Jump to content

Welcome to the Forum!

The best place to exchange builds and ideas! Vote for the best ideas and suggestions here.

Join the Avorion Discord!

Connect with other passionate players and talk about the latest news.
Discord

DLC Avorion Into the Rift Out Now!

Now available on Steam!
Steam

Beta Branch Patch 0.18 Patchnotes - Combat Update pt. II


koonschi
 Share

Recommended Posts

  • Boxelware Team

Patch 0.18

 

Date: July 4th, 2018

 

We're ready to deploy the first public build of the Combat Update II. We've got some more polishing and tweaking to do, but we want you to try out the build so we can fix errors and adjust things.

Have fun!

 

Beta Branch Note: These changes are currently available on the beta branch. The beta branch is for testing experimental changes and for finding and fixing errors.

 

This is how you get access to the beta branch (USE AT YOUR OWN RISK):

Right-Click on Avorion in your Steam list, Properties -> Betas -> Select branch 'beta'.

 

Turret Building Mode

 

"We've finally implemented the option for you guys to make your own turret designs and give your turrets custom looks, matching the ship you're flying! Disclaimer: For a multitude of reasons, mostly balancing related (but also development scope) turret designs are purely visual."

  • Players can now design their own custom turrets
  • Turrets consist of three parts: base, body and barrel
    • The base is placed directly onto the ship
    • The body is connected to the base and can rotate horizontally
    • The barrel is connected to the body and can rotate vertically
    • These parts can be rotated to get a feel for the design

    [*]Players can also design their own custom coaxial guns

    • These consist only of a single part

    [*]Players can choose the size of their turret

Using Turret Designs

  • Turret designs can only be used on top of Turret Base blocks
    • Select a Turret Base block in building mode and press the "Enter Turret Design Mode" button

    [*]A ghost preview of all inactive designs is rendered in building mode

    • Place an actual turret on the desired Turret Base to activate the design

    [*]When editing an inactive turret design the side of the Turret Base block it is going to be built on is the one you are looking at

    • This side is highlighted when the Turret Base is selected
    • The ghost preview of the selected Turret Base is put on this side

Coaxial Guns

 

"We've still got some fine tuning to do with these, so please give us feedback!"

  • Weaponry that would take 5 slots or more, is considered coaxial weaponry
  • Coaxial weapons deal 3x the damage of normal weapons that would take the same amount of slots
  • Coaxial weapons are always rigid and cannot turn

Collision Damage

 

"We've tuned collision damage to make it feel more natural and less threatening. All in all, your ships should no longer just explode after hitting a small asteroid."

  • Added a threshold for collision damage
  • Collision damage is no longer directly applied to ship HP, but in relation to the blocks that are damaged
    • No more immediate death by collision, except for when your ship only consists of a handful of blocks

    [*]Collision damage is applied in a cone, potentially damaging interiors as well

    [*]All blocks have a structural integrity, which is a percentage of their health which is subtracted from incoming collision damage

    • Armor has a high structural integrity of 75% percent, meaning that an armor block with 1000 hp will always reduce its collision damage by 750 points

Workshop

 

"Several adjustments to the workshop, especially considering the uploading of turret desings and ships including turret designs."

  • Added uploading of turret designs to the workshop
  • Ship Designs include their Turret Designs when uploaded to the workshop

Balancing

 

"In order to make the end-game a little more interesting, all Xsotan ships in the center of the galaxy scale with the strength of the player(s)' ships."

  • Massively increased damage and reach of the mobile energy laboratory
  • Xsotan ships inside of the barrier remember the player's strength and send ships with higher firepower
  • Added a 50% chance of getting a lower-slot turret drop in high-level areas
  • Activating the teleporter to the center spawns strong Xsotan ships

Client & Graphics

  • Updated Credits
  • Added a separate button for firing torpedoes (default: right-click)
  • Added a texture for Torpedo Storage Blocks
  • Added a neutral version of the editor with neutral lighting
    • The neutral version is only available when the game can be (and is) paused as to avoid confusion
    • The neutral version of the editor can be switched on and off

UI

  • Renamed 'Saved Ships' window to 'Saved Designs' window
  • Reworked design of Saved Designs window to use less buttons but instead a right-click context menu
  • Added a folder structure to 'Saved Designs' window
  • Added a prominent [Game Paused] message
  • Added a dark background to error and info message on the bottom right
  • Improved performance of Saved Designs window by creating thumbnails for ships
  • Uploading to the workshop shows better error messages
  • Saved designs window now no longer shows unknown files
  • Galaxy Map Improvements
    • Fixed markers not getting deleted on empty sectors (except when manually tagged by a player)
    • Fixed old ships still being visible in old markers, even though they're with you

    [*]Added folders to the Saved Designs Window

    [*]Improved handling of Double-Click

    [*]Made color of untrained crewmen brighter

    [*]Added french community translation of Avorion

    • Thanks to 'Ribosome' for administrating the french translation!

Scripting API

  • Added a new TurretDesign class
  • Added a dbg function to give players CoAx Guns Guns Guns
  • Implemented a script variable check to disable transfer of entities through wormholes or gates
    • Setting the value called "untransferrable" to true prevents the entity from travelling through wormholes or gates

    [*]Implemented a script function check to disable transfer of entities through wormholes or gates

Misc

  • Added better translation handling of several plurals, more to come
  • Renamed several instances of "Unknown Ship" to "Xsotan Ship"

Bugfixes

 

"Most bugfixes have been added in the 0.17.X update, but that doesn't mean you should stop keeping them coming! All user bug reports are marked with [uBR], as usual!"

  • [uBR] Fixed energy suppressor satellite tooltip
  • Fixed turrets making sounds in strange places
  • Fixed an issue where the keys for mirroring a plan in BlockTemplateBrush were hardcoded
  • [uBR] Fixed an issue with the splash screen not showing correctly
  • [uBR] Shooting down your own torpedoes is only possible for torpedoes targeting the shooting ship
  • [uBR] Fixed several crashes related to Turret AI and automatic targeting
  • Fixed a crash when enabling the debug text output
  • Fixed a crash in EnergyTab when player is not inside a ship
  • [uBR] Fixed an issue where hails couldn't be reliably answered with Return key without opening chat window
  • Fixed a script crash when trader stations have too many goods for the UI
  • Fixed a script hang when trying to transfer goods with neutral/unowned ships
  • Fixed explore sector mission hanging sometimes with no sector to explore
  • Fixed an issue when spawning persecutors in sectors with objects without owner
  • [uBR] Fixed an issue where player owned ships fired torpedoes without launcher blocks
  • Fixed several issues with quality of font rendering

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Wow the Turret editor is awesome  ;D I'm excited to see the first turrets in creations section  :)

 

When you add a turret with size 1 on a turret block with a size 2 blueprint, the turret scales up to 2 correctly. When you remove the turret, it remains on size 2 and does not scale back to original size. Is this a bug or a feature?

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I LOVE THE XSOTANS TO SCALE WITH YOUR POWER!!!

 

Nice update, someone's gonna play on the beta once again, but for coax weaponry, can it only drop or can you build a coax weapon of a turret variant in the turret factory? And, are coax weapons just like turrets but stationary, or do they have something special like a chargeup before firing? And how are turret locks of any use now?

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • Boxelware Team

Wow the Turret editor is awesome  ;D I'm excited to see the first turrets in creations section  :)

 

When you add a turret with size 1 on a turret block with a size 2 blueprint, the turret scales up to 2 correctly. When you remove the turret, it remains on size 2 and does not scale back to original size. Is this a bug or a feature?

 

I'm glad you like it!  ;D

 

The turret size changing is a bug, thanks for reporting! The fix will be live very soon.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

So the design wont scale to the size of the block at all or should it change back?

Wow the Turret editor is awesome  ;D I'm excited to see the first turrets in creations section  :)

 

When you add a turret with size 1 on a turret block with a size 2 blueprint, the turret scales up to 2 correctly. When you remove the turret, it remains on size 2 and does not scale back to original size. Is this a bug or a feature?

 

I'm glad you like it!  ;D

 

The turret size changing is a bug, thanks for reporting! The fix will be live very soon.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Thank you guys for the great update!

 

But now, that I've seen the feature list of the update:

Are you still planning to implement cloaking and boarding? I would have expected those in this update as well. Or will we get a combat-update III ?

 

Still a nice update, I love the coaxial weaponry and the power scaling!

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • Boxelware Team
Are you still planning to implement cloaking and boarding? I would have expected those in this update as well. Or will we get a combat-update III ?

Boarding definitely, cloaking needs more thought since we don't see a specific use case that would actually benefit the game except for cool or being nice to have.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Sweet update all, turret building brings alot to the game now.

 

I did notice alot of lag in the build mode when using larger templates. It happened when I was trying to place some of my premade thruster bells in a recessed area of the ship. I tested on other areas and think it could  be the shadows trying to project onto the not yet placed part

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Started a new yard-galaxy, no crashes yet after some hours of exploring :D.

The "Pause Game" thing is cool for Homeworld Tactical Overlay-style order-giving shenanigans !

 

However, found a (new?) bug ! I tried Keyboard Steering Mode, and all went well until I jumped.

If the camera isn't pointed towards the destination sector but the ship is, the ship jumps to somewhere in the current sector while I stay there piloting a drone, and the UI still displays the destination sector but the navigation computer "loses the lock", so the destination sector has to be reselected and "recalculated" to jump.

I guess I'll steer clear of this mode till it's fixed ::)

 

(Edit: Oh, and I found a Tesla Turret which uses 1 Armed Turret Slot and 1 Unarmed Turret Slot.)

(Re-edit: By Usamin! Congratulations on the AI upgrade. Now ships use reverse thrust to back down from crashes :) !)

(Re-re-edit: The new Keyboard Steering bug is also present in Mouse Steering, even if obviously less prominent.)

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Are you still planning to implement cloaking and boarding? I would have expected those in this update as well. Or will we get a combat-update III ?

Boarding definitely, cloaking needs more thought since we don't see a specific use case that would actually benefit the game except for cool or being nice to have.

 

Maybe not hiding the entire ship but just removing the green checkbox would be nice, so you can make camouflaged asteroid storage things without the dont click me im just a rock with a green square around me...

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Are you still planning to implement cloaking and boarding? I would have expected those in this update as well. Or will we get a combat-update III ?

Boarding definitely, cloaking needs more thought since we don't see a specific use case that would actually benefit the game except for cool or being nice to have.

 

Don't see a specific use???

Cloak to avoid those pesky frigs scanning your cargo.

Cloak to avoid torpedo lockon.

Cloak to avoid targeting at long range.

Cloak gives a reason for the scanner upgrade if you tie detection range with it.

Cloak gives another defense against boarders when implemented.  Can't board what you can't see :)

Cloak gives another option other than running away from an unwinnable situation. 

 

Those are just a few off the top of my head... I think Cloaking is necessary to complete this excellent game.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

The combat update is amazing so far. Some great Turrets  showing up in the workshop.  Having fun experimenting with building some designs of my own .

 

I have found a new bug on my new play through however.  If the designed turret size = the turret base block size exactly, for some reason the ship will occasionally not jump you into a calculated system, but instead eject you in your drone in the middle of the system.  You will then have to fly back to where your ship was in that same system.  The turret design/turret block of the same sizes will have reset after this also, making you have to redesign it, which is pretty easy now thanks to the amazing organization of the new saved designs!  I endes up just designing a new ship with bigger turret base blocks than the turret size and I haven't seen this happen again yet.

 

I'm very impressed overall though. Keep it up, Avorion devs!  Crossing my fingers that we will have ovoid shields which fit our ships' max dimensions and have splash effects when hit one day :). *crosses fingers

 

Edit: Hmm it seems it happened again.  So the bug isn't related to the size of the base and the size of the block.  Not sure what causes it then

Link to comment
Share on other sites

There's also the issue of reputation rewards: now only Delivery missions gives reputation rewards, and piddly ones at that. "Hanging around the sector doing almost nothing waiting for pirates and xsotan" is almost the only way to gain reputation when it's Bad or worse.

Pirate killing missions ? You need the enemy sector to be in the faction territory so a merchant would wander around to behold the battle to gain rep.  Shortage missions ? No effect. Explore missions ? No effect.

 

Other thing I remarked: accent support for grave accent (è's), thanks !

And nice addition of folders ! Gotta class my ships by material~ :)

The neutral editor allows players to make their ship unimpeded without time constraints nor the hull ticking down : no more need for secure shipyard sectors to make new ship models, nor to worry (much?) about persecutors when making a ship alone in a persecuted sector: it improves new player experience dramatically !

The new collision damage is fun: I'm currently driving a Moxie and, to damage myself in order to use a Repair Dock for rep gain, I plowed through an asteroid several times, getting damaged to more or less 60% hull... But the rear of my ship lost its blocks because of the cone. I imagine the captain going "weird, there's only superficial damage, but there's an updraft..." before yelping.

 

Oh, before I forget: the repair UI has difficulties: the ship and cost display sometimes does not work, and Repair Docks do not work at all: they "hang" when the repair button is clicked, not answering to any interactions after that.

 

(Edit: By Sayori's broken bottles ! Why is the "This production line doesn't exist" bug still around ?!)

Link to comment
Share on other sites

My negative opinions on the new "black flag" behind the collected Resources and error messages have already been voiced in the thread Hammelpilaw linked to in his post right above this one, so I won't repeat them.

 

I did want to weigh in on the matter in this topic too. The new black flag is obnoxious. Please reconsider it.

 

=====

 

Another remark: I used to be able to go into Build Mode, edit the Scale and Grid sizes, go out of BM, and return to BM, and the values would be "remembered". The only thing that would reset them was if I exited the game and loaded the game again.

 

However, now, that functionality has changed. Every time you enter Build Mode, the values are reset to 0.5 for each. This is rather annoying, as I prefer working at 0.25 for both most of the time.

 

=====

 

Otherwise, I love most of the things in the newest updates, including the icon you see on Captained AI craft so you see what they're up to, and the turret designing feature. Especially the latter is fantastic! I've created a classic 90s "floating laser turret" with a head that's slightly detached from the base and floats in mid-air. If you create it at a larger scale, then use it on a base that's too small and scale it down, the effect will be exaggerated and will be even better. Good stuff!

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • 1 month later...

I'll have to agree with others; the black background behind the text on the right does more to clutter the screen than it does to help.  In fact, I'd go a step farther and remove loot/resource and error messages from the side of the screen and send them to chat - possibly  in there own tab.  If collected resources need to be displayed for every. single. unit. - then a much less obtrusive way of displaying it needs to be figured out. Which brings me to my next concern.

 

Please allow the UI (all of it, but especially the elements we stare at all the time) to be modded. You guys are doing great work, but I can't help but think how many people are completely turned off by not only a visually unappealing UI, but also a UI that is functionally sub par in both usability and functionality.  I know in the end, ultimately you, the developers will be responsible for the way the UI looks and feels, but it can't hurt to let modders have a go at it and see where it leads.

 

I really hope modding is greatly expanded upon - in all areas - games like X3 not only survived, but thrived because of the modding community, and after going over the mods currently available here, it's pretty clear that they are being held back by the tools/api available to them.

 

Besides the UI, and modding issues, I ABSOLUTELY enjoy playing this game, and hope to be around to see it grow (more).

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • 2 weeks later...

Create an account or sign in to comment

You need to be a member in order to leave a comment

Create an account

Sign up for a new account in our community. It's easy!

Register a new account

Sign in

Already have an account? Sign in here.

Sign In Now
 Share

×
×
  • Create New...