Originally posted by author:

Hey everyone,

Thank you for your ongoing patience while we address player feedback, add requested features, and, of course, continue to fix bugs.

The major changes in this patch are that you can now manually level up your companions. There are now auto-assign buttons for each companion on level-up, following the same auto-level profiles that they had at launch.

Just like when leveling up your player character, if don't go to a companion's character sheet, that companion will stay at a lower level until leveled up.

We've also added an Agility check when fleeing random encounters on the overworld map. If you are not successful, your party enters combat in the 'Ambushed' status, suffering a -50% penalty to initiative for that battle.

Next up, there are now stat restrictions for the higher-tier weapons. You will need to increase your characters' Shooting Mastery or Melee Mastery skills to higher ranks in order to be able to equip the +1, +2 or +3 variants (for example, SR98 +1 requires shooting Mastery 25+, Cleaver +2 requires Melee Mastery 50+, etc).

The full list of changes is below, split up into general and spoiler notes.

This is just our first step in improving Broken Roads - something we are committed to doing until it satisfies your expectations. We will update again with more details on the May patch, which will be considerably larger and on top of many more combat encounters, will also be more focused on the companions, Moral Compass, narrative.

We hope you enjoy these new changes and fixes.

- The team at Drop Bear Bytes

• Added a feature to allow manually leveling up your companions.
  
• Made many improvements to the random encounters in Chapter 3
  
• Added a feature to the overworld that lets you flee based on cumulative party agility vs cumulative enemy agility and start a battle with 50% initiative if you fail.
  
• Added stat restrictions to different weapon types (for example, SR98 +1 requires shooting Mastery 25+, Cleaver +2 requires Melee Mastery 50+, etc).
  
• Added an additional origin story combat encounter in Kokeby Waystation.
  
• Added VO for Mad, Mick, Angela, and Sean.
  
• Various mixing adjustments for Animal and Ambience SFX.
  
• Fixed a line in the intro cinematic having text that doesn't match VO.
  
• Improved localisation and added some missing UI text (more to be included in an upcoming hotfix)
  
• Polished many animations and gestures throughout the game.
  
• Adjusted many waypoints and interactables in many scenes to only require the player (rather than waiting for the entire party to stand in formation).

• Players can now (Lie) to Hunter about actually killing the Ripper when handing in evidence for the bounty as well as lie that they were going to hand in the Ripper for the bounty to John and whoever is arguing with him.
  
• Players can now offer to Ben and Katherine to give the Ripper's necklace to Hunter to pretend they killed the Ripper for their safety.
  
• Players can now decide to fight in Korrelocking after offering to buy the necklace.
  
• Cover, enemy placement, and enemy behaviour fixes for Life and Mind raider combat in Korrelocking.
  
• Fixed a quest logic issue that would not let you discuss books with Talia if it was night time and she was outside of the library in Lake Deborah.
  
• The player’s party now spawns on the ground floor if exiting Brennan's quarters to start the showdown in Lake Deborah.
  
• Fixed an issue that could cause a soft lock in the final combat in the game.
  
• A leadership skill check when speaking to Djet now allows players to successfully convince her to go to Kalgoorlie.
  
• Fixed an issue where the game could get stuck in combat during the dingo random encounter.
  
• Solved an issue where it was possible to experience a soft lock while the Loaded Dog quest was active.
  
• Moved Charlie Evans for Aldersyde CH.3 to be more visible.
  
• It now costs $5,000 to repair the CAES system in Southern Cross.
  
• Fixed an unopenable chest at the south end of Brookton.
  
• Cole now spawns properly in the convoy in Merredin after not being rescued after a set amount of time.
  
• Players can now speak to Cole in Merredin about his experience in Aldersyde after not saving him in time.
  
• Adjusted interactable points of containers in Kalgoorlie, Westonia, and Lake Deborah.
  
• Solved an issue where an incorrect journal entry related to speaking to Kendra regarding firing the Southern Cross device no longer appears.
  
• Added new animations when trying to trip DJ while making tea.
  
• Added new animations when beating Priss to death.
  
• The objective of "Travel to Kalgoorlie" does not activate if players already visited Kalgoorlie or are in the process of finding a way in to the city.
  
• Changed combat area, cover, and enemy placement of Brookton Chapter 3 combat encounter
  
• Adjusted combat area, cover, and enemy placement in Brookton Chapter 4 combat encounter
  
• Adjusted position of clickable POI on Brookton camels so the interactable icons don't cover each other when holding tab
  
• Added some more camera pans back to the player when speaking to Numbat during Art and Illusion
  
• Adjusted Merredin navmesh so players can no longer walk through the fence at the north, as well as several other small navmesh objects not marked correctly.