Phase 4 testing of Obsidian Entertainment’s Armored Warfare is live and running until August 30th. The newest update includes features such as the Retrofit system and a number of new war machines like the Centauro 120. The servers will be online 24/7 during this testing phase, or at least Obsidian would like for them to be on without interruption, but it’s probably safe to bet that there will be some downtime.
New Features
The main features of this Early Access phase are:
- Retrofit system is now available (more information available in developer diary article about the Retrofit system)
- Advanced artillery support shells (more information available in our feature preview article)
- Several new vehicles (T-54, M48 Patton, Object 430, Centauro 120, FV721, Begleitpanzer 57, T-72A) with Centauro 155 removed from the dealer tree for rebalance (a preview can be found here)
- Game economy overhaul
- Significant increase in the PvE rewards, new PvE missions
- Large optimization bundle
- Rebalances of certain vehicles
- A large number of bug fixes and improvements
The full patch notes which are quite extensive and encompass a lot of changes can be found, here.
Retrofit System
Armored Warfare’s Retrofit System promises to give more control over how your machines are upgraded. The existing upgrades are based closely on the real-world counterparts of each machine, with upgrades available to each vehicle which occur in the vehicle’s real history. However, Obsidian acknowledges that militaries from all over the world often take different approaches to the same machines. This is where the Retrofit System comes in to give players the ability to do something similar. By picking and choosing specific upgrade options, players will be able to customize their ride to fit their personal tastes.
Each vehicle will have a number of Retrofit Slots available. Some of these will be “stock” on the vehicle, and others will be unlocked as part of the vehicle upgrade tree. Vehicles that previously were sparse on upgrades will generally have more Retrofit Slots, since this helps make their progression more similar to other vehicles and helps to balance them against the vehicles with more upgrades.
There are five types of Retrofit Slots. The first four correspond to the four main sections of the upgrade tree – Firepower, Armor, Mobility, and Technology. The fifth type is Universal. Retrofit Slots can only incorporate Retrofit Upgrades of the same type as the slot. Universal slots can use any type of upgrade, however.
Retrofit Upgrades and Schematics can be unlocked for each vehicle which further enhance the default vehicles and provide another layer of customization for the players.
The Centauro 120
The Centauro 120 is essentially an upgraded version of the Centauro B1 tank destroyer developed for the Italian military. The history of the Centauro program goes back to the late 80s and very early 90s, when the Italian military issued a request for a tank destroyer with firepower equal to the older Leopard 1 main battle tank (and its Italian derivate, the OF-40). Both vehicles carry advanced versions of the British Royal Ordnance 105mm L7 rifled cannon and it was that weapon caliber that was selected for the tank destroyer project.
The Centauro 120 is a tier 7 tank destroyer which features a very high damage per shot with a good amount of sustained damage. Sporting a 120mm gun, the destroyer can even hold its own against heavy armor and is able to fire advanced NATO rounds like the M829A3 depleted uranium APFSDS. Thanks to its lightweight design, the Centauro 120 is quite mobile and can zip around the battlefield for quick and devastating strikes. The tank is balanced out by having less camouflage, thanks to the massive blasts from the OTO Melara smoothbore, and its lack of armor makes it particularly vulnerable to anything but low-caliber automatic cannon fire.
PTS Changes
Even though Early Access Phase 4 is going, Obsidian is still hard at work tweaking and adding to the game via the public test server. Due to player demand, the devs will be expanding the PTS testing hours to give everyone access to the testing process.
- The PTS server will be brought back up today at 4pm PDT with same version is now available on the EA4 server.
- PTS server will also be updated with new versions as soon as they are available, the next update is scheduled for Monday Aug 17th
- Hours for PTS server will then be expanded to the same hours of EA3. There are not enough players to fill a complete 24/7 cycle, but we do feel that everyone around the globe should have access for some periods to be able to give their feedback!
- These hours will be the following:
- 11am – 11pm PDT (2pm – 2am EDT) (8pm – 8am CEST) on weekdays
- non-stop on weekends
- All restrictions will be removed. If you can Access EA4 you will be able to access the PTS server. (starting tomorrow August 14th)
- All Tier 4 vehicles will be unlocked.
- Reputation and Credit gain will remain at X5 for every battle!