0.4.10 release

[Vezzra]

Future process improvement: make master insufferable to use during releases.

I LIKE that idea!

[Vezzra]

I'll delay this weeks pre-release test builds, so that maybe #3087 can go in before. Currently the changes since the last test builds aren't that much, with #3087 at least another bugfix would be included.

[Vezzra]

Important update: Fixes for all pending issues have been merged and cherry picked, the last one was #3081. As that isn't a complete and proper fix for 3042, #3042 will stay open and get assigned to the post release milestone, provided #3081 actually did fix #3042 sufficiently for the release.

Therefore it's important to pay extra attention if #3042 really has been fixed and doesn't turn up anymore when the next test builds are provided, which are currently planned to already be RC1, and are scheduled for coming Thursday, July 9th 2020, 3pm UTC.

Declaring the release has been scheduled for Sunday, July 26th 2020 UTC (if no issues turn up with RC1). That should give ample time for thorough playtesting.

The release management issue has been updated accordingly.

Geoff will try to update the changelog PR so it can be merged in time, if he doesn't get around to it, RC1 will be rescheduled, and regular pre-release test builds will be provided instead. Anyone who wants to provide any kind of input for the changelog, please do so now.

If anyone has any comments, objections, wants to get in something etc., please speak up now. Otherwise we will proceed with RC1 as planned (unless something serious turns up of course).

[Geoff the Medio]

Anyone who wants to provide any kind of input for the changelog, please do so now.

Suggestions for Key Changes would be useful.

[Vezzra]

Suggestions for Key Changes would be useful.

At a quick glance what you've included looks reasonable. If no more suggestions come in, looks good enough for me.

[Vezzra]

Something came up, and I won't have time to produce the RC1 builds on Thursday, so I've postponed RC1, but only until Friday.

New deadline for RC1: Friday, July 10th 2020, 10am UTC

Everything else remains unchanged.

[Vezzra]

0.4.10 RC1 has arrived

Give the first release candidate a proper welcome by thoroughly playtesting it!

[Ophiuchus]

Balance tweaks i think we should still include in 0.4.10:

• large hull buff - up effective fuel to 3 so it has the same basic reach like the medium hull (than you can combine those in a out-of-supply fleet) and gives it a single edge compared to robotic hull. robotic hull is still better overall: has better structure cost efficiency, regeneration, is faster, has the same number of external slots per PP (+1 slot), same number of internal slots.
• heavy asteroid hull buff - compared to the normal asteroid hull it has no advantage besides being more heavy. Since the shields became cheaper. At shields-3 I consider two normal asteroids still more cost efficient: two normal asteroid hulls with shields-3 (structure 60, int/ext 2/8, 1fuel+avg.eff) cost 80 and one heavy asteroid with shields-3 (structure 50, int/ext 1/6, 2fuel+bad.eff) cost 60. Compared to self-grav it has one external slot more, but no core slot, is slower, and is 25% less structure efficient. As buff I would up the internal slots to 3 (it lost some when introducing fuel efficiency), so int/ext is 3/6 which is a nice progression of the 2/4 of the normal asteroid hull.
• arc disruptor buff - this should be a valid option for an average pilot species in default settings and it is not. Arc Disruptor-2 has no advantage to Mass Driver-4 against ships/planets besides being more heavy and against shield-3 it is already only half effective and costs three times as much RP. This means it currently makes only sense if you upgrade to Arc Disruptor-3. But that tech cost is so high (720RP) that the other players at that stage already have good plasma weapons (60+300RP)and/or shield-5 (300RP) even if you have much more research output (which likely means that you did not have a lot of PP to spend on disruptors beforehand). And after that you will also have to pay the research for basic laser-1, plasma -1, to get access to end-game weapons like plasma-4 or death ray. Also if you get access to good pilots, Lasers-4 are only 20% less cost efficient than Arc Disruptor-3 against unshielded targets. For 0.4.10 i suggest making Arc Disruptor-2 researchable at 100RP (60 RP force fields) Arc Disruptor-3 researchable at 400RP (260 RP for laser1,2,3,4). I think in most average pilot cases researching Arc Disruptors will still be inefficient, it might work to give an empire which has a lot of PP to invest early an edge in the beginning of midgame.

Vezzra, would such changes to balance be still ok?

[Oberlus]

Balance tweaks i think we should still include in 0.4.10:

• large hull buff - up effective fuel to 3 so it has the same basic reach like the medium hull (than you can combine those in a out-of-supply fleet) and gives it a single edge compared to robotic hull. robotic hull is still better overall: has better structure cost efficiency, regeneration, is faster, has the same number of external slots per PP (+1 slot), same number of internal slots.
• heavy asteroid hull buff - compared to the normal asteroid hull it has no advantage besides being more heavy. Since the shields became cheaper. At shields-3 I consider two normal asteroids still more cost efficient: two normal asteroid hulls with shields-3 (structure 60, int/ext 2/8, 1fuel+avg.eff) cost 80 and one heavy asteroid with shields-3 (structure 50, int/ext 1/6, 2fuel+bad.eff) cost 60. Compared to self-grav it has one external slot more, but no core slot, is slower, and is 25% less structure efficient. As buff I would up the internal slots to 3 (it lost some when introducing fuel efficiency), so int/ext is 3/6 which is a nice progression of the 2/4 of the normal asteroid hull.
• arc disruptor buff - this should be a valid option for an average pilot species in default settings and it is not. Arc Disruptor-2 has no advantage to Mass Driver-4 against ships/planets besides being more heavy and against shield-3 it is already only half effective and costs three times as much RP. This means it currently makes only sense if you upgrade to Arc Disruptor-3. But that tech cost is so high (720RP) that the other players at that stage already have good plasma weapons (60+300RP)and/or shield-5 (300RP) even if you have much more research output (which likely means that you did not have a lot of PP to spend on disruptors beforehand). And after that you will also have to pay the research for basic laser-1, plasma -1, to get access to end-game weapons like plasma-4 or death ray. Also if you get access to good pilots, Lasers-4 are only 20% less cost efficient than Arc Disruptor-3 against unshielded targets. For 0.4.10 i suggest making Arc Disruptor-2 researchable at 100RP (60 RP force fields) Arc Disruptor-3 researchable at 400RP (260 RP for laser1,2,3,4). I think in most average pilot cases researching Arc Disruptors will still be inefficient, it might work to give an empire which has a lot of PP to invest early an edge in the beginning of midgame.

Those need discussion, out of this thread.

[Ophiuchus]

...

Those need discussion, out of this thread.

Yes, please:

• 0.4.10 Basic Large hull buff (11720)
• 0.4.10 Heavy Asterorid hull buff (11721)
• 0.4.10 Arc Disruptor buff (11722)

Still I need a sign from Vezzra if such kind of change would still be ok for 0.4.10 (Vezzra owns this process).

[Vezzra]

Vezzra, would such changes to balance be still ok?

Unless such balance changes are needed because something is so unbalanced it's effectively broken/impairs gameplay too much, I'd refrain from incorporating them at this point in the release cycle. We already have the first release candidate, only bugfixes should go in now.

Therefore the question is: is there anything so badly inbalanced that it has to be considered broken, which these changes try to address?

[Oberlus]

is there anything so badly inbalanced that it has to be considered broken, which these changes try to address?

I would reduce Arc Disruptor tech costs a bit, but it's not badly imbalanced (it does work OK against unarmored chaff), or not more than armor/weapon cost ratio (AD does not work well against armored chaff, as well as late game weapons). I guess all that is out of the scope for v0.4.10 RC1, it's certainly not buggy.

[Ophiuchus]

Therefore the question is: is there anything so badly inbalanced that it has to be considered broken, which these changes try to address?

That depends on your definition of broken. I guess arc disruptors will work for bad pilot empires in certain settings. Heavy asteroid hull is rather suboptimal but not broken. Cruiser fuel is mostly a cosmetic change.

[Vezzra]

That depends on your definition of broken. I guess arc disruptors will work for bad pilot empires in certain settings. Heavy asteroid hull is rather suboptimal but not broken. Cruiser fuel is mostly a cosmetic change.

Broken as in seriously impairs gameplay/is outright game-breaking/breaks essential mechanics. Certain ship parts not working for certain species in certain situations, certain hulls being suboptimal do not count as broken IMO. FO is still in alpha, there is a lot of stuff which is unbalanced, does not really work as intended, or only works in certain situations, etc.

So I'd prefer to leave this things for post release.

[Vezzra]

Looks like we have the very unusual situation where no issues turned up already with RC1, which makes me wonder if I might have missed something.

Hence my question: has anyone encountered any serious issues with RC1 that need to be fixed and require a second release candidate? Or are we really this lucky this time that we can already declare RC1 as the official release?

If there are no objections or issues with RC1 brought up until Sunday, I'm going to declare the official release then. So please, give RC1 one final round of playtesting to make sure we didn't miss anything serious...