During yesterday’s RIFT 2.1 Hotfix #2, there were a couple surprising additions. Cross-shard group invites, anyone? That should be a welcome addition for guild alliances and groups of friends across multiple shards. We also received a much-needed answer and action taken to the recent influx of bots in RIFT. Oh, yeah. And have you tried to jump off a mountainside since the hotfix? I think it’s safe to say that the overall amount of death tolls across all shards should decrease by a substantial amount.

In light of the hotfix, Trion’s team members were back to their normal, active selves on the official forums yesterday (even Scott Hartsman, who shared his enthusiasm for Trion’s bot-quenching plans). There were a couple interesting dev tracker posts regarding undocumented additions in the update. Keep reading to find out what they were.

This coming weekend, December 14th through 18th, Trion will be showcasing RIFT Patch 2.1 and Storm Legion for free. Former subscribers will be able to explore all of the content of Storm Legion without purchasing the expansion, and prospective players will be able to experience some of the new additions to RIFT, including dimensions and the newly-arrived Fae Yule holiday event.

Storm Legion has already been called a “truly inspiring,” “gold standard” expansion with “by far the most innovative housing system in the genre.” Try it free from Dec. 14-18 when you join the Ascended in a march on the forces of Air and Death! Former subscribers can dive deep into Storm Legion with no restrictions, while anyone, including RIFT Lite players, can celebrate a huge new Fae Yule World Event and build in private or public, personal or guild Dimensions.

For more information, see Trion’s official announcement.

Mages are slowly getting an updated selection of minions and elemental creatures to assist them during their adventures, and during this past week’s updates, we’ve seen another new pet model make its way to the Public Test Server. Necromancers now have an updated model for both their Lesser and Greater Skeletal Zealot melee DPS minions. The models are probably not final in their current state due to some of the animations not being exactly correct, but the models themselves seem close to completion. Keep reading to see larger images of the new pet models!

Trion’s well on their way to continuing their goal of frequent content dates even after the recent launch of Storm Legion. RIFT Patch 2.1, also known as Endless Eclipse, will be released on live servers on December 12th:

Messengers race from Morban with grave news: Regulos readies an apocalyptic return to Telara. Agents of the Endless Court have collected his shattered essence, selected a host, and prepared a portal to the Plane of Death. The Devourer of Worlds is coming, and unlike Crucia, who offered salvation for submission, he wants only to annihilate the Ascended, their world, and all that lies beyond.

Endless Eclipse will feature Storm Legion’s second 20-man raid, Endless Eclipse, which Rift Junkies got a chance to preview during the expansion’s beta. The patch will also bring a little cheer to our faction capitols with this year’s updated Fae Yule holiday event. Level 60 players will also be able to experience iconic Storm Legion lore (hi, Crucia!) in the new Chronicle, A Hero Rises.

For more information, please see Trion’s official release announcement and RIFT 2.1′s information page.

Atrius, RIFT’s Warrior Lead Developer, gave players an update yesterday regarding the buffs and fixes Warriors will see in the upcoming 2.1 patch. Some of these changes are a direct result from the data and feedback collected after a recent hotfix. Others are focused on tank balance, DPS balance, and bug fixes. Here’s that update:

Originally posted by Atrius (Source)

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We have been working on a couple things over the last few days and wanted to let you all know some changes coming to the Warriors in 2.1, which is just around the corner.

There have been several bug fixes, these are just some of the ones I have seen talked about here.

• Electricity Blast – Only able to be used by one member of a raid. This will be fixed in 2.1
• Hardened Defenses – Giving too low of a bonus. This will be fixed in 2.1
• Accord of Power – Duration is not increased with Energy Retention. This will be fixed in 2.1
• Empowerment – Not giving the enhanced Endurance buff. This will be fixed in 2.1
• Unstable Reaction – Not generating Aggro properly. This will be fixed in 2.1.

We will also be adding in a few buffs.

• Void Knight – Will be getting another 5% bonus to Endurance.
• Tank Mitigation – Warrior tank mitigation currently seems to be about 10% behind the Cleric and the Rogue. We have been looking into this and will have it fixed for 2.1.
• Paragon Damage – This is currently behind by a significant amount, it will be buffed for 2.1.

We are also looking into other issues and these will not be the only changes. I just wanted to give you all a preview of some of what to expect.