Today we're deploying a small update with a change to the FREE FOR ALL mode, to reduce the number of participants from 6 players (+1 bot) to 2 players (+1 bot). The map size has also been reduced, and duration dropped to 3 minutes.
No Steam client update is necessary for this update. The game should auto-update when you relaunch after the maintenance.
WHY:
One important goal of Early Access is to test a variety of game modes with real players. We believe all game modes have potential, and all will be considered for inclusion in the final game (if not in the regular daily game, then as time limited special events). However, if a game mode does not perform well, it will be removed permanently. We plan to eliminate the worst performing Early Access mode every few weeks and replace it with something that has the potential to be better.
FREE FOR ALL is clearly the worst performing game mode in the first days of Early Access, with people actively avoiding it when it comes up. Before replacing it however we want to give it a fair chance to recover. We believe a big part of its problems comes from the number of participants. 7 players is too chaotic for actual tactics to form. This change, along with the guarantee that 1 of the 3 participants will always be a bot, effectively turns the mode into 1vs1 in advanced zones.
Another reason for the change is that in a future update, we plan to make it possible to see the enemy Battleships' equipped modules. This will increase the tactical element, and the on-the-spot mental preparations advanced players will have to make. All other modes have a maximum of 2 enemy ships to remember modules for. If we still had 7 enemy ships to deal with in FREE FOR ALL, it would be unreasonable to ask anyone to remember all the modules they're up against.