Commanders,
In this release, we’ve introduced a combat update aimed at creating greater gameplay diversity, more interesting decision making, and increasing the relevance and value of ships and officers you already own.
Previously, combat favored ships capable of quickly dealing damage, leading to encounters which sometimes lacked nuance and left less room for ships with different combat roles to thrive. This release will address these issues and community feedback by making updates to specific ships, ship abilities, officer buffs, and station combat.
Read on for more details!
SHIPS
To increase the variety of viable options and create more interesting encounters, we’ve buffed and reworked the stats and abilities of faction ships. No ship has received a nerf to its Strength: all faction ships will be more powerful than they were before, and hostile ships remain at the same power level as before. We’ve detailed specific changes to ship abilities below.
Bortas
The Bortas’ ability “Revenge” now triggers as soon as combat begins instead of when it is destroyed, making it relevant for the full duration of an encounter.
Centurion
The Centurion’s ability “Territorial” now triggers as soon as combat begins instead of at the start of each round. Ability values have been increased to ensure its effect is greater than before in virtually all encounters. Loading time has been reduced from 3 to 2.
B’rel, Gladius, and Intrepid
These ships’ abilities now always trigger at the beginning of combat instead of requiring their shield or hull HP to be under a specific percentage. All ability values have been increased.
Augur
The Augur’s ability “Obliterate” had the unintended effect of occasionally reviving destroyed targets. This has been fixed and the ability has been redesigned: Obliterate now applies a stacking damage bonus when attacking burning targets which increases all Augur damage. The Obliterator kinetic weapon will now fire on round 2 instead of 3, resulting in a significant damage increase for the Augur.
D4
Critical damage bonus on both the D4’s weapons has been increased from 110% to 135%.
Mayflower
Hull HP from leveling up has been increased, while shield HP from leveling up has been reduced. This will improve the Mayflower’s performance against PvE targets.
Faction Ships Level 28+
The stats of level 28 and higher faction ships have been increased, bringing the power of those with equivalent tiers from different factions more closely in line with each other. Additionally, the power of each ship is now more appropriate to its tier.
OFFICERS
The stat bonuses that officers provide to ships have significantly increased across the board, greatly boosting their impact on the strength of your ships.
Defense, health, and attack maximum bonuses have increased for all ships, except the Realta and Franklin. To compensate, the Franklin’s ship ability has been doubled. The maximum bonus varies for each 2* ship, however ships 3* ships and officers will now have maximum stat bonuses of 300%.
STATION COMBAT
Previously, Stations essentially required ships present to mount a viable defense. In an effort to allow players to more freely utilize their fleet and introduce greater decision making for attackers, we’ve increased the defensive power of Stations.
Defense Platforms have received a damage increase from level 1 to 39. Defense platforms have received a significant bonus to penetration, mitigation, damage, and hull HP. As a result, stations will be a bit more difficult to take down on their own, even when there are no defending ships present.
Thank you
We take seriously the responsibility of managing the game that we and our players love, and so we make these changes with the goal of making a better, more strategic, and more fun game for now and for years to come. We look forward to your feedback, and sharing more adventures with you.
