2013 Round Up - Merry Christmas

    I'm always amazed at how quickly December comes around each year. I

guess its because I'm always busy rolling out the next update or trying

to keep up with the next 'Festive Event'. We sure do cover a fair few of

them over the period of the year.2013 didn't seem that long but

we got a lot done. Level Six Settlements was released bringing with it a

plethora of new items. We added Player made Ships via level Six SMC's

and player crafting for Starbase Hubs (that's kept many of you busy this

year).The Genesis Project came to fruition with the first

Genesis Planet being fully formed and explored. From there the first

Genesis Land Management plots were placed on offer and Grabbed up by

early adopters. You can always grab more Genesis Points at any time and

start a GLM plot when ever you feel ready. The second Genesis Planet

will likely pop early next year I suspect.Those Pesky A.I's have

been nosing around and being a general pain in humanities backside.

Throughout the year they have pushed more and more into human and

Verecian Space. They now have a solid presence in every system where a

Nebula exists.The Coalition and Privateers have rallied more than

once to push them back from various systems and planets but still they

come. It is hoped that the Genesis Planets can generate enough automated

military hardware this coming year to turn the tide and through the use

of a 'to be announced' War-board be able to push the AI off the planets

they have a hold on and out of the systems and back into the Nebulas.Mean while the Galactic Research Project keeps working on new technology in a hope to level the playing field against the AI.During

2013 the Ship Crew system was released. Whilst its still only in its

initial format it has proven very popular with players and the current

crew mission count stands at well over 44,000 completed missions. This

system will mature in 2014 as we add more facets to it.2013 saw

us move from 180 day inactive accounts to 365 days. That means you can

leave your account with us for up to 365 days of inactivity before it

moves to the deletion queue. This was due to a fairly large influx of

'returning' players, so we thought why not.This year saw the

invention of Zero Point Items, this has spread across a fair amount of

the Structure point based systems and offers players both supporting via

the store, and via the Festive Store in game, to grab Zero Structure

point items.This year also saw a fair amount of stores opened up

to the Player Settlements. The addition of a few like the GBM and Sven /

Boris were happily received.Fuel Depots were expanded on and

more were added through the Galaxies making it that much easier to get

to your Fuel depot account and siphon off some of that much needed

supply.Settlement license locations were extended adding another

30 this year to cope with the demand and offer some expansion where it

was needed. Whilst we loose the odd settlement here and there we still

manage to hold a solid level of lively and active settlements. Currently

the figure stands are 252 open settlements.The Naristo opened a

buy back scheme for captains with items (non Misc) to purchase back for

the local Talas Currency. Look them up in the finder.The

Explorers League managed to negotiate permission from the Central

Heritage Fund to allow the collection and trade of Archaeology

Treasures. Up till then these were only collected by the Central

Heritage Fund when they were sold off privately by Captains.This

lead to the Explorers League offering Transfer Offices to all

Settlements Level Five or higher. These offices Trade High Tech Loot

types for specific Archaeology Treasures.The collection Point was

extended to a 30 day period. Makes for an easier life when you don't

have to worry about a 7 day shelf life of items.  The GBM began offering

a filtered service to display your fellow guild mates.During

2013 we opened up the option to 'build your own Derelict'. The process

is not easy and takes dedication and time but we had some great entries

and we currently have a number in the queue for moderation.Of

course hot on the heels of that was Derelict Combat and Planet Combat.

Close Quarters Combat opened up yet another facet to Core-Exiles and I

know many of you have been having fun with this initial foray in to CQC.Advanced

Refinery Management was added, allowing captains to begin utilising

Advanced Merlin Refineries.  These are fed by using the new Advance

Automated Mining drones. These mine all the higher elements from an

Asteroid field and drop them into a central store that the Penworthy

Faction has worked out with the Refinery companies.The end

product is advanced higher elements required for some of the really

advanced builds to come in 2014. It is hoped that these along with the

QMG elements added this year and the AI resources being collected will

aid humanity in the fight against the AI threat.Lets not forget

that during this year we have seen the addition of the Genesis Project

Faction and the Penworthy Faction. Both of these taking their places

next to the other 16 factions you can gain ranks and titles in game.Coming up in 2014�We

can expect the war between humanity and the AI to ramp up. If the

player base pulls together and Genesis Plots are fully utilized, and

players work to gather QMG, AI and Advanced Merlin Resources they might

just pull it off.The War-board will come in to action allowing

players to deploy their hard crafted defences into the systems under

attack. Players both new and established should then be able to work

together to start to chip away at the AI.It's likely that the

Coalition will agree on star base licensing and that we will see the

first Starbases owned and ran by players begin to populate our systems.

Of course before that I suspect that our Alien allies will agree to let

humanity open Settlements within the Expanse of course if they ever

finish Project Next Step.A number of in game facets will be given

an overhaul or simply added to as the year goes on. Guilds, RAID

combat, ships crew and pets will all be given some TLC at one time or

another.So as much as 2013 has been pretty non stop for me 2014 will be just as full.Thanks

for taking the time to read this and if you're still awake, have

yourself a very merry Christmas. If your around for the Christmas week

think about joining us in chat or in the Mech Battle that will be taking

part!Here's to 2014!Coops