// PC GAMER — GAMING
An absurdly large patch filled with over 2K lines of changes is how the devs of early access co-op RPG Fellowship hope to hook players on running MMO-like dungeons without the MMO
Season 3 brings its biggest and most important update ever.
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The developers of co-op RPG Fellowship had to publish its season 3 patch notes across five separate Steam news posts, which should tell you just how much is changing in its latest update. Along with tons of balance changes, the new season veers away from its MMO-inspired roots to lean harder into being an action RPG with loot and character builds—a decision that didn't immediately go over well.
The team at Chief Rebel are confident that season 3 will be a turning point for Fellowship as a co-op experience that emulates the thrill of running dungeons with your friends without the baggage of MMO busywork. And a lot had to change to make that happen.
For starters, the old loot system had to go. Community director Hamish Bode told PC Gamer during a recent demo of season 3 that too many players would collect the best gear and immediately stop thinking about it. In the new system, "there's always something cool that can happen," Bode said, like finding a pair of gloves that supercharges one of your abilities.
Bode was speaking my language as someone who has spent the last few weeks playing tons of Path of Exile 2. Fellowship won't be quite as deep as loot-heavy games like Diablo, but the revised item system is an attempt to give players interesting choices to make about how they want to build their characters. It also means there's a real chase for gear upgrades that will help you survive the jumps in difficulty for each dungeon tier.
Necklaces, for example, will now carry random defensive bonuses for every hero, giving you a reason to keep checking for an upgrade every time you find new ones. If you get lucky and find an item perfect for your playstyle, you can now boost all the stats on it through the new Tempering system. From what I saw, Chief Rebel was careful not to add unnecessary bloat that would make it feel like you're gambling for power. Loot has variables, but not so much that you'll be waiting days to see something useful.
Bode said the team is "hyper aware" that the last thing players want is for Fellowship to suddenly feel like a grind. "I don't think it's fun when the game just kind of feeds you everything and kind of plays itself for you," he said. "It's a really tricky balance, but we also have crafting systems so you can have more agency over how you want to progress. Even if you, for example, go for a few runs without finding anything, you can salvage those items and pump those resources into the things that are really good for you."
Season 3's long list of changes also includes things that are a direct response to players who found the last season way too easy. Bode said the team tried to help onboard new players by making the dungeons easier, but failed to account for the sheer power of its new heroes. "People who were running the new tank and the new healer—it's almost worth saying—broke the game a bit," Bode explained. "It's one of the reasons why we leaned so hard into larger scale testing for this season."
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