Black Desert Online KR went through major changes last week including Conquest War Season 5, Renown Score, and the Union system. A few days later Pearl Abyss released official explanations for the changes through the GM’s Notes. Below are Pearl Abyss’ explanations on the purpose of the changes, and how they will be improved in the future.

Related: BDO KR Patch Notes April 12th - Bonus stats from GS, Node War changes

[About Conquest War Season 5]

Pearl Abyss stated that there were a few major problems they observed in Season 4. The problems were that it was hard for a guild to challenge to take over the castle after a powerful guild owns it, and defending was much easier than attacking. Also, there was no official “Alliance” system and everyone was able to attack each other. The number of battles was decreasing, and Pearl Abyss decided that they can’t improve the situation without implementing new rules.

In the previous seasons, several attacking guilds had to challenge one defending guild and the castle gate/siege weapon balance was based on this system. It was extremely hard for a single guild to win the siege, unless the attacking guild is immensely more powerful than the defending guild.

In Season 5, the siege balance will be improved so both sides have an equal chance of winning. Siege weapons will also be reworked to allow for more systematic and strategic battles. The primary goal of Node War and Conquest War is to let guilds progress together and challenge higher goals through the progression, and Pearl Abyss assured that they will work towards this goal so everyone can have fun through progression and challenges.

[How will Conquest War Season 5 Change]

Regarding the changes with the Node system (Regular Nodes and Domination Nodes with tiers), Pearl Abyss stated that the purpose was to lower the entry barrier of Node Wars for smaller guilds and so they can take Nodes without larger/stronger guilds containing them, allowing them to enjoy warfare and earn money as well.

If the guilds progress enough, they can participate in the Node War for Domination Nodes. Competitive guilds can go for Domination Nodes and enjoy large-scale PvP everyday. Even if a guild loses, the guild will not lose control of the node that they used to own and can challenge a higher tier node again.

Except for the first week, a guild that owns a Domination T3 Node does not have to start from a Domination T1 Node again if it loses the war. The guild only has to defend its D3 Node once a week, so the total Node War time will not increase much.

Also, Node Wars will be held from 21:00 to 23:00, every Monday to Saturday, and Conquest Wars will be held from 21:00 to 23:00 every Sunday. The hours might be adjusted after the initial run, and there will be a separate notice regarding the Node/Conquest war hours after the test period is over.

Pearl Abyss also clarified some of the confusionscaused by the April 12th patch notes not being specific enough. If a guild owns a T2 node and then challenged a T3 node but failed, the guild will still have the T2. The guild will only lose the T2 node when they succeed in taking a T3 node. If the guilds goes to the Conquest War but fails, the guild will still have the T3 node. Also, guilds that own a node/territory will receive the tax that has been accumulated for a week at the moment they get a node/territory. So if a guild goes from T1 to T3 node within a week, the guild will receive the tax three times.

[The Purpose of the Union System]

Related: Additional Patch Notes on April 14th - Guild Union System added

Pearl Abyss stated that as they monitored the Conquest Wars in the previous seasons, they found out that there are not many guilds that can actually participate in the Conquest War as a single guild and guilds that do not have enough members had to merge with other guilds.

The Union system was developed so small guilds can participate in the Conquest War without leaving their beloved guilds. The maximum number of players in the Union is 100 so it won’t affect the warfare balance, but will provide a good experience and opportunity for small guilds to progress.

[The Future Course and Balance of the Conquest War]

Some future plans for the Conquest War and class balance were also mentioned in the notes. Class balancing in small-scale PvP and large-scale PvP are both very important. Pearl Abyss stated that class belance will be adjusted based on large-scale PvP first, and then they will keep on adjusting small details based on small-scale PvP.

Other Conquest War features that were not mentioned before and are in development are siege weapon reworks, the Duel system, more rewards, and the auto liberation system.

Siege weapons will be reworked to allow more strategic battles, so both the attacking side and defending side can have an equal chance of winning. The role of cannon shooters will be critical in the reworked warfare, and will be the core strategy.

The Duel system (details are subject to change) will give special buffs to the winning side. The attacking guild can invite the defending guild to a 1vs1 duel. If the attacking guild wins, everyone in the same side will receive a special buff. If the defending guild wins, only the winner will receive a special buff. If the defending guild declines the invitation, everyone in the attacking side will receive small buffs.

Also, the rewards for dominating a territory will increase. There will be more rewards on top of the tax rewards, and the additional rewards will include special buffs for guild members in the specific node that the guild owns.

Lastly, Pearl Abyss did not start developing the auto liberation system yet but will be working towards it soon.

[Renown Score and Class Balance]

As mentioned in the previous GM’s notes, the Renown Score and bonus stats from the Fame score were designed to give better motivation for progression to the players.

The primary purpose of the bonus DR is to prevent players from getting one-shot-killed. There were a lot of cases where players have very high AP but could not fight because they would be killed too fast, or were forced to focus on DP so they can survive and had low AP. This was especially a big problem in large-scale PvP like Conquest War, because players spent too much time re-engaging in the battle.

Pearl Abyss lastly stated that they acknowledge the problem with the current DR system (that it is too hard to kill anyone) and the Renown Score made the GS gap even bigger. They assured players that there will be class balance updates including damage adjustments starting this week, and will improve the system through feedback from the player-base.

Related: KR Reactions - How the Bonus AP/DR based on GS affects PvP in KR