Game version 3807

Fixes various reported issues and removes the 1st april pranks from the game again. They are still available as separate mods. You can find them here:

• Nyan cat Overcharge
• W I D E ACUs

Again with thanks to @Deribus for his extended effort and time in creating the initial implementation.

With gratitude to all those who took the time to report issues,

Jip

Bug Fixes

• (#6044) Fix Seraphim experimentals not appearing in the Notify settings window in normal games after having played Nomads.

• (#73) Fix a memory leak where weak tables are not deallocated by the garbage collector

Balance

• (#6040) Make veterancy requirements equal for presets and normal SACUs

Previously, the cost of enhancements for an SACU preset was added to the veterancy requirement of the unit, making it much harder to gain veterancy with them than manually upgraded SACUs.

Graphics

• (#6036) Add custom 'foot fall textures' for the Ythotha

Previously the Ythotha would use the same texture that the ACU does, but scaled up. It now uses a custom made texture that better fits the shape. It's not perfect, if you're interested in improving it then do get in touch with us!

Other Changes

• (#6037) Various smaller improvements to the additional unit details displayed when Show Armament Detail in Build Menu is enabled in the settings.

• (#6036) Reduce the lifetime of foot fall textures

They are now inline with tread marks, reduced from roughly 120 seconds to 4 - 8 seconds.

Contributors

With thanks to the following people who contributed through coding:

• @lL1l1
• @Basilisk3
• @Garanas (Jip)

With thanks to the following people who contributed through binary patches:

• @4z0t

With thanks to the following individuals who contributed through model, texture, and effect changes:

• @Garanas (Jip)

And, last but certainly not least - with thanks to those that took part in constructive discussions:

• @Deribus
• Aranei (Discord user)
• RarePleasure (Discord user)

Game version 3806

Fixes various bugs and visual inconsistencies that were reported by players.

With gratitude to all those who took the time to report issues,

Jip

Bug Fixes

• (#6021) Fix the teleport reticle crashing when using a modded scoreboard

• (#6021) Fix the teleport reticle not working on maps not aligned to the top left corner

• (#6022) Fix a bug where the Seraphim Air Factories are more sensitive to the terrain than the air factories of other factions.

• (#6026) Fix a bug where the build icons of the build queues of units would randomly pop up on screen when observing and/or watching a replay.

Balance

• (#6031) With the solid argumentation of Derp we decided to revert the revert of the revert that reverts the revert of the Tele Billy.

Other Changes

• (#6027) Attempt to fix odd behavior with the ACU when it gains veterancy.

With thanks to the community and specifically to @Deribus for investigating.

Contributors

With thanks to the following people who contributed through coding:

• @lL1l1
• @Basilisk3
• @Garanas
• @Deribus

And, last but certainly not least - with thanks to those that took part in constructive discussions:

• Derp
• Stormlantern
• @Sheikah45

And with special thanks to Derp and @Deribus for all their time and effort!

Game version 3805

Fixes various issues that were introduced in the past game versions.

With gratitude to all those who took the time to report issues,

Jip

Bug Fixes

• (#6017) Fix a bug that prevents you from upgrading tech 2 mass extractors to tech 3 mass extractors

Contributors

With thanks to the following people who contributed through coding:

@Garanas (Jip)

Game version 3804

Fixes various issues that were introduced in the past game versions. The most notable issue is the bug where the fog of war is not removed when a game ends.

With gratitude to all those who took the time to report issues,

Jip

Bug Fixes

• (#6002) Fix a bug where the map would not reveal at the end of the game

• (#6007) Fix Siren uselessly trying to repair units when assisting them

• (#6015) Fix a bug with capping extractors via the context-based templates feature

It was no longer possible to create the mass storage template for tech 2 or higher extractors with tech 1 engineers.

• (#6013) Fix an exploit with the copy/distribute orders feature

The exploit was that a player could assign attack orders to (mobile) units that you lack any form of intel of as long as you control one unit that has an attack order that you can distribute and/or copy.

Features

• (#6009) Add separate hotkeys to select all normal bombers and all torpedo bombers

  They can be found in the Selection category of the hotkeys as "Select all Bombers (Normal)" and "Select all Bombers (Torpedo)".
  Selecting normal bombers excludes the Mercy, as it is a kamikaze missile.

• (#6015) Extend the context-based templates feature

• (#6010) Add a hotkey label for the Attack Move button

• (#6015, #6016) Extend the context-based templates feature

The context-based templates feature generates and adjusts templates based on the context of your mouse. Globally speaking, this is one of two categories:

• (1) Mouse is over a unit or a build order

In this case the first template will always be the first buildable version of the unit that you're hovering over. Then additional templates may be introduced for common tasks, such as capping an extractor with storages.

The first 'template' acts like a color picker - it enables you to copy the unit you're hovering over and build more of them.

• (2) Mouse is over a deposit, land or water

In this scenario you can easily create mass extractors, hydrocarbons and/or walled point defenses.

Other Changes

• (#6002) Simplify the setup for moderator events

• (#6001) Add missing categories to units with Anti-Torpedo defenses

• (#6012) Add missing categories to the CZAR

• (#6005) Remove the BUILTBYEXPERIMENTALSUB category from all units that previously had it. As this category was unused, the Tempest still functions as you would expect.

• (#6006) Remove the MASSFABRICATION category from all ACUs, SACUs and the Paragon. Add the ANTIMISSILE category to the Seraphim Aircraft Carrier.

• (#6008) Remove the ANTIMISSILE category from the Brick as it does not have torpedo defenses

• (#6009) Add Mercy to the BOMB category alongside Fire Beetle. Remove Loyalist from the category as its Charge ability was removed.

  This allows category filtering to filter for Mercies.

Contributors

With thanks to the following people who contributed through coding:

• @Garanas (Jip)
• @lL1l1
• @apollodeathstar
• @relent0r
• @Hdt80bro
• @Basilisk3

And, last but certainly not least - with thanks to those that took part in constructive discussions:

• Sladow
• Babel
• Albert C
• Archsimkat
• Aranei
• @4z0t
• Shen

Game version 3803

Various small fixes for bugs that were reported by players.

With gratitude to all those who took the time to report issues,

Jip

Bug Fixes

• (520434e) Fix an edge case where the game would pause when a player is defeated.

Contributors

With thanks to the following people who contributed through coding:

• Jip

And, last but certainly not least - with thanks to those that took part in constructive discussions:

• Shen

Game version 3802

Various small fixes for bugs that were reported by players.

With gratitude to all those who took the time to report issues,

Jip

Bug Fixes

• (#5986) Fix a bug where experimental units leave no wreckage.

• (#5997) Fix losing reclaim orders when distributing a large number of reclaim orders.

Reclaim orders are now distributed in a similar fashion as move and build orders are. Each reclaim order is assigned to a single engineer. There is no redundancy anymore.

Graphics

• (#5998) Further improvements to the assets of the Mongoose.

With thanks to @Ajamajan the Mongoose received a second round of attention. Do zoom in and give the results a good look in-game!

Other Changes

• (#5995) Adds an event message when a player (un)pauses the game or self destructs units.

The chat message is also visible in the game log that is shown in the client, which is useful for moderators.

Contributors

With thanks to the following people who contributed through coding:

• @Garanas (Jip)

With thanks to the following individuals who contributed through model, texture, and effect changes:

• @Ajamajan

And, last but certainly not least - with thanks to those that took part in constructive discussions:

• Fichom
• @Sheikah45
• Prohibitorum
• @maudlin27
• @Deribus

Game version 3801

The first development iteration of 2024 is here!

There's a lot of goodies in this iteration. Most notably this developers iteration is also soaked with various balance changes. From 2024 and onwards we no longer have separate development and balance patches.

The in-game changelog will no longer include all the details of the changes. You can find the complete changelog on Github. You can use the button in the bottom-left corner of this dialog to immediately jump to details of the changes of the selected game version.

With gratitude to all those who took the time to contribute,

Jip

One does wonder - how did we jump from game version 3780 to 3801? The answer is simple - we did a whoopsie and pushed game version 3800 instead of 3780 to the FAF Develop game type. Now, it won't update the game type unless the game version is equal or more than 3800. As game version 3800 is already occupied we now have game version 3801.

Bug Fixes

• (#5897) Fix wrecks that sink to end up below the terrain.

• (#5896) Fix Corona and Swiftwind being unable to hit landed air units.

• (#5888) Prevent the player from gaining veterancy by killing allied units.

• (#5880) Fix strategic missile launchers losing progress when adjacency changes.

• (#5878) Fix the Volcano being able to redirect strategic missiles.

• (#5879) Fix various air units when landed being impossible to hit with non-splash weaponry.

• (#5931) Fix the bug related to capture time and costs for factories that are building units.

  The unit they were constructing would inflate the capture time and cost of the factory itself.

• (#5958, #5979) Fix projectiles of the Fatboy and SACUs with their respective range upgrades running out of lifetime before impact.

• (#5945) Fix the Seraphim Tech 3 Submarine Hunter not being recognized in a formation

• (#5941, #5972, #5959) Fix collision shapes of various units

  This reduces the chance that beam weapons miss.

• (203f8c9) Fix the game producing invalid JSON that is used by achievements

Balance

• (#5898) Rework projectile counts on torpedo bombers.

  The projectile count was excessive and a large quantity of torpedo bombers could consume a significant chunk of the available budget for the simulation. At the same time we increase the projectile count of the Solace to make it less susceptible by torpedo defenses.

  • Solace (XAA0306): increase salvo size from 4 to 5 but keep the same total damage output
  • Skimmer (UAA0204): reduce salvo size from 5 to 4
  • Stork (UEA0204): reduce salvo size from 5 to 4
  • Cormorant (URA0204): reduce salvo size from 5 to 4
  • Uosioz (XSA0204): reduce salvo size from 5 to 2

  Note that the projectile of the Uosioz splits upon impacting the water and therefore the actual projectile count is 6.

Additionally, the Solace's MaxRadius and MuzzleSalvoDelay are reduced to decrease the likelihood of it dropping its torpedoes over terrain. Its RateOfFire and BreakOffDistance stats are increased to prevent it from sometimes failing to drop its payload, or dropping it on top of or behind ships. Effective DPS stays roughly the same.

Solace (XAA0306): reduce its range from 32 to 26; reduce its MuzzleSalvoDelay from 0.4 to 0.2; increase it's BreakOffDistance from 42 to 44; decrease its reload time from 12.5 down to 10 seconds.

• (#5910) Adjust the pathfinding behavior of the Blaze

  The main weapon is now a turret like the majority of the units. As a result the weapon no longer negatively influences the pathfinding behavior of the unit. To compensate the hitpoints of the Blaze is reduced from 1100 to 1000.

• (#5884) The Chrono Dampener enhancement can now fire while being underwater

• (#5916, #5979, #5978) Improve the targeting behavior of the Ythotha and the Fatboy

  Both units will better align to targets to maximize the use of their weaponry.

• (#5764, #5954, #5963) Change the reverse behavior of a wide range of units

  In an attempt to improve the general pathfinding of the game, a lot more units can move now move backwards for small distances.

  In addition to gaining the ability to move backwards, the Seraphim Tech 2 Sonar gets its TurnRate stat tripled from 20 to 60 (Tech 3 Sonars have 100), and its movement speed increased by 12%, as it was very sluggish to use.

• (#5944) Increase the maintenance cost of Cybran Superiority Fighters

  Costs are increased from 25 to 30 to align with the cost increase of the previous balance patch.

• (#5947) Unfinished structures and experimentals no longer create a wreck

Features

• (#5475, #5907, #5904, #5900) Variable teleport duration and costs.

teleport-preview.mp4

Teleport duration and energy costs now increase as you're trying to jump further. The minimum is a duration of 15 seconds at a cost of 5.000 energy per second. The maximum is a duration of 50 seconds at a cost of 50.000 energy per second. The maximum can only be reached on maps of size 40x40 or larger.

This is implemented as an alternative to a maximum teleport range. This implementation still allows people to jump as far as they wish but they're naturally constrained by their own economy.

The expected costs of the teleport are displayed next to the cursor when you're trying to issue a teleport order. This uses the distance from the world position of the cursor to the unit. When you hold shift it instead uses the distance from the world position of the cursor to the last move and/or teleport order of the unit.

• (#5860) Further improve the context-based templates feature.

  You can now cycle through templates of a given context in the following order:

  • (1) The build context.
  • (2) The build order the cursor is hovering over.
  • (3) The unit the cursor is hovering over.
  • (4) The deposit the cursor is hovering over.
  • (5) The layer (land/water) the cursor is hovering over.

  The templates you are cycling through are now preserved until you exit command mode. That means once you enter command mode by cycling you keep on cycling through the same templates.

• (#5846, 5915) Further improvements to the behavior of tactical missiles.

  A single (non-aeon) tactical missile defense can now protect itself against a missile with 2 hit points again. In general Aeon, UEF and Cybran missiles have a reduced velocity. The Seraphim missiles still have the same velocity, but decrease in velocity as they get closer to the target.

• (#5923) Add the ability to load into transports by right clicking the transport button.

  This triggers the same behavior as the 'Load into transports' hotkey.

Graphics

• (#5887, #5914, #5892, #5890, #5953) Significant improvements to the graphics of the various UEF units.

  With thanks to @Ajamajan the Mongoose, Frigate and Destroyer finally received the attention that they needed. The quality of the textures of the first level of detail (LOD0) have improved significantly and the units are now visually on-par with the rest of the UEF arsenal.

• (#5911) Improve the effects surrounding Seraphim torpedo's.

  The split effect is now applied when Seraphim torpedo's split.

  Seraphim stationary torpedo defenses now drop their torpedo's into the water instead of them flying across the water surface.

• (#5970, #5960) Update the impact effects of various tactical missiles.

  All significant tactical missiles now have separate faction-specific effects from insignificant tactical missiles. This makes it easier to understand the origin of the tactical missile. Significant tactical missiles also have a larger strategic icon (4 pixels instead of 1 or 2). The Billy has a new, unique strategic icon.

AI

• (#5866) Fix submarines surfacing when leaving the factory.

• (#5872) Improve the behavior surrounding AI rating.

  They are now taking into account when computing the game quality.

• (#5861) Reduce the overhead of various navigational functions.

• (#5863) Add an alternative, more detailed version of computing valid nearby positions.

Other Changes

• (#5865, #5929, #5934, #5938, #5936, #5937, #5935, #5928, #5930,

• #5942, #5966, #5968, #5969, #5965, #5967, #5964)
  Update the categories of various units.

  These are used by key bindings and the UI to understand what the units are capable of.

• (#5870, #5858, #5881) Improve the descriptions of a wide range of units.

(#5939) Improve the naming scheme of all UEF drones and update their descriptions and Tech levels.

• (#5873) Reduce the lifetime of scorchmarks created by forest fires.

  They would previously last between 300 to 90.000 seconds. They now last between 60 to 120 seconds.

• (#5864) Fix the pin feature of the minimap not being stored in the preference file.

• (#5875) The upgraded kennel can now be drag-build when spawning it in via the cheat menu.

• (#5921) Align the target priorities of the Continental with other similar weapons.

• (#5871) Fix a framerate drop when selecting units.

  This was most notable for players with many user-made build templates. All the user-made build templates would be deep copied for each new selection. The average user-made build template easily has a footprint of several kilobytes in memory. With all the user-made build templates combined it could rack up to a megabyte worth of copied memory.

  The solution was to cache the templates so that they are only allocated once.

• (#5852) The first decimal place of damage values are now visible in unit tooltips.

• (#5849) Small tweaks to the Salvation to match the (visual) properties of other artillery.

• (#5943) The Novax Satalite System is no longer disabled when air is restricted.

  The Novax Satalite System can be restricted separately.

• (#5980) Reduce the logging of enabled UI mods.

  Especially UI mods with (large) changelogs ...

Game version 3781

Bug Fixes

• (37cf270) Fix the Easy AI not working (again)

We often use the Easy AI as a testing platform.

Game version 3780

A new year that we can only start with new mechanics that are buggy!

With gratitude to all those who took the time to report issues,

Jip

Bug Fixes

• (582be6d) Fix the Easy AI not working.

We often use the Easy AI as a testing platform.

• (#5854) Fix a bug where Auto Overcharge appears enabled but is actually disabled.

The bug occurs when the ACU attempts to use Auto Overcharge while enhancing. The Auto Overcharge behavior will be turned off but the UI was not updated accordingly. The UI now reflects this behavior.

• (#5853) Fix a bug when the Billy is redirected by a Loyalist.

The bug would generate an endless loop of explosions.

Features

• (#5855) Give AI a notion of rating.

The rating shows in the lobby and in-game. The rating adjusts depending on whether it is a cheating AI, the cheating modifiers and the size of the map.

Note that games with AIs are unrated.

Other Changes

• (#5840) Improve the English description of various Cybran units

Contributors

With thanks to the following people who contributed through coding:

• @lL1l1
• @Garanas (Jip)
• @Basilisk3
• @MrRowey
• @4z0t

Game version 3779

A new year combined with new mechanics and behavior/bug fixes!

With gratitude to all those who took the time to report issues,

Happy holidays to those that celebrate them,

Jip

Balance

• (#5815) Adjust the target priorities of the Percival

The Percival now prioritizes firing at structures over tech 1 units. Its targeting priorities are now similar to Snipers.

• (#5812, #5823) Enhance tactical missile behavior

Improved the behavior of tactical missiles across the board.

Targeting behavior now considers the full orientation of the unit, enhancing accuracy against units on slopes.

Adjusted zig-zag behavior to reduce last-minute zig-zagging before impact, making Aeon tactical missiles more accurate.

• (#5790) Re-design the Deflector ability of the Loyalist

The deflector weapon of the Loyalist allows it to take ownership of incoming tactical missiles and return them to the unit that fired it. With the new implementation the missiles that are send back have switched army and can therefore be intercepted by Tactical Missile Defenses (TMDs) and shields.

The deflector weapon can now deflect the Billy again.

The deflector weapon is unable to deflect tactical missiles that are incoming from directly above the Loyalist.

Casually playing Tennis

tennis.mp4

• (#5794) The Cybran Cruiser is now equipped with a Deflector instead of a Zapper.

The deflector weapon is unable to deflect tactical missiles that are incoming from directly above the Cybran Cruiser.

• (#5794) The Cybran Aircraft Carrier is now equipped with a Deflector instead of a Zapper.

The deflector weapon is unable to deflect tactical missiles that are incoming from directly above the Cybran Aircraft Carrier.

• (#5806) Modify the economy behavior of the Scry ability of the Eye of Rhianne.

Now behaves similarly to other economy-consuming abilities.

• (#5667) Adjust the movement behavior of the Seraphim sniper

The movement reduction of the sniper mode is now only applied when the main weapon is on cooldown. This reduces the amount of micro that is required to use the sniper.

• (#5805) Buff standard resource allocation of Seraphim SACUs

Increased standard resource production to 3 mass/second and 200 energy/second for Seraphim SACUs.

The Seraphim faction lacks a Resource Allocation Subsystem (RAS) for the SACU. We understand that players may feel disadvantaged when playing Seraphim in the very-late game phase where RAS SACUs can play an important role. With these changes, we preserve the faction diversity while providing the Seraphim faction with an alternative approach to generate mobile resources.

This is an experimental change that is subject to future tweaks.

• (#5795) Reduce the collision shape of landed air units.

Landed air units now have a smaller collision shape, matching the size of the mesh.

• (#5785) Fix projectiles being unable to impact the water surface.

Notable for UEF tech 2 Destroyer projectiles and various tactical missiles.

• (#5827) Allow SACUs to have the COMMAND target priority.

Allows SACUs to target an ACU while moving in snipe mode.

• (#5834) Fix a bug with the salvo of the tech 3 submarine.

Corrected a bug reducing damage per second to 327 instead of 363.

• (#5834) Fix Aeon anti-torpedo defenses firing two anti-torpedoes at a single torpedo.

The Aeon Destroyer and Submarine hunter are now better at defending against torpedo's.

• (#5836) Fix intel ranges being inaccurate

This is a complicated but interesting change. For the player, intel is visualized as a perfect circle. However, for the engine, intel is processed in a grid. The grid is coarse - the size of a cell for vision is 2 walls, and for all other types of (counter) intel, it is 4 walls.

This has consequences. Imagine four units with a radar radius of 28, 29, 30, and 31. Visually, it appears that the last unit with a radar radius of 31 provides more intel than the unit with a radar radius of 28. For the engine, however, because the size of a cell in the intel grid is 4 walls large, it doesn't matter - the units with 29, 30, and 31 radar range provide as much intel as the unit with 28 radar range.

With these changes, we reviewed all intel radii to ensure the value aligns with the value that the intel grid actually applies. As a result, the intel radius of units may appear smaller, but for the engine, they are the same. Therefore, the intel radii that you see now are more accurate.

An extensive test suite is also introduced to keep the intel ranges of units accurate as time passes.

• (#61) Increase the intel update frequency from 3 seconds to 0.5 seconds

In the average case, intel would only update every 3 seconds (or 30 ticks). With thanks to an assembly patch, intel now updates every 0.5 seconds (or 5 ticks). This impacts not just what you see as a player but also how quickly the weapons of your units may react to blips that suddenly pop up in their range.

• (#5836) Revert of the 15% global vision range increase as introduced by game version 3761

The vision range of various units was increased because of the slow update frequency of intel. With thanks to the assembly patch, the update frequency of intel is increased with 600%, and therefore, we're reverting the global vision range increase.

• (#5848) Remove the friendly fire of the Ravager.

• (#5789) Adjust the behavior of the Billy.

The Billy no longer explodes in the first 2.5 seconds of its lifespan. The damage of the Billy no longer pierces shields, reversing an accidental change.

Bug Fixes

• (4c9b6b) Fix a bug that only triggers in the Nomads featured mod.

• (#5818) Reduce the maximum attack radius of the Aeon Tactical Missile Defense (TMD).

The Volcano could try to intercept missiles that it would never be able to. Given that TMDs try not to overshoot their target, the behavior would cause other TMDs to ignore the missile.

• (6f3244) Fix a bug for the AI where the threat-based pathing would return an incorrect result.

• (#5809) Fix a bug for the AI where it would confuse the type of expansions, overspending significantly because of it.

• (#5804) Fix the Shard being able to evade beams.

• (#5795) Fix air units losing essentially all water vision once they have landed once.

• (#5820) Fix a bug where the assist-to-upgrade feature would not pause the structure due to network lag.

• (#5831) Fix a bug that would break achievement progression.

• (#5829) Fix a bug when the Salem makes landfall.

• (#5841) Fix a bug where units on the sea floor would not have the mass value of their wreckages reduced.

• (460fcda) Fix a bug where players would be able to cheat units in co-op when playing alone.

• (#5817) Fix a bug where the shared armies lobby option does not take into account random spawn positions.

As a result, the 'shared' armies would be scattered across the map.

Features

• (#5821) Add additional context-based templates

Involves templates for the Soothsayer, the Eye of Rhianne, and the Salvation.

• (#5820) Add additional assist-to effects

You can now assist a tech 2 mass extractor with some adjacency to start an upgrade to tech 3.
You can now assist a radar to start an upgrade. Requires some adjacency for a tech 2 radar.

You can enable/disable the behavior at the 'Commands' header of the 'Gameplay' tab of the game options.

• (#5832) Wrecks now warp back onto the map when units crash outside of the map

Other Changes

• (#5826) Show decimals of the damage radius of weapons.

• (#5816) Show decimals of the build rate of units.

As an example, the build rate of a tech 3 engineer would previously show as '32' while it is actually '32.5'.

• (#5736) Fix the intel hotkey not showing for the Scry ability.

• (#5802) Add a silo hatch animation to the UEF ACU when it fires a missile.

There's a standard reload time that applies. This is most notable for the Billy. The hatch animation acts as a rough indication for this reload time.

• (#5811) Clarify the distinction between user-created templates and context-based templates.

• (#5828) Fix various English descriptions of units.

• (#5830) Rework the frames per second counter to update less frequently

It now updates four times per second. The frame counter is moved from the left side to the right side of the screen.

Contributors

With thanks to the following people who contributed through coding:

• @lL1l1
• @Garanas (Jip)
• @Basilisk3
• @KionX
• @relent0r

With thanks to the following people who contributed through binary patches:

• @Hdt80bro

And, last but certainly not least - with thanks to those that took part in constructive discussions:

• @Apofenas
• @Deribus
• HintHunter
• @Eternal-ll
• @The-Balthazar
• @Hdt80bro