Shotbow

日本語版, Español
Annihilation Update - Serious Gallium (2.14.0)

Hello!

We are excited to announce that the next update to Annihilation will be Serious Gallium. This update brings about a much needed change to a little-known class: Scout.

Unlimited Grapple!
We're removing Scout's Grapple cooldown! Scout will soon be able to zoom around the map, scouting out enemy advances and being the first to mid! As that change makes its permanent Speed effect redundant, we decided to remove that as well. However, all Scouts will be able to have temporary Speed effects again!

Community Vote:
However, Serious Gallium isn't complete! We need YOU to help us decide which penalty Scouts should receive.

We have collected opinions, crunched data and even created an admin tool to modify Scout's many values on the fly to help us reach the perfect combination of movement and PvP.

So, to get to the point, here's what YOU need to VOTE on:



Option A: Combat Tag
When a Scout hits or gets hit by an enemy player, they will incur a cooldown that prevents grappling for 5 seconds. This cooldown would reset for each hit; dealt or received.

Option B: Weakness
Every time a Scout pulls their grapple successfully they would receive a certain Weakness level for 5 seconds. The exact Weakness level would depend on the number of armour points of the Scout, which means that a Scout who wears full leather armour would get a lower Weakness level than a full diamond one. Obviously, Boss Buff armour negates more damage than unenchanted chain armour. Therefore, the Weakness level which would be applied when wearing at least one piece of Boss Buff armour would be calculated a bit differently. A few examples:

• A full leather Scout using an unenchanted golden sword to attack an unenchanted full iron player: 13 hits (instead of 10 hits).
• A full iron Scout using a Sharpness IV iron sword to attack an unenchanted full iron player: 8 hits (instead of 5 hits).
• A full iron Scout using a Sharpness IV iron sword to attack an enchanted full iron (Protection I on all 4 armour pieces) player: 9 hits (instead of 6 hits).

Option C: A & B Combined
Option C is a combination of both the Combat Tag and Weakness options, if this option wins, Scout will receive both penalties but with reduced times to keep it balanced.

How can I vote?
The vote will only be open during the test matches. We will be ensuring that only accounts which have played in the test match have voted.

Below is the timetable for the test matches:

US & Japanese friendly matches:

1. November 3rd at 3 AM GMT / 12 PM JST / November 2nd at 8 PM PDT
2. November 6th at 3 AM GMT / 12 PM JST / November 5th at 8 PM PDT
3. November 7th at 3 AM GMT / 12 PM JST / November 6th at 8 PM PDT

EU & Japanese friendly match:

1. November 3rd at 12 PM GMT / 9 PM JST / 5 AM PDT

US & EU friendly matches:

1. November 5th at 7 PM GMT / 12 PM PDT / November 6th at 4 AM JST
2. November 6th at 7 PM GMT / 12 PM PDT / November 7th at 4 AM JST
3. November 7th at 9 PM GMT / 1 PM PDT / November 8th 6 AM JST

Remember you must be there to vote!

We ask that you try and make multiple test games to really understand the implications of both options. We will not be holding test games for Option C!

It's that particularly spooky time of the year!

Normally our seasonal updates don't bring much to the table, besides a new lobby, map, or something of the sort; however this time around I'm excited to announce all the new changes and additions that made their way into this one!

Spooky Stuff!

Now it wouldn't be a true update if the lobby didn't change; this time around we opted to rework the original lobby to fit the Halloween theme rather than using last years' or crafting up a new one. This lobby has also been added to the map rotation in its entire glory throughout the course of Halloween, and for a short period after.

Map Changes

Speaking of maps, we also reintroduced these seasonal favorites to the map selection:

• Graveyard
• Haunted Mansion

That's not all though, like with the 4th of July celebration, maps such as Temple and Beatbox received small tweaks to fit the season. Many maps also will be locked in eternal darkness, in response to feedback from a few years back, this will not apply to all maps. Arena also received a new seasonal map variant: "Arena: Spooked".

As always, if you have any maps you'd like to see in-game, feel free to submit them on the forums!

Peek-A-Boom!

This year we also reintroduced the "Peek-a-Boom" item. For those who have forgotten, this item will split into 2 separate bombs a short period after it is thrown, and upon ignition will inflict targets with blindness and destroy a large area!

Item Changes

Not everything can be spooky and scary this time around though, we've got some big changes that'll be sticking around past the fall season!

New Items

We're introducing 3 brand new items to the mix this time around; each of which has a very different use than the majority of other items currently. What are they you may ask? Well;

• First Aid Kit - Restores 15% of overall HP every 2 seconds. Effects will stop upon moving
• Gilded Apple - Instantly recovers Stamina/XP Bar, allowing for another jump or Smash attack right after being used
• Elytra - Allows the user to glide for 2 seconds, the timer begins once it is used, regardless of flight time

We're very excited to see how players use these new items, and will be watchful of feedback in-game and on the Discord regarding balancing.

Weight Distribution Changes

For all of SMASH's runtime, once an item was introduced, its spawnrate was unchanged; today that changes. As players, we've noticed that particular items tend to spawn disproportionately more often. The biggest offenders of this were food and lower tier swords. In general, the spawn rates of those items has been reduced and slight increases have been made to lower tier explosives and recovery items. The full weight changes can be seen within the full patch notes for those who are interested.

Miscellaneous Updates

These changes don't mesh together in any one section very well, however they are worth mentioning in the announcement.

Party Changes

When the Arena Update first dropped, I noticed 30+ people on, but no games were running. Games were obviously being played, but they weren't visible. Now, party games will be visible in the matchmaking screen to all players, regardless of party status, however they obviously won't be joinable.
We are also looking into additional party features to allow for those who have purchased the Party Pass, if you have any suggestions, please shoot us a message on Discord or the Forums!

Tips!

Another dated feature of SMASH is the tips; gone are the gross green and sometimes yellow messages! Tips have been reworked to function and look similar to MineZ.

Bugs

Fixed the following:

• Players can no longer be damaged by cacti in order to mitigate knockback
• Removed "Change Me!" message upon entering/leaving matches
• Hearts now properly display according to lives remaining
• Quick Menu selector updated, now opens cosmetics

Closing

First off, a tremendous shoutout to the newest member of the SMASH Dev team: BrendanLeeT; this update would not have been nearly as large without his added help. His work just within the last week has been wonderful, and I'm personally very excited to work with him on future updates (nrkade).

As always, we have our eyes glued to our screens, including the Discord channel for any feedback or ideas! We'd like to host another large community event such as a tournament or map building contest this upcoming winter as well, so let us know what you guys would rather participate in!

~ As always, thanks so much for flying Shotbow ~
-The Smash Team

Welcome to the spooky season, Shotbow! In this edition of Dentril's New Moon, we've got a lot to talk about this month, including new and exciting updates for both MineZ and Annihilation, and even a few projects of our beloved Lead Developer lazertester! With all that said, let's take a look at what's been going on in the month of September, as well as some things you can expect down the line!


Annihilation Updates
Courtesy of the awesome folks at Annihilation, we're proud to have released the Tender Titanium update this month! This was an update based heavily on community feedback, and it has brought a handful of new features to Annihilation. Some of these changes have included two new leaderboards for Biggest Winners and Biggest Deserters, and a new Item Stash system that allows you to temporarily store items you would have otherwise lost if your inventory was full.

Perhaps the most notable change of this update however was the addition of the Flurry ability to the Hunter class' kit. This fun new ability allows a Hunter to fire a barrage of player-seeking missiles that deal massive damage to those who fail to evade or block them! This feature may be a little experimental, but it's certainly a "blast", so give it a try along with the rest of this amazing update!

Additionally, with the Halloween season ramping up you can expect to see Annihilation's spooky maps on rotation very soon! These seasonal maps will be popping up in games throughout October, so make sure to keep an eye out for them when they arrive. I recommend trying one of these maps with Minecraft version 1.16, as you'll get to experience some creepy nether ambience while playing!

MineZ Updates
September has been a month of many bugfixes and general changes for MineZ, as much of the team's focus has been on preparing for the Spookfest festivities on the horizon! Some of the most notable changes between patches 4.4.1 to 4.4.4 include balance changes to the Spires, new functionality for the rifts at Bindpoint and Shacklepoint, and an astounding rebuild of Al Hasa Quarry. Furthermore, the MineZ Team recently published the MineZ Player Survey, which has proven to be a great way for all players to make their voices heard. The survey is still open, so if you're a MineZ rookie, regular, or roleplayer, then make sure to fill out this form! It will only take five to ten minutes of your time!

As we move into October and the annual celebration of Spookfest, the MineZ Team has a lot in store to fill your days and nights with fright! This year we're bringing back the long-awaited Treat Chests, along with other fantastic features, spooky rebuilds, and even a Zombee Head Hunt spanning across all of Valar! You can read more about this year's celebrations in the dedicated announcement linked above. I recommend giving it a good look; there's a lot to unpick within this post!

GG Updates
Though the GG Developers have been focusing their efforts on MineZ's Spookfest this month, GG saw a small update at the start of the month. This mini-update brought a few changes, including some additions to the ToyBox system. Regular updates will hopefully resume some time after the Halloween season, and you will be able to follow all future changes and updates with the GG Update Changelog.

Ghostcraft Updates
You may have seen or heard rumors around the Shotbow Discord that a certain Shotbow original will be returning soon. Well, the rumors are true, as Ghostcraft is slated to return for the first time in many years! This long-lost classic will soon appear on the network to accompany the spooky season, and may even stick around beyond October as a permanent Shotbow gamemode, meaning you'll be able to shear and stab to your heart's content! Keep an eye out for more information and updates in the Shotbow Discord.

Expeditions Updates
Yet another one of lazer's projects, Expeditions is an experimental gamemode that combines aspects of vanilla survival and creative plots. As one would expect from the name, Expeditions is all about going on adventures to complete tasks and gather resources in vanilla worlds, which you can then bring back to your plot. You can then build whatever you want using the products of your journey, or even take your previously gathered items to aid your next one! In order to connect to Expeditions, you can use the command /expreview and jump into an adventure of your own. This game is currently in early previews, so expect bugs and a general absence of features, but give it a try if you enjoy a generally laid-back Minecraft experience.

Statistics
Network in General
Staff updates:

• Agypagy was promoted to Full Admin
• Agypagy joined the Ban Appeal Counselor Team
• Paulossj was promoted to Full Localizer

Other statistics:

• There were 499 players banned in the last month
• This month we achieved a peak playercount of 354 on September 5th
• 1,550 in-game reports were handled in the last month
• 98 ban appeals were resolved in the last month
• There were 25 Anni Clan Wars in the last month, including 1 premiere on Youtube

Closing Words

With many of us starting school and work again, potentially for the first time in a good while, it can be a little awkward getting back into the groove of normal life. We hope that, amongst the stresses of life and the gradual return to normality across the world, you will be able to come home after a busy day and have a great time hanging out with friends and playing some Shotbow! With an entire month of exciting activity to come, I truly hope that our combined efforts can put a smile on your face all throughout October! Let's make this Halloween one to remember! That's everything I've got for this edition of Dentril's New Moon. As always...

Thanks for flying Shotbow!