A big step forward...
Early Access Update #16: Version 0.9.94
This update changes the game a lot. Summing up the highlights:
ROBOS: It makes Robos more viable with a whole list of balance changes, new hacks & upgrades.
NEW UNITS, HACKS & UPGRADES: More than 10 hacks and upgrades each, 4 new units and 2 new support buildings help fill out some gaps.
REWORKS AND REBALANCES: A lot of units, hacks and upgrades have been reworked. For example the Core Harvesters can be redeployed now. Robo Marines shoot a triple salvo, making them benefit more from their bounty skill and many more small and big tweaks.
UI OVERHAUL: We rearranged some of the UI to make it more coherent and to add clickable buttons for some functions that previously were only accessible via hotkeys.
BATTLE ARCHIVE: It makes some painful but necessary changes to the Battle Archive by replacing Universal Armor and Universal Shields.
RETROACTIVE ASCENSION ACHIEVEMENTS: If you beat a higher ascension, you will now automatically be granted the earlier ones as well.
PERFORMANCE: It should greatly improve performance.
I will keep it a bit shorter and go back to work, where there is a lot going on…
HELP US FOR THE FINAL EARLY ACCESS PHASE:
As the version numbers suggest (Although that is actually pure coincidence) we are quickly approaching version 1.0. There is new content cooking on the beta branch, that could use your feedback! A new specialist and new Ascensions are being tested and will be held there until we launch out of Early Access.
You can simply access the beta branch by enabling it in your steam library, right clicking the game going to properties -> Game Versions & Betas -> changing the branch to beta. Although called “latest unstable version” it is very rare that there is actually instability going on, usually it is our way to get feedback on new content. So if you want to help us out on the last stretch to 1.0 we would greatly appreciate you playing the beta and giving feedback either here on the Steam Forums or our Discord.
Read the full changelist below:
Version 0.9.94
GENERAL CHANGES:
Key rebinding now supports side mouse buttons (Mouse Back / Mouse Forward)
new PCX Variants and units
Combat Engineer rework - can now teleport to refineries.
Called down buildings now trigger chests
Don't show health decimals on card
Upgrades "Vampiric Attack", "Burnout Culture", "Material Transfer" and "Consume Death" cannot be assigned to Bombs any longer (except for Rocket Marines)
Upgrades “Infested Skill” and “Robust Skillset” can only be applied to blueprints with active skill that is not a toggle
Upgrade “Skill Damage” can no longer be applied to Robo Marine
Unlock all ascension Steam achievements up to the current beaten ascension
AI: If possible a Builder Base won't be built at the same location two times in a row
AI now avoids placing Builder Bases at unreachable positions
AI units now have a chance to flee in combat
Cleaned up some effects which should lead to less hitches when new units spawn
Cleaned image size scaling to use less RAM and initialize units faster
Improved visual on some smoke trails
changed building selection visual to better resemble their pathing size.
A long list of different optimizations that should improve performance overall and remove a lot of the worst dips in performance
Heat Level Display changed from Roman Numerals to normal numbers prefixed by an "H”
PCX Fortress has a cooler death now.
Strength Drop should no longer cause a slow down
CONTENT ADDITIONS AND CHANGES:
New Unit: Siege Bomb (XP Level 20)
New Unit: Robo MG Bot (XP Level 39)
New Unit: Hover Jumper (XP Level 37)
New Unit: Med Walker (XP Level 34)
New Super Weapon: Precision Artillery (XP Level 37)
New Support Building: Strength Uplink (XP Level 26)
Removed Hacks: Ambient Destruction, Rush Home, Explosive Obstacles - because basically nobody ever picks them.
New Hack: Protect The Squad (XP Level 0)
New Hack: Efficient Fortifications (XP Level 34)
New Hack: Got your back (XP Level 0)
New Hack: Drive By Hit (XP Level 25)
New Hack: AdvancedEngines (XP Level 30)
New Hack: ElusivePack (XP Level 5)
New Hack: Blurred Target (XP Level 19)
New Hack: Targeted Blast (XP Level 29)
New Hack: Concussive Blast (XP Level 50)
New Hack: Critical Strength (XP Level 25)
New Hack: Overconsumption (XP Level 0)
New Hack: Scattered Optics (XP Level 32)
New Hack: Robust Benefits (XP Level 0)
New Hack: Robotic Solidarity (XP Level 7)
New Hack: Strengthened Impact (XP Level 35)
New Hack: Get Well Sooner(XP Level 47)
New Hack: Healing Expertise (XP Level 8)
New Hack: Loaded Bots (XP Level 12)
Reworked Hack: Melee Uprising
Reworked Hack: Crystalline Undergrowth
Reworked Hack: Efficiency Model
Reworked Hack: Rich Wood
Reworked Hack: Spider Buddies
Removed Upgrades: Anti Burn Coating - because nobody picks
New Upgrade: Advanced Targeting (XP Level 21)
New Upgrade: Advanced Reload (XP Level 10)
New Upgrade: Spark Of Resistance (XP Level 31)
New Upgrade: Sticky Finish (XP Level 37)
New Upgrade: Wrecking Ball (XP Level 47)
New Upgrade: Terrain Clearance (XP Level 50)
New Upgrade: Back To Base (XP Level 42)
New Upgrade: Future Rewards (XP Level 14)
New Upgrade: Focused Blast (XP Level 22)
New Upgrade: Delayed Detonator (XP Level 12)
New Upgrade: Shared Charge (XP Level 16)
New Upgrade: Attack Upgrade (XP Level 0)
Reworked Upgrade: Ghostly Protector
Reworked Upgrade: Armored Attack
Reworked Healing Fire - Incinerator Specialist Hack
Reworked Shrinking Fire - Incinerator Specialist Hack - is now called Persistent Flames
BALANCE:
Robo Rebalancing: Factory cost for a lot of Robo Factories decreased
Reworked Core Harvester - can now use the skill to manually redeploy.
Increased the allowed maximum factory of a lot of starting units factories
Incinerator Active ability sequence happens a lot quicker, making it more reliable
Heavy MG Tank: Skill and passive reworked with Turbo instead of self-burn
MP ChargeBot: Skill and passive reworked with Robust instead of self-burn
Changed Hack: Quantity over Quality - HP reduction now only 15% instead of 30%, Cost reduction still 20%.
Changed Hack: Long Reach gives +2 instead of +3 range.
Changed Upgrade: Team Taker - now with slightly lower upside and a way smaller downside.
Changed Upgrade: Benevolent Ghost - now applies effect to most damaged units instead of closest and to 5 instead of 3 targets.
Changed Upgrade Payback: Duration increased to 10 sec from 8.
Reworked Bounty Bot skill and buffed it
Improved Health Boost Upgrade from 20 to 50 HP
Upgrade Critical Exit: target and duration increased.
Upgrade: Premium Choice - effect improved slightly
Robo Poker attack rate and damage buffed
Small Health Boost Hack gives 20 instead of 10 HP
Meta Node: Healing Home Base Range increased
Healing Rush Upgrade: Heal increased from 1 to 5 HP
Robust Revival Upgrade: chance increased to 30 from 25
Frontliner Upgrade: Tradeoff more favorable.
Robo Micro now has an active ability that grants it stealth.
Changed spawn limit and lifetime on Leaking Egg effect to be more intuitive with description.
Mantis - Recovery passive changed to trigger with a fixed range instead of sight range. So raising sight is no longer a disadvantage for Mantis
some objective buildings block player building construction like PCX Builderbases
changed A5 building armor to an HP boost on A7
BATTLE ARCHIVE CHANGES:
Universal Shields: Replaced by Shield Recharge Time node
Universal Armor: Replaced by Advanced Armor
Armor Shred: Replaced by Critical Armor Rounds
Healer Boost Node max level increased to 10
BUGFIXES:
Prohibit exception that occurs if Phase Walker gets killed while targeting the Phase Walker skill
Siege Bomb no longer falsely triggers hacks for vehicles to appear.
Prevent exception that may occur if ai wants to produce something in the moment the level finishes
Advanced Reload cannot be given to Furnace any more
Shift-left-click in Battle Archive not always incremented node as far as it could - this is now fixed
Heavy MG Tank no longer has an unused skill range value, falsely allowing those upgrades to be applied
Turret Veterancy - Fixed that some Turrets and super weapon / support buildings did not have a max rank value, preventing them from reaching Veteran status.
If AI units get stuck they try teleporting out of the situation instead of being stuck forever
Core Harvesters now can deploy on cells with other units on it as long as it is no other Core Harvester and they cannot undeploy on building cells.
Hotfix: battle archive view enabled in shops by default.
Advanced armor Battle Archive node works as advertised
Med Walker heal lines no longer hang around when there is no healing target
removed some auto playing particle systems from some obstacles
Bugfix: Light Artillery shoots three times again
future reward behavior matches description
fixed Datapod highlight ring
fixed PCX Bombers not attacking correctly
Fixed small typo in Flame Walker skill description
Attacks on things that can't be attacked (like crates) will be converted into attack move on this position instead
Display mana tooltips on card again
Fixed typo in tutorial
Fixed: Left click for attack move order could be blocked by projectiles
Fixed: PCX turrets tried to answer attacks even if target is out of reach and in between did not target anything else
When auto-attacking and target flees out of range choose a new target if existent
PCX Dragon Bug correctly immune to Burn status
Static Eater ability now only targets enemies
Don’t Touch Me - Hack now also affects enemy spawns
Engineer Death Stun now gets retriggered and should also catch enemy spawns etc.
Fixed Missile Truck impact sounds not playing
Fixed Swarm Walker Egg playing sound in selection screen
Select Idle Harvesters doesn't select busy Core Harvesters any more
Fixed: entities that visualize something with a circle when selected hide it if applying a skill
Visualization circles don't need another selection click to update their size anymore
Changed settings to have vsync turned off as default correctly
Fixed Weird green ring on FireMech Card
Fixed Battle Archive Factory Cost Reduction not working correctly
Fixed Battle Archive Skill Damage Increase not being applied to correct targets
Fixed Production Boost Tower skill effect not disappearing
Fixed Battle Archive Node that allows engineer range now matches the description
Fixed PCX Crystal Cleaner skill effect and visual match correctly now.
Fixed: MechCommander skill doesn't activate reliably on PCX Units
Fallback win condition: if all enemy buildings and units are destroyed the player wins
Fixed PCX Pokers with high attack rate having trouble dealing damage
Now Cooldown changes are reflected in fire point delays, too
Fixed Player Unit Chests will no longer spawn Spawns.
Fixed Battle Archive Building MP Charge node info not being reflected on cards.
Upgrades "Advanced Targeting", "Critical Growth", "Critical Slowness" and "Payback" can no longer be applied to blueprints without attack damage
Reroll button is deactivated for a second after clicking to prevent spamming it
Battle Archive: if using shift left-click: correct visual and audio feedback if fully upgrading or failing to do so
Fixed PCX Fortress no longer deals friendly damage
Fixed Strength icon not showing correctly on some turrets and buildings
Fixed options menu headers being very ugly in some languages
Added visual indicator when Marine Blast Tower is ready.
Added missing death state for CF Transporter
Fixed CF Transporter Description
Fixed missing localization for Fire Bomb
Fixed Firebrand PCX loca and some logic
Fixed some buildings status effect particle systems and icons not being wired correctly - there still might be some missing, let us know if you encounter something off.
Fixed Enemy Sense Battle Archive effect not scaling correctly with sight range of engineers.
Lower the probability that crashes occur when the level is loading or while in combat
Thanks for reading, let us know if you have any questions, we usually try to answer every comment here or in the forums (although sometimes it might take us quite a while).