Version 1.9, officially the Update of Plenty, is a major update to Dead Cells that was released on the 1st of July 2020 to PC, and on the 21st of July 2020 for the Xbox One, PlayStation 4, and the Nintendo Switch.

The Update of Plenty focused on reworking the game economy,^[10] how damage mutations scale,^[11] removing scrolls from items, as well as rebalancing many weapons, such as turning all crossbows into two-handed weapons. This update also introduced the backpack, the new shock status effect, and gave burning oil a separate blue fire sprite.

Important features

Weapon rework

• Following the extremely successful weapon popularity poll, we tried to give some love to the less liked weapons and slightly nerfed the most effective ones. The aim is to open up a wider range of builds, while not sacrificing what made meta builds fun.
• Most of the changed consist of slight number tweaks, some are more profound reworks but there is one notable exceptions:
  • All Crossbows (with the exception of Sonic Crossbow which is now named Sonic Carbine) are now two-handed weapons and Survival only.
  • Multiple-nocks Bow, Marksman's Bow and Nerves of Steel are now Tactic only and have been buffed.

• These weapons never really shined in Tactics because there are few reasons to take them in a Tactic build rather than in a Survival Build. And we were forced to make them less efficient than other pure Tactic range weapons to balance for the dual-scaling.
• With the 2-handed weapons becoming part of the Survival identity, it felt only natural to increase the efficiency of these weapons to make them better on par with the other choices, and to make it pure Tactic.

Economy rework

• It has been brought to our attention several times (and, frankly, we knew already) that the economy in Dead Cells was... peculiar. While everything seemed to be fine at low difficulty level, it got worse and worse in high BC, where if you wanted to buy healing you would have to basically never spend any gold on anything else. So to fix this we implemented several changes, small and big, some among them will be detailed later in this patchnote.
• Here's a short list of what changed:
  • Gold scaling is gone, long live small numbers!
  • A good amount of items had their price changed
  • To replace gold scaling, gear price now goes up with item level
  • Refining and affix reroll costs have been changed
  • Shop categories are now stats instead of equipment type
  • Shop reroll is now free, but makes items on sale pricier

Gear qualities and damage rework

• Bonus stats have been removed from ++ and S gears, but to compensate new scrolls have been added in biomes, enemy damage has been reduced, and gear damage has been changed to increase with item level.
• This change was implemented to give back some importance to gear level, and in pair with the economy rebalance give you more opportunities (and an incentive) to switch gears during your run.

New DoT: Shocked and DoT reworks

• All damage over time statuses seemed to blend together a bit too much for our taste. We decided to try and give each DoT a unique identity, and added a fourth one, shocked, in the process. Most electric weapons and items inflict this new shock DoT.
  • New DoT, Shocked: deal damage over time to the target and all nearby targets.
  • Bleed rework: Stack enough bleed status on a target and the damages left is instantaneously dealt at once.
  • Poison rework: Upon death, propagate the poison status with reduced damages and for the remaining duration.
  • Fire un-rework: Untouched, because fire was already perfect.
• Also, all affixes giving bonus damage on an enemy with a specific status have updated values.

Damage mutation rework

• Damage mutations (those who give a bonus DPS to your attacks) suffered from poor scaling, making them extremely useful at low difficulties while being less and less useful as you progress through the game.
• To remedy to that, we changed their bonus from a bonus DP to a bonus % of damages. This means that everything that boosts your attack (item level, item rarity, affixes, etc.) will synergize with those mutations.

• Impacted mutations:
  • Combo
  • Vengeance
  • Tainted Flask
  • Support
  • Tranquility
  • Gastronomy
  • Extended Healing
• Changed and increased the initial pool of mutations.
• Any diminishing return is now removed after a few seconds. This means that Freeze, Stun, Slows, and everything else that used to be less and less effective against a target in a fight can now be used more efficiently for these long boss fights. Version 1.9.1
• Community Suggestion | Equipping a two-handed weapon now gives you access to a backpack weapon slot. You can put any one-handed weapon inside so the next time you come across another one-handed weapon, you can equip both at the same time to replace your two-handed weapon. Version 1.9.1

Balancing

• All bonus damage affixes' chances of being generated have been lowered - with the newest addition, every item felt like it had 3 or 4 DoTs status synergies, making it feel like there is no point in building your build around.
• Community Suggestion | Gold scaling has been removed from the game. While it's less impressive to gain 500 gold than 42345, it's also more easy to grasp. And more importantly: this makes our work waaaay easier to fine tune the amount of gold generated in a level.
• Shop Reroll is now free, and the limit has been increased to 5 times. Every time you reroll though, the price of items available in the shop is increased by 40% of their base price.
• Spoiler level now has a guaranteed heal shop and a random gear shop, instead of two different random shops.
• Many items' base prices have been changed. The changes might not be completely apparent at first glance, as the scaling heavily modified the prices anyway, but here's the list of items which prices changed.

• Items that had their price raised:
  • All healing items
  • Powerful Grenade
  • Fire Grenade
  • Heavy Crossbow
  • Explosive Crossbow
  • Repeater Crossbow

• Items which prices have been lowered:
  • Stun Grenade
  • Giant Killer
  • Ice Armor
  • Ice Bow
  • Long Bow
  • Sonic Carbine
• Legendary Weapons no longer give scroll and give less bonus damage than before. That's not permanent - we just haven't decided on how to balance them yet.
• As mentioned above, enemy damage has been decreased to make for the loss of gear scrolls at the beginning of a run. It's very much WIP, we will be very grateful to let us know if you think enemies do too much or too little damage. Thanks!
• You now get a free amulet at the beginning of a game at BC1+. Most likely subject to changes.
• Mobs now teleport to you much faster at BC4+.
• Skills no longer proc rally nor cooldown reduction mutations.
• Reworked Heavy Crossbow:
  • Now a Survival-only two-handed weapon
  • Off-hand instantly reloads your crossbow with a volley of critical bolts
  • The hook no longer pierce enemies, even with the "pierce enemies" affixes.
  • The damages dealt by the volley of bolts is now capped by bosses damage cap.
• Reworked Repeater Crossbow:
  • Now a Survival-only two-handed weapon
  • Main hand fire rate has been reduced and now root every 4 bolts. No longer crit on rooted enemies.
  • Off-hand fires a volley of bolts all at once that inflict critical damages to rooted enemies.
• Reworked Ice Crossbow:
  • Now a Survival-only two-handed weapon
  • Main hand fire has been mostly unchanged, except you can no longer charge a volley of critical bolts with it.
  • Off-hand now fire a long range, ultra-fast bolt with infinite piercing which crits on frozen enemies.
• Reworked Explosive Crossbow:
  • Now a Survival-only two-handed weapon
  • Main fire has not been changed.
  • Off-hand is now a melee combo ... with a surprise.
• Reworked War Javelin:
  • Pressing the button again teleports you to the javelin.
  • No longer profits from Ammo mutation.
• Reworked Wings of the Crow:
  • Now features up AND down movement. You can run normally with the power activated, jump again to take flight.
  • Movement speed is increased while wings are active.
  • Attacking enemies with weapons inflict new Shock status.
  • Stomping and dodging no longer cancel the power, reactivate to cancel the power.
  • Stomping deals extra damages around.
• Reworked Tonic:
  • No longer requires a health flask or a level change to use again. Has a normal cooldown instead.
  • No longer heals you.
  • Invincibility is much shorter.
  • Grant a portion of your missing health as temporary bonus health (shield)
  • Reduce damage taken.
  • Prevent malaise.
  • Increase movement speed.
  • Shorten dodge cooldown.
• Reworked Vampirism:
  • No longer requires a health flask or a level change to use again. Has a normal cooldown instead.
  • Totally scrapped the old mechanic.
  • Now transform you entire life plus a portion of your missing life into rally. Strike fast to heal yourself!
  • High risk, high reward, right?
• Reworked Tentacle Whip: added a kick that bumps enemies away when striking an enemy too close for a critical hit.
  • The goal here is to provide a less clunky chaining when failing to crit.
• Buffed/reworked Ice Shards: The aim here is to give ice shard a strong identity of secondary weapon.
  • Removed ammo count
  • Increased slow duration
  • Reduced critical damages
• Buff all starting weapons damages (Rusty Sword, Beginner's Bow and Old Wooden Shield).
• Buffed Nutcracker:
  • Increased range
  • Reworked model and animations
• Buffed Root Grenade:
  • Increased duration
  • Slightly increased DPS
• Buffed Stun Grenade:
  • Reduced cooldown
• Buffed Frost Blast:
  • Increased range
  • Remove ammunition
• Buffed Spartan Sandals:
  • Increased hit damages
• Buffed Torch:
  • Increased hit damages
• Buffed Knockback Shield:
  • Increased damage dealt to enemies projected against a wall
• Buffed Crusher:
  • Now slows enemies in its area
• Buffed Spite Sword:
  • Increased damage
  • Slightly reduced forward momentum
• Buffed Multiple-nocks Bow:
  • Increased ammo count
  • Removed Survival scaling
  • Slightly increased fire rate
• Buffed Marksman's Bow:
  • Increased ammo count
  • Removed Survival scaling
• Buffed Nerves of Steel:
  • Increased ammo count
  • Removed Survival scaling
• Buffed Spiked Boots:
  • Reworked animations and hitboxes.
  • Slight damage buff overall.
• Buffed Balanced Blade:
  • Increased critical time
  • Increased base damage but reduced damage gained with subsequent hit (the maximum damage stayed unchanged)
  • Slightly increased breach values
• Buffed Blood Sword:
  • Increased bleeding time
• Buffed Flint:
  • Faster charge
  • Larger sparks area upon full charge
  • Sparks now ignite oil on the ground
• Buffed Greed Shield:
  • Removed gold cap to receive full gold reward
• Buffed Sonic Carbine (previously Sonic Crossbow):
  • Increased damage
  • Increased range
• Buffed Symmetrical Lance:
  • Increased range
• Nerfed Rampart Shield:
  • Reduced invincibility time after parrying
  • Added a FX to warn invincibility ending
• Nerfed Flamethrower Turret:
  • Increase cooldown.
• Nerfed Wolf Trap:
  • Reduced root duration
  • Reduced bonus DPS
• Nerfed Scythe Claw:
  • Slightly lower damage.
  • Taking a hit now cancel the critical chain.
• Nerfed Rhythm'n Bouzouki:
  • Reduced damage
• Nerfed Quick Bow:
  • Reduced critical damages
• Nerfed Necromancy:
  • only heals you up to 50% health.
• Electric Whip no longer dual-scales with Brutality (pure Tactics only).
• Community Suggestion | Clock Tower and Forgotten Sepulcher number of fragments swapped.
• Community Suggestion | Rapier now dual-scales with Brutality and Tactics.
• The new Duelist mob in Slumbering Sanctuary has been buffed (breach resistance increased and more hp).
• Buffed bonus damage on stunned enemies affix chance.
• New bonus damage on immobilized target and bonus damage on electrified (shocked) target affixes.
• Community Suggestion | Two-handed weapons can no longer appear as starting gear until the Recycling Tubes are unlocked. Version 1.9.1
• Community Suggestion | Improved one-shot protection to prevent some unfair deaths related to combos. Version 1.9.1
• The Duelist is now named Dancer and occasionally dash behind you before stabbing you in the back. Omae wa mo shindeiru. Version 1.9.1
• Community Suggestion | Mobs hitting on the invulnerability shield are now only bumped horizontally, no longer interrupting some combos (Rampagers, notably). Lots of combos are still interrupted (Guardian Knights, Lacerator, etc.) Version 1.9.3
• Community Suggestion | Affixes and mutations now affect damages dealt by DoTs. This only affects DoTs applied directly by items. Not poison clouds nor fire on the ground. Version 1.9.3
• Toxic Cloud affix pool have been reworked (no more damage bonus affixes, more bonus effect on trigger, etc.). Version 1.9.3
• Toxic Carbine now applies one stack of poison on impact. Version 1.9.3
• Guardian no longer turn towards you during their attack animation. They can still turn during their combo. Version 1.9.3
• Guardian's shield now requires a small threshold of damages to be applied before breaking. Version 1.9.3
• Slightly buffed Disengagement mutation to prevent your HP from descending under 20% while the mutation is active. Version 1.9.3
• Community Suggestion | Conjonctivius "Touhou" rain of tears attack cooldown doubled. Version 1.9.3
• Community Suggestion | When the eye of the Giant is out, both hands are now invulnerable. Version 1.9.3
• Community Suggestion | Prevent the "victims burn" affix from appearing on ice items. Version 1.9.3
• Community Suggestion | Damage received from traps are now capped at 30% of your maximum life. Version 1.9.3
• Community Suggestion | Prevent food from spawning behind (possibly closed) ZDoors. Version 1.9.3
• Buffed Grappling Hook: Controls are locked a shorter time. Version 1.9.3
• You can now drop a maximum of one blueprint from mobs in a single level. This limitation does not apply to blueprints found in secret rooms or by using the Hunter's Grenade. Version 1.9.3
• Global Shields (the invulnerability bubble) no longer interrupt spinning attacks from Lacerators, Guardian Knights and A certain secret boss. Version 1.9.4
• Community Suggestion | Nerfed Alchemic Carbine to make up for the multiple buffs received by Poison DoTs. Version 1.9.4
• Replaced one Food Shop by and Active Shop in Cavern. Version 1.9.6
• Nerfed A Certain Secret Boss laser beam damages. Version 1.9.6
• Increased Slumbering Sanctuary and Time Keeper number of Scroll fragments dropped by 1 in BC3+. Version 1.9.6
• Community Suggestion | War Javelin stun's duration decreases much faster. First strike: 100%, Second strike: 50%, Third and subsequent strikes: No Stun Version 1.9.6
• Community Suggestion | Killing one of Giant's hand now only decreases the amount of charge by one instead of resetting the charge count. Version 1.9.6
• Community Suggestion | Prevent more than 2 "+XX% damage on _ target" affixes from appearing on an item. Version 1.9.6

Level design

• Community Suggestion | Guardians's (soon to be renamed Oven Knights) density has been decreased.
• Community Suggestion | Slumbering Sanctuary bestiary has been revisited to have new mobs in the "sleeping" part of the biome too.
• The Bad Seed | Community Suggestion | The Swamp Altar is now a permanent room, and so cannot be deactivated with the "Remove lore rooms" options. Version 1.9.1

Graphics & UI

• Broadsword, Twin Daggers and Bow and Endless Quiver now display a non-critical value in their description to help comparing items.
• Community Suggestion | Added an option to display or hide the Seed information above your minimap. Version 1.9.1
• Clarified some items names and descriptions. Version 1.9.3
• Community Suggestion | Changed the confusing keyword "immobilized" to the color-coded (and obviously, objectively much clearer) "root" in descriptions to clarify synergies. Version 1.9.3

Quality of life

• The Vorpan does not appear for the first few runs, and only appear at one merchant per level.
• The very first run through Prison Quarters does not create lore rooms.
• Shop categories are now replaced with stats. As the item pool grew, categories made less and less sense. So to make sure the shops you find during your run always have something interesting for you, you can now select Brutality, Tactics or Survival when you have the shop categories unlocked.
• Community Suggestion | Thunder Shield no longer target doors. Especially golden door. Version 1.9.1
• Community Suggestion | Explorer Instinct now signals mobs carrying precious loot with a star on the minimap. Version 1.9.3
• Community Suggestion | Added a Custom Game option to use the old category choices (item types rather than item colors) in the shops. This option does not lock achievements. Version 1.9.5
• Thornies now face you when aggressively teleporting to you in BC4+. Version 1.9.5
• Community Suggestion | Forced the aquisition of Boss Cells to avoid the case where one would end the run without unlocking the next difficulty. Version 1.9.6

Music & SFX

• The Bad Seed | Added some missing SFX on Jerkshrooms and Mushroom Boi. Version 1.9.2

Bug fixes

• Fixed weird graphical interaction between invulnerable enemies and Crow's Foot mutation.
• Bleed on parry affix forbidden on bloodshield.
• Victims burn affix forbidden on Frostblast and Ice Crossbow.
• The Bad Seed | Fixed holes sometimes appearing in the walls of the Arboretum. Version 1.9.2
• Fixed Knives Thrower sometimes dancing undecided on the spot. Version 1.9.2
• Fixed Rampager sometimes attacking without warning when exiting invisibility. Version 1.9.2
• Fixed Elite mobs with the cloning ability not taking damage on aggro. Version 1.9.3
• Fixed being unable to drop an item carried by the Homunculus by pressing dodge on some controller or keyboard configurations. Version 1.9.3
• Fixed some spikes collisions. Version 1.9.3
• Fixed invulnerable Guardian reacting to strikes like their shield was broken every time. Version 1.9.3
• Fixed Adrenaline and Frenzy calculations to only scale with the base damage of an attack (before any scaling or damage buff, except critical hits, is taken into account). We were looking into nerfing these mutations when we found out that they weren't working as expected. Version 1.9.5
• Fixed Great Owl of War attacking while invisible. Version 1.9.6
• Fixed blueprints dropping from bosses out of order. Version 1.9.7

References