Knights and mercs, it is Sunday in the New Boston zone, and you know a heist is happening somewhere. Actually, quite a few heists ːsteamhappyː Update #206 rolls out expanded save slots (now 10 instead of 4), three big changes to how Contact Limit breaks pace, order and roll their options, really fun up-balance for E-Rifles and Shotguns and some F10 fixes to boot.

If you are enjoying the relentless pace of updates around here, and think perhaps this is how Early Access should be, please do take a minute to leave a review. We are working hard to keep this EA period a constant stream of improvements and hope you'll help us share that widely!

Expanded Manual Saves to 10

With the UI split out into dedicated save and load menus, it is a good time to follow up with some extra improvements. With Update #206, we've expanded the count of Save Slots you can save into from the starter 4 to a big set of 10. You can scroll in the UI to save wherever you like!

Looking forward from here, remaining Early Access improvements in this area will allow for rapid quick-save and quick-load hotkeys, as well as deleting and renaming slots.
 

Contact Limit Breaks - Logjammer

With Update #206, we've followed up on the good work from Update #203 and a lot of player feedback we've been hearing recently. This boils down into 3 important changes for Contact Limit Breaks.

• We have improved the prioritization and weighting of the options rolled for the Limit Break. This vastly improves the chances of getting Service upgrades as soon as you spend any Favors to steer their decision.
• We have tuned up the underworld simulator that schedules Limit Breaks for Contacts so that it will increase its pace if a logjam is detected. If there are more than half a dozen Contacts all waiting to complete their Limit Break, they're going to hit faster until it clears the jam.
• In Update #203, we enforced a nearly-strict order of the queue to be first-in-first-out (FIFO). This put a priority on the timing of getting above 80% Influence or Exposure but did not differentiate between 80%, 90% and 100%. With Update #206, we've tightened up these rules so that it is FIFO within Influence or Exposure bands. Therefore, anyone at 100% queues in FIFO order, and if there is no one at 100%, then 90%, etc. So, pushing a Contact to 100% Influence is the sure way to help them get to their break fastest.

Looking forward from here, we'll continue to expand the options of choices that Contacts can tap for friendly and unfriendly Limit Breaks as well as built out more Power Play storylines and service upgrade opportunities.

Check out the Contacts page on the wiki for more details about other Contact rules.

E-Rifle Ammo Switcheroo

E-Rifles starting ammo configuration has been 3 Ammo per Reload and 4 Reloads total. We are excited to swap these two numbers, with all E-Rifles now upgrading to 4 Ammo per Reload and 3 Reloads total. This is still 12 shots total for your E-Rifles but has major advantages to Full Auto fighters, to anyone using Ion Batteries (getting 4 instead of 3 out of each use), and for weapon mods as well that add to Reload total, getting more for each addition.

Shotgun Ranging

We've addressed some balance issues with Shotgun to help them be an overall more appealing class. They are very effective today at what they do well (Armor Shredding, some like to say melting!) and in-your-face damage. The rebalance is all to their advantage, compressing the progression of Max Range so it happens faster (adding +1m at Power Level 2 and 4) as well as tightening up the Optimal Range value for all levels of Shotguns so it simply is 3 less than Max Range.

v1.9.97 - Update #206: Pinnacle - 1/25/2025

- Expanded number of manual save slots from 4 to 10
- Fixed issue with keyboard or mouse sometimes not working when loading save slots
- Improved priority weighting to highly prioritize Service upgrades for Limit Break offers granted by spending Favors
- Contact Limit Breaks will occur more rapidly if a crowd is all waiting
- Exact ordering for Contact Limit Break out of the queue now prioritizes 100% over 90% over 80%, then sorts by ready date
- Improved E-Rifles to have 4 ammo and 3 reloads (vs. 3 ammo and 4 reloads) - still 12 shots but better for Ion Charger, Full Auto, Mods
- Increased Max Range by +1m for Shotguns Power Level 2 and 4 to speed up their range progression
- Increased Shotgun Optimal Range up by +1 at a number of levels so it stays consistently 3m below Max Range and keeps low Accuracy penalties at so called "long" shots
- Fixed issue with Zombie Origins Legwork not applying injury if failed
- Fixed report map issues