Posted: Sun Feb 05, 2012 3:36 pm Post subject:
Tiberium Wars Advanced 1.7 (beta)
Well, since its more than 3 years after the last englisch release (ignoring the rather unstable german 1.6), I think it's time for a new playable version.
But be warned - this is more a "test" version than a full relase. While most of the stuff should work fine, a couple of things (most notable the GDI Mastoton) are still not finished. However, these are mostly graphic problems and hardly affect gameply.
I also have to point out that the translation is not finished - while names and most of the desciptions are in english, a couple of them is still missing or in german. Still, it shouldn't be to hard to figure out.
However, you still have to install it manually and it might not work with the campaign mission, so use it at you own risk.
On the bright side, I now have access to a far better internet connection, so chances are TWA might be updated more often than once every blue moon.
I think believe that this is the first time that I have actually enjoyed playing has the Scrin!
The FX on the Scrin vehicles that have charged up on tiberium are especially nice.
Quick notes:
The Epic units constant screen shake when they move is immensely annoying.
Have you deliberately put a limit of 1 for the Scrin growth accelerator?
The Epic units 'Infantry pick up is glitchy. From what I could tell it has a habit of leaving behind individual squad members. It seemed (I would need to test it further) to tie in with when some squad members were using buildings for cover.
Is it deliberate that Devastators to Canon damage? Currently there are a Scrin campers best friend (sitting just behind Storm columns).
The only PAC I built had trouble with one of its fighters docking. This occurred after I had force fired on a neutral building.
I have never seen this happen before, and wondered if an ability tied to the new FX was to blame.
The Scrin Scourge states that it is strong against vehicles, that is only true if the vehicle remains stationary. they seem to spend more time trying to line up an attack, then in actually attacking, it makes them very easy to destroy. Maybe a small increase in the acceptable aim delta?
The Redeemer with a gun emplacement has the tracers firing from the laser. While I understand why this happens, would it not be a better idea to use a particle FX tracer? because at the moment it looks awful.
Did you deliberately remove aircraft's 'guard area' action? ( if you send them to an area in guard stance, they will normally return to that area after every ammo refill)
Once the full version is up I can do some proper testing. QUICK_EDIT
I think believe that this is the first time that I have actually enjoyed playing has the Scrin!
To be honest, I was never happy with the Scrin - they dont fit my way of playing at all, so its hard to come up with something usefull. Nice to hear it worked
Madin wrote:
The Epic units constant screen shake when they move is immensely annoying.
Funny, some people seem to hate it, some seem to like it
Madin wrote:
Have you deliberately put a limit of 1 for the Scrin growth accelerator?
Oh, that was a mistake - since the AI tend to stack them, I once tried limiting them and have them generate money, but looks like I forgot to remove that again
Madin wrote:
The Epic units 'Infantry pick up is glitchy. From what I could tell it has a habit of leaving behind individual squad members. It seemed (I would need to test it further) to tie in with when some squad members were using buildings for cover.
Could you test that a bit more? As far as I can tell, it allways worked flawless for me.
Madin wrote:
The only PAC I built had trouble with one of its fighters docking. This occurred after I had force fired on a neutral building.
I have never seen this happen before, and wondered if an ability tied to the new FX was to blame.
No, as far as I can tell, the model was never changed and the code regarding the fighters was never touched, so I guess its one of TW's random bugs.
Madin wrote:
Did you deliberately remove aircraft's 'guard area' action? ( if you send them to an area in guard stance, they will normally return to that area after every ammo refill)
Uh, didnt realise that, I change it back in later versions. _________________ QUICK_EDIT
Current changelog for 1.71 (should appear next week):
Quote:
Scrin:
-changed Devastator Warship damage type from SIEGE to GRENADE
-removed Reaper aircraft
-moved Archons to Mutant Hovel and gave them a different texture
-changed Spore Pod back to their old settings - they dont generate money anymore and have no buildlimit
GDI:
-Mastodons can't be build from a normal war factory anymore
-added death model for the Sandstorm MLRS
-renamed JumpJet Trooper to Rocketeer and added some basic flight animations
-removed composite armor upgrade from Pilots & Rocketeers
-removed "Jump" abillity from Sandstorm MLRS
Nod:
-added damage stages and build animation for the Advanced Power Plant
-renamed the "Redeemer" upgrade for the Avatar to "Avenger" and fixed a texture bug
-removed the "Quad Turrets" upgrade
Other:
-new icons for: Scrin Air Support Tower, GDI Mastodon & Rocketeer, Nod Advanced Power Plant, Scavenger Bus
-removed a part of code that forced aircraft to return to their airfields after being idle for a while
-removed a couple of redudant units from the Mutant Hovel
-a couple of small balance changes
-added some new effects
-changed bullet tracer for Hammerhead, Slingshot, Scavenger & Redeemer
-the Scavenger Bus can crush infantry and clear mines now (similiar to a Reckoner with DozerBlades)
-edited GDI Rocketeers, Nod Fanatics & Scrin Archons:
* all three are now addvaible trough the Mutant Hovel
* each of the 3 units can only be build by their own faction
_________________ Last edited by Stygs on Sat Feb 18, 2012 10:15 am; edited 1 time in total QUICK_EDIT
Posted: Fri Feb 24, 2012 11:03 am Post subject:
1.71
Notes on 1.71
Scrin Ravager (Player)
The Tiberium agitation ability does not work on enemy harvesters (the 'not allowed' cursor remains constantly), it works fine on Refineries.
(AI) However the AI can apparently do the Tiberium agitation on whatever it feels like!
This is reminiscent of the immensely annoying Zero Hour AI Laser lock bug.
This needs fixing, even if it means removing the AI's usage of the ability.
The Scrin Support airfield uses Nod repair drones. This looks bizarre.
Is there any reason why the AI always places its Decoy temple in the centre of an empty tiberium field?
No big deal, although it makes it very obvious has it would not be possible to place a normal temple in the same location.
I must say I really like the fully loaded Cultist Hexapod.
I understand you removing the ability for the Corrupter's to repair the Hexapod, but surely there must be a more logical solution?
reducing the healing amount? adding a maximum stack if possible?
You have already improved the Corrupter anyway, so them having less repairing ability would not be a big deal.
Bug: The Hexapod can no longer absorb Shock troopers. The cursor is there, the sound of an infantry squad being absorbed is played, but the Shock troopers remain where they are and no turret is added to the Hexapod.
The GDI Grenadiers EMP grenade has a bizarrely high rate of fire which is coupled with quite a long EMP effect.
Either the length of the EMP downtime or the rate of fire needs to be reduced.
The Space command uplink has a couple of UI buttons with missing strings. I am guessing that these buttons (which are greyed out) are not meant to be visible.
The Mastadon is rubbish. It has rail cannons that can miss static objects!?!
The only selling point of the EPIC units for me is the customization that you can do due to their infantry absorb ability.
The Mastadon also completely misses the point of the epic units, by adding the extra turrets you crank of the damage potential to insane amounts, which more than justifies the extra cost, when factored in with the EPIC units high health.
The Mastadon has no ability to add this extra damage.
Even if you want to keep the unit, it needs to be able to hit a static base defence 100% of the time.
The multiple Growth accelerator bug is back.
I thought that this only happens on unofficial maps, I will test my mod to see if it happens on, for example Deady serato.
The only issue here is that it makes for an easy source of experience points when they are destroyed.
Reapers can garrison buildings. Are you sure about this? to be honest I did not check to see if you have also removed the restriction on Zone troopers garrison has well.
General points
The increased usefulness of the basic rifle infantry (GDI & Nod) has had a knock on effect on the usefulness of more expensive infantry squads.
In particular the Nod Reaper is absolutely rubbish for its massive price.
$600 worth of basic infantry can easily take them down.
The issue is that it is very easy to make the basic infantry which can now counter a lot of the much more expensive squads.
Another example is the Blackhand. The C&C3 version has comically high health, but your version has gone too far in the other direction. Now $600 worth of basic infantry can easily kill a $900 Blackhand squad.
How (or if) you choose to deal with this general issue is up to you, but you must sort out the Reapers. Health or gun resistance or a price reduction,whatever, they not worth $1300 never mind $1800
Nice mod, I might do some further AI testing soon. QUICK_EDIT
Well, as Madin allready hinted at, TWA 1.71 is up for download now.
Changelog can be found here.
Madin wrote:
The Tiberium agitation ability does not work on enemy harvesters (the 'not allowed' cursor remains constantly), it works fine on Refineries.
Yeah, thats because (unlike KW) the special abillity cant check if the harvesters are full - I thought it made more sense to make harvesters unattackable instead of being able to attack empty harvs.
Madin wrote:
(AI) However the AI can apparently do the Tiberium agitation on whatever it feels like!
This is reminiscent of the immensely annoying Zero Hour AI Laser lock bug.
This needs fixing, even if it means removing the AI's usage of the ability.
[...]
Is there any reason why the AI always places its Decoy temple in the centre of an empty tiberium field?
No big deal, although it makes it very obvious has it would not be possible to place a normal temple in the same location.
I know - the AI seems to go crazy with certain abillitys... not sure why.
Guess disabling it for the AI would be the easierst way.
Madin wrote:
I understand you removing the ability for the Corrupter's to repair the Hexapod, but surely there must be a more logical solution?
Preeettty sure thats a bug - corruptors in TWA have a complicated system of filters to make sure they only heal own scrin units and damage everything else - I guess I forgot to add the Hexapod there somewhere
Madin wrote:
The GDI Grenadiers EMP grenade has a bizarrely high rate of fire which is coupled with quite a long EMP effect.
Either the length of the EMP downtime or the rate of fire needs to be reduced.
Good point!
Madin wrote:
The Space command uplink has a couple of UI buttons with missing strings. I am guessing that these buttons (which are greyed out) are not meant to be visible.
No, that works as intented
As long as the drop pods power is reloading, you can choose between Zone Raider und Zone Trooper loadout - just forgot to add the button desciptions.
Madin wrote:
The Mastadon has no ability to add this extra damage.
Even if you want to keep the unit, it needs to be able to hit a static base defence 100% of the time.
The whole unit is still not finished so I cant promise anything, but I see what I can do about the targeting problems.
Madin wrote:
The multiple Growth accelerator bug is back.
I thought that this only happens on unofficial maps, I will test my mod to see if it happens on, for example Deady serato.
As far as I knwo it appears on all maps, I have no clue why the AI is doing that (it dindt appear in 1.7 since GAs had a buildlimit of 1 to counter this).
Madin wrote:
The Scrin Support airfield uses Nod repair drones. This looks bizarre.
[...]
Bug: The Hexapod can no longer absorb Shock troopers. The cursor is there, the sound of an infantry squad being absorbed is played, but the Shock troopers remain where they are and no turret is added to the Hexapod.
Bugs, should be fixed in the next release.
Madin wrote:
Reapers can garrison buildings. Are you sure about this? to be honest I did not check to see if you have also removed the restriction on Zone troopers garrison has well.
They are not supposted to, but I have no idea how to prevent that without screwing up another thing :/
I am still not really sure what to do with the reapers, but I kinda like the way that they are now
Thanks for all for feedback, its incredible usefull _________________ QUICK_EDIT
2 important notes:
-I haven't had much time to test the balancing changes - any suggestions would be welcome.
-the Scrin Shrikes are a TEST unit - model & icon are placeholder, I just wanted to see if the idea works & is fun to use.
You also might have noticed that I didn't add any screenshots in the past month due a lack of free time - if you have any screenshots that I should add into the gallery, feel free to post them in the comments.
Last but not least I want to say thank you to ShadowKain666 for his help in translating a couple of texts for TWA.
Quote:
Scrin
-Hexapods can absorb Shock Troopers again.
-Scrin Support Towers now use Scrin repair drones instead of Nod repair drones.
-Archons can now be properly promoted.
-Corruptors can now be used to heal Hexapods.
-Corrupters healing has been reduced by 25% (their attack damage stays the same).
-Added debris models for the Eraser.
-Added new sounds for the Eraser.
-Increased Eraser attack range.
-Added debris models for the Scourge.
-Cultists no longer need a Nerve Center to be built (bringing them in line with Snipers & Shadows).
-Ravagers now need a Nerve Center to be built instead of a Stasis Chamber (bringing them in line with Grenadiers & Black Hands).
-New unit:
*Shrikes: A small group of flying suicide drones. Not very powerfull, but cheap und easy to use in masses. Can not be promoted.
GDI
-Sandstorm rockets weakened.
-Improved Hammerhead armor and lowered its cost (from 1500$ to 1300$).
-Improved armor for Zone Trooper & Zone Raider.
-Grenadiers take less damage from "gun" weapons.
-Overhauled the Mastodon's weapons and changed effects for its railguns (taken from KW MARV).
-Added damage effects to the Mastodon. (smoke, fire)
-Added "Formation Preview" model for the Mastodon.
-Added a new "Reinforcements under attack!" EVA sound for Ox Transports bringing reinforcements.
-Corrected a bug where Command Posts didn't give exp when destroyed.
-Reduced the EMP duration for EMP grenades from 10 to 2 seconds and slightly increased reload time.
Nod
-Advanced Power Plants now require a Warfactory to build.
-Corrected a bug where Advanced Power Plants didn't give exp when destroyed.
-Improved armor for all Cyborg units (including Commando & Reaper).
-Buffed the Reapers and lowered their price to 1500.
-Black Hands now take less damage from "gun" weapons.
-Locked the Decoy Temple for the AI - since their placement of it makes it obvious, there is no point in using it.
Other
-Fixed a bug that prevented heroic Scavenger Buses from attacking.
-Fixed some faulty code that resulted in aircraft debris disappearing in midair instad of hitting the ground.
-Removed "Clear Garrisoned Structure" from the Scavenger Bus tool tip.
-Added the once missing texts for Rage Generator & Space Command Uplink.
-Mutant infantry units built by GDI or Nod can now utilize the "Call for Transport" ability
-Fixed some missing/incorrect effects.
-All "Epic" Warfactories have slightly better armor and now give correct exp when destroyed.
-Tiberium Fiends are now built in hordes (instead of a single unit), thus some of their stats have been updated.
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Tiberium Wars Advanced 1.7 (beta)
