Report - Current Bugs and Issues

[zolobolo]

Some AI topics to list, maybe one or two of them is due to an issue in the logic and should be working but is thus blocked:
- AI not building market (this might be a research issue)
- Not buying Merc ships (Phidi would be the main suspect to do so)
- Does not use boarding with shuttles even when outmatched (but it uses boarding in some cases where boarding module is not present)
- Does not retreat if outmatched (in some cases it does but it seems that only for transports and scout ships). This should be a percentage thing like: 25% chance to decide for a run if outmatched
- Send out interceptors as its first move - to be reserved against rockets and other craft OR: only sent out if there are no considerable PD on the other side
- Humans do not use Assault Marines, though for this to make sense, they first need to use boarding
- Only favoring 2-3 ship designs. Tech-wise it should have researched all hull types as those tech are usually cheap but they might be going down a single tech-road and ignore the "old" tech. Though I do see 1-2 ships in a large empire so this goes against the research issue. In a typical game against Yoral it produces around 90% Frigates or destroyers and 10% Battleships. A single Light Cruiser or Carrier may pop up every 100 ship or so for some reason, but only produced as a single ship. Maybe this is due to how the ship blueprints are handled: the AI selects one enemy and chose the best counter against that but is not allowed to equip ships, and has to instead chose from existing designs (thus it only chooses the 2 best designs that fit the purpose)

EDIT: AI does not seem to use Outposts to increase its range
EDIT 2: The boarding issue is really strange. Noticed in several occasions that stations and ships have initiated boarding attack without boarding module (e.g.: Yoral Frigate, Human Destroyer, Transports, Starbase...). Also noticed in the current game that Human fleet has boarded Marauder transports via Assult craft (with shuttle ) but also with basic Destroyers. This is strange as there is nothing really to gain from this (does it disassembles them?) but does not use the shuttles against combat ships even when clearly loosing

[zolobolo]

Force Lance doesn't seem to penetrate Battle Shields and Force Fields.
According to their description they should be able to bypass them fully, but considering that they have a higher damage value then Primary Beans, this might be a description issue as both a higher damage and bypassing shields would make them far superior

[Wyvern]

When you click the button to queue a research target, and that technology is one that you have access to due to captured technology, the game can sometimes queue up extra tech first that you don't actually need.

For example, I had a game going as Gremak prior to the current patch, where I'd followed the tech path of researching lasers. With the addition of Plasma Focusing as a pre-requisite for Plasma Projectiles, I would have had to research down the ion beams tech path to research Pulson Launchers. Instead, I got lucky, and managed to acquire the Plasma Focusing technology off a captured ship - but when I went to the tech screen to queue up Plasma Projectiles, it insisted on queuing up ion weapon techs first, despite the fact that I didn't need those techs.

Directly selecting Plasma Projectiles as my next research project (instead of adding it to the queue behind my current research project) worked just fine, though.

[Wyvern]

Just got a crash while trying to load a save from the main title screen; it was taking a while and I wandered off for a bit, and when I came back the screen had gone black and popped up the red error box, something about threading? I didn't catch the exact words, and clicking on 'report' or 'copy' didn't work. I did, however, somehow manage to get a dialog box asking if I wanted to save a crash dump file, so I told it to do that - that part worked, at least.

So, of course, I restarted SiS and tried again; almost the same thing happened - loading animations became increasingly jerky until they stopped entirely - but no black screen or red error box; had to bail out to the task manager, and got another crash.dmp file out of it.

For try number three, I enabled "simplified graphics" first, and... pretty much the same thing happened; the "Loading..." text vanished after a bit, leaving only a grey box, and when I bailed out to the task manager I got the same dialog asking if I wanted to save a diagnostic file. Crash dump #3 acquired.

Next thing to test, then! The save I was trying to load was about halfway through a turn, and I've still got the autosave from the end of the previous turn. Let's see if that one loads. ...Nope. Died even more spectacularly; the loading text vanished, then the entire SiS fullscreen vanished, leaving me staring at my desktop with a spinning cursor. I'm not even getting the dialog to let me save a crash dump this time.

So I've got two unusable save files (2.6MB each), and three crash dumps (~600MB each after I compressed them). Of possible relevance: the game in question was created on r20397, and (as I'm running via steam), it was last saved under r20752. If any of these five files would be of use to you, please let me know which ones and how best to get them to you. For now, I'm going to just start a new game; that one was mostly finished anyway.

[Ashbery76]

Getting fair amount of crashes in the latest dev build.logs sent.

[Wyvern]

Tinkers don't lose population when overpopulated. And, as they (by design) also don't take morale penalties for overpopulation, you can overload a planet with tinkers with no penalties.

[zolobolo]

Scrolling with mouse for zooming in and out in the tech tree does not work (read in the change log of the latest build)
Clicking on the + and - signs next to the magnifying glass icon works as expected

[zolobolo]

Testing out the new upkeep balance - great stuff

Please note, that ground unit upkeep cost is not listed in the detailed breakdown of income/trun
Wether it was there before the patch I cannot tell. My old save doesnt show it either but taht may be due to the patch

Starbases did not get an upkeep lift as far as I can tell: Space Station, Shiyard, Starbase and Fleet Base have 0 upkeep

The additional income for food is welcome to motivate avoiding of min/maxing of food production, but it does increase income which offset the ship upkeep balance a bit and so does the lowered upkeep for advanced ground troops. Have to see how it all impacts though. If it affects the AIs decision to utilize multiple tpyes of crafts depending on its available income, that is perfect

[zolobolo]

Attacking Harpies with Ashdar fighters and bombers:
- Missed shots are not displayed (maybe display a white MISS text like damage is displayed?
- Small crafts get destroyed when the harpies blow up - their number graudaly decreases as they destroy ships - is this inteded, as I was expecting small crafts to be immune to explosion damage. This would logically involve area of effect weapons as well should they come later

EDIT: Marauder Base took with him almost 3 wings of bombers: 1 vessel left as it blew up

[zakblood]

latest build r20841, uploaded save 4296, winning as the phidi doesn't give the achievement in steam, tested 3 matches, all without success, one with cheating, 2 without, same results

all planets taken / owned, all universe discovered and mine, all tech owned also

[Arioch]

Starbases did not get an upkeep lift as far as I can tell: Space Station, Shiyard, Starbase and Fleet Base have 0 upkeep

These changes are still being implemented, and the numbers may change further as we tweak the balance. Also, upkeep numbers on units from old saves won't change unless you refit the unit or build a new one.

The additional income for food is welcome to motivate avoiding of min/maxing of food production, but it does increase income which offset the ship upkeep balance a bit and so does the lowered upkeep for advanced ground troops. Have to see how it all impacts though. If it affects the AIs decision to utilize multiple tpyes of crafts depending on its available income, that is perfect

The upkeep costs on ships larger than light cruisers will be doubling or tripling. The food selloff income is pretty small in comparison, and should mainly be helpful in the early game, when farms are more or less mandatory. If we find that players still have too much money, we'll raise ship upkeep costs higher.

- Small crafts get destroyed when the harpies blow up - their number graudaly decreases as they destroy ships - is this inteded, as I was expecting small crafts to be immune to explosion damage. This would logically involve area of effect weapons as well should they come later

Logically, it doesn't make sense to me that the smallest and weakest ships should be magically immune to explosion damage. Being a snub fighter pilot is a tough gig; they can't expect all targets to be as cooperative as the Death Star and conveniently give them time to retreat to a safe distance before exploding.

Gameplay-wise, this does reduce the power of small craft slightly, but I don't think that's a problem right now.

[Uncle_Joe]

Where are you finding the latest build? I'm not seeing anything on Steam?

[halftea]

I know I find it once I launch the game.

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{edit}: Ok, that was pre my first cup of coffee. You probably weren't asking about your current build number. I have Steam set to auto-update and am in the Beta build, so it just depends on what Sven has sent to the Steam servers... Going back for another cup...

[zolobolo]

Logically, it doesn't make sense to me that the smallest and weakest ships should be magically immune to explosion damage.

Challenge accepted :
When a large vessel detonates, the force of the explosion itself dissipates quickly into the vacuum of space close to absolute Zero temp. What remains of the explosion damage itself is promptly absorbed by a combat vessels armor, capable of withstanding both direct kinetic as well as focused energy impact for a short time.

Most of the damage generated during such explosions, is caused by the material which the annihilated vessel consisted of. These materials are split into small peaces and hurled towards enemy and allied ships alike as glowing hot shrapnel causing considerable hull damage in close proximity, when their heat energy has not dissipated yet.

Small crafts are less effected by such projectiles due to their small size limiting the chance of being hit and their sloped armor profile.
Their combat chassis also serves as a crash cage that can withstand considerably more distortion force transferred by medium to large size debris, then the thick armor plates used on larger vessels. Later being significantly less flexible when it comes to absorbing kinetic energy, covering the hull of large vessels unequally (due to cost efficiency consideration) leaving several surfaces less protected, and containing weak spots all over the hull surface due to the welding of the numerous plates it is composed of.

In short: small crafts are relatively cheap but tough nuts to crack


Regarding game play: If you decide to give explosion damage to small crafts that is fine, but following should be considered:
1. Update small crafts description that they are affected by it
2. Reduce the damage somewhat, as currently a single star-base can take out 90% of the attacking squadrons
3. We need to think about obvious exploits: sending a "mine" ship towards a carriers, that takes the fighters/bombers with it when going down

[Uncle_Joe]

When looking at the beta tab, I don't see anything. It says No beta available.

Am I missing something? Do I need to put something in the password?