Prerelease/Expans 2.001R (Core Fabricators, Zenith Power Gens, Font+)

[x4000]

The latest prerelease is available at http://www.arcengames.com/share/AIWar2001R.zip

That version is an upgrade from version 2.000, so you have to already have 2.000 (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.

F.A.Q. Answers:
Note:  This prerelease is intended for both customers of the expansion AND customers of the base game only.  Please see below for details.
1. If you have the base game, and install this, you will go into trial mode of the expansion.  Feel free to explore the expansion that way, but if you want to go back to full mode without buying the expansion, simply go into Settings, Expansions, and turn off the expansion.
2. All upcoming prereleases for the next few months (until the expansion fully releases) will have a mix of both expansion and non-expansion content.  If you just want the latest non-expansion content, see #1.
3. If you want to preorder the expansion (and get your full license key), see this page.  It's $9.99 USD (or equivalent), and requires a valid copy of the base game to play.
4. If you want to know all about the expansion in general, see that same page.
5. This prerelease version is compatible with any other version of the game -- Steam, Impulse, whatever.
6. If you use this with your Steam copy of the game, however, you will be asked to enter your AI War CD key (which Steam provides, but normally you do not have to enter), and also the integration with Steamworks leaderboards and achievements may be disabled.  So you may want to make a separate install of the preorder version if you use Steam, at least for the moment.
7. PLEASE NOTE:  The new ships for the expansion are extremely preliminary at this stage.  They are fully functional when added, but they are not well balanced at all just yet.  The balance takes time, playtesting, and a fuller view of more of the ships.  So certain expansion ships are currently underpowered, while others are overpowered.  Your feedback on this is extremely valuable, as this is something we are adjusting at present based on community feedback as well as our own testing, but we don't expect to have things even close to perfectly tuned until sometime in December.  Our first priority is to get everything working and implemented, while honing the balance as much as possible, then to really heavily polish the balance once all the ships are in place.  Just FYI!
8. If you want to update an old savegame to the expansion, simply type "cmd:activate expansion 1" (without quotes).  This includes enabling the expansion ship classes, as well as enabling golems and other new capturables, although the population of those capturables is likely to be different from what it would have been if the expansion had been turned on from the start of the campaign given the same seed and other settings.  There is no way to disable the expansion for an existing game, however, so be sure not to save over your existing file if you want to go back to the non-expansion version of the game.


What's new since 2.001Q:
(Cumulative release notes since 2.000 are attached at the bottom)

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

-All ships that have at least 1 million health are now immune to blades.  This prevents some exploits with the Zenith Viral Shredders, and makes for more sensible attack logic with Cutlasses.

-Turrets can no longer have their munitions boosted or their shields boosted, but they are now immune to minor electric shots and blades.

-Teleport Raiders, Anti-Starship Arachnids, and Teleport Battle Stations are now immune to tractor beams, since they can no longer shoot them.

-Deflector Drones now fire a new Energy Burst ammo type, instead of using minor electric ammo.

-A new set of Core Fabricators has been added for both the base game and the expansion.  These are new capturables that are scattered around the galaxy map, a count of which can be seen in the Mission Summary in each campaign.  Generally there are 2 per human starting planet, same as advanced factories.  Each of these core fabricators, once captured, lets a human player build a single type of Core ship (which otherwise normally only the AI can build).     
   The ship caps for core ships are quite low (and can be seen in the planetary summary by hitting F1 a few times), and the core ships are also very expensive, but they also cost no knowledge to unlock and are quite powerful.
   Players can see what kind of core ship will be produced at a core fabricator before they capture it by hovering over it and looking at its hover text.
   In the base game, all 9 of the core ships from the base ship classes can be found as core fabricators.  In the expansion, those 9 plus an additional 11 core ships from the expansion can be found.  Not all of the fabricators are in every individual campaign, of course, given the seed numbers noted above.

-A new expansion-only capturable, the Zenith Power Generator, has been added: Advanced Zenith power generator that produces a massive amount of energy at a very tiny cost. AI progress goes up by 20 if this is destroyed, and while your team holds it, the AIs will send 2x stronger waves against this planet.

-In the expansion only, the "energize" cheat now creates 10 Zenith Power Generators instead of 10 mark II energy reactors.

Changes from prior prereleases.
------------------------------

-The new font has once again seen a number of readability improvements, most notably with all of the numbers but also with a few of the other characters.

[FFLaguna]

-Teleport Raiders, Anti-Starship Arachnids, and Teleport Battle Stations are now immune to tractor beams, since they can no longer shoot them.

Why? If they were vulnerable to them, it'd make you have to even out your fleets or provide cover when they initially go into a system, right?

I'm new to the game. Go easy on me.

[eRe4s3r]

Bug:

When in Galaxy Map mode and having a scout on planet the game inflates Guard Post stats sometimes to as much as 3! more than are actually on the map. Warpgates and Command Stations shouldn't count as guard posts, but even so in the attached save the Planet Kronos has 3 Guard posts according to stats, and NONE according my eyes. (even if Command Station and Warpate would count the number is just plain wrong

This very annoying because it made me send a fleet there to neuter it, when theres nothing to neuter ;p

Also weird is that generally these galaxy map stats (or scout reports) behave very odd - like for example i can see ship movement even though theres no scout on a planet (simply through increasing/decreasing numbers)

[I-KP]

I've often noticed Guard Post numbers don't match up to actual Guard Posts present and assumed it was treating Wormholes are Guard Posts.  This Scout report does make Guard Post raiding awkward to conduct without having to visually scan the system manually first, which is- well, awkward.

On that vein, when neutering a planet do all wormholes still receive reinforcements meaning that you can never really stop a planet from reinforcing unless you blow everything up?  AIs still receive reinforcements around wormholes that I am on the other end of.  Where are these ships supposed to be coming from if not passed me to get there?

When a planet is wiped of all AI presence is it then normal for all planets that adjoin to that fully cleansed (but not colonised) world to then go onto permanent alert, even when I pull out all forces?  If this is the case what's the benefit of neutering other than to prevent Waves?  Does it have an appreciable effect on Cross-plant attacks?

I had one neighbouring enemy world that connected to three others (a choke point).  I thought that if this one enemy world were turned into a DMZ of sorts (i.e., nothing left there at all) then I'd protect my worlds from Wave and Cross-planet attack from that direction.  It now seems that I have three AI systems on permanent full alert instead of just the neighbouring one.  Waves I am probably safe from here but if Cross-planet attacks are going to be fuelled from these three newly alerted worlds have I just not made the situation far worse?  If that is the case is there any point at all in trying to set up a DMZ world and instead should I have just settled for doing a Gate Raid to prevent Wave attacks and only have one AI world on alert, not three?

[Echo35]

-A new expansion-only capturable, the Zenith Power Generator, has been added: Advanced Zenith power generator that produces a massive amount of energy at a very tiny cost. AI progress goes up by 20 if this is destroyed, and while your team holds it, the AIs will send 2x stronger waves against this planet.

Not that I've played it yet, but only sending 2X Stronger waves at that planet? Building a Warp Jammer Command Station completely negates this penalty. They need some other kind of drawback I think.

[Minty]

@Echo:

Sure, you can build a warp jammer station, just like you can on planets with human settlements. But that's what? Four or five K knowledge, plus the associated mineral/crystal/energy drain from the command station itself.

Either way, it's going to be expensive. Either in knowledge, or in turrets to safeguard that system. Sounds about right to my eye.

[I-KP]

Numbers are a bit easier to read.   

[Spikey00]

@Minty:

300 000 Energy, -10 Metal/Crystal.

Without calculating the cost of 300 000 Energy in equivalence of MKII pgens, I am fairly confident a sum of 300 000 Energy being produced for -10 resources each offsets the consequence of the cost of a Jammer.


Personally though, I would just use Turrets.

[quickstix]

-Teleport Raiders, Anti-Starship Arachnids, and Teleport Battle Stations are now immune to tractor beams, since they can no longer shoot them.

Why? If they were vulnerable to them, it'd make you have to even out your fleets or provide cover when they initially go into a system, right?

I'm new to the game. Go easy on me.

All those ships use Minor Electric Ammo. Turrets are now invulnerable to Minor Electric Ammo, so it would be unfair if tractor beams could target these ships, as the ships would have no way of getting away. Remember that turrets can no longer have their shields or munitions boosted, which is a big change (I know of a few strategies using these boosters that no longer work). This serves to balance that change. These are more advanced ship types, so you're unlikely to notice these changes if you're still using simple ships.

[RCIX]

I've often noticed Guard Post numbers don't match up to actual Guard Posts present and assumed it was treating Wormholes are Guard Posts.  This Scout report does make Guard Post raiding awkward to conduct without having to visually scan the system manually first, which is- well, awkward.

Theory: Since X uses invisible perma-cloaked guard posts on wormholes in a system that blow up with the command station, maybe it's counting these?

[Lancefighter]

Right, silly question.
You mention that core fabricator can build a random core unit.. Why not a random core unit that you can build mk3 of?

[eRe4s3r]

I've often noticed Guard Post numbers don't match up to actual Guard Posts present and assumed it was treating Wormholes are Guard Posts.  This Scout report does make Guard Post raiding awkward to conduct without having to visually scan the system manually first, which is- well, awkward.

Theory: Since X uses invisible perma-cloaked guard posts on wormholes in a system that blow up with the command station, maybe it's counting these?

They should count as 1 (ie 1 Command Station) or simply not count at all in the stats.
The reason is simple - stats only display things we can destroy - the guard posts that ain't there are thus a bug

But speaking of this - i do wonder what Neutering actually does... Reduce Reinforce rate?

[x4000]

Regarding the guard post counts being off, that is indeed related to the perma-cloaked Wormhole guard posts.  I have added it to my list to get them out of the count.  The wormhole guard posts are not something you can directly destroy, but by destroying the command station it also destroys these.

Regarding the counts fluctuating a bit in general, that is a known issue based on enemy ships moving between planets.  It's on my list to address, though it's not been a critical item.

Regarding neutering, what that does is reduce the total ship cap for the AI at that planet.  There are some topics in the wiki that go into great depth on how the reinforcements work if you're curious, but that's the general idea of it.

Regarding the Zenith Power Generator, that is intended to be a net positive thing to capture.  In other words, that the benefit of capturing it outweighs its penalties by a fair bit.  Given the various things that have made the AI more difficult in recent releases, and all of the net-negative capturables and superweapons that will be in the expansion, some of the capturables in the expansion are also intended to be net-positive.  Is it too powerful and unbalance?  Time will tell, with more player testing data, but for the moment I'm pretty happy with how it fits in.

[x4000]

On that vein, when neutering a planet do all wormholes still receive reinforcements meaning that you can never really stop a planet from reinforcing unless you blow everything up?  AIs still receive reinforcements around wormholes that I am on the other end of.  Where are these ships supposed to be coming from if not passed me to get there?

Yes, this is how that works -- they continue to get reinforcements at wormholes until the command station is killed.  The AI is warping its ships directly into specific locations on its planets, a capability it has in general.  It is unable to warp into your planets at any location other than directly at wormholes from its planets, but warp is how it gets all its ships into the galaxy.

When a planet is wiped of all AI presence is it then normal for all planets that adjoin to that fully cleansed (but not colonised) world to then go onto permanent alert, even when I pull out all forces?  If this is the case what's the benefit of neutering other than to prevent Waves?  Does it have an appreciable effect on Cross-plant attacks?

Cross-planet attacks seem to be much misunderstood.  Here's the details on how that works: http://arcengames.com/mediawiki/index.php?title=AI_War_-_Cross_Planet_Attacks#How_Do_Cross-Planet_Attacks_Work.3F

The AI treats all territory that it does not control as hostile.  So that includes neutral planets, and will affect how the AI reinforces, etc.  Clearing an entire planet of control from the AI is not neutering it in the sense that is used here -- that's stripping a planet, or something (we don't have a specific name for it).  Stripping a planet can provide some buffer from the AI planets without providing new ingress points into your territory.

Neutering a planet is when you destroy all of the guard posts at an AI planet, but leave the command station (and thus also the wormhole guard posts).  The benefit of that is that it can make travel easier through that planet, mainly.

I had one neighbouring enemy world that connected to three others (a choke point).  I thought that if this one enemy world were turned into a DMZ of sorts (i.e., nothing left there at all) then I'd protect my worlds from Wave and Cross-planet attack from that direction.  It now seems that I have three AI systems on permanent full alert instead of just the neighbouring one.  Waves I am probably safe from here but if Cross-planet attacks are going to be fuelled from these three newly alerted worlds have I just not made the situation far worse?  If that is the case is there any point at all in trying to set up a DMZ world and instead should I have just settled for doing a Gate Raid to prevent Wave attacks and only have one AI world on alert, not three?

Yes, you've protected yourself from waves in that direction.  But Cross-Planet Attacks and special forces ships, etc, might still come from that direction.  If you put turrets and guards on the stripped planet, then you'll have a pretty nice buffer there, though.  The Cross-Planet Attacks are not fueled in any way by how many planets are on alert, so the only thing you've made worse is the AI Progress (which I'm sure you knew).  So no worries there!

I generally don't try to set up a DMZ, instead just doing gate raids, but in some cases it is needed.  If you're seeing lots of special forces ships coming into your territory and need a buffer, then a DMZ is the way to go.  If you need safe travel through that planet but don't want the exposure of the warp gates on all its neighboring planets if you capture the planet fully, then a DMZ is the way to go.  And there are a few other cases where it is valuable to do, too.  But generally gate-raiding or neutering is the way to go, since they don't come with as much of an AI Progress increase, if the other concerns aren't relevant.  I tend to eventually wind up capturing most of my DMZ planets, anyway, to get the resources out of them (most significant if you have higher-level command stations unlocked).

[x4000]

Right, silly question.
You mention that core fabricator can build a random core unit.. Why not a random core unit that you can build mk3 of?

I'm not quite sure what you mean.  Core ships = Mark V ships.  So having Mark III Mark V ships doesn't make much sense to me.