Posted by PrintsKaspian (Source)

We've been hinting at the next major update for Albion Online for some time now... and in our latest Dev Talk, Game Director Robin Henkys finally makes it official!

Prefer a written summary? Then read on...

First Up: Patch 13

The next Balance Patch in early February adjusts combat balance values, adds a new ability for Maces, and updates some combat abilities. These changes address the meta in Corrupted Dungeons, improving the balance of different builds in 1v1 and small-group PvP.

In addition, this patch will bring the long awaited “Use All” button for bags and Tomes, improvements to Avalonian enemies, and limiting the ability to set a "Home" at Hideouts to those owned by your guild, or Level 3 Hideouts owned by your alliance.

Next Update: Call to Arms

As the Season builds up to its finale, we’re preparing to release the next big content update for Albion Online: Call to Arms. Public playtesting is expected to begin in mid-February, and in the coming weeks we'll release more Dev Talks.

Here's an overview of what this update will bring:

Faction Warfare 2.0

Call to Arms will focus on introducing the next stage of City Faction Warfare, including:

• Ability to control entire regions
• A front-line battle system that encourages competing Factions to fight in the same regions
• Rewards for loyalty to a city, with points for both attacking enemies and defending owned regions
• Monthly Faction Campaigns with valuable rewards
• Powerful new Faction Mounts
• A new Faction offering a unique playstyle for advanced players, including its own Faction cape and mount

Alongside these changes, we’re expanding the Royal Continent and adding a recurring Faction Warfare event in the center of the continent to encourage high-stakes conflict. In our next Dev Talks, we’ll go in-depth with this system, and explore the opportunities it offers veteran players and beginners alike.

Hellgates Re-Envisioned

The second major gameplay feature in Call to Arms is a massive improvement of Hellgates, including:

• 10v10 Hellgates for mid-sized PvP at any time
• Significant improvements to Hellgate graphics and gameplay
• A large variety of new Hellgate layouts
• A new and improved matchmaking system
• A “rising lava” mechanic to prevent stalling strategies
• Inclusion of many of the demonic creatures introduced with Corrupted Dungeons
• A Hellgate Infamy system, allowing players to improve their rewards and measure their success against others

This overhaul of Hellgates aims to address gameplay concerns brought to us by longtime players, as well as open one of Albion’s most exciting PvP features to more players. We'll have a full Dev Talk on the new Hellgates soon.

Additional Features

Call to Arms will also include a moving-vegetation graphics upgrade to bring plants to life, plus two major convenience improvements: improved Ability Tooltips and Loadouts.

The new Tooltips make understanding and comparing different spells and abilities much easier, as all spells will have colored tags and reworked descriptions to improve readability.

Loadouts will let players save equipment sets to quick-equip from bank chests and battle vaults. Loadouts can be shared with other players via chat or ingame mail, and made available to guilds to help recruit new players into specific roles. The feature can also be used to strategize about builds via a preview of the stats and estimated cost of a Loadout. We’re also working on quick-buy of saved Loadouts, which we hope to release in a patch shortly after the update.

We'll explore all these features in-depth in more Dev Talks over the coming weeks, so stay tuned!