Prerelease 3.140 (Galaxy Map Organization, 3 Flak Turrets, Cmd Station buffs)

[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 3.120:
(Cumulative release notes since 3.120 are here http://arcengames.com/mediawiki/index.php?title=AI_War_-_Current_Beta)

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

    *  Updated the in-game credits to reflect recent player contributions.

    * Orbital Command Station upgrades now provide more metal/crystal income, in order to make those upgrades more worthwhile. If you consider that an individual harvester produces 12 of metal or crystal, and if you consider how many harvesters can be built on most planets versus how much knowledge is required to get the command station upgrades, the upgrades were previously of lesser value than they should have been.
          o Mark II now provides 40 of each instead of 28 of each.
          o Mark III now provides 64 of each instead of 40 of each.
          o For the sake of comparison, the Mark I still produces 16 of each, and the Home command station still produces 80 of each.

    * Guard Posts now show on the top row of the planet intel summary.

    * New Hotkeys for galaxy map (likely to be changed to something else):
          o Alt+A+9 : switch to your alternate galaxy layout
          o Alt+A+(1-8) : switch to alternate galaxy layout of player 1-8 (respectively)
          o Alt+A+0 : switch to official galaxy layout
          o Please note that all alternate layouts start exactly the same as the official layout, but there's a flashing note in the bottom left of the screen if you're viewing an alternate layout.

    * While viewing your alternate galaxy layout you may:
          o Shift-left-click-drag planets around
          o Alt-left-click a planet to perform a basic automatic "pull in chains" operation that relocates subsidiary chains (defined as link cardinality <= 2) into a cluster near the clicked planet. On higher-connections-per-planet map types this may not help you at all; on snakes and spokes and such it can be a huge time-saver.

    * Added Flak Turrets: mkI, mkII, and mkIII. Graphics donated by HitmanN (with preliminary work and idea by superking, many thanks to both). The Flak Turrets have only received preliminary balancing, intended to be good against zenith viral shredders, cutlasses, and vampires, and mediocre against other very light ships, and only minorly effective against anything much bigger)

    * Extended "warp in the clowns" cheat to take 2 additional parameters (separated by commas), the first is a case-insensitive ForegroundObjectType name, the second is the base wave size (which is multiplied up down and sideways, but allows relative control)

    * Updated icon for Heavy Beam Cannons to a new graphic donated by HitmanN.

[keith.lamothe]

The latest beta is available via the Updates window in version 3.060 or greater of the game.

Just checking, is that supposed to say 3.120? (there's a few other references to 3.060 too).

Also, it looks like the bulleting isn't preventing second lines from wrapping to the left margin instead of staying aligned with the bullet.

You know me, if I'm not nitpicking I'm not breathing

[x4000]

The latest beta is available via the Updates window in version 3.060 or greater of the game.

Just checking, is that supposed to say 3.120? (there's a few other references to 3.060 too).

Yep, good to check, but this is correct.  The 3.120 wasn't large enough in non-code filesize to warrant breaking the cumulative-from-3.060 thing.

Also, it looks like the bulleting isn't preventing second lines from wrapping to the left margin instead of staying aligned with the bullet.

Yeah, nothing much I can do about that, just the artifacts of copy-pasting from MediaWiki, which has a much more advanced way of displaying compared to SMF or even just regular HTML.  So it goes!

You know me, if I'm not nitpicking I'm not breathing

Me, too.

[Ktoff]

Can you 'warp in the clowns *,2000'?

That is to say, surprise me with a 2000 wave?

[Buttons840]

Just when I thought the game couldn't get any better...

[keith.lamothe]

Can you 'warp in the clowns *,2000'?

That is to say, surprise me with a 2000 wave?

Not right now, but I could add, say, a "any" and a "schizo" option for the second parameter

[Winter Born]

Can you 'warp in the clowns *,2000'?

That is to say, surprise me with a 2000 wave?

Not right now, but I could add, say, a "any" and a "schizo" option for the second parameter

That would be cool

[danando]

nice

[platinawolf]

Galaxy order works like a charm ^^* From a map with lines going everywhere to a few clusters that are very orderly arranged Spokes though...

didn't seem to like me randomizing maps with 120 planets though,,, Eventually it froze... And when pulling one of those scroll list's the background stops moving ^^*

[keith.lamothe]

Galaxy order works like a charm ^^* From a map with lines going everywhere to a few clusters that are very orderly arranged

Glad you like it, it was a hobby quest for me

Spokes though...

Did you run into trouble using it on a spokes map?  I actually did most of my testing with spokes, though perhaps differently.

didn't seem to like me randomizing maps with 120 planets though,,, Eventually it froze...

What do you mean randomizing; using the alt-click?

And when pulling one of those scroll list's the background stops moving ^^*

You mean when using alt-click the game momentarily hangs?

[rubikscube]

thanks for buffing higher level command station as you can see not much people used it, hope it will change

[rubikscube]

just saying, having features not more income was my idea but this is still great

[rubikscube]

also why sometimes skip some 0.020 units of beta names? 0.001 for each new thing?

[x4000]

Buffing the income of the command stations was something I decided to do after my last play session; I always unlock them, but after I did some math and thought about common usage scenarios, I felt like the buff there was the way to go; it was unrelated to your comments. However, having more command station types with different various features is certainly something of interest for the future. Like warp jammer, etc.

We skip about 20 numbered beta spots every time we do an official release, to make a clearer separation between that official and the next beta series.

[rubikscube]

well, smart people think alike