aaaah right! ill get rid of the group and hopefully itll work lol

You're not crazy - I tried setting that up on the hotbar too wrt: the merge block and I swear it swapped. The key seems to be to put the fighter merge block *directly* on the hotbar, rather than with a group.

Fixed paint, adjusted colour and changed merge block on hotbar (again.. i swear it swaps around lol) as for the thruster issue on reconection, im stumped, hopefully there will be a bug fix that effects this soon=)

Full Review at The Fighter Review: Issue 5

Aesthetics: ★★★★☆

Overall the design is excellent - the core fighter is a classical starfighter shape, and the white and red-striped livery is bright and bold. My main issue was with the symmetry of the engine ring...

Systems: ★★★☆☆

The central conceit behind this fighter's design is to utilize a thruster ring to augment acceleration that can be jettisoned to give the ship greater maneuverability. The jettisoning part works well enough...

Armament: ★★★★☆

The central fighter is suitably armed for its size, with two cannons and one missile launcher. The missile launcher in particular is well-placed - well ahead of critical systems in the nose, and also by itself, which simultaneously reduces the chance of backfire and minimizes its impact when it does occur...

Overall: 3.6 out of 5 ★.