Homing Missile Launchers | Rust Update 1st September 2023
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Anticipation for September’s update is certainly brewing as we wind down to less than a week before the forced update. Based on what we’ve been seeing on staging, September’s patch should contain several new features to keep players suspicious and on the offensive. Here’s my breakdown of what we are expecting to see, but keep in mind details are all still subject to change until the release.
The RUST Attack Helicopter
Potentially, the headlining feature of September’s update is the addition of the Attack Helicopter. This helicopter (not to be confused with the Patrol Helicopter) is a player-piloted vehicle and can seat two players. These air-based vehicles can be purchased at the Airwolf shop in Bandit Camp for just shy of your life savings in scrap and can be loaded with various rockets and weapons to mount a sophisticated attack.
The Attack Helicopter seats two players, as mentioned: the pilot and a gunner. The gunner has access to a targeting screen that allows them to survey the nearby environment to mount an aerial attack. While the gunner controls the mounted turret, the pilot also has access to artillery and can fire both rockets and flares.
RUST’s Hot Air Balloon gets an armor buff
In an interesting twist of fate, the Hot Air Balloon has received a bit of love with this patch. Players may now equip Hot Air Balloon Armor onto an air balloon to provide additional damage mitigation and health. Both the armor and the balloon itself will be available for purchase at Airwolf. It is currently unknown if balloons will stop spawning in the wild due to this feature, but we’ll keep you posted.
Parachutes
Should your piloting skills turn out to be sub-par, or a nearby SAM site landed a good shot, all is not lost. Players can now don Parachutes as a survival measure against falling to their deaths. Equipping a Parachute to the new clothing inventory slot will allow you to deploy a chute whilst airborne. Once deployed, the Parachute can be controlled by the player using WASD controls to attempt a calculated landing. Parachutes are not targettable by SAMs or Homing Missile Launchers, but players are still able to shoot and damage them.
RUST’s Homing Missile Launcher
It may seem like all the chips are in favor of the aerial attacker, but in reality, land-based defense has been provisioned, too. The Homing Missile Launcher is the newest weapon that targets and locks on aerial threats. Load the launcher with a Homing Missile, then target an object for attack. A small, white progress bar will display near the crosshairs if the target is compatible, indicating when the targeting system has locked onto the object. When the target is locked, fire the missile, and try to keep the crosshair positioned over your target while the missile is in flight for maximum effect.
Other changes in this week’s RUST Update
- Weapon racks may soon be deployable on Tugboats.
- Clan tables will also be deployable on Tugboats.
- Tutorial Island is getting a lot of love.
- What’s all this about gingerbread building skins?
- New Weapon Racks:
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Thanks for reading, and see you in the next RUST update!
Video Transcript
Greetings, survivors and friends. Shadowfrax here with new Rust development. This week, those new items just keep falling out of the sky, don’t they? Feature creep? What feature creep! I think you’ve got the wrong altitude about all of this.
As I keep repeating, the probably imaginatively titled forthcoming Air Patch on September 7th is going to require you to keep your eyes on the skies and be careful where you stand on the ground, thanks to incoming attack choppers and Parachutes, for one thing. But don’t panic; everything’s not lost. This week, there’s a little countermeasure for you to ward off any high-speed trouble that comes your way.
The bright sparks at Facepunch have added a homing missile launcher to the staging branch now. And please note, although we never change, it certainly is subject to change, so don’t take anything here as final.
It and its ammo are workbench level 2 items. Here they are on the tech tree, plus unlock costs. Here are the research costs for both, and here are the crafting requirements for both. Now, I’ve got a lot on my plate today, so I’m going to let my friend explain how one works.
Okay, yeah, thank you.
Okay, so, let’s see. This is still up, too, right? So, you can see, you know, it’s safe because it looks so handmade. But just load one of those in; textures are going to follow a bit later.
I don’t know what, so don’t bother aiming down there. You can’t see anything to it yet, but you’ve got to get a lock on a target; otherwise, it’s not going to work. See? Um, so you’re going to aim at your target, wait for it to lock on, so if you’ll hear it, and then you can fire. But, of course, you’ve got to keep aiming early; it’s going to fly fast, so that’s no good.
Uh, so let’s try that again. Hold on, let me just, um, like to pop another one of those in. And so aim and get the lock on and fire. Um, and just stay locked on and only just beautiful; look at that. See? No problem at all. Hope you like it. Um, yeah, a bit of fire there on the floor. Uh, uh, anyway, uh, another one of those in. Half-master, no textures still, but never mind. Um, yeah, anyway, that’s it.
Thanks. Okay, I’m back.
I’m not sure yet if you’ll be able to find homing launchers in the wild. At the moment, they’re only craftable, but I’m sure that’ll get firmed up closer to launch. As well as working on attack helis, it’ll target mini scrap transport and scientist-controlled helis. You can get a feel for the current range here, too. But at the moment, when it spies parachutes or hot air balloons, it does nothing and must be allergic to yellow cloth, I guess. Shiver.
Normal choppers currently take one missile to destroy, and patrols take four. But what can men do against such reckless use of ground-to-air systems, you ask? Well, it appears that now you can insert flares into the attack chopper’s storage, and the pilot can then use these with the right mouse button. There’ll be a warning sound in your cockpit when a missile’s inbound, and if the timing’s good, then they’ll be thrown off course. Huzzah!
But does this mean if you’re in a mini or a scrappy, then you’ll toast because you can’t put flares in those? Well, I’m informed that you’ll still get the warning sound, and it will instead be possible to chuck handheld flares over the side for the same effect. We’ll see how this arms race goes once it’s in the wild, I guess. But let me know what you think in the comments.
Talking of hot air things, are changing with balloons. And as well as still finding them in the wild, soon you’ll also be able to buy them at Airwolf for 150 scrap. Plus, upstairs, you can grab some balloon armor for a mere 70 scrap extra. This can be equipped on the balloon, easily raising its HP by a thousand, and it even comes with a door.
You can research it for 75 scrap. It’s a tier-one item; here it is on the tech tree, and here are the costs. A couple of extra things to note: You can’t take the armor back off of a balloon. Balloons will start using slightly less fuel as of the next patch and will be cheaper to repair. Plus, the team is changing decay on them so that fully inflated ones will still decay if indoors and/or no longer moving. You will still be able to keep uninflated ones indoors, okay, though. Also, there are some changes to make sure they don’t get permanently stuck on pylons, etc. So please use the balloons more. Oh, go on, please.
Parachutes have had some more tweaks. There’s a proper model for them now when worn, and it’s easier to deploy them when jumping off of things. You can also now hold the spacebar when falling to deploy them as soon as possible, rather than having to spam it.
In other news, you’ll be able to deploy weapon racks and clan tables on Tugboats soon.
There’s a lot of work on the tutorial island being done at the moment.
If you’ve been at all following the conversation recently regarding cheats in Rust and would like to see some word from Facepunch about it, then Al made a post on X about it this week. Pause here to read; you might find it worthwhile.
And lastly, what’s this? A gingerbread building skin? No prizes for guessing when this will be available, but will this usher in a new era of trap bases? And does it mean we’re going to get tier 2 cooking at some point soon? All will be revealed in time, I’m sure. So stay tuned and leave a like, sub, and comment below.
You’re up to date. I guess you can watch me play stuff on Twitch, follow me on a few socials to get updates on my content, and support me if you wish through YouTube memberships. Super Thanks, and Patreon links are all below. I shall catch you all soon, but in the meantime, keep calm and stay Rusty. Cheerio!
