DerekPaxton DerekPaxton

1.19 Changelog

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1.19 Changelog

from Elemental Forums

*** 1.19 is a public beta ***

*** 1.19 was released on 1/27/2011 ***

 

Changes

1. Fixed memory leaks.

2. Reduced memory consumption (especially in the late game) by releasing unneeded textures instead of retaining them indefinitely.

3. Raze city no longer requires a tech and is available right off the bat for all of your cities.

4. Prestige penalty for multiple cities has been broken out in the Other category on the city screen (instead of being a part of the base prestige number).

5. AI is more careful with their sovereign.

6. In the city breakdown the amount of buildings is listed (so it will say Study x3 if you have 3 studies in that city).

7. Fixed bug where conquered cities that had caravans that called that city home would end up with messed up caravan counts.

8. Fixed a bug where player ability penalties on resource production weren't actually being taken into account.

9. Fixed the effect of the "Call of the Titans" spell, which gathers all your unstationed units and transports them to a specified tile.  It will now skip units without an attack (ie. pioneers, caravans, boats).

10. Fixed bug where particle glow effect would remain on the map after getting a goodie hut until you hit the turn button.

11. Fixed delay in tactical battles with mounted archer units.

12. Fixed bug where sometimes particles would remain on the map from a destroyed factions cities.

13. Added a new game option to adjust Movie volume.

14. Removed the city idle dialog, replaced with a report item notification in the event list.

15. Pioneers/sovs cannot build/found cities in other people's territory

16. Since spells are capped at level 5, you are no longer given the choice to keep going up in spell level once you reach that max.

17. Disabling Janusk advice does not disable his creation in the game.

18. Custom sovereign starting appearance is randomized (so you don't start with the same model every time).

19. You are now able to select a tile under a unit without moving the unit.

20. Limited improvements (like the faction specific Beacon of Hope) won't be counted as being built until they are completed.

21. Fixed Titan's Breath (thanks to Heavenfall and Kenata).

22. Fixed an issue that was keeping the AI from casting spells in tactical battles.

23. Balanced resource placement (more variety, better distribution).

24. Added a blue highlight representing the range of a spell when in spellcasting mode on both the strategic and tactical map, so the user can see how far they are allowed to cast the spell

25. Added tooltips that hover underneath the spellcasting cursor that explain why a spell can't be cast on that tile (with no tooltip shown if it is a valid target)

26. The strategic map spellcasting mode now uses the same wand cursors (with support for an invalid cursor) that the tactical map mode uses

27. Fixed a bug in spellcasting where non offensive, defensive, or terraforming spells were now checking that the spell target was valid when deciding if the spell could be cast.

28. Fixed the Fallen Ambassador (so it now correctly gives diplomatic capital).

29. Removed the Refined Diplomacy techs.

30. Added gold as a tradeable resource for fallen and changed horses to wargs for them.

31. Added the champion ablity "Diplomatic" which gives +1 diplomatic capital per turn.

32. Hooked up a list at the top of the city HUD to show the enchantments that are currently on that city.

33. Fixed a bug in the main city context wnd where it would use the AI's cached version of the battle rank for display, causing it to often not match the city HUD and other screens.

34. Fixed a bug where dispelling Guardian Ward (and any other spells that involved a city-target summon modifier) would not kill the summoned unit.

35. Fixed a bug where killing a unit summoned on a city would not cancel the enchantment that summoned that unit, keeping the spell from being cast on that city again.

36. Fixed lighting on shields in unit design screens (so they won't appear black anymore).

37. Fixed an issue that caused units to lose their custom portrait after a few turns.

38. Units now fade out when they get killed on the main map.

39. Units now fade out when they get killed in tactical battles.

40. Fixed a bug where improvements in FOW still played their particle effects.

41. Added a info button where spellbooks are displayed (such as on the custom sovereign screen) that will show all the spells that spellbook gives.

42. When improvements are auto-upgraded they no longer make the upgrade noise (which can be deafening when a bunch do it at once).

43. Auto-upgrades won't spam the event list with the "new building" messages.

44. When casting a targeted spell on an army (such as imbue champion on a stack with more than one valid target) a dialog is presented to allow the player to pick the unit he wants.

45. Fixed an issue that kept AI champions from being able to cast spells in tactical combat.

46. Players can now earn achievements in single player mode if auto-login is enabled.

47. Fixed a bug with lifesteal that caused the caster to lose hit points.

48. Fixed some bugs in tactical AI code that were causing it to think enemy units were friendly units.

49. Added code so that AI units will try to cast a heal spell on themself before resorting to trying to escape.

50. Added code so that the AI can determine the best spell to use based on AI xml weights in the spells themselves.

51. Added AIData and AIPriority tags to all spells, so we can tweak how much the AI cares about them.

52. Min defense on armor has been removed.  Previously armor never absorbed less than half the units defense value, now it has the possibility to absorb the full range (though weighter to the high end).  So every attack can do damage.

53. Increased the casting cost for Return and Teleport.

54. When a pioneer founds a city, any remaining units in its army are now automatically stationed in the new city.

55. When a sovereign founds a kingdom/empire, the popup explaining what they are doing now includes a checkbox asking if the user wants to station their sovereign in the new city, where if they choose to not have it selected, the sovereign moves to an adjacent tile like before

56. Fixed a bug with units getting stationed over end turn not showing up in a cities context, and ensuring the new city founding behavior shows the most updated city context when all the shuffling of units is done.

57. Fixed bug where, when founding a city, you could see the pioneer either die on top of the city while it was being built, or the pioneer's graphic would stick around for a turn if in cloth map mode when the city was built

58. The events for "improvement built" and "unit finished training" start out temporarily expanded, for a short period of time.

59. Faction Power Wnd entries now have a tooltip telling you how each player feels towards you.  (ex. At War, Neutral, etc..).  Also, if you are at war with them, an AtWar icon will be displayed.

60. Unit info cards reworked to show more meaningful data, have the data fit better, etc.

61. Fixed Grip of Winter and Greater Grip of Winter to correctly apply a chance of taking effect (previously they always caused the victims to lose their next turn).

62. Added an event list entry when there are enemy units in your lands.  Clicking on the event will cycle through the enemy units in your lands.

63. Added a new tactical Air 1 spell, Wind Shield.  Gives all allied units +5 dodge vs ranged attacks.

64. Removed the Blink spell.

65. You can now recruit Janusk directly from his opening dialog (instead of him talking to you and then sometimes running away).

66. Empire can now claim refugee camps.

119,109 views 254 replies
Reply #101 from Elemental Forums Top

Quoting kenata, reply 97

...

My fear, which is fairly insignificant, is that there will be no changes made to help modders. In general, I would say that the list of mod changes truly needed to reduce the current mod limitations is actually fairly small and the effort to bring them to fruition would benefit both EWOM and FE.

End of kenata's quote

Jon's recent statement makes me believe that we shouldn't expect anything major on that front for quite some time. I'm sure he/they will try, but it will take a lot of work....

Reply #102 from Elemental Forums Top

If you do not like a particular facet of the game, then use the tools you have to try and fix them.
End of quote

Unfortunately, most of us don't have the modding skills like you guys.  I'm really glad you guys have done a lot to try and fix the blandness, but a lot of those things I would have expected to be in this game already (interesting and distinct factions, interesting items with prefixes and suffixes, more heroes and champions with unique skills, better spells, techs, quests, AI, etc.)  That would have freed up the modding community to be doing even more cool stuff and taking the game in an entire different direction perhaps.

Sins of a Solar Empire II
Reply #103 from Elemental Forums Top

Derek, is there an estimate ETA for this beta (like, for instance, Thursday? :D ).

Reply #104 from Elemental Forums Top

44. When casting a targeted spell on an army (such as imbue champion on a stack with more than one valid target) a dialog is presented to allow the player to pick the unit he wants.

47. Fixed a bug with lifesteal that caused the caster to lose hit points.

End of quote

 

 Awesome! Now...I'd say 1.19 is fit for release. Any clues to when you are planning on it?

 

Reply #105 from Elemental Forums Top

Hi Derek,

Will you please add a highlight to the active city/army on the left-hand side of the screen?  Whenever I'm scrolling through each one to manage a city or an army, it's easy to lose track of where I am in the list when you have a lot of cities and armies that all look alike... which reminds me, it would be nice to have a scroll bar show up once we've gone past the limit of visible cities/armies in that list.

Let me know if that makes sense; otherwise, I can send a screenshot.

Reply #106 from Elemental Forums Top


39. Units now fade out when they get killed in tactical battles.

42. When improvements are auto-upgraded they no longer make the upgrade noise (which can be deafening when a bunch do it at once).

44. When casting a targeted spell on an army (such as imbue champion on a stack with more than one valid target) a dialog is presented to allow the player to pick the unit he wants.
End of quote

@39, why are units being removed at all from tactical battles. I WANT TO RAISE THE DEAD DAMNIT.

@42, that is a relief. I nearly died when my level 4 city in v1.1 upgraded from houses to huts.

@44, an eagerly accepted addition!

Reply #107 from Elemental Forums Top

There are some great fixes and improvements in this list (these to number just a few 1, 2, 24, 32, 37,  44), I'm really looking forward to getting my hands on this beauty.

With change: "41. Added a info button where spellbooks are displayed (such as on the custom sovereign screen) that will show all the spells that spellbook gives."

Is this available in game, maybe from the sovereign's Inventory screen or somewhere else, not really a required change but would be nice to be able to see which spells come from which book that has been researched?

The number of changes made in your patches puts other development houses to shame, congrats to everyone involved.

To echo Werewindlefr's question, do you think we are likely to see anything released this week, no pressure just excited to see the changes in action?

Reply #108 from Elemental Forums Top



47. Fixed a bug with lifesteal that caused the caster to lose hit points.

End of quote

 

Wow I didn't even notice there is a lifesteal in EWOM but it's good to hear it is fixed. What is it, a spell or ability? Anyways keep up the good work guys :-).

Reply #109 from Elemental Forums Top

It is actually not used at all. This change will allow modders to use it.



39. Units now fade out when they get killed in tactical battles.


End of quote

Boo! Corpses shouldn't fade out at all.

Reply #110 from Elemental Forums Top

Awesome. I've been waiting for 44 and 46 for ages  :grin:

Reply #111 from Elemental Forums Top

I know what achievements are, but what does 46 mean exactly? Where can I enable auto-login?

Reply #112 from Elemental Forums Top

Thanks for the estimated date (1/27/2011) Derek, looking forward to it.

Reply #113 from Elemental Forums Top

*** 1.19 is targeted for public beta release on 1/27/2011 ***
End of quote

Darn, thats pretty far away. Have to do alot of in house testing for all these changes or something? Or are there even more surprises in store for us?

Reply #114 from Elemental Forums Top

Quoting SinVraal, reply 111
I know what achievements are, but what does 46 mean exactly? Where can I enable auto-login?
End of SinVraal's quote

You cant yet.  With 1.19 you will have the option.

Reply #115 from Elemental Forums Top

One other UI problem that I saw John Hughes brought up. When in tactical battles, if you have a few special abilities on a unit, and your resolution is 1024x768 or lower, the info card blocks the menu of abilities.

Yeah, there's another ability under there which is almost impossible to click on. I really haven't complained about this, and I probably should have earlier, but it's very, very, very irritating.

 

Reply #116 from Elemental Forums Top

I know it is a tad late to expect, but would it be possible to have it so that if I have 4 single (early) designed units, I can gather them and then create a proper "Squad", the same as if I had waited/tech and had the capacity to build actual "Squads of 4"? Same should go for the other groupings as well? 8's and 12's.

Given that a single early designed unit cannot be further upgraded after creation, but can gain in Rank, and I simply dislike the terms "Cannon Fodder" and "Meat Shield" in general, why not allow a player to combine their early weak "Singles" into more potent "Grouped Singles" even if they only combine to be equal to say a new single designed "Knight".

 

Reply #117 from Elemental Forums Top

Heartily agree with John_ & impinc.

 

Just have to add:

50. Added code so that the AI can determine the best spell to use based on AI xml weights in the spells themselves.

51. Added AIData and AIPriority tags to all spells, so we can tweak how much the AI cares about them.

  :w00t: ..... \o/


Reply #118 from Elemental Forums Top

Not sure if this was addressed anywhere yet, but is there any chance we'll ever see a much-needed pre-battle formation mode (in either 1.19 or later).  In other words, immediately when the combat-map comes up (before the first turn begins), you can position your units strategically ala many other TBS games.  Of course, it would all have to be done in a small (depending on how many units you're using) limited area on your own side.

This would dramatically help tactical combat overall, and I know many out there have been begging for this.

Reply #119 from Elemental Forums Top

Quoting Derek, reply 114

Quoting SinVraal, reply 111I know what achievements are, but what does 46 mean exactly? Where can I enable auto-login?

You cant yet.  With 1.19 you will have the option.
End of Derek's quote

Thanks! I was just wondering about achievements in EWoM. So I let myself be surprised.

Reply #120 from Elemental Forums Top

This going to be a great patch.

Reply #121 from Elemental Forums Top

Quoting FatNonFree, reply 120
This going to be a great patch.
End of FatNonFree's quote

for you to "poop" on.

Reply #122 from Elemental Forums Top

Quoting Trojasmic, reply 121

Quoting FatNonFree, reply 120This going to be a great patch.
for you to "poop" on.
End of Trojasmic's quote

 

LOL

Reply #123 from Elemental Forums Top

Quoting Victor5, reply 118
Not sure if this was addressed anywhere yet, but is there any chance we'll ever see a much-needed pre-battle formation mode (in either 1.19 or later).  In other words, immediately when the combat-map comes up (before the first turn begins), you can position your units strategically ala many other TBS games.  Of course, it would all have to be done in a small (depending on how many units you're using) limited area on your own side.

This would dramatically help tactical combat overall, and I know many out there have been begging for this.
End of Victor5's quote

Something here would be nice. It's a bit frustrating to attack a city or an army out in the open and find many of my archers up front and many of my 'tanks' in the middle or back ranks, whereas the AI always has its archers in the back.

Reply #124 from Elemental Forums Top

Quoting Victor5, reply 118
Not sure if this was addressed anywhere yet, but is there any chance we'll ever see a much-needed pre-battle formation mode (in either 1.19 or later).  In other words, immediately when the combat-map comes up (before the first turn begins), you can position your units strategically ala many other TBS games.  Of course, it would all have to be done in a small (depending on how many units you're using) limited area on your own side.

This would dramatically help tactical combat overall, and I know many out there have been begging for this.
End of Victor5's quote

 

Actually i would like to have the option to work out my formations outside the battle and then having the option to choose that formation (from a number of formations) as well as positioning my units per hand.

Reply #125 from Elemental Forums Top

52. Min defense on armor has been removed.  Previously armor never absorbed less than half the units defense value, now it has the possibility to absorb the full range (though weighter to the high end).  So every attack can do damage.
End of quote

Hmm, is this the only balance change in this patch ? It's going to reduce those blocked reduce a bit and remove total invulnerability, but I'm afraid going for armor is still going to trump going for dodge, and we're still going to be flooded with "blocked" results if that's the only change. 

So 1/4th of the time, the armor is going to be worse, usually only slightly worse, than it is right now (roll on n^2, then result square-rooted, if I recall correctly). But from the number of posters and topic discussing this, it's clear it's not a "minor" problem. 

Maybe a moderate weapon buff (along with a serious HP buff to compensate) would help ? +20% attack would do the trick.