VO 1.8.136 includes:

- New Manufacturing Mission for the Neutron MkIII Turret
- New Manufacturing Mission for the Aeolus Light Repair Turret
- New Manufacturing Mission for the FireCracker Turret

Each manufacturing mission is located in a specific Conquerable Station (one per station). Each mission may be taken twice in a 24 hour period by any given user (to prevent trivial mass-production). The Neutron MkIII and Aeolus Repair Turret are pretty self-explanatory. The FireCracker Turret is something new.. a very high-speed, high-maneuverability missile with significant force impact and very little damage. Basically a guided "flak" round, which can provide a significant distraction to an inbound attacker, and knock them off course, but not do much damage. The weapon has a six-round capacity, for now. Like everything in the game, it is open to tweaking and balancing should any issues surface.

Next week I plan to do some re-working of bots on the development side, laying out the organization for some of the planned "Universe Redux". In the short term, I intend for there to be a great deal more diversity in bot drops, which will then play a big part in upcoming manufacturing missions at Conquerable Stations, and hopefully leading to a Playable Trident sometime in the not-too-distant future. We'll see how that all goes, but the bot cleanup on the development side is sorely needed, so I can get a better handle on where we are and how to take us where we need to go. I'm also looking for a lot more diversity in bot types, so when we start rolling out Nation Patrols and things, you may see "Veteran" or "Ace" class NPCs along with regular ones, and the like. That's aside from a wider selection of Hive, and hopefully some specialized types that crop up in certain locations at certain times, with very interesting and unique drops.

It should all make for some pretty cool stuff that I can (hopefully) do in a short period of time. I'm looking forward to it, and I hope everyone else does as well. Take care.

Sounds shiny

> "Veteran" or "Ace" class NPCs along with regular ones

scar, finally in Vendetta Online...now we've starbuck and her enemy...what next? do we get a Battlestar? or a Viper?

Good progress.

Good one, Inc!!

I love turrets and new toys!

After one week away, that gave me an urge to login n play...

Thanks for the update, devs. I'm not exactly sure how much longterm use these new missions will get, but the general plan you described sounds cool. I can't wait to get a "playable trident"!

Will crafting always depend on the mission interface? It seems like you're forcing this new game feature into an old interface that wasn't designed for it. What about a new interface and system that allows us to manufacture items in bulk and then sell them, like I describe here?

I like the sound of more bot drops.

Tested the repair turret.

Is it a bug or a planned feature that it have limited ammo and NO option to reload it?

Did not tested other ones, but what about firecracker ammo? reloadable or disposable turrets?

Hmm. The ammo should be purchasable. Can you not buy ammo? I thought Ray and I tested that last night. I managed to replenish the ammo somehow..

Strat: I'm trying to do as much as I can on my own, since the rest of the company is on other time-dependent projects. Plus, I don't think converting from missions to a more fully realized crafting system will be too bad, down the road.

Sounds good. I like that different addons have to be made at different stations.

Well done. It's good to see a reward for holding the Conquerable Station.

update:

it does auto-reloading once docked to any station, both repair and firecracker turrets tested. Thx for help, Crusader.

I was expecting to require to click in 'reload ammo'.

Ah yeah. Turrets are a bit weird. I forget why we had to do that. Had to work around something, I think. Anyway, glad it works.

My intentions are to push a lot more unique content into special stations. I think the drop/crafting/addon/trade mechanics will be pretty cool, and provide some interest for all gameplay types. Also planning to push that a lot more in the early levels. We'll see how it goes.

gj, but still some bugs occur.

http://www.vendetta-online.com/x/msgboard/2/23596

After some testing of the FireCracker the other day, I'm not sure if it does enough force. I seemed to be able to turbo right through its explosion.

So what, Maal? Should it really be a fast, guided conc mine?

Yeah, anything remotely near a conc mine would be bad. But if it's going to be in-game it might as well do something besides making someone's HUD flash red. Maybe enough force to knock a chasing hound off course about 5 degrees would be adequate. And then to balance out the fact the seeking missiles are evil, reduce the number of charges to one so that the operator gets to exercise some modicum of skill by choosing when to fire.

Then again, I don't think that the evilness of agile guided missiles can be overstated. Perhaps this isn't a salvageable concept.

I don't think that the evilness of agile guided missiles can be overstated.

Indeed - a concept we saw demonstrated by player-equippable turret missile launchers.

Indeed - a concept we saw demonstrated by player-equippable turret missile launchers.

Grrr...