Chapter 7 of 11 · Verified for Beta Patch 2
Merits and your faction
Earn Merits with kills in the war maps and deposits at the Recycler; spend them at your Quartermaster.
Merits are your faction's score and its currency, earned by serving Ganden or Tzhal in the war and spent at your faction's Quartermaster.
When you choose a side, the faction picker weighs Merit rank as well as headcount, and it closes whichever faction is leading to new recruits for as long as it leads.
What earns Merits
- Killing rival-faction NPCs and players in the faction-war maps, Cloud Wake and The Gallows. Kills in any other breach do not count.
- Depositing resources in the Recycler, which is also the faction depot. Minerals and looted gear count; faction-issued gear is worth zero.
- Towing relic fragments to the salvage bays in the war maps.
What each earns:
| For | Merits |
|---|---|
| Killing a rival NPC ship | 0.6 × its build rating |
| Killing a rival player ship | 2 × its build rating |
| Depositing resources | 1 × their value |
| Towing and processing a relic fragment | 12,000, shared by contribution |
- The Leaderboard page lists the current rules.
- Each side is defended by Bastion ships, boss battleships. A dev put the reward for killing the enemy Bastion at around 80,000 Merits, but said it from memory, so treat that figure as not yet confirmed.
- Whether the top 15 on the losing side get anything is also unresolved: a dev said yes, while the published event rules only reward the winners.
What costs Merits
- Shooting an ally: 2 × the damage dealt. Since Beta Patch 1, a Rampart Gatling no longer auto-targets allies who damaged you.
- Losing your faction starter ship: 25% of its build rating.
Where it is safe
Earning Merits through kills means going where the war is, and the war maps have no build-rating limit, so you can meet anything there. Your faction hub, Zhat Kali for Tzhal or Ganden for Ganden, is safe, and so is Greylock.
The Quartermaster
- Go to your faction hub.
- Find the Quartermaster under an arrow or neon sign; since Beta Patch 1, vendors also have yellow HUD markers.
- Buy ship and module blueprints, repair charges and more. Its blueprints are Faction quality, T1 only and cannot be traded.
Prices seen so far:
Seraph, 
Jackal and 
Rune: 800 Merits for 5 uses.
Enforcer, 
Orstrog and 
Vektr: 1.3K Merits for 3 uses. Buying one raises your rank to Sergeant.- Mining Drone: 160 Merits for 20 uses.
Ranks
Buying higher blueprints raises your rank, and so do the Merits you hold. The nine titles run Slug, Recruit, Legionary, Sergeant, Knight, Commander, Praetor, Exarch, Imperator. At certain ranks faction NPCs follow your pings (hold left click): one from Recruit, two from Sergeant, all at Imperator.
Your faction and Merit rank roles in the beta Discord now update on their own while you play.