# Elite Forces v 1.6 -Aces High-

## Design Notes

Version 1.6 of Elite Forces is a bit of a redesign of the Elite Forces mod that adds new features, fix bugs/issues, and improves the overall EF mod experience. Previous versions of Elite Forces provided a potentially very harsh and punishing early game experience. This version, among other things, addresses that issue in particular by making the early game a bit more survivable. However, for those of you that want to retain the previous gameplay of a high difficulty across all skull/difficulty ratings, there is an available option with the addition of a "hardcore add-on" pack. Details of this add-on and all new features and fixed are detailed below:

New features and fixes for Elite Forces v. 1.6 -Aces High-

- From this point forward there will again be one full feature release version of the EF mod, and an add-on pack that can be used for those that want an even more hardcore experience. (more details on that below)

- The features of this mod should now be scaled bit better to the difficulty/skull ratings of the game's procedural contracts. Elite Forces pilots and mechs will still enter the game starting at difficulty 3 (1-1/2 skull), however the quantity starts a bit more sparce then before. Dedicated lance formulation has changed, so players won't generally face dedicated lances that are packed with 4 Elite pilots in 4 Advanced Mechs in the early game. However, due to randomness of the dynamic pools and lance generation, this could still potentially happen! The occurrence of these forces will be more and more common as contract difficulty increases. This should improve the experience of those starting new games/careers, while still increasing the overall difficulty. Even in this case though, you will be feeling the full brunt of Elite Forces as you get into the upper difficulties. The exception to this behavior is with the inclusion of the optional "Hardcore Add-on Pack" (below).

- Ace pilots have been added to the game. Ace pilots have a more skills than elite pilots, and they also have buffs and abilities that improve their combat performance. Ace pilots should be more rare than elite pilots, and they are not in the random, dynamic pilot pools. Ace pilots will only be called by some of the new EF lancedefs. However, when Ace pilots are called, they will only spawn in Advanced Mechs.

- New abilities and buff sets for Ace pilots have been added.

- EF Lancedef formulations has been reworked. The formulations of EF lancedefs will scale better with difficulty from lances starting with one Elite pilot in an Advanced Mech leading 3 random pilots in vanilla mechs, up to 4 ace pilots in 4 advanced mechs at upper difficulties. Lance formulations are now also designed for much more variation in specific pilot/mech compositions.

- Added 9 new advanced mech variants

- fixed some build issues and errors with a number of the Advanced mechs

- Build optimization pass across all advanced Mechs, this should improve the performance of a number of advanced mechs.

- Major cleanup pass on EF json files fixing numerous errors and issues causing some EF jsons not to be called, or work properly.

- Reworked some of the Advanced mech builds, in particular swapping some upgrades (gyros and cockpit gear) that made Advanced Mechs a bit too difficult to deal with at lower difficulties (in particular hit defense gyros and injury resist cockpits)

- Advanced turrets are now properly added into the mod (unique json files that don’t overwrite vanilla turrets). Approach bases carefully!

- Removed "Blacklisted" tag from vanilla game lostech and DLC weapons (as well as some other pieces of vanilla gear), so they are now lootable.

- Removed "Blacklisted" tag from vanilla SLDF and the Grand Dragon DRG-1G (these will now appear randomly in "the wild")

- Fixed Blacknight BL-6b-KNT heat sink distribution. Moved extra heatsinks (6) from legs and distributed them to other, valid locations.

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## Hardcore Add-on Pack

For those of you that want the full original Elite Forces style gameplay, although with an even more intense experience, the Hardcore add-on is for you! I only recommend this add-on if:

1) You are playing in the end game and you want to be able to play light and medium mech contracts that are normally low difficulty. You have a lot of advanced equipment and experienced pilots, but you are tired of only playing heavy and assault mechs and at this point low difficulty/skull contracts are just too easy to be fun. ...or

2) You are starting a new campaign/career and you really love pain and frustration! You desire the impossible and want a serious challenge from the start! ***NOTE: If you do this I recommend spending some time in 1/2 to 1 skull contracts to build up some pilot skill. Starting level pilots have a rough time vs Elite pilots but they will be totally outclassed against Aces.

The Hardcore Add-on opens the flood gates and provides for the following:

- 99 additional lancedefs added to the random dynamic pool, across all difficulties starting at Difficulty 3 (1-1/2 skulls). Even at low difficulty, these added lancedefs can contain a full lance of advanced mechs and Elite/Ace pilots.

- 40 additional pilots defs for the randoms dynamic pools and dedicated EF lancedefs, starting at D3.

- Turrets can pull Elite pilots from the pilot pool

- Aces will be more common

- 6 new Advanced Mech variants

- No more reduced strength lances. All vanilla contracts that call for forces adding the "spawn_poorly_maintained_xx" SpawnEffectTags, will have this tag removed. Mechs in the lances called on in these contracts will be full strength.

- To install just unzip the add-on into the Elite Forces Mod folder. If you want to customize your experience, just install the specific files/folders you want.