Executive Producer Addresses Class Balance, PvP, Progression & the Vision of Change

The latest Black Desert Online community producer's letter has been published that contains a wide variety of information about recent missteps by the development team with regard to communication with the player base, as well as information about how development will be moving forward. Several key issues of concern from the community are addressed including PvP, progression, class balance and upcoming changes to the Node/Conquest system.

The letter begins with a brief discussion of what makes BDO special, but also admits that the team has been most concerned with maintaining the status quo than in making some of the improvements needed in the game.

The first area that came into a weekly update was an attempt to "lessen the gap cased by Grapple, Super Armor, Invincibility, Guard and dash skills whilst allowing ease in controls and combos to bring about the pure fun in combat". The changes, however, were not well-received and the team will be spending the next 30 days making adjustments and paying "extra attention in dealing with class balance". In addition, more open communication will be taking place between devs and players.

The letter goes on to discuss the reasons for the recent addition of the Renown System:

Our goal is to allow our adventurers to reach the so-called “soft cap” in equipment with more ease and interest, through either loot or other methods. We also aim to facilitate the process of obtaining equipment beyond the “soft cap” gears easier than the status quo.

Renown Score was a change to take part in this. We wanted to compensate the adventurers who had overcome the risk of Enhancement and spent millions of Silvers while growing their characters. We also wanted to reduce the instances where adventurers would get killed instantly no matter how good their equipment was due to a slight mistake in PvP. Despite our intentions, the gap in PvP balance has deepened and we sincerely apologize for causing so much concern to our adventurers.

Lastly, Competitive Node/Conquest systems will be undergoing change, though not until after the previously mentioned systems are updated. 

You can read the full letter on the Black Desert Online site.

Thanks, WNxbadboy3!