AI War Beta 7.032-7.033 "Peaceful Interlude" Released!

[ZaneWolfe]

Also, mentioned it in my AAR, but what exactly does the "Absorbs EMPs" ability on the OMD mean? And could that maybe go into the description of the unit, since it's not even on the wiki?

In theory, it will negate EMP bursts. I tend to kill EMP Guardians before they hit my chokepoint, so I'm not sure if that works in practice.

[Toranth]

-- And distributed-defense is now immediately possible from the beginning of the game, so long as you have the necessary metal and energy production.

My Energy!  Where did all my energy go?!
*looks at the thousands of turrets*
Huh.  I guess that's where it went.


So now it takes 32,250 Knowledge to unlock all the Mk II-IV general turrets (Not HBCs, tractors, Gravs, anti-*, etc).
This gives you 1,008 turrets on EACH planet, costing 3,110,400 Metal to build, 633,600 Energy to maintain, and dealing 116,145.6 DPS (old 11,614,560 DPS).
And on one chokepoint planet, you can build the Mk IVs, costing another 1,036,800 Metal, using another 211,200 Energy, and dealing another 64,871.2 DPS.
All together, that's 4,147,200 Metal, 844,800 Energy, and 181,016.8 DPS (old 18,101,600 DPS).



But still... Every world needs a ZPG to fully defend itself now 


PS:  Is there a reason most turrets don't follow the usual Mk II = 2 x Mk I, Mk III = 3 x Mk I damage progression anymore?  It's only minor variation (except Flak) but only the Needler and Laser actually follow it perfectly.

[Mad Rubicant]

Also, mentioned it in my AAR, but what exactly does the "Absorbs EMPs" ability on the OMD mean? And could that maybe go into the description of the unit, since it's not even on the wiki?

In theory, it will negate EMP bursts. I tend to kill EMP Guardians before they hit my chokepoint, so I'm not sure if that works in practice.

Tell that to my homeworld. I got hit by 12 EMP Guardians at the same time, for a grand total of 3 agonizing minutes. Since the wiki says they make a 30 second EMP, and as far as I can tell, it stacks, I'm guessing that OMDs reduce EMP time by half. I understand that EMPs are a way for the AI to break through heavy chokepoints, and oh god I'd be dead without my Gravity IIIs, but some way of countering them would be nice. Obviously it would have to cost knowledge, probably more than a planet's worth, to make it a heavy investment.

[Peter Ebbesen]

Oh, oops.  The bug there is that the MkI spider is initially unlocked, it's not supposed to be

Ah, so Mk.I is supposed to be locked initially and an old unlocked Spider Turret presumably translated into an unlocked Mk. I. Got it. Thanks.

[Aklyon]

-- And distributed-defense is now immediately possible from the beginning of the game, so long as you have the necessary metal and energy production.

My Energy!  Where did all my energy go?!
*looks at the thousands of turrets*
Huh.  I guess that's where it went.


So now it takes 32,250 Knowledge to unlock all the Mk II-IV general turrets (Not HBCs, tractors, Gravs, anti-*, etc).
This gives you 1,008 turrets on EACH planet, costing 3,110,400 Metal to build, 633,600 Energy to maintain, and dealing 116,145.6 DPS (old 11,614,560 DPS).
And on one chokepoint planet, you can build the Mk IVs, costing another 1,036,800 Metal, using another 211,200 Energy, and dealing another 64,871.2 DPS.
All together, that's 4,147,200 Metal, 844,800 Energy, and 181,016.8 DPS (old 18,101,600 DPS).



But still... Every world needs a ZPG to fully defend itself now 

Have we accidentally the excess energy situation just by giving out more turrets?

[keith.lamothe]

Have we accidentally the excess energy situation just by giving out more turrets?

It did strike me as a possible outcome.  The natural consequence of allowing a player to place all the turrets on all the places is that the player will then not feel sufficiently secure until this is actually done.

ZaneWolfe: on the spire corvette rail cannon thing I probably won't have time for a hotfix until tomorrow; actually gotta run right now.  If something more core-game breaks horribly in the meantime I may do one tonight but I'd like to avoid it.

[Peter Ebbesen]

Also, mentioned it in my AAR, but what exactly does the "Absorbs EMPs" ability on the OMD mean? And could that maybe go into the description of the unit, since it's not even on the wiki?

Okay - I can't swear to this as I was mostly busy watching my space empire die - but in the testgame two weeks back where I first encountered EMP Guardians, I concluded tentatively that Absorb EMP actually worked as a version of EMP immunity that repaired the OMB when an EMP pulse went off, i.e. an ability that didn't benefit anything but itself. Then again, it might have been repaired to full by one of the engineers that teleported back to my home during the assault, and I never got around to running a structured test afterwards, so don't rely on this without testing or other substantiation.

[ZaneWolfe]

ZaneWolfe: on the spire corvette rail cannon thing I probably won't have time for a hotfix until tomorrow; actually gotta run right now.  If something more core-game breaks horribly in the meantime I may do one tonight but I'd like to avoid it.

Ok, clearly there is only one thing to do. Someone go break the game. Now. You have your orders, move out.

Edit:

It did strike me as a possible outcome.  The natural consequence of allowing a player to place all the turrets on all the places is that the player will then not feel sufficiently secure until this is actually done.

Please don't feed my paranoia Keith. I already make absolutely certain that my choke is fully ready to be deployed, including having a Z-Trader on site, before I move it forward.

[Winge]

Have we accidentally the excess energy situation just by giving out more turrets?

It did strike me as a possible outcome.  The natural consequence of allowing a player to place all the turrets on all the places is that the player will then not feel sufficiently secure until this is actually done.

ZaneWolfe: on the spire corvette rail cannon thing I probably won't have time for a hotfix until tomorrow; actually gotta run right now.  If something more core-game breaks horribly in the meantime I may do one tonight but I'd like to avoid it.

ZaneWolfe: on the spire corvette rail cannon thing I probably won't have time for a hotfix until tomorrow; actually gotta run right now.  If something more core-game breaks horribly in the meantime I may do one tonight but I'd like to avoid it.

Ok, clearly there is only one thing to do. Someone go break the game. Now. You have your orders, move out.

As easily said as done.

Three words:  Spirecraft Attritioner, Mines.  I know someone else mentioned it, but you really need to update their damage per second and tooltip.  I'm pretty sure I could've killed an infinite amount of incoming Mk III Railclusters with JUST my attritioners.  And Reprocessors just insta-melt.  Mine damage too.  A wave just spawned a carrier halfway to my defenses, and everything in that carrier (including the Z. Starship) melted before getting in range of my shields.   >D

Keep in mind these same waves were inflicting casualties on my defenses.  Now, they can't even get past the minefields (though, I suppose the Sniper changes could be part of that too...).  Granted, I don't mind if this doesn't change for a while...I still have two exos to burn... >D

[TechSY730]

Already a thread about attrition, mines, and armor damage:
http://www.arcengames.com/forums/index.php/topic,15726.0.html

[Cinth]

It takes full caps of Attritioners about 10 seconds to kill a Spirecraft Railcluster III.  100,000 Hp vs 10,500 dps.

That's a far cry from instant kills.

Reprocessors fall fairly quick agaisnt anything with bonuses against medium hulls.  Sniper turrets have bonuses against medium hulls.  I'm pretty sure the combination of your local defenses just took care of it all rather quickly.

[Diazo]

@Absorb EMP

I am 100% sure that Absorb EMP does in fact heal the unit when it get hit by an EMP. This is in contrast to a unit with EMP immunity which simply is not affected by EMP.

I did ask about this previously when I ran into it quite a while back, there was actually reports at that time that it actually conferred EMP immunity to units near it as well. I've never tested this myself so I can't confirm it.

With how long the Absorb EMP ability has been around (pretty sure at least verison 3), I would suspect it does not actually protect nearby units as that far back very few units affected nearby units in any way and it would have been a bigger deal.

D.

[Coppermantis]

Liking these changes. Might start up my first game of AI War in a while, once my finals are over.

[Fleet Unity]

All Broken Golems instantly come online and repair themselves the second you capture a planet so it costs no metal to repair them! Although helpful I am sure this is not intended!

[Bognor]

There's a bunch of threads I haven't read, but has anyone thought about how the turret changes will impact defender mode?  I guess it's now a lot easier if you're defending multiple ingress points.