The "significant" Battlefield 3 patch has been released for PC and players can enjoy game fixes, weapon and vehicle rebalances, and improved squad joining.
Multiplayer/co-op sessions? Fixed. Loading times? Shortened. Squad joining becomes accessible by "selecting a Squad and then clicking the Join Squad button" and the ability to join empty squads. Check out more patch notes as well as weapon rebalances after the break.
Client-Side Changes:
Visuals, Stability and Performance Fixes:
- General performance and loading time improvements
- "Black Screen" fix for an issue occurring on some PC Configurations
- Stereo and Rendering Support for Nvidia and AMD Graphics Cards
- Adjusted the "stuttering" encountered on some PC configurations.
- Fixed several Crashes when joining MP and Co-Op sessions
- Fixed multiple problems when using multiple monitors (Eyefinity / Surround).
- Fixed visual corruption issues on certain Nvidia Cards
- Improved loading times for certain textures
- Added console command "GameTime.MaxVariableFps" to limit max FPS
- Added console command "UI.DrawEnable" to hide UI for screenshots / videos
- Fixed a problem with high speed mouse movement
- Added back some missing Growlers on Kharg Island Conquest Large
- Added back EOR sound for SQDM and TDM
- You should no longer be able to damage a friendly vehicle when sitting in an open position
- Grenades now drop to ground if you get killed while attempting to throw it (note the afect this will have on Hardcore mode!)
- Spawn protection now should work in Conquest. You should no longer spawn on points too close to enemies
- You should no longer spawn too close to enemies in TDM and SQDM
- Combat areas on Kharg Rush tweaked in order to disallow defenders to access the carrier ship after 1st base is taken and being able to enter the AA gun.
- Fixed a problem with revived players not suffering suppression
- Fixed a problem with the camera when being revived in COOP
- Added joystick deadzone setting
- Fixed sound for when climbing ladders
- Fixed an issue with some weapon sounds in first person
- Fixed a swim sound loop error
- Increased the damage of Helicopter Miniguns, AA guns, and Jet Cannons against infantry
- Increased the damage of Helicopter Miniguns against jeeps.
- Reduced the physics impact of AA guns and Jet Cannons, players under attack from these weapons should no longer lose control.
- Increased the damage of the 44 Magnum slightly.
- Increased the range and minimum damage of the .357 Round from the MP412 Rex.
- Increased the range of all .45cal and 9mm weapons.
- Slightly increased the range of the P90 and MP7 and PDW-R
- Slightly increased the range of the 5.56mm PDW-R and decreased the minimum damage at long range.
- Slightly increased the minimum range of the MK11, SVD, and M39 EMR 7.62mm rifles.
- Decreased the maximum damage and maximum range of the G3 and SCAR-H 7.62mm weapons.
- Reduced the damage from FIM-92 and SA-18 IGLA missiles against aircraft.
- Increased the damage and range of the 40mm BUCK rounds.
- Reduced the damage .50cal weapons do against Helicopters.
- Updated T90 canister shell tweaks to match Abrams canister shells.
- Added round duration and ticket summary at EOR
- Advanced squad polish - should be more intuitive
- Significant changes to the Join Squad functionality (see below)
- Fixed a problem regarding keybindings while playing
- You should now get a better error message when being disconnected via Battlelog
- EOD Bot exploit fix
- Several crash fixes
- Anti-stat padding measures taken, disallowing ranked servers to run obscure settings
- Improved team kill kick configuration
- Support for unranked servers. Unranked servers do not report players' scores to Battlelog, but server administrators can freely control all settings
- Ability to share your Profile and Stats pages to Facebook, Google+, and Twitter
- User Profile and Stats pages on Battlelog can now be accessed without being signed in to Battlelog if you know a user's URL
- Single sign on from Battlelog to Origin. If you're not logged into Origin and join a game server, Battlelog will automatically sign you in to Origin in the background and join the game server
- Removed FIND ME A SQUAD option
- Allow players to join empty Squads alone, thus having 1/4 squad members
- Change order of options to LEAVE SQUAD, INV A FRIEND, SWITCH TEAM
- Disable Privacy flag when 1 man squad
- Reset Privacy flag from Private to Public when squad drops to 1 player
- All occupied Squads will now show up colored blue on the Squad Selection screen
- Players who choose not to join squads will also show up as Blue in the "Not in a Squad" line
- Squads that are currently empty will display as white -- if you wish to join an empty Squad, you can choose the first one marked with white text
