Any piloted ship or capsule within tethering range that has permission to dock at the citadel can be tethered to the citadel, preventing it from being locked or damaged as long as the tethering beam is active. The tethering range of a citadel is indicated by a ring of lights around the structure.
An active tether is indicated by a tethering beam extending from the structure to the tethered ship and conveys the following benefits to the tethered ship:
- Cannot be targeted
- Cannot take damage
- Structure, Armor and Shields will be repaired as well as weapons, burnt out and/or damaged by heat, that are currently equipped on the ship
- Capacitor will be recharged
The necessity for a repair beam is only checked when the tether engages, so any capacitor discharge incurred after the repairs are done won’t be recharged until the tether has been disengaged and engaged again.
A tethered ship can still collide with other ships and as such may be bumped outside of the tethering range. To prevent this from happening, please dock the ship.
An active tethering beam is indicated as an effect within the effect bar atop the HUD, as is a tethering delay:
An active repair beam while tethered is indicated there as well.
The following actions will prevent or break the tethering:
- Active weapons timer
- Having or starting a target lock on another target
- Lack of docking rights with the structure
- Ejecting from the ship
- Ship is warp scrambled
- Activating a cynosural field generator
- Launched Fighters that were not abandoned
Cynosural Jumps into Tethering Range
Following a cynosural jump, ships are delayed from tethering by 30 seconds. The tethering delay does NOT impact docking and it applies to all cynosural jumps, including normal (super)capital jumping, black ops or Jump Freighter jumping, and to ships being bridged; it does not affect the ship that provides the bridge and stays at the origin point.
The 30 second countdown begins once the ship loses its post-jump invulnerability, which in turn lasts until a command is given to the ship or up to 60 seconds. The ship's tethering delay timer will be shown in the buff bar UI.
Tethering and Factional Warfare
Upwell Structures owned by participants in Factional Warfare within contested Factional Warfare space may only be able to tether ships under certain conditions, as outlined in the following chart:
- A ship piloted by the attacking faction (or their ally) can never receive tether from ANY structure whilst in enemy FW space.
- A structure owned by the attacking faction (or their ally) can never provide tether to ANY ship whilst in enemy FW space.