Welcome to our 242nd newsletter on Star Atlas! This weekly newsletter, published by Aephia Industries, focuses entirely on the development of this ambitious game. Here, we attempt to aggregate all the newsworthy tidbits revealed, primarily by the team, throughout the past week.
We have another short newsletter this week! The team has managed to squash the biggest bugs and is now turning its attention to quality-of-life improvements and balancing. Meanwhile, Michael (CEO) shared more about how Starbased progress may carry over into SAGE C4 and why he doesn’t want every resource to be available in the Safe Zone. Lastly, self-nominations have opened for the next Star Atlas DAO Council.
Let’s dive in!
SAGE C4
The team fixed 64 PTR bugs in five days, according to José (Lore & Community) during last week’s Atlas Brew 216 (recording by Intergalactic Herald). That total included the bug that removed all Action Points when a fleet came under attack. José said none of the remaining issues were game-breaking, so work can begin shifting towards balancing and deeper systems.
Michael also explained how progress from Starbased (the current live version of SAGE) is expected to carry into C4. XP across the four existing licenses will not transfer one-to-one. The team is working on a conversion formula that will provide some starting license or Council Rank progress, plus spendable renown. Veteran players should receive meaningful credit, but nobody will begin C4 at maximum progression.
The minable resource distribution over the various in-game regions may change before mainnet as well. C4 has more than 100 mineable resources and roughly 5,600 recipe combinations, and Michael does not want new players facing all of that at once. He would prefer a much smaller resource set in the Safe Zone, comparable to Starbased. Players could still progress there, but anyone looking for more resources and recipes would need to enter the Medium Risk Zone. This was Michael’s own design preference, not a final decision.
One part of Phase 2 remains unavailable, though. We reported that the Democracy Module was included in the Phase 2 package, but the team had not yet exposed it for testing when the Brew was recorded. Michael said it should arrive “pretty soon.”
Star Atlas – DAO
DAO Updates
The 3rd term of the Star Atlas DAO Council is coming to an end in a few months, and that means that the Council elections for the 4th term are booting up!
As always, this starts with self-nominations. These opened up last week, and community members who want to serve during the DAO’s next Council term can apply here. The form closes on August 16.
Iris’ Blessing
This Friday, August 14th, there is another Iris’ Blessing drawing! Here are all the prizes being given away during this raffle:
- 10x Fimbul ECOS Unibomba
- 10x VZUS solos
- 5x Fimbul Lowbie
- 1x Opal Rayfam
- 1x Calico Medtech
- 1x Ogrika Mik
- 1x Calico ATS Enforcer
- 7x Crew Gold 5
- 10x Crew Gold 1
- 10x Crew Silver 5
- 10x Crew Silver 1
- 5x Crew Plat 5
- 10x Crew Plat 1
Beyond the raffle, a double-XP weekend is planned for the last weekend of August (28-30), but this will only matter if the multiplayer servers come back online before that time.
Sneak Peeks
The ATMTA team dropped a concept video on X of an upcoming Pearce ground vehicle, dubbed the PEARCE XB-1. This is the first time we’ve seen a small, non-flying vehicle with wheels, but it definitely hits the Pearce aesthetic. As this is a concept video, there is no saying when (or even if) this will make it into the game.
That is it for this week! Thanks for reading, and until the next!