Game Updates - A3 Hexagon Core

[[GM]Blade]

[[GM]Olly]

Hi All,

I am GM-Olly, the Community Project Manager for A3 Hexagon Core.

A3 Hexagon Core is a community-led, open-source modernization of the A3 MMORPG core, reworked from the ground up with a focus on performance, maintainability, stability, and long-term development.

A3 is a legacy MMORPG built on technology and architecture designed for a very different era of gaming. Over the years, layers of legacy code and outdated systems have made the core increasingly difficult to maintain, extend, and optimize for modern hardware and operating environments.

Hexagon Core aims to change that by re-engineering the underlying architecture while preserving the gameplay and systems that make A3 what it is. Legacy components are being modernized, optimized, and replaced where necessary to take advantage of contemporary hardware, operating systems, networking technologies, and development practices.

Built for the Future of A3

Hexagon Core is more than a performance upgrade. It is intended to provide a foundation for the continued evolution of the A3 MMORPG ecosystem.

• Modern Performance - Reworked systems are designed to make better use of modern CPUs, memory, storage, and networking capabilities.
• Faster Development - A cleaner and more modular core makes it easier to implement features, fixes, balance changes, and new content without having to work around decades of legacy code.
• Simplified Management - Improved tooling, architecture, and deployment workflows make running and maintaining A3 servers significantly easier.
• Community Driven - As an open-source project, improvements can come from the wider A3 community rather than relying on a single development team.
• Long-Term Maintainability - The goal is to create a codebase that can continue evolving instead of becoming increasingly difficult to maintain as technology advances.
• Improved Stability - Modernized subsystems and cleaner architecture provide a stronger foundation for reliable, long-running MMORPG servers.
• Extensibility - Modular systems make it easier for server operators and developers to customize their environments and build new gameplay features.
• Shared Development - Fixes, optimizations, tools, and improvements can be shared across the community instead of being independently reinvented by every A3 server.

A New Foundation for A3

Hexagon Core is built around a simple idea: A3 should not have to remain limited by the technology it was originally built on.

By bringing modern engineering practices to a classic MMORPG, Hexagon Core aims to give A3 a foundation capable of supporting faster development, easier server administration, community collaboration, and continued innovation for years to come.

The goal isn't to change what makes A3 special. It's to build a better foundation for everything that comes next.

I am excited to present the architecture behind the Hexagon Core and give the community a closer look at how the project is built.



Hexagon Core is a community-driven project, and we would love to have more developers contribute to its continued development. If you are interested in becoming part of the Hexagon Core development team, please feel free to send me a PM. We would be happy to have you onboard!

As a part of A3 Hexagon core, we have other servers also on-board who are collaborating and sharing our server core for their server hosting. We also have plans to develop a new client based on Unreal Engine 5. Stay tuned for more updates.

Thank you everyone!

[[GM]Blade]

A3 Mania finds a new Home!

To provide the best possible player experience, with the lowest possible latency and improved gameplay performance, we have implemented a new hybrid server infrastructure with multiple servers (Mania I and Mania II). This system allows us to host multiple instances of the game across different geographical locations while maintaining a unified game state across all servers through scalable Redis infrastructure. This enables us to place game servers closer to players in different regions while keeping the overall game world synchronized.

Historically, we have invested heavily in building and maintaining our own physical server infrastructure in India. However, to support this new hybrid architecture and provide a consistent experience across multiple regions, we have had to move towards a fully cloud-based infrastructure, including our servers in India.

Outside India, we have always relied primarily on third-party hosting providers, as establishing and maintaining physical infrastructure in every region is not financially feasible. This presented its own challenges, as not all providers are optimized for gaming traffic, resulting in inconsistent latency, packet loss, and connectivity issues for some players. Moving to a unified cloud-based infrastructure allows us to deploy game servers across multiple locations and scale them according to player requirements, while maintaining a centralized and consistent game state.

Thanks to the valuable feedback provided through our dedicated ISP survey, we have been able to better understand the connectivity requirements of our players and strategically deploy edge servers to better serve different regions. With these improvements, players should now experience significantly better latency, more stable connections, and improved overall gameplay performance.

Thank you to everyone who took the time to participate in the survey and provide feedback. Your input directly helps us improve the infrastructure behind A3 Mania.

[[GM]Blade]

A3 Anti-Cheat

Due to the hybrid cloud-based architecture, the game has become increasingly sensitive to abnormal network and client-side activity. During large-scale wars, excessive use of third-party tools and software has contributed to increased latency and packet loss for players, while cloud hosting providers have also begun detecting and throttling unusual traffic patterns, giving us warnings over service abuse patterns.

Moving forward, we will be enforcing stricter restrictions on any software or modifications that interfere with the normal operation of the A3 client.

We have implemented a completely revamped Anti-Cheat system that proactively monitors the client for unauthorized interference, manipulation, and software that may affect its functionality. Detected violations may result in the account and hardware being flagged.

This is being implemented primarily to prevent excessive request spamming to the server, particularly through actions such as rapid potting, which can generate an unusually high volume of requests and contribute to overall service degradation.

Any activity that deliberately or excessively generates requests in a manner that impacts server performance will therefore be considered abuse of service and will be treated accordingly.

Repeated or serious violations will result in permanent account and hardware bans. A hardware flag will apply across the Hexagon ecosystem, meaning that once a PC is permanently hardware-banned, any A3 Hexagon-compatible client will be prevented from functioning on that hardware. This restriction applies regardless of which A3 server the client belongs to and is not limited to the server where the violation occurred.

These measures are necessary to protect server stability and ensure a fair, stable, and consistent gameplay experience for all players.

[[GM]Blade]

A3 Macro System

As part of our ongoing efforts to improve the gameplay experience for all players, we have implemented the A3 Macro System.

You can access this settings by pressing F5 key and pressing on the Auto - 2 tab.



The system provides options to automatically:

• Use HP, MP, and Shue HP potions
• Return your character to town when your HP potions are depleted
• Automatically cast skills

Server-Side Potting
Please note that HP, MP, and Shue HP potting are enforced server-side at fixed thresholds. This ensures consistent and reliable potion usage. However, Return to Town and automatic skill casting are handled by the game client and may therefore be slightly slower than server-side enforcement.

Manual Potting & Rate Limits
When the Autopot System is enabled, manual potion usage will no longer be available.

When Autopot is disabled, you can continue to use potions manually. However, manual potting will be subject to rate limits.

These limits are intentionally implemented to protect our servers from excessive potion-request spam and abuse, while helping maintain a stable and fair gameplay experience for all players.

[[GM]Blade]

You can now see Live HP Bars of the players in real-time in combat areas.



When you enter into a party, the HP bar will be converted into a Party HP bar in red color. We are tweaking the system to promote accuracy.

[[GM]Blade]

The following changes have been carried out to the game

1. Added option to launch in full screen mode. Use the * resolution setting in the launcher.
2. Added ability to select different resolutions for each of the monitors in multi-monitor setups.
3. Arena has been decommissioned. It will be launched again later.
4. Redyan Necklace no longer provides HP and MP Regeneration since it has been migrated to the Macro system.
5. Permanently fixed issues that would cause Rapone and other larcs to stay on the character after teleporting to other regions.
6. Fixed an issue wherein HP Absorber, MP Absorber, Venom Shield, Deny Mechanism, Crystellen and Blood Thirst effects will not apply when moving across episode maps.
7. You can no longer use Razbadge on your own town mates in Nevia Canyon.
8. Implemented better Nevia Canyon scoring system.
9. Fixed sync issues with Party player HP bars when using Grade 10 kits with weapons.
10. Lore will now get correctly reduced when reducing Parole points.
11. Set reduction and weapon reduction are added together and applied once, instead of being multiplied one after the other.
12. Fixed issues that caused usage of Neryidar J on Supershues. Only ESS can use Neryidar J and if you accidentally use it on a Supershue or regular shue, it won't get destroyed.
13. Gem slotting already maxed options will not cause the gem to get destroyed.
14. Fixed an issue that will allow breeding a level 100 supershue as opposed to level 110 supershue which will give you a Level 1 supershue again while crafting ESS.
15. Improved boss nagivation system
16. Chat bans due to spamming chat for 10 minutes will not persist across reconnects.
17. Removed Restriction free PK for Aura characters during prime hours.

[[GM]Scar]

A3 Hexagon Core is still a work in progress. Due to the urgent requirement to shift our servers, we had to accelerate the launch and deploy the core earlier than originally planned. In my entire time developing A3, this was the single most complicated update we had to make.

As a result, we expect there may be bugs and unexpected issues during the initial phase. We request all players to report any issues they encounter with as much detail as possible. Your reports will help us identify and resolve issues on a priority basis.

If there are any critical issues that require immediate attention, we will carry out maintenance activities every morning at 10:00 AM IST. We will keep the community informed about the issues being addressed and the fixes implemented.

We appreciate your patience and support as we continue to improve and stabilize the A3 Hexagon Core.