“We were wrong”: Wardogs devs end Season 2’s team-specific cash and XP bonus experiment after a single, tumultuous day
Wardogs developer Bulkhead has cancelled a Season 2 scheme that gave extra cash and XP to the game’s struggling Lonestar faction, known as Blue Team. The bonus attracted more players than expected, but also created matchmaking problems and gave the most active players large progression rewards, prompting the company’s chief executive to admit the experiment had failed.
The scheme offered Blue players 5% extra cash and 2.5% extra XP. Players rushing to join Blue sometimes left other teams short, delaying matches, while top players accumulated thousands of extra in-game dollars. Bulkhead says map spawn changes on Bakuriani have helped Blue’s win rate and will remain; it has also temporarily slowed vehicle progression after an exploit let players earn XP by repeatedly driving in and out of headquarters.
- Wardogs has ended Blue Team’s cash and XP bonuses after one day.
- The scheme disrupted team balance and rewarded top players heavily.
- Bulkhead is keeping map changes and slowing vehicle progression.
Both sides, in good faith
The strongest fair case each way — we don't pick a winner.
The case for
Targeted cash and XP bonuses were a reasonable attempt to make the struggling Blue Team more appealing and improve the balance of play. If the faction’s weak performance was discouraging players, a modest incentive could help address that problem and make matches more competitive.
The case against
Faction-specific rewards can distort player choices and disrupt matchmaking if too many people rush to join the same team. They can also give the most active players substantial extra progression, so ending the scheme after it caused delays and unexpectedly large rewards is a defensible way to protect fair play.
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