Mind Over Magic News

[h3]The Capstone Update[/h3]

Hey Mages,

This update wraps up the improvements that we planned post-1.0. Today's release focuses on improving performance, UI tweaks and fixes, and a lot of small improvements that make everyday play smoother.

[h3]Capstone Update Highlights[/h3]

• Performance and stability. Reduced framerate stutter tied to large stockpiles, fewer ways for tasks to deadlock, and cleaner edge cases around rifts and pathfinding.
  
  
• Clearer signals when something’s wrong. A new icon flags doors that can’t be used because they aren’t on a floor or foundation, alerts appear when a mage is at death’s door and you don’t have any usable medical beds, and bed “unreachable” warnings are easier to understand.
  
  
• Pathing and room logic. Better detection for Private rooms (even with stairs through corners), a new Public Room keyword, and fixes for rare cases where Underschool rooms could end up blocked.
  
  
• Readability and guidance. The Codex text is larger, search is more reliable, ritual entries and costs are corrected, hover links behave like links, potion selection always fits on screen, and XP hovers show exact progress.
  
  
• A few world touches. Heat Wave is back, Croa now leave corpses if they can’t reach their nests, along with some other UI adjustments and Creative Mode fixes.
  

We set out to improve onboarding, performance, and quality of life—plus add options like Creative and new settings. The Capstone Update completes that plan, and we’re proud of where the game has landed. We’ll continue to keep an eye on feedback from new and returning players. As always, thank you for being part of our community, for the thoughtful feedback, and for helping shape Mind Over Magic!


With magic and love,

Sparkypants



[h3]Update Details[/h3]

• Improvements to framerate stuttering related to stored items.
  
• New alert icon that appears on doors that cannot be used because they are not on a Floor or Foundation.
  
• Fixes for drag selection when clicking in front of a Support Column or Stair.
  
• Fix for rare cases where Underschool Rooms end up with blocked pathing due to the order placing items.
  
• New alerts that appear when Mages are At Death's Door and there are no Medical Beds or existing Medical Beds are not allowed to be used by the downed Mages.
  
• Fix for situations where resources reserved for Construction or Assembly could be used for crafting.
  
• Fix for the Spice Rack not appearing in Inventory.
  
• If a Croa cannot reach its nest or the back of the land, it will die and leave behind a corpse instead of simply disappearing.
  
• Heat Wave event now occurs again. It was disabled pre-1.0, but it is back now.
  
• Improved detection of Private rooms in cases where stairs cut through corners. This will not impact existing saves.
  
• Fix for Chopping the Jade Eggplant creating three Jade Dragon Eggs in Creative Mode.
  
• Tutorial goals for building a Chest and crop Plots now appear and immediately complete if you have already built them. This makes it apparent that you completed a goal and prevents the goal from possibly appearing later in the game.
  
• Added Public Room Keyword. This replaces "Must Not Be Private" as a condition on Room Types.
  
• Fixes to the Magic Mirror so that customizations are not sometimes lost when hiring or apprenticing.
  
• If a Dragon Egg Incubator is shrunk, it will now keep its Task for putting an egg inside when enlarged.
  
• Fix for links to Job Types in selection action button hover text so that they look like links.
  
• Fix for Ritual entries in the Codex that were showing invalid costs.
  
• Updated Repel Fog and Hire rituals in the Codex to better describe them.
  
• Potion selection UI no longer scales with the UI Scaling option so that it always fits on screen.
  
• Enlarged all the text in the Codex.
  
• Removed Wand Tier 4 as a possible selection in the Groups UI.
  
• When hovering Skill XP bars, the hover text now shows the exact progress.
  
• Updated text to help clarify that Broken furniture must be repaired before Disintegrating to recover all the resources.
  
• Updated Fractal Mold description to help clarify that it can only be harvested at night.
  
• Fix for search in the Codex not always finding entries by name.
  
• Fix for combat icons sometimes showing up with incorrect icons or stack amounts.
  
• Fix for hover text on the Relic slots on the Mage Sheet to show the Affinity information from the perspective of a mage, not a relic.
  
• Update Tanning Rack description to not say it is required to build an Atelier.
  
• Only show item dimension once when hovering on the Research UI.
  
• The Dance Party ritual now counts toward the Dancing Queen Trial.
  
• Eliminated some ways in which Rifts could appear in very small, unconnected spaces.
  
• Improved the clarity of the Unreachable alert on a bed by making it show in the way whether the bed is assigned or just allowed for one Mage.
  
• Added an icon to the Ritual selection button that shows when the Ritual is not allowed due to having an X Task Priority.
  
• Showing at least a minimum cost for the Summon rituals rather than no cost when no wands are selected.
  
• Fix for situations where two Mages/Helpers could get stuck with both trying to take the same item from storage.
  
• Better handling of Staff sitting and libations AI when Staff outnumber available seating.
  
• Fix Dormitory and Bedroom incorrectly counting Cots with Plain Beds.
  
• Stop current task if Founder Relic is removed from attuned Mage who is not standing on solid ground.
  
• Fix Cram Session achievement to account for time spent as a Student.
  

A common request we hear from new players is that they want a tutorial that provides more guidance. Now we have one!

Our goal was to make a system that reacts to your play, rather than force you to do exact steps before you can make your own choices. For example, if you start summoning students before that goal appears, you'll never see it. We tried to find a balance between delivering easily understood guidance and maintaining a feeling that you can do whatever you want, no matter what the goals say.

The tutorial is only active for new games and can be disabled in settings at any time.

As always, we snuck in some QoL. There's now a School History button at the Book of Rituals where you can see every Mage that has left your school. We added plenty of other bug fixes and improvements as well, which you can see in the build notes below!

[h3]Features[/h3]

• New tutorial system and UI!
  
• New tabs at the basement book (now called School History) that shows all former students and staff, how they left, and what they looked like.
  

[h3]Gameplay and Balance[/h3]

• The gruel pot is now a little faster to research.
  
• Fixed skill cap allocation for new students so that all magic skills have an equal chance at being a secondary skill.
  

[h3]Fixes and Improvements[/h3]

• Fixed a problem where the Build menu could get stuck closed by holding control and right-clicking while placing furniture.
  
• Added a keybinding for showing the Codex (Y).
  
• No longer show Ember Dragon in Sources lists since they show up for about everything.
  
• Updated the Sources order so that quilted are at the end.
  
• Use 24h time in the two places we weren't (log display and hud clock mouseover)
  
• Fix not being able to place furniture when using search while the Shrinks tab is selected.
  
• On unreachable bed alert, show individuals who can't reach a bed for sleeping instead of the groups that are allowed. This prevents one blocked-off mage from triggering an alert that says 'all staff, all students' can't reach a bed.
  
• Performance improvements for Mages putting lots of things in storage in complex schools.
  
• Don't show Possible Break Risk unless Mage is in the Bad Mood Conviction zone (which is 7.5 hours before a break is possible).
  
• Fix for count of incorrect rules when displaying room type checklist
  
• Added the Loud Room keyword to help make the Silent keyword easier to understand.
  
• Fix small arch support research being unlocked at game start.
  
• Fix for debug trailer camera mode so that it can be properly closed.
  
• School start screen uses proper faction icons now if you allow all factions.
  
• Fix for popups at the start of game not processing properly if there are multiple.
  
• Don't show dragon need alert when need can't be satisfied because a quest is active.
  
• Fix for visuals on top of hallway block when stacked directly on top of other hallway block.
  
• Make sure as students become apprentices and eventually staff, any allowed groups they were set that are now illegal get cleaned up.
  
• Fix missing range calculation in ghost spellcasting so that ghosts no longer sometimes have infinite range.
  
• Fix possible exception in rare case of spell targeting failing.
  
• Fix for recreation need status being improperly shown on status page
  
• Fixes for typos and language support throughout.
  
• Fix a rare situation where a Mage thinks they can't reach a position to cast, but actually can.
  
• Disable the Begin Ritual for Student Summoning if no wand is selected.
  
• Don't show Captured creatures in the Resources/New lists until you have actually captured one.
  
• When using the pathing filter with something selected that allows Assignments like a bed, show the pathing relative to the assigned Mage, not the selected object.
  
• Fix new school UI to properly show shuffled keywords after editing in the Customize UI.
  
• Fix for DoUntilX crafting for paintings/sculptures not showing the proper amounts.
  
• When changing the difficulty level during gameplay, the Architecture Style (room keywords) no longer change automatically. You can still change the Architecture Style directly if you want to.
  
• Fix for situation where battles that ended with a Mage taking lethal damage while using the Move action would soft lock. Schools stuck in this state will now exit combat when loaded.
  

[h3]5/15/2025[/h3]

• Fix for Jade Dragon not growing in Creative Mode.
  
• Fix rare exception due to blocking object forced to change position.
  

[h3]5/12/2025[/h3]

• Fix for Withered Jade Eggplant sometimes failing to spawn correctly.
  
• Fix for issue where relics could become unusable when selecting them for rituals and then cancelling the ritual.
  

One of the most common topics for feedback we receive is, "I want to be able to just build whatever!" That's what Creative Mode is all about. You don't need to research or worry about the Fog or resources in order to construct the perfect school and furnish it. For some, this will be a practice mode to try out different ideas for their next Relentless run. For others, this is is the mode they've been wanting to play in all the time. We're looking forward to see what you do with it!

There are also some frequently requested QoL and balance changes in this update, like shorter quest and construct times and the ability to queue up new Initiate Summons.

We've also heard from many players that combat can get repetitive when you're not playing on Relentless mode. We've now enabled Advanced Battle Strategy by default on Standard difficulty and show that as a top-level checkbox when creating a new game. This is not about making the game harder, but about letting the full depth of the combat systems show through in the standard game. Like other difficulty settings, you can disable it at any time to simplify things!

We have two more updates planned. The next one will add more guidance to the beginning of the game to help new players get started and explore ways to add more replayability to the game. After that, we'll be focused on QoL, especially for commonly requested UI and planning improvements.

We hope you enjoy the update. Thanks for playing Mind Over Magic!

Build notes below...

[h3]Creative Mode[/h3]

• All research is unlocked.
  
• Construct and Assemble Tasks cost no resources and require just one cast to complete.
  
• No events trigger.
  
• Resource quantities and harvest/gather/mine amounts are tripled.
  
• Freeform room keywords let you freely build whatever room you'd like.
  

[h3]Gameplay[/h3]

• Added Emergency Priority to Fog Incarnate and Bramblespawn. This causes all Mages with the Hunt Jobtype set above Never to attack. They return to normal behavior afterward.
  
• Construct times for Roof, Wall, and Floor blocks reduced.
  
• Renamed Advanced Battle Difficulty to Advanced Battle Strategy.
  
• New games on Standard difficulty default to Advanced Battle Strategy on. This is now visible outside of Custom settings.
  
• Quest durations have been reduced by half.
  

[h3]QoL[/h3]

• Summon Queueing
• Queue up multiple Summons at once so you don't have to keep coming back to the Summoner.
  
• Show the reason why right-click staff to Lecture is not allowed. (Not scheduled, etc.)
  
• When no Mage/Helper is selected, the Pathing filter now shows regions only connected by Brooms as different colors to visualize the connections better.
  
• Show Conviction value for Staff on the Hire Ritual.
  
• Hovering a Wand recipe now shows all of the same information as other recipes.
  
• Added feed alerts for Terror, Insomnia, and Melancholy statuses.
  

[h3]Fixes and Improvements[/h3]

• Fix for Relics getting destroyed if selected for multiple rituals.
  
• Fix for Fog Aegis from older saves not functioning as intended.
  
• Newly placed Small and Large Arch Support visuals no longer partially block doors.
  
• Fix for quilted still being crafted showing up in groups.
  
• Fix for wording when right-clicking on a Relic to attune it.
  
• Fix some cases where Jade Dragon care value showed 100%, but players did not receive achievement.
  
• Removed errant mention of Wand Crafting from descriptions of Sal Alembroth and Sal Oblivium.
  
• Removed inaccurate text from Wand Upgrade ritual and now showing all information in the Effects section.
  
• Fix so that Golden Berries event fully negates Ate Gutberries penalty.
  
• Repositioned tier roman numerals on research to avoid overlapping progress bars and text.
  
• No longer showing alert for being tired while having an Emergency Job if the Mage has Insomnia.
  
• No longer triggering the Runaway event if number of runaways will put player over the population cap.
  
• Added mention of ladders to Private rooms tutorial.
  
• Fixed rare case where trying to place an entity in the world results in the entity being 'lost' and never usable.
  
• Protect against mages consumed by Fog advancement when being teleported into Corrupted Mana Lantern rooms.
  

[h3]Fixes & Improvements - 3/14/25[/h3]

• Fix exception if delivery is interrupted by another delivery, and item being carried is stacked with same ingredient nearby.
  
• Fix problem where Relic on Relic Plinth cannot be removed and is not granting its power.