Vendetta Online 1.8.381-383

Many gameplay, VR and other small enhancements over the last few weeks. Lots more changes coming as we move towards various launches.VO 1.8.383 included (tonight):- Mines can no longer be dropped in No Fire Zones.- Cargo inside of ships that are docked in the Trident's cargo will now drop when the Trident is destroyed.- A message notification now appears on the HUD when attempting to pick up cargo but your ship's cargo hold is full.- Fixed Marauder, Valkyrie, Prometheus rendering issues in DirectX 11 dynamic lighting mode.VO 1.8.382 included (last week):- Fixed chat entry while changing sectors in Simulated VR.- Enhanced compiler optimizations for both Linux 32 and 64bit versions, potential performance benefits.- Glibc 2.14 and Glibc++ 3.4.15 are now required for the Linux 64 version (Linux from 2012+).- Large port on the Corvus Greyhound has been changed to a Small port (per extensive Suggestions forum thread).- Updated Oculus Rift PC SDK to version 1.6 and included basic support for the Oculus Touch controllers.- Improved default settings for the Oculus Rift, to enhance performance.- Added Simulated VR support for Mac and Linux.VO 1.8.381 included (two weeks ago):These changes are for PC (Win/Mac/Linux) platforms only and will be released for the remaining platforms in a future update.- Added Simulated VR Mode for Windows. The option is located in Options -> Game -> Simulated VR Mode and can be turned on or off. A restart of the game is required for the setting to take effect. When in Simulated VR Mode, use the right-mouse button to look around. When the button is released, the view snaps back to the forward direction.- Added missing fonts: Michroma, Orbitron-Bold, Raleway-Regular.- Default to Play-Bold if a font fails to load.- Fixed the key/button activation of zoom.- Fixed /fps font size.- 'Front' and 'Rear' text should no longer appear briefly during sector transitions.- 'Press the Activate key...' no longer appears at the wrong time when entering sectors.- Fixed HUD chat box disappearing during jump cinematics.- Added sector loading progress bar to first-person-cinematics HUD

Syndicate robots: Wave 1

As announced in the previous blog, we are developing 11 new robots belonging to the Syndicate faction. The first wave of these robots is just around the corner, so today we’ll take an in-depth look at them.

General traits

In terms of offense, the most notable attribute of the hybrid Nian-Earth tech Syndicate robots is of course their specialization for firearms. These types of guns are famous for their almost negligible energy usage, their damage and versatility coming from the available ammo types, but also for their inaccuracy and short optimal range. Syndicate robots were built with this in mind, and they are also trying to compensate for the shortcomings of these weapons.

Defense-wise their main strategy is basically to not get hit. Their armor is the weakest of all the factions, and armor resistances are universal but not very high. However, this is more than made up by their low hit size, either from the get-go or via bonuses, which can be further reduced by using an evasive module.

Looking at their base speed, they are rather on the slower end, but their relatively high mass means that they won’t lose that much of that speed when you equip them.

Last but not least, their signal detection and masking values are the best in their class, making them exceptionally useful in scouting and covert operations.

TL;DR Syndicate robots are hard to hit bulletstorm glass-ninjas.

These are mostly true for the combat-type robots, but we’ll also have 5 industrial types within the Syndicate faction. They are generally intended to fill some missing roles and industrial classes, and their traits will be a mix of the Syndicate flavor and the robots of the Nian Industrial Trust.

Let’s take a look at the first 3 robots in detail. Note that the parameters can still change and we’ll revisit them once they’ve been in use for a while.

Vektor

Vektor

Class: Light robot specialized in firearms

"The smallest member of our hybrid-technology fleet of robots. Its armor is weaker than the average, but its small size makes up for it, resulting in a hard to hit target. Coupled with excellent detection and masking systems, the Vektor makes not only a good scout, but a tough opponent in combat as well."

Slots

  • Head slots: 3
  • Leg slots: 2
  • Chassis slots: 4 (2x light turret/misc, 2x light/medium turret/misc/industrial)

Bonuses (per extension level)

  • 1% reduction to the hit dispersion of guns
  • 3% to light firearms damage
  • 1% to firearms cycle time
  • -0.10 to surface hit size
  • +2 to signal detection
Vektor

Notable stats

  • Accumulator: 200 AP @ 120sec recharge
  • CPU: 155 TF
  • Reactor: 150 RP
  • Armor: 650 HP
  • Passive resistances: 45 points universally (31%)
  • Surface hit size: 3 m
  • Locking range: 150 m
  • Sensor strength: 130 Hw³
  • Signal detection: 125 rF
  • Signal masking: 105 rF
  • Cargo capacity: 3.75 U
  • Mass: 7850 kg
  • Base speed: 104.4 kph

Syndicate Supplies cost

  • 20 TM tokens
  • 20 ICS tokens
  • 20 ASI tokens
  • 150,000 NIC

Locust

Locust

Class: Assault robot specialized in firearms

"The gist of our firearm-wielding force. A swarm of Locusts can quickly shred enemy groups, but their specialized framework increases their survivability in solo engagements too."

Slots

  • Head slots: 4
  • Leg slots: 3
  • Chassis slots: 5 (3x light turret, 2x light/medium turret/misc/industrial)

Bonuses (per extension level)

  • 1% reduction to the hit dispersion of guns
  • 3% to firearms damage
  • 1% to firearms cycle time
  • -0.10 to surface hit size
  • 2% to firearms optimal range
Locust

Notable stats

  • Accumulator: 400 AP @ 180sec recharge
  • CPU: 230 TF
  • Reactor: 280 RP
  • Armor: 975 HP
  • Passive resistances: 45 points universally (31%)
  • Surface hit size: 4 m
  • Locking range: 200 m
  • Sensor strength: 110 Hw³
  • Signal detection: 110 rF
  • Signal masking: 110 rF
  • Cargo capacity: 6 U
  • Mass: 11800 kg
  • Base speed: 106.2 kph

Syndicate Supplies cost

  • 50 TM tokens
  • 50 ICS tokens
  • 50 ASI tokens
  • 500,000 NIC

Ikarus

Ikarus

Class: Light robot specialized in transportation

"The Ikarus is a snappy answer to the Perpetuum Project's long-standing need for a fast and light transport. Its main element is a repurposed Argano-chassis, stripped of anything disposable to make room for the relatively large cargo hold. Aided by the agile undercarriage of the Laird, this is the most efficient robot to get fair-sized packages from A to B quickly. Speed comes at a price though, as the construction is very fragile."

Slots

  • Head slots: 1
  • Leg slots: 1
  • Chassis slots: 1 (light/medium turret/missile/misc/industrial)

Bonuses (per extension level)

  • +2 to signal detection
  • +2 to signal masking
  • 3% to demobilizer resistance
  • 1% to armor hit points
  • +3 to passive armor resistances

Notable stats

  • Accumulator: 150 AP @ 240sec recharge
  • CPU: 100 TF
  • Reactor: 100 RP
  • Armor: 500 HP
  • Passive resistances: 45 points to kinetic/seismic/thermal (31%), 30 points to chemical (23%)
  • Surface hit size: 2.50 m
Ikarus
  • Locking range: 120 m
  • Sensor strength: 90 Hw³
  • Signal detection: 110 rF
  • Signal masking: 100 rF
  • Cargo capacity: 20 U
  • Mass: 8950 kg
  • Base speed: 120.6 kph

Syndicate Supplies cost

  • 10 TM tokens
  • 10 ICS tokens
  • 10 ASI tokens
  • 100,000 NIC

Balancing and new extensions

We’re introducing two new extensions that will be required to control these robots: Syndicate combat robot control and Syndicate industrial robot control. It’s not hard to guess that these are the equivalents of the Pelistal/Nuimqol/Thelodica robot control extensions (with the same complexity of 9), but since here the combat and industrial types are part of the same faction we felt the need to split it up into two extensions. The rest of the requirements are designed to be on par with the other factions and are using the same extensions, depending on the robot’s class.

Of course the introduction of a whole new faction can’t go without some adjustments to the existing factions and robots. With each patch we’ll take a look at the balance within the actual class of robots and make changes if necessary. This not only means that we’ll balance regarding the newly added robots to try to fit them in, but we’ll also revisit the balance between the existing old factions. Finally, during or after the last waves we’ll check up on the global balance between robot classes and try to fix some long-standing issues e.g. with speeds.

Deployment

This first wave of Syndicate robots is planned to be deployed in patch 3.8, around the middle of next week, along with some fixes as usual. The exact time and date of the patch will be announced soon.

The rest of the robots will be introduced in a similar way over the next few months: a detailed writeup of the actual wave of 2 or maybe 3 robots will precede their deployment, and the waves are currently planned to be 3-5 weeks apart, depending on any additional features or fixes that may come with the patch.

Syndicate robots: Wave 1

As announced in the previous blog, we are developing 11 new robots belonging to the Syndicate faction. The first wave of these robots is just around the corner, so today we’ll take an in-depth look at them.

General traits

In terms of offense, the most notable attribute of the hybrid Nian-Earth tech Syndicate robots is of course their specialization for firearms. These types of guns are famous for their almost negligible energy usage, their damage and versatility coming from the available ammo types, but also for their inaccuracy and short optimal range. Syndicate robots were built with this in mind, and they are also trying to compensate for the shortcomings of these weapons.

Defense-wise their main strategy is basically to not get hit. Their armor is the weakest of all the factions, resistances are universal but not very high. However, this is more than made up by their low hit size, either from the get-go or via bonuses, which can be further reduced by using an evasive module.

Looking at their base speed, they are rather on the slower end, but their relatively high mass means that they won’t lose that much of that speed when you equip them.

Last but not least, their signal detection and masking values are the best in their class, making them exceptionally useful in scouting and covert operations.

TL;DR Syndicate robots are hard to hit bulletstorm glass-ninjas.

These are mostly true for the combat-type robots, but we’ll also have 5 industrial types within the Syndicate faction. They are generally intended to fill some missing roles and industrial classes, and their traits will be a mix of the Syndicate flavor and the robots of the Nian Industrial Trust.

Let’s take a look at the first 3 robots in detail. Note that the parameters can still change and we’ll revisit them once they’ve been in use for a while.

Vektor

Class: Light robot specialized in firearms

The smallest member of our hybrid-technology fleet of robots. Its armor is weaker than the average, but its small size makes up for it, resulting in a hard to hit target. Coupled with excellent detection and masking systems, the Vektor makes not only a good scout, but a tough opponent in combat as well.

Slots

  • Head slots: 3
  • Leg slots: 2
  • Chassis slots: 4 (2x light turret/misc, 2x light/medium turret/misc/industrial)

Bonuses

  • 1% reduction to the hit dispersion of guns
  • 3% to light firearms damage
  • 1% to firearms cycle time
  • -0.10 to surface hit size
  • +2 to signal detection

Notable stats

  • Accumulator: 200 AP @ 120sec recharge
  • CPU: 155 TF
  • Reactor: 150 RP
  • Armor: 650 HP
  • Passive resistances: 45 points universally (31%)
  • Surface hit size: 3 m
  • Locking range: 150 m
  • Sensor strength: 130 Hw³
  • Signal detection: 125 rF
  • Signal masking: 105 rF
  • Cargo capacity: 3.75 U
  • Mass: 7850 kg
  • Base speed: 104.4 kph

Syndicate Supplies cost

  • 20 TM tokens
  • 20 ICS tokens
  • 20 ASI tokens
  • 150,000 NIC

Locust

Class: Assault robot specialized in firearms

The gist of our firearm-wielding force. A swarm of Locusts can quickly shred enemy groups, but their specialized framework increases their survivability in solo engagements too.

‘’’Slots’’’

Head slots: 4 Leg slots: 3 Chassis slots: 5 (3x light turret, 2x light/medium turret/misc/industrial)

‘’’Bonuses’’’

  • 1% reduction to the hit dispersion of guns
  • 3% to firearms damage
  • 1% to firearms cycle time
  • -0.10 to surface hit size
  • 2% to firearms optimal range

‘’’Notable stats’’’

Accumulator: 400 AP @ 180sec recharge CPU: 230 TF Reactor: 280 RP Armor: 975 HP Passive resistances: 45 points universally (31%) Surface hit size: 4 m Locking range: 200 m Sensor strength: 110 Hw³ Signal detection: 110 rF Signal masking: 110 rF Cargo capacity: 6 U Mass: 11800 kg Base speed: 106.2 kph

‘’’Syndicate Supplies cost’’’ 50 TM tokens 50 ICS tokens 50 ASI tokens 500,000 NIC

Ikarus

Class: Light robot specialized in transportation

The Ikarus is a snappy answer to the Perpetuum Project's long-standing need for a fast and light transport. Its main element is a repurposed Argano-chassis, stripped of anything disposable to make room for the relatively large cargo hold. Aided by the agile undercarriage of the Laird, this is the most efficient robot to get fair-sized packages from A to B quickly. Speed comes at a price though, as the construction is very fragile.

‘’’Slots’’’

Head slots: 1 Leg slots: 1 Chassis slots: 1 (light/medium turret/missile/misc/industrial)

‘’’Bonuses’’’

  • +2 to signal detection
  • +2 to signal masking
  • 3% to demobilizer resistance
  • 1% to armor hit points
  • +3 to passive armor resistances

‘’’Notable stats’’’

Accumulator: 150 AP @ 240sec recharge CPU: 100 TF Reactor: 100 RP Armor: 500 HP Passive resistances: 45 points to kinetic/seismic/thermal (31%), 30 points to chemical (23%) Surface hit size: 2.50 m Locking range: 120 m Sensor strength: 90 Hw³ Signal detection: 110 rF Signal masking: 100 rF Cargo capacity: 20 U Mass: 8950 kg Base speed: 120.6 kph

‘’’Syndicate Supplies cost’’’ 10 TM tokens 10 ICS tokens 10 ASI tokens 100,000 NIC

Balancing and new extensions

We’re introducing two new extensions that will be required to control these robots: Syndicate combat robot control and Syndicate industrial robot control. It’s not hard to guess that these are the equivalents of the Pelistal/Nuimqol/Thelodica robot control extensions (with the same complexity of 9), but since here the combat and industrial types are part of the same faction we felt the need to split it up into two extensions. The rest of the requirements are designed to be on par with the other factions and are using the same extensions, depending on the robot’s class.

Of course the introduction of a whole new faction can’t go without some adjustments to the existing factions and robots. With each patch we’ll take a look at the balance within the actual class of robots and make changes if necessary. This not only means that we’ll balance regarding the newly added robots to try to fit them in, but we’ll also revisit the balance between the existing old factions. Finally, during or after the last waves we’ll check up on the global balance between robot classes and try to fix some long-standing issues e.g. with speeds.

Deployment

This first wave of Syndicate robots is planned to be deployed in patch 3.8, around the middle of next week, along with some fixes as usual. The exact time and date of the patch will be announced soon.

The rest of the robots will be introduced in a similar way over the next few months: a detailed writeup of the actual wave of 2 or maybe 3 robots will precede their deployment, and the waves are currently planned to be 3-5 weeks apart, depending on any additional features or fixes that may come with the patch.

GearVR Testing Signup now Available.

Vendetta Online for GearVR is about to enter a round of pre-release testing, open to players who already have the required hardware (the older Galaxy Note 4 is not supported). The list signup can be found here:https://www.vendetta-online.com/gearvr/For any who are unfamiliar, the Samsung GearVR is a VR interface for certain Samsung phones. Our game specifically supports the Galaxy S6, Galaxy S7, Galaxy S6 Edge, S7 Edge, or Note 5. Those are currently the only phones currently supported in GearVR by Vendetta Online with mobile VR.Although the idea of mounting a phone to your face may sound kind of silly, the GearVR actually works really well, and is pretty impressive.We also strongly recommend a bluetooth gamepad! Like a SteelSeries, Moga Pro, Razer, Nyko, or other. The absolute cheapest bluetooth gamepad is this Sminiker thing from China, which we've never tested, but some people claim is actually usable (probably if you get one that works, which is sort of the risk with bargain off-brand hardware from China).We have gone to great lengths to make it technically possible to play the Vendetta Online without a gamepad on the GearVR, to at least give an introductory appeal to a large market-share that doesn't have gamepads. But the gameplay experience is substantially degraded compared to what you can do with a gamepad. Any serious VO player should have a gamepad, with GearVR.Once we accumulate some testers, we'll push out Keys to people, which may then be redeemed via the Oculus App on your GearVR-enabled phone.

Vendetta Online 1.8.380

VO 1.8.380 includes:These changes are for PC (Win/Mac/Linux) platforms only and will be released for the remaining platforms in a future update.- New user-selectable fonts for PC platforms, with the new default font set to 'Play-Bold'. Fonts can be selected at Options -> Interface -> Font- New UI skin called 'Platinum' and it is now the default for PC platforms. The old skin can be set at Options -> Interface -> Skin- New option to enable first-person warp/jump/launch animations located at Options -> Game -> Cinematic Camera Mode- Performing 'Activate' will continue certain missions if there is only a 'Continue' button and nothing else to activate.- Y-B gamepad chord added to open the jettison menu by default.- Added a shadow behind HUD Notification text for better legibility.- The blinking docking bay arrows are now angled inwards for easier head-on visibility.- New head-based flight models for VR.There are a lot of changes in this update.. far more than one might realize from the changelog. As a result, we would really appreciate people posting bug reports to the Bugs Forum and letting us know of any problems you find.Patches for other platforms will be coming, but are delayed a little so we don't have to test and monitor every possible version and device during this relatively significant update.We expect there will be a round of bug-fix releases in the near future, as there usually is with any major codebase change. After that stabilizes, we'll be in a better position to consider doing some gameplay tweaks and the like.

Syndicate robots inbound

Over the years we have spent on Nia, we have learnt to hijack Nian technology, turn it against themselves, and even managed to reprogram their bases and facilities to produce more weapons and hardware needed for our cause.

Now, by salvaging and disassembling Nian robots and combining them with good old Earth technology, the Syndicate hopes to surprise the enemy by fielding something they haven’t seen so far.

Syndicate robots

Soon, the Syndicate will become a full-fledged 4th faction (or 5th if we count the Nian Industrial Trust as one) with its own line of specialized robots that you can use.

Currently 11 new robots are planned, which are assembled from existing Nian robot parts, but each of them will have their own unique stats and bonuses. As you might have already guessed, a common trait, being their faction specialization, are machine guns.

Beyond mirroring the standard line of combat bots of other factions, we’re also trying to fill some roles that we didn’t have robots for thus far, like a light transport or a robot specialized for artifact exploration.

Here is a general list of what you can expect:

  • Vektor: light combat robot
  • Helix: light robot specialized for electronic warfare
  • Locust: assault-class combat robot
  • Echelon: combat mech
  • Callisto: mech specialized for electronic warfare
  • Legatus: heavy combat mech
  • Ikarus: fast light transport
  • Cronus: assault-class industrial robot suitable for both mining and harvesting
  • Hermes: assault-class robot specialized for artifact exploration
  • Daidalos: mech-class transport, aimed to fill the gap between the Sequer and the Lithus
  • Metis: heavy mech specialized for remote support modules

Introducing these robots into the game will happen through the Syndicate Supplies shop. First and foremost we’re planning a direct purchase for a combination of Pelistal, Nuimqol, and Thelodica faction tokens, plus a NIC fee. These robots are not indended to be rare, so the cost will be more or less in line with the other faction’s robots, and the triple-token requirement should liven up the market a bit.

Over the next few blogs we will take a detailed look at each of the robots, dive into their stats and bonuses, strengths and weaknesses, and everything you'd want to know about your new best friends.

Syndicate robots inbound

Over the years we have spent on Nia, we have learnt to hijack Nian technology, turn it against themselves, and even managed to reprogram their bases and facilities to produce more weapons and hardware needed for our cause.

Now, by salvaging and disassembling Nian robots and combining them with good old Earth technology, the Syndicate hopes to surprise the enemy by fielding something they haven’t seen so far.

Syndicate robots

Soon, the Syndicate will become a full-fledged 4th faction (or 5th if we count the Nian Industrial Trust as one) with its own line of specialized robots that you can use.

Currently 11 new robots are planned, which are assembled from existing Nian robot parts, but each of them will have their own unique stats and bonuses. As you might have already guessed, a common trait, being their faction specialization, are machine guns.

Beyond mirroring the standard line of combat bots of other factions, we’re also trying to fill some roles that we didn’t have robots for thus far, like a light transport or a robot specialized for artifact exploration.

Here is a general list of what you can expect:

  • Vektor: light combat robot
  • Helix: light robot specialized for electronic warfare
  • Locust: assault-class combat robot
  • Echelon: combat mech
  • Callisto: mech specialized for electronic warfare
  • Legatus: heavy combat mech
  • Ikarus: fast light transport
  • Cronus: assault-class industrial robot suitable for both mining and harvesting
  • Hermes: assault-class robot specialized for artifact exploration
  • Daidalos: mech-class transport, aimed to fill the gap between the Sequer and the Lithus
  • Metis: heavy mech specialized for remote support modules

Introducing these robots into the game will happen through the Syndicate Supplies shop. First and foremost we’re planning a direct purchase for a combination of Pelistal, Nuimqol, and Thelodica faction tokens, plus a NIC fee. These robots are not indended to be rare, so the cost will be more or less in line with the other faction’s robots, and the triple-token requirement should liven up the market a bit.

Over the next few blogs we will take a detailed look at each of the robots, dive into their stats and bonuses, strengths and weaknesses, and everything you'd want to know about your new best friends.

Updates are a-comin’.

We've been building a lot of features over the last eight months, in the push towards a launch on VR, Steam, iPhone and elsewhere. As is often the case when we're rapidly developing, many of these changes have not been pushed into production yet. The amount of time required to carefully commit changes, test them thoroughly across all platforms, and release a patch is basically prohibitive when we're developing quickly; so it's often delayed until later.We're now approaching the point where we're going to start merging a lot of our development changes and pushing them into production. Some changes will be quite noticeable, others may be more subtle, or are more specific to certain use-cases (like VR). But understand that when you see the changelog for the next-release, there are also a LOT of invisible things changing "under the hood".Most of the visible changes are client-side stuff, tweaks or bits of polish here and there, and not fundamental gameplay changes. I also (personally) have a huge backlog of gameplay changes to do, so some of those might happen concurrently, but the patches themselves will be more about client-side development. Changes to the default UI "skin", the available fonts, various features and options we built for VR, etc.We may also "stage" the release, so the patch only hits on PC first, and then another patch follows later for Android/iOS/etc. This can help simplify our testing process.This past week, we aimed to release an update on Friday (yesterday) with these new changes, but that just proved to be infeasible. The longer we go without a patch, the more testing there is to do, and the more inevitable small bugs or issues we find, so it can take a bit longer to synchronize the development and production versions. Still, I expect we'll get a release out next week, so please keep an eye out, and report any problems you find on the Bugs forum.Once we get this next update out of the way, we'll potentially be in a better position to work on some gameplay and content related features, which I know is something people are waiting for. I also have another announcement related to GearVR beta-testing, if players would like to get involved with that, but I'll save that for a separate newspost to be written in the near future.Have a great weekend, everyone!

Policy clarification: Duel cheating.

This should be pretty clear and self-evident without explanation, but to make sure this is well-understood:Dueling is intended to be a PvP experience between two specific people, represented by two specific characters/accounts. This is why we have a duel ranking system, to illustrate the relative outcomes of these battles, and help players measure their skills against one another.Two individuals colluding to switch places on one account, so that a relative newcomer who is poor at fighting can then switch out and be replaced by a very strong and experienced player, is considered to be "Fraud", as defined by Section 1.1 paragraph 4 of the Vendetta Online Rules of Conduct. It also damages our entire duel-ranking system, in ways that are challenging to fix, and is generally bad behaviour.Now, if a single individual wants to roll a new alt-character, and try to behave like a newbie for a long period of time, and pretend to be bad at fighting, and then duel someone and surprise them with their actual skills.. fine, we aren't currently going to raise an issue over that. It skims too close to variants of Role Playing.But two people colluding together and sharing a character, that crosses way over the line, clearly violates a number of well-known policies, and will receive disciplinary action.