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

Game version 3778

A hotfix addressing lingering issues of the year 2023.

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

Happy holidays to those that celebrate them,

Jip

Balance

• (#5783) Revert the location of the UEF ACU teleport enhancement

There was an unforeseen strategy that one can apply when teleporting a UEF ACU with a Billy. The Billy enhancement now occupies the same slot as the teleport enhancement again.

• (#5782) Cybran tactical missiles now split when they are intercepted by the Aeon TMD

In moderate quantities it can create a fascinating show to watch.

tactical-missiles-aeon-tmd-01.mp4

Bug Fixes

• (7c624e, #5772) Fix rapid-fire on Aeon and Seraphim tech 2 stationary flak.

• (#5782) Fix the Aeon TMD being unable to prevent the Billy from exploding.

• (#5782) Fix the Aeon TMD firing its flare too late for incoming missiles.

Due to a bug, the Volcano had a target check interval of 1.0 seconds instead of 0.4 seconds, making it unable to reliably catch Seraphim tactical missiles due to their speed.

• (#5782) Fix the Aeon TMD locking onto missiles that it can't intercept.

This would prevent other TMD with a better chance at intercepting the missile from locking on.

• (#5782) Fix the Aeon TMD not tracking its intercept count.

Features

• (c696d43) Introduce a game option to scale strategic icons.

Also scales the pause and stun icons. Useful on monitors with high pixel density. A scale of 150% may distort the strategic icons.

• (9fd0b50) Add the ability to compute a detailed path for AIs.

The function is in NavUtils.lua and is named DetailedPathTo. The function is expensive in comparison to the standard PathTo function.

Graphics

• (ff6c016) Add new, high-quality strata layers and decals.

These assets are available through the FAF editor after retrieving the latest patch. The new biome is named 'New Realms.'

Other Changes

Contributors

With thanks to the following people who contributed through coding:

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

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

• Sting

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

• @4z0t
• @KionX

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

• Sladow
• @Sheikah45
• @Deribus
• CxZy
• @gordenwunderlich (Nex37)
• Aranei
• Ravandel
• Youknowhedead
• Samofflive
• @MostLostNoob

Game version 3777

An intermediate patch that fixes a few long standing bugs.

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

Happy holidays to those that celebrate them,

Jip

Balance

• (#5737) The Bulwark now has a dummy weapon, like other shields.

The range of the dummy weapon indicates where the shield hits the water line. The dummy weapon prevents the Bulwark from sailing right into the enemy fleet when you issue an attack move order. It roughly remains at the same range as frigates.

• (#5739) Adjust the selection priority of the Scathis.

The Scathis now has the same selection priority as other experimental artillery.

• (#5741) Fix bombers with multiple unpropelled ordinances from being able to track the target while dropping the ordinance

This primarily impacts the Zeus, Scorcher, and the Janus. The behavior is only different when the target is trying to evade the bomber. The overall behavior should be more consistent now with that of other bombers.

• (#5731) Enhancements are now taken into account when dispersing veterancy.

• (#5731) Enhancements are now taken into account when computing the mass value of a wreck.

• (#5679) Move the teleport enhancement to the left arm for the UEF ACU.

• (#5686) Rework of the Torrent.

The Aeon tech 3 missile ship is now cheaper to build. It fires more missiles that deal less damage but in a larger damage radius. The unit is now more equipped to overwhelm tactical missile defenses and deal damage in a wide area surrounding the target.

• (#5769) Rework of strategic missile submarines.

All non-experimental units with strategic missile launchers now have a 10-second reload time on their strategic missile launchers. The stationary strategic missile launchers were already affected by this reload time. It primarily applies to the strategic submarines and the Seraphim battleship.

• (#5715) Increase the range of the stealth field of the Deceiver by 1.

Unlike what the game makes you believe, intel works in a grid-like fashion. The cell size of stealth field intel is 4. Therefore, the previous increase of the radius from 20 to 23 has effectively no impact. The Deceiver now receives the buff it was intended to receive after increasing the vision range of a wide range of units.

Features

• (056106) Introduce a game option to adjust the minimum frametime.

This option allows you to align your framerate with the (high) refresh rate of monitors, potentially introducing tearing.

Keep in mind that the game is often CPU-bound rather than GPU-bound.

• (#5725) Refine the damage per second (DPS) calculations in the unit preview.

These calculations become visible only when the 'Display more unit stats' game option is enabled.

• (#5748) Extend repeat build toggle support to external factories.

You can now activate or deactivate the repeat build flag while having the mobile factory unit (e.g., the Fatboy) selected.

Bug fixes

• (#5742, #5727, #5722) Various units are no longer able to evade beam weapons.

• (9eeb38) Fix the wrong affinity mask being applied when a computer between 6 to 16 compute cores

This will noticeable impact the framerate of users.

• (#5761) Fix a bug that could make the build queue unresponsive.

A bug that was introduced two years ago. With thanks to the player named 'silentNoob' for his extensive efforts to try and document the bug.

• (#5756) Fix shields warping across the map for 1/10th of a second as they are created.

• (#5717) Fix various bugs in the firing cycle of weapons.

Most notable:

• The UEF ACU no longer fires a second tactical missile at the same target when it has the full build suite.

• The Lightning tank, Bouncer and Cougar should no longer be able to rapid fire when giving target-changing orders (such as a stop order).

• The Spearhead now fires exactly once every 10 seconds.

• Units that pack and unpack no longer pack or unpack twice in a row.

• (#5732) Fix mobile factories showing an infinite build time.

• (#5740) Fix the Seraphim tech 3 mobile artillery being unable to fire backwards.

• (#5767) Fix for units that linger while being built and the mobile factory is destroyed.

The lingering unit may not have been visible, but it does have gameplay impact. The lingering unit could for example block the placement for structures.

• (#5769) Fix the bug where the UEF Strategic Missile Submarine is able to fire multiple missiles in a single salvo.

This could give the unit a negative missile silo count. The negative count would trigger all sorts of other bugs, such as the ability to launch missiles indefinitely.

• (#5719) Fix the formations of mobile land to air units.

As a quick example, the Cybran Tech 1 MAA was considered a tank and would therefore always be at the front of the formation.

• (6a3248) Fix resources not being created on some generated maps.

• (#5718) Fix the Atlantis being unselectable while being built.

• (#55) Fix projectiles that split being able to pierce shields.

Graphics

• (#5758) Improve the charge and launch effects of the Yolona Oss.

• (#5738) Match the water absorption of the terrain with the water absorption of units.

• (#5745) Improve the build animation of the Cybran naval factories.

The build arms are now animated and only extend as far as the size of the unit that they are building.

• (#5734) Improve the water reflection of the sun.

• (#5726) Fix various bugs in the PBR shaders.

Other changes

• (#5762, #5721) Split the changelog across multiple files.

The original changelog file was so large it would almost turn into a singularity that would make generative AI blush.

• (#5672) Reduce overhead of the base classes of Cybran units.

• (#5664) Reduce overhead of the Cybran nano darts projectiles.

• (#5733) Allow the display of a build rate of 1.

Primarily applies to the Mantis and the Siren.

Contributors

With thanks to the following people who contributed through coding:

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

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

• @The-Balthazar

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:

• silentNoob
• @MostLostNoob
• @Deribus
• Highlander-tx

Game version 3776

Please refer to the notes of version 3775 for the full patch notes.

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

Jip

Reworks

• (#5681) Rework the impact effect of the Mercy

The Mercy now has its own distinct tune! The effect clearly indicates the area in which units can expect to receive damage over time. Special thanks to Deribus for his extended efforts in creating this effect.

• (#5695) Rework the appearance of the Janus

The Janus has undergone various visual upgrades, including a new mesh and a normal map that better resembles the shape of the plane. This rework, carried out by Ejsstiil, is one of the first units to receive proper attention after the introduction of PBR. For those interested, the pull request provides a comprehensive explanation of all the changes made.

• (#5705) Rework the mechanics of the flare-based anti-tactical missile weapons

The flare was lacking due to changes introduced to tactical missiles. Specifically, the velocity of certain tactical missiles posed problems. To address this, the muzzle velocity of the flare and the radius in which flares can pull in missiles are increased. The number of missiles a single flare can pull in is reduced to 3. Visual elements are introduced to help the player understand which missiles are being pulled in by a flare. Notably, the Volcano is now on par with other stationary tactical missile defenses.

aeon-tmd.mp4

Features

• (#5703) Add a highlight to the graph of the focus army

This change makes it easier to identify your part of the graph in the score screen.

• (#5640) Introduce additional roll off points for various (air) factories

The Seraphim air factories have no roll-off point anymore, as it is the only factory that hovers above the ground. The Aeon air factories have a third roll-off point towards the front of the factory.

Bug fixes

• (#5694) Fix the Striker being able to evade beams

• (#5693) Add the bonus range to the Seraphim Mobile Missile launcher

As intended by the balance team.

• (#5705) Fix the Volcano being unable to intercept tactical missiles in a reliable fashion

The tactical missiles would use the retargeting mechanic introduced with the balance patch to find a new target and home in on the target. That is of course not what is supposed to happen.

• (#5706) Fix being unable to issue attack orders with your gunships while they are landed on water.

• (#5706) Fix being able to dragbuild radars and sonars.

• (#5706) The bomb of the Ahwassa now deals damage to friendlies again.

• (#5640) Adjusting the process affinity on start up now supports CPUs with 24 or more logical cores

• (#5709) Fix anti-projectile weapons being disabled forever

This bug would only affect units with multiple weapons. In particular, torpedo defenses were prone to falling into this trap, turning them inert.

• (#5707) Fix engineers being confused when a factory is damaged

The cycle of engineers trying to 'repair' the unit that is under construction has been severed! The engineers now simply assist the factory, regardless of what else is going on.

Other changes

• (#5700) Frametime independent pulse animation for UI

• (#5706) Normalize the velocity of the Riot guns of the UEF

The velocity would be all over the place. They now all have a steady muzzle velocity of 60.

Contributors

With thanks to the following people who contributed through coding:

• @Garanas (Jip)
• @Pokute
• @Basilisk3
• @MrRowey
• @Deribus

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

• @Deribus
• @Ejsstiil

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

• @Deribus
• @MostLostNoob
• MrBeast
• Sladow
• Aranei
• Fluffy
• Sorrydough
• @ChessBerry
• @gordenwunderlich (Nex37)

Game version 3775

Another day, another patch!

This time around, it's a balance patch involving changes across the board, with special attention to balancing air units. For the full details, we recommend visiting the patchnotes website.

A special shoutout to @Brutus5000 , P4block, @Sheikah45 , Ravendel, and others who have extensively investigated and tried to fix problems with the ICE adapter.

Thanks to all those who took the time to report issues and participate in feedback sessions.

The balance team and @Garanas (Jip)

Game version 3774

Please refer to the notes of versions 3771, 3772 and 3773 for the full patch notes.

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

Jip

Features

• (#5655) Add a hotkey to interrupt the navigation of engineers

This hotkey adds micro for easier utilization of the engineer's full build range.

• (#5653) Improve the behavior of transports that want to pickup or dropoff units

With thanks to Clyf the behavior of transports is more reliable. Transports will in general be quicker at picking up and dropping off units.

Bug fixes

• (#5660) Fix various subtle bugs, improving overall stability

AI

• (#5660) Fix the distance computation of pathing functions of the navigational mesh
• (#5647) Add more debug functionality for state machines

Add more debug functionality for state machines, making it easier for developers to visualize the state machine's objectives by selecting its units.

Graphics

• (#5654) Further improve the appearance of water

Specifically by reducing the 'light emitting,' 'glow,' or 'translucent' effect, especially on wrecks.

Other changes

• Various annotation work of code has been completed
• Various refactoring of file structures has been completed

This is done in such a way that it won't break mods but it will allow us to refactor some of the classes to improve performance in future updates.

Contributors

With thanks to the following people who contributed through coding:

• @Garanas (Jip)
• @BlackYps
• @clyfordv (clyf)
• @MrRowey (Rowey)