Version 0.45 released

This is a quite exciting version I would say. A lot of stuff which I was coding in the last month and which were disabled due to being incomplete became finished and enabled now. Which means two big features. The first is the battle simulator which allows you to examine how the squadron you designed performs in a real combat versus an enemy squadron. It comes in two versions, Quick one which lets you check the overall results and Full which lets you examine detailed action logs showing which ship targeted which ship in which combat round and how much damage went to shields and how much to the ship’s hull, which ship was targeted by missiles, how many guided missiles were jammed, which ship was assaulted by fighters and how many of those were fended off by point defense weapons and how many bombs hit the target. The second big feature is the ship hulls unlocked by technologies and the ships screen. The screen allows you to examine all ship hulls, promote blueprints to prototypes, speed up the prototyping period and use some monetary incentives to make the imperial designers work harder and faster without their lame excuses why the new ship hull can’t be ready for production yet. In addition there are bunch of other features and changes like auto queuing of research option, redone houses relations, more alien races, etc. This also means this version might be quite unbalanced (note you can still play the old v0.44 via the Beta branch) and also note that the new stuff might be somewhat rough (but not necessarily, the battle simulator is decently polished for example although not 100% complete).

I would also like to thank the community. This is my fourth Early Access game and I can say that the Stellar Monarch series fans are the most forgiving when it comes to my experimentation with the new versions and those who understand the most the true nature of E.A. This attitude grants me a lot of freedom during experimentation and redoing/breaking/replacing features without the fear of the community’s reaction. This really speeds up the development process and let me make a better game in the long run, for which I want to thank you very much! Appreciated.

– [feature] Military/Ships screen with ship hulls listed, filters, option to mark favorite hulls, etc.
– [feature] Ship hulls are now properly unlocked by technologies.
– [feature] Ship hulls Blueprints can be promoted to Prototypes.
– [feature] Option to buy extra Prototype promotions (quite expensive) which can be used as an alternative to scientific research.
– [feature] Battle simulator works now. Divided into “Quick” (where you see just the result vs a selected opponent) and “Full” where you can see detailed action logs describing what happened and why it happened.
– [feature] Noble Houses relations redone to 7 tiers, also rescaled opinions to 100 opinion per relation tier and simplified it a bit (now opinion directly translates to relations without a delay).
– [feature] Gameplay option to auto queue technologies (for people who are too lazy to click on those or who thinks the emperor has better things to do than deal with research). The algorithm will strive to queue it in the way that you reach the top level technologies as quickly as possible. You can toggle it on/off anytime.

– [remove] Removed armada (since this mechanic made no sense with the new wide front combat model anyway, maybe it will be back in another form later).

– [misc] Renamed Parasites to Arachnians (I plan to use parasites as a planetary feature).
– [misc] Switched naming of ship class with ship type (to make it like in the real world).
– [misc] Various ships cleanups (hull materials names, AI ship weapons compositions, removed unused Drones, etc).

– [content] More ships (all ships from all technologies unlocking ship hulls), more technologies unlocking new hulls.
– [content] Additional technologies.
– [content] Added all planned alien races (some are only defined and not activated in the game yet). Also properly divided population into biological/mechanical (later it could be used for different effects of weapons for example).

– [balance] Redone and rebalanced AI civilized offensives (now also takes into account racial luxury percentage, which means powerful but decadent races who spend most income on luxuries will not be that much of a threat).

– [interface] Load/Save tooltip with a more clear explanation of a failed load savefile due to old version save which also indicates the Beta version availability.
– [interface] Added luxury percentage value to intelligence screen.
– [interface] Improved noble houses relations tooltip (now displaying clearly how much opinion each tier of relations requires) and improved several other house tooltips.
– [interface] Intelligence screen shows the emperor’s portrait for the Empire, also rebels portrait is randomized now.

– [fix] Small bug where super hostile house was overwriting the super hostile one upon start.
– [fix] Civilized races were making no offensive plans in mid/late game making the quite passive as the game progressed.
– [fix] Parasites never woke up the entire game (note that Parasites were renamed to Arachnians).

Compatibility note: INCOMPATIBLE, this version will not work with old saves (note that each time a savefile compatibility is broken a new Beta branch with the old version is created so you can always finish your game in progress).

Version 0.44 released

This is the kind of version which is very ungrateful to write the changes logs for. Most of the stuff I implemented is not even listed below because it was mostly about internal mechanics, not visible to the player at all but very, very important for the future features (read: battle simulator which is starting to take a nice shape but is not enabled in this version yet). So, here it is, a bunch of fixes, small interface improvements and content updates.

– [feature] All summon to audience options now use Emperor Focus points, can’t be cancelled and have no limit to the number of people summoned per audience (so now all “summon” buttons use the same mechanic). Also, regular governors can be summoned as well, but for a higher cost than governors of megalopolises.
– [feature] Traditions for noble houses (affects initial reforms support, how the house votes, perks, etc). Very barebone for now.

– [misc] Optimized saves filesize (it went a bit excessive).
– [misc] Renamed Hospitability to Habitability which is much more intuitive.
– [misc] Renamed Emperor’s Attention points to Emperor’s Focus points.
– [misc] Note that behind the scenes combat mechanics were changed heavily (but I tried to not upset the current gameplay balance, so ideally you should notice no difference here).

– [content] Added option to summon a head of a noble house to discuss reforms.
– [content] Events: Galactic Stock Exchange, Galactic Bank.

– [interface] Added Relation/Opinion/Favors on noble personnel audience screen.
– [interface] Audience events tooltip for modifiers list all the effects of the modifier.
– [interface] Audience events tooltips improved to make audience effects display more clear.
– [interface] Noble Houses ornamental bar on houses screen (with traditions icons added).
– [interface] Squadrons screen improved.

– [fix] Race descriptions: Outdated Terran race description (race details – society), fixed one wrong alien portrait also added some basic description to all xeno races.
– [fix] Wrong tooltips descriptions for some planets in the Astronomy minimap mode.
– [fix] The back button in the construction menu working incorrectly.

Compatibility note: NO CHANGE, this version works with v0.40+ savefiles (note that each time a savefile compatibility is broken a new Beta branch with the old version is created so you can always finish your game in progress).

Version 0.43 released

Fourth update since E.A. has started. This version contains many small but very nice interface improvements, the premise being “less clicking”. Hotkeys were redesigned and assigned to the most frequently used actions. The reports auto zoom on a planet which is being reported (can be toggled on/off) and other small improvements. In addition strategic interstellar missiles were implemented and space exploration rebalanced.

– [feature] Interstellar strategic missiles (like strategic bombs but without the need for the orbit control, requires an imperial starbase in range).
– [feature] Strategic weapons production changed. You can produce as many strategic weapons as you want, but the price increases each time you purchase one (the counter resets upon Council gathering (each season)). Also, the base price increases a bit each season.
– [feature] Upkeep for starbases/fortresses/comm towers implemented (for now the cost is very low).

– [remove] Removed happiness reduction over time (too confusing and growing decadence of the Empire can be portrayed by other means anyway).
– [remove] Temporarily removed biological bombs (those will be back later).

– [misc] Overmind is killed when a civilized race takes over a planet.
– [misc] Custom options have been reset due to storage change (just recheck those as you wish and those will save properly).

– [balance] Requirements for planet ‘s loyalty glorious achievement reduced.
– [balance] Crime reduced (possibly the whole crime mechanic might be removed later, we will see).
– [balance] The number of exploration attempts each turn is now affected by the galaxy size.

– [content] Adventurer on audience event for additional exploration attempts. He will show up at later stages of the game (with a very low chance at the early stage) also the chance of showing up depends on the ratio of unexplored planets to the galaxy size.

– [interface] Finances tax tab beautified.
– [interface] Reports: auto find target planet on a report change (can be toggled on/off).
– [interface] Beautified right side report buttons and added “All” folder. Also tooltips on reports buttons listing hotkeys.
– [interface] “Find” planet button now has [f] hotkey (and a tooltip listing the hotkey).
– [interface] Removed several less used hotkeys (e/r/t) to free those for other uses (beside, those were assigned to not so often used actions anyway).
– [interface] Hotkeys redone: Now [q] is used for a “quick” access to the most used/logical action in the current context (for example on planets without any owner it would be “Establish outpost”, on alien planets “Conquest” on unexplored “Priority exploration”). Basically it means that you can click on a planet and then press ‘q’ and in like 80% of cases it will be exactly what you wanted to do. Also it’s used to cancel to just selected quick action. All [q] hotkeys are listed in the appropriate tooltips.
– [interface] Hotkeys [r] to open/close reports.
– [interface] Establish outpost and exploration priority displays on the starmap as orders (so you can see those on a glance and it’s more logical/consistent). Also added shades of the order marker so you can spot a difference between the outposts that can be established now and those that are not neighboring the imperial borders yet.

– [fix] Glorious achievement “All techs of level 10+” was not triggering.
– [fix] Other small fixes.

Compatibility note: NO CHANGE, this version works with v0.40+ savefiles (note that each time a savefile compatibility is broken a new Beta branch with the old version is created so you can always finish your game in progress).

Version 0.42 released

This version focuses on technologies, added a lot of new ones. Also added more technologies related to late game colonization since it was tricky with the existing technologies. In addition it has a mix of various smaller fixes, improvements and rebalances.

– [feature] New technologies (requires starting a new game to have access to those). Assured at least one 1-12 technology in each field of science regardless of technologies generation mode.
– [feature] Fortress worlds have x5 ground garrison and much faster ground forces reinforcements. Also provide additional missiles and fighters to imperial squadrons fighting over the planet (details in the Fortress tooltip).

– [misc] All staring megalopolises (Old empire setting) are now Megacity/Terran/Steppe/Jungle planets only.
– [misc] Megalopolises can be created on Hospitability 10 or higher (so at least one green maker is present) planets only (taking into account all factors, not just the planet type).
– [misc] AI now skips the first turn (no conquest on the game start anymore) since it was confusing to some players.
– [misc] Tonnage of AI squadrons redone, it’s a big change internally which is required for future features but not much very noticeable for now. You could notice only a mild spike in the alien squadrons effectiveness and that the tonnage numbers are different.

– [balance] Rescaled defensive priority range from 1-9 to 1-21 (allows orders having more impact).
– [balance] Defensive priorities rebalanced (now the defence is 3 jumps deep also a lot of numbers adjusted).

– [interface] Alien planets have now hidden labor and infr. points.
– [interface] Disallowed access to Administrate/Fief tabs on lost planets.
– [interface] Improved tooltips for starmap homeworlds (specified alien capital/overmind and also displayed the owner crest).
– [interface] Outpost/Colonization properly display a note it’s impossible on heavy radiated planets.

– [fix] Nukes heavy radiation bug. Illegally taking control over heavy radiated planets (outposts, colonization, combat, etc).
– [fix] Incorrect “Capital of the empire” tooltip on enemy homeworld planets.
– [fix] Hostile aliens now destroy player starbases if the planet is owned by them for any reason (for aliens who do not declare wars and to handle lost worlds).

Compatibility note: NO CHANGE, this version works with v0.40+ savefiles (note that each time a savefile compatibility is broken a new Beta branch with the old version is created so you can always finish your game in progress).

Version 0.41.1 released

Bugs, bugs, bugs. This version is one big bug fix and series of rebalances. It has also one small feature, Public Works which is a new option on Administration tab for core worlds only.

– [feature] Public Works button on Administration tab for core worlds (improves planet’s maximum development level by +0.1 for a non trivial amount of credits, can be used up to 10 times per planet). Intended for the most important planet only (too expensive to use massively).

– [interface] Additional combat reporting (planet won/lost, space/ground battles in progress). I’m not very happy with that one and it would need further finetuning.
– [interface] Research bonuses tab beautified and expanded.
– [interface] Small improvements in various places.

– [balance] Court Administration points gain and ministries efficiency bonus greatly reduced. Ministry level effect reduced.
– [balance] Stability bonus to Administration points gain reduced.
– [balance] Rescaled houses opinion to ratio relations (now 30 opinion per relation tier).
– [balance] Now planets start with fewer cities already built.
– [balance] Houses income reduced to 1/5 (not that there is much use for this money right now, but it will be useful for future features, plus it makes the personal treasury feel more precious when you see the disproportion between the personal and imperial treasury).
– [balance] Base max squadrons for noble houses now scale with number of planets (to a small degree), makes it more reasonable at huge galaxy setup or during the late game.
– [balance] Cost of investment in Food processors and Mineral refineries greatly increased. Increased number of unlocked investments from 3 to 6 and adjusted several techs so all 12 investments can be unlocked (note this will only partially work with old saves, so you might be unable to unlock them all).

– [fix][balance] Invincible last squadron which could happen in same cases (also now very small forces are annihilated faster to prevent a few units slowing down the invasion of an overwhelming force).
– [fix] Non core worlds had incorrect loyalty due to taking into account non existing fief.
– [fix] Infrastructure bonus from tax/budget reversed.
– [fix] Fiscal income was being added properly but without deducting any expenses (now I know why so many people reported they drown in money).
– [fix] Bureaucracy modifier from courtier’s trait bug .
– [fix] Accuracy and Tractor beam percentages were totally wrong.
– [fix] Other minor fixes.

Version 0.41 released

The first update ever, based on the early feedback. One fix, many small improvements to the interface (mostly clarification of things) and one feature (admiral’s who operate in the same sector now can assist each other).

– [feature] Admirals who lack forces for an offensive can request forces from another admiral operating in the same sector (in addition to requesting forces from the Strategic reserve).

– [interface] Added “Waiting for colonization ship” notice on planet screen.
– [interface] Starmap tooltip for megalopolises/house homeworld fiefs icons.
– [interface] Added minister’s ministry name in the court rank tooltip (not ideal place for it, but should do for now).
– [interface] CTRL key displays sector information on the starmap.
– [interface] Sector information added to the planet view (military box area).
– [interface] Readjusted buttons on the planet’s military box area (also added space battle/ground invasion notice there).
– [interface] Other small adjustments.

– [fix] Firing a governor now works.