UPDATE: Cryptic's David "Daeke" Bass has posted on his Twitter page that there's a workaround for the free Retcon. Just type "/Character_UseFreeRespec" in chat. It should remove all your powers without warning. You have to be at the Retcon screen for it to work.

Cryptic applied a large patch today that provides a number of changes to various power sets and adds a number of performance fixes to the game. It doesn't, however, contain the free Retcon that was promised to Champions Online players. According to the patch notes, a bug is delaying the process, but the team hopes to have it resolved by tonight.

Due to the power set changes added in this patch, Cryptic suggests you read the full notes before purchasing powers or redeeming your free Retcon once it's implemented. If you'd like to follow the company's advice, the lengthy patch notes can be found after the jump.

Also, don't forget a Champions Online developer's chat will be held today at 4:30 p.m. PDT. All the information you need to participate can be found here.

• Delayed: A full Retcon is available for any character created before 2009-09-10 08:30 UTC. To use it, visit the Powers Trainer, choose "Retcon," and click on "Use Free Reset." (A bug is preventing this from going through. We're currently working on it and hope to have it resolved by tonight. Thanks!)
• This patch provides a number of changes to various power sets. Please check the detailed patch notes before making any decisions regarding power purchasing (or before redeeming your free Retcon).

General

• A full Retcon is available for any character created before 2009-09-10 08:30 UTC. To use it, visit the Powers Trainer, choose "Retcon," and click on "Use Free Reset."
• Added a number of performance fixes to the game.
• We've changed the term "Display name" or "Public account name" to be uniform across our platforms. It is now referred to as your "Handle".
• Changed the way Strength adds to physical melee damage powers. Damage bonus is still capped at 20%, but this cap is now much easier to reach, and can be reached just through some modest effort at collecting gear, without a Characteristic Focus in Strength. This change has NO EFFECT on damage added from taking Strength as a Characteristic Focus. This is a distinct and separate bonus.
• Enemies now have slightly fewer hit points in the level 11 - 14 range; this is from an adjustment in the compensation for player's gaining Characteristic Focuses.
• Lore: Updating Lore Category: Lore Items have been moved to their own category in the Perks tab of the Mission Journal. This was done to better identify them as a group and draw a stronger connection between these items and the information in the Lore Library as they are directly related features.
• Perk: Nemesis Pirates (all ranks): Icon: Nemesis Pirates icon now uses the correct art.
• Perk Pet Store : Added in expression such that players can only buy a specific pet once.
• Power Replace items have been improved - now, in addition to the standard awesome damage effect, they provide a defense buff.
• Power Replace items that are granted from missions now properly bind on pick-up.
• Fixed some holes in the maps that allowed players to fall through the game world.
• Fixed incorrect tagging on a number of Tier 4 Arms Utility Secondaries (they were tagged primary despite having secondary stats and being intended for secondary slots).
• MARS Stim and MARS Shield stores now correctly display their level requirements for purchase.
• Fixed the message you receive when attempting to trade with a player who is currently "busy."
• In order to delete a character, you now must type in their name instead of "DELETE."
• The help UI now includes an internal game manual.
• Master Looter mode has been fixed.
• Retailer device Hyperconvection Field Generator will now do the proper amount of damage.
• The Feline Metabolic Serum upgrade can be properly activated.
• Fixed flickering point light shadows on multiple GPU SLI and Crossfire setups.
• Stats now update properly when switching between builds.
• Reduced quantity of posts to Twitter and Facebook.
• Lore items were incorrectly displaying that they granted Perk Points. They do not.
• Fixed dynamic lights created by power FX not working.
• Certain graphics cards would crash the game (or have no effect) when enabling anti-aliasing. This has been fixed.

User Interface and Chat

• Added a number of new loading screens to various instances.
• The in-game mouse cursor has all-new appearances based on whether you're pointing at a friend, an enemy, etc.
• If your selected target is in your guild the target window will use a different colored font indicating so.
• Pets tray now works in non-English UIs.
• The minimap now has a settings button on the right side (indicated by a gear). Under settings you can toggle what kind of icons you want the minimap to display.
• Chat - If you close the chat auto-complete suggestion list, you can now reopen it using the Tab key.
• Looking for group status is now displayed on the chat popup menu button.
• Increased the default opacity of the mission tracker from 40% to 65% to make it more readable.
• Tweaked the mission tracker opacity transition time from 0.2 to 0.075 to make it more responsive.
• Added a new social button to the minimap which will open the social window.
• Moved the minimap mail button to the bottom right side of the minimap.
• Appearance update to the minimap and world map resource icons (Arms, Science and Mysticism). They now have an extra white outline to make them easier to spot.
• Appearance update to all of the minimap hex shaped buttons.
• Updated the minimap clock background sprite by making it wider and changed the font to make it more readable.
• Changed the default minimap clock time display to be local time instead of server time.
• Tweaked the neighborhood minimap text area by enlarging it and tweaked the font by making it one point smaller to make longer map names be more readable.
• Added status/LFG options to bottom of player search UI (to increase discoverability).
• Chat UI - Accepting channel invites via the Chat Settings Channel tab now works properly.
• Made lore UI more readable (improved look).
• There is now a sell confirmation for double-clicking an item in the store, and by right-clicking an item in your inventory while the store is open. There will not be any confirmation if you click the sell button at the bottom of the store window.
• Fixed erroneous description for the crafted device "Talisman of the North Wind".
• Chat can be initiated using the NumPad Enter key in addition to the main Enter key.
• Text entry areas now use both the main Enter key & NumPad Enter key consistently.
• Buttons are no longer activated by using the NumPad Enter key. You may use the Space Bar to activate buttons.
• Fixed character creation screen to allow multiline story entry (previously the Enter key caused a focus transfer).
• Item tooltips should now update if they change while being hovered over with the mouse (for example, double clicking to equip them).
• The command "/rearrange" can now be used to enter and exit window rearrange mode.
• The Champions menu will now properly popup on the right side of the minimap, if you move the minimap to the left side of the screen.
• Added tooltips showing keybinds and slash commands for every item in the Champions menu, except for show/hide chat.
• It is now possible to bind everything in the Champions menu to a key through the keybind interface, except for show/hide chat.
• The guild bank now properly shows the first guild tab instead of "Buy" when there is only one tab.
• The mission tracker open & close buttons should now work right the first time.
• The Character Info screen should now properly display the NPC's description.
• Added 3 new items to minimap - Music, Sharing, and Help.
• The messages you receive when you level up are now categorized as "Rewards" instead of "Reward (Minor)". This means they will show up in your Chat tab by default instead of the Combat tab. This only applies if using the default chat settings.
• Buff tooltips have been updated to use a nicer font for the title.
• Added /sharing command to open the social media options.
• Added /itunes and /winamp to set the active music player and open it.
• When mousing over a movable window your mouse cursor should change indicating that it can be moved.
• Tooltip positioning logic improved. Tooltips should now never go offscreen (except in the extremely rare case where they're simply too large) and they're smarter about when to flip directions.
• Added search button to social UI.
• Large windows no longer auto-close fixed-position windows when opened (they still close other large windows, though).

Powers

• Jetboots can now be colored in the Powers window.
• Fixed bug that could cause you to get stuck in the charge state of Force Eruption and similar Powers.
• Added PvP functionality of the Crippling Challenge advantage (breaking blocks) to its description.
• All Controllable pet powers: Follow distance dropped to 8' to increase responsiveness when following.
• Dual Blade: Sword Cyclone: now returns the proper amount of energy when you have Momentum.
• Dual Blade: Sword Cyclone: Butcher's Blade: Now has the proper radius at all ranks.
• Dual Blade: Eye of the Storm: Blade Beyond the Veil: Must now be bought in order to work.
• Electricity: All powers that can Arc: Fixed a bug that allowed the arcs to hit a friendly target if you were attacking destructible objects.
• Electricity: Electric Form: Changed animation.
• Fire: Pyre and Telekinesis: Telekinetic Eruption were both using incorrect values for damage. They are now using the correct values. This results in a loss of damage for both of these powers, bringing them in line with other similar AoE powers.
• Fire: Pyre's Backdraft advantage now requires a 1 second charge and can only occur once every 5 seconds.
• Force: Field Surge now grants a significantly greater "heal" to your forcefield, if you have any rank of the Personal Force Field power. The bonus granted is slightly larger than the forcefield granted if you do not have the Personal Force Field power. Activating this power with PFF will briefly display the "extra" bubble, but this is just a visual effect so you can know that it worked.
• Force: Force Shield: The advantage Force Sheathe was doing the wrong calculation to determine damage reduction. It is now doing the correct calculation. This will result in less damage reduction from this advantage. The duration the resistance lasts has been increased.
• Gadgeteering: Field Drones: Radius for healing allies dropped to 20' around owner, drones give preference to healing owner if below 90% health. Drones given an "Attack" command at a friendly target will attempt to heal that target. If the owner of the drones is below 90% health, the drones will do a single healing attempt on the target and then return to heal the owner. Drones flight power was adjusted to allow them to navigate better indoors.
• Unarmed: Lightning Reflexes now gains significantly better benefit from Dexterity at low levels. Players should see an overall improvement in this power's performance and value as a defense. It is still the case that this power excels against high tier enemies, and is less effective against henchmen.
• Might: Hurl's rock chunk will now properly hide if you block half way through the animation.
• Munitions Bots, Attack Toys, Command Animals, Tyrannon's Familiar: Fixed AI bug where the creatures could lock up in combat when used in conjunction with Field Drones due to being passed a friendly attack target. Critters in assist mode now properly attack the owner's attack target if the owner initiates the combat. If a critter in assist mode is attacked while out of combat, it defends itself normally.
• Munitions: Assault Rifle: Rank 2 and Rank 3 now properly increase damage.
• Munitions: Bullet Ballet: Not Without Incident: Changed to a 30% chance to proc, up from a 10% chance to proc. Still a 100% chance to proc while Enraged.
• Munitions: Mini Mines: Wall of Fire: Tuned so that, while it summons two sets of mines, each set does 30% less damage.
• Munitions: Shotgun Blast: Now applies a small amount of knockback resistance.
• Munitions: Shotgun Blast: Breaching Round: Now applies knockback resistance.
• Munitions: Fixed a Sniper Rifle power replace that was doing way too much damage.
• Power Armor - Shoulder Launcher should now actually be attainable when the tooltip says it is.
• Single Blade: Reaper's Caress: Updated description to indicate that is applies a Bleed on its third attack.
• Single Blade: Reaper's Caress: New functionality for Vicious Vigor advantage: Hitting a Bleeding target with the third attack of the combo will cause you to become Enraged if you were already not Enraged.
• Single Blade: Dragon's Bite: Damage now improves from charging.
• Single Blade: Dragon's Bite: Cull the Weak: Updated description to note that it will not work on Master Villains or higher rank enemies.
• Single Blade: Dragon's Bite: Cull the Weak: Now properly does bonus damage to Master Villain and higher rank enemies.
• Single Blade: Reaper's Embrace: Updated description to state that it expires all bleeds on the target. Each expired bleed Ruptures, dealing additional damage.
• Single Blade: Reaper's Embrace: New advantage: Power no longer ruptures Bleeds but instead does 50% more base damage to debuffed enemies.
• Single Blade: Focus of the Unconquered Swordsman - Now passively buffs slashing damage.
• Single Blade: Focus of the Unconquered Swordsman - Passive slashing damage buff increases with rank.
• Single Blade: Scything Blade: Updated description to says it applies a Bleed, but it only applies a Bleed if they're not Bleeding already.
• Single Blade: Scything Blade: Rank three now has the proper range.
• Single Blade: Reaper's Caress: First attack now improves when you rank it up.
• Sorcery: Reduced the health of Sigils.
• Sorcery: Sigils don't cost energy until the end of the cast now, so you won't be charged for just tapping them.
• Sorcery: Sigils with the advantage should have a 6 second cooldown now.
• Sorcery: Circle of Primal Dominion: In-combat regeneration functions again.
• Sorcery: Skarn's Bane and Eldritch Shield can now be upgraded.
• Sorcery: Divine Renewal has been changed to a small sphere for targeting, instead of the cone.
• Supernatural: Condemn: The way the hold is applied has been changed. Previously, the strength of the hold scaled with your charge, meaning low charge Condemns would likely not hold targets. The new method has a chance at tap to apply a full strength hold, and that chance increases as you charge it.
• Supernatural: Devour Essence: Phlebotomist: Heals for 150% (down from 200%) when the target is Bleeding.
• Supernatural: Iron Lariat: Now applies knockback resistance. Updated description.
• Supernatural: Regeneration now has improved scaling with Recovery.
• Telekinesis: Ego Blades: All Ego Blade powers should scale off of the Ego stat now instead of Endurance. All descriptions mentioning that scaling have been updated as well.
• Telekinesis: Fixed Ego Annihilation and Ego Weaponry to display the correct names while Id Blades are active, so they function like the rest of the Ego Blade attacks.
• Telekinesis: Ego Blade Frenzy has had its range set to 7 feet (was 10 feet) as this is the correct range for all melee powers.
• Telepathy: Telekinetic Reverberation should now actually give energy when it is triggered, instead of giving zero energy.

Missions/Environments

• Lair Villain, Sigs and Cosmic Villain reward drops last longer before despawning (30 minutes).
• Callout rewards should no longer drop to player's inventory and should instead be given invisibly (no more picking one by accident from a set of rewards).
• Added Knockback Resistance to all Critter knocks and pulls. If you encounter a critter that knocks or pulls you and does not also apply a "Knockback Resistance" buff, please bug it (with the critters name).
• Addressed an issue with loot not dropping in several instances.

Desert

• Removed schtick attack from Malformed Grondlings.
• "Hang 'Em High": Extended time for mission failure.
• "Hang 'Em High": Added a cleanup on the Judge for a failed open mission attempt. If the mission fails he will now despawn. He will now also attack the player closest to him when he spawns.

Canadian Wilderness

• Diverting Dispatches repeatable mission now has a 15 minute cooldown period before it becomes available again.
• Steelhead kidnapees are no longer attackable by players.

Millennium City

• "Jail Break" - changed a few things in the mission to fix an issue with the proper critters not spawning. Also changed the manner in which you receive credit for the critter kills to help with mission completion.
• Club Caprice: Added several new costumes for Club Caprice civilian partygoers.
• "Bullet For Biselle": Fixed a sniper that was not properly set up.

Nemesis

• Nemesis "Thug" minions were not being counted towards proper tallies when they were using Darkness powers. This has been fixed.
• Attempting to exit the Museum Prequel through the hole in the wall no longer gives you three prompts to exit.
• Challenge Military Clones: The fight with Lethal should now be more manageable for players attempting to complete that Nemesis mission.
• Fixed a bug in the nemesis editor where you could not double click an selection to proceed.
• Updated the lists in the nemesis editor to use the same styling as the power selection for consistency.
• The sorcery framework should once again appear during nemesis creation.
• Fixed the typos in "Those Quirky Qularr".
• Fix for the audio issues with Ghost Veil in the Zombie Mines Nemesis Showdown.
• Completing "Doomsday Device" will no longer spawn you to a stuck location.
• NPC Send Mail: The email sent to players when they are eligible for the Nemesis content now gives additional information on where to find MCPD Captain Martin.

UNITY

• Fixed an issue that prevented players from interacting with Worm Gem mounds and some explosives, which was making several UNITY missions unable to be completed.

Crafting

• Some performance improvements have been made to crafting.
• Added Competent, Skilled, Very Skilled, Highly Skilled to all component descriptions to clarify what band of skill levels they are used in Blueprints.
• Fixed incorrect components on Arms and Science bags.
• If you have no crafting blueprints, you now get basic instructions in the crafting UI when you open it.
• All HOTBots and Temporary Forcefield consumables from Science Crafting have been recosted to be in line with the Arms and Mysticism healing/damage prevention consumables.

Character Creator/Tailor

• The tailor should stop removing added unlocked costume pieces when editing the costume.
• It's now possible to change weapons at character creation.
• The Tailor now accurately reflects that creating a new costume is free.
• Added a prompt when applying an unlocked costume piece, when it needs to change a costume category.
• Fixed a bug where applying an unlocked costume piece wouldn't properly set the costume piece, if it had to change a costume category.
• The clicking the default costume button in the Tailor will now use the same default costume in the Character Creator.
• The tailor will now display the costume properly (instead of turning it invisible) when editing a costume or creating a new costume, even after canceling the creation of a new character.

Hero Games (PvP)

• Fix an issue that could occasionally cause players in the Lava Temple PvP map to be trapped outside the map when they spawn.
• The context menu now shows on neutral entities (this is only applicable in duels).
• When entering a duel everyone else around the player becomes neutral. Previously, friendlies showed aspects of enemies and enemies showed aspects of friendlies. This has now been updated to show a gray health bar. This change shows only while Dueling.
• PvP opponents are now colored orange instead of red.
• Hero Games maps now have Game Specific Images on the loading screens.
• Changed the prices on items, costume unlocks, and action figures in the Hero Games stores located in Millennium City. In general, items will cost considerably less Acclaim to purchase, especially at lower levels.