Outriders' upcoming patch will nerf Technomancers & Tricksters among a slew of bug fixes

Square Enix and People Can Fly got off to a bit of a rocky start with server issues and other flaws in Outriders, but the game is out there now and for all its issues, there’s still arguably a lot of good in it. To that end, the devs are working to make Outriders a better game and have the first big patch for Outriders coming right around the corner. There’s a lot of bug fixes for things like disappearing HUDs and cross-play, but it also looks like bullet abilities and especially the Technomancer and Trickster classes are getting the nerf bat.

Outriders shared a detailed breakdown of what’s coming in the next patch in a Steam developer blog and extensive post on the Outriders Subreddit on April 8, 2021. According to the breakdown, Outriders is getting its first big patch sometime in the following week. There are a lot of things addressed in the patch rollout. This one should fix graphical issues, HUDs disappearing, and maybe even finally make cross-play work.

Unfortunately, it’s not all peachy if you’re a Technomancer or Trickster. The post also talks about balancing the game. A number of exploits are being shut down, including one that allowed players to quickly farm Legendary gear out of historian, bounty hunt, and monster hunt quest repeats. One of the major balances tackles bullet abilities like Twisted Rounds (Trickster), Blighted Rounds (Technomancer), and Volcanic Rounds (Pyromancer).

Late in the demo lifecycle, we discovered a bug with regards to the bullet augmentation abilities damage calculation formula. While we fixed this bug, some unforeseen imbalances were unfortunately introduced, which has led to bullet-based abilities vastly outperforming other skills. The main problem with this is that such bullet based builds require much less investment to make them "top tier", compared to other builds. To achieve this, we have made a couple of adjustments for the Trickster and Technomancer classes, who benefit the most from their bullet abilities power. It's uncertain as to whether these changes will prove too strong or too weak, so please do consider this to be only the first step, as we will continue monitoring and adjusting them in the future. Just like you, we hope to see more inspiring and crazy combinations of Abilities and Mods! ~ The Outriders dev team

What does this amount to? Rather large changes. The Twisted Rounds ability’s cooldown is getting raised by nine seconds (16 seconds pre-patch to 25 seconds post-patch). Trickster temporary bonus damage was also reduced on various class tree nodes (50% nerfed down to 35%) and Technomancer Vulnerable status damage boost was also reduced (25% nerfed to 15%). Essentially, it will be a big hit to those players who were focusing on bullet ability-heavy builds. It’s part of ongoing experimentation, so it also remains to be seen if these are the last changes.

Either way, it looks like if you were reliant on your bullet abilities, Outriders is about to get a bit harder. That said, the number of bugs being fixed should make for a fun and more stable game. Want to know our impressions of the best and worst of Outriders? Be sure to check out our Shacknews review and stay tuned for more details as the patch rolls out next week.