Prerelease 1.014S (Mercenary Ships, Revamped Cross-Planet Attacks)

[x4000]

The Latest prerelease is now out: http://www.arcengames.com/share/AIWar1014S.zip

That version is an upgrade from version 1.013, so you have to already have 1.013 (or greater) installed. Just unzip it into your game folder (usually C:\Program Files\Arcen Games\AI War\ unless you specified something else). Please make sure that your unzip process keeps the folder structure from the zip file, rather than just unpacking all of the files into the base target directory.

What's new since 1.014R:
(Cumulative release notes since 1.013 are attached at the bottom)

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-Cross-Planet Attacks have been revamped so that their size now varies with the AI Progress level.  They are also now more diffuse (coming from more potential directions at once), and also non-specific about where the attack is forming (though planets with more ships are more likely to originate them).  Cross-planet attacks also may now come from several different planets all at once.

-Players can now only build 20 space docks instead of 30 (to make room for the new mercenary space docks).

-New Mercenary Space Docks have been added, which can produce mercenary fighters, bombers, and cruisers.  These mercenary ships are much more expensive than their normal counterparts, but they have no ship caps.  These will effectively balance out the new economy, providing players with a new way to spend their excess funds -- as well as a way to get larger fleets when the ship cap is reached, although this is not as cost-effective a route as increasing the ship cap via new technologies or new ship types.

CHANGES FROM PAST PRERELEASES
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-The placement of ships in build placemet mode has been improved so that there is now less delay associated with that, and it should work easier in the

[Warnstaff]

Oh good god I gotta try them mercs out! Thanks!

[x4000]

No problem!

[liq3]

heh....

I'm gonna get myself into an "unkillable" position, and just put those mercs on loop for a few hours. I expect my PC will grind to a halt, but the 10,000 ship fleet will be so worth it.

I'm going to pretend the no ship-cap cheat doesn't exist btw.

[x4000]

heh....

I'm gonna get myself into an "unkillable" position, and just put those mercs on loop for a few hours. I expect my PC will grind to a halt, but the 10,000 ship fleet will be so worth it.

There's no such thing as an unkillable position, so far as I can tell.  When you come back, you'll probably be dead from cross-planet attacks.  And/or the planets will be so heavily reinforced from the AI that it will take forever to attack any of them.  And/or some AI ships will slip through your lines if you are not watching and guiding and they will take out your command station.  That almost happened to one of my teammates twice in my session tonight, and we were actively playing and watching.

You can definitely step away from the computer for a few minutes if you're in a good position, but leaving it for hours is probably suicide.

I'm going to pretend the no ship-cap cheat doesn't exist btw.

No worries.

[liq3]

heh....

I'm gonna get myself into an "unkillable" position, and just put those mercs on loop for a few hours. I expect my PC will grind to a halt, but the 10,000 ship fleet will be so worth it.

There's no such thing as an unkillable position, so far as I can tell.  When you come back, you'll probably be dead from cross-planet attacks.  And/or the planets will be so heavily reinforced from the AI that it will take forever to attack any of them.  And/or some AI ships will slip through your lines if you are not watching and guiding and they will take out your command station.  That almost happened to one of my teammates twice in my session tonight, and we were actively playing and watching.

You can definitely step away from the computer for a few minutes if you're in a good position, but leaving it for hours is probably suicide.

Hehe. Unkillable is this...

There's only one wormhole the AI can launch waves through. It has 95% of my turrets covering that wormhole (some being Mark II), and 7 forcefields. It also has full cap of Mark II and I Deflector drones covering it. NOTHING is getting through that. Oh, it also has a Mark I ion cannon on the planet. <3

Now, that planet is at the end of a long strip of like 5 planets. My homeworld is at the other end. There's 2 more planets I own connected to my homeworld. Now, when I say "unkillable", I'd basically just leave the merc thing on loop, with a FRD rally point for the merc dock near my home station. I'd also put my 5 Mark III force fields over my home station. Nothing would get through. :]

Oh, I also have nearly every starship in the game on my home planet. <3

That's what I meant by unkillable.

Also, I think cross-planet attacks are still broken. I make thread about it here.

[eRe4s3r]

I absolutely love the new changes, mercenary ships is a superb way to solve the swimming in resources issue. And now players CAN survive larger than 3000 ship raids if they play it right..

Very nice changes!

[Echo35]

Nice! I have unfortunately been extremely busy with things the last two weeks and haven't been able to play much of 1.14, but I'm definitely going to make time now.

EDIT: I was just about to make a post in the suggestion board about how nice it would be, since we have proper flow economics now, to be able to see a break down of how much metal and crystal things are using, and low and behold its already there. Get out of my head!! 

[x4000]

That's what I meant by unkillable.

Okay, granted, that's pretty unkillable.  However, if the AI does enough cross-planet raids that it can't break through your forces with, then eventually the threat level might be several thousand ships, enough so that it can break through.  But I agree that's looking increasingly unlikely with your setup there, haha.  Still you'll have the later problems with expanding out and attacking them, so I don't think you'll gain too much of an advantage with that strategy, but you might be able to hold steady with it.

[x4000]

I absolutely love the new changes, mercenary ships is a superb way to solve the swimming in resources issue. And now players CAN survive larger than 3000 ship raids if they play it right..

Very nice changes!

Thanks!  Yeah, you can definitely survive the big raids with that.  Plus, with all the new/cheaper turrets, the new starships, etc, you can definitely survive a 3000 ship raid -- especially if most of those are infiltrators or something.  Last night in my 3-player game we survived several 2500-ship raids without withdrawing our forward fleets that were taking AI planets.  It was rough, and we lost several planets each time, but with turrets and a thousand or so mobile ships of our own we managed to whittle them down before they killed us.

Anyway, glad the mercenary ships are such a hit!  I figured this would be a really helpful to manage those pesky resource overflows without unbalancing things too much.

[x4000]

Nice! I have unfortunately been extremely busy with things the last two weeks and haven't been able to play much of 1.14, but I'm definitely going to make time now.

EDIT: I was just about to make a post in the suggestion board about how nice it would be, since we have proper flow economics now, to be able to see a break down of how much metal and crystal things are using, and low and behold its already there. Get out of my head!! 

Haha, no worries.  There's a bug with that right now, which Rev posted, in that it is showing too small of numbers for that (around 24x too small per second, I think), but I have not quite got to that one yet.  Probably tonight or tomorrow, but then you'll have just what you need there.  So much stuff still on the list, but I think it's turning out really well.  Hopefully this will be ready for an official release by Tuesday or Wednesday, but I suppose we shall see!

[Revenantus]

Just a quick hypothetical in relation to the AI's relatively new retreat behaviour.

If the player was to 'plug' a wormhole with a Tech III forcefield, would the retreating AI ships attempt to find an alternative escape route, or would they press themselves against the forcefield in a futile attempt to reach the wormhole?

[x4000]

Just a quick hypothetical in relation to the AI's relatively new retreat behaviour.

If the player was to 'plug' a wormhole with a Tech III forcefield, would the retreating AI ships attempt to find an alternative escape route, or would they press themselves against the forcefield in a futile attempt to reach the wormhole?

Good point.  Most likely they would attack the force field, if that's the wormhole they were determined to use.  But there's a fair chance they would choose another wormhole to start with (the force field is not a consideration, but the AI often "retreats" inward toward the player, looking for a better place to attack, rather than back out into its own territory).

[Echo35]

Nice! I have unfortunately been extremely busy with things the last two weeks and haven't been able to play much of 1.14, but I'm definitely going to make time now.

EDIT: I was just about to make a post in the suggestion board about how nice it would be, since we have proper flow economics now, to be able to see a break down of how much metal and crystal things are using, and low and behold its already there. Get out of my head!! 

Haha, no worries.  There's a bug with that right now, which Rev posted, in that it is showing too small of numbers for that (around 24x too small per second, I think), but I have not quite got to that one yet.  Probably tonight or tomorrow, but then you'll have just what you need there.  So much stuff still on the list, but I think it's turning out really well.  Hopefully this will be ready for an official release by Tuesday or Wednesday, but I suppose we shall see!

::Looks at game:: Yeah, I've got two space docks with an engi assisting each, and they're both showing -4/-7 consumption. That does seem a bit low...

[Admiral]

Very, very interesting idea with the mercenary ships! I can't wait to try it. Who came up with it? I assume you as there is no credit in the 1014.txt file.

I don't know if this is a good idea, but would it be possible to add the starting "racial" special to the list of ships it can build? I understand why you limited it to just the core three (easier to balance that way, among other things), but it could be considered that the "starting four" are really your core fleet that you build your strategies upon.

Thanks!