Returning player but more of a new player, few questions

Hello

 

I used to play a very, but very long time ago, i remember playing before version 1.0, the thing is rushed to R15 with Jericho frigates, but also reched R11 with Empire and Federation, then was not able to play anymore because of work, like 3 years ago i tried to play again and read they implemented some kind of rewards for “new players” reaching new ranks on factions and since i was R15, and R11 on the other 2 i was not able to get those rewards and i remeber these where worth a lot of gringding time like almost a r8 destroyer or something, so i decided to start over just because of that, after all i rushed to hing ranks and only had 1 high rank ship of each faction (before they implemented a thing that made you own certain amount of ships from a faction to get higher ranks or i remeber something like that maybe im wrong), but now i come back again and notice Jericho And Federation dont have lines on tech tree until R7 to R8, also this clearence system i dont remeber, basically i know nothing about the game so my questions are:

Did they remove this rank reward system worth materials for manufacture for new players or its still there?

 

screenshot-200329-161334.jpg.f570533d8f0f26c0285d02ef8f6f9ebc.jpg

Did they remodel some ships, like Stix? i remember it different

 

and well that its i only want to know if rank reward system is there or changed to decide if keep playing with my rushed accound or the new one