Has it really been a month since the last update? There have been many interruptions, including travel. One of those trips brought u15 back on line, a server that adds 64 CPU cores and a lot of RAM to the grid. This will be the first full server restart since then.
Pirates
Pirates do not use new style spacecraft.
Pirates received some considerable attention to improve them as a PVE game element. Rather than list a bunch of technical details, I will update the wiki on Pirates soon. Like, as soon as I am done posting this update and restart the servers.
Pirates Plunder Cryo Passengers
Pirates should plunder cryo passengers.
Pirates will now transfer cryo passenger to their ship, enough to fill their own empty cryo berths. They leave the rest.
Pirates Plunder then Attack
Pirates plunder me when I stand down but then they attack. I thought they were supposed to let me go.
Pirate captain decision making was improved. Pirates will now simply loot your ship if you stand down.
Pirate Spam
Pirates repeat the same messages over and over.
Pirates no longer repeat their messages.
Spacecraft SOS Spam
A spacecraft was crying out a fuel emergency for a really long time, like days or weeks. How could it stay alive that long?
Agent teleported to the ship. It then began falling from orbit because it had no fuel. It fell into a lava sea and was destroyed.
A bug prevented the ship in that situation from receiving any physics/movement processing. The bug was fixed.
Solar System Decay
Solar systems are not decaying as they should.
Discovered/fixed an error that caused a maintenance function on solar systems to stop being called periodically.
Stuck After Ship Self Destruct
If the ship I am aboard is destroyed, I am usually left in some strange stuck state that requires a restart of the client program. This is very annoying.
Two scene sync bugs were found and fixed. I no longer get stuck when my ship explodes.
Designer Turret Broken
I resized a turret that I copied/pasted from another design and it was broken with no way to fix it. It looked ok but, when you operated the turret from the console, the rotations were insane.
Fixed scaling effects on turret gun and base position vectors. Also fixed similar cases on other parts that store a vector, e.g. rotating beacon.
Designer Turret Base
There is a command to adjust the turret gun but not the base. Once a turret is made, the base rotation axis can never be changed. This would have helped to fix the turret broken by the previous bug.
Designer command was added, to configure the base rotation axis of the selected turret.
Say What People Loaded
It would be helpful if the designer gave some feedback when loading people in the preview.
Designer now gives feedback when people are loaded in the preview.
Path Bug
Crew whose DNA has a very low center of gravity could not find their way aboard my ship. I designed it with all the walk paths 1m above the floor.
Fixed a bug that caused creatures with a low CG to not notice when the desired path location was reached.
Designer Set My DNA
It would be useful in the designer if I could change my DNA, to insure the doors and halls work for a specific specie.
Solo designer now has a Helpers|Change My DNA command. It enables you to load your DNA from a .chr file.
To save your avatar's DNA to a .chr file, use the button on the avatar selection page, during game login.
Enemy Crew Does Not Attack
I was aboard a pirate ship. All the crew and troops were at their stations; the captain was in the command chair. Nobody attacked me. It was sort of Borg-ishly weird.
Officers, crew and troops at stations now remain alert for threats nearby. All but the pilot will leave their station to attack enemy units. This applies to all NPCs, not just pirates.
Pirate Flees to Station?
I was aboard a pirate ship in battle. The captain decided to depart the area by going to the nearest station. Oops, what station?
Changed outdated pirate commander, who was playing the old "pirate station spawns pirate ships" game. That went by the wayside a long time ago, not sure why. Pirate commander now has a much better decision making process. Pirate commander AI is still adapting to recent changes; that is, it's still a work in progress.
Pirate Scuttle
I was aboard a pirate ship in battle. As soon as the ship lit on fire, it went on red alert. Fire isn't that big of a deal. It lights easily, doesn't do that much damage very fast, and is easily extinguished using water. Unfortunately, pirate captain's were using red alert as a sign of defeat, then scuttling their ship.
Pirate officer makes a more careful assessment before deciding to hunt, flee, scuttle, etc.
Pirate Positioning
When pirates attack, the pilot decides where to position their ship relative to the target ship. In many cases, this location is out of sight of the bridge, not very Star Trek-ish.
NPC pilots now aim for a point in front of the target vessel that should usually put them in the field of view of the bridge, when executing a Plunder or Attack order. This applies to all NPC pilots, not just pirates.
Pirate Hits Shields
A pirate attacked my ship. It came screaming in, demanding I surrender, then hit my shields like a bug hitting a windshield. Poof!
Changed piloting AI to avoid shields.
Pirate Hits Own Bullets
I encountered a group of pirates. It was awesome to watch them come in, guns blazing, lighting up my shields. However, by the time they got to me, they caught up to some of their own projectiles and took considerable damage. My guys never fired and they were smoldering wrecks.
Projectiles fired from turret guns no longer hit the firing vessel, unless the firing location is inside a room of the firing vessel. NPCs do not know this so they will continue to avoid hitting their own hull when targetting their turret guns.
Energy weapon turrets are resolved instantly when fired so they are not subject to the bug. They can/will continue to hit the firing vessel.
Client Crash During Battle
A pirate was attacking my ship using rockets. My client program crashed when a rocket exploded.
Fixed a logical error exposed by an assertion failure.
Pirates
Pirates do not use new style spacecraft.
Pirates received some considerable attention to improve them as a PVE game element. Rather than list a bunch of technical details, I will update the wiki on Pirates soon. Like, as soon as I am done posting this update and restart the servers.
Pirates Plunder Cryo Passengers
Pirates should plunder cryo passengers.
Pirates will now transfer cryo passenger to their ship, enough to fill their own empty cryo berths. They leave the rest.
Pirates Plunder then Attack
Pirates plunder me when I stand down but then they attack. I thought they were supposed to let me go.
Pirate captain decision making was improved. Pirates will now simply loot your ship if you stand down.
Pirate Spam
Pirates repeat the same messages over and over.
Pirates no longer repeat their messages.
Spacecraft SOS Spam
A spacecraft was crying out a fuel emergency for a really long time, like days or weeks. How could it stay alive that long?
Agent teleported to the ship. It then began falling from orbit because it had no fuel. It fell into a lava sea and was destroyed.
A bug prevented the ship in that situation from receiving any physics/movement processing. The bug was fixed.
Solar System Decay
Solar systems are not decaying as they should.
Discovered/fixed an error that caused a maintenance function on solar systems to stop being called periodically.
Stuck After Ship Self Destruct
If the ship I am aboard is destroyed, I am usually left in some strange stuck state that requires a restart of the client program. This is very annoying.
Two scene sync bugs were found and fixed. I no longer get stuck when my ship explodes.
Designer Turret Broken
I resized a turret that I copied/pasted from another design and it was broken with no way to fix it. It looked ok but, when you operated the turret from the console, the rotations were insane.
Fixed scaling effects on turret gun and base position vectors. Also fixed similar cases on other parts that store a vector, e.g. rotating beacon.
Designer Turret Base
There is a command to adjust the turret gun but not the base. Once a turret is made, the base rotation axis can never be changed. This would have helped to fix the turret broken by the previous bug.
Designer command was added, to configure the base rotation axis of the selected turret.
Say What People Loaded
It would be helpful if the designer gave some feedback when loading people in the preview.
Designer now gives feedback when people are loaded in the preview.
Path Bug
Crew whose DNA has a very low center of gravity could not find their way aboard my ship. I designed it with all the walk paths 1m above the floor.
Fixed a bug that caused creatures with a low CG to not notice when the desired path location was reached.
Designer Set My DNA
It would be useful in the designer if I could change my DNA, to insure the doors and halls work for a specific specie.
Solo designer now has a Helpers|Change My DNA command. It enables you to load your DNA from a .chr file.
To save your avatar's DNA to a .chr file, use the button on the avatar selection page, during game login.
Enemy Crew Does Not Attack
I was aboard a pirate ship. All the crew and troops were at their stations; the captain was in the command chair. Nobody attacked me. It was sort of Borg-ishly weird.
Officers, crew and troops at stations now remain alert for threats nearby. All but the pilot will leave their station to attack enemy units. This applies to all NPCs, not just pirates.
Pirate Flees to Station?
I was aboard a pirate ship in battle. The captain decided to depart the area by going to the nearest station. Oops, what station?
Changed outdated pirate commander, who was playing the old "pirate station spawns pirate ships" game. That went by the wayside a long time ago, not sure why. Pirate commander now has a much better decision making process. Pirate commander AI is still adapting to recent changes; that is, it's still a work in progress.
Pirate Scuttle
I was aboard a pirate ship in battle. As soon as the ship lit on fire, it went on red alert. Fire isn't that big of a deal. It lights easily, doesn't do that much damage very fast, and is easily extinguished using water. Unfortunately, pirate captain's were using red alert as a sign of defeat, then scuttling their ship.
Pirate officer makes a more careful assessment before deciding to hunt, flee, scuttle, etc.
Pirate Positioning
When pirates attack, the pilot decides where to position their ship relative to the target ship. In many cases, this location is out of sight of the bridge, not very Star Trek-ish.
NPC pilots now aim for a point in front of the target vessel that should usually put them in the field of view of the bridge, when executing a Plunder or Attack order. This applies to all NPC pilots, not just pirates.
Pirate Hits Shields
A pirate attacked my ship. It came screaming in, demanding I surrender, then hit my shields like a bug hitting a windshield. Poof!
Changed piloting AI to avoid shields.
Pirate Hits Own Bullets
I encountered a group of pirates. It was awesome to watch them come in, guns blazing, lighting up my shields. However, by the time they got to me, they caught up to some of their own projectiles and took considerable damage. My guys never fired and they were smoldering wrecks.
Projectiles fired from turret guns no longer hit the firing vessel, unless the firing location is inside a room of the firing vessel. NPCs do not know this so they will continue to avoid hitting their own hull when targetting their turret guns.
Energy weapon turrets are resolved instantly when fired so they are not subject to the bug. They can/will continue to hit the firing vessel.
Client Crash During Battle
A pirate was attacking my ship using rockets. My client program crashed when a rocket exploded.
Fixed a logical error exposed by an assertion failure.