Escalation (Developer Preview)

[Qbicle 118]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FCGGaOsZZ1cSource:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FCGGaOsZZ1c

 

 

• In short: new PvE mode that is open to Tier 10 and Legendary Vehicles, with modifiers and tougher enemies
• Revamped version of Quarterback will be available at launch, with more to come in the future
• At least for Quarterback, the mission will be hard due to strengthened enemies but mechanically simple, so it's less about cooperation and more about focusing on firepower and not getting hit.
• There will be an achievement for completing the mission under 4 minutes, which rewards the players with a loot crate similar to those in recent Battle Paths (i.e. a premium vehicle or a commander, otherwise it's gold).
• Game mode is not meant to be done in solo. SS claims he can barely do so with cheats on.
• An article listing the details will be published soon on the official website

 

Misc info:

• SS does the narration and recording for this video (which he wasn't expecting to do so, but it's either him or going generative AI for the job), while gameplay footage is from another dev
• American Dream is being fixed according to a response to comment on YouTube
• Regarding win rates, "SO Easy is... 85-91%, SO Hard is 67/83/74 respectively for Rate of Decay [presumably followed by Lone Star and Tiger Shark]. PvE hard winrate across the board is around 90-95% with the exception of Tiger Claw (30%), Wages of Sin (84%) and Dawnbreak (13%)". Presumably SO Heroic also shares around the win rates as "SO Easy".

Edited August 6 by Qbicle (see edit history)

[Qbicle 118]

Source:

https://armoredwarfare.com/en/news/general/developer-diary-legendary-pve-and-escalation-event

 

Quote

Today, we’d like to tell you more about a new PvE mode and event that will be hitting Armored Warfare in the near future.

In early August, we are launching an event called Escalation as an introduction to the new PvE Legendary difficulty in Armored Warfare. This difficulty is tailored for Tier 10 and Legendary Vehicles only and represents our new vision of endgame PvE content.

 

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Armored Warfare has plenty of PvE content, but most of it is a bit long in the tooth and, what’s more important, players are so familiar with it they could probably pass some of the missions with their eyes closed. The Legendary difficulty level we’re introducing fixes all that because with the new Modifier system, maps become far less predictable.

The core of the idea is simple. As a part of the introductory (and time-limited) Escalation event, we have overhauled a single PvE mission called Quarterback to the new Legendary difficulty level, which should pose a serious challenge even to the best of vehicles and the most coordinated of teams. The overhaul consists of:

• Visual changes (the map now looks prettier)
• Gameplay changes (the mission longer and requires you to hold the refinery, not just capture it)
• More numerous and tougher enemies including a new category, the Elites
• The most important part – the Modifier system, which is the core of the Legendary difficulty level

Two difficulty sub-modes will be available during the Escalation event – the easier one will feature fewer modifiers, the harder one will feature the full set.

The mission also features Elite enemies. Elite enemies represent hardened Clayburn Industries troops sent by Clayburn himself to hunt you down. They are marked with a different color than usual vehicles and will appear in three different configurations:

• Officer – a single powerful enemy appears on this map (this is effectively an optional boss fight)
• Ambush – series of elite enemies are positioned around the map (these spawn on several positions during the mission but do not move around too much)
• Patrol – elite enemy groups patrol the area and may appear randomly during the mission

Elite positions are visible on the minimap.

Now, let’s talk about Modifiers. Modifiers represent changes to the mission’s gameplay, each adding an extra difficulty to contend with. In addition, for each of these three categories, all enemy vehicles receive a substantial hitpoint and module protection buff.

There are three types of modifiers:

• Map modifiers (affecting the basic map gameplay)
• Bot modifiers (affecting only normal enemies on the map)
• Elite modifiers (affecting only Elite enemies on the map)

The map modifiers are:

• Artillery – off-map artillery is periodically targeting players during the mission
• Darkness – night fighting, enemy vehicles are harder to spot during the night
• Bunkers – hardened enemy positions appear across the map
• Snipers – enemy snipers appear across the map, mostly around the refinery
• Storm – raging storm deals damage over time to player vehicles via lightning strikes, which can be avoided by moving

The general enemy vehicle modifiers are:

• Improved Damage – enemy vehicles deal more damage than usual
• Improved Health – enemy enemies have more health than usual
• Improved Camouflage – enemy enemies have higher camouflage factors than usual
• Improved Penetration – enemy enemies have higher ammo penetration values than usual
• Improved Mobility – enemy enemies maneuver and turn their turrets faster than usual

The Elite enemy vehicle modifiers are:

• Elite Armor – elite vehicles have thicker armor than usual
• Elite Weapons – elite vehicles deal more damage than usual
• Elite Health – elite enemies have more health than usual
• Elite HEAT Immunity – elite vehicles cannot be damaged using HEAT shells or missiles
• Elite Reload – elite vehicles fire faster than usual
• Elite Speed – elite vehicles drive, accelerate, and turn turrets faster than usual

Naturally, such difficulty must be properly rewarded. Let’s talk about what the Rewards.

You can look forward to:

• Increased XP and Credit income
• Increased amount of Legendary Loot Crates for mission completion
• Additional Legendary Loot Crate for killing all Elites on the map for everyone
• Special achievements with epic rewards (including Premium vehicles)
• The Escalation event in the classic form you are used to with an extremely enticing top prize called Pilgrim Crate that will award you with high-Tier vehicles you don’t have yet (or Legendary Blueprints)

As was mentioned before, we have overhauled the mission’s visuals as well and have added a lot of new details you’ll have to discover for yourselves. The Escalation event will be available for the remainder of summer with more PvE (Legendary) content already in the works.

 

Modifiers are expected to change every 6 minutes similar to PvE map rotation

[Zafir 14]

Currently, the Legendary version of Quarterback does not support Cavalry Contract mission progress.

 

Achievements are:

Legendary Speedrun — Complete the mission in 4 Minutes with Elites present in the mission (2 minutes to fully cap and 2 minutes holding cap, can be done on the lower difficulty one, if it has Elites as a modifier)

Legendary Coordination  — Destroy the Clayburn Office at the exact time you fully cap successfully holding the Refinery. (The Lieutenant at the cap needs to be eliminated at the completion of the cap timer, should count on the lower difficulty one)

Legendary Killer — Eliminate each Elite patrol vehicle in 1 min after they enter the mission. (What it says on the Tin, should be possible on the lower difficulty and if possible no armor and/or HP enhancements for Elites)

 

Reward: 100k Credits, 5k Reputation, 1x Desert loot crate (see Spoiler)

Spoiler

Legendary Killer seems to be removed now (see Spoiler):

Spoiler

Legendary Coordination might have been altered to holding, got it originally by “accident” as the lieutenant was destroyed ~ 5 sec before the cap timer completed.
However, it was removed from the mission report and is once again unfinished in the achievements tab.
Guess they might've tightened up the grace period and you may need to actually also hold the cap and lieutenant till the end to get the achievement, wording got worse on that one. (see Spoiler)

Spoiler

 

 

 

Edited August 13 by Zafir (see edit history)