Just a few days after a Dune: Awakening AMA in which developers promised some changes to the endgame, here's the first: Creative director Joel Bylos said today that some areas of the deep desert will be flagged as "partial warfare (PvE) areas," enabling players to explore what it has to offer without fear of getting caught up in fights they don't want.
Issues with the deep desert, Dune: Awakening's PvP area, were front and center during last week's AMA, and while Funcom made it clear that it wasn't planning on making major changes to the ornithopters at the root of so many complaints, it did commit to improving the experience overall. Part of that, apparently, means making it accessible to all players.
"Let me start by stating this unequivocally—we want PvE players to be able to play the endgame and have access to the content of the endgame," Bylos wrote in today's update. "Our goal is not to force PvE players to interact with a PvP system that they may have no interest in."
Bylos said Funcom still believes in the "core concept" of the Deep Desert, and hopes players will come to engage with it as it was originally envisioned. But the reality, he continued, is that some players are complaining about being excluded from the endgame because of "the extremely competitive nature of the Deep Desert," and so changes are coming.
"Starting soon, some areas of the Deep Desert will now be flagged as 'Partial Warfare (PvE)' areas where players will be able to explore testing stations and harvest T6 resources without the threat of conflict they may not want," Bylos wrote. "It’s important to note that the top tier of the game is balanced around guilds and groups, so people will still find it grindy if they play solo.
"Landsraad control points, shipwrecks and the largest spice fields within this region of the Deep Desert will remain 'War of Assassins (PvP)' flagged. The deepest parts of the Deep Desert will remain as they currently are—high reward, high risk areas."
As someone who enjoys PvP combat sometimes, but not all the time, this seems like a reasonable compromise to me, and that appears to be the overall reaction from Dune: Awakening fans too. There are of course a few here and there who aren't happy about the perceived softening of the deep desert, but on the whole people seem happy. And why not? Players who want all PvP all the time are still free to take on Dune: Awakening that way—this just opens the door for everyone to have a better time with it.
Bylos also reassured readers that PvP changes are on the way too, including a nerf to scout ornithopters—something that was discussed in the AMA—and changes to other mechanics. A date for the deep desert changes wasn't provided but Bylos said they'll happen "soon."
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