The Exchange Update on PTS

An Exchange to buy and sell items with other players. A revamp to the way you gain EGO Rating. BMG Particle Updates.

Source: http://forums.defiance.com/showthread.php?237848-The-Exchange-Update-to-PTS 

THE EXCHANGE

Introducing a brand new feature to Defiance: The Exchange! You can now use this new interface to buy and sell your items to and from other players! Want to get rid of a few extra Jackpots? No problem, list them on The Exchange, and hopefully someone else needs them more than you!

Some notes about The Exchange:

• The Exchange is located in the Defiance Store UI. You can navigate to it by going to the store (f5 on PTS), and moving the tab over to The Exchange
• All players will be able to browse and purchase items from The Exchange
• Non-patron players will not be able to sell items on The Exchange without an Exchange Sell Slot. Exchange sell slots can be purchased from the Defiance store for bits (up to a maximum of 4)
• Patron players will automatically have 2 auction sell slots, and can go up to a maximum of 6 with additional purchases
• Once an item is purchased or sold, you can collect the item or proceeds from The Exchange interface in the My Orders or My Items sections
• A 15% fee is deducted from the proceeds for all sales that are made as a transaction fee
• In order to post an item on The Exchange, a fee will be required up front depending on the duration, rarity, and asking price (This is currently disabled on PTS for testing purposes, but will be added in the near future)

Please hop on PTS and test this feature! We will require all the possible testing we can get from players, so that we can identify bugs early and make sure this system is 100% stable! I will have a more detailed write up in the future on exactly how to utilize The Exchanges filter and search features.

EGO LEVELING REVAMP

Coming with The Exchange update, we have completely changed the way players level in Defiance. Beginning now, on PTS, players can level all the way to EGO 6000 based solely on XP earned in game. What this development means, is that pursuits will no longer be required to obtain the maximum EGO rating in Defiance.

Some notes about this system:

• Players who are already EGO 6000 will remain that way. Additional rewards can be obtained every time you complete your XP bar while you are 6000. The XP required for this on PTS is lower than the anticipated Live release, please keep that in mind
• Pursuits will still add to your overall EGO rating, however they are no longer required to level
• XP will continue to level up past the original 305 EGO levels. You will not continue to get EGO perk points past that point
• When this feature finally goes live, current 6000 players will receive special to be determined bonuses for their work in getting to 6000 on the old system
• Players will be able to level to 6000 doing whatever they enjoy! Whether it is PvE, or PvP, or just arkfalls all day long!

MONTEREY PVP MAP

We have a VERY EARLY version of the Monterey PvP map to present to you all! Feel free to queue up for this map, and provide feedback. Please keep in mind that this is a very early iteration of this map, and the more feedback we get, the better we can design it the right way! 

NEW GRID SIEGE

The Grid are back in Silicon Valley! A new Grid Siege has been added with similar rewards as the recent Shrill Siege. Head over to Silicon Valley and try this new siege out!

WEAPON CHANGES

• All Assault Carbines and Assault Carbine Variants have been changed:
  • Hip spread significantly reduced
  • Bloom Reduced
  • Recoil Increased
  • Recoil Pattern Changed
• All Disruptors and Disruptor Variants have been changed:
  • Burst Count increased to 4 (from 3)
  • Base Mag size increased to 80 (from 60)
• All Fraggers and Fragger Variants have been changed:
  • Burst Delay reduced to .4s (from .5s)
  • Base Mag size increased to 10 (from 8)
• All Autopistols and Autopistol Variants have been changed:
  • Increased base damage by 25%
• All Bolt Action Snipers have been changed:
  • Removed kick from Aim view after firing

These changes are all retroactive.

BMG PARTICLE UPDATES

Some BMG updates have been done to a few of the particle effects. Please keep in mind that this is just a first pass, and more changes will hopefully be coming in the future.

• Reduced light intensity
• Added alpha to blooms/bursts
• Links have less connections
• Reduced amount of VFX particles and emitters

TUTORIAL

The Reactor encounter at the end of the tutorial should now end much quicker, allowing players to progress faster

BUG FIXES

• The weapon mastery experience curve for healing with BMG weapons has been fixed to now award the appropriate amount of experience.
• Fixed a few crash events that were causing server crashes