Prestige in Tarkov is WILD

(Into)

Prestige has been added into EFT and the means to get there are kind of wild. The idea itself has been floated around by the community for a long time. Something to allow players endless amount of replay value while still earning something should you go the distance and not only reset your character back to level one but take on the Herculean task of completing all the quests, getting the kappa container, and meeting the other requirements to unlock prestige. There are only two levels of prestige currently in the game, but BSG plans to add a total of ten levels by the time EFT reaches a state for a 1.0 release. The idea itself always sounded enticing; there is a large community of people within Tarkov that truly do enjoy the grind. Playing the game for tons of hours to unlock everything they possibly can, level up as high as possible, and now after patch 0.16, prestige as many times as they can before the game wipes once more. And its implementation was relatively straight forward. Again, one of the few new features that has been added to Tarkov that simply just works, which is refreshing to see. So today, I wanted to go over the prestige system in Tarkov, what it takes to get there, compare it to other games and ask the questions of why do people prestige and is it even worth doing at all.

(The requirements necessary to start over)

Prestige in this game works a little different from other games that may have a similar system. There are multiple perquisites that need to be met before the option is available to you. From having your account at a certain level, which is fifty-five, unlocking the kappa container which means completing most of the quests available in the game. Completing the quest new beginning which is handing in a variety of different figurines to Ragman. Having your strength, endurance at level twenty, and your charisma at fifteen, to upgrade your hideout modules to have level three security, rest space, and your intelligence center level two, and having a total of twenty million rubles on you. That is a long list of things to complete to simply get the option of starting over again. This isn’t like Call of Duty, where you just need to play and rank up your account to the maximum and hit the reset button. Obviously, it’s a much more involved process. The biggest hang up will most likely be getting to the kappa container. Considering you need to complete pretty much all the quests in the game (not every single one of them but a vast majority), it’s going to take people quite a long time. Perhaps you don’t like a certain map, and those quests give you trouble. Or, once you get to the quests that unlock at higher levels, the requirement for completion just begins to take longer. There can be a myriad of reasons why people would begin to slow down after a certain point. Quests in general can take a few raids of attempts unless it happens to be one that requires turning in items, and you are on top of it beforehand. But these conditions are some of the most involved I’ve personally seen for a game and reaching the point of starting over just for the fun of it. Which begs the question: why would you ever want to prestige in the first place?

(Prestige if cosmetic only, hopefully)

For the time being and hopefully going forward, there are only cosmetic reasons you would want to put in the work to even have the chance at prestige. When you do it the first time, you unlock a bunch of different visual additions to your character. Be it new hand gestures, a new dog tag, armband, and some new hideout customization options too. The second prestige, if you are crazy enough to get there, also includes another new gesture, a new melee weapon, another new armband and dog tag, more hideout options, and the ability to have an extra daily and weekly challenge available to you. While these options are certainly welcome, and solid cosmetic reasons for players to push to higher levels, quest completion, and prestige requirements, I still find it difficult to understand what would drive someone to work this hard for cosmetics, even if they are exclusive, relatively speaking. I suppose, at least from my perspective, it’s not that different than a speed runner continuously working towards better records or being the first raid party to complete a boss in an MMO. There is a certain level of, well... prestige that comes from putting that work in and showing other people that you did the thing. Although depending on who sees your account deep in the prestige system, they might have some other choice words for you. But regardless, it’s something that not everyone is going to feasibly be able to do. Nor is it something everyone even has the desire to do. For me, it might be something to work towards in PvE, where I can take my time, but on the live servers where we are still getting occasional wipes, I’ll pass, personally.

(Is Prestige healthy for the game?)

A question that popped up in my head when the idea was initially being thrown around by BSG before it was added, is how would prestige affect the game as a whole? Depending on the rewards for doing it, was it only going to be cosmetics, would people play the game differently depending on the requirements to complete it? But from it being in the game for months now, it seems like its implementation has done nothing but give those who would seek high PMC levels anyway, good reasons to pursue those original goals. It was a good change, and a solid addition for those looking for the ultimate end goal to grind for in Tarkov. Which for the longest time, was something the game struggled with for quite some time. After you got max level traders, it was basically just go and use the best gear and fight other players. And then the kappa container got people to play pretty much the entirety of the game and complete all the quests. And then Lightkeeper was another new milestone to achieve. Now, there are tangible things to actively seek out from playing a lot, leveling up and getting kappa. And since all the rewards are pretty much only cosmetic (let’s hope it stays that way), there is no downsides to the prestige system being added. For some reason, my brain went to worst case scenario and thought it was going to throw the balance and pacing of the game into chaos. Cause now people had reasons to grind the hell out of EFT, they were going to do it with a newfound ferocity that wasn’t there previously. Luckily, because of the found in raid changes to the hideout, alongside the flea market being locked off for three weeks at the start, everyone felt the most in line with one another than pretty much ever before. We were all worried about selling barter items we needed so we all just horded like animals and bought a bunch of junk boxes. But now, those who seek the challenge of completing as much of the end game content in EFT as possible, they can truly be rewarded for that level of commitment. And again, as long as it stays cosmetic only, there is no downside to them adding the extra eight levels of prestige to the game later down the line.

(Outro)

Prestige was something the community had wanted for quite some time. The longest, and most desired end goal to ever be added, it has cemented itself as something those who are diehard fans of the game can seek out and explore to their hearts content. Since we only have two levels of prestige, I can only imagine what people will look like when all ten levels of it are added into the game. I suspect people will be doing marathon runs of the game from brand new accounts. But as a mechanic, it was implemented well, has decent enough rewards, and takes a long time to even do once. If you can get that far, it is certainly an achievement. But to go all the way, and do it ten times over, you got to be a special kind of crazy to go that far. And I mean that in the best way possible. Thank you very much for taking the time out of your day to watch this video. Let me know down in the comment section below, your thoughts on the prestige system in Tarkov, if you plan on or already have done it at least once and be sure to subscribe for more videos about how this game can be so addictive for so many people, and that those tendencies finally have a place to truly manifest. I hope to see you in future ones.