Thurin

something I don't remember seeing discussed throughout the KS campaign was AI !

• who's your AI wizard over there?
• how smart can we expect the enemy squads to be?
• will enemies be following scripted behaviours taken from a pool of coded behaviours, or will they try to optimize the current course of action that gives them greater chances to strike us, while remaining safe?
• can we expect to see enemy squads moving in a coordinated way, or will enemies act more or less independent of each other?
• can we expect different combat behaviours from the different factions? (military factions being more tactical & aggressive, rebels more in a guerilla mode, striking from a distance and disappearing, ...)
• :) might AI behaviour become moddable at some point? I'd love to put my hands on the game's AI !!

what is the total number of playable sectors you'll be aiming for? (assuming the game gets funded with a final value somewhere in the $350,000-$400,000 range)

the game's current expected release date is Nov 2014. Could you give us some guesses for approximately when could we expect to see the distributions of the Alpha and Beta builds (and also the "early access" release)? I know this is hard to guess, but even an indication like 6 months prior to final for Alpha and 3 month for Beta, is already informative.

regarding modding (and sorry if this has been answered somewhere else already): will it be possible to script new interactions/dialogues between the mercs and NPCS? or put another way: will modding be limited to creating new settings for the fights to take place in, and new weapons, or will it also be possible to create new stories/quests within the game?