10/4 @ 11:26pm EST - Down to the wire, the progression merge is still pending...

10/4 @ 2:30pm EST - The team is still shooting to get the new progression system in by the wipe tomorrow. We're waiting on the merge into main...

10/3 @ 5:00pm EST - The new progression system is still being worked on but has not yet been merged into staging. With Helk being under the weather, it is not completely certain if this new system will make it in Thursday. As always, we'll keep you up to date as we know more.

4:30pm EST - The devblog is out and the update is live!

11:00am EST - The team continues to be on fire this morning with more quality of life changes including a new high external stone gate, fixes for placing large furnaces below floor grills, and tweaks to damage when laddering over high external stone walls. Details have been added below.

12:00am EST - Update day is here and not only are we seeing a welcomed nerf to twig raiding and a slew of quality of life improvements, there are some very exciting changes to the game right around the corner.

Our update stream goes live at 2pm EST. Follow @Rustafied for news throughout the day. Let’s get into it...

Update summary video

Here's our update summary video from Puddy.

Twig raiding nerf

A large shift this week as placing twig in building blocked areas has changed. Players can now only place twig foundations and floors in blocked areas. Ladders can still be placed also, but gone are the days of twig stairs and walls in restricted cupboard zones.

Not only does it alter the dynamics of raiding, this change makes high external walls, compounds, and quarries much more viable. Granted, you can still ladder over a high external with a couple syringes, but it’s much more expensive of a proposition now. Rope will also be a more valuable commodity, as ladder requires 3 feet to craft.

Edit: The damage volumes have been tweaked for the barb on top of high external walls. This doesn't change the amount of damage, but does increase the hitboxes, making it harder to get over walls with ladders.

New high external stone gate

The high external stone gate has been updated to include more barbs and panels around the side, making it harder for miscreants to sneak their way in. The door animation has also been significantly sped up... awesome!

Large furnace placement

Further felating reddit, Andre has fixed fix a longstanding issue with large furnace placement. You can finally put large furnaces under floor grills which have already been placed!

Map by default

You’ll never need to craft a paper map again as Helk made it so everyone has a map, all the time. No more inventory space or crafting required, simply press ‘g’ and your map appears. Granted, this kills the idea of sharing and trading maps, but did anyone really do that anyway?

Edit: Map writing has also been disabled for everyone except moderators.

Storage and furnace QoL improvements

Helk has made some changes to furnaces and storage to make life much easier. Here's the low down:

• Shelves can be placed over top of existing boxes
• You can pick up furnaces, storage boxes (small and large), and fridges if they are empty, unlocked, your hammer is equipped, and you have building privilege
• Furnace costs 100 less wood (but no longer starts with wood)
• Picking up and moving things decreases the items health

RAM usage added to perf

A handy new metric has been added to the ‘perf’ command. Client ram usage is now indicated for perf 5 through 8 (set in console).

Progression progress

Helk is well underway on the new progression system. A hybrid of components and blueprints, this next evolution of progression will fundamentally shift how items are crafted and made available. Although this work is not able to be tested yet (it's still on its own branch), we do know roughly what to expect given Helk’s commits and a chat we had.

First of all, blueprints are coming back, and will work pretty much the same as they did back in the old days: certain items can be crafted by default, other items require a blueprint to be learned before you can craft them. Each player will have their own learned blueprints for each server and they will persist across map wipes (but not server to server).

Blueprints will be obtained through research benches. You’ll need the source item and a certain amount of scrap to get a blueprint. The specifics of percentage chance and costs are still to be determined, but it looks like researching will be very similar to what it used to be - except instead of BP frags, you use scrap. It’s not clear as of yet if you’ll find blueprints around the map, or if they’ll only be obtained through research.

Once a blueprint is learned, you’ll need the appropriate workbench, along with ingredients, to craft the item. There will be 3 tiers of workbench, each likely harder to obtain (i.e. more expensive). Workbenches will provide a crafting speed bonus, although it is unknown what that bonus will exactly be and if it changes based on items or workbenches.

As with all large shifts to the game, this will not only take time to implement, there will be a lot of balance required. The various values, tiers, loot tables, and more which needs to be honed to find the ideal level of progression could easily be more work than the initial implementation.

Good news is: we probably won’t have to wait long. Helk told me he is shooting to get this new hybrid progression system in for the forced wipe next week (October 5th). Stay tuned for more on this new system (including a fresh guide) in the coming days.

Sedan improvements

The new, admin spawned sedan has received some improvements since its inception to the game last week. Not only has collision been greatly improved, it now has working head and brake lights. You can toggle them on or off with ‘f’ if you feel like signaling another driver on the road, or just creeping up on a motherfucker.

Keep in mind, this vehicle is still only able to be spawned in by admins (‘spawn sedan’ in console) and needs a bunch of work before it’s ready to go live in game.

Player model updates

Taylor's body of work (which has been added and removed twice now from staging) is still on its own branch, which means as of now, it won’t be in the update. This could change though, as several more commits were made Wednesday evening which isolated hair and clothing changes.

As you’ll recall from previous posts and devblogs, these player model updates include new faces, moving / blinking eyes, and tweaks to the body models. Although it will be a slight character reroll in the sense that you might get a new face, it doesn’t appear any genders are shifting in conjunction with these changes.

The other week, these updates were added then removed at the last minute due to unforeseen issues. Taylor, who loves teasing our cocks, did the same thing again this week. As always, we’ll keep you updated when they get added back in.

Hair on the horizon

On the same branch as player model updates, hair has been roughly implemented for the first time. Given there are only three models at the moment (one for each type: head, face, and pubic), I wouldn’t expect to see hair in game for the next couple of weeks.

Potential lag fixes

Server lag has been a real bitch this past week, with spikes happening sporadically on populated servers. After working with the devs to profile some of our servers, several issues with navmesh have been found and fixed.

Although signs point to navmesh being the culprit, we're not 100% sure it is, or if the issue has been resolved. With that in mind, if you notice lag spikes on populated servers after the update, remember it is not ‘the fucking shitty-ass server’, it’s a known issue with the game which the developers are actively looking in to.

Other stuff

• Wooden ladders can be stacked to 5
• Can repair damaged ladders
• Can stack items that have condition if their condition is maxed out
• Raw and spoiled meat no longer goes straight to belt when picked up
• Updated grass materials
• Tweaks to penumbra shadows
• AI Progress
• Fixed shadow quality change from 0 to 2
• Barricades wood, wood barbwire, metal share a more convenient footprint/volume