I watched a let's play video of this game and I think it looks like it could be a lot of fun.
Anyone have any experience with it? I think I might go in for early access (even though I just bought a bunch of new games that I have barely touched....)
I have had it for years....development is VERY slooooooooowwwwwwww.
It has a lot of potential, and is enjoyable in its present state, but it has a long way to go.
I find it very challenging...almost too challenging. I have been unable to make much progress.
I just took a quick peak into the forum and one of the first threads was this...
http://fractalsoftworks.com/forum/index.php?topic=11041.0 (http://fractalsoftworks.com/forum/index.php?topic=11041.0)
Yeah...early access for over FOUR SIX years. Significant content updates once, maybe twice a year....
Thanks. I think I'll give it a whirl.
Reminds me of SPAZ (Space Pirates and Zombies)
Could be wrong but that's the vibe I got.
Quote from: Jarhead0331 on May 10, 2016, 08:33:53 PM
I have had it for years....development is VERY slooooooooowwwwwwww.
It has a lot of potential, and is enjoyable in its present state, but it has a long way to go.
Yeah, precisely this. Development is absolutely glacial. I bought it a long time ago and frankly my enthusiasm for it is gone.
Maybe I'll get a good game out of it one day, but I have zero hopes pinned on it to be honest.
Fiddled around with it a bit last night. Man, there are a LOT of key commands! I'm enjoying it so far but it does feel a little overwhelming once you start commanding fleets. I think I need to remap a bunch of controls that seem like they'll get the most use.
The combat reminds me a bit of Gratuitous Space Battles except that here you get direct control of your ships. Sort of like a mix between GSB and Starfleet Command.
Quote from: Silent Disapproval Robot on May 11, 2016, 10:21:49 AM
Fiddled around with it a bit last night. Man, there are a LOT of key commands! I'm enjoying it so far but it does feel a little overwhelming once you start commanding fleets. I think I need to remap a bunch of controls that seem like they'll get the most use.
The combat reminds me a bit of Gratuitous Space Battles except that here you get direct control of your ships. Sort of like a mix between GSB and Starfleet Command.
I have found it almost impossible to competently manage direct control of a ship (ie. control with newtonian physics, facing due to firing arcs, multiple weapon systems, flux, shields, etc.) while also managing control of a fleet.
Quote from: Jarhead0331 on May 10, 2016, 08:33:53 PM
I have had it for years....development is VERY slooooooooowwwwwwww.
It has a lot of potential, and is enjoyable in its present state, but it has a long way to go.
I find it very challenging...almost too challenging. I have been unable to make much progress.
I recall buying into this when it had a different name years ago. Haven't looked into it in a long time since it was taking forever.
Still like the concept. Just not sure if it's content will be done before I die.
Quote from: Nefaro on May 11, 2016, 03:47:53 PM
Quote from: Jarhead0331 on May 10, 2016, 08:33:53 PM
I have had it for years....development is VERY slooooooooowwwwwwww.
It has a lot of potential, and is enjoyable in its present state, but it has a long way to go.
I find it very challenging...almost too challenging. I have been unable to make much progress.
I recall buying into this when it had a different name years ago. Haven't looked into it in a long time since it was taking forever.
Still like the concept. Just not sure if it's content will be done before I die.
I think it was called Starfarer or something like that then.
EDIT: Accidentally wrote my line into the quote :P
Yep! That was it.
Was called Starfarer at the time.
The devs had been silent for quite a while but they've been on a bit of a tear for the last month. Lots of updates and hotfixes.
I love the idea of this game but god damn it's hard to control all the features in real time.
QuoteHotfix (RC19), April 21, 2017
Campaign
Trading/refitting at market will stop your fleet
Reduced speed of REDACTED frigates by 30
Salvage and surveying will not be prevented by nearby fleets that are fleeing, maintaining contact, or standing down
Changes as of April 20, 2017
Campaign
"Unidentified fleet" sensor contacts now use dashed gray/transparent circle indicator
Hull Modspec items show a dimmed "display" area when hullmod is already known
Changed markets to always have some hullmods for sale instead of a very small chance for each hullmod to be available
Fleet screen: added "number of d-mods" indicator to each ship
Made modspecs cheaper
Bumped up XP for discovery and salvage
Markets with fuel, supplies, and crew will have some on the open market even if there is unmet demand (i.e not required to use black market in this case)
Reduced chance for phase ships to be found in smaller enemy fleets
Small chance of a heavily-degraded Afflictor in pirate fleets (can easily be pressured/chased down by starter Wolf; runs out of peak time very quickly)
Laid-in course now shown on map
Skills
Added "reduces effect of d-mods" fleetwide effect to one of the industry skills
Added "deployment cost reduction also applies to maintenance" industry skill effect
Increased magnitude of "fewer d-mods on recovered ships" skill effect; now also affects own ships
"Post-battle salvage" bonuses are now just overall salvage bonuses
Ships
Paragon's Advanced Targeting Core modified to only add 50% range for PD weapons (still 100% for other weapons)
Falcon: increased burn level to 9
Tempest: increased Terminator drone speed, now armed with Ion Pulser
Miscellaneous
Advanced combat tutorial: added mention of "hold fire" and "pull back fighters" controls
Fleet command tutorial: revamped to match state of game; added "avoid" and "eliminate" order sections
Stopped using roman numerals in ship names
Logging on OS X: will now produce Contents/starsector.log, which gets overwritten with every game run
Bugfixing
(Hopefully) fixed issue with possible repeated reputation drops from black-market trade on pirate markets
Fixed Salamander missile AI not tracking phase ships the same way as normal missile AI
Fixed bug where d-hull-modified deployment cost was only rounded for display and not consumption
Changes as of April 13, 2017
Campaign
Planets with ruins will now have orbital junk, like regular markets (but no radio chatter)
Person-bounty fleets now marked as "mission important" (i.e. will show indicator on map/campaign when visible)
Can no longer scuttle, sell, or store the last ship in your fleet
Control-clicking on a stack cargo to take or buy it will transfer just enough to fill up free capacity
Another ctrl-click will take the rest, if desired
Mostly meant to make topping off on fuel quick and easy
Control-clicking cargo to sell/store/eject it will initially only transfer enough to put you at maximum capacity, if you're above it
Another click will transfer the rest
Added slight base demand for fuel and supply to all markets (makes supplies/fuel more generally available)
Fuel:
Reduced price to 25 credits (from 50)
Roughly doubled amount available
Increased proportion of fuel from salvage, battle salvage, and scuttling
Reduced ship fuel capacity, generally by around half
Cargo ships tend to have a bit more
Carriers a bit less
Overall goal is to encourage more casual exploration (cheaper, more abundant fuel) and open up a few more choices in fleet composition (how many/what types of tankers to use)
Reduced cargo capacity somewhat, especially of combat ships above frigate level
A fleet with many larger ships is more likely to want to bring freighters along
A fleet with mostly frigates is largely unaffected compared to before
Attempting to activate the transponder when doing so will make a faction hostile will bring up a confirmation dialog
Scavenge ability:
Chance of an accident starts low and increases with subsequent operations in same debris field
As do the losses from an accident
Updated sensor range calculation
One fleet's sensor profile is added to another fleet's sensor range to get the detection range
Skills/abilities/terrain etc still modify this combined range, as before
Ships contribute 30/60/90/150 to sensor strength and profile, based on ship size
Added to a base fleet strength/profile of 300
Only the 5 ships with the highest profile and strength are used, can be different set for each
Adjusted various related hullmods; of particular note:
High Resolution Sensors give a flat +60 to sensor strength
Phase Field sets the ship's profile to 0
Maximum sensor range indicator (to detect your fleet) now also shown when mousing over another fleet
Overall:
Slightly increased detection ranges, most impactful for smaller fleets
Easier-to-gauge impact of specific ships, since it's linear
New inventory icons for fuel and supplies
Added campaign tutorial:
Introduces major gameplay elements and goes through active abilities
High-level, involves doing a multi-stage mission to get out of new starting star system
Can be skipped; if skipped starts player with similar resources/standing as if they did it
New game creation:
Added button to randomly generate a name
Added button to randomly a pick portrait
Re-did starting options
Starting ship: Wolf or Wayfarer
Second ship: Kite with officer, or Shepherd with heavy machinery
Difficulty: normal or easy
Tutorial: do or skip
Easy difficulty now:
Reduces damage taken by all ships on your side by 25%
Increases sensor range by 500
Increases all salvage (combat and non-combat) by 50%
Added visual indicator for mission-important entities in campaign screen
Added "survey planet" mission
Turned off trade disruption condition for now (incentivizing the wrong things, current iteration not working design-wise)
In-flight refit: adding weapons/hullmods will again reduce CR, but not below the malfunction threshold
Still makes outfitting recovered ships mostly free as they can't start with more CR than that
Prevents some potential exploits
Improved fleet AI: computes better intercept point when pursuing another fleet
Reduced use of Emergency Burn by AI fleets, especially during pursuit
Running a salvage operation or scavenging will now bring your fleet to a stop
Added UI indicators to debris fields to make them easier to spot
Solar Shielding: modified description to mention that it also protects against hyperstorms
Campaign music will now stop while surveying a planet or otherwise interacting with it
Radar now shows hyperspace terrain (does not show any other kind of terrain)
Ships
Shepherd:
Added Salvage Gantry as built-in hullmod; +10% potential salvage
Increased fuel capacity
Paragon: reduced OP by 30, added built in "Advanced Targeting Core" - +100% weapon range
Miscellaneous
Disabled buttons will now flash when they fail-to-be-activated using the shortcut key
Modding
Added secondary faction color for fleet circle indicators
"secondaryUIColor":[<color>],
"secondarySegments":<integer>,
Only used by the fleet/station/entity/etc circles, nothing else
Ship tooltip: non-phase cloak right-click systems will show "Special" instead of "Defense" and the proper system name
reportBattleFinished() now properly called when battle ends, both for autoresolve and player battles
Bugfixing:
Fixed Wolf collision radius (was smaller than shields, could cause limited collision detection problems)
Fixed another campaign-game level memory leak
Patch notes pt 2 (wouldn't all fit in one post)
QuoteChanges as of March 23, 2017
Campaign
Added several salvage-related themes for procedurally-generated star systems (e.g. "ruins", etc)
Added new mission to encourage/reward exploration
Added "Distress Call" player ability; may result in friendly fleet arriving with some fuel or supplies
May now receive distress calls while traveling through the Sector
Ejecting cargo:
Creates "cargo pods" that will drift away and be lost within a few days
Can stabilize orbit of cargo pods for several months; costs supplies based on amount of cargo
Only in-system, not in hyperspace
Can put crew in cargo pods ("cryosleep" etc)
Person bounties:
Increased maximum concurrent to 5 (was: 3)
Increased base reward to 30k (was: 20k)
Added random component to reward
Target fleets now hide out outside the core worlds area and tend to favor star systems that are also otherwise interesting
Can click minimap in intel message detail to switch to map tab showing location that was on miniamp
Surveying planets now generates a "Survey Data" commodity
Ranges in quality from Class 1 through Class 5 depending on planetary conditions found
High-class data is extremely valuable
Added a "lay in course" feature
To activate, "lay in course" from map
Works across star systems, i.e. can lay in course for specific planet while in another system
Will pick optimal jump-points and update next waypoint automatically
Shows info re: where you're going (direction, fuel, distance, time)
Can divert from it and then resume autopilot easily
Planets that don't already have related jump points (i.e. gas giant gravity wells) get "nascent" gravity wells in hyperspace
Transverse Jump ability:
Jump into systems using nascent gravity wells
Jump to hyperspace from anywhere in-system without using a jump-point (costs fuel and a bit of CR)
Unlocked by level 3 Navigation skill
Neutrino Detector ability (requires Sensors skill)
Detect entities anywhere in-system
Remote Survey ability
Gain preliminary survey information for all nearby planets
Unlocked by level 1 Surveying skill
Rare Ore renamed to "Transplutonics"
Increased maximum player fleet size to 30
Improved scuttle dialog; scuttling now also yields heavy machinery
Added stand-alone stations to the intel "planets" tab
E.G: station around Jangala isn't included there since it's part of the Jangala market
Kanta's Den *is* included since it's the main entity comprising its market
Maxios and Killa - decivilized markets - now do not participate in the economy; can't be traded with
Enemy fleet commanders now have access to fleet-level skills such as "Coordinated Maneuvers" and "Electronic Warfare"
Number of enemy officers capped by the commander's Officer Management
Likelihood and level/presence of these skills varies by faction; i.e. pirates are less likely to have them, and if they do they'll be lower level
Officer skills for AI fleets are picked appropriately for carriers (while still using the same "select 1 skill" process the player uses)
Added multiple special events that occur during salvage operations
Debris fields generated by battles now sometimes yield recoverable (but badly damaged) ships
Battles now generate derelict ships that slowly drift away, can be salvaged, and are eventually lost
Adjusted fleet compositions so that beam-focused Wolf variants don't show up in smaller fleets as often
Ship recovery
Destroyed and disabled ships have a high chance of being recoverable after combat
Recoverable ships get permanent d-mods (Compromised Armor, Degraded Engines, etc)
Deployment supply cost of ships reduced by 20% (multiplicative) per d-mod
Enemy ships get more d-mods, own ships get 1 extra d-mod each time they're recovered
Several ways to ensure ships are always recoverable:
Reinforced Bulkheads (ship it's installed on)
Damage Control skill (ship piloted by person w/ skill)
Fleet Logistics skill (all ships piloted by officers in fleet)
Ships with (D) mods can be restored at a market, for a high price based on the amount of damage (up to around 4x base with 4 d-mods)
This includes both damaged ships and ships that normally have dmods, such as Luddic Path frigates with Ill-Advised Modifications
Ship autofit
Pick a "target" variant from a configurable set and it will automatically create a fit using what's available
Will use similar weapons if exact ones in target variant aren't available
Multiple options (buy from market, allow black market purchases, etc)
Replaces "manage variants" in refit screen
"Select next ship with unspent ordnance points" button in refit screen
Unspent ordnance points now also shown on ship list in refit screen
Option to quickly spend any unspent points for a ship without fully refitting it
Will spend points on vents, capacitors, and some general-purpose hullmods
Refit screen
"Add hullmod" dialog:
Added tabs to filter hullmods by category (All, Offensive, Defensive, Engines, Special)
Added "hide already installed hullmods" checkbox
Added indicator to show which hullmods are already installed
Improved overall readability and adjusted color scheme to be more in line with rest of game
Made some miscellaneous visual improvements
Added filters (by type and source) to weapon and fighter picker dialogs
Improved readability of items in dialog
Added "PD" indicator and weapon range to each item
Weapon tooltip now shows EMP damage for MIRV-style weapons
Miscellaneous
Added progress bar to game saving
Windows will no longer think the application is not responding while loading or saving a game
Ship ordnance points increased across the board by 0-20%, around 10% in most cases
Some ships increased more or less of an increase for balance reasons; examples:
Harbinger: 80 -> 95
Apogee: 135 -> 140
Ship refit now only degrades CR when something is removed. I.E. adding weapons or hullmods will not reduce CR unless something is removed to make room
Mostly applicable for recovered ships - spending their free OP will not tank their CR
Reduced deployment and maintenance cost of Buffalo Mk.2 to 4 supplies (was: 6)
Fixed frame rate drop when opening interaction dialog that could occur at larger fleet sizes
Removed CR reduction for hull damage taken in combat
Added "enableUIStaticNoise" setting to data/config/settings.json to disable UI static noise overlay
Weapons with recoil now retract their barrels while ship is venting
Reduced game startup time
Ships given the "Retreat" command will now turn to face pursuing enemy ships and perform more of a fighting retreat
Added "Direct Retreat" command for a best-speed retreat
Added workaround for issue with some recent versions of NVIDIA drivers causing game to not start
"Harass" assignment: ships will now make sure to stay outside enemy weapon range
Officers:
Now start with 2 skill selections at level 1
Max out with 7 level 3 skills at levl 20
Limited to 10 skills total
Skill overhaul
Aptitudes and skills limited to 3 levels
Both increased using "character points", player gains 1 per level
Each skill level has a perk, skills generally do not have bonuses that increase with level
Aptitudes no longer have a direct effect but only unlock higher levels for governed skills
Combat skills more focused on defense and overall weaker than before
All percentile reductions from skills are now multiplicative
Combat skills:
Combat Endurance
Missile Specialization
Ordnance Expertise
Target Analysis
Damage Control
Impact Mitigation
Defensive Systems
Evasive Action
Advanced Countermeasures
Helmsmanship
Leadership skills:
Command & Control
Officer Management
Coordinated Maneuvers
Fleet Logistics
Fighter Doctrine
Carrier Command
Wing Commander
Strike Commander
Technology Skills:
Gunnery Implants
Power Grid Modulation
Electronic Warfare
Loadout Design
Sensors
Navigation
Industry
Safety Procedures
Recovery Operations
Field Repairs
Surveying
Salvaging
Removed navigation requirement for using star jump-points
Combat objectives:
No longer give command points for capturing
Starting command points set to 5
Nav Buoy
Gives +5% top speed
Related skill: Coordinated Maneuvers
+1-4% top speed per ship deployed, based on size
10-20% maximum based on skill level
Does not affect fighters
Coordinated Maneuvers and Nav Buoy combined total limited by maximum (base 10% w/o skill)
Sensor Array renamed to Sensor Jammer
Gives +5% ECM rating
Total value compared for each side, losing side's weapon range reduced by the difference
Related skill: Electronic Warfare
+1-4% ECM rating per ship deployed, based on size
10-20% maximum range effect based on skill level
Does not affect fighters
Command points now regenerate at a rate of 1 every 120 seconds
Comm Relay increases regeneration rate by 25%
New/adjusted hullmods:
All percentile reductions applied by hullmods are now multiplicative
Most already were; this is just cleanup to ensure consistency
Goal is to avoid unreasonable stacking, i.e. -50% and -50% reducing a value to 0
Flux Coil Adjunct, Flux Distributor:
Cost 4/8/12/20 ordnance points
Provide dissipation/capacity at 75% efficiency compared to vents and capacitors
Available from the start
Generally reduced penalties from d-mods
ECCM Package: now also reduces weapon range penalty from losing Electronic Warfare
Expanded Missile Racks:
Now increases missile ammo by 100% (was: 75%)
Ordnance point cost increased substantially
One-shot Reaper torpedo launcher now has a 5 second cooldown
Degraded Engines: reduced sensor signature penalty, reduced movement penalty
Accelerated Shields: no longer available from start
Expanded Magazines: no longer available from start
Reinforced Bulkheads: available at campaign start
Salvage Gantry: removed bonus to salvage from being deployed in combat, wasn't working right design-wise
New hullmods:
Expanded Deck Crew
Recovery Shuttles
Nav Relay
ECM Package
Operations Center
Ships
Omen: added built-in ECM and ECCM Package
Tempest: increased shield arc to 120 degrees (was 90)
Apogee: replaced ship system with Active Flare Launcher (2x)
Conquest:
Added "Heavy Ballistics Integration" built-in hullmod: reduces large ballistic OP cost by 10
Reduced OP by 30 (relative to higher, rebalanced value)
Aurora: changed non-front-facing medium turret from energy to synergy
Added Drover-class midline carrier, destroyer-sized with 2 fighter bays
Added Legion-class low-tech battlecarrier
Weapons
Sabot SRM:
Now fires a spread of 5 warheads
Each deals 200 kinetic and 400 EMP damage
When hitting hull/armor, EMP damage may arc for another 400 EMP damage
Hellbore Cannon:
Halved rate of fire
Reduced flux cost to 750/shot (was: 825)
Adjusted visuals for muzzle flash, shot, and impact (more prominent)
Overall: low dps, very high per-shot damage, very low flux cost
Mjolnir: increased flux/shot to 500 (was: 400)
Storm Needler:
Reduced flux cost/shot to 65 (was: 75)
Increased shot speed, added a bit of inaccuracy
Removed windup time
Reduced range to 700 (was: 800)
Guardian PD: reduced OP cost to 18 (was: 22)
Combat
Proximity Charge Launcher: projectile speed increased to 100 (from 50)
Mainly for REDACTED reasons, not to improve it as a generic ship weapon
Ship AI:
Fixed some issues with AI being overly careful around enemy fighters
Improved logic for spacing out larger ships
Fixed issue with "eliminate" and "engage" ordered against stations
Modding
Game will throw an error message when running with any version of Java other than 7
allowAnyJavaVersion to override this
Game will now fail to load on Windows if jarfile filename case doesn't match that of the actual jarfile
On Linux, will crash while trying to load misnamed jarfile instead of
Game now checks for duplicate ids in various csv files being loaded, e.g. rules, person_names, etc
Will throw an error when found; helps prevent hard-to-track-down "duplicate rule id, so it's quietly not doing anything" bugs
ALL_SHIPS_IN_FLEET skill effects do not apply to fighters
Use ALL_FIGHTERS_IN_FLEET and/or SHIP_FIGHTERS instead
MissionDefinitionAPI.getDefaultCommander(FleetSide side)
Can be used to give fleet-affecting skills to mission sides
Station weapons now render above all station modules
Fixed issue where mods were unable to override colors in settings.json
WeaponGroupAPI:
WeaponAPI removeWeapon(int index);
void addWeaponAPI(WeaponAPI weapon);
Skills can unlock campaign abilities ("ABILITY_UNLOCK" effect type)
Added several values to faction doctrine that configures how commander skills are generated
Commander skills are skills such as officer management, electronic warfare, etc
Added player level cap to settings.json; "playerMaxLevel"
Mirv behavior spec: added "spreadInaccuracy" that applies even when evenSpread = true
Edit Variants: added checkboxes to force maximum combat skill levels on each side of simulation
Name of "defense" for hull in ship tooltip now properly uses name of right-click system if it's not phase cloak
Built-in hullmods can now influence the OP cost of weapons
Bugfixing
Fixed issue where post-combat salvage would only contain half the cargo that should have been looted from the enemy fleet (affected just cargo from trade fleets and such, not basic supplies/equipment/fuel drops)
Fixed issue that caused black market weapons to not use the proper range of factions to pick from
Fixed memory leak that was caused by opening the refit screen, exiting it, and then reloading a save without unpausing the game
Added workaround for occasional issue with wrong aspect ratio on multiple-monitor systems
Yup. No updates for over a year. This one is juicy and you know what? I still completely suck at playing this.
Oh I bought this in 2011!
Still looks interesting enough, will have to dig out the download. Thanks for the reminder..
It took me three times just to win the fight in the tutorial. I flew around in the main game for a bit, made some cash, and then died hard in my first engagement that used fleets instead of just 1 v 1.
Quote from: Silent Disapproval Robot on May 01, 2017, 04:02:47 PM
It took me three times just to win the fight in the tutorial. I flew around in the main game for a bit, made some cash, and then died hard in my first engagement that used fleets instead of just 1 v 1.
Yeah. The controls are good. The UI is good. The information feedback is good. Its not a knock on the game that it is so difficult, but man, it really is hard to control your ship and a fleet in combat. I'm really not sure how people succeed in this.
I'm playing with mouse and keyboard. Hopefully it's just a case of practice making it become more second nature but the sheer number of buttons is making it pretty overwhelming right now. I can't count the number of times I've accidentally dropped my shields and started venting flux when I was trying to do something less suicidal.
It's pausable real time, and from the fleet tactical map you can assign various activities to ships or groups of ships. Like an RTS a bit.
I think the trickiest part is that you have to control the ship with WASD in a 2d newtonian physics setup. These things won't respond quickly, but pressing 'C' seems to apply some sort of thrusters/brake setup to dampen down any inertial movement from engine use.
Getting your weapon arcs on target, whilst managing your shields and flux setup, venting wherever possible is a bit of a juggling act for one ship. You have to rely on the AI to manage your fleet ships. Pause, lay down tactical commands, unpause, fly and shoot a bit, pause and re-asses. :)
Think it will take a fair amount of practice to get good at it. Looks to have some depth to it.
So is this game a bit like Void Expanse and SPAZ?
Decent walkthrough of the new patch here.
One thing that popped up a while back, was people pitting ai controlled fleets against each other:
http://fractalsoftworks.com/forum/index.php?topic=11539.0
After watching the LP this sure looks to be my cup of tea! The fiddly pilot kind of tea. :)
Also bought this way back when it was Starfarer. Downloaded the latest to see how its progressed. Does it ever ask for a serial number? I want to check if my sn is still recognized.
Quote from: steve58 on May 04, 2017, 12:29:56 PM
Also bought this way back when it was Starfarer. Downloaded the latest to see how its progressed. Does it ever ask for a serial number? I want to check if my sn is still recognized.
Yes. It will ask for a SN if an old version is not already on your system.
Quote from: steve58 on May 04, 2017, 12:29:56 PM
Also bought this way back when it was Starfarer. Downloaded the latest to see how its progressed. Does it ever ask for a serial number? I want to check if my sn is still recognized.
Made me panic and go look for my login & serial #.
Whew! Still had it written down.
Been so long, I regularly forget about it.
This seems to be like another one of those games that is in permanent Dev Purgatory. With a trickle of advancement over quite a few years, but never complete. :-[
Thanks, JH. I've uninstalled any/all previous versions, ran ccleaner, etc. and reloaded the latest version (0.8a, RC19). I've fired it up a few times, but it still hasn't asked for a serial number. Guess it will eventually. :-\
Quote from: Nefaro on May 05, 2017, 05:58:11 AM
Quote from: steve58 on May 04, 2017, 12:29:56 PM
Also bought this way back when it was Starfarer. Downloaded the latest to see how its progressed. Does it ever ask for a serial number? I want to check if my sn is still recognized.
Made me panic and go look for my login & serial #.
Whew! Still had it written down.
Been so long, I regularly forget about it.
This seems to be like another one of those games that is in permanent Dev Purgatory. With a trickle of advancement over quite a few years, but never complete. :-[
Yup, went hunting for my purchase info as well. Got it on May 4, 2011!
^Interesting. I installed on a new system and it asked for the SN. When installing a new version on a system with a prior install, it never asked. Perhaps something in the registry?
^possibly, but thats one reason I ran ccleaner (to clean up the registry after install). Not a big deal. I've got a sn if/when the game asks for it...
I thought this game had died in early access but they released the patch notes for version 0.9 (not yet released but...soon?)
QuoteCampaign
Colony building:
Player can establish a colony on a planet they've surveyed
Requires crew, machinery, and supplies
Can change the planet's name, either when colony is established or at any point later on
Can build "Industries" and "Structures" (same thing, mechanically) at a colony
Some example ones:
Mining
Farming
Spaceport
Heavy Industry
Orbital stations (of several varieties)
Military Base
Tech-Mining
... and a number of other ones
Some industries can be upgraded, i.e. "Patrol HQ" -> "Military Base", or "Heavy Industry" -> "Orbital Works"
Most industries are known from the start, but a few more exotic ones can be learned
Can set a "stockpiling level" for a colony to have it build up extra resources the player can take
Stockpiling costs credits, but somewhat less than the base cost of the commodities
Stockpiles will be used to counter temporary shortages
Player colonies have a "local resources" submarket where they can take from, or add to, stockpiles. There's a "storage" submarket for resources that must remain untouched.
Player colonies do *not* have an Open Market unless there's a "Commerce" industry
Colonies start at size 3; population growth depends on many factors and can be directly invested into
Can assign AI cores to manage industries for various, significant benefits
A Military Base produces patrols which will defend the colony
Can hire Administrators (up to a limit) to manage your colonies
Can learn skills that improve the colonies under your control
Maximum number under personal control is soft-limited - reduced stability for going beyond
Can assign Alpha Cores to manage your colonies, for a massive benefit
Establishing the first colony also creates a new player faction
Can set the faction name and select a flag
Can adjust both at any point in the future
Blueprints for ship hulls, weapons, and fighter LPCs:
Required by Heavy Industry to build ships
Ship production "quality" is based on many factors and affects the number of d-mods a produced hull will have
Can be improved by certain items found during exploration
Some basic blueprints always known from the start, rest have to be acquired
Blueprints can be prioritized to get the desired fleet composition and weapon/fighter use
Affect fleet production by player colonies
Player can custom-order known ships and weapons
Will be built based on the monthly production capacity of their heavy industry
And delivered to a designated gathering point, along with some crew, fuel, and supplies
New economy system to support colony mechanics
Player buying/selling has direct impact on market's available commodity numbers
Player colonies can become suppliers for other factions and generate export income for the player
Relative "accessibility" of colonies determines who the best supplier is
Player has several tools to manage this, from establishing waystations to piracy
Officers found in sleeper pods can now be up to level 15 instead of 5
Administrators can now be found in sleeper pods; likeliest place to find high-skilled ones
Can now go over the maximum number of officers and administrators
Can't use the ones over maximum
Can't hire to go over maximum
Mainly useful to be able to find officers/admins in sleeper pods, while already at maximum
Factions
Factions have access to ships/weapons/fighters based on their blueprints
AI ship loadouts are dynamically generated, based on what's available
Factions have been adjusted so that their available blueprints and doctrine make each more distinct
Examples:
The Hegemony favors larger ships and high-quality officers
The Luddic Church, while also mostly drawing from low-tech designs:
Favors larger numbers of ships with lower-quality officers
Makes extensive use of Converted Hangars
Has access to a faction-specific "Perdition"-class torpedo bomber
Faction doctrine: settings that affect faction fleet composition and ship behavior
Each setting can go from 1 to 5
Warships - proportion of regular combat ships found in fleets, on average
Carriers - proportion of carriers
Phase Ships - proportion of phase ships
Warships, Carriers, and Phase Ships must add up to 7 points
Officer Quality, Ship Quality, and More Ships - must also add up to 7 points
Ship Size - independent setting, determines average size of ships preferred
Aggression - determines personality of officers; does not affect the player's own fleet
Also applies to combat personality/behavior of ships without officers, both for the player and for other factions
This aspect *does* affect the player's own fleet
Each faction now has an appropriate doctrine setting
Monthly income and expenses:
Outposts/colonies
Base income from a population
Upkeep for each industry; based on hazard rating of planet
A lower-hazard planet can support more industries on the "base income"; exact numbers still TBD
Can go above that for a negative income
Exports: income for becoming the best provider of a commodity to another faction's colony
Incurs "overhead" when there are many exports from the same colony
*Always* better to have more exports, but the added benefit drops off quickly
Storage - 1% of base value of stored ships/cargo
Crew, officer, and administrator salaries
Presented in a detailed monthly report
New tab: "Command", shortcut "D". Allows player to:
Manage colonies
Can also see which markets you have storage at and what's stored where
View latest income report
Manage the doctrine and blueprint priorities
Make custom production orders
Cargo screen
Can quick-transfer (or sell) a lot of cargo by holding down Alt then mousing over the stacks
Can be turned off via settings.json
Improved quantity selection slider for picking up part of a stack
Supplies/fuel/crew/marines/heavy machinery now shown first in sorted cargo; other commodities also shown before weapons/fighter chips/etc
Revamped intel screen
Tag-based filtering system
Always shows map
UI is updated based on the current state of missions and such
Can accept and abandon certain missions directly from the intel screen
Can flag pieces of intel as "important"
Intel is now "live" and does not require a new message for the information displayed to change
Person bounties:
Will now pay out and increase reputation when hostile or worse with offering faction
Information given re: where to find target now includes constellation and some planet/star system type hints, but no actual star system unless it's a lone star
Reward no longer based on market stability
System bounties:
Will now pay out and increase reputation when hostile or worse with offering faction
Most likely in systems containing markets hostile to each other
Faction commissions:
Have to talk to a high-ranking faction official to get one
Pays a level-based monthly stipend in addition to a small bounty for enemy ships
Partially restores standing with other factions as hostility status changes
Can be resigned; smaller reputation penalty if in person
Restores standing with factions that became hostile as a result of holding the commission
Faction hostilities: fixed various issues re: hostilities properly ending and total number/frequency
Last for at least 6 months, and rarely more than a full cycle
Hostilities between Hegemony-TriTachyon and other starting hostilities between major factions (i.e. not pirates/pathers) are no longer permanent
Smugglers now have a low reputation impact if attacked, i.e. won't turn entire faction instantly hostile
Chance to have advance intel about departures of trade fleets/smugglers, including timeframe and cargo
Changed options for colony interaction
Can open all core UI tabs with corresponding shortcut instead of just a subset
Added "visit dockside bar" option; details are WIP
Added "Consider your military options" option; sub-menu allows player to attack orbital station
Will also contain a few TBD mechanics re: planet-based military actions
Dropping cargo pods may now distract pirate fleets; duration of distraction (if any) depends on quantity of goods ejected
Autoresolve (AI vs AI, and auto-resolved pursuit battles):
Takes d-mods/production quality into account
Works with stations and modular ships
Made various improvements to "where is this entity" mission/bounty/etc description text
Toned down bounty level-scaling
Added "Compromised Storage" dmod, reduces cargo/crew/fuel capacity of ship by 30%
Added to Mudskipper Mk.2
Added Gremlin-class lowtech phase frigate, with pirate and Luddic Path versions
Buy and sell cost of ships now includes the base supply cost of their current combat readiness (i.e., no/minimal credit loss for recovering CR on a ship and then selling it)
Similar CR-based modifier added to supplies etc recovered when scuttling a ship
Added two new torpedo bomber wings: Perdition and Cobra
Fleet AI:
Much less easily sidetracked by chases; patrols in particular will largely focus on defending their objectives
When orbiting a planet, will spread out to try to avoid overlap with other orbiting fleets
Reduced number of campaign ship contrails; improves performance a lot and should generally not be noticeable
Sensors: combined detection range in hyperspace now limited to 2000 units (was 5000)
Added "generate name" option to colony renaming dialog
Installed fighters now shown in the fleet screen
Trade fleet routes will stop by a waystation if appropriate
Fighting independent scavenger fleets will now only slightly reduce standing with the independents
Temporary/event-based market conditions no longer have "event" label, grouped to the left of other conditions instead
Condition icon size scales down if there are too many to fit in the available width
Lava planets will no longer show up as part of the combat background (too bright)
Jump-point tooltip no longer shows planet types in unexplored star systems
Number of d-mods is now shown for each fleet member in the campaign fleet tooltip
D-mods are now also highlighted in the ship tooltip's list of hullmods
Made "fleet despawning" animation smoother
Number of supplies UI indicator will now include the picked-up supply stack, if any
When a course is laid in and you approach a jump-point, selecting "leave" will also disable autopilot
Quote
Miscellaneous
Updated to use newer version of xstream (1.4.10)
Cleaned up controls screen - updated text and removed commands that are no longer in the game
Made some improvements to game-saving code that should speed it up on non-SSD drives
Made in-combat "exit game" button red to avoid potential confusion with "claim victory"
Vertical scrollbar active area now wider, indicator expands when mouse is in active area
Improved algorithm for automatically generating weapon groups
Improved game startup speed when sound is enabled by up to around 40% total, depending on the system specs
Orbital Stations
Can be built at a colony to provide defenses and support nearby friendly fleets in combat
Existing colonies have these as appropriate
Three tiers: Orbital Station, Battlestation, and Star Fortress
Three tech levels/styles: low tech, midline, and high tech
Roughly similar combat power of each style, but different tactical approaches
Dynamically fitted with weapons based on faction weapon availability
Higher-tier stations are bolstered with drones and minefields
Combat
Improved proximity fuse range detection vs longer/thinner ships
Phase ships:
Doom: new ship system, "Mine Strike", spawns high-damage, high-delay proximity fuse mines
Huge buff overall
Harbinger: system changed to Quantum Disruptor
Afflictor: system changed to Entropy Amplifier
Various performance improvements, should be around 20-30% faster
Toggling autofire on on an already-selected weapon group will make that group autofire
Can override and get manual control by selecting the group again
Fixed bug that caused the fighter rate replacement multiplier to apply twice
New graphics for Annihilator Pod medium weapon
Greatly improved missile tracking
And fixed issues with ECCM sometimes making it worse; it should now be a significant improvement
Hurricane MIRV:
Made missile and warheads more visible
Reduced number of warheads to 7
Warheads are now two-stage (aim then unguided burn), but much more accurate
Integrated Targeting Unit: increased OP cost for frigates to 4
Centurion: middle two turrets can now face front; arcs expanded
Low CR no longer reduces missile weapon ammo
Renamed "Guardian PD System" to "Paladin PD System" (reasons REDACTED)
Colossus Mk.3: removed fighter bay and Ill-Advised Modifications
Added "Converted Cargo Bay" that adds 2 converted fighter bays
Ship AI
Fixed issue that was causing small weapon groups made up of hardpoints to not be set to autofire
Will no longer fire low-ammo missiles vs overloaded fighters
Fixed issue with too many carriers auto-escorting nearby combat ships
Reduced tendency of carriers to assign their fighter wings to escort nearby ships instead of attacking
Carriers assigned a "search & destroy" order will no longer use nearby ships to hide behind
Improved logic for multiple ships not using too many total missiles vs a single target
Fixed issue that was causing carriers to order fighters to "engage" too far from target, causing unnecessary loss of the 0-flux boost
Fixed issue that was causing carriers with some support fighters to not order the other fighters to engage
Fixed bug that caused a retreating ship with front shields to keep them on when it was not necessary
More likely to set smaller groups to autofire when flux is low, including hardpoint groups
Improved autofire flux management
Will autofire most kinds of weapon groups, depending on flux level and dissipation
Able to keep on pressure with low-flux weapons when on high flux
Improved flux management for high-flux weapons such as Heavy Blasters
Fixed bug that was causing fighters to only rarely fire missiles/torpedoes at low-hitpoint targets
Improved omni shield use vs phase ships
Fixed bug that was causing the AI to improperly evaluate where it has the most remaining armor
Ships gradually get more aggressive when their peak time and CR tick down
Modding
Fixed crash from left-clicking station in hyperspace
Error message due to incorrectly configured music set is now comprehensible
Ships with modules:
Modules are no longer configured using weapon groups
Added "modules" section to .variant files instead
Modules will be ordered in listed order provided "modules" is an array of objects
Station/ship-with-module weapons no longer rendered in separate pass above everything
Use module order to control rendering order instead
Variants, hulls, skins, skills, weapons, projectiles: will be merged with core files when loaded
Meaning, a mod can now provide a partial file with just the changes rather than a complete file
Renamed FleetDespawnListener to FleetEventListener
Added reportBattleOccurred() method to FleetEventListener
Fixed bug to do with beamFireOnlyOnFullCharge and venting while firing at max charge
Proximity fuse projectiles with a trigger range of 0 will now only explode at end of range
MutableStat values no longer capped to be >= 0
Added better error message when game crashes due to an invalid ship system id being specified
Added MissileAPI.interruptContrail() - needs to be called twice, once at old and once at new location
Added MarketAPI.get/setEconGroup()
Markets within the same econ group only trade with each other and are not visible when viewing nearby markets etc from a market in a different group. Default group is null (the value, not the string).
Added ShipAIPlugin.getConfig() method that returns a ShipAIConfig (or null if a custom ship AI doesn't support the core config parameters)
Added "tags" and "rarity" columns to ship_data.csv
Skins do NOT inherit tags from the parent ship, but can have their own tags specified via a "tags" json array
Default d-hulls also do not inherit any tags from the base hull
Added "tech/manufacturer" column to ship and weapon data
Defaults to "Common" if unspecified
"manufacturer" key to override in ship skin file
SectorEntityTokens and MarketAPIs stored in a MemoryAPI will be replaced by their ids in save files, and restored on load
For this and other reasons, code must gracefully handle a case where an entity is put into memory but then is no longer there or *is* there but is no longer in any LocationAPI
Removed dHullOverlaySmall/Large from hull_styles.json; replaced with single dHullOverlay, which should be large-ish and will tile to cover bigger hulls (instead of being upscaled)
hull_styles.json: now 3 d-mod overlays per style; light/medium/heavy, in only one size
d-mod overlays tile for larger ships
Moved get/setModuleVariant() methods from FleetMemberAPI to ShipVariantAPI
Weapon group generation:
Added "GROUP_LINKED" and "GROUP_ALTERNATION" AI hints to weapon_data; will attempt to place weapons with those in separate groups and set them to linked or alternating
Added groupTag column to weapon_data; when set, will heavily favor placing weapons with same groupTag into the same group, without other weapons in it
Will not auto-generate weapon groups for AI fleets until combat starts, for performance reasons
Fixed word-wrapping issue when a single word is too long for a line
Added limited support for drones with SHIP collision class; will no longer crash into mothership
Added "canUseWhileRightClickSystemOn" to ship system definitions
Missiles now support the "jitter" effect, above the missile sprite only
Changes to fleet despawn logic: listeners will now be notified before the fleet member list is cleared
Allows seeing fleet state at time of despawn if it wasn't snapshotted
Fleet members removed afterwards
Added CollisionGridAPI that gives access to internal bin-lattice used to speed up collision checks/AI
void addObject(Object object, Vector2f loc, float objWidth, float objHeight);
void removeObject(Object object, Vector2f loc, float objWidth, float objHeight);
Iterator<Object> getCheckIterator(Vector2f loc, float checkWidth, float checkHeight);
Added to CombatEngineAPI:
CollisionGridAPI getAllObjectGrid();
CollisionGridAPI getShipGrid();
CollisionGridAPI getMissileGrid();
CollisionGridAPI getAsteroidGrid();
Added to SettingsAPI:
String readTextFileFromCommon(String filename)
void writeTextFileToCommon(String filename, String data)
Load/save text data from the <installdir>/saves/common/ folder
Limited to 1MB per file, 50MB total files per session
Hull mods tagged with "no_drop_salvage" will not drop from campaign salvage operations
Different from "no_drop", which will only make them not drop from defeated ships in combat
Added alternate system for listening to campaign events, see: ListenerManagerAPI
Allows registering to listen for only one type of event
Not everything converted to use it, but will only use this system going forward
Added event-listening interfaces:
ShowLootListener
SurveyPlanetListener
EconomyTickListener
DiscoverEntityListener
Added IntelManagerAPI to manage player-visible pieces of information
See: Global.getSector().getIntelManager()
Replaces EventManager etc
CommMessageAPI, SectorAPI.reportEventStage, etc deprecated/removed
Game no longer loads/uses reports.csv
Missions are re-implemented as "IntelInfoPlugin" rather than a events
A few events that were essentially scripts (such as OfficerManagerEvent) remain for legacy reasons
MissionBoard and related APIs removed
All of these are now handled through IntelManager
Removed concept of "comm channels"; channels.json no longer loaded
Added CombatEntityAPI.getAI() method to get at proximity fuse AI from projectiles
Added ProximityFuseAIAPI, with an updateDamage() method, so changing damage via script can work on flak and similar
Added SettingsAPI.getMergedJSONForMod(String path, String masterMod)
Bugfixing:
Fixed issue with market/planet name mismatch for some procgen planets
Fixed issues w/ small dormant remnant fleets not engaging and sometimes dropping loot if harassed
Ship AI: fixed issue where 4+ carriers could get stuck in an escorting-each-other loop
Fixed bug that caused Fleet Logistics 1 to make destroyed ships only have a 50% chance of recovery rather than 100% as intended. Disabled ships still got the 100% chance.
Fixed issue with Plasma Cannon not being properly affected by Safety Overrides
Save bar no longer get stuck if saving the game throws an error for any reason
Fixed issue with scavenger fleets stuck in "returning to <market>" state
Fixed issue that was sometimes preventing carriers from properly obeying "Full Retreat" order
Fixed rendering issue with black holes on radar
Fixed issue with Strike Commander causing projectile weapons from fighters to hit multiple times
Fixed crash when a mission variant had a fighter wing from a mod installed and the mod was then disabled
Fixed visual issue with jump-point in Westernesse star system
Fixed issue with debris fields not despawning properly and causing savegame bloat (thanks, Tartiflette!)
Fixed issue where could select civilian/unarmed ships for pursuit autoresolve
Fixed issue where fighter chips would disappear from inventory when opening refit screen for a ship with that fighter built in
Fixed issue with fighters returning to a retreated carrier getting stuck off-map without retreating
Fixed station rendering issue in campaign where module placement wasn't quite right
Fixed bug that caused phasing mid-burst to improperly shorten some weapon cooldowns
The resolutionOverride config file setting now works with fullscreen mode
Fixed issue that cause a black hole to appear in the middle of the sector map in some games
Fixed bug that caused the player to have to wait for their allies to finish the battle after full-retreating from it
Fixed issue that caused REDACTED fleets to respawn extremely quickly in some situations
OK. You talked me into it.
Can't find it. Is it a Steam game? What is the current name? Starsector does not show up.
It's not on steam. Direct from developer only. I don't think this game will ever be finished. We get like one update per year.
http://fractalsoftworks.com/ (http://fractalsoftworks.com/)
I've owned it for so long, yet has been in such slow development that I usually forget about it.
Hope it goes feature-complete and gets most of it's balancing done at some point. Always looked like huge enjoyment potential once it gets there. 8)
It already is a very playable game. I don't play it that often mostly because I suck at it.
Same. I do OK controlling just my own ship but as soon as I have to start worrying about a fleet, it ends in debris fields, corpsicles, and restarts.
Time to dust off the cobwebs of your Starsector install. Looks like another large update (https://www.rockpapershotgun.com/2018/11/16/starsector-space-sim-new-2018-release/) has dropped. Patch notes --> here (http://fractalsoftworks.com/forum/index.php?topic=13445.0).
It better be large. Only took a year and a half.
...and now another year and half since the last release...0.95a is finally here.
https://fractalsoftworks.com/category/releases/ (https://fractalsoftworks.com/category/releases/)
Tried to buy but the purchase system would not ever work.
Installed the patch. It deleted all my bindings (not a huge deal as it'd been so long since I played it last that I don't remember any of the bindings anyway). Went through the tutorials again. Maybe I'll actually progress far enough to get into the campaign this time!
Finally got it. Looks interesting!
A new patch is out to fix some issues that cropped up after the big update.
I've been having fun with it even though I'm terrible at it. I cobbled together my first fleet and went around taking mercenary contracts. It was going swimmingly until I got lost in hyperspace and ran out of fuel...
New patch out- 95.1a
Ugh. I downloaded it a few days ago. They reset all the keybindings. Killed my interest.
Is't there an .ini file or something that you could save before updating that would preserve your settings?
They added new commands in with the latest patch so copy/pasting my old commands seems to break things.
I just wish I wasn't so bad at it.