WIP 1.06 Changelog
New Additions
Skirmish Changes
After listening to community feedback on Skirmish mode and analysing data since the release of Rising Storm 2, we have made a number of major changes to Skirmish, which we are trialing on this update to the Community Testing Branch (CTB)
New Skirmish-Specific Roles
We have changed the loadouts for each role in Skirmish mode, which should address any balance issues between the various factions in the game. As always, your feedback is welcomed and appreciated.
Some highlights of this include the removal of the Scout's MD82 mines, and lowering the number of rounds RPG soldiers start with to one. Below you can see a full chart of the new Skirmish roles and their loadouts:
Playercounts and Squads
During this round of CTB testing, we would like to try out Skirmish at both higher and lower player counts, including 6v6 and 12v12. There will be servers running both high and low player count servers. We have also made changes to the HUD to allow for higher playercounts in Skirmish games.
Changes to the Skirmish Timer
Skirmish rounds now start with two minutes on the clock, and has an increased maximum timer of three minutes, increasing the benefits of capturing objectives quickly. It should no longer disadvantage a team to capture an objective immediately on round start, effectively hitting their maximum spawn time limit.
Match-End XP Bonus
Now, when a player completes an entire match they will receive a points bonus, scaled depending on the number of rounds that player participated in.
Gameplay
- Changed the abdomen damage values so that the whole torso can now be a one-hit kill. This should substantially increase the viability of semi auto battle rifles and bolt-action rifles
- Reduced the damage of 5.56 and 7.62x39mm rounds marginally compared to the larger-calibre 7.62x51 and 7.62x54mmR rounds. The overall effect should be that the large-calibre rounds are lethal to the center mass, whereas the assault rifle rounds should take 1-2 shots, depending on the exact hit location.
- Added player-selectable strike-direction selection to the Napalm strike, used in the same way as selecting the strike direction for the Canberra Bomber.
Levels
- New Skirmish map: VNSK-Temple
VNSK-Temple takes the final Citadel objective of Hue City and converts it to Skirmish for small-scale battles. Although we have made some aesthetic tweaks and changed the time of day to dawn, this map is still in a beta stage, and any and all feedback is more than welcome through the usual channels.
- New Skirmish map: VNSK-Riverbed
VNSK-Riverside takes the three Easternmost objectives of Song Be and turns them into a new Skirmish area designed for slightly larger player counts than our other Skirmish maps. This map is still in a beta stage, but does include non-finalised time-of-day changes, and is the second night map in the game.
- New Territories map: VNTE-OperationForrest
We are including a work-in-progress version of VNTE-OperationForrest for 64 players. This includes entirely new objective areas and a new "stormy" aesthetic, with a raised water level compared to the Supremacy version of the map released with the 1.05 Bushranger Content Update. Any and all feedback is valuable here, since the map is still in the early stages of development.
- Drastically improved performance on Operation Forrest. If you experience poor performance while playing this map, please report it through the usual channels
- To address balance concerns we have re-worked the US spawn area in Firebase, moving it slightly closer to the central playspace and added cover along the Northern edge of the map.
- Rebalanced Cu Chi, An Lao Valley, Long Tan, and Rung Sac per player feedback and analytics
Cu Chi
- Moved the ruins at the start of the plantation area to make it easier for attackers to cross the road
- Partially redesigned objective A to make it easier to attack, the pillbox now has better cover for attackers and the East flank on the South side of the capzone has been redesigned to give attackers better firing positions
- Added more cover on the approach to objectives D, E and F within the plantation
- Added 50 reinforcements to the attackers, increasing the number available from 680 to 730
Rung Sac
- Changed the two initial spawn points for the Australian Forces into one centralised one, and added soft and hard cover to the approach to both Objectives A and B on the Australian side. This breaks up line of sight and prevents spawn camping.
- Removed some cover from the NLF side of Objectives A and B
- Reduced the number of exploitable hiding spots in the jungle overlooking Objective D to prevent defenders from hiding out in the jungle and killing attackers in the capzone
Long Tan
- Added cover to Objective D to make it easier for the Australian Forces to defend
- Opened up the windows of the destroyed huts at Objective D to allow attackers to better defend the flanks of the Objective, and more easily repel attackers already inside the capzone
- Added cover to the flanks of the final Objective to make it harder for attackers to flank
An Lao Valley
- Supremacy mode: increased the NVA reinforcements from 635 to 660
- Supremacy mode: increased the point value of the Coffee Plantation objective from one point to three
- Territories mode: Reduced the reinforcements for both teams by 100, meaning the North have gone from 634 to 534 and the South have gone from 660 to 560
Audio
- Added a "Command" voice channel for the Commander, Squad Leaders and Radiomen to communicate in separately to general team VOIP
- All VOIP communication now plays through the 3D Positional VOIP channel in addition to the channel itself, making players audible to nearby players regardless of their selected channel
Art
- Added missing lightmap UVs from various foliage meshes
- Updated third person mantle animations to make them smoother and less "jittery"
UI
- Added a "paper doll" UI element, which displays where players have taken damage. The graphics on this element are not final, and will be iterated on before the next patch.
Webadmin
- Server admins now supersede members for reserved slots
Bugfixes
Crash Fixes
- Test Fix for Crash-on-Launch
In this CTB build we are pushing out a potential fix for a crash on launch which has been affecting some players. We encourage players who have been experiencing this crash to download the CTB, and provide feedback on their experience with the stability of this build so that we can verify the effectiveness of this fix before pushing it to the Live game.
In internal testing the fix we are pushing out to the CTB has shown to be very effective in solving our most common launch issue, however there are additional crashes not addressed by this fix which we're still working to resolve. If the CTB client continues to crash on launch please be sure to send in detailed BugSplat reports so that we can address any issues not resolved by this fix.
- Fixed additional, less-common crashes which occured on game launch
- Fixed some crashes which would occur when changing maps
- Fixed an SDK crash where the editor would crash when copying and pasting meshes while the viewmode was set to "lit"
Gameplay
- Fixed an issue where helicopter occupants would not be notified if a helicopter landed in enemy spawn protection
- Fixed an issue where if you fired the RPG-7 at a specific moment in the animation the weapon would no longer be able to fire
- Fixed an issue where Northern Forces players could plant tunnels inside Objectives on some situations
- Corrected a loadout issue present in the previous Skirmish-focused CTB where Northern Forces RPG men would spawn with more than one rocket with the new Skirmish mode loadouts
- Fixed an issue where you would become stuck in a "spectator camera"-like state if you were in character customization when a round started
- Helicopters no longer take heavy damage from environment Punji Sticks
- Helicopter miniguns no longer instantly destroy other vehicles
- Toggle Sprint hotkey will no longer toggle zoom after player stops moving
- Fixed a few cases where third person player models obscured helicopter passenger vision
- Fixed an exploit where Southern Forces players does not need to be near a tunnel to manually destroy it
Levels
- Corrected various collision issues, snags and stuck spots across all maps - any particularly bad spots will be called out individually in their levels' fix lists.
Long Tan
- Re-aligned some ruined wall meshes to prevent players from seeing the open back face of those meshes
Hue City
- Fixed an area of broken sidewalk players could become stuck in
Cu Chi
- Fixed an issue where some walls would not cast shadows
Rung Sac
- Fixed an issue where Napalm and the Canberra Bomber would not work on Rung Sac when called on Objective D
- Fixed an issue where the fog in the swampy area around Objective C would cull out if viewed from certain angles
- Fixed an area where players could become stuck between rocks under a footbridge on Rung Sac
- Added collision to a pile of ammo boxes on Rung Sac
- Fixed an issue where some meshes on the level would display the default tiled texture
- Fixed an issue where the sewer ceiling under the final objective on Rung Sac lacked collision, allowing players to see through the map
- Fixed an issue where players killed underground would be launched into the sky on Rung Sac
- Fixed an issue where it was possible to spawn on top of the meshes of the tunnels underneath Rung Sac
- Added collision to the rocks around a tunnel entrance on Rung Sac, preventing players from falling out of the map
Operation Forrest
- Fixed various invisible collision issues and floating meshes across the map
- Fixed an issue where the DSHK nest near NLF spawn culled out too early, leaving a visual hole through the map
- Added more spawn locations for pilots
- Fixed an issue on Supremacy mode Operation Forrest where players could fall into an open hole in the terrain
- Removed floating pans from the sky above the mansion objective on Operation Forrest
- Planted a floating oil drum near the Bushranger helicopter spawn on the ground on Operation Forrest
- Fixed an issue which players may have noticed in the last CTB where Territories Operation Forrest failed to grant Australian Forces players spawn protection after Objective C
- Fixed an issue on Territories Operation Forrest where players who die in tunnels are launched into the air
- Fixed an issue where players were able to mantle onto punji sticks on Operation Forrest
- Fixed a table in one of the houses on Operation Forrest which has broken collision, causing players to "bounce" if they touched it
- Fixed an issue where the spectator camera location would put the camera underground
- Fixed a seam on one of the trenches which allowed players to see through the map
- Added missing weapon restriction volumes to the tunnels under Operation Forrest, correcting an error where Southern players could use their primary weapons inside tunnels
- Fixed an area in the graveyard on Operation Forrest where players could become stuck between the rock face and a tree
- Added an out-of-bounds volume to an area which previously caused landed helicopters and players to float outside the main play-area of the map
- Fixed collision issues which allowed players and cameras to pass through various rocks on Operation Forrest
Firebase
- Added spawn protection to the Northern Forces spawn area
- Fixed an exploitable area on Firebase where players were able to climb over some barbed wire and onto the roof of one of the buildings
- Fixed an issue which caused movement in one of the trenches to be blocked by invisible collision
Art
- Fixed an issue which caused various trees and walls to display at a low level of detail while using Instanced Rendering
- Fixed an issue where the MAT-49's stock would sometimes clip through the camera when folded
- Fixed an issue where the player camera would "pop" at the end of the L2A1's reload animation when deployed on its bipod
Sound
- Fixed an issue which caused 3D positional VOIP chat to not work
UI
- Fixed an issue where the icon displaying the number of friendly players inside an objective with you would also include enemy players
- Fixed an issue where the server browser failed to identify the game mode running if a server is playing a custom map
- Fixed an issue where the 3D Positional VOIP indicator would appear on the left of the screen regardless of the distance from the speaking player
- Fixed an issue where it was possible to spawn into the game and have no objective markers on the overhead map, and no letters in the objective markers on the HUD
- Fixed an issue where commanders would be unable to place new move/rally markers after clicking on an objective on the Overhead Map
- Fixed an issue where teammates would not appear on the Overhead Map
- Fixed an issue where the spectator HUD would display incorrect messages to change Camera functions
- Fixed an error in the settings where the Mantle prompt would be turned off by default, it now defaults to "on"
- The XM177 no longer shares the same kill icon as the M16
- Fixed an issue where the overhead map would fail to display objective icons on maps with more than 14 objectives
- Fixed an issue where having a Slash (/) in your Steam Name would cause your in-game name to be replaced with RSPlayer
- Fixed an issue where the Bushranger Helicopter appeared as a tunnel on the HUD and Overhead Map when spotted
- Fixed an issue where the character, profile and stats, and store pages could become inaccessible from the main menu
- Localized the "Cancelled Tunnel Destruction" message to non-English languages
- Removed the line "North Territories: 0" from the Server Information window
- Corrected the prompt displayed to the players when selecting "Clear Co-Ordinates" from the Squad Leader order widget
- Fixed an issue where no message would display for Northern Commanders attempting to use Ambush Respawn while the ability is on cooldown
- Fixed an issue where the HUD Tip widget would display as empty when scrolling the mouse wheel to change weapons
- Fixed an issue where sometimes helicopter pilots' names would not display on the deployment menu
- Fixed an issue where the "need ammo" icon would appear desynchronised from players when viewed from inside a helicopter
- Fixed an issue where the "need ammo" icon would fail to clear after giving ammunition to a player requesting ammo
Webadmin
- Fixed an issue where setting "Announce Admin Logins" to "keep silent" would still cause the server to announce when an admin logged in
