Still really enjoying the rebalance of the early game. The choices are interesting, and not always what I assumed. I was expecting the Male Touch/Gals are Superior option to be more along the lines of "fine, you want dudes, here, pick this option", and yet it was a genuine choice with consequences, and staying the course as in older versions wasn't the "right" path. The slavery/employment difference makes a big deal as well. In previous runs I always kept slaves because it was free storage, and the only other option was money, which wasn't generally the issue. Now that you literally have to choose between paying a fair wage or the lash, it's a whole different matter, and another consequence which I suspect will crop up again in the future.
I always enjoyed this mod for it's atmosphere and world building, but felt that the game itself was kinda shoehorned into it. That is so not the case anymore. Gameplay and the world feel so in tune now, it's so much more intuitive why something happens, or what you need to do. The extra narrative hand holding at the start and the push into "heroic swashbucklers" rather than "bloodthirsty pirates", plus making it clear that the Mutant Alliance has a hand in things from the start really gives the early game focus. Also I dunno if I just gitted gud, but combat feels a LOT more fair early.