Zero-K v1.14.5.3 - Eggs and Wires

This update adds wires between structures to visually connect energy grids. This makes grids easier to use and more satisfying to build. We have also added commander eggs, which let players rebuild lost commanders. The egg can also be transported and thrown, to take advantage of its disabling explosion.

On the more regular side of things we have a revert of the Hermit regeneration experiment, and numerous features and fixes. These include a new attrition graph for the endgame stats, and a lighting system update to fix the Pylon light bug.

Balance

Fixed commander morph costs being unintentionally far too high.

Added Commander Egg.

• Buildable from the bottom right of the Special tab.
• Costs 600 metal.
• Morphs to commander for free if the team has lost commanders.
• Hatched commanders are given to players without a commander.
• Can be thrown and detonated for 20k disarm and slow damage.

Hermit loses its regeneration.

• Idle auto heal time 10 -> 60 seconds.
• Idle auto heal rate 10 -> 5 hp/s

Singularity Reactors can be built on the edge of the map again.

• Units that die outside the map explode far away, rather than on the map edge.

Discouraged movement blocking via nanoframe spam.

• Nanoframes placed in quick succession can be passed through until 15 metal is spent.
• Units can become stuck, but a move command seems to be sufficient to free them.

Features

Added grid wires between Metal Extractors and energy structures (thanks Licho and Anarchid).

• Flow shows energy use and colour shows efficiency.
• Grid thorns flash when the grid is at capacity.
• The underlying mechanics are unchanged, but the enemy will have an easier time scouting.

Other features:

• Added two attrition endgame graphs. These damaged value or killed value dealt:received ratios.
• Ronin treats Scalpel and Moderator as skirmish targets, so tries to stay at max range (thanks D0ubleD0uble).
• Solar and Wind generators are now harder to select, or easier to not select accidentally.

Fixes

• Panning with middle mouse button no longer deselects terraform commands, which is consistent with other commands (thanks Birdulon).
• Fixed Pylon lights sometimes jittering around or drawing somewhere else.
• Overhauled the entire weapon lighting system behind the scenes. Lights should render faster and generally look better.
• Fixed the first Sparrow of the match being able to hover mid air.
• Fixed incorrect burst damage for Starlight in the unit stats window.
• Added overslow information to the unit stats window.
• Fixed inconsistency between weapons and death explosions in the unit stats window.
• Fixed other scores obscuring the highlighted player in the endgame graphs.
• Fixed Locust jets angling downwards at full speed (thanks Stiofan-K).
• Windmills no longer crash all gadgets when the energy multiplier option is set to zero.
• Fixed GL parameter pollution in an unused map extension widget (thanks Helwor).
• Added framework required for rml UI support (thanks loveridge).