As Expedition Mode becomes more stable, the way people play becomes more apparent and balance problems can be tackled.
"Hard Points" is a new mechanic aimed a raising the durability of weapons. Most battles seem be a race to de-gun the opponent. There are no direct weapon durability buffs coming yet but the durability of their connection points would be a limiting factor without hard points.
Expedition Mode as is has been fairly uninteractive as human players just flee from fights with any amount of risk. The "Pursuit Speed Bonus" aims to allow either party to choose to fight when the match-up is close to even, rather than the faster ship playing gatekeeper.
Longnecks have proven to be a big issue in a world where there is always somewhere to run. Longneck users no longer have to experience their built-in drawback so they cannot retain their situational strength. These changes aim to force longnecks to compete in the same space as twin cannons. In a 1v1 matchup, a good shot on the longneck can still easily destroy a twin turret but the enemy captain has some more room to make the sniper's job as hard as possible.
Finally, looking towards the future, solo ship play will be getting some attention. The autoturret buff aims to improve the weapon without improving the value of a human player constantly repairing it so solo fliers can feel like autoturrets are a good choice. This won't be the end though; solo players still need a little help. I am looking into adding up to 2 AI turret gunners for ships that have no crew.
1.9.1.2
Major Features
- Added "Hard Points". Hard points give hp bonuses (1/3 hard point hp up to 2000 combined) to all connected parts that are not also hard points. Bonus hp is spread evenly to connection points. All weapons besides rams are hardpoints.
- Ships get a small speedboost in pursuit of other ships so ships with small mass differentials can both catch up to eachother. "Pursuit Range" begins at 450 meters.
Minor Features
- Changed the extraction compass marker to a gold arrow.
- Longneck range reduced to 275 (same as twins). Changed the falloff curve so longnecks deal max damage between 125m and 200m. Reduced the projectile speed by 50%. Added a small amount of base inaccuracy.
- Increased all autocannon HP to 2000.
- Doubled the hp of cargo pads.
Bug Fixes
- Fixed being able to bring a ship you cannot afford using the "current ship" option.
- Fixed AI airships sometimes temporarily turining off course during cell shifts.
- Fixed "FPS holes" that caused massive frame drop when looking in certain directions.
- Fixed not being able to kick crew members in lobby.
