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Sources

Source: Say hello to Juggler and Puppeteer

Version notes

Updated to game version v2.2.0.

Patch notes

Hello,

DemonCrawl v2.2.0 is now available on the Windows stable branch.

This patch introduces 2 new masteries, 3 new stage mods, 16 new items, an expanded Hero Trial effect pool, and numerous changes based on player feedback.

We have also prepped the game for our upcoming Easter event, which runs between April 1st and April 15th - stay tuned for more information on that.

Mac and Linux builds expected to follow within 72 hours.

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New Masteries

The core design of this mastery was submitted to us by player LarnoWheels on our Discord server. Here's how they described it:

"I'm a sucker for things that interact with chance-based effects (i play a lotta roguelikes hehe) so i had an idea to mix together two stats that are chance-based into the same mastery. It's probably not a perfectly balanced concept but i like the idea of a Juggler/Jester-based class.

Juggler is a mastery focused around scaling evasion and/or powerchording chances to increase their survivability and offensiveness."

With 40 masteries in DemonCrawl, we are always looking for ideas that occupy new design space - and Juggler definitely checks that box. Managing two diametrically-opposed stats is an interesting playstyle and a welcome addition to the game.

Additional Juggler-related art was submitted by player Evermore. Thank you both!

We wanted to implement the Puppeteer mastery all the way back in v1.63, when Doll items were first introduced. But it needed more time to cook. Almost six years later, we're finally happy with its direction:

Puppeteer accumulates Doll items as you play stages. You can summon your Dolls as temporary strong familiars for a price. You can activate any other mastery ability if you have the related Doll for it.

As such, Puppeteer is a sort of "wildcard mastery" that should perform well in the hands of those who have a strong knowledgebase of masteries in general.

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16 New Items

After implementing Juggler, we realized that Evasion had surprisingly little support in the item pool. So we're addressing that with new additions like the Decoy Log:

Dedicated Evasion builds can lean into the "double-dip" effect on their evasion, while other builds won't mind picking up a Decoy Log simply for its 1-in-4 chance to dodge any attack.

We also added an expensive new legendary item for "infinite enthusiasts" (if you know you know):

This can undoubtedly enable some absurd comps--possibly too absurd--but we're excited to see what creative uses you can find for it.

Full patch notes are below.

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New Features

New Easter rewards: 10 avatars + 2 inventories
Easter avatars from 2023 moved to Easter Prizeboxes
New mastery: File:Juggler.png Juggler - Strike and dodge in equal measure (suggested by LarnoWheels)
New mastery: File:Puppeteer.png Puppeteer - Sculpt dolls and bring them to life
New legendary item: File:Resounding Rune.png Resounding Rune - "Your other legendary and passive items trigger an additional time."
New legendary item: File:Juggler's Memento.png Juggler's Memento - "Start the next dimension with Juggling Balls for every 10% powerchording and evasion you have."
New legendary item: File:Puppeteer's Memento.png Puppeteer's Memento - "Start the next dimension with mastery charges equal to your number of Doll items."
New consumable item: File:Whiskey.png Whiskey - "Gain 3 souls and lose 10% pathfinding." (suggested by Balor64)
New consumable item: File:Stealth Potion.png Stealth Potion - "Gain 10% evasion. For the next 100 turns, your evasion checks activate 4 additional times."
New consumable item: File:Big Bones.png Big Bones - "Bury Bones in target 3x3 visible area."
New consumable item: File:Juggling Balls.png Juggling Balls - "Powerchord a valid target visible cell, or open target hidden cell and evade if it has a monster."
New passive item: File:Juggler Doll.png Juggler Doll - "At the start of each stage, powerchord cells for a number of turns equal to your mastery charges. When you activate your ultimate ability, evade monsters for a number of turns equal to your mastery charges."
New passive item: File:Puppeteer Doll.png Puppeteer Doll - "Activate random Doll effects equal to your mastery charges at the start of each stage, and when your ultimate ability is activated."
New passive item: File:Zen Stones.png Zen Stones - "Changes to evasion, pathfinding, and powerchording will apply to all these stats."
New passive item: File:Mean Spirit.png Mean Spirit - "When you win a stage, all living objects flee. Gain 1% powerchording whenever an object flees."
New passive item: File:Archmage Crystal.png Archmage Crystal - "When you collect a diamond, duplicast a random magic item." (suggested by Emberflame)
New passive item: File:Decoy Log.png Decoy Log - "Gain 25% evasion. When you evade, you have a chance to solve nearby cells equal to your evasion."
New magic item: File:Airbag.png Airbag - "[150 Mana] Automatically discharges when you're about to take damage. Gain 3% evasion and reduce the damage to 1."
New omen: File:Rude Goalbug Machine.png Rude Goalbug Machine - "Whenever you would restore life, gain defense, or coins, delay it by 50 cells opened."
New omen: File:Crony Capitalism.png Crony Capitalism - "Every 100 turns, lose all of your coins. Reset this status counter when you spend coins."
New stage mod: Intimidating mod - "Chance to negate evasion, pathfinding, and powerchording by the percentage of stage completion."
New positive stage mod: Ethereal mod - "Stage contains ethereal cells." (suggested by Zackary4536)
New positive stage mod: Peaceful mod - "Stage power and monster count are lower than usual." (suggested by Zackary4536)
New sigil crafting material: Lead Lamella - "Downgrade a sigil to the previous level."
New sigil crafting material: Apex Twine - "Reroll the highest-level effects of a sigil."
New gameplay setting: Confirm Stage Finish - "Show a confirmation popup when pressing Finish on a regular stage"
20 new Hero Trial rules

Balance Changes

Undertaker II reworked: "Reduce monster damage by the total value of visible Sanctified cells in the same quadrant."
File:Auramancer.png Auramancer I nerfed: "Each stage has 3 random auras and you are immune to the negative effects of auras. Once per turn, you can remove an aura with right click."
File:Auramancer.png Auramancer III nerfed: Ability charge cost increased from 3 to 4
Ghost form buffed: While in ghost form, any object that flees might drop items, even if the flee is triggered by an item
File:Ghost mastery.png Ghost mastery unlock requirements changed from Ectoplasm counter to scaring objects in ghost form
Tablet of Lairetam buffed: "Gain a random artifact at the end of each stage, and a stack of 20 artifacts at the end of the quest."
Tabula Rasa buffed: "[200 Mana] Activate effects that would trigger when you enter, begin, win, or complete a stage."
Golden Boots nerfed: Status duration increased from 10 to 20 turns (suggested by Is An Idiot)
Excalibur reworked: "If your morality is 30 or greater, you can kill monsters and bosses and you lose morality instead of taking damage."
Giga Health Potion reworked: "At the start of the stage, restore your life to max and gain 10 souls, then lose this item."
Giga Mana Potion reworked: "At the start of the stage, fully charge and duplicast your magic items, then lose this item."
Golden Chalice reworked: "[150 Mana] Gain between 10 and 15 coins." (suggested by benny)
Bones buffed: "Apply Sanctified to target visible cell without an aura. Restore lives equal to the cell's value."
Divine Handaxe buffed: Chop even more wood
Divine Wishbone buffed: "40% chance to revive on death."
Unstable Compound price increased from 13 to 18 coins
Happy Cloud price increased from 21 to 23 coins
Alcohol renamed to File:Beer.png Beer
Celestial mod buffed: "Gain 1 revive. At the end of the stage, lose max lives equal to the minimum stage power. Normal heart drops are converted to souls." (suggested by Balor64 and elmarhoppieland)
Love Chest buffed: "Gain souls equal to the minimum stage power when you open this chest. It contains a life item."
Lucid Chest buffed: "Solve a random cell for each visible cell of value 3 or greater. It contains a solve item."
Metal Chest buffed: "Repair damaged armor when you open this chest, then fortify your armor. It contains an armor item."
Labyrinth Chest nerfed: "If you have no pathfinding when you open this chest, gain 3% pathfinding. Otherwise, gain 1% pathfinding. This chest contains a pathfinding item."
Guarded mod difficulty rating increased from 1 to 2
Item Shop price ceiling lowered from 1.3x to 1.1x item value (does not include 1.1x multiplier of Hard Mode) (suggested by TEAM WORM)
Updated monster drop tables
Golden Chest and "Charitable" award now use the shared loot-value calculators

Quality of Life

Sky Net no longer produces a toast alert when you don't have any orbs
Updated descriptions of items that trigger on `WIN_STAGE` as opposed to `COMPLETE_STAGE` for clarity
Updated Scout III description for clarity: "Solve a number of cells equal to that which you would solve by your pathfinding."
Improved Tropics stage background art (contribution by Evermore)
Improved graphics for Easter stages and menus
Twitter button removed from main menu for the time being
Reworked item sprites: Beggar's Cup, Blackmail, Bonfire, Breadcrumbs, Blissful Gut, Brainwash, Crystal Veins, Deerstalker, Diamond Dessert, Dirty Soap, Edict of the Old Gods, Flashlight, Frostbite, Heavy Burden, Mana Lung, Millstone, Mucilage, Nuclear Waste, Ouroboros, Padlock, Stinging Nettle, Thought Bubble, Tithing Plate, Trash Bin, Tree of Life
Reworked avatars: Newborn, Sagebark, All-Seeing Eye, Space Trooper, Vampilocks, Yule Goat, Zombie Steed
Expanded avatar/mastery palette using color spectrum coverage analysis
Sound effect when you kill a boss
Minor color adjustments for stages: Machine, Vale, Hell, Tribe
Updated default leaderboard version to v2.2.0

Bug Fixes

Reworked item repeat trigger checks for better standardization
Reworked around a dozen hardcoded item effects into the standard item pipeline
Fixed a few Mythic Emblems using random stage mods instead of preset mods
Fixed a state leak that could occur when moving directly from Hero Trials to Arena
Fixed File:Auramancer.png Auramancer stage-start Frozen aura placement so hidden Frozen monsters now correctly reduce the remaining monster count
Reworked multi-monitor window handling so fullscreen/windowed transitions and scaling stay on the current monitor
Removed legacy GameMaker conditionals in several scripts to reduce risk of rare logic mismatches
Moved legendary item cap handling to standard pipeline to prevent issues with arena
Fixed issue with Hero Trial description not replacing "x%" substring correctly
Fixed a bug where consumable targetable items like Stick would not fire other "on consume" effects
Fixed a rare issue where consumable targetable items could incorrectly return false after certain object movement effects
Fixed Undertaker III sometimes applying Sanctified to more cells than intended
Fixed File:Auramancer.png Auramancer Doll toast alert showing -1
Fixed "Springtime" typo in a couple avatar names

March 30, 2026 Patch

Contents

Sources

Version notes