Whoop whoop!
Best of luck to Keith! And that destroyer in flight looks nothing short of awesome. Can’t wait to see what the fully textured and outfitted ships finally look like!
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Loving the enthusiasm around here these days. Great update!
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These updates are only going to get better and better. Can’t wait to see massive battles with capitals, even untextured ones!
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Can’t wait for Alpha weekends and ALPHA, waiting them 10 months!
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Great as always. Expected to see more in the future.
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Nothing important then… 
Is the plan for the aerodynamics of the ship model to be taken into account, or does each ship just have uniform drag in all directions?
If a ship is flying through an atmosphere at high speed with flight assist off, could it flip out due to aerodynamic forces?
Can’t wait to try it out!
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Is there a definitive answer to the question of allowing capital ships into the atmosphere?
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Not sure if an official decision was already made, but I think it would be reasonable to allow capitals to enter the atmospheres of planets with the maneuverability in atmosphere being hindered greatly. Much like the flight style of the current Corvette.
I imagine they would be allowed, or else it would be a rather arbitrary restriction. The question should be whether or not capitals can do anything but crash inside an atmosphere.
I personally believe allowing capitals to fly and operate in an atmosphere would add depth and gameplay value.
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I don’t see why not. Everything about this game engine has been freedom to go anywhere. How well they handle remains to be seen!
There’s no single simple answer to the question: it depends on the capital ship’s ability to sustain more acceleration than the planet’s gravity, which means that it will be possible for some capships and some planets but not others, or even for the same capship, it’ll be possible on a low-gravity moon such as Mars, but not a higher gravity planet such as Earth.
To that equation you also need to add atmospheric density, since higher friction means a faster entry will sustain damage to the ship. So if you try to fly a cruiser in a dense atmosphere at 5 Km/sec, you’ll burn the ship; but if you do the same with an interceptor, you might only sustain minor damage.
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This implies it’ll be possible to get some capital ships into a situation where they are doomed to descend to the surface and never escape. That doesn’t sound like a great user experience… care to elaborate @INovaeFlavien?
Obviously if they utilise orbital mechanics they’ll be able to descend and then ascend out of the gravity well again which could be a rewarding thing for skilled players to pull off.
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There will be an alarm and some warnings before you reach the critical altitude. If you ignore them, well, you’ll suffer the consequences. I can’t imagine any other alternative other than forcing an artificial explosion ? But I’m not sure that’d be a better user experience 
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Good! 
Yes, warnings will help alert to the danger. Equally, perhaps higher speed will allow lower flight and an escape back to safe altitude (depending on flight model).
No to enforced explosions please. Punish people in scientifically plausible ways for their stupidity!!!
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That sounds awesome, imagine a fleet of smaller ships banding together and pushing a capital ship out of orbit… We need grappling hooks! (or tractor beams).
A big ship using its tractor beam to keep a smaller enemy ship from fleeing would be an awesome thing too.
Is damage from ramming ships planned? A severely damaged capital ship could try to ram an enemy capital ship in a kamikaze action.
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Or push a disabled capital into another…
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Just wanted to ask if that asteroid you mentioned will be in upcoming patch. 
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Currently we’re planning on allowing kamikaze to be a viable strategy however it’s possible griefing could affect our final implementation.
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Did you say 神風? Going to have to get some advise from the locals.
There are several strategies other vehicle-based games implement to help combat team ramming. The most simple and effective is to kick a player from the match whenever they destroy a certain amount of friendlies in a session. This works to fight other methods of griefing as well. In I:B, I imagine it would have to keep them from joining the same match or also prevent them from joining any matches for some time.
@TARS Tractor beams or some method of latching onto ships sounds like a cool utility item and could enable repair/salvage playstyles.
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