Amazon Games has revealed the details for the upcoming first season of New World Aeternum. The plans for the Season of Conquerors are not well received by many players.
What do I need to know about the season? The Season of Conquerors starts on January 21, 2025. The first season world of New World revolves around the theme of PvP: All player characters will be flagged for PvP from level 15. Those who loot the new resources and loot items will drop them upon dying. Several special events will take place during the season. Eight new artifacts will be introduced.
In addition, there will be a pass with free and premium paths, through which you can earn loot like artifacts, skins, transmog tokens, dyes, and consumables. At the end of the season, the season world will be closed, and you can transfer your seasonal character to a permanent world. All of this has been known since December 2024.
The gameplay trailer for the launch of New World Aeternum:
A season for the niche
What have the developers revealed now? In an intensive course on www.newworld.com, the developers unveiled many new details about the upcoming season.
- Along with the season worlds, a new character slot will be added so players can start with four characters without having to sacrifice one of them.
- You will receive 25 percent more experience and weapon mastery in the season worlds.
- From level 15, you can automatically ride. You will receive the first mount at a campsite.
- You will have immediate access to the heart rune slot.
- In the endgame of the season, you should face other players alone or with your company to climb the leaderboards and earn rewards such as mount attachments, helmet skin, tent skin, or a PvP-centered house trophy.
- Although the developers had announced a free path for the season pass, the new article states: “To receive rewards from your journey on the seasonal server, you must purchase the premium pass.”
- At the end of the season, ethereal and conqueror equipment will be converted into competitive items with PvP-centered effects.
For the season, the developers are introducing new equipment pieces:
- The (easily craftable) ethereal equipment has a level requirement of level 15, while the even more powerful conqueror equipment requires level 20.
- The ethereal and conqueror items will drop upon death and have durability. Conqueror items will lose significantly more durability upon death compared to ethereal items.
- The base value of ethereal and conqueror items is stronger than that of other items. Weapons have a 20 % increased base damage, and armor and accessories provide 3 % damage absorption per piece. You cannot add gems to these items.
- Ethereal items give players access to splinter stones, from which conqueror items can be crafted. Although splinter stones will drop upon death, they can only be created by wearing certain ethereal equipment while farming elite checkpoints, darkness outbreaks, and gathering resources.
- When ethereal items break, you will receive a special dust that you can convert into player experience through crafting and opening ethereal lifespans. Additional dust can be obtained from refining wood, ore, fibers, hides, and stones.
- When opening each ethereal lifespan, you have a chance to receive sandpaper, tanning agent, solvent, melting salt, fibrous fibers, ethereal mount food, mount straps and shoes, R4 heart runes, and crafting plans for all conqueror weapons.
How is the community reacting to the announcements? In December, part of the community had already criticized the plans for the new season of New World. One of the main criticisms at that time: player numbers are falling, servers are dying again – the new season will accelerate this process and lure players away from the normal worlds.
This point is also being raised again now. A_Grim_Ghost writes on Reddit: “Now that I see all the details… yes, I’m out. Have fun splitting the 13,000 players that are still left, and good luck when the first group of no-lifers starts dominating the seasonal servers. Nobody asked for any of this, we wanted actual improvements for the game.”
Many other Aeternum fighters also fear that players with a lot of time who acquire powerful conqueror items quickly will have a huge advantage and could ruin the experience for others. Chunky-Cat explains on Reddit: “The first group of people who acquire these ethereal and conqueror items will roll over the entire server.”
There is also criticism about the fact that you have to buy the premium pass to receive rewards from the season journey. Plumpy_Gnome puts it succinctly in his post on Reddit: “What a joke… Now we HAVE to pay for rewards that we earned?”
Puzzleheaded-Bass598 summarizes on Reddit: “It turns out there’s no reason to play on this server if you don’t want to buy a season pass.” Fluid-Run-1522 fears on Reddit: “If people actually play this and pay for it, they [the developers] will have no reason to improve and expand the game; it will just be recycled garbage until it dies…”
How does MeinMMO editor Karsten Scholz assess the upcoming season? The first season of Aeternum will appeal to only a certain niche due to its strong PvP focus. Most MMORPG fans prefer to play PvE content. Additionally, New World is not a very good game in itself to keep fans constantly pushing through the leveling phase.
With the recent announcements, the season will likely be even less interesting for players. This is catastrophic in multiple respects. Aeternum was supposed to give the MMORPG a third spring. However, the roadmap and the content supply for the normal servers should have come much earlier.
Instead of expanding the normal servers with new, long-term motivating content for veterans and new players, the developers have invested a lot of energy in a season that hardly anyone will play. One could say it is a typical Amazon Games move. Another mistake is addressed here: Aeternum was supposed to bring great momentum to the MMORPG New World, but Amazon Games made a mistake that was predicted.
