Insider Patch Notes 2.0.4.5
The latest Insider build is here! We’ve got new features, new fixes and new things for you to test. Full patch notes are below. Enjoy!
Insider Patch Notes - Update 2.0.4.5
Insider Update 2.0.4.5 is now live! This update further focuses on the feature set we intend to release as part of the July release to retail. With final bug fixing and balancing coming to an end this is our current July Release Candidate – We are continuing to work on the Known Issues called out in the Patch Notes and plan to have these resolved prior to us releasing to Retail in July.
As this is our last Insider release before releasing to our wider audience next week, please jump in and help us ensure our release is stable. Please play all areas of the game as you would in retail to help give us the most coverage - If you haven’t tried out the Black Powder Stashes Voyages yet, head to Duke in your local Outpost Tavern to begin your voyage.
If you do encounter any bugs, then please head to the
Sea of Thieves support site and let our Player Support team know.
Updates!
- Stronghold Keg Reputation Balancing – The Reputation gained from handing in Stronghold Gunpowder Kegs has been increased for Gold Hoarder, Order of Souls and Merchant Alliance Trading Companies – Athena’s Fortune Reputation stays unchanged. Previous Insider builds were incorrectly rewarding much lower reputation given the risk/reward of these items.
- Mermaid ‘Following’ Behaviour – When swimming away from your ship the Mermaid will now wait much longer before ‘following’ the player and appearing ahead of them. Previous Insider builds had this ‘following’ behaviour increased which caused sneaking players to be discovered due to the repeated spawning of the mermaid.
Fixed Issues
General
- Resolved a stability issue causing Gunpowder and Stronghold Kegs to sometimes explode during server migration.
- Resolved a stability issue causing some players to crash from active gameplay when engaging in melee combat.
- The following emotes now trigger correctly when selected; Sleep, Point, Cheer, Make Friends.
- The Tall Tales Reputation page now supports a wider range of written languages without overlapping text.
- The Pirate Phrase Wheel now has messages for Raw Fish; Devilfish, Battlegill, Islehopper, Pondie, Wrecker and Plentifins.
- When navigating the Settings pages with a controller, items are no longer highlighted as if you were using a mouse.
- The Session Setup Panel no longer displays when joining another player through an invite.
- The ‘Toggle HUD’ is no longer available in the Front-End Settings Menu
- With ‘Let Games Read to Me’ and ‘Speech to Text’ enabled, messages received from other players can no longer played out of order than which they were sent.
- With ‘Let Games Read to Me’ and ‘Speech to Text’ enabled, messages sent from your player are no longer narrated by your own client.
Arena
- Players will be removed from the tavern cannon when migrating to a new server.
Tall Tales - Shores of Gold
- Lore books can once again be found in the world while playing through a Tall Tale.
- Characters met during Tall Tales will now animate correctly and lip sync during cutscenes.
- ‘Art of The Trickster’ – The Skeleton Waves now consistently spawn during the Trapmaker’s Lair encounter.
- ‘Art of The Trickster’ – The ‘Captain of the Lair’ now consistently spawns at the end of the Trapmaker’s Lair encounter.
- ‘Fate of the Morningstar’ – When releasing a trapped soul, leaving a returning to the chest will no longer replay the animation.
- ‘Revenge of the Morningstar’ – Resolved a stability issue causing some players to crash when summoning Grey Marrow.
Known Issues
- Treasure & Items Left Behind – When crews begin a voyage or Tall Tale and subsequently cancel, any Tale Items or Treasure spawned in upcoming dig locations are left dormant in the world. These dormant items are causing other crews who are allocated the same dig locations to become soft locked – We are working on a resolution for this issue for our July Release.
- Speech to Text Accessibility – When communicating from PC to Xbox with Speech to Text enabled, the receiving player will be unable to hear the message – We are continuing to investigate this issue with the platform team.
- ‘Stars of a Thief’ Totem – After placing the Star Jewels in the statue to retrieve the totem, leaving the area and returning will cause the statue to close and the totem to be lost – We are continuing to work on a resolution for this issue however will not be releasing for our July Release.
Insider Features Still Active
- Reaper’s Black Powder Runs – Duke is challenging crews to face off against rivals in an explosive new Reaper’s Run, the ‘Reaper’s Black Powder Run’. These dangerous new voyages task crews with hopping from Fort to Fort finding Gunpowder Kegs, Buried Merchant Crates and even guaranteed Stronghold Kegs for each Chapter! With two routes to pick from, crews should keep watch for rival crews as they trek the East Fort Run or West Fort Run. Tackling these voyages with your Reaper’s Flag raised adds extra risk to your voyage but unlocks some unique rewards. These voyages can be repeated if you dare!
- Black Powder Smuggler’s Runs – For crews looking for a less competitive challenge with the same explosive consequences Duke is offering a set of ‘Black Powder Smuggler’s Run’ voyages. These new voyages take crews into each region of the seas to collect Buried Merchant Crates, Gunpowder Kegs even guaranteed Stronghold Kegs for the Trading Companies. Pirate Legends have an exclusive Voyage tasking them to venture into the Devil’s Roar and brave the threats with a ship stacked full of kegs! These voyages can be repeated to your hearts content once completed.
- Trading Companies Stockpiling – The Gold Hoarders, Order of Souls and Merchant Alliance Trading Companies have begun stockpiling defences and will now reward players for handing over Gunpowder and Stronghold Kegs. Not wishing to be unprepared, the Mysterious Stranger has also begun rewarding Pirate Legends with Athena’s Fortune reputation for handing over Gunpowder and Stronghold Kegs.
- Mermaid Gems – Duke has heard word of Mermaid Gems being scattered across the world; washed up on Islands, inside Skeleton Fort Vaults and even inside sunken shipwrecks – the Trading Companies are eager to take these off your crew’s hands.
- Mercenary Commendations and Rewards – A range of Mercenary Commendations are available to unlock from your crew’s explosive efforts out on the seas. Earn Doubloons, Unlock Titles and purchase newly available ‘The Inevitable Reaper Flag’, ‘The Inevitable Reaper Sails’ and the ‘Mercenary Figurehead’ for taking part in Duke's latest challenges.
- Hunter's Call Rewards – We've listened to the feedback and whilst rewards are still increased compared to the general release version of Sea of Thieves, they have been reduced from previous Insider builds. The rewards for meat however remain unchanged.
- Cursed Cannonballs - Effect Durations - The duration of effects for all player curses have been reduced. The duration of effects for Peaceball, Riggingball and Ballastball have been reduced.
- Cursed Cannonball - Anchorball - Anchorball still lowers/raises the anchor but no longer locks it out from being used for a time afterwards. Helmball and Barrelball remain unchanged.
- Tall Tales Skeleton Lord Balancing – Captain Briggsy, Captain Greymarrow and the Gold Hoarder now have a more balanced encounter for 2 person and 3 person Crews.
- Tall Tales ‘Shroudbreaker’ New Puzzles – The Shroudbreaker Tall Tale has had a range of new Vault Puzzle variants added to provide a varied experience each playthrough.
- Tall Tales ‘Cursed Rogue’ New Puzzle & Briggsy Fight Locations – The Cursed Rogue Tall Tale has had a range of new Puzzle variants added. Crews will now find new locations for Skeleton Crews and buried Quest Items and will engage Briggsy in different locations on islands for a more varied experience each playthrough.
- Tall Tales ‘Revenge of the Morningstar’ New Puzzle Locations – The Revenge of the Morningstar Tall Tale has had a range of new Puzzle variants added to new islands for a more varied experience each playthrough.
- ‘The Shores of Gold’ Gold Hoarder Encounter – Players engaging in the final encounter will now be given more time to complete the battle before the encounter times out.
- Megalodon Encounter Balancing – We’ve done a wide balancing pass on the Megalodon encounters out in the world. When encountering a Megalodon players should more clearly be able to identify their personality from how they act around the ship and attack, allowing you to strategise on how to engage with them. Fleeing from a Megalodon to a nearby island, Meg will quickly give up and leave the area rather than lying in wait under the waves for an extended period. Crews on Sloops and Brigs are now much more likely to encounter a more balanced encounter, while still proving to be a challenge to take down.
- Eye of Reach Skeletons – Players will now only encounter Eye of Reach wielding skeletons manning certain posts on a Skeleton Ship. These skeletons no longer spawn on islands or during encounters.
- Skeleton Ship’s Cursed Cannonballs – When engaging a Skeleton Ship, the frequency in which they fire Cursed Cannonballs has been reduced.
- Escaping a Skeleton Ship – When chased by an emergent Skeleton Ship, crews no longer need to put as much distance between them before the Skeleton Ship decides to let you escape.
- Sunken Shipwreck Rewards – Diving into a sunken shipwreck, players now have the chance to find Gunpowder Kegs and Resource Crates in addition to all the other previously found rewards.
- Mermaids Improvements – The mermaids are more helpful, appearing more quickly and in a closer location for players.
- Interactive Hatches – The Shipwrights have added player-controlled hatches to both Sloop and Brigantines. Brigs have hatches added to the small window in the Captain’s Cabin (be careful not to trap your nose), Sloops now have hatches on the small windows which players can close to help defend from attacks.
- Sloop Mast Damage – A damaged Sloop Mast now takes half the time to resurrect to provide a more balanced experience for smaller crews.
- Morrow’s Peak Outpost Geysers – Geysers on Morrow’s Peak Outpost in the Devil’s Roar now spawn much less frequently.
- Devil's Roar Volcanoes - Volcanoes encountered in the Devil’s Roar do not hit ships as often .
- *Improving Resource Crates *– Players are more likely to find banana, cannonball and wooden plank resource crates washed up on beaches across the world. When you find these they will now contain much more resources to begin with.
- Skeletons on Cannons – Skeletons on islands are less accurate with cannons and take longer to return after being killed.
- Session Setup Panel – When navigating the front-end menu and selecting your Game Mode, Ship Type and Crew Type – there is a UI panel showing the choices that you have made.
- Controller & Keyboard UI - Improved the layout of the Controller and Keyboard screens on the settings menu.
- *Support for ‘Escape’ to back out of Settings pages in stages *– A new toggle has been added in Settings > Accessibility > ‘Escape as Back’ when using Keyboard & Mouse controls. When toggled on, the ‘Escape’ changes its function when navigating the settings menus. When drilled into submenus, previously ‘Escape’ would return the player all the way back to thetop level menu – with this setting enabled, Escape now steps the player back through each menu requiring multiple presses to return to the top level menu.
- Support for Mouse Hover in Settings – When using a mouse to navigate the settings menu, hovering over an item no longer automatically selects it and requires players to click to select to avoid accidental selection while navigating. This does not affect navigating the settings with a controller.
- Outpost Tavern Audio – Tavern ambient audio experience has been enhanced to be more interesting for players.
- Audio during Pirate Selection – The ambient audio experience has been enchanced when selecting a new pirate.
- ‘Let Games Read to Me’ Message Priority – When triggering multiple narration messages, there is now a hierarchy to manage the order in which narration messages are played. Narration of server messages takes priority and pause any current message, playing immediately and queuing up subsequent messages. Narration of UI messages is second in priority and will play if no other message is currently playing. UI messages will not queue and will override a currently playing message. Player chat messages are third priority and will only play if no other message is currently playing.
- ‘Let Games Read to Me’ Player Chat Messages – The first chat message from a player will begin with "[Gamertag] says", with any consecutive messages from that player dropping the “[Gamertag] says” so that multiple messages will be read out as if they were part of one larger message. As soon as there is a break in speech however, the player’s gamertag will be read out again at the start of the next message.
- Support for ‘Tap to Interact’ – An option has been added to the Accessibility Settings ‘Reduce Held Interactions’ which allows many ‘Hold to Interact’ actions to only require an initial Tap, players must still stay within range and wait the full duration of the action.
- Radial Menu Support for ‘Toggle’ – An option has been added to the Accessibility Settings ‘Toggle Radial Menus’ which allows radial menus to be opened and closed with two separate button presses rather than a button being held and released.
- Radial Menu Support for ‘Sticky’ – An option has been added to the Accessibility Settings ‘Sticky Radial Items’ which allows radial menus to stay selected when releasing the analogue stick.
- Radial Menu Support for Keyboard Bindings – All radial menu’s now support selection using number keys in addition to using the analogue stick. These keys can now also be re-bindedin the Keyboard Settings page.
- Support for ‘Tap to Interact’ – An option has been added to ‘Reduce Held Interactions’ in the Accessibility Settings, which allows many ‘Hold to Interact’ actions to only require an initial tap. Players must still stay within range and wait the full duration of the action.
- Radial Menu Support for ‘Toggle’ – An option has been added to ‘Toggle Radial Menus’ in Accessibility Settings, which allows radial menus to be opened and closed with two separate button presses rather than a button being held and released.
- Radial Menu Support for ‘Sticky’ – An option has been added to ‘Sticky Radial Items’ in Accessibility Settings, which allows radial menus to stay selected when releasing the analogue stick.
- Radial Menu Support for Keyboard Bindings – All radial menu’s now support selection using number keys in addition to using the analogue stick. These keys can now also be re-bindedin the Keyboard Settings page.
- Digging up Bait – Players now have a chance to find fishing bait from digging in the world. Digging on Beaches, Shorelines and Grassy areas will yield the different bait types, happy digging! The amount of bait found in island barrels has also been reduced as part of this change, however crews will still find they can find some stock at outposts when starting their journey.