Greetings, Adventurers!
Aeternum is an ever-evolving world, and as such, we continue our efforts in providing our players with an assortment of ongoing new features, content, and changes. Similar to the activities leading up to our latest major update, we are approaching the release of our next large release and would like to once again invite you all to participate in the next cycle of our Public Test Realm (PTR)!
PTR
The Public Test Realm (PTR) is a limited-availability server-set that will give players an early look at upcoming features. These preview builds are snapshots of upcoming major releases and are not final versions — you may encounter bugs, crashes, missing text, or other issues. Between our internal testing efforts and your reports, we hope to catch and resolve all serious issues before they reach the live servers. However, not every bug or feedback piece will be actioned on before release — some changes need time to be investigated further, and may arrive in a subsequent patch or two. Nonetheless, hundreds of changes have already been made — with more to come — and the full release notes will be shared on release day.
To help with the feedback process, all newly created PTR characters will have the opportunity to instantly level to select level-ranges outfitted with appropriate gear and items.
The PTR will officially open tomorrow, June 23, at 10 AM PDT (5 PM UTC). To maximize world population and encourage group play, there will only be one world available (“US East PTR 1”) for this playtest cycle, with it located within the US East regional datacenter. You may have to change your regional selection from the main menu in order to discover the available test world.
If you encounter a bug, exploit, or have suggestions to improve a feature or piece of content, we’d love to hear your feedback on our PTR sub-forum (you can also utilize our in-game feedback tool). We will do our best to address as much of your feedback as possible before the content update makes its way to our live servers. Your participation will help us to deliver awesome content and updates in the future!
During this iteration of the PTR, we look forward to hearing your playtest feedback regarding the following changes.
Major Updates
Summer Medleyfaire Event
Amidst the tragedy and violence of Aeternum, a Medleyfaire Maestro has declared it's time to party away your woes! Summer Villages have been erected in Brightwood, Everfall, Weaver's Fen, and Monarch's Bluffs. Raise your reputation with the Maestro through quests, catching fish like the famed Aeternum Sturgeon with Maudlinbugs, and more to net special holiday rewards. You can even frame your favorite catches for your home at new Mount-A-Catch stations found in every village! Come let loose and celebrate life on the island of Eternal Life!
Musical Instruments
Musical Instruments are a rhythm-action based trade skill coming to Aeternum that make the world a stage! There are 5 instruments for players to pick up and learn, plus an initial 31 songs to collect and master! You can play solo, or as a group with up to 5 Adventurers. These musical instruments include:
Guitar
Mandolin
Upright Bass
Drums
Azoth Flute
Songs are unlocked by salvaging pages hidden throughout Aeternum. Complete the Summer Medleyfaire quests to earn a special set of pages and starter instruments. Better instruments can be crafted through the Furnishing trade skill. Furnishing can also roll new Music trade skill specific perks.
Press the F5 key to initiate a performance. Each one will reward players with trade skill XP and various buffs. Better performances receive stronger buffs and more trade skill XP. Spectators enjoying the show will also receive a buff and can toss a coin to the performers as a tip.
More buffs unlock as your trade skill XP increases. The buffs (in order of progression) are:
Decidedly Dexterous: Gathering Speed increases by 75% for 30-90 min.
Territorial Triumph: Territory Standing Bonus increases by 10%-30% for 30-90 min.
All Together Now: Group Character XP Sharing Bonus increases by 4%-15% for 30-90 min.
Song in your Step: Reduces Player Encumbrance by 200-1,000 for 30-90 min.
Fortune’s Favor: Gathering Yield increases by 3%-10% for 30-90 min.
Luck’s Labor: Gathering Luck increases by 2% - 5% for 30-90 min.
Barnacles & Black Powder
A dark tide rises in Aeternum with the arrival of Admiral Blackpowder and his dastardly crew! Quest givers in the Cutlass Keys settlement and the new docks on the territory’s eastern shore will be looking to offer you loot and renown for defeating the despicable evil within the new Barnacles & Black Powder expedition.
Rumors suggest there might be an even greater power within the Admiral's hold. Not to mention, more than meets the eye... as with most things in Aeternum, of course. Barnacles & Black Powder is an endgame expedition. The entrance can be found at the small docks in south east Cutlass Keys.
Expedition Mutators
Barnacles & Black Powder will be mutated 2 weeks after it releases into the live game.
3 new mutations will also join the mutation rotation!
Icebound:
A mutation that focuses on Ice elemental effects related to incoming and outgoing damage. It can also apply Slow status effects!
Oppressive:
A promotion set that includes mana drains and zones of silence, which prevent ability usage for a short period of time.
Frenzied:
This variant applies Curses to players that dodge. Curses stack and deal damage over time. Max stacks also damage nearby allies.
Expedition Enhancements
New quality of life features have been introduced to alleviate some points of friction for our expedition explorers!
Expedition Group Finder (Same World)
Finding a group to run expeditions with while solo isn’t always easy when you need to ask through Chat. So we are excited to release our first version of the Group Finder tool for expeditions! With this feature, you’ll be able to access a specific Group Finder for each expedition (accessed through expedition entrance UI or related expedition map icons), browse listings created by other players, or post your own request. The tool allows players to declare their preferred team role — such as DPS, Tank, or Healer — and recruit based on those roles. You can also set minimum Gear Score and Level, then inspect members to learn their average GS, weapons, and mastery levels.
Expedition Tuning Orb Removal
In this update, we’ve removed Expedition Tuning Orbs and replaced them with daily limits for Normal and Weekly mutated expedition runs to make all expeditions easier to access. This new system features:
15 Normal Expedition Runs per player per day or 105 per week, per player.
25 Mutated Expedition Runs per week.
For concerned players, this is how we plan on introducing it after the PTR:
In order to honor the value you’ve put into acquiring existing Tuning Orbs, any orbs in your inventory upon the update will be replaced with caches that give loot appropriate for their expedition. While you won’t get a full run’s worth of coin and drops, the rolls will include boss drops for weapons and armor in addition to opportunities for Expertise bumps.
For Normal expeditions, caches will reward a roll from the sub-boss and main boss found in that specific expedition, and grant coin equal to 50% the cost previously associated with buying that specific type of orb from the Faction Shop.
For Mutated expeditions, caches will reward 4 boss rolls off the final boss of 4 eligible mutators, and coin equal to 50% the cost previously associated with buying that specific type of orb from the Faction Shop.
More details can be found within the release notes.
Loot Rebalance
With the accessibility changes to expeditions, we’ve moved roughly 80% of coin generated from expedition bosses and have instead spread it out to coin drops from elite chests and darkness breaches completion bonuses to help compensate for the reduction. Twice a day, players can loot elite chests in the open world or complete minor and major darkness breaches to earn a bag of coins. Each bag contains 500 coins.
Along with that, we have introduced a new method to help the player overcome the randomness of Expedition Loot. Materia is a new type of resource , Materia, that can be used to craft your desired drop. There are two ways to obtain this resource. Any named item obtained from an expedition can now be salvaged into Materia of its corresponding expedition type (Amrine Materia, Depths Materia etc.). The player will also receive Materia when defeating the main boss of an expedition.
Mutator Loot Shift
We’ve shifted the difficulty levels at which loot unlocks. The system was originally intended to give players a sense of rewarding progression as they play through the different difficulty levels — which it did accomplish — but the lower levels didn’t feel particularly good due to sparse rewards. We’ve therefore changed what items unlock at which difficulty level, which should result in a wider variety of lower level rewards. No loot has been removed, as specific items have shifted to unlock at different brackets and in certain groups.
We’ve also added another accessory to each mutator. Previously, each mutator dropped 2 of the 3 types of accessory. Now every mutator can drop all available types.
Instanced Wars
Previously while one or more wars were ongoing, server performance could become degraded. This could result in latency spikes for players in the war and surrounding areas of Aeternum. We have rearchitected the underlying technology for wars and are happy to report that wars should no longer pose risk of such a drastic negative performance impact to participants nor the world around them!
Loot, Perks, and Trade Skills
Note that all tuning values on the PTR are still in flux and may change before retail release into the live game. Please experiment, have fun, and send us your feedback!
Perk Rebalance
We have examined the meta and its issues impacting endgame viability. With this update we adjusted over 150 perks to help make them more useful and competitive compared to the best perks in the game. Skill-specific weapon perks are now more powerful, with some receiving substantial rework to be more viable. For example, we buffed the Durability perk and renamed it to “Indestructible” because players will no longer take durability damage when it is equipped.
We also tweaked how perks are calculated in order to provide players with more options for better perk combinations. For example, the trade skill drop chance on earrings now has a very low drop chance on drops to increase the combat focused perks players get from earrings. These perks can still be controlled via crafting using their specific craft mods to make specific items.
Dual Stat Change
In order to improve the quality of crafted and looted items, we’ve made some changes to dual stat attribute combinations. We’ve changed the scaling of the primary stat to scale higher, giving these stats larger impact. We’ve also made a number of changes to the 50 threshold bonuses to encourage more stat splitting across all builds. This is a very experimental change and we are looking for feedback through the PTR to evaluate the balance and impact of these changes before going live.
Loot Quality
The overall quality of drops has been improved based on player/expertise level. That means at level 60, players should earn more Epic and Rare loot than Uncommon loot. The Epic and Legendary loot also have a higher chance of receiving more viable stat combinations (e.g. increased chances for Keen, lower chances for Beast Bane). Perks that roll are all still random for non-named items, but players should see better combinations of perks overall. We’ve also improved the chances that higher Gear Score items can drop from lower level creatures, giving a small chance 600 Gear Score items can come from level 59+.
Bonus Loot Drops
The loot players rolled from Gypsum Casts were not very rewarding, so we improved the likelihood that you’ll roll Epic and Rare loot. We’ve also increased the range at which Expertise can be gained off these rolls.
Perfect Salvage
We heard the feedback, and recognize that salvage became much less interesting at endgame. With this update we made salvaging more rewarding through the introduction of Perfect Salvages. Whenever you salvage an item you will now have a chance to perform a Perfect Salvage. Perfect Salvages can reward players with the following:
Research materials (such as weapon scraps) that can be used to gain crafting trade skill experience.
Special orbs that can be converted into gypsum casts which bypass the normal daily limit.
Materials to fabricate special items.
Other valuable resources.
Trade Skill Changes
Improvements to trade skills are being made to reduce friction and speed up leveling for many Gathering, Refining, and Crafting trade skills:
Gathering
Reduced Logging XP required to level from 1 to 50 by 15%.
Reduced Logging XP required to level from 51 to 200 by 20%.
Reduced Fishing XP required to level from 1 to 200 by 50%.
Refining
We are removing tiers from reagents (Tannins, Fluxes, Sandpapers, Weaves, and Solvents). Our goal is to simplify these to a single tier, giving them the potency of T5 reagents to help players progress trade skills more efficiently and reduce the friction of converting reagents. Plus, remove the confusion around what tier of reagent to apply when crafting.
Reduced Leatherworking XP required to level from 1 to 200 by 10%.
Reduced Smelting XP required to level from 1 to 200 by 10%.
Reduced Weaving XP required to level from 1 to 200 by 15%.
Reduced Woodworking XP required to level from 1 to 200 by 15%.
Reduced Stonecutting XP required to level from 1 to 200 by 20%.
Crafting
Improving the trade skill XP on tier 4 and tier 5 crafted items for all skills.
Reduced furnishing XP required to level from 1 to 200 by 20%.
Reducing the trade skill XP required for Weaponsmithing and Furnishing for levels 1-200
(not yet in this build).
Crafting, Gathering, & Refining Clothing
We’ve rebalanced the drop chance and locations of all trade skill clothing to better improve their availability.
Of course, that’s not all! You can review all of the upcoming changes for this patch by checking out the full PTR release notes, shared within the PTR sub-forum.
PTR Client Access
This special preview client will be made available for download through the stand-alone Steam application, “New World Public Test Realm” (which should already be in your Steam library if you own the main game). When the test period is complete and the main New World game is updated with the previewed content, the PTR world will shut down and may be wiped clean. You will continue to see the New World PTR application in your Steam library, but there will not be an active server until the next time we announce a public test
PTR Backstory Loadouts
Upon character creation on the PTR, players will be given multiple caches of special armor and weapons. Each cache has a designation based upon a general build and a main attribute: CON, DEX, INT, FOC, and STR.
To help manage the sudden onset of new items, do not open all provided caches at once, or you’ll risk becoming encumbered! Instead, equip all provided bags and then follow-up with opening each cache deliberately. Any undesired caches can be dropped or deposited into your personal settlement storage.
PTR FAQ
HOW DO I ACCESS THE NEW PTR?
Everyone with a copy of New World will be automatically granted access to the secondary PTR app. The PTR is not compatible with the live game, so you will need to download a separate client (and have the hard drive space required to support it). From there, we will have special worlds available within supported regions. Not all regions will initially be supported. Access is on a first come, first served basis. There may be queues.
CAN I PLAY WITH OR TRANSFER MY LIVE CHARACTERS TO THE PTR
Unfortunately, no. These are separate ecosystems, so at this time it is not possible. However, to make testing easier, we will occasionally provide our play-testers with special accommodations such as instant levels, special gear, etc.
CAN I PROVIDE DESIGN FEEDBACK REGARDING WHAT’S INCLUDED ON THE PTR?
Preview game builds on the PTR are finished with their core development and are in their final phase of testing and bug fixing. Our main focus at this phase is improving quality, although we will appreciate any feedback you have to share.
I HAVE A PROBLEM; HOW CAN I CONTACT CUSTOMER SUPPORT?
Our policies and Code of Conduct cover the PTR, and in-game moderation will continue to be supported. Unfortunately, due to the temporary and potentially unstable nature of the PTR, general Customer Service assistance through both Live Chat and through the Support Website will not be available.
I DON’T WANT TO PARTICIPATE IN THE PTR, CAN I REMOVE THE APP FROM MY LIBRARY?
Don’t worry, no offense taken. Players can manage visibility of the New World Public Test Realm Steam Library entry. Opening up the game options (right-click > Manage) offers the “Hide Game” function.
Thanks for your support and participation! We'll see you in Aeternum.