Survivor Mercs News

Commanders, our 4th major Early Access update, codename "Bootcamp", is about to drop!

We spent the past weeks working on various systems to improve the gameplay for new and veteran Commanders alike.

Learn the ropes in the new Bootcamp operation to train in capturing objectives, squad building, looting, extracting, and bot destroying, incl. a new boss to test your skills as a Commander before you take on the main M.E.G.A. Corp. goons!


Your new assistant and heli pilot, Conduit, will help you master the Standard Operations and start building your bunker. Once you're decked out and familiar with the new skill trees and specials of your individual Mercs and Gear, go on Elite Operations for a real challenge - and get the rare loot you need for the final bunker upgrades.


We recommend you start from scratch after this update to learn about your Mercs' unique strengths & weaknesses as they received a massive overhaul.

Unlock new things gradually as you complete the 120+ achievements that are displayed as battle decorations in your new Awards room. Mercs and Gear have some new tricks up their sleeves, specifically new proc effects and other synergies with your squad and Commanders.


Apart from these highlights, the update comes with even more new content, a big list of bugfixes, QoL & UI improvements, better performance, and balancing adjustments.

[color]Update 0.9.10 "Bootcamp" is scheduled for Tuesday, Jun 4, 2024.[/color]

We initially wanted to ship this update in May. As we implemented all these new things and fixed various bugs, we went through more balancing iterations than expected.

Example: we "lost" enemies on the map over time. Turns out one system ended up resetting only 100 enemies - in total - instead of queuing up to 100 that got somehow lost or stuck.
After we fixed it, the maps became unbeatable with a ridiculous number of enemies on screen. Now some of you may actually like that challenge, but we always wondered why it felt like enemies were missing.

And with so many systems interlocking now, every nudge in one area propagates throughout the whole game.

Why tell all this?

We believe that the update is good to go. BUT it has some rough edges because we can only test so much with our small dev team while also developing the game.
That's where you come in, Commanders. We need your input & feedback: tell us what you love and what you like less about the new update. How's the challenge? Does the progression feel rewarding? Do you notice any bugs or issues? What needs buffs & nerfs?

That's why with this update 0.9.10 we recommend you reset your savegame!

FEAR NOT! We DON'T nuke your savegame.
Some of you spent dozens of hours in the game already, and we won't take that away from you.

Once you start the game with a savegame from prior versions, we automatically create a local backup of your savegame. THEN you'll be asked to reset your savegame, optionally.

You will keep your Steam Achievements and settings. You can opt for it, or don't. Whatever you choose, you can always restore your savegame from prior to this update.

We hope this will be a convenient way to handle further Early Access updates.

With the update, we'll post a detailed patch note as usual with many more details!

Thanks a lot, Commanders, for all your support and patience while we try to make the game better with every update.
We're super excited for June 4, and hope you are, too!

We were able to hold off the evil M.E.G.A. Corps for now, but we're going to need to rally more forces in the future. Congratulations to our Community Event Winner! With your killer catchphrase and intimidating force, the M.E.G.A Corps has been sent packing!

[h2]Mayday Community Event Winner[/h2]

[h3] vanguardreviwer "I love the smell of hellfire in the morning!"[/h3]


[h3]Rewards:[/h3]

• 3 Survivor Merc Keys to give away to your friends and family
  

Reminder that you have 30 days to respond to the ww_cm account on Steam to receive your keys!

Keep an eye out for a brand new update Coming Soon Commanders! We have very very exciting things ahead. Looking forward to letting you in on the plan when the time is right, can't let the M.E.G.A. Corps catch on to our schemes.

- The Survivor Mercs Community Team

We’ve received an incoming transmission to the helicopter. The corrupt M.E.G.A.Corps have overrun The Steam Forums! Now it’s your job to kick them out.

Share a screenshot of your Commander launching into a mission from the helicopter in Survivor Mercs with a signature caption that screams “GTFO!”, and our 3 favorite submissions will win 2 Survivor Mercs Keys to keep or give away to their friends/family. One special Community Voted Winner will also receive an extra key for being the realest MVP in the resistance.

Intimidation backed by action is the best strategy Commanders, by showing our numbers, this will be a surefire way to blow the M.E.G.A. Corps off our turf.

[h3]Submission Rules:[/h3]

• Share a screenshot of your Commander launching into a mission from the Helicopter to the Screenshots Section of the Steam Forum with a funny unique caption
  
• Thumbs up your favorite submission to vote for the community winner. You can find everyone's submissions in the Screenshots Section of the Community Hub. Be sure to filter for Most Recent!
  
• One entry per user
  
• Once winners have been announced, you have 30 days to respond to the ww_cm account to receive your keys
  

[h3]Submission Details: [/h3]

• You can upload screenshots using the screenshot uploader tool. By default this button is bound to "F12", and can be edited within the Steam settings.
  
• Open the Steam client and click on "View" and then "Screenshots" at the top to access the screenshot uploader.
  

If you need more assistance with how to upload a screenshot to Steam Community, please check here https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=181142704

[h3]Rewards:[/h3]

• 3 of our favorite submissions will win 2 Survivor Mercs Keys to keep or give away to friends/family
  
• 1 Community Voted winner will win 3 Survivor Mercs Keys
  

You have until May 8th Commanders. Hopefully we can stave off the evil M.E.G.A. Corps in the meantime.

We salute you Commanders.
- The Survivor Mercs Community Team

Commanders, are you geared up for Boot Camp?

We are excited to share our latest Early Access Roadmap News with you, giving a preview of what's to come in the next weeks for Survivor Mercs!

In the last update, "Evolution" (0.9.9), we laid the groundwork for more interesting squad builds and meta progression, introducing many new Traits and ways to configure your Commanders, alongside many improvements and new features like the Armor system.

This last update was inspired by your feedback and input, and we were able to patch multiple annoying and hard-to-reproduce bugs based on your reports. THANK YOU very much for caring about the game and helping us make it better ❤

If you aren't already part of the community, join our Discord to get in touch with us and help with improving the game:




So, Commanders, report in for the briefing on updates 0.9.10 and beyond!

Our primary focus with the next update(s) is making the game deeper and more fun for both our veteran Commanders as well as our new recruits.


[h3]More Synergy & OP Squad Build Potential [/h3]
Since you're now able to configure your Commanders to your liking, it's time to give you more choice over the rest of your squad and how it works together in your build.

This is happening in two major steps, with the first one going into the next major update 0.9.10 "Boot Camp" - a skill tree overhaul for all Mercs - followed by another huge change, Commander Weapons. Additional adjustments for Gear and Traits will leverage that to give you many more creative ways to synergize and combine everything into your OP killer squad.

The primary goal of the skill tree rework is to provide you with meaningful choice between at least two, mostly 3-4, very distinct profiles for each Merc. We will provide a full list of these changes with the respective update notes. Overall, we're working on this:

• Many more Mercs can specialize in different damage types.
  
• Some Mercs will receive completely new, additional attack options.
  
• Others receive additional Utility skills that may affect your Commander or whole squad.
  
• Most skill trees will have more notable impact on attack, targeting, and movement patterns.
  
• More special skills with new status and proc effects will await you in or at the end of these new skill trees.
  

We are testing new status effects for Mercs and Commander Weapons, potentially also for enemies, to give you more control over the action and add more variety:

• Decay - temporarily reduce target's Armor
  
• Marked - target is prioritized by your Mercs
  

We will also use status effects for our new proc effects system. We will start with "on crit" procs that are enabled by Gear, Merc skills, or Traits, and offer new ways to cause mayhem, especially together with the status effect procs that can trigger if certain status effects are combined in the correct order. But they come at a trade-off: some status effect procs may cancel each other out.

Update 0.9.10 brings some of these procs, others are following with the Commander Weapons that are less focused on damage but on status effects to give you more control over your squad and its combat effectiveness.


[h3]Improved Level-up System[/h3]
The next update will bring some improvements to the level-ups and reduce the randomness, specifically supporting you to choose the Merc skill tree options.

Upgrades for Mercs, Commander Abilities, and Gear are separated from the Generic Upgrades, and we want to ensure you can pick from all exclusive skill tree options when you reach a branching point. The Generic Upgrades appear frequently in your upgrade rotation as a similar special case. Overall you are going to be less dependent on randomness, your Commander's Luck attribute becomes more meaningful, and Re-rolls & Excludes are more useful.

We're also trying to reduce the sheer number of level-ups to make each upgrade choice more impactful.


[h3]Battle Decorations & Awards[/h3]
We are about to introduce a new "Trophy Room" for your bunker, with a huge amount of new Awards for completing different challenges and Steam Achievements to complement them.



The Awards are divided into ribbons, badges, and medals based on their challenge difficulty, neatly sorted into the Trophy Room. But they are not just for the completionists among you! They also serve our new recruits to learn more about the ways to play the game, and will inspire some of our veteran Commanders to experiment with new squad builds and Commander configurations.


[h3]Elite Operations[/h3]
Starting with the upcoming update, we are going to introduce a new Elite Operation Type for the existing maps.

Elite Operations are harder variants of each map's Standard Operation.
We see a lot of players struggling in the first runs since our difficulty is currently balanced to provide an interesting challenge for both new recruits and veteran Commanders.

The new Standard Operation will be a bit easier compared to the current one, allowing you to learn more about the basics of the game and experiment with different squad builds. But you will only find common loot!

So to upgrade your bunker rooms to higher levels, you have to play the new Elite Operations. These will be tougher than the current Standard Operations, so you need some Bunker upgrades and advanced Traits to get the rare loot required for improving the Bunker rooms further. We're trying to find an interesting balance and different enemy setups for each Operation Type to add more variety and fun surprises. Expect these changes to come in multiple steps! As usual, we'll lay the groundwork in the next major update and will refine it based on our insights and your input and feedback.

The new Elite Operation will be interwoven with the new Awards, and much of the other content and features, particularly late-game progression. As always, we'll try to make it compatible with your existing savegames, but we cannot promise that we won't reset at least part of your progress to make everything work.


[h3]Meet "Conduit"[/h3]
We're about to introduce "Conduit", your heli pilot. She's your helpful assistant and will appear on multiple occasions to provide little hints or bits of background information to help you understand some of the inner workings of the game.



Her appearance also marks another step in adding more lore and flavor to the game. We aim to show more of the personality of the individual Mercs and M.E.G.A. Corp.'s big bosses. We hope you'll welcome Conduit to your bunker with open arms!


[h3]General Improvements[/h3]
In addition to these highlights, the upcoming update(s) will bring many more additional improvements, like various UI changes and additions, e.g. damage type icons to identify quickly how Mercs, Gear, and Traits work together. We also continue working on performance improvements, better Merc behavior, and juicier boss fights.


[h3]The Road Ahead...[/h3]
We are working on many other things at the moment, too. The following list of items is neither complete nor final!

But we want to provide an outlook as to what's coming, and are always happy to hear your thoughts:

⏩ A new Airlift room allows you to save some loot instead of extracting.

⏩ Choose between different Commander Weapons to gain additional firepower and control over your squad, utilizing many of the new status effects and synergies.

⏩ Enjoy a better, more polished UI and configure your input mappings alongside other improved settings and options, specifically to support accessibility.

Apart from these, we're always looking to add new maps & bosses, enemies, Mercs, and other content as they fit these updates.

We continue in Early Access and plan to release these updates over the course of the next weeks and months.

Please join the discussion on our Discord server and let us know which of these new features or improvements you are most excited about.

Congratulations to our Diamond Dog community event winner! With 2136 Blood Diamonds extracted in a single Survivor Mercs run, you really made a name for yourself in the resistance!

[h2]The First ever Diamond Dog - Mithur[/h2]


[h3]Reward:[/h3]

• The Temporary Title “Diamond Dog” in the Wandering Wizard Discord. If you have not yet joined the Wandering Wizard Discord, you can join here.

You have successfully funded the revolution with your efforts Commander, we salute you.

We also have a very exciting update from the developers coming soon so please keep your eyes peeled for some exciting news and announcements! Additionally, 1.0 is right around the corner, so be sure to leave your feedback and engage with fellow community members in the Wandering Wizard Discord and Steam Forums. We want the resistance strong for all the battles that lie ahead.

The Survivor Mercs Community Team
-