Hunters,

This update is a direct follow-up to 1.2.0, and much of it comes straight from your reports.

The main focus is jewellery. Rings and amulets were designed almost exclusively around melee, leaving ranged and magic characters with very little worth equipping. That changes with 41 new pieces and a complete balance pass over the existing selection.

The second major focus is the item card. Several of you reported that it was oversized, difficult to read and sometimes cut off entirely. It has now been rebuilt to size itself around the information it actually contains.

As always, your existing saves remain fully compatible.

• 41 new rings and amulets have been added. Jewellery coverage increases from 31 melee, 10 magic and only one ranged piece to 38 melee, 24 magic and 17 ranged pieces.

• Ranged characters now have meaningful jewellery choices throughout the entire game. Ranged jewellery is now genuinely best-in-slot for ranged builds instead of feeling like an afterthought.

• A complete ranged jewellery line has been added: seven rings and seven amulets with their own recipes, progressing from early leather and sinew bands to feathered relics.

• Ten new magic pieces carry their themes through their materials and carved runes instead of relying on glowing effects.

• Five new melee amulets and eight rare finds introduce additional special effects.

• A new skilling line adds tool-shaped rings for gathering and crafting.

• Three new jewellery sets have been added.

• All 41 new pieces feature newly painted artwork.

• The ring progression is back on its intended curve. A player reported that the level 55 Diamond Ring provided seven attributes and two skills, while the Grave Warden Band offered far less at a similar level. This was a genuine balance issue rather than a display problem. Thirteen pieces were scaling incorrectly for their equipment slot and have now been corrected.

• Luck was contributing too much of jewellery’s total power. Its overall share has been reduced from 20.6% to 12.6%. The total power of every piece remains unchanged, so nothing you already own becomes weaker overall.

• Crafted rings now provide Armour, Evasion or Ward values in line with the armour trinity.

• The Greytooth Mantle was the only legendary cape in the game without a single attribute, making it look empty beside even a common cape. It now provides 5 Strength, 5 Constitution and 2 Dexterity alongside its existing 3% lifesteal. Its values have deliberately been kept below the endgame capes so that it fits its intended level without overshooting it.

• Sixteen crafted staves and wands required materials that did not match their element—a poison wand could require Frost Essence and Frost Shards, for example. Every affected recipe now uses materials matching its own element while retaining the same total material value as before.

• The item card now sizes itself according to its contents. Previously, it always occupied a fixed half of the screen regardless of how little information it contained, leaving large empty areas and pushing values far away from their labels.

• The suffix column is no longer cut off. On cards with a long offensive column, the artwork column previously expanded in fixed proportion with the data and consumed the space required by the suffix.

• Signature effects belonging to the base item—such as the lifesteal on a Champion drop—now appear directly on the card. These effects were previously only displayed when they came from a random suffix, causing several legendary items to look as though they did nothing.

• Long effect descriptions and price lines no longer extend beyond the frame.

• At smaller resolutions, item cards now scale their text between 80% and 100%, wrap lines correctly and use hyphenation instead of cutting words apart. At widths of 1600 pixels and above, the text remains pixel-identical to its previous appearance.

• Two-handed weapons no longer repeat that they replace your off-hand item. The header already identifies them as two-handed.

• Steam Deck: The update notice could become tall enough for its close button to appear below the bottom of the screen, preventing players from reaching the game at all. Its height is now capped so this cannot happen again on any screen.

• Companion abilities now carry their correct element. The Pyreling and Slagfiend were firing a grey projectile instead of a fire effect. Every companion ability now takes its visual theme from the status it applies.

• The Item Wiki now shows where a plant’s seed can be obtained. Previously, growing a plant listed Farming as its only source without explaining where to find the seed required to grow it.

• The inventory and bank can now be sorted by item type, using the same groups as the filter chips: weapons, armour, tools, food, potions and materials. Items are sorted alphabetically within each group.

• The in-game update notice is now a single short line linking to the full patch notes. From now on, complete patch notes will be published here on Steam.

As always, if something feels wrong, please tell me here or use the bug report button in the options menu.

Special thanks to the players who sent screenshots of the broken item cards. Nearly every fix in this update began with one of those reports.

Hunters,

Update 1.2.0 rebuilds three major parts of Grim Reach at once.

Magic now has a proper identity. Every element brings its own combat effect, crafted staves and wands span the full elemental range, and magic weapons finally scale with Intelligence. The old, largely unused Mana system has been replaced by Spell Reserve—a new value that grows with Wisdom and powers two distinct magic stances without being consumed by individual casts.

Hunting arrives as a brand-new skill, featuring baited traps that continue working while you are away and a complete bait progression tied directly into Fishing.

At the same time, the long-standing leather bottleneck in Crafting is gone. Five tiers of fibres and cloth now feed into the new Tailoring skill, giving robes and capes their own dedicated progression.

The update also introduces procedural combat effects for every weapon and element, three true equipment kits, a 29th Champion carrying a legendary greataxe, two new companions, 69 Steam achievements, and many smaller improvements and fixes.

Your existing saves remain fully compatible.

Set baited traps throughout zones you have already unlocked in combat and collect creature loot both online and offline.

• Trap slots unlock at Hunting levels 1, 5, 15, 30, 50 and 75.

• Every successful catch provides five loot rolls from a creature you have previously defeated.

• Your traps continue working while you are offline.

• Catch XP is equal to five times the creature’s combat XP.

• The first successful catch of each creature grants double XP.

Five tiers of bait have been added to Fishing:

• Worms — Fishing level 1

• Grubs — Fishing level 20

• Crabs — Fishing level 40

• Squid — Fishing level 60

• Glow Bait — Fishing level 80

Each Hunting zone requires bait matching its tier.

If a trap runs out of bait, it retains its assigned zone and waits. Hunting resumes automatically as soon as the correct bait becomes available in your inventory or bank.

Leon is a booted tomcat obtainable through Hunting.

• Drop rate: 1 in 8,000 per successful catch

Weaving, mage robes and capes have been moved out of Crafting and into the new Tailoring skill.

Five new fibre tiers can be gathered from new Foraging nodes and grown in New Haven:

• Nettle

• Flax

• Thornhemp

• Ghost Silk

• Starflax

These fibres can be woven into five corresponding tiers of cloth.

Every cloth armour set, from Apprentice robes to Voidweave, is now crafted entirely from cloth. Leather remains limited to ranged equipment and a small selection of capes.

Your existing Crafting progress will be divided according to the items you have actually crafted:

• XP earned from robes, capes and cloth will be transferred to Tailoring.

• All remaining XP will stay in Crafting.

• Equipped items will remain equipped during the conversion.

I am sorry that this update splits your existing Crafting progress. Giving cloth equipment its own materials and progression is the better decision for the game as a whole, and it is better to make that change now rather than much later.

The previously incomplete Dimweave set has been finished. Five newly painted pieces now form a complete second starter set for mages that requires no leather.

The Silkweaver can now be obtained through Tailoring.

Every magical element now has its own combat identity for both players and monsters.

Burning targets take 10% increased damage from all sources.

The third consecutive Chill freezes the target for one attack. After being frozen, the target becomes immune to Freeze for 6 seconds.

Shock no longer causes attacks to be skipped.

Instead, each application delays the target’s next attack by 0.4 seconds, stacking up to a maximum delay of 1.2 seconds.

Critical Shock hits also arc for 30% additional damage.

Poison can now stack up to five times.

While poisoned, the target’s regeneration and lifesteal are reduced by 50%.

Void damage applies the new Drain status, reducing the target’s damage dealt by 15%.

Each Arcane hit grants one stack of Resonance.

Every stack increases damage by 2%, up to a maximum of ten stacks.

Every Aether spell:

• Restores 2% of your Ward

• Ignores 50% of the enemy’s Ward

The old, unused Mana system has been replaced by Spell Reserve, a fixed combat stat similar to Armour.

Where Intelligence increases your magical damage, Wisdom now increases your Spell Reserve. It starts at 30 and gains another 10 points for every point of Wisdom, in addition to any Spell Reserve bonuses provided by your equipment.

Spell Reserve is not consumed when casting. Instead, it powers one of two renamed magic stances.

Grants 1% increased spell damage for every 30 Spell Reserve, up to a maximum of 15%.

Grants 1% increased Ward regeneration for every 20 Spell Reserve, up to a maximum of 30%.

This bonus is added on top of the stance’s existing 50% increased Ward regeneration.

Wisdom now protects every combat style.

Each point of Wisdom reduces the duration and strength of enemy Burn, Frost, Shock, Poison, Bleed and Drain effects by 1%, up to a maximum reduction of 40%.

Existing Mana-related bonuses will be converted automatically:

• +1 Mana Regeneration becomes +10 Spell Reserve

Magic weapons now scale with your Intelligence through the new Spell Focus stat.

Depending on the weapon, Spell Focus provides approximately:

• +15% damage range at level 30

• +22% damage range at level 60

• +30% damage range at level 90

Magic weapon cards now display both their Spell Focus scaling rate and their actual damage range based on your current Intelligence.

Crafted staves and wands no longer share the same Burn effect.

Every crafting tier now contains a rotating selection of:

• Fire

• Frost

• Shock

• Poison

• Arcane

Void joins the elemental ladder from Blacksteel onward, while Aether joins from Titanium onward.

This brings the complete elemental effect library into regular combat and gives crafted magic weapons distinct purposes throughout progression.

Every weapon type and combat effect now uses procedural particles and animations.

New effects include:

• Glowing embers and spark trails

• Ice shards

• Branching chain lightning

• Poison bubbles

• Arcane runes

• Light-swallowing Void cores

• Golden Aether feathers

• Melee slash arcs

• Arrow flight

• Blood, ichor and bone dust

• Block sparks

• Companion abilities

Active status effects now remain visible on their target. The affected fighter briefly flares when the status is applied, followed by a quieter looping effect that remains until the status expires.

The Combat Effects option now offers three settings:

• Full

• Reduced

• Off

The three previous loadout templates are now true equipment kits.

Each kit holds its own equipped items, including tools. You can switch between them from the character sheet whenever you are outside combat.

Switching kits fully restores:

• Health

• Ward

Tooltips for inactive kits now also show which tools are stored inside them.

Ossric the Marrowbound, the game’s 29th Champion, now stalks the Highlands.

He carries the legendary greataxe Esthar, Storm of Bones:

• Applies Bleed on hit

• Every fourth swing strikes twice

Hunting and Farming provide fewer reward rolls than most other skills. Their companions therefore have higher drop chances:

• Leon, the Feared: 1 in 8,000 per successful Hunting catch

• Farming companion: 1 in 4,000 per harvest, increased from 1 in 15,000

Once obtained, companion cards now display the exact effects of their passive bonuses and combat abilities, including numerical values and timing.

Grim Reach now features 69 Steam achievements covering the entire journey through the Reach.

Everything you have already achieved in-game will be reported to Steam the first time you load your save after installing the update. Existing players will not have to start from zero.

• Champion unique items now display their special effects, such as lifesteal, directly on their item cards.

• The Item Wiki now lists the appropriate Champion as a source for Champion unique items.

• Multiple on-kill healing, Ward restoration and cooldown reduction effects now stack instead of only applying the strongest effect.

• Ward now regenerates outside combat at a rate of 5% per second, preventing magic users from starting every fight with zero Ward.

• If you are defeated during a queued fight or dungeon run, the queue no longer pauses. The remaining attempts for that entry are skipped, and the queue continues with the next entry both online and offline. The queue panel will tell you what was skipped.

• The combat log now identifies Shock arcs and Ward restored by Lightblessing.

• Weapon ability descriptions now display their actual application chances.

• Item cards now resize themselves according to their contents, preventing long stat lines from becoming compressed.

• Action Queue amount buttons—1, 25, X and Endless—now use the same iron frame as other interface buttons.

• Inactive equipment kit tooltips now list their stored tools.

• Autosaves now occur every 5 seconds.

• Switching equipment kits no longer reports items stored in another kit as newly discovered, including enchanted items.

• Companions with missing passive descriptions, such as additional ammunition effects, now display the correct text.

• The Discord button has been removed, as there is currently no official server. Yet.

• Bug report drafts are now preserved after submitting a report.

• Shift-clicking inside the bank no longer selects interface text.

• Consumable item cards, including stews and tonics, now retain their frames correctly.

As always, if something feels wrong, please tell me here or use the bug report button in the options menu.

Thank you for playing.

— Adhavar