Gems of War Patch 1.0.9 Arrives! By Rebecca Smith, 11 Mar 2016 CommentsHero Classes• Players will be able to unlock classes for their Heroes by completing Class Quests.• Class Quests appear after you have finished the main story in a Kingdom• There are 7 Classes when 1.0.9 launches, with more to come in the futureo Warlord- Quest located in Broken Spireo Knight- Quest located in Sword’s Edgeo Priest- Quest located in Whitehelmo Archer- Quest located in Forest of Thornso Warden- Quest located in Maugrim Woodso Sorcerer- Quest located in Karakotho Necromancer - Quest located in Khetar• Classes can be levelled using Souls, each level grants extra Spell Mastery for a single color, and occasionally grants extra Magic when using weapons of a certain color.• Classes like troops, have 20 levels, each one giving extra Skills• Classes have 3 Traits, like troops, that must be unlocked. The 3rd trait is always a unique and powerful Legendary Trait.• Classes have 3 perks, obtained after 10, 25, and 50 victories. Perks grant extra skill points, or allow the Hero to function as a Troop Types• At Level 10, all classes give the Hero a Kingdom Type, just like troops get (always the Kingdom that they are unlocked in).• At 250 Victories, Classes unlock a special Mythical Class Weapon with a powerful spell.New KingdomsThe Kingdoms of Drifting Sands and Blighted Lands have appeared in the game. You can find their kingdom troops in chests!Please note that Ifrit and Venbarak are not currently available in chests. They are coming in future events.World Map Layout• The world map has had a makeover with a new look.• Glory is now displayed as a currency like Gold and Gems.• Chat- a new chat system has been added to the game.o There are 2 Tabs for Chat- Global and Guildo Global Chat- allows Players to chat together in game from any screen.o Guild Chat has been moved from the guild menu to be part of the new chat system.o There is Leave button on the chat screen for players who aren't feeling chatty today.Balance• Challenge battles have been reworked so that they are more interesting and challenging to play.• Troops now gain uniquely-tailored Skill points for levels 16-20 and as well as ascending, this means that the Skill values on troops will have changed from patch 1.0.8.o All troops have been affected by this so we haven’t listed out the exact changes here. See the updated Troop List.• Traitso All (natural) Legendary Troops have gain special unique Legendary Traitso True Shot has been changed to have a 75% chance to activate and has become a Legendary Trait (on Orion).o Added new Trait: Armor Piercing, which has a 50% chance to ignore Armor on Skull matches. This has replace True-Shot on most Troops.o Agile has been changed to have 20% chance to activate (down from 30%).o Blessed and Cursed effects have increased from 1 to 2o Leader’s effect has been increased from 2 to 3• New Traits have been added to the game.o Chill Touch- Frozen on Skull damageo Shatter- Double damage vs Frozen Enemieso Insulated- Immunity to Frozeno Death Touch- Death Mark on Skull damageo Doom- Double damage vs Death Marked Enemieso Warded- Immunity to Death Marko Grudge- Gain 1 Attack when an enemy casts a spell• Status Effectso Burning and Poison can now kill a troop.o Silence no longer drains Mana from victimso New Status Effect: Frozen, a Frozen troop cannot contribute extra turns to its team, either from its spell, or from matching 4/5-of-a-kind of its color. (Note that it CAN still contribute turns as indirect result of gems spawned by its spell forming a 4/5-of-a-kind, provided they do not match one of its own colors).o New Status Effect: Death Mark, Troops with Death mark have a 10% chance to immediately die at the start of their turn. This cannot occur in the first 2 turns after they receive death mark.o New Status Effect: Barrier, A troop with Barrier is immune to the next piece of damage he receives, either from skulls, spells, or status effects.o New Status Effect: Disease, a Diseased troop only gains half the mana from gem matches (round up).• Kingdom Stat changeso Zhul’Kari has changed from Attack to Magico Mist of Scales has changed from Life to Armoro Grosh-Nak has changed from Attack to Armor• Team Bonus Changeso Zaejin Team Bonus has changed from +10 Life for 4 troops to +4 Life and +3 Attacko Stormheim Team Bonus has changed from +2 Life and +4 Attack for 4 troops to +10 Life for 4 troopso Maugrim Woods Team Bonus has changed from +4 Life and + 3 Attack for 4 troops to +2 Life and +4 AttackTroop BalanceEach (native) Legendary gain Legendary Traits the replaced existing traits. Legendary Traits are always the third trait unlock, despite where the remove Trait was. In addition, many non-Legendary Troops were rebalanced. For a full list, please visit: gemsofwar.comRefunds AvailableDue to the balancing adjustments, the following Troops will be available for Refund for one week:• Atlanta• Avina• Bone Dragon• Celestasia• Centaur Scout• Cthyryzyx• Frost Giant• Ghoul• Glade Warden• Gnoll• Lady Sapphira• Orc• Orion• Ranger• Reaver• Skeleton• Wolf KnightGeneral• Ascension- the Arrow buttons will now cause more cards to be deducted than 1. This should save many fingers from Ascensions requiring 25+ troops.• Refund Menu- Players are able to refund a troop, gaining back souls and Traitstones spent on it.o Refund will only be offered at the discretion of the dev team, when they believe a troop has been nerfedo Troop Refunds will only be offered for a single weeko Refund Button is found when you tap on a Card in the Troop Collection Menu.• Difficulty- Has moved to the World Map from Hero menuo No longer affects PVP or Arenao Both PVP and Arena will gradually increase the difficulty (slightly) as you progress, gradually turning off the AI Combo-breaker (as you approach 8 wins in the Arena, and as you approach Rank 1 in PvP). This means that games will start getting harder the better you are doing.o Difficulties will now unlock as you level up.• Arenao Soul have increased back to 1.0.7 levels!o You now have to win 7 matches in order to be able to purchase the troopso The purchase price for troops you already own has been increased from 1 Gem, to be in-line with what you would pay for a key.• Treasure Hunt Mini Game has received a little loveo Turns reduced to 8 (from 15). This reduces the total number of moves in a game by 10-20% (NOT by 50%)o Most payouts in treasure hunt have been increased by around 20%o Every 15 moves will give you a random Traitstoneo New result summary with number of turns played & scoreo New payout table has been added to the right hand side of the boardMajor Bug Fixes• Fixed an issue where a Troop with agile wouldn’t die despite taking damage.Known Issues• When the Black Beast has no longer has an Ally to devour, he doesn’t create Skull Gems (as per his the latest changes to his spell).• Watcher's Mana drain does not trigger on the new status effects: Death Mark, Frozen and Disease. WindowsGame Patch Written by Rebecca SmithRebecca is the Newshound Manager at TrueSteamAchievements, TrueAchievements and TrueTrophies. She has been contributing articles since 2010, especially those that involve intimidatingly long lists. When not writing news, she can usually be found sharpening her very, VERY, pointy grammar stick in anticipation of its imminent use. Outside of TSA, TA and TT, she works in an independent game shop so that she can spend all day talking about games too. At home, with a variety of PCs and consoles on hand from which to choose, starting with a ZX Spectrum, games are never far away there either. However, as you're not supposed to have an unhealthy obsession with just a single subject, she also likes to read and dream about owning her own tribe of minions. She'll occasionally go outside.