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

The internal beta will run through Summer/Fall 2017; until then there will be consistent updates and features being added. The game will launch to the public on December 6th, and the test server will be reset.
Players who have access to the internal beta will be posting here to discuss the game, report bugs, and talk strategy.

11/3/17 Build Update:

• Many of the sector maps on the galaxy have been revised to have to be more distinct from one another, and have been improved for more strategic options. There are over 15,000 sectors/maps on the large map being played.

• The waiting for transit phase popup for observer mode will no longer persist after the transit phase has ended.
• Fixed an issue where players could move to an incorrect location during the Sol tutorial.
• The AI director will now only send a maximum of one ship to a sector per combat round.
• Players will no longer be able to attempt travel to a locked sector in the possession of the opposing faction.
• New avatar images have been added to indicate which Hive, Ma'alaketh, and Genari ships are controlled by NPCs.
• Fixed an issue where AI controlled ships were not reliably appearing with the correct avatar image.
• Fixed an issue where the ships destroyed statistic on the Captain’s Profile was incorrectly offset by 3 classes.
• NPC Civilian ships will now correctly show their transit phase animations.
• The leaderboard will now only show captains for the current server season.
• Fixed an issue where the camera would cut back to the player’s ship between each cinematic in a transit phase.

11/7/17 Build Update:

• Sectors under an opposing faction’s possession that can be attacked will now display a white lightning bolt.
  
• Marine Pods will no longer deal crew damage to Ma'Alaketh or Hive ships.
  
• The captain skill Slaughter II will now give +2 XP per crew kill instead of +4 XP.
  
• Fixed an issue where a large map object was not being properly shown but was still preventing players from navigating through the nodes it occupied.
  
• Weapons can no longer counterfire when they are damaged.
  
• The background for the server select scene has been updated.
  
• The frequency players will run into a general error on the Sol tutorial that will prevent progression has been reduced.
  
• Players are no longer able to travel to sectors adjacent to a player’s current location but are not adjacent to a friendly sector.
  
• Addressed an issue where some of the beam drones were not firing.
  
• Single player missions upon completion will now award a bonus 10 XP.
  
• Fixed an issue where the purchase ship button would remain visible after purchasing the ship.
  
• The captain's panel on the Spacedock will now show the Leadership/Honor Point value for the captain instead of displaying the XP value twice.
  
• The queued for map popup will no longer persist into combat.

11/9/17 Build Update:

• The skill Damage Boost 1 now requires an officer level 2 to acquire.
• The skill Damage Boost 2 now requires an officer level 4 to acquire.
• Attackers are now awarded double the number of siege points for destroying an enemy player. The siege point values remain the same for defenders and for destroying AI controlled ships.
• The XP earned each time a player damages an enemy player’s ship has been doubled.
• Fixed a bug where the auto repair from freeflight would continue to repair upon entering combat again.
• Fixed a bug where more than one freeflight auto repair sequence could occur on a single ship.
• The hull points of all ships have been increased by 50% rounded up to the nearest whole number.
• The Leadership/Honor point costs of many ships have been changed.

11/14/17 Build Update:

• It now requires 5 regions defended to get one point towards upgrading an officer.
• Ships will be removed from solo missions upon player disconnect instead of waiting 10 minutes.
  
• If an enemy ship is selected and detection is lost, the camera will now center back on the player's ship.
  
• Fixed a bug where weapons could counterfire with no power allocated.
  
• How information is displayed on the captain and officer bars on the left side of the space dock has been revised.
  
• Mines and Beam Drones in the tutorial are now identified as Training due to some of their unique characteristics.
  
• The galaxy map now has a key that displays what some of the different icons mean.
  
• The AI director will now look for a shipyard with a valid path to a sector before attempting to launch reinforcement ships.
  
• Players are now able to delete their character from active servers on the server select screen.
  
• New tutorial popups have been added to the shipyard for helping players getting started.
  
• Detecting another ship while moving through debris will no longer return the player’s ship to their starting location but instead, be placed on the nearest unobstructed node.
  
• New tutorial popups have been added to the galaxy map warning players to avoid entering Ma’Alaketh or Hive territory.
  
• The hex grid for maps can now be hidden through options menu preferences. If already in a map this toggle will require players to leave and re-enter to take effect.

• The Sol chief medical officer now has the Emergency Escape skill. When a player’s ship is destroyed in combat the highest level officer(s) will be carried over with their level, unused skill points, and skill assignments preserved to the next ship purchased of the same class and variant. If there is more than one officer is of the same level then the one saved is determined at random. For each rank of this skill, one additional officer will be saved.

11/15/17 Build Update:

• Fixed an issue where the Tutorial popup describing Honor and Leadership points was not appearing.
  
• Fixed a typo in the entering Hive territory tutorial warning on the Galaxy Map.
  
• Fixed an issue where weapons that counter-fired a marine pod were not being correctly put on cooldown.
  
• Weapon power levels will now cycle from max to unpowered and back if the user continues to click on the weapon icon during allocation.

 

11/21/2017 Build Update

• The general tutorial popups will no longer appear during the tutorial simulation.
  
• The combat notification for Genari marines killing a ship’s crew now correctly says Honor points.
  
• The preferences section of the options menu now has a volume control.
  
• The Galaxy Map will now only show details for only sectors to which players can directly travel or under their faction’s control. Otherwise, the sector details will show a question mark.
  
• Tutorial popup will now appear for the first time a player attempts to enter each of the different environment types.
  
• Skirmish and Battle Royale will now only show Sol and Genari Ships.
  
• Fixed an issue where if a captain’s name was too long the Empire section of the Shipyard would not appear.
  
• Fixed an issue where Genari captains were appearing with Sol ranks on the Spacedock.
  
• Fixed an issue where the server would lockup momentarily resulting in players being booted.
  
• The main game music for the server select, intro cinematics and loading screen have been replaced with the official Space Wars theme music.
  
• Fixed an issue where chat text was being cut-off and not correctly wrapping when on the Galaxy Map.
  
• NPC combat ships will no longer be able to use Premium Avatars as their captain portraits.
  
• Fixed a bug that would allow players to exceed their limit of support ships active in the galaxy.
  
• Fixed an issue where the planets on the Galaxy Map were not being shown in the correct order.
  
• Fixed an issue where the client would consider counterfire as still being enabled when the weapon became unpowered resulting in an insufficient power warning.
  
• The Efficient Officer Training captain skill will now reduce the cooldown time for upgrading officers by 50% instead of 75%.
  
• Capture points will now be awarded if a ship is destroyed from indirect damage caused by another ship’s explosion.
  
• The tutorial popup “To the Frontlines!” now also informs players about using the Zoom on the Galaxy Map.

11/28/2017 Build Update:

• Players are now able to return to the Galaxy Map if they want to leave the queue for entering a Sector Map.
• An all-new Ship Glossary has been added to the game. While in a sector hitting the “g” key will open the glossary and the “i” key will show the stat card for the currently selected ship. The glossary can also be accessed on the Spacedock. This feature is a work in progress and will undergo improvements and changes.
• When a player creates a captain for the first time they will now have an option to sign up for the Space Wars newsletter.
• Updated how the game handles ship movement to better address cases where ships would stop on occupied nodes when detecting another ship or entering an environmental node.
• Players will no longer automatically stop if moving into detection range of an enemy ship that has already been detected by an ally.
• The Genari captain skill “Honorable Death” will now refund Honor Points based on the ship’s purchase cost.
• Captain portraits are now classified as Premium or Standard.
• When changing the captain portrait the popup will now default to Premium portraits.
• New Sol and Genari premium portraits have been added to the game.
• When creating a new captain the portrait will no longer default to Premium portraits.
• To prevent spamming chat an error will now appear if a player posts 3 messages within a 5 second period.
• The officer skills Overload have had their damage modification values reduced to the following:
  • Overload I now increases damage by 20% instead of 50%.
  • Overload II now increases damage by 40% instead of 100%.
  • Overload III now increases damage by 60% instead of 200%.
  • Overload IV now increases damage by 100% instead of 300%.
• The XP awarded for capturing a region has been doubled.
• The XP awarded for live player kills and live player hits (not NPCs) has been doubled.
• The About button on the Options Menu now displays the Space Wars legal text.
• The game’s full name Space Wars: Interstellar Empires will now be shown.
• Sol Plasma Beam weapons' range damage bonuses now extend much farther (+1 (1-6 ) +2 (7-10) +3 (11-14)

11-30-2017 Build Update:

• The main server select screen has been updated. Players will now be able to see their previous captains for closed servers and watch the ending cinematics on the left column. Active servers where the player has a captain will now be shown in the center column. Pending and Active servers where the player does not have a captain will now appear on the right column. Each of these three columns have arrow buttons to cycle through the available selection.
  
• Off-Topic is now the default chat tab.
  
• The popup to leave the map queue can no longer be closed to always give players an option to leave the queue.
  
• Fixed an issue where an additional sector ID was appearing on the right column on the Galaxy Map.
  
• Sol, Genari, Hive, and Ma’Alaketh beams are now more distinct from one another.
  
• The officer skill Power Boost V will now increase power by 25% instead of 30%
  
• Player’s officer rosters will now be consistently ordered.
  
• The Maneuverability officer skills have had their movement point modifier reduced.
  
• Level 1: change to 5% from 10%.
  
• Level 2: change to 10% from 20%.
  
• Level 3: change to 15% from 30%.
  
• Level 4: change to 20% from 40%.
  
• Level 5: change to 30% from 60%.
  
• The ship glossary now has a button so it can be opened on the Galaxy Map and on combat maps. This button appears as a small globe.
  
• The ship glossary is no longer accessible from the Spacedock.
  
• More ship and structure cards have been added to the glossary.
  
• Addressed some interaction issues with the ship glossary.
  
• The Space Wars theme music will no longer play on loading screens.
  
• The leave map button will no longer persist after activation.

12/01/2017 Build Update:

• Each type of support ship now has a unique icon for indicating what nodes they affect.
  
• Players will now be able to see the support ship icons of their allies.
  
• The server select screen now has new icons associated to each server name.
  
• Fixed an issue where sectors with structures was not properly showing the structure icon in all cases on the galaxy map.
  
• Fixed an issue where credit amounts were not properly updating if a player changed their captain portrait multiple times.
  
• A notification message will now be displayed in chat to a player if they post too frequently over a period of time instead of a popup.
  
• When a player is muted by an administrator the notification message will now be displayed in the chat to the player instead of a popup.
  
• Fixed an issue where an invalid selection error would be triggered when deselecting support ships on the Spacedock.
  
• Trying to move after pressing leave map during free flight will no longer generate an invalid map error.

 

12/04/2017 Build Update:

• The Legacy Medals feature has been added to the game. There are now medals that will carry over from season to season that are much more detailed than the standard medals. These medals can be seen by clicking on the Legacy Medals button on the upper right of the server select or on the captain tab of the Spacedock.
• A player’s combat turn will now automatically end if they run out of movement points and have no powered weapons that can still be fired.
• Made some improvements to file compression to reduce the overall size of the game.
• Fixed an issue where some objects were not properly appearing on maps.
• Fixed an issue where the fire effect for the destroyed moon would not appear correctly.
• Fixed an infinite loading screen issue that would occur when if the user attempted to enter galaxy and then clicked to enter the tutorial.
• The click sound effect on the "All" or "None" for the Shipyard filters are no longer louder than the other button sounds.
• Sol lasers will now use the same power gradient as genari lasers.
• The ship roster on the Spacedock will now order ships consistently based on Class, Type, and Variant.
• Change Portrait will no longer display your current portrait as a selection option to prevent accidental re-purchasing.
• Addressed a circumstance where an error message would be triggered when returning to the Spacedock from the Tutorial.
• Addressed an issue where the Purchase Credits popup was not dynamically adjusting based on screen resolution.
• Several more improvements have been made to the Ship Glossary regarding user interaction and showing non relevant information.
• Fixed an issue where there would be a secondary flyby when a ship warps out of a map.
• Fixed an issue where an error would occur when attempting to power a system that was repaired.
• Officer Skills will no longer appear in Skirmish matches.
• Addressed an issue where a previous Captain’s ships would be shown on the captain creation screen after a server season ends.
• Fixed an issue where multiple movement commands would be queued up.

12/06/2017 Build Update:

• Open servers will now be displayed in the center column of the server select screen if the user has no active characters.
  
• The XP gained notification in-combat will no longer delay user commands from being executed.
  
• Fixed an issue where some tutorial text was not appearing during the Sol tutorial.
  
• More Premium captain portraits have been added to the game.
  
• Addressed an issue that was preventing the observer mode from being seen while waiting for the next transit phase.
  
• Fixed an issue with the movement preview not appearing in the Genari tutorial.
  
• The captain creation screen will no longer display the starting ship XP value but instead display the strengths of the faction that is selected.
  
• Using the mouse scroll wheel for chat when the chat cursor is active will no longer zoom in and out of the map.
  
• Edit ship name will no longer be available if the player has no ships.
  
• A player's current premium captain portrait will no longer appear in the standard section of the change portrait window.
  
• Addressed a lighting issue with the Lorgha Moon map object.
  
• The enemies eliminated window will now delay loading back into the Galaxy Map until it is closed.
  
• All the graphics quality settings when launching Space Wars will now be capped at 60 FPS to reduce GPU strain.
  
• The purchase credits window will now show two decimal places for prices.
  
• The intro cinematics will use their original music instead of the server select music.
  
• Fixed an issue that would trigger the general error popup at the end of combat.
• Range damage bonuses for Sol Plasma Beams expanded in range.

12/07/2017 Build Update:

• Fixed an issue where the NPC ship Military Freighter was facing the wrong direction when moving.
• Fixed an issue where clicking the right arrow on the medal case could also result in selecting a Legacy Medal.
• The faction strengths on the captain creation screen are now identified as Sol Faction Advantages and Genari Faction Advantages.
• A new Genari clan, Yandari, has been added to the captain portrait select screen.
• Addressed a typo on the purchase credits confirmation popup.
• Legacy Medals will now display the character name, server name, and date earned.
• Added new method for processing ship system updates to address not being able to fire after repairing.
• Fixed an issue where the player could become stuck on the Shipyard when attempting to enter galaxy.
• The ‘Quit’ button on the options menu is now called ‘Quit Game’.
• The Shipyard will now automatically refresh after unlocking a ship.

12/07/2017 Build Update:

• Fixed an issue with the ships not being properly ordered in the turn bar.
• An automated notification system for server restarts and shutdowns has been added to the game.
• The faction limits for all sectors have been reduced:
6vs6 now reduced to 4vs4
8vs8 now reduced to 5vs5
10vs10 now reduced to 6vs6
Extra large sectors eg. 20v20 now half that amount
• The Skirmish simulation mode will no longer have a turn timer.
• More premium avatars have been added to the game.
• Fixed an issue with the Tutorial where an error message would appear when attempting to fire your repaired weapon.
• There is now a new sound to indicate when it is your turn in combat.

Space Wars Patch Notes 12/13/2017

• Custom ship names will now be properly displayed to yourself and other players in combat.
• The movement speed for ship animations has been doubled.
• Officer communication messages will no longer block attack animations.
• The Missiles and Marine pods now travel 25% faster and beam durations have been reduced by 25%.
• A new visual has been added to indicate when it is your turn.
• The icon for your own ship in the turn bar will now appear as green.
• The options for View Ship on the Spacedock are now properly aligned.
• All resolutions that are not compliant to 16:9, 16:10, 5:4, or 4:3, aspect ratios have been removed from the resolution selection.
• Fixed an issue with the Shipyard panel being skewed at 16:10 aspect ratio.
• Server Selection and Leaderboards now properly support the 4:3 aspect ratio.
• Re-watching ending cinematics can now be skipped like the intro cinematics.
• Fixed an issue where the previous button was not properly cycling through all the ships on the character select screen.
• Fixed a visual issue where ships would disappear from the ship roster if repurchased too quickly.
• Fixed several cases where civilian ships would warp out in a different direction from where they were pointing.

 

Spacewars Patch Notes 12/17/17:

Following the Lore behind Sol & Genari, some major Changes. Sol have better engines, and force fields, Genari better armor.
Most Sol Imperial Worlds ships have a boost in power output:
-Most Class III: +1 Power
-All Class IV: +2 Power
-All Class V: +4 Power
-All Class VI-IX: +6 Power
All Sol Imperial Worlds ships have improved and more efficient force fields:
-All Class III-X: Increased tier efficiency (less power cost to charge shields) and introducing a fourth-level force field. Smart players will make full use of this advantage and utilize their Science Officer to a greater extent.
Improved Survivability in Higher tier ships for both Sol and Genari:
-All Class 4 ships and higher get hull point boosts.
Power Output reduction for certain Genari Ships:
-Agile Flyer IV: -1 Power
-Interdictor III: -3 Power
-Victory III: -3 Power
Weapon Power reduction for two UltraFast Ships:
-Agile Flyer IV: From 1-2-1 to 1-1-1
-Mendi III: From 1-2-1 to 1-1-1
More changes coming on Tuesday, plus bug fixes and few features (eg. XP for tender repairs, other support ships, XP for engine hits).

 

I've noticed that new players quite often are confused by where to go on the galaxy map, especially if there isn't any border activity. So I've sent a feature request to the programmers;
So its recommended to put in a thunderbolt feature on every invadable sector to show players these are all available. See image attached.
The thunderbolt would be smaller, with a dim flash in greyscale.


Then a key would be placed on the galaxy map to help identify what these icons mean.

 

Engine damage is different than crew losses affecting engine power efficiency. So when the crew is 'healed' or 'replaced', they help restore the loss of engine efficiency.

 

The areas where you sometimes 'bounce', the programmers found an invisible map entity that wasn't showing up properly. It will be a fix on Tuesday's update.