Star Citizen Roadmap Update – Player Habs, Master Modes & Antares
Hello & Welcome to a Star Citizen Roadmap Update we are also going to be delving into some questions that Community Manager Jake Accapella Answered too.
So with this latest publish, CIG are adding the Q1 2023 and Q3 2023 schedules for downstream and upstream teams, respectively, with more teams to be added in a subsequent publish.
What does that mean?… downstream teams require work to be finished on certain features that upstream teams may be working on, they may put the final touches to things or work on VFX, they are reactive to upstream team work and ass such CIG only typically are able to schedule work for around a Quarter out for them.
Upstream teams might work on a feature from it’s very beginnings and set the major tentpole deliverables for SQ42 and Star Citizen, these might work on art, vehicles, locations and gameplay features. CIG show these teams sometimes up to 4 quarters out.
The Scorpius Antares was added to the Release View for Alpha 3.18.
It’s described here as RSI’s EMP and quantum jammer-equipped fighter.
And we also got to see a picture of the ship in some more detail… it will be flyable and on sale with 3.18 live.
Onto the Progress Tracker and what was added there:
New Missions – Salvage Contracts
With more civilian access to salvage ships, contract brokers are offering salvage jobs for derelicts around Lagrange Points around Stanton. These brokers charge a fee for their services so this will require some buy-in, but the contractors are free to keep any salvaged material for resale. We know these are planned for Alpha 3.19 and there have been some leaks and rumours that Colvus Darneely may be able to give you some personal and potentially unlawful missions.
Duster Faction Outfits
Developing multiple outfit variants for the Stanton gang, the Dusters.
This outlaw gang will add a load of extra depth to the stanton system once more developed but they are technically giving some missions in the game now. Expect them to have a physical presence like the Nine Tails eventually… that’s why they need outfits!
Master Modes
Implementing new modes to vehicles to manage a their speed, components, and role-specific functions. This is connected to the Nav & SCM/Combat Modes that CI are planning on pushing the game to. This is all to evolve combat and multi-crew to CIs goal. They want there to be a lot of nuance to combat, meaningful choice in customization, multi-crew with the crew actually actively participating in the ships combat and function. They want to have dogfights and combat be a deliberate choice and for ships to have their roles more defined.
Persistent Habs
Previously removed from USPU’s schedule, this deliverable returns to Progress Tracker with this publish. – Work that grants players the ability to have their own Persistent Hab with the upstream teams planning to have their work complete on this start of September.
There was a Spectrum Question directly related to this
Does Persistent Habs mean Persistent Hangars? Are those one and the same thing now or ever been?
Jake – They’re separate deliverables!
Another Question related… Persistent habs added to roadmap before persistent hangars?
Not complaining or anything, but it’s a bit strange from a technical standpoint, isn’t it? After all, hangars can be instanced, but the expectation and plans for habs is that everyone will have their own unique address – and those multitude of addresses have yet to be built out (coming in 4.0 at the earliest, according to ISC).
Jake – Hangars have been on Progress Tracker since last year!
And Jake is very much correct the USPU team have been working on this for a couple of years it seems with work for the upstream teams planned to be completed in May potentially.
The Persistent Hangars Feature reads – Work that grants players the ability to have their own Persistent Hangars. This will also bring changes to the Cargo gameplay loop by allowing players to pack their grids manually.
Jake – The Vehicle Experience Team merged into the Vehicle Feature Team in April of last year! Here’s the roundup with the deets: https://robertsspaceindustries.com/comm-link/transmission/18639-Roadmap-Roundup-April-27-2022
“we’re adding the Q1 2023 and Q3 2023 schedules” What about Q2?
Jake – Upstream teams have three quarters to a year on the roadmap, downstream is just the current quarter. So its adding Q3 for upstream, and Q1 for downstream.
More info about how all this works is here on the Companion! https://robertsspaceindustries.com/comm-link/transmission/18532-The-Public-Roadmap-Companion
Jake – For downstream teams, yes. Upstream teams have had Q1 and Q2 up on Progress tracker for a few months now. This update is the schedule that was made at the end of January, and as we mentioned in the last roundup, some technical issues with the roadmap itself prevented us from updating then.
Q2 for downstream teams will be added near the end of Q1/beginning of Q2.
Looking for an authoritative response if possible. Is the new Antares only going to allow the co pilot have the Jammer and EMP? Or will the pilot also be able to access both if there is no one in the back seat?
Jake – We’ve got a full Q&A coming for the Antares when it releases in 3.18!
Boom that’s it for your roadmap update today!