We have been hard at work over the last couple weeks and we are hoping this patch will be a real crowd pleaser for all you veteran players out there. We have heard your suggestions and here is what we have come up with to address them.

Badass Bandits:

One huge request has been to keep the bandits viable into mid and late game, so hunting them is not just an early game thing anymore. We have given the whole bandit system a major overhaul to support this. Here's what's new. New Bandit Parts: First off, the bandits got bigger, so they needed a part size upgrade to match. We have added medium and large noses, wings, and engines for the bandits (8 new parts) which are also available in the junkyard. They are also pretty darned cool looking. New Bandit Brains: Bandits can now level up just like the other captains on the map. This means they now get perks just like other captains as well. Bandit's will become much stronger as they level up and utilize their perks. This means damage, shield, power bonuses etc... Just like you. New Bandit Ship Building: Bandits can now upgrade their ships on the fly, just like other captains. They also build them BIG. While bandit parts tend to have less punch, they will now make up for that by fitting more cores. The highest level Bandit Chief can field 21 core monstrosities. Bandits also now USE their salvage. This means a bandit who wins a battle doesn't just break down the parts for scrap, but instead fits the new part on their junk ship nightmare to make it even stronger. You can spot the toughest bandits toting around parts from their victims. New Bandit Types: We now have the Bandit Enforcer and the Bandit Chief. Bandit Enforcers will only spawn out of hives of level two or three. They have a bonus of 3 cores on their ships as well as a level bonus on spawn. Level 3 hives will spawn Bandit Chiefs. They get the 6 core bonus as well as a larger level bonus, making them incredibly dangerous. If you see a bandit hive in your space, the smart move is to kill it before it hits level 3. Nastier Hive Combat: With the increase in the strength of the bandits, we needed to make the hives a little more difficult to uproot (more on that in a sec) So hives now have a defending mothership to augment the defending strike craft. The Swarm: We have been calling bandit hives, “hives,” for a while, but now have taken it to heart. They work like beehives now. So you kill a hive, and it now swarms and leaves the territory that it was in (avoiding the faction of whoever killed it) This initial swarm state is “dispersed” meaning the bandits have been thrown to the wind for the most part and are looking for a new home, but over time, the swarm reforms into something you can attack. Once the swarm comes together, you can attack it. This is a very difficult strike craft battle, but like bees, the swarm is carrying honey. If you attack the swarm, the crates of resources that they are taking to their new destination are up for grabs. When you mouse over a swarm, you see where it is headed as well. Perhaps you want to let a swarm land at its intended destination if it is in enemy territory, but you can also attack it and divert the swarm to a new territory, if you win. We hope you all enjoy these new bandit mechanics. Keep in mind that we finished this new tech yesterday so there may be tuning issues, but we will get on top of those as well.

Synergies:

Another big issue has been the ideal ship shape problem. It turns out making a ship and L or a T shape would give you the most bang for your buck (pun intended.) To add depth to the decision making, not only for spine shape but even for core placement, we have added the Synergy system. How synergies work is that they provide bonuses for two way connections between cores. A core with one core connected (end of the line) gets no bonus. Two cores connected, 10%. Three cores connected 30%. Four cores connected 60%. Since cores are mainly responsible for power generation, health, and a portion of shields on your ship, you need to decide if that extra wing the L or T shape will get you is worth more than the power to shoot your guns more, have more health and have your shields last a bit longer. Right now, the numbers for the bonuses of synergies are a best guess as is the tuning of the weapon power consumption which is still using the old non synergy power consumption model. Tuning will come over time as we find a new balance of firepower vs reactor power, but for now we just wanted Synergies in your hands, so have fun. Synergies are visualized through core to core connections that pulse with increasing speed as the synergy bonuses progress. If you look at your ship in the assembly screen, you should notice more meat in the connections between parts. These are the synergy “pipes” that are there to show synergy progress. You can also see the synergy progress by mousing over a connected part. It is the new green icon at the bottom. In combination with the new part swapping ship building system, you should now place your best cores in the positions with the highest synergy bonuses on your ship. So we don't want to see any 6 star cores at the end of an L anymore, get that thing synergized. :)

Cloaking:

We introduced starmap cloaking in the last patch, but it was a bit over powered. We have adjusted it so that cloaking now has a longer recharge time (90 vs 60 seconds) takes a bit more rez to maintain (3x vs 2x consume) and also now has an activation time (15 seconds)

Moving Forward:

For our next update, we will likely be working on tuning and doing a large bugfixing round. It isn't glamorous, but we have been so busy adding features to SPAZ 2 for almost 3 months now that we have had little to no time to play the game and tune all these new features. We also have very large bug lists that need to be dealt with. Most of it is quality of life stuff thankfully, but it is important. Other things we are looking at, though probably in the update after the big tuning pass will be a whole new Strike Craft System, Killing of Captains, and Faction Death. Thanks very much for your continued suggestions and support. They really do help to make SPAZ 2 the best game it can be. We really appreciate you all sticking with us!