Publisher 1c Entertainment and developer 6 Eyes Studio have posted a devlog detailing monster variants in the upcoming “Missions and Monsters” DLC in Fell Seal: Arbiter’s Mark.
Along with the reveal of new splash art (as seen above and in full resolution here, via Steam), the devlog on January 18th detailed how monsters would have variants.
In short, a monster will now have access to up to two sub-classes at once, granting them new skills, passive abilities, and counters. The devlog notes that each variant will grant “2 active abilities, 2 passives and 1 counter,” and while monsters “get 6 passives in total, […] they have a little less flexibility than humans in selecting them.”
This does not just apply to enemy monsters, as players will be able to recruit their own. They can join as rewards from special missions, or being tamed by the new Wrangler class (which will be elaborated upon in a future update). Aside from monsters being unable to change their base class, how monsters learn new skills was explained in more depth.
“Each monster base class (such as Vangal, Ercinee, etc.) will have its own skill tree, with their upgraded tiers (eg. Vangal -> Komainu -> Gyaum) being a node on their tree they can spend AP on to learn. There will be a tutorial on the process added early in the game to make sure things are well explained!
[…] The variant classes will have their own skill tree and AP pool and will unlock their abilities and passives in the usual way. New variants will be unlocked in a variety of ways, including having a high enough level in other variants, mission rewards, and special monster badges.”
The devlog explained these variants will be reflected on the monsters sprites. In the animated .gifs below you can see a “a Thorned Vangal uses Thornstrike on a Venomous Skeletal Daodrenner,” as well as a Blardger cycling through “many of its possible variants.”
(Editor’s Note: The second image is hosted via Steam).
The Blardger also seems to be able to have Skeletal, and Thorned variants (as indicated by its skull head, and spiked collar variants). This may mean that a variant’s skills, abilities, and counters are shared across all monsters that have access to it. We have reached out to 6 Eyes Studio for comment.
Finally, the devlog explains why the developers did not utilize recruiting monsters in the base game.
“We feel that too many games in the genre have recruitable monsters tossed in, but never bother to make them as attractive when compared to human classes, which tend to be more feature-rich. With our system, we’re aiming to change that and make monsters both viable and interesting. They’ll have different pros and cons than humans, but ultimately should balance out well when compared. It’ll be up to player preference at that point!”
In case you missed it, we also covered prior devlogs here.
Fell Seal: Arbiter’s Mark is also available on Windows PC, Linux, Mac (all via GOG, and Steam), Nintendo Switch, PlayStation 4, and Xbox One. In case you missed it, you can find our review here (We highly recommend it!)
