The November patch is a large one, with four new maps added to the matchmaker pool, numerous balance tweaks, and many other improvements and fixes.

The most notable balance changes are:

• Armour now reduces damage by a factor of 3 rather than 4. This is to increase counters to armoured turrets and Crab, and to give Halberd space to be tankier while firing.
  
• Hovercraft have their uniquely terrible slope climbing replaced with uniquely fast speed while turning. A bonus feels better than a penalty, and the old penalty was pretty obscure as well as limiting for map diversity.
  
• Limpet received its prophesied nerf now its power and general utility has been discovered.
  
• The ongoing small tweaks to vehicle raiders continue in an attempt to share some of the success of Rover with Hover and Tank.
  
• Swift no longer fires while landing. Its weapon maybe have to be buffed in the future to compensate.

New features include a command for easier factory plate placement and improved effects for Halberd and Buoy. Modding for many niche special abilities is much easier and a few edge case bugs have been fixed.


1v1 pool:

• Added Faultline, Doldrums, Random Plateaus, Shimmershore, Trojan Hills, Mecharavaged.
  
• Removed Intersection, Ravaged, Crubick Plains, Frostburn, Izki Channel, Anvilwood.

Teams pool:

• Added Faultline, Doldrums, Random Plateaus, Shimmershore, Trojan Hills, Mecharavaged.
  
• Removed Intersection, Ravaged, Crubick Plains, Frostburn, Aurelian.

Armour damage reduction reduced 75% -> 66.6%. The following units were partially compensated.

• Halberd health 1250 -> 1600
  
• Crab health 4000 -> 4200
  
• Solar Collector health 500 -> 600

Hovercraft have increased mobility.

• Rather than slow to 60% while turning like other vehicles, they keep all their speed.
  
• They climb slopes as quickly as other vehicles, rather than climbing much slower.

Quill turns faster because large turning circles are needlessly annoying on constructors.

• Turn rate 920 -> 1100.

Dagger deals more damage, but not enough to affect its matchups against most raiders.

• Damage 100 -> 110

Scalpel is smarter.

• Overkill prevention fires less often at targets that are probably going to die.

Dart swarms are slightly less deadly.

• Damage 35 -> 32
  
• Slow damage 140 -> 128

Fencer is the backbone of Rover, which seems particularly powerful, so can afford a small nerf.

• Cost 140 -> 145

Kodachi is cheaper but finds it harder to deal free damage.

• Cost 175 -> 170
  
• Range 215 -> 210

Limpet took years to be noticed, and it is finally time for its first nerf.

• Cost 150 -> 160
  
• Speed 123 -> 120
  
• Damage 150 -> 120
  
• Slow damage of 1200 unchanged.
  
• Overslow 5s -> 2s (matches Moderator)

Cutter should not be outclassed by Hunter so early.

• Cost 70 -> 65

Swift is no longer a form of artillery, and boost is consistent with other abilities.

• Can no longer fire while landing.
  
• Boost recharge rate now obeys status effects.

Faraday has less damage and stun uptime, on top of the general armour nerf.

• Damage 1200 -> 1100
  
• Reload 2.7s -> 2.9s (stun uptime 74% -> 69%)

Faraday and Gauss have more appropriate collision shapes.

• They now have flatter collision volumes when closed.
  
• If they can shoot over a wall, their aim point is now adjusted so that enemies can shoot back.

Commander Disruptor Bomb is now consistent with Limpet.

• Damage 350 -> 210
  
• Slow damage of 2100 unchanged.
  
• Added 2s overslow to Violet Slugger for consistency with Limpet.

Disco Rave Party is now consistent with Limpet.

• Added 2s overslow to Violet Slugger.

All slow pulses, besides the more continual pulse of Outlaw, now have a slow to damage ratio of 10:1, and 2 seconds overslow.


Dagger and Bolas radar icons are now consistent with other light/heavy raider pairs.

• Icon type Raider/Support -> Scout/Raider.
  
• This will be confusing at first, but the consistency should be worth it in the long run.

Factory plates are easier to place with the new factory plate command.

• Added a generic factory plate command that turns.
  
• It turns into the factory plate of the nearest factory in range of the mouse.
  
• It exists in the grid construction menu with hotkey BV.

Fixed some texts:

• "defense" -> "defence" (rather than a mismash of the two options)
  
• "minimun" -> "minimum"
  
• "stun time" -> "max stun time"

Other features.

• Self-destructing a selection of units costing less than 1000 now never triggers autoresign.
  
• Rectangle terraform now turns red when too large.
  
• Added Swift boost and jumpjet cooldown to selections panel.
  
• Landed Swifts refund their boost.
  
• Add Fire Towards Enemies to the hotkey menu.

• Improved projectile effect and muzzle flare for Buoy and Halberd.

Many previously hardcoded abilities now have customParams or are configurable in LuaRules/Configs. While it was possible for mods to copy gadgets to configure such behaviour, it is now easier to do so in a configurable way. This includes:

• Dirtbag mound.
  
• Full interactions for sonar, radar and radar jamming (eg being disabled when disarmed).
  
• Phantom firing while cloaked.
  
• Air transports.
  
• Teleport beacon.
  
• Overshoot prevention for turrets.
  
• Gravity weapons being allowed to Set Target allies.
  
• Torpedoes not jumping out of the water when they hit the shore.

• Fix ward fire error spam on metal maps.
  
• Krow and Thunderbird now decloak during bombing runs. Previously Thunderbird would only decloak when bombing via attack order.
  
• Clean up metal spot detection code.
  
• Improved base64 encoding memory usage.
  
• Fix Scylla firepoint offset/clipping.
  
• Fix special weapons not updating their image and text in some cases (eg select a Swift then a Charon).
  
• Fix SLAM rocket model.
  
• Fix stretched Dart track texture.

Here is the Zero-K news for October.

• GoogleFrog talks about the background and design philosophy of Zero-K in an interview by StealSpeaks. This is the first Zero-K developer interview, and there was a lot to cover, so expect part two in a few weeks.
  
• There will be a 1v1 tournament at 19:00 UTC on Saturday 23rd October. It is open to everyone. To sign up post in this thread. Here is a countdown timer for timezone conversion.

We've finally solved a minor bug that caused anti-air missiles to sometimes penetrate aircraft. While quite rare, it was causing Vandal to make unfortunate mistakes against Thunderbird. Besides the fix, there are a few buffs for Hover and Shieldbots, and nerfs for Rover and Amphbots. Badger is of particular concern as it needs adjusting after its unit AI improvement. We are also experimenting with extra initial resources, with the goal being to give players more freedom in the early game.


Increase starting resources slightly as an experiment.

• Initial resources 250-> 325 metal and energy.

Metal Extractor is lighter and cheaper for quicker and riskier expansion.

• Cost 90 -> 85
  
• Health 640 -> 600

Felon is better shielded and matches Thug's recharge time.

• Max shield 1600 -> 1800
  
• Recharge rate 16 -> 21

Convict matches Thug recharge time too.

• Recharge rate 9 -> 10.5

Vandal is better at shooting in dense clumps.

• Shorter collision volume.
  
• Higher angle of fire.

Limpet is a little worse against assaults.

• Slow damage 1500 -> 1200

Bulkhead is even less tanky.

• Health 1650 -> 1540

Dart aims faster.

• Turret speed 200 -> 320 degrees/second

Scorcher has regained the status of 'very good' so it can be returned to its previous price.

• Cost 125 -> 130

Badger is easier to catch.

• Speed 60 -> 55.5

Claw (Badger's mine) is worse at hitting small nimble units

• Sight radius 64 -> 120
  
• Decloak radius 50 -> 80 (consistent with 2x2 footprint units).
  
• Flight time 1s -> 1.7s.
  
• Initial projectile speed 50 -> 70
  
• Final projectile speed 300 -> 130
  
• Projectile acceleration 200 -> 50
  
• Turn rate reduced by 28%
  
• Toned down projectile lighting

Dagger fully loses some nerfs from last year. Its price nerf (75 -> 80) remains.

• Speed 143 -> 144
  
• Range 210 -> 212

Bolas has small buffs as it is easy to overdo.

• Cost 185 -> 180
  
• Speed 95 -> 96
  
• Range 230 -> 232

Engineer chassis is slower.

• Speed 39 -> 36

Lotus is slightly worse when built under fire.

• Added 0.8 second post-construction deploy time.

Planes have some important fixes.

• Fixed all anti-air, Ogre and Picket projectiles sometimes passing right through aircraft.
  
• Reduced the size of plane hit volumes to better match their model now that the underlying issue with anti-air inconsistency resolved.

• Added modoptions to set innate income and initial resources.
  
• Added a modoption to randomly set initial resources.
  
• Added a modoption to set seeds for random maps.
  
• Added support for weapondefs_mod and explosiondefs_mod. Mods can define these files to act on the weapon/explosions tables as they are loaded.

This update solves a few recent issues with ground targeting. The easy fix was for Duck, which was previously able to fire torpedoes out of the sea and onto land. The trickier changes solve the unfairness of ground targeting widgets by making the interface more powerful in ways relevant to humans, while reducing its power for widgets.

Other balance changes include Felon tweaks and slower transport speed for Jack. The AI has been updated to fix a bug, and all the configs are now based on the previous bleeding edge test version.

Duck is no longer able to ground fire torpedoes. This is consistent with other torpedo and depth charge weapons.

Bandit now leads targets at close range correctly.

Felon has improved burst and DPS, but less efficient charge to damage conversion.

• Reload 0.16s -> 0.13s
  
• Damage 110 -> 94 (DPS 660 -> 705)
  
• Shield energy per shot 80 -> 75 (damage/charge 1.38 -> 1.25)

Reaver aims more smoothly and is smarter.

• Aim period 5 -> 3 frames.
  
• No longer automatically fires at walls protecting enemy mexes.
  
• Jinks when fighting units such as Rogue.

Phantom aims faster than it turns to cut down on firing mishaps.

• Turn rate reduced by 5.4%.
  
• Aim speed 360 -> 480 (no scope).
  
• Aim period 5 -> 1 frames.

Added the state toggle Fire Towards Enemies for the following units. The toggle is off by default.

• Kodachi fires towards nearby enemies that are behind it, to avoid running into its own fire.
  
• Badger fires in the direction of the closest enemy, whatever the distance.

Many units that could deal damage slightly beyond their maximum range, usually by using area of effect damage, now have reduced range for ground firing with the Set Target command.

Added a weight category - medium - to further differentiate transport speed penalties.

• Light units cost up to 500
  
• Medium units cost more than 500 and at most 1000.
  
• Heavy units cost more than 1000.

Transports carry units of each weight at the following speeds.

• Charon transports Light/Medium units at 70%/50% speed.
  
• Hercules transports Light/Medium/Heavy units at 75%/65%/50% speed.

The light and heavy speed penalties existed previously, they are unchanged. The medium units that were previously light are Jack, Skuttle, Felon, Phantom, Minotaur, Emissary, Lance, Impaler, Siren, Envoy, Aspis, Iris and Djinn.

• Updated the skirmish AI to fix an idle factory bug - for real this time.
  
• Removed time constraints on bonus objectives for the first five planets of the campaign.

• Units can now be told to fire towards an enemy or location. To do so, issue a non-area Set Target order with the Ctrl modifier. This behaviour is paused when enemies are nearby, unless the unit is set to hold fire.
  
• Improved the smart nano turrets widget Auto Patrol Nanos v2. This is still disabled by default, pending more live testing.
  
• Improved some widget descriptions.
  
• Added an option to hide chat.

• Added explode on victory modoption.
  
• Fixed the example model scaling gadget for dae.
  
• Added an unused root to the piece hierarchy of Glaive, Iris, Conjurer, Gremlin, Scythe to allow for easy model scaling.
  
• Exposed Spring.Utilities.CommandNameByID(cmdID) and Spring.Utilities.Traceback() to widgets.

• Saved some memory in the UI framework.
  
• Fixed torpedoes sometimes falling through the map.
  
• Fixed imaginary numbers in the ballistic projectile solver.

Back in February we reduced the starting resources and commander income, with the aim of extending the early game slightly. After six months of data and feedback we suspect balance suffered as a result, so the income change has been reverted. We also addressed another ongoing balance project - Shieldbots - with a few buffs.

This patch has the usual smattering of fixes and UI improvements, with the most notable being improvements to Area Mex and fixes for the AI. Area Mex now works pregame and has a terraforming mode. To counteract the terraforming mode a few units have been given wall-defeating behaviours. The AI fix is more of an update that started as a fix, and includes tweaks to the difficulty levels. Feedback about the difficulty progression would be appreciated.


Increased starting income back to pre-February 2021 levels.

• Initial metal income 5 -> 6.
  
• This was done via increased commander income (3 -> 4).
  
• Initial stored resources is still lower than before (300 -> 250).

Bandit DPS is now closer to Glaive than Duck.

• DPS 83.5 -> 86 (+3%)

Outlaw slows more rapidly.

• Real damage 26 -> 27 (+3.5%)
  
• Slow damage 78 -> 81 (ratio unchanged).

Rogue regains its weapon from a few months ago, but not its body.

• Projectile velocity 185 -> 192
  
• Damage 340 -> 350

Felon aims faster and can tank a Phantom shot.

• Health 1400 -> 1600
  
• Removed artificial 133ms aim delay.

Sling is slower.

• Speed 48 -> 45

Badger is slower and more expensive.

• Cost 260 -> 270
  
• Speed 65 -> 60

Bulkhead is less tanky, now dying to two Stinger shots.

• Health 1720 -> 1650

Cutter is better at picking off Hunters.

• Range 260 -> 265

Stardust fires at full speed for longer.

• Heat decay 14.28% -> 16.67% per second.

Reaver, Pyro, Crab, Archer, Ripper, Claymore, Kodachi and Ogre now automatically shoot towards obscured or terraformed metal spots. Some of these units bypass or smooth terrain, while others simply have the AoE to deal a bit of damage through walls.

Reaver, Archer, Venom, Crab, Firewalker, Badger, Kodachi, Scalpel, Dante, Merlin, Mistral and Siren now aim through terrain when told to target the ground.

• Removed Jurassic Sands and Calayo.
  
• Removed Aurelian from 1v1 (still in Teams).
  
• Added Ravaged and Frostburn to 1v1 and Teams.
  
• Added Izki Channel to 1v1.
  
• Added Banana Republic to Teams.

Area Mex has the following improvements.

• Added Area Mex to the pregame queue.
  
• Point clicking now snaps to the closest point, the same as using a metal extractor blueprint.
  
• Point clicked Area Mex commands have the same key modifiers for queuing adjacent energy.
  
• Shift-release behaviour is now consistent with structure placement (it deselects if an order has been issued).
  
• Added a terraform mode.

Area Mex terraform works as follows.

• It exists as a separate command (default hotkey Alt+W).
  
• By default it does not appear as a UI button.
  
• The basic command builds a wall after the mex is complete.
  
• Issue with Alt to dig a hole prior to placement instead of a wall.
  
• Issue with Ctrl to increase height/depth of terraform.
  
• Configure the height/depth in Settings/Interface/Building Placement.
  
• Has the same point click improvements as base Area Mex.

Other interface changes.

• Unit markers report the progress of things under construction.
  
• Freed up F6 and F7 for hotkey binds.
  
• Starlight and Disco Rave Party now have a directional placement arrow (like factories).
  
• Claymore has anti-bait against free units by default.
  
• Unit descriptions now consistently say 'Anti-Sub' for units that can reasonably fight submerged Ducks and Seawolves, and 'Undersea Fire' for units that can fire while submerged.
  
• Tweaked the default Alt+N terraform wall slightly higher.
  
• Added a Alt+M default terraform hotkey, which is like Alt+N but high enough to protect Stinger from Lance.

• Local widgets can no longer use Spring.GetVisibleProjectiles.
  
• Local widgets no longer receive enemy projectiles from Spring.GetProjectilesInRectangle.
  
• Ploppable factories now have the 'ploppable' CustomParam, rather than ploppability being determined by a config file.

• Fixed AI factories sometimes 'breaking' lategame. This required an AI update, so post feedback about the migrated difficulty levels. Beginner and Novice are unaffected.
  
• Removed Economist AI as it is now bundled into Brutal.
  
• Fixed Quake (seismic missile) being able to crash Glint (Starlight's satellite) back to earth.
  
• Fixed Raven sometimes failing to dive against Aegis.
  
• Fixed unit AI internal commands sometimes cancelling user commands via duplicate orders.
  
• Fixed uneven and misnamed startboxes on Stronghold_V4.
  
• Fixed Conjurer wreck being indistinguishable from Gremlin.
  
• Fixed dying terraform anchors dealing 0.0001 damage.
  
• Fixed garbage being rendered with Outline Shader enabled.
  
• Fixed the cheat menu not appearing on its own if the Null AI had a different name.
  
• Fixed spectator panel numbers bobbing up and down.
  
• Fixed mex placement widget eating too many mouse buttons.
  
• Fixed some gray labels in missions with locked units.

This is a small update to the matchmaker and planet Kirdipan - the terraform mission. Kirdipan is a bit fairer with tweaks such as clear Pylon lines, Owls to scout the map, and no underwater units.

The 1v1 matchmaker now looks like a single queue with two option for a wider search range (handicap and ranked). The 'Match Available' status should reliably report the game type, with '1v1' corresponding to a narrow search range game, and '1v1 Handicap'/'1v1 Wide' corresponding to the two options. Both can be ticked to accept both types of game. The standard search range has also been increased from 330 to 345.

Income multipliers can now be set for each team under Options to serve as a form of handicap. This is a commonly requested feature for coop games, but to take it a step further we're trying out a new matchmaking queue.

The '1v1' queue now generates even matches up to a certain skill gap, beyond which it creates unranked games with an income boost for the lower-ranked side. To stick to even games use the new '1v1 Narrow' queue, and for the best queue times use both at once. The '1v1' queue allows a slightly wider skill gap than previously, while '1v1 Narrow' allows a slightly narrower gap.

Update: There is now a '1v1 Wide' queue with the same match range as '1v1', but without the handicap.

• Per-team income multipliers can now be set under Options -> Multipliers in battle lobbies.
  
• Added a '1v1 Narrow' matchmaking queue that creates more evenly matched battles than the previous system.
  
• The '1v1' matchmaking queue can create either handicap or non-handicap games. If a match would qualify for '1v1 Narrow' then a normal match is played, otherwise the match does not affect ratings and the lower skilled player receives a small income boost.
  
• Added a '1v1 Wide' matchmaking queue with the same match range as '1v1' where games are always ranked and without a handicap.

• Added anti-structure overkill prevention for Lance, Lucifer, Ravager, Crab and Cyclops.
  
• Reef and Shogun try to stay at max range against all targets.

• Added NW vs. SE startboxes for Archsimkats Valley.
  
• Calayo is back to just being NW vs. SE.
  
• Tweaked metal spots on Battle for Planet XIV and DeltaSiege Island 8 Way.
  
• Tweaked the sun and water parameters for a few maps.
  
• Tweaked welcome text.
  
• Better support for modding a few things related to the economy (fewer files to override).

Everything should go just a bit smoother with this update. The AFK detector now has a countdown and disables construction, bringing harmony to teams. A number of unruly fonts and boxes have been brought into line, bringing harmony to the interface. The normal difficulty AI has chilled out. Singleplayer and multiplayer can be as one with skirmish and campaign autosaves during matchmaking. Most harmoniously, maps can now (effectively) be nice smooth circles rather than pointy squares.


Flea has a bit more map presence to make up for the previous Venom nerf.

• No longer slightly leads its target, removing a small retreat disadvantage.
  
• DPS increased by 7.1%

Conjurer is in slightly more danger from its own cloaked bombs.

• Area cloak and jammer range 192 -> 184

Scorcher is slightly worse at poking other raiders.

• Range reduced by 1.9%
  
• Projectile speed reduced by 1.9%

Badger is more vulnerable and has a slower rate of attrition.

• Speed 67.5 -> 65
  
• Reload time 5.5s -> 5.6s

Quill gains more speed advantage.

• Speed 84 -> 87 (2.8 -> 2.9)

Dagger has another range change.

• Speed increased by 0.35% to a round number.
  
• Range 205 -> 210

Bolas is slightly cheaper and faster.

• Cost 190 -> 185
  
• Speed increased by 0.53% to a round number.

Mace regains its old range.

• Range 340 -> 345

Halberd has a better matchup vs. Metal Extractors.

• Damage 150 -> 160

Claymore has more burst and has 13.8% more DPS.

• Reload 2.8 -> 3.2
  
• Damage 400 -> 520
  
• Increased edge effectiveness.

• Normal AI is now noticeably easier, with the goal of reducing the jump from Easy to Normal.
  
• Hard AI is slightly easier. Brutal is unchanged.
  
• The player has more defenses in campaign mission 2 to give them more breathing space.
  
• Added a few extra things to destroy in campaign missions 2 and 3.
  
• Singleplayer games are now automatically saved when a matchmaker match is found, for players that would like to play singleplayer while in the queue.

• Added Anti-Bait toggles for Knight, Dagger, Cutter, Hunter, Blitz.
  
• Fix Bandit unit AI, it now idle flees itself and Duck.
  
• Urchin can no longer Force Attack the ground (both on land and underwater).
  
• Gauss now aims down cliffs properly.
  
• Units can no longer guard themselves.
  
• Fixed retreating Attack Move units occasionally returning with Move after being repaired.
  
• Fix Ronin and Rogue on Attack Move jinking too fast to aim and fire.

• Renamed the lobby option toggle to "Inactive Player Unit Sharing" and added a default that enables it in PvP while disabling it for Coop.
  
• Increased AFK threshold from 30s to 40s.
  
• Added a visual warning that start at 32s of inactivity.
  
• Fixed typing in chat erroneously not counting towards activity.
  
• Shared constructors and factories are now given a Wait command, which is removed when they are shared back.

• Maps can now define a playable area, restricting unit movement and construction. Circular maps can be created with a config file and functions for arbitrary shapes have been exposed.
  
• Added a circular playable area to BlackStar.
  
• Cleaned up metal spot inconsistencies on Pinewood Derby, Archsimkats Valley and Altair Crossing.
  
• Added startboxes for Stronghold, Throne, Tundra, Rysia, Battle for Planet XIV, Vernal 3-way, and Small Supreme Battlefield Dry/Islands/Original.

Added the following two functions for dynamic start boxes and metal configs, but technically they can be used for all mapping and modding.

• Spring.Utilities.Gametype.isCompStomp() returns true if there is exactly one team that only contains humans.
  
• Spring.Utilities.Gametype.isTeamFFA() returns true if there are more than 2 teams and at least one of them has multiple players.

• Added warnings about LaserCannons with ranges not equal to a multiple of their speed. The next release they will get turned into erroring on load
  
• Script.IsEngineMinVersion returns true correctly on bleeding edge (i.e. versions X.1.Y-Z).
  
• Projectiles are no longer filtered for spectator widgets.
  
• Added a detonate command to an unused kamikaze submarine.

• Tweaked numerous ingame and menu font sizes and button dimensions for consistency.
  
• Improved font management to cut down on memory usage.
  
• Improved the load time of the map list in the game lobby.
  
• Fixed map and mod downloads occasionally needing to be retried near completion.
  
• Made cost and time more prominent in construction tooltips.
  
• Right mouse button now takes precedence over Alt on the factory build queue.
  
• Fixed large build queues adding units uncontrollably with Alt and some rapid clicking.
  
• Improved Fusion, Antinuke and Trinity smoke effects and Zenith beam effect.
  
• Fixed Antinuke and Area of Effect visualisation being slightly off-position when targeting water.
  
• Fixed a bug with persistent build spacing with non-default settings.
  
• Fixed how the ingame abuse report window reports FFA.
  
• Fixed a rare commshare bug that could break team FFA.
  
• Fixed negative damage showing up in endgame graphs.
  
• Fixed Strider Hub not aiming correctly.
  
• Fix the Wait indicator not appearing over factories.
  
• Fix the Wait indicator not appearing over transferred units.

This is the first big balance patch of the year, just in time for the second tournament series of the year. Shieldbots are better early and have more tools in their arsenal, but the standard shieldball is less powerful. Hover and Tank have buffs for improved unit variety and to bring them up to the power level of Rover. Spider has a few small tweaks to make them less reliant on Venom.


Lobster Roll series two will start on the 17th of April and is open to everyone. There is a round robin warm-up tournament this coming weekend, on the 10th of April. Sign up to the round robin here. Join the Discord server for announcements about the upcoming series.


The following changes have been applied to the matchmaking pool. The full pool can be viewed here.

• Added - Crubick Plains, Aurelian, Calayo, Red Comet Remake, Fairyland, Sertaleina.
  
• Removed - Sparkles Reef, Prestige, Otago, Iced Coffee, Ravaged, Mechadansonia.
  
• Updated - Cobalt Dream, Dune Patrol Redux, Fallendell.

Shieldbots are the main issue among the bot factories, and it was not just an issue of overall power. Players in the middle of the ladder were having trouble against the Shield midgame, while those at the top found Shield to be at too much of an early disadvantage. To solve this we buffed their early game while nerfing the standard shieldball. We have also tweaked Spiders to make them less reliant on Venom.

Bandit is a bit better to help Shieldbots through the early game.

• Health 330 -> 340
  
• DPS increased by 2.5%

Convict is faster to assist early expansion.

• Speed 60 -> 61.5

Rogue has a nerf to save some matchups from mass Rogue supported by the buffed Bandit.

• Health 580 -> 540
  
• Turn rate reduced by 10%.
  
• Projectile velocity 192 -> 185
  
• Damage 350 -> 340

Thug regenerates slower to make shield charge more valuable.

• Speed 57.75 -> 57 (what a weird number, now same as Outlaw)
  
• Shield capacity 1250 -> 1200
  
• Shield regen 16/s -> 14/s

Felon has 18.8% less DPS and charges slower.

• Shield regen 18/s -> 16/s
  
• Aim time 0.3s -> 0.166s
  
• Reload 0.13s -> 0.16s
  
• Charge per shot 75 -> 80
  
• Damage 108.4 -> 110

Outlaw takes on more responsibility for riot power from Felon.

• Cost 260 -> 250
  
• Health 1050 -> 1100
  
• DPS increased by 13%

Vandal takes on more responsibility for anti-air power from Felon.

• Range 880 -> 900

Racketeer is slightly easier to field.

• Cost 350 -> 340
  
• Speed 51 -> 52.5

Snitch is slightly harder to position.

• Speed 120 -> 117

Dirtbag is better at spotting and harassing.

• Speed 78 -> 84
  
• Sight range 560 -> 600
  
• Reload 2s -> 1.9s
  
• Damage 45 -> 55

Reaver has a buff to help Glaive deal with Bandit.

• Cost 220 -> 210
  
• Speed 1.71 -> 1.75
  
• Reload 0.5s -> 0.466s

Flea is harder to spot when burrowed.

• Decloak Radius 200 -> 160

Venom has less stun uptime, as well as slightly less DPS.

• Reload time 1.1s -> 1.133s.

Hermit is one of the more maligned assaults, so gains some assault power.

• Cost 160 -> 150
  
• Health 1400 -> 1500

Widow drains more energy to make it harder to field early on.

• Cloak cost 12/4 -> 15/5 (Moving/Static)

Rover is dominating the vehicle matchups, yet there were few complaints about Rover itself. We took this to mean that Rovers feel fun and well balanced, even when losing to them, so opted mostly leave the factory alone. Instead, we took a look at Hover and Tank. Hover has a decent earlygame but a lack of transitions, so we buffed some of their more niche units, while Tank has the opposite problem, so we buffed Tank earlygame.

Fencer is more vulnerable.

• Health 560 -> 530
  
• Setup time is 6.6% longer

Quill is now only slightly more expensive than a standard constructor.

• Cost 130 -> 125

Halberd can be unleashed now that Anti-Bait makes it less annoying to fight.

• Cost 240 -> 210

Mace is a better riot at the expense of a little range.

• Health 1300 -> 1400
  
• Range 345 -> 340
  
• Aims 20% faster
  
• DPS increased by 10%

Kodachi feels fairer to fight so can afford a buff.

• Cost 180 -> 175
  
• Health 670 -> 680

Welder is cheaper but also more vulnerable to raiders.

• Cost 200 -> 185
  
• Health 1800 -> 1700
  
• DPS reduced by 4%

Ogre needs a buff to fight Mace 1v1 and win.

• Health 1850 -> 1950

There are now some optional resource panels to enable under 'Settings/HUD Panels/Economy Panel' with Simple Settings disabled. They need to be positioned with Ctrl+F11. There are two panels to track constructor activity, a panel for overdrive, and a panel for wind speed.

Other Changes:

• Added Shield Charge/Maximum to aggregate selection stats and switched some rows to improve order stability.
  
• Added Avoid Bad Targets toggle for Claw, Ultimatum, Scorpion and Nimbus.
  
• Nimbus flies a little closer to make it reliably fire at tall turrets.
  
• Artemis overkill prevention is more careful about wasting missiles.
  
• Mace skirms more unit types.

• Fixed two bugs that caused some terraform shapes to stall at 99% completion.
  
• Fixed commander drone duplication upon morph.
  
• Crab is better at uncurling.
  
• Clear Factory Queue now works with factories set to Wait.
  
• Fixed Artemis not firing when on land of height zero.
  
• Landbound Urchins are better at firing into the deep ocean.
  
• Fixed transports having trouble unloading tall units.
  
• Fixed some edge cases with antinukes.
  
• Fixed Ravager suspension.
  
• Tacnuke sounds now play at higher priority.

The big feature in this update is bait prevention. Units and turrets, such as Artemis, should be significantly better now that they can more precisely obey your wishes. Felon is a beneficiary as it can be told to avoid armoured units, but it may be kept in check by another new behaviour: Most units now fire at the edge of small shields if there is nothing else in range.

There are few actual balance changes to better observe the ramification of the latest advances in unit command. Apart from that there are a few features and fixes, such as the ability to click on names in the endgame stats to highlight a line, and improved map filtering.


Advanced Radar moves towards justifying its cost, as an experiment.

• Cost 500 -> 400
  
• Sight 800 -> 1120
  
• Range 4000 -> 5600

Claymore has a smaller collision volume.

Duck missiles have less fuel, but still enough to hit land targets.

Jugglenaut and Newton now have aim lookahead (aiming towards targets that are about to enter range).


Units and turrets with reload time or costly projectiles can now be told to avoid low value targets. This can be configured under Settings/Unit Behaviour or controlled with the Avoid Bad Targets state, which is shown by default. The states are:

• Disabled.
  
• Free - Avoid light drones, Wind, Solar, Claw (Badger mines), Dirtbag, nanoframes up to 50 metal and armoured targets (except Crab).
  
• Light - As above, as well as units costing less than 90, Razor, Sparrow and unidentified radar dots.
  
• Medium - As above, as well as units costing less than 240, except Stardust, with the addition of Raptor.
  
• Heavy - As above, as well as units costing less than 420.

Some units default to Free and a few default to Light. The behaviour is overridden by Attack Move as well as manual targeting.

Units are also more opportunistic when it comes to fighting shields, now firing at nearby small shields if nothing else is in range. Most non-artillery do this and it is essentially a range buff against shieldballs. This behaviour, called Ward Fire, can be configured in Settings/Unit Behaviour or enabled as a state toggle under Settings/Interface/Commands.

There are also a few improvements to Attack Move.

• Siren brings its main gun into range on Attack Move.
  
• Most skirmishers and assaults no longer engage drones on Attack Move, however they will still fire at them if nothing else is in range.

• Individual players can now be highlighted in the endgame graphs by clicking on their name.
  
• Improved the filter box of the map list.
  
• Renamed 'Map Selection' to 'Set Map Bans' in the Matchmaker Tab.
  
• Selecting Puppy, Athena, Caretaker and Strider Hub enables the reclaim highlight overlay.
  
• Unit info screens now show movement type.
  
• Clarified Reaver and Hercules helptext.

• Greased Tremor rotary drive.
  
• Fixed Crab curling?
  
• Fixed Adamantine Mountain team names.
  
• Fixed newly constructed units sometimes not following factory waypoints.
  
• Fixed overkill prevention sometimes knowing too much about unidentified radar dots.
  
• Fixed trouble toggling Puppy Goo.
  
• Fixed some parts of long terraform queues being cancelled prematurely.
  
• Removed Leaper Chickens from planets Sapphire and Vis Ragstrom.