Rivals of Aether II Patch Adds New Cosmetics and Balance Changes

New Rivals of Aether II patch is still hot off the presses and as usual, it brings in new cosmetic alongside a variety of balance changes and overall game fixes.

In terms of cosmetics, the main draw it of course the Dreamer Absa bundle that gives her a more festive look and comes with a dance taunt that you can use to make people groan.

However, the meatiest part of the patch is in the updates to gameplay, which you can find below.

Audio Updates

• Slade now has a second victory voiceline option that can play during his victory sequence.

Gameplay Updates

• Fixed a bug that allowed Grab/Parry inputs to buffer airdodges out of tumble if the AirGrab/AirParry setting was set to Airdodge.

  • Now they will function the same as pressing the Shield button.

• Fixed a bug that caused characters to flinch in the air (which would immediately cancel into the Fall state) when hit by a weak spike while they are far from their ECB.

• Fixed a bug that allowed characters to pick up an item during jumpsquat by holding a direction and pressing Attack.

  • This created visual issues, since many characters grab items and opponents with the same hand.

• Added a space between "Underground" and "Arena" in the stage skin's name.

• The overhead HUD arrow will now show when the character is holding an item.

• His bubble resource will now be consumed when he breaks out of his poison bubble.

  • Previously, it would only apply a 2 second cooldown to Down Special, but now it will prevent him from making another bubble until he touches the ground.

• The small hurtbox that appears under Wrastor while he's dashing/running is now static and appears 4 frames earlier.

  • Previously, the movement of this hurtbox could cause certain low-hitting attacks to whiff unexpectedly. Now the hurtbox should be more consistent at preventing those weird whiffs.

• Fixed a bug that caused his slipstream cooldown UI to be incorrect when throwing the slipstream as soon as it comes off cooldown.

• Forward Air hitboxes split into two smaller hitboxes, retaining the horizontal range but shrinking the vertical range.

  • This move is intended to control a lot of space in front of Fleet, but the vertical range made it a little too good at hitting opponents below her as well.

    

• Dash Attack friction reduced during the Between Hits and Active 2 windows.

  • This makes hit 2 less likely to whiff when hitting extended hurtboxes with hit 1, since Maypul will slide farther forward. This also means Maypul will slide forward a short distance during the Active 2 window, increasing the horizontal coverage of hit 2.

• Dash Attack hit 1 active frames: 6 > 5

  • The reduced friction increased the maximum range of this move, but removing one active frame from hit 1 keeps the range essentially unchanged.

• Getting pummeled will now remove Terry from the ledge.

  • This makes this behavior consistent between Terry and Poppy. Lily is still removed on grab to prevent shield camping on top of Lily from being too strong.

• NEW FORWARD SPECIAL: Orcane leaps forward, hitting opponents away with a tail swipe before bouncing off of them. The tail swipe can also be manually activated by pressing Special while leaping. If Orcane absorbs a puddle during the startup, the move will be much stronger, won't go into special fall, and will fire a droplet projectile at a downward angle.

  • The previous Forward Special was useful in certain scenarios, but ended up being too powerful for recovery when it had invulnerability, and too weak offstage after the intangibility was removed. The new Forward Special is faster and can hit opponents if it detects them while traveling, making it much less vulnerable to simple edgeguards. Orcane can also stop his momentum and perform the tail swipe early, which can foil edgeguard attempts if Orcane predicts their timing.

    

• Weight: 100 > 95

  • Orcane's relatively high weight combined with his plethora of recovery mixup options made him extremely difficult to KO without launching him directly into the blastzone. In terms of recovery, his new Forward Special is an upgrade, so we're toning down a few other things to bring his recovery into a more reasonable place.

• Puddle is now removed when Orcane is pummeled.

  • This gives the opponent counterplay to puddle being placed on the ground.

• Down Special puddle pop will now put Neutral Special on a 15 frame cooldown.

  • This reduces the coverage of Orcane repeatedly using Neutral Special and Down Special to trap opponents at ledge.

• Forward Tilt now has a sweetspot on the tip with knockback: 5 + 0.86 > 4.5 + 0.96

• Forward Tilt inner hitbox knockback: 5 + 0.86 > 4.5 + 0.86

  • This slightly buffs long-range Forward Tilt and slightly nerfs close-range Forward Tilt, giving the move a bit more depth than it had before.

• Down Tilt damage: 9 sweet + 7 sour > 7 sweet + 5 sour.

  • Aside from just toning down the damage on hit, this also makes it 2 frames worse on shield.

• Forward Air now has diminishing returns on its max fall speed during the active windows, losing 25% of its effectiveness with each use, with a minimum value of 50% effectiveness.

  • This reduces Forward Air's effectiveness as a stalling tool while recovering. This also makes it less effective at rocketing past the ledge after a walljump if it was already used to get to the wall.

• Back Air hit 2 now has a duplicate hitbox that is clamped to the gameplay plane.

  • Previously, the second frame of the sweetspot could whiff in certain scenarios, due to its large displacement into the foreground. This new hitbox should make it more reliable without altering the range of the move.

• Back Air recovery: 16 > 20

  • The extremely short recovery of this move made it a bit too difficult to punish, especially for how powerful the sweetspot is. It also allowed Orcane to follow up even after missing the sweetspot.

• Up Special ledge grab box extended backward during the Active window.

• Up Special can no longer grab ledge backward during the Active window.

  • Previously, the ledge grab box only extended in front of Forsburn to prevent grabbing the ledge backward, but this caused some weird situations on Hyperborean Harbor where he could miss the ledge when going at very specific angles. This change should prevent that, and the explicit lockout from grabbing ledge backward should keep the functionality the same as before in all other cases.

• Interrupting Absa's Forward Special after she has initiated the cloud placement but before the hitbox comes out will now reset Forward Special's cooldown.

  • Previously, there was a short window where the cloud would be destroyed but the Forward Special cooldown would still be applied.

• Up Special ledge grab box extended backward during the Active windows.

• Up Special can no longer grab ledge backward during the Active windows.

  • Previously, the ledge grab box only extended in front of Absa to prevent grabbing the ledge backward, but this caused some weird situations on Hyperborean Harbor where she could miss the ledge when going at very specific angles. This change should prevent that, and the explicit lockout from grabbing ledge backward should keep the functionality the same as before in all other cases.

• Bug fix: Chair can no longer be destroyed by blastzones while a player is grabbing it.

• Forward Special spike knockback: 6 + 0.75 > 6 + 0.625

  • This move was KOing too early, especially with all the ways she can combo into Forward Special far offstage.

• Run speed: 14.95 > 16.5

  • Still a relatively low run speed, but this also increases his dash length slightly, since he will now accelerate during dash instead of decelerating.

• Can no longer be pushed while shopping.

  • Previously, he could get pushed away from the chest or even off a ledge while shopping.

• Pirate Hook price: 1100 > 1000

• Winged Boots price: 1400 > 1200

• Phoenix Feather price: 1700 > 1500

  • This makes him a little less dependent on saving his money, 

• Drop of Nourishment damage when thrown: 4 > 5

• Drop of Nourishment damage when dropped: 2 > 3

• Down Strong hit 1 innermost hitbox moved 20cm forward.

• Down Strong hit 2 innermost hitbox moved 20cm backward.

  • This reduces the range of the reverse hit, as these hitboxes are mostly intended to prevent the move from having a deadzone in the center.