We don't know, so we can't say for sure. The devs typically don't announce such things until they are close to being ready for the experimental branch (nearly done basically). Best case is we get a small teaser or two when the time is getting close. But even then, the teasers typically don't reveal very much. All you can do is wait like the rest of us. The devs aren't likely to announce anything more than "AI improvement scheduled for end of year update (if all works out)". ^ Not a real quote, but that is how things are typically done and about all the info we ever get. As you can see, not much to learn from an announcement like that (if that were an actual announcement, it is just an example). The people that do know aren't going to announce it until it is time, either because they are bound by NDA (inside testers) or because it is the devs and they don't share things until it is time (usually).
By the way, in case you haven't seen it yet, here is the link for the dev blog they did back in February that outlines some of the things that are planned for this year. https://empyriononline.com/threads/milestones-2022-a-brief-preview-of-the-coming-months.99532/ The dev blogs are rare. It is a newer thing they are trying. Take any dates with a grain of salt in there. Even the various milestones could be cancelled if it doesn't work out, or at the very least pushed off until an unknown later time. As you can also see from that (the biggest teaser we've ever gotten really) things are still left very vague. Not much actual info on how things would work or anything like that. This is the most we can ever really hope for. If you are looking for something along the lines of a roadmap, that's it. They don't like to do typical roadmaps at all because they don't like to promise something they later on realize they don't like or won't work (or just never get around to). And as I said, the dev blogs are relatively new, and that is the biggest one we've gotten I believe.
