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The "New Battlegrounds" Update

The “New Battlegrounds” Update

Managers, welcome to the next big update.

After heavily overhauling the MOBA tactics engine last month, it’s time to show some love to the tactical shooter side of ESMO.

Today, I’m thrilled to expand our map pool with two absolute classics, introduce a brand-new way to customize your roster’s look, and finally roll out a massive quality-of-life update to the Playbook that will make strat-crafting much smoother.

Here is the full breakdown of what’s hitting the servers today.

🗺️ New Maps: Mirage & Inferno

The classic battlegrounds have arrived.

I am incredibly excited to introduce Mirage and Inferno to the tactical shooter map pool! Because adding new maps significantly shifts the meta and requires deep strategic adjustments, I am rolling these out carefully to ensure everything is balanced before they hit official tournament play.

  • Matchmaking Only (For Now): Mirage and Inferno are currently only available in Ranked, Quick, and Friendly matches. I want to gather as much data and player feedback as possible before enabling them for tournament matches.
  • Map Preferences: To help you test these out (or avoid them while you build your playbook), I’ve added a new map selection tool for matchmaking. You can now set a Preferred Map to guarantee practice on a specific battleground, or set a Banned Map to keep it out of your matchmaking rotation entirely.

🔫 New Feature: Weapon Skins

Look good, frag better.

Esports is just as much about building a brand and an identity as it is about winning. I’m excited to announce that you can now purchase Weapon Skins for your players!

You can now fully customize your team’s loadouts. Whether you want your star Sniper wielding something flashy or your entry fragger styling on the opponents, you can now outfit your roster with personalized flair before they step onto the server.

📋 Playbook QoL: Smoother Strat-Crafting

Spend less time clicking and more time outsmarting.

Creating the perfect execute takes time, and the tools you use should help you, not slow you down. I’ve heard your feedback on the strategy editor, and I’ve completely smoothed out the workflow with these new additions to the Playbook:

  • Copy Tasks: You can now instantly duplicate tasks! Whether it’s a specific movement path, a utility lineup, or a holding angle, just copy it at the end of the player’s plan.
  • Direct Task Numbering: Tired of dragging and dropping steps across a massive timeline? You can now manually type in the task number to instantly move it exactly where you want it in the order of operations.
  • Smart Holding Positions: This is a huge time-saver. When you create a new “Holding” task, the position will now automatically be inherited from the player’s previous task. No more manually setting the “from” field to were they should currently be!
  • Insert Before / After: Precision editing is here. You can now instantly add a brand-new task explicitly before or after an existing task without messing up the rest of your timeline.
  • Strategy Filters: Playbooks were getting messy with old or situational strats. I’ve added a quick filter toggle to Hide/Show Disabled Strategies, allowing you to keep your active playbook clean and focused.

The update is live now. Jump into matchmaking, deck out your players in some new skins, and start cooking up those Mirage executes in the upgraded Playbook. I’ll be watching the match data (and feedback) closely to see when the new maps are ready for tournament integration.

Keep the feedback coming!

- Leavzou