Fragment's Moonrise V1.8: The Lair of Fire

Welcome to V1.8!

Its been a little longer than normal! And with good reason: the Lair of Fire in its entirety has been finished!

This next series of major maps are going to be a lot more demanding to develop for, and to start them off, I bring you the Lair of Fire.

From Okeiri’s World Tree Map, head southwest to gain access to this new area. After a short journey, you’ll arrive at the Entrance.

The forest is going to begin to sprawl out a lot more going forward, and the Entrance is the first of many. A passageway nearby will eventually lead to the Path of Ice environment, but for now it has simply been placed in.

As you go forward, you’ll be greeted with a few new types of enemies: dragons capable of powerful Fire Mysticism. Let’s check them out...

Fire Arkoyle

A dragon similar to the Mataush miniboss fight all the way back at the start of the Grove, the Fire Arkoyle casts a bursting fireball that can even harm its allies. And that’s going to be the theme of this environment: fire is chaos, and thus the encounters will be just as chaotic. All major fire dragons will be able to damage each other, but they do have higher Fire resistance to compensate.

Molten Arkoyle

The Molten Arkoyle casts a fireball capable of burning anything it touches as it travels, in addition to dealing damage. This does mean if you position yourself appropriately, you’ll be able to have other dragons get inflicted with Burning from this fireball.

Flame Matosta

A dragon similar to the Surras miniboss fight back at the start of the Grove, the Flame Matosta casts fireballs that rain down from the sky. True to the design of the Matosta, it can harm itself in addition to being able to harm its allies.

Molten Matosta

The most powerful of the Fire Dragons, the Molten Matosta casts an intense flame that burns everything it touches and chases the player relentlessly. You will need precise movement in order to dodge this spell.

Lair of Fire Exclusive Enemies

Added exclusively for the Lair of Fire are a few extra enemies used to supplement the chaotic gameplay and lore of this environment.

Otherworldly Flame

A dark purple plume of smoke, the Otherworldly Flame rains fire down from the skies (similar to the raining fire during the latter half of the Barein fight). This being also has the ability to summon two special enemies: the Enflamed.

Enflamed Arkoyle

Equivalent to the Lesser Arkoyle, the Enflamed Arkoyle chases after the player and casts a more powerful fire spell. Summoned by the Otherworldly Flame.

Enflamed Matosta

Equivalent to the Lesser Matosta, the Enflamed Matosta is a stronger variant summoned by the Otherworldly Flame.

New General Enemies

Some new support enemies were necessary to be added to the game in order to improve each respective environment.

Life Arkoyle and Matosta

The Life Arkoyle and Life Matosta are new powerful healers, capable of rapidly healing any damaged ally. An issue with the previous primary healer, the Water Arkoyle, was that it could easily get out of position and not be able to perform its healing role. The Life Arkoyle and Matosta have been equipped with a way to restore mana while simultaneously teleporting nearby allies, to ensure their always in the fray and able to perform front-line healing duties.

Sound Arkoyle and Matosta

The Sound Arkoyle and Sound Matosta fill a Resistance-modifying role. The Sound Arkoyle is capable of increasing the Resistances of all nearby allies while the Sound Matosta has a long-ranged Resistance-reducing spell.

Nature Arkoyle and Matosta

The Nature Arkoyle and Nature Matosta fill a unique position-based role. They are capable of Rooting any hit player unit, making them unable to move and thus easy prey. The Nature Matosta also has access to the powerful Earthfall skill for devastating damage.

Secrets

Hidden with the Lair of Fire are two pathways that lead to unique rewards. Be sure to explore around to find them!

Feross the Lesser Flame Dragon

The boss of the Lair of Fire and keeper of the Tome of Fire is Feross, the insane Lesser Dragon of Flame.

As the fight with Feross progresses, it becomes more and more chaotic. He can summon Otherworldly Flames thoughout the fight, and the lower health he has, the more dangerous he becomes. His fireballs start off small, the same size as Barein’s, but as he gets weaker, the fireballs get much much larger. In addition, as his health is lowered, more and more flames begin to surround the arena. By the end of the fight, the arena has been squeezed to nearly half its size.

Finally, as a finishing move, Feross casts a massive fireball. This fireball will destroy the entire arena, damaging everything within it. When he casts it, you’ll need to finish him off as quickly as possible, because this fireball is the most devastating attack in the game (so far!).

New Class: Apprentice of Flame

As a reward from Feross, you will receive the Tome of Fire, which unlocks the next Elemental Apprentice class: the Apprentice of Flame. The Apprentice of Flame specializes in large AOE damaging spells based around the fire spells of the dragons of the Lair of Fire in addition to some spells influenced from Classic.

Oh! And last but not least, some new music has been added to the Nightforest!

With all that being said, I hope you look forward to the next major update to the game: the Path of Ice. My original goal was to release new updates roughly every month, but because I want to really detail these next series of environments, updates will likely only be every ~2 months.

Thanks for checking out Fragment's Moonrise!