By Diet_Fanta/Tatara/Markupatam from Kyrios Archeage 3.1: The Beginning On January 19, 2017, Korea will be getting a new patch. With the name translating to “The Beginning”, this patch will balance a variety of things, such as promote maritime trade, introduce a new level cap and further gear progression, and overall provide a more convenient and enjoyable way to play Archeage. In addition to this, the patch will introduce new lore; the details about the lore are currently not well known (And I won’t go into them as I don’t care; someone else can do that), but several sources have implied that the story will travel to the beginning of Archeage, which is reflected by the title of the patch.Level Cap Changes and the such Two years after the level cap was increased from 50 to 55 (On January 2014 in KR), XL intends to increase it once again. It is not currently known to what level they will increase it to (I am suspecting that it is 60), but, XL has indicated the new level cap will not just be about leveling; the new level cap will create a new “level up goal,” which will further the experience of the players. XL has also stated that they intend to make this future leveling process unprecedented, and that there will be new ways to level your character. There will be more details on this next week when XL releases this info. New Zones and Changes to Zones In 3.1, a new zone will be released called “Whale Songs.” The zone will feature new mobs that players will be able to kill, as well as the new methods to levelling your character. The mobs in this zone will also drop better loot than mobs in previous zones, and there will be some new way to earn honor points in this zone. There may also be other new zones being released in Auroria. I have found some resources on XL’s site about them, but will not publish them at this time, as they may create speculation (Which I discourage). Moving along with the topic of zones, Golden Ruins will now have Peace and War periods, meaning that you will be able to receive honor from within it. Reedwinds, the new zone in 3.0 that is yet to be added, will also undergo Peace to War periods, and loot from the Three-Legged Crow will reflect off of the state of the zone.Boss Spawn and Loot Changes Kraken: Appears on Tuesdays, Thursdays and Saturdays at 22:35 and disappears after 3 hours. Red dragon: Appears on Tuesdays, Thursdays and Saturdays at 22:40, and disappears after 3 hours. Leviathan: Appears on Tuesdays, Thursdays and Saturdays at 22:30 and disappears after 10 hours. Delphinad Ghost Ship: Two appear every day at 22:45. XL has said that they are implementing these changes in order to stop large guilds and alliances from monopolizing boss rotations and free-farming servers. They hope that this will create more PvP and that it will encourage players to contest these bosses more. In addition to that, the spawn timers and despawn timers of Morpheus, Hanure, and Rangora will be adjusted. The loot from these bosses will also be adjusted. In order to keep up with the progression of crafted gear, boss gear will also have a new progression system (Seems to be similar to the dungeon gear progression system). You will be able to upgrade the loot of bosses such as the Kraken, making the Delphinad-level gear into gear that is a higher level than that. You will also be able to upgrade the armor that Meina and Glenn drop. Red Dragon loot has been nerfed to a certain extent. From now on, you will have to grind your way to obtain items that reflect the ones that are on the current live version of the game. That being said, the end result will be the same as the weapons currently on live servers. In addition to all that I have mentioned, PvE bosses will become slightly harder. With 3.1, when you approach a boss, your PvE damage will decrease, and so will the effectiveness ofhealing. However, you will be immediately flagged for PvP within the radius of the boss, no matter if the zone is in peace or not. Upgradeable Boss Loot ● Rangora Cold Anguish ● Morpheus Searing Oath ● Jola Shield ● Kraken Weapons ● Vyrava’s ScepterThe above image is for a new boss present in the new Whale Song territory. He will be revealed next week, so keep your eyes out for that, as I will post when he is revealed.Changes to the Hero System In 3.0, XL redesigned the rewards of the hero system, taking out the gold that it rewarded, and instead substituting it for honor. In 3.1, XL will add special rewards to that system in the form of special, timed weapons. These weapons will not have great DPS, but they will have unique passives, not available to any other weapons. The passives include things such as a large health increase. Skill Queue Changes It would appear that KR is getting a better and smoother skill queue system. I don’t know if it will be implemented on Trion’s version (Everyone on KR has sub-20 ping, so it is much easier to work with such things in their region than in ours). That being said, Inven describes it as a system that mitigates the difference in attack speed caused by the player’s network, so perhaps it will be a good fit for NA. Changes to Crafting The crafting system present in Archeage will be undergoing some changes in order to easen the ability to obtain crafted gear, as it is currently much more straightforward, and to a certain extent, easier, to obtain a T7 Obsidian item (Which is slightly better than Ayanad) than obtain an Ayanad item of the desired grade and proc. For that reason, XL has decided to simplify the crafting process by removing some of the gear that nobody uses from the process in general. Current System: Apprentice’s - Craftsman’s - Artificer’s - Artisan’s - Conqueror’s- Illustrious- Magnificent- Epherium- Delphinad - Ayanad Changed System: Illustrious - Magnificent- Epherium- Delphinad - Ayanad - ErenorThis is actually basically the same thing as using an Armorer’s house, so the change is a little redundant, but is one that should have been implemented a while ago. In addition to those changes, there will now be a new special proc when crafting, where you will be able to choose the exact proc of the item (You will be able to choose if it goes Flame, Wave, Lake, etc.). The images for such a proc are shown in image 1. 1 Changes to Gear As you may have noticed, there is a new tier of weapons after Ayanads. As many may know, Erenor was long