News & Updates
After years asleep, The Hidden Grotto has been rebuilt for the modern age and reopened to the world.
The old blanket regeneration buffs each own a pool now: a hearty meal (well fed) mends the body, spore mend restores mana, and healing power amplifies all recovery by half again on top. The strongest amplifier wins — they no longer stack blindly.
Great symbiosis returns at level 80 as the symbiarch's war-buff (hitroll, damroll, armour and sanctuary), while perfect symbiosis rises to the level-95 capstone: a mighty heal that floods you with the grotto's full vigour (triple regeneration) and a coat of stone, echoing a lesser gift to grouped kin. Haste returns to the Sporecaller where it belongs; symbiarch and mycelist learn vigorize.
Poison may now be cast in the thick of battle, not only between fights.
aff now names what each effect actually does — sanctuary's 20% ward, stoneskin's halving, the exact regeneration you gain per tick, and more — and every spell and skill now announces the moment it wears off.
The warrens' crooked, one-way passages have been set right, so every step retraces cleanly — the maze is gone. Warren patrols and drifting spore-motes now wander the ruins for company.
A raw crawl drops from the Mouth of the Warrens straight into the deep. The light-touched who dare the dark may now reach the old Fungus King without ever braving the Wardens' gate.
The Mycelians' ruined home beneath the Agrul Mountains is a proper town at last. A guarded gate now bars the way in — a warning-sign threshold, then a gatehouse where four Warren Wardens suffer no light-touched soul to pass. Within: a full market street (general goods, armour, weapons, an apothecary of healing saps and antivenoms, and a provisioner of food and drink — all stocked), named guild halls for every craft, the Restcap Inn, and a Sprouting Loft where a Caretaker tends the newly-grown beside a battered practice stump. The waystone at the fountain has been redrawn to name it all and tell every class where to train.
The way down from the mountains into the warrens is no longer marked on any map — read the stones and find the snow-choked cleft. The crack to the deep ruins, a hidden supply alcove, and a loft above the Gallows are all concealed now, for those who explore rather than follow directions.
Sporefolk are one web. When a Mycelian casts a beneficial spell while grouped, a portion of it now flows out along the mycelium to every kinsman at their side.
The Mycelian classes have been rebalanced. The Sporecaller's spellbook is reordered into clear arts of decay, defence and utility, crowned by a new capstone, Rot Bloom. A new knife-art, Spore-burst, rams spores into a wound and lets a stacking rot eat the wounded over time. The Gallowcap's Envenom becomes a lethal capstone. Healers keep a single protection each and sharper cures. And poison-sense is no longer a spell any Mycelian learns — it is simply in their blood.
Healing power is no longer a second, weaker heal. It now leaves a deep regenerative warmth that doubles your recovery of health, mana and movement for a time — and the Nightwraith line learns it too.
The score display now shows your title, lines up neatly, and fills out your combat column — armour, wimpy and all.
Over fifty forgotten zones — sealed, severed, or simply mislaid for years — have been rejoined to Palantonia. Brigadoon in its mists, Mirkwood's dark paths, the Southern Desert, Hades Down Under, the Winter Wonderland, the Deep Chasm and many more now wait beyond roads that, at last, go somewhere. Maps are old and dangers unmeasured: explore, and report anything broken or unfinished to Grimlocke.
The Mycelians, sporefolk born from the glowing mycelium of the Hidden Grotto itself, now walk Palantonia. Three paths of their own — the Sporecaller's arts of rot, the Mycelist's living mending threads, and the Gallowcap's patient venom — each with a hero form waiting past level 100. Their ruined home lies hidden under the Agrul Mountains; poison cannot touch them, the dark restores them, and the open sun wilts them. See help mycelian.
Every shadow now has its own way out. Ninjas learn smokebomb — hurl one at your feet and vanish; the room sees only the bursting cloud, never which way you went. Assassins learn slip — one moment in the fight, the next simply gone. Both work like retreat and sharpen with use.
Mind blast returns to the wraith's grimoire at level 70 — a heavy bolt of raw psychic force that needs no madness woven beforehand, built to end prey that turns and runs. The impact drives two points of madness into whatever survives it.
Several quest characters — the old cleric behind the waterfall, the caged witch, the spirit of the moss — were speaking only to onlookers, never to the very adventurer standing before them. Now their pleas, their thanks, and their partings are meant for you. Hand over what they seek and you will finally see them go.
The score sheet is now a full dashboard — vitals bars, an exp meter, kill counts, and your active enchantments at a glance. Casting truly rewards mastery now: spells sharpen with use past the practice cap, so the endless "lost your concentration" days are over. Conjured food comes as a colorful 10-dish spread that can leave you Well Fed (+50% regeneration for a time), and madness kills now pay their owner in full (exp and autoloot). The battle meter screams MAD:MAX! DETONATE NOW! when your stacks ripen.
Under the hood: a certain infamous god-sword has been erased from the armory rolls entirely, a crash on equipping innate-bearing armor was slain, and several ancient over-bright relics were gently tamed.
hiddengrotto.org now breathes like the grotto itself: carry a lantern with your cursor while bioluminescent spores drift up every page, titles ignite like phosphor, and content surfaces from the dark as you scroll. Class and race picks animate, stat counters roll, the galleries glow — and it all respects reduced-motion settings and works on any phone. June's news now lives on the archive page.
Every Worldsmith relic now comes in two forms: fight with a good heart and the Worldsmith's last work gleams gold; fall to darkness and you receive its night-forged twin — same power, opposite soul, and each rejects the wrong-hearted. The dream line gets dedicated daggers: the Dreamsplinter and the Nightsplinter. Meanwhile the Sword of the Faithful has dulled with age — its sanctuary is gone and its edge blunted — making the Forge relics the finest weapons in the realm. Also in this pass: Dreamweavers and Nightwraiths now cast normally (the old psi-only block is gone), dreamblade leaps straight to your hand and fades in time, dreamfury works mid-fight, whisper is now dark whisper, and cacophony tells you when no minds are near.
The dream line fights for real now. Dreamweavers weave dream-forged blades and creeping madness: whisper, paranoia and fracture mind stack madness on a foe, and every stack gnaws at their mind each combat round (watch MAD:xN on the battle meter). New abilities include dreamblade, lucid strike, phantom edge and dream fury, capped by a Total Psychosis finisher that hits harder for every stack. At remort, the Nightwraith can detonate all stacked madness with total psychosis for massive damage and a rush of returned mana. Both classes are tougher (more HP per level, faster practices), and the old copy-paste psionics are retired.
A new page on the website gathers the world's real stories in one place — the Palantonia myth, the Worldsmith, the red dragon at the gate, Lord Emok, Ethoi, and Billy's Sanctuary — each with its own art, filterable by category and by good, evil, or neutral alignment. Visit the Lore Library to explore.
The halls surrounding the Worldsmith have grown considerably — fire-scorched, frost-bitten and iron-worked wings now branch from the central forge hall, alongside a bustling support quarter of ore yards, barracks, a trade floor, an armoury and a small shrine. Watch for corrupted and zealous guardians stationed throughout the new halls.
The Worldsmith now speaks a warning before he hurls the Anvilbreaker — heed it. The forge's tougher defenders hit harder and pay better in coin for every fall, and the hidden fountain past the gate no longer runs dry after a single drink.
The Worldsmith has been found wanting no longer. He now wields a colossal sledgehammer, the Anvilbreaker, and on rare occasion hurls it at whoever among his attackers he judges weakest, striking true unless they dodge in time. Two apprentices now stand at his anvil and will not let him fall alone.
A new way in: the old locked gate south of the frozen lava pool has been sealed shut and hidden from sight. Slay the red dragon that guards the chamber, and look closely at what it was guarding — an inscription waits for those who read carefully.
A place to catch your breath: past the gate, a hidden passage leads to a quiet alcove with a fountain, safe from harm and swift to heal — rest here before pressing on, or speak the word etched in the water to retreat the way you came.
The great revival of June 2026 — the Battle Meter, the combo system, the Ninja overhaul, the Forge of the Worldsmith, and the first stirrings from 2005 — lives on in the archive. Browse the archive →