A lot has happened this last year and as the year draws to a close, we’d like to take the chance to make a review of the year in Avorion! A big thank you to everyone helping us, without this wonderful community this wouldn’t have been possible.


Let’s start at the beginning of the year. Last year in December 2017 we released the Economy Update and due to your feedback we spent most of January working out the last kinks and add in a few more things. The Economy Update brought player stations into the game, an improved economy and AI docking. Another exciting part of the update were cargo shuttles! The first way to let your stations directly deliver and fetch goods to and from other stations.


The first big update in 2018 was the Combat Update I in February. With switching to a sector the first easy fast travel was introduced. No endless flying through multiple sectors if all you want to do is see why that mining ship back home isn’t mining anymore!

Another feature of this update brought us a lot of heat with you guys: Torpedoes. We introduced torpedoes as a new ammunition based weapon with high damage. Torpedoes were also used by Persecutors, which we introduced to make progression into the galaxy a little more difficult. If you were a player back then, you know that we were a bit over-enthusiastic with the damage these things dealt and in the following patches we toned it down considerably without damaging their effectiveness. By now torpedoes have their rightful place as a very strong weapon type, but are no longer over-powered.


In April we introduced a smaller update containing UI improvements. A big part of that was the changes to the server browser, now featuring a server history, the possibility to favorite servers and more filters. Additionally we implemented automated crash reports, and got a ton of information on crashes. That made it possible for us to hugely improve server stability! Thank you for everyone who took part :)


After that update we continued work on Combat Update II and released a first version of it in June. With this update we introduced player designed turrets, complete with an all new build mode just for that! And were overwhelmed by the amount of cool designs that we had just three days after release of the update! You guys blew us away with you enthusiasm :D


In August we had the wonderful opportunity to go to Gamescom in Germany. It was our first ever time showing Avorion and it was amazing. We met so many fans and new players, got a ton of feedback and were genuinely surprised how many people liked Avorion! It was a huge boost to our motivation to continue the work on Avorion! Thank you to all who stopped by, we had a blast!


Right after Gamescom we threw ourselves back into work. The System Upgrade Update contained a rework of our upgrade system. Making them more consistent and also introducing permanent installation for nice extra perks. And while we were busy reworking the upgrades, the Xsotan artifacts got some more love as well. Every artifact has now specific perks that are dependent on the boss that drops them.


And last, but not least: The AI & Map Commands Update that we’re testing right now on the beta branch. It gives you the means to command your ships via the galaxy map, even if you’re half a galaxy away! And not just to send them mining or patrolling. You’re now able to enchain orders and send ships on trade routes with multiple stops.

A big pet peeve of our community was the AI behavior. And with this update we tackle that: AI is now able to boost, path finding calculation is done much quicker and those escort ships don’t struggle to keep up with you anymore!

And now it’s today, the last day of this wonderful and productive year. Thank you to all of you who have helped us by playing the game and providing feedback!

We wish everyone a happy new year!

Beta Branch Note: These changes are currently available on the beta branch. The beta branch is for testing experimental changes and for finding and fixing errors.

This is how you get access to the beta branch (USE AT YOUR OWN RISK):
Right-Click on Avorion in your Steam list, Properties -> Betas -> Select branch 'beta'.

"We've added some missing features that we still wanted to get in there, as well as some QoL improvements."

• Added escorting to map commands
• AI ships can now dock with stations over distance when they have functioning transporters
• Harvest state now leaves automatic turrets automatic if every turret in their group is also automatic
• Armed turrets are now used for salvaging
• Automatic armed turrets remain untouched and can be used to set independent orders, e.g. defend.
• Aggressive AI looks for enemies more carefully and swaps targets when it gets attacked
• Ships with players currently piloting them are no longer pushed away from stations
• Alliance map sectors are now timestamped and only updated if newer data (from a new member) is available
• Galaxy Map takes into account the timestamp of a sector info to show the most up to date info about a sector
• Player's ships' Patrol AI no longer attacks civil ships (Aggressive still does)
• Improved flight behavior of HarvestState

• Added more precise AI status descriptions for mining and salvaging
• Added hints for how to get more turret slots
• Added hints that unused upgrades can be installed (if possible)
• Updated german localization
• Added several missing icons

• initialize(...) functions for Entity, Sector and Player scripts get an implicit variable "_restoring"
• when the initialize is called while restoring the script from disk, instead of when it's being freshly added
• Added optional color argument to script ComboBox addEntry function
• Added getShipType(name) to client Player and Alliance
• Added transporterRange property to Entity
• Added getAllies(factionIndex) function to query all allied entities of a faction
• Added belongsToFaction(int, id) function to quickly check if an entity of a specific id belongs to a specific faction
• Added a dummy error message to invokeRemoteEntityFunction() and invokeRemoteSectorFunction() to match the signature of the client call

"As usual, bugfixes marked with [UBR] have been brought to our attention by the community. Thanks everybody for contributing and keep it up! :)"

• Fixed several issues related to path finding and boosting of AI ships
• [UBR] Fixed ships flying away into nothingness in a single direction
• Fixed a few issues with alliance map editing
• Fixed several issues reported via crash reporter
• [UBR] TurretAI now no longer shoots down torpedoes fired at factions with neutral relation standing (allies only)
• [UBR] TurretAI now no longer shoots down torpedoes fired by allies, except if targeting own shipss
• [UBR] Fixed an issue with inviting players to groups
• Fixed alliance-colored map indicators for non-special sectors
• [UBR] Attack state now enables its weapons (if disabled)
• Fixed several issues with path finding and attacking enemies
• Fixed several issues in scripts reported via crash reporter
• [UBR] Fixed an issue when where point defense turrets could not be created by researching
• Fixed shield damage not being recognized as damage contribution to an enemy
• Fixed lines in Strategy Mode no longer working
• Fixed an issue where the camera could be zoomed into the drone
• Fixed a crash in scrapyard when selling ship

Beta Branch Note: These changes are currently available on the beta branch. The beta branch is for testing experimental changes and for finding and fixing errors.

This is how you get access to the beta branch (USE AT YOUR OWN RISK):
Right-Click on Avorion in your Steam list, Properties -> Betas -> Select branch 'beta'.

• [UBR] Fixed missing tooltip in craft portraits
• [UBR] Fixed big splotches of missing textures on map
• [UBR] Fixed auto paying of alliance crews not working with new overview
• Fixed an issue with renaming alliance crafts
• [UBR] Fixed missing transfer of ships to alliance

"These have already been released last week, they're only mentioned here for the sake of completeness."

• Implemented correct localization of hyperspace cooldown error message
• Cargo tab now uses the correct plural form
• Transaction strings in Smuggler's Market are now translated correctly
• Updated German Localization
• Fixed dock AI crashing when no fly state is set and flyTarget is nil
• Fixes error messages from remotely calling functions returning tables
• Fixed map commands crashing when ordering differently than over the map
• Fixed Trading System crashing when being from outside when it wasn't installed yet
• Fixed a crash in new ShipUI for ships with large amounts of cargo
• Fixed a crash when assigning orders to turret groups after the ship was destroyed or the sector was changed
• Fixed errors in buy/sell order filter fields due to bad patterns
• Resource shortage bulletins are now translated correctly
• Delivery bulletins are now translated correctly
• [UBR] Added check to prevent players from setting an empty craft name
• [UBR] Changing a block now checks the maximum allowed volume
• Improved handling of broken interaction between buy/sell goods ai and trading system
• [UBR] Fixed ships boosting away or into things
• [UBR] Fixed ships boosting for too long while following
• [UBR] Fixed several graphical errors when undoing scaling the ship in build mode

• Added getAllies(factionIndex) function to query all allied entities of a faction
• Added belongsToFaction(int, id) function to quickly check if an entity of a specific id belongs to a specific faction

• Fixed several issues reported via crash reporter
• [UBR] TurretAI now no longer shoots down torpedoes fired at factions with neutral relation standing (allies only)
• [UBR] TurretAI now no longer shoots down torpedoes fired by allies, except if targeting own shipss
• [UBR] Fixed an issue with inviting players to groups

Beta Branch Note: These changes are currently available on the beta branch. The beta branch is for testing experimental changes and for finding and fixing errors.

This is how you get access to the beta branch (USE AT YOUR OWN RISK):
Right-Click on Avorion in your Steam list, Properties -> Betas -> Select branch 'beta'.

"You will now be able to order your ships over the galaxy map now. You can give commands, enchain multiple commands and even loop them. Ships can now also buy and sell goods for you to stations and others."

• Added sending orders to your ships via the Galaxy Map
• You can tell your ships to:
• Jump to a certain sector
• Buy goods for a specific price margin X% until they have Y on board
• Sell goods for a specific price margin X% until they have Y left
• Attack Enemies
• Patrol a sector
• Mine Asteroids
• Salvage Wreckages
• Loop with other commands
• These commands can be enqueued by holding Shift so your ships can move over large distances
• Routes for crafts will be rendered to the Galaxy Map
• Indicators for alliance crafts are now rendered on map
• Added switching to sector into a specific craft or drone
• Alliance ships are now listed in sector tooltips on the galaxy map
• Added checkbox to galaxy map to hide alliance information
• Added little dots for commandable ships in a sector

"We improved the flight behavior and AI of ships, they are now much faster and a lot more dangerous since they will get to players a lot faster."

• Improved flight behavior of AI ships
• AI ships can now use boost
• AI ships can now drift to change their flight direction
• Instead of braking, standing still, turning, accelerating
• Improved pathfinding behavior of AI ships
• AI ships won't get stuck as easily
• AI ships will now fly a lot better through asteroid fields
• Docking AI now flies near the target station while no dock is currently free yet
• Fighters on attack order who don't have a target any more are now set to defend the mothership
• Stations with docks now push away lifeless obstacles to keep docking areas free
• Stations with docks now push away objects that can move on their own after they have blocked a dock for over 5 minutes
• Repair fighters now heal the mothership when set to defend
• TurretAI now shoots down torpedoes that are targeting friends, if none are targeting the mothership

"We added a completely new harvest state to the AI that is a big improvement for automatic mining and salvaging. It makes use of the new pathfinding algorithm to maneuver around asteroid and wreckage fields quickly and safely. Bigger wreckages are now favored over smaller ones. The ship will now stay stationary as long as its lasers are in range. If a turret is facing the wrong way the ship will roll around its longitudinal axis to always face the target. This means it is best to place all turrets on the same side of the ship. We also added a detection if ships get stuck, in which case they change position or try the next target. You might not notice all these details but harvesting will work a lot more smoothly now."

• Added a new Harvesting AI specifically for mining and salvaging
• Harvest AI now rolls so that the turret can hit the target
• Harvest AI picks a new waypoint if the current one cannot be reached
• Harvest AI turns in place if weapons are out of range but firing long enough
• Harvest AI now picks the target's closest block
• Harvest AI now uses the appropriate turrets and sets independent turrets to autofire
• Salvage AI now prefers big wreckages over small ones that are close by
• Salvage AI now ignores tiny wreckages

"It was about time to rework the old, dusty UI of the fleet window and give it a new design and more features, such as renaming your ships."

• Improved layout of Player Fleet Window
• Ships now have a preview image
• Ships now have their cargo displayed in full detail
• Ships now have their status what they're currently doing listed
• Ships can be shown on the map
• Ships can be renamed

"From now on you'll be able to communicate with stations without actually docking to them, a feature that a lot of players have requested. We also improved map managing of alliances."

• Newly founded alliances now have their founder's current sector as home sector coordinates
• Added new alliance privilege: Edit Map
• Players with this privilege can edit the alliance map just like their own, players without just edit their own
• Alliance map note is now shown if it is different than the player's note
• Switching between crafts is now allowed no matter the distance
• Exception: From drones or fighters to other crafts
• Added a new Transporter Block
• Transporter blocks are available in Xanion and upwards
• Transporters will allow players to interact with stations over distances as if docked
• Transporters require a system upgrade "Transporter Software" to function
• Added a new System Upgrade "Transporter Software" required for long-distance transports
• Only works in combination with a transporter block
• Implemented auto-reloading of torpedoes to shafts
• Note: Only works for newly bought torpedoes

• When boosting is stopped, maximum velocity of ships drops by 200 m/s per second, instead of a percentage falloff
• Salvaging and mining laser range now scales more with size
• "The AI" (the boss) now has bad relations to AI factions by default
• Added a minimum directional thrust to ships to ease AI steering
• Added low inertia braking to AI ships to ease AI steering

"VERY IMPORTANT INFORMATION FOR MODDERS: We've added extra security for calling functions remotely, this *will* break your mods if you're using remote invocations. Also, those changes listed here are probably not complete, there should be more."

• IMPORTANT: Implemented "callable" tag for remote invocations
• Functions that are to be callable from remote clients must have been tagged as callable!
• Example: callable(namespace, "functionName")
• See existing scripts for more details
• For compatibility reasons, this behavior can be disabled in the server settings (HIGHLY DISCOURAGED): Flag "ExplicitCallables"
• Added a ControlUnit class
• Added several new callbacks to client Player class for Galaxy Map
• Galaxy Map can now be used to create UI via scripts
• Added order infos for crafts representing their current orders
• Added functionality for calling functions of scripts in another sector
• Added functionality for executing lua code in another sector (server to server only)
• Added functionality for calling functions remotely in another sector
• Added a new AI state: HarvestState, explicitly for collecting resources from Asteroids and Wreckages
• Added script functions to Entity: jumpPossible(), get/setHyperspaceJumpReach()
• BlockPlan can now force a material transformation where higher blocks are transformed into hull blocks
• Added functionality to Galaxy to load sectors and keep them in memory
• Added a property to get data folder of Server
• Added several status properties to Server
• Added a "onChatMessage" callback for Player and Server whenever a chat message is received from a player
• Added ControlActionBit enum
• Added a CraftPortrait class which renders a circle with a ship in it
• Added an ArrowLine class which renders a line with arrows
• Added a MapArrowLine class which is the ArrowLine for the Galaxy Map
• Added a MouseButton enum for mouse buttons
• Added a KeyboardKey enum for keyboard keys
• Keyboard now accepts both string keynames as well as KeyboardKey codes
• Added reading of ship hyperspace reach in Player and Alliance
• Added reading of ship cargo in Player and Alliance
• Added reading of ship status in Player and Alliance
• Added lots and lots of callbacks to Alliance and Player on client
• Added counting of registered functions to a callback
• Fixed "userdata" being wrongly given as a bad type for parameters when invoking c++ functions
• Sector:getEntity() now accepts both strings representing a uuid and Uuids
• Added an isStuck property to ShipAI
• Works only while the state is set to Flying
• Added new callbacks "onCraftSeatEntered" and "onCraftSeatLeft" for Entity and Sector
• Invocation of functions on scripts by index instead of name works correctly now
• Added a Label property "shortenText" to enable shortening of texts with "..."
• Added a Slider property "showMaxValue" to show the max value in its caption
• Removed displayName/displayPlural/translatableName/translatablePlural/translatableDescription properties from TradingGood
• Added displayName(amount) to TradingGood which returns the translated name in correct numerus
• Added displayPlural(amount) to TradingGood which returns a userdata object that can be sent and translated on the client

• Changed Anti-Grav to Antigrav to make it consistent throughout Avorion
• Added a "friends" tab to Serverbrowser
• Free and occupied weapon slots are now listed in the ship tab
• Improved showing and hiding of hints, depending on what the player is doing
• Building mode tooltips now don't get rendered when occluded by a window
• Removed redundant noble metal mines from Found Station Window
• Hyperspace cooldown and HP are now shown for alliance ships as well
• Improved displaying of tooltips so they don't block existing UI as much
• Building state shows a notification for hotkeys upon opening
• Increased size of building hotkeys window
• BuildingUtilities have a text hinting towards F1 for showing building hotkeys
• Added a warning when transporting problematic goods with and without licenses
• Increased brightness of the indicators in explore sector mission
• Improved game settings layout
• Improved graphics settings layout
• Alliance crafts now have their own indicator color
• Improved tackiness of several icons
• Removed "Tagged" line from galaxy map sector tooltip
• New script-based menus in the top right corner are now highlighted
• Added hint for accepting missions at bulletin boards
• Added input box to Hire Crew menu
• When hiring crewmembers the other rows are no longer reset

• Fixed wrong year in script documentation copyright
• Fixed wrong company designation in script documenation
• Changing control style is only possible while flying, no longer while building etc.
• Added anonymous game statistics sending to make better decisions about balancing and feature priorities
• This can be disabled in the settings.ini file
• Implemented correct conversion in documentation for bitsets and VectorTableCopy
• Several smaller performance improvements
• Added PointDefenseLaser and AntiFighter to turretfactory
• Added several new bugs
• Added merging of hangar & edge blocks
• Added tons of more correct plural translations

"Fixes marked with [UBR] were brought to us by the community. Thank you very much and keep up the good work!"

• Fixed several crashes in scripts
• [UBR] Fixed bad beam and muzzle colors when custom shot colors are used
• [UBR] Fixed an issue in shield recharge tooltip
• [UBR] Fixed an issue in turret factory that allows people to create turrets with higher rarities than expected
• [UBR] Fixed hyperspace price and energy being calculated wrongly
• Fixed an issue where scaling turret parts didn't work
• Fixed several instances where scripts were wrongly added to objects multiple times
• [UBR] Fixed MAD science lab dropping extreme turrets
• Fixed an issue where the title of a mine's trade window was translated incorrectly
• Fixed an issue where blocks of invincible entities could be destroyed by collisions
• [UBR] Fixed an issue where sometimes the wrong station was founded
• Fixed an issue where the color wasn't applied when modifying the whole turret part
• Fixed several spelling mistakes
• [UBR] Fixed issues with marking last line of inventory as favorite/trash
• [UBR] Fixed inventories being too far scrolled down to see contents
• [UBR] Fixed zooming out causing the ship to rotate
• [UBR] Fixed a few crashes in Group UI
• [UBR] Fixed color selection window not showing any colors when first opened with hotkey
• [UBR] Energy Suppressors from alliances no longer spawn with non-iron materials
• Fixed auto-selection no longer working after targeted object was destroyed
• [UBR] Fixed an issue in mining system where other ships were wrongly detected as the player's ship
• [UBR] Fixed several issues where uncritical errors were falsely logged when entities didn't exist
• Fixed an issue where component script callbacks were not sent
• Fixed an issue where muzzle positions of custom coaxial turrets were wrong
• Fixed an issue where restoring the explore sector mission did not work
• Fixed an issue where the handle of a ui slider could partially protrude over the side of the bounding rect
• Fixed a crash in ShipSystem when fetching an upgrade from a slot that doesn't exist
• [UBR] Fixed permanent upgrades disappearing from a ship when founding a station
• Fixed an error where ships stopped after they were destroyed instead of their wreckage flying on
• [UBR] Fixed reduction for pilots (via upgrades) not working with script functions
• Fixed an issue where an expanded combobox's clickable area was only as wide as the box itself

"These are smaller issues that will be fixed while the update is on the beta branch. They have been postponed because we thought releasing the update had priority."

• We are currently still working on ordering ships to escort other ships over the map
• We are aware that AI ships won't use transporter blocks yet, we're working on that
• Some mission texts are not translated correctly

• Implemented correct localization of hyperspace cooldown error message
• Cargo tab now uses the correct plural form
• Transaction strings in Smuggler's Market are now translated correctly
• Updated German Localization
• Fixed dock AI crashing when no fly state is set and flyTarget is nil
• Fixes error messages from remotely calling functions returning tables
• Fixed map commands crashing when ordering differently than over the map
• Fixed Trading System crashing when being from outside when it wasn't installed yet
• Fixed a crash in new ShipUI for ships with large amounts of cargo
• Fixed a crash when assigning orders to turret groups after the ship was destroyed or the sector was changed
• Fixed errors in buy/sell order filter fields due to bad patterns
• Resource shortage bulletins are now translated correctly
• Delivery bulletins are now translated correctly
• [UBR] Added check to prevent players from setting an empty craft name
• [UBR] Changing a block now checks the maximum allowed volume
• Improved handling of broken interaction between buy/sell goods ai and trading system
• [UBR] Fixed ships boosting away or into things
• [UBR] Fixed ships boosting for too long while following
• [UBR] Fixed several graphical errors when undoing scaling the ship in build mode

Hey everybody!

Sadly we didn't manage to meet our self-imposed deadline (surprise...) but we're hard at work with the update. So we want to give you some more infos on what's happening right now, what's giving us trouble and what's done.

So the update took longer than anticipated because we had to add new UI for the galaxy map, which should also be completely scriptable, since that's one of the features that's been missing from the galaxy map for a while. This UI is now in and we're working on the last polish and bug fixing for the galaxy map UI before the update can go live.

This is one of the more exciting things about this update: We've decided to add trade ship commands to the galaxy map, allowing you to order your ships to buy or sell certain goods in a specific sector. These commands can be enchained with the other commands, essentially allowing you to order your ships to fly a certain trade route or to sell its wares while it's headed in a certain direction!

Apart from that we're also fixing issues from the current branch which have been reported by both players and our crash reporter. Fixing those can also take lots of time and is, to us, equally important as new features.

I won't be giving a specific date which we're not going to meet yet again, but I can tell you that at this time all the important features are in and we're working hard towards connecting it all together and releasing it to the beta branch as soon as we can.

Stay tuned and see you soon!

Hey everybody, this is a quick update to what we're working on right now and what you can be looking forward to! In general, the next update will be about AI improvements and improvements to controlling your fleet in various sectors.

We're improving the pathfinding and flying AI, which means that ships will fly their full speed when they can, and they will also maneuver asteroid fields a lot smarter. This will also make the game a little harder, because you won't be able to fly away from enemies as easy as before.

We're making improvements to the AI considering mining and salvaging. So far, miners and salvagers have been behaving a little weird for lots of people. There's a simple reason for that: Mining is just "attacking" an asteroid. This led to some weird behaviors since ships were also trying to move dynamically, which is not necessary, because they don't have to avoid being shot by asteroids. We're now implementing a separate AI for harvesting, ie. mining and salvaging, which will improve things a lot.

This change will hopefully make lots of modders happy: Over the last weeks we've been laying the ground work for calling functions and executing code between sectors. Scripts from one sector will now be able to call functions in scripts present in another sector. There are a few limitations to this due to how the Avorion engine is structured, but in general this will allow your scripts to easily talk to each other even when they're in different sectors. Which brings us to...

The above groundwork will enable one vastly important feature: Inter-Sector commands for ships! You'll be able to command ships over the galaxy map even when they're not in the same sector as you. But we're not stopping there! We're also adding queues of commands, so you'll be able to command your ships to fly to one sector, mine asteroids or attack enemies, and then jump to yet another sector. And you'll be able to loop these commands as well.

To be honest, we don't know how the majority of players play the game. This is a big issue when it comes to making decisions about new features, balancing and content. In order to improve this, we're adding completely anonymous analytics to find out how you guys play the game, and things like where most players die or how much money is actually made by combat, trade, etc.

We're currently preparing the Mac Version of Avorion for Release. While we won't list it for Mac immediately in the store, we'll be releasing the Mac Builds for download soon, so everybody who has a Mac will be able to download the game. We're asking everyone of you to please download and try out the game on Mac, and please report any issues you're having!

There is no time frame yet as for a beta release. Progress is good though, we're done with nearly everything except for queuing commands and the new (scriptable) UI for the galaxy map. We're hoping to be able to release to the beta branch in the next 2 weeks!

Until then, have fun and leave us your thoughts here!

Hey everybody,

I'm excited to announce that the System Upgrades Update is now live on the default branch after performing well on the beta branch!


We've added a second system of gates to the game: Ancient gates that are a lot bigger and go a lot further than the current existing gate system. These gates are meant for easier and farther fast-traveling and will also support transportation of bigger ships, but you'll need to find a key to activate them.


Upgrades can now be installed 'permanently' for additional bonuses on ships. Most upgrades give a +50% boost in stats when installed permanently. In order to remove permanently installed upgrades you have to either destroy them or remove them safely next to an Equipment Dock.


We reworked the way the Xsotan Artifacts work in order to give them some more character (and to be completely honest: Them giving +unspecified turrest was just an oversight that we left in there). Each upgrade will give a boost resembling the boss or quest that dropped it, so for example the AI artifact will give you AIs and you won't need any more gunners and pilots.

Check out the full patch notes here:
https://steamcommunity.com/gid/103582791456780049/announcements/detail/1692681328248706470
https://steamcommunity.com/gid/103582791456780049/announcements/detail/3026873541070707815

Hey everyone,

Our Swiss friends from Stray Fawn Studio are releasing their game Nimbatus - The Space Drone Constructor today! We're wishing them best of luck with their release and to celebrate, all Avorion players are getting a 10% discount coupon that's valid until 10/10/2018!

The discount code accumulates with their launch discount to give you 20% off Nimbatus for a week.

Good luck to our friends and have fun!

Beta Branch Note: These changes are currently available on the beta branch. The beta branch is for testing experimental changes and for finding and fixing errors.

This is how you get access to the beta branch (USE AT YOUR OWN RISK):
Right-Click on Avorion in your Steam list, Properties -> Betas -> Select branch 'beta'.

• Added hints to research satellites on how to beat the M.A.D. science lab

• Implemented better highlighting of crew transports
• Targeter no longer auto-selects when mouse cursor is over a window

• renderEntityArrow function can now specify how far from center of the screen the arrow should be
• Entity():getNum[Un]armedTurrets() now returns 0 when no turrets component was found
• Implemented fast-determining of sector content
• Passing nil to a string parameter in a c++ function now results in a string with "nil" in it (instead of an exception)

• Improved debug output in case of crashes
• Minor translation improvements
• Improved checks for online servers in server browser window

• [UBR] Fixed Overheat and Burst Fire being put twice into tooltip description box
• [UBR] Fixed sector reach multiplication instead of addition in hyperspace upgrade
• Fixed an issue in research station when synchronizing server and client is slow
• Fixed a crash in a script when a ship that doesn't belong to a faction is told to jump
• Fixed a server-sided crash in mine/station founder scripts
• Fixed several potential crashes in multiple scripts
• Fixed a crash in shipyard.lua when no style with the specific name was found
• Fixed a crash in font renderering engine
• Fixed an issue where auto-turrets weren't shooting enemies
• Fixed an issue with gate-maps where start sectors wouldn't have gates
• [UBR] Fixed an issue that allowed duplication of upgrades
• [UBR] Fixed an issue where delivery mission with faulty loaded location data would crash
• [UBR] Fixed an issue in crew transfer window when entering non-numbers

• Fixed research satellite script crashing for existing satellites
• Removed debug output
• Fixed some turrets turning red
• Fixed several minor issues in various upgrades on client
• Fixed an issue in crewboard when calling a crew transport
• Fixed a crash in faction war meta calculations
• Fixed a few issues in craftorders.lua when clicking an entity that has already been destroyed on the server
• Fixed a few issues in building mode when objects don't have a Turrets component
• Fixed a crash when a script gets removed while its dialog is open
• Fixed a crash in building mode in repair brush
• Fixed a crash in parsing of description, money and resources parameters
• Fixed a crash in gate scripts when gate no longer belongs to a faction or its faction was deleted
• Fixed issues with Faction() sometimes returning nil
• Updated german localization

Beta Branch Note: These changes are currently available on the beta branch. The beta branch is for testing experimental changes and for finding and fixing errors.

This is how you get access to the beta branch (USE AT YOUR OWN RISK):
Right-Click on Avorion in your Steam list, Properties -> Betas -> Select branch 'beta'.

"We added a second gate-system for better fast-travel, that also allows gate travel of larger ships. Upgrades can now be installed permanently for improved stats. Most upgrades get a stats-bonus of about 50% for permanent installation."

• Added a new ancient gate system for easier fast-travel
• Ancient Gates have to be activated before they can be used
• Ancient Gates are a lot bigger and can lead a lot farther than normal ones
• Upgrades can now be installed 'permanently' for additional bonuses
• They can only be removed safely near Equipment Docks (3km distance)
• Upgrades are now displayed with a little anchor when they're permanently installed
• They can still be removed anywhere else by destroying them
• Color of entire ship can now be changed in building mode
• Shot color can now be set for turret designs
• Salvaging and Mining AI sends a message if there is nothing to mine or salvage in the sector

• Increased upscaling of Xsotan damage in the center from up to 600% to up to 800%

"We reworked the Xsotan artifacts to give them a more meaningful way of how they work."

• Swoks Upgrade gives +10 military turrets
• Researched teleporter key gives +8 arbitrary turrets
• Teleporter key by the merchant gives +10 unarmed turret slots
• Energy Lab upgrade gives massive energy boosts
• Smuggler Upgrade gives massive hyperspace boosts
• AI upgrade makes turrets and fighters no longer require gunners, miners or pilots
• Upgrade dropped by the four gives bonuses to nearly everything
• Haati upgrade is now an activation key for ancient gates
• Xsotan teleporter key upgrades are now considered unique and each one can only be installed once in the same craft
• Xsotan upgrades DON'T have to be installed permanently to work with the teleporter!

• Renamed (Un)armed turrets in upgrades to (Un)armed turret slots
• Reduced "tackiness" of frames in UI grid selections
• Clients are now notified internally when an alliance is disbanded
• IPs for public test server(s) are now downloaded and saved locally to keep them up to date
• Cleaned up code for window for joining via IP
• Blueprints for fighters can now be removed from Hangar Tab
• Color can now be changed in whole ship modification window
• Added loading screen tips for shields

• Added ShadingType enum for block shading types
• Added getting entities by script to ClientSector
• Added missing TurretBases enum to ScriptComponentTypes
• Added PlanMesh component
• Added ReadOnlyTooltip, ReadOnlyScriptUI, ReadOnlyIcon and ReadOnlyPlanMesh to client script API
• Extended ShipSystem to support permanent installation features

"Bugfixes marked with [UBR] are bug reports that we received from users. Thanks for reporting everyone and keep up the good work!"

• [UBR] Fixed securing values resetting all script values to nil when another script crashes the VM
• Fixed a crash when flying through gate while having it selected
• Fixed a performance issue when loading data from disk
• [UBR] Fixed an issue where dragging fighter blueprints lead to squad fighters being deleted
• [UBR] Fixed an issue where switch to sector wouldn't place players into their alliance ships
• [UBR] Fixed an issue where players would start out with mining lasers that would consume massive amounts of energy
• [UBR] Fixed an issue where Xsotan Fighters were depicted as neutral even though they were already attacking
• [UBR] Fixed an issue where Xsotan Fighters weren't attacked by PDCs
• [UBR] Fixed an issue with the calculation of DPS for overheating weapons