Dune: Awakening is preparing up for a new patch in August, currently live on the public test client, that tackles some annoying gameplay issues and introduces a controversial tweak to farming. The patch includes a fix for the notorious ornithopter griefing tactic and quality of life improvements, but it also makes a change to flour sand farming that’s bound to upset many players.
Ornithopter collisions now push the vehicles apart. This aims to stop the cheap griefing where players land their scout ornithopter on top of another player’s vehicle, trapping them until a giant worm comes for a snack. It’s a classic low blow in PvE zones, and this knockback mechanic might just put a stop to it. Apparently, it also helps when groups of scout ornithopters swarm carrier ornithopters, though I haven’t seen that chaos myself. If you want to test this out, the public test server hands out a free scout, assault, and carrier ornithopter.
Flour, Sand, and Spice Sand fields in Hagga Basin are being redistributed to allow worms to reach them. Spice sand? Fine, that’s always been dangerous to farm. Worms chasing spice harvesters makes sense. But those safe little patches of flour sand near rocks? That’s a different story. Since launch, players have quietly enjoyed farming flour without worm threats. It’s a dull chore, sure, talk over in your chopper, grab a bunch of flour sand, and haul it off to craft silicon blocks. It’s boring, but safe. Adding worm danger to this task doesn’t make it interesting; it just drags out the grind. Why mess with that? Funcom, I get you want to shake things up, but this feels like punishment for a mundane task. Imagine if I moved your coffee mug onto a train track and made you dodge trains just to take a sip. That’s how this feels.
On the brighter side, the patch adds some handy buttons:
- Deposit All Blood and Deposit/Extract All Water buttons for blood purifiers and water cisterns. No more button mashing for tiny amounts.
- You can now search for items by name in the exchange, and categories have been reorganized to make browsing less of a headache.
These are welcome fixes, but they don’t quite make up for the flour sand change. Still, the patch is live on the public test client, and Funcom plans to push it to the main game on August 12.
Curious to see how this will affect the farming meta and player reactions. Will the ornithopter fix reduce griefing or just frustrate pilots trying to coordinate? And seriously, why mess with the one boring thing that players had going for them?
Check out the full patch notes here.
