Couldn't see so far the Herald approaching any of the other empires except from that of the player to strike deal (monitored their two nodes on a tiny map)

According to an earlier discussion the Herald should be visible traveling to these empires and in order for the AI to strike a deal with the Arda (purchase tech) I assume this is also needed

game_6101, stardate 1374

Tried to send pops from Toliman I or III to the new colony on Toliman IV, but on the "dropping" of the pop courser nothing happens.
Then I find several Transports en route to unknown in the Toliman system. A little one, on the Gremak diplomacy screen. One of the wisdoms of Glitok the devourer has a typo/unresolved glyph. Or maybe Glitok stuttered edited by sven: This text glitch should be fixed as of r21855.

Sparse systems may have gotten too spares -see image below

Haven't been playing on sparse maps for a while now - but if I would hazard a guess, this might be due to the implementation of Hyperspace anomalies as star systems might be avoiding them too much for their own good

zolobolo wrote:Sparse systems may have gotten too spares -see image below

Haven't been playing on sparse maps for a while now - but if I would hazard a guess, this might be due to the implementation of Hyperspace anomalies as star systems might be avoiding them too much for their own good

Been doing some playing on this map and it seems the intention is to have lanes via star systems in which case is not an issue

Here is an example where AI needs to attack both tactically and strategically but does not engage

See system: akham
1. Player has a single scout and Oupost in the system
2. AI has sent a destroyer there after having lost their whole fleet with all of the combat ships (so far perfect: avoid direct confrontation with my main fleet and attack undefended systems)
3. But the AI does not attack

Even worse: by taking out the Outpost, the player would have his invasion fleet removed from the AI system as due to the sparse system setup, the range would be broken. Not attacking in this case is a huge issue for the AI

Generally though the AI does not need to consider such complex range/threat evaluation models.
Simply make sure that they attack all undefended systems with Scouts, planets and especially Outpost with small forces in them, and all the rest will fall into their place.

The player would still be able to try and bait and switch the AI, but would require a large force in reserve for that, which would defeat the purpose if the AI just retreats when confronted by an overwhelming force (which it is mostly already doing just fine)

Please find the save for analysis attached (this case is probably the same as reported a couple of times before: when AI fleet does not attack despite having the advantage: might be a battle evaluation miscalculation)

CTD with below error message during battle with Harpies

Save file has been attacked - just end the turn on the battle and the error should crop up during processing of the enemies turn

There is no special circumstance that I cyan see which would differentiate this battle to countless other ones against large Arda Seed fleets and there does not seem to be anything special happening during the error itself.

Integrity of Local Files has been checked via Steam agent and game restarted but did not resolve the issue

zolobolo wrote:CTD with below error message during battle with Harpies

Thanks for this upload -- it's a worrisome one. My best guess is that the issue is somehow connected to the new Protean suicide attack logic / animation. The crash is not replicating on my dev machine though, which means the issue might be specific to NVIDIA cards. I'll keep digging (I've got an NVIDIA box around here somewhere I can do some tests on).

sven wrote:

zolobolo wrote:CTD with below error message during battle with Harpies

Thanks for this upload -- it's a worrisome one. My best guess is that the issue is somehow connected to the new Protean suicide attack logic / animation. The crash is not replicating on my dev machine though, which means the issue might be specific to NVIDIA cards. I'll keep digging (I've got an NVIDIA box around here somewhere I can do some tests on).

Bingo

After you wrote this, I went back and watched the turn play out again a few times: sure enough it always happens when a Protean finished its move

Interestingly, it is not in a position to detonate though, way to far away from my ships for that...

Please see screenshot before move is completely finished - I cannot take a screen right at the end of the move sequence as the picture is actually rolled back to the below stance when I try to snag it

zolobolo wrote: Interestingly, it is not in a position to detonate though, way to far away from my ships for that...

It's using a shaped-charge weapon, so, it is actually in range at the end of that move

I believe a fix should be posted in the 'in_development' steam branch. r21857. Thanks again.

sven wrote:

zolobolo wrote: Interestingly, it is not in a position to detonate though, way to far away from my ships for that...

It's using a shaped-charge weapon, so, it is actually in range at the end of that move

I believe a fix should be posted in the 'in_development' steam branch. r21857. Thanks again.

Thanks, the issue has been resolved with the update.

Nice work on the animation, looks really neat

One more thing: Damage output inflicted on the target is not yet shown when Protean discharges unlike for other weapons when they hit.
Damage can be seen on the target ship parameters so they are applied, it is just that the numbers are not displayed

zolobolo wrote:

sven wrote:

zolobolo wrote: Interestingly, it is not in a position to detonate though, way to far away from my ships for that...

It's using a shaped-charge weapon, so, it is actually in range at the end of that move

I believe a fix should be posted in the 'in_development' steam branch. r21857. Thanks again.

Thanks, the issue has been resolved with the update.

Nice work on the animation, looks really neat

One more thing: Damage output inflicted on the target is not yet shown when Protean discharges unlike for other weapons when they hit.
Damage can be seen on the target ship parameters so they are applied, it is just that the numbers are not displayed

THX: damage is now displayed

zolobolo wrote:Here is an example where AI needs to attack both tactically and strategically but does not engage

See system: akham
1. Player has a single scout and Oupost in the system
2. AI has sent a destroyer there after having lost their whole fleet with all of the combat ships (so far perfect: avoid direct confrontation with my main fleet and attack undefended systems)
3. But the AI does not attack

Even worse: by taking out the Outpost, the player would have his invasion fleet removed from the AI system as due to the sparse system setup, the range would be broken. Not attacking in this case is a huge issue for the AI

Generally though the AI does not need to consider such complex range/threat evaluation models.
Simply make sure that they attack all undefended systems with Scouts, planets and especially Outpost with small forces in them, and all the rest will fall into their place.

The player would still be able to try and bait and switch the AI, but would require a large force in reserve for that, which would defeat the purpose if the AI just retreats when confronted by an overwhelming force (which it is mostly already doing just fine)

Please find the save for analysis attached (this case is probably the same as reported a couple of times before: when AI fleet does not attack despite having the advantage: might be a battle evaluation miscalculation)

Sicked around this scenario where the AI is passive to see what happens in the long run.
After 50 Turns or so, some considerable amount of reinforcements arrive and the AI actually attacks!
See screen below just before the arrival of the Destroyer - on the next turn they attack

This it really seems like the AI is either:
1. Playing a strategy which includes building up a specific force before doing anything else and thus ignoring low-hanging fruits
2. The threat evaluation of my Scout+Outpost is way of (this seems highly unlikely given the sheer force that was patiently building up next to my scout and Outpost + it should then result in the AI never engaging anything). Maybe the evolution is only off when Shipyard/outpost is next to the planet? Maybe the AI thinks these stations to be Starbases?

It seem to have to do something with Outposts and Stations (or a minimal threat level an AI fleet needs to have before allowed to engage as it is the same fleet)

Shortly after the attack on the player outpost and Scout, sent a more dangerous fleet there and the AI engaged directly:

Harpies are still considered to blockade colonies when the Harpy Repellent technology is possessed. Shouldn't codes to allow ships to pass unmolested also allow regular commercial shipments in and out to colonies?

nweismuller wrote:Harpies are still considered to blockade colonies when the Harpy Repellent technology is possessed. Shouldn't codes to allow ships to pass unmolested also allow regular commercial shipments in and out to colonies?

Yup, that's a bug; thanks for pointing it out. The blockade behavior should be fixed in r21893.