The Sentinel got a really nice upgrade in the Ancient Rifts Update for Everspace 2.
For those who don’t know, the Sentinel is the ship that you start with in Everspace 2. It has some pretty well-balanced stats compared to other medium-fighter-class ships.
Anyway, in the Ancient Rifts Update, the Sentinel’s special effect or passive ability has been reworked. Instead of increasing the duration of buffs applied to the ship by 30%, the Sentinel’s special now increases the fire rate of its primary weapon by up to 20%, depending on the current shield charge percentage.
According to Erik Schrader, community ambassador for Everspace 2, this change was necessary because the previous special effect was just not that interesting. The rework was done because the developers felt that there were still certain areas of the Sentinel that could be improved.
Schrader went on to say that the Sentinel’s main point is its shields. Since the ship already has the ability to defend itself, it just makes sense to increase its offensive capabilities to balance things out.
Speaking of which, the Ancient Rifts Update implements more balancing tweaks as well. For instance, the missiles fired by the “Auto-fire at Critical Hit” attribute have their damage reduced by 60%.
Here are the other changes:
- Zurilia Bombers will now briefly disable their front shield when firing missiles
- Striker ULT will now automatically deactivate if no further enemies are in range
- Reduced drop chance for signal decoders as High-Risk Area boss loot
- Some structures like tanks will now also sometimes drop scrap metal when destroyed
- Improved speed of save game creation to reduce lag during saving
- Saving during Enemy Wave Challenge is now no longer possible due to exploitative behavior
- Changed look of Service Drone
- Changed look of Elek's ship
- Improved boss fight in Ghost Fleet: Better flight behavior that makes it easier to hit the boss
- Improved boss fight in Ceto before entering Union: More health and better weapons
- Increased loot quality bonuses of High-Risk Area mutators
- Improved Fusion Hook "Kunai" behavior to prevent targets from overshooting
- Completing certain unknown signal or distress call events will now grant a small amount of renown
- Improved Reflecting Panel behavior for better handling
- Item indicators for outleveled equipment now take rarity into account as well
- Weapons are aligned straight forward in sequences now
- Crafting
- Removed general restriction that crafted items cannot be modified
- Added restriction that items above player level cannot be adapted if gap is higher than 2
- User Interface
- High-Risk areas now display with proper HUD marker in supralight even if not hovered or targeted
- Secondary weapons with low fire rates now display a cooldown in HUD to indicate when they can be fired again
So, what can you say about the Sentinel’s new special?
Everspace 2: Ancient Rifts Update is available on PC.
