Happy Monday, everyone! CitizenCon approaches and we’ll have additional details for the event coming later this week.

Jester rips into the increasingly ridiculous superstitions shared by pirates. All RSI communications

COMM-LINK

Cutlass Red- Standalone Ship / Prix : 194.4$ TTC

100i- Standalone Ship / Prix : 72$ TTC

Happy Monday, everyone, arrrrrr!

Charitable Rust Skin Contest
Charitable Rust[www.charitablerust.com] is back!

Saturday November 19th & Sunday November 20th, 2022
For 2 days Rustafied[www.rustafied.com] will be hosting a charity event to raise money for World Central Kitchen[wck.org]. WCK is first to the frontlines, providing meals in response to humanitarian, climate, and community crises all over the globe.

[www.charitablerust.com]

To kick things off we're starting with the skin contest. These very limited skins will be part of the Twitch drops[twitch.facepunch.com] & Item store purchases surrounding the event.

If you are a skin creator and want to have a shot at getting your work into the game, this contest is for you! All proceeds go towards charity!

Contest Rules
Use #CR2022 as official contest tag in workshop.
No re-uploading old or previously submitted skins.
Do not steal or use any copyrighted or otherwise trademarked content.
Must be 100% original work (can work with others if all are listed on workshop page).
Must follow all basic workshop submission rules and standards.
If using the World Central Kitchen logo, it cannot be used on any weapon skins. Only the Charitable Rust logo may be used on weapon skins.
Submissions must be high quality and Hi-Res, normals properly done/baked.
Cannot contain offensive or sexual content.
Don’t forget upload limit for the amount of skins you may submit.
Skins must be submitted by midnight(23:59) PST September 30, 2022.
Please see full details here on how to enter and what to expect!

If you're a content creator/streamer and want to participate check out their info on how to sign up[www.charitablerust.com]!

We'll post more info about the event as we get closer.



Hemp Base Empire
https://www.tiktok.com/@matt.zan in TikTok does a little bit of movie magic to show us his hemp empire little 2x2 with an extension on the back.

Original vid:

[www.tiktok.com]

Outside reveal:

[www.tiktok.com]



Creator Spotlight
This month we have a lil penguin you might know as BlizzardID[www.twitch.tv]!

"I got into Rust after watching a Frankieonpc video in 2013, back when the game was still on browser. At the time, I was playing a lot of the Arma2 DayZ mods so figured it was right up my alley. I played it on and off but wasn't properly hooked until early 2016. I had just dropped out of University and finally had the right amount of time to enjoy the game.

What's always made me fall back in love with this abusive relationship of a game, is the thrill of having all of your hours of effort taken away, but on the flip side being able to do it to others too. It makes everything feel so much more exhilarating and gives fights a lot more meaning than in any other game I've ever played.

After watching some Trausi[www.twitch.tv] and Bchillz[www.twitch.tv] I decided to post some of my clips and videos on Youtube, which did pretty well for that time. Sadly I was also an anxious mess having my motivation fade in and out. Youtube's income was basically a coinflip and I wanted a bit more stability. That's when I decided to take a break from things for the next 3 years and got a degree.

In that time is when I would really come to enjoy streaming, mainly due to the back and forth jokes you can get from chat. I'm happy that my caveman ass got to meet so many people through this weird game of hitting rocks with rocks."

[clips.twitch.tv]



Big Brain
It's it every day your base build restrictions line up with a doorcamper in your airlock, but when they do... Kira[www.twitch.tv] seized the opportunity.

[clips.twitch.tv]



Reddit Bits
User _Dareon_ asked his noob friend to start a compound and, well..



flyingovermyhead likes to torture his victims



Some days are good and some days are bad. Sorry Cameron0f



Rabb8 has an idea that should be protected at all costs! Turrets, cages, windows, spotlights.





Just going to leave this here..
hJune[www.twitch.tv] said he would cancel me if I put this in the blog but I don't negotiate with terrorists.

[clips.twitch.tv]

If you're wondering how hJune & CoconutB[www.twitch.tv] got to this point they ghosted a big group on hardcore.



I was lucky enough to watch this stream in real time and I have to say it was one of the more entertaining ones!

Also, while we're here...

[clips.twitch.tv]



Streamerland Event
Coming soon!

October 6th-12th, 2022
Agustabell[www.twitch.tv] and some of the biggest names in the Spanish streamer community will be participating in a 7 day event!

450 players, slow progression unlocks, and all out raids on the last day!



With this comes Twitch drops! Be sure to get your accounts synced[twitch.facepunch.com] so you're ready to claim. Watch our socials for more info!


Show me the stuff!
If you made something cool or saw something cool, reach out! Tag me on the Twitterverse or u/ErrnieGerrn Reddit.

Covert art by Blakrown[www.behance.net].

Solar Winds 3 Paint Pack- Paints / Prix : 26.4$ TTC

Vanguard Harbinger - Standalone Ship / Prix : 417.6$ TTC

Avenger - Solar Winds Paint- Paints / Prix : 7.2$ TTC

Gladius - Solar Winds Paint- Paints / Prix : 9.6$ TTC

Vanguard - Solar Winds Paint- Paints / Prix : 15.6$ TTC

Avenger Warlock- Standalone Ship / Prix : 122.4$ TTC

Cutlass Black - Skull & Crossbones Paint- Paints / Prix : 14.4$ TTC

Avast there! It be that time of the year again, when the timbers be shivered and the swashes be buckled, and all manner of briny bilge rats come out to engage in merry marauding across the ‘verse.

Every two weeks, we accompany the Roadmap update with a brief explanatory note to give you insight into the decision-making that led to any changes. This is part of an effort to make our communications more transparent, more specific, and more insightful for all of you who help to make Star Citizen and Squadron 42 possible.

Pirate Week Dynamic Event Schedule

Welcome to August’s Squadron 42 development report. Enclosed you will find details on the latest progress made across the campaign, including updates to cinematic scenes, the game engine, and character art.

This update is for the Public Test branch of Valheim, and may therefore be unstable. Before we launch this update to the Default version of the game, we want to make sure to have a chance to discover bugs and adjust the balancing, to give you the best game experience possible.
Access the Public Test branch by right clicking Valheim in your Steam library, and then select ‘Properties’. In the new window, select ‘Betas’ and type in the code “yesimadebackups”. The Public Test branch should now be available for you to choose from.
Please leave any feedback you may have in the appropriate channel in our Discord, or in the subforum here on Steam.
As always, remember to be considerate towards players not partaking in the Public Test, in case they want to avoid spoilers.
As the password indicates, please make sure to make backups of your save files before playing.
This patch entails a couple of changes to prepare the game for the upcoming crossplay feature! This will be necessary in order for you to be able to play Valheim with your friends who might get the game via other platforms – because we suspect you might want to show them your cool buildings, or that you might want to join them to help them find a tombstone.

Our friends at Piktiv have worked hard to make sure the game looks and feels the same regardless of what platform you’re using, and if you’re playing as a Steam player with other Steam players, nothing will be different. You will only notice a change if you’re running a dedicated server, where you can choose for it to support crossplay. If you enable this, players will be able to join the server both by using the regular IP address, or by using a join code specific to the server.

As always, make sure your game has the same patch version as your friends’, or else connecting to each other might not work. You’ll find the version number in the bottom right corner of your main menu screen.


Detailed patch notes:
* Crossplay support added
* ‘Manage saves’ GUI added so that it’s easier for players to restore/remove saves & backups
* Minor network optimization for in-game hosting (Less demanding for the host when other players are in the game at the same time)
* ‘Join Game’ tab has been updated. Players can now add favourite servers, and see if a server is running, and if they support crossplay or not.**
* Players can now use the parameter ‘-crossplay’ while running Dedicated servers to support crossplay. When using this parameter, the backend will be running Playfab instead of Steamworks. (A ‘Join code’ will appear when you join a Dedicated server supporting crossplay. Players can use this code to join the server)

**A question mark indicates that a server status is uncertain, while a red X indicates that the server is down. If there is a “shuffle” icon next to the server status, that means the server supports crossplay.

Cousin Crow’s journey from wild child to wildly successful entrepreneur hinged on his ability to foment change in himself, others, and most importantly ships.

This portfolio originally appeared in Jump Point 9.10.

When Cousin Crow’s Custom Crafts opened its new flagship store on Orison in 2949, the event was so massive that the Providence platform registered a record-setting number of controlled bursts to maintain its proper altitude. People packed the store and overflowed up the stairs in both directions, overrunning the Crusader Discovery Center and Covalex store. Crusader Security considered ending the raucous event early but worried about how the already rambunctious crowd might react. As culture reporter Sabastien Frost remarked, “Half of Lo spent their life savings to attend this thing, and they aren’t leaving until all the booze is gone.”

The store was built out of a series of old repair bays that had formerly been used to maintain Crusader’s fleet of cargo haulers. The open design allows customers to see ship customization in action. Yet for the opening extravaganza, these repair bays held classic ships, or pieces of them that showcased Cousin Crow’s most famous mods and paints. “Each ship you see is part of my story. Part of what got me here,” recounted Nampo Vasko, or as he’s known under his more popular moniker ‘Cousin Crow,’ before pointing to a small piece of the first Kraken Privateer, “For example, that’s the ship that made all this possible.” The shop features a triptych of vibrant graffiti-style murals that pay homage to Vasko’s home neighborhood of North Block in New Junction. Designed by friend and frequent collaborator ‘Tufo’ Donato, the murals are meant as both a reflection of where Cousin Crow started and a reminder that no matter how much his life has changed, a part of him remains the same kid from the wrong side of New Junction.

LO DOWN

Born in New Junction (Lo, Corel system) in 2883, Nampo Vasko spent his days raising hell with friends instead of working on his Equivalency. He would later state that his primary education came from the smuggling runs his mother took him on. Seeking to pay off the debts accrued from her gambling addiction, Nampo’s mother would frequently sneak contraband in and out of New Junction. Nampo’s role on these trips would be to provide a cover story and act as a distraction if any authorities paid their ship unwanted attention.

When Nampo was twelve, his mother suffered her biggest loss wagering on the Murray Cup. In order to pay her debt, she agreed to “loan” Nampo to a local Banu criminal souli. The Banu put him to work on a wide variety of tasks, but Nampo fell in love with stripping ships for parts. It was through this work that Nampo would acquire the first ship he ever attempted to repair himself. That 2894 Cutlass was featured prominently at the opening event, with a sign describing it as “the ship that made Cousin Crow fall in love with ships.” Even after helping pay off his mother’s debt, Nampo became a regular at the Banu chopshop and grew more and more entangled with New Junction’s criminal underworld. Nampo continued to work on ships and absorbed the Banu philosophy that no design was sacred, and everything could be improved to look or work better. He created ship liveries for fake companies, modified internal layouts to build smuggler’s holds, and more. Yet as Nampo grew, so did his ambitions. Seeing the amount of credits smugglers made compared to chopshop workers, Nampo assembled a group of friends and stole a Constellation. Under Nampo’s direction, the group reworked it into a smuggling ship and used his underworld connections to do small runs. A replica of that Connie’s smuggler’s hold was on display at the opening and described as “his first failed design” for not properly concealing contraband. In 2905, Advocacy, operating on an anonymous tip, arrested Nampo and his crew for smuggling and sent them all to a rehabilitation facility.

BECOMING COUSIN CROW

Nampo found prison life both excruciatingly mundane and terribly dangerous. As his friends fell into gangs, Nampo instead used his boisterous and affable personality to survive. His jet-black hair and ability to float between groups earned him the nickname Cousin Crow, “cousin” being slang at that facility for someone who could be trusted. After hard work earned him an early release, Nampo returned to his North Block neighborhood. He scraped together credits by doing ship repairs and modifications for people he met through connections made in prison. Since they all knew him as Cousin Crow, he went with the name when opening a small ship customization shop in 2924.

Cousin Crow’s Custom Crafts grew into a North Block sanctuary where folks could hang out safely. Though he stayed on the straight-and-narrow, Cousin Crow happily and expertly tricked out ships to be as audacious or inconspicuous as their owner desired. Often he hired friends fresh out of prison or looking to leave the outlaw life to work at his shop. The most notable being ‘Tufo’ Donato, who would go on to design some of the company’s most famous liveries and the graffitistyle murals currently adorning the Orison store.

The original shop’s reputation slowly spread and attracted customers from outside the Corel system. Cousin Crow’s big break came in 2942 after partnering with a luxury tourline company to modify an old Genesis Starliner into the ultimate party ship. A massive marketing campaign saturated spectrum with images of the starliner and made Cousin Crow’s a name in ship conversion circles across the empire. A piece of that party ship was also on display at the store opening described with the ad campaign’s infamous tagline, “So much fun, it shouldn’t be legal.”

Not long after, Drake executives invited him to visit their headquarters on Magnus. There they showed Cousin Crow plans for their first capital ship and offered him a chance to make an exclusive livery for the launch. Cousin Crow countered with an even bolder idea. Over the years, many of his clients had hired him to convert their ship’s holds into Banu-like marketplaces. Rather than have to do an after-market retrofit, how much better would it be if he could work with Drake directly? The executives loved the idea and soon the Kraken Privateer was born, sealing Cousin Crow’s reputation as one of the premier conversion shops in the UEE.

Soon, Cousin Crow found himself successful beyond his wildest dreams and with more credits than he could ever spend. He became a connoisseur of high-end street fashion, a generous patron of his favorite artists, and a classic ship collector. He also poured credits into his business by drastically expanding his shop in North Block and hiring friends and family at sky-high salaries to curb any lingering temptations to running afoul of the law.

In 2944, following his recent success and his earlier impressive “party ship” starliner conversion, Crusader Industries reached out to Cousin Crow to see if he was interested in overseeing its engineering team responsible for converting branded starliners to customer specifications. As part of the deal, Cousin Crow negotiated for a flagship store on one of Orison’s most heavily trafficked platforms.

From wild child to wildly successful entrepreneur, Cousin Crow has become a beloved hero to North Block residents for achieving success without turning his back on where it all began. A feat he achieved by adapting to any situation and seeing the potential for change in himself, other people, and most importantly ships.

The Fun Pimps are happy to announce that we'll be participating as an exhibitor at TwitchCon 2022 - San Diego!

We will be promoting a brand new twitch extension with exciting new features, coming in Alpha 21. Some of you may have already seen in Prime's Twitch.tv streams! Our new Twitch Extension for 7 Days to Die aims to make it easier than ever before to help or harass your favorite streamers. Viewers can spend free points (or even bits) to interact with their favorite streamer. They can help or hurt you with zombie spawns, debuffs (or buffs), and unique game events that you cannot experience outside of Twitch viewership including: homerun derby, bucket heads, and more!

Stop by the booth and say hello to our wonderful development team, get an early look at the Twitch extension in action, find out how to get some new 7 Days to Die swag, or win big with the cosplay contest!


Sign up for the Extension Demo Experience

We're hosting signups for Twitch streamers to try out the extension at our booth! If selected, we'll assist you in setting up your Twitch account to stream with the new extension. Each demo experience is projected to last anywhere from 20 minutes to 1 hour.

7 Days to Die Cosplay Contest

We're hosting a large competition for all of the talented cosplayers out there in our community! Come show off your expertise in crafting the finest of costumes, and have a chance to win fantastic prizes! All participants will at least win a runner-up prize!

Official Contest Rules[7daystodie.com]


Rules:
Cosplay must be related to a character or enemy in 7 Days to Die.
Cosplay must match TwitchCon’s established guidelines on appropriate behavior.
You must be present to take a photo at the TwitchCon 2022 booth, and provide information so that we can reach out after judging. No entries from outside of TwitchCon San Diego will be accepted.
Prizes:

1st Place: MSI RTX 3090 TI (Approx. $1,339.99 Value)
2nd Place: Dream Stream Setup (1 x Elgato Stream Deck, 1 x Elgato FaceCam (Premium 1080p60 Webcam,1 x Elgato Wave:3 Microphone, 1 x Elgato Key Light; Approx. $729.93 Value)
3rd Place: Elgato Stream Deck (Approx. $209.99 Value)
All Runner Ups: 7 Days to Die Steam Key, and 7 Days to Die Key Art T-Shirt (Approx. $54.98 Value)

New Merchandise!

We're debuting two new items that will soon be listed on our Amazon Store – a newly designed T-Shirt and branded lanyard! And as a special surprise, if you visit our booth, you might be able to win these items for free!*

*Visitors will be required to provide information and, if interested, engage in the “TFP Dance”. An example of the dance will be provided. Any and all free merchandise is only available while supplies last at our booth. One per visitor.

Due to some platform-specific requirements, the Crom coins packs (new virtual currency) won’t be available immediately after release for the Microsoft Store version. You can read more about this in this separate announcement.
The MStore version of the game will receive this patch on Sept. 15. This should not affect compatibility when playing.
Maelstrom creatures may not despawn after the storm has passed in Isle of Siptah.
Yellow lotus potion (potion of natural learning) might erase acquired feats from Isle of Siptah and from the Library of Esoteric Artifacts.
Fixed a sizeable number of crash and stability issues.
Addressed performance issues caused by Explosive Jars.
Fixed an issue where Rough Timber Interior Walls were not affected by stability nor proximity checks.
Gate frames now need to snap to buildings properly again.
Placing foundations near trees or large rocks removed them, leaving the foundations floating. This has now been fixed.
Changed recipe for improved fishtraps and shellfish traps so they can be properly placed.
Fixed an issue where all placeables had the dismantle option.
The materials you get back with the dismantle option is now affected by the Crafting Cost Multiplier server setting as well.
The “Rough Timber Balcony” recipe was missing from the “Rough Timber Frames” feat. This has been fixed.
Killing vultures now correctly counts towards the “Defeat Bird Creatures” challenge.
Addressed an issue that could cause Events to not be correctly updated under certain circumstances.
Addressed an issue that could cause the Bazaar to fail to load under certain circumstances.
Fixed an issue where some DLC pieces were not able to be spawned via Admin panel despite owning them.
Entering the Sorcery grotto on Siptah would kill players. Sorcery is dangerous, but not THAT dangerous. So we fixed it.
“Flex” emote is now correctly granted after achieving level 58 in the Battle Pass.
Fixed an issue that caused server passwords to not be saved when using Direct Connect.
Fixed an issue that could cause animations to desync for other players when riding the Batmount-bile.
Fixed an issue where characters would appear as floating after landing under very specific circumstances.
Addressed an issue where the Crom Coins balance was not updated correctly under certain circumstances.
Fixed an issue where the server browser could incorrectly show 0 players in a populated server.

Greetings!

We’d like to start off with the good news that the patch we mentioned last time, which fixes an issue causing crashes and world resets, is live and working well. A big thank you to everyone who helped test it – if you also want to be part of our Public Test group, you can read more about it here.

Now though, on to those development updates! If you follow us on Twitter, you might have heard the whispers that we’ve been working on boss related stuff. This is still in progress, and while we want the boss to be a surprise for you when you first play, we can safely say that it will be something you haven’t seen in Valheim before!

You might have read that we came to the conclusion that some of the steps in the Mistlands progression weren’t quite in the right order. We have put in a lot of work to create nice (and creepy) dungeons for the biome, but we realised they didn’t serve as much of a progression purpose, nor feel as rewarding, as we wanted them to. So after some discussion we added a special extractor item used for processing and a new Core; the Black Core. We’d love to read your guesses on what they’ll be used for!



Another thing we can show you is something you’ll notice straight away if you decide to make a new character when going into the Mistlands. Vikings were known for their fancy hairstyles, so we wanted to add a couple of more options for you – is there any particular hairstyle you would like to see?



Fancy hair also needs fancy clothes! If you’ve got a lot of feathers lying around you’ll be able to use them to craft a cape luxurious enough to make Hugin jealous. Is this going to be a new favourite garment, perhaps?



We know many of you are looking forward to the Mistlands, and we are grateful for your continued patience. Although we are not quite ready to set a date, we promise it is coming, and that we’re working hard to make sure it’ll be worth the wait!

Build of the Month
As per usual, you players keep being incredibly creative with the building in Valheim. This week we’d like to show off this epic castle that JJTheBuilder89 made! If you’d like a chance to have your building featured here, just use the hashtag #ValheimBotM on Twitter, Facebook or Instagram. You can check out previous winners in this Steam thread.



Skål!

The Iron Gate team


If you’d like to discuss the content of this post, please visit our Discord, or our forums on Reddit and Steam, or make a comment on social media!

Happy Monday, everyone! The final week of Ship Showdown is upon us, and hoist the colors, Pirate Week 2022 is here!

CitizenCon 2952 - Save the Date!

After thousands of creative submissions and a round of epic head-to-head battles, we’ve entered the Elite Eight. Now it’s time to crown the ultimate Ship Showdown champion and determine which ship is the true community favorite in 2022.

Welcome to August’s PU Monthly Report. From ladder updates to all-new outposts for Pyro, a huge amount of work was completed this month for the next few patch releases. Read on for everything done in pursuit of the ‘verse’s biggest-ever updates.

Callie C delves into the strange circumstance around why former teen heartthrob Bo Lynn was fired from a starring role in a highly anticipated new vid.

Send Your Tips to StarWatch!

Welcome back to StarWatch, kiddos. I’m Callie C and still with me is our all-knowing legal eagle, Monroe Kubo, who thankfully didn’t run away when I hounded her for legal advice during the break. It was definitely for a friend though.

Monroe Kubo: Oh, come on Callie, I would never abandon you. I’ll just mark our little consultation as a billable hour.

That’s why you’re the best, which is exactly why I forced you to stick around to give us your expert opinion on the biggest scandal of the week. Former teen dream Bo Lynn has sued the producers of Time Riser for lost wages after being fired from the vid’s starring role.

The former heartthrob, who’s been pounding the pavement to flip a flagging career while dealing with an extremely messy and public separation from Julie Marks, finally landed a lead role in Time Riser, the highly anticipated new vid from Amadi Murnau. According to insiders, Bo believed this role would be his ticket back to the A-list and wholly dedicated himself to preparing for it.

Time Riser is, of course, based on the immersive, action-packed apocalyptic survival sim of the same name, which even I’ve heard about so it must be big. The budget is allegedly astronomical, partly due to Murnau insisting that the vid’s massive action sequences use practical effects. Bo Lynn bought into her vision wholeheartedly and, according to the vid’s producers, took it upon himself to hire an entourage of trainers and survival specialists to prepare him for the role. That’s weird, right? Aren’t these costs that a production would normally pick up?

Monroe Kubo: Absolutely. If a production wants an actor to be, say, proficient at sword fighting, they would arrange everything to make that happen. That way they can rehearse exactly what’s needed on set and minimize the chance of anything going wrong.

And, boy oh boy, did things go wrong. Although verifying certain specifics has been difficult – and trust me I’ve tried – I’ve confirmed that Bo died, yes died, and regenned several times while preparing for the role. This allegedly includes him freezing to death after spending a night alone in the mountains and falling to death – shattering almost every bone along the way – while free soloing a canyon wall. Talk about taking method acting to an absolutely absurd extreme.

When filming began, the producers claim the injuries Bo suffered during his intense prep hampered his ability to do stunts. Multiple regens over a short period of time compounded these physical issues. The producers claim that health and safety concerns left them no choice but to fire Bo and recast brawny David Brundle in the role.

Monroe Kubo: Oh, I like him.

Now, here’s where things get truly weird and wild. Because Bo has good representation and a bit of cache from his early days as a star, his contract had a “pay or play” clause. Monroe, can you explain exactly what that is? And how can I get one?

Monroe Kubo: Essentially, it’s a provision that says Bo gets paid no matter whether the vid gets made or not. So, if say the financing falls through, or if a storm destroys all the sets and production shuts down instead of rebuilding, then he still gets paid.

And it’s my understanding that this clause would also be triggered if that person was fired, right?

Monroe Kubo: Correct, but I asked around and no one could think of an instance where that has happened. Typically it’s only the biggest stars that get the “pay or play” clause. It’s considered an extra incentive to get them to join a production.

Like a guarantee that signing onto a project will be worth it for them. That way if they hold certain dates and potentially turn down other projects, they’re still compensated for that time.

Monroe Kubo: Exactly. Time is money, particularly at that level of fame.

So here’s what I don’t understand, why did the producers of Time Riser even give this clause to Bo? I mean, he hasn’t been a big draw for years and probably needed the vid more than the vid needed him?

Monroe Kubo: Fair question. I can only speculate here, but I’d guess that part of it was to cater to Bo’s ego and make him feel like the star the vid needed. And, no offense to him, but this production seems to be more about the spectacle than the stars. By the time he was cast, the production was probably already greenlit, so I bet they saw no harm in giving it to him.

Now, despite losing his life a few times, his strange method of clashing extreme sports and acting prep wouldn’t be such a big scandal if the production paid his full contract after recasting him. But that’s not what happened here. Instead, they claimed that Bo dying and regenning essentially voided the “pay or play” clause in the contract. What’s their argument here? Am I a different person after I regen?

Monroe Kubo: According to the producer’s argument, yes and no.

Well thanks for clearing that up.

Monroe Kubo: The producers are asserting that the “pay or play” provision only applies to the Bo who was initially cast. The version of him without the scars and who could run without pain. They’re not saying Bo Lynn is no longer Bo Lynn. They’re saying their contract was with a very specific version of Bo and when he regenned it voided the “pay or play” clause.

Even though he regenned due to his preparations for the role.

Monroe Kubo: The production’s motion to have the suit thrown out explicitly states they were not involved in assembling Bo’s training team and are in no way responsible for what happened to him.

But Bo’s lawyers have claimed that he was strongly encouraged by both the producers and Murnau to be in the best shape of his life and prepared to do his own stunts.

Monroe Kubo: I mean, it’s quite a leap to interpret that being told to be ready for a physically demanding job means “go free solo canyon walls.” Unless he has comms or a recording of a conversation where someone from the production explicitly told him to go to such extremes, I don’t see how that helps his case. And I believe the producers are saying that they would have used different trainers which would have led to a different outcome.

I’ve heard so many rumors about the absolutely bonkers budget for this vid, like they flew in a Caterpillar filled with temperature-controlled crates full of snow from Vann because Murnau insisted that the snow where they were didn’t have the right microstructure to catch the light the way she needed it.

Monroe Kubo: Oh, haven’t heard that one yet.

But considering that they’ll go to those extremes for this production, why didn’t they just pay Bo?

Monroe Kubo: I commed a handful of contacts who are familiar with the project and each one had said the same thing – budget overrun. Simply, this decision seems like a cost-saving measure meant to keep the production from spiraling further out of control. I don’t know the exact figures but Brundle definitely has earned some serious credits for past roles, so they are definitely not cheap. And don’t forget that the production had to be shut down while they recast the role and waited for Brundle to finish shooting another project. They were able to pick up some second unit stuff, but a majority of the cast and crew were being paid to hang out and do nothing until their new star was ready.

I’m guessing that other filmmakers are going to be very interested in seeing how Bo’s lawsuit might play out.

Monroe Kubo: Oh for sure. I definitely think “pay or play” clauses are going to get very specific about regen going forward. But I also don’t think we’re going to get to see much of this lawsuit play out. My instinct is that this will be settled out of court, probably at a significant cost but at less than the full contract. If I was advising either side, that would be my goal.

Why’s that? Side note, we should def bring you back for a courtroom fashion episode. Labels for Lawyers? Fashion Judge? There’s definitely an idea here. Anyway, back to Bo.

Monroe Kubo: From Bo’s side, I’d be worried about the production requesting access to his regen data. Not just for privacy issues, but the few details already leaked paint a picture of him taking his prep to an extreme. If they can’t prove that the production directed him to do that, there’s a chance a jury would see his actions as unreasonable and even detrimental to the production. Giving him nothing at best and at worst a bill for their legal fees or even the cost of production delays caused by his actions.

And from the producer’s side?

Monroe Kubo: This is a real spider’s web of issues. Mainly because if their argument wins and a court decides that their contract was with a very specific iteration of Bo, then they save that money but also open a floodgate of wider issues related to contracts. Imagine the far-reaching implications if the UEE legal system begins to consider contracts, or even certain clauses, only valid for someone until they regen.

No, thank you. I’m barely a celebrity and renegotiating contracts is already a big enough pain.

Monroe Kubo: Now imagine if every time you regen an employer gets to claim you’re a “worse” version of yourself. How do you think that’ll go for employees?

It would get me to give up on fashion and wear heavy armor everywhere I go.

Monroe Kubo: That breaks my heart. What a terrible universe it would be denied your dazzling eye for style.

Thank you for saying that, Monroe, and sticking around to get into the nitty gritty of this truly wild legal scandal. You’ll have to come back to discuss the outcome once everything’s settled. We need to take a quick break, but when StarWatch returns we’ll be playing everyone’s favorite outfit assessment game, “Wear It or Tear It!” Trust me, you won’t want to miss it.

September is here with this month’s Subscriber offerings; Zeus-themed Exploration Suits from RSI, the Consolidated Outland HoverQuad as Vehicle of the Month, and the Drake Cutlass Steel available with enhanced insurance till the end of the month.

Happy Monday, everyone!

Join the Battle Of The Bricks team, and let us continue raising money for charity for children in need throughout the year!

Hardcore Gamemode[rust.facepunch.com]
A major part of Rust is its brutal nature and ruthless PvP, when we added the softcore gamemode last year we saw and have continued to see feedback that many of you want a game mode which takes away the standard Vanilla comforts we've added throughout the years and gives a more ruthless, hardcore experience, so we've done just that.

Introducing Hardcore mode - a new game mode in Rust aimed towards veteran players, gone are the comforts such as safezones, team system and maps but don't worry, the vast majority of our servers will still be regular vanilla Rust.



During this first pass, you will find the following changes on Hardcore servers:

Added:
Local chat (100m range)
Limit of 5 sleeping bags & beds
In-game changelog (top left of inventory)
Removed:
Contact system
Compass
Crawling when wounded
Global chat
Rust+
Team system
Map
MLRS
Safe zones
Changed:
Blueprints wipe monthlyWe believe this is a good starting place for a less forgiving game mode of Rust and we will continue to iterate and improve on it moving forward. If you're a server owner and wish to enable hardcore use the following var in your server startup config "-gamemode hardcore"

10 new official servers will be launching today with this new game mode.


New Furnace UI[rust.facepunch.com]
Furnaces & cooking interfaces were cumbersome and not intuitive for newer players to use, requiring precise splitting of stacks to smelt efficiently, online calculators and guides to manage efficiently. We disliked this and felt we could do better, so we revamped the UI and some functionality.

They smelt and cook at the same speed & capacity (or better!) as before while being quick and easy to use.



With this update, you'll no longer be able to store non cooking/smelting-related items inside your cooking deployables (furnace/campfire), to address this see storage buff below.


Storage Buff[rust.facepunch.com]
Over the past couple of years, we've quadrupled the number of in-game items and switched over to the component system, all of which require large amounts of additional storage. Now with the cooking and smelting UI revamp and removing the ability to store items within these deployables (campfire, furance etc) it was overdue we took a look at storage.

Today we've increased the small wooden storage capacity to 18 from 12 and the large wooden box to 48 from 30.



In the future expect to see new types of storage solutions.


Coaling Tower V2[rust.facepunch.com]
I made some simple improvements to the coaling tower that aired in our last update inside the Trainyard monument.



These changes include a new way to access the tower from the top where the suspended bridge is located. This will make retreat from the building easier when the area is contested.




Quality of Life Changes/url][/h2]Single Pickup UIMass pickups now contained within a single UI widget when hitting resourcesZipline TreesTrees no longer block ziplines causing players to dismount and fallRespawn Fall DamageFixed a long standing bug cuasing players to receive fall damage after respawing[url]Hapis Island[/url]After neglecting our poor island last month, we are now patching in a boatload of much needed fixes, along with adding in a few improvements.The new "HDRP" cliff models are way more temperamental regarding placement than the old ones, and as a result we've had our hands full identifying and plugging tons of little holes to stop sneaky players from abusing the map. This patch fixes every single one we've had reported and identified.In addition, the long southern and northern road tunnel placeholders have been reworked. Instead of being these overly long and unpractical spaghetti monsters, they now follow a precise and much shorter path to make them a practical way to traverse. We've also dressed them up and added various loot spawns along the way.Lastly, the road surface has been a complete mess since the big update, thanks to some technical issues I won't bore you with - but this has also been tackled now. Roads everywhere should now be smooth to drive on, with no sinking anywhere.I won't go over all the other small fixes here and there, but know that we will continue to improve and fix anything else that comes up. Big thanks to all who submitted bug reports![url]Reclaim and Marketplace[/url]I've updated the old placeholder reclaim (softcore mode) and marketplace models with something much more in keeping and unique. [url]Twitch Rivals Recap[/url]Rust x Twitch Rivals 2 was a huge success! and we wanted to share some interesting stats with you.[url]Aug - 9th - Aug 13 (Rust Twitch Category)[rust.facepunch.com]
386,889 peak concurrent viewers
7,500,319 chat messages sent
20,062,838 total hours watched
50,950,310 total views
2,499,030 clip views
19,037 Unique broadcasters
Item Skin Drops[twitch.facepunch.com]
Drops earned: 2,997,340
Drops claimed: 2,428,533
This is only our second Twitch Rivals and we feel it was much better than the first. With time we'll perfect it and turn it into one of the best events on Twitch!

If you wish to see more from Twitch Rivals check out the community blog here[rust.facepunch.com] which went into more detail.

Huge thank you to all the creators involved and special thanks to Twitch, Captains, Rustoria and skin artists who helped make this happy.

More Twitch drops in the near future.



FULL DEVBLOG HERE[rust.facepunch.com]

Greetings Exiles!

The Age of Sorcery begins, heralding a new era of Conan Exiles!

Today, we expand Conan Exiles with the biggest free update since launch, adding sorcery and rituals, an attribute and perk revamp, a new building interface, improvements to a long list of other features.


With this monumental update, we fulfill the Sword & Sorcery promise that lies at the heart of Conan the Barbarian, and give each of you a choice: What manner of power do you choose, and how far will you go to secure it?

To celebrate the release of Age of Sorcery, Conan Exiles is free to try from 19:00 CEST today until September 8, so now’s the time to invite your friends to embark on new adventures, and maybe sacrifice them for fresh blood after.

For Conan Exiles, this is a major shift in how we release both free and paid content, with what we call Ages. Each Age has its own theme, free content, and Battle Passes. This is a complete rethinking of how Conan Exiles will continue to expand – with more evenly paced content drops and an easy way for any of you to support the game’s growth and receive exclusive themed cosmetics.

Below, you’ll find a quick recap on the major new features that you can enjoy right now.

Sorcery Delve into dark secrets and reap the rewards! Sacrifice your life force in return for a long range of corrupted sorceries. Take to the sky with your own personal bat monstrosity, make blood sacrifices to summon demons and raise the dead, conjure storms, and much more!



Battle Pass & Bazaar The paid Battle Pass and in-game Bazaar item shop are brimming with cosmetics such as sorcery themed building pieces, armors, weapons, and more! Complete challenges to advance your Battle Pass and earn the rewards, many of which are free.

Attributes and Perks Revamp With today’s update, you can specialize your character further than ever before by choosing between two powerful perks at every other attribute milestone. Those who choose the dark path of sorcery can also infuse their strength, vitality, and authority with corruption. If you put in enough corruption points to reach a perk milestone, that perk will be replaced by a special sorcery perk.

Explore a whole bunch of different builds, whether you are a barbarian, sorcerer, or something in between.

Building Interface and Overhaul Building has received its very own dedicated interface, making it quicker and easier than ever to build, on keyboard and especially on controllers. There’s no need to craft building items either, since it’s crafted directly from the interface.



Creative Mode We want all of you to build the way you want. Accessible directly from the main menu, the new Creative Mode grants you unprecedented freedom to build without costs or restrictions. Soar through the world and raise cities like a god.

Follower Updates With the arrival of sorcery, we’ve added a whole bunch of new followers. We’ve also tweaked balancing, reducing follower health overall and tied follower damage to the Authority attribute.

And much more! There’s a huge number of other improvements, which you can check out in our Full Patch Notes[forums.funcom.com]!

Thank you all for joining us on this journey. We can’t wait to see what you will all get up to with all these changes! This is only the beginning...

Exiles of the sorcerous lands!

The time is here, Update 3.0 is finally upon us. This is the biggest free content update we have ever worked on for the game, and there is a lot to unpack here. So let’s get started!



Conan Exiles Update 3.0 brings a ton of new content, revamps core aspects of the game and adds a new progression system and an in-game shop. This amount of changes can be overwhelming, so we have compiled most of what you can expect in this update, while keeping some of the details as a surprise for those of you who don’t want spoilers!

We hope you enjoy the read and Update 3.0. Our team has been hard at work on all these features for months and we’re ecstatic to be be able to finally let you get your hands on what will be the biggest content update for Conan Exiles to date.

Welcome to the Age of Sorcery.

Every two weeks, we accompany the Roadmap update with a brief explanatory note to give you insight into the decision-making that led to any changes. This is part of an effort to make our communications more transparent, more specific, and more insightful for all of you who help to make Star Citizen and Squadron 42 possible.