Many of you are excited about Survival, and as am I. But do you really understand what the point is to Survival? What will make you want to keep fighting?
For some of you it'll be for the sake of fighting -- these mobs are superpowered mobs from the average sectors, with higher stats than you could imagine. There's also plenty to spare, testing your skill to the death.
But for the rest of you, it'll be for the new Tier armor. This armor consists of literally 45 new sets being added into the game. All custom, all good looking.
I felt I'd let you all know how these Tiers are going to work. It's actually rather simple.
First off, I'll have to explain how Survival works. This is my first in-depth explanation of Survival. Survival works a LOT like Sector. In some maps you will have multiples "zones". A zone is an area where you must kill all mobs to continue. However, mobs are much stronger and they're much more numerous than any given normal sector. Zones are completely custom and tested. On the final zone, every mob respawns upon death. They respawn with the same stats they had when they spawned normally. At this point, the goal is to fight off as many superpowered mobs as you can, to the death.
All HPs and RBs are disabled for the mode, and there are no random drops. Item boxes and barrels are a thing of the past -- you will never encounter either of them in Survival mode.
Knowing how Survival works allows for understanding the drop method. There are three Tiers of armors available from Survival. Each Tier is stronger than the last, in an order somewhat following this: Tier 1 =< +2-3, Tier 2 =< +4-5, Tier 3 =< +7-8. This makes Tier 3 the strongest armor in the game. The catch? It's extremely hard to come by. Tiers begin to drop at x amount of kills (x is determined by the map). At x kills, Tier 1 will begin to drop. X is, say, 50. Generally it's whenever you'd get to the end zone, but this is not a consistent case. Then, at y kills, Tier 2 will begin to drop, but Tier 1 will also drop, making Tier 1 the common drop and Tier 2 the rarer drop. Y is, say, 100. It means you've survived the final zone for quite awhile. Then, the final Tier, Tier 3 will begin to drop at z kills. At z kills, Tier 1, 2 and 3 will all drop -- but Tier 3 will still be a rarity. The kill determination is not group-wide. It's determined by the player who made the kill. As a result, it means you as a player will have to kill x, y, or z mobs for that reward to drop, and it's free-for-all at that point. In addition, only "boss" mobs will drop the boxes, like always. However, they're pretty plentiful -- you'll have no troubles with that.
Tier items are designed to be an achievement, as well as something to aim for at a higher level. As such, they are untradeable, even to someone who could have potentially received that box. Survival mode works much different than the normal Sector -- the differences follow:
-Survival can be accessed by {s} in a sector room
-Survival can only be started if every player in the room is >= the survival level
-Survival does not have an end, even if you manage to wipe out every mob (only really possible in Survival Level 1)
-Every Survival map has a timer of 99 minutes
Similar to sector, however, mobs will be stronger depending on how many players are in the room, and plenty of other sector-like qualities.
We strongly hope you guys are as excited for Survival as we are. We had a lot of fun making this new mode, and we can't wait to see you guys have fun enjoying it.
In other news, for those of you who decided to read, we're releasing Easy/Medium/Hard modes in addition to this Survival update. All sectors will have the ability to be switched to Medium or Hard mode using the {m} or {h} qualifiers. Easy is the default without a qualifier. Easy/Medium/Hard modes are functional on all Sectors and all Survival maps, and medium mode gives an additional 50% EXP, gigas and coins while hard mode gives an additional 100% EXP, gigas and coins. This has been a relatively hidden update for awhile simply due to its non-importance when compared to Survival mode.
I'll answer any questions here personally guys. But before you ask, we do not have a set release date for Survival yet -- we are waiting on Meteor to finish all the Tier sets. If he finishes this weekend, the release may be Sunday or Monday night. We will not set another date in case we need to break it again.