AI War Beta 4.045 Released!

[x4000]

Original: http://arcengames.blogspot.com/2010/12/ai-war-beta-4045-released.html

This one is a much larger bugfix/balance release.  The asteroid seeding is a lot better now (only in new campaigns or savegames being upgraded to include asteroids for the first time, though), and there are a couple of new cheats (handy for us for testing), and the core shield generators have a few more kinks worked out of them.

Also, the wave size scaling by tech level has been adjusted in a nontrivial fashion, and a huge number of data centers are no longer seeded (as well as being cut out of existing savegames that are upgraded).  These changes are also intended to provide more fluid, less exploity-if-you-do-the-right-thing play.

And, of course, a dozen or two of other miscellaneous items.

This is a standard update that you can download through the in-game updater itself, if you already have 4.000 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 4.000 or later, you can download that here.

[Dyers_Eve]

Yay. Shield bearer nerf. While you are on the subject of AI progress buildings and core planets, could you make it so that AI superterminals and AI co-procs don't get seeded on AI home planets or maybe core planets too.

Also when AI does a CPA the ships never attack but stay on the threat counter until they find my fleet far away or partially destroyed and jump on the opportunity. Is this intended behavior? Because I have to attack the AI CPAs on their planets to clear them and it's kinda backwards since CPAs are supposed to be the AI attacking me not the other way around. I could also use a priority abcde in addition to numbers to keep track of the new AI shields.

[Lancefighter]

For those of you keeping track

thats a shield bearer BUFF for the player.

[Garthor]

Weren't Shield Bearers changed from Heavy to Structural, like, three days ago?  I recall Heavy being very frustrating to deal with, because while there are more ships that get a bonus against it than Structural, most of those bonuses are somewhere between 1.75 and 4.  On the other hand, many bonuses against Structural are in the 10-45 range, which makes quite a difference when you're dealing with millions of hit points.

Also, Basic and Laser turrets having a bonus against the bearers is not much of a condolence, seeing as the forcefield makes everything under it immune to tractor beams, and turrets are notoriously bad at chasing things.

[superking]

AI Stealth Guard Posts now have the cloaking super boost ability.

    * Thanks to mr_lolz for suggesting.

lol, mega

just a thought on harvesters- with 3000 armour they are still equally resistant to most fleetships, not to mention the weedy weapons of cloaked raidery types. If they had little or no armour (more HP to compensate) then such ships would be effective again... alot of ships seem to have lots of armour for no good reason and fleetship performance suffers as result.

[x4000]

Dyers-eye: regarding the ai behavior, yep that's intended. It's in the release notes from a bit back.

[Elukka]

Somehow, now that the AI is more careful and seems to retreat more often, it's actually scarier.

[Vinraith]

Weren't Shield Bearers changed from Heavy to Structural, like, three days ago?  I recall Heavy being very frustrating to deal with, because while there are more ships that get a bonus against it than Structural, most of those bonuses are somewhere between 1.75 and 4.  On the other hand, many bonuses against Structural are in the 10-45 range, which makes quite a difference when you're dealing with millions of hit points.

Also, Basic and Laser turrets having a bonus against the bearers is not much of a condolence, seeing as the forcefield makes everything under it immune to tractor beams, and turrets are notoriously bad at chasing things.

My thoughts exactly. I was thrilled when they were changed to structural, as I was able to finally damage the damned things. Now they're back to being invulnerable balls of annoyance.

[platinawolf]

I'm having some trouble with the AI knocking down distrubution nodes and other stuff ^^* Perhaps make them indestructable or somesuch as the AI really is irritating with popping every node on my planets or even neutral ones I've taken over for ARS's.

[Fleet]

Weren't Shield Bearers changed from Heavy to Structural, like, three days ago?  I recall Heavy being very frustrating to deal with, because while there are more ships that get a bonus against it than Structural, most of those bonuses are somewhere between 1.75 and 4.  On the other hand, many bonuses against Structural are in the 10-45 range, which makes quite a difference when you're dealing with millions of hit points.

Also, Basic and Laser turrets having a bonus against the bearers is not much of a condolence, seeing as the forcefield makes everything under it immune to tractor beams, and turrets are notoriously bad at chasing things.

My thoughts exactly. I was thrilled when they were changed to structural, as I was able to finally damage the damned things. Now they're back to being invulnerable balls of annoyance.

You could damage them as structural, with 4 million health? I spent ages killing a single Mk I bearer with the better part of my Mk I fleet. I don't want them to be balls of annoyance, which is why I reported the balance issue with them being structural.

[Vinraith]

Weren't Shield Bearers changed from Heavy to Structural, like, three days ago?  I recall Heavy being very frustrating to deal with, because while there are more ships that get a bonus against it than Structural, most of those bonuses are somewhere between 1.75 and 4.  On the other hand, many bonuses against Structural are in the 10-45 range, which makes quite a difference when you're dealing with millions of hit points.

Also, Basic and Laser turrets having a bonus against the bearers is not much of a condolence, seeing as the forcefield makes everything under it immune to tractor beams, and turrets are notoriously bad at chasing things.

My thoughts exactly. I was thrilled when they were changed to structural, as I was able to finally damage the damned things. Now they're back to being invulnerable balls of annoyance.

You could damage them as structural, with 4 million health? I spent ages killing a single Mk I bearer with the better part of my Mk I fleet. I don't want them to be balls of annoyance, which is why I reported the balance issue with them being structural.

Bombers made mincemeat of them comparatively easily, certainly much more easily than when they had the same amount of health and were classed as "heavy." In short, you could treat them like any other force field when they were structural, attack with sieges, bomber starships, and bombers and they were at least a bit less intractable. The health nerf should certainly help though, regardless. Are they really easier for you to kill on "heavy?" I think it's interesting that we obviously have the same goal here but are having markedly different results with hull type changes.

[Lancefighter]

put them at ultra-heavy then?

[Vinraith]

put them at ultra-heavy then?

Works for me.

[Giegue]

 yeah, I find CPAs confusing as well. especially on snake maps, I build my defenses on the front, but nothing ever arrives... I'm sure there are tons of ships somewhere back in the ai planets that were spawned, but they aren't really ATTACKING! perhaps they should be renamed to massive interplanetary reinforcement instead.

[Invelios]

yeah, I find CPAs confusing as well. especially on snake maps, I build my defenses on the front, but nothing ever arrives... I'm sure there are tons of ships somewhere back in the ai planets that were spawned, but they aren't really ATTACKING! perhaps they should be renamed to massive interplanetary reinforcement instead.

Wait, ships spawn in a CPA? I was under the impression that existing ships where just "freed" from guarding whatever they where guarding and therefore attack your planets.