It’s hard to believe that another year is coming to a close. Sneaky Saint Gorgie is up to their old tricks and while some Marines have been getting some nasty yucky and gooey clogs in their stockings, that silly Saint Gorgie also seems to be dropping off lots of goodies too! We’ve expanded our available skins, and a whole new list of items have been added to your customize menu for you to further put your style on display. Some of our previous packs or individual skins have been expanded to cover more items and there are also a handful of all new individual weapons skins to check out. If you owned a now expanded DLC pack previously, then you get the added skins to that pack free of charge. This is our thank you to you for your continued support of our team and development of Natural Selection 2. If you don’t already own some of those packs or individual skins, some DLC packs will be on-sale starting December 22 on our steam store.

Update 336 also includes the merger of the NS2+ mod features directly into the released game, under a newly titled Advanced options menu. A special thank you also the Mendasp, the original creator/maintainer of the NS2+ mod. It is very clear the impact this mod has had on the game since its inception, and we are thankful for the many hours and support they have shown the community over the years.

Many of the original maps have also gone through some changes, including some major changes to Docking and Refinery. As always, we hope that you will look through the list of other changes and bug fixes that went into this update. So many people have been involved in this project over the years, and the lasting impacts continue to show through.

As we move forward to 2021, the Development Team is looking forward to the alpha release of our match-making system code named: Thunderdome. We hope that this new system will allow players all over the world to have quick and stable access to play a round of NS2 and create a way for more games to happen. We are also in the late stages of developing backend support to move our NS2 Steam Workshop to support UGC. We are as always excited to bring you new options and features to NS2, and thank you for all your support and feedback over the years.

Merry Gorgemas from all of us at UWE and the Community Development Team!

Remember all sales of NS2 and DLC directly affect our development budget and allow our team to continue work on NS2.

The following balance changes have been live in the UWE Hotfix Extension for a few weeks, so you have likely already been playing with them!

• Adrenaline: No longer increases maximum energy pool. Increased energy regeneration rate remains the same.
  
• Gorges now have 50 armor (down from 75) (-16% eHP)
  
• Gorge Webs are now always 1 hit with the axe. Additionally, the hitbox has been adjusted so that axes can now hit them more consistently.
  
• MAC cost is now 3 from 5
  
• MAC supply cost is now 15 from 5
  
• Robotics Factory Cost is now 5 from 10
  
• ARC Factory Upgrade cost is now 10 from 5
  
• ARC Factory Upgrade no longer requires an Armory.
  
• Pulse Grenade Damage and Energy Damage radius is now 4 from 3 and 10, respectively.
  
• Pulse Grenade no longer tapers damage based on distance.
  
• Cluster Grenade now only gives 20% of its damage to players, from 50%.
  
• New Cinematics for pulse grenade explosion added.
  
• Grenade launcher grenade damage decreased to 74. However, damage now scales with Marine weapon upgrades, so normal damage will be achieved with weapons 3. (this means on weapons zero the GL will do 82% of its previous damage, gaining 7% damage per weapons level)
  
• Flamethrower damage decreased to 10. However, damage now scales with Marine weapon upgrades, so normal damage will be achieved with weapons 3. (this means on weapons zero the FT will do 82% of its previous damage, gaining 7% damage per weapons level)
  
• Things on fire will take damage that is scaled with Marine weapon upgrades. 7% per upgrade.
  
• Fire puddles spawned from flamethrower will now also scale with Marine weapon upgrades. 7% bonus per upgrade.
  
• Fade Initial Blink speeds are now 15.5, and 16 for celerity (up from 15 and 15.5). Speed clamp for rapid turns has been increased to 16, up from 15.

• The bulk of all cosmetic skins now use our material hot-swapping system. This reduces the amount of data each client must cache, and prevents the server from having to swap models. This also eliminates the need for clients to precache all the various models that were previously used.

• The popular server mod known as NS2+ is now officially integrated into the game as the Advanced options menu.
  
• Scan range will be shown now before you click on the ground as a Marine commander, so you know the affected region beforehand. (Thanks Katzen!)
  
• All previously existing skin set DLCs for Marines and Aliens are now updated to include all missing lifeforms, weapons or equipment.
  
• For instance, this means if you already owned the Kodiak DLC you previously only had the Rifle as a Marine weapon skin – but now you automatically will have all weapons and even a new Kodiak Command Station skin. We feel this brings more value to the existing DLC sets. However, like the rare Skull and Crossbones Rifle skin, we also included 3 new premium Rifle skins that are not in any bundle. All of the new items for the various sets will only be freely awarded if you own their associated DLC; the sets will not automatically be completed if each item in it was bought individually.
  
• Added a popup when you launch the game that will warn users if they are running the game on a HDD instead of an SSD or equivalent.
  
• It’s not hardware shaming if it’s helpful, right?
  
• Added new Pulse grenade fx to match the new consistent damage and effect radius.
  
• Renamed Force Even Teams to Balance Teams to better communicate the change in behavior for the feature.
  
• The Top Bar (shows team resources, players in spawn queue, etc) will now toggle on or off automatically when showing the Scoreboard in order to better show the server name and round time.
  
• Improved the in game chat with a subtle drop shadow for readability.

• Fixed that Commander skills were not being computed correctly due to an error in tracking the amount of time a player was actually a Commander.
  Note: All Commander skills will be reset as a result of this bug. Due to the invalid data generated by this issue, it created widely incorrect skill values. All players will have half of their average skill applied to their Commander skill upon reset, in order to increase the speed in which Commander skill is accurately determined. This does not apply to any other player-skill, only Commander.
  
  
• Fixed Refraction graphics option defaulting to High even if Low was selected and shown, causing some FPS loss in certain situations.
  
• Fixed the occasional issue of research notifications showing up twice on screen at the same time.
  
• Fixed that the research notification feature could possibly cause tech tree desync issues that may have prevented aliens from evolving during a round with certain server modifications or plugins. (Like shuffle on round start)
  
• Fixed that the parasite status icon did not show for Exos when using Low HUD Detail.
  
• Fixed a “Green Checkmark” indicator for tooltips auto completing on spawn for new players.
  
• Fixed the Gorge Belly Slide tooltip angrily spamming until it consumed the entirety of your screen. We want to teach players, not bewilder them.
  
• Fixed tier one BMAC skins (Friendly Yellow and Military Green) were not visible in the Customize Screen if they were not owned already.
  
• Fixed damaging multiple targets at the same time with the Grenade Launcher would clump together the damage numbers on screen making them unreadable.
  
• Fixed build rates being unintentionally nerfed for Marines. (fixed in extension mod)
  
• Fixed Gorge Bile Mines being unintentionally nerfed in damage. (fixed in extension mod)
  
• Fixed that Bot names were not updated to include new Playtester names.
  
• Fixed Alien Tunnel tooltip typos. Their shoul’dnt bee anymoire.
  
• Fixed Alien Tunnel’s Collapse binding being inconsistently on the wrong key compared to any other structure. It’s now on the V key.
  
• Fixed Crags always playing its healing (passive or active) animation and the associated effects once built. It will now only play them when actually healing.

• All map ambient sounds now have a volume slider adjustment (global setting).

[/list]

• Merged in NS2+ lights as “Minimal lights” into the following maps (Thanks pSyk):
  
• Biodome, Descent, Eclipse, Summit, Tram and Veil
  
• Biodome (Thanks pSyk)
  
  • Smoothed out collision around the vent entrance in Alley to help Aliens not getting stuck.
    
  • Fixed Marine stuck spot in vent entrance in CO2 Scrubbers.
    
  • Fixed structure placement exploits in the tubes in Hydroponics.
• Descent (Thanks pSyk)
  
  • Fixed preplaced IP being out of CC range in Drone Bay and thus randomly placed.
    
  • Fixed being able to arc Drone Bay Harvester from Hydro.
    
  • Fixed being able to arc Launch Control Harvester from Club.
• Docking
  
  • Commander Invisible overhauled from scratch (Thanks The Salty Sea Captain)
    
  • Redone Pathing from scratch (Thanks Kash)
    
  • Tweaked collision on problematic props throughout the map (Thanks Kash)
    
    • Cafeteria – (Thanks pSyk)
      
    • Moved one of the pillars to make room for commander structures and also block a line of sight from the Bar entrance to the tech point.
  • Central Access
    
    • Broken down some of the railings to allow for more fluid movement through the room. (Thanks pSyk)
      
    • Relocated the exit to the north of the room. (Thanks Mephilles)
  • Courtyard
    
    • Removed a trick jump that allowed marines to climb up near the Locker Room entrance much faster
      than intended. (The forklift trick jump is still possible)
  • Ballcourt – (Thanks to Mephilles, pSyk and Kash)
    
    • Added floor panels and general clutter to the room.
      
    • Reduced length of the room by approximately 20%
  • Back Alley – (Thanks Mephilles)
    
    • The whole hallway area has had its width almost doubled and extra cover added.
  • East Wing – (Thanks Mephilles)
    
    • Reduced the height variation by 48 units (around the height of a 4 step staircase).
  • Stability Monitoring – (Thanks Mephilles and Kash)
    
    • Introduced a small height variation to the room and added extra cover.
  • Terminal – (Thanks Mephilles)
    
    • Rerouted the exit leading to Courtyard.
  • Landing Pad – (Thanks Kash)
    
    • Added blockers to prevent players getting underneath the Landing Pad.
• Metro (Thanks Mephilles)
  
  • Winter Seasonal decorations added to the ready room.
• Origin (Thanks pSyk)
  
  • Added Minimal Lights support.
    
  • Replaced waterfalls in Maint, Bio and RR with new, shorter ones from Summit (Thanks IronHorse).
    
  • Fixed unpowered spot in Power Core (Thanks Euphie and Salty).
• Refinery (Thanks Zavaro and Psyk!)
  
  • General
    
    • Cleaned up layers in editor
      
    • Moved map several hundred units away from the origin to prevent weird cinematic bug
      
    • Significantly cleaned up CommanderInvisible group
      
    • Improved the Refinery main menu
      
    • Containment
      
    • Added additional line of sight blocks
      
    • Moved tech point slightly
      
    • Removed bullet collision for ceiling geo
      
    • Included some bits to protect aliens on ceiling geo
      
    • Moved Chasm-Containment door up slightly for players to more easily fit through
      
    • Moved Heatsink-Containment big crate more into Containment to removed significant line of sight problems
      
    • Minor cosmetic changes
  • Chasm
    
    • Moved resource nozzle (Thanks, Psyk!)
      
    • Removed some ceiling cover
      
    • Moved Chasm-Lava Falls connector to Turbine entrance
      
    • Added path for Marines to jump into Containment-Chasm vent
      
    • Removed ceiling Chasm vent
      
    • Added some cover to Turbine-Chasm hallway
      
    • Added path for Marines to jump into Chasm-Conduit-Routing vent
      
    • Added CollisionGeometry to Containment-Chasm corner to prevent players from getting both stuck and in places they are not supposed to be
      
    • Added new damage trigger under the Chasm’s chasm pipes to prevent players from thinking going to the bottom is a good idea
      
    • Fixed some Lava Falls-Chasm vent layer shenanigans
      
    • Fixed getting stuck on the walls in the Lava Falls-Chasm vent
      
    • Some minor cosmetic changes including missing grating backface
  • Turbine
    
    • Increase the size of Turbine platform
      
    • Added Turbine-Chasm vent
      
    • Added additional bisecting pipe for cover
      
    • Fixed stuck spot in corner behind pipe
      
    • Added considerable contrast to the scene
      
    • Minor cosmetic changes including all new electric cinematics under the floor (Thanks, Ironhorse!)
  • Conduit
    
    • Added additional pipes for cover and flanking
      
    • Updated CollisionGeo near ceiling
      
    • Fixed floor collision
      
    • Minor cosmetic changes
  • Routing
    
    • Added new resource nozzle (Thanks, Psyk!)
      
    • Added small nooks in the hallway to remove narrowness
      
    • Added significantly more cover (Thanks, Psyk!)
      
    • Moved Smelting-Routing vent exit
      
    • Added Chasm-Conduit-Routing vent
      
    • Minor cosmetic changes and fog!
  • Smelting
    
    • Added big pillars to the middle of the room
      
    • Replaced bucket cinematics with static props for cover and visuals
      
    • Added more cover to Routing-Smelting platform
      
    • Minor cosmetic changes
  • Transit
    
    • Replaced bucket cinematics with static props for cover and visuals
      
    • Added pillar to Transit resource nozzle room-dark hallway
      
    • Added more cover to resource nozzle room
      
    • Moved Smelting-Routing-Extraction vent from Extraction to Transit
      
    • Fixed an area with duplicate geometry
  • Extraction
    
    • Moved Smelting-Routing-Extraction vent from Extraction to Transit
      
    • Added quick jump ramp from Extraction to Flow Control
      
    • Moved big ceiling platform upward to prevent Exos and Onos from getting stuck
      
    • Added yellow lines to the Flow Control window to help players to more easily visualize the area
  • Flow Control
    
    • Heavily modified Extraction-side entrance to prevent incredible long lines of sight for Grenade Launchers to siege the tech point (Still possible, may fix)
      
    • Added yellow lines to the Flow Control window to help players to more easily visualize the area
      
    • Removed invincibility spot in the ceiling
  • Exchange
    
    • Added yellow lines to Exchange window to help players more easily visualize the area
      
    • Removed invulnerability spot on the ceiling
      
    • Fixed pipe prop abruptly ending
  • Empty Space
    
    • Fixed some collision geometry by Pipeworks entrance to prevent players from getting stuck
      
    • Onos can now fit behind the resource tower
      
    • Non-Onos/Exo players can now move around Pipeworks-Exchange pipe in the small connector room
  • Pipeworks
    
    • Moved large pillar westward to shrink space for players attacking the tech point
      
    • Minor visual changes
  • Heatsink
    
    • Heavily modified Pipeworks-Heatsink exit to provide a better player experience with different cover, a different style of turn and more open floorspace for better fights
      
    • Moved Heatsink-Containment big crate more into Containment to removed significant line of sight problems
      
    • Fixed top of Heatsink support structure piping
      
    • Removed invincibility spot on Heatsink chasm
      
    • Added CollisionGeometry to keep players from getting stuck behind cargo crates
      
    • Added CollisionGeometry to east wall to prevent players from getting caught on it
      
    • Added skirt underneath lift to keep players from thinking they can get under it
      
    • Changed mid-room vent entrance to wall for easier access for skulks
      
    • Added CollisionGeometry to wall to make it harder to get stuck on in combat
  • Lava Falls
    
    • Removed southern Lava Fall resource nozzle
      
    • Replaced large multi-tiered tower with single level pillar
      
    • Moved resource nozzle
      
    • Added significant amount of cover around resource nozzle platform
      
    • Added jump from southern Lava Falls to room bisecting pipe
      
    • Repurposed ceiling platform cover as hanging cover for southern Lava Falls bisecting pipe
      
    • Added big electric thing from southern Lava Falls to northern Lava Falls
      
    • Added pillars near Containment-Lava Falls entrance for more cover
      
    • Added much more cover to southern Lava Falls
      
    • Added more pipes for cover to account for multi-tiered tower being removed for flying/blinking lifeforms
      
    • Added pillars to eastern Lava Falls-Chasm connector
      
    • Added pipe underneath platform to prevent players from thinking they can get underneath it
      
    • Removed collision on lava fall prop, so you better be absolutely sure you want to jump into it
      
    • Fixed collision with CollisionGeometry for each lava fall
      
    • Major cosmetic changes including new Lava Falls cinematics, decals, and fog!
• Summit (Thanks pSyk)
  
  • Fixed wall climbing issues with the pillars in Crossroads.
    
  • Fixed stuck spot in corridor ceiling between Comp Lab and Flight.
    
  • Reduced occluders and cinematics to improve performance.
    
  • Shortened waterfall cinematics to improve performance (Thanks IronHorse).
    
  • Replaced majority of water splash cinematics with another version that gets removed by ns2+ particles option.
    
  • Moved one starting IP in Atrium more to the left outside onto the catwalk to create more space for base building.
• Veil (Thanks pSyk)
  
  • Fixed Fade stuck spot in Topo between the pipes.
    
  • Removed shadow casting on several lights (high & low) in C12.

• Added console command “version” to be able to determine internal incremental build ID for testing purposes.

• Added “Minimal Lights” group to the editor. This allows mappers to more efficiently create minimal lights (previously ns2+ high performance lights) to maps.
  
• Added Client.GetReadyForOverrideMaterials() to indicate a render model can have any of its materials overridden.

• If you pick up a weapon skin you do not own and attempt to change *any* weapon skin – even a different one than what you have equipped – it will revert the unowned skin you are holding to the default normal skin. We ideally want this only to happen if you change the skin of the weapon you’re holding.
  
• If you look very closely you might notice your military BMAC skin change to the default yellow for exactly 1 frame while weapon swapping.
  
• Selecting the Colorblind mode in Advanced options can be difficult due to the drop down menu’s positioning.

October is always an exciting time of year for our Natural Selection Development Team, and this year is no exception. 18 years ago a totally unique and amazing new mod for half-life hit the interwebs and for many us, changed our lives. Fast forward to today, and its sequel Natural Selection 2 is celebrating eight years since release. Our Team and dedicated community continue to get games active and going 24hrs a day around the world and today is our next step in supporting all of you into the future. Update 335 is the official release of Hive Skill 3.0 (see our previous blog detailing the changes), our latest update to the backend skill tracking and sorting system for NS2. Hive Skill 3.0 for the first time introduces per team skill tracking including commander roles too. Our hope is to help better sort teams for more even rounds and enjoyable gameplay, but we want to make sure you know that this wont happen instantly. The update to the backend code is being merged with current data and will take many new rounds to begin to fully flesh out its adjustments, but in general our new algorithm seems to be doing better from the start. And just to be clear, no existing skill data/rank is lost in the update. An absolutely huge thank you to CDT Member Moultano for all his math wizardry.

Under the hood we have some bug fixes and enhancements to various maps and cinematics to entice you with some fun new gameplay. You can read all about those and other changes with this update in the changelog below.

Happy Natural Selection Anniversary Week!

Remember all sales of NS2 and DLC directly affect our development budget and allow our team to continue work on NS2.

Gameplay

• Maturity and Gestation (Alien egg evolving) both now have a slight softcap in regards to their rate of completion being sped up by Nutrient Mist and/or Gorge Healspray.
• Mines will now only show on the map for enemies if they have been damaged recently or are currently Parasited.
• The Fade has had some movement changes with the goal of making it more visually consistent and predictable. 
  • Air friction has been increased (feels heavier) when achieving high speeds and not currently in Blink. 
  • Blink now has a minimum speed of 13.5
  • Blink now has an initial speed (first Blink) of 15
  • Additional Blink speed gained from each Celerity upgrade chamber is now 0.2 from 0.5. (Total of three chambers = 0.6 from 3)
  • Auto-crouch feature was removed until a better solution can be found. We recommend holding that crouch key at all times like in the old days.

Tweaks / Improvements

• Your Hive Skill will now account for which team you play on or command.
• Added new Research Notifications for field players, to help keep track of researching tech. You might notice that Research Notifications show on the left side of the HUD for both teams and as a result your in use upgrades are shown on the right side for both teams. This feature can be disabled in the NS2+ option “Research Notifications”. 
• We’ve made multiple changes to the Marine flashlight to make it more useful in poor lighting conditions. Most notably a larger cone size, a greater range, and being brighter. It also has had its atmospherics setting brought down to almost nothing, so you won’t have to worry about your teammates blinding you anymore! Lastly it has specular graphics enabled for the first time and the color profile has been tweaked subtly to be friendlier on the eyes.
• Tunnel collapse killfeed icon now has a fitting icon.
• All weapon tracers created from firing weapons (e.g. Marine Rifle, Hydras, Lerk Spikes etc) will now be visible even when their origin point is not visible. This will help telegraph where attacks are coming from, even around corners.
• New Gorge Spit effect and model, which now is highlighted in Alien Vision. This aids in the player’s ability to track the speed of the projectile for accuracy purposes, while also making it more visible for everyone to respond to.

Fixes

• Fixed being able to very slightly shoot farther than what your camera was showing at the extreme angles when looking up or down.
• Fixed being unable to connect to a server while already in a listen server.
• Fixed throwing a grenade right away when a Marine player has no weapon in both primary and secondary slots while also placing a mine. 
• Fixed Consume and Recycle playing the “Research Complete” effect when complete.
• Fixed changing some options not saving correctly to disk unless Apply was used. You should’ve been clicking Apply anyways though, because it was the right thing to do. I bet you don’t even use your blinker in space.
• Fixed “Mines” text being plural since there’s only one Mine in a pack now.
• Fixed progress bar that shows up in the bottom-center of the screen not using the correct team theme whenever you see it correctly, then get forced onto another team, for example with cheats or via some balancing mod.
• Fixed progress bar for Alien Commander UI where consuming something would incorrectly say “Upgrading…”.
• Fixed Tunnel Collapse tip text saying “TIP” because.. well, it wasn’t much help was it?
• Fixed repairs from MAC and Welders repairing too fast due to it ignoring the health-per-armor value.
• Fixed the occasional displaying of the old loading screen concept art.
• All child cinematics triggered by normal Cinematics playback now inherit their parent’s visibility. We encourage proper cinematic rearing around here, ok.
• Hydras will no longer be shown on the killfeed when digested. You can safely eat them in silence, like a fat kid raiding the pantry at 2 am.
• Fix the client crashing when failing to mount a mod when connecting to a server
• Fixed reflections sometimes using the wrong tint. Super shiny infestation in dimly lit rooms are no more.
• Fixed Bile mine not affecting structure health even when armor has been fully depleted.
• Fixed tracers not being deleted rarely, which could cause them to continue to add up in the background and dropping your framerate to extreme lows. 

Maps

• Caged (Thanks pSyk)
  • Removed shadow casting pointlights to improve performance
• Metro (Thanks Shrimm, pSyk, Mephilles)
  • Added Halloween assets in Ready Room
  • Performance improvements to Underpass, Slum and low lights quality
  • Fixes to GL bounce spots in Arrivals and Midtown
  • Added a fuel car in Arrivals to reflect the big crates used in Jambi's Pipeworks
  • Opened the first door leading to Lobby coming from Lane to give Aliens more options to flank Marines in Arrivals without getting chip-damage.
  • Adjusted cover in Underpass, added pillar, rerouted road, moved lightposts and forklift around.
  • Improved lighting of several vent entrances and added details to make them easier to spot
  • Trick jump in Alley vent should be easier now.
  • Added Pre-Placed Infantry Portals for marines.
  • Improved clogability of Underpass->Midtown Connection. You can no longer sidle the walls as a marine
  • Reversed ceiling cover in Underpass->Midtown Connection. You can now use it against enemies coming from midtown.
  • Improved minimap appearance of vents, Should be easier to see some vent entrances from the minimap now.
  • Fixed issues with lobby minimap generation being too bright.
  • Minor visual fixes and QoL fixes here and there.
  • Increased ceiling space above Arrivals techpoint
  • Added minivents in arrivals from techpoint ceiling area to north side of the room
  • Changes to Atrium to help Aliens against ARCs
• Origin (Thanks pSyk)
  • Visual tweaks ( wet decals )
  • Made the connection between Monitoring and Water Treatment slightly more alien friendly
  • Added 2 more small obstacles between Generator and Ventilation to help aliens against ARCs
• Summit (Thanks pSyk)
  • Visual update (More details, better lighting, wet decals, etc.)
  • Added new cinematics (Thanks IronHorse!)
  • Moved res node in Flight Control
  • Removed open (negative) space in Flight Control by adding more rock slides
  • Added a bit of rock cover in the corridor between Flight and Comp
  • Widened the vents in that corridor, so it's easier to drop into them
  • Removed one ceiling grating part in that corridor as well
  •  to give Aliens more vertical options
  • Moved the powernode in Comp Lab (can't ambush a Marine from the vent anymore)
  • Added some elevation to the vent part between Sub and Maintenance so a single Marine can't go to Comp from Ventilation (new vent exit!)
  • Added a medium container in Maintenance
  • Aliens can now use the Crossroad vent carefully to not trigger the Maintenance door
  • Added a new cover and ambush spot between Glass Hallway and Data Core
  • Made the power node chamber in the middle of Data Core more friendly for tunnel placement
  • Added 2 small obstacles near the res node area in Data Core to make it easier to engage Marines shooting res node and tunnel
  • Moved power node in Summit Reception to the pillar and made it thicker
  • Removed/Broke railings in Summit Reception and Crossroads
  • Shrunk the tree in Atrium so one Marine can catch a Skulk
  • Added floor screens/signs in Atrium as cover to make up for the smaller tree
  • You can now get out of the Crevice pit when you fall down onto the rock ledge above death trigger
  • Combined the two ceiling extrusions into one big one above the hallway between Sub and Comp
  • Reduced the length of the Glass Hallway troll vent so Skulks can only use 2 of the 3 gratings to parasite through.
  • Minor visual fixes and QoL fixes here and there.
• Docking (Thanks Runestorm!)
  • Added many wetmaps in various places. (My shower locker rooms immersion is finally complete)

Tools

• Updated Tracy profiler
• In game Profile console command will no longer crash through loading
• LaunchPad now correctly handles updating Mod descriptions and no longer adds blank lines when publishing.

SDK

• Builder options under the “Build” toolbar are now saved.
• Builder will now prompt a confirmation window if you attempt a Rebuild.

Known Issues

• There’s still some typos with tips and the tunnel consume grid position is not consistent with other consume positioning. This is fixed in the next patch.

Eclipse Tower is in ruin after the Kharaa invasion. The battle was brought home in the name of “scientific research,” deemed necessary to protect our future. We thought the battle was over and all were safe, but we were wrong…

The Kharaa have escaped to the streets below Eclipse Tower and are already advancing throughout the district. Reinforcements have been called in as the streets, markets and clubs are evacuated. The war for our human existence rages on. We have to hurry to eliminate the threat; they’ve reached the Metro lines and can quickly spread out across the entire city.

As the fights continue into the tunnels of the Metro, shimmers of blue and white appear in the darkness. A faint shriek can be heard in the distance, it seems familiar but all the same different. What new terror Lerks in the darkness?

The team is excited to bring you our most ambitious map to date, METRO. This new and unique map truly brings us to the Human world and leaves behind the remote facilities of distant meteors and other planets. We owe a huge thank you to the many map testers and a very dedicated group of Community Developers including; Kash, Mephilles, pSyK, Shrimm, Loki, Zavaro, Paul Wolfe, Runestorm, Vlaad and Master G. They’ve all worked hard over the last few months (if not more) to take the inspiration from community map Jambi and re envision a whole new look and style for the NS2 universe. Be sure to enable the reflections graphics option in game to really see the map at its best.

Remember all sales of NS2 and DLC directly affect our development budget and allow our team to continue work on NS2.


Marines:

• Armslab t-res cost increased to 20 (up from 15)
  
• Armor 1 and Weapons 1 research times now take 75 seconds each (up from 60 seconds)
  
• Power node build time is now 12 seconds (up from 8)
  
• Shotgun scaling received from the Armslab weapons upgrades is now 5.9% (down from 10%) [Damage per shot is now 170/180/190/200 down from 170/187/204/221]
  
• The Shotgun now has falloff once again from 5-15m, 50% maximum penalty, linear
  
• Pistol damage is now 20 normal damage (down from 25 light)
  
• Decreased the maximum number of mines per marine from 2 to 1, reduced the cost from 10 to 5 p-res

Aliens:

• Skulk bitecone reduction has been reverted to 1.2x1.2 (up from 0.8x1.2)
  
• Skulk sneak speed is now 4.3 (up from 4.0)
  
• Skulks now receive 50% speed boost on the initial jump
  
• Advanced Metabolize now requires Biomass 5 to research. (up from 4)
  
• Vampirism: Each shell now adds 0.5 seconds of shield duration before the shield starts to decay. (3 shells will now give 1.5 seconds of shield duration before decay begins) [Up from a flat 0.5 second duration]

• Added the new map, METRO
  
• Removed Exo Railgun target highlighting, as it could introduce severe frame-rate drops in some cases. We may revisit this at a later date, but for now it was worth removing.

• Fixed that Marines could see consumed Tunnels in the kill feed.
  
• Fixed the Retry or Reconnect console commands not being usable when already connected to a server.
  
• Fixed that the client would not receive a popup warning them that mods have been disabled when updating to a newer version of the game.
  
• Fixed Railguns being unable to deal damage to an alien when the skybox was behind them.
  
• Fixed wrong damage numbers showing from corrosive damage. For example, using Bile Bomb on a 90 armor marine would show 146 damage instead of 180.
  
• Fixed damage numbers showing too much damage done to Exos upon death.
  
• Fixed the killing shot done to an empty Exosuit showing separate damage numbers.
  
• Fixed Main Menu background sound effects would continue playing when loading into a server or local mod.
  
• Fixed that Drifters could not patrol between more than two points.
  
• Fixed warm up mode showing the default Armory model instead of the Advanced Armory.
  
• Fixed the Arc Factory research progress would not actually show on the Tech Tree menu.
  
• Fixed the typo in the Commander Prototype menu that said “Jetpack, Jetpack”.
  
• Fixed a crash when disconnecting from a server.

• New atmospheric cityscape sound added for Metro (Thanks MasterG!)

METRO (new map)
Special thank you to the following people and all of our Map and Play Testers:

• Kash - Project lead, 2d/3d signs, some in-editor work
  
• Mephilles - Lots of in editor detailing and bug fixing.
  
• pSyk - Performance master, in editor detailing and final lighting.
  
• Shrimm - Lots of in editor detailing, Bug fixing and NAMT leading.
  
• Loki - Map’s godfather and visionary.
  
• Zavaro - Reskinning assets and tweaking trim textures
  
• Samoose - Extra textures, loading screens
  
• Paul Wolfe - Stalls and holograms
  
• Runestorm - A metric ton of new textures, decals and models
  
• Vlaad - Many awesome 3d models (lamps, streetlights, the truck, ac units etc)
  
• MasterG - City Soundscape.

Unearthed (Thanks Kash!)

• Lighting Tweaks mapwide, unearthed in general should perform better, especially with shadows enabled on high quality lights.
  
• Altered collision issues map wide to make for a smoother experience.
  
• Fixed stuck spots in Transfer, a lot of stuck spots indeed.
  
• Holes fixed in multiple spots throughout the map.
  
• Occlusion alterations in Toxic Pool, Transfer, Regulation and Furnace to address performance concerns in those areas.
  
• Added a sheet of cover to Toxic Pool.

• Editor - Fixed that box selection could be a little bit too sensitive, resulting in the mapper sometimes unknowingly selecting a large amount of stuff behind a wall when they only wanted to select the wall.

Added "wetmaps" to the game. This allows mappers to specify regions that should appear "wet" or "damp" without having to modify materials to create wet variations of them. Similar to fog volumes, mappers can specify "wetmap volumes" -- areas bounded by an arbitrary mesh volume and give it a "wetness" value. Then, the sharp edges can be smoothed over by placing wetmap decals.

• Reflections do not initialize in the main menu on first launch.

Check out the new map METRO, coming soon in update 333 in a casted 6v6 brawl! METRO features a never before seen new cityscape aesthetic and awesome new art!

Watch the Stream VoD here on twitch!

Greetings Citizens!

While it’s been a while since the B.M.A.C. production came online through the Trans-Gov Federation, we’ve been in the background quietly tinkering away on deep system improvements within the mainframe while aboard this station. We recognize the Kharaa threat is an ever present and increasing one, and because of that the Federation wants you to know that your well being is important to them.

As such we’ve made things go faster. We’ve oiled up some rusty parts. And we’ve reprogrammed the nanites to not be so painful upon injection. We think we’ve made good progress and are excited to show you some of our work by getting it into your hands for assessment double time. Just be sure you don’t forget to fill out the p3.1415 forms in the Discord server to let us know how satisfactory your experience was.

Contained within TSF-Software-Patch.332 is a host of improvements to both performance and stability, as well as some new customization options for the Elite B.M.A.C. package, and entirely rewritten AI behavior. There’s also balance changes and visual changes. The list is long but fear not, if you do not read the entirety of the log the fine is only 500,000 credits per section 10.2009 of the Articles of Citizenship. 

We still have some exciting and very large features to add in the next software update that will arrive soon, such as matchmaking and a new city to defend, Metro. But these tasks are so large that the Federation has brought another member aboard our team to help: Salads. Please welcome him with the traditional and formal greeting per regulations. He’ll be in the back of the station, behind the terminals that say High Voltage.

Remember all sales of NS2 and DLC directly affect our development budget and allow our team to continue work on NS2.

This is Command Station Alpha, over and out.


Changelog


Gameplay

The long list of balance and gameplay changes can be found here in a separate blog


Optimizations

• Removed one frame of mouse input delay that was always present in the game! You felt it, we felt it, it was only a matter of finding and destroying it after all these years of looking. Here is an example in 30 fps of the degree of impact this had on aiming before it was fixed, where the green ball represents the amount of the delay that was present compared to the pink crosshair.
  
• Optimized worker thread load to prevent blocking other threads from running (which could cause a timeout during connection and other issues)
  
• New and faster file hash algorithm for consistency checking. This provides faster consistency checking and therefore slightly reduced loading times.
  
• Reduced frame time maximums by preventing the steam friends list from updating every 15 seconds regardless of whether it was visible or not.
  
• Resolved performance issues and conflicts from build 331 in relation to SDL changes that affected some clients (Thanks Terence!)
  
• Optimized frame times by preventing weapon displays from rendering every frame, even for weapons you are not carrying.
  
• Drastically improved the average frame time of Spectator health bar update routine
  
• Greatly optimized the Mini-map update routine. The run time was rather long at 50+% of the total world update time and thrashed the Garbage Collector. It has been entirely refactored to be more efficient and JIT’d.
  
• Refactored scoreboard to use the new map container which makes things more efficient 
  
• Optimized the Garbage Collection. Made sure the Lua GC doesn’t run during world update routine, reducing frame time spikes. Adjusted the run time of the GC dynamically based on the production. Increase the GC timer resolution to overall decrease the time the main thread waits for the GC job to finish.

Tweaks / Improvements

Added new Elite tier B.M.A.C. skins!

• You can now view and purchase most of the skins that are sold directly in the Customize Player menu! (We may add more over time) Requires Steam Overlay to be enabled, and the prices should automatically reflect your local currency.
  
• Added the fabled and long requested Fog feature to maps! It’s sparingly used mostly in non playable areas of maps, and costs almost nothing in regards to performance. However it can be toggled on or off in the graphics option menu.
  
• Options will now save locally on your hard drive in addition to the Steam cloud save option (by default). This means that if Steam cloud fails for whatever reason, your settings will now be loaded from disk.
  
• New Powernode visual effect improvements to better match the balance changes (no more blueprints!) and state. For example: The color of the powernode material, the light on top, and the cinematic fx all change based on its health. The pulsating area lighting that occurs after destruction no longer occurs until the 15 second requirement has passed that allows rebuilding it - meaning there is actual uninterrupted pitch darkness right after the power is destroyed, and there is a visual cue for when the node is able to be rebuilt again.
  
• Disabling Voice Volume will now prevent the user from transmitting their voice data to the server as well. This means if you mute everyone by setting Voice Volume to 0, you cannot speak to them either.
  
• Back by popular demand: Parasited status icon for Marines show once again regardless of your HUD detail setting
  
• Made it easier to cancel a primed Grenade in your hands by switching weapons
  
• Bots have been generally improved in many many ways. From randomized individual personality traits that dictate things like how supportive or aggressive they are, to reactions being revised to feel more human-like, to movement routines such as sneaking, dodging etc. Their accuracy even scales automatically with the server’s average skill level to ensure they remain challenging for players without being overpowered. There will be many more improvements to come in the future as well. Give them a shot and tell us what you think! 

Fixes

• Fixed timeouts that would occur for players when attempting to connect to a server.
  
• Fixed structures being detected but not visible if scanned (Thanks Katzen!)
  
• Fixed commanders forced to repress the grid key for dual action items (Thanks Katzen!)
  
• Fixed that the scrollbars in the News / Changelog main menu area did not actually scroll. 
  
• Fixed that the NS2 process would often remain running in the background after closing the client, preventing you from relaunching it as Steam would see it as still running
  
• All Marine models now utilize the same hitboxes. Previously only the default normal armor was using an updated and more performant version.
  
• TBB library binaries updated to include VC 2013 redistributables to prevent some cases where the game would not load for some users.
  
• Fixed double and triple buffering Vsync options not correctly applying at startup.
  
• Fixed that returning players who had an old and removed feature called Camera Animations left over in their options file, could cause issues such as crosshair misalignment.
  
• Fixed the round start countdown camera animation not smoothly transitioning to the player’s final view. Note that the server mod “Shine” may prevent this animation from occurring at all in some cases.
  
• Fixed Shade Hive passive upgrades overriding the Shade structure when it came to cloaking behavior. For instance, cysts should not decloak unless touched when a Shade structure is nearby, but should decloak within range when there is no structure but they are instead cloaked by the hive type’s passive ability.
  
• Fixed an issue where occasionally some players would be missing from the Vote Kick menu in game.
  
• Fixed “Previous Weapon” binding not working correctly if rebound to anything but the default mousewheel binding. 
  
• Fixed the last Cyst in a chain often dying when placing a long chain (Thanks Katzen!)
  
• Fixed that a Cyst chain does not reconnect properly when replacing one Cyst in a long chain.
  
• Fixed that Crush upgrade did not increase damage against unpiloted Exos
  
• Fixed Crush not affecting Gorge Spit weapon
  
• Fixed spawn angle bug for the final time (we think), where the player would not be aiming at where they were previously during the respawn animation. May you slay many a Skulk who dares to bite your infantry portal.
  
• Fixed Tunnel Exit button being selectable for the commander for a brief time frame after collapsing a Tunnel, which would show a placement model to place a new one, but would not actually allow you to do so.
  
• Fixed Tunnels occasionally not connecting to one another after upgrading to Infested and then collapsing one.
  
• Fixed Alien heal / regen soft cap that was previously implemented but was not working correctly.
  
• Fixed recently killed Gorges still spawning Babblers, which could cause Gorge ragdolls to do amazingly silly things.
  
• Fixed the missing Join Team bindings in the menu. We don’t know where they went or why. But we had a nice long talk with them and they’ve agreed to stay in the menu for the time being so long as you don’t spam them further.
  
• Fixed BMAC taunts playing default marine taunts when in an Exo
  
• Fixed an exploit of being able to create unlimited Babblers in the world by utilizing two coordinated and highly mischievous Gorges that were hell bent on dominating the galaxy through repopulation efforts. 
  
• Fixed random client crashes that occurred when multiple files were missing during loading into a game.
  
• Fixed Voice chat HUD feature showing names of talking players, even players from the enemy team, when voice volume is set to 0.
  
• Fixed Voice chat playing back actual voices all at once after changing the voice volume slider from 0. Sure we all hear voices from time to time, but we’re never supposed to hear 10 other people barking orders at us once, that’s too far, right bob? Yea see, bob agrees.
  
• Fixed Hallucinated Drifters having stuttering movement.
  
• Fixed a bug with players getting omitted from the scoreboard in some cases. 
  
• Fixed decals projecting onto Mine placement models
  
• Fixed Bots being removed when a Commander Bot was replaced by a player. 
  
• Fixed Fade old description and typos in the evolve menu 
  
• Fixed many Steam Achievement wording issues
  
• Fixed client crash when exiting Skulk race challenge
  
• Fixed some crashes when using Profile command and using Exos
  
• Fixed crashing when utilizing Cr4zy’s alien vision
  
• Fixed the Crusher on Mineshaft to ensure it actually kills players once again. This seemingly innocuous fix led us down a deep dark rabbit hole that exposed some potentially fundamental issues in networking that have huge ramifications and that we may one day be able to expand on after fixing. Stay tuned Marine.
  
• Fixed material swapping crashes. This could occur from a player swapping BMAC skins or even seeing someone else do it. It applies to all material swapping uses however (this patch uses the system for the new powernode fx)
  
• Fixed that Alien bots do not return to the Hive for health
  
• Fixed that Marine bots would often build structures by spamming the use key, making a sound so annoying you wanted to throw them off the deepest cliff in mordor into a fiery pit of doom from which they can never be heard from again.
  
• Fixed that destroying a dropped Machine Gun with Bilebomb awarded no score points.
  
• Fixed that Marine bots did not buy Grenade Launchers or Flamethrowers
  
• Fixed that Marine bots ignored dropped Machine Guns
  
• Fixed Grenade quickthrow (aka Tertiary) animation bugs that could cause your HUD to disappear and some other wonky behavior.
  
• Fixed Babblers not respawning on a Gorge if they spammed the Bait Ball. This should allow new players who often fall for this trap to still get some use of it.
  
• Fixed Gorge Bile Mines not cloaking when near a Shade.
  
• Fixed that Medpacks would not drop when bound to mouse wheel during tutorials
  
• Fixed case where having a coded mod active on the client would prevent tutorials from loading.
  
• Fixed some cases of client crashing upon start up
  
• Fixed that the friends list would update even when the menu was closed, which could cause a hitch.
  
• Fixed client crash with Skulk Race challenge when viewing leaderboards
  
• Fixed the Credits screen background blending incorrectly in some cases
  
• Fixed script error when a marine died on top of an ammo pack
  
• Fixed script error from a race condition when a player with a Machine Gun died
  
• Fixed script error that could occur if an Onos died during using Stomp
  
• Fixed script error when dying as a Skulk when Leap is researched and you have the tooltip on screen to leap.
  
• Fixed potential read-access violation crash on shutdown
  
• Fixed many memory leaks

Sounds

• Fixed that your own sounds such as footsteps, would often be offset from the player, sounding as if you were walking or strafing ahead of yourself somehow. This was most notable on virtualized 7.1 sound setups. The paranoia from hearing footsteps outside of your own body is gone!

Maps

• Added fog to various maps. (Thanks BeigeAlert, pSyk, RuneStorm)
  
• Derelict (Thanks pSyk):
  
• -Fixed tunnel placement exploit.
  
• Docking (Thanks RuneStorm):
  
• Various bugfixes and tweaks to visuals.
  
• Tram (Thanks pSyk):
  
• Improved collision on pipes and geo near the ET-Mezz vent.
  
• Fixed upgrade structure placement exploit in Server.
  
• Added a ladder into the vent from Shipping to Logistics.
  
• Unearthed (Thanks pSyk):
  
• Fixed structure placement exploit in Marine Start.

Tools

• Integrated new slick and robust profiler named Tracy. It’s a separate executable you have to run and connect to the game executable. You can find the profiler binaries and a manual pdf in the utils\Tracy folder. 
  
• The Tracy capture tool uses a lot of memory due to capturing a lot of data points by default. So you can only have it running for a few minutes before it will start thrashing your swap file.
  
• If you run NS2 as administrator Tracy will capture your complete cpu context. Which means that if you decide to share such a capture with others they will be able to see all applications that did run on your system during the capture!
  
• Engine console commands: 
  
• tracy_start - Starts Tracy's listening thread allowing profilers to connect.
  
• tracy_stop - Requests the connected Tracy profiler\capture tool to disconnect itself.
  
• Command line options:
  
•  -tracywait  - Will start up Tracy very early on in engine initialization and block loading until a Tracy profiler or capture tool connects. Great for finding slow loading problems
  
•  -tracyip  will set the ip address Tracy client embedded in the engine will bind to, by default its loopback\127.0.0.1. This allows you to run profiler\capture tool on another computer.
  
• -tracystart  is like -tracywait but doesn't wait for profiler to connect
  
• Added latest version of the .Net Performance Analyzer. Used to open in-game profiler captures.
  
• The profile command tool’s pause feature can be rebound through the in game bindings screen now.
  
• Fixed TechSupport.exe not working at all and updated tech support email.

SDK

• The Steamworks library for the game is upgraded to the latest version (v1.46)
  
• [Map Editor] can use two new entity types: fog_mesh_volume and fog_sphere_volume.
  
• [Map Editor] Added a “Crack-finder” feature in the menu that will use an edge finding shader in the editor to highlight small cracks in the map, similar to what alien vision can provide in game.
  
• In game Profile console command’s pause binding is no longer hardcoded to spacebar. You can rebind it in the Misc section in your bindings menu.
  
• Improved Crash Handler full dump generation to prevent silently exiting.
  
• Added a console command "lag_fix <true|false>" which enables/disables the mouse input delay fix so you can compare (the fix is enabled by default).
  
• Fixed Launchpad being frozen after publishing a mod
  
• Fixed a crash in Viewer when loading between different models and viewing collision

Known Issues

• Bots still have many issues which are known and are being actively worked on, from improvements to actual bugs.
  
• There’s currently no form of communication to the player when their applied healing is not 100% effective due to the healing cap. We plan on changing this in the future.
  
• There are numerous parasite visualization bugs related to the shader, status icon, or outline. We’re aware of all of them and their importance but boy oh boy are we not excited about the amount of work involved here.
  
• BMAC taunts in exos do not update if your skin is changed while still in an exo.
  
• Babblers can still attack a powernode even if completely destroyed.
  
• The new marine hitboxes have an issue with the shoulders where they flare outward more than they should. We’ll be addressing this next patch.
  
• From commander view while placing a structure, the floating in world powernode health that is shown may be inaccurate. 

------------------------------------------------------------
Here is a snippet of what's in store for Patch 332, which is coming soon! This changelog contains the Balance Patch Notes, there is much more in the full changelog which will be released when the build goes live.

● The health and armor status (hp bar) has been removed from enemy players in combat (We recommend enabling damage numbers)
● Re-drop block times for commanders placing cysts and resource towers is now 1 second (down from 5-7 seconds)
● Fixed cysts sometimes dying when placed (From Katzenfleisch)
● Fixed commanders forced to repress the grid key for dual action items (From Katzenfleisch)
● Fixed scan not having a visual range displayed (From Katzenfleisch)
● Fixed structures being detected but not visible if scanned (From Katzenfleisch)




● Model size decreased by 10% (90% original size)
● Bite cone changed to 0.8 wide by 1.2 tall (from 1.2×1.2)
● Skulk sneak speed changed to 4.0 (from 4.785)
● Skulks now only receive a speed boost from a consecutive jump.

Heal Spray
● Now also adds maturity to alien structures and speeds up player evolutions while they are embryos.
Web

Web
● placement ghosts will now stay visible and turn red if you stretch them past their limit instead of despawning
● Webs are now only placeable on the ground from one endpoint (to fix “duct tape” floor strip webs)
● Gorges can finish placing webs from much further away. Starting placement range is unchanged.
● Web Snare now reduces movement speed by 66% and tapers off gradually over 5 seconds (up from 2.5 seconds)
● Webs now turn invisible, only fading into view at 5 meters or closer, with a distortion effect at longer range
● No longer parasites marines
● No longer appears in the kill-feed
● Now have a “hardening” mechanic: Webs will gain “charges”, which will allow them to web enemies multiple times.
—○ When charges run out, the web will die.
—○ Each charge gives the web 10 hp.
—○ Webs start with 1 cahrge.
—○ Max 3 charges.

Babblers
● No longer gains biomass HP scaling (previously 1.5 hp per biomass)

Spike
● Projectile size increased to 60mm (up from 45mm)
● Now penetrates soft targets (MACs, Drifters, Hydras) (From Twiliteblue)
● Now deals double damage to Mines (Damage: 5 -> 10)

Blink (From Golden)
● Increased friction when moving faster than base blink speed
—○ Will lose velocity more quickly when moving faster than 16.25
—○ Rate at which you lose velocity is reduced when using celerity

Metabolize
● Advanced Metabolize now heals effective HP (treats armor as 2 hitpoints)

Stab
● Damage decreased to 120 (from 160)
● Damage type changed to structural (2x to structures)
● Fades can now blink, jump and move freely while performing stab.

Vampirism
● Primary attacks now generate an HP shield instead of healing.
● The shield begins decaying after 0.5 seconds of your last hit and will taper off over the next 4.5 seconds.
● The maximum shield amount is 1.5 times the value of the charge of a single hit with 3 shells.
● The shield does stack with mucous and babblers
● Skulks only charge 14% health per bite (decreased from 20%)
● Vampirism no longer has any effect when used against Exosuits

Drifter Abilities
● All abilities have now a cool down of 12 seconds (instead of only 1 second for mucous and hallucinations)

Ink Cloud
● Decreased cooldown to 15 seconds (from 16)

● Implemented a softcap for maturity and gestation (evolving rate)
—○ Both maturity and gestation have a 1.5x threshold, and a 0.25 capped efficiency. This means that no softcap will be applied for 1.5x of the added amount’s rate, but leftovers will be subjected to a -75% penalty.

● The Healing softcap now correctly clamps overhealing.
—○ If an Alien structure or player is healed by more than 14%/sec of their total effective hit points any additional healing is reduced by 66% .
MISC
● Maturity information is now visible in the nameplate for alien structures
● Crag, Shade, and Shift supply cost changed to 20 (down from 25)
● Destroying an HMG with Bile Bomb now awards score points
● Onos taunt now uses the charge sound (instead of the stomp sound)

#Discussions_QuoteBlock_Author

Comments:
The removal of health bars is quite the boon to aliens, so to accomodate that we’ve made some changes to the Fade & Skulk movement to accommodate that. The skulk has also been shrunk slightly while having it’s bite cone narrowed. This is to help align the skill curve of the Skulk with that of the basic marine… be mindful of where you are biting! Aside from these, there are some other notable items: The gorge has gotten a few new tricks as Webs have received a significant rework to orient their play style more toward their original intended purpose of “trapping” and significantly slowing careless marines. Vampirism has received a major rework which maintains it’s combat prowess but tones down the sustain it provided after combat.

● Marine dropped weapon decay timer is now 16 seconds (down from 25)

● Reverted to build 326-behavior
—○ 17 pellets, each deal 10 damage
—○ Divided into 4 rings of 4 pellets each, +1 pellet in the middle
—○ Pellet sizes are all 16mm
—○ No Damage Falloff

● Reload time is now 3.5 seconds (from 5 seconds)
● Decreased drum ammo size to 100 (from 125)
● Now awards 5 score points when destroyed by bilebomb

● Removed energy damage (1 energy per hit)

● Damage changed to 130 (from 150)
● Mines can now be properly killed during their arming period when first deployed. In this case, they do not explode or deal damage.
● Marines now keep unused mines when they die and receive them back when they respawn (like hand grenades).
● HP changed to 30 health and 9 armor (from 40 health and 5 armor). Tip: With crush it takes only 4 parasites (instead of 5) to destroy a mine
● Lerk spikes now deal double damage to mines (Damage: 5 -> 10)
● Mines now award 5 score points when killed by an alien
● Mines now display on the minimap for all marines, and for aliens when damaged or parasited
● Weight reduced to 0 (from 0.1)

● Removed lengthy deploy animation so grenades are now thrown much faster. (quickthrow and regular throw)
● Pulse grenade
—○ “Electrified” effect now also nullifies and prevents targets from benefiting from drifter Enzyme and Mucous abilities
● Decreased weight to 0 (from 0.1)

● Reduced opacity of “scanlines” UI texture to be less obstructive (25% of original value)
● Exos are now free to fire their weapons while thrusters are being used
● Thrusters can now be toggled on and off freely without waiting for maximum charge between use.
—○ Thruster fuel now has a 0.75 second cooldown before recharging after last use
● Exosuits now “self-repair” when out of combat at a rate of 8 armor/second
● Alien Vampirism no longer has any effect when used against exos

● Damage type is now “heavy” (double damage to armor)
● Damage changed to 6 (down from 10)
● Overheat animation sped up such that the time out of combat now matches up exactly with the heat meter for that weapon (before, the overheat animation would finish well-after the heat meter was empty)

● Powernode Blueprints have been removed
● All Powernodes now start socketed but unbuilt. The Powernodes in the Marine Base start built and Alien Hive start destroyed upon round start
● Powernodes that have no health are not highlighted for either team and can’t be damaged
● Powernodes that haven’t been built yet do not affect the location’s light state
● The construction progress of a Powernode is synchronized with their hit points. This means when an enemy damages an unbuilt Powernode by 1% hp it also looses 1% construction progress
● Marines no longer receive automated orders to construct a Powernode unless there is a structure or blueprint inside the given location that requires power
● Fixed cluster grenade burn damage numbers being displayed to the target

#Discussions_QuoteBlock_Author

Comments:
It wouldn’t be a balance patch if the Shotgun didn’t receive some tweaks! This time we’ve reverted it to its original pre-shotgun-pocalypse state. The HeavyMachineGun has also received a slight rework. We’ve acknowledged mines can be a bit of an issue lately, so they’ve received several adjustments to bring them back in line while still keeping them useful. Exosuits have also received a slew of new changes* and can now auto-repair themselves when out of combat (*The Railgun rework from the beta still requires more polish, and did not make it into this patch). One of the most significant changes in this patch can be seen in the powernode rework! These changes are primarily visual in nature but greatly improves the clarity of the health state, and the usability with the removal of powernode blueprints.

Hello Everyone!

There hasn't been a game update in the last months as we have been busy working on some larger features. To keep you all in the loop here is a short summary of what we are working on. And what you can expect from the next game update.


Since December our Balance Team has been busy cooking up the latest set of tweaks and shake ups for gameplay.

We said a bittersweet goodbye to BeigeAlert during this time as he pursues an exciting new opportunity. However this caused a bit of a delay for the development of gameplay changes.

Enter Katzenfleisch joining the team! He has been working together with Ghoul since February to get us back on track. Trucking along and implementing the balance changes requested by the balance team (led by Rantology).

To have a look at what is cooking in the stove join a server running the UWE Balance Beta mod. Look for servers with “UWE Beta Balance” in the title.


The last update decreased the connection timeout to 5 ms from 5 minutes to get rid of ghost player entities. Those blocked players from reconnecting to a server. However this resulted in some players being unable to connect to servers without timing out while loading.

Looking into the issue we discovered multiple critical issues. The engine currently doesn't handle file assets as well as it should. It doesn't schedule some tasks properly onto the cpu. And it fails to manage some callbacks properly. All of that slows down loading on some systems drastically. Making the client unresponsive to incoming network messages, causing the server to assume the client timed out.

But it also has some very negative effects on the stability of the frame time for all systems.

So fsfod and Ghoul integrated some new debug tools to better diagnose these kind issues. And are currently resolving them one issue at a time.

If you are affected by client timeout issues please join our discord server where we regularly publish new experimental builds with the latest iteration of those fixes. (Often found in pinned messages in the NS2 chat channel)


Loki, Kash, Zavaro, Runestorm, Rantology, Ironhorse, Shrimm, Psyk, Mephilles, Samoose, Vlaad, and the Map Testing team have been busy working on an epic new map called METRO for quite some time.

Right now the art team is busy detailing and optimizing the final stages of the map. METRO will make its debut in the upcoming patch. For now, here is a teaser image as an appetizer for you:



Does it also take you too long to find a good match? Are you tired of waiting to get a slot on a server? Or ending up with players of a totally different skill tier? Or having to play with a way too high ping because there are no servers in your region?

Darwin’s Thunderdome aims to answer those questions. Essentially it’s a system that groups players based on their geographical region and hive skill. Then spins up a dedicated server as close as possible to the players.

Additionally you will be able to create private lobbies. So you can play with your friends without having to worry about finding a server or setting up your own.

Currently Thunderdome lobbies are limited to 12 players and only support the vanilla NS2 game mode with some essential mods. Additionally we may add support for alternate game modes, and potentially have playing while queuing on special skirmish servers.

Existing community servers will still provide a different kind of social experience. Thunderdome is not meant to replace them. But as a way to play a good match of Natural Selection 2 as quickly as possible.


As usual we and the community developers also fixed reported bugs and various QoL changes. For more details we can only recommend to have a look at our bug tracker trello board. Most of the fixes that will likely make it in are usually in the Fixed and Tested column.


We would like to thank all Natural Selection 2 players for their ongoing support. And can’t wait to hear your feedback in the comments. If you would like to directly get in touch with us just join our discord server.

This latest update brings something new and special to the game. Introducing the B.M.A.C, two exciting new robotic models joining the Marine forces.

The Bipedal-Mobile-Automated-Custodian and Bipedal-Mobile-Automated-Countermeasure are here to help and serve your needs. Play as one of these new marine models with up to 10 different variants for you to choose from. The B.M.A.C. also includes two brand new voices with all new taunts and requests. Community Development Team members Vlaad and Sweets worked very hard with our team over the last couple months developing the models and sounds respectively, and a HUGE shout out to Rune for all the trailer help and going beyond the extra mile. We’ve had so much fun building these into the game and hope that you’ll enjoy them too.



The rest of the patch has some nice new UI updates and other tweaks. We aren’t stopping here and have some very exciting things to come with our December update, so stay tuned!

Check out the full changelog below to see all the goodies contained within.

Remember all sales of NS2 and DLC directly affect our development budget and allow our team to continue work on NS2.


Gameplay

• Shotgun

Added back a damage falloff (0-25% damage reduction from 6m to 12m)

Optimizations

• Improved application start up time and behavior.
  
• Resolved GUIView:Load related frame time hitch when picking up a weapon
  
• Drastically reduced the amount of frame time hitching caused by the help screen when dropping or picking up a weapon.
  
• Improved memory management of webviews

Tweaks / Improvements

• Added 10 new Marine full conversion skins called B.M.A.C
  - Skins come with new models, voiceovers, sounds and effects.
  (A very special thanks goes to Zavaro and voice actor Carl McGahan for your voices!)
  - They come in 3 different DLC price tiers – buy yours today and support continued NS2 development!

• Added new team info HUD bar

Main Menu

• Limited frame rate to 60 frames per second in the menu to improve background art asset preloading and reduce GPU usage.
  
• Added Changelog and News windows
  
• Added menu button for our official Discord server (next to the Wiki button)
  
• Added Quit menu so you can choose between disconnecting, moving into the ready room or closing the game
  
• Customize Menu
  - Added Store button
  - You can now cycle forwards and backwards through the available skins by using Left or Right mouse buttons
  
• Server Browser
  - Made the refresh button more visible – you really can’t miss it now.
  - Added back a separate column for the map names
  
• Improved alt tabbing and application window resize and focus behavior. Fixed various issues related to changing resolution, window mode or switching to another application. Basically it feels snappy and responsive now. (Thanks Salads!)
  
• Fixed the loading background’s aspect ratio to fill the screen at all ratios (Thanks Salads)
  
• Added a detection for running in Wine
  
• Disabled out of process crash handler when running in Wine

Fixes

• Fixed supply costs for Armories, Observatories and Sentry Batteries
  
• Fixed that commanders could build additional structures even when the supply limit was reached by preselecting given structures before reaching the limit.
  
• Fixed a client script error that occurred when a veteran tried to join a team at a bootcamp server
  
• Fixed that ARCs didn’t take any corrosive damage by Infestation after their first deployment
  
• Fixed that pregame throwables stutter when thrown
  
• May your target see your snowballs flying at their face smoothly now
  
• Fixed that Alien Tunnels collapsed even if the second entrance was rebuilt, causing entrances to not connect to each other.
  
• Fixed structure only damage did affect babbler shield real goodly. (Arcs can’t destroy babblers on you anymore)
  
• Fixed that damage to the babbler shield didn’t stop new babblers from hatching
  
• Fixed that a Gorge couldn’t re-attach their own Babblers
  
• Keep those cuddly things warm again! Just don’t forget to give them out still, you greedy Babbler incubators..
  
• Fixed babbler mine icon in the alien buy menu
  
• Fixed that the Shell Hive upgrade icons in spectator view displayed in red despite their status.
  
• The worst color. You know it. I know it.
  
• Fixed that the voice chat bar overlapped with the spectator player info elements
  
• Fixed a few render-related crashes.
  
• Fixed client crash due to using an invalid shader reference
  
• Fixed that GUIItems displaying text with non-zero alignments would sometimes be culled for being off-screen, even though they were still on-screen.
  
• Fixed that if only a few babblers were removed on your babbler shield, they’d instantly repopulate instead of waiting the normal 2.5 seconds.
  
• Fixed Tundra Exo minigun showing the Kodiak skin on one of its arms.
  
• Fixed that enabling the Entity update routine delayed caused various script errors. Various script errors could occur by mixin logic that assumed that OnUpdate was called at least once before OnInitialized.

Sounds

Maps

• ns2_Caged ( Thanks pSyk )
  - Removed Gorge Bile spot in Shipping by moving the crane directly below the ceiling.
  - Fixed wall ARCs and similar wonky ARC spots between Shipping and Ventilation.
  
• ns2_Derelict ( Thanks pSyk )
  - Fixed hole in map, which enabled Lerks to get outside.
  - ns2_Origin ( Thanks pSyk )
  - Reduced map size and travel times slightly by moving Biodome and Furnace ( plus adjacent areas ) closer to the center of the map.
  - Updated loading screen to accommodate changes (Thanks Samus)
  - Slightly nerfed ARC spots in Generator and Smelting room.
  - Nerfed the GL bounce spot outside of Ventilation.
  - Removed some ambush spots between Marine Start and Computer Lab.
  - New, cleaner connection between Ore Extraction and Generator with another little vent to help Aliens in that area.
  - Minor changes to Water Treatment-Maintenance connection to improve combat and reduce frustration for Skulks running up the stairs into a Marine.
  - Various fixes.

Tools

SDK

• Added console command “dump_tracer_info”, which prints a description of all the bullet tracer effects to the console.

Known Issues

• After a Tunnel exit is rebuilt, tunnel flinch animations still play inside the Tunnel forever, only if a player remained inside during this process. (you have to not die before its rebuilt)

Thank you for all the feedback on Update 329. This hotfix should serve to improve your experience.

A note to our Linux users; Although we no longer directly support a Linux client, please be aware that NS2 does run when using Proton. If you are unable to start NS2 via Proton (right click at Library entry -> Properties -> check Force the use of a specific steam play compatibility tool -> select latest version of proton) please confirm that your system is compatible to dxvk (see https://github.com/lutris/lutris/wiki/How-to:-DXVK ).

Tweaks / Improvements

• Removed the DirectX 9 render option and defaulted all clients to DirectX 11. A lot of clients have been frequently crashing due to a bug in the DirectX 9 render pipeline
  
• Renamed the Atmospheric Quality options and added a warning to make users aware that the high and extreme options are only meant to be used on really powerful systems
  
• The Anti aliasing graphics option will default to FXAA instead of TAA. We had a lot of users reporting performance issues with TAA enabled on low to mid-tier hardware
  
• Make sure to cleanup unused intermediate GUIView objects when done rendering GUIStyledText. Leftover GUIViews could cause performance issues
  
• Added the current count of GUIViews to g_stats
  
• Improved the menus fonts (AgencyFB) so they are easier to read and don’t look as blurry
  
• Improved the server console fonts scaling to be easier to read
  
• Disabled MouseButtonOne as possible binding to toggle the console to avoid that users become unable to interact with the menu without editing the remote option file manually

Fixes

• Fixed that the remote option (bindings) reset at every launch of the game for some users due to a faulty xml node name. And added safety guards to the engine for this to not happen again
  
• Fixed that users on windows 7 without update KB2670838 installed couldn’t start the game due to missing support for DirectX 11.1
  
• Fixed TAA causing black pixel artifacts under DXVK (used by Proton)
  
• Fixed that some weapon tracers were never destroyed causing performance issues
  
• Fixed that some art assets were not properly precached for new menu
  
• Fixed profile pictures in the friends list did not always display correctly
  
• Fixed that the new server browser didn’t take reserved slots into account
  
• Fixed that the menu text entry cursor was blurry / wasn't using distance field font correctly
  
• Fixed that some spectator UI elements blocked input from passing to the main menu.
  
• Fixed various typos in the new menu
  
• Fixed a script error caused by removing a badge that returns to some off-screen part of the tray (only happened with large numbers of badges).
  
• Fixed that the abyss gorge only unlocked after 6 instead of 5 played rounds on Origin

Welcome back to “Colony Zero,” the forgotten mining facility on the moon Freya IV. Greed and a continued push for dominance brought the TSF to this moon, but what they found while mining deep was something they felt was far more valuable than ore or minerals; little did they know it would start a pandemic reaching across the entire galaxy.

Our newest official map, ORIGIN, a remake of the NS1 map, holds the answers to the Origins of Kharaa and is now available to play. You can earn the special Abyss Gorge skin after playing five rounds, but hurry as this skin is only available for a limited time! Thank you to pSyk for all his hard work on re-creating this classic map and to our map testing crew for all of their time reviewing and assisting on the map.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aC7q_eterMY

Update 329 also brings another set of balance changes aimed at creating more variation of play and strategy. A new menu system has been designed and built for a better player customizing experience and allows for easier implementation of future features to come. We have officially moved to DirectX 11 and added support for Temporal Anti-Aliasing, both of which can help produce better quality of play and visual upgrades to your game. Additional changes to other official maps have also been added to support better gameplay and help new players learn the maps.

A reminder that with the release of 329 we have officially dropped support for the Linux client of NS2. We will continue to support and update the Linux Dedicated Server. For those using the Linux client, you can still play NS2 via the Steam Play compatibility tools (Proton). Proton is still in Beta and being actively developed so there may be some features or functions that do not work. We have confirmed that playing the game while connecting to a dedicated server does work and in some cases the performance is much improved from the Linux client.

Check out the full changelog on the blog to see all the goodies contained within.

Follow the NS2 Development Roadmap to see our plans for future updates.

Remember all sales of NS2 and DLC directly affect our development budget and allow our team to continue work on NS2.