Dev Blog

Alpha 5 is Coming to an End

Alpha 5 will be ending on December 1st, that's in 30 days from the time of this post being written. This will give you plenty of time to finish up any Alpha 5 goal and complete the two additional Alpha 5 goals that were just added. More on that later.

Other upcoming dates to note:

• The Halloween event will be shutting down on November 5th.
• The Beholder Boss will remain available until the end of November.
• Alpha 6 begins on December 1st!

New Profession: Brewing

Brewing is the first new profession added since the original Chef skill was added last year. This profession allows you to craft potions and poisons using herbs.

To get started with Brewing visit the Dizwin Merchant outside the Lighthouse to learn your first recipe. Then keep your eyes out on the other recipes as you explore and play the game. If you need a hint where to find any recipe visit a brewing cauldron to get the recipe discovery hints.

Making potions requires usually two ingredients. Either an Empty Vial or an existing Potion, in addition you also will need some herbs. Herbs you can find using the Botany profession, more on that below.

Once you have the recipe to make your first potion, and the supplies needed to make it, you need to find a brewing cauldron.  Brewing cauldrons are in every major town and sometimes may be found in other buildings and locations throughout the world. Currently there are 4 cauldrons for you to use. One of which is in the basement of the Lighthouse. Can you find the other 3?

Its important to note that to level brewing requires you to create potions of your current brewing level to get the most experience. Lower level potions will result in no experience gain. Also, please remember that you may not level your brewing (or any profession) higher than your character's level.

New Profession: Botany

As you explore the world you will come across new plants and herbs that you can interact with. Your botany skill will be used to collect them. If your botany isn't high enough you will be unable to collect it. So start off with the lowest level herbs in the starting zones of the game, and work your way through to the more rare and epic herbs. The higher the herb's level, the better the potion or poison it will make!

You do not need to complete any quest or learn the Botany skill. Simply find your first herb and away you go!

	Seamoss	Found on the various beaches of Domhan, usually growing on cliff faces near the sand.
	Chyme	Found in the grassy plans or fields of the Domhan Coastal regions. It also sometimes grows in forest timbers.
	Noctis Root	Found near cliffs and ridges. This thorny plant requires a skilled Botanist of level 2 or higher in order to pick.
	Faoin's Grasp	Found in dark caves and forests, usually near skulls or bones. This plant is very poison and requires a skilled Botanist of level 3 or higher in order to pick.
	Wildtail	Found uncommonly all over the Domhan region, usually near trees or bodies of water. This flower is extremely delicate and requires a skilled Botanist of level 4 or higher in order to pick.
	Shadow Cap	Found rarely in moist, dark caves and forests. Identifying this mushroom from the deadly ones requires a skilled Botanist of level 5 or higher.

Change Log

0.5.23

Professions:

• Brewing - a new profession allowing you to convert herbs into potions and poisons.
  • Two new poisons are now available.
  • All existing Vials are now craftable.
  • Healing Potions are now craftable through Brewing.
• Botany - a new profession allowing you to collect herbs.
  • Automatically learned by all players from level 1.

Quests:

• Healing Coral - This quest now results in earning the recipe for the Healing Potion recipe.
  • The repeatable Healing Coral turn-in has been removed. All Healing Coral that was looted for this turn-in are now junk items you may sell for gold.
• Certain Quests have been updated to provide Brewing Recipes as rewards.
  • If you are playing a character that already completed quests in the game that now reward a Brewing Recipe, then you interact with the quest giver to learn the missed recipe.

Alpha Goals:

• New Alpha 5 Goals:
  • Get your Brewing Skill to Level 5.
  • Collect 20 Shadow Caps, the rarest herb thus far in the game.
• Completing the Death Mazes Alpha Goal will be incompletable after November 5th. Be sure to complete this before the Halloween Event goes away.

Misc:

• All player's inventory space has been increased to 200 weight (up from 150 weight). This is a temporary measure until we can improve the weight system in the game further.
• Various monsters, merchants and other loot tables have been adjusted to now drop Brewing Recipes and herbs.
• A new "World Boss" has been added to the Slime Glade. The spawning mechanics are purposefully undocumented. Good luck discovering how it works.
  • This boss drops Derry Spores and is repeatable, allowing you and your party a means of farming the Derry Spore cosmetics without a daily lock-out.
  • It also has a very small chance to drop a cursed equipment item, a first of such category.

Bug Fixes:

• Various crashes and spelling mistakes have been fixed.

0.5.24

Bug Fixes:

• Big Mama:
  • Should no longer consume Slime Cores on failed attempts.
  • "One Shot" Mechanics should ramp up in damage giving more of a warning.
• Alpha Goal - "Reach Brewing Level 5" Progress should no longer display null/5
• Witch should no longer mention the removed (repeating) coral turn-in.
• Damaging Poison should now properly work.
• Hitting Enter in chat to send a chat message should no longer refocus the chat.
• Botany -
  • Seamoss should now provide skill experience once again.
  • Shadow Caps spawn in less places, free uping other herbs to spawn.

0.5.25

Bug Fixes:

• Big Mama:
  • Seriously she should be fixed now.

0.5.28

Misc:

• Halloween has come to an end.
  • All unspent "Spirit Charms" have now become a sellable junk item called "Inert Charms".
  • The Spirit Flute and all Halloween related quests have been removed.
• Angry Turkeys have swarmed into the Domhan Region. Rumor has it they are protesting the up and coming Phanxgiving celebration. Be careful, most enemies in the Forest area now have a chance to spawn Angry Turkeys.
• A new [Recipe: Roasted Turkey] is now for sale at the Chef in the Domhan Inn.
• The dungeon "The Lair of the Beholder" has been temporarily relocated to the Domhan Outpost grave yard (south of town), allowing heroes to enjoy the halloween dungeon until the end of the month.

Bug Fixes:

•  Using space on the login screen no longer attempts logging you in.

What are you waiting for? Download the game and check out the game's latest Alpha patch now!

You may download the early Alpha access easily through itch.io:

We are really enthusiastic to have you play our game! Being a small indie game
dev company, we depend on your support to keep us going.
Please consider making a small donation to help us fund the continuous
development of Aether Story! It will really help us out.

If you already have Alpha Access, head on over to the Game Downloads page and download the new Launcher Setup Installer!

And don't forget to join us in Discord.gg/phanxgames to share your suggestions, find other players to play with, and hang out.