@Ovinomancer , that looks pretty good to me in terms of assessment. I think I'll have a better feel after the next few sessions when combat experience, trekking, and exposure/conditions come into play.
I think you may be right though. The Panic rules issue may be a pivot point that really hurts this game. The more I get exposed to them, the less I love their instantiation. And play is so propelled by them that it becomes a thing.
Some of them are good because they belie environmental stresses that are broad:
7 NERVOUS TWITCH. Your STRESS LEVEL, and the STRESS LEVEL of all friendly PCs in SHORT range of you, increases by one.
8 TREMBLE. You start to tremble uncontrollably. All skill rolls using AGILITY suffer a –2 modification until your panic stops.
10 FREEZE. You’re frozen by fear or stress for one Round, losing your next point of action. Your STRESS LEVEL, and the STRESS LEVEL
Others...not so good.
11 SEEK COVER. You must use your next action to move away from danger and find a safe spot if possible. You are allowed to make a
retreat roll (p. 59) if you have an enemy at ENGAGED range. Your STRESS LEVEL is decreased by one, but the STRESS LEVEL of all
friendly PCs in SHORT range increases by one. After one Round, you can act normally.
I mean...come on here. This is extremely specific, extremely action economy specific, and extremely threat type/kind specific (you aren't Seeking Cover against a biological threat that can't pursue you/attack at range nor a geographic hazard that isn't a pyroclastic cloud or the like!).
Not great.
I'm also unclear on what the cash economy is supposed to do for outlying Frontier Colonies that are small and isolated.
What this game may turn out to be is a very aspirant Story Now game with some hexcrawl tech and some very poorly conceived tech that wobbles play a fair bit.