Prerelease 3.089 (Golem AIP nerf, Avenger nerf, AI beam cannon nerf, auto expl+)

[x4000]

The latest beta is available via the Updates window in version 3.060 or greater of the game.  Just open the game and you can quickly download the prerelease through the updates tab.  If you don't yet have 3.060 or greater, you can download 3.060 here.  This prerelease version is compatible with any vendor's version of the game -- Steam, Impulse, whatever.

Note:  If you have bug reports related to this release, please log them in the bug reports subforum with one bug per topic.  It makes things infinitely easier for us.  Thanks!

Looking for a Patch That Can Be Manually-Installed?
Because of the time involved in creating multiple versions of each patch, we only create manually-installable patches for official versions of the game, not each beta prerelease.  But you can easily create your own manually-installable beta patch!  Please note that current betas can only be successfully applied to version 3.060 of the game or later (if you later wish to revert to the official version for any reason, you can download the full raw files from the above link to do so).

To create your own manual beta patch, simply download these two files:
1. Current Beta Director Xml File.
2. Current Beta Zip File.

If you try to open that zip file, it will say it's corrupt -- that's okay, it's not really a zip file.  Finally, create a new zip file on your computer, and put both the director and the fake-zip-file inside it.  Call your outer zip file something that starts with Beta and ends with an extension of .zip.  Beta.zip will work just fine, or you can name it after the specific version number if you want to hang onto it.  And that's it!  Now you have your very own manually-installable package of the AI War beta version of your choice, which you can install by simply selecting via your Updates window in the game.  Please note that "Beta" in the filename is case-sensitive.

What's new since 3.088:
(Cumulative release notes since 3.060 are attached at the bottom)

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

-Golems no longer cause an AI Progress increase upon their death.  This makes golems a lot easier and more economical to use, making them more useful in general.

CHANGES TO PAST PRERELEASES
=======

- Previous version's attempt to limit AI heavy beam cannon use had some problems, fixed and tightened down so that AI level 1 and 2 planets never have them, AI level 3 and 4 planets can have 1 mkI cannon, and AI Core and Home planets can have 1 mkII cannon.

- Avenger's attack power, forcefield health, and hull health significantly nerfed.  Still capable of reducing thousands of ships to their component sub-atomic particles.

- Fixed bug in previous version that was not properly clearing out planetary summary during planet switches (it's still different than 3.060 behavior, but not necessarily in a buggy way).

- A+E+X combo for auto explore is a bit better detected by the input code.  Still some issues to be worked out.

[RCIX]

Yay golems dont cause aip boost on death

- Avenger's attack power, forcefield health, and hull health significantly nerfed.  Still capable of reducing thousands of ships to their component sub-atomic particles.

Gotta love that line

[x4000]

Thought that Golem change would be popular.

And yeah, Keith is great with the humor in the release notes, that's always him.

[Ozymandiaz]

Nice! Gonna use a few more Golems now

[MaxAstro]

Unfortunately it's the "death of a thousand cuts" constant AIP from repair that is the reason I never use golems, not the on death AIP jump.  Nice to see some attention paid to the fact that they were way too AIP expensive, but I probably still won't use them. 

[Doddler]

I still don't get how so many people have issues with Mk I and Mk II beam cannons, they're less effective against groups of ships than lightning, especially on Mk III and IV worlds. :/

Anyways I was going to try out the avenger by loading a game where one was active, but I got a pretty nasty error.  I've attached a screenshot.

In the end I loaded a game just before the avenger was released.  I had a blockade of 2900 ships, my ship cap in everything.  He destroyed almost everything but we got his shields down half and destroyed the modules.  I then broke a Mk III zenith reserve, and returned to my homeworld for a last stand with 2000 more ships.  In the end I was able to defeat it, but only 5 minutes after I had already lost my homeworld. 

He still moves quite fast, so its hard to really stop him, he's not really exposed to any defensive structures for very long.  I noticed lots of my ships were unable to hit him due to his shielding.  Also, his immunity to all missile and blade attacks actually prevented a lot of my ships from participating in bringing him down.  And the death nuke is a huge kick in the pants.

I think he's doable now, although it would really be nice if it moved slower.  I couldn't stop him from destroying my homeworld even with my ship cap in units twice over and a wall of 300 Mk III turrets (Laser and Basic).  Also, the Avenger from the last AI doesn't really matter because you've already won.

[keith.lamothe]

Sorry about the bug, that's a side effect of my removing some module hardpoints; I thought I had tested that...

Anyway, glad to hear it's more doable now.  The blade immunity is a direct side effect of health total, though perhaps I could bypass that; not sure about the missile immunity.  Anyway, the idea is that it shouldn't be immune to much in the way of damage, just ridiculously tough.

I was going to nerf the speed from 5 to 1 but went back on that after reducing the armament.  Perhaps 3 would be good, or maybe 4.

[Draxis]

Planetary overview still seems to have a bug, when I look at an AI world, for one second the overview reports double the number of every type of unit

[keith.lamothe]

Yea, I saw that too, just didn't have a lot of time for tuning.  Thanks for confirming that I wasn't crazy (well, in that particular way)

[Doddler]

I was going to nerf the speed from 5 to 1 but went back on that after reducing the armament.  Perhaps 3 would be good, or maybe 4.

I think the thing is that a full fleet can't really kill it on it's own, so you need time to rebuild, and you don't really get that at his current speed (considering that everything you had assaulting the AI homeworld is probably dead).  I couldn't really tell how much time it took in game time because the time stops counting one you win, but you have about 10-15 minutes from AI homeworld destruction to an Avenger on your homeworld if it's sitting 8-10 hops from your homeworld.  I only got to use about half that time because he crippled me for energy on his ways through my systems.  I did manage to kill it in my game, but only after it destroyed my homeworld, using about 4000 of my own ships and an additional 600 ships from a Mk III Zenith Reserve.  Also when I tried it I had placed like 400 turrets in its path, but he was out of range of them in 30 seconds, it didn't feel like it was effective to set up a blockade.

[keith.lamothe]

I think the thing is that a full fleet can't really kill it on it's own, so you need time to rebuild,

Yea, it was my intent that you'd need to pull several "Wolf-359" attacks to take the thing down; with the first trying to bring the shields down to a manageable level, the second trying to destroy the external guns, and the third trying to actually destroy it, or something like that.

and you don't really get that at his current speed (considering that everything you had assaulting the AI homeworld is probably dead)

Yea, initially I had had some idea of it being tractorable so you could slow it down until it blew up all the tractor beams, but I wanted to avoid exploits like towing it away with Riot starships or ether jets... though honestly maybe that should be allowed, if you can actually pull it off.

I couldn't really tell how much time it took in game time because the time stops counting one you win, but you have about 10-15 minutes from AI homeworld destruction to an Avenger on your homeworld.

Yea, depends on the number of links.  The idea is that you would need a pretty significant fleet-production backbone to have a chance   But it doesn't need to be a total rush.

[Blahness]

What was the previous avenger stats, and what was it nerfed to? 

Just curious <_<

[keith.lamothe]

It used to mount:

4x Avenger shields (80M hp each)
4x MkIV Heavy Beam Cannons
4x MkIII Heavy Beam Cannons
4x MkII Riot Control Shotguns
"That's not a moon" quantities of armor, to the tune of 400M hp

in 3.089 it has:

1x Avenger shield (400M hp)
1x MkIV Heavy Beam Cannon
3x MkIII Heavy Beam Cannons
8x MkII Riot Control Shotguns
200M hp

[Doddler]

Yea, initially I had had some idea of it being tractorable so you could slow it down until it blew up all the tractor beams, but I wanted to avoid exploits like towing it away with Riot starships or ether jets... though honestly maybe that should be allowed, if you can actually pull it off.

Being able to delay it at all would probably bring it into 'reasonable' territory, I think.  I've never used ether jets before, but I have a feeling the avenger would make quick work of them if he wanted to. :p

[FrostyThePyro]

Put stacks of forcefeilds/engineers on the wormholes you think it will take.  It doesnt ignore force feilds right (this is just a brainstorm as  I havent fought the avenger yet, but its a technique I have taken to using on my current game on a "snake" map to help prevent teleport raiders from skipping my defended systems and rapidly knocking out my less defended interior, though some still manage to get through anyway))