It’s a fresh week for Rust development and the team is working on some shifts to decay, bug fixes, and continuing work on dungeons. Let’s get into it...

Decay for all twig

Complementing the recent changes to building placement, Andre has tweaked how decay works. All twig building blocks (not just foundations) will now have decay applied to them. High tiers (wood and above) still only have decay on foundations.

With this change, Andre has moved the processing of decay to a central building manager. This removes semi-randomized invokes, making it more efficient and hopefully improving performance.

Hapis fix

Since the update last week, if you run a Hapis map server, you’ve probably noticed your console getting spammed with ‘look rotation viewing vector is zero’. Thankfully, Andre has fixed this issue.

Dungeon art

Vince and Damian continue their progress on the dungeon art branch. Adding several greyboxes for office building interiors, they are working to get the new Rocket Factory dungeon ready. No word yet if this will be in game by the next forced wipe (June 1st), but I’ve got my fingers crossed it will be!

Hapis improvements

Petur keeps trucking along on his Hapis map improvements. This weeks focus is on improving the river area’s. No updated visuals yet, but hopefully we’ll see more as we approach the end of the month.

Other stuff

• Garry has fixed a NRE when checking banned server ips
• Some tweaks to GamePhysics (hopefully to improve performance)
• Models/textures/gibs/etc for dropbox version 2 (doesn’t appear to be in yet)
• Fixed insane planner leak
• Fixed riot helmet rad protection

12:25am EST - Update day is upon us and we’ve got a new form of base defense, tweaks to building and decay, and other fixes.

Our update stream goes live at 2pm EST. Follow @Rustafied for news throughout the day. Let’s get into it...

Shotgun Trap Added

A new form of base defense has arrived! A low tier turret, the Shotgun Trap can be placed on foundations, walls, and ceilings - but not the ground. It only fires handmade shells, but can hold a total of 384 rounds and bolsters a fire rate of 1 shot per second.

Similar to the flame turret, authorization is based on the nearest cupboard. Unauthorized people will be fired upon repeatedly when in range. Although the range is a couple meters, you'll want to place these as close as possible to deal maximum damage.

Unlike turrets, the Shotgun Trap does not swivel in any direction. They can, however, be placed on walls and even ceilings, so you’ll be able to exercise a bit more creativity when planning your defense. It has a health of 200 and can be destroyed in about 18 swings of a metal hatchet (or 40 shots with an AK). You can also repair it and pick it up.

Cost
1000 wood
250 frags
1 rope
1 gear

Ammo
Handmade Shells

Capacity
384 rounds

Craft time
30 seconds

Health
200

Floor grills above large furnaces

Some fresh possibilities with furnace bases are opening up this week as floor grills may now be placed above large furnaces. Although this would be more ideal if triangle frames and grills existed, it will at least allow you to prevent nakeds from building over your walls and stealing your furnace loot.

Keep in mind, it only takes 1 C4 to get through a floor grill. But hey, some protection is better than none!

Floor spikes block foundation placement

A new way to block twig raid towers is here - albeit pretty inefficient. Andre has made it so Wooden Floor Spikes block foundation building, meaning they’ll need to be destroyed prior to starting that raid tower. Unfortunately for base owners, they only take a couple hatchet swings to destroy, so you’re probably better off using Wooden Spikes.

Twig decay

You should be seeing less random twig structures around after this update as Andre has applied decay to all twig building blocks (as opposed to just foundations). Higher tiers still only have decay on foundations.

He’s also moved the processing of decay to a central building manager, which should make the whole process more efficient by getting rid of randomized invokes.

Entity leak

There has been an issue causing an extra 25-35k entities on certain (higher pop) servers. Although the performance impact of this was probably minimal, it did cause some issues with prefabs not being correctly destroyed - like when items would combine or animals ate dropped food.

This has now been fixed. Animals have a better chance of eating dropped food if they are chasing you. Keep in mind, not all animals will eat dropped food if in pursuit as they only do that if they are hungry.

Classic theme soon to be back

Alex is in the process of bringing back the classic musical theme to Rust. Although he told me it probably won’t make it in this week, it’ll likely be ready by next week's update.

Server crashes

Server stability has been below par the past week or two. Consoles freeze and servers simply stop responding until manually restarted. This is an issue with all servers - although seemingly more common with higher populations. We’re working with the developers to get them the logs and save files needed to track this down. Unfortunately, the cause issue of this issue is still unknown as of now.

Other stuff

• Fixed riot helmet radiation protection
• Fixed insane planter leak
• Progress on the Hapis improvements (not live till June 1st at the earliest)
• Progress on the new Rocket Factory dungeon (also June 1st at the earliest)
• Fixed a NRE when checking banned server ips
• Some tweaks to GamePhysics (hopefully to improve performance)

US Odd launching Monday

Due to the high demand of our Monday wipe server in the EU (Odd), we’ve decided to launch a similar server for our US audience. Launching this Monday (May 22nd), US Odd will wipe every week on Monday at 5pm EST (and with forced wipes). This Vanilla server will feature a 200 population count and 5k map. Keep an eye out on the official list Monday to join.

3:50pm EST - Client update and devblog are out!

Bugs is on vacation. Nevertheless, the update stream will start as normal at 2pm EST. It is also update day, so here is what's coming in this week.

Update summary video

Here's the update summary video from Puddy.

Hapis Improvements

The commit feed has been blowing up with Hapis changes and improvements over the last few days. Petur is moving forward to get the Hapis rework ready for the June 1st forced update. Based on feedback from our players, and changes anticipated with the forced update we will be increasing our Hapis server population from 100 to 150 players. Stay tuned!
 

Rocket Factory

Several commits have been made recently, based on the current progress it seems like the Rocket Factory will be ready for the next forced update. 
 

Shotgun Trap

The cost of the Shotgun Trap has increased to two gears this week, and it now loses 50% health when it’s picked up. It also has a nice new placement guide.

• Item skins can now be changed at a repair bench
• Scrap has a worldmodel
• Roadsign Armor reworked
• Water jug sounds were added

Aimcone tweaks

As Helk wrote in the commit “aimcones slightly tighter because they're now aimcones and not aimsquares”. We will be testing and updating with results prior to the Thursday update, hopefully this offers improved firing mechanics. The aimcone has been the subject of numerous posts and conversations on reddit over the last few weeks though Helk has recently stated that the aimcones have remained unchanged since their introduction in 2015. Here is an example of the change.

Rocket Launcher Health

The rocket launcher can now shoot 50 rockets before breaking rather than 20ish. At this time we have not seen any changes involving cost or damage.

Hapis Overhaul Progress

As mentioned in devblog 161, the first phase of the Hapis Island upgrades are scheduled to launch with the June 1st update. This is exciting because Hapis has been in need of some love for a while. 
 
New caves, topological changes, loot improvements, lighting enhancements, and coastline changes are in store. Per devblog 161, we are expecting a second phase of upgrades to be added in the July 6th update. We will be increasing our Hapis Island server population to 150 this week as well. Expect some gameplay streams as well!
 

Rocket Factory

A few more commits for the rocket factory have been added this week. As of right now there is no confirmation that it will go live on this forced wipe. As always, we will keep you posted with any updates on this.

Other stuff

• Improved vertex lighting correction
• Some sidewalk texture polish, looking more multipurpose, grid alignment on meshes
• Fixed positioning of the map so it sits better in the player's hands
• Tweaked skin specs to mitigate head/body seam
• Wooden logs can be harvested for wood
• Resources no longer occasionally spawn inside of each other
• Fixed repair being free on some objects that only cost a very small amount of resources
• Small trees give same wood per hit as large trees (still less wood overall)
   

3:30pm EST - Update is live and devblog is out!

2:00pm EST - Our update stream is live! twitch.tv/rustafied

1:00am EST - It's that time of the month! A forced wipe is incoming today along with a bunch of balance shifts and tweaks.

Our update stream goes live at 2pm EST. Follow @Rustafied for news throughout the day. Let’s get into it...

Update summary video

Here's the update summary update video from Puddy.

Recoil and aimcones

Over the last two days Helk has made a series of twitter posts discussing the state of gunplay in Rust. He has posted a few videos comparing the aimcones in Rust and Battlefield along with two polls asking for feedback from the players. The latest poll asks yes or no to “recoil compensation (optional), rifles have zero aimcone until automatic fire”. This evening Helk has added big changes to PVP including new recoil and balance to most weapons and uniform shake effect to guns.

Gun balance

• Pump shotgun costs 5 less HQM
• Thompson costs 10 less HQM
• Assault rifle has 50% more durability

Laser sight changes

Helk made some tweaks to laser sights. Here's a summary:

• Laser sight no longer reduces ADS
• Aimcone laser sight removes
• Aimsway laser sight reduces hipfire aimcone by 25%
• Laser sight more visible at distance
• HQM cost is now 3 down from 8

Hapis upgrades

The Hapis upgrades described in our Tuesday post are almost here! We encourage players to check out these changes tomorrow on our Hapis server. We are increasing the population from 100 to 150 as well, expect some great PVP and exploring on this upgraded map!

Drop Box

Coming in at the last minute Helk added a drop box. Want to drop items off in your base without going through doors? If so, this is for you. With the capacity of a small box you can now quickly drop items off into your base. Anyone can drop items into the box, regardless of build privilege, but the items are only accessible from the rear of the box.

Cost
200 Metal Fragments

Craft Time
30 Seconds

Harvestable logs

One nice quality of life change this week involves the ability to harvest logs and downed branches. While they don’t yield as much wood as a tree, each of them gives the an equal amount. How much wood you get overall depends on the tool that you are using.

Yields

Rock 125
Stone hatchet 194
Metal hatchet 211
Salvaged axe 250

Cacti

All cacti can now be harvested. The two in the images below now yield cloth and cactus flesh at the same rate as the standard small cacti.

Sandy nodes

Like the snowy nodes in the great white north, the nodes in the desert now have a sand covered bottom. A small but aesthetically pleasing change.

Original

New

Other stuff

• Ability to limit voice counts for individual sounds globally
• Added shotgun trap sounds

European Survivors 

Rustafied is happy to announce it is assisting with the hosting of European Survivors, a vanilla server that wipes weekly in the EU. You can access the server via the following:

client.connect 31.186.250.66:28061

It’s a fresh week for Rust development and we’re seeing some tweaks to shotguns, improvements to dropboxes, progress on dungeons, and more. Let’s get into it...

Shotgun pellet grouping

Grab your waterpipes! Helk has shifted shotgun pellets, giving them an affinity to stay grouped to the center. This creates and tighter spread and should increase the damage dealt - especially at close range. Speaking of range, he has made it so they have a much faster damage falloff (only effective for ~30- meters).

Note that these changes are applied to the ammo, not the weapon, meaning the Eoka will also be affected. That said, Helk shared with me the changes to handmade shells were pretty minor - most of the significant changes were to buckshot.

Dropbox changes

After its addition last week, the dropbox is seeing some quality of life improvements. They now stack submitted items of like-kind (stones added to other stones, etc). They also no longer auto submit items.

Mailbox auto submit

Just like the dropbox, the mailbox no longer auto submits items.

Shader changes

Diogo is doing his thing, tweaking shaders and fixing ‘crazy emissive laser disco blobs.’ As always, it’s a little hard to decipher exactly what the fuck he is talking about. That said, you can probably expect some improvements and slight changes to how stuff looks come the Thursday update.

Dungeon art progress

Damian and Vince continue trucking along on the new dungeon, Rocket Factory. Work this week appears to be focusing on walkways and offices of this exciting new PvP zone. As with all dungeon art, we won’t see this in game till the next forced wipe (July 6th) at the earliest.

Hapis 5 branch

After launching the first iteration of changes last week, Petur has started the next round of updates to the Hapis map. No visuals on this yet, however, it appears a new canyon area has been added. Like the dungeon art, these changes will likely not go live till the next forced wipe.

Other stuff

• Added maxpeerspersecond client convar (counteracts P2P packet flooding)
• Fixed viewmodel going crazy when ADS immediately after weapon deploy
• 3rd party asset removal (cleaning out old Unity store assets)

2:30pm EST - The update and devblog are out!

2:00pm EST - Our update stream is live! twitch.tv/rustafied

11:50am EST - The recoil stuff was merged in this morning, added some more specifics below.

12:00am EST - Update day is upon us and we’re seeing improvements to recoil, a buff to buckshot, optimizations, and more.

 Our update stream will start at 2pm EST. Follow @Rustafied for news throughout the day. Let’s get into it...

Update summary video

Here's our update summary video from Puddy!

Recoil improvements

In the wake of the drastic recoil changes from last week, Helk has iterated on aimcone behavior. Bullets now have a chance of going directly where you’re aiming, instead of simply landing anywhere in the aimcone. As Helk told me, it should feel much more like Battlefield.

With these fundamental shifts to recoil, there have been a bunch of changes to weapons and ammo. Here's a rundown:

• Automatic weapons + SAR have their aimcones weighted so a few more shots will land in the center rather than the edges
• AK47 slightly higher horizontal recoil and slightly lower max aimcone
• Double barrel shotgun has less recoil aimcone
• Eoka has less aimcone
• Handmade shell does 9 damage per pellet instead of 7
• Handmade shell spread increased slightly and pellet velocity decreased

Buckshot buff

The spread of buckshot pellets has been improved upon by Helk this week. Similar to the recoil changes, pellets now have an affinity towards the center as opposed to randomly going anywhere in the aimcone (about 20% of pellets are weighted to the center).

With this change, their range has been nerfed slightly - damage falloff is now faster, losing effectiveness at around 40 meters. See Helk’s tweet for a before and after shot.

Slug cost halved

Helk has cut the cost of shotgun slugs in half!

Old cost
20 frags
20 gun powder

New cost
10 frags
10 gun powder

P2P packet flooding fix

A potential fix is in for the player to player attack which has been prevalent for some time now. Andre has added maxpeerspersecond client convar, which hopefully helps mitigate the p2p packet flooding attack.

Dropbox changes

Helk has improved some characteristics of the newly added Dropbox item. First, items no longer auto submit when you put them in (this has been applied to the Mailbox, too). Also, the Dropbox no longer tosses items into the world when dragged into a full dropbox, they simply go back to the slot they originated. Finally, like items will automatically stack when dragged in. These simple UX changes should make using the dropbox a bit more functional.

Optimizations

Andre has tweaked some things with textures to increase performance. Along with optimizing anisotropic and trilinear filtering settings on workshop skins, the minimum AF setting on all textures is no longer forced (only the maximum) allowing for lower qualities and hence, better performance.

Other stuff

• Added server.woundingenabled - if set to false players always die instead of wounding
• Clamp NPC walk animation speed (effect spamming fix)
• A lot of tweaks to shaders (see devblog for more details)
• Small tweaks to the small clutter rock scales
• Dungeon art progress (rocket factory dungeon)
• Hapis improvements second iteration under way
• Fixed crazy emissive laser disco blobs (I love Diogo’s commits)
• Fixed viewmodel going crazy when ADS immediately after weapon deploy

4:40pm EST - The devblog is out!

4:30pm EST - We're hosting PoonGalore with some fresh wipe gameplay on our channel!

4:25pm EST - The client and server update have hit!

2:00pm EST - Our update stream is live! twitch.tv/rustafied

12:20pm EST - Tons of balance tweaks and fixes being committed today in preparation for the update launch. I'm adding to the article below as needed...

2:00am EST - The builds are complete and our staging server is up to date with the new progression system! It has some bugs and still needs a ton of balance, but stay tuned for a bunch of tweaks before the update goes live.

1:30am EST - Today is not only the first update of the month (including the forced wipe on all servers), it marks the inception of the newest form of progression in the game. On top of that, we’re seeing the first natural landmarks along with some other tweaks.

Our update stream goes live at 2pm EST. Follow @Rustafied for news throughout the day. Let’s get into it...

Blueprints 3.0 video

Here's a summary video from Puddy on the new progression system.

Summary of the new progression

If you played Rust prior to July of 2016 (before XP or components were introduced), you likely already have a solid grasp on the fundamental concepts of this new progression. A hybrid of the blueprints and components, Blueprints 3.0 brings back the idea of learning a blueprint before being able to craft an item. Additionally, it introduces several levels of work benches, requiring you be in front of a certain work bench to make particular items.

Perhaps now more than ever, it is important to note: large changes to the game such as this require extensive testing and balance. The loot tables alone for a shift of this magnitude may require weeks of tweaking and retooling before getting to an ideal state.

The good news is Helk told me he’s improving on how the loot tables are set, providing more automation for easier tweaking going forward. With that in mind, please be patient with this new system, especially in the first week, as things are bound to need balance.

What are blueprints?

This implementation of blueprints borrows much from previous iterations. Low level items are ‘default blueprints’ - meaning everyone on the server knows how to craft them by default. Most items, however, require that a player learn the blueprint prior to being able to craft.

Once learned, blueprints are tied to each player on each server. That means if you learn a blueprint on one server and then join a different server, you will have to acquire and learn that blueprint again.

Blueprints generally don’t wipe every time the map wipes, so it is advantageous of players to stick to servers which they’ve already learned blueprints on. Although server owners can choose to wipe blueprints at any time, Facepunch generally doesn't force a blueprint wipe unless a change to the game dictates a fresh start. On Rustafied servers, we plan on only wiping blueprints when forced by Facepunch.

How do you get blueprints?

There are several ways to obtain blueprints. Like a rock or torch, they are items in the game, meaning you can drop them on the ground, trade them with friends, or find them in others loot. Unlike other items in the game, you can also use a research bench to create a blueprint.

Once you have a blueprint in your inventory, if you haven’t learned it already, you can click a button to learn the blueprint. The second you do that, the item disappears, and you are able to craft that item on the server (provided you have the required resources, components, and workbench access if needed).

Blueprints do not currently spawn in loot, only whole items which then need to be researched. Here are the main ways you’ll obtain blueprints in Rust:

Research them
Similar to repair benches, research tables can be crafted (with a level 1 work bench) and placed around your base. Standing in front of one, you’ll be able to place an item and a specific amount of scrap to create a blueprint.

If you played Rust back during the old blueprint system, this will sound very familiar. Back then, you’d use BP Fragments along with an item to gain a certain percent chance of generating a blueprint. This new scrap system, although similar, is not a game of chance like the researching of old - a specific amount of scrap will definitely yield you a blueprint.

Trade them
Vending machines may become much more advantageous for proprietors and customers alike as Helk has added specific functionality for trading blueprints. In the administration panel, when setting your sell orders, just click on the little blueprint item (if applicable) and the vending machine will sell the blueprint instead of the item.

Default blueprints

Here is the current list of default blueprints (i.e. items you'll never need a blueprint or workbench to craft):

Edit: Eoka, handmade shells, gunpowder, metal shopfront, vending machines, and crossbow have been made default blueprints.

How work benches work

A concept fresh to this version of Rust, but not entirely new (if you played Legacy), work benches have been added. With 3 levels, work benches not only speed up crafting, they are required to make certain tier items in the game.

Each higher level workbench requires items which can only be crafted by the previous level, meaning you can’t skip ahead by crafting a level 3 work bench without having a level 2 bench already.

You’ll also be able to find workbenches in certain rad towns, but risking all the resources to carry them into a highly contested area probably won’t be worth it more often than not.

As far as speed is concerned, bonuses on crafting times are based off the tier item versus the level work bench. An item requiring a level 1 work bench will craft much faster in the direct vicinity of a level 3 work bench - up to a 75% increase in speed.

Work Bench Level 1

Cost
500 wood
100 metal frags
50 scrap

Requirements
None

Work Bench Level 2

Cost
500 metal frags
20 high quality metal
500 scrap

Requirements
Work Bench Level 1

Work Bench Level 3

Cost
1000 metal frags
100 high quality metal
1250 scrap

Requirements
Work Bench Level 2

Edit: The scrap prices of work benches 2 and 3 were just increased. New values added above.

Balance shifts

With a change of this magnitude, a ton of shifts to balance will be needed. Here are some notable changes we're seeing already:

• HQM from recycling components has been reduced to nearly nothing
• Loot tables have completely changed. You now find whole items much more often and scrap in almost everything. Check out a raw print of the current loot tables here (thanks to Maxaki of Blueberry servers for this info).
• Found weapons start at a very low condition
• M92 and LR300 cannot be crafted
• Metal shopfront and vending machines are cheaper to craft
• Research table is cheaper to craft
• Tshirts and long sleeves are cheaper and no longer require a sewing kit

Ice lakes

Heading up north post-wipe, you’ll notice some changes to the surroundings. Ice lakes, the first iteration of natural landmarks, have been added to the snow biome. These lakes come in two sizes (small and large) and can be built on like normal ground.

These new sheets of ice not only provide help points of reference, they offer some of the flattest building surfaces known to Rust! They vary in characteristics; some lakes have rocks in the middle, some are just flat. Also, some large versions include a broken down truck. Although there is no loot to be found in the truck, it does appear barrels and food crates spawn around these lakes. There are several of these natural landmarks per seed. They don’t really stand out on the map, but you can find them by looking for the slight oblong indents in snowy areas.

As you may recall from previous devblogs, this snow biome revamp also included some ice sheets and new icebergs. Unfortunately, those still need some work and have not made it in this week. That said, expect those and more natural landmarks making their way into procedural map generation in the near future!

Other map changes

As with many first updates of the month, today's patch includes shifts to procedural map generation. Beyond the Ice Lakes mentioned above, there have been some changes to how roads generate. Using a new algorithm, road creation is now much faster and better looking. Although it isn’t 100% continuous, roads now avoid being split by monuments - instead, they prefer going around.

Other stuff

• New skins are live!
• High external walls and gates require some space between them when placed parallel to each other (i.e. when stacking them)
• Cooking raw deer meat now correctly turns into cooked deer meat
• Barricade placement tweaks (concrete, stone and sandbag)
• There is a new official site for overall Rust statistics

After the huge shift last week that included the reintroduction of a blueprint system, the dev team is moving forward with some balance shifts and other improvements to help address some issues and help polish this new hybrid system.

Item rarity and vending machine tweaks

Guitars, planters, and ceiling lights are now tier 1 rarity. The vending machine tooltip shows if the item for sale is a blueprint or not. Water purifiers and stone spears are now default blueprints. Hapis Island site B tunnels now have a chance to spawn elite loot crates. Boonie hats, bandanas, and ball caps are unresearchable. Signs and picture frames are unresearchable as well.

Object and tool improvements

A tool cupboard is no longer required to pick up items, meaning that items placed outside of cupboard range can be picked up. Hands intersecting while running with a pickaxe has now been fixed as well. You can now pickup research/repair benches and repair workbenches.

Other stuff

Unity 2017.1.2f1
Added tire effects when car drives over different surfaces
Workbenches have deploy sounds
System info includes process memory usage
Added "Batching" and "Decor" scenes to reduce game object hierarchy clutter

5:20pm EST - Client just hit - this update is live!

5:16pm EST - Devblog is live! Client update still pending...

4:54pm EST - Server update just hit! Client and devblog still pending...

4:45pm EST - Should be any time now as Helk is just getting the blog prepped.

1:30pm EST - Several more balance changes just came in, updated the post below.

12:55pm EST - A family emergency just came up and we will be unable to do our update stream today. I'll make sure to tweet everything to @Rustafied as it happens. Sorry for the inconvenience.

12:01am EST - We’ve had a week to dive in and get to know this new system and so far the reception from players has been overwhelmingly positive. Primitive fighting has been extended, commerce is booming, social aspects are finding their way back in, and several opportunities for improvements have come to light. As a result, we're seeing a ton of balance and QoL shifts this week.

Follow @Rustafied for news throughout the day.

Update summary video

Check out our update summary video from Puddy.

Elite crate nerf

Attempting to find balance (a theme this week), Helk has nerfed elite crates. The now only spawn every 2 hours - instead of every 20 minutes - and they yield half as many items as before (2 definitions as opposed to 4). Also, the launch site now has 1 less elite crate spawn.

Bradley shifts

At the last minute, Helk has tweaked some things with Bradley. It not only spawns less frequently, it now effectively drops elite crates instead. It also now only starts healing after 10 minutes and takes 5 minutes total to heal - much slower than before.

Quality of life improvements

In the wake of the new blueprint system, we're seeing a bunch of quality of life and balance shifts. Here are some highlights:

• At the highest levels (launch site roof and nuke plant), a small amount of radiation leaks through the hazmat suit.
• Airdrops now spawn fewer high end rifles, more shotguns and ammo. They also drop turrets instead of turret parts.
• Higher chance of finding tools in caves - less chance of finding miner and candle hats. Also, less HQM drops in caves.
• Lowered high quality metal available from helicopter and bradley parts.
• Boonie hat, candle hat, and miner hat all now have some armor protection.
• Tuna can lights and lanterns are now brighter, and the tuna can light is now cheaper (25 metal frags instead of 40).
• The miners hat has a blinding flair, and no longer emits light visible to other players.
• Recycling broken items now yields slightly more resources than before, and recycling weapons forces them to output ammo/mods before recycling.
• Fix for stone ore scarcity.
• Slightly lower chance of satchel duds.

Picking up random items

Tired of seeing dinette sets lining the countryside? Well now you can clean things up a bit! Some items like tables, chairs, and refrigerators can now be picked up to use or recycle without a tool cupboard.

This functionality is limited to only a few items at the moment though, as things like water holders and planters cannot be picked up. Turrets still require building privilege to pick up as well.

Workbench radius tripled and rotation added

After a week of basically having to stand on top of the workbenches, Helk has tripled the benefit radius, allowing a little more freedom while crafting. Another key change is the ability to rotate workbenches, which provides a little more freedom with placement and base design.

Blueprint balance

While this system will certainly see some more significant changes in the coming weeks, we have a few noteworthy things coming in today:

• Cluttery deployables spawn as blueprints in barrels instead of the object.
• Flamethrower requires work bench level 2 to craft.
• Pants, hoodies, guitars, planters, and ceiling lights are now tier 1 rarity.
• Snow and vagabond jacket cost 50 cloth (instead of 200) and are 1 rarity tier lower.
• Vending machines now display whether what is being sold is an item or a blueprint.
• Water purifiers, small/medium signs and stone spears are now default blueprints.
• Boonie hats, bandanas, ball caps, signs, and picture frames cannot be researched.

Grid added to map

Navigating using the in game map just got a bit easier as Helk added a grid. Each grid has it's own label in the top left, and the whole grid can be toggled off with a checkbox on the top left of the screen.

Other stuff

• Fixed launch site exploit allowing people shooting from within the walls
• Fixed stray dome sounds on lighthouse
• Fixed peacekeeper mode not working on turrets
• Fixed bug where candle hat had a light radius of 30m
• Hapis Island now has a chance to spawn elite crates
• Sewing kit requires less rope
• Tweaked high external wall and gate deploy volumes to make it easier to close compound walls
• Added tire effects when car drives over different surfaces
• Workbenches have deploy sounds
• System info includes process memory usage

1:30pm EST - It’s a fresh week for Rust development and we’re seeing balance shifts plus forward progress on exciting new features. Let’s get into it...

LR-300 buff

The LR-300 will shoot a bit quicker after this update as the fire rate has been increased by 10%. In addition, it is now skinnable, so expect some fresh looks for this rifle in the near future.

Loot changes

Expect some shifts to loot drops this week as Helk is working on several tweaks to balance loot tables. First, although it was reverted for now, is that loot spawn properties changed to never produce duplicates. That means you should never find the same of two items in one loot crate. Stay tuned for more details on these shifts as we get closer to Thursday.

Player model updates

The new player model updates have once again been merged into the staging branch. These include new faces, various player model improvements, and several types of hair (including facial, head, armpit, eyebrows, and pubic). At the moment, these hairstyles are not applied by default. Instead, they are attire items, and can only be spawned in by admins. Also, player eyeballs are currently missing, which is pretty creepy looking.

I wouldn’t expect hair to make it in the update this week, but it does look like these player model updates might - although they have been reverted several times now after being merged, so who knows...

Vehicle progress

As we know from the roadmap and previous devblogs, several types of vehicles will be added to Rust in the future. Vincent is working on a new vehicles branch, and his commits are starting to shed light on some features to expect.

First, there is a cage module for prisoner and slave transportation. Also, there will be at least two types of storage modules: a short flatbed and a long flatbed. At the moment, most of the work appears preliminary, so I wouldn’t expect to be rolling around the landscape any time soon. As always, we’ll keep you up to date as this branch progresses.

Other stuff

• Bow change reverted (this went live in a hotfix over the weekend)
• Hapis Island exploit fixes
• No longer automatically call "backup" on server start by default (better for server providers, add +backup to your startup parameters if you want this)
• Two sided hanging sign & landscape picture frame unlocked if player has Steam item

Steam reviews

Incase you missed it on last week's devblog, Rust steam reviews have been taking a beating lately. If you’re enjoying the game, please take a couple minutes to write a positive review for it.

Seeking server moderators

In the interest of maintaining the highest caliber of servers possible, Rustafied is looking for more moderators. We are only looking for experienced applicants - so if you’re over 18 years of age, and have a background in moderating for Rust or other games, please go fill out an application today!

6:06pm EST - Client update is out!

6:02pm EST - The devblog just hit.

5:45pm EST - Server update is out! Client and devblog still pending...

5:00pm EST - Still waiting on the update to hit... wiping our US servers now in the interest of maximizing wipe day game play!

4:20pm EST - Looks like the update is a bit delayed today. Took the stream down in mean time but will tweet as soon as we see movement on the patch going live.

2:00pm EST - Our update stream is live! twitch.tv/rustafied

12:15am EST - It's update day and we've got barbeques, fresh faces, and balance. Our update stream goes live at 2pm EST. Follow @Rustafied for news throughout the day.

Update summary video

Here's our update summary video from Puddy!

Barbeque added

A new way of cooking food has arrived! Barbecues are officially in the game, and they allow you to cook significant amounts of food. A default blueprint costing wood and metal fragments, these barbecues have more than twice the capacity of campfires.

When not in use, this makeshift cooker has a closed lid. When turned on, however, the lid lifts up (with a nice little animation) and the flames come on.

Cost
100 wood
40 metal frags

Crafting time
30 seconds

Blueprint
Default

Player model updates

The long awaited updates to skins have made their way in! These include new faces, moving / blinking eyes, and various other changes to the player models.

Although this doesn’t mean a complete character reroll - sex stays the same and skin tones generally do too - but you may notice some different characteristics to your player model after the update. Here are some examples (NSFW pics here).

Hair progress

In conjunction with these skin updates, hair has made its way into the game… sort of. Players are all still hairless by default, however, various hair items may now be spawned in by admins.

Although we’re not seeing these manes in game yet, there has been some good progress, including the addition of some new hair types (arm pit, eyebrows) and several new styles. Expect more on this in the coming weeks.

Start crafting, walk away

Crafting higher tier items just got more lenient as it no longer cancels your crafted items when walking away from a work bench. That means you can queue up a bunch of stuff while standing by a work bench, travel anywhere you like, and your items will continue crafting.

Loot distribution

I have it on good authority (i.e. Helk told me) that some significant changes are coming to loot distribution soon. No commits for this yet, but I'll update this section as soon as we have more information.

Edit: Doesn't look like this is making it in today...

Blueprint Balance

More balance with regards to blueprints this week:

• Python now requires a tier 2 work bench (instead of tier 1)
• Ladder hatch now requires a tier 2 work bench (instead of tier 3)

LR-300 buff

The LR-300 will shoot a bit quicker after this update as the fire rate has been increased by 10%. In addition, it is now skinnable, so expect some fresh looks for this rifle in the near future.

Other stuff

• New skins added!
• Animals now react to gunshots (along with slightly better animal movement)
• Bear rug, Rug and Table can no longer be picked up when building blocked and they require a hammer to be picked up
• Bow change reverted (this went live in a hotfix over the weekend)
• Hapis Island exploit fixes
• No longer automatically call "backup" on server start by default (better for server providers, add +backup to your startup parameters if you want this)
• Two sided hanging sign & landscape picture frame unlocked if player has Steam item

Saltyween Skin contest

As you may have seen on the community update, our friends over at Xtab are having a Halloween skin contest. Go check out more information on their post!

December 2nd will be this year's Charitable Rust event - mark your calendars!

For the third consecutive year, we're putting on a 12 hour live stream event to benefit charity. All the proceeds this year will go to Direct Relief. If you're not familiar, they help survivors of natural disasters and poverty in over 80 countries worldwide. With all the shit going on in the world (hurricanes, wildfires, earthquakes, etc.), I figured this was a fitting charity for this year.

Charitable Rust will take place on a custom event server with slews of giveaways and prizes, along with a full day of action including a Rust casino, carnival, parkour challenges, 3D maze, invasion gameplay, and much more.

We're looking for volunteers to participate in the event through raising awareness, streaming, and providing prizes to give away. If you are interested in participating, please go to charitablerust.com and fill out the participation form at the bottom fo the page.

Stay tuned over the coming weeks for more information on Charitable Rust 2017.

Halloween event this Saturday!

In preparation for Charitable Rust, we’re running a Halloween event this Saturday (Oct.28th) from 5pm to 8pm EST. This will not only be an awesome time, it’ll help us stress test several events for the charity event. Check back here (or follow @Rustafied) for the server information prior to start time on Saturday.

Saltyween winners!

The Xtab Saltyween contest - of which I was a judge - has come to a close. Go check out the winners here. Congratulations to everyone who won!

Development news

The dev’s are off to a good start this week with progress on vehicles, AI, fixes, and a new Halloween branch. Check back here on Thursday for the full scoop.

10/28 @ 5pm EST - Our Halloween event server is now open! connect 216.52.143.207:28060

6:45pm EST - The client update and devblog are live!

6:17pm EST - The server update just hit. Also, we have murderer NPC's in game for Halloween!

6:13pm EST - Still waiting on the update to hit. We are seeing some special Halloween stuff hitting staging on the latest builds - I've added some pictures below.

5:20pm EST - The update is still pending. We took our update stream down to wipe our US servers in the interest of maximizing wipe day gameplay. Follow @Rustafied to know exactly when the update hits.

3:00pm EST - Our update stream is live! twitch.tv/rustafied

1:12pm EST - Helk told me it's going to be a bit later of an update today. Therefore, we're going to delay starting our stream for an hour - new start time: 3pm EST.

12:02am EST - Update day is here and we’re seeing loot balance, AI tweaks, performance enhancements, and a new type of door.

Our update stream goes live at 2pm EST. Follow @Rustafied for news throughout the day. Let’s get into it...

Update video summary

Here's our update summary video from Puddy!

Garage door added

A new building element has been added: the Garage Door. Taking up the same amount of space as the double door, this new gateway slides up and down when opened or closed. Able to be locked (although lock placement is off at the moment), the garage door is a bit stronger than sheet metal doors and likewise, is more expensive (keep in mind, this could change with balance shifts prior to launch).

Unlike the sheet metal door, the garage door is not a default blueprint. Once you find one, it’ll cost 75 scrap to research and then require a level 1 workbench to craft. They are skinnable as well, so expect some visual variations coming soon.

Also, to point out the obvious, no, we don’t have cars in the game yet. This might beg the question: why the hell do we have garage doors then? Well, as Helk told me, this was low hanging fruit as everything was pretty much ready to go - therefore, he decided to just toss it in. Here are some details:

Cost
300 metal frags
2 gears

To research
75 scrap

Work bench
Level 1

Health
600

To destroy
1 C4
3 rockets
5 satchels

Halloween is here

In preparation for the spookiest of holidays, the team is planning on several new Halloween collectibles. At the moment it appears these will be items for sale in the store, but we may also see some more spooky stuff around...

Edit: The items you can pick up (stone, wood, ore) along with backpacks have been reskinned to a Halloween theme (and give resources). There's also some spooky new ambient sounds.

Edit 2: Murderer NPC's have also been added for Halloween! They spawn around the map, attack you with cleavers, and drop loot when killed.

Here are some pictures:

AI Tweaks

After several improvements to AI last week, we’re seeing more tweaks and additions coming today. Along with advances in invalid destination detection, there have been some fixes to AI and player movement physics colliding. Long and short: animals will hopefully move a bit better after the update.

Loot balance

As mentioned in the devblog last week, Helk is planning on changing how loot is dropped entirely. Through shifts to the loot table generation and better item categorization, loot will hopefully be much less RNG feeling, and provide a more rewarding experience overall. As of this moment, these changes have not been merged yet.

Edit: There is now an equal chance for all item drops in a tier, however, it doesn't look like the significant changes to loot balance are making it in this week.

Server performance improvements

Server performance has been pretty crappy lately. Thankfully, Helk told me there are a bunch of optimizations coming in today, so hopefully lag and hitches should be greatly improved after the update.

Edit: Unfortunately, instead of 1 step forward, we ended up taking several steps back with regards to server performance. It is fucked at the moment on larger servers. We're working with the developers now and just switched our EU Main server to debug mode so they can profile it and see what the issue is.

Edit 2: It appears much of the poor server performance was caused by the new server encryption. We've turned encryption to 1 on our main servers and perf seems to be much better.

Other stuff

• Bonefollower/camera excecution reorganization (spectate camera is much more solid now)
• Increased ceiling light rope length
• Rocket factory ladder to top has been changed to a walkway
• Fix  for debris field not updating on map
• Barbeque can no longer be placed in monuments and can no longer clip through walls

Halloween event this Saturday!

In preparation for Charitable Rust, we’re running a Halloween event this Saturday (Oct.28th) from 5pm to 8pm EST. This will not only be an awesome time, it’ll help us stress test several events for the charity event. Check back here (or follow @Rustafied) for the server information prior to start time on Saturday.

Charitable Rust 2017

Mark your calendars: December 2nd will be this year’s Charitable Rust event! With tons of games and prizes, this 12 hour livestream event will help raise funds for charity. For more information, check out my previous post, or watch the video below:

A picture from our Halloween event last weekend. A huge thank you to everyone who participated!

Happy Halloween everyone! It’s a fresh week in Rust development, and with the forced wipe right around the corner, we’re seeing some exciting changes to the landscape. Let’s get into it...

Topology tiers

Andre, working on the save153 branch, has added a labeling system for different topology. With 3 tiers total, these labels will help dictate where players spawn along with what biomes appear in each tier. At the moment, players will spawn on Tier0 beaches in temperate climates. Tier1 and Tier2 will have no players spawning, but will be either arid, temperate or arctic.

Keep in mind, this is mainly a labeling system, it does not necessarily mean huge changes to the overall layout of procedural maps. That said, it’s possible this categorization could be used in the future for other functionalities (i.e. certain loot for certain tiers).

The branch has not been merged into main yet, so there is no way to test it at the moment. Stay tuned here on Thursday for more information.

Ice sheets and Icebergs

Damien continues his work on the snow biome revamp branch. With a focus mainly on the new ice sheets and icebergs, it appears we may have a bunch of new sights and game play opportunities up in the arctic come Thursday.

Similar to the save153 branch, these changes have not been merged into main yet. Stay tuned for more visuals and info as Thursday approaches.

Hapis fixes

In preparation for the forced wipe, Hapis is seeing some love from Alistair this week. Along with the addition of the Bradley APC (no rocket factory added yet), we’ve got some exploit fixes and changes to radiation.

Savas tweaks

Savas is also getting some attention this week as we’re seeing some tweaks to loot, exploit fixes, map marker tweaks, and the addition of a north and south recycler.

AI Improvement

After the addition of murderer NPC’s for Halloween last week, we’re seeing some improvements and optimizations to the underlying AI system. Although the murderer NPC’s are only planned to be a Halloween event, they are a great test for upcoming scientist NPC’s to be added to the game.

EU Long launch!

I’m happy to announce our newest server launching this Thursday: EU Long. A clone of its US counterpart, EU Long will have 200 slots and only wipe the map when forced. The server is currently running for testing purposes, so look for it on the community list if you want to help test (or get a head start on some blueprints).

11/3 @ 11:30am EST - WIPE NOTICE: There is a forced protocol update coming out shortly which should fix the various issues introduced in yesterdays patch.

Given the extent of the situation (floating resources and bases, shitty server performance, high pings, etc.) we are deciding to wipe the map on all of our servers when this update hits. This is something we were trying to avoid, however, given the quantity of issues less than 24 hours into the wipe, we think this is our only option to ensure reliable game play for the rest of the wipe.

10:40pm EST - We're rolling updates on our servers to help fix the map issues. Pardon the downtime.

8:10pm EST - We've been dealing with the map issues caused by the latest update. Updating a server with the latest hotfix appeared to only make the issue worse. Furthermore, freshly wiped servers still have map issues. The devs are aware of the issues and working on a solution.

6:20pm EST - A small (optional) server and client update just came out to fix the monument issues.

5:35pm EST - There are some issues with monuments and procedural map generation after this update. The developers are aware and working on a fix. We'll keep you posted as always.

4:45pm EST - The update and devblog are live! We're hosting Lucroan with some fresh wipe gameplay.

2:00pm EST - Our update stream is live! twitch.tv/rustafied

9:55am EST - The save153 branch has been merged meaning ice sheets, icebergs, and a whole bunch of loot changes are now live on staging. I'm updating the post below accordingly.

12:01am EST - The first Thursday of the month is here, and with it, not only a forced map wipe, but a new gun and some significant changes to maps. At the moment, many of the changes are still on separate branches (and therefore can't be tested). Expect additions to this post throughout the day.

Our update stream goes live at 2pm EST. Follow @Rustafied for news throughout the day. Let’s get into it...

Update summary video

Here's our update summary video from Puddy.

Nailgun added

Helk has added a new member to the Rust arsenal: the Nailgun. With it, a new form of ammo: Nailgun Nails. Featuring a 16 round clip, this new gun requires a level 1 workbench, frags and scrap to craft. It is, however, a default blueprint - so no researching required.

At the moment, this is a baseline implementation. The model for the nailgun is a revolver, and the icon for nailgun nails is an arrow. I’ll add more details and pictures once some more polishing has been done.

Edit: The model is now in, added pictures below. Also, some costs have been updated.

Cost
75 metal frags
15 scrap

Requirements
Default blueprint
Level 1 workbench

Ammo
Nailgun Nails
8 frags for 5 nails

Ice sheets and icebergs

We’re seeing some significant shifts to the arctic biome this week with the addition of icebergs and ice sheets. When traveling up north, players will be able to jump across various ice sheets, and get to a whole new type of icebergs.

This is all still on a separate branch (save153), so we don’t have the ability to test or provide more visuals. It is expected to be merged in shortly though, so check back here soon for more information and pictures.

Edit: These are now live on staging. You can build on them and they look fucking awesome!

Stance recoil

Shifts to shooting this week as Helk tweaked some gun dynamics. Crouching will now provide the best accuracy (same as before), moving while firing will result in a much less accurate shot, and accuracy while standing has been reduced.

Topology tiers

A new categorization method for procedural map generation has been added. Parts of the map are now split into three different tiers. These dictate where players spawn, along with what monuments and biome type appear.

Players now only spawn on Tier 0 beaches in temperate climates. Tier 1 and Tier 2 will have no players spawning, but will be either arid, temperate or arctic.

Each monument will now only spawn in its given tier. Launch site, military tunnels, and power plant only appear in the top tier (Tier 2), while airfield, satellite dish, dome, water treatement, trainyard, and ‘radtown3’ will appear in Tier 1. All other monuments and rad areas (i.e. supermarket, gas station, harbor, lighthouse, etc.) will appear in Tier 0 zones.

In conjunction with this, new loot tier types have been added to each monument. Although most of this code is still on a separate branch and therefore cannot be tested, this stands to change loot distribution across the map in a big way.

Loot changes

In addition to the new tiers, Helk has made a bunch of shifts with what loot spawns where. Here are some highlights:

• There is a new 'basic' wood loot box added to supermarkets, gas stations, and warehouses.
• Military tunnel spawns 2 elite crates in the center..
• Supply drop always drops atleast 2 weapons, 2 armor pieces, and ammo.
• Crate logic always spawns 1 component with 40% chance of workbench item instead of either or.

Hapis changes

Hapis got some love from Alistair this week. Along with adding the Bradley APC (no rocket factory added yet), he’s fixed some exploits and did several changes to radiation around the map.

Savas changes

Savas is also getting some attention this week as we’re seeing some tweaks to loot, exploit fixes, map marker tweaks, and the addition of a north and south recycler.

Other stuff

• Halloween content has been disabled
• Candle hat is a default blueprint
• Metal window bars are cheaper to research
• Fixes to player models (bone scaling, geometry, and more variation to dark skin colors)

EU Long live today!

Our newest server, EU Long, officially goes live today. Similar to its US counterpart, EU Long will have 200 slots and only wipe the map when forced. You can find it on the official server list.

Charitable Rust 2017

Charitable Rust is just 1 month away! Mark the date: December 2nd!

For the third year in a row, we’re putting on a 12 hour livestream event, where all the proceeds go to charity. This year, all funds will go to Direct Relief, a longstanding charity who provides aid to victims of natural disasters and poverty in over 80 countries. For more information, or if you’d like to participate, check out charitablerust.com.

Blueprint wipe?

No. I confirmed with Helk there is no planned forced wipe of blueprints. Certain servers may choose to wipe their blueprints manually, however, Rustafied servers will only wipe blueprints when FacePunch forces (which will not be today).

1:15pm EST - It’s a fresh week in Rust development and we’re seeing changes to the commits page, progress on hair, an updated double barrel world model, and more!

Commits page update

If you are in the habit of browsing the Rust commits page religiously like me, you’ve probably noticed some shifts. Instead of each commit being listed out chronologically, items are now split up between each developer for each day.

Also, legibility has been increased as the display of what branch the commit is on has been shortened and added to the tail end of each commit (omitting any text if it’s on the main branch). If you look at the times, the order of each person's commit might be a bit confusing. Don't worry, the commits are in chronological order - the times just don’t show AM or PM at the moment.

If you’d still like to view the commits in the exact order they were added, your best bet is @RustUpdates on Twitter.

Edit: The times are now in 24 hour format, which makes more sense.

Hair progress

Diogo is diving deep into hair implementation this week with a ton of commits to the ‘hair-impl’ branch. So far we’re seeing hair randomized based on steamid, hair type assigned based on skin/race/sex, and a whole bunch more tweaks to hair overall.

Will hair make it in this week? That is up in the air at the moment, but it does look like the team is pushing to get it added in the near future.

Shotgun world model

Alex has updated the double barrel shotgun worldmodel along with tweaking some of the material settings. Here are two shots:

Christmas is coming

Vincent is working on a new ‘ho-ho-ho’ branch in preparation for the in game Christmas event. Like previous years, we can expect gift boxes to spawn around the map at various intervals, stockings, and candy canes. It looks like we might also see some new stuff for this year in the form of tree decorations. My fingers crossed for the airdrop turning into Santa’s sleigh!

Other stuff

• Flame turret can no longer be locked
• Viewmodel skinning update for SAR & Eoka
• Updated the nailgun prefab with new LOD models

11/10 @ 11:15pm EST - An update is out which addresses the save issues. Looks like only certain server saves were affected by rollbacks - most of ours weren't. 

11/10 @ 6:30pm EST - There is an issue with maps not saving. The devs are working on a fix, but a map rollback of an undetermined amount of time may be imminent. More information here.

5:00pm EST - The devblog and update are out!

3:00pm EST - Our update stream is live! twitch.tv/rustafied

1:45pm EST - Our update stream will have a delayed start this week due to an NRE when joining the staging branch at the moment. The devs are aware and working on a fix now. Stay tuned...

11:10am EST - Blueprint experimentation has been added to workbenches. See more info below.

12:15am EST - Update day has arrived, and with it, changes to workbenches, a nailgun raiding nerf, and hair!

Our update stream goes live at 2pm EST. Follow @Rustafied for news throughout the day.

NSFW warning: Given the new hair isn't just on players heads, there are several naked Newman's pictured below.

Hair is here!

After much anticipation, hair is finally in the game! Like race and gender, each player gets randomly assigned a hairstyle. Along with a fresh do, character models now also have a bit of bushel under the arms, in their nether regions, and if lucky, on their face.

Given this is a first implementation, there is still work to be done - placement of certain things (I’m looking at you, eyebrows) can use some work, and clothing clipping is abundant. I would expect more tweaks and new hairstyles in the near future. Till then, here’s some pictures:

Edit: So TSSAA antialiasing makes hair look a lot better (and is now the default setting). Here are some fresh pictures with that set:

Workbench experimentation

A new way to get blueprints is here: workbench experimentation! You can now bring scrap to a workbench and (providing you add the required amount) run an experiment to get a blueprint from that tier (no original item required!). 

If you played the game during the previous blueprint system (before the XP system) then you'll recognize the similarity to blueprint fragments, pages, books, and libraries. This new system, however, just costs scrap and requires a workbench.

The current scrap costs are as follows:

• Level 1 workbench: 100 scrap
• Level 2 workbench: 300 scrap
• Level 3 workbench: 1000 scrap

Nailgun raiding nerf

Since its inception last week, the Nailgun has been the new go to for taking down wood doors. Unfortunately, that will no longer be the case after this update, as Helk changed it so the Nailgun no longer damages wood structures.

On the plus side, nails now stay in the world and are retrievable just like arrows.

Item research cost decreases

Several items have been made cheaper to research. Here's a list:

• Oil refinery
• Searchlight
• Medkit
• Miner hat

• Chain link and prison parts
• Double metal door
• Grill

Other stuff

• Crossbow and bow no longer have stance recoil
• HV arrows are now a default blueprint (still require WB1)
• Can now use a blueprint if it's in a storage container
• Updated garage door and nailgun sounds
• A new format for the Rust commits page
• Flame turret can no longer be locked

Charitable Rust: December 2nd

For the third year in a row, we’re putting on a 12 hour livestream event, where all the proceeds go to charity. This year, all funds will go to Direct Relief, a longstanding charity who provides aid to victims of natural disasters and poverty in over 80 countries. For more information, or if you’d like to participate, check out charitablerust.com.

11/16 @ 12:00am EST - A new tree mini game and falling trees are coming in today.  Still waiting on them to be merged in, check back later for more information. 

1:30pm EST - It’s a fresh week for Rust development and we’re seeing a bunch of forward progress on things for the next forced wipe.

Building 3.0

Andre continues rocking out his work on the building system 3 branch. Aiming to be complete by the end of the month, this branch will feature some significant shifts to how building privilege and decay works.

As mentioned in the last devblog, building privilege will be emitted by building blocks instead of a tool cupboard radius. In addition, they may require (or enforce) only one cupboard per building, add new ways of upkeep, and maybe even some new building blocks - half wall is great and all, but let’s get half blocks back!

Don’t expect any of this in game this week, but stay tuned as the month progresses for more details.

Dungeon art progress

Damien, working on the dungeon art 8 branch, is tweaking and improving the rocket factory. Along with fixing some LOD glitches, he’s made walkway textures more rusted, fixed some lighting bugs, and opened up some additional doors and windows. As with all dungeon art, this work won’t be added till the next forced wipe (Dec. 7th).

Hapis work

Alistair is making some shifts to the north of Hapis. Along with tweaking some of the loot up there, he’s done more work on the snow and ice. As with the dungeon art, these won’t go live till the next forced wipe.

Christmas content

We’re seeing a bit more progress on the ho-ho-ho branch from Vincent. Specifically, he’s added some decorations for doors and windows. This, along with the already existing Christmas content (presents, candy canes, santa hats, stockings, etc.) should make this a very Merry Christmas in Rust.

4:00pm EST - The update and devblog are live! We're hosting JonnySomething with some fresh wipe gameplay action!

2:00pm EST - Our update stream is live! twitch.tv/rustafied

11:20am EST - Update day is upon us and we’re not only seeing a bunch of progress on long term projects, we’ve got some new dynamics with trees.

Our update stream goes live at 2pm EST. Follow @Rustafied for news throughout the day.

Tree minigame

Another notch off the roadmap this week as the tree harvesting minigame has been added. Similar to the node minigame, this allows you to gather resources faster by hitting the right spot.

The tree minigame doesn’t have bright shiny hotspots though. Instead, X marks the spot. Head up to a tree, hit it once, and a red X will appear somewhere on the trunk. Continually hit the X’s to gather more per hit (starting at 16 wood with a metal hatchet, the gather rate increments by 2 per hit till you get to 30).

You will notice a slower gather rate if you choose not to participate in this minigame, as the wood per hit on a metal hatchet stays at 15.

Given this was just added, I wouldn’t be surprised if the numbers and / or graphics change in the near future.

Falling trees

The mini game isn’t all that’s changed with gathering wood - realism has been upped slightly this week as Helk added falling trees. This is purely a client side visual effect at the moment. Instead of trees just disappearing once they’re harvested, they fall down.

This does shift how much wood is gathered while chopping. You'll get less per hit while the tree is standing, then you'll recieve half of the tree's resources when it falls.

Also note, if you have rockets to waste, you can take trees down with them. Not very practical, but a cool effect nonetheless.

Keep in mind, this is an initial implementation, so more may be added to this in the future (I’m thinking piles of wood which spawn after a tree falls would be pretty sweet).

Audio fixes

Along with adding new sounds for trees falling, the team has implemented several fixes to various audio issues. Most exciting: a failsafe fix for the rare stuck bush rustle bug! There’s also some tweaks to cave reverb and music.

Hair fixes

After its inception last week, hair is seeing various fixes this week. Along with some miscellaneous tweaks to graphical issues, hair now deforms to the beanie hat. Also, an issue where beards wouldn’t show has been resolved.

Long term progress

Much of the team's work this week was with long term projects set to go live with the next forced map wipe (on December 7th). Although we won’t see any of this in game this week, we’ve got some exciting additions next month including building 3.0, junkyards, new Christmas content, dungeon improvements, Hapis tweaks, and more!

Check out the devblog later today for more specifics on this progress.

Other stuff

• Workbench can no longer be locked (bug fix)
• Fixed foot flipping around like pinball flippers when player was on stairs
• EAC SDK update
• Tweaks to navmesh - now processes before server starts again

AU blueprint wipe

You may have noticed some downtime with our Australian server. Unfortunately, our server host in that region (OVH) totally shit the bed and lost all the data on the box. That means a complete wipe (including blueprints) has taken place for that server.

Sorry about this, failures of this magnitude are rare but do happen sometime. In light of this, we’re setting up some automated offsite backups for our servers in the near future.

Charitable Rust is two weeks away!

That’s right! Our yearly charity event is just over two weeks away. On December 2nd starting at 11am EST, we’ll be doing a 12 hour livestream event to raise funds for Direct Relief. The event takes place on a custom server with games, challenges, races, competitions, a whole ton of prizes, and your favorite Rust celebrities! Check out charitablerust.com for more information.