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 3.181:(Cumulative release notes since 3.120 are here
http://arcengames.com/mediawiki/index.php?title=AI_War_-_Current_Beta)
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* When a large new AI Barracks is created, that can cause a momentary lag in the time, which we forgot to mention last game. Now there is also a message shown of "AI Barracks Created With Units: 1200" or similar, to let players know what is going on. These lag spikes are really temporary, not all that common (except when loading old savegames with tons of units over the ship cap), and lead to better performance on an ongoing basis in that savegame.
* Previously, AI Barracks were not allowed to be created except when the attack + threat level was already over 1500. Before that point, it would cause border aggression only, which could be rather catastrophic with older savegames, especially longer ones. Now the AI Barracks are allowed to kick in at any time regardless of the attack + threat levels. This also will make the barracks more likely to be used during the course of normal games started in 3.181 or later.
* Previously, Border Aggression could be really vicious, sending vast quantities of ships cumulatively into threat when there are a lot of planets all with fewer than 200 excess ships on them (the minimum to make a barracks). And it could also be really vicious in sending a lot of core or mark IV ships at the players when they were used to seeing mark I or II ships in a game.
o Now the Border Aggression will never kick in at all if the attack + threat level is already 500 or more.
o Additionally, when ships would be released via border aggression, and those ships have a tech level that is more than 2 marks higher than the current tech level of that AI player (so, mark IV/V ship with a mark I AI tech level, or mark V ship with a mark II AI tech level, basically), then these excess ships are simply exploded rather than being released. This keeps the ship caps pruned as needed without causing a ridiculous spike in difficulty and without having players ever get swarmed with core ships early in the game.
* Refactored the ship category buttons at the bottom of the main screen to a two-tier model letting the player drill down to either the full list, the low-power list, the non-low-power list, or a list of a specific ship-type.
* Command Stations and Guard Posts now get their own line of icons in the intel summary in the galaxy map. This prevents them from completely overwhelming all of the other special ship icons by their presence.
* The ships that show up with an icon on the intel summary view have their own text line directly below in purple, but they were also still showing up in the larger lists of my/allied/enemy ships further down. Now they have been removed from those lower lists (but not the counts of enemy ships by mark level), so as to make those lists more focused and easier to read.
* The non-core guard posts now have white borders like other ships. The core guard posts will soon.
What's new since 3.182:(Cumulative release notes since 3.120 are here
http://arcengames.com/mediawiki/index.php?title=AI_War_-_Current_Beta)
-------------------
* Since the ship-type quick buttons at the bottom now have a category-based first-tier, the "low power" button now lists manufactories, energy reactors, and constructors again.
* The ship-type quick buttons at the bottom now sort ship types by category and then mark level, rather than the other way around.
* Hybrid spawn time increased from 20 minutes to 25 minutes, to give the player a little bit more time before they start facing walls of hybrids blocking their advance.
* Mark III, IV, and V Ion Cannons are no longer seeded on planets next to human homeworlds (they won't be removed from existing savegames, though).
* Recent prereleases had a crash bug in the stats window code if playing a game where you had killed any of the old guard posts. Fixed.
* The borders of the far zoom icons have been made consistent between all the various screens, including the lobby and the intel summaries, and in general look a little less ragged.
* The lobby has been completely reworked in a way that will be easier to port to unity coming up, and in a way that avoids potential rendering problems that a minority of players were suddenly seeing based on the old way the lobby was redirecting window output from one window handle to another.
* Added some basic alert messages when a human planet is under attack by Hybrids, Preservation Wardens, (hostile) Roaming Enclaves, or hostile warheads.
* Neinzul Preservation Warden youngling build rate reduced to 1/3rd of what it was.
* Neinzul Preservation Bomber attack power increased quite a bit (was like a mark I bomber, was intended to be more like a mark III bomber). Also applies to Neinzul Bombers spawned by bomber clusters seeded by the Neinzul Cluster Bomber AI Type.
* The infiltrator bonuses have been nerfed about 10x, especially against heavy defense units, as mid-sized groups of infiltrators could kill them in mere seconds.
