KickStarter Stellar Tactics, a sandbox sci-fi RPG - now available on Early Access

[Infinitron]

 

[Taka-Haradin puolipeikko]

http://steamcommunity.com/app/465490/discussions/0/1318836262672874191/?ctp=3

Hi Marco [LBTF] - Mod support will be limited to creating story missions. I'll provide an editor for that after the game is released. The editor will allow players to populate the universe with all kinds of story/mission content, though they will need to use existing content in the game - enemy types etc.

Multiplayer - Not ready to announce anything on that now

You can see the road map here with the proposed features for each stage of development.

http://steamcommunity.com/app/465490/discussions/0/350532795334521117/

edit.
http://steamcommunity.com/app/465490/discussions/0/2425614361140593491/

Progress update - 11/17/17
Lots of progress this week, primarily on the chaff system, directional shields and planetary effects.

Chaff system - The chaff system is complete. You can purchase chaff from any ship equipment vendor. Your ship holds a total of 50 chaff modules which can be deployed in combat to confuse enemy missiles.

Directional shields - This system is complete now and includes some changes to the way shields work. Your combat shields take damage until a shield is depleted of energy. At that point, you start taking damage to your secondary shields. If you your secondary shields are depleted, any combat hits making it through depleted directional shields apply damage to your hull armor. You can select a facing shield to receive extra recharge energy. See the video for details.

Target micro menu - The target micro-menu is finished for now. You can select any ship and a popup menu will allow you to scan or approach that target. I'll likely be adding other features to this menu in the future.

Planet visual update - I've been wanting to do this for a while so I took a break from AI and other coding to update all the procedural planet atmospheres - I think they look a lot better. It's hard to tell in the screenshot though in the game it makes a big difference.

Updated atmosphere materials
Community Created Artwork for Steam Artwork
By: Stellar Tactics
Updated the planet atmospheres this week. They look much better.


That's it for this week. Thanks everyone!

 

[Infinitron]

 

[Morkar Left]

Secondary shields, that's unusual.

 

[Taka-Haradin puolipeikko]

http://steamcommunity.com/app/465490/discussions/0/1488866180601938515/

Progress Update 11/24/17
Hi everyone. Another weekly progress update.

This week I spent a lot of time on Ship AI including enemy AI collisions, faction through the universe and cleaning up a few long standing bugs in space. Asteroids now have collision and enemy ships avoid stars, planets, space stations and asteroids. See the video below for a few highlights.

A big chunk of code that had to be written was the faction system. While the basics were already in, they weren't exposed to the enemy ship AI. Here is how faction works in Stellar Tactics:
--When you start a new game, the universe is generated. Every system gets a certain main faction with Achmedius, the starting system, being a Halamis system.
--The AI starts to launch ships with various jobs based on that faction - patrol, anarchy, trade, explore, faction warfare and a few other tasks.
--Ships are launched from stations and begin their various roles, traveling between systems or staying within systems depending on their role.
--You can engage any ship in combat, hostile or friendly. The act of initiating combat causes a minor faction hit with that faction. Destroying the ship generates a higher faction hit to that particular faction. Destroying a ship aligned with a faction generates negative faction with all aligned factions and generates positive faction with factions that are not aligned.

So, there are consequences. This lets you explore the universe and shift your alignment by targeting enemy ships and taking ground based missions that target a specific faction so you can begin to move your faction in a direction where a certain faction you are interested in will do business with you. You could conceivably become aligned with Phage, Scavvers and Raiders if you wanted to. Just know that eventually (not in the space combat build) some stations will not allow you to dock to do business with them if you end up an enemy of that faction.

Hostile factions, Raiders, Scavvers, Phage start out as hostile. All other factions, including the various Houses (Halamis, Aralion, Conrair, Cilivon, Shikaru and Varadyn) start out neutral or wary. If you have been gaining faction in the Abandoned Research Facility, you should have a slightly higher faction with Halamis depending on how many missions you've taken.

There are other factions that are tied closely to the story:

--The Syndicate - Outlaws tolerated by the powers that be. Need something? No problem. Want someone eliminated? Of course! Smuggling? Oh yeah! Masters of stealth, on the ground and in Space.

--Kchor - Blue skinned mutants, wise and secretive. The Kchor are one of several mutations that arrived after the long trip through space. No much is known about the Kchor though they have been called on by The Sovereignty to keep the peace in the various wars that have taken place since the Arrival. Their reward? Autonomy.

--The Fabricants - Purveyors of the finest augmentations and equipment upgrades, the Fabricants also dabble in the darker arts of melding machine with flesh. Some call them Necromancers, others shun them outright.

--The Coven - Outcasts from the time of the Arrival, not much is known about The Coven. It is said that when they arrived, they woke from sleep with incredible Psionic powers. With no understanding of their immediate powers, they nearly destroyed themselves and anyone who contacted them. They were given an ultimatum - leave or be incinerated. They left to the far ends of known space and only have dealings with the Syndicate who smuggle supplies to them on a regular basis.

--The Traders Guild - One of the most powerful guilds, the Traders Guild controls commerce between systems. They will need your help and your alignment with them could make you a smuggler or a wealthy merchant. Your choice of course.

--The Order - A radical religious order that believe in the Old Gods. They are tolerated by The Church and the Sovereignty and actually align on the side of good throughout the Universe. They are the Paladins of Stellar Tactics and merge powerful ancient rituals with melee and ranged combat. They are fierce opponents.

--The Church - The primary religious order of Stellar Tactics Universe. They are primarily political as church and state are one. They are also aligned closely with the Sovereignty and have vast holdings across the known universe - however, something is amiss and you will need to make difficult decisions as the story progresses.

--The Jhemm - You encountered them in the Ruins in Achmedius - You are the only known contact and the Jhemm chose you for reasons you do not yet fully understand.

--The Sovereignty - The Sovereignty are the reigning power in the Universe. One of the first Houses to arrive, they quickly gathered power and subjugated the rest of the Houses as they arrived. Several wars have been fought, however, The Sovereignty has maintained power. A Republic, The Sovereignty imposes limited laws and an iron fist when needed. They are aligned with The Church and share power with them. The Church is the law and The Sovereignty enforces the law.

I'm now down to one major feature that needs to be finished for the space combat update. That is, random missions. It wouldn't be much fun to hope an enemy ship wandered into Achmedius so, this next week I'll be focusing on adding missions that can be taken to defend certain points in space like asteroid fields, stations and planets. Some of these will be random events and others missions that you pick up on the trade station.

Once that's in I'll be testing and cleaning up any bugs and then I think I'll be ready to release the space combat update. I don't have an exact date, but soon.

Have a great weekend!

 

[Infinitron]

 

[Taka-Haradin puolipeikko]

http://steamcommunity.com/app/465490/discussions/0/1488866813763468098/

Progress Update 12/1/17
This week I am finally feature, code and content complete for the Space Combat update. Now it's just play testing, bug fixing and once everything is stable and bug free, I'll get the update posted for everyone.

This week I worked on the Incursion mission system. Incursion missions take place randomly when you are exploring in space. Stations and AI ships in the system will offer you a reward if you can defeat hostile ships in a specific area. You get a cash reward, faction and of course loot when you defeat the incursion. These missions are temporary and if you dock or land on a planet, the incursion will not be there the next time you enter space. They do persist between save games - so if you have an active incursion and save your game while in space, they will be active the next time you load your save.

Of course, there will be more mission types for Alpha. Once Alpha is released the plan is to add more detailed mission types - an example would be:

You receive a distress signal from a ship orbiting a planet in the current system. You accept the mission and travel to the ship and defeat a group of ships attacking the AI that contacted you. You could then be given another mission to rescue the remaining crew on a nearby planet. Once that mission is resolved, the AI may send you to another sector to take another task.

The mission system is quite powerful and procedural missions like this will keep the game alive long after the main story is completed. In sandbox mode, these missions will be the backbone of exploration.

The other big task this week was Station AI. Stations now launch local ships that mine local asteroid fields. It's just the first of several AI tasks local systems will be performing that will make systems feel alive and populated.

That's all I have for this week. Now it's just a matter of crushing a list of bugs, play testing and making sure everything is stable for the update. Thanks for being patient everyone!

Spoiler

 

[Morkar Left]

Updates like these make me still believe that there are still fantastic games in the future to get released!

 

[Infinitron]

Big news:

Many of you have asked that I remove the constraint of flying only on a 2D plane in space. For a long time I didn't want commit to this until I had combat in and started play testing the system. I'm happy to say I woke up this morning at 5 AM with an idea that fixed a few problems I had with vector math related to space combat and decided to implement it. The combat patch will include full 3D flight for space exploration and combat. Thank you all for your feedback. As always, I'm listening!

 

[veevoir]

"I woke up this morning and made space flight & combat 3D"

 

[Morkar Left]

Many of you have asked that I remove the constraint of flying only on a 2D plane in space. For a long time I didn't want commit to this until I had combat in and started play testing the system. I'm happy to say I woke up this morning at 5 AM with an idea that fixed a few problems I had with vector math related to space combat and decided to implement it. The combat patch will include full 3D flight for space exploration and combat. Thank you all for your feedback. As always, I'm listening!

This guy...

:australia:

Seems like Cleve found his master.

Don't think it would have been necesarry but I don't mind either when it gives the impression more similar to a space sim.

 

[Taka-Haradin puolipeikko]

http://store.steampowered.com/news/externalpost/steam_community_announcements/2163281492522968600

Progress Update 12/8/17
9 DECEMBER - STELLAR TACTICS



Not much progress to report this week, and no fancy videos because...well...space combat is feature complete. That doesn't mean it's bug free and balanced right now. Nope, not yet. Play testing has shown that space combat may be really difficult - really. So, I need to get that fixed. That and a list of bugs. Meanwhile, I thought I would share my TL~DR Space Combat Survival Guide. Here you go:

TL~DR Space Combat Survival Guide

In the immortal words of Admiral Harnsteaad - "Dammit man! Their shields, destroy their shields or we all die!"

Power is everything. If you find that your capacitor is getting below 1/3 in combat, then you likely have a power problem. If this is the case, you will never break through enemy shields because your turrets will misfire reducing your DPS to the point where enemy shields are recharging at a higher rate than you can tear them down. What can you do?

1) Try adjusting your speed down first and see if that brings your capacitor back up.
2) If you shields are doing well, try lowering the power to your shields
3) If neither of these work, you likely have a bad power ratio meaning your power plant cannot keep up with your weapons.
4) If #3 - run!

What can you do about your power?
1) Find a better warp drive
2) Buy turrets that draw less power or, use light turrets and projectile weapons instead of beam weapons. A heavy beam turret is worthless if you don't have enough power to keep it firing.
3) Find more efficient shields

Ok - let's assume you have enough power to power your turrets now. This is a survival checklist for entering combat:
1) Turn your combat shields on and power them up
2) Set your directional shields forward
3) Approach the enemy with micro-warp (you will be kicked out of micro-warp when close enough for combat)
4) Once engaged - hit the pause key [P]
5) Scan your enemies and find the most powerful - usually the one with the most missiles - and target them.
6) Un-pause and keep an eye on your capacitor - it should never get far below 1/3 - if it does adjust your power to speed and shields so your capacitor recharges at a higher rate.
7) Never let a depleted shield face the majority of fire. Keep rotating your ship to bring charged shields in line with the majority of the fire.
8) If you have a burnt shield, rotate another shield in the direction of fire and set your directional shields to the depleted shield to quickly recharge it - once it's far enough along, rotate that shield in the direction of fire.
9) Never use afterburners unless you are above 3/4 capacitor

Cargo carriers, Merchant ships and some Explorers are not really combat fighters. They need to "turtle" - that means speed is not important - reduce power to thrust to almost zero, center power to your shields and make sure you have enough power to your capacitor to maintain it. If your capacitor is maintaining, raise power to your shields a bit until you are balanced. Never use afterburners unless you have enough power.

One last word of advice - if your capacitor is guttering out, you will not win a fight, ever. You could sit there in a shield standoff forever!

 

[Infinitron]

 

[Taka-Haradin puolipeikko]

http://store.steampowered.com/news/externalpost/steam_community_announcements/2284879949512125477

Space Combat Patch Released!
23 DECEMBER - STELLAR TACTICS

I'm happy to announce the release of the Space Combat patch.

First, I just want to say - "I'm not finished with space combat!"

That's right. The goal here was to get all the base systems in. The turrets, effects, ships, ship and equipment vendors, stats and skills, loot and all the rest of the core systems that make up space combat in Stellar Tactics. What do I have planned for the future?

• Point defense systems
  
• Equipment that will give you a quick shield or capacitor charge when you need it.
  
• Warp Drive inhibitors
  
• Sub-system targeting
  
• Branching missions that take you to other systems, then take you to planetary locations, stations, anomalies and space wreckage.
  
• Missions for miners so they can gather rewards for surviving in dangerous systems or for finding rare minerals
  
• Escort missions
  
• More AI ships on various tasks in the systems of the universe.
  
• Perks for space combat. I'm holding off on these until I have more feedback on the core systems from the community

And more...

Before you get started, please review the Space Combat Guide. At least the first section as it gives you a few very important survival tips.


Official Space Combat Guide
A Guide for Stellar Tactics
By: Stellar Tactics
The basics of space combat. Covers buying ships and equipment, basic combat tactics and ship combat systems.


With the release of space combat, the game should hold over 200 hours of content to max your crew in the best equipment and to acquire the best ships and gear available. I hope you all enjoy the update and I'm looking forward to all of your feedback on the forums.

I'd like to thank rebelwolf75, nottrusted, nobrien, Roberto and others for testing Stellar Tactics over the last few weeks. They spent a lot of time in the game and made a lot of helpful suggestions and found a good number of bugs that are now fixed.

I've also crushed a good number of bugs unrelated to space combat and made a few enhancements to the game. See the patch notes below.

What's next? I'll be taking another pass at ground combat to remove a few annoyances, perfect the blocking system and tighten things up. I'll likely take a few passes at ground combat before the game is finished.

Following that I have a bunch of content that's been developed in parallel with the space combat patch that I need to get in the game - content that needs to go in so I can open up the FTL gates.

Here are the patch notes:

ADDED - You can now eject stacks of items from your cargo hold while in space. Anything you eject is automatically destroyed and cannot be retrieved. Should make mining runs a bit more profitable.
ADDED - a reminder message will be displayed that micro-warp is disabled in gravity wells and enabled when leaving gravity wells.
UPDATED - If inside the gravity well of any sun, you will start taking damage. First to your shields and when those are depleted, you will take damage to your hull armor. If you stay in the vicinity of the sun your ship will eventually be destroyed.
UPDATED: Weapon impacts, explosions and projectile effects updated for all ranged weapons in ground combat.
UPDATED: On skill-up, messages are now queued and displayed both on the screen and in the log.
UPDATED: Collisions with asteroids are now active.
UPDATED: Cargo can now be sorted by all items, ore/gas, commodities and equipment. Commodities are not in the game yet.
UPDATED: Afterburner speed greatly increased. Capacitor cost decreased.
UPDATED: Ship speed is now based on piloting skill and the equipped warp drive.
UPDATED: Micro-Warp speed increased and is now based on piloting skill and equipped warp drive.
UPDATED: Interactions with chests, objects and npc's are much faster now.
UPDATED: Area exits are now much more obvious. Small panels for area transitions have been removed and replaced with panels that cover doors on rollover and when holding down the highlight key = TAB by default.
UPDATED: Base weapon damage now scales per the level requirement of the weapon every few levels. So, you get bonus base damage depending on the level requirement of the weapon and of course bonus damage based on your skills/perks. Enemies get the same base damage scaling. This change is not retroactive so weapons in your inventory use the old range modifiers.
UPDATED: Pistols, rifles and heavy weapons have had their range increased. This change is not retroactive so weapons in your inventory use the old range stats
UPDATED: You can now mine any asteroid, not just asteroids in asteroid fields.
UPDATED: When purchasing ammo (ship and ground combat), the HUD now displays the maximum amount of ammo you can purchase in the pop-up window and the slider is set to only allow you to buy the maximum purchasable amount for that ammo type.
UPDATED: Second round of visual polish for the Dauntless - Added addition effects, lighting and grime.
UPDATED: Removed the siren effect on all decks except for the VATs - it was annoying while engaging the last part of the Dauntless experience.
UPDATED: All areas of random mission maps are now displayed on the mini-map. As you explore, areas that have been explored turn grey. Areas that have had mission objectives cleared turn green. the area you are currently exploring is black with a small compass indicator. Should help better undestand the scale of the area to be explored for missions.
UPDATED: Removed the option to generated a full party of team members. When you leave the Dauntless, you can choose only one team member and this was confusing and some felt that it was a waste of their time if they did not read the universe creation screen carefully. The loss of crew members after the Dauntless is a key story element for future story content.
UPDATED: Dialog with Dr. Rhamus in ruins revised to add additional dialog options.
UPDATED: Addition of a new mission when receiving your starter ship. You are now sent to the Trade Station to gather your team of mercenaries.
UPDATED: Loot rewards for the Halamis Facility are now more consistent. Reward tokens and faction are less random so you can better gauge the level of reward for a mission type.
Fixed - Can now use F1-F4 in inventory and character info screens to switch team member info when in space.
Fixed - System messages are now queued so all messages are displayed to the screen in order.
Fixed - When approaching the sun, you will now make an emergency stop.
Fixed - A major physics error that could send your ship careening into the sun or elsewhere when you collide with stations and other space objects.
Fixed - A display bugs when dragging team members between ship station slots.
Fixed - A bug in space when selecting objects that could cause objects in the foreground or another object from being selected.
Fixed - You can now re-scan object like planets and ships
Fixed - When leaving the Dauntless, in some cases, the selected final team member's equipment was unequipped and placed in the stash leaving them standing there in their underwear once they arrived in the ruins.
Fixed - Material error on the trade station - too shiny!
FIXED: Ambient audio slider renamed to Music Volume - main menu music volume is not set to your current settings.
FIXED: Combat movement when healing will no longer result in negative AP
FIXED: Movement cursors will no longer be left on the ground in some rare cases
FIXED: When moving, you can no longer loot items. Previously it would appear as if you could loot items from long distances.
FIXED: A bug where landing on a planet could take you to another planet landing location
FIXED: A long standing bug that could cause extra AP to be used in combat when healing targets that you walk to.
FIXED: A long standing bug that could cause your entire AP bar to drain while walking towards an enemy target for attack when wielding a melee weapon or fists.
FIXED: A bug introduced by the new navigation icons could cause the player to arrive at target and then rotate in an arbitrary direction when attacking with melee weapons by clicking on an enemy from a distance.
REMOVED - Motion blur micro-warp effect - replaced with a new effect.
PERFORMANCE: General optimizations for AI in all locations.

 

[da_rays]

Well my X-mas vacation just got occupied . Great patch , lots of tiny improvment , time for a new playthrough from the Dauntless to see how the intro shape up. Nice to also see the guides for Space combats. Gonna give that a whirl once i got myself a new crew .

Havent tried mining asteroid yet , hope I see a good fluidity with all the new content. Will try to leave some impressions from the start to my 1st space combat.
X-Mas cheers to all

 

[veevoir]

Is there enough content to have good fun for hours testing?

 

[Taka-Haradin puolipeikko]

Buttons for auto sorting inventory and filters by item type would be nice.
I just completed long mission in lost research station and my back back and stash are filled with things like "rare scratched laser rifle of Salami" (or something to that effect) and vendor trash.

 

[Alienman]

Salami laser?

 

[Taka-Haradin puolipeikko]

Salami laser?

Actually one of the item manufacturers is called Halamis.

Problem with inventory is that it's very quickly filled with randomly generated stuff that has those kinds of descriptors.
Meanwhile game might use same icon for pistol that does electrical damage and pistol that does kinetic damage, both have differing range, clip size and use different ammo.

 

[xipenec]

I just tried it.
And the tactical combat in the beginning, right now, is trash. Rudimentary to the most basic state of 'attack is your only option'. There are no zones of control, no reaction fire, nothing.
You place your gunners and trigger the enemy with a melee guy and run back while the gunners shoot till everyone dies.
Diablo like loot.
Its shit and its gonna stay that way for a loong time. Considering the huge amount of skills, its never gonna get good as a tactical game.

 

[HeatEXTEND]

never gonna get good as a tactical game.

Servicable will do just fine for this type of game, patience is key here

 

[StellarTactics]

Hi Takka - Haradin - I'll be adding sort features in the future. for now the stash has general sort icons for all item types. When crafting goes in you will be able to break vendor trash and all other items down into crafting components. This will be placed in a separate crafting inventory.

Not sure about Salami - though it's good on sandwiches.

xipenec - sorry to hear you didn't enjoy the game. I'm always working on it. Check back in a while - I'll be taking another pass at the combat system soon. Certainly it is not X-Com and never will be. There are some features coming in the future that will differentiate this game tactically.

Thanks HeatEXTEND - Yes, I'm working as fast as I can and it takes time More content will be coming after I take another pass at combat and fix some general bugs that I have on my list.

 

[HeatEXTEND]

 

[Taka-Haradin puolipeikko]

http://steamcommunity.com/app/465490/discussions/0/1620600279673639741/

Patch Notes 1/7/18 - 0.113
Well, I'm back at it after the holidays. Hope you have all had a great start to your New Year.

First - load times have improved in all areas - about double what they were before on average. Areas like the trade station have improved but need more work. Load times are of course dependent on your system specs.

I've added new border highlights throughout the game for objects in the world environment.

I've consolidated a lot of the game data so patch sizes can be much smaller going forward.

Here are the notes:

FIXED - You can no longer equip a heavy turret to a light turret slot. If you currently have a heavy turret equipped to a light turret slot, you will only be able to equip a light turret to that slot going forward.
FIXED: Typo on new game creation screen.
FIXED: A crash when creating a new game - caused when clicking or dragging the mouse while the starting in-game cinematic was loading.
FIXED: Universe generation random seed can no longer exceed 8 digits in the entry field.
FIXED: When exiting video tutorials from the help menu, the game is no longer left in a paused state.
FIXED: Heavy turrets and missiles can no longer be placed in light turret slots. If you have a ship where you have equipped a heavy turret in a light turret mount point, it will still be there, however, you will only be able to equip a light turret there going forward.
FIXED: Hacking exploit fixed.
FIXED: Speak to Scarby mission now completes and is removed when speaking with Scarby.
FIXED: Travel to Achmedius Trade Port mission now completes. Just head towards the Cantina area on the trade port to auto-complete the mission.
FIXED: Capped afterburner speed while in combat so ships equipped with high quality warp drives cannot exceed the speed of combat projectiles.
FIXED: If a team member is blocked when walking towards or trying to use a object, they will no longer stop and then perform the action on next move or action.
FIXED: When entering a gravity well from micro-warp, occasionally you would lose keyboard control for thrust and rotatation - you would need to click in space to restore keyboard control of your ship.
UPDATED: The Pharris Mace AK-7 is now available on the ship merchant.
UPDATED: Updated the way characters interact with objects in the environment so animations do not delay interaction and block clicks.
UPDATED: Ship missile speed increased
UPDATED: The game now uses border highlights for interactive objects in world exploration mode. Old highlighting methods have been removed.
UPDATED: Ranged weapons that drop from enemies or purchased from vendors have had their maximum ammo capacity increased. This change is not retroactive and does not affect equipment you currently have in your inventory.
UPDATED: Nano's can now be equipped to all weapon types. There are a total of three ranged and three melee specific mods. Nano's are now global.
UPDATED: Tutorial videos are now higher resolution - some will be revised in future updates.

A note about sidearm range. The average range of sidarms was doubled in the last patch (Space Combat Patch). This bonus is applied when starting a new game to all starter weapons and to any new weapons you find. The change is not retroactive - so sidearms looted before the space combat patch still have the lower range - I won't be modifying them. Any loot drops or weapons found on merchants going forward will have the new range adjustments applied to them.

This patch adjusts maximum ammo up for rifles and sidearms. This can of course be adjusted by applying mods to higher quality items.

In Stellar Tactics, your ranged weapons have a falloff factor to chance to hit (accuracy) and bonuses applied based on your skill, stats and other factors with that weapon class. Here is how CTH and range penalties are calculated:

1) Your base CTH is calculated based on the weapons maximum range and the range to your target - a range penalty
2) A crouch bonus is calculated if you are crouched
3) A weapon skill bonus is calculated and applied. The higher your skill the more accuracy bonus is applied to the weapon. When you start the game, you have only a few points of skill in whatever your weapon choice was when you created your character. As you increase in skill, you will noticed that your CTH goes up - at higher levels you will rarely miss.
4) A STAT bonus is calculated (PER, DEX etc)
5) A weapon tier bonus is calculated ( Basic, Exceptional, Rare etc)
6) A weapon wear panalty is calculated (this is disabled for now until crafting and repair go in the game)
7) Your adjusted BASE CTH is calculated based on the information above.
8) A penalty for Burst and Full-Auto fire modes are applied if applicable (these will be adjusted when I work on the ground combat system)
9) A body target penalty is applied to the CTH calculation - smaller body parts are harder to hit - like a head shots.
10) And finally an equipped mod bonus is applied to the calculation if applicable
11) Some weapons recieve a CTH bonus factored by range applied to the final calculation.

As I mentioned, sidearms have seen a bit of attention doubling their range. I am listening to the feedback your are posting and I'll start working on a good number of changes and additions to the combat system starting next week. These include the addition of a few new options in combat, adjustments to the movement and blocking system, burst and full-auto damage and effects and the removal of a number of general gameplay annoyances that are on my list to fix. I'll keep you all posted as I make progress on this.

Thank you all for the feedback.

 

[Taka-Haradin puolipeikko]

http://store.steampowered.com/news/externalpost/steam_community_announcements/2356940080947550180

Patch 0.118 and what's next!
20 JANUARY - STELLAR TACTICS


Hi everyone! You can find the latest patch notes since the last patch announcement below. I'd also like to give you a little preview of some of the work I'll be doing. This will be the last patch for a while unless there is a blocker or some other major problem that comes up so I can branch off and focus exclusively on the ground combat system for a while.

Here are the things I'm hoping to get into the combat update

Movement and blocking system overhaul - I'll be refining this system so blocking mechanics and movement in combat are much improved. The goal is to provide consistent blocking mechanics for both the enemies and the player characters going forward and to remove various annoyances with the current system.

Attacks of opportunity - (PC's and NPC's) If characters are adjacent to an enemies position and move out of range, the closest combatant will get a free single attack. That is a single melee attack or a single shot from ranged weapons.

Defend - (selected when ending your turn - PC's and NPC's) - Can be selected if you have 2 AP left over - gain immunity to one attack in the next round of combat.

Guard - (selected when ending your turn - PC's and NPC's) - I'll be looking into the ability to guard areas of visibility, gaining an opportunity to fire on enemies coming into the characters line of sight. This selection when ending your turn will likely take all your AP, can only be used once in any combat scenario. I find this mechanic overpowering so I want to make sure it is used sparingly. I'll scrap it if it's abusive.

Better display of LOS visibility when targeting enemies.

I'll be removing the cursor based targeting functionality. The current active cursor will be removed completely. Instead you will have a improved information and targeting UI for rollover info and selected targets that includes dedicated targeting for head, torso, arms and legs.

I'll also be tightening up delays in all combat animations, ranged weapon delays and generally polishing a number of areas related to the ground combat system.

I'll be adding combat specific powers that allow you to perform a variety weapon attacks and effects. These have always been a part of the plan and it's time to implement them. Examples are sniping, backstabs, teleportation, PBAoE attacks, weapon overloads, spread damage for shotguns and smg's as well as shared melee and ranged effects. First-aid will get AE heals, HoT, buffs and debuffs.

• These will all come as Neural Devices that interface with your team members neural implants. Powers are knowledge gained through the use of these devices greatly enhancing your performance and skill.
  
  
• Each team can have 3 active devices equipped at any time that must be equipped before the start of combat.
  
  
• These devices will have level requirements and you will find upgrades that can be equipped at various skill levels.
  
  
• They will drop off enemies and can be found as loot.
  
  
• All powers will have an AP cost
  
  
• All powers have cool downs.
  
  
• These neural powers will also gain bonuses from your perks where it makes sense.

The above is not related to "Azimuth" which is something that will go in the game at a later time.

I'll make sure to post regular updates and share videos when it makes sense. Thanks again for your support!

Recent patch notes

0.118
FIXED: Trigger group mods for pistols that have burst and full auto modifications now work as intended.
FIXED: Merc stat assignments now display correct HP when assigning STR/END in character information UI.
FIXED: Assigning points to stats no longer adjust your HP to max while in combat.
FIXED: Alpha blending errors in some areas corrected.
FIXED: Alpha blending errors when using multiple gas grenades corrected.
FIXED: Bright green weapon on or near ground when swapping weapons removed.
FIXED: Door to Phestus now works as intended. I had disabled it a while ago so it was always open.
FIXED: A bug that could cause the enemy to stop responding if healing inside a gas cloud.
FIXED: A bug that would cause toxic gas clouds to continously stack dot damage on combatants.
FIXED: When attacking with melee weapons from a crouched position and using the combat queue, it was possible to get an additional attack.
FIXED: The crouch/stand icon on the toolbar is now correctly updated when attacking from a crouched position.
UPDATED: The 1AP cost to turn your team members while in combat via the tool bar has been removed. You now have unlimited visibility from your position at no AP cost.
UPDATED: Double clicking inventory items no longer moves them to your stash. You must shift click or drag and drop items from you inventory to the stash icon.
UPDATED: While in combat you can no longer select other team members by left clicking with the mouse. This was confusing because you could have unintentionally selected another team member who's turn was not active and tried to end your turn. If you have another team member selected when it is your turn, you cannot end your turn. You can still select other team members using the F1-F4 keys while in combat or by clicking on their portraits.
UPDATED: After rotating the camera using the left mouse button, the cursor is restored without needing to move your mouse.
ADDED: If you have the mission "Speak with Scarby" in your active log after you have already finished the mission, you can now return to Hurzog Mining, walk towards the vendor and the mission will auto-complete.

0.117
UPDATED: Labels in space for incursion ships are now orange instead of red so they can easily be recognized and separated from other hostile ships (red labels).

UPDATED: Space incursions can be canceled when not in combat while in space. No need to dock anymore. Just click the small cancel icon on the incursion label at the top of the screen.

UPDATED: Armor, weapon, mod and shield vendors now offer more items when they generate their inventory. This leads to more options available on the vendors.

ADDED: Border highlights for all enemies and player characters in combat - this work is part of the combat revamp - many more changes to come to the core systems.

FIXED: One of the mutant types was always hidden when not in direct view, even when using the [TAB] key (default for highlight objects). Could make it difficult to identify the enemy during combat.
FIXED: You can once again micro-warp from incursions (assuming your turrets are off) at full speed.
FIXED: Ship loot crate labels no longer disappear if you travel far away from the crate.
FIXED: Ship loot crate labels no longer appear on screen when the crate is behind you or not visible in the camera view.
FIXED: A bug that would allow ship vendors to occasionally sell turrets that would not fit on ships.
FIXED: Assigned merc weapons when recruiting them now generate with the correct range and max ammo values.
FIXED: Starting ranged weapons for your generated character and team members are now corretly assigned with default range, ammo and damage values based on the adjustments I made a while ago (increased base range for rifles and side-arms, increased base ammo capacity for weapons).
FIXED: Mining skill level cap adjusted to level 60 like other skills.
FIXED: A bug with stun grenades permanently stunning enemies.
FIXED: It was possible for enemies to heal themselves beyond their maximum HP
FIXED: Turrets now fire even if you don't have a team member in the weaponry station slot.

0.115
FIXED: A few starter weapons needed ammo and range updates.
FIXED: A navigation error in the Vats.
FIXED: Another possible fix for the keyboard not responding when micro-warping to a station.
UPDATED: UI information lists in space can now be scrolled when dragged and with the mouse wheel.

0.114
FIXED: A crash when launching from the surface near the Aznari Ruins the first time you enter space. Thanks for reporting this!
UPDATED: Loading a save game while already in the game world is now much faster
UPDATED: Returning to the main menu while in the game world is now much faster - that includes Game Over...
UPDATED: Loading screen display updated so it functions like it did before displaying tips, progress etc.
UPDATED: When customizing character portraits/names/voices in the popup window after clicking character portraits in the character info window, the arrows to the left and right of the portraits can now be clearly seen. Before they could have been overlooked.