Update 1.4
General topics
Release date:
Still for October, without a specific date.
 
PTS
As announced, technical test and public launch were postponed.
After the discussion with the ETF, they realized, they wanted to add specific features to the PTS build so that players can give feedback about those features.
Is planned to be launched next week – but that is not definitive yet
 
Learnings
Time to Kill / Time to be killed
They really wanted to identify the core problems with the game to solve that, before they move ahead with more content
They collected immense amount of data and put them into graphs and analyzed them
 
Results
The enemies in endgame are too bullet-spongy and deal way to much damage
There is no build diversity – when you do not have a very specific build you are not effective in endgame.
You just need specific Skills / and Gear Sets.
Limited amount of good builds and that is not what an RNG game is about, there needs to be variety and multiple ways to build an effective character.
That also makes the game very difficult – not only for solo but also for un-optimized groups.
 
Time to kill and Enemy Scaling
There is a huge difference between 1-30 and in the endgame.
While the time to kill is pretty linear in 1-30 and increases exponentially as soon as you hit endgame
 
Best gear vs. optimized gear
While the time to kill for 1-30 with best/random and min-maxed equipment is close and linear, there is a huge difference in endgame between best/random gear and min-maxed gear
 
Stats
Gear mods
Level 12: mods contribute 6% to the damage
Level 30: mods contribute 40% to the damage – they are critical part of the game (and that is a low number, because it does not include weapon mods)
 
Skills
Level 30: Skills contribute 78% to the damage (when you cap electronics it is even more)
 
Takeaways
The game is balanced for the best possible build and since there is a huge damage gap between the best equipped and worst equipped player – the game is very hard for the average player.
The NPCs are too powerful
The difference between the best-equipped player and the average equipped player should not be that big.
Gear mods are too powerful in endgame and have a too big impact on the build
Skills are too powerful
SmartCover and Pulse are the most used skills
 
Update 1.4 changes
General changes
Fixing enemy health and damage post level 30 so that it is linear and not exponential, so that it also takes fewer shots to kill an NPC.
Time to be killed in comparison: Now it takes 2.1 seconds to be killed by a standard Riker – it will be 6 seconds in 1.4.
Time to kill in comparison: Not it takes for an unoptimised build / unmodded ACR 3.8 seconds to kill a Riker – it will be 2.1 seconds
 
Graph (thanks to /u/oji310)
http://i.imgur.com/Ql7mT3F.png
 
Difficulty progression
Now you can play normal/hard mode missions without big problems – but the gap between hard and challenge mode is huge and you basically need challenge mode gear to even play that content.
 
Reworking the difficulty scaling in endgame
Greater granularity
Even transition to endgame not huge difficulty spikes
Better loot and mission rewards
linear equipment progression
Support solo players
RPG/Shooter experience back
Clearer path through endgame, what to do, where to get better gear and what you need to do, to get a progression
 
World Level
Players can now select the World Level in endgame when they hit level 30.
You are able to set the level of the NPCs and the loot to a specific level.
Named roamers are back in the open-world (Bullet King lives) and now you can farm open-world
The World Level can be changed at any time
There will not be level 34 / 35 NPCs
The World levels will be unlocked as you progress
 
The World Level will affect the enemy levels of:
Missions
Open World
Incursions
Underground
 
World Level impact
Tier 1 (Level 30 enemies – GS 163 loot (rare 182)) – no challenge mode
Tier 2 (Level 31 enemies – GS 182 loot ) – challenge mode is available
Tier 3 (Level 32 enemies – GS 204 loot )
Tier 4 (Level 33 enemies – GS 229 loot ) – heroic mode in Incursions
 
Normal / Hard / Challenge / Heroic selection
Challenge-mode will not be scaled to four players, so you can play it solo now.
Elite NPCs are now smarter than before – so they will not be just bullet sponges but move faster and more tactical.
Heroic will only be available for Incursions
This difficulty will not increase enemy level – but the amount of loot you get
That is the same for solo and group players
 
Gear Score Changes
Max Gear Score will be 229, so Gear Sets have the same as the highest possible high-end
High-End items will be more important now, since they are at the same level as Gear Sets
 
Loot
All enemies are able to drop the best loot of that Tier. But of course trash mobs have a less chance than a named enemy.
Trash-mobs in Incursion are not included in that.
 
Matchmaking
You matchmake with people on your World Level
You can also play with players on a higher World Level and get the loot-drops from there (power leveling)
You can also join players in a lower World Level to help them out
 
Dark Zone / PVP
Dark Zone selects the World Level for you
PVE Dark Zone: they are listening, but there will not be specific Dark Zone Changes in 1.4
The World Level also applies to the Dark Zone
The Dark Zone Bracket is still calculated based on your gear score

Special Report - September 22

After we got the update about the new World Tiers, we now got the detailed information about the changes to the character and the gear:

Equipment

One of the main changes to the current gear is that after Update 1.4 every piece of equipment dropped in World Tier 2 and higher will have all three stats on them. These base stats will increase with each increase in gear score.

In Update 1.4, all gear will lose their skill bonuses, while backpacks, holsters and knee pads gain new performance mod slots. This limits the current RNG and makes it easier for you to customize your gear to fit your build. These new slots won’t replace any of the current ones.

High End Gear and Talents

They´ve looked through all high end gear talents and tried to balance the numbers on them to make more of them viable for endgame. This includes either lowering or increasing some of their bonuses.

Existing Mods / Equipment

   Old gear will not get performance mod slots.
    Current performance mods will lose their major bonus, and their skill bonus will be rebalanced and rerolled.
    All your weapon mods will be rerolled.

Scavenging

Scavenging as attribute will be removed from the game. If you have Scavenging on your current gear, that stat will be replaced and rerolled.

Weapons

They have changed the damage the various weapons do and their current roles. In the live game, SMGs for example do higher damage than Assault Rifles, which is not intended. Instead their future power will come from the fact that they are stable and have high critical damage, which means your goal is to get as many bullets as possible on the target. Many Light Machine Guns will see a buff and get closer to the damage numbers of Assault Rifles, which will make them more powerful and viable to use. Some specific outliers that are currently way too powerful, like the MP7 and M1A, will see their raw damage numbers lowered to make up for the fact that they have big bonuses to handling. Weapons that are unpopular in the current meta, like the SRS Sniper Rifle and the M2-49, have had their damage output increased to bring them up to par.

They are planning to do something more with the Named Weapons in the future, but you won’t see any significant changes with Update 1.4. That said, their talents and damage have been updated together with all regular weapons.

Weapon Mods and Talents

So far a weapon mod would have one guaranteed bonus it always came with, and one equally high bonus rolled randomly from the pool. That second bonus will be removed from the mods and replaced with an amount of minor bonuses, depending on the quality of the item. The different varieties of stability (horizontal stability, initial bullet stability and stability) and accuracy (accuracy, hip fire accuracy) are now, for example, single stats (stability and accuracy).

With these changes you really have to make the choice if you want a weapon with high damage or a good handling. Very high damage will give you strong recoil or a small magazine, while a very accurate weapon will have less damage.

Damage bonuses like headshot damage, crit damage, armor damage etc, are becoming additive instead of multiplicative, which means that damage won’t spike as much as it does today. Those spikes make it really hard to balance enemy health and aren’t very fun in PvP.

These changes also mean that investing in Firearms will be a much more significant source of damage output, leading to more decision making when building your character, as building for DPS will mean sacrificing other stats.

Weapon talents have seen a rebalance too, with unpopular ones receiving a buff to bring them back to the meta while the current overpowered ones have seen their numbers slightly lowered. Some talents that previously were seen as niche and hardly ever used have seen a change in functionality. Other weapon talents that were beyond saving have been removed from the game completely.

Armor

They want to reduce the impact of armor and instead make health (via Stamina) your main source of toughness. This means that in order to create a tank character, you will have to spec in Stamina and sacrifice Firearms and Electronics.

Armor will now support your toughness, but you now need more armor to reach the same survivability as in 1.3. In addition, while you will gain more armor as you increase your Gear Score, higher World Tiers will also mean that you need more of it to gain the same damage mitigation. As stated, the damage mitigation is still capped at 75%, but we currently have no number how much armor that is – the only thing that was confirmed is, that it will be more difficult to reach armor cap.

Gear Sets Rebalancing

The four-piece bonus of the Gear Sets has been reworked to make them either useful or not as powerful so that every set should find its place in the meta. Also the five-piece bonus that was introduced for Striker and Sentry´s call with the last update, has been removed from the game.

They’ve also changed the 2-piece bonus to focus more on utility instead of straight up stat bonuses. They will now allow you to customize your character even further and complement your weapon mods, by giving bonuses to things like accuracy, stability, ammo capacity and similar, instead of just giving pure damage boosts.

Skills

They’ve increased the amount of Skill Power needed to make your skills as efficient as in 1.3 and they increased the Skill Power gained from Electronics. The result is, that you won’t be able to rely on Skill Power from gear bonuses if you want to be a skill specialist. In Update 1.4, increasing your Skill Power will be an active choice you make by investing in Electronics while sacrificing other character attributes, similar to Firearms and Stamina noted above.

There are also no hard caps for skills. Instead they are introducing a curve of diminishing returns. That means that the more Electronics you have, the less of an impact every additional point of Skill Power will have on the power levels of your skills.

First Aid was bugged up to now and healed the player several times. That was not working as intended and had some undesirable side effects, especially when combined with talents like Triage. That has been fixed and to compensate the base healing of First Aid has been increased. It’s also worth mentioning that First Aid will now heal the user instantly, with no delay.

First Aid – Defibrillator will be better at healing allies and will now revive them from death as well.

Smart Cover now focuses more on defense, and with skill specialized gear, will buff the team’s damage mitigation by 30% to 35%. The damage buff was removed and replaced with weapon stability and accuracy buffs, which are very useful with the adjustments made on weapon handling in general.

Pulse still provides critical hit chance and damage buffs, in addition to its recon abilities, but the numbers have been brought down to match the decrease in power of NPCs.

Turrets are getting more health and, like Sticky Bomb and Seeker Mine, will effectively deal more damage due to the lower enemy health.

Ballistic Shield has more health, since it was destroyed way too quickly before, and many of the bugs associated with it have been fixed.

Support Station has seen its healing amount increased and been given more health. The Support Station will also let solo players revive themselves.

Skill Cooldown

The Skill Cooldown starts when the skill is destroyed and not when it is triggered. This way it is not possible to have 100% uptime anymore

Signature Skills

Survivor Link – the damage mitigation has been lowered from 80% to 50% and its duration lowered from 15 to 12 seconds.

Recovery Link has seen its range increased while also giving more healing overall. If you’re playing solo and you have Recovery Link off cooldown, the skill will outside of the Dark Zone automatically trigger when you are about to die, saving you from death.

Tactical Link the damage buff was lowered from 50% to 30% and the critical hit chance buff was removed altogether. Three new buffs were added instead: weapon RPM, reload speed and weapon stability.

Consumables Changes

Special Ammunition Instead of lighting things on fire or staggering your enemies, they will instead convert some of your bullet damage to fire or blast damage, damage which in turn is affected by exotic damage reduction. Based on a short discussion with Weapon Master Fredrik Thylander, this is the first step in changing the Special Ammo in a new direction.

Other Changes

Weapon Skins

   Will now be shared on all characters
    You just need one skin for all weapons

Roamers Spawn Timers

   Daily respawns

Paramedic/Police backpack

To get the bonus with more Med-Packs and the ammo bonus, you need to have them equipped at all times. Once you unequipped these backpacks, you will also loose that bonus