New to Dauntless
Frost Escalation
The permafrost has begun to melt, revealing fragments of an ancient past … and awakening something deep within the ice. Battle through Skaldeskar’s frostbitten lands with the aid of its warrior queen, Linnea Silver, and seek out the Urska in a new Escalation. But beware … all travel through Skaldeskar comes with the risk of frostbite: a disabling condition that can freeze a Slayer in their tracks.
Urska
Frost Escalation’s keystone Behemoth is the Urska — a nightmare pried from the pages of Skaldish legend. Collect Urska parts in Frost Escalation to forge new legendary weapons and armour. These powerful frost pieces come with a new legendary ability (for weapons) and a new perk (for armour). You can also unlock a full cosmetic variant set through the Frost Escalation talent tree.
Realm of Ice Hunt Pass
February 4 also launches a new Hunt Pass: Realm of Ice. Upgrade to Elite to unlock access to two sets of otherworldly armour: the Frost Shaper (level 1) and the Paladin of Vylmark (level 50). Inspired by the iridescent lights of the polar aurora, these pieces will shine in any collection.
New rumours
Talk to Honest Ozz and discover two brand new rumours. Don the heat of the sun itself by unlocking the Searing Dawn helmet skin from “A Vision of Fire.” If the darkness of night is more your style, complete the “Shadow Boxing” rumour for the Thorns of Dusk strikers skin.
Saint's Bond
Ramsgate’s most romantic holiday returns this Thursday with seven weapon rumours and more rewards in Ozz’s shop. Exchange gifts with friends to collect special titles, then group up to gather Hearts of Rage — a limited-time drop from raging Behemoths. Saint’s Bond begins February 11 and ends February 18 at 10 AM PST.
Journal
All Shadowtouched and Deepfrost variant Behemoths now have journal entries that unlock upon first encounter. Players who have already encountered these Behemoths will need to fight them again to unlock their entries.
Quality of life
Gameplay
Increased player “stickiness” on Behemoths to make sure players no longer slide while attacking them.
Quests
Ozz’s shop now has two separate tabs: Event and Rumours.
Players can now preview all steps in a rumour’s quest chain by talking to Ozz, navigating to the Rumours tab, and selecting “Preview Rumour Steps.”
Pay-to-skip options in rumour quests now makes it clear that the skip is for a single step — not the entire chain.
UI
Improved the UI for the frozen status.
Rumours now have custom quest markers.
Crafting menus will now show which parts you are missing when crafting an item.
Performance
Fixed an issue where some players couldn’t launch Dauntless on older versions of Windows after patch 1.5.2.
Miscellaneous
The Crown of Friendship will no longer appear in your Slayer Links reward pools if you already own it.
Balance
Economy
Aethersparks are no longer purchasable for platinum.
Aethersparks are now rewarded after every wave of an island event, with the final wave granting the most. Events will now roughly grant the same amount of sparks on average, regardless of the number of waves.
Increased the number of aethersparks in patrol chests.
Increased the number of aethersparks rewarded by island events.
Perks
We’re continuing to look at unpopular or underpowered cells to try to bring them into the meta. The goal is to give players more ways to come up with interesting builds that are fun and effective. This week we focused on Adrenaline, which is an interesting mechanic that changes your moment to moment decision making. We found it just wasn’t competitive in terms of damage, so we’re improving it. We also removed the negative effects on our least used cells to make them more viable.
Increased Adrenaline perk damage from 0.3/0.6/0.9/1.2/1.5/1.8% damage for every 10 stamina missing to 0.5/1.0/1.5/2.0/2.5/3.0%.
The Strategist cell no longer reduces your maximum health. Increased the amount of shielding granted from 25/50/75/100/125/150 to 50/75/100/125/150/175
The Engineer cell no longer reduces healing from your flask.
The Mender cell no longer reduces healing from your flask.
The Sprinter cell no longer reduces your maximum stamina.
We’ve also removed the Fireproof, Bloodless, Shellshock Resist, Insulated, and Warmth perks from all gear and replaced them with more useful perks to give players more build diversity options.
Volcanic Helm (Charrogg) now has the Sturdy perk (previously Fireproof).
Fiery Gauntlets (Embermane) now have the Endurance perk (previously Fireproof).
Gnasher Cap (Gnasher) now has the Tenacious perk (previously Bloodless).
Eye of the Swarm (Kharabak) now has the Wild Frenzy perk (previously Shellshock Resist).
Shocking Stride (Nayzaga) now has the Energized perk (previously Insulated).
Feet of Ice (Pangar) now have the Overpower perk (previously Warmth).
Quillspike Boots (Quillshot) now have the Barbed perk (previously Shellshock Resist).
Skraevwing Gloves (Skraeve) now have the Iceborne perk (previously Warmth).
Shrikedown Greaves (Shrike) now have the Grace perk (previously Bloodless).
Lightning Gloves (Stormclaw) now have the Catalyst perk (previously Insulated).
Hunting Grounds
Increased normal Hellion’s star rating from three to four stars on Hades Reach, making it tougher and more dangerous.
Gameplay
The chilled status effect now reduces attack and movement speed when active. Players can reduce the time affected and clear the status by spending stamina (through heavy attacks, sprinting, etc.).
Miscellaneous
Event currencies have been capped at 500 units.
Bug fixes
Repeaters
Fixed a bug where switching barrels on the repeaters when using a supply crate would not update the damage until the player swapped to another weapon.
Hellion
Fixed a bug where Hellion would have discoloured square patches on its tail.
Gameplay
Fixed a bug that was blocking certain island events from granting rewards, including aethersparks.
Fixed a bug where Ironhide Pylons increased damage instead of decreasing it. They had one job…
War pike nodes on the Slayer’s Path no longer apply wounding to all weapon types.
Escalation
The Surgical Destruction amp will now correctly apply stacks for breaking wounded parts.
Players are no longer highlighted when interacting with the Escalation crystal.
Fixed an issue where Behemoths could spawn in walls. May need further improvement.
Fixed various cases of falling through the environment or getting stuck on rocks in Terra Escalation.
Fixed various cases of missing collisions and clipping issues in Blaze and Terra Escalations.
UI
In the Hunting Grounds, moving quickly from one fight to the next now displays the correct Behemoth in the overlay.
The armour crafting screen now shows gear that has yet to be unlocked.
Player name, title, and guild will now be correctly left-aligned in all cases on the HUD.
Fixed a bug where the downed player icon would not appear over players’ heads.
Fixed a bug where the player would not receive the Message of the Day if a tutorial message was being displayed.
Fixed a bug where the aether vent interaction icon would appear over the end of hunt summary.
Fixed a bug that would leave the “Purchase Rumour” UI visible after purchasing.
Fixed a bug where active Hunt Pass text broke out of its text box in Spanish and Russian.
Fixed various typos and missing words found in quest dialogue.
Holding the button to power surge an already power surged weapon no longer plays the surging sound.
The “Equip” button on the repeaters crafting screen now works as intended.
Exploration merits description has been properly localized in all languages.
Environment
Fixed some environmental collision issues with the Trials island. Players should no longer be knocked out of the arena.
Fixed a bug that would make islands with misty atmospheres look very bright and flashy. We apologize to your eyeballs.
Fixed numerous cases of floating bushes, faulty jump vents, clipping assets, and holes for all environments.
Cosmetics
Hair and eyes no longer clip through the Wreath of Shadows helm skin.
The Wreath of Shadows helm skin now has the correct default dyes.
Removed collision on the Gone Fishing emote’s bucket. Players can no longer build a stairway to heaven out of buckets.
Fixed beard hair clipping through multiple helms.
Ramsgate
Interacting with the Portal Driver now correctly adds the Clear Skies journal entries to the player’s journal.
Miscellaneous
Severed Behemoth tails will no longer glow when on the ground. They will look more lifeless, as intended. Gross.
We’re keeping a close eye on aethersparks and these are the first steps at addressing the feedback from the community. Due to ongoing player and internal conversations, we’ve decided to make aethersparks an earned-only currency while also increasing their output.
Aethersparks were intended to serve as a reward currency that encourages players to engage with the game in various ways. With Reforged, we wanted players to experience the breadth of Dauntless in a loop. This was to avoid the problem of one endgame activity that players would grind endlessly, and ensure that players are experiencing all Dauntless has to offer. We still believe aethersparks, aetherhearts, and reforging serve this design purpose but this goal is better served if aethersparks exist solely outside of monetization.