The Test Server has been updated once more in preperation for a update and wipe to Live scheduled for tomorrow.
In a post on the H1Z1 subreddit General Manager Landon Montgomery stated "Right now, we're planning on pushing Live tomorrow AM" he continuted "I estimate we'll unlock Live sometime between 7AM and 10AM PST and I will post a new Live update when that happens with complete patch noes".
They have also temorarility increased loot on all Live servers from now until the wipe as a little stress test.
Update: Update and wipe has been confirmed as starting at 1AM PT (9AM UTC)
All servers will come down for a Game Update at 1 AM PT (9 AM UTC). Downtime is anticipated to be less than 9 hours. Notes to follow!
— H1Z1: Just Survive (@H1Z1JustSurvive) February 14, 2017
Source 1: Reddit /r/h1z1, Source 2: Reddit /r/h1z1
Just Survive Producer Michael Clark just announced on the subreddit that if all goes well with the next Test Server update, which they are planning for Monday 13th that there will be an update and wipe to Live this week. Here is the announcement:
Hello Survivors!
After the progress we have made this weekend towards issues reported on Test, we expect a wipe and Live update this week.
When the team is in the office tomorrow morning (2/13) there will be a final update to JS Test, and if that build is stable we will push that build live later in the week.
We know many players have been desiring a wipe, and so we wanted to let you know as soon as the decision was made.
Please report issues on Test in the Test thread here.
And please check out the live stream from Friday and the Reddit discussion here.
Thank you!
Source: Reddit /r/h1z1
It seems like forever since there has been something to post about, today however was announced that there will be a livestream on Friday February 10th, here is the announcement from Landon Montgomery:
Hi!
We didn't forget about this, I promise. In fact, the team's been talking about it a lot over the last month and we finally realized that if we did a complete reveal of everything we have planned for 2017, it'd be a 10-hour stream! I know a lot of people would actually enjoy a marathon show, but in the interest of focusing on key features we're going to segment things out over the next several streams instead.
This Friday at 3PM PST, JS Lead Game Designer Ben Jones will sit down with Senior Game Designer Justin Dazet and special guest, BruceLeeRob to discuss a number of new things. We'll talk about the new and greatly improved melee system, Strongholds (base building like you've not seen it before in JS), and we just might reveal a surprise at the end of the show. You've all been incredibly patient these past few months and deserve to see what we're up to! As always, we'll be happy to answer as many questions as we can so please come prepared.
Here is the link to the Twitch channel it will be broadcast on: https://www.twitch.tv/h1z1justsurvive
3PM PST is 6PM EST / 11PM GMT / midnight CET / 9AM (Saturday) AEST
Source: Reddit
Along with the update to the Test Server on November 22nd there were some hints and very rough work in progress assets found in the files associated with modular base building. All of these assets appear to be 5 metres wide or multiples thereof which is the same as the current base building walls.
Today in a Community Outbreak stream lead designer Ben Jones revealed some concept art and talked about their thoughts and ideas for base building going forward. They are certainly going for a much more modular system that many will be familiar with from other games like Rust, with upgrades from wood to metal to cement etc.
You can watch the whole Community Outbreak stream below, they also touch briefly upon some other aspects such as AI and NPC overhauls.
Last week there were some rumors (via The Ancient Gaming Noob) that Russell Shanks who took over the position of President when John Smedley stepped down in July 2015 had left the company in October, the rumor originated from a change in Shanks LinkedIn profile.
On Monday it was confirmed by Daybreak (via MMORPG.com) to be tue and that Ji Ham of Columbus Nova the investment firm that purchased Daybreak (formerly Sony Online Entertainment) who has been listed as the co-President of the company since July 2015 will continue as acting president.
Daybreak Games confirms that Russ Shanks has recently stepped down from his position at Daybreak to pursue other interests. Ji Ham will continue as acting president of the company.
What does all this mean for H1Z1 and their other games? Well, probably nothing at all...
All Just Survive servers will be offline beginning at 2:00 PM PT (10:00 PM UTC) for a game update. Downtime is anticipated to be approximately 6 hours.
General Improvements
Exploits Fixed
Bugs Fixed
Source: h1z1.com
First we would like to apologise for not reporting this sooner, we overlooked these changes with our initial datamining of the recent King of the Kill Test Server update.
Almost all items from older reward bags, some of which were worth 200 scrap will all be worth just 5 scrap from the next major update, if you have any of these items and intend to scrap them, do so asap before the next major update.
Below is a full list of items that will be changing:
Greetings Survivors,
Survivors Rest is happy to announce it's most recent update to Price Suggestions. Prices will now update for each item automatically once a day to reflect the suggested sales prices on OPSKINS.com in the form of USD. Where we have based our prices on OPSkins in the past, we quickly realized it was becoming nearly impossible to keep up with regardless of the help you as a community provided with our Price Voting application. To summarize, from here on out, all prices on the site will not be controlled manually and will be automatically updated to prices reflecting OPSkins. This should improve price gauging and create an overall safer trading environment for all users.
Safe trading,
Survivors Rest Team
Starting this week, Survivors Rest will begin undergoing changes to it's 'Price Suggestions' for items. With H1Z1 no longer being a part of the Steam market, we will be shifting our prices over to a USD value similar to and based around OPSkins' price histories. This should allow for much more accurate pricing on our end and guide users to better, smarter trades. Similarly, price voting will now allow and support OPSkins links as evidence and reference when creating a price suggestion.
We'll do our best to keep everyone updated as these changes are implimented over the course of this next week. While we realize this is a major change that may impact the value of certain items, we believe it to be a necessary change that will overall improve our users trading experience.
Safe trades,
Survivors Rest team.
Update #1: King of the Kill items have been updated to reflect OPSKINS' price histories. Items to be finalized still. Just Survive items have not been updated yet.
Update #2: Just Survive Rare and Ultra Rare items have been updated to reflect OPSKINS' price histories. Uncommon, Common and other items will follow soon.
Today Daybreak dropped another bombshell in regards to H1Z1 items and trading, from July 25th we understand that all items from older crates will no longer be able to be sold on the Steam marketplace. This includes items from the Alpha Launch Crate, H1Z1 Wearables Crate, Battle Royale Wearables Crate - Unlocked, Marauder Crate, BR: Vigilante Crate Key and H1Z1 Invitational Crate Key and the change will effect both H1Z1: Just Survive and H1Z1: King of the Kill. Here is the official statement that was posted to Steam news for each title.
On July 25th, 2016 we will be removing the ability to sell certain older H1Z1 crate items on the Steam Marketplace. Crate items have been marked trade only since Mercenary Crates were released last year. This change brings the older (pre-Mercenary Crate) items in line with the rest of the crate items in the game. Please note that crates themselves can still be traded and sold on the Steam marketplace.
Radar_X (Tony Jones - Community Manager) on Reddit posted the following comment.
This was a very necessary change but we can't go into the specific reasoning.
There is a lot of speculation as to why these changes have been made, a lot of naive people on Reddit are accusing Daybreak of being greedy or doing this to make more money when in fact the opposite is true. These changes actually mean less money for the developer in the long run as they now miss out completely on the 10% fee they would get from every Steam marketplace transaction. Instead users will trade or purchase from third-party markets such as OPSkins.com where Daybreak will receive no fees.
We can only speculate as to the true reasons behind the changes which could very well be some sort of ongoing legal issues which they are making these changes to comply with conditions imposed upon them some some external force.
This news is even more reason that Daybreak needs to heavily consider removing the 7-day trade locks on items received from trading, for the good of the trading community.