Incursions

An extreme incursion

Incursions are an end-game activity in Everspace 2. An incursion event consists of one to three large Ancient beacons invading a location and spawning in Ancient-controlled units, who attack any and all other ships in the area. They are introduced in the side mission Incursions as a side effect of creating the Spatial Bypasses. The large amount of hostile and neutral ships fighting eachother can create an extremely chaotic battlefield. Incursions are the sole source of legendary signal decoders and Reliquaries, which are the primary ways to obtain Radiant legendary items.

Mechanics

Beacons

The Ancient Beacons in an Incursion are initially shielded and cannot be damaged. However, they can be rendered vulnerable by destroying the hostile Ancient-controlled enemies. Each destroyed enemy will release purple orbs of energy, which return to a beacon and weaken the shield. When enough enemies are destroyed and a beacon's shield goes to zero percent, it will be vulnerable for a short period of time (15 seconds). While the Ancient Beacon is vulnerable sounds will be slightly muffled and a pulsating sound will play. If the beacon is not destroyed in time, it will regain its shield, but will not regenerate health. If destroyed (down to 0% integrity), the beacon will explode and shatter.

Beacon status is shown on the right-hand-side of the screen with a percentage bar below the beacon number. While shielded, the bar is blue. While vulnerable, the bar is red.

When the last beacon is destroyed, the incursion will end and any remaining neutral or Ancient enemies will leave the area or become dormant and float in space. A large amount of loot and a Reliquary will drop from the last beacon when it shatters.

Generation

Incursions can occur in several locations in each system, but only up to five are active at one time. When a system has a location with an active incursion, it will be marked with a purple beacon-shaped icon on the map. Each location within a system that has an active incursion will also be marked with the purple icon, indicating the incursion difficulty. This icon is also visible while travelling in supralight.

Each incursion is only active for a short time (up to 10 minutes). The countdown timer and difficulty are displayed when hovering over the location on the map. There are no consequences for missing or leaving an Incursion; it will simply disappear and a new one will generate shortly.

Difficulty

Incursion difficulties range from moderate (one beacon), high (two beacons), to extreme (three beacons). Difficulty increases the number of hostile ships as well as increasing their stats, similarly to Ancient Rift lunacy. Extreme incursions are notably difficult and can be very chaotic. A fine-tuned Ships (ES2) build and skilled piloting may be required.

High difficulty incursions have a chance to drop a radiant (or normal) reliquary, while extreme incursions will always reward the player with a radiant reliquary.