Report - Current Bugs and Issues

[zolobolo]

I can confirm:
- Marauders have not taken slaves for a long time since the update which made them freindly towards AI empires
- This change has been lifted yesterday and Marauders are conducting attacks against neighbouring empires
- Slave pops of neighbouring empires has also popped up again but this seems hard-coded and not a result of raiding

Note: Even though Marauders had a masive raiding fleet available to them and have beaten the defending fleet and invaded the planet, they did not raid. During the attack they actually sent all of their transports back to their base (for no apperant reason as they have initiated the attack to no retreat was necessary from the enemy system) and have only invaded with groundtroops carried on their Command Cruisers

I agree that in the early game the player would mostly not notice the Raider activity against AI colonies but from mid-game on they are visible due to alliances and shared vision thereof, and since lost colonies are visible via the territory border system. I would advise against automated slave pop generation from neighbours as it is appreant from mid-game on and it seems that a dynamic slave economy is attainable and would be in line with the games credo of every event taking place on the map: I have seen Marauders raiding my colonies numerous times before and thus the only major obsticle should be if the AI can take the occasional beating

Solution might be dynamic relationship:
Every 10 Turns,
If AI is stronger then Marauders attack 60% of the time else accept paymanet
If weaker and payment<80% of income then pay 75% of the time else hostile relationship

This way, financially rich empires mostly avoid being attacked but would sometimes be attacked and strong empires would eventually attack Marauders

Will start a new game and check if the AI can now handle the Marauders and still remain competitive

Update: The Marauders are doing much better now then the last time I saw them attacking as they are now also capturing ships (for which their Command Cruisers are in an optimal position) - they for sure do not need any buffs: hopefully the AI empires can keep up

[zolobolo]

If reactivation of Harpy invasions and pirates is also planned, then the probability of conflict between AI and Marauders can be furhter decreased via hte probabilities.

Harpies already posed the smalles threat to the AI as they did not attack with large forces when they still did and once they were in a sytem, they didnt bother the planets directly (besided blockading them)

Pirates could be scripted to only attack the most powerful empire(s) on the map. Flavor text: "The riches kept in the coffers of empire X have gotten around the Galaxy. Privateers and scum from all coreners of the cosmos are encrouching on their position to loot what they think should rightfully be theirs."

[sven]

Update: The Marauders are doing much better now then the last time I saw them attacking as they are now also capturing ships (for which their Command Cruisers are in an optimal position) - they for sure do not need any buffs: hopefully the AI empires can keep up

Would you upload this game? Right now, I *think* the only way an AI should end up in conflict with the Marauders is if the AI believes it can capture the Marauders' planet, so it starts a fight. My guess is that in this case an AI started such a fight unwisely, and got itself into a problematic conflict. I'd like to verify that though. There's a chance things aren't quite working as I imagine. Also, perhaps, the AI's judgments about whether or not it can indeed take out a Marauder base could use some tweaking.

[zolobolo]

Would you upload this game? Right now, I *think* the only way an AI should end up in conflict with the Marauders is if the AI believes it can capture the Marauders' planet, so it starts a fight. My guess is that in this case an AI started such a fight unwisely, and got itself into a problematic conflict. I'd like to verify that though. There's a chance things aren't quite working as I imagine. Also, perhaps, the AI's judgments about whether or not it can indeed take out a Marauder base could use some tweaking.

Uploaded as game_7532

The attack is initated by the Marauder fleet at system Dubhe: it seems they attack with their transports as well - this should be the issue
As they later decide to retreat the transports from the battle, they are pulled off from the system - they should probalby not attack with transports (even for the purpose of potential boarding) as these kind of ships are too flimsy for that. By leaving out transports from the attack like is the default behaviour when the player attacks and enemy fleet, this issue should be resolved

After the attack is succesfull, they go on and invade the planet: I would suggest that Maraduers always only raid and never invade. This would serve two purpose:
1. AI empires are not hurt that much by raids then by invasions
2. The Marauders should serve as occasional flavor so that they do not become boring quickly. By taking planets, their presence is more pronounced on the map.

Suggest to only have a small chance of direct conflict for these to same reasons: by having either side paying off the other, the AI gets more breathing room, and over time the Marauders will likely take some slaves anyhow before their hopefully inevetable (but somewhat prolonged) demise by AI fleets

I haven't seen any cases yet where the AI attacks a Marauder base since the update, but will keep an eye on it

[Danath]

Game_7621 is old bug again: Marauder "encounter", but the only ship in the system is Tinker's. Even worse, I think these particular marauders are the only ones I refused to pay tribute on first encounter because they are at NW corner of the galaxy, way far from my territory.

Also, reminder that Humans keep asking for food because of a famine on Fargone... a giant gas planet...

[zolobolo]

AI (Tinkers) initiates attack but retreats at Turn 1

Game uploaded: game_7707

[zolobolo]

Playing as Gremak it does not seem to be possible to reach 100+ positive relationship with Marauder factions: peakes at 97 (even when buying futher slaves and ships) and annex the minor faction

If I remember correctly, this was possible before: bug or intentionally disabled for DEV purpose?

If enabled/enambed again, it is fine if a large amount of influence needs to be paid for each minor faction when the option becomes available (gues above 100+ relationship)

[nweismuller]

Game_7709: captured a Tinker transport at Nunki a number of turns before the uploaded game. Never got the dialog for what to do with captured ships, and the transport has been stuck, uninteractable, 'under civilian command' since then.

[nweismuller]

Game_7785: Failure to truncate decimals in coin values for current treasury result in horrible, ugly, awful interface issues. Can no longer read current labor; accurately reading current coin income is also an issue, because treasury values spill right over into the food section of the top bar. The fact that certain transactions don't round to the nearest coin is frankly probably an issue in itself. Occurred after granting a coin gift to the Yoral Khaganate on request.

[sven]

The fact that certain transactions don't round to the nearest coin is frankly probably an issue in itself. Occurred after granting a coin gift to the Yoral Khaganate on request.

Yeah, I was messing with the resource request logic a few days ago, and it looks like I failed to round some of the result numbers It should be fixed as of r37970.

[nweismuller]

game_7793: Another case of captured transports remaining as 'ships under civilian command' in orbit of a star, unable to be interacted with in any way. Transport Azimir.

[sven]

game_7793: Another case of captured transports remaining as 'ships under civilian command' in orbit of a star, unable to be interacted with in any way. Transport Azimir.

Thanks for this upload. There was some ancient logic in the game that was intended to make unprotected transports surrender if they were cornered by enemy fleets. That logic was broken, however, which could lead to cases like this bug. I've taken a shot at cleaning out and updating that surrender logic -- I believe it should now be working more or less as intended. (So bugs like this should be fixed as of r37979.)

[nweismuller]

Just played through a game, and made sure to intercept a Yoral transport when they gave me a chance after declaring war on me. The transport did indeed surrender, so it seems to be working properly.

[nweismuller]

game_7832: Captured progress on 'Hidden Bases' technology after battle with Stone Hammers at Shaula; tech description indicates it should be hidden and non-discoverable.

[nweismuller]

game_7851: Requests from both Colonials and Orthin to join their wars as allies on the same turn they conclude a peace treaty with the enemies they want me to fight. (Colonials made peace with the Tinkers, and are asking me to fight the Tinkers, and Orthin made peace with the Yoral, and are asking me to fight the Yoral.) Probably worth a sanity check so that allies don't request you to join an ongoing war they just ended the same turn.