An armoured Legend with an orange visor and a translucent cyan cape flies low over rain-soaked rooftops lit by neon signs.

Travel lines

Eight ways to cross Catena, and what each one costs you in a fight.

What a line changes

In the dev build Six lines' movement runs in the development build, on the server and in the client.

Every line reaches every objective in Catena. A line buys you shortcuts, style and Sync, and nothing else. What it changes is the way you get there, and what it costs you in a fight.

Nobody flies at level 1

In the dev build

Every Legend begins as a fledgling: warm, unspliced and grounded. A fledgling sprints fast, jumps once more than a person should, and can climb a wall. It cannot fly, blink, swing or outrun anything.

The game is designed so that every critical path in Catena can be finished on foot. A Legend who owns no travel node can still reach every objective, and that rule is the fledgling guarantee.

No weave, no clinic, no permission on file. Twelve metres a second, one more jump than you knew you had, and a wall the city was fairly sure was a wall.

The loaner

Partly built The loaner's flight exists in the build's first-flight scene, which runs on mock data.

Before any line, the first flight lends a new Legend a Clinic rig.

A Clinic loaner, still warm from the last Legend. It flies. It will not fly for long.

The First Splice

In the dev build The ceremony runs in the development build.

At Operator 10, Doc Splice seats the first node of the line you declared. The ceremony is the First Splice, and the Clinic also calls it the First Awakening.

A Legend who refuses the needle becomes a Cleanskin, and the weave lines close for good.

The first time you leave the ground, it is because something finally said yes.

Doc Splice is waiting. Open the trees and choose.

The Clinic prompt

Declaring a line

In the dev build

Choosing a line in the creator is a declaration. You are filed as a fledgling and stay grounded until the First Splice. Choosing none is a legal answer.

Only one line is active at a time. Over a career you can master one tree and partly grow two more, and nobody owns all eight. A Legend can wake further lines later, and only the Cleanskin refusal is for life.

The tree

In the dev build The trees run in the development build. The Operator 30 node of each also asks for the line's story, which is designed.

Every tree has the same seven tiers, from Operator 10 to Operator 50, and every tree costs the same 22 points to master. Travel points are a pool of their own, separate from the Wetware Grid.

Every tree has this shape. Skybreak's is shown here.

  1. Operator 10

    Wake

    First Lift. Flight exists, under a low ceiling.

  2. Operator 15

    Form fork

    Take one. Thermal Read. Ride the city's updrafts for free lift, and hover in combat for less Strain. Dead Lift. A big charged launch that can carry a consenting ally.

  3. Operator 20

    Reach

    Cruising Altitude. A higher ceiling and a faster cruise. Boost unlocks.

  4. Operator 25

    Cadence

    Full Attitude. Full three-dimensional steering, and a faster boost.

  5. Operator 30

    Questline node

    Ceiling Breaker. The line's top speed, and the sonic boom.

  6. Operator 40

    Apex fork

    Take one. Sonic Dive. A committed dive attack that turns speed into an impact. Cargo Writ. Carry allies the whole way.

  7. Operator 50

    Capstone

    The Sky Was Never Revoked. A faster boost ramp, strain-free hover bursts against the city's enemies, and a takeoff panel of its own.

The eight lines

In the dev build Six run in the development build. Jury-Rig's tree is written and its gadgets are not built. Fluxboard is in the workshop.

See also