[Client/UI Changes]

• Fix things like [Scoped] from becoming a squad link, expects to find at least a single number after [S to be a valid squad link.
• Right clicking a squad link now copies it to chat for easier sharing (previously left and right click both joined squad).
• Moved "Choose between ships" text element behind "Barf's" button to prevent players from being unable to click part of the button in Ships tab.
• Corrected Class toggle label cutting off text in the F10 menu.
• Renamed Test 1 to "Public Test Server" for future preparation of a dedicated player test server. Will be a post announcing when this is ready.

[Class Changes]

• Seer no longer has a Warp Navigation bonus as part of it’s skills. Any seers on login will automatically get the appropriate level of warp navigation they had.

[Item Changes]

• Adjusted Academy Thatch, Gelato, Thatch, Singularity Sphere and Merchant Navy Contriver Vis, Reflectivity and Diameter as they were missed during the freighter size changes.
• Red Drone has had new Shield, Weapons, and Energy for the Red Drone. This will result in a removal in augmods, increased shield bank and energy bank but less energy and shield regen, the weapons now have On Hit effects (the beam has Splash and the pulse has AoE). Increased the Mobility Factor of the Red Drone from 200 to 300.
• Adjusted Red Caiprianha, Salvation, Blocker to be 30 second duration tweaks with 90 second cooldowns. The magnitudes of their effects have been changed to reflect their increased duration. Their secondary effect applies immediately upon using the tweak instead of after a delay.
• Adjusted Red Afterburner tweak to apply a forced thrust effect.
• Red Tweak now lasts for 1 hour and grants 7.5% Hull Space as well.
• Replaced Transference Efficiency with Damage, Transference Power, or Critical Hit Strength on Expanders, Ship Hulls, Overloaders, Shields, Solar Panels, and Engines. Replaced Transference Efficiency with Rate of Fire on Transferences.
• Corrected Panther Instinct and Primal Panther Instinct’s descriptions (sense -> sensed).
• Added text to Anatolian Crown and removed double punctuation on Anatolian Trade Orders.
• A rotating blocker auto equipped to all CnC kits sticky that activate while the CnC is damaged and give -80% damage taken for 60 seconds on a 180 seconds charge time.
• Reduced the On Hit effect damage of the Bounce effect from 125% to 100%. Some of the weapons this effects are: Empyreal Extracting Cannon, Empyreal Solar Pulse, Celestial Heavy Autopiercer, Celestial Autopiercer, Celestial Particle Cannon, Experimental Celestial Autopiercer, Luminous Destabilizing Implosion Rigidifier, Operative’s Blaster, Grand Eclipse, Extracting Bombard, Angre’s Demolisher.
• Station Weapon:
  • Super Lasers have had their DPS increased, DPE decreased, and Range increased
  • X/Y/Z Lasers have had their Range and AoE range increased.
  • MagCannons have had their DPS increased, DPE decreased, and Range increased.
  • Note: The Annihilator Cannon and Adamantiumized Heavy Cannon have NOT had their range increased.
• Blue Photon Fore Missile Tubes item has been deleted. While it was already removed from the Blue Photon Corvette ship, this will remove any existing unremovable copies left.
• Halloween line of Pumpkin Seed tweaks now last for 7.5 seconds instead of 20 seconds.
• Added AIONLY tag to the + neurotweaks, used in the generic tweak superitems.
• Removed Oilheart’s Afterburner+, Shield Salvation+, and Tiny Power Punch+ neurotweaks from vending list. These were accidentally added to the vending list due to the originals having the TYPE tag set to common, back when it was still used.
• Removed Charge Afterburner neurotweak from vending list, it was created for a superitem to use.
• Changed Halflife of the following commodities to 168 hours:
  • Conclusion Icicle, Xeno Energy Remains, Xeno Shield Remains, Giant Goblets, Gargantuan Goblets.
• Temporal Dipole has been changed on the Cybernetic Zebucart: Instead of a nanite granting bonus damage to specific damage types,  now the item applies a permanent +40% damage bonus tweak when equipped.

[Mission Changes]

• Fixed no start vendor for the “A Beginning of an End” mission in Paxian Foothold galaxy.
• Updated Paxian Foothold Cloaking 23 mission to refer to Cloaking instead of Piloting.
• Strontium-90 mission “[Tier 7 Platinum Bounty] Kalthi Dungeon Guards” now requires the player to hunt for 30 Super Omega BattleStation instead of 30 Omega BattleStation.
• Fixed Omega BattleStation kills for Strontium Gold missions not counting.

[Universe Changes]

• Qu’ishi Qa now has reduced the respawn time during the final phase’s Envelopment circling drones and added a one time blocker to the start of this phase.
• The Vihara Dvarata instance’s wormholes to Vihara Dve and Vihara Tra in Vihara Ekam have been swapped around to their correct positions as per the map and their corresponding wormhole positions in Vihara Katur.
• The Vihara Dvarata instance’s Vihara Tra gal now properly locks the exit until all nearby enemies are eliminated, and will update its visual lock status accordingly.
• The Akhara Dvarata instance’s early encounter with Rajanicaravizvadrz and Rajanicaragupta in Akhara Tra will now play a warpout sound effect and properly display a visual portal effect when they retreat to their arenas, and they can no longer be killed early (this did not give loot or affect their later fights).
• Aveksaka in all Subspace boss instances and in Avidhi Sas now have floating text when they shout.
• The Kandara Dvarata instance boss Mahazaya Var Indrakoza now has proper punctuation on its shouts.
• The Vihara Dvarata instance boss Vaidya will no longer enrage prior to entering their arena, allowing players to safely enter as originally intended.
• The Praheti that transform into Sahvitra, found in some Subspace boss instances and other areas’ asteroid belts, will no longer spam a brake tweak every few seconds after their first evolution. That egg form is now named Praheti Sahvitra.
• Adjusted various boss shouts to be floaty additional to galaxy chat.
• Fixed issue with Sun in Saros mini before Grand Empyrean Eclipse not working for OOC.
• Remove turning from Bana King’s clusterbomb
• Adjusted the Cybernetic Zebucart and Masala King roamers:
  • Both bosses have much higher respawn rates
  • Both bosses no longer globally shout when they respawn or upon killing a player. Their other global shouts remain.
  • Both bosses have a new mechanic that will cause them to reset and recenter upon being far away from the center of the galaxy they are being fought in.
  • Speedy Gonzales’ vulnerability phases have been changed.

[Next Universe Changes]

• Empyrean Weekly Boss kill mission will auto starts on entry to Celestial Encampment.
• Added a bunch of additional planet and moon names to universe generation.
• Drastically increased damage of Fuzz.

[Server Changes]

• Non-PVP galaxies should prevent Tweak Inflicting Item from applying negative effects if shooter and target are player objects
• Torpedos should now follow the same z-motion as plasma, except only moving on Z after they start tracking.
• The four NCC-Bulk and NCC-Special skins (Indigo Beige NCC, Jet Eminence NCC, Cerise Purple NCC, Coquelicot Sea NCC) are no longer available for purchase due to a technical issue with the skins and the tinting system they use. These have been refunded and removed from accounts that currently have them.
• Proto-wormholes now inform on when they will open when attempting to jump into them if they will open in the next 7 days.

[Bug Fixes]

• Fixed Aurora bubble visuals on Matriarchal Overwhelming Fury to match the tweak time.
• Bots will now refuse to RTS scoop PVP items.
• Fixed a bug where tractor could remain on when the source is in stasis.
• Irradiated ships that placed Fires or Parasites on targets prior to being irradiated will no longer block OOC.
• Previously invisible Lightning Bolt missiles from Olympus will now have a yellow particle trail as their visual.

As promised in the previous blog post, here is the blog describing the milestones and objectives that will be used in the 20th Anniversary Event starting on June 13th! This post will also share some more details on the time that things will happen in the event, and in what ways game systems will be changed.

Universe Changes

The universe for the 20th Anniversary Event Server will be changed in the following ways:

• At the start of the event, no Warp Navigation training methods are available.

• Warp Navigation 1 is made available at Paxius 3 hours into the event

• Warp Navigation 2 is made available at Paxius 9 hours into the event

• Warp Navigation 3 is made available at Paxius 24 hours into the event

• Warp Navigation 4 is made available at Paxius 48 hours into the event

• PvP is enabled in all randomly generated Earthforce layer galaxies, and some unique galaxies.

• PvP is enabled inside the non-instanced galaxies in the Serengeti.

• There are only 4 Fractured Galaxies, they are available at the start of the event. They have PvP windows every single day.

• There are fewer galaxies in Wild Space, and they will be fully revealed before the last day of the event.

• A construction speed booster is available in the Earthforce Frontier Station in Sol. It provides a +400% bonus to construction speed.

Game Rate Changes

Certain systems are changed are as follows:

• Equipped augmenter drop rates are increased by 500%

• Bindomite drops from dungeons are increased by 500%

• Experience rates are increased by 500%

• Colonies will tick 1000% faster

• Prospecting nodes provide 400% more resources

• All weekly lockouts are daily lockouts

• Cargo has a 10% chance to drop on death

Milestones

Featured in the 20th Anniversary Events are server wide milestones. These milestones are tracked by the server, and all players’ efforts contribute to the completion of these milestones. Depending on the number and type of milestones completed, the Liberty server will be granted extended bonus events! These are split up into different reward tracks, with more progress leading to better rewards!

Wild Space Domination

1. 10 Galaxies are claimed by players – 1 week of the Halloween event will be applied to the server

2. 50 Galaxies are claimed by players – 1 week of the Halloween and Easter events will be applied to the server

3. 100 Galaxies are claimed by players – 1 week of the Halloween, Easter and Christmas events will be applied to the server

Clearing the Universe of Opposition

The following bonuses are additive with each other:

• Roaming Red Night Fury is defeated by the players – Week long Bindomite & Aug event +25%

• All Sas outposts are defeated by the players – Week long Bindomite & Aug event  +25%

• Cybernetic Gonzales and Angre the Spice Baron are defeated by the players – Week long Bindomite & Aug event +50%

Money is Up

1. Credits on all characters is above 100 bill when the event ends – 1 week of 10% extra credits dropped from AI on Liberty

2. Credits on all characters is above 500 bill when the event ends – 1 week of 50% extra credits dropped from AI on Liberty

3. Credits on all characters is above 3000 bill when the event ends – 1 week of 100% extra credits dropped from AI on Liberty

Put em’ All Together

Completing multiple milestones of various tiers will unlock a special reward. During the coming universe the Star Sonata Team will develop and release iconic ships from Star Sonata’s earlier days as modern ships! These will have up to date stats and super items. They will also have their own acquisition method and cost. Taking part in this event does not mean the ships are given to you, just that they will be developed and released into the game.

1. Complete one milestone from each category above – NCC Bulk (Support Freighter) and Ragnarok are developed and released

2. Complete two milestones from each category above – Gelato(Industrial Freighter) and Earthforce Battleship are developed and released

3. Complete ALL above milestones – Bulk Trader (Industrial Freighter) and Hotrod+ are developed and released

Individual and Team Goals

What’s an event without some fancy unique rewards! Players will be rewarded with a single copy of each reward per account. These items are neurobound, meaning they cannot be transferred to other accounts or sold on the market. Rewards will only be granted to accounts that earn them on the Event server, so if you want to receive the reward on a specific account on Liberty you must use earn the reward on that account on the Event server.

Individual Goals and Rewards

There are two individual rewards you can get for taking part in the 20th Anniversary Event:

• Login to the Event server – Celebratory Zebucart Skin

• Obtain Piloting 20 on at least one character on your account – Celebratory Holoprojector

Examples of these rewards will be added into the post at a later date.

Team Goals and Rewards

There are four total rewards you can get as a team! Keep in mind, this is the team that your account is on when the Event server closes, and has no relation to your team on the Liberty server. Having a single character on one of the holding teams of any of the Ai Empire HQs will make that account eligible to gain the reward. It is possible to get more then one of these!

• Currently own Scorpius when the event ends – Cybernetic Hacker

• Currently own Paradise when the event ends – Zaphragi Flurry

• Own and hold Citadel until the event ends – Kalthi Cloak

• Own and hold Dorado until the event ends – Celestial Pillar

These objectives are the main competition for this contest! They will be revealed near the end of the event, and they will only reveal one at a time.

 Wrapping Up

And that’s the bulk of the details

Some small things to note:

• The holoprojectors shown here will have versions of them obtainable on the Liberty server through various methods after the event, however those versions will not have the same color palette as what is shown here.

• All of the bonuses for completing these milestones will activate starting 10 days after the following universe has started! Those dates would then be: July 8th 2025 to July 13th 2025.

• The skins and holoprojectors will be provided to the players once the event has concluded, the holoprojectors have been added to the game and the list of players to reward to are tabulated. They should be all distributed within 14 days of the event being completed.

I, and the rest of the Star Sonata team, hope you enjoy this little celebration event!

Earthforce has officially established contact with a parallel universe—home to a counterpart organization known as Dark Earthforce. Though initial diplomatic exchanges were surprisingly cordial, relations quickly deteriorated following a contentious debate between our Lyceum and their so-called Dark Lyceum concerning the nature of our shared reality.

The point of contention? Flatness.

Dark Lyceum scientists made the bold—and patently absurd—claim that our universe, like theirs, is flat, citing their own sensor data as evidence. Our Lyceum researchers, ever gracious, recognized the primitive state of their counterparts’ scientific understanding. In an act of generosity, they not only recalibrated the Dark Lyceum’s instruments but also took the liberty of rewriting their research papers to align with the more rigorous standards of our science.

This well-intentioned intervention was met with resistance. A Dark Earthforce ambassador accused our Lyceum of overstepping diplomatic boundaries and called for an immediate cessation of all contact.

Our Lyceum’s response was swift and scholarly: they published an extensive series of papers demonstrating the fundamental flaws and obsolescence of the Dark Lyceum’s scientific methods.

Dark Lyceum retaliated not with data, but with doomsaying—issuing a dramatic prediction that our supposedly flat universe is now on an irreversible path to collapse. While this claim lacks any credible scientific basis, our Lyceum has acknowledged, with some concern, that the damage may already be done. A growing consensus among researchers suggests that the very act of acknowledging such flawed reasoning may have initiated an unstoppable chain of existential destabilization.

In short: diplomatic contact has ended, their science remains in shambles, and our universe may be doomed.

Dev Notes

• Extractors other then space oats shut off, colonies will no longer make purchases to/from user stations, AI stations will no longer decay goods 7 days before end of the universe. Will be a reminder post.
• Bases, permanent drones, and the credits on active bots will be lost.
  • Player ships will not be affected.
• If you’re docked during the reset, you will spawn into the new universe using your docked active ship.
  • Careful not to spawn into the new universe in an immobile ship!
• Wild Space will be scrambled and receive a new map shape.
• All other layers will have the systems scrambled but contain the same shape.
• After a universe reset, all of your docked ships will be in a state of limbo allowing you to dock them all at any non-player station.  You can use the /limbo chat command only once to bring all of your docked ships back into limbo to dock them elsewhere. There is no longer a time limit.
  • You can purchase additional limbos via Limboing Tow Service at Friedman station in Free Market for 5 billion credits each.

PST: 10:00
MST: 11:00
CST: 12:00
EST: 13:00
UTC: 18:00
GMT: 18:00

Announcement: 20th Anniversary Event

Help us celebrate twenty years of Star Sonata! With our little game completing its second decade, we feel it’s only right to run an equally spectacular event to commemorate the occasion! We’ve done so many events over the years but the most storied and popular was the “PvP Server” event of 2020. So, we would like to formally announce Star Sonata’s 20th Anniversary Event: A ten-day fresh start server on temporary characters with the rate of progression turned up to 11. This event will run from June 13th to June 23rd.

The Rundown

Here’s what you need to know about the upcoming celebration (more details to follow as the event gets closer):

• The event will run from June 13th to June 23rd 2025.

• You will log in to your regular account, but on a separate server labeled “Event” in the server drop down. The Live server will continue as normal.

• On the Event server, your account starts with no characters. Any characters you create will be completely fresh at level zero. These characters will only exist on the Event server and won’t migrate to the Live server afterwards. You don’t have to worry about overwriting anything on Live.

• You can create as many characters on the Event server as your account normally allows.

• Pay to Play and Free to Play statuses will be copied from Live. If you would like to subscribe, do so in the usual way and your subscription status will immediately copy over to the Event server.

• Standard restrictions for Pay to Play and Free to Play will apply on the Event server.

• All character and team names will be available and are first come first serve!

• Remember that any characters you create on the Event server will not be saved once the event ends. Any items you collect, stations you built, and skills you trained will be lost.

• There will be no web based features for characters on the Event server.

• Experience gain, item drop rates, lockout rates, construction rate and colony tick speeds will all be greatly increased!

• The server will be a full-featured universe with all skills, zones and bosses accessible. However, Warp Navigation skill levels will be time gated to set the pace during the early part of the event.

• There will be individual, teamwide and server-wide goals to complete, with various rewards on the Live server for completing them! These will be detailed later. Any individual awards will be cosmetic in nature.

• To get into the retro spirit of the event, the Earthforce layer will be PvP enabled (except for the protected galaxies around Sol).

The follow on post will give specifics on the timeline of the event as well details on the goals and rewards.

I hope you are excited as we are to celebrate twenty years of Star Sonata!

[Neuroforge Changes]

• Fixed description of Resonating mod on energy to state the usual shield/radar effect in addition to the half chance to use fuel.
• The rate at which you are offered the option to swap your Enhanced mod goes down as the Enhancement level of the mod goes up.
• Options to swap secondary mods, remove secondary mods, or add a new secondary mod, will be offered more as you are at higher levels of enhancement.

[Anatolia Changes]

• See Link
  • Not noted in the blog post:
    • Influence is no longer lost upon joining a team.
    • Influence is no longer lost upon player or asset death.

[Client/UI Changes]

• Added new Squad Link feature in Squad menu for creating an clickable invite link in chat.
• Added 8 skins to the Cybernetic Zebucart, 2 of which are exclusive to it.
• Added new skin for Ruined ships called Neon Nightmares.

[Class Changes]

• Added a non-bankable augmenter reset to shadow for this universe.
• Ranger:
  • Sniper empowered shot changes:
    • Critical Hit Chance used in damage calculation is now reduced by targets Critical Hit Resistance.
    • No longer benefits from Critical Hit Chance greater than 100% (after the reduction from Critical Hit Resistance)
    • Beam hits do empowered damage to collision code targets, like projectiles already did
  • Re-added 10% Damage per level for Heavy Fighters on True Grit skill.
    • Ranger still retains the 7 total marks
  • Ranger marks now decay every 5s after the first decay at 40s (while no new ones are being applied), instead of 40 seconds per mark.
• Speed Demon:
  • Overdrive energy charge no longer dissipates on jump.
• Shield Monkey:
  • When a Shield Monkey deals transference damage to a target, the shields they gain via stealing are not mitigated by the resistances of that target.
    • The damage dealt is mitigated by both the target’s shield stealing resistance and beam resistance.
    • Both damage dealt and shields gained are still mitigated by class based mitigation mechanics, Like  Speed Demon’s glance and Berserker’s frontal shield.
  • In the last patch we adjusted the rate at which shield stealing does damage and restores shields. These values were reverted to what they were before they were changed. You can see these values on the Shield Monkey Class 3 skill.
  • Made it so Transference Power auras will affect how much damage is done with a Shield Monkey Enveloper
  • Shield stealing self healing is no longer reduced by stealing resists.
  • The Shield Monkey Enveloper can only give up to 10% of the Shield Monkey’s current shield bank as bonus damage per shot.
  • Shield stealing resistance mechanic has been refactored. Resistances should now be consistent in both effect and how they are displayed to players.
• Berserker:
  • 33% of On-Hit effect damage is used for Lifesteal from the Berserker Shield Redistribution Device.
  • 0% of Damage Over Time effect damage is used for Lifesteal from the Berserker Shield Redistribution Device.

[Item Changes]

• Faranji Flower Power, Empyreal Extracting Cannon, Empyreal Solar Pulse, Celestial Heavy Autopiercer, Celestial Particle Cannon, Luminous Destabilizing Implosion Rigidifier, Operative’s Blaster, Korbolko’s Quantum Breath, Grand Eclipse Extracting Bombard, Angre’s Demolisher changed to 2 bounces from 6.Their DPS, DPE, bounce range, and damage multiplier on bounces have been adjusted as well.
• Mini Madness has been changed from an aura generator to a super item, and requires a super item slot. Its effect remains unchanged.
• Angre’s Garam Masala has had the following changes:
  • Changed the -Recoil buff from -20% to -40%, this makes the tweak about ~10% better used on cooldown than Perilous Burst with neurotweaking, instead of being ~7% worse.
• Various Scanners now list the Max Speed Difference for scanning on the item description now.
• The following Fighters have had their radar stats increased: Bulker Guard Fighter, Bulker Light Fighter, Bulldog Light Fighter, Dachshund Light Fighter, Dolius Hermes, Domesticated Killer Wasp, Greenish Fighter, Panther Kitten Fighter, Tamed Wasp, Terrier Light Fighter, Whippet Light Fighter, Vulture Hatchling, Condor Hatchling, Hawk Hatchling, Roc Hatchling, Harrier Hatchling, Caracara Hatchling, Kalthi Redeemer, Blue Photon Shrike, Blue Photon Raptor, Death Winger, Leopard’s Kitten, Kidd’s Henchman, Nightfury Hatchling, Crystal Shard Fighter, Red Fighter.
• Red Cell has had the following changes:
  • Shield Recharge increased from 2% to 5%. Increased Radar from 5% to 7.5%.
• Red Drone, Red Phaser, Red Fighter, Red Displacer have been adjusted.
• Cybernetic Zebu has had the following changed to its super items:
  • Temporal Dipole no longer randomly deducts shields twice. Only deducts 10% current shields instead of 20% when cycling.
  • Causal Domain Device has 10 second debuff duration increased from 5 second. Transference vulnerability and shield recharge debuff increased from -33.3% to -50%. Electricity needed increased by 100%.
• Outpost drone is no longer able to be acquired and has been made a temporary drone.
• Operative’s Escorting Field has had its Critical Immunity effect removed (Effect did not work as expected).
• Several Ship Scanners with ‘Ship Scanner’ labels have been updated to ‘Ship Item Scanner’ and ‘Ship Hull Scanner’.
• Matriarchal Overwhelming Fury no longer consumes current shields when used.
• Nightfury’s Burst tweak has had its stats cut in half, its Unique With Damage Tweak status removed, and its quality level changed to Uncommon.
• Red Loop Pill had its Recoil increased from -20% to -25%.
• Red Glow Pill had Energy Charge Increased from +120 to +240, added -5% Beam Vulnerability for 5 minutes.
• Pax Scutum’s All Hands on Deck superitem is now Unique With Damage Tweaks, and can be unequipped.
• Bhisaj’ayu Shield Overcharger superitem is now Unique With Damage Tweaks, and can be unequipped.
• Cybernetic Nullifier Shell’s Matriarchal Blessing super item now gives transference vulnerability to the user and nearby allies instead of transference power to yourself. This only works in PvP zones.
• Untanglers have been rebalanced.
  • Minor stat changes.

[Mission Changes]

• Improved summary on ‘Making Improvements’ mission line in Beta Antares.
• Added additional clarifying text to some low level missions that unlock Item Exchanges.

[Universe Changes]

• Reduced the shields of most AI in the Nexus.
• Added Celestial Blueprint Cache – Primary/Secondary/Tertiary to Celestial Encampment trade in via AC to acquire rare blueprints in exchange for Primordial Tokens.
• Jungle Crests for Mentions are now a one time mission and now are an item exchange in the AI Station.
• Cybernetic Gonzales has been reworked.
• Fixed trade in for “The Fast and the Pulsius” incorrectly taking “Xeno Energy” instead of “Xeno Energy Remains”.
• Minor change to mission structure in Red Outpost.
• The difficulty of the AI in the fighting pits stage 1 has been decreased.

[Next Universe Changes]

• Paxian Foothold is marked as a Special galaxy on the galaxy map.

[Server Changes]

• Made the stated Shield Stealing resistance in the ship scanner reflect diffusers and auras, but not beam resist.
• Made Resistance to Damage aug stat not give Transference Resistance.
• Shield Stealing resist will now be sent to your ship window as your Transference Resistance(resist towards healing is still a separate line item).
• Added message for how many shields a ShM stole if you have /showdamage on.

[Bug Fixes]

• Rounding calculated weapon slots down to the nearest 0.1 to address the error where the client and the error messages think you have enough weapon slots for another half weapon, but you don’t actually.
• Universe shortcuts should no longer be able to randomly choose the same from/to gal twice.
• Fixed a bug with torpedo tracking when moving while shooting.
• Fixed range restriction on Targeting Computer not being enforced.

With the major class reworks from the neuroforge behind us, we have been watching the meta and all of the accompanying build craft closely. There are some things we have observed that we believe need to change in order to encourage more variety. These changes are all on the Live Test server, available for you to test before they hit the live server. Feel free to check them out there!

Shield Monkey

With the previous patch, we made some changes to Shield Monkey. These directly reduced the Shield Monkey’s ability to both deal damage with shield stealing and heal up from shield stealing. It also gave them the ability to do increased damage with their weapons with the  Shield Monkey Enveloper. There was a vision that the Shield Monkey would mainly use stealing to refill it’s shields, and then deal damage with non-transference weapons with the help of the Enveloper. In actuality, the way the new shield stealing resists were calculated ended up mitigating the healing gained by the Shield Monkey. This made that playstyle unviable.

Stealing is not only critical for a Shield Monkey offensive ability, it’s also needed to help the Shield Monkey survive. Most importantly, its what allows them to heal others for more shields than they are capable of generating with their own shield bank. When we moved to a system where healing is 1:1 between the healer and the healed, we added Shield Stealing as a way for the class to keep up with incoming damage a squad might find themselves facing. Because a Shield Monkey needs this mechanic to function, having the amount of shields a Shield Monkey could restore vary so wildly from target to target doesn’t make sense. So here’s what we decided to do:

• When a Shield Monkey deals transference damage to a target, the shields they gain via stealing are not mitigated by the resistances of that target.

  • The damage dealt is mitigated by both the target’s shield stealing resistance and beam resistance.

  • Both damage dealt and shields gained are still mitigated by class based mitigation mechanics, Like  Speed Demon’s glance and Berserker’s frontal shield.

• In the last patch we adjusted the rate at which shield stealing does damage and restores shields. These values were reverted to what they were before they were changed. You can see these values on the Shield Monkey Class 3 skill.

We also noticed that stealing resistances were not always working as intended. Some combinations of AI resistances and diffusers were returning unexpected results.

• Shield stealing resistance mechanic has been refactored. Resistances should now be consistent in both effect and how they are displayed to players.

Finally, the way the Shield Monkey Enveloper works created some pretty ludicrous results under certain circumstances, resulting in very high Damage Per Hit values when optimized just right. We are aiming to force Shield Monkey’s to aug and gear for larger amounts of Shield Bank in order to fully unlock the damage potential of the Shield Monkey Enveloper, making it more tricky to replicate those high Damage Per Hit numbers.

• The Shield Monkey Enveloper can only give up to 10% of the Shield Monkey’s current shield bank as bonus damage per shot. This is reduced from 50%.

We are still trying to find ways to divorce Shield Monkeys from relying on its shield bank in order to power its mechanics. As long as it does, it needs to be able to generate enough shields to feel potent when using its tools.

Ranger

Ranger has been very successful at reimagining the Sniper gameplay it was meant to replace. We need to make one change to the way the class functions with Critical Hit Chance, so that it falls in line with the other classes in terms of how the stat interacts with it. This is going to heavily pull back on the ability of end game Ranger to scale with Critical Hit Chance, but it is necessary to do before we start piling on the Critical Hit Chance sources as we move into another tech level.

• Ranger’s empowered shot will only benefit from 100% critical hit chance worth of bonus damage. This bonus damage is now calculated after checking the targets Critical Hit Resistance against the Ranger’s Critical Hit Chance.

• Ranger’s “True Grit” skill now gives +10% more damage per level.

  • This damage was previously on this skill, however it was originally removed in favor of Ranger getting a 7th mark. Now they both get the bonus damage and retain the 7th mark.

Berserker

Players may have noticed that we have been very careful to make changes to Berserker. Our previous changes were focused on reducing the amount of multiplicative sustain they could generate via Lifestealing, and in doing so we made it so that they only gained 10% of their normal value from Damage Over Time weapon effects (Parasites and Fires) and On Hit weapon effects (Area of Effect, Splash, Bounce, etc.). This was the same multiplier for both effects. We do not like how this has affected the class and are making further adjustments.

• 33% of On-Hit effect damage is used for Lifesteal from the Berserker Shield Redistribution Device.

• 0% of Damage Over Time effect damage is used for Lifesteal from the Berserker Shield Redistribution Device.

Neuroforge Item Logic

We have not made many changes to the Neuroforge since it was released. We think it is in a good place, for the most part, and are mostly interested in making some slight adjustments. As a player invests more and more item copies into a Neuroforged item, the option to swap an Enhanced mod for a different Enhanced mod just isn’t as desirable. Obviously, if a player has a high enhancement level it means that they want to keep that Enhanced mod! Because of this, we’re going to make the following adjustment.

• The rate at which you are offered the option to swap your Enhanced mod goes down as the Enhancement level of the mod goes up.

  • Options to swap secondary mods, remove secondary mods, or add a new secondary mod, will be offered more as you are at higher levels of enhancement.

The Emperor Contest has long been one of the most prestigious and contentious parts of Star Sonata, and this upcoming contest will continue this trend. With the next cycle fast approaching, we’re introducing a significant overhaul to how the contest works. Specifically how Fragmented Imperial Signets are obtained, how Influence is gained and lost, and when the contest comes to an End.

These changes are designed to add more depth, encourage active participation, and tighten the pacing of the contest.

If you want to understand the context of these changes, take a look at the previous Dev Diary.

Strands and Surges

Gone are the days of farming Strategos’ for Fragmented Imperial Signets. In the upcoming contest, we’re introducing Anatolian Surges. These will spawn enhanced versions of existing Hoplite and Ekdromoi, along with the return of a powerful mini-boss. These special AI will only spawn throughout the Anatolia layer when Strategos’ are active, creating dynamic and time-sensitive opportunities for teams to engage and earn Signet Fragments.

When defeated, Surge Spawner enemies drop a new item: the Imperial Strand. These strands must be delivered to Anatolian AI bases and traded in 1000 at a time to form Fragmented Imperial Signets.

To keep the intensity focused, Imperial Strands will only drop during the three-week contest period. Once that window closes, even if the contest enters a tiebreaker phase, no more strands will appear and no more surges will occur.

Escort the Influence

Gathering Influence no longer relies on an automatically deposited currency. Instead, it’s now an active objective. Influence now drops as 1 of 5 different Influence granting items from the AI in Anatolia. All Anatolian AI, except for those spawned in a Surge, will drop some of these special commodities.

Teams must recover and escort these items back to AI bases in Anatolia to successfully bank the influence and gain points for their team. This is the only way players can contribute toward their team’s standing in the Emperor Contest.

When a player holding these commodities dies, they drop as a physical item in space. Anyone can pick it up and ferry it to an Anatolian AI base to turn it in and gain Influence for their team. This change adds a new layer of tactical decision-making: Do you split up to bank influence as it comes in? Hold on to all of it and deposit it at once? Send someone to go intercept the enemy as they’re depositing Influence? That’s up to you.

Note: The amount of Influence a team can acquire from a Strategos and its minions is unchanged.

“The End”

In the event of a tie after the 21 day contest period, the only way to win has been to gain a 1 million point lead, regardless of how long it took. The process of getting that lead could theoretically drag on for weeks (or even longer), and we heard your feedback loud and clear. We understand that this uncertainty about how long the contest will last is not sustainable.

So, in the upcoming contest we’re introducing a decaying lead threshold. After the contest period ends, the required lead to win will shrink over time—until, after one week, even a single point lead will grant the top team the title. This ensures a definitive and timely conclusion while still rewarding consistent effort and tactical finesse.

We’re excited to see how these changes will shake up the contest and can’t wait to watch the new strategies unfold.

Note

The Anatolian Expanse and associated Emperor Contest is a labor of love by us to support an active PvP event that breaks up the day to day activities in Star Sonata. We appreciate the many rounds of feedback the community has given about this experience. We are committed to continuing to support this activity and monitoring its success and failures. This blog post includes all information on the current system used to ascend to the throne to become Emperor, but like with many things in Star Sonata, it changes often. This system will likely be iterated into the future to bring an experience that promotes competition. You can stay up to date on what is involved in the contest to become Emperor by visiting our wiki page on the topic. https://www.starsonata.com/wiki/index.php/Emperor

[Red Outpost Changes]

• New Red Outpost bosses and loot next universe.

[Anatolia Changes for Next Universe]

• Moved AI Stations to new galaxies away from the entrance.
• Added Fragmented Imperial Signet turn in for 1000 Imperial Strand.
• Imperial Strands acquirement method will be explained closer to the Emperor contest.

[New Shop Items]

• Added 3 new skill unlocks:
  • Galaxy Builder Neural Boost (100 SP): Increase Station Management to 20, Combat Bot Tweaking to 30, Station Tweaking to 18, Programming to 60, and Drone Research, Bot Research and Station Research to 5. Your character needs to be at least level 1000 to unlock this.
  • Sonata Degree Neural Boost (50 SP):  Increase Infinite Knowledge to 20, Advanced Transwarp Navigation and Transwarp Turbocharging to 5, Astral Injection to 10, Nanotech Plating to 25, and Piracy to 20. Your character needs to be at least level 1000 to unlock this.
  • Master Neural Boost (180 SP): Level your character up to level 1000 and gain all the skills from the Core Skills Neural Boost, Galaxy Builder Boost, and Sonata Degree Boost. Your need a character of at least level 1000 on your account to unlock this.

[Client/UX Changes]

• Added support to Colony screen for right click context menu with “Add to Trade Bay” and “Market Check”.
• Added “?” icon to the transwarp menu to highlight hotkeys and a close window box.
• Previous Modifier (defaulted to Shift) + double click now selects all of the same type within the galaxy. (Drones, Stations, Combat Bots, Trade Bots, Wild Bots)
• Previous Modifier (defaulted to Shift) + triple click now select all assets within the galaxy.
• Fix for right click -> transfer being incorrect order due to a bug.
• Added toggle to Display section of options to disable Mouse Wheel Zoom.
• Adjusted Ship Stats window’s spacing.

[Class Changes]

• Shield Monkey:
  • Shield Monkey Enveloper and Advanced Shield Monkey Enveloper: Shield Monkey enveloping shot is now from ShM class skill 3, with a more advanced version of it as an advanced subskill.
    • To enable Shield monkey enveloping shot, you must equip a Shield Monkey Enveloper. This is provided when training ShM class skill 3. You can also obtain one at the ShM station in Lyceum.
  • Swapped Shield Monkey skills 2 and 3 stats.
  • Added your flashing shield bar when you do a ShM enveloping shot.
  • Added an effect when you start shooting with ShM enveloping effect
  • Enveloping Monkey advanced subskill allows for a better ShM enveloper and allows your deployed temp drones to get the effect of your equipped enveloper.
  • Shield stealing will use most vulnerable of the targets resists, rather than having no resists, but will not gain vulnerability for extra damage.
  • Shield Stealing now does 50% less damage but self heals for the same amount as before.
• Gunner:
  • Gunner Targeting Computer takes 33% electricity instead of 20% for every extra shot, and has a 15 second cooldown instead of a 60 second cooldown.
• Ranger:
  • Removed the 10% damage from each level of True Grit. Gave Marksman an extra mark on each level instead.
  • Updated the skill description with the new amount of mitigation per mark now that the ranger has 7 marks.3.33% mitigation per mark -> 2.85% mitigation per mark. There is no change in mitigation when at total marks.
  • Empowered shots on Beams now use the proper formula instead of the old critical hit way.
• Speed Demon:
  • Speed Demon Target Tracker has had its Duration increased to 10 seconds, and its Charging Time reduced to 20 seconds. It has also gained a 10 second evasion bonus on activation/refresh
  • Note: The Target Tracker will now cause Torpedoes to launch towards the target when active.
  • Removed the Speed Demon Escort Device.
  • Speed Demon Overdrive Device has been changed, it is now an equipable item with 2 modes that can be toggled via using the item. It will also automatically enter Discharge Mode when full, and Charge Mode when empty. In Charge Mode, it stores 40% of the firing energy of your active weapon when that weapon hits a target. In Discharge Mode it offsets a portion of the energy costs that would come from your energy bank from the device’s capacitance instead, scaling up as your current energy bank decreases. While Discharge Mode is active, your weapons will gain 35% more damage.
  • Speed Demon Class 3 now Mitigates up to 50% of the damage taken when traveling close to perpendicular to the impact angle. Moving slower than the speed of the impact lessens the effect. Note: If the impact is from a projectile the speed of the projectile is used, if the impact is from a beam the speed of the firer of the beam is used.
  • SD target tracker now emulates the extra range normally gained when firing velocity inheriting weapons while moving in the direction of the shot – no effect on non-inheriting weapons

[Skill Changes]

• Updated Transference Control’s description to reflect that it doesn’t do anything at this time.

[Item Changes]

• Increased Damage Multiplier of On Hit weapon effects by 1.25x.
• Quantumly Attuned Temporal Tracker’s for Angre the Spice Baron and Cybernetic Gonzales will decay after 15 minutes.
• Weapons that apply visibility now use flat visibility instead of percent based visibility, like they used to.
• Reduced Angre’s Garam Blend’s rate of fire bonus from -50% to -22.48%.
• Jungle Spirit augmenters now cost 1 Honorary Mentions instead of 2 Jungle Armada Crests.
• Zauron’s Mask and Heart of Sol are now size 0 and shipbound, instead of unequipable. Zauron’s Mask now grants 2000 visibility when equipped just like Heart of Sol.
• Fleet Commander locked fighter super items (Commander’s, Captain’s, Admiral’s, Chelonic Call) only effect fighters launched by the user.
• Bunkered Offense Protocol super item on Kalthi Armored Deployer only effects drones deployed by the user.
• Empyreal Zenith’s Coalition Regenerative Field Emitter now only effects drones deployed by the user.
• Chelonic Call can no longer be equipped with another Aggressive Protocol.
• Colony Industrial Commodity value increased by 100%.
• Commodities used to make T0 Active IC’s have had their Half-lives’ increased to 168 hours.
• Matriarchal Overwhelming Fury now has a 40 second cooldown, its bonuses last 7 seconds, and it removes 30% of current shields instead of 35%
• Increased the stats on the Gonzales Redundant Capacitor.
• Adjusted the augmods on the Gonzales Reversion Protocol.
• Torpedoes
  • The damage, speed, DPE, burn time and range of regular Torpedoes (ex. Titan Torpedo) has been adjusted. They should be much more reliable to use now, and some may have less DPS.
  • Thoraxes and Clenches have a 1 second shorter Engine delay.
  • Rockets have increased DPS and tracking.
  • Bombs have increased projectile speed and tracking.

[Mission Changes]

• Removed erroneous mission lock on [Tier 1 Silver Bounty] Aveksaka that required killing Ruby Carriers.

[Universe Changes]

• Blue Photon Test Range will no longer give a PvP warning upon entering the rift.
• Angre, Gonzales and their minions no longer will spawn with augmenters or mods.
• Angre’s minions had diffusers removed and the Chai fighters had their shield bank and shield regen reduced.
• Removed Energy / Laser Diffuser drops from Basils.
• Decreased the drop chance of the diffuser from Gonzales’ treasure vault
• Added a new weapon to Cybernetic Gonzales’ treasure vault

[Next Universe Changes]

• Cybernetic Gonzales and Angre the Spice Baron’s mobs now despawn if they do.
• Cybernetic Gonzales and Angre the Spice Baron now respawn faster.
• Cybernetic Gonzales and Angre the Spice Baron had some of their shouts made more clear.
•  Cybernetic Gonzales now spawns more minions.
• Cybernetic Gonzales minion’s attack patterns have been adjusted.
• Some of Cybernetic Gonzales and Angre the Spice Baron mechanics have been changed. These relate to the despawn and difficulty scaling.
• Buffed KD DG Minions (Lots of minions were adjusted, some in small ways others in bigger ways)
• Nerfed KD DG Bosses (Most of these were made to have less shield regeneration but more bank, there should be more variety in the bosses and difference between banky bosses and regenerative bosses).
• Increased the drop rate of Slumber Augmenters from roaming Slumberchrome variants by a factor of 5-10 and removed them dropping from DG versions.
• Increased the drop rate of Slumber Augmenter to guaranteed on Slumber Muncher.
• Increased the drop rate of Herbal Sensor Blueprint from roaming Basils by a factor of ten.

[Server Changes]

• Augmenter drops are now the same category as other debris for targeting.
• Added new dev support for more advanced scripting for future bosses.
• Using a fighter bay to recall fighters now returns 75% of the launch energy scaled with the remaining flight time.
• Removed the mechanic where drones would recharge their shields in your inventory. They just get set back to full shields.
• Upgraded the ship window to make the ship stats more legible.
• Adjusted Boss reset logic when players are using stealth to prevent a reset.
• Ai/bots now dock at 80% of the player max docking distance (based on ship/base sizes), instead of a static 50 distance.
• Pinned item can no longer be consumed by Neuroforging.
• Added “Shield stealing resist” to ship scanner output for Shield Monkeys.
• Added “Resist All” info to ship scanner output.

[Bug Fixes]

• Potential fix for major desynchs for both player and AI caused by grem effects.
  • These could have been caused from anything from AI super items to player grem weapons.
• Empowered shot with large negative crit chance can no longer cause negative damage
• Fixed several spelling errors in various places of “neccessary”.
• Wormhole check for PvP entering a safe area now checks for Public Instances.
• Fixed missing space typo in the ‘Report back to’ mission message.
• Fixed an issue with Matriarch Aurora’s phase 2 weapon disable not working during one of the phases.
• Fixed the Galactic Control team skill’s description, the number of gals ownable with lvl 0 is 30 not 20.
• A mission that reward a skill the player already has will no longer fail to complete and instead will skip the skill reward with an event error message about it.

Citizens of the cosmos, terrible news! (Or great news, depending on whether you were currently winning or currently being atomized.)

The universe is collapsing. Again. I think again?

Yes, yes, we know. Third time this cycle. Maybe fourth? Who’s counting? (Not us, we outsourced counting to an AI, and it left a sticky note that just says “Oops.”)

The Great Cosmic Hamster, upon whom the stability of all spacetime depends, has unfortunately perished and stopped running on its wheel. Some say from exhaustion, others from eating a suspiciously large chunk of Energon labeled ‘Not Food’.

Regardless, the Lyceum Scientists have decreed that reality must be turned off and on again. As per protocol, all quantum entanglements will be untangled, all celestial bodies will be shuffled like a poorly stacked deck of cards, and every known map will become outdated overnight. Attempts to prevent this by holding onto physical space with sheer willpower have, historically, ended in disappointment and spontaneous disintegration.

Dev Notes

• Extractors other then space oats shut off, colonies will no longer make purchases to/from user stations, AI stations will no longer decay goods 7 days before end of the universe. Will be a reminder post.
• Bases, permanent drones, and the credits on active bots will be lost.
  • Player ships will not be affected.
• If you’re docked during the reset, you will spawn into the new universe using your docked active ship.
  • Careful not to spawn into the new universe in an immobile ship!
• Wild Space will be scrambled and receive a new map shape.
• All other layers will have the systems scrambled but contain the same shape.
• After a universe reset, all of your docked ships will be in a state of limbo allowing you to dock them all at any non-player station.  You can use the /limbo chat command only once to bring all of your docked ships back into limbo to dock them elsewhere. There is no longer a time limit.
  • You can purchase additional limbos via Limboing Tow Service at Friedman station in Free Market for 5 billion credits each.

PST: 10:00
MST: 11:00
CST: 12:00
EST: 13:00
UTC: 18:00
GMT: 18:00

[Gonzales the Cyber Demon]

• Gonzales the Cyber Demon has been added as a Kalthi Depths roamer.

[Client/UI Changes]

• The shield bar no longer flickers when looking at something being damaged that you have never targeted.
• Added search bars to Ships tab when docked at a station and the Possessions tab under the Character menu.
• Adjusted the right click -> transfer context menu order of ships to reflect the sorting of the ships tab.

[Skill Changes]

• Updated the description for Seer’s Shadow Ambush and Brooding Gaze to be more descriptive
• Trade bots no longer get the Zen of Ranger bonus.
• Removed several unlisted instances of Ranger retaining old Sniper projectile impact and projectile speed modifiers.

[Item Changes]

• Adjusted the Grand Empyreal Destabilizer, it now disables weapons of enemies for 3 seconds and then increases their weapon recoil by 50% for 7 seconds.

[Mission Changes]

• Updated “It’s a Trap” mission to be clear that the player needs to go near the E.F.V. Sovereign to cause the waves of mobs to spawn. Fixed misnamed ambush mobs that caused them to not count as kills for the mission.
• Temporal Trackers are now offered via missions when progressing through the Red Rogue storyline in Paxian Foothold.
• “Optional: Angre the Spice Baron” mission has been changed to “Temporal Hijinks”. This mission requires players to gather Damaged Peacekeeper Equipment, and kill 1 of each of the Kalthi Depths DG bosses.

[Universe Changes]

• Angre the Spice Baron has significantly more shields and does more damage, is immune to damage when his minibosses spawn, and Manuel de Castro and James Plantain must both be dead for Angre to start taking damage again. Angre now begins despawning as soon as he is engaged, instead of starting to despawn when 5+ players are present.
• Added Soul Beam to DG/Uber drop list.
• Only Arsonist now gives a lockout when fighting in Rumble Colosseum. Mobs in the instance now longer spawn with augmenters.
• Several Spice Pirate ships no longer spawn with diffusers.
• Increased the cooldown on the Empyreal Equinox’s warp device.
• Removed Speed Demon skill from Handmaidens and replaced with appropriate augmods to prevent extreme damage when multiple tweaks are used.
• Infernal Tempest and Infernal Darkness will no longer give PvP warnings upon entering the rifts.

[Next Universe Changes]

• Reduced range and damage of Slumberchromes and MF Slumberchromes.

[Server]

• Bindomite Changes:
  • Made DG Bindomite drops scale from 10% to 40% depending on DF.
  • Reduced the Bonus Weekend Bindomite bonuses back down to 25% and 100%
• Bots will now value the attack power of DOT (damage over time) weapons higher.
• Seer Remodulator now works against stations and drones.
• The notification showing the start of the Emperor Contest will now be visible three days prior to the start instead of one day.
• Sun vulnerability auras no longer apply to attached bases.

[Bug Fixes]

• Fixed several typos in mods.
• Splendid Trove information now correctly indicates it gives Honorary Diplomas in a quantity of 5 per cache.
• Fixed acceleration/turning stats on fighters showing as 0.
• Fixed issue with Temporary Drones not firing at objects with envelopments.
• Fixed a bug where influence could be accrued outside of a emperor contest.
• Targeting computer will no longer fire when the ship is in stasis.