Noting that it’s become a “dominant option and is eclipsing a lot of the other short-range options that exist in the game,” Ziegler said that the change would ensure that it can no longer down an enemy with Blue rarity shields (or above) with two short-range hits. It’s still very useful for two-shotting those with Green rarity shields, so you can still farm Free Kit Runners for Contracts.

Ziegler notes that this change should “force a reload in scenarios where the target has a blue shield, allowing for some more counterplay in these scenarios.” It may sound like the death knell for those who love to 1v3 or, even better, rat in a corner during Solos to kill unsuspecting players, but the WSTR should still be a useful option. Just not the only one.

Of course, this is far from the end of balancing as the team is keeping track of a “variety” of issues, so even more changes could come down the pipe. In the meantime, maybe you should enjoy the current WSTR in all its pre-nerfed glory.

One of the more notable new additions is the Mercy Kit, which Rooks spawn in with. If you’ve ever inadvertently killed an opposing player without meaning to, you can use this to revive them. Whether they give you a receipt or not, well, that’s just a risk you’ll have to take. Solo players can also now discover Depleted Self-Revive kits, which provide avenues for revival if knocked down.

If you found the Rewards Pass underwhelming, especially on the Premium track, Bungie has added three new skins for the Thief, Assassin, and Destroyer. The Free track now contains a Recon skin, WSTR Shotgun skin, and profile emblem. As for C.A.R.R.I. or the CyberAcme Runner Reinforcement Initiative, it offers new Commendations that can be earned from completing contracts, extracting as Rook and more.

These can be exchanged for a “random stack of Salvage items or Reputation Packs that provide reputation for their associated faction.” If that wasn’t enough, solo players now earn increased XP and faction reputation, though the standard faction contracts grant more rep for all types of players.

Check out some of the patch notes below and full details here. You can also learn what’s next on the roadmap here.

Marathon Update 1.0.6

General

• ONI has launched the C.A.R.R.I. or CyberAcme Runner Reinforcement Initiative, a new protocol that rewards both solo Runners and coordinated Crews for completing contract objectives and exfiling together.
  – CyberAcme Commendations are a new material earned by helping crewmates complete contract objectives, completing contract objectives as a solo
• Runner, or successfully exfiling as a Rook. Extra commendations can be earned when you exfil with other players outside of your Crew. Play nice, now.
• Added Stay Together, a new end-of-run experimental feature that allows you to stay with the Runners you just successfully exfiled with by creating a new Crew with them. Who said you can’t make friends on Tau Ceti?
  – Only one crewmate needs to successfully exfil for Stay Together to be available – if you’re eliminated, stay connected!
• Added the capability to access the Rewards Pass from the top left display of SILK.
• We want to increase the value of the Rewards Pass, both the Free and Premium tracks. As a result, we are adding four new Runner Shell styles, a WSTR Shotgun style, and a profile emblem to the Season 1 Rewards Pass:
  – Premium Track: Thief, Assassin, Destroyer
  – Free Track: Recon, WSTR Shotgun, Profile Emblem
• Fixed an issue where the rank up rewards tutorial could be out of sequence.
• Disciples of Arachne earnable shell styles are now available in the Codex.
• Updated the Perimeter (Beginner) new player map to now be a solos-only map that remains available to players until Seasonal Level 12.
  – The Perimeter (Beginner) map presents a reduced risk of encountering other Runners.
• Added five new contracts for the Perimeter (Beginner) map.
  – New and existing players under Seasonal Level 12 will also have access to new optional CyberAcme contracts tailored for the beginner experience to help with their first steps in Marathon.
  – To help players understand the mechanics around the Perimeter Beginner contracts, these new contracts can only be progressed while in Perimeter Beginner or Perimeter Solo Runs.
  – These contracts are no longer accessible after reaching Seasonal Level 12 and will be removed even if decrypted or active.
• When the final exfil is active and there are less than 10 seconds remaining, the timer for other exfils will be reduced to match the remaining session timer. Tie goes to the Runner, after all.
  Developer Note: Previously, the 10-second countdown for non-final exfils was being overwritten by the final exfil timer. Because the difference was only a few seconds, players would see the exfil animation and believe they successfully exfiltrated only to discover they did not in the Run Report. We think this change will result in last-second exfils feeling more “fair”.

Progression

• Increased runner level and faction reputation earning for solo players.
• Increased standard contract faction reputation rewards for all players.

Armory

• The C.A.R.R.I. Armory allows you to spend CyberAcme Commendations for Salvage Crates that grant a random stack of Salvage items or Reputation Packs that provide reputation for their associated faction. Salvage Crate and Sponsored Kit stock refreshes daily while other C.A.R.R.I. offers do not refresh and can only be purchased once.

The Recon is a Shell for players who like to hunt down their opponents, unleashing pings to see them through walls, tracking their footprints, and even sending a drone to decimate all and sundry. It’s all quite cool until you consider that it could be used against you when you dive into Marathon for a run or two.

The Recon is one of those Shells you’d rather have on your team, and we’re particularly happy to use it as a part of a Duo. It does take a bit of skill to pull off, though. It’s almost as nasty as the Thief, and that’s saying a lot. It will be interesting to see how the new drone fares with all of the balancing tweaks that Bungie will implement in the coming days.

Marathon is available for Xbox Series X/S, PS5, and PC. It allegedly cost over $200 million, though it’s apparently closer to $250 million.

That said, it is a triple-A title and that reportedly extends to the budget. Forbes’ Paul Tassi claims that its budget is “over $200 million” and may even be closer to $250 million. The kicker is that it allegedly doesn’t include maintenance or new content. Are end-game activities like Ranked Mode and Cryo Archive, which launched several weeks after, included? We can’t really say.

However, it’s very likely that the mid-season balance patch and new Implants fall under new content, as will any new maps, Runners, weapons, cosmetics, and much more.

A lifetime peak concurrent player count of 88,337 on Steam and less than 30,000 in the past 24 hours would sound disastrous with that kind of budget. After all, Marathon costs $40, and if it reportedly sold 1.2 million, that’s nowhere close to breaking even. However, Sony could be playing the long game and relying more on recurring revenue from a dedicated hardcore player base.

We’ll find out in the coming months, so stay tuned. In the meantime, check out our review of Marathon here.

There are some promising updates about Duos making their way to the game as a part of Season 2, including a new experimental queue on April 15th, 10 AM PT. It’s otherwise been a busy week of balancing the game over at Bungie, with several nerfs of popular tactics hitting the game, the Biotoxic Disinjector being prominent among them.

It’s all part of an effort to make Marathon well-balanced, and to transform Tau Ceti IV into the destination of choice for those of you who can’t get enough of extraction shooters. In the meantime, those among you who’ve been having a blast playing as part of two-member extraction squads could dabble with bigger teams, or maybe take a breather if you’re so inclined.

Marathon is available for Xbox Series X/S, PS5, and PC. It’s due to receive even more content in Season 2, including a night version of Dire Marsh and a new Runner. Check out the roadmap here.

“At least they didn’t touch the damage,” is what you’d probably say next, but alas. The Melee Damage stat, which can provide up to 100 percent bonus damage against other Runners, now only provides a maximum of 50 percent. Don’t worry – it’s still an effective tool against UESC bots and other non-Runner threats.

The reasoning for this change is reasonable enough. “Melee in Marathon is intended to be a high-risk but potent method to contest close-quarters weapons like shotguns and submachine guns. However, the breakpoints for quick melee kills show up too early in the Melee Damage stat progression, which means additional investment into a build isn’t required to get the maximum effective output.”

So while Bungie doesn’t want melee to feel downright useless, it believes “that getting to that maximum output should be the result of meaningful buildcrafting and upgrade progression.” Consider the knife as more of a “powerful backup tool” that requires “more thoughtful play” instead of the Eater of Worlds that it previously was.

The other big change is to the Bubble Shield. It’s now Superior rarity, making it less common, and its health has dropped by 33 percent. The good news is that its resistance to UESC damage has increased by 17 percent and Volt Weapons are less effective against it.

Check out the rest of the patch notes below for more details. Bungie previously revealed changes to the Recon Shell, but the Vandal Shell is also getting a touch-up on April 14th, so stay tuned.

Marathon Update 1.0.5.3

Combat

Knife

• Reduced the maximum lunge distance by ~10% and trimmed down the targeting angle by ~20%.

Bubble Shield

• Increased rarity from Deluxe (blue) to Superior (purple)
• Reduced bubble HP by 33%
• Removed vulnerability to Volt Weapon damage
• Increased resistance to UESC damage by 17%

Runners

Stats

Melee Damage

• Reduced bonus damage provided by the Melee Damage stat from a maximum of 100% to a maximum of 50% against enemy Runners. Damage against non-Runner targets is unchanged.

DEVELOPER NOTE: Melee in Marathon is intended to be a high-risk but potent method to contest close-quarters weapons like shotguns and submachine guns. However, the breakpoints for quick melee kills show up too early in the Melee Damage stat progression, which means additional investment into a build isn’t required to get the maximum effective output. We don’t want to compromise on having melee feel powerful, but believe that getting to that maximum output should be the result of meaningful buildcrafting and upgrade progression. Our goal for this change and the knife lunge changes above are that the knife remains a powerful backup tool, but requires more thoughtful play – both in and out of run – to be most effective.

Thief

• Fixed additional Grapple-related slide cancel movement exploits.

Vault and Armory

• Fixed an issue causing the Vault and Armory to sometimes appear to be empty.
• Fixed an issue causing the Armory item refreshes and free daily items to not appear consistently.

Contracts

Traxus

• Removed “in a single run” condition from Traxus Return On Investment 4/5.

Zones

Cryo Archive

• Fixed an issue that would cause an exfil countdown to reset if the 1st crew member to enter left the circle, even if the other crew members were in the circle.

“Biotoxic Disinjector. It’s Strong! … too strong… We will be doing a change on live, taking it down a notch and nerfing its damage. We’re likely to make some adjustments to Biotox in the near future and may not stick to this damage nerf, but for now, we wanted to make sure we could curb a little bit of its dominion in the game.”

The result of that change is a whopping 35% to the weapon’s damage, which could be a massive hit to your strategy if you’ve been relying on its ability to overwhelm your opponents with its lasers and grenades. It’s still quite strong, but may require more skill and strategy to use.

However, with upgrades to other areas such as the Recon Shell’s Echo Pulse, finding new ways to keep your opponents guessing shouldn’t be too much of a problem if you’ve managed to overcome Cryo Archive and get the Disinjector in the first place.

While the damage nerf might only be temporary, we wouldn’t count on the Disinjector ever going back to how strong it’s been. Of course, that may be the least of worries for hardcore players as Bungie aims sniper rifles, thermal scopes, bubble shields, and even knife damage with its mid-season balance patch. It’s live on April 14th, so stay tuned for detailed patch notes.

First is Echo Pulse, the Shell’s Ultimate, which will now clearly denote enemy Runners and UESC bots. And while other players can still use Signal Jammer, that will only disguise you as a UESC threat when pinged. If that wasn’t enough, it’s going to become a “bit tougher” for opposing teams to know if they’re in range of Pulses.

The Tracker Drone, often mocked for its unreliable tracking (the irony is strong with this one), is also getting a buff. Along with “improving its tracking strength,” it will pivot to other targets if it’s unable to reach the currently designated threat.

Of course, that’s only a sliver of what’s coming in update 1.0.6, which goes live on April 14th, so stay tuned for more details. And while balance changes are nice, it also introduces new items for solo players and teams who prefer “merciful” options. Will those new Implants promised in the roadmap also show up? One can certainly hope.

Without explicitly detailing nerfs or how these aspects would be changing, game director Joe Ziegler said, “Some of these changes will be likely coming in the next patch, the next set will likely be arriving a week after.”

Describing bubble shields as “too easy to get, too powerful to use,” he also said that knives scale “too easily” in power level. Which is more than fair – I’ve seen players run into bubble shields with a knife and a dream, and emerge victorious against multiple foes. Of course, sniper rifles feel “too strong in all scenarios” and thermal scopes are “too present and dominant,” so they’re also getting some adjustments.

Not all of it is nerfs, however. The Vandal and Recon Shells will have “more oomph to match their counterparts,” hopefully making them more viable in higher-level activities. There’s also some new items on the way – one that “gives Solos a more common option when downed,” and another that provides a “more merciful option between crews.”

What could the latter mean? We’ll have to wait and find out, but Ziegler promises a “lot more goodies in the coming patches.” And if your particular area of interest isn’t specified, Bungie has a “big list of things we’re looking into that extends beyond this.” It will require more time to “figure out,” however, so stay tuned for updates.

Marathon is available for Xbox Series X/S, PS5, and PC, and despite plummeting player counts on Steam (alongside allegedly middling sales), we quite enjoyed it. Whether it will survive in the over-stuffed live-service era remains a toss-up, but a hefty amount of content is planned for later seasons.

This queue will be available until April 8th, 10 AM PT, and should prove intriguing. Outpost is quite the brutal map – it’s no Cryo Archive, but trying to manage its puzzles, obtaining security clearance for certain extraction points, and whatnot can prove challenging, especially for two players. Bungie is keeping a close eye on this, along with any potential issues.

What’s next? Director Joe Ziegler didn’t say, but he noted that, “It’s been valuable to observe the data and hear the feedback. We’ll continue to beat it up, iterate, and update you as we evolve it.”

Nearly a month since launch, it’s unclear when Marathon will receive permanent queuing for Duos. While you can load into maps with a pre-made group of two players, you’ll still run into teams of three. Duos only matches two-player teams together, keeping things balanced. However, with how much the game is designed around squad play, it’s no wonder that Bungie has been testing two-player teams before making it available across the board.

As always, stay tuned for updates. In the meantime, a mid-season balance patch should hit in the coming weeks alongside new Implants to customize your Runners with. Season 2: NIGHTFALL is still a ways off, starting in June, so it will be interesting to see if Bungie can sustain the player base until then.