Cosmoteer update 0.26.1 is now available!

This update contains dozens of performance optimizations that combined should significantly improve performance in almost all situations and especially for late-game Career saves. Many testers are seeing a 2x or even better improvement in framerates. We are also hoping that this patch will improve overall multiplayer connection reliability and reduce the frequency of disconnects.

If you have a poorly-performing saved game that has not improved by this patch, please send it to us so that we can investigate and make further optimizations. Likewise, please let us know if you are still experiencing unexpected disconnections while playing multiplayer. Thank you!

Enjoy!



Full patch notes:

• Performance & Stability:
  
  • A huge number of performance optimizations that together should improve performance in many situations, including and especially in late-game Career games. Most late-game Career saves we've tested have at least 2x improved FPS and some as much as 5x improvement.
    
  • Significantly improved multiplayer connection reliability. Disconnects should hopefully be much less common now.
• Balance Changes:
  
  • Thrusters no longer have any magical "lateral" thrust. As a result, ships whose thrusters are mostly disabled/destroyed will no longer be able to rotate or maneuver unexpectedly well for no apparent reason.
    
  • In lieu of lateral thrust, ships with at least one operational thruster now have a very small amount of non-rotational "magic" thrust that they can exert in any direction but only when still or traveling at very low speeds. In general this should almost never be noticeable or significantly impact combat, but it allows ships with poor thrust balance to very slowly maneuver out of difficult spots.
    
  • Reduced Flak Battery ammo capacity from 92 to 52.
    
  • Reduced Flak damage vs ships from 2250 to 1750.
    
  • Increased Flak damage vs projectiles from 2250 to 2500.
    
  • In Build & Battle, teams that are defeated during a battle phase will now be given observer vision for the remainder of the battle phase.
• Visuals:
  
  • Update Flak Battery art to reflect its reduced ammo storage.
    
  • Many particle, VFX, and audio effects will no longer spawn/play/render when zoomed out or off-screen. This should generally not be too obvious but may occasionally be noticeable if you zoom/pan the view quickly or while paused.
    
  • Sun damage VFX will no longer appear on asteroids within the sun's damage zone, and number of sun damage particles for non-asteroids has been reduced. This is a performance optimization.
• Built-In Ships:
  
  • Added 3 new Monolith combat ships: Destructor, Saber and Vanquisher.
    
  • Added 3 new Monolith defense platforms: Medium Chaingun, Medium Deck Cannon, and Medium HE Missile.
    
  • Added 2 new Cabal combat ships: Lesath and Redline.
    
  • Added 4 new Cabal defense platforms: Small HE Missile, Medium HE Missile, Medium Ion, and Medium Laser.
    
  • Added 2 new Imperium combat ships: Qin Shi Huang and Slipstream.
    
  • Added 3 new Imperium defense platforms: Medium HE Missile, Medium Ion, and Medium Laser.
    
  • Added 2 new Fringe combat ships: Hanabi and Shredder.
    
  • Added 4 new Fringe defense platforms: Small HE Missile, Medium HE Missile, Medium Cannon, and Medium Laser.
    
  • Added the winners from the Jan. 2024 Design Contest.
    
  • Miscellaneous updates to various other built-in ships.
• Build & Battle:
  
  • In Build & Battle, players who have forfeited the game will no longer be presented with tech options or a ready button, will receive observer vision, and will be automatically readied up.
• Bug Fixes:
  
  • In Build & Battle, it was possible to refund a stashed tech that was being used on the player's ship.
    
  • Missing "Distribute Power" strings in the controls settings.
    
  • Medium, Large, and Deck Cannon shoot flashes weren't properly rotating to match direction of the barrel.
• Modding:
  
  • Added a 'FloodBuffProvider' that provides buffs via a flood-fill algorithm. (Currently unused in vanilla but planned to be used for a future part.)
    
  • All buff provider components now support multiple 'Criterias'.
    
  • Added a 'Quad' media effect which renders a simple sprite quad at the effect location. (Currently unused in vanilla but planned to be used for a future part.)
    
  • Removed the SuppressWholeShipTargetOverlaysForPartsFilter and SuppressWholeShipTargetOverlaysWhenTargetingShipRelativePoints parameters. The existing SuppressShipWideExplicitTargetsWhenTargetingShipRelativePoints and SuppressDirectControlWhenTargetingPartsFilter parameters now include their functionality.
    
  • Part ContinuousEffects and TriggeredEffects components now support an optional 'MinMediaEffectsIntensity' parameter. If the effect intensity is under this threshold, then the media effects will not be played.
    
  • Part ContinuousEffects and TriggeredEffects components will no longer play their media effects while their ship is not on screen or out of the player's sight range. Set 'MediaEffectsRequireShipInView' to false to always play their media effects.
    
  • Part ContinuousEffects and TriggeredEffects components now support a 'MaxMediaEffectsZoom' parameter that will prevent the media effects from playing if the player zooms out more than the specified amount.
    
  • ContinuousEffects components now support an optional 'IntensityTweenDuration' parameter that if specified will cause the effect intensity to smoothly change over that amount of time. (Modded thrusters will likely want to use this to smooth out intensity changes in their plume VFX.)
    
  • Thrusters no longer support ValueOutputSmoothing. (Use ContinuousEffects' new IntensityTweenDuration instead.)

Cosmoteer release candidate 0.26.1 is now available for testing! (To play this release candidate, you must opt in to test it. Please see this post for info on how to test release candidates.)

Most notably, this release candidate makes major performance improvements that should significantly improve framerates in many situations, especially for late-game Career saves. (If you have a poorly-performing saved game that is not running significantly better with this update, please send it to us for further testing.)

RC1:

• Performance & Stability:
  
  • A huge number of performance optimizations that together should improve performance in many situations, including and especially in late-game Career games. Most late-game Career saves we've tested have at least 2x improved FPS and some as much as 5x improvement.
    
  • Significantly improved multiplayer connection reliability. Disconnects should hopefully be much less common now.
• Visuals:
  
  • Many particle, VFX, and audio effects will no longer spawn/play/render when zoomed out or off-screen. This should generally not be too obvious but may occasionally be noticeable if you zoom/pan the view quickly or while paused.
    
  • Sun damage VFX will no longer appear on asteroids within the sun's damage zone, and number of sun damage particles for non-asteroids has been reduced. This is a performance optimization.
• Balance Changes:
  
  • Thrusters no longer have any magical "lateral" thrust. As a result, ships whose thrusters are mostly disabled/destroyed will no longer be able to rotate or maneuver unexpectedly well for no apparent reason.
    
  • In lieu of lateral thrust, ships with at least one operational thruster now have a very small amount of non-rotational "magic" thrust that they can exert in any direction but only when still or traveling at very low speeds. In general this should almost never be noticeable or significantly impact combat, but it allows ships with poor thrust balance to very slowly maneuver out of difficult spots.
    
  • Reduced Flak Battery ammo capacity from 92 to 52.
    
  • Reduced Flak damage vs ships from 2250 to 1750.
    
  • Increased Flak damage vs projectiles from 2250 to 2500.
    
  • In Build & Battle, teams that are defeated during a battle phase will now be given observer vision for the remainder of the battle phase.
• Built-In Ships:
  
  • Added 3 new Monolith combat ships: Destructor, Saber and Vanquisher.
    
  • Added 3 new Monolith defense platforms: Medium Chaingun, Medium Deck Cannon, and Medium HE Missile.
    
  • Added 2 new Cabal combat ships: Lesath and Redline.
    
  • Added 4 new Cabal defense platforms: Small HE Missile, Medium HE Missile, Medium Ion, and Medium Laser.
    
  • Added 2 new Imperium combat ships: Qin Shi Huang and Slipstream.
    
  • Added 3 new Imperium defense platforms: Medium HE Missile, Medium Ion, and Medium Laser.
    
  • Added 2 new Fringe combat ships: Hanabi and Shredder.
    
  • Added 4 new Fringe defense platforms: Small HE Missile, Medium HE Missile, Medium Cannon, and Medium Laser.
    
  • Miscellaneous updates to various other built-in ships.
• Bug Fixes:
  
  • In Build & Battle, it was possible to refund a stashed tech that was being used on the player's ship.
    
  • Missing "Distribute Power" strings in the controls settings.
    
  • Medium, Large, and Deck Cannon shoot flashes weren't properly rotating to match direction of the barrel.
• Modding:
  
  • Added a 'FloodBuffProvider' that provides buffs via a flood-fill algorithm. (Currently unused in vanilla but planned to be used for a future part.)
    
  • All buff provider components now support multiple 'Criterias'.
    
  • Added a 'Quad' media effect which renders a simple sprite quad at the effect location. (Currently unused in vanilla but planned to be used for a future part.)
    
  • Removed the SuppressWholeShipTargetOverlaysForPartsFilter and SuppressWholeShipTargetOverlaysWhenTargetingShipRelativePoints parameters. The existing SuppressShipWideExplicitTargetsWhenTargetingShipRelativePoints and SuppressDirectControlWhenTargetingPartsFilter parameters now include their functionality.
    
  • Part ContinuousEffects and TriggeredEffects components now support an optional 'MinMediaEffectsIntensity' parameter. If the effect intensity is under this threshold, then the media effects will not be played.
    
  • Part ContinuousEffects and TriggeredEffects components will no longer play their media effects while their ship is not on screen or out of the player's sight range. Set 'MediaEffectsRequireShipInView' to false to always play their media effects.
    
  • Part ContinuousEffects and TriggeredEffects components now support a 'MaxMediaEffectsZoom' parameter that will prevent the media effects from playing if the player zooms out more than the specified amount.
    
  • ContinuousEffects components now support an optional 'IntensityTweenSpeed' parameter that if specified will cause the effect intensity to smoothly change over time.

RC2:

• Moved the Flak Battery's ammo storage tiles to the two center tiles instead of the two side tiles.
  
• RC Bugfix: Crash when moving ships in creative mode using the object selection tool.
  
• RC Bugfix: Crash when selecting parts in build mode with mirror mode enabled.
  
• RC Bugfix: Crash when Boost Thrusters run out of power while boosting.
  
• RC Bugfix: Errors loading saved games with Flak Batteries.
  
• RC Bugfix: Ion Beams and Prisms targeting friendly ships/parts would only fire intermittently.

RC3:

• Update Flak Battery art to reflect its reduced ammo storage.
  
• RC Bugfix: Point Defenses were unable to damage projectiles!

RC4:

• In Build & Battle, players who have forfeited the game will no longer be presented with tech options or a ready button, will receive observer vision, and will be automatically readied up.
  
• Added the winners from the Jan. 2024 Design Contest.
  
• RC Bugfix: Thrusters were taking 3x as long to ramp-up as was intended.
  
• RC Bugfix: Invalid blueprints were often not properly shown as invalid.
  
• RC Bugfix: Thruster plumes appeared to ramp up and down jerkily.
  
• Modding: ContinuousEffects' IntensityTweenSpeed parameter was not properly considering the current game speed.
  
• Modding: ContinuousEffects' IntensityTweenSpeed parameter is now buffable.

RC5:

• Thruster plume VFX should now ramp up and down both more smoothly and more accurately represent the underlying thruster activation level.
  
• RC Bugfix: Crashes caused by RC4's IntensityTweenSpeed changes.
  
• Modding: Replaced ContinuousEffects' IntensityTweenSpeed with IntensityTweenDuration.
  
• Modding: Thrusters no longer support ValueOutputSmoothing. (Use ContinuousEffects' IntensityTweenDuration instead.)

RC6:

• Random crashes during gameplay.

Cosmoteer update 0.26.0 is now available!

This update adds the Modular Rocket Thruster (M.R.T.), a new modular thruster that is constructed out of multiple individual parts, similar to the Railgun. The M.R.T. consists of three different modular parts:

• Rocket Nozzle: Like the Railgun Launcher, this goes on the outside of your ship pointing in the direction of thrust. By itself it has the same thrust as a Huge Thruster, but it can also be extended with the...
  
• Rocket Extender: These go directly behind the Nozzle or another Extender and are analogous to Railgun Accelerators. Each one increases the thrust by +100%, as well as increasing power usage and ramp-up time. (Note that there is no "end module" equivalent of the Railgun Loader.) Unlike Railgun Accelerators, if an Extender (or even the Nozzle itself) runs out of power, the thruster as a whole will continue to function but without that individual extender's contribution.
  
• Rocket Fuel Pod: Unlike normal thrusters, both the Nozzle and Extender have very limited battery capacity (only 2 batteries each), so they'll run out of power very quickly. But you can add up to two Fuel Pods attached to the sides of each Nozzle or Extender to provide +4 batteries per Fuel Pod.

By allowing more of a ship's total thruster power to be housed within the ship's interior, these new M.R.T.s should significantly increase the variety of viable ship shapes and designs.

Have fun!




Full patch notes:

• Modular Rocket Thruster (M.R.T.): A new modular thruster that is constructed out of multiple individual parts, similar to the Railgun. The M.R.S. consists of three different modular parts:
  
  • Rocket Nozzle: Like the Railgun Launcher, this goes on the outside of your ship pointing in the direction of thrust. By itself it has the same thrust as a Huge Thruster, but it can also be extended with...
    
  • Rocket Extender: These go directly behind the Nozzle or another Extender and are analogous to Railgun Accelerators. Each one increases the thrust by +100%, as well as increasing power usage and ramp-up time. (Note that there is no "end module" equivalent of the Railgun Loader.) Unlike Railgun Accelerators, if an Extender (or even the Nozzle itself) runs out of power, the thruster as a whole will continue to function but without the individual extender's contribution.
    
  • Rocket Fuel Pod: Unlike normal thrusters, both the Nozzle and Extender have very limited battery capacity (only 2 batteries each), so they'll run out of power very quickly. But you can add up to two Fuel Pods attached to the sides of each Nozzle or Extender to provide +4 batteries per Fuel Pod.
    
  • About Engine Rooms: You can still use Engine Rooms to buff Rocket Thrusters. They provide the usual +50% buff, but only to the individual Nozzle or Extender modules that they are touching. They cannot provide the buff by touching a Fuel Pod (they have to touch the Nozzle or Extender directly), but they can distribute power to fuel pods through a Nozzle or Extender (i.e. they only have to touch the Nozzle/Extender, not the fuel pod itself; the fuel pod is treated as local storage for the Nozzle/Extender).
• User Interface:
  
  • Engine Room power distribution can now be toggled off. When off, they will still provide the +50% buff to thrusters but will no longer distribute power to them; crew will have to bring power directly to the thruster.
    
  • The Creative Mode "Clear Everything", "Clear Debris", and "Clear Weapon Projectiles" options have been replaced with a new "Clear Objects" option that allows a much larger and more customizable set of object types to be removed from the game.
    
  • The planet "Distance" slider is now called "Depth" to clarify its behavior.
    
  • Various translation updates, including for the new M.R.T.s and the recent Build & Battle improvements.
• Built-In Ships:
  
  • Added 1 new Monolith ship: Emancipator
    
  • Added 1 new Cabal ship: Sol Regius
    
  • Added 1 new Imperium ship: Semiramis
    
  • Added 1 new Fringe ship: Kingslayer
    
  • Renamed Almogavar to Suppressor and Almocaden to Successor.
    
  • Miscellaneous other minor ship updates.
• Bug Fixes:
  
  • Canceling or undoing a part's construction right as it finishes construction could prevent it from getting properly queued for deconstruction, which could then cause ship construction to get "stuck", or sometimes even crash when later reverting blueprints.
    
  • Possible crashes on Linux/Steam Deck when ending the current game instance or switching title screen backgrounds.
    
  • When "I Hate Crew Construction" and "I Hate Salvaging" were both enabled, non-player parts were unintentionally giving a full refund when deconstructed.
    
  • Chaingun Magazines weren't showing the ammunition connection icon when the magazine was flipped relative to the attached Chaingun or Magazine even though it would still feed ammunition.
    
  • In many cases, the window in which thrusters could ramp back up to full power after ramping down was much longer than intended.
    
  • The Ion Beam emitter operating audio had a small audible "pop" in it every few seconds.
    
  • Asteroids that spawned within the sun's damage zone didn't have as much size variety as was intended. (This fix will not affect any star systems that have already been visited.)
• Modding:
  
  • Engine Rooms now distribute power using a new buff type called 'EnginePowerDistribution'. Any modded parts that should receive power from Engine Rooms should now add this buff to their ReceivableBuffs.
    
  • All buff providers now support a list of valid 'Criterias' they can match with.
    
  • Parts now support optional 'MinBuffValues' and 'MaxBuffValues' parameters which allow them to limit the values of incoming received buffs.
    
  • MultiResourceStorage now supports 'DistributeProportionallyByAvailable' and 'DistributeProportionallyByCapacity' modes for both AddMode and RemoveMode.
    
  • Thruster components now support an optional 'ValueOutputFactor' parameter, which itself is buffable.
    
  • The 'AnimationSpeedFactorRenormalize' parameter of Graphics and ResourceSprites is now ignored if its AnimationToggle is off.
    
  • ViaBuffs now supports multiple components using 'ComponentIDs' instead of 'ComponentID'.
    
  • Added a 'BuffableValue' part component which provides a value to other components that can be modified by a buff.
    
  • When multiple buffs are applied to a part, only one of the buff icons is displayed. You can control which buff's icon is displayed by setting the 'IconPriority' parameter for the buffs. (Defaults to 0. The buff with the highest IconPriority will be displayed.)
    
  • Buff icons and text will no longer be displayed for parts that buff themselves.
    
  • Added a 'ValueAccumulator' part component. (Currently unused in vanilla.)
    
  • Fix: The IncomingBuffTypes parameter of ViaBuffs wasn't properly restricting the proxied components to only those of the specified buff types.

Cosmoteer release candidate 0.26.0 is now available for testing! (To play this release candidate, you must opt in to test it. Please see this post for info on how to test release candidates.)

This release candidate adds the Modular Rocket Thruster (M.R.T.), a new modular thruster that is constructed out of multiple individual parts, similar to the Railgun. The M.R.T. consists of three different modular parts:

• Rocket Nozzle: Like the Railgun Launcher, this goes on the outside of your ship pointing in the direction of thrust. By itself it has the same thrust as a Huge Thruster, but it can also be extended with...
  
• Rocket Extender: These go directly behind the Nozzle or another Extender and are analogous to Railgun Accelerators. Each one increases the thrust by +100%, as well as increasing power usage and ramp-up time. (Note that there is no "end module" equivalent of the Railgun Loader.) Unlike Railgun Accelerators, if an Extender (or even the Nozzle itself) runs out of power, the thruster as a whole will continue to function but without the individual extender's contribution.
  
• Rocket Fuel Pod: Unlike normal thrusters, both the Nozzle and Extender have very limited battery capacity (2 batteries each), so they'll run out of power very quickly. But you can add up to two Fuel Pods attached to the sides of each Nozzle or Extender to provide +4 batteries per Fuel Pod.

Please let us know what you think of the M.R.S. and about any bugs or issues that you find. Have fun, and thanks for testing!


RC1:

• Modular Rocket System (M.R.S.): A new modular thruster that is constructed out of multiple individual parts, similar to the Railgun. The M.R.S. consists of three different modular parts:
  
  • Rocket Nozzle: Like the Railgun Launcher, this goes on the outside of your ship pointing in the direction of thrust. By itself it has the same thrust as a Huge Thruster, but it can also be extended with...
    
  • Rocket Extender: These go directly behind the Nozzle or another Extender and are analogous to Railgun Accelerators. Each one increases the thrust by +100%, as well as increasing power usage and ramp-up time. (Note that there is no "end module" equivalent of the Railgun Loader.) Unlike Railgun Accelerators, if an Extender (or even the Nozzle itself) runs out of power, the thruster as a whole will continue to function but without the individual extender's contribution.
    
  • Rocket Fuel Pod: Unlike normal thrusters, both the Nozzle and Extender have very limited battery capacity (2 batteries each), so they'll run out of power very quickly. But you can add up to two Fuel Pods attached to the sides of each Nozzle or Extender to provide +4 batteries per Fuel Pod.
    
  • About Engine Rooms: You can still use Engine Rooms to buff Rocket Thrusters. They provide the usual +50% buff, but only to the individual Nozzle or Extender modules that they are touching. They cannot provide the buff by touching a Fuel Pod (they have to touch the Nozzle or Extender directly), but they can distribute power to fuel pods through a Nozzle or Extender (i.e. they only have to touch the Nozzle/Extender, not the fuel pod itself; the fuel pod is treated as local storage for the Nozzle/Extender).
• User Interface:
  
  • Engine Room power distribution can now be toggled off. When off, they will still provide the +50% buff to thrusters but will no longer distribute power to them; crew will have to bring power directly to the thruster.
    
  • The Creative Mode "Clear Everything", "Clear Debris", and "Clear Weapon Projectiles" options have been replaced with a new "Clear Objects" option that allows a much larger and more customizable set of object types to be removed from the game.
    
  • The planet "Distance" slider is now called "Depth" to clarify its behavior.
• Built-In Ships:
  
  • Added 1 new Monolith ship: Eradicator
    
  • Added 1 new Cabal ship: Sol Regius
    
  • Added 1 new Imperium ship: Semiramis
    
  • Added 1 new Fringe ship: Kingslayer
    
  • Renamed Almogavar to Suppressor and Almocaden to Successor.
    
  • Miscellaneous other minor ship updates.
• Bug Fixes:
  
  • Possible crashes on Linux/Steam Deck when ending the current game instance or switching title screen backgrounds.
    
  • When "I Hate Crew Construction" and "I Hate Salvaging" were both enabled, non-player parts were unintentionally giving a full refund when deconstructed.
• Modding:
  
  • Engine Rooms now distribute power using a new buff type called 'EnginePowerDistribution'. Any modded parts that should receive power from Engine Rooms should now add this buff to their ReceivableBuffs.
    
  • Parts now support optional 'MinBuffValues' and 'MaxBuffValues' parameters which allow them to limit the values of incoming received buffs.
    
  • MultiResourceStorage now supports 'DistributeProportionallyByAvailable' and 'DistributeProportionallyByCapacity' modes for both AddMode and RemoveMode.
    
  • Thruster components now support an optional 'ValueOutputFactor' parameter, which itself is buffable.
    
  • The 'AnimationSpeedFactorRenormalize' parameter of Graphics and ResourceSprites is now ignored if its AnimationToggle is off.
    
  • ViaBuffs now supports multiple components using 'ComponentIDs' instead of 'ComponentID'.
    
  • Added a 'BuffableValue' part component which provides a value to other components that can be modified by a buff.
    
  • When multiple buffs are applied to a part, only one of the buff icons is displayed. You can control which buff's icon is displayed by setting the 'IconPriority' parameter for the buffs. (Defaults to 0. The buff with the highest IconPriority will be displayed.)
    
  • Buff icons and text will no longer be displayed for parts that buff themselves.
    
  • Added a 'ValueAccumulator' part component. (Currently unused in vanilla.)
    
  • Fix: The IncomingBuffTypes parameter of ViaBuffs wasn't properly restricting the proxied components to only those of the specified buff types.

RC2:

• Renamed the Modular Rocket System to Module Rocket Thruster to clarify that this is a new kind of thruster and not a new weapon.
  
• The Creative Mode "Clear Objects" dialog will now remember the previously-selected object types. (Until the app is restarted.)
  
• Bugfix: Canceling or undoing a part's construction right as it finishes construction could prevent it from getting properly queued for deconstruction, which could then cause ship construction to get "stuck", or sometimes even crash when later reverting blueprints.
  
• Bugfix: Chaingun Magazines weren't showing the ammunition connection icon when the magazine was flipped relative to the attached Chaingun or Magazine even though it would still feed ammunition.
  
• Bugfix: The Ion Beam emitter operating audio had a small audible "pop" in it every few seconds.
  
• RC Bugfix: The lighting effects on long Modular Rocket Thruster was extending too far up the thruster and was flickering unnaturally.
  
• Modding: All buff providers now support a list of valid 'Criterias' they can match with.

RC3:

• Bugfix: In many cases, the window in which thrusters (especially M.R.T.s) could ramp back up to full power after ramping down was much longer than intended.
  
• M.R.T. ramp-down is now 2 seconds but increases proportionally as ramp-up increases with each extender.
  
• Adjusted the rocket nozzle's hitbox to better match the size of its sprite.
  
• Translation updates for the M.R.T.s and recent Build & Battle improvements. (Not quite fully translated yet but should be ready for the stable patch.)
  
• Modding: The new 'FractionalNonPlayerRefund' parameter is now optional and won't cause errors if omitted by mods.

RC4:

• RC Bugfix: Ships that use M.R.T.s as retro-thrusters could have issues coming to a stop.

• Bugfix: Crash when starting a Build & Battle game if you had any default crew roles saved.
  
• Bugfix: Ships with predominantly small thrusters could often fail to "settle" into their desired position.
  
• Bugfix: Ship velocity matching when following or attacking another ship was broken.

Cosmoteer patch 0.25.2 is now available! This update adds support for 3-4 teams and free-for-all to the new Build & Battle PvP mode, as well as new built-in ship designs and a handful of bug fixes.

Enjoy!

Full patch notes:

• Build & Battle:
  
  • Free-for-all is now supported with up to 8 players.
    
  • Team games now supports up to 4 teams.
    
  • Team starting positions in the battle phase are now randomized each round.
    
  • Once all players have marked themselves as ready, there will now be a 5 second countdown before the battle phase begins.
    
  • If the player has any default crew roles saved, those will now be loaded automatically at the beginning of the match.
    
  • Chainguns will now start the battle phase fully stocked of ammo even if they were firing at the end of the build phase.
• User Interface:
  
  • In the ship editor, a "bullets" icon will now be displayed on Chainguns and Chaingun Magazines to indicate when they are properly connected.
• Built-In Ships:
  
  • Added 4 new Monolith combat ships: Almocaden, Almogavar, Project Mistilteinn, and Thyreos.
    
  • Added 4 new Cabal combat ships: Cassiopeia, Eclipse, Gienah, and Nashira.
    
  • Added 2 new Imperium combat ships: Augustus and Thunderbird.
    
  • Added 4 new Fringe combat ships: Desecrator, Desolator, Hentzau, and Sicario.
    
  • Renamed the 'Elanine' to 'Robin' and the 'Can Opener' to 'Desperado'.
    
  • Miscellaneous updates to various other built-in ships.
• Bug Fixes:
  
  • The recent fixes to the thruster logic screwed up Direct Control Mode, which should now also be fixed.
    
  • Occasional crash caused by recent thruster A.I. fixes.
    
  • Crash when deleting a planet in creative mode while its options window is open and U.I. animations are turned off.
    
  • The battle phase in Build & Battle could end prematurely if a ship makes an FTL jump, which could lead to various other issues.
    
  • In some circumstances, a ship's A.I. was unable to back away from a very close asteroid or other object.
    
  • Using the "grab" tool to move parts wasn't properly copying the existing part settings to the new part.
    
  • Deconstructing damaged parts was sometimes not giving quite as much resources back as you would have received had you repaired the part first.
    
  • Various text rendering issues when a ship contains an ampersand (&) in its name.
• Modding:
  
  • OpenCloseSprite should now properly move/rotate when the component it is chained to moves or rotates.
    
  • Blueprints now support sprite animations.
    
  • Buff provider components can now be set to 'BlueprintsOnly = true'. This will remove most performance costs for buffs that are only used for display purposes and have no affect on gameplay.

Cosmoteer release candidate 0.25.2 is now available for testing! (To play this release candidate, you must opt in to test it. Please see this post for info on how to test release candidates.)

This release candidate contains improvements to the new Build & Battle PvP mode, new built-in ship designs, and a handful of bug fixes.

Have fun, and thanks for testing!

RC1:

• Build & Battle:
  
  • Free-for-all is now supported with up to 8 players.
    
  • Team games now supports up to 4 teams.
    
  • Team starting positions in the battle phase are now randomized each round.
    
  • Once all players have marked themselves as ready, there will now be a 5 second countdown before the battle phase begins.
    
  • If the player has any default crew roles saved, those will now be loaded automatically at the beginning of the match.
    
  • Chainguns will now start the battle phase fully stocked of ammo even if they were firing at the end of the build phase.
• User Interface:
  
  • In the ship editor, a "bullets" icon will now be displayed on Chainguns and Chaingun Magazines to indicate when they are properly connected.
• Built-In Ships:
  
  • Added 4 new Monolith combat ships: Almocaden, Almogavar, Project Mistilteinn, and Thyreos.
    
  • Added 4 new Cabal combat ships: Cassiopeia, Eclipse, Gienah, and Nashira.
    
  • Added 2 new Imperium combat ships: Augustus and Thunderbird.
    
  • Added 4 new Fringe combat ships: Desecrator, Desolator, Hentzau, and Sicario.
    
  • Renamed the 'Elanine' to 'Robin' and the 'Can Opener' to 'Desperado'.
    
  • Miscellaneous updates to various other built-in ships.
• Bug Fixes:
  
  • The recent fixes to the thruster logic screwed up Direct Control Mode, which should now also be fixed.
    
  • Occasional crash caused by recent thruster A.I. fixes.
    
  • Crash when deleting a planet in creative mode while its options window is open and U.I. animations are turned off.
    
  • The battle phase in Build & Battle could end prematurely if a ship makes an FTL jump, which could lead to various other issues.
    
  • In some circumstances, a ship's A.I. was unable to back away from a very close asteroid or other object.
    
  • Using the "grab" tool to move parts wasn't properly copying the existing part settings to the new part.
    
  • Deconstructing damaged parts was sometimes not giving quite as much resources back as you would have received had you repaired the part first.
    
  • Various text rendering issues when a ship contains an ampersand (&) in its name.
• Modding:
  
  • OpenCloseSprite should now properly move/rotate when the component it is chained to moves or rotates.
    
  • Blueprints now support sprite animations.
    
  • Buff provider components can now be set to 'BlueprintsOnly = true'. This will remove most performance costs for buffs that are only used for display purposes and have no affect on gameplay.

Bugfix: Occasional crash caused by recent thruster A.I. fixes.

Reverted the upgrade to Microsoft .NET 8 because it was incompatible with Steam Deck and Linux. (The upgrade may be reinstated in the future if/when Proton adds .NET 8 support.)

Cosmoteer patch 0.25.1 is now available! This patch primarily has a handful of bug fixes and quality-of-life improvements for the new Build & Battle multiplayer PvP mode.

Meanwhile, we're continuing to work on Career 2.0. That update won't be ready for a while yet, but nearer in the future you can look forward to a new ship part and some more improvements to Build & Battle (such as the oft-requested support for 3+ teams and free-for-all).

Enjoy!

Full patch notes:

• If Build & Battle is played with an unequal number of players on each team, the team with fewer players will now be given more money each round to compensate.
  
• For Build & Battle games, the lobby will now show the current round (and maximum rounds) instead of the time remaining.
  
• In Build & Battle, the beginning of each build or battle phase will now be "introduced" with large text displaying the round number and phase type.
  
• Build & Battle is now translated into all officially-supported langauges.
  
• Miscellaneous other translation updates.
  
• Cosmoteer now runs on the Microsoft .NET 8 Runtime. This may provide a very small boost to performance.
  
• Bugfix: Crash in Build & Battle if the Unstash button was spammed.
  
• Bugfix: Crash in Build & Battle if all the players were on Team 2.
  
• Bugfix: Rare crash when hiring crew.
  
• Bugfix: In Build & Battle, the players' ships could sometimes be spawned overlapping their teammates when returning to the build phase.
  
• Bugfix: In the information box for a Build & Battle game, the victory point limit was being incorrectly displayed with a credits (money) icon.
  
• Bugfix: In the information box for a build & Battle game, the credits per round was not being correctly displayed with a credits (money) icon.
  
• Bugfix: The thruster algorithm wasn't properly taking thruster ramp-up times into consideration, which was causing ships with large thrusters to be more unstable or "wobbly" when flying than necessary.
  
• Bugfix: The small amount of lateral force exerted by thrusters wasn't ramping up and down properly.
  
• Bugfix: At high game speeds and/or low framerates, ship thruster VFX could appear very glitchy.
  
• Bugfix: Any errors initializing UDP sockets for multiplayer should no longer prevent you from playing "Online" via Steam.
  
• Bugfix: Hosting a multiplayer game with a very large number of mods activated could prevent the game from appearing in the lobby's list of games.
  
• Bugfix: Visual and audio effects would sometimes not play or were glitchy while in Direct Control Mode while the controlled ship was moving quickly and either the game speed was set very high or the framerate was low.
  
• Bugfix: Minor background color issues on some sprites including structure tiles, resources, projectiles, and crew.
  
• Modding: In Build & Battle, multiple techs can now unlock the same resources and toggle choices.
  
• Modding: Fixed crash when crew construction is enabled if a part lists the same resource type multiple times.
  
• Modding: Particle effects now support optional 'FpsCompensation' and 'FpsCompensation' parameters that will "fast-forward" emitted particles by varying amounts to compensate for low FPS. This can be used in addition to or as an alternative for FpsCompensator. It uses more CPU than FpsCompensator and can't spread out the initial starting location of particles like FpsCompensator can, so it is recommend that you still use FpsCompensator unless you have a specific need for the new FpsCompensation parameter.
  
• Modding: The particle 'Lerp' updater was usually reading LerpIn values from the wrong particles when used as an initializer.
  
• Modding: Fixed crash when trying to open the planet generator editor.