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SpaceCorps 2027 0.4.8

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@rorychatt rorychatt released this 03 Oct 15:16
· 5 commits to main since this release
v0.4.8
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SpaceCorps 2027 0.4.8 puts three swarms of alien bosses on the map. It also splits the six shield cells and the six thrusters into two families of four tiers each, names the twelve rockets by family and tier (Lancet I, II and III) and rolls their damage when they are fired, counts the eighth shield at 50 percent, gives a respawned ship 3 safe seconds and a hull of at most 10,000, and pays a PvE kill by how tough the alien is. Your cells and thrusters are converted in place and some of them are worth less, so the "If you already play" list below is worth reading.

The game plays on the public server https://spacecorps-game.sliplane.app. Your pilot, ships, items, credits, clan and world carry over.

Download page: https://spacecorps.github.io/play/
On Hangar: https://hangar.sliplane.app/p/spacecorps/spacecorps-2027

What's new

Highlights

  • The Seeker Swarm: from season day 4 a Boss Seeker (four times a Seeker) with up to four healing Seeker Slaves roams the first two sectors of every company. It pays ten Seekers, split by damage, and drops a cargo box.
  • The Pirate Swarm (a Pirate Boss with up to five healing scouts that fires rockets at the pilot who shot it) and the Dormant Swarm (a Force and two Pulses that fly between the Danger Sectors through the real gates) are the hardest aliens in the game: the Pirate Boss, the Force and each Pulse pay more than a Crystalys in credits, Thulium, experience and honor.
  • All three swarms start on season day 4 (First Contact) and last until the wipe; a server that restarts after day 4 puts every boss on its map at once. A Swarms category under the Aliens in the in-game wiki, in 12 languages, tells how each one fights and what it pays. Until you update the game, a 0.4.7 client draws every swarm ship as a small plain green alien (see Updating).
  • Shield cells in two families: Capacity (more shield and recharge) and Absorption (more absorbance), tiers I to IV: tier I from the Shop for 30,000 credits, II to IV made in Assembly.
  • Thrusters in two families: Impulse (the most flat speed and a small multiplier) and Momentum (less flat speed and a bigger multiplier), tiers I to IV: tier I for 20,000 credits. A thruster's multiplier now acts on the whole engine.
  • Your old cells and thrusters are converted in place, and some are worth less (see below).
  • The eighth shield and every one after counts 50 percent (it was 25), and the Hangar shows what each slot counts for.
  • Rockets are named by family and tier (Lancet I, II, III) and their damage is rolled when fired: 80 to 100 percent of its number (90 to 100 for the N.U.K.E. and N.I.K.E.).
  • The Forge: the first buff is sure, each further buff slot of a tier-up fills with a 50 percent chance, and an Assembly upgrade keeps the number of buffs.
  • Respawn: no welcome line, 3 seconds in which you cannot be hurt and cannot attack, and a hull of at most 10,000 with an empty shield.
  • PvE points by toughness: Seeker 1, Phantasm 2, Bulwark 4, Goombah 7, Crystalys 16.
  • The Group window shows what a mate shoots. Station missions 6, 7 and 9 ask for Solar levels, Solar keeps making power while it upgrades, and DS-1 has no Mission Control.
  • Menus: no status bar, credits and Thulium at the top right, descriptions on hover in Assembly, a new Interface tab in Settings, selectable wiki text and a Copy page button, and no kill-log capsules at the top of the screen.
  • Windows memory: the game's memory no longer grows with every Materializer spin on the Galaxy Gates page, and the log file gets a memory line a minute.

If you already play: what changes for you

  • Your shield cells and thrusters are converted in place to the nearest new item: Basic and Advanced cells become Absorption I, Reinforced II, Elite and Prime III, Sovereign IV; Thruster I becomes Impulse I, Vector and Thruster II become II, Ion and Thruster III become III, Plasma becomes IV. Each piece keeps its row, its place, its Forge tier and its buffs, and takes the new tier's numbers (the tables are under "Ships and items: what your old cells and thrusters become"). Big ships with a full set of cells have 11 to 16 percent less to take, and the owners of a Plasma Thruster fly slower.
  • The cells in detail. A Basic cell gains in everything; an Elite gains a point of absorbance and loses a quarter of its capacity and recharge; an Advanced, a Reinforced, a Prime and a Sovereign keep their absorbance and lose 29 to 50 percent of their capacity and recharge. Nobody is given a Capacity cell: the family starts empty for everyone.
  • Who has less shield, and why. The Sovereign was both the Capacity IV's capacity and the Absorption IV's absorbance, and no new cell is both. A ship with a full set (three cells in every Heavy Shield Core) has less shield after the update. What the ship takes before its hull is gone changes only where the shield, not the hull, was the limit. The same sets in the Hangar, measured on a real 0.4.7 server and then on the 0.4.8 server, are in the table under "Ships and items: what your old cells and thrusters become", and they include the eighth shield counting 50 percent. With a full set a Paragon took 640,000 before its hull was gone and now takes 537,172 (16 percent less), a Wraith took 1,011,622 and now takes 861,930 (15 percent less), an Ironclad took 1,393,305 and now takes 1,246,290 (11 percent less); the Protos, Kitefin and Ostirion take the same as before. To get the capacity back, fit Capacity cells. A Capacity Shield Cell IV has the Sovereign's 12,000 capacity and 1,000 recharge with +5 points of absorbance instead of +10. Mixing the two families is the best fit for a big ship: a Wraith with 25 Capacity IV and 11 Absorption IV cells in its twelve Heavy Shield Cores, the Capacity cells in the slots that count most (the Hangar shows what each slot counts), takes 1,057,410 before its hull is gone, where 36 Sovereigns took 1,011,622.
  • Your thrusters are converted in place to the nearest Impulse Thruster, which multiplies a little too (x1.02 to x1.03). Only the owners of a Plasma Thruster fly slower, on every ship: up to 1.94 of the 62.4 engine points of an Engine III with three of them (3.1 percent; a Wraith with that engine goes from 301.8 to 299.8, a Protos from 223.1 to 221.0, 0.9 percent; about 2 percent of a ship's speed when every engine holds three of them). The owners of a Thruster I, a Vector, a Thruster II, an Ion Thruster and a Thruster III fly faster or just as fast in every host (the table is in the same section). It adds up per engine. A thruster with a Forge buff on its multiplier can lose a little more, because a buff on the new thrusters' small multiplier is worth a thousandth: with every stat at the top of the Eternal tier (x1.15), the worst host loses 5.7 engine points for a Plasma Thruster, 1.7 for a Thruster II, 1.5 for a Thruster I and 0.8 for a Thruster III (the Vector and the Ion Thruster still gain). Such a buff keeps working until the piece is forged again.
  • Queued crafts, the Transport Cache and bonus codes follow: a cell or thruster in a queued craft collects as the renamed piece, a cached piece stays cached, and a bonus code that named an old cell gives the new one. The Shop no longer sells any cell or thruster for Thulium.
  • Rockets have new names: Lancet is Lancet I, Javelin Lancet II, Harpoon Lancet III, Rivet I, II and III were Rivet, Mallet and Piledriver, Ember I, II and III were Ember, Corona and Eclipse, Scatter I, II and III were Scatter, Barrage and Maelstrom. Your stacks, your hotbar slots, your ammo statistics and your bonus codes are renamed with them. Prices, stacks and reach are unchanged, but their damage now varies: on average a rocket hits 10 percent below its old number (5 percent for the N.U.K.E. and N.I.K.E.), because the old number is now the top of the band.
  • Forge: items you have keep every buff. From now on a tier-up fills a further slot only half the time, so a Godly piece has its second buff half the time; merging two copies fills a slot a tier-up missed.
  • Respawn: a ship that comes back from a death has at most 10,000 hull and no shield, so a Wraith or an Ironclad must repair after it. "Return to Base" docks it at 10,000 and the Hangar does not repair it.
  • Your PvE score is recounted at the server's first start from your kill statistics, so your old kills count at the new weights. Nobody loses points for kills: every weight is 1 or more.
  • Station missions you have accepted are carried over. A mission that the old tasks already called complete completes, and the others keep what they have and start the new Solar goals.
  • Settings: your saved values carry over to the new General and Interface tabs.

Swarms: the Seeker Swarm

  • Where and when: from season day 4 (First Contact) until the wipe, each of the sectors M-1, M-2, T-1, T-2, G-1 and G-2 has one swarm in every world: a Boss Seeker and up to four Seeker Slaves. A boss never appears within 2,500 units of the edge of a station or a gate ring.

  • The Boss Seeker is four times a Seeker in hull, shield and damage: 3,200 hull, 3,200 shield and a laser volley of 720 in Alpha (a Seeker has 800, 800 and 180). Its speed (120) and range (600) are a Seeker's. It is drawn twice the Seeker's size in an amber livery with a name tag. It does nothing until it is hit; then it stands where it is and fires, and the swarm's members within 1,500 units join against the first pilot who shot.

  • Seeker Slaves are plain Seekers (800 hull, 800 shield, 180 a volley). One comes every 10 seconds, up to four. Each one within 600 units heals the boss 50 hull points a second (hull only, never shield). They stay within 500 units of it and leave 30 seconds after it dies, unless they are attacking.

  • The worlds: in Beta and Gamma the hull, shield, damage and heal are 1.5 and 2 times these numbers, and the pay 2 and 3 times, as for every alien.

  • Pay: exactly ten Seekers. Pilots share it by the damage they dealt to the boss; you need 5 percent of it to share, and a group counts as one entry. Under 5 percent you are paid nothing and the Game Log tells you. Your boosters and premium apply to your part.

    World Credits Thulium Experience Honor
    Alpha 8,000 40 1,000 20
    Beta 16,000 80 2,000 40
    Gamma 24,000 120 3,000 60

  • The cargo box goes to the pilot who dealt the most damage (reserved for that pilot and their clan for 30 seconds, then anyone): the loot of ten Seekers (a 20 percent Ship Fragment and a 50 percent 1 to 2 Daraxium, each rolled ten times), 200 to 400 Standard Battery, 10 to 20 Advanced Plasma, 2 to 4 Ultra Core and 2 to 3 rockets of one random credit-shop kind.

  • Back and gone: a new Boss Seeker appears 2 minutes after one is destroyed.

  • What you are told: the sector's chat says "Seeker Swarm: Boss Seeker has appeared in this sector." and "Seeker Swarm: Boss Seeker was destroyed." The Global chat's kill feed names the pilot who is credited on every map ("alpha destroyed Boss Seeker"), in every world, without the world's name.

  • Counted by itself: the Boss Seeker and the Seeker Slave are kinds of their own in your kill statistics. They do not count for the Seeker's quests or Wipe Points; a boss kill earns 5 PvE points, a slave 1.

  • It is dangerous to start the fight. A new pilot (a Protos, 8,000 hull, no shield) is destroyed in 12 seconds by the boss alone and in 6 with its slaves. A Quantum Laser 2 reaches 700, past the boss's 600, and a Protos is faster than its 120: kept out of its range, two level 3 pilots kill it in 37 to 51 seconds with x1 ammo in the model. Measured on a scratch server, two pilots (a level 3 and a level 2 kit) destroyed one in 17 seconds of fire with x2 ammo and 112 seconds with x1.

  • Other aliens and the company pilots: an alien never shoots a swarm member and no swarm member shoots an alien; the company pilots (the NPC squads) ignore the swarms.

Swarms: the Pirate Swarm

  • Where and when: from season day 4 until the wipe, each of the sectors M-2, M-3, T-2, T-3, G-2 and G-3 has one Pirate Swarm in every world (18 in all): a Pirate Boss and up to five Pirate Scouts.
  • The Pirate Boss is an Ironclad at 50 percent of its hull, shield and damage: 300,000 hull and 50,100 shield in Alpha, speed 92, range 700. It is passive and fires no lasers, and it does nothing until it is hit. It is drawn as an Ironclad in a dark brick-red livery with a name tag.
  • Its weapon is a rocket: every 5 seconds it fires a straight, unguided rocket at the first pilot who shot it, as long as that pilot is within 970 units (1,000 in the -3 sectors): a Rivet I (2,500 damage) in the -2 sectors and a Rivet II (5,000) in the -3 sectors. It keeps roaming its route while it does. The rocket's damage grows with the world as the lasers' do (1.5 and 2 times in Beta and Gamma).
  • A rocket from an alien is one of the Rivets above, drawn red, with a quiet sound of its own, and its damage is not rolled. It hurts pilots only: never an alien, a swarm ship or a company pilot, and nothing in a safe ring, in the 3 seconds after a respawn or cloaked. A pilot it destroys dies to an alien. Being straight, it hits the first pilot on its line, so a bystander can take a rocket meant for the attacker, and a ship that keeps moving sidesteps it.
  • Pirate Scouts are Kitefins at 50 percent in the same livery: 12,000 hull, 9,818 shield, a 98 volley, speed 175, range 700. Up to five, one every 10 seconds, within 900 units of the boss, attacking on sight within 700. Each scout within 600 units heals the boss 40 hull points a second (hull only; 60 and 80 in Beta and Gamma). They leave 60 seconds after the boss dies unless they are attacking.
  • Pay: the Pirate Boss 116,000 credits, 725 Thulium, 29,000 experience and 232 honor in Alpha (9.7 Goombahs, and more than a Crystalys's 60,000, 200, 12,000 and 52 in each; twice and three times that in Beta and Gamma; split by damage as the Boss Seeker's is); a Pirate Scout 800, 4, 100 and 2, a Seeker's, for the pilot who hit it first.
  • The box, for the pilot who dealt the most damage: 5 to 10 rockets of one random credit-shop kind and 500 to 1,000 of Advanced Plasma or Siphon Battery, and half the time 1 Reinforced Hull Plate. A new boss appears 2 minutes after one is destroyed.
  • How hard: in the model, three level 4-5 pilots with x2 ammo destroy it in about 5.6 minutes if the damage is spread over them (it takes four or five pilots if all of it falls on one of them), a level 8 Paragon alone in about 4.4, and a lone level 4-5 pilot cannot. The group it needs grows with the world: 3, 4 and 6 level 4-5 pilots in Alpha, Beta and Gamma if they spread the damage. Killing the scouts first does not pay, since a new one comes every 10 seconds. On a scratch server three level 4-5 Ostirions with x2 ammo destroyed one in 5.4 to 5.7 minutes.

Swarms: the Dormant Swarm

  • Where and when: from season day 4 until the wipe, one Dormant Swarm lives in each world, on the Danger Sectors DS-1 to DS-4, and starts on a random one of them.
  • The Dormant Force is a Wraith at 100 percent with lasers three times a typical fit's: 324,000 hull, 83,400 shield and a 2,880 volley in Alpha, speed 225, range 800. Two Dormant Pulses are Paragons at 100 percent (128,000 hull, 64,570 shield, a 1,920 volley, speed 210) and follow it. They are drawn in a violet livery with name tags.
  • They sleep until they are hit. Then every member within 1,500 units joins against the first pilot who shot. Each fires a straight rocket every 5 seconds, as the Pirate Boss does (and from up to 990 and 1,000 units): a Rivet III (7,500) for the Force, a Rivet II (5,000) for each Pulse.
  • They travel. The swarm stays 8 to 15 minutes on a Danger Sector, then flies to the gate of another one and jumps through it as a pilot does: a 3-second charge, a warp flash and a quiet sound of its own. It never takes the three gates out to the company maps and never enters the black hole's circle, and it neither starts nor ends a jump within 10 seconds of a hit (a hit in the charge ends it); a pilot who keeps it under fire keeps it where it is, and can jump after it.
  • Back: 1 hour after all three are destroyed, on a random Danger Sector. If the Force is destroyed first, a Pulse leads the others. A server restart starts the swarm anew.
  • What you are told: every pilot flying in the world, on any map, gets a chat and Game Log line when the swarm appears ("Dormant Swarm: Dormant Force has appeared on DS-2."), every hour it lives ("The Dormant Swarm is still out there: it is on DS-3 now.") and when the last of its ships is destroyed. A violet marker shows its sector on the galaxy map and its ships on the minimap of that sector, and the Global chat's kill feed names the pilot credited with the Force.
  • Pay (Alpha; 2 and 3 times in Beta and Gamma), split by damage, each ship its own kill: the Force 160,000 credits, 535 Thulium, 32,100 experience, 139 honor; each Pulse 75,000, 255, 15,200 and 66.
  • The Force's box: 2,000 to 3,000 Ultra Core and Experimental Fusion Core in total, 30 to 50 rockets of one random Epic kind, and half the time a N.I.K.E. or a N.U.K.E. Each Pulse drops, 20 percent each, an Ancient Control Unit, a Power Core and 1 to 5 Dark Matter.
  • How hard: in the model eight level 8 Paragons win with x2 and with x4 ammo and one never does. The smallest winning group is 4 pilots on x2 ammo (3 on x4) in Alpha, 6 (4) in Beta and 8 (6) in Gamma.

Ships and items: what your old cells and thrusters become

  • The cells: the row, owner, place, Forge tier and buffs are kept; the numbers become the new tier's (capacity, recharge a second, absorbance in points):

    Old cell Becomes Old: capacity, recharge, absorbance New
    Basic Absorption I 1,000, 100, +2 1,500, 125, +4
    Advanced Absorption I 2,500, 250, +4 1,500, 125, +4
    Reinforced Absorption II 4,200, 350, +6 3,000, 250, +6
    Elite Absorption III 6,000, 500, +7 4,500, 375, +8
    Prime Absorption III 8,500, 700, +8 4,500, 375, +8
    Sovereign Absorption IV 12,000, 1,000, +10 6,000, 500, +10

  • A full set (three cells in every Heavy Shield Core) in the Hangar, measured on a real 0.4.7 server and then on the 0.4.8 server, with the eighth shield counting 50 percent. "Takes before its hull is gone" is the shield and the hull together, but no more than the hull divided by one minus the absorbance:

    Ship (generator slots) Shield Recharge a second Takes before its hull is gone
    Protos (4) 362,950 to 255,850 22,806 to 13,881 40,000, the same
    Kitefin (5) 429,059 to 302,451 26,960 to 16,410 120,000, the same
    Ostirion (6) 524,409 to 369,666 32,952 to 20,057 240,000, the same
    Paragon (8) 567,109 to 409,172 35,635 to 22,200 640,000 to 537,172 (16 percent less)
    Wraith (12) 687,622 to 537,930 43,207 to 29,186 1,011,622 to 861,930 (15 percent less)
    Ironclad (14) 793,305 to 646,290 49,848 to 35,065 1,393,305 to 1,246,290 (11 percent less)

  • The thrusters (speed and multiplier; the engine points of an Engine III with three of them, before and after; and the speed of a Wraith with that engine):

    Old thruster Becomes Old: speed, multiplier New An Engine III with three A Wraith with an Engine III and three
    Thruster I Impulse I +5, x1.00 +5, x1.02 21.0 to 22.3 258.3 to 259.6
    Vector Impulse II +7, x1.02 +10, x1.02 27.4 to 38.2 265.0 to 276.4
    Thruster II Impulse II +10, x1.05 +10, x1.02 36.9 to 38.2 275.0 to 276.4
    Ion Impulse III +13, x1.08 +15, x1.03 46.6 to 55.7 285.1 to 294.8
    Thruster III Impulse III +15, x1.10 +15, x1.03 53.0 to 55.7 291.9 to 294.8
    Plasma Impulse IV +18, x1.12 +17, x1.02 62.4 to 60.5 301.8 to 299.8

Ships and items: the shield cells

  • Two families, four tiers each. Capacity cells hold and recharge twice as much as the Absorption cell of the same tier, Absorption cells add twice the absorbance. Absorbance is in points added to the core's own 45, 48 or 50 percent.

    Cell Rarity Capacity Recharge a second Absorbance
    Capacity Shield Cell I Shoddy 3,000 250 +2
    Capacity Shield Cell II Common 6,000 500 +3
    Capacity Shield Cell III Rare 9,000 750 +4
    Capacity Shield Cell IV Epic 12,000 1,000 +5
    Absorption Shield Cell I Shoddy 1,500 125 +4
    Absorption Shield Cell II Common 3,000 250 +6
    Absorption Shield Cell III Rare 4,500 375 +8
    Absorption Shield Cell IV Epic 6,000 500 +10

  • No stat of any cell is above the Sovereign's (12,000, 1,000, +10), so no set of the new cells beats a set of Sovereigns counted the same way. The best Heavy-core set is still exactly 80 percent, and only with three Absorption IV in the core; a set of Capacity cells is 65 percent.

  • Where you get them: the Shop sells tier I of each family for 30,000 credits and nothing else (no cell is sold for Thulium any more). Tiers II to IV are made in Assembly out of one loose piece of the tier below, which keeps its Forge tier while its buffs are rolled again:

    Step Takes Thulium Also Time
    II a tier I cell 1,000 10 Cataclysite, 4 Reinforced Hull Plates, 2 Velkonite Reinforced Plates 1 min
    III a tier II cell 1,500 15 Cataclysite, 6 Reinforced Hull Plates, 4 Velkonite Reinforced Plates 1 min
    IV a tier III cell 2,500 20 Cataclysite, 8 Reinforced Hull Plates, 6 Velkonite Reinforced Plates 1 min 30 s

  • The quests that paid a cell now pay an Absorption Shield Cell I (quest 7), a Capacity Shield Cell I (quest 23) and an Absorption Shield Cell II (quest 66), and the ALPHATESTER code gives an Absorption Shield Cell I.

  • A rule of thumb (it has a help card on the Shop's cell page): a ship held by its hull (the Protos, Kitefin, Ostirion and most of the Paragon) wants Absorption; a ship held by its shield (the Ironclad, and the Wraith in a mix) wants Capacity.

Ships and items: the thrusters and the speed formula

  • Impulse adds the most flat speed and multiplies a little; Momentum adds less flat speed and multiplies more. Tier I is sold for 20,000 credits, tiers II to IV are made in Assembly out of the tier below.

    Thruster Speed Multiplier Step: Thulium, also, time
    Impulse I +5 x1.02 Shop, 20,000 credits
    Impulse II +10 x1.02 1,000, 10 Ship Fragments, 1 Power Core, 2 Velkonite Reinforced Plates, 1 min
    Impulse III +15 x1.03 1,500, 30 Ship Fragments, 2 Power Cores, 4 Velkonite Reinforced Plates, 1 min
    Impulse IV +17 x1.02 2,000, 60 Ship Fragments, 3 Power Cores, 6 Velkonite Reinforced Plates, 1 min 30 s
    Momentum I +4 x1.08 Shop, 20,000 credits
    Momentum II +8 x1.10 as Impulse II
    Momentum III +11 x1.13 as Impulse III
    Momentum IV +12 x1.14 as Impulse IV

  • The new formula: an engine or Adaptive Core adds (its own base speed + the flat speeds of its thrusters) x the product of their multipliers to the ship's speed. Until 0.4.7 the multipliers acted on the engine's own base speed alone (2, 4 or 6, and nothing for an Adaptive Core), so a multiplier was worth almost nothing. A Momentum Thruster's multiplier is worth more in a bigger host: an Engine III with three Momentum IV makes 62.2 where three Impulse IV make 60.5.

  • The best builds: the best Engine III holds an Impulse IV and two Momentum IV (62.3), the best Adaptive Core II two Impulse IV (35.4, where a Momentum pair makes 31.2). The Wraith's best build, 872.2, is still the fastest of the six ships, the Ironclad's best is 822.3, and the Ironclad's base speed stays 92. The best builds move down by 0.5 (the Protos) to 5.0 (the Ironclad) from the Plasma Thruster builds of 0.4.7.

  • Against an Ostirion with an Engine II and two thrusters, an Impulse Thruster I flies it at 223.1 and a Momentum Thruster I at 222.6, which is slower than a Crystalys (230). From tier II both families outrun it: 234.0, 245.5 and 249.1 for Impulse II, III and IV, 233.2, 242.5 and 245.8 for Momentum II, III and IV (the Momentum II by 3.2).

  • The Forge's buff on a multiplier acts on the part above 1 only: a x1.15 buff on a Momentum IV's x1.14 makes x1.161, not x1.311, and on an Impulse IV's x1.02 it makes x1.023. The Forge rolls no buff on a multiplier of 1.05 or less, so an Impulse Thruster holds one buff (its flat speed) at every tier and a Momentum Thruster two.

  • Every thruster card shows its Speed Multiplier, the Impulse Thrusters' x1.02 and x1.03 too.

Ships and items: the eighth shield counts 50 percent

  • The rule: the shields of a ship are counted by place, best first: the first four count 100 percent, then 85, 70 and 55, and from the eighth on 50 percent (it was 25). The slot's share (core 100, support 75, auxiliary 50 percent, a drone's slot 100) applies on top. The engines' places are as they were, 25 percent from the eighth on. An Adaptive Core takes the shields' tail for its shield and the engines' for its speed.
  • Who gains: only a ship with eight or more shields. The Protos (4 generator slots), Kitefin (5) and Ostirion (6) do not change on their own slots. In the best fit of each ship (the best mix of Capacity IV and Absorption IV cells): the Paragon's shield on its own slots +2.1 percent, the Wraith's +9.0, the Ironclad's +15.6 (793,305 to 916,830). Shields on drones gain the most: an Ironclad with 16 drone shields goes from 1,128,555 to 1,587,330 (+40.7 percent).
  • The Hangar shows it. A generator slot that counts less than all of its item carries a small percent badge (for example 64 percent for the 5th shield, 85 percent, in a support slot, 75 percent). The item's card says "Counts 64%: shield no. 5 (85%), support slot (75%)", and the Shield and Speed tiles list the items by place and say what a further one would add. The flight Ship window shows the same lists on hover.

Ships and items: the Forge

  • After the first buff, a further buff is a 50 percent chance. A tier-up gives an item with no buff its first for sure. For every other slot the new tier holds, it rolls a 50 percent chance on its own; a slot that misses stays free, and the next tier-up tries it again. The Forge panel says "up to N" buffs.
  • What it means on average for an item with four stats (a Shield Core): 1.0 buff at Tainted, 1.5 at Godly, 2.25 at Rupturing, 3.1 at Eternal (it was 1, 2, 3, 4). Merging two copies still fills what was missed. Items that exist are not touched.
  • An Assembly upgrade keeps the number of buffs of the piece it uses up (a Pulse Amp into a Nova Amp, a Quantum Laser 3 into a Starfire-3, a cell or a thruster into the next tier), at least one above Standard; the buffs themselves are rolled again as before. A piece that has one buff rolls it again on a random stat.
  • The lottery at collection (the tier a craft can win) is not changed: a won tier still carries the whole set.

Ships and items: rockets

  • Names: Lancet I, II and III (guided, single target), Rivet I, II and III (straight, single target), Ember I, II and III (guided, blast) and Scatter I, II and III (straight, blast). I is Common, II Rare, III Epic. The N.U.K.E., the N.I.K.E. and the admin Kick Rocket keep their names. The hotbar codes are LNC I, LNC II, LNC III, and likewise RVT, EMB and SCT. Speed, reach, price and stack of each rocket are as before (a Lancet I costs 500 credits, a Lancet III 5 Thulium), and so is the number that is now the top of its damage band.

  • Damage is rolled once, when the rocket is fired, uniformly from a lowest share of its number to all of it, and a blast deals that one roll to every ship in it. The number of the old tables is now the top of the band:

    Rocket Damage
    Lancet I, II, III 1,600-2,000, 3,200-4,000, 4,800-6,000
    Rivet I, II, III 2,000-2,500, 4,000-5,000, 6,000-7,500
    Ember I, II, III (at the centre) 1,120-1,400, 2,240-2,800, 3,360-4,200
    Scatter I, II, III (at the centre) 1,400-1,750, 2,800-3,500, 4,200-5,250
    N.U.K.E. (at the centre) 45,000-50,000
    N.I.K.E. 67,500-75,000

    The twelve roll 80 to 100 percent (a laser volley's own band); the N.U.K.E. and N.I.K.E. roll 90 to 100, so what they destroy in one hit stays reliable. There is no critical hit, and nothing about your ship, amps, ammo or drones changes the roll. The Shop's cards and the hotbar tooltips print the range.

  • What it does to the fights: a Lancet I still kills a Seeker in one hit at every roll, and a Phantasm in three on average (four at the lowest roll). A Rivet II kills a Phantasm in one hit at a roll of 89 percent or more, else in two. A N.I.K.E. still destroys a fresh Protos, Kitefin or Ostirion in one hit at every roll. A N.U.K.E. still destroys a fresh Protos anywhere in its blast, but a fresh Kitefin only within 50 units of the burst (220 units at the best roll).

Combat and respawn: dying and coming back

  • No welcome line after a respawn or a reconnect; a launch still welcomes you.
  • 3 seconds of protection after every respawn (base, portal or the spot): the ship cannot be hurt and cannot attack. A laser or a rocket is refused with "You can't attack while your spawn protection lasts." and only the time ends the window, not a refused shot. This replaces the old 5 seconds that your first shot ended. The EMP, the Cloaking CPU and the three abilities still work, since none of them deals damage. The chip on the screen counts the seconds.
  • At most 10,000 hull and an empty shield. A ship returns with the smaller of its hull and 10,000: a Protos (8,000) returns whole, a Kitefin (24,000), Ostirion (48,000), Paragon (128,000), Wraith (324,000) and Ironclad (600,000) at 10,000 of their own maximum. The death screen says so. A Repair Drone I needs about 65 seconds from 10,000 to full on a big ship, a Repair Drone IV about 19. Reviving a wrecked ship in the Hangar gives the same hull; changing company (5,000 credits) still repairs in full.

Combat and respawn: PvE points by toughness

  • A kill pays PvE points by how tough the alien is, the square root of its hull plus shield divided by 1,600, rounded: Seeker 1, Phantasm 2, Bulwark 4, Goombah 7, Crystalys 16. The weight is the same in every world. Swarm kinds: Boss Seeker 5, Seeker Slave 1; Pirate Boss 10, Pirate Scout 1, Dormant Force 25, Dormant Pulse 10.
  • Existing scores are recounted at the server's start (and at every start after it) from your kill statistics: level times 100, experience divided by 1,000, and every kill at its weight. A pilot with 100 Seekers and 10 Crystalys goes from 455 to 605 in the test; a pilot who killed every kind from 1,108 to 1,333. The PvE ranking reorders: a hunter of Goombahs and Crystalys can pass a pilot killer.
  • The Rankings page, Statistics > Ranking and the in-flight Ranking window list "Points per alien kill"; the PvE help card and the alien articles state the weights.

Combat and respawn: no station in the Danger Sectors

  • DS-1 has no Mission Control station any more (DS-2, DS-3 and DS-4 never had one). The safe zones of a Danger Sector are its gate rings. A pilot parked at the old station launches there unprotected. Take and claim missions at a base; the missions you have keep counting.

Groups: what a mate shoots

  • A mate's row shows their target: its name (a skull for an alien, a person for a pilot, a robot for a company pilot) and two thin bars, hull and shield. The hover card gives the exact numbers ("Hull 13,936 / 16,000 (87%)"). It shows for 5 seconds after your mate's last lock, only for mates on your map in your world. A cloaked pilot's bars reach only the mates who could see that pilot anyway. Stations and gates are never targets. You never see your own target in the group (you have the Target window).
  • The Group window opens 380 points tall, enough for a full group of five fighting. A pilot who once dragged the window keeps a saved height of 296 points and can have the last row cut until they resize it.
  • Fixed: hovering a bar in the Group window drew two cards on top of each other; there is one card at a time now.

Missions and Skylab

  • Station missions 6 and 7 ask for a Solar level where they asked to keep the power at 0 or more (which has been true for almost everybody since 0.4.7's Solar), and mission 9 asks for Core and Solar 6 where it asked for 5. Nothing may go above the Core, so the Core comes first. Pay is unchanged.

    # Mission Now asks for
    5 Brighter Panels Raise Solar to level 3 (the briefing says the farms keep running)
    6 The Thulium Line Build a Thulium Farm and raise Solar to level 4 (take the Core to 4 first)
    7 Growing Season Raise the Credit Farm to level 3 and Solar to level 5 (the Core goes to 5 first)
    9 Open the Supply Line Raise the Core and Solar to level 6 (it asked for 5); it opens after mission 7
    10 Core Ten Raise the Core to level 10: it climbs from Core 6 now, in four steps, about 93,000 credits and 3 hours of timers

  • Solar keeps making the power of its current level while it upgrades. Until now a Solar upgrade switched every farm and collector off for its timer. Now nothing is switched off, and the Forgery can start new batches.

  • A 0.4.7 client keeps showing "Offline while upgrading" on the Solar card and the old warning before a Solar upgrade; the server is right.

Menus, Settings and wiki

  • The station menu has no status bar or ticker at the bottom any more. It only ever showed a welcome tip and an echo of the page you had opened, never anything from the server.
  • Credits and Thulium are at the top right of the toolbar, beside the honor and the sector: Premium, credits, Thulium, honor, sector, Launch. On a narrow window the amounts shorten from 10,000 up (987.7M) before Premium drops to its crown, and hovering an amount shows the whole number.
  • Assembly shows the full description on hover of a recipe, a queue row, a material, a Forge cost row, an upgrade chain tile or a Forge piece. A cut description line gets one wrapped tip.
  • Settings has a new Interface tab, second in the switch. General keeps the language, Camera Zoom, "Camera stays where I put it" and Reset view, Do Not Disturb and the crash-report switch. Interface holds HUD Opacity, Show Stats Overlay, Show network info, Show My Drones, Show Enemy Drones and Show Map Grid, and Show kill feed, Hide Global chat and Ignored pilots. No setting changed its name or its value.
  • The kill-log capsules at the top centre of the screen are gone. The Game Log window (the Log button) lists the same lines, and the chat's Global kill feed is untouched. "Portal too far to jump." is a toast. The claim-denied line ("X hit it first: the reward is theirs"), friendly-fire honor penalties, "Quest Failed" and the Shield Surge and Emergency Repair end reports are in the Game Log only.
  • Wiki text can be selected and copied. Drag across paragraphs, lists, headings, tables, formulas and quotes, and press Ctrl+C (Cmd+C on a Mac); links still follow a click. A Copy page button over every article copies the page as Markdown, in your language, and shows "Copied". A drag has to start on text and does not scroll the page: for a long page use Copy page.
  • The wiki's pages for the shield cells, the thrusters, the Forge, the rockets, the speed, the shields and inventory, the respawn and the Groups follow these numbers, in all 12 languages. A Swarms category, beneath the Aliens, has an overview and an article for each of the three swarms, and the Wipe Timeline says that the swarms begin at First Contact (day 4); the swarms' numbers in those pages are written from Swarms.json.
  • Help cards for the generators' places, the cells' rule of thumb, rocket damage, the Forge, PvE points, respawn and groups are new or changed, in 12 languages.

Windows memory

  • What was found: the Chrono-Gate's count on the Galaxy Gates page was drawn at a new font size every frame of a Materializer spin, and every new size grew the font texture, which never shrinks and exists three times. On a Mac, 236 spins took the game's live memory from 316 to 1,276 MB and the texture to 16384 x 8192 pixels (537 MB a copy).
  • What was fixed: text sizes that follow an animation, a drag or a window are snapped to whole pixels (the gate's count steps in 3 percent rungs), and the texture is at most 2048 x 2048 pixels (16.8 MB a copy). The same run now stays flat, 222 to 258 MB in our runs. The hub copies a map update's data far less often (4,888 allocations to 1,699 for one update, 20 times a second).
  • A memory line in the log file: once a minute spacecorps2027.log gets a mem line with the process's memory, the font texture, the textures and meshes, the connection's inbox and the cache. It holds numbers only, no account data. If the game takes more memory than you expect, send the log.
  • Not proven: this is the only thing we found that made memory climb in our runs, and it is not proven to be what some Windows PCs showed (the Windows heap and the graphics driver could not be measured here). An optional test build of the game with another memory allocator exists for A/B tests; the release uses the default one.

Fixes

  • Item names keep their tier where a tile or card cuts them (the Transport Cache, the Shop), and a cut name has no space before its ellipsis.
  • The rocket picker's tiles fit the new codes: the code has the bottom of the tile and the count moved to the top left, so LNC III, RVT III and the others fit.
  • A price or a badge that fits keeps its size; only text made smaller to fit snaps to whole pixels.
  • A refused jump ("Portal too far to jump.") is a toast now, so it is not lost with the kill-log capsules.

For administrators and the server

  • Swarm tools: GET /api/admin/swarms and POST /api/admin/swarms/spawn, /remove, /gate, /move and /timing spawn a swarm on a map now, take it off, move the season day the swarms start on in a world, send the Dormant Swarm to a Danger Sector (at once or by its gate) and set its dwell and return times. They are recorded in the admin actions (swarm-spawn, swarm-remove, swarm-gate, swarm-move, swarm-timing); a 0.4.7 admin page lists them as "other".
  • Config files: Resources/Swarms.json is new (the swarms' strength, pay, drops and timers; the server refuses to start with a wrong one and says which field). RespawnConfig.json has respawnInvulnerableSecs (3) and respawnHull (10000) in place of protectionSecs. Rockets.json has rollMin (0.8) and specialRollMin (0.9); 1.0 makes the damage fixed again. ForgeConfig.json has extra_buff_chance (0.5; 1.0 restores 0.4.7). Groups.json has targetSecs (5). ranking-config.json has the PvE weights.
  • The server renames in place at its first start the cells and thrusters (twelve names) and the rockets (twelve), with their stacks, hotbars, statistics, admin records and bonus codes, and recounts the PvE points at every start. Take a volume backup first (docs/DEPLOY.md, "The deploy of 0.4.8").

Updating

  • From 0.2.1 or later: the game downloads 0.4.8 by itself. Click Restart to Update, or quit the game, and it installs. If you installed the game with Hangar, Hangar updates it.
  • From 0.2.0: download it once from the download page and replace the old app or folder.
  • Update the game. The server updates first, and a 0.4.7 client keeps working, but it shows some things the old way:
    • Swarms: it draws every swarm member as the small plain green alien it draws for a ship model it does not know (about the Seeker's size, a little darker than a Seeker), under the name the server sends ("Boss Seeker", "Pirate Boss", "Dormant Force"), not as the Ironclad, the Kitefins, the Wraith and the Paragons the new client draws, with the member's hull and shield in its target panel. An alien's rocket is drawn as any rocket. The new chat and Game Log lines show in English and it ignores the kill feed line for a boss. It has no marker for the Dormant Swarm, no violet or red livery, no charge at the gate and no warp flash or sound when the Dormant Swarm jumps.
    • Cells and thrusters: it lists the new names and numbers the server sends, but draws the converted pieces with their old icons, and the eight new pieces (Capacity and Momentum) with a generic glyph. Its help cards and its wiki describe the 0.4.7 rules.
    • The shields' tail: it shows the server's numbers, but no percent badge on a slot and none of the new lines on the Shield and Speed tiles.
    • Rockets: it shows and fires every rocket under the new names, but its Shop lists the twelve under one heading, "Other rockets", its Hangar lists them by tier, its picker draws the longer codes cramped (the code and the count meet), and the descriptions show in English. Its cards print the top damage (a Lancet II says 4,000), since it does not know the band; the damage numbers and the Game Log show what was rolled.
    • Respawn: its death screen says "Your first shot ends it", which is wrong (a shot is refused and the window runs its 3 seconds), the chip counts the 3 seconds, a refused shot shows in English, and it has no hull line.
    • The Forge: its panel shows the tier's full number of buffs, where each further one is a 50 percent chance.
    • PvE points: it has no "Points per alien kill" line, its PvE help card says 1 point for every kill, and the alien articles have no PvE row. Its Ranking calculation shows the weights from the server.
    • Groups: no target block in the Group window.
    • Station missions: it shows the new Solar goals ("Raise Solar to level 4") in its own language but the five changed briefings in English; its Solar card says "Offline while upgrading".
    • DS-1: it draws no station there and its Mission Control button is dimmed.
    • The menu, Settings and the wiki: it still has the status bar, one long General tab, the kill-log capsules at the top and unselectable wiki text; it has the old memory behaviour.
  • A 0.4.8 client on a 0.4.7 server (a private server, or while the update is on its way) still plays: no swarms, no percent badges on slots, no mate targets, one damage number on a rocket's card, and help texts that describe 0.4.8 rules. Update the server first.

Platforms

Package For
SpaceCorps2027-macos-universal.dmg macOS 12 Monterey or later, Apple silicon and Intel
SpaceCorps2027-windows-x86_64.zip Windows 10 and 11, 64-bit
SpaceCorps2027-linux-x86_64.AppImage Linux x86_64, glibc 2.35 or newer (Ubuntu 22.04, Debian 12, Fedora 36 and later), Vulkan
SpaceCorps2027-linux-x86_64.tar.gz the same Linux build, as a folder to unpack

Graphics need Metal (macOS), DirectX 12 or Vulkan (Windows), or Vulkan (Linux, Mesa 22 or a vendor driver). The game needs 4 GB of RAM at the least and 8 GB is recommended: measured on a Mac for 0.4.6, the game's footprint in flight peaked near 3 GB at Low and near 4 GB at High. It needs 400 MB of free disk space; the wiki translations add 1 to 2 MB to the download. On computers with 8 GB, Medium or Low uses noticeably less memory than High.

First launch

The builds are not signed by Apple or Microsoft yet, so on a first install your system asks once before it opens the game. Updates the game installs itself don't ask again.

  • macOS: open the dmg and drag SpaceCorps 2027 onto Applications.
    • macOS 15 and newer: open the app once and click Done. Then go to System Settings › Privacy & Security and click Open Anyway next to "SpaceCorps 2027 was blocked".
    • macOS 12 to 14: right-click (Control-click) the app, choose Open, then Open again.
  • Windows: right-click the zip, choose Extract All, and start spacecorps2027.exe from the SpaceCorps 2027 folder: the whole game is in that one file. If SmartScreen says it "protected your PC", click More info, then Run anyway.
  • Linux: run chmod +x SpaceCorps2027-linux-x86_64.AppImage, then start it. Or unpack the tar.gz and start SpaceCorps2027/spacecorps2027.

Known limits

  • The new texts in the other languages have not been read by native speakers. Every new or changed sentence of this release in German, Spanish, French, Hungarian, Italian, Japanese, Korean, Brazilian Portuguese, Russian, Swedish and Simplified Chinese (the cells and thrusters, the shields' tail and the badges, the Forge, the rockets, respawn, the group targets, the Interface tab, the swarms' lines and the wiki pages) was written by AI and has had no native-speaker review. Please tell us what reads wrong.
  • During the update, old clients show some things the old way (see Updating): the server deploys first, so for the hours before you update, a 0.4.7 client shows the converted pieces under new names with old icons, one damage number on a rocket, the old respawn text and no group targets, while the server already works by the new rules.
  • Some of you now have less shield or fly slower. That is the design of the families, not a bug (see "If you already play"). The update itself gives no compensation to anyone.
  • The balance of the swarms comes from a model and scripted fights, not from play. The kill times of the Boss Seeker and the Pirate Boss were measured on a scratch server with scripted pilots, and the Dormant Swarm's fight, pay and box were checked there too; the rest are the model's. The model assumes an unguided rocket lands on 30 percent of its shots, while scripted pilots that stand still took every one, and nobody has played the Pirate and Dormant fights with moving pilots yet.
  • A straight rocket hits the first pilot on its line, so a bystander can take a rocket aimed at the pilot who shot the boss.
  • The Boss Seeker is dangerous to a new pilot (12 seconds for a Protos with no shield) in the sectors where new pilots start. Keep out of its range of 600 until you can fight it.
  • A boss left half destroyed stays half destroyed: no swarm boss regrows, so a swarm can be destroyed in two sittings by two groups. After a server restart every swarm boss appears at once, and a Dormant Swarm that was waiting out its hour appears too.
  • An Ironclad with 16 shields on its drones is very hard to destroy: the best attacker needs 113 seconds out of the box and 133 to 140 with all of today's Wipe Points and an Eternal set (every other ship and build stays under 2 minutes). The 50 percent tail did that, and we may tune it.
  • From tier II, the thrusters of both families outrun a Crystalys (an Ostirion with an Engine II and two flies at 234.0 with Impulse II and 233.2 with Momentum II, against 230).
  • The rockets' average damage is 10 percent (5 for the N.U.K.E. and N.I.K.E.) lower than before, on purpose; the numbers may be raised.
  • The Windows memory fix is measured on a Mac only. The Windows copy and paste of the wiki's Copy page and of selected text has only been tried with a stand-in clipboard, not on a real Windows PC. A very large window (4K at 150 percent, or 5K) can still make the font texture start again now and then, a 12 millisecond hitch with the memory flat.
  • The Group window, for a pilot who once dragged it, can cut the last row until they resize it.
  • The Lasers table of the station's wiki is clipped at 1024 x 640 (its Range column reads 6, 7, 8). This was so in 0.4.7 too.
  • The builds are unsigned, so macOS Gatekeeper and Windows SmartScreen warn on a first install (see above). There is one public game server with limited capacity; it may restart for updates, and your ship is saved when it does.

Report problems at https://github.com/SpaceCorps/play/issues or on Discord.

Verify your download

SHA256SUMS lists every package's SHA-256 and is signed with the SpaceCorps release key
(SHA256SUMS.minisig, minisign). With both files next to
the package:

minisign -Vm SHA256SUMS -P RWRhY8TTCr07i1iOS7MT45OHD3LFJJnWXWCF19fy7hjV1RD8cwWlVKF1
shasum -a 256 -c SHA256SUMS --ignore-missing   # Linux: sha256sum -c SHA256SUMS --ignore-missing

Checksums

Package SHA-256
SpaceCorps2027-macos-universal.dmg 52169a9234887a6428185ed08c7eb9c5a13e3fb16d32c9143af086539d8e25f9
SpaceCorps2027-windows-x86_64.zip 02fb545b98e86bbaa2cb55a284339221dae9d29aa545dfc57c3f1c85f452e795
SpaceCorps2027-linux-x86_64.AppImage 00de8942fd4dc31de5c7f217d9fd0fcd2d4a350343d532f347815186f20f6999
SpaceCorps2027-linux-x86_64.tar.gz 3d08eaee97495367acdd2d802f56e141382737fdac72279a1374bc89b6542403
Assets 8
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