It's time for a monthly update, Shatterliners!
Here's what it has brought.
Expedition tweaks and changes
A new Sector Boss encounter: the Glasshead Nursery. Think a Gardener is bad enough? Well, hold his beer while he morphs into an Uber Gardener! Shut down the Nursery before more Gardeners can spawn.
Activities improvements:
- World activities will no longer spawn in neighboring positions.
- Activity rewards were rebalanced to avoid situations when some activities were ignored due to their lower rewards.
- The Locked Tower activity has become easier to complete.
Five new perks:
- Chain Lightning: gives a chance to discharge a bolt of chain lightning upon kill.
- Salty Shot: the enemies have a chance to drop some Red Salt upon death.
- Explosive Precision: the enemies killed with precision shots have a chance to explode.
- Automatic Reloader: the active weapon will reload upon ammo pickup.
- Healing Ammo: heals the player upon ammo pickup.
When you collect Red Salt, it converts into seasonal XP at once so that you may extract all of it in the end.
Seasonal XP is now displayed on your HUD along with other resources.
Contracts now reward you with two Blueprints instead of one. Furthermore, they provide you with seasonal XP instead of credits.
We increased the regeneration speed in PvE
The most noticeable increase is for Segment 2 of the health bar, especially when you walk. Regeneration speed when you run increased for all the segments.
Weapon balance tweaks
Upon careful study of the game data and players' feedback, we saw that some weapons were in need of rebalancing.
- XM-27 Pacifier assault rifle: the rate of fire decreased by 7%. The D-AR ARMAG M5 enhanced capacity magazine now reduces weapon stability by 15% instead of aiming speed.
- Zenith assault rifle: The AK-RPK 101 enhanced capacity magazine reduces reload time by 20% instead of 15% and reduces aiming speed by 10%.
- XM-40 Conciliator assault rifle: the rate of fire increased by 7%.
- Λ-9 Legatus assault rifle: the base damage decreased by 10% at mid-range and by 25% at long-range.
- Presarm VX-7 sniper rifle: The AM4 MAG enhanced capacity magazine reduces reload time by 20% instead of 15% and reduces aiming speed by 15%.
- G7 Springer pistol: the base damage at effective distance was slightly decreased. The MZ-09 E extended magazine reduces reload time by 20% instead of 10%.
- Black Falcon II shotgun: accuracy decreased by 20%.
- R21 Brute shotgun: the rate of fire decreased by 10% while stability decreased considerably due to a new recoil pattern.
- Berlington TAC shotgun: accuracy during movement decreased by around 15%.
- Λ-1 Centurion submachine gun: the rate of fire decreased by 5%, stability decreased by 10%, and accuracy decreased by 10%.
- G5 Earl pistol: the base damage at effective distance slightly decreased.
- U22 Svarog and U44 Culverina: In PvE, revolvers have not only got considerable base damage and precision damage boost, but they can also pierce the opponents and deal damage, albeit reduced, to a target behind the pierced one.
PvP Escort Mode tweaks
- The escorted payload got a new visual on the Barracuda map, and this new payload has no Bomb Dogs nested in it.
- Both the Barracuda payload and the old-style payload on the rest of the Escort mode maps got their movement speed tweaked: the maximum speed decreased by 20%.
Miscellaneous
- Fourteen new kill reactions for Strafer AIs were added.
- Сontroller aim assist changes: we improved the aim assist behavior, changed the aim assist presets, and added the aim assist strength as a separate user option.
- Minor Player's Profile Screen tweaks: we added the Edit Badge button in the upper-left corner and changed the playtime units of measurement from "days, hours, minutes" to just hours.
- Improved Score Board looks. We also added the party and party leader indicators.
- PvE Episodes and Blitz missions are now within a single playlist, and the available mission changes every hour.
Animation improvements:
- Improved synchronization of AI animation.
- Smoother animation for various interactions with objects, including the recon class climbing, rearming at the ammo crates, and interacting with movable boxes, bins, and vehicles.
- Improved animation of the Environment Scanner.
BUG FIXES
- Crash fixes.
- Fixed issue in Expedition where the Crystalline Storm could damage players inside buildings or under the ground.
- Fixed issue in Expedition where the Strife perk icon disappeared if the player looked at the affected AI through a zoomed-in weapon.
- Fixed issue in Expedition where a sample couldn't be picked up any longer if it had been dropped by a player mid-jump.
- Fixed issue in Expedition where the dead player failed to teleport to the next zone.
- Fixed issue in Expedition where an extraction point could spawn onto a supply drop.
- Fixed issue in Expedition where a canister that couldn't be picked up might appear in one of the maze rooms.
- Fixed issue in Expedition where the mission sounds could be played during the reward screen sequence.
- Fixed issue in Expedition where the Esc-menu's list of perks overlapped with the mode description text.
- Fixed issue in Expedition where the electromagnetic beam turrets could spawn at unreachable locations.
- Tweaked Gunslinger task localization where sidearm kills were changed to pistol kills since this subtask doesn't count the kills from the Lupara shotgun sidearm.
- Fixed issue with an unnaturally bent Orbit's arm when he was preparing to throw the Swarm Grenade, as observed by other players.
- Fixed issue with Ram's axes where they could stay hanging in the air near movable objects when thrown at them.
- Fixed issue with the Sheriff Holster attachment for the U22 Svarog revolver where the perk reactivated after the quick melee attack.
- Fixed issue with Pill's med drone where it was continuously trying to teleport to its owner when Pill was using a zip line.
- Fixed issue in the Invasion mode where Ram could skip the first and second objectives.
- Fixed issue in the Cyber Trail PvE mission where some Seeker Mines were invisible during the metro tunnel encounter.
- Fixed issue with a glitchy reload animation of the Dragonfly sniper rifle.
- Fixed issue where Malva's hair would become pitch-black at low graphics settings.
- Fixed issue where Mongoose's grenade launcher slightly twitched after each shot.
- Fixed issue with Kite's remote mine placed on a movable object where the mine dropped on the ground if the object was kicked or moved; but for a new player who connected to the match after this, the mine was hanging mid-air.
- Fixed issue with stickers on the R60 Gevaudan shotgun where the sticker placement was different in the first-person and in the third-person view (the point of view of other players).
- Fixed exploit on the Deathlab PvP map where a player could climb onto an area not designed to be reachable.
- Fixed issue on the Nisida PvP map where there was a hazard zone where it shouldn't be.
- Fixed issue where the character left shoulder animation was broken when the player was carrying crystalline batteries in Expedition and changed direction abruptly.
- Fixed issue with the Momentum Booster attachment for the SAG-8 Reaper sniper rifle where the attachment allowed the player to shoot twice without reloading.
- Fixed issue where a party of six players could queue for a 3 v 3 match and never find a match, obviously.
- Fixes for minor visual issues on Metro, Escape, Nisida, and Barracuda PvP maps, in Hecatomb and Twin Stilts PvE episodes, and the Sunken Lab Blitz mission.
- Fixed issue with the Bloodlust loader attachment for the Berlington TAC shotgun where the attachment failed to work on AI enemies.
- Fixed issue in the Twin Stilts PvE mission where unstable samples, if dropped, didn't disappear after a timeout.
- Fixed issue where the AI weak points could stay on the ground after the body had disappeared if the AI was killed not in its weak point.
- Fixed issue with the minimap where sometimes minimap icons could get stuck at its center.
- Fixed issue with the XM-27 Pacifier's Executor muzzle break didn't work.
- Fixed issue where Brisa's trap mine's spikes could get invisible upon the mine's activation.
- Fixed issue where Kite's crystalline revolver icon could show the ability was available when in fact it was depleted. This happened if Kite died when using the ultimate ability and was resurrected by a teammate.
- Fixed issue on the March PvP map where one of the overhead pipes exits was blocked by an invisible wall.
- Fixed issue on the Escort PvP map where a player could get on top of the traffic signpost.
- Fixed issue in the Twin Stilts PvE episode where the player's icon was displayed under terrain when the player entered the portal.
- Fixed localization issue where the description of the Sure Shot task failed to indicate it was PvP only.
- Fixed issue with artifacts of Malva's Basic Medic Suit during cut-scenes.
- Fixed issue with the TA-12 red dot sight for the Λ-9 Legatus assault rifle where the 10% faster aiming-down-sight speed applied only after two seconds of aiming; and with the Farsight Prism red dot sight for the Zenith and Λ-7 Ghost assault rifles where the 10% faster sprint-to-fire transition also applied after 2 seconds of aiming.
- Fixed issue with the Executor attachment for the XM-27 Pacifier and the Weight Rebalance attachment for the Λ-7 Ghost didn't work.
- Fixed issue with the Gunstream Z-54 red dot sight for the Z-940 Drachen submachine gun where the attachment changed the general weapon's field of view instead of the FOV when aiming down sights.
- Fixed issue where the tip of the weapons equipped with the iron sight moved too much in relation to the weapon's butt when the player quickly moved the weapon while aiming down sights.
- Fixed issue where the Versus the World task was too hard to complete.
- Fixed issue with a shaky animation toward the end of the Zangor Impala sniper rifle's inspection.
- Fixed issue in the Sunken Lab Blitz mission where the text warning of a hazard area was missing in the lab.
- Fixed issue where movable objects could get in front of players and hide them on the Most-Valued-Players screen.
- Fixed issue in Expedition where the electromagnetic beam turrets could spawn at unreachable locations.
- As some fixes in Patch 73.3 failed to work, we rechecked them in Update R74 and we confirm they work properly:
- • Fixed issue in Expedition where the players were shown on the ground for a split second before the cinematic clip with deployment.
- • Fixed issue in Expedition where the Shady contract could be completed by itself, without players' doing anything to this end.
- • Fixed issue in Expedition where the requested supplies could be dropped in the area where the players had come from.