The delivery is the first thing that changed, and the title hides the rest
Every client update since launch went out live: 6 August at 09:00 UTC with no downtime, 12 August at 08:00 with no downtime, 19 August the same. This one closed matchmaking at 06:00 UTC+0 on 28 August, took the servers down at 06:30 for about two hours, and required a client update from the app store afterwards. That is a first, and it is worth reading as a scale signal — the changes underneath are the largest task-economy revision since the season opened, plus a third balance pass. A post titled "Server Maintenance Update" is not what any of that would normally be filed under, which is the practical reason this page exists.
- Matchmaking queues closed 30 minutes before the window, at 06:00 UTC+0 on 28 August. Bellring said the window might end early or run long and that changes would be posted across community channels.
- A client update from your platform store is required after it. A player who logged in without updating is not on this patch, which matters because the balance changes below are not cosmetic.
- Nothing in the post explains why this one needed downtime. The Oceania server addition is the only line that plausibly requires it, and Bellring does not connect them.
Season and Contract Tasks: every task asks less, and there are still 152 of them
This is the headline, and Bellring frames it as a response rather than a plan: persistent feedback about the excessive difficulty of Season Tasks and Contract Tasks, multiple internal discussions, a finalised revision plan and "dedicated progression-easing strategies". Read the shape of the easing carefully, because it is not what an apology usually contains. Not one task was removed from the season. DevNote #8 priced the full end-game unlock at 152 tasks on 20 August, inside an apology for how large that number is, and this post does not touch it. What fell is what each task asks of you — which is the change that actually reaches a player who was never going to finish 152 of anything.
- Monster-slaying tasks need fewer kills, and their difficulty-mode restrictions were lowered. Tasks that pushed you into a harder mode to complete them no longer do — the single largest source of the "excessive difficulty" complaint, because it forced a mode choice rather than a time cost.
- Tasks that required *executing* other Gyldhunters now count a defeat instead, and ask for fewer targets. An execution depends on whether the downed player's squad picks them up, so this was the condition least under the player's control.
- Equipment-value restrictions became equipment-rarity requirements. Cheaper to satisfy, and stable in a way a value was not: a rarity is printed on the item, while a value moved with the Auction House.
- Objectives that share progress across a team now carry a visual indicator, so a trio can split the list deliberately instead of guessing which tasks pool.
- On the Contract side: most completion counts reduced, tasks requiring specific containers to be searched removed outright, and tactical-item tasks satisfied by any tactical item rather than the one named.
- The Daily Task reward goes from 30 Contract Sigils to 40 — a 33% raise on the one thing a player does every day, and the only number in this section that went up.
Mercenary loses the dodge i-frames, and the Hammer loses free pressure
The largest single mechanical change in any of the three balance passes so far. Dodges performed under Leap Step, Dynamic Charge and Relentless Advance no longer grant invincibility frames, and cost more Energy. A plain dodge is not what the line names — this is specifically the talent-modified dodge that four weeks of Mercenary play has been built around, and a guide written before today is describing a defensive kit that no longer exists. It lands on the class that already took seven reductions on 19 August, which makes two consecutive passes against the same class after the 12 August pass left it alone entirely.
- Leap Step, Dynamic Charge and Relentless Advance: i-frames removed from dodges taken under them, Energy consumption increased. Retest before trusting any Mercenary rotation that dodged through a committed swing.
- Earthshaker and Skullcrusher now consume Energy at startup rather than on release, and their single-use cost is reduced. Bellring names the target: repeatedly charging and cancelling to apply pressure at no Energy cost. The reduced cost is the compensation for spending it earlier, not a buff.
- Skullcrusher also gets an increased cooldown, making it the only Hammer line here that is a cut on its own terms.
- Thunderous Hammer and Skullcrushing Echo get a very short internal cooldown on their cooldown-reduction effects, so hitting several targets at once no longer resets a skill instantly.
- Two lines go the other way: Warhammer Sling's animation is faster, and a bug where a light strike after Impalement could re-trigger Impalement is fixed.
- DevNote #8, on 20 August, called Warhammer "in line with expectations" and said Bellring "may introduce minor tweaks" based on upcoming data. Seven days later a zero-cost pressure loop is gone. Whatever the note meant by minor, this is the class of change it produced.
Sorcerer takes the largest block, Shadowstrix takes the line DevNote #8 hedged, and Blackarrow finally goes up
Ten Sorcerer lines, six Shadowstrix, three Blackarrow, two Withered Knight and one Seer. The interesting reading is not the count but which of them were promised: DevNote #8 named ranged classes, Shadowstrix Super Armor and Sword Mercenary as its targets, and three of those four appear here. What did not appear is the row that note called overperforming outright — Sword & Shield Red Shield, where it said it was "already looking into adjustments" to Deflect. That is still outstanding.
- Sorcerer: Meteor Charm loses PvP damage but returns more Energy when released uncharged, Gravitational Vortex is "greatly reduced", Stardust Tempest's slow now expires quickly once a target leaves the area, Storm Impact's dodge-distance reduction is shorter and weaker, and Shadow Veil is shorter.
- Stardust Torrent is the one that changes a build rather than a number: damage moves out of the first channelling stage into the third when Unending Torrent is taken, total output stated as unchanged — and without that talent, reaching the higher stages now takes longer. A Stardust build that skipped Unending Torrent is the build this pass edits.
- Meteor Impact gets a shorter cooldown, and Swift Strike no longer inflates its base cooldown. The two skills stop taxing each other.
- Shadowstrix: Spinning Slash loses damage and movement distance, aimed by name at indiscriminate Super Armor counterattacks — the capability DevNote #8 said it was "highly likely to consider removing … in the future", seven days earlier. Phantom Shift's speed boost now applies only while moving toward enemies, and Flurry Strike loses damage. Lightweight gets two fixes and Wound Buildup one.
- Blackarrow: Spore Arrow damage increased — the first Blackarrow increase in any pass since launch, after cuts on 6 and 12 August and an absence on the 19th. Against it, Lasting Pain's extension of immobilise and crowd-control debuffs is reduced.
- Withered Knight gets no balance numbers at all, only two fixes: silent footsteps, and the Parry-branched dash attack travelling fast enough to throw the character into the sky.
Nameplates off, Soul of Return capped at 1, and a fix aimed at a class of bug rather than an instance
The systems half of the post is where it touches players who never open a balance table, and two of its lines change how a match is read rather than how a class performs. Enemy player names no longer appear above characters, and Bellring gives the reason as reducing cross-teaming violations — which connects it to the Fair Play post of 21 August, where over 80% of poll respondents supported penalising temporary teaming. The poll was the voted half of that answer; this is the mechanical half. It also removes a piece of information you have had since launch: at range, you can no longer confirm who is who.
- Soul of Return now stacks to 1, stated as griefing prevention. The item that gets you out can no longer be hoarded, and can no longer be taken in a single grab.
- A new Oceania server — the first regional addition since launch, and the one change here that shows up on a ping graph rather than in a patch note.
- Two named sources of server-side rubberbanding are reduced: branch skills executed immediately after a dodge, and destroying breakable objects via movement or skills. Note what is absent — the chime and treasure-chest refreshes the 19 August post named as the cause of frame-rate hiccups are not mentioned, so that diagnosis remains open. A system performance diagnostic pop-up was added, which is how Bellring intends to collect the rest.
- A protective constraint system now applies across all classes to stop characters launching into the sky after high-speed movement. That fault has been patched one instance at a time since 6 August — Blackarrow's side-dodge jump displacement then and again on the 12th, Withered Knight's Parry dash in this very post — and this is the first line aimed at the family rather than a member of it.
- Brandrgarde had low-level monsters removed where they were packed too densely or sat near the map edges, which changes the cost of a route to an edge extraction.
- Quality of life: the Blocklist limit rises to 100, chat gains a "Scroll to Bottom" button, World Chat carries recruitment messages, and buying inside the Overpayment Range now asks for a second confirmation — the first mechanical protection against an Auction House price trap this game has shipped.
- Also fixed: Seer's Burst Rune stripping an enemy's invulnerability as they left a Mist Lord's room, the Creation gem affix stacking abnormally, Hallowgrove rope collision and an invisible wall that failed to block, Brandrgarde terrain collision, and the "Match Found" sound being overridden.