Guests:

• Kaan, Lead Level Designer
• John, Level Designer II
• Manuel, Senior Level Designer

TL;DW:

• "Asteroid bases are like bunkers 2.0" - more content space, more sandbox type of missions, more gameplay types.
• Asteroid bases can also be worth visiting if you don't have a mission (there are puzzles and treasures).
• Contested zones will have multiple entries from both interior and exterior of a station to limit bottlenecks.
• At specific "depth" of a contested zone players can find exfiltration routes that will bring them back to a safe-zone. They are one way.
• Reminder that contested zones are intended as a PvP space.
• Jared: "Our job in those situations (griefing) is to find alternatives for the players who are suffering at the hands of PvP - provide ways they can counter it, provide alternatives that provide the same experience (...) When the player runs out of options and gets killed over and over again, that's when there's a problem."
• There are 5 contested zones in Pyro at the moment, more or less evenly spread.
• Some contested zones require specific items to access them.
• Contested zones have short, mid and long term "branches" - the last one might requires items to access as well. Some of those items have to be gained from other places. Longer branches = better rewards.
• Current plan for asteroid bases is to have both combat and "safer spaces" - not safe safe, as in PvP will be possible, but without enemy NPCs.
• There will be functioning asteroid bases in the future, not in 4.0.
• They'd like to implement less obvious traps in the future (like booby trapped chests etc), will have to be scanable or recognizable in some other way. (Jared wants a mimick)
• Contested zones are created with 4-5 person groups in mind, up to 40 people per "dungeon".
• Early sections of contested zones are soloable, deeper parts will require help.
• Asteroid bases are always visible on the map (no need to find them/pick a mission to travel there). This might change later down the line.
• "There's new stuff coming to Stanton in 4.0."
• Pet Kopion variant coming in 4.0 (NPC owned only for now).
• Contested zone difficulty will vary depending on depth and on which station you're in.
• SC didn't have the tech to distribute player rewards for doing in-game things until recently (Operation Overdrive).
• Ghost Arena was inspired by the "Running Man".
• Current (deserted) asteroid bases have no official landing places (pads, hangars) available. Future ones will act as gas stations with place for small-medium ships, might have docking tubes for bigger ones.
• Asteroid bases are done partially by hand instead of fully procedurally (they use hand made room sets instead of randomizing each room individually).
• No gravity or power manipulation for contested zones initially, there are key cards and fuses though.
• Contested zones will offer rewards unavailable in any other way. Provided example was ship components (military, stealth, competition ones, only certain variants not all).
• 4.0 will finally bring back ship components making a difference to ship performance.
• You'll have to use freight elevators to extract larger loot from contested zones.
• Asteroid bases aren't planned as a step towards player owned locations ones at the moment.
• Contested zones will be regularly updated as new items and systems come online.
• Some locations in contested zones will have time pressure elements (timed gates, respawning and patrolling AI etc).
• There are 3 variants of asteroid bases (combat, puzzle mixed) at the moment.