Perpetuum

Update news for 2009-12-06 - Introducing the Sequer

This patch incorporates many core changes, both server and client side. Our main aim was more server stability and less lag, but naturally changes of this magnitude bring along new bugs as well. So please bear with us and keep on reporting in the forums, you've all been a tremendous help so far!

Known issues in this build (other than the x-hundred old ones):

  • When you're outside and the client is closed unexpectedly (ie. crashes), you'll be left out there until you relog again.
  • Docking beam is not working.
  • Miner and harvester beams disappear after the first cycle.
  • "Oneshot" mode on modules is broken (when you turn off "Automatic").
  • Newly purchased or manufactured robots start out with 0 HP. So don't forget to repair them before taking them out cause the lightest breeze will make them explode :) (yes they need to be repaired now, see a bit later)

On with the good news:

Robots and modules

  • New: The long-awaited transport robot is here: welcome Sequer! With 60 units of cargo and bonuses for armor resistances and shield absorption, this little sleepy guy will be a very useful tool to all industrialists out there.
  • New: Gargoyle, the vegetarian brother of the Termis is now also available at every market.
  • Change: Now that we have a transport robot, the cargo volume of all other robots has been reverted to their previous amounts (yes, the nerfbat strikes hard).
  • New: Robots will no longer get magically repaired when you enter a base. There is a temporary "Repair robot" function in the hangar rightclick-menu: this will still allow you to make repairs for free, until we integrate this into the repairshop.
  • Fix: Most robot bonuses had no effect at all, now all of them should work properly.
  • Fix: New cycle time modification calculations. The fix affects all cycle times and also previously not working level 10 extensions.
  • Fix: Going through a teleport will no longer reduce your robot's bonuses to default levels. This should also fix rare occasions where the current accumulator level was higher than its maximum capacity.
  • Change: Names, descriptions and icons of miner tuning modules have been changed to reflect the fact that they give bonuses to both mining and harvester modules. They are now known as 'industrial tunings'. Furthermore, their cycle time bonus has been switched to a mined/harvested material amount bonus.
  • New: Ammunition reload times are now shown in robot information windows.
  • New: The 'Reload all' function will now also work on empty modules, provided there is suitable ammo in your cargo.
  • New: Empty modules now have a 'Load available' option, which will quickly load the first suitable ammo from your cargo.
  • Fix: You will no longer be able to fit modules, or activate robots fitted with modules, for which you do not have the required extensions. All active robots have been deactivated to prevent situations where you wouldn't be able to login after this, due to missing extensions for your current robot.
  • Fix: If you rightclick-info a charge in the equipment window it will properly display the charge information, instead of the module's it's in.
  • Fix: Dragging robots into module slots resulted in various errors.
  • Fix: Armor repair messages were sent twice in the combatlog.
  • Fix: Remote armor repairers will now repair at the beginning of their cycle, not at the end.
  • Fix: Packaged robots will no longer occupy their full unpacked volumes when put in another robot's cargo.
  • Change: Only packaged robots can now be put into cargoholds.
  • Fix: Named sensor amplifiers had wrong volume values.
  • Fix: Ballistic missiles didn't have any required extensions.
  • Fix: The universal geoscanner should now work properly.
  • Fix: Kinetic armors accidentally affected all squadmembers.

Graphics

  • New: Visible impact effects on shields.
  • New: Kernel icons.
  • New: Improved magnetic weapon effects.
  • Change: Proper icon for Helioptris.
  • Change: Triandlus was growing in the wrong plant, its model has been switched to the proper one.
  • Change: Tile based scanning results are now displayed underground so you can better see the environment.

Graphic engine

  • New: Numerous performance optimizations.
  • New: Anti-aliasing is now available in the options panel.
  • New: Turning down terrain detail will also fade plants and trees much closer. This also brings a decent performance boost to all of you with low spec machines. (This does not affect rocks/buildings for now.)
  • New: There is a new checkbox in the options panel which will let you turn off all decorational plants (non-blocking and non-harvestable) to further improve performance.
  • Change: The bloom and sharpen posteffects have been merged into one shader and now can only be toggled together. The advantage of this is even more performance gain.

Gameplay

  • New: Two new options are available in the right-click menu of modules (when outside): the first is 'Enable standby mode', when you turn this on, modules can be activated even when there is no target. In this standby mode they consume 10% energy of what they normally need, and will start firing as soon as you lock a target. The second option is 'No automatic deactivation', it does exactly what it says, modules will stay activated even when a target is lost or destroyed, until you turn them off manually. These functions are still incomplete/experimental so use them at your own risk!
  • New: You can now start shooting a target even when locking is still in progress. Of course accuracy will be greatly reduced at the beginning of locking and will gradually get better as it gets close to finishing.
  • Change: Geoscanners do not require a target anymore. Scanning will be completed on the tile you are standing on when the scanning cycle finishes.
  • Fix: Teleports hijacking players to random places.
  • Fix: Destroying containers will no longer trigger level 50 lightning storms of doom. *sniff*
  • Fix: The 'toggle all weapons' function (space by default) sometimes did not work for all weapons.
  • Fix: Crash when dragging an item from your cargo into an NPC lootcontainer.
  • Change: The main teleport exit zones in Daoden have been relocated closer to the base.

Extensions

  • New: Available EP is now also displayed on the extensions panel.
  • Fix: 'Efficient harvesting' had both its attributes set to Heavy industry. The secondary attribute has now been changed to R&D.
  • Change: Material specific 'Intensive' mining extensions have been changed from rank 5 to rank 3, and now reduce cycle time by 1% per level instead of 3%.
  • Change: The accumulator usage bonuses of 'Efficient mining' and 'Efficient harvesting' have been boosted from 3% to 5% per level.
  • Fix: The description of 'Sensor connection' falsely stated that it affects remote sensor amplifiers and sensor suppressors. This extension actually affects the locking time modifier of (non-remote) sensor amplifiers.
  • Fix: The description of 'Sensor suppressing' has been clarified - it only affects the locking time modifier of sensor suppressors.
  • Fix: The description of 'Complex jamming electronics' has been clarified, and now has 'Jamming electronics' as a prerequisite.

Industry

  • New: Up until now the accuracy of geoscanners didn't have any effect. Happy times are over, the lower the accuracy, the more noise the results will have. Perfectly clear results can be achieved with a 10.0 accuracy or above.
  • Fix: Disappearing production jobs should be of the past.
  • Fix: Refining, recycling, repairshop efficiency and engineering/factory slots will be properly updated after upgrading the relevant extension. Previously this only happened after relogging.
  • Change: Having or not having the required materials for manufacturing a license will now count into the 'manufacturable yes/no' display.
  • Fix: Research time/cost for the Arbalest patent was not in line with the other assault robot patents.
  • Fix: The following patents had no required extensions listed: small/medium energy injector, small/medium auxiliary accumulator, energy injector charge, industrial tuning.
  • Fix: The Universal harvester charge patent had duplicate required extensions.
  • New: The refinery is now also available from the right-click menu of raw minerals.
  • Fix: The Universal scanner was broken.
  • Fix: Compositecore slug licenses were mislabeled as "chemoactive".

Corporations

  • New: If a corporation loses its CEO for any reason, a random Deputy CEO will be chosen as the new CEO (if no deputy CEO is present, then a random member).
  • New: From now on you are required to drop your corporation roles before deleting your Agent.
  • New: Member applications can now be viewed and evaluated in a new window.
  • Fix: Client crash when kicking a member from the corporation.
  • Fix: The 24-hour cooldown for making deposits after creating a corporation will no longer affect the CEO of that corporation.
  • Fix: The CEO and Founder fields were switched on the corporation profile window.
  • Fix: Viewing a patent's information in a corporation storage will no longer give you a "This item is not yours" error.
  • Fix: The checkbox for the Production manager role was stuck in a disabled state after the Deputy CEO role was turned on and off.
  • Fix: Corporation member sorting by 'Last online' was broken.
  • Fix: It was possible to create a corporation without a ticker.
  • Fix: It was possible to enter more NIC than you had when placing corporation deposits (or what the corporation had, when making payouts).

Market

  • Change: Market item selection has been changed to one-click.
  • Change: All NPC buy order prices have been increased in the outer zone terminals to encourage mercantile transport.
  • Fix: The Standard tracker tuning patent has been moved to its proper category, weapon tunings.
  • Fix: Kernel prices were all the same, now higher levels should be worth more.

GUI

  • New: The map will now remember its last position.
  • New: Scanresults will now highlight on the map if you hover over them in the list.
  • New: The radar compass has been upgraded to be more visible.
  • Change: Extension Points display has been moved to the upper statusbar.
  • Fix: The chat will no longer switch randomly between channel tabs after entering or exiting a base.
  • Fix: The combat log will now remember its opened state.
  • Fix: The chat message input area has been resized to have two-line height by default.
  • Fix: Buy/sell window input fields will no longer reset when someone joins the chat.
  • Change: Enemy lock indicators and standings brackets have been made more transparent.
  • New: Options button in the top menubar.
  • Fix: The waypoints panel had missing scrollbar functionality.
  • Change: Police turret radar and tactical icons have been changed to cyan squares.
  • New: Doubleclicking a maximized window's header will restore it to its previous size.
  • Fix: Buy/sell windows were not updated if you wanted to buy/sell another item while the previous one was still open.

Sound

  • Fix: Explosion sounds didn't decay with distance.

General

  • New: Deleting one of your Agents will now require you to enter its name to confirm the process.
  • Fix: Robot cargo load was not updating properly when a very low volume of items was sold directly from it.
  • Fix: Unintended disconnect when logging out from the terrain.
  • Fix: Container windows will not stay open anymore if you got an error while opening them.
  • Fix: Error messages were missing when packaging a robot failed for some reason.
  • Fix: Screenshots started to become corrupted if you created lots of them.
  • Fix: Closing the terminal chat channel gave an error upon exiting the terminal and didn't open again when entering.
  • Fix: The chat display buffer has been limited to 50 lines.
  • Change: The length of the bio has been limited to 2000 characters.
  • Change: The enter key can no longer be assigned as a hotkey.
  • New: Changelog RSS.

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