Join us on Discord for public playtests Friday at 12pm ET, Saturday at 3pm ET, and Monday at 7pm ET.
Update 1.9.0 begins live Expedition Mode testing! During the regularly scheduled playtests, the game mode will be changed to Expedition Mode as long as the mode is functioning. Keep in mind, the frameworks supporting this game mode are not yet complete so it may not perform reliably and will certainly be missing a massive number of quality of life features. Features and fixes will be ongoing as the mode is tested.
Choose Your Airship
To captain up in expedition mode you must have enough resources to pay the build cost of your ship. A small amount of each resource will be subtracted from airship build costs so smaller ships can be built for free. The build cost of your ship is listed on a chalkboard on the left of the hangar.
If you don't have a light cargo vessel you can find one on the workshop:
Betty
Trike
Pack Ram
Fill Your Cargo Hold
Once you captain up and load into the archipelago, use the axe and pickaxe to mine resources. Different resources are found in different places. Aetherium is found at high altitudes, cyprium inside forests, and magnesite growing from large magnetic rings.
Mining isn't the only option though. Forts and some ships will be loaded with random cargo so if you can take them down, the resources are yours. Hijacked ships can also be extracted for half their build costs.
Extract
With a full cargo hold its time to cash out. Your extraction point will be marked on your HUD by a black dot. Getting within 50 meters of your extraction point will disconnect you from the game, refund your build cost for any parts not destroyed, and transfer your cargo hold to your stockpile. If you managed to wrangle an enemy airship, you will receive 50% of the build cost but will leave any other ships behind so best have a crew mate extract with it instead.
There are many things left to add/improve for expedition mode but I'm going to lay out some of the more obvious issues that may come up.
- Travelling between islands takes forever. Jet streams will be added so you can catch the wind and speed over to an adjacent land mass. The speed boost will be bigger for bigger (slower) airships.
- How many resources do parts cost? Individual part costs will be made visible in the future.
- The AI are so annoying. currently, AI without cargo serve purely as road blocks for other resources. The plan is to add a bounty system that transfers resources directly to the stockpiles of any crew that takes them down.
Patch Notes
1.9.0
Major Features
- Expedition mode has been unlocked for playtests.
- Added a board in the hangar that tells you the resource cost of your airship. These values are not final or complete.
- Added cyprium, magnesite, pigeons, and gold resources. Gold can only be looted from cargo holds, cyprium is found near trees, pigeons are gathered through eggs from chopped or shot down branches found on cliff faces and in thin trees, and magnesite grows on large magnets.
- AI cargo ships and forts will spawn with cargo.
Minor Features
- Improved reconnect reliability for slower connections and weaker computers.
- Improved reconnect speed for matches with lots of cargo parcels.
- When a fort is defeated reinforcements will sometimes arrive.
- Build mode warnings visually "pop" when they appear so they are more noticeable.
- Added a warning for when a ship has insufficient pressure to move at full speed.
Bug Fixes
- Fixed a bug where firearms could be fired during the equip/unequip animation.
- The reconnect overlay no longer blocks the TAB menu.