AGS announced they are updating PTR for New World and the changes that just went live will add more diversity for endgame but also chagrin for those sick of the inhumane amounts of grinding.
New World is getting more updates soon but before they go live, they will be on PTR for some mysterious purpose. Into the Void update was there too but the feedback was mostly ignored and terrible changes were pushed out, just like they would be if PTR didn't exist. It remains to be seen whether this cycle will be different.
Anyway, the biggest addition in New World PTR are certainly Mutators. These are basically a collection of temporary alterations to expeditions that will buff up enemies, give players a handicap or introduce additional mechanics to the instance. If you played Destiny 2 or pretty much anything with random modifiers for an activity, you are familiar with the concept.
These Mutators will add replayability to expeditions but also improved rewards for the players who complete modified expeditions, based on their performance. The score will hinge on things like total enemies killed, the number of named enemies killed, time to completion and number of deaths in the party.
These changes sound pretty good and should AGS avoid introducing gamebreaking bugs with the update, it will spark more interest in New World. However, the devs heeded Thanos' teachings and they've balanced out good additions with bad ones.
Gear Score cap will be raised to 625 with this update and players who spent obscene amounts of time getting the annoying numbers up to 600 will be up against it, again.
Amazon Game Studios
One relieving circumstance is that the new cap will be reached through upgrading Gear Score on your 600 GS items instead of having to farm them up again. This will be done by using a new currency that will be obtained through mutated expeditions, crafting 600 GS items and opening Gypsum Casts for slots that have 600 Expertise.
Going the additional 25 levels will probably not be an issue for the ruling class but moving the goal post for newer players will absolutely be a bad change.
