Star Citizen Alpha 3.13.1 is Now LIVE

Star Citizen Alpha 3.13.1 is Now LIVE this is the Fleet Week Ready Patch… so you’ll want to download this in preparation for fleet week is you are currently a star citizen player.

If you are wanting to play during the freefly starting the 22nd then you’ll need to download the game then… no preloading for those folks unfortunately as far as I am aware.

But all the Fleet Week content is basically here BUT disabled until it starts 4pm UTC Friday May 21st.

But let’s take a look at those patch notes and additions to the game:

The Crusader C2 & M2 Hercules Starlifter as well as the Tumbril Nova have been added to the game. Massive Haulers and a fun tanky tank.

Ship To Station Docking – Adding the ability for players to dock large ships to docking ports at space stations. Including various related work such as having ATC assign you docking ports when appropriate, new docking connectors, and new lobbies in space stations for large ships to connect to. This initial implementation will give docking access to the 890 Jump and Hammerhead. Players can ASOP spawn or hail the station like before and be assigned a docking port instead of a hangar with these ships. While docking, hailing the station will assign a docking port and bring up the docking interface for players to align their ship’s docking port to the docking collar either manually or using the auto-land system by holding N (default).

Armistice Violation Changes – Changed the armistice violation to give no grace warning and be able to generate multiple infractions in a short time if violations are persistent. Increased the duration armistice violation and aggravated vehicle damage remain on the player’s criminal record.

Location security response will now be more aggressive based on criminal heat in the area

Updated cockpit glass wear effect on Hornet F7A, F7C, F7CM, and all razor variants
There is an ongoing Carrack Performance Optimization pass here too.

There is also a New Arena Commander mode: 1 vs 1 Duel Mode.

Although there was no LTP wipe with the patch there was a bit of a advisory here:

General changes to what isn’t stored in LTP are ongoing. Certain items such as merits, consumables, and ammunition may be removed in this release and into 3.14.

We know that CI are trying to keep your assets and progress between patches BUT it isn’t always going to be the case, there will be wipes in the future too.

There were a load of Major Bug Fixes in the patch too:

Fixed an issue that could cause Star Citizen to crash immediately after pressing “Launch Game” in the Launcher
Fixed an issue causing improper and inconsistent collision between ground cover such as small vegetation having collision / large rocks having no collision, and vehicles
Accounts with large personal inventories should no longer cause server performance issues when joining a game server
300 series customizations should now apply to ships in game
Players should no longer experience an infinite loading screen when attempting to load into the PU
Players should no longer get stuck in an infinite load screen after using bed logout in a ship
Chat should no longer be partially off screen on super/ultrawide displays
All missions that take players to underground facilities will no longer withdraw when approaching
Freelancer MIS/MAX/DUR turrets should no longer have limited motion and should now be aligned correctly
Players should no longer be able to steal other Players Ships/Ship AI and Push Ships through collision using the gravity on the 890 Jumps Hangar
SDF shields should no longer allow damage penetration while the ship is at speed
Refuel and Rearm services at New Babbage should now function correctly
The docked Merlin on pirate Constellations should no longer be friendly and give the player a friendly fire warning during combat
Drake Buccaneer landing gear should no longer disappear when retracted and should be visible when deployed
Landing gear should now animate correctly on all Freelancer variants
Esperia Talon should now sit properly and not clip its nose into the landing pads
Pushing a trolley onto the cargo ramp of the Constellation will no longer cause the player to speed up while going over the ramp
Players should no longer be able to take other players medPens from their suits by interacting with them
Wallace Klim should no longer spawn away from his table, facing the wrong way and floating
Chairs in the dining area of the Reclaimer should no longer be placeholder models
The Door Open/Close Toggles on the ROC DS should now correctly close the pilot seat door
There should no longer be two Exit Prompts in the Turret Seat of the ROC DS
Fixed an issue causing the Greycat ROC to not receive as much damage as intended when a mineable explodes near it
The vehicle barrier in the Carrack should now be able to be closed after raising it
The side turret seats within the Anvil Carrack should no longer be missing the orange highlight when interacting with them
The Hammerhead elevator should no longer collide with the landing bay at Port Olisar, causing the ship to move
The Gladius ladder door animation should now play properly and close after the ladder is stored
Leaving a trolley in a door way as it shuts should no longer clip through the floor erratically and kill players
Attempting to place food or drink in New Babbage should no longer sometimes cause the player to consume it instead
Fixed an issue causing mineables to not spawn on Arial
Players clothes should no longer clip through undersuit when viewing PMA on the mobiGlas
Fixed an issue causing some moons to have surface temperatures of 0°C and apply no environmental / temperature affects to players
Localised text should no longer be present when right clicking a party channel
Stowing a weapon and walking at the same time should no longer send the weapon back into the player’s hands
The Anvil Hawk wingtips should no longer be missing SDF shields
Talon and Talon Shrike should now be able to be bought in game

Fixed 13 Client & 6 Server crashes
Fixed 4 Main Thread Deadlocks
Fixed multiple Backend Service crashes
Backend Service Performance Optimizations

However there are a few Known Issues that you’ll want to avoid if you can:

Cursor may remain visible, and isn’t constrained to the game window
Some Items can be missing after update, Character Reset or pledge change
A maximum of 50 contacts show in-game, regardless of how many friends are present on Spectrum
Abnormally long delay between pick up storing of fps mineables/harvestables/items
Ship positional Desync
Meet Miles Eckhart not working
Swapping FPS weapon drop weapon
Medical Pen (Medi Pen) not healing blood loss
Oxygen is depleted while sitting in ship
Getting crime stat for killing lawful bounty targets
Mission target NPCs not loading in / taking a long time to load in when the objective is reached
The customizable nameplates do not appear to be visible on multiple ship skins and variants
On landing pads, trolleys are unable to be pushed / pulled up the entryway / cargo ramp, or elevator ramps.
Constellation can despawn when flying 30km away after undocking
Docking with a moving ship lags behind, causing a large snap into the docked position
Trolleys found in Area18 hangars are clipping through the floor, removing functionality
Players can spawn facing the wrong way at the start of the match or after dying in Arena Commander

Spawn lockers were supposed to be in this patch as far as I was aware BUT I can’t see a specific listing for that… nor implementation of it in game yet… maybe it’s going to be for the NineTails Lockdown after Fleet Week or something… I think they might be using them on the Javelin Tour… maybe? If you know please drop me a comment.

Commodity Alerts are in this patch too but not mentioned in the notes, you’ll be able to see items that are over and understocked in your mobiGlas and be able to make some more profit.

So How is the Patch? I’ve only had limited playtime on the Live build.

It’s significantly more stable than the 3.13 roll out for sure, no client or server crashes for me yet AND performance is good! Desync is not ideal… to be honest… the know issue list is a but of a kick in the groin… but a lot is avoidable and their could be additional hotfixes to solve, getting crime stats for lawful bounty killing and the like…

Is it Ready For Fleet Week? Kinda… I want some of those known issues dealt with really… anything that restricts game access, prevents you playing a section of the game OR is hella janky needs to be resolved.

However having the servers in a good state and having new players and backers wanting to have fun during fleet week be able to log in is the most important thing AND it looks like CIG might just be good with that this year… Guess will will find out in the next 48 or so hours!

Boom, that’s it for the 3.13.1 LIVE PTU Patch Notes! But what do you think? Have you tried it yet, good, bad… are any bugs fixed that you were previously experiencing? Are you having new ones? Are you ready for fleet week, do you think CI are?

Whatever your thoughts I’d love to hear from you in the comments below.