Battlefield 2042's new Dark Protocol event has you 3D-printing soldiers to fight with you
As many suspected, Battlefield 2042's upcoming limited-time event does indeed involve AI soldiers.
Right on schedule, DICE revealed the next Battlefield 2042 limited-time event, kicking off next week as part of the game's Season 6. Dubbed Dark Protocol, the event introduces a new game mode with three core activities.
The big twist is that both teams can call upon AI soldiers to fight alongside them.
These synthetic soldiers are called Geists, and they serve whichever team 3D-printed - yes, you 3D-print allies in this one. The new mode to justify all this chaos is Killswitch, a 12v12 close-quarters game mode available on four maps: Redacted, Manifest, Hourglass, and Spearhead. Only infantry and light vehicles are supported.
Your goal is to capture more AOS nodes than the enemy team, but there's actually a lot more to it than simple zone capping. Unlike flags, both teams can make progress on capturing a node simultaneously, and their progress does not reset.
For instance, if one team gets pushed out at 50% capture progress, they can still build on that, if they manage to get back into the capture zone. Only when a node is fully captured does your team earn a point, and the first to earn five points wins.
Nodes also do not have capture multipliers like Conquest flags, so a single person can defend/attack. Which may not seem plausible, until you realise you can rely on the help of AI soldiers. By utilising the Forge, you can spawn a squad of Geists to help you attack or defend.
Only one AOS node is available at a time. Once one team has claimed it, the next one arrives and both teams race to fight for it.
The other interesting twist to Killswitch is that the Forge will always spawn AI squads once it's activated. So while you may not have initiated the request, you can still claim the squad for your team if you manage to do it before they're synthesised.
It does sound like there's more going on here than needs to be, but we'll have to see for ourselves when Dark Protocol kicks off Tuesday, October 31. The event will remain active for two weeks, ending November 14.
Like all Battlefield 2042 events, Dark Creations has its own set of rewards, split across each week, There are also themed cosmetics you can buy in the store.
