PAYDAY 3 Brings High-Tech Heists with ‘Syntax Error’ Update, Drones, AI, and Stylish Gear Revealed

PAYDAY 3’s Update 1.1.0, titled “Syntax Error,” introduces an exciting array of new features and content, enhancing the game’s heisting experience. This update, released on December 12, 2023, brings in the Syntax Error bundle which includes three downloadable content packs (DLCs): a heist, a Weapon Pack, and a Tailor Pack.

The heist in this bundle leads players on a mission to tie up loose ends with a mysterious faction that tried to have the Payday Gang eliminated. The action unfolds at the primary data center of Scry Digital, located on the edge of Ryan Park in New York City.

You can find the full patch notes below.

PayDay 3 December 12 Full Patch Notes

GENERAL

• Fixed an issue where leaving a party too quickly could cause matchmake issues
• Lowered the auto aim minimum distance from 150 to 100 cm for controller players
• Fixed an issue of where throwing knives weren’t being picked up at their thrown location
• Increased the amount of special spawns on OVK across all heists from 2 -> 3
• Specials now spawns more frequently when the FBI van is active
• Fixed an issue when clicking restart level multiple time could cause the player to get stuck
• Implemented several fixes to help prevent disconnections during heists

BALANCE

The Design Team has been working hard as always and there are a ton of balance changes for you to suss out. Mio’s been kind enough to leave us comments below under most changes to explain the change and its reasoning.

• Added Armor Repair Kits to the game
  • Armor Repair Kits serve as a weaker version of the Armor Bag. Interacting with a repair kit will repair your damaged armor chunk, but it will not restore lost armor chunks
  • Armor Repair Kits can be obtained by trading hostages between assault waves. Hostage trades will alternate between giving you First Aid Kits and Armor Repair Kits
  • Dozers will also drop Armor Repair Kits upon death
  • In the future, we will place Armor Repair Kits in levels the same way players can find First Aid Kits and ammo

SKILLS

• Collateral Control (Sharpshooter) now also includes environmental hazards. This means that things like fire extinguisher explosions will not damage you, crewmates or civilians.
  • Collateral Control didn’t feel entirely worth the skill point, and both players and devs alike have killed many civilians with fire extinguishers and red barrels, so this change felt appropriate.
• Solid (Enforcer) no longer prevents melee damage from the Dozer (it will still let you ignore the stagger effect).
  • This was an unintended bug with the skill, as it was never meant to prevent damage.
• Updated the Negotiator (Manipulator) skill to reflect the implementation of armor repair kits.

WEAPONS

• The speed at which you pick up sentry turrets now depends on whether the sentry turret has overheated or not. Sentry turrets that have not overheated take 1 second to pick up (down from the previous 2 seconds). Sentry turrets that are overheated take 2.5 seconds to pick up (up from the previous 2 seconds).
  • Sentry Turrets are in a decent spot at the moment, but we wanted to reward players for redeploying them before they break, hence this change.
• Fixed an issue where sentry turrets could despawn when placing them on the railing inside the house of Cook Off

ENEMIES

“We still have more work to do on the Techie before we are comfortable putting her in all heists in the game. While most of our work is focused on making drone air navigation work across the entire game, we also plan to add a second drone type that the Techie can spawn as well as other gameplay tweaks. In the meantime, please use this opportunity to give us feedback on the enemy; let us know if you find it too difficult, too easy, or if you feel anything else should be addressed before she’s added to other heists.” -Mio

• NEW ENEMY: The Techie is now available on Syntax Error!
  • The Techie will spawn in the heist during loud gameplay and find a hiding spot
  • Once hidden, the Techie will set up a refractor shield to obscure her location
  • While hiding, combat drones will spawn on the map and attack players
  • The closer players are to the Techie, the more intense the “glitch” effect on the player HUD will be. Use this to pinpoint the Techie’s hiding spot
  • Activating an ECM Jammer will destroy all drones and prevent new ones from spawning for as long as the ECM is active
  • Players can use the Scrambler Base skill to hack combat drones to fight on their side for 6 seconds before self-destructing
  • Known Issue: player sentry turrets can currently target combat drones. This will not be the case once the Techie is available on all heists.

“In order to increase the pressure on OVERKILL, we’ve adjusted the health damage Specials do on this difficulty and increased the amount of Specials that can spawn. This makes mistakes even more deadly. The Cloaker has also received a damage buff across all difficulties outside of Normal, so his hits should now hurt almost as much as his words.” -Mio

• The enemy Special cap has been increased from 2 to 3 on OVERKILL difficulty across all heists
  • NOTE: This does not allow multiple specials of the same type to spawn at the same time
• The FBI van’s enemy respawn cooldown reduction has been increased from 20 to 50 seconds
  • This means that while the FBI Assault is active, all Special and Uncommon enemies will be allowed to respawn as soon as they are killed, with the exception of the Dozer and Techie -Mio
• Dozer melee damage has been increased from 100 to 150 on OVERKILL difficulty
  • For reference, player health is currently 100, so while this change might seem like too much even with abilities that reduce damage, it will be more relevant once players get more health options in the future
• Zapper electrocution damage has been increased from 15 per second to 25 per second on OVERKILL difficulty
• Nader gas grenade damage has been increased from 20 per second to 30 per second on OVERKILL difficulty
• Cloaker melee damage has been increased from 2 to 4 per hit on Hard, 4 to 6 on Very Hard and 6 to 15 on OVERKILL difficulty
• Dozers will now drop Armor Repair Kits when killed, instead of First Aid Kits
• Player can’t take Zapper as a human shield anymore
  • This was a bug, as only First Responders, Guards, SWAT and Heavy SWAT are intended to be human shields. We know the Zapper is a bit weak right now, but he’s not supposed to be that weak. -Mio

TECHNICAL

UI

• Updated skill description of Sharpshooter collateral control to add “an environmental hazard” such as explosives placed in the levels
• Improved how subtitles queue up to make it less jumpy when voice lines are played close to each other.
• Fixed so that subtitles doesn’t overlaps with the in-game HUD
• Fixed an issue causing the subtitles to not appear in the first animated movie scene

VISUALS

• Fixed visual issues on the police cars in Cook Off
• Added first person animation for putting up planks on windows
• Added a moon in the sky at Cook Off
• Changed Crosshairs Max Scale default value to 200 for new players
• Introduced partial fix for texture issue in the intro sequence at Turbid Station

HEIST

• Drill is no longer placeable before opening the wall panel in Touch the Sky
• Solved an issue where players could use the micro camera to see the codes through the door on Touch the Sky
• Made sure the objective updates properly when finding the first Satellite Prototype in Turbid Station
• Fixed an issue where the player could open train doors from underneath the train on Turbid Station
• Fixed issues with containers that can opened and closed that could lead to that player get stuck inside of them in 99 boxes
• Added blockers for tossing bags out of reach in Turbid Station.
• Various minor visual issues fixed on Turbid Station.
• Adjusted so that SWATs doesn’t climb over a fence when they can walk just next to it in 99 Boxes
• Loot bags can longer be thrown out of reach near the stairs leading to the train yard at Turbid Station
• Added a missing collision on stone slab over a door in Turbid Station
• Removed an invisible collision inside the Cook Off house that was causing navigation issues.
• Adjusted some lights inside trains at Turbid Station so that they don’t turn off when looking at them in certain angles
• Z-fighting on a train at Turbid Station and added collision to parts of the train that was missing that.
• Fixed an issue where a cloaker could kick the player through the vault in Rock the cradle

KNOWN ISSUES

• The preview of weapon modding doesn’t update when modding a weapon.
• OVERKILL Weapon will disappear when  going through the skylight of Touch the Sky.
• The van can disappear from Cook Off under certain circumstances, we are working on a solution but couldn’t implement it before this update.