Answers
Getting started
Is it safe to close the browser in the hub?
Yes, progress is saved in the hub.
- Hubs are safe: no fighting there unless both pilots accept a duel.
- The Forge keeps working while you are offline.
- Close it in a hub, not mid-run. The only way out of a breach is a train, and ships have been lost to crashes and disconnects; during beta the devs restore genuine reconnect losses.
Warning
Switching tabs mid-breach is risky too. Since Beta Patch 2, a game tab left in the background for more than a minute disconnects.
Merits & faction war
Do the factions have different bonuses?
Not right now.
- Ganden and Tzhal are the two playable factions in Beta 1.
- Each has its own home hub, Ganden and Zhat Kali, and lower-tier breaches the other faction can't enter.
- What differs is who can join: the faction picker weighs Merit rank as well as headcount, and closes the leading faction to new recruits while it leads.
Does repairing faction NPCs earn Merits?
Not directly: a trusted player found that repairing allied NPCs gives no Merits on its own.
- Repairing allied players does pay: you earn a share of the Merits from their kills.
- Whether kills an NPC makes after you repair it count for you is unconfirmed.
Combat
Can I swap weapons mid-run?
Only at refit terminals inside the breach, and you can be attacked while there.
- Find a refit terminal. Only some breach maps have them.
- Tether to it with the harpoon and wait out the hack, which takes 8 seconds. Once authorised, tethering again skips the hack.
- Swap modules. Only idle ones can be removed: no target, not cycling, cooling down or reloading.
Good to know
- Attacking another player breaks your tether and locks you out of the terminal for 30 seconds.
- You also can't refit while one of your modules is active on another ship, or theirs on you.
Tip
The terminal also repairs, paid in ORE from your ship's cargo: 5 per 100 armor, 10 per 100 hull.
Any tips for clearing tier 4 and 5 breaches?
Take enemies one at a time and never overextend, a trusted player advises.
- Pick enemies off one by one.
- Kite them instead of charging in.
- Don't overextend.
- Avoid the highest-rated elites (around 9.6K build rating).
Items, ore & cargo
What's salvage luck?
Better drops.
A dev believes it may also help a mixed ore node upgrade to Dark Triton.
Where to get it:
Salvager Rig: +12%, plus +20% mining speed.
Survey Scanner: +8%.
Utility Conduit: +7%, plus 2 cargo cells.- Rolled modifiers: hulls and most module types can roll salvage luck.
- Lucky Cigarettes, the safe Tek cipher: +15%.
Percentage bonuses to the same stat stack with diminishing returns, so each extra source adds a little less.
Crafting & blueprints
Does a crafted item's rarity vary?
No: a crafted item has its blueprint's rarity; only quality varies.
- For a higher rarity, craft from a rarer blueprint. Rarer blueprints cost more materials.
- For better quality odds, research the blueprint. From T4 you can't roll Flawed.
- Extra modifiers are added afterwards with consumables: Hermes augmenter, Norn overclocker and Laplace matrix add them (max 4). Adding a modifier to a Normal item makes it Advanced.
- A Ptah crucible rerolls quality after the craft.
- The Forge keeps working while you're offline.