V1.38 Pre-Patch Notes (Week Two)

The updated (week 2) pre-patch notes for patch 1.38 are up on the official Global Agenda forums!

This seems to be a very interesting patch. Some key points I've picked out:
- Account Based Inventory
- Magmalance/AoE Nerf
- Mine Nerf
- Nanite Buff
- Neutralize Wave Nerf
- Removal of the Stun from the Assassin's Sword loot item
- Xbox Controller fix

I've attached the patch notes here if you're interested:

» Click to show - Click again to hide... «

This article covers test guidance for the second round of Public Testing on Version 1.38, to be conducted from Friday, Oct 22 through Monday, Oct 25.

Version 1.38 includes new features, new content and fixes for Global Agenda.

Public Testing for Version 1.38 will unfold over multiple test weekends, with each weekend having specific test goals. The final date for live deployment of Version 1.38 will be determined based on Public Test Server results and feedback.

Once released, Version 1.38 will be free to all players that have purchased Global Agenda. Players should be reminded that Global Agenda no longer requires a subscription to access any game content.

Week Two Testing: OCT 22 through OCT 25

An early release of Global Agenda Version 1.38 will be available for public testing from late on Friday Oct 22, 2010 (US Eastern Time), until early on Monday morning, Oct 25, 2010.

Follow GATestSvrStatus on Twitter for the most up-to-date Test Server availability information.

This article describes the specific scope and features to be tested during this period, and may NOT represent the full and final scope of the VERSION 1.38 release.

For this test, your characters from the Live environment will be transferred as they were on THURSDAY, OCTOBER 14 at approximately 10:00 AM US EASTERN (14:00 GMT). Note that we have not refreshed the database since last week’s testing. Players who created accounts after this time will not be able to participate in this weekend's test.

Use "/bug" and/or the VERSION 1.38 TEST FORUM to report problems.

Major Highlights since Version 1.37

New Weapon Drops!

• Enemies in the Sonoran Desert zone and co-op missions have a set of new Uncommon and Rare quality ranged and melee devices for each class added to their loot tables, available for use or trade.
• Specific weapons:
  • Brawler's Beat Stick - Slow attack speed. Right click: Heavy swing deals increased damage and does knockback (40 power cost). Backstab inflicts 30% slow for 3s. *Removed chance to stun*.
  • Heavy Wrench - Fast attack speed. Block deals damage. Backstab inflicts 30% slow for 5 secs.
  • Legion Combat Knife - Fast attack speed. Block deals damage. Backstab inflicts bleed effect, dealing damage over 5 secs equivalent to Poison Injector, but should stack with other poisons.
  • Rusted Machete - Fast attack speed. Block deals damage. Backstab reduces physical protections by 12%.
  • Colony Energy Rifle - Slower rate of fire than HEL-TAC, slightly higher overall dps.
  • Dweller Sniper Rifle - Slightly slower rate of fire than other sniper rifles, but higher damage per hit.
  • Legion Side Arm - Slightly slower rate of fire than other medic pistols, but higher damage per hit and slightly higher dps from hits. Right-click scope increases range. *Removed scope bonus damage*
  • Legion SMG - Slightly slower rate of fire than Heatwrack M.A.S.E.R., but higher damage per hit. Right-click scope increases range. *Removed scope bonus damage*
• Elites in Commonwealth missions now have a chance to drop powerful Rare and Epic quality weapons of Commonwealth origin.
• Specific Weapons:
  • Assassin Blade - Right click: Heavy Slash deals extra damage and inflicts -15% phys protection debuff (40 power cost). Backstab deals extra damage equivalent to Ghost Sword. *Removed chance to stun*.
  • Techno Blaster - Right-click: Charges up high impact blast (1 second buildup time), dealing increased damage and knockback. *Damage and knockback and power cost of alt-fire increased slightly*
  • Helot Minigun - Improved accuracy and heavier knockback than iMinigun.
  • Adrenaline Gun - Increases target's max health by 400 for heal duration.
• TEST INSTRUCTIONS: There is a temporary vendor in Dome City Technology area. Visit this vendor to purchase the new weapons and test them out. This vendor exists for PTS only. With version 1.38 these weapons will drop off bot kills as specified above.
  

Most Inventory is now Account-Based vs. Character-Based.

• All characters on your account now share most inventory item types in the same way they share credits and tokens
• For example, an Achievement Reward Helm earned by one character is now wearable by any other character in your account. Similarly all your crafting materials are shared by all characters in your account.
• Exceptions include: Class-based Helmets, Suits and Weapons. Both of these item types are class-specific and are still character-based.
• With this change, all Mail and Auction activity is also Account-Based and no longer Character-Based.
• As part of the data conversion to Account-Based inventory, any items in your mail-box will be removed from mail and automatically placed within your Inventory.

Achievements & Rewards

• Users who recruit other players into the game will now receive achievements & badges. Plus achievement item rewards for big recruiters. More Friends = More Benefits!
• • Recruit 1 friend - “Happy Bag” flair item
  • Recruit 2 friends - “Mad Bag” flair item
  • Recruit 3 friends - “Knockout Bag” flair item
  • Recruit 4 friends - “Scared Bag” flair item
  • Recruit 5 friends - “Boonie Cap” flair item
  • Recruit 20 friends! - “Frank the Tank” prestige pet
  • Recruit 50 friends!! - “Baby Warlord” prestige pet
• AvA Achievements - An achievement has been added for AvA participation

Challenge function

• Pre-made teams can now challenge each other to matches.
• A 4-person team leader can issue a /challenge in-game to another leader of 4-person team.
• If the challenged team-lead accepts, the teams play a 4v4 mission against one another from a named 'challenge' queue.
• Match results are recorded in the database with with the addition of a "Challenge" flag and this data is available to third party reporting sites via the stats API.
• /Challenge can be used for informal duels but also to support any player-managed tournaments, brackets, and team rankings.
• Challenge Achievements - Achievements have been added for using /Challenge

Threat Changes

• Made threat levels decay over time
• Made threat impact of healing be spread out over all the impacted threat tables rather than being applied entirely to them all
• Fixed a bug with threat targeting that was causing results inconsistent with threat values when bots attempted to target the opponent with the most hate.

Device Changes:

• Super Smash Boost and Oathbreaker Morale Boost had their buff values decreased significantly, to be more in line with other Boost devices
• Assault Rockets - all rocket launchers had their AoE radius brought in slightly
• MagmaLance - Initial impact damage reduced 10%
• Recon Mines - all mines had their total damage decreased 10%
• Nanite Heal Guns - initial heal application value was doubled
• Power Wave - Power Regen removed. Now instantly grants 60 power to affected allies, and an additional 20 over 4 seconds
• Neutralize Wave - Removed poison dot effect. Instead deals damage for each beneficial effect removed. Now correctly removes Regeneration. Fixed an issue that made it so Neutralize Wave incorrectly skipped removing movement and damage penalties applied by Regeneration and shields, while still removing the associated buffs.
• Assault’s Berserk offhand had its effect category changed to now correctly stack with offhand shields
• Grizzly and Harrier Drones had their accuracy reduced slightly
• Poison Grenade and Soul Stealer should now correctly use LOS and not deal damage through force walls
• Fixed an issue with Dual Daggers on female characters (previously had no block effect or electric sizzle)

AvA

• Minimize Bid Locking - The bid window time is now random. The match always launches 4 minutes from the initial bid, but the time between initial bid and final bid is random. In conjunction with this change, the Agency rebid timer was changed from 30 seconds to 10 seconds. This is intended to allow agencies to be more responsive to being outbid.
• AvA Helm for 10 wins - A new epic holo-helm has been added as a reward for the Win 10 Seasons of AvA achievement.
• AvA Platforms had their Physical Protections reduced by 5

Halloween

• There will be an in-game Halloween event running from Wed. 10/27 through Sunday 10/31.
• A new Halloween-styled Defense Map will be the only map in the Defense Queue for that period - Oasis Checkpoint... of Doom.
• 13 new Halloween masks of Uncommon through Epic qualities, have been introduced for the event.
• These mask flair items are acquired by playing the Halloween Defense map. They have a chance to drop from any bot in the mission, but will always drop from defeating the end boss.
• Halloween flair items are seasonal and can only be worn from October 1 through November 30th.

Other changes

• Death count for victory bonus in Raid Defense missions has been increased from 4 deaths to 6
• Drop rates for T2 Armored Plate and X8 Nanoprocessors were increased and can also now drop from Colony Drone Mk. 2 in Raids
• Due to budget cuts within the CPSD, Think Tanks will no longer appear in Double Agent missions.
• Dune Commander’s Thrusters now deal significantly more damage to mechanical targets
• The effects for the Assault Minigun and Robotics Rumbleblaster have been updated for better visibility
• Carter's Accessories received a new shipment of Minotaur heads and other backlogged items that were unavailable for a while, and are once again available in exchange for tokens.
• The Tremor Pilot Flair sold at Carter’s Accessories had its quality increased from Common to Uncommon
• New Prestige Pets Added. Mini-versions of the Commonwealth Elite enemies (Helot, Alchemist, Techro, Assassin) have been introduced as prestige pets. Mold Blueprints for these pets are rare end of mission loot drops from winning Ultra-Max and DoubleAgent SpecialOps missions. Molds are then crafted and used in conjunction with the Pet blueprint available from new PetCraft shop in Accessory area.
• New Holo Suits as AvA Season Victory Rewards - A Rewards shop has been added to the Strike Force area of Dome City. The shop is stocked with 3 new Holo-Suits for each class. These suits are purchased with tokens but they are only available to players who have earned AvA Victory achievements

Miscellaneous Bug fixes:

• Fixed Quality Level of All Achievement Helms: Item Tooltip Quality Color was not matching the Icon or the Quality of the device
• X-Box Controller Fix
• Account-based inventory - Miscellaneous clean up around flair specific to each character and fixes issue where crafting skill are shared but crafting materials are not.
• Fixed issue where some crewable vehicles do not fire
• • Dark Steel Vindicator (1580; Vindicator_Dark)
  • Vindicator Siege I (1403; Vindicator_Siege_I)
  • Dark Steel Vindicator (1580; Vindicator_Dark)
• When attempting to fire, the bots do lose energy, but no fire animation is played and no damage is done.
• Fixed issue with health max change not setting correctly
• Recursive Colony Hunter Spiders have evolved and will now only attempt to use their objective damaging beam when in range
• Fixed issue where master volume slider adjustment was not causing sound effect, music and incoming voice sliders to move
• Fixed collision in remote area of OpenZone where players would be stuck falling forever.

Downloading the Public Test Client

For instructions on how to access the Public Test Server, please visit: http://hi-rez.custhelp.com/app/answers/detail/a_id/167

The Public Test Server will only be available for testing at certain pre-announced times ahead of patch deployments. Watch the Public Test Server Forum for announcements on test availability, or follow GATestSvrStatus on Twitter.

FOR TESTING DURING WEEK TWO:

• A new vendor has been temporarily added in the Market area in Dome City who sells the new weapon drops from Sonoran Desert and Commonwealth missions to facilitate easier testing of the new devices.

Known Issues

Here are some particular known issues to be aware of.

• Leaving an agency sometimes does not work properly
• The Icons for Knockout Bag, Scared Bag, and Boonie Cap are being reworked.
• Holosuits’ Achievement Required message extends past viewable area.
• Certain Specialty Head Flair Items Appear Equipped on Profile Screen, but not on player in-game.
• Matches initiated through /challenge currently have a player cap of 8 people (hard cap for the maps)

Official Pre-Patch notes come from here:
http://hi-rez.custhelp.com/app/answers/detail/a_id/232