Next Patch on PC Will Bring Everfrost, Queue and Overflow Bag Changes

We normally do not cover regular patches extensively around here. Next Thursday however has some surprises in store that we quickly want to preview. Bad news first: The crashes are still not fully fixed, but quite a lot of other interesting stuff made it to the build. The Guardian Fighter’s Protector capstone was fixed for example and the active bonus of the Young Yeti is finally working. There are a bunch of other smaller changes, so make sure to read through the notes!

30% free Everfrost Resistance?

When logging onto existing chars on preview that have done the introductory quests of Storm Kings Thunder, they are going to find a mail from Duvessa Shane in their mailbox. Attached is a “Periapt of Everfrost Resistance” that goes to the “Useful Items” tab and grants 30% Everfrost Resistance permanently. That does not only instantly cover the queue requirements for Svardborg and Fangbreaker Island, an additional 30% resistance obviously also makes running the content a lot easier. Characters that struggled might now face much less challenge. And endgame geared toons are able to get to the 80% resistance cap.

This is a major game-changer in Storm Kings Thunder content, but in line of what the devs said about the system. Just like Black Ice Resistance, the Everfrost requirement was not planned to stick around forever. Players on our message board tossed in the possibility that it could be a preview only item for testing purposes by the way. Those however are normally granted through a special vendor, not the mail system. And well, it’s in the patch notes. So we currently expect it to be legit.

Queue Changes

The queue is another big area that gets an improvement. Next to quite a few quality of life stuff, the key change of the system is different item level requirements for public and private queues. The overall consensus was that groups at the minimum requirement had no real shot at making the dungeon. That’s why those item levels have been increased. On the other hand competent and well set up groups should be able to get into dungeons earlier. So item levels for private queues were significantly lowered.

In theory it’s a great change, but it might not change the queue dynamic too much. Players that were primarily using private channels to get into groups have no incentive to stop. For most the requirements for public groups are probably still too loose to really solo queue into a dungeon and expect a smooth run. But it’s absolutely a step into the right direction. Players always have questioned the accuracy of queue requirements and will probably be pleased to see adjustments.

Overflow Bag

There have always been certain restriction for having items in overflow bags. You couldn’t invoke for example or open certain boxes. Now these restrictions are severely enlarged. Strings in the game files indicate that several actions are now impossible with a certain amount of items in the overflow bag. You can’t queue with more than ten items for example, other players reported there’s also a restriction on travelling.

• You have more than {value} items in your overflow bag. Please clear the bag before proceeding gameplay.
• {MemberName}@{MemberHandle} cannot queue with more than {Value} items in his overflow bag.
• You cannot queue with more than {Value} items in your overflow bag.
• Requires less than {Value} items in overflow bag

The official reason for this is lag by the way. We don’t want to get too conspiratorial here, but the devs probably also didn’t like that overflow slots were used as free extension of the bag space, which is largely something you need to buy for real money in the game. Anyway, the everyday impact on most players should be low.

That’s our short message from the preview server folks. Tell us what you think about the changes in the comments below or visit the corresponding thread on our message board!

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