Dauntless latest update marks its first major patch since the formal launch of the game with a spooky Halloween themed season pass. As players have come to expect, a number of requested quality of life improvements have been made as well as some major updates to Behemoth scaling.
The first major quality of life improvement is a big one, as Dauntless now features a three-minute AFK timer that will remove absent players from a hunt. This is welcome news and should all but stop players from queuing up for a hunt and then doing nothing once a quest begins.
With Haunted Shadows, Slayers will be able to work towards a set of cosmetic Armour and the "Ghost of a Dog" emote. Some may wonder if this was indicative of a non-combat pet system being implemented, but the developer has not made any new announcements since first stating that there were no plans for any such system. The Elite track provides an additional set of armor styled after the Night Hunter.
Slayers will have until November 5 to partake in the Dark Harvest seasonal event and enjoy the transformed look of the town. The event brings mysterious glyphs with warnings from the Unseen cult and no doubt will be picked up again in a future event.
Behemoths have seen a significant update as well. The developers state that "A number of Behemoths were set to power and resistance levels that did not match the lobby UI. These incorrect values have been adjusted to reflect their intended state. Most notably, all variants of Tempestborne Stormclaw were significantly weaker than intended and have been strengthened to match their intended levels. Power and resistance affect damage dealt and taken only – no changes were made to total health."
Most notably, this will affect the effort needed to defeat Heroic+ versions of each Behemoth. This should provide a nice challenge for most players, especially since many Behemoths could be rushed down with little effort. Now the tactics will remain the same, but combat will take longer.
Finally, an unexpected change to attack speed has some players frustrated. The developers state that "Attack speed was originally thought of only as a function of DPS, but in practice, we're seeing it provide [sic] sizeable boosts to safety due to its ability to frequently proc on-hit effects. We're reducing the magnitude of attack speed granting effects to reflect this."
As a result, virtually all attack speed modifiers in the game have been nerfed, including weapon-specific buffs, lanterns, cells, and perks. This will make the use of slower weapons like the Hammer and Axe more challenging and will demand a strong knowledge of Behemoth movement to execute the same attack strings as before patch 1.02.
Overall the changes appear to make for a healthier game, and now we have only one question: Where is the Nintendo Switch version? We can almost certainly still expect it to release in 2019 as promised, but it looks more and more like we will see it in late December.
Source: Playdauntless.com