10:45am EST - The client / server update just hit. Our main server is updated and freshly wiped. New map here.

1:16am EST - Monday is the new Friday. At some point today (I do not know when) we will see a huge update hit main. Not only are there a bunch of new items, there have been some big changes to gameplay. I’m highlighting the shifts to two important dynamics: Raiding and projectile damage. Before we get into that, a short summary of what's new in this update...

What’s new

The state of raiding

One of the biggest dynamics of gameplay to shift in this update is raiding. Along with the addition of C4, building health regen is no longer in effect, allowing people to take their time hacking down walls. That may sound horribly unbalanced towards raiders, and it would be, if it weren’t for durability. Items now lose health when you use them. On top of that, they get damaged much quicker when hitting building parts, requiring multiple tools to bring down walls. We did some testing on walls, these are our findings:

Tier 1 (twig)

Health
50 hp

Any tool
At 50 hp, this might as well be a cardboard box. Basically any tool will get through this quickly.

Tier 2 (wood)

Health
1000 hp

Stone hatchet
Doing 6 damage per swing, this takes down a wood wall in 2 min 15 seconds, and requires 2 hatchets (meaning, 1 breaks halfway through).

Hatchet
At 10 damage per hit, this is the most efficient tool we tested. It breaks down a wood wall in 1 min 20 seconds and requires 1 hatchet.

C4
One explosive charge does 1000 hp damage to the block it is put on (and does less damage to other building parts nearby). Therefore, 1 C4 per wood wall.

Tier 3 (stone)

Health
5000 hp

Hatchets
Only doing 1 damage per swing, neither the stone hatchet or hatchet are viable options.

Salvaged Tools
Salvaged tools actually do more than 1 damage per hit, however, they lose around 25% health every 100 hp damage they do. This means taking down 1 stone wall will take over 10 tools. Not impossible, but not very efficient.

C4
5 C4 will take down 1 stone wall.

Other notes

Crafting C4 requires you to find both the C4 blueprint and the Explosive blueprint (both very rare)
It doesn’t appear very feasible to take down a stone building with tools (although it is possible)
These numbers are likely to change very soon

Projectile damage changes

Maurino has tweaked the damage done by many weapons. Long and short, most guns were nerfed significantly while the bow is now much more dangerous. Here’s some specifics:

Bow

Was
40

Now
65

AK

Was
80

Now
35

Thompson

Was
40

Now
20

Shotgun*

Was
30 (pp)

Now
5 (pp)

Eoka

Was
40

Still
40

* Per pellet, 15 pellets per shot.

C4 destroys tool cupboard

One big glitch currently with C4 is that it destroys cupboards within a ~20 meter radius, even through walls which have been dealt no damage. This is exacerbated by the fact you can now toss C4 (which is pretty cool, mind you), allowing people to toss C4 at buildings and destroy multiple cupboards with 1 blast. Once the cupboards are gone, place your own cupboard and, viola, welcome to your new house! The team is aware of this glitch so expect a fix soon. In the mean time, put those cupboards extra high!

Edit: This has been fixed.

Animal gather rates

Another glitch, which people will mind much less, is that animal gather rates appear to be stuck on max. This means you get many more resources from animals, regardless of the tool. Enjoy the extra cloth while you can, the team is also aware of this one.

Sound going off

And for an annoying one, sound is going off completely at random points. Affecting players on all platforms, sound randomly goes off after about 30 minutes of gameplay. The only known fix is a complete restart of the game. I chatted with Garry about this one and he believes it is a Unity error. If that is the case, it’s a big error, and will hopefully be fixed on the next Unity beta release.

Corrugated metal

Back in development new, Paul just posted this shot of the new metal tier (not in this update).

Question? Comments? Join the conversation at Rustaforum.com