Alpha Patch 3.0.0 has been released to the PTU, and is now available to test! Alpha 3.0.0 is our largest content release to date featuring numerous tech and core system updates. Players will have access to planetary surfaces for the first time on 3 moons (Yela, Daymar, and Cellin) along with an asteroid (Delamar). These new surfaces are expansive, with over 3 million square kilometers to explored, and dotted with surface outposts and derelict ships. Additionally we have added 4 new ships, our first dedicated ground vehicle (Ursa Explorer), the foundation of our revamped mission system with new missions, a completely new launcher and patcher system, and so much more! Since we have much to test with many features still being worked on, we will be doing focus waves of testing so we can nail down particular features and systems before moving on to the next. Your launcher should should show "3.0.0-672282" as the client version. It is strongly recommended that players delete their USER folder for the Public client after patching, particularly if you start encountering any odd character graphical issues or crash on loading. The USER folder can be found (in default installations) at C:\Program Files\Roberts Space Industries\StarCitizen\LIVE. Important: Focus: New patcher, station traversing, ship spawning, StarMap app, quantum travel, landing, air traffic control (ATC) system, quantum fuel usage/balance, hydrogen fuel usage/balance, afterburner, shopping, ship MFDs, missions, core combat (mission focus). All the ships are flyable, but the following are the ships that have had the most attention and focus: Gladius, Hornet Series, Sabre, Vanguard, Constellation Series, Cutlass Black, Caterpillar, Nox, Dragonfly, Prospector, Freelancer, Aurora series, Argo series, Buccaneer, Greycat, Starfarer series, Khartu-AL, Avenger series, Gladiator, Mustang series, Herald, Merlin, 300 series, and the Ursa. We would like you to focus on the above for this initial wave of testing and bug reports. NOTE: Other content and features are in and listed in the notes, but currently not the focus of this testing phase as they undergo bug fixes and polish. Additionally, there's content that is not listed in the notes that are intended for live release and will be added iteratively during the testing cycle. Key Game-play How Tos: Afterburner: There is now a single afterburner with the ability to achieve higher top velocity under certain conditions, giving us AB SCM and AB Cruise with the only distinction being two different speeds. You can only enter AB Cruise if your flight path is a straight, forward line. Otherwise you're limited to AB SCM, i.e. while maneuvering/strafing. Once in AB Cruise you can release the afterburner key and go into an AB idle mode to maintain your current speed. Throttle setting and y-axis strafe level allows incremental speeds, but you will decelerate if you change your vector. If you continue to hold AB and maneuver, you drop to AB SCM speed until you return to straight-line flight. AB Idle holds your current velocity as long as you're not maneuvering and decoupled rotation is allowed while in AB idle. Ship Start Up: Approach the entry point of your ship, then press and hold "F" to activate the interaction system. Select from the various inner thought prompts using the cursor or mouse wheel to move between them. Once inside your ship, again press and hold "F" and select the "Flight Ready" prompt to run through complete ship start up. Alternatively, you can press the "F5" key for quick start up. Landing: Landing now takes place through an Air Traffic Control (ATC) system. When close to a landing location, request a landing by navigating to your "Comms" menu on the MobiGlas (note: this is incorrectly displayed as a ship icon) and pushing the hail button (wifi symbol). Wait a moment, and ATC should assign you a landing location. Note, you may need to request take off to leave Levski (trigger opening of bay doors). Quantum Travel: To quantum travel to a destination, open your MobiGlas (F1) and select the StarMap App (diamond shaped symbol). From there, use the mouse to select a destination. Whether or not an object can be selected for QT is determined by gravitational values (The larger the object the further away you can detect it, large objects with small objects in orbit drown out their detection capabilities at long ranges). Meaning you will not be able to travel from point A to B at all times, but instead may need to move into orbit of a larger body to detect destinations also in orbit. For example, to get to a station orbiting a moon that orbits a planet, the route is Planet>Moon>Station. Once you have a destination selected you can "set destination" on your MobiGlas to bring up a quantum travel target. As before, align with the QT target and press "B" to travel. Known Issues: Content missing key elements: User Interface Insurance and Persistence Internal Ship Docking Comm System New Features General Content Breathing, Stamina & Heart Rate Oxygen Supply: Many areas, such as space or the moons of Crusader, do not have breathable atmospheres and are dangerous for characters unless they’re wearing a pressure suit. Most pressure suits are equipped standard with an oxygen tank. As you breathe, you will slowly consume the oxygen inside your tank. Your oxygen tank will automatically begin to refill once you are inside an area, station, ship or outpost with a breathable atmosphere. If your oxygen supply runs out, your pressure suit contains a small buffer of oxygen to provide you with a short amount of time to try to find an oxygen supply. If your suit is not sealed or you’re not wearing a helmet, you will not have this buffer. If you do not have any oxygen available, you will asphyxiate and quickly pass out. Stamina: As you exert more effort by running, jumping, etc., your muscles work harder and begin to consume more oxygen. To keep up with this higher demand, your heart rate and breathing increase to provide your muscles with a steady supply of oxygen. Wearing heavier armor will increase how much effort it takes to do actions and will tire you out sooner. The more you exert yourself, the harder you breathe and the faster your oxygen supply will be depleted. Heart Rate Monitor: The heart rate monitor on your helmet’s HUD and in your mobiGlas functions as an exertion/stamina meter. As a character exerts themselves, their heart rate increases. If a character exerts themselves too much, they will enter a Hyperventilated state. This will restrict the actions that you can perform, and things like running, sprinting or vaulting will be blocked until you exit the Hyperventilated state. Heart rate and breathing can also effect recoil handling and aim. As your heart rate increases the character’s aim will begin to sway, ranging from a minor wobble to wild drifting. Once levels reach certain critical thresholds your vision will also begin to be effected, slowly dimming till it goes completely black. Once your heart rate returns to normal, so will your vision and movement. Wound System Injury is now taken into account for status effects to a small degree including movement penalties for limb damage. Interaction System Interaction Mode: Holding down the [F] key will activate Interaction Mode - a contextual cursor will appear in the center of the screen, interaction points will highlighted, even from a distance. The parallax cursor movement allows selection of anything on screen with little head movement, while retaining full input control. Movement is limited to walking speed while in Interaction Mode. Holding the right mouse button enters into 'focus'; the camera rotates and zooms in on the cursor location, putting it in the center of the screen. From here, the cursor behaves normally. Releasing right click returns to standard view. Left click confirms the selection, and the associated action begins. Releasing [F] will always immediately return to natural gameplay. Inner Thought Prompt: When near enough to interact, the inner thought prompt will softly appear on the player screen, tilting towards the location of the interaction to help provide context to the inner thought text. The text will inform you of the action that will be performed upon interaction.Moving away, looking away, or having line of sight to the interaction point blocked will remove the inner thought prompt. The inner thought text will display on screen relative to the object of interaction, but will stay at a fixed size so it's guaranteed readable. The ellipse below the text indicates that secondary options are available, and they can be accessed with the cursor or mouse wheel. Hint System Added the foundation of a new "hint system" which will allow players to learn about how to play the game whilst playing it and reduce the burden of having to consult an off-line resource. Party Launch System Added new command /partylaunch. If the party leader enters /partylaunch into the chat window in game, this will send a notification to each party member when the leader enters an instance that they can either accept or ignore. If accepted they will be put into Matchmaking system to join the leader. If the server doesn't have enough space for the full party, all players in the party will be put back into Matchmaking to find another server.