Hey everyone, Pappy here!

It’s been a little while since my last update, so I figured it was about to time to reach out again, take a look back at 2016, and provide some teasers for what’s coming up next for WildStar.

First and foremost, let’s talk about Redmoon Mutiny—the second phase of WildStar’s latest raid, Redmoon Terror. It was released November 16, and I’ve had a great time watching our raiders jump in and go toe-to-toe with some of our most memorable and challenging bosses to-date. I’d like to give a big shout-out to Raid Designer Tyler Fuchs (CRB_Tyrius) and the rest of the WildStar team for delivering such a great experience, and another big shout to Codex for their world-first kill on Laveka the Dark-Hearted. Since then, we’ve had a number of guilds clear the raid, with many more in-progress. I also think that it’s important to note that we just recently dropped the faction barrier when creating groups for instanced content (including raids), as well as for social systems like circles and housing—allowing all of you to play together regardless of whether you’re an Exile fighting for your new home, or defending your galactic legacy as a proud Dominion citizen. Along with these tasty morsels, we’ve also enjoyed the spooky celebrations of this year’s Shade’s Eve, the dangerous delights of another Dungeon Chase, and the exciting exploits of this past weekend’s Double XP X-Plosion—and in just a few weeks we’ll all be enjoying the capitalist kookiness of Protostar’s Gala Winterfest Extravaganza once again!

Looking back, it’s been a pretty big year for WildStar. Since January, we’ve released Destination Arcterra, continued our World Story in Vault of the Archon, streamlined our tutorial experience, successfully launched WildStar on Steam, given our players new and exciting character features with Heroes Evolved, released a brand new raid with Redmoon Terror, and then finished it with the recent release of Redmoon Mutiny. We also started our DevConnect series back in March, which has resulted in some great discussions among our passionate community members, and brought a number of big improvements to the game—including the faction barrier changes, additional race/class combinations, and enhancements to make WildStar more alt-friendly. All of these changes and additions have been focused on two things: continuing to provide our players with new and exciting adventures on Nexus, and making WildStar more fun, friendly, and accessible to everyone. We’ve made some great strides this year on both fronts, but we have a lot more in store for the future.

Over the last year, the WildStar team has been asking some important questions about our game and the direction that we want to take it. What is the best way to provide our players with compelling and meaningful character progression? Do our players feel adequately (and appropriately) rewarded for the time they spend in our game? What new experiences should we create, and how can we give continued relevance to all of our existing content? With these questions in mind, the team has been working on a number of exciting features for WildStar, along with some brand new content that will take players to exciting (and dangerous) places, both on and off planet Nexus. We’re looking forward to sharing more with you in the next few weeks—so stay tuned!

As always, I want to give a huge thank you to the WildStar community! As I said before, we’ve had a big year, and it’s because of you that WildStar only continues to get better and better.

See you all on Nexus!

Pappy

An unnaturally-vibrant array of Gummilynx mounts are now available on the In-Game Store! These floating, gelatinous creatures would be right at home in a gingerbread house, or maybe a housing plot movie theater. The Rapple color is unique to our Signature members as a special limited time preview, but the other Bingberry, Concord, and Loppfruit variations are available for everyone—and (while we don’t condone taking bites of your Gummilynx) will inevitably get caught in your teeth.




You’ve come to know and love the seasonal topiary décor bundles, but everyone knows the winter version is the only one that matters. You’ve painstakingly turned your housing plot into a snow-covered hotel, gone to great lengths to model its elevator full of blood, and taken a shine to its important ballroom bar and food storage lockers, but now—today—you can finally recreate those final terrifying scenes in a frigid topiary maze. You’re welcome, universe.

• Launch the game
  
• Click on the Phineas icon on the bottom left, or press the letter “U” on your keyboard

Most everything on the store can be purchased using either OmniBits (a free currency earned in-game alongside XP) or Protobucks, so get your Protostar-approved items today!


All this icing looking pretty sweet? Then dive in today and get yourself a galaxy-sized slice of WildStar cake—no subscription required.

Put on your game faces people. It's time to be a player versus other players! “Power, Prestige, and PvP!” is a limited-time bonus event that doubles the rate you earn Prestige. Which isn’t, like it may sound, indicative of your recognition among the local monocle-laden nobility—no, in WildStar Prestige is PvP currency.

From December 9 at 2am PST until 11:59pm PST on December 12, you’ll earn Prestige twice as fast.

You can queue for Battlegrounds starting at level 6 through the Content Finder (press the N key), or you can start an Arena team for practice or ranked matches, which begin at level 30 and 50 respectively. You can even take party in the most dangerous game of all: world PvP. Keep in mind that full social leadership options (such as the ability to invite others to social groups, like Guilds or Arena teams) require Signature status, or reaching the 1,600 Cosmic Point reward.

Be sure to keep an eye on your Prestige—it caps at 12,000 points until you spend some. Visit the vendor regularly in Thayd (for Exiles) or Illium (if you're with the Dominion) to spend your Prestige regularly and wisely, and you can keep dominating the unlucky chuckleheads that made the mistake of going toe-to-toe with you.

See you on the Nexus battlefield!

In this latest edition of the series we’re shining a spotlight on Australian guild The Timeless. Whenever they’re not engaging IRL “drop bears” in hand-to-hand combat, these lovable lads and lasses can be found blasting their way through Redmoon Terror at times nearly 20 hours ahead of us Carbine folks on the U.S. west coast. For this reason we consider The Timeless to literally be a guild of the future, and therefore popped down under for a chat with their guild leader, Drenaka.


Tell us a little bit about the formation and foundation of The Timeless.

The Timeless is an Australian/Oceanic time zone guild on Exile Entity (U.S.) currently focused on progression raiding in Redmoon Terror. We started out when the game launched as a group of friends mostly on the east coast of Australia—and some late-night Americans coming from other games looking to try WildStar—and quickly grew with players doing housing, dungeons, and eventually raids. During this time we gained more players from Australia and New Zealand, and so started considering ourselves an Australian/Oceanic guild and suited our activities around the GMT+10 time zone.

When did you first start actively raiding in WildStar and what drew you into the game’s raid scene?

The Timeless started forming our raid team around September 2014. Initially our team was small and changed frequently, until we found a good mix of classes. The primary drive for the group of current players is the engaging and challenging content that WildStar provides, and the unparalleled combat system.

Another drive for us is we like proving people wrong that tell us "You can't do that." :) When we started there was an idea in the community that if you weren't in America, you wouldn't be able to do the endgame content because of latency, and we wanted to show that this game could be fully enjoyed no matter where in the world you resided!

As guild leader, how do you go about keeping members happy, choosing officers, maintaining a raid schedule/roster, making steady progress on boss encounters, and everything else that comes with the title?

Our guild has a wide variety of play styles and balancing those does sometimes cause disagreements; but thankfully our members understand that we are a small community and need to work together so we don't have too many disputes. In officers, we look for people who are interested in helping out, but it's more of a formality as most of our discussions are held in the open with contributions from all. Our raid schedule has been fairly fixed over our history, and our roster has been primarily made up of a strong core with several helpers that we call on when needed. Amongst our core, some of our members participate in other raids and bring that experience to us to work into our strategies, which usually have to be adjusted from the “meta” to factor in our higher latency. Previously we have used spreadsheets to manage fights and rosters, but have recently been moving away from them as we found them to be excessive to maintain for our style. :)

What is your most memorable boss kill and why?

Our most memorable boss kill would almost certainly be Avatus. It was a long road with many challenges and struggles along the way, and so when it finally died the joy in voice channels was immense—that a pink dropped on our first kill was the super fancy icing on the already-amazing cake!

What do you think of Redmoon Terror so far and what boss are you currently working on?

We’re currently working on Engineers and have been very close to downing them in our last few attempts, and should be getting that kill very soon. In general, Redmoon Terror has been fun for us. As the content is quite fresh with new mechanics that have not been seen before, it's been highly engaging for a lot of our older members, especially with the focus on more individual responsibility.

Editor’s Note: Following this interview, The Timeless took down Engineers on Monday, November 28. Congrats!

Do you consider your guild to be tight-knit friends and family, or did you all largely meet in the game?

Most of us met each other for the first time in-game. Some members have been friends from other games or joined together as real-life friends (or family in some cases!). Over time we’ve grown close and even play other games together during downtimes or off-raid nights. Recently we used PAX Australia as a reason to hold a guild meetup for past and present guild members, which resulted in people flying in from all over the country to attend!

Do you accept new members often (including casual players and non-raiders)? If so, what do you look for in candidates and how can one apply to become a member?

We are always accepting of new people who are friendly and keen to become part of the community. While our focus is on raiding, we do have several people who do housing and other non-raid PvE and some PvP content, so are very open in who we accept.

For raiders, we look for people who are willing to learn and can make our times, which are based around the GMT+10 time zone. We prefer people who choose classes they are comfortable with, while also filling any gaps we see occurring in encounters. If you wish to join us you can contact any of our members, or use our google form linked on the official WildStar website.

Finally, for the sake of being thorough, do you accept members from locales outside Oceania?

While a large amount of our guild is Australian, we accept members from around the globe, and have people from Southeast Asia, America, and Europe raiding regularly with us. We like to keep our Mates Per Second high, and will suitably warn you of the dangers of drop bears and other important Australian facts. ;)

Thank you for your time and good luck on Engineers, Mordechai, and the challenges that await The Timeless in Redmoon Mutiny. Cheerio, mates!


If you’re a guild leader interested in having the spotlight shone on your guild next, visit our official forums for more info on how to apply.

For a limited-time Protostar will match your experience point for point, which means you earn twice the XP every time you earn XP during this special event. The XP X-Plosion runs from November 24 at 2am PST until 11:59pm PST on November 28.

Keep in mind that the double XP from this Double XP X-Plosion! event stacks with the bonuses from Signature, and Signature offers a ton of other great benefits too—including new monthly login rewards!

We recommend maximizing Protostar’s very generous Double XP X-Plosion! by tackling adventures, expeditions, and dungeons, which you can queue for by using the Content Finder (N). Already level 50? During the event you can earn Elder Gems twice as fast to purchase items like Ability or AMP points. When you hit the weekly cap of 350 Elder Gems, your XP is converted to gold. It’s a good time to make good use of your time!


Don’t have any WildStar characters yet? The Double XP X-Plosion! event is the perfect time to start, and it’s completely free!

Signature Preview



If there’s one thing any trickster daredevil on Nexus might feel is missing from their hoverboard: wheels. Tack on a couple pairs, grease up the ball bearings for pure speed, and you’ll be ready to ride the rails of nostalgia in no time! Starting to wonder why wheels are necessary on a board that hovers in midair? Well, stop thinking so much, ‘cause this Skate-or-Die Hoverboard also comes stacked with fire-breathing exhaust pipes! Again you ask why? Reasons, outrageous reasons!


You’ve scoured the galaxy in search of mythical menaces. You’ve protected the common folk from threats of bloodthirsty, mangy canids—or so the Protostar would have us believe. You’ve even gone so far as to muddy the realm of scientific fact with questionable urban legend. And now you can wear the proof! Certainly not a fabricated fad piece sitting in piles at every opportunist’s souvenir shop, the Chompushanka Hat lets everyone know you’ve encountered the fabled beast and lived to wear it’s head on your head!




Autumn is so on-fleek right now, and there’s no better way to represent than by dying your battle-worn wares in a shade best described as “dead leaf.” Pick up the Luminous Ocher Dye to send a message to allies and enemies alike that you’re a true hero who always runs toward a bloodied fray, and also that you’re partial to adorning yourself with earthy pigments.

• Launch the game
  
• Click on the Phineas icon on the bottom left, or press the letter “U” on your keyboard

Most everything on the store can be purchased using either OmniBits (a free currency earned in-game alongside XP) or Protobucks, so get your Protostar-approved items today!


All this icing looking pretty sweet? Then dive in today and get yourself a galaxy-sized slice of WildStar cake—no subscription required.

Signature Preview



When putting a saddle on a battle-ravaged Girrok doesn’t quite convey just how tough and tumble you are, go ahead and tame one of these beasts that’s also fused to the bone with loftite. Not only will you look pretty menacing atop this freak of nature, you might dampen the knickers of nearby opponents. For a limited time this new mount is available only to Signature Members.


Signature Preview



Brave the wilds in space-aged tribal gear, and show all beasts and enemy combatants that you’re made for the most extreme living. Pick up the Trappers Togs available for a limited time only to Signature Members.




It’s time to fully embrace the magic of the season and its ever-turning autumn shades. Cozy up on an inviting park bench and enjoy this Fall Park FABkit for your housing plot, complete with quaint lamp, available to everyone on the In-Game Store.




If you’ve already decked out your home with faction pride, maybe it’s time to consider inviting some friendly folk to loiter about your land. Show your respective superiors that you’re more than willing to host some civilians by picking up the Exile and/or Dominion Citizen Sampler Packs, now off Signature Preview and available to everyone on the In-Game Store.




It’s time for Madame Fay to swap up her available mounts, and the copper variant of the Skelocirex is now in stock and available to the fortunate among you. As a reminder, this update replaces the chrome variant in the Madame Fay Fortunes. With the next refresh all three color variants will be available for a limited time, which you can collect and turn in for the ultra-rare tar version.

We’ve updated the Enemies and Allies section of Loremageddon with a new story on Laveka the Dark-Hearted. This nefarious Necroshaman is the mastermind behind the events unfolding in the upcoming Redmoon Mutiny update, and aboard the Redmoon Terror itself.

Visit the Enemies and Allies section of Loremageddon, and keep checking back as we continue to add new iconic character bios and backstories. But you don’t have to wait on these updates to learn more about WildStar; there is a metric ton of lore and story in-game, and you can play it now—for free!

The Big Game Hunters of Nexus have been stalking the wild beasts and challenging the nastiest depths of this mysterious, treasure-filled planet for years now, and they simply don't have enough room to store all the amazing loot they've accumulated. But they can't just give these amazing rewards away to anyone who hasn't earned them. They've established the Dungeon Chase so dungeon delvers from all over the galaxy can prove their worth and earn amazing items themed around dungeon mainstays like the Osun, the Torine Swordmaidens, and the Protostar Corporation. And remember, during this event you can set your sights cross-faction to help fill out your dungeon group.

By completing dungeons during the Dungeon Chase event you’ll earn Small Game Scraps you can exchange for Big Game Bucks with Exchanger Gigax. And like their name implies, Big Game Bucks are used to buy all sorts of limited-time housing plot décor pieces from his partner, Collector Davarn. Both Exchanger Gigax and Collector Davarn can be found in the capital cities.

Of course good ol’ Protobucks or OmniBits can be used to buy Big Game Bucks in bundles from the In-Game Store, as well as two unique Dungeon Cases only available during select times of the event. Dungeon Cases might contain housing plot décor pieces, in addition to other exclusive rewards like the Striped Torine Pumera mount or Striped Torine Swordkitten pet (both new to this Dungeon Chase), or one of the Dungeon Crawler décor NPCs decked out in stunning Osun armor. Collector Davarn also offers crates of randomly assorted Protostar-themed Proto-Tector décor NPCs for your Big Game Bucks.




In case you’re wondering what happened to the Proto Case from the previous Dungeon Chase, this time around the following items can be purchased with Big Game Bucks directly from Collector Davarn:

• 1 of 7 pieces from the Protostar décor set
  
• Housing Supervisor NPC
  
• Protostar Drillbot NPC
  
• 1 random NPC décor from a large grab bag containing Housing Supervisor, Protostar Drillbot, and Dungeon Crawler NPCs
  
• "ProtoSwing Dance Time" Music Track

November 11–14, 17–21

Each opened Swordmaiden Case is guaranteed to give you currency (either gold or Service Tokens) and has a chance to drop one of the following:

• 1 of 7 pieces from the Torine décor set
  
• Swordmaiden NPC
  
• Life Elemental NPC
  
• 1 random Dungeon Crawler NPC from a large grab bag
  
• Axis Pheydra Iconic NPC décor
  
• "Oath of the Swordmaiden" Music Track
  
• Torine Twilight Skybox
  
• Striped Torine Pumera Mount
  
• Striped Torine Swordkitten Pet
  
• 1 of 3 Flasks (Experience, R&R, and Riches)

November 14–21

Each opened Forge Case is guaranteed to give you currency (either gold or Service Tokens) and has a chance to drop one of the following:

• 1 of 7 pieces from the Osun décor set
  
• Osun Juggernaut NPC
  
• Osun Hatewitch NPC
  
• 1 random Dungeon Crawler NPC from a large grab bag
  
• Avra Darkos Iconic NPC décor
  
• "The Fortress" Music Track
  
• Forgemaster's Delight Skybox
  
• Striped Torine Pumera Mount
  
• Striped Torine Swordkitten Pet
  
• 1 of 3 Flasks (Experience, R&R, and Riches)

Starting November 17 at 10am PST both cases will be available until the Dungeon Chase ends at 10am PST, November 21.

Excited to jump in and get into the chase? Start playing WildStar today—for free!

While the actual second half of the Redmoon Terror raid doesn’t open until November 16, you can enjoy a ton of new features and improvements beginning November 9 with the release of the Redmoon Mutiny update.




Now that Mordechai is out of the picture, it’s time to face the real power behind the Redmoon Marauders—Laveka the Dark-Hearted. The second half of the Redmoon Terror raid contains a new level of challenging content for coordinated raid teams to attempt to tackle.

• Redmoon Mutiny
  
  • ​The second phase of the Redmoon Terror raid—Redmoon Mutiny—will be available on November 16! In addition to a dozen mini-bosses, three new challenging boss encounters await well-prepared groups, including the insidious final boss—Laveka the Dark-Hearted.
• Cross-Faction Grouping
  
  • Players of the opposite faction can now be invited to all social systems, including Friends, Guilds, Circles, Neighbors, and Arena teams.
  • Players of the opposite faction can now be invited to groups, allowing for cross-faction raiding and other premade grouping.
  • Adventures and World Story instances aren’t currently supported for cross-faction groups.
  • Players of the opposite faction can now be added as Neighbors, which will enable them to visit your housing plot.
• PvP Leaderboards
  
  • Players will now have access to Leaderboards that can be found in the System Interface Menu.
  • Players will have in-game viewing access of the top 3v3 Arena teams and top-rated Battleground players, according to region and current PvP season.
  • Battleground rankings are separated by class.
  • Arena team entries also show all individuals on the team.
    
    • In order for players to contribute to team rank, they must: play in at least 30% of the team’s matches if the team has played 20 or fewer matches; or play in at least 10 of the team’s matches if the team has played more than 20 matches.
  • Both the Arena and Battleground Leaderboards show overall rank, player/team name, and rating.
  • The Leaderboards refresh hourly and an up/down arrow icon reflects ranking trend from the previous hour’s rankings.
• Class Abilities
  
  • Fixed an issue where cooldown modifications to in-progress cooldowns were incorrectly multiplying the base CooldownReductionModifier every time they were updated.
  • Fixed an issue where grouped players of the same class with the same abilities on their Action Set—but different Amps—would sometimes display incorrect charge rates (for the shared abilities) due to the other player triggering certain Amps.
• Arcterra
  
  • Fixed an issue that caused some events in Arcterra to not clean up properly and get stuck in a broken state.
• Raids
  
  • Initialization Core
    
    • Y-83 Increased the number of décor drops provided upon raid completion.
    • The Techno-Phage Cache now has a small chance to provide some of the more exclusive raid décor drops.
• Holo-Wardrobe
  
  • The Exile Commander's costume no longer has a faction requirement and can now be worn by both factions.

• User Interface
  
  • ChatLog
    
    • Fixed possible Lua error when getting a killing blow on a creature.
• Paths
  
  • Settler
    
    • The Farside Food Ship Chefs have returned to their roots and are once again offering all the foods needed for the Meals on Tractor Beams achievement.
  • Explorer
    
    • Fixed a bug that gave too little time to capture a Frazzling for the Exile version of the Scavenger Hunt: Frazzling Chase mission.
  • Arcterra
    
    • Boreal Ice has had its quality updated to white, from gray.