AI War Beta 3.907 Released!

[x4000]

Original: http://arcengames.blogspot.com/2010/10/ai-war-beta-3907-released.html

More bugfixes and balance tweaks, again. And the last of the memory-usage improvements we'll be able to safely make before 4.0 comes out.

This new version really ramps up the size and ferocity of the waves as the difficulty is increased, while at the same time making them a bit weaker at difficulties 5 and below (starships are hard to counter for true newbies, as it was pointed out).  The difficulty 6 should be fairly straightforward still in terms of waves but difficulty 7 is definitely getting more harsh, and in difficulty 8 they should be a major event -- not to rival a CPA or anything, but also not a complete brush-off.  All those knowledge-free turrets now have a lot more of a purpose!

Also fixed some balance issues with the Neinzul roaming enclaves and preservation wardens (they were still too brutal), and a number of fixes and improvements have been made to the Objectives and References tabs.

This is a standard update that you can download through the in-game updater itself, if you already have 3.701 or later. When you launch the game, you'll see the notice of the update having been found if you're connected to the Internet at the time.  If you don't have 3.701 or later, you can download the windows installer for 3.711, or the OSX installer for 3.712. Once you do an in-game update, they'll both be on the latest version, despite starting at slightly different versions.

[Thumpy]

the change on the refence sheet is great. less searching and scrolling involved.

[x4000]

Awesome.  Kudos to Keith on that, that page is totally his baby.

[Sizzle]

One of the tweaks was a filter for:

Hostile Ships (anywhere you have scout intel)

How feasible would it be to maintain a list of "Hostile ships you have seen this game"?  That means that one of the AI's has that unlocked and can use it, regardless of if they're present at a planet you have intel on or not.

I *still* can't test so this is more of a theoretical question.  Stuff that would impact how much this is needed would include:

- can waves/CPA's/eye spawns/insert mechanic here be of a shiptype that hasn't been unlocked yet?
- how likely are you to have planet(s) that have no ships of a type the AI has unlocked?  If you have 10 scouts out there on 10 worlds, what are the chances that none of them will have something the AI has previously unlocked?

Do we want to force a new round of scouting (assuming a lot of your scouts are dead) just to try to find out what you need to build to take on something that just kicked your butt?

[Collic]

Love the wave balance changes so far on my current game, best solution all round I think

On my last game with the previous pre release I got wiped out utterly by a 2,000 ish CPA - I deserved it of course I don't think that would have happened as easily had I been pressured to keep up current and credible defences at my outlying planets. So, great change !

The extra filtering options are also very welcome, as are tachyon guardians on the galaxy map.

[Lancefighter]

this will certainly get fun - no wave warnings + crossplanet waves.. + diff 8 at the moment.

cant wait

[Mánagarmr]

Haha, have fun! My first wave on 8 difficulty was 280 MK I bombers and two starships. Was tough just 15 minutes in, but I made it.

[Ozymandiaz]

More of a thought on the 906 release then 907, but would it be an idea to adjust some of the units caps (increment) on the Zenith trader? Llatly I have started using eco station II a lot more then I used to, and with recent changes I do got a better start economy, but I still found it a huge investment as it was, and given the random appreances of the trader as well, I did not often build any of them unless I went for a turtleish game, or in the end game. The change on the Z power is nice, and I approve. But the things now got an astronomical cost, I am wondering if maybe too much of a cost? Mind, I have not been able to test much since I always seem to be away on some business trips everytime AI war goes through some huge changes

I also like the scout changes, will make the higher marks more useful

[Mánagarmr]

Yep, scouting is DEFINATELY harder now. I like it A LOT! It was a bit easy before. Some high mark planets are even hard to penetrate with a full cap of both scouts and scout starships.
Very good work!

[Lancefighter]

But the things now got an astronomical cost, I am wondering if maybe too much of a cost?

according to my awesome math, its about as good as having 5 mk3 reactors, for a total cost of 200m/c per sec.
Or, about 10 mk2 reactors, for a total cost of  150m/c per sec

It takes about 5-6 hours to pay itself off if you build it

[Ozymandiaz]

But the things now got an astronomical cost, I am wondering if maybe too much of a cost?

according to my awesome math, its about as good as having 5 mk3 reactors, for a total cost of 200m/c per sec.
Or, about 10 mk2 reactors, for a total cost of  150m/c per sec

It takes about 5-6 hours to pay itself off if you build it

Oh, the zenith energy one is good, I was mainly thinking about the rest, spending a long time on a SuperFortress is a huge commitment, and with the time it takes to build it (and the limit of 1) you are usually not too interestind in that planet anyways, unless its a Mk IV factory world in the middle of hostile territory and far off from your main worlds, and often at least I gate raid the planets around such important points, and the MK I Ion cannon quikcly outdates when you take a few planets (and oits not uncommon to capture them either ).

Just a thought really. Not based in strict testing, yet

[Shardz]

I saw the scouts took a hefty health nerf in the last patch, and sure enough...If it is intended for the scouts to have a maximum scouting range of three hops before their demise then mission accomplished.

The overall game is feeling and looking really solid. I've put in a little time playing over the last two patches, but haven't seen anything odd or broken. I'll leave the balancing to the stat jockeys, but the whole project has really shaped up nicely. Downloading today's patch was really slow, though...not sure if it was me. It was so slow that it just dumped me back into the lobby - I'm guessing it timed out after a while. After three tries I eventually got it, though.

[Mánagarmr]

I saw the scouts took a hefty health nerf in the last patch, and sure enough...If it is intended for the scouts to have a maximum scouting range of three hops before their demise then mission accomplished.

The overall game is feeling and looking really solid. I've put in a little time playing over the last two patches, but haven't seen anything odd or broken. I'll leave the balancing to the stat jockeys, but the whole project has really shaped up nicely. Downloading today's patch was really slow, though...not sure if it was me. It was so slow that it just dumped me back into the lobby - I'm guessing it timed out after a while. After three tries I eventually got it, though.

It gives you a reason to unlock better scouts. Or simply live with the fact that you are short-sighted So yeah, mission accomplished indeed.

[Collic]

About the scouting - it always used to be that you had to unlock the higher mark scouts if you wanted eyes on every system without any intervention on your part. I'm glad this is back in balance, it gives some value to the better scouts again.

The system is also improved with tachyon guardians - its been mentioned that if you take these out they will rarely be re-built, so you can carve a path for scouts. You couldn't do this before when turret balls would be rebuilt almost immediately - it was either take some planets or invest heavily in better scouts.

[x4000]

Sounds like all is well, at the moment, regarding wave size and scouting balance, etc.

Regarding the costs of the things like SuperFortress, etc, those are meant to be prohibitive -- it's like building one of those ultra weapons in SupCom, those would take literally an hour and cost everything you had at the END of the game.  At the start you had no hope to build them.  I've always wanted the Zenith Trader stuff (which is awesome all around) to have a similar sort of balance, that you wouldn't even think of building them in the first couple of hours of the game, because there would simply be no economy for it. 

Often it was "I don't have a fortress yet, I don't even have many mark III ships, but I have a SuperFortress that eats every wave that comes to my planet!" and I think that was out of kilter and always was.