*** CLOSED BETA UPDATES & DISCUSSION/BUG REPORTS IV ***

Another update has been posted to the server, this one has the Fleet Commander skill update!

Summary

The Fleet Commander skill is now available. This skill allows the player to have a secondary or tertiary combat ship will follow you around the galaxy that will attack enemy ships. When the player acquires the now available Captain Skills called Fleet Commander I & II they will be able to toggle one or two combat ships to take into the galaxy. Go to the Shipyard, set the Role filter to Combat Ships, then requisition the Combat Ship you want. Then go to the Space Dock and toggle the checkbox next to the Combat tag on your ship selection.

Combat Ship Commands

Each combat ship will have a list of four commands that appear on the left side of the screen when they are selected in a map.

• Follow Me - The Combat Ship will follow you around the map and will always try to be close enough to you so you get its bonus. This is the default setting.
• Hold Position - The Combat Ship will stop following you around the the map, but if you leave the map it will warp out with you and resume following you around the galaxy.
• Back to Base - The Combat Ship will warp out of the map and return to the Spacedock. When used you will need to return to the Spacedock to retrieve your Combat Ship.
• Attack - The Combat Ship with hunt down and attack the closest enemy ship.

One key aspect is that the Fleet Commander and Commander skills are mutually exclusive.

• Fleet Commander 1: prevents the captain from ever achieving (Battleship Commander)
• If the player has Fleet Commander 1, Warship Commander, and Capital Ship Commander they can have 1 additional combat ship and it and the player are restricted to a maximum ship class of 8.
• Fleet Commander 2: prevents the captain from ever achieving (Battleship Commander) and (Capital Ship Commander)
• Capital Ship Commander: prevents the captain from ever achieving (Fleet Commander 2)
  Battleship Commander: prevents the captain from ever achieving (Fleet Commander 1)

AI Changes

• AI controlled ships will be better at finding other ships.
• AI ships will no longer fire their weapons across the map. Now they will fire based on a threshold for their hit chance. This is to prevent the bots from closing the distance with other ships.

General

• If a Captain or Officer does not meet the required level for a skill the game client will now display a notification.
• Fixed an issue where AI following ships would not appear if you enter a map next to a map object.
• Addressed an issue where the client was spamming the server with ShipyardGetOfficersMessage requests.
• There have been many AI adjustments made to accommodate the Fleet Commander skill that may not be noticeable by players.
• The majority of development time has been spent debugging the Fleet Commander functionality.

 

Another update for the weekend, and the server has been reset. Tomorrow, a large batch of beta signup people will be invited to populate the server.

• The AI will now be more effective at allocating power to prevent situations where they are unable to move.
• The AI will now partially power systems when it makes sense. This helps with situations where it uses too much or too little of its available power.
• The AI will now make sure they're actually in the map before attempting to repair.
• The AI will now avoid radiation environmental hazard instead of ignoring the danger they pose.
• The Support and Combat ship command buttons will now correctly show the state of the currently selected command for the selected ship.
• The visual and sound for Maalaketh beam weapons have been updated to better convey the intensity of their effect.
• Fixed an issue that would sometimes cause the player to remain on the loading screen indefinitely when entering into a Skirmish match.
• Fixed an issue that would cause ships to not properly be detected when they reenter a map.
• While in Freeflight the player and all of their Support & Combat ships will now warp out at the same time.
• Improvements have been made to better randomize the starting location for ships.
  

 

For those of you starting new characters, I noticed for me, the intro video didn't play, was it the same for you?

 

^^^ I agree with this, and I do think it will be something that will be implemented on launch.

 

Welcome Kaden, looks like the Intro Video has been fixed by the time you tested it out. The Character Creation screen still needs some work/improvement (its also kind of plain/boring in my opinion).
The updating of XP is still a problem, and one of the things that needs fixing for sure. It should update the moment you arrive at a station.
About the Transit video, that is also a known issue, where sometimes the ship warping in doesn't seem to appear/is invisible.

 

Update for this weekend!
Space Wars Patch Notes 6/30/2017

• When a vessel is attacked, either the engines or hull will take damage, but not both.
• The chance to damage systems (e.g. engines, weapons, etc.) when attacking a ship has been revised to be more consistent.
• With the exception of engines, a damaged system will no longer be selected to receive additional damage.
• The purchase cost of ships on the Shipyard is no longer the same as the HP/LP reward value for when the the ship is destroyed, and the costs for ships have been revised.
• Shields will no longer auto repair, and will now correctly require the player to use repair points to make them operable if disabled by damage.
• The hexes bordering map objects adjacent to one another will now be unified as a single inaccessible area instead of separate inaccessible areas.
• The introduction cinematic will now always be shown when a player creates a captain.
• Support ships and additional following combat ships will now move to the hex closest to the player if no adjacent spaces are available.
• The values of several ship skill and systems have been changed.
• Several ships have had their skills and/or systems changed to improve game balance.
• Ships destroyed by radiation will no longer leave wreckage in the wrong location on the map.
• Repair Bay and Medical bay will now appear appear as systems when viewing ship details on the spacedock.
• The nameplate popups for ships will now display the name and type of the ship instead of class and type.
• A case where an invalid duplicate of a ship would appear in Skirmish has been resolved.
• The officer Skills Dark Matter Astrophysics have been redesigned:
  • Dark Matter Astrophysics I: Allows for faster escape out of the sector in Combat: Larger ships (Class V and higher) no longer require several rounds to escape with their dark matter drive in combat.
  • Dark Matter Astrophysics II: The Dark Matter Drive can be activated anywhere on the map in combat -- they no longer need to travel to the edge of the map to escape.