PTS Update for 26th June 2015

RIFT updated the Public Test Shard (‘PTS’) on 26th June 2015. This is the same update as 25th June 2015, except that before the Livestream on the 26th, Trion re-enabled all NPCs in the open world. This includes Rifts, nodes, instance portals/etc, which is why there’s a whole bunch of new information that’s popped up.

Summary:

• Easy/Hard Modes.
• Planar Crafting Weekly/Rifts.
• New Sky Projectors.

As always, everything below is subject to change prior to hitting Live and some things included below may never make it to Live release.

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Easy/Hard Modes

As you might already know from following Trion’s livestreams, there is going to be an Easy Mode and Hard Mode for Intrepid: Gilded Prophecy coming in 3.3.

There’s also Easy and Hard Modes for Rhen of Fate! The portal is available again on the PTS and there’s now two toggles inside the entrance.

Note: You can still do Normal Mode by not hitting any of the toggles.

Clicking on an orb will start a long cast and a warning will pop up in your system messages:

Looks like Trion have decided to make Easy Mode only reward raid marks with no loot or achievements.

Hard Mode will have “additional rewards”. Unknown at this stage what form they’ll appear as. Past Hard Modes (like in Frozen Tempest) gave an additional chest that rewarded Radiant Infinity Cells (relic upgrade component). (Thanks to Chickie for the info!)

If you can form a raid of interested players, give the new modes a shot on the PTS!

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Planar Crafting Weekly/Rifts

Planar Crafting Rifts

With everything back up in the open world on the PTS, you can now open up Planar Crafting Rifts on the PTS. These open up in Tarken Glacier and you can obtain the lures from the test NPC in Master Mode Dummy Foundry.

Not going to go further into Planar Crafting since they were addressed/detailed in the 26th June Livestream.

Got feedback on the new rifts? Send in a report via in-game feedback or the PTS Sub-forums.

Planar Crafting Weekly

The Planar Crafting Weekly is now up on the PTS. Opposite Howard (the main crafting weekly questgiver) in Choreburg, Draumheim. Finishing it will reward your choice of Crafting Rift Lure.

You can check out the recipes below for reference or feedback purposes:

Interestingly there’s no quest for Runecrafter or Apothecary. (Dream Weaver seems cheapest and fastest for anyone to obtain).

• You can only obtain one quest per week per char.
• The Planar Crafting Weekly quest is separate from the current Crafting Weekly quest so you can do both.

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New Sky Projectors

New Sky Projector dimension items have popped up on the PTS, both in the RIFT Store and via notoriety vendors.

Notoriety Sky Projectors

The Nightmare Tide notoriety vendors scattered throughout the Plane of Water zones now sell new Sky Projectors. Most cost plat with Heavy Fog Sky Projector requiring 5,000 Sourcestone (

Each one sells the Heavy Fog Sky Projector which doesn’t require any notoriety as well as one additional Sky Projector that requires Revered tier reputation with the associated faction.

Heavy Fog Sky Projector

Replaces your sky with a thick fog. It doesn’t seem to affect the ground though.

Swamp Sky Projector

Just…green. With a light source in the sky.

Light Fog Sky Projector

A light fog.

Mount Sharax Sky Projector

The Mount Sharax Sky Projector is basically the sky above Mount Sharax. Some clouds:

And below is the sky when you are close and facing Mount Sharax. The ‘beams’ of light move in the same fashion as over Tarken Glacier. Click the below image for a large view!

Your character also starts exhaling vapor just like in Tarken Glacier when the sky is active! (Thanks to Samuraiko for the info!)

Draumehim Sky Projector

The Draumheim Sky Projector is rather special. It’s the same as the one over Draumheim with the large ‘sun’ and all. What’s special is that it has the watery effect that you see when you look up at the ocean sky from below Draumheim. They have a back and forth ‘wave’ effect.

Perfect for ‘under-the-ocean-sky’ dimensions.

Squall Sky Projector

A ring-like storm with various sections of the sky rotating in different directions. Feels like you’re in the eye of a storm.

It’s also raining.

Enchanted Sky Projector

Enchanted Sky Projector adds falling blue motes to the entire dimension.

RIFT Store Sky Projectors

The RIFT Store (default key “]“) -> Dimensions -> Interactive has a whole bunch of new Sky Projectors.

• Spring Day Sky Projector for 30,000 Planarite (general open world currency).
• Sunny Day Sky Projector for 3,000 Infinity Stones (Level 51-60 open world currency).
• Mind of the Overseer Sky Projector for 15 Lucky Coins (artifact set currency).
• Black Garden Sky Projector for 6,000 Favor (PvP currency).
• Starry Night Sky Projector for 9,000 Infinity Stones (Level 51-60 open world currency).

Spring Day Sky Projector

Spring Day Sky Projector has a small amount of clouds in various areas of the sky and a light, blue-ish sun.

Sunny Day Sky Projector

The Sunny Day Sky Projector is bright. It makes the ground in the Anywhere dimension basically look like sand. That’s how bright it is. It’s bright.

Mind of the Overseer Sky Projector

The Mind of the Overseer Sky Projector is pretty amazing. It’s got the whole ‘death’-based sky at the top as per below:

However, it also makes everything green! Buildings get a green texture to it almost like you’re smack bang in the middle of Lord Arak’s playground.

Not only that, but the ground becomes black. This is the Anywhere dimension, and the ground is black with a slight green hue.

Costs 25 Lucky Coins, so start saving them up! (You get 1 Lucky Coin for each Artifact Set you turn in to the artifact vendor.)

Black Garden Sky Projector

Black Garden Sky Projector as per below.

(Never looked up in Black Garden Warfront before…didn’t even realise it had a unique sky.)

Starry Night Sky Projector

The Starry Night Sky Projector is basically the Night Terrors Sky Projector but without the planet and moons. It gives off a reddish tint and makes the entire dimension a lot darker.

You can check out some comparison shots of the two projectors courtesy of Samuraiko below:

Felyna@Faeblight has also provided a nice collection of screenshots of the Starry Night Sky Projector and has included clusters of Light VFX dimension items to show just how dark the dimension becomes when using the projector.

You can check out Felyna’s collection of screenshots of the Sky Projector here!

(Thanks to both Samuraiko and Felyna@Faeblight for sharing these screenshots!)

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Some nice additions to the PTS now visible thanks to the reintroduction of stuff in the open world on the PTS. Might be time to stock up on some of the currency and build up notoriety for those sky projectors!

For past PTS Updates, click here. You can also find past datamining here.