September 2026: ship wars, bombardment and the edge of the world

September was mostly server work: the strategic layer came alive, and the world finally has an edge. baffler · 2026-09-25

The strategic layer

Supply ships now matter in more ways. The server gained phased autonomous supply production, so ships keep building useful cargo without constant orders, and players can still take manual control. Double-pump ship travel and finite orbital bombardment followed. Bombs are durable and can be intercepted.

Then supply-ship warfare: ships in the same or adjacent sectors fight with visible torpedoes, their shields recover over time, and a ship under attack sends a distress signal. The torpedo, the distress sound and the spaceship explosion all come from the original client’s own assets and code paths; the combat numbers are our server’s policy, since no record of the official formulas survives.

The edge of the world

Drive off the edge of a Wulfram II map and the terrain keeps going for a while. The original client generates that border terrain itself, from a fixed random seed. The server now reproduces the same eight surrounding grids with the original generator’s algorithm, so physics outside the map matches what players see. A configurable gray-zone pushback then nudges vehicles and loose cargo back toward the playable area.

The wireframe on the homepage is one of those border grids.

Smaller fixes

• Friendly caltrops no longer shove allies, and hostile caltrops detonate before collision response.
• Incoming-missile warnings point at the right target.
• Refueling feedback is quieter.
• Tank jumps and docking send the original sounds.

Next

Uplink capture self-destruct, and the first fidelity passes on the reconstructed client’s UI.