Nebula War
Every galaxy in Orbitarion has one nebula — a contested zone with 10 slots that alliances fight to control. Slots produce Valor Points each tick they're held. Hold enough, and your alliance climbs through the tier system to unlock better Dominion access and economic bonuses.
Nebula War is the early-to-mid-game alliance content in Orbitarion. Where Orbital Dominion is endgame coordination across the universe, Nebula War is the daily skirmish — every alliance has nebulae to attack, hold, and defend within their galactic neighborhood.
This page covers slot mechanics, NPC garrisons, cooldowns, VP, and how Nebula tier flows into the rest of the game.
Map structure
Each galaxy has one nebula. Each nebula has 10 slots numbered 1 through 10. Slot 1 is the easiest entry point, slot 10 is the hardest endpoint. The deeper you push into a nebula, the harder the NPC defenders and the higher the VP reward for capture and holding.
| Slot | Fleet cap | NPC fleet count | NPC strength |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | 5 000 | 2 fleets | Light |
| 2 | 8 000 | 2 fleets | Light |
| 3 | 12 000 | 3 fleets | Light–medium |
| 4 | 18 000 | 3 fleets | Medium |
| 5 | 25 000 | 4 fleets | Medium |
| 6 | 35 000 | 4 fleets | Medium–heavy |
| 7 | 50 000 | 5 fleets | Heavy |
| 8 | 70 000 | 6 fleets | Heavy |
| 9 | 100 000 | 7 fleets | Very heavy |
| 10 | 150 000 | 8 fleets | Endgame |
Each slot can hold up to 10 separate defender fleets (per-slot capacity for stationed garrisons). When NPCs hold a slot, those fleets are pre-seeded by build_npc_fleet_for_slot — bigger slots get more fleets, all of them stronger.
Slot states
A slot is in one of three states:
| State | Meaning |
|---|---|
| npc | Default starting state. Void Raiders hold the slot |
| alliance | An alliance controls the slot. They earn holding VP each VP-tick |
| empty | The slot is cleared but no alliance claimed it. Free to be re-occupied. NPCs respawn here after 24 hours |
When you defeat all NPC fleets in a slot, the slot transitions to alliance (if you're in an alliance) or empty (if you're solo). Once the slot is alliance-controlled, it stays that way until another alliance attacks and clears it.
Lockdown
Immediately after any slot is cleared (NPC or alliance), it enters 2-hour lockdown. During lockdown, no one can attack the slot — the new controller has time to garrison without immediately losing it.
After 2 hours, lockdown expires and the slot is attackable again. The 2-hour timer is wall-clock time, not ticks, so it applies the same to Speed Rounds and regular Seasons.
Adjacency — you can't just attack slot 10
You can only attack a slot you have adjacent access to. The rules:
| Slot | When can you attack |
|---|---|
| Slot 1 | Always attackable (entry point) |
| Slots 2–10 | You must control an adjacent slot (slot−1 OR slot+1) OR that slot must be empty |
Practical implication: you start at slot 1, fight inward. You cannot skip ahead to high slots — you have to push through. This makes alliance coordination important: an alliance that takes slots 1–6 anchors a wide front, while skipping slots leaves vulnerable gaps.
An empty adjacent slot still counts. If slot 4 is empty, you can attack both slot 3 and slot 5 from it.
Attacking a slot
To attack a slot, send ships from your planet using the Nebula Attack action. The engine validates:
| Check | Rule |
|---|---|
| Slot exists, not in lockdown | Slot must be attackable |
| Adjacency | See above |
| Not your own slot | Cannot attack a slot your alliance already controls |
| Wave cooldown | 5-win wave cooldown (see below) |
| Attack cap | Your sent fleet must be ≤ 150% of the slot's fleet cap |
| Combat ships | Capture-ships and steal-ships cannot participate in nebula attacks |
Once validated, the attack resolves immediately during that tick — not on a delay. There's no fleet ETA. You spend the ships, you get the result, you receive surviving ships back.
Attack cap
The 150% cap prevents whales from one-shotting endgame slots with overwhelming force. For slot 10 (150 000 cap), the maximum attack fleet is 225 000 value — enough to power through but not infinite.
One fleet at a time
The slot has multiple NPC or alliance defender fleets, but they fight one at a time — sorted by fleet_number. Your attack engages the lowest-numbered active fleet, depletes it (or loses to it), then the next attack engages the next fleet. To fully clear an inner-ring slot you might need 5–8 separate attacks.
This is intentional. It makes high-slot captures feel like sieges, not single skirmishes.
Wave cooldown — 5 wins in 2 hours
To prevent farming, the engine enforces a 5-win wave cooldown per planet, per nebula:
If your planet has won 5+ nebula battles in this nebula within the last 2 hours, you cannot attack again until the oldest of those 5 wins ages out (rolling 2-hour window).
This is real wall-clock time, not ticks. After your 5th win the cooldown timer resets each subsequent win, so an active raider could theoretically keep waving every 24 minutes. But back-to-back farming is throttled.
The cooldown is per nebula. You can attack other nebulae in parallel — Nebula War is meant to encourage diversification across multiple galactic theaters, not focused grinding on a single target.
Losses and draws don't count toward the wave cooldown — only wins.
Capture VP — instant reward on clearing a slot
When you fully clear the last defender fleet in a slot, your alliance receives instant capture VP:
| Slot | Capture VP |
|---|---|
| 1–3 | 10 |
| 4–6 | 15 |
| 7–9 | 25 |
| 10 | 50 |
Capture VP is awarded once, at the moment the slot transitions to alliance (or empty if you're solo).
If you're not in an alliance, you still clear the slot — but no VP is awarded. Solo play takes slots; alliance play earns from them.
Holding VP — recurring reward, every 24 ticks
While your alliance controls a slot, it generates holding VP every 24 ticks. The amount depends on the slot:
| Slot | Holding VP per 24 ticks |
|---|---|
| 1–3 | 10 |
| 4–6 | 15 |
| 7–9 | 20 |
| 10 | 30 |
Plus alliance-wide dominance bonuses based on how many slots in a single nebula your alliance holds:
| Slots held in one nebula | Bonus VP |
|---|---|
| 4+ | +20 |
| 7+ | +50 |
| 10 (full sweep) | +100 |
A full-sweep nebula (10 slots controlled by one alliance) generates 165 VP per 24 ticks from holding (3×10 + 3×15 + 3×20 + 30) + 100 dominance bonus = 265 VP per cycle, plus a one-time 200 VP from captures (3×10 + 3×15 + 3×25 + 50).
Holding cadence
The 24-tick rhythm means holding VP accrues:
- Regular season (30-min ticks): every 12 hours
- Speed Round (5-min ticks): every 2 hours
Holding VP accrues independent of who's in the slot — alliance members don't need to garrison the slot for VP to be earned. Once captured, the slot earns VP on its own until cleared.
Alliance tiers — VP unlocks tier benefits
Total cumulative VP determines your alliance's tier, which unlocks benefits across the game:
| Tier | VP threshold | Benefits at a glance |
|---|---|---|
| Unranked | 0 | — |
| Bronze | 2 000 | −5% ship/defense build time, −5% research speed |
| Silver | 8 000 | −10% build time, −5% ship cost, +1 active Dominion slot |
| Gold | 20 000 | −15% build time, −10% ship cost, 1 free scan / 24t / member |
| Platinum | 50 000 | −20% build time, −15% ship cost, 2 free scans / 24t / member |
| Diamond | 100 000 | −25% build time, −20% ship cost, 3 free scans / 24t / member, −1 fleet ETA to allied-nebula galaxies |
VP thresholds are the same across all round types — Speed Round and Season use identical thresholds. Diamond is reachable at 100 000 VP regardless of which round you're playing.
Cumulative VP only grows — it doesn't decrease when slots are lost. You can lose a slot and your alliance keeps the VP it earned from holding it.
Tier is recalculated every 24 ticks during holding VP processing. See Alliances — Alliance tiers for the full benefit breakdown.
NPC garrisons — Void Raider AI
When a slot is in npc state, Void Raider fleets defend it. These are NPC ships from "The Void" race (see The Void) — bot-only, no commander, ~70% efficiency of equivalent player ships.
NPC composition
Each NPC fleet in a slot is built by build_npc_fleet_for_slot based on the slot number. Composition scales upward:
- Slot 1: Mostly Fighters
- Slot 4: Fighters, Corvettes, Frigates
- Slot 7: Frigates, Destroyers, first Cruisers, occasional Battleship
- Slot 10: Cruisers, Destroyers, multiple Battleships, deep stacks
The composition is identical across all 33 nebulae in a round — every slot 5 has the same NPC strength, regardless of which galaxy you're in. This makes the game fair for new players entering any galaxy.
Premium intel
By default, you see only the slot's NPC fleet class composition (e.g. "Fighters, Corvettes, Frigates"). Premium subscribers see the exact ship names and quantities of each NPC fleet before attacking — a major intelligence advantage for planning attacks against high-slot NPCs.
NPC respawn
When a slot becomes empty (cleared but unclaimed), Void Raiders respawn into it after 24 hours of real time. This means an unclaimed slot is not lost forever — eventually NPCs reclaim it and a new alliance can start the cycle.
The respawn uses slightly weaker NPC fleets (p_strength = 0.75 vs 1.0 initial) to give the alliance an easier opening to retake territory they'd previously held.
Void immunity
Void Raider ships cannot be stolen by STC steal-ships. The boarding hardware doesn't work on Void hulls. STC players attacking nebula NPCs deal damage normally, but never gain captured ships — only kills.
This prevents farming nebula NPCs for free fleet. It also means STC players need a mix of kill-ships in their nebula attack fleets — pure steal-fleet doesn't translate well here.
Defending your slot — alliance garrisons
When your alliance controls a slot, members can garrison their own ships there to defend it. The mechanics:
| Behavior | Detail |
|---|---|
| Who can garrison | Any member of the controlling alliance |
| What ships | Any combat ships from your home fleet. Capture and steal ships cannot garrison |
| Slot capacity | Up to 10 separate fleets per slot, one fleet per garrison submission |
| Travel time | Garrisons travel from your planet to the nebula slot — same ETA as a regular fleet movement (typically 1–4 ticks depending on Engines research) |
| Status | in_transit while traveling, stationed once arrived |
| Withdraw | You can withdraw your garrison from a slot, ships travel back home (withdrawing status, same ETA) |
When attackers fight your slot, they engage one fleet at a time — the lowest-numbered active stationed fleet first. Defenders take proportional losses across all ship types in that fleet. Surviving ships from that fleet remain stationed.
Auto-return when slot changes hands
If your alliance loses control of the slot while your garrison is in transit (still traveling to the slot), your ships automatically return to your home planet rather than landing on a hostile slot. This means you don't lose ships to a "wasted" garrison attempt.
Combat — same engine as PvP
Nebula battles use the same simulate_battle engine as PvP and Dominion. All standard combat mechanics apply:
- 3-round battle with initiative-based firing order
- Hit chance based on weapon_speed and agility
- EMP freezing for ATH ships
- Commander buffs apply to the attacker (always) and to the largest-contributing defender when the slot is alliance-controlled
- Luck factor of ±15% per battle
- PDS does not apply — nebula slots are not planets, no ground-based defense
NPC fleets defend without commander buffs (NPCs have no commander). Alliance-controlled slots get full commander buff support — encouraging your alliance's biggest commander to be the one anchoring the defense.
See Combat for full mechanics.
Premium battle replay
Premium subscribers can view full 3-round battle replays of any nebula battle they participated in, with detailed event logs for each shot. The get_nebula_battle RPC returns the complete log. Free players see only the summary outcome.
XP from nebula battles
Nebula combat earns Commander XP for both attacker and defender:
| Event | XP per event | Daily cap |
|---|---|---|
| Battle won in nebula | 15 | 60 XP/day per planet |
| Slot held (T1, slots 1–3) | 0.5 per planet per tick | unified 120 XP/day cap |
| Slot held (T2, slots 4–6) | 1 per planet per tick | same cap |
| Slot held (T3, slots 7–9) | 2 per planet per tick | same cap |
| Slot held (T4, slot 10) | 3 per planet per tick | same cap |
A fully-active nebula player can hit the 120 XP/day holding cap easily — that's a reliable +120 XP/day baseline for your Commander throughout the season. See Commanders for details.
Speed Round XP is 2× these values, just like every other XP source.
Push notifications
Premium subscribers can opt into push notifications for nebula events via the notify_nebula preference. Events that fire push notifications:
- Your slot is being attacked
- Your garrison takes damage
- An NPC slot in your nebula has been cleared
- Your alliance has captured a new slot
Free players see these events in the in-app news feed but don't get phone push.
Strategy notes
Anchor slot 1 first. It's always attackable, the NPC fleets are weakest, and securing it gives you adjacency for slots 2 and 3. Most alliances start their nebula presence here.
Spread the wave cooldown across members. A 5-person alliance can sustain 25 wins per nebula every 2 hours by rotating attackers. Coordinated waves clear nebulae faster than solo grinding.
Don't let unclaimed slots sit. A cleared empty slot respawns NPCs after 24 hours of real time. If you want to keep alliance VP flowing, claim the slot the moment you clear it.
Garrison defensively. A slot you don't garrison can be retaken by even mid-tier attackers. The 2-hour lockdown gives you time to deploy, but eventually it expires.
Watch full-sweep bonuses. Holding all 10 slots in one nebula adds +100 VP per 48-tick cycle. Two alliances racing for a single nebula's full sweep is a recurring v2 storyline.
Premium pays off here. Exact NPC composition is significant — knowing slot 9 has 7 fleets with specific ship distributions lets you build precise counter-fleets. Battle replays for post-mortem analysis matter for alliance coordination.
ATH is the best nebula race. Void Raiders have 0 EMP resistance across all classes. ATH freeze fleets dominate NPC engagements.
Quick reference
| Concept | Detail |
|---|---|
| Nebulae per galaxy | 1 |
| Slots per nebula | 10 |
| NPC race | The Void (Void Raiders) |
| Adjacency | Slot 1 always attackable, others need adjacent controlled or empty slot |
| Slot states | npc, alliance, empty |
| Lockdown after capture | 2 hours real time |
| NPC respawn after empty | 24 hours real time |
| NPC strength on respawn | 75% (vs 100% initial) |
| Attack cap | 150% of slot fleet cap |
| Wave cooldown | 5 wins in 2 hours per nebula per player |
| Capture VP (slots 1–3 / 4–6 / 7–9 / 10) | 10 / 15 / 25 / 50 |
| Holding VP per 24 ticks (slots 1–3 / 4–6 / 7–9 / 10) | 10 / 15 / 20 / 30 |
| Holding cadence (Season) | Every 12 hours |
| Holding cadence (Speed Round) | Every 2 hours |
| Dominance bonus (4+/7+/10 slots) | +20 / +50 / +100 VP |
| Tier thresholds (all rounds) | 2 000 / 8 000 / 20 000 / 50 000 / 100 000 |
| Max defender fleets per slot | 10 |
| Ships excluded from nebula combat | Capture-ships, steal-ships |
| STC can steal NPC ships | No (Void immunity) |
| Commander buffs in nebula | Attacker always, defender = largest contributor |
| PDS in nebula | None |
| Premium intel | Exact NPC composition + full battle replays |
| XP per won nebula battle | 10 (cap 30/day) |
| XP per holding (max) | 60/day across all slots held |
Documentation reflects Orbitarion v2.0. Last updated: 2026-06-07.