I ran a thread on reddit a couple of weeks ago to see why some people really hated the XP system and to find out what elements of the BP system they missed. Pretty much everyone said they hated how the XP system forced them to play in a somewhat linear fashion and that there was no researching of items. This meant if you killed a higher-tier player their items were mostly useless to you because you were too afraid to take them out of your base. To that end, I’ve reintroduced researching into the game - but it’s not exactly how it was before. It’s similar to the old way of researching in some ways, and I’ll lay it all out for everyone so you can see the differences.
First, you need a research bench. These can be found at various monuments, or they can be crafted at level 10 and above.
Second, you’ll need to find some Research Paper. You can find it rarely in barrels, and more commonly in loot crates.
Third, you’ll throw your target item into the research bench and based on its durability, you’ll have a base 0-30% chance of research success. By adding more Research Paper you can increase the success chance. Different tiers of items require more or less research paper to maximize success chance. Low-end items require only one or two, and high-end items can require up to 10.
If research is successful, the source item will be destroyed, and you’ll be granted a number of Blueprints for that item. The quantity of blueprints you receive is based on the item and its rarity. Things like ammo will give you many dozens of blueprints, and things like Assault Rifles will grant you upwards of 5.
Each BP can be looked at as a single craft session. They stack and are tradable, but they
do not permanently unlock items. Pressing the ‘Craft’ Option on the blueprint will initiate a crafting session of the target item, assuming you have the available resources for it.
What this means is that if you happen to find a Semi Auto Pistol, for example, you can take it back to base and break it down to produce several craft sessions of it in exchange for some research paper if you have it. (Or none if you’re a degenerate gambler).
Be warned: items created from Blueprints have a limited durability, and are such as less likely to succeed in being researched again.
This system effectively allows a bit of fast-tracking if you opt for that sort of gameplay, and it also increases the usability of loot from players who are higher than you. I know it’s not a perfect solution, but I hope it’s an appropriate stop-gap measure to please all the people who were upset with the more linear nature of the XP system. I’m hoping this gives us a bit of breathing room to rethink the entire thing, and really get some solid answers on how the XP system has negatively affected Rust, so we can form an action plan moving forward. More on that at the bottom of the blog.
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