Greetings, Rune Hunters.

I'm Seong Seop Song, the director of UNDECEMBER.

The last season, 'Trials of Power' began in the middle of winter. Now the flowers are starting to bloom, signaling the season’s end.

As we bid farewell, we welcome the new season: 'Starwalker'.

In 'Starwalker', you'll experience content centered around the illusion of choice.

You may believe you're making your own decisions, but in truth, you're merely following the threads of fate.

Let me introduce you to the new season, 'Starwalker', beginning with its new content: 'Wheel of Fate'.

1. Wheel of Fate

Daily Mission was in need for improvement because it has been some time since its implementation.

We brainstormed ideas and came to a conclusion that we should remake the feature into something more exciting since it's what the you do every day.

Thus, Wheel of Fate was born.

In Wheel of Fate, you’ll spawn on a circular board, with a randomly placed Chaos Dungeon area on each node. You can conquer a node by defeating the boss within its dungeon.

You can get various rewards by conquering your way into the center from the outer circle. Also, In Time Trial stages, you can get materials for Unique Synthesis.

You can perform Unique Synthesis by talking to an Astrologer, who randomly appears on the board.

When you reach the center, you’ll enter combat with more powerful versions of the 12 Messengers.

There’s also a small chance you'll face the hidden boss: 'Starlight Guardian'.

By defeating the hidden boss, you can obtain a lot of materials for Unique Synthesis—and don't forget about the special reward that is only dropped by 'Starlight Guardian'!

Now, let me explain about Unique Synthesis.

2. Unique Synthesis

Many Rune Hunters weren't sure what to do with low-value Unique items—to address this issue and make Wheel of Fate more exciting, we’ve added Unique Synthesis.

On a Wheel of Fate node, an Astrologer NPC, who provides Unique Synthesis service, may appear.

You need to choose your moves strategically, because every time you clear a node, the Astrologer will move to another node.

After entering the Unique Synthesis screen by talking to an Astrologer, you can use your Unique items and materials you obtained in Time Trial stages to synthesize new Unique Gears!

There are also special rewards you can only obtain through Unique Synthesis, so we hope you look forward to it!

3. Unpicked Ranking

In UNDECEMBER, there are a wide variety of skills, and we’re doing our best to ensure that Rune Hunters can make use of all of them by rebalancing those with low usage rates.

We felt it was a shame that, even when some Rune Hunters spent time mastering those rebalanced skills, they rarely had opportunities to showcase them.

We are adding Unpicked Ranking to address that issue—so that Rune Hunters can show their effort to the other players.

In this newly added Unpicked Ranking, you cannot register skills that were already registered in the previous weeks.

Also, Unpicked Ranking is determined by selecting three skills from the players who recorded the highest DPS, without any duplicate skills.

Since you cannot register skills that were aleady registered in the previous weeks, you must challenge it with different skills every week.

This content will demand deep understanding of UNDECEMBER's systems and mechanics.

We're expecting to see new builds emerging from the skills that were outside the spotlight!

4. Weapon Costume Sharing

We knew there was high demand for new weapon costumes, but it was challenging to create them for such a wide variety of weapons.

To resolve this issue, we've added a feature to share Weapon Costumes between the weapons that have similar animations.

For example, previously, 1-handed Sword costumes were only available to 1-handed Swords, but now you can apply them to daggers, axes, scepters, and more!

We understand that some of you may have been disappointed that there weren’t costumes for your weapon to your liking—but we hope this will help lessen that frustration, even just a little.

5. New Skill and Link Rune

Lightning Slash is a melee weapon AoE skill that can be used with a 1-handed Sword or a 2-handed Sword.

On use, it will deal Lightning DMG, not only to the target area, but also to the enemies around it by causing Chain Lightning.

Skill Rune Flash is a powerful weapon AoE skill that can be used with a Dagger.

On use, the character will charge for a short distance, and summon Additional Strike areas on the enemies along their path.

Additionally, we will be rebalancing various runes, and adding new Link Runes that can only be linked to the Weapon Range tag.

We hope you enjoy new builds that will come with this new season!

6. Monster Maximum Level Increased and Powerful Gears

We are finally increasing the maximum levels for monsters, which was long overdue. Along with that, the Statue Level will be extended to 40.

The monsters with increased levels will drop powerful Gears.

The stronger monsters will be threatening, Rune Hunters. But I am sure you will overcome such challenges, as you always have.

7. Chaos Statue Hard Mode Selection Improvements

Chaos Statue's Hard Mode level selection are removed. Instead, you can now choose Hard Mode difficulty after Lv. 21 or more.

We expect more Rune Hunters get access to high-value items with this lower requirement for Hard Mode.

The Hard Mode for Lv. 36 or above, which will become available later, will have much tougher difficulty.

You have always surprised us with such unexpected builds. We're excited to see how you handle these levels, Rune Hunters.

8. Hardcore Mode Removed

Season Hardcore Mode were implemented back in Season 2 for Rune Hunters who look for more challenges.

After careful consideration, we've decided to discontinue Hardcore Mode.

With its low player participation and our primary focus being on Normal Mode, it's become difficult to deliver content that's both fun and challenging through Hardcore Mode.

Thus, our next season will only provide Normal Mode.

With that, we are planning to add the method to obtain Serpens Essence, the hardcore exclusive item, in Normal Mode.

We're also discussing ways to enhance the benefits in the season Normal Mode as a replacement for the Hardcore Mode buff benefits.

To conclude,

We are working hard to provide the best experience with the next season, 'Starwalker'. We hope you're looking forward to it as much as we do.

I'd like to conclude this Director's Letter by thanking you, Rune Hunters, for your continuous support for UNDECEMBER.

Thank you.