Update:Star Citizen Alpha 2.6.1

2.6.1 is intended to be a bugfixing/polish patch rather than a larger content patch, with the main aim of improving the player experience and building upon the foundations for features we introduced in 2.6.0.

Weapon Balance

 * We are adjusting the damage output of the shotgun and the sniper rifle, which both feel to be lacking the punch we would like from these weapons

Map Improvements

 * We are making some adjustments to the maps in order to make the map layout more balanced between the teams
 * UI Art are creating propaganda posters to be placed around the level to add more to the feel of the environment

Dialogue Line Improvements

 * Adding additional dialogue lines into the Star Marine game modes for the Sim Announcer and Team Leaders to inform players of time left in the match, capture points taken/contested, etc

Review of Ship Speeds

 * After seeing feedback from 2.6.0 we feel that further changes need to be made to the speeds of ships in SCM to create a wider spread that is in line with the ship role.

Fuel Consumption Tweaks

 * An extension of the above. This is intended to make fuel more of an expendable commodity that has to be managed.

Weapon and Mount Health Balance

 * After reviewing feedback, we’ve found that weapons and their mounts can be too easily destroyed with splash damage. We are increasing the health of both components to combat this.

Weapon Projectile Speed Balance

 * We’ve found that weapon projectiles have a varied speed across the game, which makes aiming with certain weapon setups in flight a challenge due to the position of the lag pips. Adjusting projectile speeds should bring these pips closer together in more setups to reduce the current extreme offsets we’re seeing.

Allow Max Afterburn on all Axis

 * Allowing the ability to reach maximum afterburn speeds on all ship axis when strafing, but at a reduced acceleration rate on any other axis than Y (straight ahead) as regular maneuvering thrusters don’t have the power to reach those speeds at the same rate,

Serialized Variable

 * Originally moved out of the 2.6.0 goals due to the time required to complete this.

Message Ordering

 * Originally moved out of the 2.6.0 goals due to the time required to complete this.

Mega Map (Singleplayer) – Stretch Goal

 * Originally moved out of the 2.6.0 goals due to the time required to complete this.

Bug Fixing

 * Since 2.6.0 went Live, we’ve identified a number of issues with the new main menu, and also other bugs with the UI in general that we would want to fix for 2.6.1. This bugfixing is where the bulk of the time is going to be spent for the UI team

In-Game Leaderboards

 * Adding the current website based leaderboards into the game.

In-Game Loadout Customisation
Upon investigation, this feature may be bigger than initially anticipated and with more dependencies and so may not make 2.6.1
 * Adding the ability to change the loadout of your character in between respawns in Star Marine.

Grenade Indicator

 * Adding an indicator to visually mark the position if thrown grenades.

Super Hornet Update

 * Updating to new damage state system, new Shaders, bug Fixing, and optimisation pass to bring it in line with more current ships.