Marathon's First Mid-Season Patch Nerfs Thief and Adds New Battle Pass Skins

Marathon's first big mid-season patch has arrived, bringing with it a laundry list of changes and updates to everything from Runner and weapon balance to new earnable vanity items and events. This update marks the middle of the sci-fi extraction shooter's first season post-launch and hopes to introduce enough new elements to entice newer, more casual players while still rewarding hardcore extraction fanatics.

Here are the most important updates and changes coming in the Version 1.0.6 update for Marathon.

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Marathon to Trial Free Kit Only Mode, With More Experimental Modes to Come

Free Kit Frenzy will go live on April 14th and follows the successful Duos experimental queue, which ran for three weeks.

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By Jack Carson

Introducing the C.A.R.R.I Event

The main headlining feature of Version 1.0.6 is the introduction of the C.A.R.R.I event. The CyberAcme Runner Reinforcement Initiative is a new event that Bungie hopes will incentivize players to work together and cooperate more, as you will earn special commendations for helping team members complete objectives that can be traded in the Armory for high-tier weapons, salvage, and Faction reputation.

Bungie is leaning heavily into this more cooperative style of play in the mid-season patch, introducing five new Implants that Runners can equip to buff or aid allies, as well as a new Mercy Kit, which you can use to revive downed enemy Runners. Friendly Runners can even earn themselves the new Pacesetter Title by repeatedly assisting other players with kills, objectives, and more.

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Version 1.0.6 Brings Updates to All Runners

Alongside an exhaustive list of weapon tuning updates, Bungie has also taken a look at all the game's Runners for various balance tweaks, with the most notable changes coming to Recon, Vandal, and Thief. We already knew that changes were coming to Recon and Vandal to put them more in line with the other Runners on the Marathon cast, but a significant nerf to the Thief Shell was a bit unexpected, if not unwarranted.

Runner	Balance Updates
Destroyer	Nerfs Increased Thruster heat cost by approximately 9% to better account for its strong mobility and combat power. Fixed an issue where Riot Barricade could be rapidly activated and deactivated without costing ability energy, allowing players to peek corners.
Recon	Buffs Reduced the visibility of enemy Echo Pulse waves as they travel away from the activating Recon. Echo Pulse pings now distinguish between enemy Runner and enemy UESC targets. Signal Jammer no longer completely blocks Echo Pulse pings. Signal Jammed players now display the UESC ping navpoint instead of the Runner navpoint when hit by Echo Pulse. Improved Tracker Drone tracking strength and turn rate. Reduced Tracker Drone travel speed while it has no active target to help prevent it from overshooting tight corners that a target may be behind. Tracker Drone now periodically reevaluates its tracking target. If it can no longer reach its original target, it will attempt to find a new one.
Rook	Fixes Fixed an issue where swapping shield implants could cause Signal Mask to flicker.
Thief	Nerfs Each Pickpocket Drone can now accept a maximum of one Claymore attachment. Increased Pickpocket Drone thruster audio volume to make active Pickpocket Drones easier to track. Reduced Pickpocket Drone descent acceleration to more closely match ascent, making its movement feel more predictable. Reduced the distance of the Pickpocket Drone rarity highlight on targets from 50m to 35m. Reduced Pickpocket Drone base health from 70 to 60.
Triage	Fixes Fixed an issue where Med-Drones could track to and attempt to attach to allied Pickpocket Drones. Fixed an issue where Med-Drones would sometimes not use the correct cosmetic color scheme based on the Triage’s equipped cosmetics.
Vandal	Buffs Reduced Amplify base cooldown from 180 seconds to 150 seconds

Version 1.0.6 Brings New Free and Paid Cosmetics for Marathon

Version 1.0.6's biggest draw for many players will be the addition of many new vanity items to Marathon's Battle Pass and Codex. With the inclusion of new Arachne-sponsored kits, six new challenges have been added to the Codex, awarding you with a slick red and black Arachne-themed Runner Shell if you complete a run with the appropriate free kit. The free kits available to players change daily, so check in at the Armory regularly to see when you can pick up these killer new cosmetics.

Meanwhile, both the free and paid tracks of the pass are receiving an injection of new rewards with Version 1.0.6. At launch, Marathon's first Battle Pass was lambasted by players who, on the whole, thought the small pool of rewards wasn't worth the entry price, especially with only one earnable Runner skin. Well, with the latest update, the premium track is getting new monochromatic recolours for Thief, Assassin, and Destroyer, while the free track gets a new skin for Recon as well as the WSTR Shotgun.

Other Changes Coming to Marathon in Version 1.0.6

In addition to these larger-scale changes, update 1.0.6 of Marathon also brings a collection of smaller adjustments. Enemy footsteps will have improved audio clarity at close to medium range, a series of early beginner contracts for CyberAcme will be added to help onboard new players to Tau Ceti VI, a new Stay Together option will be added at the end of crew-fill runs, and the strength of Thermal Scopes has been greatly decreased.

While not in the mid-season update at launch, Marathon Game Director Joe Ziegler has stated that another round of Experimental Queue testing will begin tomorrow, on April 15th.

This new batch of experiments follows the success of the duo queue (which Bungie has confirmed will be made into a proper queue type in Season 2) and will be called the Sponsored Queue, inviting Runners to battle it out on Dire Marsh with only free-kits. This new mode will be live from April 15th until April 29th.