Mineral Market Deregulation

In yesterdays meeting the board of Enceladus Corp voted to lift the price regulation rules of the Mineral Market. Effective today the station owners will no longer impose arbitrary prices based on external factors and the market will rely on supply and demand generated by its participants. While the majority of the market participants welcome this change, the Mining Guild raises concerns that deregulated ore prices might result in unprecedented inflation.

Extended pre-flight inspections

After another incident with a spaceship stranded on the rim of the A-Ring directly after orbital insertion due to inadequate propellant load, pre-flight inspections will now include checking the propellant level of all crafts that leave the station. Numerous independent contractors raise concerns that this step was taken not to improve crew safety, but rather to force all contractors to submit detailed flight plans, exposing their excavation zones to Enceladus Corp.

Auxiliary loophole closed

Starting this month, the auxiliary power systems will not be classified as ship accessories, but rather power system extensions. The previous classification as accessory allowed manufacturers to omit parts of the specification, such as the mass of the unit, from their marketing material. Reclassification closes this loophole, forcing both manufacturers and distributors to comply with all ship extension regulations.

Maintenance Logs

• Your actions can now influence the Mineral Market prices on Enceladus. The effect of this change is retroactive and all past purchases and sales will now be reflected in the prices.
• Market chart predictions for inexperienced geologists will now be more chaotic, making investments riskier.
• Ammunition, propellant and nanodrone component prices are now tied to mineral market prices of iron, water and platinum respectively.
• When you employ or dismiss a crewmember, the Mineral Market price prediction chart will now update immediately.
• Auxiliary power systems now have mass.
• The dive selection screen will now show the amount of propellant required to perform orbital insertion, warn you if you did not take enough to complete the manoeuvre and prevent you from launching until you take enough.
• Dialogue during combat was prone to looping and repeating the same commands if little changed between messages.
• Skipping ahead time in Enceladus while trading will now record subsequent trade days as separate events in your ship logs.
• THI Cargo Container will again leave a 500 kg buffer of ore on your ship to handle trade and drone fabrication without requiring a manual switch of the container pumps.
• Lifepods you recover in the rings wont be recorded in your ship logs as salvaged ships.
• Audio feedback from lifepod radio will now respect time slowdown.
• When pressing analogue control on the gamepad and moving the mouse simultaneously the icons on the screen changed a few hundred times per second, which could flood the buffers and cause crashes.
• HUD scale slider in settings also affected the zoom level of your ship's reconnaissance drone camera as long as the setting menu was opened.
• The game could crash when loading a slightly corrupted save.
• Improved performance of the Enceladus station menu.
• When examining autopilots in the Hardware menu, the simulation will now show a shadow simulation of your currently equipped autopilot, showcasing the difference in behaviour.
• When you asked bounty hunters what to do with prisoners, the coordinates of the drop point you got would expire as soon as you visited it. It will now persist for 30 days.
• When someone leaves your crew and takes another ship during a quest event, they will now leave your crew immediately.
• If you manage to externally fire up a thruster in a ship that is not operational by applying sufficient heat, the thruster valve will automatically close. This prevents accidental ignition of the thrust of cargo containers and mining companions using your own thrusters, which would fire constantly until released.
• Switched the location of the Steam overlay notification popup to not obscure version string.
• Fixed a number of typos.

[ 2022-05-12 09:35:34 CET ] [ Original post ]