The latest Borderlands 3 patch is basically all about quality of life upgrades

More stability and a better UI are the focus

As promised, Gearbox just recently pushed a post-Thanksgiving update out to Borderlands 3 that fixed a number of lingering issues that have either been there since launch, or where introduced in another update (the joys of coding).

The main event is stability, as well as a ton of UI fixes. In fact a lot of those stability fixes actually deal with the UI itself, and anything from menu performance to incorrect vending machine thumbnails have been addressed. As someone who plays played a lot of Borderlands 3 and found myself nodding in agreement and going “mm hmm” to pretty much every bullet point: you just know it’s a good patch.

There aren’t any real character balancing changes here outside of some fixes for broken Zane/Moze/Amara skills, which is great since we don’t need to debate or discuss big nerfs for what is ostensibly a PVE game. My favorite patch note that I could have used when creating a new character for each class: “added functionality to skip the intro movie once the video has fully loaded.” What a pain!

Oh, and while this isn’t a press conference, you do get a “one more thing.” Gearbox is giving away three free codes through January 10. All you have to do is redeem the shift codes on this page here, or you can find them below. It’s just two Echo Skins and a legendary assault rifle, but it’s something. You can find subsequent free gifts on the regular via the game’s Twitter page.

Patch 5 [Reddit]

Borderlands 3 Gift of Mayhem Shift Codes (redeem here):

• W9WTT-FSFTZ-5WRZR-63BB3-WK6WT
• WSW33-HSFJ9-CWRZF-6J3B3-JF6BF
• KZC3B-33Z39-5CFSX-6BTJ3-RWFZF

Patch 5:

New Content

• Added support for Borderlands 3 DLC: Moxxi’s Heist of The Handsome Jackpot. Live on December 19.

Stability

• Addressed a reported concern related to the Grenade Indicator widget
• Addressed a reported concern related to the Minimap widget
• Fixed a crash that sometimes occurred when exiting the ECHO menu
• Fixed a crash that sometimes occurred when a user attempted to load int the game after experiencing a network error
• [Console] Fixed a rare crash that sometimes occurred in split screen when players leave the party
• Fixed a rare crash that sometimes occurred after idling for ten minutes
• [Xbox] Fixed a crash that sometimes occurred in split screen on Xbox One
• [PC] Improved network performance on PC to prevent hitching related to friends or networked games

UI

• Improved Inventory Menu performance
• Improved performance when opening Guardian Rank Menu
• [PC] Added support to immediately swap between glyph types when using Auto-Detect
• Added numbered icons to the Mayhem Mode icon on the HUD
• Added missing Japanese characters
• Addressed an issue where all functionality could sometimes be lost when pressing the Options button within the Mode menu before starting a game
• Addressed an issue where Mayhem Mode icons on the HUD would sometimes become inconsistent when adjusting difficulty
• Addressed an issue where thumbnails and locked state could sometimes become incorrect when viewed in the inventory menu
• Addressed an issue where vending machine thumbnails could sometimes be incorrect
• Addressed an issue where the Photo Mode settings could sometimes scroll off the screen
• [PC] Addressed an issue where the PC text chat UI would sometimes disappear after being opened for the second time during a cinematic
• Addressed an issue where Friend Profile icons were sometimes not showing up correctly on the ECHO menu
• Addressed an issue where the character icon sometimes failed to be present when viewing the Friends Mail prompt in the Mail Menu
• Addressed an issue where clients could sometimes lose functionality when opening the ECHO menu after exiting a vehicle
• [Console] Addressed an issue where item cards would sometimes appear cut off when viewing items in chests in split screen
• [Console] Addressed issue where small item cards would sometimes be displayed on the wrong player’s screen in split screen
• Addressed an issue where clients who late joined the Takedown at the Maliwan Blacksite would sometimes not have Spectator Mode button prompts
• Addressed an issue where performance could sometimes be negatively impacted by pressing inputs from two different sources while spectating during the Takedown at the Maliwan Blacksite
• Addressed an issue where primary and secondary stats could sometimes overlap on Legendary Artifact item cards
• Addressed an issue where multiple notifications were sometimes being triggered after having completed a Challenge

Missions

• Addressed a perceived progression blocker that sometimes occurred if the player jumped before Chadd did during the mission “Swamp Bro”
• Addressed a perceived progression blocker where the objective “Kill Ratch” sometimes wouldn’t update during the mission “The Family Jewel”
• Addressed a perceived progression blocker during the mission “In the Shadow of the Starlight”
• Addressed perceived progression blockers related to traveling between environments on Promethea
• Addressed a reported concern where waypoints would sometimes fail to appear when obtaining a mission for an environment that hadn’t been unlocked yet
• Addressed a reported concern where players were sometimes unable to complete Fast Travel Station Zone Progress when exploring Cathedral of the Twin Gods
• Addressed multiple issues with ECHO dialog not playing

Gameplay

• Updated weapons wielded by CoV Badass enemies to use bullet-based variations to cut down on FX spam
• Fixed a reported concern where Guardian Rank Perks would sometimes be disabled for users that had already unlocked them
• Addressed a reported concern where enemies would sometimes deal excessive damage to vehicles in True Vault Hunter Mode
• Addressed a reported concern where the Spiderant King enemy sometimes failed to launch the sticky projectile from his tail when performing a Web Pull attack
• Addressed a reported concern that enemies might not spawn from Warp Anchors and Dropships
• Addressed a reported concern that Zane’s “Quick Breather” skill was sometimes not functioning
• Addressed a reported concern that Zane’s “Schadenfreude” skill would sometimes not award the player Shield restoration
• Addressed a reported concern that Zane’s “Praemunitus” skill would sometimes not award the proper size clip on the first clip of the weapon the Digiclone is spawned with
• Addressed a reported concern that Moze’s “Stainless Steel Bear” skill would sometimes not award the damage bonus to Iron Bear
• Addressed a reported concern that Moze would occasionally be ejected from Iron Bear immediately after entering it
• Addressed a reported concern what a client’s camera would sometimes occasionally stutter and lose functionality after performing Amara’s “Downfall” skill into a kill volume
• Addressed a reported concern that Amara’s “Indiscriminate” skill could sometimes create lots of ricochet bullets when firing the Legendary Maliwan Shotgun “Projectile Recursion”
• Addressed a reported concern where “Invulnerable” shields would sometimes fail to block rounds fired from the Legendary Maliwan Shotgun “Projectile Recursion”

General

• Added functionality to skip the intro movie once the video has fully loaded
• Added vending machines to Skywell-27
• Disabled access to Photo Mode during Fight for Your Life
• Changed the default send mail error message to encompass additional issues
• [PC] Adjusted volume and attenuation to bring music volume up while playing in HiFi mode on PC
• Crew Quarter Room decorations now correctly use the rotation of the hook
• Optimized Challenges to prevent hitching when saving
• Optimized Challenge Completion percentage computation to occur over multiple frames to prevent hitching
• Fixed a reported concern where save game could sometimes get bloated with duplicate Challenge data
• Fixed a reported concern where save game data could sometimes have a minor leak
• Fixed a reported concern where the game would not start up in correct resolution sometimes when using Fullscreen mode and display scaling
• Fixed a reported concern where the player could sometimes remain invisible after respawning
• Fixed a reported concern where clients would sometimes not see Sanctuary III Fast Travel Stations until they were already in the map
• Fixed a reported concern where the D-Pad would sometimes not change selections in the Sanctuary III Fast Travel list
• Fixed a reported concern where clients might not unlock Fast Travel Stations after using the Fast-Forward feature
• Fixed a reported concern where environments could sometimes appear unnaturally bright due Time of Day errors
• Fixed a reported concern where vehicle boost FX could sometimes appear black
• Fixed a typo for the spelling of the “IMMUNE” text pop in German
• Fixed a reported concern where some strings for the Key Binding Menu were not localized
• Fixed a reported concern where the Badass Event icon could sometimes show up when the event had been deactivated when using the ECHOcast Twitch Extension
• Fixed a reported concern where Cryo destructible pose sometimes did not match character when in ragdoll
• [Console] Fixed a reported concern where the Custom Waypoint hint text would sometimes appear in the Zone Map in non-current environments on consoles
• [Console] Fixed a reported concern where Photo Mode filters sometimes weren’t working properly with HDR
• [Console] Fixed a reported concern where Vault Hunter profile cards sometimes didn’t pull from local data for split screen players, causing a mismatch in presentation
• Fixed a reported concern where the client would sometimes see an unresponsive black screen after accepting an invite during the intro movie
• [PC] Fixed a reported concern where the Vault Hunter profile cards on Epic Game Store were sometimes not showing correctly