KINGDOMS OF GRIFFIA

Midpoint 2024 Update

NEWS

Hello Sprouts,

We are at the year's midpoint and wanted to release an update outlining our progress and direction. So far this year, we have made significant progress with many quality-of-life updates to the site's existing features. The art team has completed some of the missing lore, information, and assets for the Lore Tab and its overhaul. We are currently right on schedule, and the Capria Settlements are nearing completion, so stay tuned for that.

Let's start, as always, with changes that are live now. Please read the update thoroughly; this is another massive quality-of-life update impacting all users.

Mod Position - Live Now

Many ARPGs have teams of volunteer Moderators to assist in making the ARPG run smoothly, especially when a lot of the work is manual and requires a significant amount of human interaction. However, our site has reached a point where most moderation tasks have become automated, so Griffia can easily be managed with low approval times. This has always been our goal, which has been the case for a while now! As a result, we have decided that the mod position is no longer needed to support Griffia's needs. Our systems will only become more efficient and automated as time goes on.

Griffia would not have reached this point without moderators, but there is no more work for them to assist us with now or in the coming future, and they should be free to be players again. We want to humbly thank all those who have helped run this ARPG up to this point. Their contributions have been instrumental in getting us here, and their effort is greatly appreciated by us—the owners—and by the community.  

Incoming 2024  Features and Future Goals

Porting

Porting is now mandatory for some activities. We have already started requiring porting in design approvals and other areas of the ARPG and will slowly continue to introduce this requirement to most features on the site. If you have been waiting to do porting, we recommend you start now; the sooner you port your characters to the new system, the better. It is much faster and easier for approval to check the design history than our old system. Most DeviantART links are broken, making approval more difficult.

The next approval area to receive this change is Uploading Masterlist images (Avatar, Form 1, Form 2.) Beginning August 5th.

From there, we will add the requirement to activity approvals (Weekly Prompt, Trials, Classes.) ETA Fall 2024

We know porting looks daunting, but it is a very long read. As a small incentive, players who port their characters will have access to the new Bloomsday feature!

Bloomsdays - Coming Soon

New and Ported Griffians will have their Bloomday's listed on their Masterlists. Meaning that Bloomdays will now be searchable on the Masterlist. Users can quickly check out which day characters were created and share them with others! These Bloomdays will be created automatically and added as default information on all new characters upon creation once this change goes live.

Mascots - Coming Soon

After automating the site's account-bound [AB] feature, maintaining our original tracking system is no longer necessary. We have reached a point where we can remove outdated restrictions, allowing Maze and Haze to have the customization many users have requested for years. Mascots will now be able to have theme and design changes by using the Dye Fruit. The only remaining restriction we will enforce is the gene color restriction (White for Maze, Black for Haze).  

To kick things off, we will be hosting an activity at our next major event where users can change their mascot's theme for free. After that, we will release the "Mascot Theme Biscuit" item for this purpose. Once the item is ready, all current mascots will receive it for free, regardless of whether their theme has already been changed during the event.

All new Mascot approvals will need to choose a theme upon creation. Since Mascots are their own species, they have no theme restrictions. This means Mascots can use any open theme within their species if it isn't taken by another Mascot.

[CYO] & NO Griffolk Theme Changes - Coming Soon

After automating the Account Bound [AB] feature and adding a searchable CYO tag, there is no longer a need to maintain our old "NO" tracking system for the following Subtypes:

- Cruxfaunt - Perfaunt
- Dream - Guardian
- Fest - Foolee
- Field - Bagbean 
- Hunter - Bavom
- Ion - Terradragon
- Jollytox - Kryptox
- Pond - Fashion Fishy
- Prometheus - Parasplicer
- Runelee - Fornlee
- Sirius - Caster

Once the change is live, all the above character Subtypes will receive a free Griffolk Theme Biscuit. The theme rules will be updated to reflect this change. All Subtypes, except the Field Bagbean, will have no theme restrictions. The Field Bagbean will be restricted to animal(Fauna), plant(Floral), and food(Nomnom) themes.

Shifting Focuses  - Coming Later

Our primary focus has been creating new lore and building infrastructure for quite some time. We haven't had much time to dedicate to the economy and game features unless it was necessary to improve infrastructure. However, this is about to change. We aim to finish our current lore projects by December 2024, and the programmer is moving from quality-of-life updates to new features soon. We have already begun some background work for future Activities, Achievements, and improvements to the game's economy and features that will come after we complete the lore.

What is the Future of Economy Balancing and Item Distribution?

In the future, we aim to separate the types of items won in different games to improve the gaming experience. We will make drops from Sidekicks and Chronopods even more specialized so they do not duplicate the most common items won everywhere.   

Crafting Materials will be a significant part of our vision for future prizes.

Our current ARPG has a surplus of similar items obtained from various activities. As a result, many of the game's items are exchanged for GC in the Void Well. We know the game desperately needs balancing, and we plan to balance the costs, prizes, and distribution of items as more game systems are completed.

Item Changes

1. Petitions - Coming Soon

Petitions will change from Awards to Trinkets. They do not fit into the future achievement system, so this decision allows us to keep them as items. They will be transferable between characters and users.

2. Void Essence - Coming Soon

Void Essence will be transferable between characters but will remain account-bound for now.  This item is still being investigated.

3. Subtype Fruit for Companions - Coming Soon

We have heard the feedback and agree that Companions will have their own Subtype Fruit. This new fruit will be a variant of the existing Subtype Fruit. The names will be updated to reflect their function, and the Subtype Fruit for Companions will be significantly less expensive than the Griffolk Subtype Fruit.

Love Items in the Market - Coming Soon

Love Petals and Love Vouchers will finally become a part of the Market for a GC amount rather than a random chance through Winning Flower. This has been feedback for a long time, and we are very happy to unveil this change for the community. 

The value of this item will fluctuate each month depending on how many are purchased by the community. This will become the first item to receive this treatment as we step back into economy balancing. We believe that creating your own characters is an integral part of the ARPG, and we always want it to feel like you acquire items by actively playing the ARPG rather than by chance.

Important: Love Vouchers and Love Petals will be added to the Market on August 1st and removed from Winning Flower when it's no longer September 2024, giving us three months to monitor the economy.

Initial Love Item Starting Prices (August 2024):

Love Voucer = 15K Gold Coins

Love Petal = 5K Gold Coins

Winning Flower  - Coming Later

The day has finally come: We are closing the Winning Flower and replacing it. We no longer need it as a GC sink now that Love Items will be available in our markets. 

We will replace Winning Flower with a Community Garden run by the NPC's Agnes, Famora, and Bisque. This game will be a free-to-play daily item roller to acquire the most basic items. The activity will expand from upgrades and community interaction. It will not have any high-value items in the loot pool. More on this game closer to its finalization.

When we retire the Winning Flower, the Smol/Swol exclusive to this game will no longer be available as loot in the ARPG, so collect them now while the game is still active.

Winning Flower will remain live until the end of 2024 without the Love Items unless the Community Garden is completed earlier than planned. If not, it will retire on January 1st, 2025.

Treasure Hunt - Coming Later

Treasure Hunt will be expanding. We will exchange the current map with Quest's Treasure Map, which will become the game's default map. 

In the future, we will add different unlockable maps for this game with varying pools of items and intractability with your Griffolk's Tools and Companions. As we go further, we will update you. 

Quest's map will be added on August 5th and will only award Gold Coins. The Swols exclusive to this game will no longer be available as loot in the ARPG, so collect them now while the current map is active.

Market

We've decided to remove the requirement of owning Eather Bracelets to use the Eather Forge to improve gameplay. Our future vision for the Eather Forge is to serve as a hub for altering the appearance of Tools, Gear, and Sidekicks. Requiring the Eather Bracelet creates a barrier for new players due to the content we want to introduce through the shop.

This shop will be a cosmetic shop for making visual changes and will function as a valuable GC sink for players looking to personalize their Griffians' gear and Masterlists.

For example, when we complete the achievement system and "Documentation" becomes an achievement, Portal Passes will remain as gear earned from the Starter Trial.

The current three portal passes will be combined into a single basic-looking portal pass. This pass can be visually upgraded to match your Griffolk's aesthetic with new designs available, including the original Capria, Beania, and Fluffia covers for that hint of nostalgia.

Time Loot/ Time Plot - No ETA

We will take this opportunity to mention again the plans for this game. The current Time Loot is a temporary clicker game. The replacement will be a management strategy game. However, unlike our other games, it must be "fed" the time items to fuel your loot results and recharge chronopods, and it will have many more new features. We want to remind users that it has been some time since we mentioned the direction for the Time Plot game. As we go further, we will update you. 

Reminder to save all your time, water, and time fertilizer that you receive.