The addition of phase logistics ships makes me very happy, and the changes to Phase Field and High Resolution Sensors, the Go Dark ability and the Sensors skill, along with the addition of "Salvaging and Scavenging now briefly increase the fleet's sensor profile by 1000 units" sound like a really well thought out combination.
In the current version I'm a fan of sensor strength/profile focused exploration fleets and I imagine this is going to make for some dynamic gameplay, forcing you to choose between what to salvage and what to leave behind.. I guess generally this is going to create a sort of hard cap for how close to enemy fleets you can sneakily salvage stuff, but improve your ability to be undetected in other situations. I never thought about it, but it definitely makes more sense this way, since it's weird that an enemy fleet could detect something like a derelict ship, but not think something's off when that derelict ship suddenly turns into a debris field.
Scarab:
Increased flux dissipation to 250 (was: 150)
Increased flux capacity to 2500 (was: 2000)
Removed the two less than optimally placed weapon slots
It makes me happy to see the most (?) underwhelming ship in the game to get a nice buff. Also another feasible ship for slamming beams onto..
Paladin PD System
Burst PD Laser
Heavy Burst Laser
Mining Laser
The changes make me very happy. I still have a gut feeling that with these changes the Heavy Burst Laser will end up being underwhelming for its cost compared to the small Burst PD and the Paladin PD, but it's been some time since I last looked at the stats. And also a buff to some beam based weaponry makes me happy, goes well with that improvement of the Scarab
Ion Pulser:
Increased range to 500 (was: 450)
Increased damage to 100 (was: 75)
Increased emp damage to 600 (was: 400)
I'm surprised about these changes, I've always thought the Ion Pulser was one of the most effective energy weapons (and also a lot of fun to use).
This change along with the decrease in OP for the Light Needler makes me wonder if you want to promote the use of more burst weapons, or if the reasons for the changes are completely something else.
Heavy Armor: reduced maneuver penalty to 10%, moderately increased armor bonus
As I was saying with burst weapons.. seems suspicious
(but nice to see
)
This is a juicy sounding buff, I'm excited to build some loadouts around these changes. Also becomes a more attractive choice for insurance to save AI pilots from their own mistakes.
All types of contacts allow you to order ships/weapons/fighters, without having a colony
Trade: use your own blueprints only
Military: use own, or faction's blueprints
Underworld: order good stuff regardless of blueprint availability; more expensive
Underworld contact functions as "arms dealer"; not selling production capacity
Is a way to get access to rare ships/items that might otherwise be too hard to find
Especially being someone that is unnecessarily picky about picking a colony spot and end up spending way too long deciding on a good system, I think that after the Skill System revamp and everything to do with Story Points, this is the most interesting addition for me. Being able to use your blueprints early on like that really opens up some nice options, like if you found a Buffalo (M) blueprint (did that even have a blueprint or am I making stuff up?) but you're having trouble finding good freighters for sale. Ahh that's going to be helpful,
And then the Military and Underworld options sound even more exciting on top of that... I'm curious, is this also going to mean that we
don't need to be commissioned + high relations with a faction if we want to buy their good weapons or even ships?
Increased XP gain from fighting more challenging battles
Does this mean challenging in the sense of really high end late game battles, or challenging in the sense of battles against fleets much bigger/higher tier relative to your fleet? If it's the latter then that sounds really exciting and a lot of fun
, a really nice boost for the early game and a satisfying reward for spending the time to load out a fleet efficiently, and not as many downsides to keeping a small fleet.
Also if it's the latter, does it take into account both fleets' officer levels? I wonder, would it also take into account the player's combat skills level?
