Star Traders: Frontiers Update #197: Venerable Liner

[fallen]

Update #197 is hot on the tail of #196, following up with improvements to Interdictor craft versus craft battle in the void, 3 new craft specifically built for it, a big improvement to Missions to allow the Flash Charge Talent, and tweaks to the venerable Frontier Liner starting ship.

If you're enjoying the updates, we be sure to leave a review!

Dogfighting Adjustments

Some big changes have swooped in for the craft versus craft fighting with Update #197. First, we've separated an Interdictor's chance to hit an enemy capital ship from its chance to hit an enemy craft. In total, this is about a +20% accuracy boost across the board. Also, we've changed the Skill used for attacking an enemy craft to Gunnery instead of Electronics, which plays to the favor of Interdictor builds.

Built to Hunt

The newest addition to the craft you can purchase at the starport are built to hunt, seek and destroy enemy craft. These 3 new Interdictors from Cadar, Thulun and Alta Mesa are focused on defensive flight plans only and will not do well attempting to attack the enemy ship. However, they shine with high chance to hit other craft, higher void damage and higher engine agility. They're great for taking out torps and missiles too.

Flash Charge Comes to Town

For those players often using the Navigator's "Flash Charge" talent, the inability to use it in mission combats has made more things unfairly challenging. The captain of the carrier I was flying today during testing was supremely happy to be able to use Flash Charge at last in his bounty hunting missions, as his ship has no weapons he can fire from range 5 and getting to 4 makes all the difference.

Flash Charge still can't be used in every story situation, but we're working on ways to remedy that. This improvement also opens the door for future pre-combat Talents that may be added (pre-launching an Interdictor for example) and making them easy to add to the mission selection screen when they go live.

Frontier Liner

With this update, we've adjusted the Frontier Liner to focus more on exploring with its default configuration. Already boasting an A2 Weapons locker, we've stripped some of the shorter range guns off it in exchange for a Harvester Bay to increase rewards, an EVA Airlock to reduce ship damage during exploring and Matchweave Suits to cut down on crew damage.

Next Project: Cyber Knights

The big year of 2020 has arrived and we're now 11 days and counting from launching Cyber Knights: Flashpoint on Kickstarter! You play the razor-sharp leader of a band of soldiers of fortune, hackers and thieves operating under the crumbling dome of the New Boston Zone in 2231. Built around a core of turn-based gameplay featuring stealth, hacking, ambushes, firefights and complex missions, Cyber Knights weaves the human drama story of your team, their loyalty and their sacrifice in a dehumanizing cyberpunk world.

Coming to KickStarter in FEB 2020, sign up to get the call and alerted about free first day rewards, discounts and more! We're gathering the most crackpot amazing alpha team ever and we hope you'll join us.

v3.0.31 - 1/22/2019

- Added 3 new Interdictor craft (Cadar, Thulun, Alta Mesa) designed specifically as defensive and for dogfighting
- Added 3 new craft design visuals for new interdictor models
- Split out Interdictor's chance % to hit craft from ships, increases dogfighting accuracy by about 20% across the board
- Chance to hit enemy craft during dogfighting now based on craft Gunnery over Electronics, increases dogfighting accuracy
- Missions for ship combat now offer Navigator "Flash Charge" as an option to start the battle
- Improved Frontier Liner starting configuration to be more Exploring focused, added Harvester Bay (m) and EVA Airlock and Matchweave Suits (s)
- Fixed issues in Orbital Ops that could result in occasional Conflict/Faction mismatch
- Trait cards in Salvage improved and bugs with not applying Traits fixed
- Fixed some display issues on Game Over screen

[nerezzar]

Woohoo, flash charge! Finally!

Should make those Jyeeta a lot more manageable on impossible.

[fallen]

Jan 24, 2020 0:34:48 GMT -5 nerezzar said:

Woohoo, flash charge! Finally!

Should make those Jyeeta a lot more manageable on impossible.

It took a while but we're excited to deliver

[koles]

It could be nice surprise if enemy also could use flash charge at start of combat
would be more exciting than his use of twitch surge

[fallen]

Jan 24, 2020 17:59:29 GMT -5 koles said:

It could be nice surprise if enemy also could use flash charge at start of combat
would be more exciting than his use of twitch surge

It turns out that koles too love tears

[koles]

i'm not a mosochist

anyway game give us advantage over enemies when we can choose how to react - but enemies cant do that.
sure, we are heroes but I bet that in quadrant there are other heroes too

[raithnor]

Wanted to say I really like the changes to the Frontier Liner. Having a starter vessel optimized for exploration is really helpful. Gives the ship an identity other than "The thing you use for trading until you unlock the Galtek Freighter."

Look forward to other ship designs and redesigns.

[fallen]

raithnor thank you and thanks to spacez52 for the suggestion

[spacez52]

Jan 26, 2020 10:09:42 GMT -5 fallen said:

raithnor thank you and thanks to spacez52 for the suggestion

I've been suggesting some things but the suggestion to change the Frontier Liner came from fortune918 .

[fallen]

Woops. Sorry, too many threads not enough coffee.

I am sure I can fix that ...