Expedition has got a major overhaul: it now has three difficulty levels – Regular, Challenging, and Extreme.
Why? First of all, we want people to play at the difficulty they want. Secondly, we want to eliminate the frustration new players may face when they plunge into the Expedition whirlpool head first. Thirdly, old expeditions tended to take a lot of time, and not all of us have this luxury. A game session in easier Expedition variants takes less time.
New players will have to play the Expedition Tutorial and complete an extraction to be able to play a regular expedition. Then the player needs to have completed three extractions to open the Challenging and Extreme Expeditions. If it is not your first day in Shatterline and you’ve opened at least ten Season Pass levels (even for past season passes), all Expedition variants will be accessible from the get-go.
As you have correctly surmised, Regular Expedition is the easiest one. It offers you only the first and second threat levels and only two sectors to explore. There are no dungeons, no frustrating and difficult contamination modifiers, and no super deadly bosses. Even extraction encounters will only happen at threat level 2. Surely, in Challenging Expedition things get more difficult, and could get really nasty in Extreme Expedition.
Other Expedition changes:
Contract and activity rewards increased. Furthermore, with the introduction of different difficulties, the contract reward quantity now depends on Expedition difficulty, not the threat level as it was before.
The chances of getting rare resources from activities and dungeons also increased.
Three new contamination modifiers were added.
PROGRESSION
Weapon progression time considerably decreased while the number of experience points needed to open weapon tiers 4 and 5 decreased as well (by almost 30 and 50% respectively).
BALANCE CHANGES
Pill's Quantum Nullifer has got some more rebalancing:
Before the present change, the ability removed enemy projectiles and froze enemy AIs within a 10-meter radius for 3 seconds.
Now, the projectile-removal radius decreased to 6 meters. The initial AI freeze works as a freezing blast within an 8-meter radius. Then, while the ability is active, the freezing continues working within a 4-meter radius around the player.
The ability visual effects were improved to boot.
Shotguns rebalance:
We admit that killing with a shotgun with hip fire may be way too easy. So we decided that playing with a shotgun shall be rewarding when you shoot while aiming. Therefore, if you hip fire with a shotgun, you will experience decreased accuracy and increased pellet scattering compared to ADS shooting.
All shotguns' damage decreased by around 10%, but their effective distance increased by 10-20% and overall operational distance increased by 50%.
With these changes, all weapon attachments that increase accuracy or decrease pellet scattering grew in importance.
This change is not cast in stone. We will monitor the game data and your feedback and will adjust accordingly.
MELEE WEAPONS
We are expanding the melee arsenal with Kite's Tactical Machete.
UI/HUD IMPROVEMENTS
Now equipped operatives perks are shown on the Pre-Battle Screen for Episodes and Expedition. When you open the PvE Perks screen, one of the perks will always be already selected by default. It will be the perk you selected before. If none has been selected before, the system will select the perk available for acquisition.
The Armory screen was overhauled: not only does it look better now, the information is easier to read.
Item or perk cards you pick from boxes in Expedition were improved: the visuals of the resource cost on the bottom of the card were updated, and the cards from the Chosen stashes are adorned with Crystalline.
The Escort mode HUD improvements:
Updated rounds announcement visuals.
Progress bar improvements in terms of the payload movement direction, distance to the closest checkpoint, and the number of players inside the payload area.
We introduced a new payload state icon and its color scheme, the colors being the same for the payload area marker. It's blue for the team that needs to convoy the payload when this team is pushing it, red for the defending team when the payload is being convoyed by the attackers, yellow when the payload control is contested, and grey when there are no players from either team nearby. If the payload is being pushed by the defending team, the icon turns red for the team that needs to convoy it and blue for the defending team.
BUG FIXES
Fixed issue in Expedition where crystalline birds could attack Brisa while she was cloaked.
Fixed issue in Expedition where the “Hunt Glassheads” contract continued counting the kills after its completion.
Fixed issue in the Expedition Tutorial where black textures appeared on the roads after the player killed Lava Glassheads.
Fixed issue in the Expedition Tutorial where the Decontaminator panel showed the lock icon even if the player had enough Salt to activate the Decontaminator.
Fixed issue in Expedition where Spitfire failed to rotate to follow the player’s movement.
Fixed issue in Expedition where grenades failed to explode on impact with the Power Stones. A similar bug was fixed where frag grenades or grenades from Mongoose’s grenade launcher didn’t explode on hitting the tree-like spore trap’s weak points if the Explosive Expansion perk for Mongoose was equipped.
Fixed issue in Expedition where groups of AIs could spawn under terrain across multiple locations on the map.
Fixed issue in Expedition where events spawned too often at threat level 2.
Fixed issue in Expedition where the result screen showed 0 collected resources if Expedition was a failure.
Fixed issue in Expedition where Spitfire could spawn under terrain.
Fixed issue in Expedition where spawn points were deactivated during the fight at the payload.
Fixed issue in Expedition where the Strafer Depot HUD marker was visible without the scanner use.
Fixed multiple issues in Expedition’s Chaser Hunt dungeon.
Fixed issue in Expedition where the Salt counter reset to zero when another player joined the game session in the middle of the match or when a player respawned after switching to another operative, but set back to the previous value when another salt deposit was picked up. We also fixed a similar bug where players couldn’t activate the Decontaminator if they were killed and changed the operative, which led to resetting the Salt amount to zero.
Fixed issue with missing damage feedback when shooting at Behemoth’s weak points.
Fixed issue where a weak spot appeared on Gardener’s body after death.
Fixed issue in the Border Control episode where Stilt’s area attack visual effects remained on the player’s screen if the player respawned after having died during this attack.
Fixed issue with the Red Lake outro cutscene where Orbit was always displayed with an active ultimate.
Fixed issue in the Hephaestus episode where a player would be left at the elevator boarding platform if the other two players activated the elevator and the said player didn’t move onto the platform.
Fixed issue in the Twin Stilt episode where an incorrect navigation marker was shown on the minimap.
Fixed issue where the picture became blurred in one of the Intro Mission scenes with Echo if FSR or DLSS options were enabled.
Fixed issue on the Promenade PvP map where there were gaps between several objects on the map, and a player could shoot through them.
Fixed issue where the text chat hint was visible during a PvP match replay.
Fixed issue where an incorrect ammo count was displayed on HUD for the Dragonfly sniper rifle if it was used with the Magazine Boost perk and the AM4-T MAG attachment.
Fixed issue on the Weapon Customization screen where sometimes the weapon could shift to the left side of the screen when a player cycled through different weapon paints.
Fixed issue where Orbit’s ultimate activation wouldn’t break a door.
Fixed issue in the Shooting Range where yellow triangle markers above bot heads were positioned slightly to the right of the targets.
Fixed issue where the descriptions of Malva’s Perseverance 3 and 4 perks had errors in the amount of increased health.
Fixed issue where Pill always switched to the primary weapon after using the Quantum Nullifier, notwithstanding what weapon had been in use before the ability was activated.
Fixed issue with the non-working Momentum Booster perk for the Λ-9 Legatus assault rifle.
Fixed issue where the Momentum Booster perk refilled more bullets into the magazine than its capacity allowed.
Fixed issue in the Invasion mode where the boss could fail to spawn.
Fixed issue where sometimes a player could leave the squad when joining a match before the “Connecting…” message appeared, but still be placed into the same match with the former squad members.
Fixed issue with the Presarm VX-7 sniper rifle where the player couldn’t perform a shot right after the weapon was reloaded if the AM4 MAG attachment was equipped.
Fixed issue where weapon stickers were not visible on the weapon in the Armory, but were visible in the game.
Fixed issue with incorrect Malva’s Armored Headgear cosmetic item localization (used to be CPL Headphones).
Fixed issue with camera clipping with the 90-degree FoV.
Fixed issue where all Mongoose’s head customizations were locked if the player had any upper headgear on Mongoose and the lower headgear automatically equipped after purchase.
Fixed issue where the Master Expeditor task’s description failed to mention that a specific number of sector bosses needed to be defeated in Expedition in one run.
Patch 79.4
Fixed issue in Expedition where players couldn't retrieve their extracted loot after a successful extraction.
Halloween Content Update
The game has been updated with the Halloween event featuring:
a Halloween PvP mode as a Weekly Event;
Halloween Nisida PvP map;
various Halloween attributes in Expedition and all PvP maps.
Сomplete special tasks and get Halloween win poses for your operatives. The event will end on November 7.
On top of the Halloween event, we fixed an issue where teammates couldn't resurrect Kite if he wore the Galactic Shadow Warrior outfit. Furthermore, we disabled the Chaser Hunt dungeon in Expedition as it still had serious unresolved bugs. Our apologies we couldn't resolve all the critical issues in the dungeon within a reasonable time!
Enjoy trick-or-treating, everyone!
Patch 79.3
The "Busy as a Beaver" task became easier. Instead of finding nine beavers in one PvE episode, you now need to find nine in total, however many missions it may take.
A fix for several issues in Expedition’s Chaser Hunt dungeon where a Chaser failed to spawn after the second bait had been set, where a Chaser could fail to get into the first trap, and where too many Chasers spawned during the “Capture a Chaser” objective.
A potential fix for the bug in the same Chaser Hunt dungeon where the final boss could fail to get into the state when it was vulnerable.
Patch 79.2
Fixed issue where the recent decrease in the number of zipline uses (7 instead of 15) to complete the "Use Ziplines" contract failed to apply.
Fixed issue in Expedition where no resources appeared after completion of the Chaser Hunt dungeon.
Fixed issue in Expedition where a player could kill the Chaser Hunt dungeon boss with one shot from the Sodom power weapon.
Fixed issue in Expedition where the Chaser wouldn't spawn after players obtained the second bait in the Chaser Hunt dungeon.
Patch 79.1
Fixed issue in Expedition where players couldn't enter the Chaser Hunt dungeon.
The 100 degrees FoV option was removed as it caused too many issues on different maps.
Update R79: Season Echo
Hi there!
A new season has arrived.
SEASON ECHO
As always, new challenging tasks and cool rewards await you:
Win poses. Yep, you've heard that right! One for each operative in the game.
Groovy weapon skins. And you can get some of them by simply completing weekly tasks.
Spiffy operatives outfits.
Eleven new weapon perks to craft:
The Skater Shooter perk for the M2 Tactical SAS shotgun: sliding enhances the slug rounds, greatly increasing firing range and decreasing pellet spread.
The Determinator perk for the Λ-7 Ghost assault rifle: every second miss reloads one bullet from the backpack.
The Accuracy Boost perk for the G5 Earl pistol: increases hip fire accuracy by 15%.
The Range Boost perk for the G5 Earl pistol: increases damage beyond the effective range by 10%.
The Precision Range Boost perk for the Impala sniper rifle: increased effective precision damage range by 20%.
The Crystallized Ammo perk for the R21 Brute shotgun: Aiming down sights crystallizes the ammo in the chamber. Enemies killed with such an ammo spawn Crystalline sprouts upon death.
The Factory Settings perk for the Black Falcon II shotgun: gradually reloads ammo into the magazine when you are moving.
The Deep Pockets perk for the Λ-9 Legatus assault rifle: the ammo from the bottom half of the magazine deals bonus damage.
The Reload Boost perk for the Zenith assault rifle: increases reload speed by 10%.
The Dragon Breath perk for the Zenith assault rifle: all bullet hits deal slight area damage, but no precision damage.
The Damage Boost perk for the Λ-1 Centurion submachine gun: increases damage by 10%.
New seasonal accolades with unique nameplates.
Game shop update: over 50 offers featuring more than 200 items for Season Echo.
NEW MAPS/ENCOUNTERS
New Episode: Hephaestus. Doctor Sullivan has been kidnapped by the Strafers and forced to devise a Crystalline mining operation on an active volcano in the Tyrrhenian Impact Zone. Or so he claims... It's up to you to rescue the doctor and uncover the truth behind this suspicious endeavor.
New Expedition Dungeon: Chaser Hunt. Delve into the Chaser breeding ground in the Red Realm and capture a few Chasers... for the sake of science. Just remember not to get captured yourselves!
GAMEPLAY AND BALANCE CHANGES
Pill's Quantum Nullifier tweaks:
In PvP, the device removes projectiles and traps for 3 seconds in the 10-meter radius, in comparison to a single remove before.
In PvE, it now also freezes enemy NPCs, and the freeze time depends on the distance to the target: the further the target, the shorter the freeze.
The ability cooldown increased by 50%.
If the ability is not used effectively, some of its charge will be restored.
Weapon tweaks:
The Presarm VX-7 sniper rifle: precision damage effective distance decreased by 12%.
The R21 Brute shotgun: damage decreased by 13% while the effective distance in PvE increased by 25%.
The U22 Svarog and the U44 Culverina revolvers: in PvE, base damage decreased by 15%, and precision damage decreased by 10%.
The Λ-1 Centurion submachine gun: a new recoil pattern for the first five bullets.
Weapon attachment tweaks:
The TVG-FG Mk.1 grip for the XM-27 Pacifier assault rifle: stability increased from 7 to 10%.
The GS TAL-I11 laser sight for the Z-940 Drachen submachine gun: the reduced time for the sprint-to-fire transition was buffed from 15 to 25%.
The FS True Sight RDS for the G5 Earl pistol: the increased damage rose from 5 to 10%.
The Gunstream O-300 RDS for the Z-940 Drachen submachine gun: the aiming-down-sight speed and crouch movement speed both increased from 10 to 15%.
The Auxiliary Reload System for the R60 Gevaudan shotgun refills 6 instead of 3 rounds into the magazine upon a double kill.
Expedition tweaks:
The contamination increase for sector boss and decrease for supply drop encounters were removed.
The Red Salt in Chosen Stashes was replaced with smaller resource packs.
The "Collect Red Salt" goal requirement was reduced to 400.
Chances to receive Spores in World Activities increased as did the average Spores amount.
We removed damage to players when they kill a Minotaur or a Strafer Grenadier in their backpacks, a Seeker Mine, or a Glass Hound, while in close proximity to the target.
Players will no longer be penalized with the stagger mechanic from explosions. Moreover, the stagger effect on players is considerably lower, if they carry a dedicated melee weapon at the moment of effect.
USER INTERFACE
The equipped PvE perks are displayed on the Operative Selection screen.
Updated sprint, dash, and exosprint HUD icons. Moreover, the sprint icon now pulses when the stamina is at full.
The Premium Season Pass purchase option was added to a separate Game Store tab.
The in-game weapon customization screen got tweaked: the weapon perk was moved to the right side of the attachments while the attachment icons became smaller for more attachments to fit into the screen.
MISCELLANEOUS
You can now change the Field of View in the general tab of the game options.
PvE perks resources can now be found as rewards for selected weekly tasks.
For completing PvE episodes, you will get random rewards, including PvE perks resources.
PvE progression is now available on the Shooting Range.
In PvE episodes, you may encounter a new dweller - the beaver. There is a special task to find it, and an instant award for finding it, to boot.
Unlimited Season progression: after completing the Season Pass, you will keep getting special boxes with challenging tasks ad infinitum. The task descriptions have some words missing, on purpose, of course, but the task names will give you a hint.
BUG-FIXES
Crash fixes, including a fix for the crash during the Stormbringer episode.
Fixed issue in Expedition where extraction could not be completed if a player died and respawned by timer during the extraction encounter.
Fixed issue in Expedition where Glass Hounds and Seeker Mines, and exploding barrels, when exploding close to the player who killed them with any damage boost perk, could one-shot kill the player.
Fixed issue in Expedition where there were no red impact warning markers on the ground for the Air or Meteor Strike contamination modifiers during the Envoy dungeon.
Fixed issue in Expedition where gunshot sounds could be missing after the weapon was picked up from a supply bin.
Fixed issue in Expedition where the Meteor Strike could happen inside the portal during the Crystalline Treasury encounter.
Fixed issue in Expedition where power weapons could get resupplied from ammo crates by any operative or by Pill from ammo drops as well.
Fixed issue in Expedition where static charge negative modifier damaged a player if a drone (either Pill’s, Malva’s, or Orbit’s) was nearby.
Fixed issue in Expedition where part of the Research Station textures were corrupted at low graphical settings.
Fixed issue in Expedition where an arrow marker appeared on the nearest obstacle or terrain part when you pinged any point-of-interest marker after the scanner sweep.
Fixed issue in Expedition where a player could stand on top of the Gravity Tower.
Fixed issue in Expedition where grenades failed to explode at hitting the hot substance during the "Destroy Hot Substance" objective of the Corrupted Research Station encounter.
Fixed issue in Expedition where a player couldn’t ping the Power Stones during the encounter.
Fixed issue in Expedition where at the beginning of the opening cut scene it was shortly interrupted with a glimpse of the landing site and black screen.
Fixed issue in Expedition Tutorial where the yellow highlight particles didn’t disappear after the player reached a specific location.
Fixed issue with Expedition’s Strafer Vault where sometimes the canister room’s door failed to open if the player died and respawned in the canister room.
Fixed issue in Expedition where the Spitfire was missing a health bar during a secondary encounter.
Fixed issue in Expedition where the black hole inside the Gravity Tower became invisible after players destroyed the last battery right before the Gravity Tower closing animation.
Fixed issue in Expedition where Chosen stashes might fail to open.
Fixed issue with an incorrect main goal description on HUD in the Expedition Tutorial.
Fixed issue with a missing progress bar when interacting with the console in Expedition’s Research Station.
Fixed issue where the "Use Ziplines" contract failed to mention that only specific zip lines shall be used to complete it. Additionally, the number of required zipline uses decreased from 15 to 7.
Fixed issue in the Stormbringer episode where AIs didn’t attack the player who stayed near the ammo crate during the “Wait for the Fog to Dissipate” objective.
Fixed issue where the Uber Gardener missed collision physics in the Stormbringer episode.
Fixed issue in the Stormbringer episode where crystalline flowers on the town streets didn’t do any damage to a player.
Fixed issue where enemy red outlines were missing on the Chosen in the Invasion mode.
Fixed issue where Strix’s hair had artifacts if the Marshal Hat was equipped.
Fixed issue in PvP where a respawned player was receiving damage from Pill’s ultimate weapon if the said player had been killed and his body had been hit with Pill’s flamethrower projectiles right before the player hit the Space button to respawn.
Fixes for multiple visual issues with weapon and character cosmetic items.
Fixed issue where aim assist on the gamepad didn’t work on Ram wearing the Shellguard Battle Suit.
Fixed issue where the correct animation for Ram’s ultimate could fail to play if Ram performed a climb a moment before activating his ultimate.
Fixed issue where some parts of stickers on the Drachen Racer weapon skin looked blurry.
Fixed issue where the major part of the Hell-Cat suppressor on the G9 Kungen pistol looked pitch black.
Fixed issue where the Z-940 Drachen reload animation played twice in the Intro Mission if the submachine gun was equipped with the R9 PROMAG magazine attachment.
Fixed issue where the Samurai Training perk for the G5 Earl pistol didn’t work as intended: it failed to increase the rate of fire and randomly restored the player’s health.
Fixed issue where the "Bang-Bang!" task worked in PvP as well.
Fixed issue with broken attachments for submachine guns: the SHAFT CR50 muzzle break and Armalibs RDS-7 red dot sight for the Tornado , the CLAW FP and GB-13 Angled grip for the Λ-1 Centurion, the GS TAL-I11 laser sight for the Z-940 Drachen, the Farsight SAR red dot sight for the Firespray, and the TOR-MK red dot sight for the Cinetech M5.
Fixed issue where the RPM Boost perk for the XM-40 Conciliator increased the rate of fire by 7 instead of 10%.
Fixed issue where a ranked match didn’t end when the entire opposing team left the game.
Fixed issue where Brisa, Strix, and Malva had their hands twisted in cut scenes if they had a melee weapon drawn before the cinematic start.
Fixed issue on the March PvP map where parts of a player's body could stick through a shipping container when the player was standing close to it, and thus the players could be killed in those parts.
Fixed issue where already completed tasks could show as still in progress.
Fixed issue where a player couldn’t change the operative via the Esc menu on the Shooting Range without respawning.
Fixed issue with a visual artifact when drawing the U44 Culverina revolver.
Fixed issue where the notification about a new available PvE perk appeared in the Armory.
Fixed issue where the weapon customization hint was present on HUD with a melee or an ultimate weapon drawn.
Fixed issue where the Fatal Wounds and Explosive Expansion PvE perks didn’t affect Glasshead capsules.
Fixed issue where the PvE end-session screen appeared after a PvP match.
Fixed issue in the Promenade PvP map where Ram could reach restricted areas by using his ultimate ability and walls.
Fixed issue in the Team Deathmatch mode where players could reduce the score of the opposing team by dying inside a killzone and getting revived by a teammate.
Fixed issue where the Pump Action Boost perk for the Black Falcon II shotgun had an increased pump action speed by 12 instead of 15%.
Fixed issue on the Escort map where a player could get stuck between the green SUV and the fence.
Fixed issue where an enemy Orbit drone could mark your teammates with the red chevron marker and theses chevrons were visible to friendlies.
Patch 78.4
Fixed issue in Expedition where Glass Hounds and Seeker Mines, and exploding barrels to boot, when exploding close to the player who killed them with a sentry perk, could one-shot kill the player.
Fixed issue where Strix’s energy shield failed to appear when she performed a block with her shield and hammer.
Patch 78.3
A fix for the PvE crash.
Patch 78.2
Fixed issue in Expedition’s Memory Crystal activity where one of the batteries could spawn in an inaccessible location.
Fixed issue in Expedition’s Envoy Dungeon where players respawned outside of the dungeon area if they were killed during the engagement at the entrance to the dungeon and respawned by timeout.
Fixed issue in Expedition where players respawned outside of the research station building at the Research Station and Corrupted Research Station encounters if they were killed during the miniboss fight.
Fixed issue where the player’s statistics screen showed incorrect figures for playtime and the K/D ratio.
