Firefall Patch Notes: Patch 0.6 (March Milestone)

These Firefall patch notes are reproduced directly from the official forum thread, and we’re posting them here for reference and easy access.

Progression

The new progression system is live!

• Weight has been renamed to “Mass”.
• CPU has been renamed to “Cores”.
• All currently created items in the game have been removed and replaced with starting gear.
• Tiers have been removed from the game. Unlocking new Battleframes now costs 10 Pilot tokens or 100 Red Beans. Pilot tokens are awarded at the 5th, 7th, 9th and 10th unlocks in each of the 3 constraint progression trees.
• Unlocking progression items in the three trees will increase Battleframes Mass, Power and CPU Cores accordingly. Battleframes movement speed and overall damage will be affected by Mass and Power usage respectively. More constraints mean more room to equip better gear!
• Acquiring progression items in the three trees requires Experience, Resources, and a special crafted item for the 10th unlock. Each Battleframe has a different resource requirement and special item needed to progress.
• CPU Cores are used to equip abilities. These will be utilized more in a Future Update
• You can now preview Battleframes before unlocking them.
• As this is a system in progress, please help us by reporting any oddities, and expect changes as we work out the kinks and bring more features online!

PVE

The Accord Battle Lab

Welcome to the The Accord Battle Lab:
The Accord Battle Lab serves as a basic tutorial for players as they enter the game. This experience will introduce the player to the world of Firefall. It features a series of challenges from movement, combat, character customization, and introduces weapons and abilities for each of the 5 Accord Batteframes. For this patch, all players, when they first log on, will play through this experience.

Things to Expect:

• When players enter the experience, they will find that they are in Civilian Clothes, and will be walked through a series of challenges
• Players will be given access to each of the 5 Accord Battleframes and be offered challenges to test each of these abilities.
• Players will meet both Aero and Oilspill

Known Issues

• If you use any of the interactable terminals more than once, you will queue VO lines. This can result in Aero repeating herself.
• After selecting a Battleframe from the Holograms you will see 5 challenge Drones. They are friendly. Interact with them and they will give you the appropriate challenge
• The Triage Challenge is not working as intended.
• Before using an Ultimate, make sure to run over the HKM Power Up. This is mentioned in text and via a Sin Card, but some people miss both of these.

Chosen Warfront

General

• Chosen no longer attack watchtowers from random locations on the map.
• Attacks now come in more organized groups in much more noticeable ‘warfront’ patterns.
• Chosen attack from outposts they control and directly from the melding
• New Chosen AI has been integrated into all warfront encounters

Invasions

• They’re back, and have been redesigned
• The Chosen are focused on invading Thump Dump and Sunken Harbor
• The Chosen use siege tactics to bombard the SIN towers as well as invade with ground forces to destroy the shield generators, requiring players to both defend and attack to deal with the threats.
• Invasions are designed to be multi-squad encounters

Chosen Scouts & Drop Pods

• Drop pods have been redesigned
• They no longer spawn everywhere / anywhere in the world. Instead, they are called down by Chosen Scouts.
• Chosen Scouts and their drop pods are designed as solo-player content.

Incursions

• Incursions have been redesigned
• The number of Chosen defending the Incursion has been increased and the number of defending structures has been decreased in order to make the encounter more mobile
• Players need to clear out the area around the Incursion in order to spawn a Shield Disruptor
• When players use the Shield Disruptor, it begins the defend state. During this time, players defend the Shield Disruptor against waves of Chosen while it brings down a shield protecting a generator.
• When a generator is vulnerable, players can quickly blow it up to start the next defend wave, which is harder than the previous wave
• After all the generators are destroyed, the Warbringer is vulnerable and can be destroyed
• Incursions are designed to be squad content

Watchtowers

• When occupied by Chosen, the spawn room contains a device that governs the Chosen’s ability to spawn in that room. Players can interact with that device to blow it up to prevent the Chosen from spawning in the watchtower until a new device is arcported in.
• Watchtowers updated with new VO
• Watchtowers now display the amount of Chosen in the vicinity (if any) when Accord controls the tower
• Watchtowers are no longer revealed by default on the map. They are now associated with certain points of interest (POI). When players uplink to a POI’s SIN tower, the associated watchtowers are then fully revealed.
• Watchtowers are designed to be group content
• Placement of some glider pads on watch towers have been adjusted so they no longer propel the user into terrain

POI Buffs

• POIs under Accord control now give players buffs
• Major POIs (Thump Dump, Copacabana, Sunken Harbor, and TransHub) each give a unique buff to all players in the zone while the Accord maintains control of the POI
  • Copacabana: Increased health regen
  • Thump Dump: Increased resource gain
  • TransHub: Reduced cooldowns
  • Sunken Harbor: Increased XP gain
• Minor POIs (Sigu’s Sanctuary, Northern Shores, Cerrado Plains, etc) give a small stacking damage buff that increases in strength the more minor POIs that are controlled by the Accord
• When the Accord loses control of these POIs, they also lose the associated buffs
• Note: UI is not yet in the game to communicate that these buffs are active, but they are working behind the scenes. We decided to keep the bonuses in-game while we continue to work on the UI for it.

ARES Missions / Local Events

Introduced ARES missions throughout New Eden!

• There are many new locations around New Eden where your expertise as an ARES operator is required
• Thirty new interior spaces will now challenge you with objective based combat scenarios
  • Missions vary in difficulty, from solo encounters to five player group scenarios.
  • Fight through several different mission types with ever changing enemy forces in every one of the thirty spaces.
  • Earn rewards for the new crafting and progression system.
  • Nearly 200 unique narrative scripts have been added to these encounters which highlight the role of players as ARES Operators and inform about the state of New Eden and its population.

Known issue

• Sometimes the Arcporter does not appear at the end of an ARES mission. If this happens, you may need to re-enter the mission volume and exit again to make it appear.

New Event: Player Created LGV Races

• A new item called “Starting Line” is craftable at the manufacturing station, and becomes a consumable.
• Place the Starting Line anywhere in the world. You are automatically given the Finish Line which you place a minimum of 500m from the Starting Line.
• Anyone can participate in the race by interacting with the Starting Line.
• The race will stay in the world as long as players keep using it.

Thumper and Scanning Improvements

• All of the thumper costs and capacities have been adjusted.
• New sizes of Personal and Squad thumpers have been designed by Accord engineers and are available for manufacture. Find the thumper that best fits your squad’s gear and skill!
• Personal Thumpers are designed for 1-2 players. Resources recovered are split amongst the squad.
• Squad Thumpers are designed for full squads. Resources are shared equally amongst the squad (no splitting).
• Creatures spawned by the thumper are much more region-specific.
• The balance and timing of all thumper spawns have been adjusted.
• Completing a thumper to 100% yields a double resource bonus.
• Completing a thumper to 100% results in an XP reward for the squad.
• Explosive Aranhas killed by players only have small explosions instead of their large self-destruct explosion.
• If you help a squad with their thumper, you will receive a small resource reward from the Accord.
• Thumpers now have global mapmarkers – check your map to find a nearby squad with an open slot that is digging for a resource you need.
• Lots of new voice over and feedback has been added to the thumper encounter.
• Thumper placement rules have been adjusted to reduce positional exploits.
• Players are now able to thump in flat water and wet sand
• Many other small improvements to thumpers including: visual effects, lighting, creature spawn positions, thumper health, new creatures, etc.
• You can only see the Thumper map markers if you’ve connected to the SIN tower for that area
• Scan Hammer visuals have been improved – the SIN data should be much easier to read in order to find the best veins.

Open World

• The Sunken Harbor watch towers now have unique names
• Sunken Harbor spotlights now move even if players are not looking at them
• Several NPCs in Trans Hub now have different names
• Floating buildings around New Eden have been put back on the ground
• Various floating rocks, bushes, etc. are now back on the ground
• Various texture glitches have been fixed
• Various texture seams have been closed
• Hisser nests now align properly to mountains
• Fixed auto turrets that clipped through the ground
• Antennas are now properly displayed from far away
• Plugged terrain holes in the Dig Site 5 cave
• Plugged terrain holes in the back of the Cliffedge Encampment near Copacabana
• Plugged terrain holes around the Broken Shores Secret Lab
• Plugged terrain holes around Thump Dump
• The SIN Tower in Thump Dump now has collision
• Shield barriers of the SIN towers in Sigu and Stonewall are now correctly aligned
• The /cheer emote of the female character no longer loops
• Removed some rocks in the middle of the road by Cerrado Plains

SIN Imprints

• Fixed some SIN imprints that were not playing
• Playing a SIN imprint will interrupt other SIN imprint recordings
• SIN imprints are now prettier and easier to see from a distance
• Missions & Encounters
• Daily missions are now resetting properly
• Players no longer get double rewards for the Holmgang mission
• Dynamic events are now spread out in a more distributed pattern

Chosen

• Chosen have a new fashion designer
• Chosen have taken to wearing masks
• Chosen have developed their own weapons and weapon appearances
• Chosen will now take additional damage when shot in critical locations with any weapon
• Chosen are no longer able to re-capture towers after dying
• Chosen no longer get stuck between a crate and a rock ledge
• Chosen no longer get stuck during an invasion trying to target shield generators through walls

Chosen Assault

• Renamed to “Shock Trooper”
• Now uses the Chosen Assault Rifle instead of the burst rifle
• Various AI tweaks and improvements
• Gets the party started by deploying a Tortured Soul spawner

Juggernaught

• There have been slight adjustments to his plasma cannon

Siegebreaker

• Revision to hit area of Siegebreaker’s charge attack
• Corrected animation issues with Siegebreaker’s weapon firing

Sniper

• Chosen snipers have been spotted in New Eden for the first time
• May also deploy Tortured Soul spawners

Engineer

• Chosen engineers are now pushing out of the Melding
• Now owns Chosen Drones

Drone

• Owned by Chosen Engineer
• Provides support to other Chosen units

Tortured Soul

• Chosen have been seen sending mutated creatures known as Tortured Souls into battle.

Grunts

• Now only plays one sound when making melee attacks
• The Chosen grunt now plays his attack animation properly
• The Chosen Grunt animations no longer twitch

Creatures

• Creatures now drop specific crafting components instead of random resources
• Where creatures spawn in the world is more closely related to the environmental conditions.
• NPCs can now use weapon alt-fires, be cautious
• Creature burrow/unburrow improvements
• Reduced health points of smaller creatures like the shelless Hisser and Skiver from 700 to 200

Terrorclaw

• Terrorclaw now hits targets in a more reasonable area while rolling
• Fixed various animation glitches

Toxic Aranha

• Toxic Aranhas now have screen effects when damaging a player

Thresher

• Thresher charge delay duration reduced

Wyrms

• Wyrms are hostile and gradually decay hostility
• Fixed wyrm facing issues with ability and attack
  • Shortened target selection range in combat
  • Checks range before attacking

Storm Kestrel

• Storm Kestrel have their descend speed reduced but their charge increased

Explosive Aranhas

• Explosive Aranhas will not walk through shields anymore
• Less powerful explosion when killed by a player vs. blowing up on their own

Wasp

• The wasp has been introduced into New Eden for the first time
• Behaves much like the Culex and can be found inland

Skiver

• Skivers have been introduced into New Eden for the first time
• Skivers are small creatures with low health and tend to attack in swarms
• Sand Skiver variants are found in different biomes than Skivers

Combat

General

• Double Damage is now dropped when the carrier dies. It can be picked up again by nearby enemies/allies during its 20 second “active” duration.

Movement

• Increased base movement speeds in PvP
• Increased air control universally
• Increased jet thrust strength
• Increased gravity
• Added “Air Sprinting” – press and hold shift while jetting to move faster in a horizontal direction. Costs more energy per second.
• Sprinting will now drain energy while enabled in PvP

Crafting

We have laid the foundation for our new crafting system!

Resources

• Resources now only have 3 aspects (down from 5): Power, Mass, and CPU-Cores
  • Like the previous resources, each resource in a family is "best" at a specific aspect
  • An additional stat on resources is called "Purity" which influences the the refining process (read below)
• The number of resources are changing from 3 families of 3 (9 total) to 5 families of 3 (15 total)
  • Resources and families have new, less cryptic names
• Creatures now drop only crystite and have a chance of special drops which are used in many recipes

Resource Refining

• Raw resources
  • All resources are acquired as "raw" and must be refined before they can be used in crafting recipes
  • Aspect stats of raw resources persist into their refined versions
• Refining takes the raw resources and splits them into multiple results:
  • Seed Crystite (currency)
  • Refined resources (used for crafting)
  • Crystite Hybrids (used for crafting)
    • Crystite hybrids are used in the new crafting system to power the more powerful weapons and abilities
    • For every unit of raw resources being refined, there is a 0.1% chance of getting a crystite hybrid
      • If you refine 1000 units of a raw resource, you get 1 crystite hybrid 100% of the time
    • If you refine more than 1000 units you have a +0.1% chance of getting an extra crystite hybrid per unit being refined
      • Refining 1355 units of a raw resource means you get 1 crystite hybrid, and have a 35.5% chance of an additional crystite hybrid
  • The higher the purity of the raw resource, the more units are outputed when refined

Crafting & Components

• All Battleframe modules & weapons now have component-based recipes
• To build a Plasma Cannon I, you must first build two components: the Plasma Cannon Barrel I and the Plasma Reactor I, each requiring refined resources
• Each component affects a different attribute of the master item – the Plasma Cannon Barrel I affects AOE radius, the Plasma Reactor I affects damage
• The quality of the resources used determine the quality of the component crafted – the higher the component’s quality, the better it affects the related attribute
• There are 4 stages of crafting planned per item, this patch features the first two
• The higher the crafting stage, the more complex the recipe and the more powerful the item
• More powerful gear will be more constraint-hungry – see the Progression notes!)
• For the time being, ALL crafting recipes are available – in a future patch, you will have to research each crafting recipe before you can build the item

Manufacturing UI

• A new, and still in development, interface has been added at the molecular printer to allow players to manufacture components and gear.
• Recipes are organized by category for organizational purposes.
• A search field has been added for ease of finding specific nanoprints.
• All players will have 2 available workbenches allowing 2 nanoprints to be built in parallel.
• Many improvements to come in future patches.

Old Resources

• New recipe added for Beta Crystite Refining
• The Beta Crystite Refining recipe takes up to 6 inputs at once
• The Beta Crystite Refining process takes 20 seconds regardless of the amount of input
• You can use full stacks of resources in the Beta Crystite Refining recipe
• Old resources will convert into Beta Crystite at a ratio of 1:1
• You may only use old resources for Beta Crystite Refining, all new recipes will require the new resources.
• The vendor containing items purchasable for Beta Crystite is not yet in the game, it will be made available at a later date.

Battleframes

• Each Battleframe now comes equipped with a unique Hyper-Kinesis Module (HKM) which is the "ultimate" ability of the Battleframe.
• HKMs are charged by dealing damage, taking damage, or healing
• After a duration of not dealing damage, taking damage or healing, the HKM meter will slowly lose its charge.
• Added a HKM meter to the bottom of the ability bar.
  • Yellow: signifies you are charging your HKM
  • Green: signifies HKM is ready
  • Red: signifies HKM charge is fading
• Known issue (bug): using your scan hammer will empty your HKM charge

Accord Battleframes

Assault

• Primary Weapon – Plasma Cannon
  • Fires a plasma round which deals both splash damage and extra direct damage. Splash radius has been reduced.
• Alternate-Fire – Scattershot
  • Fires a shotgun-style blast of small plasma projectiles
• Specialty (Passive) – Accord Absorption Plating
  • Player receives a bonus heal over time equal to 25% of the health granted from a health pickup.
• Ability 1 – Crater
  • Player slams to the ground, dealing AOE damage that scales up based on distance travelled (height).
  • Crater now sends the player down-and-forward at a consistent angle.
• Ability 2 – Afterburner
  • Player dashes in the direction they are facing at a high speed
• Ability 3 – Overcharge
  • Overcharges the Battleframe, causing the player to deal bonus damage for the duration
• HKM – Shockwave
  • Fires a shockwave shell in the direction the player is aiming, dealing massive damage to any enemy it passes though

Biotech

• Primary Weapon – BioNeedler
  • Discharges small spikes at a high rate of fire.
• Alternate Fire – Needle Shotgun
  • Fires a cluster of spikes at once
• Specialty (Passive) – Accord Siphoning Plating
  • A percentage of all damage and healing dealt returns to the Biotech as health.
• Ability 1 – Healing Wave
  • The Biotech sends out a wave in a frontal cone that heals allies, as well as damages and knocks back enemies.
• Ability 2 – Poison Trail
  • The Biotech emits toxic clouds that linger for a duration, dealing heavy damage and snaring any enemies that pass through them.
• Ability 3 – Triage
  • Biotech is able to revive allies at a much faster rate, as well as receive less damage from enemy attack for its duration.
• HKM – Accord Chemical Sprayer
  • The Biotech’s weapon switches to a chemical sprayer for a short duration, which damages any enemies and heals any allies caught in the spray.

Dreadnaught

• General – Base movement speed increased slightly.
• Primary Weapon – Heavy Machine Gun (HMG)
  • Requires spin-up time before firing, and rapidly discharges bullets in a cone of fire.
  • Accuracy cone has been improved, though weapons damage decreases beyond 20m.
  • Rate of fire decreased slightly and damage per round increased slightly (no change in DPS).
• Alternate Fire – Forward Shield
  • While the alt fire is active, a Forward Shield is projected from the HMG, blocking incoming projectiles until its health reaches 0.
  • If the shield is "broken", it will go on a short cooldown
• Specialty (Passive) – Resilient Plating
  • When the Dreadnaught falls below 35% health, it gains increased health regeneration until reaching 35% again.
• Ability 1 – Explosive Rounds
  • Overrides the HMG ammo for a short duration. Rounds deal bonus damage and explode on impact, causing some AOE damage.
• Ability 2 – Heavy Armor
  • Activates a shield around the Dreadnaught, causing them to take less damage for a short duration.
• Ability 3 – Repulsor Blast
  • The Dreadnaught emits a powerful wave of energy, dealing damage to and knocking back any enemies caught in the blast.
• HKM – Accord Mortar Launcher
  • The Dreadnaught’s weapon is replaced with a Mortar Launcher, which fires projectiles that explode for AOE damage upon impact.

Engineer

• Primary Weapon – Sticky Grenade Launcher
  • Fires grenades that stick to surfaces and wait to be remotely detonated (can stick to players).
• Alternate Fire – Sticky Grenade Launcher Detonation
  • The alt fire detonates all deployed grenades from the Sticky Grenade Launcher when triggered.
• Specialty (Passive) – Accord Nanite Deployment
  • When the engineer’s deployables drop below a certain amount of health, small nanites are deployed to repair the device over time.
• Ability 1 – Heavy Turret
  • Deploys a heavy turret that deals moderate damage within combat range. This turret automatically upgrades itself after dealing enough damage to enemies.
• Ability 2 – Forward Shield
  • Deploys a quarter-dome shield that blocks projectiles and prevents enemies from moving through it.
• Ability 3 – Supply Station
  • Deploys a supply station that periodically spawns health and ammo pickups that anyone can use.
• HKM – Anti-Personnel Turret
  • Spawns a useable anti-personnel turret that can be controlled by either the player or ally. Lasts 30 seconds or until destroyed.

Recon

• Primary Weapon – R36 Assault Rifle
  • A specialized assault rifle with a mid-range scope, better accuracy, and harder hitting rounds.
• Alternate Fire – Range Scope
  • The Recon aims down the sights, greatly increasing accuracy when firing.
• Specialty (Passive) – Accord Regenerative Plating
  • Grants health regeneration after achieving a kill or assist
• Ability 1 – Cryo Bomb
• Throws a grenade that detonates on impact
  • Enemies caught in blast radius are significantly snared for a short duration
• Ability 2 – Decoy
  • Activates a cloaking field, rendering the Battleframe invisible
  • Leaves behind a SIN hologram that does not move to distract enemies
  • Hologram explodes at end of duration for moderate AOE damage
• Ability 3 – SIN Beacon
  • Launches a beacon in a straight line from the Recon.
  • Sticks to any surface and adds enemies in its radius to SIN. Enemies entered in SIN in this way take additional damage from the Recon’s allies.
• HKM – Accord Artillery Strike
  • Designates an artillery strike at spot of reticle
  • After a brief moment, Accord artillery shells impact the designated area for AOE damage

Specialty Battleframes

Assault

Firecat

• Primary Weapon – Thermal Cannon
  • Fires a small fire-based plasma projectile that does heavy/wide AOE damage.
• Alternate Fire – Triple-Shot
  • Fires three smaller projectiles that damage and apply the Firecat’s passive damage-over-time effect to enemies they hit
• Specialty (Passive) – Incinerator
  • Any damage dealt by the Firecat’s abilities or alt-fire cause their enemies to catch on fire, dealing a minor amount of fire damage every second. The lifetime of the effect is extended when the target takes damage from the primary fire of the Thermal Cannon.
• Ability 1 – Thermal Wave
  • Shoots a burning projectile in a straight line forward that deals moderate damage
  • Applies passive damage-over-time effect to enemies hit
• Ability 2 – Immolation
  • Deals heavy fire damage to enemies around the player. Also applies the passive damage-over-time effect.
• Ability 3 – Inferno Dash
  • Player dashes in the direction they are facing at a high speed
  • Enemies in the path of Inferno Dash are ignited with the passive damage-over-time effect.
• HKM – Fuel Air Bomb
  • Calls in a bomb that explodes for significant fire damage over a large area upon impact.

Tigerclaw

• Primary Weapon – Fusion Cannon
  • Fires a plasma round that deals bonus direct damage but has very little splash.
• Alternate Fire – Nova Cannon
  • Fires a larger, slower moving plasma ball that deals heavy AOE damage and costs more ammunition
• Specialty (Passive) – Auxiliary Fuel Tanks
  • Activating an ability causes the Tigerclaw to gain bonus energy regeneration for a duration
• Ability 1 – Trailblaze
  • Creates a spot of energy on the ground that significantly increases the Tigerclaw’s movement speed as well as the movement speed of allies when passed through. Up to 3 uses of this ability can be stored at once.
• Ability 2 – Missile Shot
  • Single shot override for the Fusion Cannon
  • Travels faster and does AOE damage upon impact
• Ability 3 – Disruption Wave
  • Sends a ball of energy straight out from the Tigerclaw
  • Deals small amount of damage to enemies and snares them for a short duration.
• HKM – Tether Field
  • Fires a projectile that detonates and creates a field of energy
  • Enemies caught in the field are unaffected unless they leave the field
  • Leaving field causes enemy to be significantly snared for a moderate duration
  • Tigerclaw’s Specialty is active for duration of Tether Field

Biotech

Dragonfly

• Primary Weapon – BioRifle
  • Fires small energy projectiles at a high rate of fire
  • Projectiles do a small amount of AOE damage upon impact
• Altfire – Micro-Healing Wave
  • Applies a small heal-over-time to affected allies, which is cancelled upon taking damage
• Specialty (Passive ) – Rally
  • Allies below a certain percentage of health when healed receive an extra heal-over-time. The heal-over-time stops if the target takes damage.
• Ability 1 – Healing Ball
  • Fires a projectile that detonates upon impact of an ally or when ability is pressed again. The detonation heals allies within the AOE’s explosion and damages enemies
• Ability 2 – Healing Pillar
  • Fires a projectile on the ground that creates a circle. After a short duration the circle erupts in a pillar, healing allies and damaging enemies in the radius
• Ability 3 – Emergency Response
  • Dragonfly launches up and forward at a high velocity
  • Leaves a cloud behind that causes enemies to take bonus damage for a duration if they pass through it.
• HKM – Healing Dome
  • Places a deployable at point of activation and creates a dome. Allies within the dome are healed for a significant amount over time.

Recluse

• Primary Weapon – BioCrossbow
  • Fires a crossbow bolt at a relatively low rate of fire
• Alternate Fire – Poison Grenade
  • Fires a grenade that explodes on impact, poisoning any enemies struck
  • Applies Necrotic Poison
• Specialty (Passive) – Necrotic Poison
  • Deals a percentage of the target’s maximum health in damage every second.
  • Duration refreshed when struck by a BioCrossbow Bolt
• Ability 1 – Kinetic Shot
  • Single shot ammo override
  • Deals bonus damage based on distance the projectile travels (more distance grants more damage).
  • Applies Necrotic Poison
• Ability 2 – Creeping Death
  • Single shot ammo override
  • Projectile detonates upon impact and releases a large cloud of poisonous gas, which grows over time
  • Applies Necrotic Poison
• Ability 3 – Evacuate
• • Causes the Recluse to launch up and backwards at a high velocity
  • A poison cloud is left where the Recluse launche from and applies Necrotic Poison as well as damages enemies
• HKM – Necrosis
  • Creates a cloud around the Recluse. Deals significant damage to nearby enemies and applies Necrotic Poison

Dreadnaught

Mammoth

• General – Base health increased.
• Primary Weapon – Heavy Plasma Machine Gun
  • Rapidly fires small plasma projectiles that explode for light AOE damage on impact
• Alternate Fire – Snare Rounds
  • Fires plasma bolts accurately at a much slower rate, but snare targets upon impact
• Specialty (Passive) – Imminent Threat
  • All enemies near the Mammoth take more damage from all sources
• Ability 1 – Teleport Shot
  • Fires a projectile that teleports the Mammoth to the spot of impact. Modified to allow hitting the ground or other objects.
  • Damages creatures when teleporting to them.
  • Limited Range
• Ability 2 – Thunderdome
  • Creates a shield at the location of the Mammoth, which allies can freely pass through, though enemies cannot
  • Blocks projectiles
• Ability 3 – Shield Wall
  • Raises a durable forward shield that blocks incoming enemy projectiles.
  • Mammoth and allies can fire through the shield
  • Allies behind the shield take less damage from all sources
• HKM – Tremors
  • Powerful seismic waves erupt from Mammoth every second for Tremors’ duration, causing damage to nearby enemies, knocking them back and snaring their movement

Rhino

• Primary Weapon – Heavy Laser Machine Gun
  • Fires lasers at a high rate of fire and maintains damage at longer distances than other HMG variants.
• Alternate Fire – Focused Beam
  • The Heavy Laser MG fires a single, short-ranged laser that consumes ammunition at an incredibly high rate but does higher DPS than the primary fire.
• Specialty (Passive) – Personal Shield
  • Each time the Rhino activates an ability, it gains a personal shield that absorbs a low amount of damage.
• Ability 1 – Charge!
  • The Rhino accelerates over a few seconds and maintains the new maximum speed for a few seconds more
  • Enemies the rhino passes by are snared for a short duration
• Ability 2 – Gravity Field Grenade
  • Rhino throws a grenade that creates a gravity field at the point of impact
  • Projectiles that pass through the field are redirected to the center
  • Enemies caught within the field are heavily snared
• Ability 3 – Sundering Wave
  • Powerful wave erupts from Rhino dealing low damage to nearby enemies and causing them to take bonus damage from all sources for a duration
• HKM – Dreadfield
  • The Rhino surrounds itself with an energy-siphoning vortex.
  • Drains energy from nearby enemies
  • Grants bonus damage to Rhino that stacks based on how many enemies are affected.

Engineer

Bastion

• Primary Weapon – Tesla Rifle
  • Fires a straight beam of lightning that has a limited distance.
  • The damage of the Tesla Rifle ramps up as it successfully hits targets. This bonus damage decays over time when not firing or missing.
• Alternate Fire – Drain Beam
  • An energy-siphoning beam that is very short range and drains the target’s energy quickly.
• Specialty (Passive) – Overseer
  • When a Bastion is nearby its deployables, those deployables take 15% less damage from all sources
• Ability 1 – Multi-Turrets
  • The Bastion can place multiple, weaker turrets. These turrets can stick to any surface and can be upgraded once to specialized styles of turrets.
• Ability 2 – Sentinel Pod
  • Deploys a sentinel pod. This device will repair damaged deployables in range once per second. If no deployables nearby are damaged, it will look for a nearby enemy to siphon energy from and deal slight damage to.
• Ability 3 – Energy Wall
  • Fires a projectile that can be detonated to create a wall that’s impassable to enemies.
• HKM – Fortify
  • Fortify strengthens all of the Bastion’s deployables in range, healing them back to full life and giving them a bonus rate of fire for the duration.

Electron

• Primary Weapon – Shock Rifle
  • Fires a straight laser that goes long distance and is very precise
• Alternate Fire – Energy Orb
  • The Shock Rifle’s alt-fire shoots an energy ball that can be detonated by hitting it with the primary fire of the weapon. Otherwise it explodes on impacting a surface.
• Specialty (Passive ) – Fail-Safe
  • Upon reaching a low health threshold, the Electron’s Battleframe detonates an EMP blast. This blast completely drains the energy of any nearby enemies and gives all of their abilities a 2 second cooldown.
• Ability 1 – Boomerang Shot
  • The Electron fires a projectile out that passes through enemies and deals relatively high damage. This projectile stops at a certain distance and then returns to the Electron, once again damaging enemies it passes through. The Electron gains a temporary shield if any enemies are hit.
• Ability 2 – Bulwark
  • Fires a projectile that can be detonated. Upon detonation, any friendly targets in range gain a temporary shield that will absorb damage.
• Ability 3 – Hypercharging Pad
  • Deploys a pad that generates a pickup periodically. When run over, this buff grants the player bonus movement speed and energy regeneration for a duration.
• HKM – Electrical Storm
  • Launches a projectile that moves fast and can be detonated. Once detonated, the projectile grows into a large spherical energy storm that moves slower and snares all enemies it passes near, as well as dealing significant damage.

Recon

Nighthawk

• Primary Weapon – Bolt-Action Sniper Rifle
  • Deals high damage per shot, and double damage on headshots.
• Alternate Fire – Scope
  • A scope which gives the player a 4x and 8x zoom.
• Specialty (Passive) – Ambush
  • When not in enemy SIN, the Nighthawk deals more damage. This can only occur for one shot every 30 seconds.
• Ability 1 – Execute Shot
  • The Nighthawk loads a special round for his next shot, which deals 20% more damage (base). If the target dies from this shot, they bypass incapacitation and are dead. If he shoots a downed opponent with this shot, the opponent is executed and explodes for AOE damage.
• Ability 2 – Smoke Screen
  • Throws a smoke grenade that removes allies from SIN and prevents targets inside from being added to SIN.
• Ability 3 – Long Range Charge
  • Deploys an explosive at long range. This explosive sticks to any surface and does not detonate until the ability is activated again.
• HKM – Eruption Rounds
  • The Nighthawk equips special ammunition for the duration. These rounds explode for AOE damage whenever they pass near an enemy target.

Raptor

• Primary Weapon – Charge Rifle
  • Charges up while scoped, dealing more damage the longer it has to charge between shots.
• Alternate Fire: Scope
  • A scope which gives the player a 4x and 8x zoom.
• Specialty (Passive) – Conduit
  • Successfully hitting an enemy with the Charge Rifle grants the Raptor an electrical charge. Upon reaching 3 electrical charges, all of his abilities become Empowered and gain additional effects/benefits.
• Ability 1 – SIN Scrambler
  • One shot ammo override
  • Scrambles target’s SIN reading, making them appear as an enemy to their allies
  • Prevents healing for its duration
  • SIN Scrambler makes target take additional damage from all sources when Empowered
• Ability 2 – Power Field
  • Launches a deployable that detonates when impacting a surface
  • Creates a power field that grants allies Supercharge when they walk through it
  • Increases rate of fire and gives unlimited ammo
  • Grants unlimited energy when Empowered
• Ability 3- Teleport Beacon
  • Throws a beacon that the Raptor will teleport to when activated again.
  • Raptor gains massive movement speed bonus after teleporting when Empowered
• HKM – Overload
  • The Raptor uses his Battleframe to power his Charge Rifle, firing electrical beams instead of regular bullets. These beams deal splash damage at their points of impact. For the duration of Overload, his Charge Rifle charges twice as fast and all of his abilities are Empowered.

New You

• New You and Manufacturing Terminals now show up on the world map
• The comparison tooltips are a lot bigger
• It’s now possible to select ornaments when in New You
• This change was done to avoid situations where certain ornaments with slot restrictions are equipped in such a way that none of the head slots are available which makes head selection impossible
• New ‘mouth’ category for ornaments in the New You
• Sex changes are now available in the New You
• Bald is beautiful, bald is back! The bald option should now be available as a "hair" option

Garage

• Removed duplicate items from the selection lists
• Group similar abilities and weapons together
• Cleaner exit for Garage if suddenly closed, so it can start up properly the next time it is accessed
• Stabilized the garage and reduced crashes
• Fixed patterns being inaccessible without a custom warpaint
• Fixed breakage when exiting garage without saving a pattern edit
• Automatically navigate to the slot of the loadout you are currently wearing when opened
• Increased the visibility of tooltips in the garage
• Removed ammo, reactor, and processor slots
• Show confirmation dialog for constraints upgrades
• Disabled zooming in and out
• Fixed an issue where the garage interface was unresponsive
• Fixed a bug where making the armor pattern smaller or bigger would break the garage

Vehicle

• Improved vehicle behavior
• Vehicle engines now are disengaged when the vehicle is destroyed
• Reduced the collision impulse when the vehicle is moving at low velocity
• Improved vehicle collision against deployables
• Reworked vehicle collision damage
• Vehicles should no longer receive damage on bumpy roads
• Fixed a bug where a player gets immediately ejected from a vehicle if they hold the interaction key too long while entering
• Tied exhaust effects to engine state so there is no smoke while the engine is off
• The light of the LGV is no longer shining through the LGV
• The Founder LGV is now back in the calldown menu

Interface

• Notifications can now be accessed from the World Map, New You, and the garage
• Fixed an issue where players received multiple loot messages
• Fixed an issue where players received multiple experience gain console messages
• Fixed the giant nametags in the spectator mode
• The E-To-Interact interface element is now pointing better at the player’s face
• Changed some interface outline colors
• Post processing for low and medium settings is now disabled
• Added notifications for experience boosts
• Added notifications for experience boost expiries
• Fix for when using the scan hammer via the fire ability keybind, would then select the first ability rather than stay on the scan hammer
• A text field was added to the loading screen to indicate when you are connecting to the server versus actually loading into the game.
• The character creation screen has been cleaned up and battleframe selection has been removed since all players will receive each of the Accord battleframes.
• The text of the loading screen has been repositioned
• Fixed a bug where active menus did not receive mouse clicks
• Fixed a bug where interface elements could receive mouse clicks while still loading into the game
• Optimized the loading process and progress display of the loading screen
• Fixed the bug where players were stuck in the loading screen at 100%
• Added a "waiting for response" message to the Login UI
• The intro sequence can now be skipped by mouse click or space bar
• The ESC-menu is the topmost menu again
• The crafting interface closes itself automatically when the resolution is changed
• Fixed a bug that displayed self-heals twice in third person
• The death message when killed by an explosive Aranha is now much shorter

Navigation

• Introduced a new navigation system that shows breadcrumbs to objectives and waypoints
  • Hold F to display all current navigation trails
• Waypoints
  • Reduced the distance at which waypoints are docked to the edge of the screen
  • Improved the 3D look of waypoints
  • Waypoint icons will scale with distance to the player
  • Gigantic waypoint labels have been resized
  • Waypoint indicators are now animated when the user opens the world map

SIN Cards

• Improved the perspective to the player so SIN cards are better to read
• SIN cards fade out after 100m distance by default
• Improved the size scaling of far away SIN cards
• Improved the resolution of big SIN cards so the font looks less pixelated
• Increased the small SIN Card of small thumpers to make it look more proportional

Achievements (shortcut “Y”)

• The achievement window has been made prettier
• The achievement completion count text is now displayed properly
• A reward display and tooltip has been added for achievements
• Pressing the view achievements key while an achievement notification is up will open the window to that specific achievement entry
• SIN imprints can be played from the achievement window
• Added animations to the achievement icon
• Achievement icons now light up brighter on mouse over
• Added a reward unlock text in the achievement completion notification
• Updated the achievement notification to not display the reward text if the achievement was completed before
• Combat awards and achievement completion notifications are now separated
• Fixed the daily challenges not displaying the completion notification
• Adjusted the saturation of the achievement progress bar background
• Daily achievements now work as intended
• Fixed a spelling error of the Colossal Remains achievement
• Completing the achievements of Grand Executioner and Scourge of the Chosen will reward the user with the same accessory, which is the Executioner’s Hoody

NavWheel (shortcut “~”)

• Added a preview list to the side as you move through the top-level, to show you what is in each category
• Added a calldown history for the last 8 used items you slotted. Cycle through them with the ‘Select Next/Previous Calldown’ keybinds under Interface (defaults to [ and ])
• Increased the text space for titles in the NavWheel
• Added armies to the social menu
• The friends list option now opens the correct interface
• Added navigation hints to the NavWheel
• The social section has been reorganized
• The achievements option has been moved to the correct section (was in the social section before)

Keybindings

• Moved "Activate Selected Ability" to be after the "Select Previous/Next Ability" bindings

HUDNotes

• Popups will no longer appear on loading screens
• Fixed a bug that would display old subtitle text if no new subtitle is available
• Popups will now be on the topmost layer
• Popup are not clickable
• Duel request HUD-notes are now colored in the PvP color
• World map / Minimap
• Fixed an issue where initially the world map was loaded at a wrong position
• The world map now notifies you when outposts in unexplored areas are taken over by Chosen so players are aware when they walk into a possible conflict
• Watchtower icons now appear on the mini-map as well as world map
• The watchtower icon now correctly changes the color after becoming friendly

Options

• Gameplay options
  • Added options to disable fly cam to respawn point

Challenge system (shortcut “/challenge”)

• Replaced the old challenge system with a new interface that can be accessed through the NavWheel (‘~’), the Versus menu (‘K’) or by typing “/challenge”.
• Added an event to update the daily challenge timer on daily challenge update
• Added PvP item rewards for winning and losing teams
• You cannot queue while in a challenge
• You cannot create a challenge while queued
• Players are no longer required to be in a squad to initiate or accept a challenge. Invite squad leaders to invite their entire squad.
• Invite spectators directly to the match challenge
• All private challenge mode matches provide no XP
• All private mode matches are played at 2pm in-game time
• Added a ‘lobby’ chat channel
  • Chat with both teams in a private chat channel while waiting for Ready-Up
• Play matches with fewer than max players
• View map selection in UI
• See who is ready and not ready on either team
• Kick players from the challenge mode
• Give invite permissions to other players
• Invite squad leader to invite his entire squad

Social Features

Armies

• Armies have been added to Firefall!
• You are now able to build an army with your friends
• Access the Army panel via the Social section in your Nav Wheel
• Name your Army and set the Army Tag that will appear next to your name.
• Manage your roster and promote members to help you out.
• Get your own chat channel (/a or /army to select channel)
• Additional Army functionality in future releases.

Squad

• Implemented a search (lfg) feature
  • Panel can be found under the social section of the nav wheel
  • /lfg <message> slash command. If message is left blank, the command will toggle the player’s lfg status

Friends

• Added sounds for when friends come online and go offline
• Added chat messages for friends coming online and offline

Chat

• Chat now shows army tags for players in active armies
• The chat no longer fades out if you are AFK
• Emotes are now case insensitive
• Removed the Splash Damage tip when taking falling damage
• The Red 5 Studios logo has replaced the [R5] tag on developer chat messages
• The bonus reward text color has been changed
• Chat bubbles have been fixed
• The chat is being docked into predefined slots on the New You, garage, and crafting screens to prevent overlap and hiding of key UI elements
• Fixed a typo in the chat bubble
• Added additional channel sound options

PvP

• Teams will rebalance during warm up if players drop or join in late.
• Added large XP rewards for winning and losing in PvP
• Removed individual XP rewards for kills, hacks, etc.

Sabotage

• The message “warm up” is no longer intersecting with the timer at the top of the screen
• The interface now flashes while hacking a point

Harvester

• The interface has been cleaned up and the winner is now displayed properly at the end of the match
• Added capture points to the HUD and minimap
• The boost effect no longer plays after the effect expired
• Increased the size of the A,B,C objective so they can be read from greater distances

Shanty Town

• Added bullet collision to a ramp in Shanty Town
• Players can no longer fall and get stuck in a tight spot behind a building
• Closed the underside of a tower

Sunken Harbor

• Various force fields on Sunken Harbor are now properly aligned to the opening
• Floating ammunition powerups have been put back to the ground

OCT

• Double Damage now spawns near the currently open point. I.e. when B is capturable, Double Damage spawns near B, and when C is capturable, it spawns near C.
• In round 2, OCT will end as soon as a winner can be determined rather than going until the timer runs out.
• Fixed a bug where the winning team sometimes did not get the win

Moisture Farm

• Moisture Farm will temporarily be offline for PvP matchmaking while its spawning rules are revamped and updated to our new encounter system.

PvP Queue

• Hitting ’unqueue’ now unqueues the player even when he gets the confirm/decline match popup
• Squad mates get notifications of other squad mates cancelling the queue
• The match will wait for the ‘Accept Match’ period to end or for all players to accept instead of starting with the minimum amount of players
• Removed unqueue when becoming idle.

Matchmaking

• Modified the balancing algorithm to create better teams with disparate skill ratings
• Teams are now auto-rebalanced if a match is in warmup and one or more users are backfilled or dropped during launch
• Improved searching mechanism to matchmake players faster
• Players at extreme ranges of skill ratings should experience much lower queue times
• All matches created via matchmaking are played at hours between 8am and 6pm in-game time (no more night time PvP)

Misc

• Fixed a launch error when using Russian characters in the name with a windows account
• Resume file downloads for the patch files
• Reward experience points for zone unlocks
• Updated password reset appearance
• Adding ‘Forgot Password’ button to login UI
• Updated the Red 5 logo movie to be higher res and quieter
• Fixed bug where dropship twists on landing pad
• Fixed bug where dropship sinks into landing pad
• Tweaked gamepad and gamepad aiming
• Improved support for Windows user names with UNICODE characters
• By default clients entering the game for the first time will play the introduction sequence regardless if the character has seen it already
• Lots of installer/patcher changes
• Various crash fixes for disconnecting in various error scenarios
• Fixed a crash when restarting a replay as spectator
• Changing the default fly cam FOV to 90 degrees to better align it with the game FOV.

Visuals

• Outline shader improvements
  • Improved the artistic style of character and object outlines to have a more SIN feel
• New Water Rendering
  • Rewritten and massively improved
• Screen Space Emissive Lighting
  • Each pixel on the screen is an emissive light source.
  • Very expensive effect, not enabled by default (not even on Ultra settings)
  • Watch as your Battleframes and the world light up!
• Smaller worst-case patch sizes
• Added support for high-DPI display settings
• Multi-monitor surface support (Eyefinity, Surround)
• Fixed a bug to restore the camera when exiting vehicle
• The vertical FOV is now preserved when the window is wide
• Enabled the area light on grass
• Reduced the moon size in the moon illusion effect to make it look more natural
• Updated video quality auto-detect settings
• Decals have shadows now
• Vegetation (i.e. grass) bends when players walk through itMade the lens-flare effect look more dirty
• High sun intensity will boost sky intensity to provide an "HDR-ish look"
• Enabled terrain normal maps on medium shader quality which is an huge improvement at a moderate cost

Audio

• Added sounds to the character create screen
• HMG and Sniper flybys are now playing properly
• Improved the music system
• Fixed a bug where the HMG weapon sound would loop
• Increased the SIN imprint audio volume
• New jumpjet sounds have been added for Dreadnaught, Engineer, Recon and Biotech

Performance

• Performance Improvements (both CPU&GPU)
  • 40% improvements on some CPUs/GPUs
• UI improvements
• • 20% improvement of the user interface
• Fixed a memory leak in matchmaker
• Plugged a physics engine memory leak
• Plugged a UI memory leak
• Fixed several 64bit fixes
• Fixed a bug that caused the system to assume the client was running on a 32-bit system and thus trim down some memory pools
• Fixed a particle bug where deleted memory was accessed
• Tweaked terrain for ultra settings
• Added water performance improvements for low to medium lighting quality settings
• Various latency tuning and cleanups
• Fixed parallax mapping, now twice as fast
• Implemented additional fine-grained shadow quality settings
• Tweaked shadow cascade distances for overall performance and quality improvements
• Fixed large frame time spikes in physics engine when many enemies were killed in close proximity