Hello Rebels,

As we’ve discussed, the launch of “tier 15” was a major shift in how we approach the game, and the events and content release cadence were a large part of that. For a variety of reasons, some things worked and some things didn’t. It was important to give the new event model a chance, but it became pretty obvious towards the end of our second cycle that change was necessary.

To that end, I’ve been evaluating what did work with the new system, what worked better in older models, player feedback, expectations and trying to mould them together into a new approach. So buckle in, this is likely to be a lengthy explanation of the major changes on the imminent horizon.

CORE EVENTS

To start things off, the “core” events or general weekend events, where the majority of new content is released, are going back to a one new ship per month cycle. I don’t think it is necessary to detail what all didn’t work with the 2-month cycle, but it was enough that we felt going back to our traditional content release was warranted.

However, unlike our old model, where we typically had a 3-event cycle with a “re-run” tacked onto the end, now we are going to run a 4-event cycle every month. The main named event, Marauders, will be the name of the September main event. Mobilization and Decimation will follow, then Termination will close out the cycle. Each of these events is keeping the same general structure they had under the previous model, which means the Termination events will continue to be a phase-style event that primarily takes place in local space. 

As far as how the latest content will be obtained, there are a few changes coming. The newest hull Blueprint and Mk2 patterns will be available in the Main event, Mk3/4 in Mobilization and Mk5/6 in Decimation. Other new content will be sprinkled throughout the 4 events, with the level 3 weapons notably first becoming available in Termination. Outside of the level 3 weapons, Termination will function as a kind of catch-up event, but that will make more sense when we see the event go live. I don’t think I need to get into the specific details here, just set the expectations.

One thing about content acquisition that I feel strongly about, particularly with our game, is that the newest content needs to have value. In VC, for a long time, that has not been the case; most players don’t seem to actually play with hulls until they are Mk6 and fully fitted. To me, that just feels wrong. Under the previous model, I tried to enforce that, and as a result, many of you felt that in doing so, I devalued your hard-earned Mk6 hulls. That feedback was heard.

So I’d like to try more of a hybrid approach; keep value in the previously built Mk6 hulls, but still reward use of the newest hull during the current cycle. In this new model, targets tuned for Mk6 hulls will reward the majority of the intel you’ll need to make purchases during the events. However, locked away in temporary sectors that only the newest hull will be able to enter, will be targets that drop Mk2,3 and 5 upgrade patterns, while Mk4 and Mk6 patterns will only be available in the store. If you want to keep up with the upgrades, you will need to use the newest hull to do so, but these targets won’t be worth very much intel; the reward is the patterns. This way, we aren’t over-rewarding pattern targets, so there is no incentive to over-grind useless extra patterns. My hope is that this system ensures that your existing Mk6 ships have value to earn intel, and so does the newest hull at lower Mk levels to keep up with upgrading itself.

SUB EVENTS

No doubt, most of you have experienced our new approach to Dreadnought releases with the New Frontiers event. This is part of our approach to give you more ways to play the game. Something I will commonly see pointed out is that outside of the main events, there really isn’t much to do in the game, and I don’t disagree. So we’ll be putting additional emphasis on giving you a reason to play outside of the events.

The first step in that has been the New Frontier event, which seems to have been fairly well received. This event will be a regular fixture of the schedule, and once everyone has had a chance to fully upgrade the Frontier, there are a couple more surprises in store to keep these dreadnought events relevant moving forward.

But that’s not the only thing we have planned, which leads me to the Riots. Many of you have likely seen me comment that the Riots are going to go away, and that is true, but something else will be taking its place that will give you more control over how you manage your build queue. One of the common issues with the existing Riots is that if a particular version of the event isn’t running at the right time, then the rewards don’t have the same impact. The other glaring issue with the event is that the reward far outweighs the effort needed to acquire it. I know this won’t be a popular change, but it is necessary. With that said, I’d like to introduce the Temporal Fracture event and a refreshed time token market we are calling the Temporal Bazaar.

Another common complaint I see is that this game has been largely reduced to an auto-farmer, which is not what we want to be. Over the years, I have tried multiple ways to encourage manual combat, but at the end of the day, the reward has never been worth the effort, and this event will attempt to correct that. Unfortunately, due to some backend issues, the version of this event that will be launching during the week after the Marauders event ends is not the final form, but getting out a functional version was important. 

What the event will eventually look like is actually very similar to the Riots; two different targets will spawn in local space, defeating those targets will reward intel that unlocks tiered rewards. That reward is a new permanent currency called Temporal Shards. Temporal Shards can then be used in the Temporal Bazaar to redeem various time tokens. The Bazaar will have a limited supply of tokens that will be replenished at the start of the new event cycle. What this means for you is that you will have the ability to purchase the tokens that you need at a time of your choosing to best support your builds. 
              

Now for the part that some of you won’t like. These targets are NOT easy. There will be a more auto-friendly option to participate in the event, but it is not the most efficient option, nor is it meant to be. The 225 level version of the Mysterious Raider target is tuned for Mk6 hulls and is going to be more difficult than your average 220 level Omega targets in the core events. Not all ships will perform equally in these targets; you will not be able to blindly throw 7 fleets of T15 ships at this target and expect them to all have similar performance. Fleet composition will matter.

Then there is the Mysterious Raider 290 level target. I would consider this target to be roughly on the same difficulty level as some of the recent event campaign targets. If you attempt to auto this target, you will at minimum lose multiple ships, if not the entire fleet. Manual combat is REQUIRED. And again, not all match-ups are created equal; your fleet composition will matter, and your skills as a pilot will matter. 

But here’s the good news: the 290 target is worth 25x the intel of the 225 target. Meaning that with a bit of effort and some skill, you can save yourself a lot of time and a lot of repairs. That’s the point of this event: to reward the effort of manually flying your ships. To actually play with the content instead of just watching it, and to hopefully bring back something that’s been missing from the game for quite some time.  

Now I did say this is what the event will eventually look like. We’re still ironing out some kinks with introducing a new currency. For the time being, this will look more like a typical event with a dedicated shop that will remain open a bit longer to give you that freedom of choice we’re aiming for.

PVP EVENTS

This can be a touchy subject for some, which I recognize. We believe that PvP is a core aspect of gameplay in Vega Conflict. We want to find new ways to encourage participation and reward engaging in PvP. I’m not announcing sweeping changes to how these systems work or anything like that; some changes will be coming down the road. For now, what we have to work with for PvP events is Civil War and Alliance War; changing the way these events function is not a simple task. I have some ideas to freshen up Alliance War, but for the time being, Civil War is going to continue to be our primary PvP event. The current issues I see with that event are the timing of it and the rewards. 

I want to talk about rewards first because this is the hard part. There is a significant disconnect between what the PvP community (as they have communicated to me) views as proper rewards for the event and the prizes that we can justify giving away by the performance of the event itself. Even when we have tried different things to increase the rewards the event operates at a loss. Meaning that, even in its current state, the event does not justify the rewards it grants.

So what do we do? I don’t want to not run a PvP event, but it becomes increasingly difficult to continue to run them when the argument could be made that they negatively impact the performance of the game. Not to mention the amount of flak I take from players when it comes to the rewards we can grant, that puts me in a bit of a pickle.

It took a little while to get there, but I think we’ve gotten to a place with T15 where there are interesting interactions between the factions that have resulted in PvP being more engaging than it has been in recent memory. I’m not saying it’s perfect, but we are committed to continuing to implement balance changes to improve PvP combat. I hope that this leads to a natural rejuvenation of the PvP space, which it is showing signs of doing. If PvP is more interesting and engaging, players are more likely to partake, which means the argument can be made to offer better rewards. So that is one positive sign.  

In my discussions with more PvP-focused members of the community, one of the things that regularly comes up is wanting something exclusive and wanting early access to upcoming content. The Radiant skin was a step in that direction; it was important that it be an exclusive reward to the PvP events and to keep it limited so it retains value. I hope to be able to continue that trend. We are also in a position where offering early access to upcoming content may be a possibility, and one that I want to explore.

I will continue to try to find a proper balance between the expectations of the PvP community and realistic expectations for rewards in Civil War moving forward, but I strongly believe we are in a better position to find a middle ground that we can all be happy with.

Now, for the timing of the event, as I have explained multiple times, there was a reason CW needed to last 4 days during the old event structure. This has proven to be WILDLY unpopular. So we’ll compromise, from now on, Civil War will be a 2-day event running during the middle of Termination. As mentioned earlier, there is a bit of a catch-up aspect to Termination, so if players want to avoid the Civil War that will be taking place during the event, it would behoove them to keep up with their upgrades so that multiple days of participation in the Termination event might not be as necessary.

That was a lot, as I expected it to be. I appreciate any who has taken the time to absorb this information. No doubt there are likely to be questions. I’ll do my part and try to answer them as I can, but hopefully the vision is clear.

KIX_Damus.