Hello and welcome to the #3 Dev Diary for the upcoming Rheinland Update.

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Overview

With update 5.1 around the corner it's time for some more system news. First things first, 5.1 is coming soon. We promise. I don't want to give an exact date due to potential unforeseen delays killing the hype therefore I'll say it's coming somewhere in April. While everyone in the dev team is wrapping up their department's work within the scope of the update, I'm here to shed more light on the 5.1 system changes as well as a bit of the general news.

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Unstable Jumpholes

In 5.1 unstable jumpholes will permit all ships through, with a cargo limit of up to 650 units. That means capital ships and transports will be able to traverse quicker, so long as they don't exploit the trade potential most of them offer in a form of shortcuts. The reason for the change is simple - unstable jumpholes were always meant to be gameplay improvements that don't make trading insanely busted, and with this we are opening them up for all classes rather than them being snub-exclusive. The only exception to this will be atmospheric systems; those will remain snub-only. Overall we expect unstable jumpholes to result in less confusion for (new) players and slightly more player interaction with the increase to ease of traversal.

As an additional clarification: unstable jumpholes always have, and still will, count towards a faction's ZoI in the same manner normal jumpholes do.

The one unresolved thing that we can use community feedback on are systems such as Omega-55 and Copernicus: should those remain snub-only or be open to all ships? At the moment they are behaving the same as all other unstable jumpholes, meaning any ship with less than 650 cargo can activate one.

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Cruise Speed Changes

All combat vessels will receive a cruise speed buff of 150m/s. That means capital ships will cruise at 500m/s, bombers at 510m/s, and so on. Freighters will get the cruise speed buff. Ships that will not receive a buff are all transport vessels, with one exception - frigates. With 500m/s cruise, a frigate doing strictly f2 - f3 routes with no trade lanes will be slightly outperformed by a 5k transport, meaning frigates will be far more viable for trading in Edge Worlds and its borders.

Why haven't transports received the buff as well? Primarily because it's more of an economy team matter than a systems one. It requires route re-calculation and an economy review, with keeping in mind the fact that trade lanes will still heavily skew all house trade. Relative to one another, transports and trading as a whole are for the most part unchanged, with the only exception being the above-mentioned frigates. That means the Barge will still remain the same compared to a 5k cargo transport, as an example.

Why did we do this? To reduce travel time, primarily inside houses, and increase player interaction across the board. System sizes in Freelancer are drastic, ranging from the smallest (Chugoku, Tau-37) to the largest (New York). Reducing travel time helps getting faster to wherever the action is happening in-game as well as reduces "useless" flying through empty space in the middle of nowhere. It also helps generally move between (unlawful) bases inside houses, for which you often need several minutes of flying. An example of this would be a cruise between Rochester and Buffalo, or Sigma-15 and Dresden jumpholes in Frankfurt. We expect this to, for the most part, only result in an overall increase in player interaction as you can CD the opponent trying to flee mid-combat, while the relative speed ratios have not changed. It is also a small buff to piracy, though pirates should by now camp choke point locations rather than chase down fleeing transports.

There is one caveat to this, which brings me to the next point.

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System Upscaling

Systems too small or too cramped to accommodate the cruise speed buffs have been upscaled. This primarily affects systems in the Edge Worlds, and systems with no trade lanes in general. Some received only a partial upscale, meaning re-arrangement and increased spacing of objects without scaling the map. Some have received an increased map. And some received a full upscale, both the map and the arrangement of objects.

Systems upscaled are:

• Chugoku: full upscale (map + layout)
  
• Tohoku: objects spaced out more (Hokkaido hole)
  
• Tau-37: full upscale
  
• Omega-41: full upscale
  
• Dresden: map upscale
  
• Omicron Alpha: objects spaced out more (Tau-37 hole)
  
• Omicron Theta: full upscale
  
• Omicron Delta: objects spaced out more (everything except Nauru and surroundings)
  
• Omicron Zeta: objects spaced out more (jumpholes)
  

Additionally, these systems might potentially need an upscale. For now they are unchanged:

• Sigma-17
  
• Tau-23
  

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A Bit of Balance

Despite hearing and being teased about battleship changes for 5.1 (Video 1 | Video 2 | rework details are in the description of the video), they are being delayed for now. Reason is, it's far too much work to get it done properly at the moment. Framework is there, but every battleship requiring unique components, engines and everything else is quite time consuming. What is coming for sure, however, is a cruiser rework. The goal is to primarily give cruisers more duel mechanics, as well as make them more fleshed out in the role they are meant to execute - very fast, high dps ships with low range and an in-your-face playstyle. I won't go too much into the details of the cruiser rework, though I will mention main points of it:

• All cruisers will receive components, similar to battlecruisers.
  
• Cruiser heavy turrets have been divided into forward-only guns (bow chasers) and backwards-only guns (stern chasers). They can both shoot broadside with a slightly overlapping arc.
  
• Bow chasers are faster, less efficient, with more range. Stern chasers are more efficient and pack a higher punch.
  
• Prims remain 360 guns, same as now. Pulses as well.
  
• Cruiser shields have been reworked. They have lower capacity and larger regen, while draining powercore if damaged. You can turn off the shield regen (and core draw) with a new "/shields" command, which you can keybind.
  
• Higher DPS across the board. Stronger cores.
  
• Lower range on all guns, to keep cruisers in check for the core/dps buffs and propel their in-your-face playstyle.
  

How does this work out in practice? On paper you'll want to shoot the opposing cruiser with your stern chasers as much as possible, as they are the most efficient. You will also want to shoot the opponent's components as much as possible. In practice this is not easy due to both ships' movement making components harder to hit as well as the speed of stern chasers being lower than bow chasers, which are less efficient but will hit the target easier. Both hitting components consistently and hitting the opponent with the stern chasers will be a challenge, as the opponent will try to do the same to you, engaging in a tactical battle on top of existing mechanics such as core, range and arc management.

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Conclusion

We have more than a few story-related system changes outside of Rheinland, which I won't spoil for now until Jammi makes a dev diary. As for the above changes, please report any bugs related to ships having des-ynced speed relative to their class. POBs in upscaled systems will be relocated accordingly. Nothing else to add, other than encouraging you to give as much feedback as possible below. We'll potentially see more in-depth dev diaries of 5.1 balance and story changes, but until then, see you another time.