Wasteland Gazette

Grom no longer takes a prisoner at face value. He questions them first.

• Where they come from. A prisoner remembers the group of the enemy you bound: Reptilian, bandit and raider, or a survivor forced to fight for the Reptilians.
• Different questioning. Each group gets its own interrogation report. Bandits turn out to be bandits, madmen or collaborators.
• Nothing is locked. Hand over, sell, gift and bulk delivery still work for every prisoner. The group changes what Grom says and how he says it.

Grom has a past, and he opens up to people he trusts.

• Talk. Four topics unlock as your standing grows: Stranger, Contractor, Partner and Confidant. The first talk each day earns affinity.
• Quiet Aid. Bring medicine, food and herbs. Grom never says where they go, but the more you bring, the more he gives back.
• Pit upgrades. Reinforced Cells and the Medic Corner raise what every laborer produces. The Interrogation Room pays in loot and doubles camp intel.

Every line Grom says in the Labor Pits now has its own voice-over, from his greeting to his verdict on a bandit. If you miss one, the replay button plays it again. The voice stops the moment you leave the pit.

The Sector Server Chat now follows you around the game.

• Online from login. You show up on the ONLINE NOW list the moment you log in, not only after you open the chat.
• DM alerts everywhere. A pop-up appears on any screen when someone messages you, and a small pill stays on screen until you read it.
• While you were offline. Messages sent while you were away are waiting at your next login, with a summary of who wrote and how many times.
• Delete a conversation. Every DM in the sidebar has a red X, and an open DM has a delete button. Deleted chats stay deleted.

Cerberus is the cybernetic form of your K9, so he no longer joins the squad as a second dog. Buy him and he takes the K9's slot.

• Shift button. The Cerberus card now has a switch, like the ExoFrame skin: switch to the regular K9 and he takes the slot back, switch to Cerberus and he replaces the K9 again.

Vex, Rust and Kilo were answering every single message. Now they answer when you ask. A question, a topic or their name gets an instant reply. Greetings and small talk only get one now and then, and players chatting with each other are left in peace.

Friendly duels count. Win and your Arena rating goes up, lose and it drops, with the same rating rules as the Ghost Arena. Both fighters also get the Arena scrip reward. Duels do not touch the Ghost Arena cooldowns or its daily limit. The Ghost Arena stays limited, because it can be farmed. Duels need two people to agree, so they have no daily cap. The same two survivors can only fight again after 5 minutes, so the channel stays readable.

When Cipher releases Shaft B-12, you have exactly three steps south to reach the exit before the tunnels purge everything. A pop-up tells you, and a counter stays on screen. Ignore the warning and take a fourth step, and you die. You get one respawn at camp. The second time is real permadeath. We are serious about permadeath in this game.

Every named boss and mini-boss now ends with a victory card of its own, with its own colour, headline and closing line. Foreman Kruk, the Zmora, Lady Midday, High Overseer Sszakar-Aten and ten more. Winning a big fight finally feels like winning a big fight.

In Polish mode some buttons could stop working, like the Sanctuary Hub in Camp. Language switching no longer touches the game's inner workings, so every button goes where it should.

Every fight now plays out on one widescreen stage. You and your ally stand on the left, the enemy squad on the right, over the background of the place where the fight started. Your combat log, your target and your actions all sit on the same screen, and it fits your window with no scrolling, sidebar open or closed. Click an enemy portrait to switch targets. Prefer the old layout? A CLASSIC VIEW button is always one click away.

Distance matters now. Charge to close in or Pull Back to open the gap, for 1 AP each.

• Ranged weapons hit harder from far away and weaker up close.
• Melee weapons can only strike at close range, so get in there.
• Melee enemies, like wolves and butchers, run at you. They charge across the open ground, then lunge before they reach full strength.
• Ranged enemies keep shooting, but lose some punch when you stay far.

Your companion is no longer just a gun beside you. Spend 1 AP to send them forward and they step up toward the enemy line, drawing most of the fire while you shoot from behind. Or recall them to play support, and now you are the one taking the hits. You choose who tanks.

A new card in Camp: the PvP Arena. Pick a survivor from the list and fight a ghost duel against their saved character, with the gear, talents and stats they actually carry. They do not need to be online. Wins and losses move you on the Ladder, so you can see exactly who rules the sector. This is the first step. Live duels are something we want to build next.

A special event boss that rewards patience, not power. Bebok has 100,000 HP but hits for only 1 to 2 damage, and he is the same on every level. Take as long as you like. He cannot be bound with rope. Bring him down and he always drops the one and only Godlike Bebok's Scrap Pack, a backpack worth 1000 kg of carry weight. It exists nowhere else and never drops from normal loot. Bored mid fight? You can leave whenever you want.

On a High Heat day, going out in the open at noon or in the afternoon with thirst below 60% can end badly. Your vision blurs, a pale figure shimmers on the road, and Lady Midday comes for you with a thermal sickle that cuts straight through armor. You can drink and clear your head, hide in the shade until dusk, or stand and fight. Watch her sickle: she raises it one round and strikes the next. Cover softens the blow. Indoor trips like bunkers and clinics are safe from her.

Called shots are finally worth their 2 AP.

• Arm Shot. A hit cripples the enemy's aim: for 2 rounds its attacks miss 50% of the time.
• Leg Shot. A hit hobbles the target for 2 rounds: melee enemies cannot close in and everything it does hits 40% weaker. A melee target is also knocked back, pushing the fight one range step farther away.

The Defense Walls, Medical Infirmary, Workshop, Scrap Pit and Wasteland Bar screens had big blank gaps between the banner, the titles, the status panels and the cards. Those are gone, and the building cards now fill their rows evenly.

Every piece of advice Trader Kaelen (or the Wasteland Bar) sells now does something, and the screen tells you what.

• Rad-storm warning: a Rad-Storm hits the next morning. Open-air trips cost 2 Medicine (radiation meds) or 20% max HP and stamina. Tunnels and Bunker are safe, fishing and hunting are closed.
• Convoys, traps, barricades, labor, road offers, hunting and bosses: each tip gives a short bonus, such as a free wall patch, 40% cheaper road offers, extra meat and wood, or 25% more damage to bosses.

A new contract from the Shady Informant. In the flooded swamps of the Silesian Park lives Utopek-7, a mutated amphibian in a red miner's helmet, guarding an old Water Purification Pump. You choose how this ends. Trade and feed him filter cloth and rations and he dredges up rare loot from the swamp. Or take the water by force: he spits armor-ignoring bio-acid and can drag you under to drown you, until you break free. Win, and the pump is yours, adding clean water to your base every single day.

Nobody could tell you what a Global Broadcast Pass was, so now the survivors can. Ask around in Sector Chat and the NPCs will explain it, and the Broadcast window and its sidebar tooltip now say what a pass does and how you earn one.