Summer 2020 Test Realm 🌻
⛱️ Summer Test Realm ⛱️
As many of you know, Wizard101 receives 4 main updates per year: Winter, Fall, Spring, and Summer. Today (June 1st), Summer Test Realm was released and brought several new changes to the game. In this article will recap these changes and explain how they might change the game!
🦩 Grizzleheim Lore Spells Craftable 🦩
After nearly a year, KI has implemented crafting recipes for the Grizzleheim Lore Spells: Ratatoskr’s Spin, Grendel’s Amends, and Hammer of Thor.
Some of these are a little tricky to craft! Each spell costing 25 Amber; plus 50 Flying Squid Ink / 150 Diamonds for Grendel’s Amends and 150 Agave Nectar for Ratatoskr’s Spin.
However, a lot of people are grateful these spells are finally craftable rather than only dropping from a pack; especially Ratatoskr’s Spin, which is a game-changer for many Life wizards.
It is rumored that the Grizzlehiem Lore Spells and their TCs drop from Loremaster, but this is not yet confirmed.
🏐 Changes to Shadow Pips and Shadow Spells 🏐
Another major change to the game is the shadow pip nerfs. Here is the list:
As you can imagine, this brings a LOT of changes to both PvP and PvE.
– Fire From Above: Nerfed about 400 damage, and instead of leaving 3 fire traps, it leaves just one.
– Raging Bull: Nerfed about 100 damage, accuracy debuff changed from 25 to 30.
– Abominable Weaver: Nerfed about 400 damage, shield changed from 75 to 50.
– Glowbug Squall: Nerfed about 400 damage, removes 1 blade instead of all.
– Rusalka’s Wrath: Nerfed about 300 damage.
– Mystic Colossus: Nerfed about 400 damage, instead of shattering after the hit, removes one ward before hit.
– Hungry Caterpillar: Nerfed about 400 damage.
– Call of Khrulhu: Nerfed about 200 damage.
– Winged Sorrow: Buffed about 100 damage.
– Gaze of Fate: Nerfed 300 per hit (600 total).
This makes PvP especially less reliant on spamming shadow hits. Since the hits are much weaker (some of them even half of the original damage), people in PvE and PvE alike cannot spam shadow hits to kill enemies or players. For example, Squall only does slightly more than storm lord (about 40 more), which, in PvE, renders it basically useless and forces storms to have more strategy than Bugs first turn. Ice will also be a lot less reliant on Weaver Spam in PvP as it is much weaker and is now a regular tower shield, which many people are excited about. KI has stated that with a debuff in hits, there will also be a debuff in mobs to help PvE’s case. It is quite interesting that no Mirage shadow spells were touched, despite the request of many people on Social media. Wings of Fate and Life Scion are (for the time being) also untouched. In addition, KI has also changed how players get shadow pips.
KI has stated that once they make these changes, based on player damage output, they will nerf health of mobs and can do so very quickly based on this.
As you can see, Shadow Pips no longer rely on chance. This is a game-changer for PvP because people can no longer rely on shad-spam from chance. It looks like shadow pips will be reliant on a bar that is filled at a rate dependent on your “Shadow rating”. Personally, this makes a lot of sense as it is removing even more RNG from the game.
🐚 Changes to PvP Chat 🐚
KI is trying new steps to ensure that PvP is less toxic and a community for everyone. First, players are grouped into either a combatant (person on the sigil), spectator (someone watching), or outsider (someone who is outside of the PvP match). People fighting (combatants) can only talk with their team. Anyone outside of that team cannot talk to them. Spectators must be level 15 and PvP sergeant (550-600 rank) in order to talk in the match. This means no more throwaway accounts to be toxic on in PvP if your main account is muted. In time this will make PvP more enjoyable and less toxic for a lot of people. It also helps enforce that mutes are actually working as a punishment.
🏄 Character Model Improvements 🏄
Characters are now upgraded in graphics! In addition to this, the Magic Mirror will (in live realm) cost gold instead of crowns! A pleasant change, that many players will be happy about. Wizards now even blink! When you make a new wizard, you can now pick a preset of clothing to rock in Unicorn Way. Some of the Wizard City clothing has also been updated slightly, such as elegant gear.
☀️ The Daily Spiral ☀️
The Daily Spiral is basically a “News Page” that opens when you log into your character! It includes your Main Quest, Daily Assignment in detail, a link to the latest game news (which includes sales, updates, and more), event updates (such as Scroll of Fortune, Beastmoon, Pet Promenade), Crowns status, and “Item Recommendations.”
🕶️ Spells and Teasers 🕶️
In Test Realm, we can view 4 new Spellemental spells, which the Spellements are available from the Decius Test Shop in the Commons, and will most likely be from a Lore Pack in Live Realm.
This includes an Ice heal, a 4-pip death AOE with steal health, a 4-pip Spirit version of Spectral Blast, and a Fire spell which hits and steals a charm. @AussieThorn on Twitter made a video of all of the animations.
@KyleIceW on Twitter also showed a mysterious room in the Arcanum which could be in the next Arc.
🏝️ Final Thoughts 🏝️
People should wait and see how these changes (especially the nerfs to shadow spells) affect the game in both PvP and PvE before they make a judgement about them. It’s clear to see that this update is very poorly received, and some nerfs are read as extreme; but do remember that Test Realm is not permanent and the Dev Team will most likely make (many) more changes this month before it is put into Live Realm (it is called “Test Realm” for a reason). The new way players gain Shadow pips is intriguing, this could make PvP less RNG based. All in all, people should probably give the Devs a chance to change a few things. Someone even mentioned that we might not even need ice/fire ward on PvP pets with these new changes. We can only wait and see how this affects the new age of PvP while also abiding to PvE players’ wishes.
This article will be updated as more information comes out! You can read the update notes in detail here. Make sure you comment your opinions on this Test Realm!
Edit: Please don’t harass the Devs, even if they are making choices you don’t agree with, threatening and bullying is not going to help you get your way. They are real people with real jobs who are truly working to try to appease the community, and rest assured, they take it seriously. Thanking them is probably the least you can do. Leaving polite feedback is a great way to have ones opinions voiced to KI, which can be anything from a calm tweet tagging Wizard101 / the Devs or using #Wizard101, or using the top right bug icon in test realm and submitting a comment or feedback.
Thank you all,
-Nate Era