Hello Bloodhunt Community!
We are happy to announce that the Bloodhunt June Community Update has been completed and will be rolling out on 8 June!
The scope of this update was based upon the community survey and the more pressing issues that our players told us about through social media.
We aim to have a rapid pace when it comes to pushing out bug fixes while at the same time allowing sufficient time for testing and the submission process.
At the same time, some issues that might seem simple and straightforward to fix may have multiple dependencies or other complexities and, as such, we are not always able to fix everything that we want within the time frames we’ve set.
Let’s check out the changes and bug fixes for this update!
Gamepad Improvements
We’ve heard from a lot of players on console and PC that the gamepad controls need some love to be more competitive against mouse and keyboard. As such, please see this as a first step towards improving the overall experience when playing Bloodhunt with a gamepad.
Response Curve
- Replaced our old dynamic curve with a traditional exponential curve.
This is the 0-1 movement of how far on the stick the player has moved the stick, mapped onto a curve. The change should allow more control for both precision aiming and fast turns.
Sensitivity
New default values for the different sensitivity multipliers. In a future release, we will rename the following settings since they are not multipliers on top of one another.
- Sensitivity (X) – New default should be 5
- Sensitivity (Y) – New default should be 5
- Sensitivity ADS (X) – New default should be 2.5
- Sensitivity ADS (Y) – New default should be 2.5
- Sensitivity Scoped (X) – New default should be 1
- Sensitivity Scoped (Y) – New default should be 1
Acceleration
- Replaced our old exponential curve with a linear acceleration that kicks in after a short delay.
Once the stick is maxed out at the edge, the turn speed increases at a certain rate over time, until the game says that the turn speed is at the limit.
Aim Assist
This is related to anything regarding staying on target or making it easier to acquire a target.
NOTE: These are not settings, this is just a breakdown of how Aim Assist works.
Aim Slowdown
When aiming near a target, the sensitivity slows down. This is most strongly felt at short to medium-long range. This is not highly active for the closest ranges or the longest ranges.
- Hip-fire off target – There is an initial slowdown when aiming close to a target.
- Hip-fire on target – When aiming at a target, this is more aggressive so that you do not leave the target.
- ADS off target – When ADSing close to a target, this is still active but not as strongly.
- ADS on target – When ADSing on a target, this is also active but less than when hip-fire aiming.
Turn Assist
When aiming near a target while you are moving, the camera helps you turn a bit. This is mostly felt at short ranges. This is not active for the very closest ranges or the longest ranges.
- Hip-fire off target – There is a small amount of aim turn assist when looking close to a target while you are moving.
- Hip-fire on target - There is a small amount of aim turn assist when looking at a target while you are moving.
- ADS off target – There is a small amount of aim turn assist when looking close to a target while you are moving.
- ADS on target – There is a moderate amount of aim turn assist when looking at a target while you are moving.
This is only the start, and we will keep improving it until we find a good balance between the input methods.
Bug fixes
Fixed a bug that was causing performance issues if the player did not skip the intro cinematic
PS5 – Fixed an issue that was causing some Founders Edition items to disappear after the player had unlocked a Battle Pass item
PS5 – The adaptive triggers no longer get stuck in the “activated” state
The Saboteur’s “Unseen Passage” activation sound and visual effects no longer unintentionally repeat under certain conditions
Fixed an issue that prevented you from targeting the “Earthshock” power directly below you
Decreased the chances of an issue occurring that sometimes caused the matchmaker to fail to find a player for your team in group modes
The Trophy/Achievement “From Prague to Malmö” has been fixed (finally!)
Players no longer lose all ammunition when picking up a weapon of the same calibre while reloading
We fixed an issue resulting in first-time Bloodhunt players not getting matched against other new players. This will improve the onboarding experience for new players.
We fixed a few exploits that were being abused
UI
Clarified which outfits are clan-specific in the Battle Pass and the flash store
Balance changes
For this update, we took a look at the more pressing balancing issues that needed to be tweaked, and here are the new values that we decided upon:
Bloodhunted Timer
The Bloodhunted timer has decreased from 60s to 40s
After some internal testing, we settled on a 40 second timer, which improves the odds of surviving while still encouraging players to uphold the Masquerade. We also tried 30s, but it felt too inconsequential.
Ventrue – Enforcer – Flash of Marble
- Flesh of Marble duration decreased from 4.2s to 3s
Bloodhunt has fallen into a bit of an Enforcer meta as the season has progressed. We’ve seen a lot of frustration when going up against the Flesh of Marble power. Although we’ve been working on some improvements to how it functions, these changes are unfortunately not fully ready at this time. Having said that, we wanted to make some other improvements that we can in the meanwhile. Nerfing the duration might not solve everything but it means that Ventrue players will have to be a bit more alert and on their toes.
Additionally, we know that the Enforcer pairs very well with shotguns, so some of the adjustments we’ve outlined below are part of our short-term balancing strategy.
Shotgun Rebalance
Pump-action Shotgun:
- Effective range decreased from 12, 14, 16m to 8, 10, 12m
- Spread increased from 2.5 to 3
- Damage decreased from 10x12 to 8x12 (Damage per pellet)
- Fire rate has increased from 1.2s to 1s
Double barrel:
- Effective range has decreased from 8, 10, 12m to 6, 7, 8m
- Spread increased from 3.5, 3, 2.5 to 4, 3.75, 3.5
- Damage decreased from 10x12 to 8x12 (Damage per pellet)
Shotguns are very popular this season and they’ve become a bit too much of a must-have. In particular, they’ve been too deadly at ranges where you might not expect to have to worry about a shotgun, so we’ve pulled back their effective range a bit and also made some tweaks to their spread values. Damage has also been reduced.
As mentioned, shotguns have had superb synergy with Flesh of Marble, allowing Enforcers to turn invulnerable right after firing both shots of a double barrel, reload, then immediately break FoM with another burst. Vandals are also known to make very good use of shotguns, and we have a feeling they are going to come back strongly now that their archetype power should be working properly, especially considering that Vandals have remained very effective in spite of the targeting issue.
We plan to revisit the shotgun balance once we can release a more elegant balancing solution for the Flesh of Marble power, so let us know your thoughts on these changes!
Revive invulnerability timer
- Revive invulnerability timer has been increased from 0.75s to 1s
We increased the invulnerability timer to ensure that players can’t take damage before they’re able to act when reviving. This change gives players a better shot at escaping or fighting back when left to regenerate after being downed.
Melee weapons
- Melee life-steal decreased from 50% to 30%
Melee has been a hot topic of late, and while we can see that it is not universally agreed upon that melee is too strong, we see a lot of frustration towards it. We want to start by limiting the health you gain back to make it less difficult to defeat a melee attacker that you nearly killed before they started swinging at you. We’ll be monitoring the results closely to see if this is a step in the right direction or if we need to try something different.
New Features
In this update, we are also adding support for VRR (Variable Refresh Rate) on the PS5.
This means that if you have a television/monitor which supports VRR you will be able to get smoother frame delivery with even less chance of screen tearing.
It’s important to note though that this does not mean that the game will run in 120 FPS but it will enhance visual performance for Bloodhunt on PS5 by minimizing or eliminating visual artefacts, such as frame-pacing issues and screen tearing.
If you are interested in knowing more about VRR, we recommend this blogpost that our friends at PlayStation have prepared on the topic: https://blog.playstation.com/2022/04/25/variable-refresh-rate-support-for-ps5-is-rolling-out-this-week/
Known Issues
Infinite loading screen – We are aware that some players may run into an infinite loading screen and we’re pretty sure that we’ll have a fix for this in the next update.
Red Gas Desync – Although we made some progress on this issue and have a potential fix for it, we need more time to ensure that it’s a safe fix and that it works as intended. We currently have this in scope for the next update.
Respawning in the red gas – The issue with the player still respawning in the red gas in rare cases is something that is still on our list of bugs to fix.
Getting stuck in a falling animation – We’ve had some reports of players getting stuck in a falling animation. However, we have not been able to pinpoint how to reproduce this bug properly. As such, we would like to hear from you if this bug happens often to you and you might have an idea of why.
Players are sometimes unable to pick up items that were dropped from an elevated surface – We are working on fixing this for the next update,
Players are unable to complete the “Blade Master” challenge – Unfortunately we were unable to fix this issue in this update and it will instead be in scope for the next update,
We are still working on the “reload bug”, which is in reality a deeper, more complex, multi-headed hydra of related issues, and were unfortunately not able get it resolved for this update. While a reload problem might sound very straightforward, a proper solution involves quite a bit of work and quite a lot of testing to make sure we aren’t causing other, equally undesirable side effects. (If you’ve been following us since we launched, you might remember that this issue was a consequence of fixing a problem with hit registration.)
We are also still in process of resolving the “phantom red gas” issue, which is caused by uncommon instances of disagreement between the server and client on where exactly the gas boundary is at certain stages. Those fixes are also not quite ready for release, but we’re making good progress and will have more information soon.
We are creating some shorter videos that will explain a bit more about the various challenges that come with running a live service game and what we are doing to improve not only the game but how we make games, so stay tuned for that on our social media channels.
Until next time, see you at dusk!
/ Sharkmob
