Combat
The lock is a claim the server grants; a mining laser is a tool; the shield comes back and the hull does not.
Every hit is resolved on the server. The client predicts and is corrected; it has no say over damage, loot or position.
The lock
T asks for a lock; the server grants it or says why not, in words on the screen:
| Refusal | Meaning |
|---|---|
| out of your weapon’s reach | Reach is the best gun you carry, never the ship’s |
| no claim may be served here | This zone is not a battlefield |
| no weapon fitted | A mining laser cannot hold a claim |
| that ship is in a berth | Nothing docked can be locked or shot |
| no shield emission to ride | The target’s shield is down - a stripped ship cannot be locked, so the pilot who is losing becomes harder to track |
| lock lost - out-turned | Held more than 42° off your nose for long enough, the claim dies |
A lock is what lets the ship’s tracking assist fly; without one there is none. Right click / X releases. When someone holds you, the HUD says !! <name> HAS YOU.
Shield and hull
The shield takes the hit first and comes back on its own: 260 a second, starting five seconds after the last hit. Breaking off for a few seconds is a real move. The hull comes back only at a station, never in open space, so hull spent out there stays spent until you dock. Ramming a rock costs hull too, as the square of your speed.
Weapons
The trigger is Left click / F; 1–6 choose the mount. Mining Laser I is a tool: it cuts rock and drones and never hurts a pilot’s ship. The guns, tier I:
| Gun | DPS | Reach | Price |
|---|---|---|---|
| Pulse Cannon | 420 | 1.8 km | issued to everyone |
| Scatter Gun | 700 | 450 m | 5,000 |
| Railgun | 900 | 5.2 km | 14,000 |
| Beam Lance | 1,250 | 2.4 km | 26,000 |
| Siege Cannon | 2,100 | 3 km | 60,000 |
No rank gates a weapon. What gates it is the price, the hull - a fighter has the Rapid and Close mounts only; Precision and Siege need a bigger hull - and the item’s own + ladder at the forge. Each mount takes a different kind of gun.
Where the fighting is
- Sectors, always. The threat band is on the chart; entering threat t needs rank (t−1)×10.
- A belt only while the front has reached it, a home only while its siege window is open. Your colony’s Shallows, never.
- A 600 m ceasefire ring stands around the ladder’s door stations: no blow lands there, and no shot can be fired from inside one either. A station’s own no-fire envelope holds your trigger; the HUD says so in red.
- Nothing docked can shoot or be shot.
Drones
A patrol is something you can watch. A drone attacks only when shot or crowded (about 300 m). It fires from 1.2 km against your cannon’s 1.8; a threat-1 drone dies in about six seconds under a starter cannon and does 70 a second back. Its wreck spills five units of silicon; the sector replaces it in 45 seconds. A kill pays the same XP at every depth: depth is where the work is, not the work.
Pilots, and the ledger
Killing another pilot pays 60 XP, spills their hold, counts for the war, and pays a bounty from the injured Compact’s purse if they were Wanted there. Wanted is earned by robbing another Compact’s convoys: past a threshold that Compact stops selling you guns and hulls, and its pilots see the mark on your hull. Three ways down: restitution at their trade port, the weeks (15% of the debt lapses each ledger week), or being killed by one of theirs, which halves it.
When an engagement ends, one line: Engagement closed · dealt · took · seconds, and a finding - Most of your fire never reached. Close the range. If it ended with your hull, see Death.