By Adam Smith on June 12th, 2012 at 1:00 pm.
It seems like only yesterday that Nathan wrote these words in regards to unlocking gear in Tribes: Ascend: “item unlocks still present a rather intimidating series of (often literally) uphill battles.” The Accelerate Update flattens out those hills, or perhaps raises players to the top and allows them to roll down the other side. Well, sort of. The update addresses some frustrations by having gear upgrades unlock through use, although new weapons themselves will still cost XP or gold. There are 27 weapon variants coming as well, providing a place to spend all that surplus XP. The video below explains all.
Listening to community feedback – and this isn’t only true in gaming – often seems to mean hoping that at least a small section of the community says something that you intended to do anyway and then doing it. Hi-Rez seem to be more flexible and willing to adjust according to experience, even if that means adjusting experience according to experience. Good work.
12/06/2012 at 13:13 SandmanXC says:
Props to them. This and the Deal of the Day system really made weapons way more affordable.
Also, more people should join the Rock Paper Spinfusor group on steam and play with other RPS readers. Guaranteed to be at least 366% more fun than playing with random people.
12/06/2012 at 13:18 frenz0rz says:
Except the server is still set to Arena mode. Boo.
12/06/2012 at 13:37 DeVadder says:
It is set to CTF again. It just will not change until one map is finished. The server administration is a pain.
12/06/2012 at 13:33 Lolmasaurus says:
Could you please direct me to the URL or some such then? A quick search showed no steam groups of that name. I’ve been looking for some guys to play tribes with for a while.
12/06/2012 at 13:38 DeVadder says:
The forum thread containing all information and rabble can be found at
bit.ly/RockPaperShazbot
(Capitalization, Ho!)
12/06/2012 at 14:05 Lolmasaurus says:
Admiration for your swift administration of information.
12/06/2012 at 15:01 TheDoveston says:
Such pleasing use of alliterative language makes my happy bones tingle.
12/06/2012 at 13:20 Scarclaw says:
But we still have to save up ridiculous amounts of EXP for the weapons. So, there’s still a problem.
12/06/2012 at 13:24 The Godzilla Hunter says:
It really doesn’t help that much at all. The problem is (at least, in my opinion) not that the upgrades are expensive, but that the actual weapons cost tons. Seriously, you could afford to unlock every class in the game, and buy upgrades for many of their starter weapons, and that STILL would not be enough XP to buy a plasma rifle.
12/06/2012 at 16:00 rb2610 says:
I’d say it improves the issue pretty effectively, I played one game earlier as PTH, got 3 flag caps and a kill or 2 and ended up getting 2 upgrades for every item, even the shotgun which I didn’t even use.
To upgrade all that with XP would have cost at least 10,000, probably not for off 20,000. I’d say getting 10,000-20,000 worth of upgrades in the space of a single match is a pretty effective way to help the problem as it saves grinding out that much XP to spend on upgrades when it could instead go towards a weapon or unlock a class.
If anything, I was surprised at how fast the upgrades are given out, although it looks like armour is the one item which is going to take time to upgrade compared to everything else.
12/06/2012 at 13:31 frenz0rz says:
If you look at the patch notes they’re also increasing reward for flag defense to 300, reward for emergency flag grabs to 500, and reward for killing Shrikes to 700. I’m not sure what they’re currently sitting at, but it sounds great for someone like me who tends to play Doombringer a lot.
I’m also intrigued as to what makes this new Titan Launcher so special.
12/06/2012 at 20:03 squidlarkin says:
It launches titans, right? That sounds pretty special.
12/06/2012 at 13:21 ThTa says:
Worth noting is that the weapon variants are variants of the initial (free) weapons you get with each class and will only cost 4800-18000 XP (as opposed to 42000-100000 for actually different weapons).
I’d say this patch is definitely a step in the right direction, with them nerfing automatics (albeit only a slight bit) and attempting to fix chasing (and unfortunately failing miserably with bandaid perks that won’t even work properly). Good to see them listening to the community.
I’d rather them throwing out “upgrades” entirely to them getting a slightly reworked progression system, though.
12/06/2012 at 13:26 Hunchback says:
Lol, awesome! I just uninstalled this yesterday cause it was WAY too slow to grind up unlocks…
Downloading again… heh
12/06/2012 at 13:26 Flukie says:
I hope for Smite they just replicate League of Legends, which looks like they are in the Closed Beta.
12/06/2012 at 13:53 Hoaxfish says:
Why would copying someone else’s active MOBA/DOTA game be a good thing?
Tribes, if anything, is popular because it’s not really copying anything that’s currently “in fashion” for the genre (i.e. CoD’s slow modern cover-shooter).
13/06/2012 at 10:39 EPICTHEFAIL says:
He meant the monetization system you dullard. Paying for skins and making gameplay-relevant stuff more accessible for the F2P- only crowd. The one thing that made me stop playing tribes is the fact that it takes too long to get anything. This is not perfect, but it is a step in the right direction.
12/06/2012 at 13:36 byteCrunch says:
More or less the reason I stopped playing, I got tired of the grind to unlock stuff with XP, though getting weapons still requires XP or gold, wonder if they reduced the amount. Last time I played it was something like 100k XP to get a weapon.
12/06/2012 at 14:09 povu says:
I’m lucky in that I only like playing the Soldier and the Pathfinder, so it didn’t take me very long to unlock the stuff I want. It’s not a grind for me now, it’s just playing for fun.
12/06/2012 at 14:20 deadly.by.design says:
If anyone enjoys the game at all, I recommend the $30 gold package. It’s enough for a 90-day booster (2x XP) and then ~2500 gold left to spend on items. If you use it wisely on the daily deals, it’ll take you quite a long way. By the time your booster has run out, you’ll probably have everything you need for the classes you play and also have new classes & items unlocked, too.
But, yeah, if you’re trying to get everything and haven’t even spent $10 and received VIP status (perma +50% XP after one purchase), I can see why it would seem daunting. Rather than calling it completely f2p, I think T:A is more accurately “pay a little.” The base XP rates (non-VIP/Bonus) take quite a while to accumulate 100k.
Regardless, I view this patch as largely positive news. Variants may be just that–variants–but at least they give us options and are relatively cheap to unlock. I would prefer more CTF maps, rather than C&H, but whatever. The SMG tweaks are also welcome.
Patch notes:
http://www.egmnow.com/tribesascend/tribes-ascend-accelerate-patch-notes/
12/06/2012 at 14:52 Borborygme says:
Ive only started recently, but thats the conclusion I’ve come to also. Seriously, they didnt make the game as a service for humanity. It’s free to play up to a point. You can unlock every class and perks without putting any money into the game. If you want more, that means you like the game, and you should get some money out and support it.
12/06/2012 at 15:51 Greggh says:
I wish I had IRL friends who played Tribes or Day Z :(
12/06/2012 at 22:53 Ganjatron says:
If you’re in the states, find my name on steam, all my buddies went off to D3 so I also have zero people to play with.
12/06/2012 at 16:36 SolaceAvatar says:
Doesn’t really change anything. Upgrading costs about 7-15K, a new weapon costs 100k. So clearly that’s always been the part that’s been frustrating.
It’s also why I’m not gonna give them any money to unlock it that way. It costs 10$ to unlock a new weapon. Of which there’s, what… 30ish? I’m not paying 300$ for this game.
12/06/2012 at 16:50 deadly.by.design says:
I’d say you’re technically right, but effectively off. It only costs $10 to unlock a weapon if you pay full price or buy inefficient amounts of gold. The introduction of daily deals makes buying things pretty reasonable, assuming you only bite on the 50-75% off deals. So, my $30 got me a 90-day booster and enough gold to buy 8-10 new (would-be 100k/$10) weapons on sale.
So, I spend my xp on unlocking what I *really* want, spend a small amount of gold on heavily-discounted items I *eventually* wanted, etc. In other words, anybody buying guns at full price, or non-bundled, is kind of doing it wrong.
By, all means–*don’t* spend money on the game if you don’t like it. But if you do, supporting the devs isn’t such a bad thing.
12/06/2012 at 17:18 Shortwave says:
Yea’ I spent ten bucks and got the two big guns I needed plus a few extra things such as two perk unlocks. I also keep an eye on their promotional deals. The other week they gave away 200 gold for free, which was enough to buy a good number of things as well. There was the double XP weekend at which I mostly unlocked every single cheaper item that existed..
Now I just enjoy the game and once a week and randomly realize I have a shitload of XP, buy something epic that I won’t even use since it’s not my class. I’m really happy for all the hours I’ve had fun for an optional ten bucks. I was honestly doing fine with the default weapons upgraded.
12/06/2012 at 18:06 SolaceAvatar says:
So, using those deals you spent thirty dollars and unlocked a third of the game (so far, until they add in more weapons). If you get bored and want to play the other classes, it’s gonna cost you a hundred dollars at that rate. That’s still well over the price of a game that doesn’t try to nickle and dime you.
12/06/2012 at 18:12 deadly.by.design says:
To answer: I still have over 2,000 gold, so I’m really just unlocking things as I feel like. When the most expensive items (100k/~700gp) go on heavy sale, they’re only 200-something gold. It’s not a big deal unless I have some burning desire to get items I don’t even care about.
As for the rest, it’s just how f2p game models work. If you’re the kind of player who chafes at not having 100% access to everything, then I wouldn’t recommend playing them. (or you could play [modern military shooter X], pay $60, and still not have it all?)
While you may or may not have unlocked 100% of everything, T:A can be played and enjoyed for a modest amount of money, and that’s the bottom line.
Honestly, though, I don’t expect to need much of anything after my 90-day booster runs out. Maybe I’m not a typical Tribes player, but I don’t like every class, and therefore don’t need a lot of the available items. I’ve had everything I needed for my favorite class after playing for less than a month.
13/06/2012 at 23:48 SolaceAvatar says:
Well, in fairness, I also don’t like “modern military shooter X” for that exact reason. ;)
12/06/2012 at 18:51 MordeaniisChaos says:
Plenty of games don’t give you access to gear and weapons, this one just lets you pay for it if you want. It’s basically Battlefield, but without the required payment at the start.
12/06/2012 at 17:40 Shortwave says:
Well I just got into the game and I can already say a lot of people should be happy.
The prices on the new guns I looked at were cheap as dirt and can easily be unlocked in an hours hard work..
Here random person, have a magical key to give you 250 gold so you can just buy one of the new ones!
XFB24D26E8AC132430
Reply if you got it so you don’t waste anyones time. : )
12/06/2012 at 18:07 Borborygme says:
Sweet, got it… thanks buddy! :D
12/06/2012 at 18:50 MordeaniisChaos says:
When comcast replaces it’s fucked up caps (I only get a fraction of that a month, and 50GB is nothing when you game and follow a gaming site that focuses on long form videos) I really want to get into this. I played some a while back and it’s so damn fun. But it’s hard for me to play stuff like that because it tends to eat up bandwidth with all of the updates and stuff.
12/06/2012 at 21:01 deadly.by.design says:
Isn’t their normal cap 250GB? What’s wrong with your service?
13/06/2012 at 07:04 thebigJ_A says:
I have Comcast, and my cap is way higher than 50…
And I also follow Giantbomb (I assume that’s who you meant. If it’s not, it should be!)
Somethings wrong on your end, duder.
12/06/2012 at 18:53 Dreamworkers says:
I really want a reset button to reset xp and gp.
12/06/2012 at 19:25 niudds says:
http://is.gd/PFQQs4
12/06/2012 at 23:51 escortbayan says:
thanks alot for all escort bayan
13/06/2012 at 21:40 El_Emmental says:
They haven’t nerfed the plasma or the jackal yet… Anyone with a plasma weapon win 90% of its duels (on public servers of course), while the Jackal 3-rounds burst does more damage than the sticky grenade (= Infiltrators are attacking Heavy classes head-on).
A lot of “variants” are just direct upgrade:
- SMGs are becoming more powerful (the “reduced clip” downside is not a nerf: the total damage done by a single clip is almost the same – and I just calculated, the DPS with a reload is actually higher with the variant => the variant is a win-win upgrade), especially at close range (there was a small nerf for long range SMG hits).
Funfact: all classes (but the Brute) have a SMG-like weapon. So much for the originality and emphasis on prediction skills.
=> Pathfinder (LAR), Sentinel (Falcon), Infiltrator (Rhino), Soldier (Assault Rifle), Technician (TCN4), Raider (NJ4/NJ5), Juggernaut (X1 LMG), Doombringer (Chaingun).
- Mortar Deluxe and Thumper DX variants have slightly reduced radius (the nerf is very small), and a much bigger damage output. Unless you’re playing with a touchpad, this is a no-brainer.
13/06/2012 at 23:51 SolaceAvatar says:
Yeah, I also think the majority of the unlockable weapons are just stronger than the default ones. Funny how they’re the ones that cost money!
14/06/2012 at 17:51 PPOY52 says:
Good god. The man in the video is so scary. /cry