BULKHEAD 公布 WARDOGS 第二赛季更新细节

BULKHEAD has come forth with more details on things to expect from Season 2 of WARDOGS. If you missed it, WARDOGS is the PC-only shooter that is not only currently taking over culturally in the shooter scene, but also in my life. WARDOGS, since it’s early access release, is basically the only thing I have wanted to play the entire time. So I’m here with you, not just sharing what’s been announced because I’m supposed to, but because I’m excited to see it too. There’s a lot incoming, and there’s surely a ton that we haven’t even be told about yet (the devs have said as much themselves). For what they’ve already shown off though, there’s plenty to look forward to.

Getting the elephant in the room out of the way first, BULKHEAD made sure to address some of the commentary from the wider community on concerns about the reset. They have made it clear that the resets are an integral part of the experience within WARDOGS, not only for economy stabilization, but also for the general restructuring and balancing of flow within WARDOGS. On October 15, Season 2 will begin and all players will return to level one in all classes and overall. Money will be put back down to default (Season one started you with $10,000, and I assume Season two will be the same), and your money from Season one will be converted to the permanent currency: gold bars. Gold bars are used to purchase cosmetic items from the in-game black market, and are the only way to get new weapon skins and emotes.

Season one was set to be the shortest season on purpose, with BULKHEAD acknowledging not only in their own video release, but also in several interviews that they knew the late game was going to be broken and unbalanced. So the plan was to reach the end game gear, get a feel for how it affects rank disparity, and then reset and reform things to make more sense. Season one is a test run for a short term picture of the bigger scene that will be the lifetime of WARDOGS. As I heard BULKHEAD CEO Joe Brammer say in one of his podcast appearances, paraphrased: the early game was well balanced because that’s what they had the most testing and feedback on prior to season one, during their assortment of alpha and beta playtests. Now that Early Access has arrived, the late game gear is only just now finally being introduced for them to get feedback on, and the feedback is obvious: a lot of it is imbalanced and overpowered. It is also made clear however that BULKHEAD knows and accepts that WARDOGS can never be a perfectly balanced game by nature of the sandbox they’re trying to create. They want people to find ridiculous strategies that make the other players mad; however, they do take note of when the community latches onto specific strategies that end up dominating player focus. They note that these are things that they try to make adjustments around. They want you to have freedom, but they don’t want to have one method be the answer for everything.

Balancing adjustments that will be arriving include probably the thing I’ve seen discussed most online: Tier 4 armor. Tier 4 armor has become notorious at this point for being absurdly powerful, and the helmet all too much so. So, in season two, tier 4 helmets will be receiving the Tarkov treatment. Wearing one will restrict your vision and hearing, which is a fair trade off for being able to survive a headshot from everything short of a 50 cal. Currently non-specific adjustments for weapon damage, recoil, and suppression are listed among the changes to be expected too, so the armor itself might very well be less effective in that regard once we actually deploy into season two. Likewise within that, there’s an ambiguous listed goal of “establishing clearer roles across weapon classes”. Since WARDOGS allows you to free-form your loadout, and doesn’t make you choose a class, I am curious as to what this means, but am left with as much detail as you are on this one.

The biggest (and funniest, if you ask me) announcement that’s in season two though, in my opinion, is that they’re actually doing something about Blue team balancing. If you haven’t noticed, then you haven’t been playing WARDOGS. Blue team loses. That’s the rule. Blue team simply is the community decided reject team, and it’s become an actual problem while playing. If you play more than one round, it’s not uncommon to witness a server dying because on start, nobody will choose the blue team, instead sitting and contesting their entrance to either red or blue. The round never starts as too many people are unassigned, and then eventually everyone leaves and you just have to join a new server entirely. Reasoning for this is mixed, between being a self-fulfilling prophecy since blue ends up largely populated by people that care less about winning, and actual issues with the fact that spawn location gets you sandwiched and bad camo designs. Regardless of the why though, WARDOGS will be seeing some attempts to balance the team on a wider scale. Spawn locations will be seeing adjustments, the camo will be changed. But the biggest thing… they’re introducing propaganda, baby. The “social experiment” with Season 2 only will be introducing a “recruitment drive” for the blue team. Lonestar will be given a cash and xp bonus for anyone that chooses them, and regardless of team, WARDOGS will be introducing a vendor discount for losing teams as well as locking down the ability to switch teams late in the match.

For actual content, season two will be bringing in a good variety: four weapons, four vehicles, three buildables, weather presets, and an experimental wager system. One each for assault rifle, DMR, SMG, and LMG. We’ve got the MCX-Spear (TCX-SPR in-game), M14, PP-19 Bizon, and Evo-3 Ultra respectively. Vehicles include a new transport Jeep: the Wolf-110, as well as it’s armed variant, the T-72B3 battle tank, and the Flakpanzer Gepart AA tank. Buildables introduce a much requested MG emplacement as well as a “large shelter” and wooden ramps to help negotiate some of the terrain awkwardness. The weather system being added is not dynamic, but rather, a static mode for a given match. Thunder is made to be synchronized across the entire server, so you can capitalize upon the volume to make a move. Last but not least, the wager system; already spoken upon pre-release, the wager system is made to give players objectives and conditions for their matches and put a price on doing so. Harder objectives increase the payout as the odds get more difficult. This system is being listed as very experimental, and they clearly have concerns that it might break the economy, as it’s being stated to potential removal in the event of unforeseen problems.

Last thing to address before closing out is that BULKHEAD also mentioned that they are attempting to focus on implementing additional permanent progression mechanics that carry over between seasons. Listed as one primary example is an overhead “skills system” that will adjust various handling and behavior of your character in matches. It was said that they are already tracking all of the xp and stats for every player, so whenever these mechanics are actually introduced, WARDOGS will retroactively place everyone into the point of progression that they would have been if it were here the whole time. Season two begins on October 15, and is slated to run longer than the very short season one, but… there is no specific date that I’ve seen so far as to when it ends. Regardless, definitely more than a week, per their own allusion. Don’t be afraid to or dissuaded against playing before the 15th though. Maybe just… save some of the money you get rather than blowing it all, if you care about the gold bars.

Also, be sure to check out the official “Road to Season 02” video from the BULKHEAD YouTube channel.

WARDOGS | Road to Season 02