Lairs where not all Bramble was being properly assigned its thickness.

- Fixed bug ensuring that Trophy Cases specifically attributed to a Lair by virtue of its type of Lair were never trapped.

- Fixed bug with Air Summons that wouldn’t allow the spell to summon any of the monsters added in 2024.

- Fixed error preventing Plant Growth miracle from growing either Redstain Fungus or Greenworm Vines.

- Fixed bug where it became impossible to use the Instant Sale perk if you were trying to do it in a square with discarded items. This doesn’t seem to be an issue with other similar situations, but to be honest, I don’t know why it’s not, so I’ll keep my eyes open.

- Fixed bug when querying Muriel’s Axe that was showing a very wrong calculation for its max damage (though it was doing correct damage during combat).

- Fixed multiple errors where any naturally Immobile monsters added in 2024 were showing up as if they were Entangled if seen through special means like Keen Smell.

- Fixed error causing Phantom Treasure not to work properly when paying Trainers.

- Fixed rare error in some Legendary Lands where a Cauldron wasn’t being properly initialized as a given type, causing it to potentially do nothing - now when the game finds such a Cauldron when loading the data, it randomly assigns it a type. (This was a holdover from early days of the game when a Cauldron’s type wasn’t determined until you interacted with it).

- Fixed error causing Scroll Merchants, Mundane Item Merchants, Magic Item Merchants, Jewellery Merchants and Wand Merchants encountered in Legendary Lands to have no inventory to sell. It’s possible that all current Legendary Lands were created before those NPCs even existed, meaning you never would have met one there anyway, but at the very least it’s fixed for the future when more Legendary Lands may be created.

- Fixed errors causing the following unique spellcasters in Legendary Lands to be spawned unable to cast spells: Grudt Szal, Indrix Varm, Allibor, Hem Dane, two unnamed Rakshasa Shamans, Brean Mas, and an unknown spellcaster in the Academy of Death.

- Fixed errors causing Kalvar and Thissos, two uniques in Legendary Lands, to have generic names, instead of their given names.

- Fixed error where, if you were dual wielding, whenever you hit a monster with the second equipped weapon, the sound effect would always be of fists hitting, instead of the sound of the remaining weapon. Also fixed bug having the same effect if you were dual wielding, but then unequipped your primary weapon.

- Fixed bug allowing hallucinated monsters to destroy Glyphs by entering them.

- Fixed error causing Rusty Spike Trap graphic to linger when you set such a trap.

- Fixed errors with Friendly Poison Needle Traps, Friendly Poison Dart Traps and Friendly Contact Poison Traps that could allow you to poison the monster to a specific level even if it was already poisoned to a higher level (effectively weakening the poison in its system).

- Fixed error causing the effects of Cellar Sight, in terms of what you can see on the map, to take effect the turn AFTER you contract the disease.

- Fixed error where the game didn’t ALWAYS turn your graphic to a werebeast graphic if you turned into a werebeast.

- Fixed error that always resulted in your graphic becoming a Wererat graphic when it DID change your graphic, regardless of the type of werebeast you were supposed to turn into.

- Fixed error not displaying the “T” in the Map screen on Coffins that are known to be trapped.

- Fixed error during query of Pantosian Shrine when you had Level 1 Child of the Mad God perk not stating that you have 2 chances of success.

- Fixed error during query of Baloraasinian Shrine when you had Level 1 Child of the Mad God perk telling you you DID have 2 chances of success.

- Fixed errors with Befouled Potions of Poison Immunity and Befouled Potions of E.S.P., telling you you’d found an Unknown Potion when you found them, even if your Alchemy Skill was at least Basic.

- Fixed errors when querying the Lair titles of 29 of the monsters added in the previous update that would leave sections of the output text blank.

- Fixed error not labelling a Palmistry Scroll as a Cantrip Scroll, and not including the text about how Cantrip Scrolls can be automatically identified.

- Fixed error that would accept a key press so rapidly after you agreed to Quit and Save that it could either immediately reload your game or re-enter the Caverns if you’d used Enter or Keypad Enter to affirm.

- Fixed error when a monster cast Colour Spray against another monster that would not allow the spell to have its Paralyzation effect if the monster was already Confused for 20 or more turns.

- Fixed error causing the turn on which an Impending Lightning Strike event will occur to be automatically revealed as soon as the Event is triggered at the start of a new map.

- Fixed bug that would occur during a Lightning Strike event, mingling the text output of the event with the text output of the Event screen, causing an unreadable mess.

- Fixed minor error (which probably had no effect whatsoever since all memory is freed automatically), not expressly freeing the memory for sated1.png or bigsated.png when you quit the game.

- Fixed error allowing Hungry Books to be visually recognizable for what they are even before they’ve been encountered.

- Fixed error allowing Hungry Books to make noise before they’ve been encountered.

- Fixed error not always graphically adjoining cave walls if one of them has a Tapestry on it.

- Fixed error not always graphically adjoining cave walls if one of them has Ancient Runes on it.

- Fixed error when querying Greenheart’s Greaves, not ouputting the bracketed defense rating that takes into account your Character Level.

- Fixed error causing the Polish miracle to appear in black instead of gray in your miracle list when you have at least 50 Faith Points, instead of the 65 Faith Points the miracle requires.

- Fixed error not displaying how many Spell Points an enemy Warlock has left, unless that Warlock is capable of casting spells in combat (as opposed to merely using the points for summons).

- Fixed error not displaying how many Spell Points an enemy Talltiowardan Witch has left.

- Fixed bug (I think) rarely allowing you to auto-walk onto Concealed Doors before you’ve even detected them.

- Fixed error causing the auto-walk to balk at crossing over an immobile monster who’s safely locked in a cage.

- Fixed bug causing Lightning Fields to remain visible, and their lighting effect to keep flickering, even if they’ve been deactivated.

- Fixed errors when asking Wandering Smith to repair Footwear, Legwear or Gloves that didn’t allow the Smith to name the item when confirming. (So it would read something like, “Have Smith repair for X gold pieces?”)

- Fixed error when buying a Spell Book from Spell Merchant that could rarely and suddenly swap voices for the Mundane Item Merchant.

- Fixed missing Pyerling death sound effect.

- Fixed outdated info when you query a Rod of Pestilence, claiming successfully using it gave an 85% chance the monster you’re fighting catches a random disease (as it used it to), intead of a 100% chance (as it does now).

- If you query the Mage Helm icon while a White Stag Sighting event is active, it will once again correctly tell you that the effect will remain in play until you leave the map (instead of perpetually telling you it had 1 turn left). (This had already been implemented got accidentally undone a few updates back).

- Fixed error with Xegexian Handaxe that wouldn’t scroll “Skill Points” and “1” when it earned you a Skill Point, if it was your second wielded weapon.

- Fixed error causing Merchants you free from Manacles to have no inventory to sell (which was, admittedly, realistic, but made them kind of useless).

- Fixed error not showing empty manacles on the wall after you free a Manacled Prisoner.

- Fixed errors causing Sense of Surroundings perk not to detect Submerged Cave Entrances or any of the Lair entrances added in 2024.

- Fixed bug that could mix up damage values between primary and secondary weapons when backstabbing.

- Fixed bug outputting gibberish in the Type: section when querying a Solidify Spirit Scroll.

- Fixed slightly wrong description of Lair when querying the lair title in a Dimetrodon Lair.

- Fixed incorrect placement of “Poison” symbol (and placement of the wrong sized symbol) when querying Blowgun or Stingray Spear. I’ve tried to set it up to adjust the placement if the damage line grows longer due to enchantments, but haven’t tested this yet.

- Fixed bug where the graphic was covering some of the quotation in the text output of the Tremors Event.

- Fixed error where the text from a Raelian Spy Network event would overwrite the Event’s graphic. I’ve respaced the text, and removed some of the flowery good wishes from Javiun Lalieth to ensure it no longer reaches the graphic.

- Fixed text overwrite in query of Lightning Augmenter.

- Fixed text overwrite in query of Shrink Spell Book (and reworded the text to make it clearer, to boot).

- Fixed text overwrite in query of Immolate miracle.

- Fixed text overwrite in query of Acid Breathing Dragon.

- Fixed text overwrite in query of Caped Faceless Demon.

- Fixed text overwrite in query of Duergar.

- Fixed text overwrite in query of any Tar Demon variant (other than standard).

- Fixed pluralization error when meditating at a Stained Glass Window, claiming, “You gain 1 Faith Points!”

- Fixed missing word in the query of and in the initial textual output of the gaining of the Tropical Touch Perk.

- Fixed typo when querying Wand of Grave Protection, calling it a Rod.

- Fixed typo when querying a Create Golem Spell Book, claiming the contained Spell is called Shrink.

- Fixed typo in query of Ghostly Grasp Gate title.

- Fixed a few typos when you avoid contracting certain diseases during combat telling you you’d avoided it because “you already have them” instead of “you already have it”.

- Fixed typo in text output of Hose Down spell.

- Fixed typos in text output of the acquirement of the Soul Collector perk at any level.

- Fixed typo in saved deathphrase when you “Went Hypothermic In a Icy Pit.” (should have beeen “an Icy Pit”).

- Fixed typo in text output of Inflation event.

- Fixed typo in text output when you gain the Level 1 Natural Enchanter perk.

- Fixed minor typo in recording of manner of death for the highscore screen when you are enshrouded by a Sheet Phantom, (formerly saying “Enshrouded by Sheet Phantom” instead of “Enshrouded by a Sheet Phantom”).

- Fixed typo in query of Recharge Prayer.

- Fixed typo in query of Prayer of Crystallization.

- Fixed typo in query of Scroll of Transmute to Gems.

- Fixed several typos in queries of any kind of Beanstalk.

- Fixed extra space in the middle of the name of Unnatural spellcasters.

- Fixed extra space in text output from a Detect Spirituality miracle in the rare event that it detects more than one Temple.

- Fixed typo in text output if you try to use the Create Ghoul miracle on something ineligible (an absent corpse or the wrong kind of corpse).

- Fixed typo in text output of Angel Sightings event.

- Fixed typo in query of Guardian Ancestors perk.

- Fixed typo in query of Reality Breakdown event.