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1.7 Patch Change Log (Release 4/21)

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1.7 Patch Change Log (Release 4/21)

from GalCiv3 Forums

The long awaited Starbase update is here!

The new Constructor queuing system means you'll never need to track upgrade modules again. We've also completely reworked the Shipyard ship list to make it easier to find the right ship for the right job. Also, we've added the ability to inspect an enemy fleet and get prediction of the fight's outcome. The ship component system is getting balancing change. Finally, we've improved the diplomacy trading system.

Please check out our Dev Journal to learn more about the 1.7 update.


https://forums.galciv3.com/477007/page/1/#3632209


Overview

Reduced Starbase micromanagement
Starbases now queue upgrade modules directly from Shipyards. Ordered Constructors automatically travel to the Starbase and upgrade it. Constructors are ordered from the Shipyard that can deliver the upgrade in the shortest amount of time.


Improved Ship List
Introducing new Ship List sorting and grouping options to make it easier to find the ships you want. Mark your "favorite" ships to make them easy to find in every game.


Improved Starbase Window
We've updated the Starbase Window to better present information about the installed modules and the Starbase's effects. The window also displays more detailed Starbase statistics. These changes will aid you in managing the Starbase and empire.


Battle Assessment
Know what you are getting into! Hovering over an enemy fleet now displays an estimation of whether or not your fleet will be victorious. This same information is displayed prior to starting a battle.


Ship Component Mass Changes
Component mass now scales based on the ship's hull size (e.g. you need bigger engines to move a bigger ship). The changes shouldn't affect average players but are important to address some late-game exploits. Although this change won't impact the standard ship designs, existing custom ship designs may need to be revised to work with the new system.


Diplomacy Updates
Your friends are more likely to give you a better deal! Diplomacy trade values now scale based on your relationship with other factions and the game difficulty.


Planetary Alert System
Planetary growth stalled? We added new alerts on the planet window to warn you if your influence, population, or approval are holding back your colony from its full potential.


Third Party App Block Option
We added a game option that blocks 3rd party applications from hooking into the game's graphics process and crashing the game. Blocking is enabled by default. If you'd like to capture in game video, you will have to disable this game option.


Change Log

Starbases

  • Starbases can now queue multiple upgrade modules directly from Shipyards. Once built, Constructor modules automatically travel to the Starbase & upgrade it.
  • Starbases have Shipyard sponsors. As modules are added to the Starbase queue, Constructors are added to the Shipyard's queue that can deliver the module in the shortest amount of time. By default, all Shipyards sponsor all Starbases. This can be changed on the "Sponsor" screen.
  • Starbases can handle constructors with multiple modules.
  • Players can choose what Constructor blueprints to use on the "Sponsor" screen.
  • Selecting a Starbase on the Galaxy map will draw connection lines to the Starbase's sponsor Shipyards.
  • Queued Constructors are treated the same as other Constructors while en route. Diverted, destroyed, or traded Constructors will be re-queued automatically.
  • Players can enable Starbases to automatically order available upgrade modules.
  • The Shipyard manufacturing queue displays the Constructor's destination and upgrade module type.
  • Starbases can still be upgraded by manually built Constructors and specific Mercenaries.
  • Queued Constructors have a custom ship design for each faction.
  • Added maintenance cost to all starbase modules for all difficulty levels except beginner and normal difficulties.

 

Ship List Screen

  • Ships are organized by type and role.
  • New sorting options: size, attack, version and resource cost.
  • You can add ships to a "favorites" list that is saved when you exit the Ship List screen. These "favorites" available even if you start a new game.
  • Added a prioritize button to move selected ships to the top of the build queue
  • Added reverse sorting to the ship design list.
  • Newly designed ships (including auto-upgraded ones) are marked as "new" so they are easy to find.


Starbase Screen

  • Added more detailed Starbase statistics.
  • Modules and their effects are now both visible simultaneously on the main screen.
  • Added a build queue for ordering new modules. Build queue items include an estimated time of arrival.
  • Added a Sponsor screen to manage what Starbases are building Constructors for that particular Starbase. By default, all Shipyards are sponsoring each Starbase.
  • Sponsor screen has a "Set as default Constructor" option which makes the currently selected Constructor the new default Constructor for future Starbases.


Battle Assessment

Hovering over an enemy fleet displays an estimation of whether or not your currently selected fleet will be victorious. This same information is displayed prior to starting a battle.


Shipyard Auto-Idle

Added Shipyard auto-idle function that replaces the old "shutdown". If the Automatic Idle checkbox is selected, the Shipyard will shutdown if it has no ships to produce. Adding a ship will automatically resume production.


Diplomacy

We have improved the balance of the diplomacy system to make it more fun and less exploitable.  

  • Item trade costs are adjusted based on relations and difficulty.
  • Culture treaties can no longer be stacked with same faction.
  • Added Diplomatic Office and Diplomatic Outpost Starbase modules.
  • Updated AI Strategies and Diplomatic Modifiers to better balance AI aggressiveness.

Planetary Alert System

Added alerts added to influence, population, and approval statistics if one of these attributes is at risk. The Alert tooltip includes information on how to address the problem.


Gameplay Changes

  • Lowered cost of Celestial Tourism for Krynn to be closer to the average cost.
  • Ship component mass now scales based on the ship's hull size.
  • Sensors now have a "sensor power" statistic that controls the area scanned.  Sensor power has a diminishing returns effect on overall sensor range.  Sensor tooltips provide additional feedback on this new system.
  • Changed the default Planet Frequency from Abundant to Common
  • Increased the Sensor Power of higher level Ship Components and Starbase Modules.
  • Limited some ship components to be one player, including the Bane and special Precursor components.  
  • The Scout ideological Event now uses Sensor % bonus instead of a flat range bonus.

Interface

  • Added a "None" option for Govern/Command window for a ship/fleet's destination
  • Added "eject all" button for stationed ships in a shipyard, starbase, or planet.
  • You can now (again) choose Medium UI scale for 1920x1080 screens.
  • Custom scout ship will no longer appear with the Survey Ship icon
  • The content of the Mined Resources tooltip will no longer escape its frame.
  • Created a new Sensor Range tooltip that shows the Sensor Power, what is affecting the Sensor Power, and how much Sensor Power is required to upgrade the Sensor Range.
  • The "Saving Game... Please Wait.." message should no longer get stuck on the screen.
  • Fix stretching artifact in the up and down combo box arrows.
  • Updated the Ship Designer's resource bar to be vertical to match the strategic map and shipyard.  This will also address problems with text in that control from being clipped.
  • Updated the Sort order arrows on the Shipyard List
  • Fixed a  bug that was turning all Status Bars to the Highlight color in Large UI
  • The "now building" text now correctly shows the build module for starbase modules in the shipyard context area, the shipyard tooltip, and the shipyard list item in the main game Shipyards list on the right side.
  • Fixed an occasional problem with selecting ships when the player had negative resources
  • MP: The start button no longer appears over the "Mega Events" drop down menu
  • MP:  The "Mega Events" listbox is disabled as Mega Events are not allowed in MP.
  • MP: Human players now always appear on top in the lobby, whether they are ready, pending, or unclaimed (for restored games).


Bug Fixes

  • Outbreak Ideology event now provides the proper research bonus
  • Fixed a crash when attempting to loading an old save game pre-Mercenaries and then using the fog-of-war cheat after buying Mercenaries.
  • Fixed typos in the Mercenary ship descriptions
  • Mercenary ships can no longer be upgraded by stationing them in planets, shipyards, or starbases.
  • Fixed lighting issues in the Yor faction leader animation.
  • High-end Prototype ship blueprints are now marked as "-R" designs
  • Fixed some weird starting perspectives in Battle Viewer
  • Fixing a CTD caused by destroying planets.
  • Updated the campaigns with text fixes.
  • Fixed issue with Gravity Field Generator star base module that was speeding up enemy ships rather than slowing them.
  • Fixed bad data on the Precursor Satellite world that was causing the associated events to not work as intended.
  • Add new Heavy Survey blueprint to all races
  • Fixed numerous crashes on game exit.
  • Fighters are no longer missing in Battle Viewer
  • Interceptor fighters will no longer appear in the Shipyard List.
  • Disabled Colonizing event on the Iconian secondary world to so that the Iconian's system is consistent with other faction starting systems.
  • Fixed a case that would cause the starting Battle Viewer camera to be pointing in the wrong direction.
  • A faction's power will no longer wrap to zero if the ship power ratings were too high. This was causing really powerful factions to surrender.  
  • Fixed a problem with Mods with custom ship styles that were causing an infinite loop and crash.  
  • Fixed a stuck turn when a command tells a ship to eject to the shipyard it's being built at.
  • Fixed an issue where a shipyard can station too many ships.  This was the source of multiple problems including crashes and odd gameplay behaviors (e.g. creating stacks of mixed player ships and enemies).
  • Fixed an issue where ships can eject onto anomalies and nebula when a free tile was available
  • Fixed an infinite loop when there are no Shipyards in the empire that can supply module orders.
  • Fixed stale battle log data that was causing fighters to be incorrectly spawning either in the battle viewer or on the game map.
  • Fixed planets that were turning invisible after fighting off an invasion.
  • If a ship joins a fleet on "Guard", the fleet will stay on on "Guard"
198,625 views 74 replies
Reply #26 from GalCiv3 Forums Top

Quoting redviper37, reply 24

Does anyone find himself unable to edit their old ship designs?  I wanted to reuse my models&name, simply remove a few weapons to bring them back from over-capacity with the new changes, but I just can't click on my old ship design in the designer.  Anyone else?

There's a bug right now that prevents you from selecting overcapacity designs.  We're working on a fix.

 

Reply #27 from GalCiv3 Forums Top

  Any chance of a new build this week?

 

Offworld Trading Company
Reply #28 from GalCiv3 Forums Top

Overall looks like nice improvements.

Although I'm very concerned about the mass scaling since that has decreased my enjoyment of every other game that put it in.  Ok sure bigger engines needed to move the larger ships does make sense but more mass for the exact same weapons, sensors, fighter bays, etc doesn't so much and just gets frustrating.

However that is still theory for me since I have uninstalled Galciv3 until a smegging next / prev hotkey for planets, starbases and shipyards is added.  That is a basic UI requirement for a game like this and I can't believe it wasn't there from beta 1.  If 1.7 was that addition and only that I'd call it an awesome if ridiculously overdue patch.

I hope to come back in 1.8 with the right changes but I'm done putting time and money into a game I can't enjoy in its entirety offline and every turn the UI detracts so much from a game that could be so great.

Reply #29 from GalCiv3 Forums Top

1.7 is not out yet. It is still in neta.

Reply #30 from GalCiv3 Forums Top

Now that starbase management is a little less tedious (a lot should still be done, like managing multiple starbase at a time, a build all modules button, using game-wide constructor blueprint) - I played through an immense universe and notice all tasks slow down a lot as the empire grows, even tasks like adding an improvment to a planet or adding a module to a starbase. The game still doesn't feel fun, but rather tedious, as the empire grows - the slow down, the going through 150 starbase to add a new module type (which now will upgrade automatically, but the initial add of each type seems to be manual),  Also managing planets and not being able to select a group of planets and do an operation on them (like change to research focus) is annoying and hotkeys for cycling through and adding things are missing.

The speed slowdown as empire grows, practically renders the game unplayable in the later stages.

I hope stardock will begin to focus more on play-ability of the game, I was an elite founder and thus will get all future extensions, but it doesn't seem like the core issues of the games are being addressed between releases, 

 

 

Reply #31 from AshesoftheSingularity Forums Top

Kenneth, I'm with you man. The issues you describe are much less problematic on small maps. As you like to play the largest of maps and the average person plays a small map, you are in the minority of the playerbase thus your concerns and wishes are of lower priority. It may sound like I'm being unhelpfully sarcastic and antagonistic toward the devs here, but I'm actually just paraphrasing their own words. Sorry man, this game just wasn't designed for the largest of galaxies.

Reply #32 from GalCiv3 Forums Top

Bumping for new patch...

Reply #33 from GalCiv3 Forums Top

Man! This list looks quite nice indeed. I only got to spend a little time with it last night (worked 13 hours and was just too beat...) but what I saw was good. Reading these notes today I'm really excited to check out some of these new changes! Good job guys!! :thumbsup:

Reply #34 from GalCiv3 Forums Top

I think the racial trait observant is broken now.

if I have no observant at all for sensors at normal

My starting ships have a sensor range of
2 for colony
3 for scout
5 for survey ship

If I have observant at +25% sensors.

My initial starting ships have a sensor range of
2 for colony
3 for scout
5 for survey ship


Reply #35 from GalCiv3 Forums Top


(opt-in #2) Fixed cases where "saving game…" message was stuck on the screen

This is still happening on the latest build, sorry :(

Also still getting a lot of lag with build que's adding/removing buildings on planets changing ques on star bases, changing ques on ship yards on large games...  This has gotten very easy to notice in 1.7 since the addition of the extra build ques.  There hasn't been much talk about it and, I hope is being looked into.  This has nothing to do with turn time but, game response while changing things during the players turn.

Reply #36 from GalCiv3 Forums Top

Not sure if this has already been mentioned or not but in the Ship Designer, the tooltip for Sensor Range does not display any information when hovered over.  It DOES go up as various things that effect Sensor Power are added to a ship.  But the breakdown of what is affecting Sensor Range is completely blank.

I have a screenshot showing this in action:

 

Reply #37 from GalCiv3 Forums Top

This is more feedback than anything else, but The Scout Mega Event now looks to be very under powered for the Benevolent and Pragmatic choices.  Unless I am very much mistaken, those two choices now only add one unit of "sensor power" and two units of "sensor power" respectively.  This isn't very much at all in the grand scheme of things with the new sensor power structure.

Looking into components, the Pragmatic choice seems to be the same as exactly one Navigational Sensor while the Benevolent choice is half of that.

Now I realize that one "free" Navigational Sensor on all ships isn't nothing.  But in the old system this event gave increased the sensor range by 1 for Benevolent choice and 3 for the Pragmatic choice.

Perhaps the sensor power choices could be bumped up to give them a bit more oomph under the new system.

Reply #38 from GalCiv3 Forums Top


(opt-in #2) Item trade costs are adjusted based on relations and difficulty.

REALLY noticing this one.  It is making things much more painful for me, and that's probably a good thing.

Reply #39 from GalCiv3 Forums Top

First off, this patch (the opt-in beta) has been a massive improvement on reducing the monotony of starbase construction when playing large maps. However there are still some painful things to manually do that I would greatly appreciate being fixed. Massive improvements to gameplay and reducing clicks would be:

Option in main menu to re-enable "upgrade starbase" being present before "end turn" when a constructor is stationed at a starbase with free modules as was the case in 1.6. I understand why it was removed but why wouldn't it be up to the user whether to have it enabled or not?

Option to update ALL starbases to a new constructor type. Changing 70+ starbases to the new design manually is a painful waste of time.

Option to update ALL starbases to toggle auto-upgrade modules. I would like this setting off at the beginning and on later in the game.

Option to blacklist a starbase from providing constructors for starbases that are set to automatic. For example, I want my starbase with the Hyperion logistics system to be infinitely building combat ships but constructors will take priority over an infinite ship (which I think is a good thing) and therefore it would be nice to have a tick that I could check to opt-out.

Lastly, this has bothered me since I started playing the game:

Option to set defaults for planets. i.e. I want all planets to default to "Auto-upgrade improvements" OFF. It is kind of annoying to have to do it for every planet when it should be easy enough to set a global update in govern.

 

There is also a bug where the outcome of a battle that is watched is NOT the outcome that you saw. I will win soundly and then the animation will play and suddenly I will have lost. I have experienced this a lot if the outcome was "unclear" or lower towards my favor.

Reply #40 from GalCiv3 Forums Top

Noticed the Temple of Enlightenment (Ideology Building) is finally RESEARCH based, instead of approval!

I am not a politician and I approve this message.

Reply #41 from GalCiv3 Forums Top

A bug in constructor Upgrade costs for used constructors

If I upgrade a single new constructor to a new double constructor it costs 188 credits
If I upgrade a single new constructor to a new triple constructor it costs 331 credits

If I upgrade a used double constructor 1 constructor left to a full double constructor it costs 58 credits
If i upgrade a used triple constructor 1 constructor left to a full triple constructor it costs 61 credits.

This is a major bug the upgrade costs of used constructors should match the costs of a new single to a appropriate double or triple.

This bug allows me to create over 40 starbases on the 2nd hardest level before the compute can create 5 or 6 ...

it completely unbalances the game.

Since this patch is all about starbases this is a simple fix to make, otherwise I have no need to ever use the fancy features you added for starbase maintenance

Reply #42 from GalCiv3 Forums Top

Thanks for update #3!

Reply #43 from GalCiv3 Forums Top



(opt-in #3) Increased the Sensor Power of higher level Ship and Starbase Components and Modules.

Huzzah!



(opt-in #3) Starbase request feature now can deal with constructors that provide multiple modules. It will keep using the same request if the incoming constructor has multiple modules. The labels in the shipyard will only show the first module the constructor is building.

Huzzah!



(opt-in #3) Add maintenance cost to all starbase modules.

Uhh, wow =)  This might prove painful for starbase spammers like myself.



(opt-in #3) Created a new Sensor Range tooltip that shows the Sensor Power, what is affecting the Sensor Power, and how much Sensor Power is required to upgrade the Sensor Range.

Huzzah!

 

 

Reply #44 from GalCiv3 Forums Top

Wow, very nice work StarDock!

Reply #45 from GalCiv3 Forums Top

Would you suggest we start a new game... or should these changes update into games started in update 1 or 2?

 

 

Reply #46 from GalCiv3 Forums Top

Question: Does the handy -20% maintenance costs race bonus also cover starbases also since maintenance for starbase modules has been added?

If not that would be a good thing to add to it in the next patch?

Reply #47 from GalCiv3 Forums Top

Quoting Taslios, reply 45

Would you suggest we start a new game... or should these changes update into games started in update 1 or 2?

As general rule, you should restart to get the latest changes.  However, the update shouldn't break existing games.  

Reply #48 from GalCiv3 Forums Top

Thanks for the update. I keep seeing this issue with the Snathi when going to the UP:

 

Reply #49 from GalCiv3 Forums Top

Quoting airayn, reply 46

Question: Does the handy -20% maintenance costs race bonus also cover starbases also since maintenance for starbase modules has been added?

If not that would be a good thing to add to it in the next patch?

It does not look like that is happening.  I'll add it to the bug list. 

Reply #50 from GalCiv3 Forums Top

Thanks for adding that to the bug list :)!