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Sins of a Solar Empire v1.04 Final Change Log

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Sins of a Solar Empire v1.04 Final Change Log

from Sins Forums

As we get ready to release version 1.04, we figured it was time to post an updated change log. :)

Please note that save games and replays from v1.03 and earlier will not work with v1.04!

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Gameplay / Balance:
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-Market value changes:
 -Ratio of buy/sell is now 2:1 instead of 3:1.
 -Min price now 200 instead of 80.
 -Boom/crashes now last ~twice as long.

-Multiple instances of the Embargo planet debuff from the same player no longer stack.

-Capital ships
 -All non-Colony capital ship top speeds increased from 500 to 525.
 -All Colony capital ship top speeds increased from 400 to 475.

-Siege Frigates:
 -Build costs decreased by ~15%.

-Javelis, Illuminator, Assailant:
 -Linear acceleration decreased from 200 to 150.
 -Top speed decreased from 800 to 500.
 -Range decreased from 130% to 115% of 1.02 ranges.

-Illuminator:
 -Hull points increased from 520 to 620.
 -Shield points increased from 450 to 550.
 -Attack type changed from CAPITALSHIP to ANTIMEDIUM.
 -Front bank damage increased from 33.8 to 58.5.
 -Side banks damage decreased from 33.8 to 30.3.

-Defense Vessel:
 -Reduced cooldown by 45%, damage reduced proportionally to maintain DPS.
 -Fleet supply increased from 3 to 4.
 -Now properly benefits from Advent laser research topics.

-Attack types
 -AntiVeryLight chance to hit bombers decreased from 85% to 75%.
 -AntiVeryLight damage vs Light armor decreased from 100% to 75%.

-Carriers
 -Slight cost reductions for all carrier cruisers

-Returning Armada and General Fleet Spawning
 -No longer possible to spawn ships past fleet point limit.
 -Ship slot count updated after each spawn to prevent RA exploit (clicking multiple abilities at same time).
 -Increased level 1 RA cooldown by 120 secs and level 2 RA cooldown by 60 secs

-Map Balance of Power fixed to have less Heavies and populated desert worlds.

-Stilakus Subverter's Distortion Field ability will no longer cause it to micro phase jump towards targets travelling to other planets.
-Fix for problem where after playing Sins for 100000 seconds (27.7 hours) damage and various other systems wouldn't update correctly.
-Fix for strike craft squads being able to launch when they should be grounded.
-Phasic Barrier now toggles off more consistently when it's 'autocast off' conditions are satisfied.

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AI:
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-Fixed minor bug in Unfair AI not behaving quite correctly.
-Fix bug where AI would retreat from his homeworld or last planet.
-AI is less likely to gang up on the leading player in Easy or Normal.
-Autocast logic for hull point restoring abilities no longer consider structures under construction as damaged.
-Fix for ships not auto-attacking after breaking alliances.
-Fix for AI difficulty settings not behaving correctly.
-Misc tweaks.


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Networking / Multiplayer:
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-Fixed minor bug in ico-join game screen where fleet size display was incorrect.
-Improved in-game chat text entry:
 -Escape no longer clears the chat buffer when closing the window.
 -Sending whispers is remembered (don't have to retype the whisper when sending again).
 -Sending to allies is remembered (don't have to retype /a when sending again).
-Chat string and colors changed.
-Fixed bug where joining a multiplayer game in a slot that was previously held by an AI player would have the AI still be enabled when you started the game.
-When a human player drops and an AI replaces him, the AI now has his happiness set to the required amount for existing alliances so he doesn't drop them all instantly.


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UserInterface / HUD:
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-Fix map names for Backstab and Balance of power.
-Fixed bug where fleet pip clouds would not show up when loading a saved game.
-Fixed string label for IDS_COHESIONRANGE_FAR_NAME and IDS_COHESIONRANGE_FAR_DESCRIPTION.
-Changed artifacts researched stat to be "artifact discoveries"
-Tweaked some ability descriptions to improve their clarity.
-'Unit under attack' events are now suppressed for trade and refinery ships.


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Modding:
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-Entity name lookup is now case insensitve.
-New options to enable error messages. This can be turned on by modders in the user.setting file to simplify tracking down errors instead of mysteriously crashing.
-Fix num particles in the user.setting file not actually increasing and added user control over the number of particle simulations since this is another main limiter for those with uber computers who want to push things.


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Misc:
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-Fix for saved games not respecting custom game options.

162,710 views 119 replies
Reply #26 from Sins Forums Top
The updates look okey but I still think illuminators have been nerfed. They along with destras can make for a reletivly cheap and effective defense force for planets caught off guard by enemies and pirates.
Reply #27 from Sins Forums Top
The black market is fixed again! I was really, really hoping that this would be changed for 1.04.
CursorFX - Customize your Windows cursor
Reply #28 from Sins Forums Top
innociv, piece of advice, for free even.

Stop acting like you are the God of Sins. Stop coming down from your Ivory Tower on the High Mountain and proclaiming Your Word As Law. It's seriously annoying. Maybe you don't act this way in real life, but you should know that real people do not react well to arrogant, condescending, self-righteous individuals. They just don't.

You may be right, you really might be. But your presentation is severely lacking. Moreover, are you SURE you can really just predict with absolute certainty what every player is going to do now? Are you really sure how these changes will affect game play? Are you CERTAIN that there's nothing you are missing? Are you truly saying that you can inherently understand and do ALL the math necessary to make your sweeping proclamations? I somehow doubt that you can. You can guess, you can hypothesize. You can probably do it better than many others. But the bottom line is, you really don't know, do you? I mean, how can you? I don't mind if you spout off as King of Sins, but why don't you at least wait until the patch has been out for a bit? The fact that carriers are cheaper and LRMs slower may have more impact than you are realizing. Can you know for sure that it won't?

Anyway, piece of advice. Lose the arrogant high-and-mightiness and you might get a warmer reception on these forums.

Reply #29 from Sins Forums Top
Wow Innociv that's interesting point. I wonder if that's why they changed antiverylight damage to do less vs light, in order to buff bombers. Which makes it stupid as hell because now you cant use fighters vs lrms and you cant use flak as well as before, so to counter lrms I have to tech to HC? WTF? It makes very little sense. And now u will probably have a better chance of using bombers vs flak. Any scenario where bombers counter flak is a retarded one! Why would you make bombers effective vs Flak? The whole counter system is still making little sense. I liked flak vs lrm thou, and same for fighter vs lrm/siege.
End of quote


There's something about this post that doesn't make sense. Oh right, Fighters don't do AntiVeryLight. They do AntiLight, so how are these changes making Fighters worse against LRMs? In fact, Fighters are better against LRMs because (1) LRMs are slower, (2) Carriers are cheaper, and (3) Flaks are 25% worse against LRMs. So, basically, I don't understand your conclusion at all. And bombers are only slightly safer against Flak, but Flak's counter is still basic Light Frigates. Strikecraft are not and never will be a counter to Flaks--that would be about as counterintuitive as it gets.

If I'm wrong that Fighters do AntiLight, then I preemptively eat my words, but I'm pretty sure the only thing that does AntiVeryLight is Flak...

Reply #30 from Sins Forums Top
Arrogance or not, good arguments are still good arguments. Just because no one knows for sure doesn't mean that sweeping predictions can't be made.
Reply #31 from Sins Forums Top
(Copy and paste this response on any location in the universe as you see fit, if you should see fit)

Ok I know around patch time for any game, especially one that was recently released, there are lots of forum arguments over game balance and in some cases lots of posters get way too emotional over a video game. (Previous poster not included, and many others here)


So what usually happens is there are a large player base that sees the inconsitancies with the game, and are a little unhappy that the game isnt working out the way the developers intended it to, or hinted that it should be playing out during the beta phase.

So there is always this gap between the time that patches are released and players are satisified (or more dissatisfied) with the results -- dissatisfaction is usually produced by having a large set of inconsitancies be unattended to for a long period of time, or by having sevral patches come out that dont seem to do anything towards the problems.

But the actual problem is that there is a very large gap between game development and design phases, software devlopment, and balancing all sorts of other stuff like new additions to future patches, hardware compatibility list and testing (and that never stops, in any patch). So game developers have to balance all this stuff out, and decide over the course of several patches, do we want to introduce new content, or bug fixes, or minor (or major) balance changes, or address hardware issues? Do we do this all at once, or in moderate bulk, or in small chunks (where one chunk is a quick small balance change, ala this patch, or hardware-software modification, or content, etc etc.) or leave the vast masses unhappy for a longer period of time to drop it all from the great heavens at once? (if that should fail, that can cause major dissatisfaction with the populous)


So that seems to be where we are at this juncture in time for this game, Sins of a Solar Empire (you know which fourm right? :) Jk jk), so usually the group of people that are the most angry that their faction/race/units/graphics/PC/sound card/toaster doesnt work right are the loudest - well sorry man, but thats how the process is. Software development and Game Design doesnt happen over-night. It takes time, and the coordination of lots of people doing lots of different things at once, and there is someone that has to decide who's work goes into this new patch, and who gets left out for the next patch, or the patch after, or the patch after that patch after another major addition, or maybe never at all.

Its a slow one, and although sometimes it really sucks, and because no one has been able to figure out a better way to make games, coming to any game forum and being overly emotional does not help the situation. - Infact, game devs start to dislike small groups of their customers because they get into the "unwinnable war", where there is no easily viewable group of people that can understand what they have to do to get from the beginning of a task to a finished product, and they have to play the balancing act against time to keep their customers happy.


So hey, im not saying game Devs are going to start popping in and saying "Look, some of you are retards, relax, be positive, give me a daily boost insted of a constant negativity-universe that im reading here so I can make you guys happy again! (and earn money while I have fun)". They wont do that, but I will since I have no vested interest here at all.


Really, I know a lot of you guys even those with very good complaints are not all like this, but there is a percentage of users that are - and thats what im targeting here. If you know you arent a "whiner" and are constructive in your criticisims, you know im not talking about you -- but if you are a 16 year old boy (or act like one) with an over developed sense of self worth and improperly directed emotional responses (even though you may feel like you dont have any emotions at all), then you probabbly still dont know that I really am talking to you!

Criticisim is always a good thing, but this is grown up time, and nows a good time, (and you know who im talking to when you read this), to pull the Dev's up by their suspenders (do people even still wear those?) and give them a pat on the back and say:



"Hey pal, thanks for the software patch. Its not everything we wanted, but you made a good product here, so im going to keep thinking that you'll come out with some changes soon that will be really good".



No reason to be a dolt though and have false hope in a doomed project at anytime, but this game doesnt seem to be a doomed project, so no reason to go that route.

Pip-pip and all that.
Definatly agree that more changes need to be made, maybe soon eh? What ever happens happens.


Reply #32 from Sins Forums Top
Nevermind, my other post didn't die after all...
Reply #33 from Sins Forums Top
"-Chat string and colors changed."

That's good news, without a doubt.

I'm worried about the LRM changes though. The biggest problem with LRMs from my experience isn't that they're speedy and strong, but that they're dirt cheap and strong. These changes will make the LRM death blobs slow, but how will that help save your structures and your defending fleets from trying to hold them off, except give you more time to abandon the world to them? They won't be able to chase your Capital down, but it's not like you can actually fight them either.

The speed changes hurt the LRMs as a whole, but making Flaks less effective against them and a bunch of improvements to the Illuminator seems like it will only encourage not only TEC and Vasari to spam LRMs, but for Advent to try to as well.

Has the golden age of LRM spamming now just begun, I wonder.

Incremental patching in a direction is nice, but LRMs really have had a couple months now in the sun. Them finally being used in a mix fleet would be nice rather than just being the fleet (even an over-nerf that would require some undoing would at least get some variety into the game).

I hope for 1.1 that the LRMs are given a serious examination of their roles and place in the meta-game. Their cheap price, their damage type, their low tech tier and low build times all allow these units to really just hurt the variety and interesting aspects of the game. There are other balance issues, for sure (carriers ineffectiveness due to very cost effective flak, Subverters area of effect attack, Returning Aramada, etc.), but LRMs tend to break the game before these things even come to play.
Reply #34 from Sins Forums Top
Hey for sure TheRedMaw! Looks like the devs have themselves in a pickle with this one, im looking forward to see how they solve it!

More expensive LRMs? Less effective LRMs? A new game design aspect? Maybe a cap on LRM frigates, or a message that pops up on everyones screen that says "you're lame for spamming those you Samoflange"?

I bet they like design pickles, guess thats why they get paid :)
Reply #35 from Sins Forums Top
This is idiotic, to be a good strategist your skills or in this case units need to be effective. Ever play Guild Wars? Thats a game where you can form strategies since there is a counter to every skill in the game. What you are saying to me is basically, I don't know how to play because advent doesn't have anyway to counter a TEC or Vasari rush. How can I make a strategy when there is nothing to work with that can be remotely effective?I suggest you go online, play advent against a competent TEC or Vasari player. And then come back to me and say something, instead of making a silly remark such as this.
End of quote

I suggest you to stay polite and wait the patch come out before crying. Advent have many ways to counter TEC, even in early games. They have purificators very early in the game. I don't think the ennemy will continue to fight with you if a group of purificators begins to destroy a world they have. The hangar defense of the Advent is very good too is you want to increase your research abilities before attacking.

Reply #36 from Sins Forums Top
haha... I like innociv... hes knows where he stands and he makes good points... and he doesnt it mostly without flaming you guys... respect his authority...

hahaha im not his bitch or nothing, but innociv is like me, an arrogant bastard, and I agree with him on the RA thing, don't know what the fuck you guys are talking about in terms of the fighters/bombers thing..

anyway, keep the topic ON topic, aye?

good stuff boys, keep it real and look after yourselves.
Reply #37 from Sins Forums Top
innociv: I don't think bombers should easily be able to counter flak. After all flak is there to shoot strike craft. It should not be counterable by strike craft ;)

The problem is that strike craft are built for free. Having them too strong makes harassing strategies way too powerful. On the other hand having them weak (as they are now) it makes them useless in a streight-up fight.

I do not see any way around this except maybe for charging money for strike craft to be built. That way their damage could greatly be increased to make them useful and they'd still be balanced.

About LRM: Having them that slow is interesting and I'm looking forward to see how this will play out in real games. However, innociv made a very valid point: Despite being so slow, LRM are still the by far best ship and there simply is no real counter to it. Flak is still the best thing to build against LRM which is just wrong imho.
Maybe change bomber armor also to very light and have flak deal only 20% to everything except very light? Bombers could get a better survivability then fighters with the hit chance (to-hit on fighters 90%, to-hit on bombers 50%) or simply by HP (double all bomber HP when changing the armor type).
Reply #38 from Sins Forums Top
wow looks like im in the whiner world here......


just wait and test b4 u actualy whine bout the patch

im very curious about how the speed and range reduction wil affect the lrm spamming...

my thoughts are that many people wil just continue spamming lrm;s
atleast now we have a much easier way to counter them, not by spamming your own lrms, but by pure strategy

no more capital ship tagging, you are finaly able to run and tag ALOT of them lrms should they try 2 follow the capital


not sure what everyone is talking about in bombers and fighters being changed... they looked fine 2 me (even tough carriers being 2 expensive.. even thats fixed soon .. YAY)


i think theyre doing a great job making illuminators strong
there are 2 types of whines about illums here:

1: it'll be to strong compared 2 cost
2:'advent have no counter to lrm since their own lrms comes late


... wtf??
thats the answer guys.. u just gave it...

1: illum = way stronger then any lrms.. speccialy if using the sidebanks (advent = not a naab race!!!)
2: it is "chea"p enough" and strong so the advent actualy get a chance

when advent finaly get lrm tech (they better get a smal econ first!!) u can assume enemy has about 15 / 20 lrms
time for the advent to get its own lrms .... alot stronger.. but less.... lot less

im not quite sure about increasing overal damage, tough.. it already had enough damage... only wrong damage type
but we'll see that ingame



much thx 2 KuroTora .. and i totaly agree with him :P (and got that post copied should i wanna stomp a few more whiners :)

show some respect for the devs....... atleast be happy they dont have the power to kick your ass (some people here deserve that badly)

Reply #39 from Sins Forums Top
heya. my 5 cents about (tech2)lrm and carriers:

*The slow speed of the lrms will mainly protect caps from beeing ganked. Think i am right here.
*The slow speed also effect the expansion in the beginning of the game, cause you have to wait a bit longer for them to reach their target. Also regarding to moving them around to intercept fleets they are now unusable. Raid fleets become more viable if a opponent focus to much on lrm.
*less range, hua tec's lrm still fire quite far but i wonder if advent ships now can acutally stay in the Iconus bubble AND hit the lrms. Repositioning isnt a viable anymore cause of the slower speed and the associated (increased loss of damage inflicted ).
*Fighters can actually fly better strike runs against LRM cause the dont have to chase them as long
IF the LRMS are running.
*Bombers get more powerfull, actually forcing opponents to build fighters squads now or their caps get killed of by bombers (=> less other units including lrm)
*Cheaper carriers, well i dont knwo how much yet but it sound like a -20 $ or like -5 resource somewhere. Not much at all but still biases the whole thing a time bit more towards carriers efficiency.





Reply #40 from Sins Forums Top
I dont understand the RA change.
The cooldown was 6 minutes before and will be 7 minutes for lv 2 and 8 minutes for lv 1 now. But it takes 8.5 minutes to regenerate the antimatter for a single cast.

Which means that the cooldown change has no effect at all.

Am I missing something?
Reply #41 from Stardock Forums Top
Thanks Ironclad, this patch sounds good to me.

Still I'm concerned about Siege frigates being useless, and I think I've found a way to bring them back into the game: change their default target order

When deploying a siege frig in a system with enemy planet, they'll go straight after the planet ignoring ships and defense buildings.
with this behaviour there's two solution:
a) siege frigate are usefull and there will be bombing raids (a tactic witch annoys new players and is considered useless and a waste of resources by skilled players)
b) siege frigate is useless as in 1.03 and is not used (except following a fleet to finish a planet)

To me the solution is to change their default targeting priority:
1) target ships
2) taget defenses
3) target planets

That way siege will be used like any other frig until system defenses are down, then they'll take out the planet.
Sure they need a buff perform this role, but at least we would see many of them.

Just my 2 cents :)
Reply #42 from Stardock Forums Top
Sorry double post after timeout.
Reply #43 from Sins Forums Top
@ therlum. you sure about the times?

If the recharge rate is slow than the cooldown then this nerf only has effect if you research enhanced antimatter regen. enough.

It's there first user request balance attempt. Give em some slack ;)
Reply #44 from Sins Forums Top
Vinz, the problem with that is it's a simple groupkey assignment and command on gravwell arrival for skilled players to completely override that default behaviour f their attacking fleet and immediately send the siege frigates in to bomb the planet. If the siege frigs are buffed, it's just that much more killing that they get to do before they can be countered.

You'd also have to reprioritize defense targeting too, or your sieges won't last a minute once they get in range of the defending fleet, given their high priority as targets.

-- Retro

Reply #45 from Sins Forums Top
I think they key to balancing LRMs will be making fighters (the intended counter) more resilient. Their counters (flaks) are far too cost effective in countering them making them a bad choice. Once they are made more resilient they will become a good counter to LRMs.
Reply #46 from Stardock Forums Top
@theRetroboy
I agree with you that a human player can still assign the target manually.
but in my mind only vs ships and building capabilities would be buffed, not planetary damage.
And since the siege ship cost would still be pretty high, a planet bombing rush would not be more cost efficient than traditionnal fleet attack.
That tweak would also solve Ai's siege rush in a better way than rendering siege frig useless.
You made a good point regarding targetting values of ship and I'm really sad these values cannot be modded.

Reply #47 from Sins Forums Top
but the problem is that caps still won't be able to fight if the enemy has more than 30 LRMS.What would be so bad about lower AntiMedium damage Vs. CAPITAL to 50%(from 75%) and lower their damage to buildings 25%? :/ That's what they need the most.
End of quote


Agreed. Ive stated that very thing before. Never understood why they do 75% to caps. Only bombers, heavies, and other caps should do 75% or more to capital armor IMO.
Reply #48 from Sins Forums Top
In my opinion the patch will lead to one important conclusion: From now on you will need to have more different unit types in your fleet. Mass spamming one unit type (e.g. LRM) isnt that effective anymore, allthough it might still work versus some slower players. And I guess thats what the developer intended with the patch. Cause LRM spammed TEC rush on Razor gets boring.

Against LRM caps work nicely too. 1 Kol or Kortogul may counter 7-10 (depends on tech) easily, assuming you have given them some pirate or militia XP until level 3. Just pull your caps out early enough while fighting and have 2 repair bays ready on your nearest planet/roid. And yes, its possible to build 3 caps in the same time your enemy is building 30 LRM. Dont try this with any non-tanking cap. Its important your caps have either shield tanking or anti-phase missiles abilities.

And btw, I won a lot of games with advent too, dont understand some say its an underpowered race. With a setup like Progenitor (Malice = 16% damage distribution), 5 Guardians (33% Shared damage) and 10 Illums you may easily defeat a much greater fleet of 20+ other LRMs. Its the damage distribution with malice and the 3-way Illums that make it possible to win even unimpossible fights. You just need to micro your battles closely.
Reply #50 from Sins Forums Top
[quote]And btw, I won a lot of games with advent too, dont understand some say its an underpowered race. With a setup like Progenitor (Malice = 16% damage distribution), 5 Guardians (33% Shared damage) and 10 Illums you may easily defeat a much greater fleet of 20+ other LRMs. Its the damage distribution with malice and the 3-way Illums that make it possible to win even unimpossible fights. You just need to micro your battles closely.

No one is denying that advent is ok mid/end game. Obviously you were "allowed" to expand and build up. If you were to had gotten rushed right at the beginning of the match by cobalts and lrms then there wouldn't be much you could do. And don't say to tech up to tier 3 and get illums and guardians. Because you need resources to do that. When you are being rushed and you don't have any unit to counter the ones assaulting you, then you are going to be put on the defensive and quickly drain your resources towards trying to reassemble a fleet and repairing any structures that might had been destroyed. In short, what you are saying has nothing to do with early game. So yes there is a problem with advent. Its not to hard to see.