Whats so exciting about this escalation?

Sorry for not being so excited at this point....
Perhaps I didn't find the new good stuff yet, but.
If your in an outfit and are not allowed (to craft and) use any of the new stuff, whats the point?
All remains the same, except for tons of new bugs.....

As a Non-Zergfit player; Once or twice a week... you'll get to pull an ESF and try to ram it into a big flying Barge.

It's basically up to an hour long air Anomaly where you used to ram into Liberators except the ESFs you're pulling from the ground remain full Nanite Price. And even if your Outfit OWNs the big flying Barge, the ESFs that it launches for free, spawn so slowly that you might as well not even bother if the queue is longer than 10 people on board.

Also you can't deploy MAX suits on top of the Deck of it unless the Captain promises not to move the thing more than 20 meters at a time which also makes it a Sitting duck for being mass-Rammed by Galaxies

You'll also be randomly auto-deployed into it if your Outfit owns it, And if it's taking any Damage at all, YOU CAN'T REDEPLOY BACK OUT OF IT and you're stuck inside until it blows up

Least the maximum pressure garbage alert is deleted.

If you're a solo player then all this update has done is absolutely ruin your map screen with literally pointless numbers and every now and then there will be a whole lot more ESFs around and a big flying base that you can do nothing with, other than die to it.

If you're in a small outfit it's more or less the same except you'll actually be collecting those numbers on the map.

If you're in a big mega outfit it's more or less the same except those numbers you're collecting pay for someone else to have fun with the big flying AMS.

The actual percentage of players that will be long-term engaged by this new content is very small i'd say, everyone else is just paying for them to do it.

Saw my first Bastion today, ESF pinata.... I counted 10+ Skyguards around mine and wow, certs raining.

I'd like to see if it can be used better but first impression was "lol, that's pointless!"

I died twice while gawping at a Bastion...

This brings up what I think are two important points, but with a lot of salt.
1. That redeploy problem. My outfit apparently had like 30 guys stuck inside the damned boat at all times when the entire time it was up (45 min).
2. That vehicle queue, seems long.

How are the bastion interceptors actually limited? Is there a max number of them, or is there a spawn rate?
If there is a max number of them then at least outfit leadership can go and say "everyone who wants to fly a plane, you're in alpha or beta squad, those are the plane squads" and just have them do that.
If you can theoretically have as may players in interceptors as other constraints allow, then that **** starts to get really hard to organize. You dont want to have people waiting in the bastion with nothing to do, unable to even redeploy. You dont want to have that queue sitting empty. You dont want to pull people from Libs or Gals or skyguards just to fill up the interceptor queue. You cant even see the interceptor queue unless you're stuck in the bastion, unable even to redeploy.

FTFY.

And a "Sanctuary" and kinda different "Air Alert".

Whats the Sanctuary good for? Can't shoot anything/-one there

If you spend enough time there you'll be rewarded with a golden jockstrap that you can wear on every faction.

I mean, I would wear it.

For me it's the much higher population, and the behaviour of the players; there's a lot more squads and platoons trying hard to conquer or defend bases.

That's what is so exciting about the patch, for me.

Of course there's loads of other stuff but at teh end of the day, if no one cares and everyone goes to one base and fights there for 5 hours, or if people care and try to fight for bases, it isn't the same game, at all.

You do know you can turn the numbers off right?

Actually, no, I wasn't aware of that! Thank you.
I did look for an option or check-box either in settings or on the map screen but I must have missed it so I apologise for that. Where is this option?

Click through the icons in the map legend looking UI element on the top right part of the map screen. Sorry don't remember which button specifically without logging in to look, but it's in the tab with all of the map filters - there are actually a decent number of them.

As someone who is not in a zergfit full of scumbagging sh*tters, your experience is best described in this little tale:
You take a walk and find a coin. You pick it up, happy about this little fortunate incident. Sometimes little things matter, too. Then a thug jumps out from behind a corner and shakes you down completely. After he is done and leaves, he in turn is ambushed by a strong person you are aquainted with. He in turn shakes down the mugger. You say "Hey, thanks, that was really nice. Too bad you weren't here a bit earlier, but anyway, good job!". He goes "Only did it for the money". You wonder a bit, but decide to thank him again: "Yeah, anyway, thanks for taking the money back, he just took that from me". And the other one simply goes "I know, I was around the corner waiting for him to finish you up. Now I took it from him, so it's mine!"

(Also the thread for reporting deleted bastion parts - we don't get many resources as it is as a little group - that they said people should respond to is locked. Cruel jest, seriously.)

Nothing is exciting about this update they just dumped more crap ontop of the old crap hoping it will make for exciting gameplay and add some depth to it, But it's A complete mess.

You get a gigantic population boost and bigger, better fights as a result.

The content of the update itself doesn't interest me, but I've finally started playing again because of the huge population boost.

Pop boost in and of itself isn't actually too god outside of certain areas. Because this increased population likes nothing better than taking the abses you just captured with a lot of effort just by sending 5 times as many people as you have. And your allied big numbers wait until you lose the place so they can recap for their outfit.
They somehow managed to tweak the meta in a way that more players are actually BAD for everyone who's not a mindless zergling.