New World Gives A Behind The Scenes Look At Artifacts And Answers Questions About Balance

Hey there New World fans. There was a lot of info dumped on us today about our favorite MMORPG with a behind-the-scenes look at Artifacts and this week's episode of Forged in Aeternum which may be good news for those who weren't crazy about the shirking heals nerf.

First up, Artifacts. The goal with Artifacts was pretty obvious; offer unique playstyle alternatives, and improve underutilized or unenjoyable options. The design process for Artifacts in New World begins with rough themes and different ideas for perks. Many changes are made throughout the development process. For instance, Scorpion's Sting had a prototype version that could pull enemies far behind you if you were close enough, even over cliffs.

Balance is created with the ideas of versatility and viability. First, it is determined if an Artifact will be heavily used, then they use data plus player feedback to gauge which Artifacts are more or less favorable. Finally, they are balanced based on pairings of other items.

At the end of the day, Artifacts are supposed to be fun encouragement to try things outside of the normal builds.

Today we also got a Q&A video from the New World devs. One of the most interesting answers they give is in response to balance changes. They want to make balance changes more frequently, which they have begun doing, but they may have overdone it a bit on things like the Shirking Heals nerf. Look for that to be walked back a little bit in a future balance change.

The New World devs also feel that they've done a good job of making the MMO a little more casual friendly. There are grinds in the game, but they are much quicker now than they used to be, and that is intended.

There was a lot of talk about the economy as well. Everybody in the game, especially the casuals we mentioned above, are having a hard time making gold. Gold is definitely hard to come by in New World. The devs address many of these questions in the Q&A video below.