Greetings Taernians,
The second Community Update of this year is coming, but this time we’ll focus more on balance. Don’t worry - as always, we’ve also made some improvements based on your suggestions from Discord. But let's get down to business!
The Community Update will go live on October 14th.
We’d like to thank you for lots of useful feedback, be it on Discord or via surveys - it was extremely helpful. Some of the changes were on point (and you let us know about it), some things had to be tweaked a little bit, and some weren't really popular. We’ve collected all the info, analyzed it, and tried to fit it in with the vision of the future of Broken Ranks. It’s worth remembering that balance in an MMORPG is not a constant - it’s a process. Now let’s get to the takeaways from the recent tests so that you can see what awaits us in the upcoming update!
Intelligence Stays
The new attribute increases the chance to cast buffs but can also extend their duration or add something extra to the buffs that last only one round or don’t have a duration at all (like Healing or Dispel). After the first round of tests, we lowered the requirements and most of you were happy with that. You also liked the additional effects, so it seems like we’ve hit the jackpot. It’s possible that the system will be expanded in the future with new properties, but let’s focus on the present for now. ;)
Knitting the Knight
Knights will see many changes to their skills:
- Calculated Strike - during PTR2, you could see how it weakens melee defense, accuracy from the other zones, and mental damage. We’re happy that most of you liked this, so we’re leaving it as it is.
- Shield Bash - for now, we won’t be increasing the damage of the skill and the debuff works like intended, so we’re leaving it as it was during the tests.
- Sacrifice and Power of Unity - they’ll now boost attributes: Sacrifice will increase strength and power while Power of Unity increases dexterity and knowledge. The more strength the Knight has, the bigger the bonus from Sacrifice. The effect of Power of Unity, on the other hand, is affected by the Knight’s dexterity. After PTR2, we decided that the power of the buffs should scale more with skill level so that lower levels can benefit from them more. Apart from that, we removed the physical hit chance modifier from Sacrifice to make it equally beneficial for magical and physical classes.
- Purity Aura - the changes made during both PTRs are here to stay. In short: the skill will be more beneficial at master levels for the endgame. It’ll also provide % resistance.
- Shield Block - the debuff to accuracy will be disabled when the Knight is below 40% HP (when blocking matters the most).
Apart from that, shields will now be more useful in combat, because you’ll be able to insert offensive orbs into them.
What about Knights’ vambraces? There’ll be compensation. We thought long and hard about it but finally we decided on an NPC that will give you the following options:
- exchanging incrustation between Undurises or Takerons and Keel (meaning transferring stars from your vambraces to your shield and vice versa)
- exchanging upgrades between Undurises or Takerons and Keel (meaning transferring upgrades from your vambraces to your shield and vice versa)
- exchanging Undurises or Takerons for Keel together with all upgrades and incrustation of the vambraces (the vambraces will be removed from the backpack)
- damaging Undurises or Takerons (so that you can freely sell them)
However, all of the options above have certain limitations to prevent abuse:
- each option can be used only once per character
- only applies to characters level 110+
- the gear must be repaired and bound to the character interacting with the NPC
- the gear must be in the backpack and there can only be one pair of vambraces and one shield there (you have to decide which vambraces to use for the process)
- only applies to gear repaired before the publication date of this article, i.e. 08.10.2025 17:00:00
Other or exceptional situations not covered by the above solutions can be reported via the support. We’ll treat each report individually.
Sheed - Balance and New Combo Effects
Sheeds will get some necessary changes - mainly so that they can better fulfill their role and be equally useful in a party, no matter its composition. In addition to that, we're introducing something new - combo effects that will introduce a fresh element and make the gameplay more fun.
Skills:
- Chi Punch - damage on adept and master will be lowered, same as on PTR
- Front Kick - returns as an opener. It’ll get a more powerful (versus what you saw on the PTR) debuff that lowers melee defense. This is because, in their debuffer role, Sheeds attack last
- Cheap Shot - it’ll complement Front Kick's debuff and empower Chi Punch
- Liver Punch - the effect that increases ranged damage has been transferred here from Front Kick. This skill will now synergize only with ranged classes
Legendary Washi will be nerfed - its base damage will decrease from 175 to 165.
Combo effects will be completely new and meant to make the gameplay more fun. This is something we’ve been thinking of for the longest time and they are a perfect fit for the Sheed playstyle.
- Front Kick + Cheap Shot -> increases the damage of all Sheed melee skills (if both debuffs are maintained, the effect will more than compensate for the nerf to damage)
- Front Kick + Liver Punch -> increases the damage of ranged attacks (if both debuffs are maintained, ranged classes will see a big boost to their damage)
Warning! The effects will only work if both buffs are active on the target.
What about Barbarians and Fire Mages?
We wanted the Barbarian skill Thick Skin to be more useful in the endgame where characters have high resistances. The tests have shown that you liked the change, so the skill will provide % resistances at master. Also, after PTR1, we increased the amount of resistances granted by lower levels.
As for the Fire Mage, we made some changes to Dispersion Aura. The skill should now work better in the endgame with alorn maxed out. The Aura still reduces damage taken, but no longer works as extra alorn and, instead, is bundled with effects that decrease damage taken from specific zones.
Miscellaneous Changes
Rerolling challenges - it’s the end of repeating instances. After a reroll, the challenge goes to the end of the queue and you won’t get it again until the challenge pool is exhausted (or you complete a challenge). Just remember that the cost of rerolling increases up to a point with subsequent rerolls (the first two are free).
Pierce Doll - we want to normalize the damage of all debuffers, so the skill will deal less damage than before. In addition to that, we decided to also decrease its accuracy after PTR2.
Elemental drifs will be slightly nerfed - the initial value of extra damage will be decreased from 0.5% to 0.35% and their level scaling will also be lowered from 0.5% to 0.35%. They should still be worth it but not dominant.
Build presets - a new, long-awaited feature! Now you’ll be able to save the distribution of attributes and skills so that you can easily switch between different builds. The cost of resetting stays the same.
After PTR1, we added the possibility to buy reset subscriptions - separate ones for skills and attributes. After PTR2, we went a step further: we lowered the price of those buffs to 260 platinum and also introduced a combined buff, for both skills and attributes, for 450 platinum. The prices above are promotional and they’ll stay that way for now (for an indefinite time).
You’ll also see packages of reset tokens in the store which will allow you to buy several of them at a discount. Changing your build will have one limitation - you can’t do it inside an instance.
Instances and QoL Changes
Greater Hawk and Wendigo will get their own instances accessible during dynamic events, so you’ll have more opportunities to get their rare loot. After PTR2, we have also increased the number of entry items that you can get during the second stage of the event. Don’t worry, the Greater Hawk and Wendigo spawning randomly in various areas aren’t going anywhere - this feature will stay as it is.
As for Daily Quests, we’ve improved their profitability just like on the PTR.
Many of you will surely be happy that we’re removing weight from instance entry items (Crampons, Rings of Transportation, Time Crystals, and Time Slivers) that cannot be put in the deposit. After the PTR, we increased their limit from 30 to 50.
Draugul and Tarul entry items will see bigger changes - we’re splitting them. Now there’ll be two different items with separate reset timer and cost. In the case of Draugul (Time Crystal), the cost will be lower.
As for Tarul (Time Sliver):
- you will now be able to buy single slivers instead of packs of 5
- we’ll keep the increasing cost, but the maximum price will be reached on the third sliver
- crampons will no longer be required to enter the instance (in exchange, buying Time Slivers will now have a gold cost)
What about entry items from before the update? After all, some of you might have bought Time Crystals to go to Tarul. On the other hand, those who have already exchanged them for Time Slivers would greatly benefit from this since Crampons are no longer required. To balance this, we’re introducing “old” and “new” slivers - the ones you currently have in your backpacks will become old ones and you won’t be able to use them to enter Tarul. We’ll also spawn an NPC in Beirn who will, among others, exchange them for new ones. The NPC will have the two options below and will disappear on January 9th, 2026.
- Time Crystals can be exchanged for 5 new Time Slivers if you also give him Crampons and 100k gold (meaning at the previous instance entry cost) - thanks to this, you'll be able to exchange all the Time Crystals you have at the moment of the update.
- Old Time Slivers can be exchanged for new ones if you also give him Crampons.
And that’s all as far as big changes and fixes go. As you can see, many things were tweaked and some new features will stay with us permanently. As always, you’ll be able to see more details and a full list of changes in the changelog. We’ll publish it on the day of the update.
