AI War Beta 7.043-7.044 "Beltsander of Worlds MkI" Released!

[keith.lamothe]

(Crossposted from this blog post)

This one is mainly bugfixes and balance work for the new expansion, but also some base game stuff.

Not a lot to say here except to read the above-linked release notes if you want to know the details.  Partly just making this an update-with-blog-post (as opposed to yet another hotfix on the previous forum release thread) to make sure the new blogging system works, etc :)

Update: 7.044 is out to hotfix a bug in the pathfinding amendments (to make it not prefer nomads so much) that basically broke pathfinding in a lot of cases.  Whoops!

Enjoy!

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.

[orzelek]

I think something went slightly wrong in this one.
Load my save file from http://www.arcengames.com/mantisbt/view.php?id=15477 and try to order champion to return home.
I can't make him do that currently - no white line on map draws to show travel path like HW is not accessible from planet he is on. I can make him go there by jumping to neighboring planet first and then path further from there. This behavior persists through save/load.

[keith.lamothe]

I think something went slightly wrong in this one.
Load my save file from http://www.arcengames.com/mantisbt/view.php?id=15477 and try to order champion to return home.
I can't make him do that currently - no white line on map draws to show travel path like HW is not accessible from planet he is on. I can make him go there by jumping to neighboring planet first and then path further from there. This behavior persists through save/load.

Thanks for letting me know, taking a look now.

[keith.lamothe]

Update: 7.044 is out to hotfix a bug in the pathfinding amendments (to make it not prefer nomads so much) that basically broke pathfinding in a lot of cases.  Whoops!


Your test case worked after that, orzelek; let me know if you run into another case like that.

[Draco18s]

Looks good!

[tadrinth]

Minor polish suggestion:  Dire Guardian Lairs should probably list either how long it takes them to construct a Dire Guardian, or the build point threshold at which they finish construction.  Or, have the build points count down to zero instead of up, but just editing the tooltip is probably easier. 

[ZaneWolfe]

I'm having technical difficulties, and I just don't know what went wrong, and thus can't test this, but as far as 'splitting the graph' goes with nomads. I know that if you try to cut humanity off entirely from the AI then things go wrong FAST, but what about only partially cutting off? Two ideas/examples. Cut off your HW from AI space, and thus become technically unable to lose, but make sure a handful of other human worlds are still in the AI reachable grid. Would it still do terrible things? Final idea, on say an X map. Cut off one, and only one, of the branches, severing one of the AI HWs from the rest of the galaxy. What happens?

[Mad Rubicant]

I'm not sure you've thought of it, but can the Exile spawn on a Nomad? If so, how does that interact with the minesweeping of the Exile hacks?

[tadrinth]

As long as gravity drones of reasonable mark can reduce Hybrids to be slower than bombers, I'm sold on their usefulness.  Gravity is most useful against melee ships and things that run away (etherjets), anyway, and those tend to be fast, so it doesn't seem like it would take all that much gravity to have a useful effect on the things you really want slowed down.

Also, I would love a Core Photon Lance Turret Controller.  You can never have too many Photon Lances. 

[keith.lamothe]

I'm not sure you've thought of it, but can the Exile spawn on a Nomad? If so, how does that interact with the minesweeping of the Exile hacks?

It won't pick a nomad planet for the exile.  Nor will it let you survey-hack a nomad, iirc, because the "data" that would be revealed would be wrong shortly thereafter.

You can never have too many Photon Lances.

Given that it is the most calculation intensive attack mechanic in the game, your CPU disagrees

[Aklyon]

You can never have too many Photon Lances.

Given that it is the most calculation intensive attack mechanic in the game, your CPU disagrees

Huh, it is?

[keith.lamothe]

You can never have too many Photon Lances.

Given that it is the most calculation intensive attack mechanic in the game, your CPU disagrees

Huh, it is?

Yea, it's basically the heavy-beam mechanic (which involves a range check vs all eligible targets, followed by sorting them by distance, followed by actually attacking them in order), applied every frame for the duration of the beam.

Kind of crazy, actually, but I thought it was too cool to not do

[The Hunter]

You can never have too many Photon Lances.

Given that it is the most calculation intensive attack mechanic in the game, your CPU disagrees

Huh, it is?

Yea, it's basically the heavy-beam mechanic (which involves a range check vs all eligible targets, followed by sorting them by distance, followed by actually attacking them in order), applied every frame for the duration of the beam.

Kind of crazy, actually, but I thought it was too cool to not do

Does that includes Wrath Lance?

[keith.lamothe]

Does that includes Wrath Lance?

Yep, for each beam.  I imagine the industrious could kill their CPU pretty good by taking 20k ships vs a wrath lance.

Of course, that's a bit like trying to gunk up an oven during its "self-clean" cycle.  Possible.  Temporarily.

[Draco18s]

More detail on that over here.