Hey everyone,

Here are the patch notes for Friday, the 27th of January! Just in time for the weekend!


We have merged characters with Last Man Standing and Shattered Skies thus bringing you more cosmetic choices than ever! All of the LMS exclusive taunts, cosmetic masks, hats and character outfits are now shared between game characters and can be unlocked at your leisure by participating in either game!

• Currency has been unified to be represented as one currency - Dominion Coins (D-Coins).
  
• As part of the process, we’re converting all existing Faction Coins into D-Coins.
  
• Rewards for all map objectives have been standardized to reward Dominion Coins (D-Coins) which can be spent at vendors in Dominion Outposts. By unifying the currency rewards it makes sure that over time objectives aren't devalued because you no longer need the reward a specific objective gives. You can always use the currency to acquire the items you need.
  
• Vendors in Dominion Outposts now sell a variety of gear and items that may be useful to your character
  
• Vendors can now be used to sell a variety of the gear and items you found while looting in exchange for Dominion Coins (D-Coins). This creates a new avenue to earn D-Coins besides just participating in map objectives.
  
• Vendor Prices are balanced around what an average player earns per day playing

• Loot patterns for the entire game have been remade from scratch. Key changes worth noting are that military spawns and police spawns are different, cop cars are a point of interest as well as rooftops, guard towers and hidden locations. Civilian loot has civilian items, military areas have military items generally speaking. Refrigerators and tables have food and water. A civilian home has a different loot table than a civilian car etc
  
• Bank Tabs hooray! You can now arrange your Global Vault much easier using various item and gear categories to keep your vault looking organized and in working order rather than a jumbled confusing mess of gear.

• We asked the userbase what they thought about it and the overwhelming vote was to add it to the game
  
• There are lots of cosmetic crates containing character cosmetics, taunts and weapon skins available from the main menu as well as at vendors in Dominion Outposts
  
• All cosmetics, taunts and weapon skins can be obtained by simply playing the game, earning D-coins and then purchasing them from vendors using D-Coins
  
• We appreciate it very much if you choose to buy them! :)

• Waiting for profile to finish loading no longer gets stuck!
  
• Armor has been standardized. Soft Armor has 20% mitigation, hard armor has 25% mitigation and Dominion Armor has 30% mitigation. Their respective LV4 upgrades provide an additional small amount of mitigation. Higher tier versions offer additional durability.
  
• Billboard building now has a second fire escape staircase leading to the rooftop
  
• PK rating has been changed to 'Total Kills'
  
• 14 new cosmetic crates have been added to the game and can be purchased using D-Coins
  
• 6 new weapon skin crates have been added to the game and can be purchased using D-Coins
  
• 3 new taunt crates have been added to the game and can be purchased using D-Coins
  
• Backpack text now displays more information when looting a backpack off the ground
  
• Territory capture nodes have been removed from the map in preparation for Territory Warfare standalone mode.
  
• A bug related to looting backpacks and displaying the wrong item has been fixed

• Damage variance for Mk1, Mk2, Mk3, Mk4, Mk5 and Legendary weapons has been decreased to bring these weapons more in line
  
• There is no longer an increase in rate of fire for Legendary weapons and higher tier weaponry compared to it's generic version
  
• HP ammo damage has been buffed from 20 damage per bullet to 23
  
• AP ammo damage has been buffed from 22 damage per bullet to 24
  
• Special ammunition remains unchanged at 25 damage per bullet

• Aliens now play a more significant role in defending lootable areas thus creating a more active PVE experience dealing with aliens
  
• The reactor has become more difficult due to the alien threat
  
• Aliens have become a much greater threat and will attack you in greater numbers
  
• Aliens no longer have armor
  
• Alien health now varies depending on location. Aliens in areas with higher end loot are proportionally stronger.
  
• Alien damage now varies depending on location. Aliens in areas with higher end loot are more dangerous in melee range than aliens near gas stations and smaller loot areas.
  
• Alien navigation around military bases has been improved

Play Last Man Standing Alpha for FREE this week!

Today we launched the Alpha for Last Man Standing. This is our version of Battle Royal that is set in the Shattered Skies world. We invite you, and all of your friends to come and play for FREE this weekend while we conduct our first ever public stress test of the game!

Visit http://www.playlms.com and click 'PLAY'

Download the FREE game client by using the link on the official website

Create a FREE NEW account or login using your existing Shattered Skies account. Select ALPHA for Last Man Standing and play it for free.

Share with your friends - alpha is free for all players to try it out!

Once again – THANK YOU for being such loyal players!

Hey everyone,

We have a large patch today with many fixes!  Enjoy!

• Massive FPS overhaul.  Everyone should be getting much higher and more consistent frame rate
  
• Orange Crate in Wolfpine now properly gives loot as a reward
  
• Placing shields on slanted surfaces is now fixed
  
• Tabbing out on a reward screen no longer causes the mouse to become invisible
  
• Framerate should not drop as much when a lot of players are nearby!  
• A bug related to this was found and fixed!
  
• Trees and bushes have been further optimized
  
• The action UI has been further optimized
  
• Confirmation windows can now be closed via space bar or the enter key making menu interactions much smoother
  
• Aliens have received some adjustments to their health and armor, you should find they are easier to kill now
  
• If you find floating spawns, please report it in the bug section with a screenshot and description of where you were on the map.  Many objects have been changed and thus some spawns may be floating!
  
• Known instant Prone exploits have been fixed.  If you have another working method, please report it and we will fix it
  
• A bugged particle related to Neutral Flags has been fixed!  
  
• A bug with lighting that sometimes causes your screen to become very dark has been fixed
  
• Audio fixes for explosions and gunfire when sometimes you would see someone shooting or a grenade exploding but not hear it
  
• New sound for when you loot a weapon
  
• Sniper audio has been fixed
  
• Stamina regeneration cooldown period has been made to be much more forgiving after receiving damage.  You should more quickly begin regenerating after taking damage. 
  
• Typing /server now properly shows the number of players on the server!!!

Impact sound for headshots has been fixedImpact sounds when you are shot have been fixedThe reactor timer has been re-added to the mapSnare time upon taking damage has been reduced from 1 second to .8 seconds (20% reduction in snare time)

• ACX10 is now a single shot weapon and has received a slightly increased rate of fire
  
• Wolfstrom is now a burst fire weapon and has received a slightly increased rate of fire.  If the community determines this weapon is still too weak, we will adjust it further.
  
• Armor Damage on AP and Special ammunition types has been reduced and normalized for both of these ammo types.
  
• The Corpse Grinder has gained additional recoil and spread as well as a slightly reduced rate of fire.  It was simply too dangerous and should be more in line with other weapons now.  It's an excellent alien killer and prefire spam house sweeper.
  
• Corpse Grinder can now shoot while crouched or proned
  
• Minor weapon adjustments for weapons with too much recoil like the Bizon.  Post your feedback in the weapon balance thread with what you think is too strong, too weak and just right.  

• You can no longer sprint while in mid air.  Your feet must be on the ground in order to sprint.  This affects extremely 'whippy' 'squirrely' movement and makes it less erratic and more predictable.  Some players may not like this change, others may love it.  We want to experiment and reduce the amount of 360 movement while in midair.  Players should rely on cover objects like deployable shields to avoid damage, not sprinting in circles in midair.  If this change does not feel right, we will change it back.  This is purely a test change to gather community feedback.  Very few games allow full 360 air strafing control, you can still air strafe, you just can't sprint while doing it now.  Let us know how it feels after you PVP.  
  
  
• Bleed duration has been reduced from 300 seconds to 30 seconds.  Bleed damage has been reduced from 25 to 15.  You can only bleed when shot by a player, aliens cannot bleed you.  This gives more urgency to dealing with the bleed effect in PVP, but also allows you to deal with bleeding as a temporary ailment instead of a 300 second ailment (if you don't have a bandage) and begin regenerating health as soon as bleed ends.  You will take more immediate damage from bleed now, but you will begin recovering from it much faster with passive regeneration.  

Check out the latest planned updates coming for Shattered Skies based on recent community feedback! Let your voice be heard!

http://forum.playshatteredskies.com/topic/41575-patch-based-on-community-feedback/

Hey everyone!

Here are the patch notes for our mega update patch 1.5!  A lot has changed :)

• Player hitbox impact detection issues have been resolved, the character no longer has holes in it :)
  
• Framerate been improved on most PC configurations
  
• We've solved most of the stutter/frame rate stability issues and we will continue to work on remaining ones as soon as we'll find ones.
  
• The Reactor Gateway is now synced across all servers and happens at the same time.  When the event is live, it is live for 1 hour.

• PK rating rewards are now based on your 'Career High' PK rating.
  
• Once you have unlocked an item with your Career High, you can use it forever!  Examples of this would be the Warlord Cosmetic set or PK related unlockable taunts
  
• There are a bunch of new taunts!  Some can be unlocked with Career High PK rating, and others from Taunt boxes.  

• Many crafting recipes have changed, take a look at the crafting menu for more info
  
• Many crafting materials have been removed or modified
  
• You can now convert generic weapon parts into Legendary Weapon parts via the crafting menu
  
• You can now convert meteor ore to meteor metal via the crafting menu

• A helicopter carrying valuable Dominion Tech has crashed in The Valley.  Bring the lost Dominion Tech back to the Dominion Outpost.  
  
• This item is marked on the map for all players to see while you are carrying it!  
  
• Earn Dominion Coins to be spent at vendors for successfully delivering the Dominion Tech!

• Align yourself with one of two factions at a Dominion Outpost - the Crusaders Guild or Brotherhood of Chaos.
  
• Participate in Faction Warfare by taking control of Capture Nodes located throughout the map and fight for control of the Valley with members of your faction!
  
• Faction members within faction combat areas are marked on your HUD with a chevron and you cannot deal damage to them and they cannot deal damage to you.
  
• Earn Coins for participating in Faction warfare and spend these coins at Dominion Outpost vendors!

• Dominion Uplink stations randomly get sabotaged and must be repaired
  
• Players that repair these uplink stations are rewarded by the Dominion with currency that can be spent at vendors.
  
• If there is not a single working Uplink station, supply drops will no longer spawn for players so it is worth keeping them repaired to maximize looting potential

• This activity has been removed.

• Armor is now divided into three classes - Soft, Hard and Dominion Armor plates. Each armor class is stronger than the previous one, providing clear and well defined progression
  
• Each Armor class has three levels, which differ by how much durability each Plate has - ie how many shots it takes before it breaks
  
• Armor Plates are no longer repairable and durability has been increased to compensate for this change (armor parts have been removed from the game)
  
• Level 3 armor of each class can be upgraded via crafting into "Crystal infused armor" - Providing the best in class protection and durability for that tier of armor.

• Food and Water meters have been removed from the game
  
• You will now passively regenerate a small amount of health over time
  
• Food and water are now considered 'minor' medical supplies and restore a small amount of health
  
• Medical items have been streamlined and redundant medical items have been removed

• New weapons are now spawning: the THOR 5 and variations of it, the legendary HSE 'Zarfelt', the legendary RV50 'Sabretooth', CF10 and variations of it, and a new AT4 Missile Launcher
  
• Gun Paint Skins now come from "Gun Skin V1" and "Gun Skins V2" boxes which can be purchased using Coins at Dominion Outpost vendors.
  
• Weapons are now labeled as Mk I, Mk II, Mk III, Mk IV, and Mk V instead of cog, mercenary, specops and elite
  
• Weapons now use standardized magazines meaning a 100 round Drum for an AK also works on an MXZ5 which makes collecting and organizing weapon attachments much easier
  
• Mk I and Mk II guns can now use skins!
  
• Generic versions of weapons are no longer fully automatic

• Ammunition has changed - HP ammo is the weak "tier 1" ammo, AP is stronger "tier 2" ammo and Special ammo is the ultimate "tier 3".  Each ammo type is better in every way than the prior ammo.
  
• Weapon ammunition has been standardized to the following:  Rifle Ammo, SMG/Pistol ammo, Shotgun ammo, Sniper ammo

• New cosmetic items and rarity!  Check the Customization menu for more information
  
• Character cosmetics now come from Dominion, Crusader and Brotherhood cosmetic boxes
  
• The character can now jump while moving backwards!

• The Brightness Slider has been fixed
  
• The map has been updated to show more map events and information about activities
  
• The Movie Theatre is now an enterable building!
  
• The Fire Station is now an enterable building!
  
• Your own footsteps are much quieter than other player footsteps to prevent mistaking your own footsteps for another player
  
• Respawn timers have been adjusted to be more forgiving

Original Post -- http://forum.playshatteredskies.com/topic/37582-patch-day-tuesday-31-2016/

We're expecting to bring the game servers down for up to 24 hours to perform the 1.5 Update and account wipe.

We estimate that servers will be down roughly 24 hours and be down until roughly noon on Wednesday, November 2nd.

See you on other side!

The original post and discussion can be found here: http://forum.playshatteredskies.com/topic/28085-september-27-weekly-update/


It's been a week since the last update, and over the last week lots of systems we've been working on started really coming together. I'd like to go over most important parts first, and at the end will mention what else is new to the game.


Pretty much solved by now. We do not experience any more issues on our test servers, yet we'll have to test it on fully loaded server. Also those on lower end computers will get some fps bump.


We've done some work adding new area on the map, expanding explorable area, as well as doing minor tweaks in existing areas. We've also finished making interior and new exterior for the Fire Station and working on making interiors for the Theater.


Okay new loot system will actually encourage players to explore world. first of all you'll be able to loot almost any gun from the world, yet rare guns will be extremely rare, so your best chance still will be to get them as reward participating in various new missions and activities.

What we did is that we've pushed all weapons spawns to the outskirts of the areas, making sure that solo players will be able to find guns, armor, etc before getting into firefight. Second we're spawning weapons now thru special "gun crates" - basically you'll need to open crate to figure out which gun is in there. Those crates will be dropping on death. Crates are clearly marked and color coded - so if you'll loot Mercenary gun crate - you may be sure it contains Mercenary grade gun - assault rifle, smg or even sniper. 

Low end meds, HP ammo and food will be pretty liberal spawned in a world, so it'll be easy to ensure your basic survival. At same time all good stuff will be hard to get - either thru looting or thru activities in a world.

We're also pushing ALL military grade stuff, good armor, meds and ammo, explosives, etc to the several "military installations" on the map, which are scattered on outer edges of the map. Once again - more fun this way.


Lets put it simple - we had bugs where our skeleton had "holes" in it, meaning sometimes you knew you're shooting dude and instead you've been shooting thru him. FIXED!


While in general weapons will remain as is, we've done some nerfing making sure that there's no such difference between lowest and highest tier weapons. Ie we've made sure that higher tier guns will still be more deadly, but ONLY if you're skilled enough. Ie in hands of the skilled player, it'll make a difference, but it will not matter much for below average player.

Second thing you'll notice is that bullets are flying slower now. In fact if you're engaging enemy at longer distances, you'll need to take that in account. Good thing is that new bullet marker will allow you to see how your bullet flies and where it hits. This also allowed us to increase damage distances for guns, making medium and long distance shooting to be more skill play comparing to what it was before. YET all this doesn't really changes short distance encounters - ie you won't notice difference at short range. I personally really love it, it actually allows me to have more fun trying to shoot ppl at long distances. It was kinda "meh" that assault rifles had such small range, but now it's becoming once again deadly long range weapon. YET - only if you have skills. For average casual player there'll be no difference.

Attachments. One of the reasons we're doing wipe is that most guns in same class now are sharing all attachments - magazines, etc. We also introduce 'legendary" attachments - attachments that once equipped will slightly make your gun better - doing few percent more damage, increasing damage distance, etc... Yet once again - all numbers are balanced so players with skill will really benefit from those. There'll be of course some exceptions, so we do not want to create completely overpowered guns :).



Our engine team released new rendering code that move our quest to full physically based rendering one more step further. So now not only overall game looks more real and lighting feels more natural, but you also will get better looking materials and - all this works FASTER than it was before. Meaning - more fps for you!

The original post and discussion can be found here: http://forum.playshatteredskies.com/topic/26202-september-21-game-status-and-patch-progress/


The timeframe for the patch - very end of September, first week of October.

Let me briefly talk about what to expect with the upcoming patch. Please note that as of right now, we’ve made drastic changes to the database on our dev servers, so pretty much the game code and game data is incompatible with the public build of the game. What it means is that we can’t do the patch until we’re done with all new feature changes first. What it also means is that unfortunately we'll have to do a selective wipe of inventories and use data to make sure we do not have corrupted data.

http://forum.playshatteredskies.com/topic/27582-wipe-details/

First of all I want to talk really quickly about our motivations behind this large update and gameplay mechanics changes.
One thing we've noticed over last two months, is that we have group of players who came to the game expecting slow paced exploration survival game, and as result being completely turned of by a fact that game is neither of those things. So we want to make sure that players are coming with right set of expectations - that game is PVP focused with plenty of PVE/exploration to do on a side if you want to.
Second thing is new player experience. Basically we thought a lot how we can simplify "onboarding" of the new players, yet keep game to be hardcore experience we wanted it to be.
Last but not least - end game and meta game. Our plans was to introduce those by end of the year, but it turns out that players need it much sooner, so we're adding that to the game as well.

All those things affected what we're doing with game right now, and we hope that at the end you'll like it too.

So lets start with changes we're making to the loot system, map design and overall exploration / pve part of the game as well as new player experience.


This is something that is super important for us as game designers. First of all we're changing where loot is spawning. We're moving "rare" loot away from potential PVP centers and we're placing lot more loot on outskirts of the map, thus making players to go around the map in order to find rare items, rare ammo and meds. While best weapons are still be available by participating in various activities, we also making sure that players who really into more exploration gameplay will be able to find nice items by just looting world. Yes - this won't be the best way to do that - after all our game is PVP shooter and we promote that, but you'll be able to do it by just playing solo and exploring world.
Exploring world also have it's own benefits as there'll be certain high end items, that will only be available either by high level crafting or by looting world.


Dominion are tasked with detecting presence of extremely powerful alien monsters spawned on the map. As soon as those monsters will appear on the map, players will be notified about that event and will be able to participate in hunting down and killing this alien creature. On Death it will provide variety of rare and valuable items. This is purely PVE event and while other players will be able still attack you, focus will be on working as a team in order to bring down high powered, well protected alien monster. It'll be a guaranteed way to get best items. 
 

We’re redoing the whole way you’ll be getting valuable alien materials that can be used to infuse ammo, armor and weapons to make them stronger as well as obtain valuable currency used to buy items from vendors. We’ll concentrate alien minerals in a areas around Impact Craters. Whole area will be hidden in a dense volumetric fog banks preventing users from seeing what’s happening inside and limiting viewing distance while inside. Aliens there will be higher level and more tough than aliens spawned randomly over map, so it’ll take more effort to scavenge resources there.


We’re going to remove “Novice Servers” and instead of that focus on adding aids for new players that will help them navigate the game and fight more seasoned veteran players they will encounter. While there’s nothing in the game will really prevents new players from fighting seasoned ones besides skill set and knowledge of the map, we recognize the frustration that comes from perceived item advantages veteran players may have and we’re going to address that by providing new players with 3-5 bags containing good mid-high tier weapons and armor to help them feel more on level with veteran players in the beginning. Still we all know that player skill and knowledge of the map is what really matters.
We also redesigned how map works, and it will provide more robust way for all players to see what's happening on the map, which events are active and allows them to quickly decide where they need to go next to have some piece of action.


We’re combining “World” and “Proximity” spawns into one option, that allows solo ( or grouped ) players to respawn soon after their death in the world, yet placing them relatively far away from the place of their death. While you still will respawn in the same part of the map where you’ve died, it’ll take you few minutes to get to point where you’ve died. On other hand grouped players will be able to respawn in a close proximity to leader of their group, but they’ll have to wait significant time before they’ll be able to do that, eliminating “group zerging” style of gameplay. Spawn in a Dominion outpost option will remain unchanged obviously.

One of the biggest changes that actually dominated all of our changes we've made to the map and loot, was adding long term meta game to the Shattered Skies. We've removed all existing Faction mechanics from the game and replaced them with new ones.


Okay first of all there will still be three factions in the world – Dominion, Brotherhood of Chaos and a faction with temporary name “Crusaders”. Out of those three factions, the Dominion is one that controls Outposts ( your safe zones ) and Comm Stations. Dominion is also providing Supply Drops helping people left stranded in “The Valley” ( our map ). Brotherhood and Crusaders on other hand are local factions composed of people who survived “Event” and are fighting in the world to control resources and territories within The Valley.

While you can’t become officially aligned with Dominion, you can pledge allegiance to the other two factions by interacting with faction’s RECRUITERS NPC inside perimeter of the Dominion Outpost. There’ll be time restrictions though on how often you can change your allegiance. Once aligned with a faction, you’ll be able to participate in Attacks and Defense game to control territories in game for your faction by capturing control points on the map. Faction that controls most territories on the map will provide to all of it’s members who’re currently present on the map fixed income in form of the Faction Coins every 15 minutes or so. Faction Coins will be used to purchase Faction specific cosmetic bags as well as faction specific items – explosives, medical, etc. While old restrictions of Faction levels are gone, all you need are Faction coins, that are same way as Starlight Coins - non droppable resources.


Each "control point" on the map will be designed to feel like good PVP map, allowing for fun and tactical gameplay in order to capture and control point and territory associated with it. Each control point area will allow access to crafting bench for fast crafting of barricades and fortifications as well as access to rare item spawns.

Once faction secured control over point and territory, control point will be locked out and other faction will not be able to capture it for some period of time. At same time controlling faction members will be able to deploy barricades and fortification as well as active defenses ( mines, traps, turrets ) to make it harder for other faction to recapture point in a future. All those items will need to be individually crafted and placed by players - same way you're crafting and placing things like shields now.

Area around control point are being designed specifically to allow tactical and strategic placement of the fortifications and barricades to protect area.

Next I'd like to talk about changes we've made to UI/UX, crafting system and overall charges to the economy and items in a game.


First of all we're changing number of materials available in a game, making it more manageable and clear to players. Second thing is that we're reorganizing crafting recipes into following categories -
DEFENSIVE - all barricades, shields, things like that
OFFENSIVE - traps, mines, TURRETS :) - both automated and player operated
ARMOR - recipes that allows you to take Level 3 armor and infuse it with alien materials effectively making it "Level 4" armor.
AMMO - once again way for you to take AP bullets of each type and infuse it with alien materials to make it stronger
FOOD - various enhanced food recipes
MATERIALS - mostly for converting weapon parts into legendary parts and ultimate dust material into basic materials.
Overall we're removing recipes that proved to be not used by players, and we're adding bunch of new things for players to craft. All advanced crafting recipes will require bench all the time.
We also spread recipes more evenly across character levels.


While economy didn't changed much in a game, we've put focus on a more balanced distribution of the "currency" in a game. We do have four currencies in a game that can be used at Vendors - Starlight coins that you're getting by crafting using Alien materials as source components ( so think of that as PVE currency :) ), as well "Faction coins' - three different type of coins related to each faction that you'll be receiving for participating in faction activities.

We're revamping the NPC trader experience, moving it to a more conventional store style UI, where we’ll have vendors selling various categories of the items, and not restricting one vendor selling only gun skins… While not something that will affect how players play game, it’ll streamline and improve players experience with vendors. We're also going to drop the “Faction Vendor” that proved to be cumbersome and not really appealing to players. Instead items that in the past you’ve been able to get thru that vendor will be sold for “faction coins” by your “normal” vendors in a dominion Outposts. More on Factions below.


Next we'll talk about how we've changed existing SOLO PVP activities as well as about adding new one.

We’re retiring Roadblocks, and we’re changing the way Comm Stations events are played. You’ll be tasked with repairing and keeping Comm Stations active for Dominion in order for Dominion to be able to keep providing Supply Drops and other functions in The Valley. For doing that you’ll be rewarded with Dominion coins that you will be able to spend at Vendors.
 
- Once in a while the dominion loses one of it’s transports that moves precious cargo of processed alien crystals. Each time it happens they will place bounty for Search and Rescue mission available to all players. Players will need to locate crash site within given area of the map, retrieve “secured container” and deliver this container to the Dominion Outpost for the reward. Reward will be similar to one players are getting now for activating Reactor. And yes – we’re going to beef up those rewards proving exclusively awesome items and weapons to our players.
  


Our biggest efforts went into making sure that the game is providing a high framerate for large scale PVP fights. While the game was doing great framerate wise ( as proved by data we’re gathering from game clients as well as survey you guys responded to ) in areas with a small number of players and away from large firefights, there was sudden framerate spikes and drops in areas where players gravitated to for large PVP battles. We’ve focused our efforts to optimize both code and content to eliminate those issues. As we’re moving forward we’ll continue to work on optimizations.

First of all we’re introducing permanently unlockable “Tiers” for PK Rating. So from now on instead of fighting to keep your PK Rating high all the time, all you’ll need is to “unlock” new tier by reaching it once. After that even if your PK Rating can drop, and you will still be recognized as high tier player, and all cosmetics will be unlocked for you to use. Your highest PK Rating will now become part of your “player nameplate” and player card.
On the other side we’re removing the handicap for grouped up players when they attack other players. We also dramatically increased minimum spawn distances for single players, as well as increasing revive timer for grouped players, balancing out those for a more fair PVP experience. While grouped PVP players will not have a handicap fighting a team of players who do not group, they will have the advantage of the closer respawn comparing to single players. Yet single players will have shorter respawn time, allowing them to get back to the action faster.

We’ve made big changes to the HUD as well as to the Map in game to make sure that they will provide a very clear list of activities available to you in game, as well as your progress status toward rewards in those activities. With major overhaul on how Map works, we’ll provide you with a personalized list to display what you can do in game to get better gear or experience at any time. We’ve made some changes to the HUD as well to help with that.
 
One of the changes we’re making is to remove the Global chat channel. What our analysis showed is that global chat is used for practically two purposes – trading request/ads as well as unnecessary grieving between players. With much more meaningful conversations going on in Proximity channel as well as via proximity VOIP, we’ve made the decision to remove the global channel and introduce global “Trade” channel instead. This channel will solely be dedicated to trading and using it for other purpose will result in temporary removal of in game communication privileges including access to chat and voip inside the game for certain period of time.

Food and waters are gone. In fact they've been replaced by a new stat called "Well Being". This system is yet under design, and for now until we're ready to talk about it more, food and water are acting as small meds giving you small health and/or stamina boost. You can also craft different food items into one of the "crafted/cooked" food items, effectively making it into makeshift "civilian medkit".

We’re streamlining armor by making three types of the armor – SOFT, HARD, DOMINION. Each type of armor provides a specific protection level. Within each type there’re several levels of durability, ie Soft Armor Level 1 provides same damage reduction as Soft Armor Level 3, but survives less hits. Crafting recipes will be provided to upgrade level of the armor within same type.
 
We’re streamlining how ammo is represented in game. After careful evaluation on use patterns for guns in game as well as discussion with players, we’ve made the decision on replacing the way we represent ammo from more simulation “by caliber” style to more video game “by type’ style – ie instead of describing ammo as “5.56mm” we’ll describe ammo as “rifle ammo” making it easier for players to identify and sort through ammo types. We also combining 9mm and .45cal ammo into one “pistol rounds” type of ammo and we’re adjusting damage done by pistols accordingly – so from player perspective things will stay same, it just that they will not run into situation where they have 9mm ammo and .45cal pistol… Once again this is done to streamline user experience and make the game to be more user friendly.
 
We’re making sure that all guns are able to use same attachments and that most guns will share magazines, making it easier for players to concentrate on customizing weapons to their needs.

Other aspects of game will remain more or less same, but of course we've done some minor adjustments to mechanics, loot, etc based on your suggestions.

Dear players,

In the last two months since we’ve launched Shattered Skies, we’ve received thousands of suggestions and ideas from you on what you like and what want changed in game. We’ve gathered all that feedback and turned it into a development plan that we’re in the process of implementing right now. The first of these large patches bringing your ideas into the game come end of September, I think it’s a great time to go over the changes coming to the game.

Let me briefly talk about what to expect with this patch. Please note that as of right now, we’ve made drastic changes to the database on our dev servers, so pretty much the game code and game data is incompatible with the public build of the game. What it means is that we can’t do the patch until we’re done with all new feature changes first.



Our biggest efforts went into making sure that the game is providing a high framerate for large scale PVP fights. While the game was doing great framerate wise ( as proved by data we’re gathering from game clients as well as survey you guys responded to ) in areas with a small number of players and away from large firefights, there was sudden framerate spikes and drops in areas where players gravitated to for large PVP battles. We’ve focused our efforts to optimize both code and content to eliminate those issues. As we’re moving forward we’ll continue to work on optimizations.



We’re going to remove “Novice Servers” and instead of that focus on adding aids for new players that will help them navigate the game and fight more seasoned veteran players they will encounter. While there’s nothing in the game will really prevents new players from fighting seasoned ones besides skill set and knowledge of the map, we recognize the frustration that comes from perceived item advantages veteran players may have and we’re going to address that by providing new players with three bags containing good mid-high tier weapons and armor to help them feel more on level with veteran players in the beginning. Still we all know that player skill and knowledge of the map is what really matters.



First of all we’re introducing permanently unlockable “Tiers” for PK Rating. So from now on instead of fighting to keep your PK Rating high all the time, all you’ll need is to “unlock” new tier by reaching it once. After that even if your PK Rating can drop, and you will still be recognized as high tier player, and all cosmetics will be unlocked for you to use. Your highest PK Rating will now become part of your “player nameplate” and player card.
On the other side we’re removing the handicap for grouped up players when they attack other players. We also dramatically increased minimum spawn distances for single players, as well as increasing revive timer for grouped players, balancing out those for a more fair PVP experience. While grouped PVP players will not have a handicap fighting a team of players who do not group, they will have the advantage of the closer respawn comparing to single players. Yet single players will have shorter respawn time, allowing them to get back to the action faster.



We’re combining “World” and “Proximity” spawns into one option, that allows solo ( or grouped ) players to respawn soon after their death in the world, yet placing them relatively far away from the place of their death. While you still will respawn in the same part of the map where you’ve died, it’ll take you few minutes to get to point where you’ve died. On other hand grouped players will be able to respawn in a close proximity to leader of their group, but they’ll have to wait significant time before they’ll be able to do that, eliminating “group zerging” style of gameplay. Spawn in a Dominion outpost option will remain unchanged obviously.



We’ve made big changes to the HUD as well as to the Map in game to make sure that they will provide a very clear list of activities available to you in game, as well as your progress status toward rewards in those activities. With major overhaul on how Map works, we’ll provide you with a personalized list to display what you can do in game to get better gear or experience at any time. We’ve made some changes to the HUD as well to help with that.

One of the changes we’re making is to remove the Global chat channel. What our analysis showed is that global chat is used for practically two purposes – trading request/ads as well as unnecessary griefing between players. With much more meaningful conversations going on in Proximity channel as well as via proximity VOIP, we’ve made the decision to remove the global channel and introduce global “Trade” channel instead. This channel will solely be dedicated to trading and using it for other purpose will result in temporary removal of in game communication privileges including access to chat and voip inside the game for certain period of time.

We're also revamping the NPC trader experience, moving it to a more conventional store style UI, where we’ll have vendors selling various categories of the items, and not restricting one vendor selling only gun skins… While not something that will affect how players play game, it’ll streamline and improve players experience with vendors. We're also going to drop the “Faction Vendor” that proved to be cumbersome and not really appealing to players. Instead items that in the past you’ve been able to get thru that vendor will be sold for “faction coins” by your “normal” vendors in a dominion Outposts. More on Factions below.



We’ve made the mistake when we initially announced Shattered Skies to name it “survival full loot drop PVP shooter mmo”. While we thought that players will know that game is not as much about survival, and more about PVP, there was still a large number of players who came to the game expecting to have more of a survival exploration feel of the earlier games we’ve worked on before. Going forward we’ll try to do a better job and will remove traditional survival genre elements like food/water management, mandatory crafting, etc.



One of the biggest changes to the game in terms of gameplay mechanics will be the complete overhaul of Faction mechanics and gameplay. Let me put it simple – it was CRAP. So instead we’re going to introduce a new system that will work better as both short term and long term game experience. It also will help to define Lore of the world better – which is kind of important for the future.

Okay first of all there will still be three factions in the world – Dominion, Brotherhood of Chaos and a faction with temporary name “Crusaders”. Out of those three factions, the Dominion is one that controls Outposts – your safe zones and Comm Stations. Dominion is also providing Supply Drops helping people left stranded in “The Valley” ( our map ). Brotherhood and Crusaders on other hand are local factions composed of people who survived “Event” and are fighting in the world to control resources and territories within The Valley.

While you can’t become officially aligned with Dominion, you can pledge allegiance to the other two factions by interacting with faction’s RECRUITERS NPC inside Dominion Outpost. There’ll be time restrictions though on how often you can change allegiance. Once aligned with a faction, you’ll be able to participate in Attacks and Defense game to control territories in game for your faction by capturing control points on the map. Faction that controls most territories on the map will provide to all of it’s members who’re currently present on the map fixed income in form of the Faction Coins every 15 minutes or so. Faction Coins will be used to purchase Faction specific cosmetic bags as well as faction specific items – explosives, medical and fortification devices.


We’re retiring Roadblocks, and we’re changing the way Comm Stations events are played. You’ll be tasked with repairing and keeping Comm Stations active for Dominion in order for Dominion to be able to keep providing Supply Drops and other functions in The Valley. For doing that you’ll be rewarded with Dominion coins that you will be able to spend at Vendors.



Once in a while the dominion loses one of it’s transports that moves precious cargo of processed alien crystals. Each time it happens they will place bounty for Search and Rescue mission available to all players. Players will need to locate crash site within given area of the map, retrieve “secured container” and deliver this container to the Dominion Outpost for the reward. Reward will be similar to one players are getting now for activating Reactor. And yes – we’re going to beef up those rewards proving exclusively awesome items and weapons to our players.



Dominion are tasked with detecting presence of extremely powerful alien monsters spawned on the map. As soon as those monsters will appear on the map, players will be notified about that event and will be able to participate in hunting down and killing this alien creature. On Death it will provide variety of rare and valuable items.



We’re redoing the whole way you’ll be getting valuable alien materials that can be used to infuse ammo, armor and weapons to make them stronger as well as obtain valuable currency used to buy cosmetics and bags from vendors. We’ll concentrate most of the alien minerals in a areas around Impact Craters. Whole area will be hidden in a dense volumetric fog banks preventing users from seeing what’s happening inside and limiting viewing distance while inside. Aliens there will be higher level and more tough than aliens spawned randomly over map, so it’ll take more effort to scavenge resources there.



We’re streamlining armor by making three types of the armor – SOFT, HARD, DOMINION. Each type of armor provides a specific protection level. Within each type there’re several levels of durability, ie Soft Armor Level 1 provides same damage reduction as Soft Armor Level 3, but survives less hits. Crafting recipes will be provided to upgrade level of the armor within same type.


We’re streamlining how ammo is represented in game. After careful evaluation on use patterns for guns in game as well as discussion with players, we’ve made the decision on replacing the way we represent ammo from more simulation “by caliber” style to more video game “by type’ style – ie instead of describing ammo as “5.56mm” we’ll describe ammo as “rifle ammo” making it easier for players to identify and sort through ammo types. We also combining 9mm and .45cal ammo into one “pistol rounds” type of ammo and we’re adjusting damage done by pistols accordingly – so from player perspective things will stay same, it just that they will not run into situation where they have 9mm ammo and .45cal pistol… Once again this is done to streamline user experience and make the game to be more user friendly.



We’re making sure that all guns are able to use same attachments and that most guns will share magazines, making it easier for players to concentrate on customizing weapons to their needs.

Other aspects of game will remain more or less same, but of course we've done some minor adjustments to mechanics, loot, etc based on your suggestions.