Is the new content from 1.3 missable?

[hectoneon]

i am on my first playthrough, which i started before the 1.3 update. i am currently in chapter 4 at the point of having to decide if i want to enter the red tower now.
i have explored the map as much as i could and i don't think i have found the area teased in the update screenshot. i assume i'm approaching the end of the game and would like to not miss any questlines. i have completed all side quests except for the ruin raiders one since i've sold two of the signets to a trader that is no longer accessible.
how do i trigger the content from "the flesh rises"? does it start after the end of the main story or have i maybe already missed it?

[Sera]

flesh rises is after you activate the 3 stones in the blood marsh
you need misty step south of the device to pick up a key, then you can descend at the location where you've charged the stones into the boss room

the fight is something you will maybe do once and never again. you get a spell for a "travel form" from it.
Which is absolutely pointless at this stage of the game because you get it after you did the final quest before you enter the point of no return

they really struggle with the feedback how dead and empty the game is after act1

the new spells and abilities are a similar lackluster. "we add spells so you can be a caster before act4 when you get your runestone" - proceeds to gate 8 out of the 11 new abilities behind the runestone of act 4

it is a small dev team, sadly their lack of experience to handle the user feedback shows

[hectoneon]

thanks, that helped a lot.
also, wow, you really weren't kidding. that fight is practically tailor-made to shine a spotlight on every clunky aspect of the combat system.

[Ink]

We had an open beta for this fight that went for quite a while, same for the new spells. We tried to form it around the feedback we got during. The main intention here was to deal with player's complaint of a lack of challenging chapter 4/endgame content. I agree that the usefulness of the wolf spell at this point in the game is questionable, though it's not easy to find a good reward for an optional very hard endgame boss, and it was more about that itself than the reward. Half the spells, the ones you don't need a runestone for and can get early, are for players that are insistent on early mage-play, which was never planned, but is now facilitated,- why not. The other spells are for players that wanted more late-game weapon abilities. Could you tell us what you think is clunky? Your criticisms are fair but we need a bit more detail to actually ascertain what you mean to do something about it.

[hectoneon]

Originally posted by Ink:

Could you tell us what you think is clunky?

sorry for the late reply, i hadn't gotten around to playing much lately. i hope this doesn't read like some super harsh criticism/rant. i really don't mean it that way - i had a lot of fun with drova.
i also don't use the term clunky in a purely negative way, in fact the clunkiness of the combat mechanics adds to drova's old-school charm for me. my issue is rather that the design of the flesh boss fight is directly at odds with the combat mechanics that worked perfectly well for basically the entire game. i specifically mean the interruptions/forced stops of movement that come with most actions (like sheathing/unsheathing weapons, using potions and spells) as well as the slow movement speed with a drawn weapon while also not being able to dodge liberally. these mechanics serve to limit mobility in fights, whereas the flesh boss places heavy emphasis on mobility.
i don't really know how to "fix" the fight though. *to me* it feels a bit too long at three stages and more tedious than challenging. the first two are very similar and in the third i was basically just outhealing the the damage from the splash attacks. the fight also made me reluctantly overhaul the (close to default) controls that i had used all game until this point. moving the quickbar items to the number keys and the abilities/spells to letters and enabling quickcast mitigates some of the mobility issues and would be an improvement to the default controls in my opinion.

[Ink]

Originally posted by hectoneon:

Originally posted by Ink:

Could you tell us what you think is clunky?

sorry for the late reply, i hadn't gotten around to playing much lately. i hope this doesn't read like some super harsh criticism/rant. i really don't mean it that way - i had a lot of fun with drova.
i also don't use the term clunky in a purely negative way, in fact the clunkiness of the combat mechanics adds to drova's old-school charm for me. my issue is rather that the design of the flesh boss fight is directly at odds with the combat mechanics that worked perfectly well for basically the entire game. i specifically mean the interruptions/forced stops of movement that come with most actions (like sheathing/unsheathing weapons, using potions and spells) as well as the slow movement speed with a drawn weapon while also not being able to dodge liberally. these mechanics serve to limit mobility in fights, whereas the flesh boss places heavy emphasis on mobility.
i don't really know how to "fix" the fight though. *to me* it feels a bit too long at three stages and more tedious than challenging. the first two are very similar and in the third i was basically just outhealing the the damage from the splash attacks. the fight also made me reluctantly overhaul the (close to default) controls that i had used all game until this point. moving the quickbar items to the number keys and the abilities/spells to letters and enabling quickcast mitigates some of the mobility issues and would be an improvement to the default controls in my opinion.

Don't worry, doesn't seem rude or harsh in the slightest, this is a very helpful critique!