Author Topic: Prerelease 1.999N (Co-op tweaks, wormhole egress, ship positioning priorities)  (Read 2526 times)

Offline x4000

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The latest prerelease is available at http://www.arcengames.com/share/AIWar1999N.zip

That version is an upgrade from version 1.301, so you have to already have 1.301 (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 1999M:
(Cumulative release notes since 1.301 are attached at the bottom)

-------------------

-A new Expenses By Player tab has been added to the Stats window.  This new tab shows a sorted list of all the current resource outflows, making it possible for players to diagnose higher-than-it-should-be expenses of metal and crystal (which are usually due to errant engineers or some ships that were under construction but which were forgotten about by the players).

-Each entry in the Give button's popup listing now includes a "Can Be Given" count, which shows how many of the selected ships can be given to each allied player (based on the rules of prior unlocks, ship caps, etc).  This will help prevent confusion in multiplayer games when players want to gift ships but cannot.

-When a player is disabled, their ships are removed from Pause All mode if they were previously in that mode.

-The metal, crystal, knowledge, and energy HUD data is now visible for all allies (active or disabled) in the tooltip when hovering over the HUD indicators for the local player.  This lets players more effectively manage disabled players' economies, and keep up with how each other's economies are doing without having to ask.

-Previously, using the N+2 or N+3 or N+1 filters would cause non-military ships to be selected when they otherwise would not be.  Fixed.

-Fixed a minor localization error in part of the intermediate tutorial.

-The attack bonuses of snipers and sniper turrets have been reduced by around 1/3, to make it so that they are not so overwhelmingly more effective against bombers and other similar ships.

-Snipers now have a .2 penalty against resource structures, and a .3 penalty against engineers.

-The outdated installer slideshow images of the game have now been updated.

-When ships are entering or exiting wormholes or being first created from a dock (and thus fading in/out), the following changes have now been made.  They cannot fire at enemy ships or use any of their active special abilities -- including teleportation -- and enemy ships cannot fire at them (including Area Of Effect attacks) or use tractor beams on them.  All ships also now come out of wormhole at a constant move rate of 12, regardless of normal or free-roaming defender mode and regardless of their normal movement abilities or even if their engines have been disabled.
   -This also fixes the very rare occasional "superships" issue.
   -This also fixes the issue with teleporting ships seeming to appear at any place on a planet, rather than emerging from a wormhole and then moving to their destination.

-Collision priorities have been added.  When a higher-priority ship would collide with a lower-priority ship of the same team, the lower-priority ship moves out of the way instead of the higher-priority ship looking for a new location.  This can make it easier to place immobile ships into a group of mobile ships, or to position something with a booster ability in the middle of a group of ships to boost.  This also makes it much easier to put fixed-position ships (resources, mines, turrets, etc) in the midst of a group of mobile allied defenders.
  Current priorities (numeric values are irrelevant, just relative values matter):
  10000: Immobile ships
  500: Starships
  200: Munitions Boosters
  100: Engineers
« Last Edit: October 14, 2009, 11:33:39 pm by x4000 »
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Offline Kjara

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I love both the sniper changes(the 200 mk I snipers only managed to kill one resource collector + my mkII energy plant in the latest raid), and the collusion change.  I'd suggest making all science vessels, mobile constructors, colony ships and repair docks be equal to engineers(would make them easier to keep in the center of a formation when protecting them) though repair docks should perhaps be above even starships.

Also its not clear where forcefields/movable command centers(mk II and III) fall on that list(i'd suggest between starships and immobile ships if they aren't already there)

Offline quickstix

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-A new Expenses By Player tab has been added to the Stats window.  This new tab shows a sorted list of all the current resource outflows, making it possible for players to diagnose higher-than-it-should-be expenses of metal and crystal (which are usually due to errant engineers or some ships that were under construction but which were forgotten about by the players).

This is good news for my obsessive management behaviour. I very much like all the management, interface and control improvements in AI War so far, it's such an important aspect to really being able to enjoy and play a game to its fullest.

Offline keith.lamothe

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Wow, you just keep putting cool stuff in there that I never saw coming :)
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Offline x4000

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I'd suggest making all science vessels, mobile constructors, colony ships and repair docks be equal to engineers(would make them easier to keep in the center of a formation when protecting them) though repair docks should perhaps be above even starships.

Also its not clear where forcefields/movable command centers(mk II and III) fall on that list(i'd suggest between starships and immobile ships if they aren't already there)

Good point on these.  For O, here will be the revised list:

  10000: Immobile ships
  10000: Force Fields
  10000: Movable Command Stations
  500: Starships
  200: Munitions Boosters
  150: Mobile Repair Station
  100: Engineers
  50: Warheads
  50: Resource ships (science lab, etc)
  50: Sensors (tachyon drones, etc)
  50: Colony Ships
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Offline x4000

  • Chris McElligott Park, Arcen Founder and Lead Dev
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-A new Expenses By Player tab has been added to the Stats window.  This new tab shows a sorted list of all the current resource outflows, making it possible for players to diagnose higher-than-it-should-be expenses of metal and crystal (which are usually due to errant engineers or some ships that were under construction but which were forgotten about by the players).

This is good news for my obsessive management behaviour. I very much like all the management, interface and control improvements in AI War so far, it's such an important aspect to really being able to enjoy and play a game to its fullest.

I agree, a refined interface is just crucial.  And since AI War is breaking so much new ground with the scale, we're having to really innovate with the interface, too (and a lot of that comes from players).  This particular idea occurred to me while I was playing my weekly session, when a player on my alpha team couldn't figure out why he had 700 crystal outflow all of a sudden.   Turns out he had 18 engineers assisting a starship constructor, but that was almost impossible to tell before.  Now it should be easy!

Wow, you just keep putting cool stuff in there that I never saw coming :)

I aim to please! :)
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Offline Kjara

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Is it going to be a problem when a space tug brings a starship to a mobile repair dock? Other than that, the numbers look good to me.

Offline x4000

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Is it going to be a problem when a space tug brings a starship to a mobile repair dock? Other than that, the numbers look good to me.

I don't think so... but possibly.  I don't think ships collide when they are still in tractor beams.  However, when ships then are let go, if they don't have a location to go to, that might then cause a problem.  I think I'll bump the repair station up to 1,000, given this.  Good idea!
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Offline Oewyn

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Couple of notes on N:

1) Tugs are grabbing force fields again :-/
2) MRS and forcefields have some collision issues, MRS like to drift towards one direction (most likely because of the tugged force fields)
3) I had some issues with forcefields not wanting to stay put: see save.  I don't know if it's because of the etherjets or what but they refused to stand still.
4) Having issues with exo shields... they seem to be disappearing when they finish building.
« Last Edit: October 14, 2009, 10:03:15 pm by Oewyn »

Offline x4000

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Couple of notes on N:

1) Tugs are grabbing force fields again :-/
2) MRS and forcefields have some collision issues, MRS like to drift towards one direction (most likely because of the tugged force fields)
3) I had some issues with forcefields not wanting to stay put: see save.  I don't know if it's because of the etherjets or what but they refused to stand still.
4) Having issues with exo shields... they seem to be disappearing when they finish building.

For #1, that's on my list.  For #2, I think that will be fixed when I fix #1.  For #3, forcefields were simply not in a high enough priority, I think is what the issue was.  O should be fixing that.  For #4, that is very curious and I'll look into that when I'm looking at #1.  Thanks!
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Offline x4000

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