 As the dust settles from update 13's arrival and salvation's activation of the Proteus Wave device, in this video we're looking at what update 13 really delivers, what it means for narrative in Elite Dangerous and where this leaves the game now. Suffice to say this video is chock full of spoilers right from the very start. To be sure you don't miss any of our videos hit the like and subscribe and remember to click the little bell icon and select all notifications and if you want to help directly support the work of this channel you can also join our Patreon via the link in the video description. As promised after attracting as many of the Thargoid as possible to HIP 22460, salvation activated the Proteus Wave device yesterday in the heart of a Thargoid surface site. Frontier had promised history and history is indeed what was delivered, in the law, in game and in real world terms, Elite has now entered a new era. In the story what we saw yesterday was the Thargoid surface site first being used to amplify the Proteus Wave sending it out across the system and knocking all the Thargoid ships offline, seemingly system wide. The surface site however appeared to then generate its own Thargoid flavoured version of the wave similarly blasting it out across the system knocking all human ships offline. Immediately afterward the Thargoid vessels wake up and again resume their attacks on the now completely defenceless humans. The results of that unopposed attack are exactly what you'd expect. The Proteus Wave behaved as expected, it's the Thargoids and their biomechanical technology that is the wild card here. The initial Proteus blasts in earlier chapters of the Azimuth Saga clearly caught them off guard. Subsequent uses of the weapon however have met with less and less meaningful results, to the point now where its effect on them appears to be temporary. Similar to the EMP pulses they use on human vessels during our encounters with them. For so, Guardian weapons in HIP 22460 are useless, the effects of the Thargoid blast are evident upon arrival in the system as your ships systems glitch and fritz. Anything Guardian based immediately begins to degrade and rapidly becomes inoperative. Thargoid vessels are super active and super aggressive in the system, if you drop into normal space anywhere in the system Thargoid vessels are not far behind and they usually arrive within a couple of minutes and immediately attack. So far I've been attacked in debris clouds, in the middle of a ring system and on a planet surface. Nowhere in HIP 22460 is safe, nowhere. One of the biggest oh wow moments however was when we approached planet 10B. The sight of the Proteus device is a huge green glowing angry looking mass clearly visible on the planet surface from mega meters away as you approach in supercruise. Planets 10B and 10C are still permit locked so we won't be landing there yet if indeed ever but from very close orbit the green glowing whatever it is is absolutely huge and feels your field of view. There are logs available from the remnants of azimuth's mega ships in system because of the attacking Thargoids obtaining them can be a trouser altering moment but it is possible and they are well worth seeing and hearing. Elsewhere off the back of yesterday's events other changes are now starting to appear. Plugging a guardian relic into a Thargoid mechanism now seems to corrupt the relic with sour salad signatures and has garnered the attention of both Professor Palin and Ram Tarr who are paying for more corrupted guardian relics to be delivered to them to further their research. As you can imagine the community is now speculating where that research will lead what's important in all of this is that it will lead somewhere and that means further new things are on the horizon. What happened yesterday with the firing of the Proteus weapon is just the start and at the end of the cinematic there was an ominous Thargoid scream the like of which hasn't been heard before Frontier clearly telegraphing something to the player base. In game terms what does all this mean then? We've clearly annoyed the Thargoids I don't think anyone is surprised by that but a simple resurgence in their previous activity and our previous counters to that activity wouldn't be enough of a post Proteus consequence. There needs to be more. The new situation in HIP 22460 could be taken as a sign of what's to come. If the Thargoids have learnt to generate an anti-guardian field from their many surface installations that in turn then causes our current guardian base technology to fail then they can in theory prevent us from easily removing them from a system where such an installation exists. If that's the case we'd need to develop a counter to that field or work out how to shut it down. As part of the patch notes for update 13 it was noted that a new state of pending for use before a system goes into a state of incursion is now in place. More granularity in system states with regards to all things Thargoid would seem to imply at least that a much more BGS like back and forth with the Thargoids could be in our future where perhaps our actions against them or the effects of their presence could prove more meaningful. It's possible then that a new Thargoid war and indeed a new Thargoid arms race could be in our future likely spearheaded once again by Palin and Thar. Just a quick FYI as well a new panel appeared in the cockpit UI yesterday on the left hand side showing a new at a glance summary of the current system its security state and population etc. What of salvation then is he dead and done with? A closer look at the cutscene delivered in game yesterday shows glimpses of salvation on board a fleet carrier style ship looking at the Proteus site from orbit. You might have assumed that was the bridge of the bright sentinel but a closer look at the tablet device to the right of the command chair shows the ship to be called Nemesis and there is no other wreckage around the bright sentinel we can draw from that then that in all likelihood salvation and the Nemesis survived the attack and escaped. With all the noise of the last few days it's easy to forget that as I speak these words it's only Wednesday we have yet to have the traditional Thargs day tick on Thursday when the game takes its turn and the Thargoids make all their moves. I do think war is coming we could see the opening salvos of that new war beginning as soon as tomorrow. I spoke at the start of this video about history and how Frontier had promised that update 13 would deliver it. In the lore the Proteus wave event is absolutely a moment in history. In game it seems likely we are entering into a third war with the Thargoids and a new generation 2.0 of Thargoid incursion with the start of a new technological arms race. Out of game history has further been made however. There was a watershed moment at the start of this year when Frontier shut down all communications and engagement with the community and effectively fell silent. Off the back of the troubled Odyssey launch poor initial reception and lower than expected sales performance from the expansion this silence was taken by some as a sign that the game was being parked in maintenance mode. When the cancellation of further console development for the franchise was announced those murmurings of doom were further compounded. The community demanded clarification and better communication from Frontier and eventually Frontier spoke. Whilst they didn't wish to go into specifics for fear of dealing in spoilers they did offer assurances very specifically that the game wasn't dead and that Odyssey had a future for itself in development. They also promised better communication. The build up to the events of yesterday was a crescendo moment in the company's dealings with its playerbase. The community team has been ever present, engaged and excited. Likewise the devs have engaged on social media and in person when restrictions are allowed and it's been a breath of fresh air and actually felt like a live service game delivering on an important content update to its playerbase. Update 13 for Odyssey was a crucial moment for Frontier. They've often been criticized for buggy launches and the shadow of Odyssey's launch still looms large. They needed every aspect of the Proteus event and the start of the aftermath era to deliver. They needed it to be a smooth launch and they needed the community to like what they saw and the developers have landed both those ships beautifully. Yesterday was undoubtedly a day of contrasts for players on horizons however. Before the drop yesterday Frontier were encouraging commanders to head to HIP 22460 to witness the events and they also said everyone would see the end of the azimuth saga regardless of the platform they were playing on. As it transpired those two statements were not the same thing. Players in Odyssey saw both, players in horizons saw only the cutscene. Whilst the wording of their communications could have been more exacting on those specific points, doing so would have essentially spoiled a lot of the surprise delivered by the existence of an in-game cutscene. They had specifically stated in the months running up to update 13 that horizons was now static and that the new narrative going forward would only be delivered through the Odyssey codebase. It certainly seems now that update 13 is where the two universes of elite dangerous branch apart. With the arrival of the aftermath we're starting to see what the Odyssey codebase is capable of producing and it will be fascinating to see how it progresses further from here. Here at the pit we have openly criticised Frontier when their communication was lacking and it's only right that they be congratulated when they get it right. The out of game build up to the Proteus event has been a benchmark moment in the game's history. Fdev have masterfully handled their communications and engagement with the playerbase in a way that I've not witnessed from this company before. It's been refreshing, exciting, funny, constantly engaging and a privilege to witness. The community has been fired up and brought back into the game like never before and it really feels like Frontier and now alongside us all excitedly steering the ride. I personally can't wait to see what happens next. There's a new confidence oozing from Frontier these days and their live stream on Thursday evening is bound to also be one for the record books. If Elite Dangerous is your go-to space game then it's your turn again to be excited. Aftermath feels like the start of a bold brave new era for the game and that finally now the Odyssey has begun. How was patch day and the Proteus wave event for you? What do you think the aftermath has in store for us? Let us know in the comments below. That's it for now. Thanks very much for watching. If you enjoyed this video consider subscribing to the channel and maybe take a look at one of our other videos linked on screen right now.