First Descendant developer Nexon has released a major update for its popular shooter and explained some of its thoughts behind the game.
Patch 1.0.2, out now on PC, PlayStation, and Xbox, adds the promised matchmaking to Infiltration Operations on hard mode, renames monster models, eases the punishing strike a bit, and makes a number of bug fixes. Other highlights include slowing down the speed at which the Instructor bot talks (which was too fast to really keep up).
As part of the patch notes, Nexon insisted that there are no plans to nerf the meta builds that players are currently using to destroy bosses, called Colossi in the game, in mere seconds. These types of builds, which revolve around the character Gley and the rare Tamer machine gun, were expected, Nexon added.
“It has come to our attention that the community is concerned about potential nerfs to Tamer and Gley’s infinite magazine builds,” Nexon said. “This meta is very strong, but since it’s within the scope of what the dev team has planned, there are no immediate plans to do so.
“In addition, some weapons are more powerful than Tamer, and there are a variety of character forms that rival Gley’s infinite magazine, so please enjoy them to the fullest. We’ve been looking forward to seeing the Descendants use creative builds to quickly take down the mighty Colossi, so we’re quite pleased to see this in action now.”
There is also an interesting note that addresses the community’s concern that the drop rates of some much-needed items were not displayed accurately in-game. Long story short, some players felt that the drop rates displayed by The First Descendant were not the actual drop rates in the game, as many tried to obtain these particular items as part of the free looters’ punitive crackdown.
“We are aware that as many Descendants begin to work in earnest, various discussions are taking place regarding drop rates,” Nexon admitted. “There is no variable drop rate system in First Descendant. We use the flat rates shown in the game.
“The developer team has reviewed the purchase rates on all servers and confirmed that they are dropping according to the displayed rates. We are currently working on various measures to ensure that the community can trust the developer team, such as revealing item drop amounts for each content. And we also prepare ways to improve the farming experience. The First Successor will continue to communicate transparently and honestly.”
However, the patch does not address The ultra-aggressive monetization of the First DescendantNexon has not explained either the striking similarities between the icons used in The First Descendant and Bungie’s rival looter Destiny.
Still, The First Descendant is attracting players, with a peak Steam player count of 264,860 so far – enough to break into the top five most played games on Valve’s platform. Microsoft and Sony do not provide player numbers for PlayStation and Xbox.
Descendant First Update 1.0.2 Full Notes:
Content improvements
– Added “Start Public Operation” function (matchmaking) to Infiltration Operations (Hard). “Start Public Operation” is available even if you change the selected reward, but if you choose an additional option, only “Start Private Operation” will be available.
– Removed Sequential Type Immunity Spheres from Named Monsters. They are changed to either default or elimination types.
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# Director’s comment The Dev Team acknowledges the community’s concern about the monotonous models of Named Monsters and strives to improve them. In particular, we’ve noticed that the pattern that involves breaking spheres in a specific order is not suitable for public matching, and we’ve decided to remove it immediately. As new models are developed, we will soon update the existing named Monster models one by one. Since Named Monsters often appear in Hard Difficulties and Special Ops, we will continue to work towards diversifying their models. |
– Tripled the amount of rare base materials dropped from Encrypted Vaults. Vulgus Elites that appear in Field Missions and Infiltration Operations will now drop them as well.
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# Director’s comment The most efficient way to farm rare base materials is still through Encrypted Vaults, but for those who prefer monster hunting, we’ve updated field missions and infiltration operations to remove these materials as well. The Dev Team will closely monitor the overall farming status and do their best to create a joyful environment for all our Descendants. |
– Reduced the time from two 90 second occupations to two 60 second occupations for the Kingston ‘Vulgus Data Transmitter’ hacking mission.
– Improved the visibility of the Battle Pass Battle Supply Shop button by redesigning it in the format of the Bonus Shop banner.
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# Director’s comment You can get free season limited skins from the Battle Supply Shop. Complete pre-season challenges to claim your special skins! |
– Updated the Library window from closing when opening and closing the map via the Purchase Info popup.
– Improved the length of party invitation messages to make them easier to confirm and accept.
– Improved the duration of the following instructor lines.
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# Director’s comment Many Descendants have commented that the Descendants dialog contains many useful tips for the game. Currently, it is not possible to replay previous dialogs, but we are planning to fix this. We will continue to make improvements so that Descendants can easily access the information they seek. |
– Moved the NPC guide you meet after first arriving in Albion closer.
Optimization Improvements
– [PC] Improved the stability of the shader preparation process by reducing the CPU load during shader generation.
We are currently actively monitoring this issue and if you encounter issues with a 13th or 14th generation Intel, please refer to the official Intel guide.
– [PC] GPU memory usage decreases when set to high or higher quality.
– [PC] Fixed an issue where character skins would appear abnormally at low graphics settings intermittently during extended play.
– [PC] Fixed a bug that allowed frame limits to be set when using Nvidia and AMD frame generation.
– [Common] Fixed an issue where shadows would intermittently appear abnormally depending on the view.
– [Common] We made various other adjustments for optimization purposes and we will monitor them continuously.
Bug fixes
(1) UI/UX
– Fixed an issue with displaying unused items in the Library.
(2) Descendants
– Fixed an issue where Descendants could not exit DBNO when their HP was below -100% from the module settings.
– Fixed an issue where Kyle would occasionally go airborne when using ‘Superconductivity Thrusters’ during ‘Repulsion Dash’.
– Fixed an issue where Esiemo could not get up while using ‘Arche Explosion’ and being triggered with Knockback.
(3) Modules
– Fixed an issue where firearm ATK increases per stack in the ‘Sharp Precision Shot’ module were summed instead of multiplied.
(4) Equipment
– Fixed an issue where a weapon’s attribute damage did not deal more than 100,000 damage.
– Fixed an issue where higher values were displayed as the Ultimate (Gold) option despite the skill cooldown and reactor skill cost stats being preferred with lower values.
– Fixed an issue where lower values were displayed as the Ultimate (Gold) option despite the weapon change speed stat being preferable with higher values.
(5) Field
– Fixed an issue where “Amorphous Material Model: 118” and “Shape Stabilizer Form 8” did not drop in “Frozen Valley: Vulgus Strategic Outpost” in Fortress (Hard).
– Fixed an issue where Elite Vulgus in White Night Gulch ‘Upper Hatchery’ battlefield missions did not drop rewards.
– Fixed an issue where monster spawning was interrupted at some strategic Vulgus posts.
(6) Example Dungeon
– Fixed an issue where Vespers resource box materials were dropped from Echo Swamp, Agna Desert, White-night Gulch, Hagios and Fortress Infiltration Operation resource boxes.
(7) Research
– Fixed an issue where Ultimate Descendants core materials were incorrectly displayed as Rare instead of Ultimate tier.
(8) Miscellaneous
– [French] Fixed an issue where the ‘Go to Title Screen’ menu was displayed with the same phrase as ‘Exit Game’.
– [French] Fixed an issue in the story where ‘Ultimate Chimera’ was used for ‘Dreadful Abomination’.
– [French] Added missing words to the probability screen for tier 3 Executor group 4.
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# Additional director comment It has come to our attention that the community is concerned about potential nerfs to Tamer and Gley’s infinite magazine builds. This meta is very strong, but since it is within the scope of what the Dev Team has planned, there are no immediate plans to do so. In addition, some weapons are more powerful than Tamer, and there are a variety of character forms that rival Gley’s infinite magazine, so please enjoy them to the fullest. We’ve been looking forward to seeing the Descendants use creative builds to quickly take down the mighty Colossi, so we’re quite pleased to see this in action now. We are aware that as many Descendants begin farming in earnest, various discussions are taking place regarding decline rates. There is no variable drop rate system in First Descendant. We use the flat rates shown in the game. The Developer Team has reviewed the purchase fees on all servers and confirmed that they are dropping as per the displayed fees. We are currently working on various measures to ensure that the community can trust the development team, such as revealing item drop amounts for each content. And we also prepare ways to improve the farming experience. First Successor will continue to communicate transparently and honestly. |
Wesley is the UK News Editor for IGN. Find him on Twitter at @wyp100. You can contact Wesley at wesley_yinpoole@ign.com or confidentially at wyp100@proton.me.