Prerelease 3.171 (Bugfixes, no more sniper shots for heavy defense)

[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 3.170:
(Cumulative release notes since 3.120 are here http://arcengames.com/mediawiki/index.php?title=AI_War_-_Current_Beta)

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

    *  Fixed arithmetic overflow exception crash that could occur if the AI tried to launch a wave against a planet with an inordinately high total wave multiplier (multiple golems and zenith-power-generators, etc).

    * In previous prereleases the new no-more-than-6000-ai-ships-per-planet cap was preventing the Avenger and its modules from spawning. Fixed. Be afraid.

    * Previously it was possible for the automatic AI engineer retreat logic to place an undue load on the CPU, fixed to pace these calculations.

    * Since some folks were seeing inordinate delays in ships gaining protection from counter-shooters that they've just moved under, made TryProtections throttle more intelligent about how much a given check really cost.

    * Ion Cannons, Orbital Mass Drivers, Counter-Spies, and Core Warhead Interceptors all now have only 120,000 attack range. This covers pretty much all of a planet anyway, but is no longer so large as to be considered a sniper shot. Thus, ships with immunity to sniper shots are no longer immune to these weapons.

[x4000]

Regarding the next official release, that will probably be on the 22nd instead of tomorrow.  For one thing, it would be stupid marketing-wise to release a big version during the big torrent of E3 news.  Talk about a quick way to get ignored.  For another, looking at the bug reports forum there are a few more of those recent reports that we'd like to tackle first.  This release has a number of those, but pushing back the release slightly will give us more time to do a few of the others before the next official, which I think will be good.

[Ozymandiaz]

Take your time getting it ready, no point in rushing it

Also, we got the beta releases anyways

[x4000]

Yep, that was the thought over on this end, too.   Thanks for the support!

[rubikscube]

  For one thing, it would be stupid marketing-wise to release a big version during the big torrent of E3 news.  Talk about a quick way to get ignored. 

Don't be offended by this, but we will love you always ( unless this is a super big launch that you will plan to announce to the world again?)

[x4000]

We announce every release, and tend to get a surge of minor coverage about it: blue's news, etc, tends to make mention of that.  Definitely helps our ongoing visibility and letting new potential customers know about us.

[rubikscube]

of course, besides from this forum, and steams forum, what other forums do you visit as "the creator of ai war"

[x4000]

of course, besides from this forum, and steams forum, what other forums do you visit as "the creator of ai war"

That's not where I announce this sort of thing -- I send out a press release to about 90 gaming news sites and blogs, and typically about 5 of them pick it up and run a story.  But, as for where I go for other forums to talk about AI War with players... right now not many.  Over the life of AI War, I've made maybe 200 posts combined over a span of 20-25 forums.  Big ones were Quarter To Three, Wargamer.com, Gamers With Jobs, Space Sim Central... and a number of others.

[Buttons840]

I first hear of AI War on a Steam advert.  I looked at the game but though it didn't offer much beyond what Sins of a Solar Empire was providing me at the time.  Sins was a great game with amazing competitive multiplayer, but plagued by bugs which were especially bothersome given the long game times; but I digress.

The 2nd time I heard of AI War I was scrolling through gaming new on N4G.com and saw an article where Chris stated he intends to continue free DLC for the game, as well as paid expansions, for several years.

I finally ended up buying the game on Impulse and was pleased to learn that I could detach the game from Impulse using the binaries downloaded from Arcens website.  I've since bought all my games from the website considering that you probably get more of the money since Steam or Impulse don't take a cut.  Though I guess on the other hand those services wont list your game as being so popular, and that could lose you some publicity.

I'll have to start mentioning the official updates on the boards I visit, n such.  

[x4000]

Many thanks for the support!  It's always fascinating to hear how people came to the game.   And, yes, we're happy when people buy the game from anywhere, for the reasons you noted pretty much.

[Volatar]

I'll make sure to resurrect the thread on the Bay 12 forums when the nest big update comes out 

Thats where I originally heard about the game.

[x4000]

Ah, yeah, that was another major one.  I left out like 5 other major forums I've been active on, it's hard to remember everything off the top of my head.  Often I remember the personalities and the forum theme better than the name of the forum itself if I wasn't overly familiar with it before visiting; I'm bad with names.

[Volatar]

Bay 12 is the forums for Dwarf Fortress. We are very weird gamers over there 

[superking]

Bay 12 is the forums for Dwarf Fortress. We are very weird gamers over there 

about 50% of them do computer science for starters 

[x4000]

It's a good forum, though, to be sure.