New World Adjusts Progression Changes, Won't Nerf Players' Gear

When the changes to New World's endgame progression were announced a few days ago, they went over as well as any changes to endgame progression typically go for an MMORPG that's been out for less than three months -- in other words, not well at all. In this case, it wasn't so much the different process by which players would achieve power in the future, but the fact that gear that players had already worked to obtain would be nerfed.

Realizing its mistake, Amazon Games has backtracked somewhat on its plans. In a forum post today, developer Zin_Ramu stated that "Gear Score scaling will only apply to items sold or traded after that patch. So any items obtained prior to this patch will not be impacted or reduced in any way." He called the reduction of power for existing players "unacceptable" and realizes that the dev team was "wrong" to think that players would be all right with a temporary reduction in power.

Crafted items will also be exempt from the changes, for players who don't want to engage in the Expertise system. In addition, the Gear Score reduction will be set to a midpoint between your character's Expertise and the GS of a weapon you obtain: "So if your Musket Expertise is 520 and you buy a 600 GS Musket off the market, your effective GS will be 560."

In better news, the public test realm is doing its job, as Zin_Ramu said that would be a number of balance changes coming to the new Gypsum system based on feedback from the PTR. All of the listed changes seem to make the system friendlier for players, such as by reducing crafting costs and cooldowns. At this point, "New World" shouldn't just refer to the game itself, but to where the developers find themselves, as they keep discovering new and clever ways to antagonize their player base.