Ok, I've been playing the 1.79 trunk for a few days now (version available 23rd Dec)-
Few observations - big groups of adversaries are far more dangerous than before- even in an 'iron ass' Caddy, a group of 6 or 7 can be quote devastating (made the mistake of pitching into one of the multi-gov war's, and suddenly 9-11ships all turned on my at once annihilating me in seconds...)
....to be honest, this is probably more 'right' in terms of game balance - these sort of fights should challenge even the best/strongest...(whether through skill or ship)
Pirates (well - all ships actually) far more readily turn round and hyperspace out if things don't go their way - which again is pretty reasonable really ! had one jump about 5 times to escape me..
Not had a chance to test the safer systems, but overall good
One observation- assigning a button to the cloak key (via joystick menu) no longer seems to work - it is accessible as primeable equipment, but assigning a direct button doesn't seem to work.
Not sure if this due it still being WP, my missing something, or weird behaviour from my joystick (X52)
Anyway, looking forward to the stable version

and many thanks to all those who have worked on this
