Here are a few fixes to round out the year. Seawolf behaves better around coasts, Metal Extractor placement is smoother, and a lingering graphics bug has been resolved. This is probably the last patch of the year so I’d like to thank the community for helping each other through an otherwise difficult year.

Fixes with multiple dot points

Submarines can no longer traverse shallow water, reverting a recent experimental change. Unfortunately it resulted in Seawolf needlessly revealing itself to surface weaponry while skirting islands.

• Minimum depth 5 -> 15.
• Seawolf now has a higher aim point and fire point. This solves various weapon blocking bugs that could occur around coastlines.

Metal Extractor placement is now consistent with other structure placement.

• If you click where a mex can be placed, the mex is placed, otherwise the click is ignored.
• Previously, whether the click was used depended on the ghost under the mouse cursor.
• This caused issues such as being unable to click on a blocked location near a free metal spot to place a mex.

Fixes with one dot point each

• Writing a report description is now mandatory.
• Replaced the ‘Clan List’ button in the Profile tab with ‘Contact Admins’ as this seems more useful.
• Fixed reclaim failing to be highlighted during start position selection.
• Filtered out the low quality part of the construction unit reply.
• Fixed the problems stemming from the outline shader update, possibly even correctly. This fixes the non-default widgets that were missed by the previous patch, such as Bloom and Blob Shader.
• Modding in extra shields is now a bit easier.

This patch started out with a slew of graphical and interface improvements, but grew to include a few balance tweaks as well. To start with, the main menu is a bit sharper and the panels on the right are more welcoming. Players can be now reported with a convenient form via the lobby or through the Tab Playerlist ingame. Other ingame improvements include instantly updating state toggles, a greatly improved outline shader, and hotkeys for terraform presets.

On the balance side of things, mexes are slightly weaker to reward early raiding and factories are bit cheaper to make switching easier. A few other units have been tweaked, with the biggest being nerfs for Funnelweb and Ultimatum, which should open up the mid-lategame options in large teams.

Balance

Metal Extractor is slightly more vulnerable to light raids.[list]

• Health 700 -> 640

Factory switching can afford to be easier now that air is less dominant in 1v1.[list]

• Cost 800 -> 700

Outlaw is worse against units that keep their distance.[list]

• Cost 250 -> 260
• Further increased AoE damage falloff.

Knight is also worse against units that keep their distance.[list]

• Range 350 -> 340

Pyro is slightly weaker because it is dominant in some matchups and we are not ready to look at Jumpbots. This is a partial revert of a buff from February, in which it gained 80 health and 8% DPS.[list]

• Health 700 -> 670
• DPS reduced by 4%

Jack and Dirtbag deal extra damage due to a bugfix.[list]

• No longer deal ‘around’ 25% less than their stated damage against targets ‘near’ max range.

Tarantula is better at hitting planes.[list]

• Missile turn rate increased by 17%.

Swift is less able to dodge missiles.[list]

• Thickened by 37.5%.

Raven swarms are slightly easier to rearm.[list]

• Rearm time 10s -> 8s
• Rearm cost 100 -> 80 energy

Likho has more downtime between bombing runs.[list]

• Rearm time 20s -> 25s
• Rearm cost 200 -> 250 energy

Ultimatum is more specialised against striders.[list]

• Cost 2000 -> 2500
• Decloak Radius 100 -> 120
• Reload 1.5s -> 2s

Funnelweb loses the ability to outrun many armies.[list]

• Cost 3500 -> 4000
• Speed 54 -> 40

Rover Assembly has a slightly smaller collision volume.

Airplane Plant no longer covers its construction and rearm pads with its collision volume.

Mechanics Fixes

• Lobster-bestowed fall damage immunity prevents cloak for its duration.
• Fixed a bug where burrowing units (Snitch, Imp and Flea) sometimes remaining cloaked when launched into the air.
• Fixed units sometimes retaining their full LOS when launched high into the air.
• Raven and Impaler overkill prevention is more lenient against targets that they do not kill in one shot.
• Overkill prevention for many burst weapons has been improved and some failure cases have been patched. In particular, burst anti-air should be a little better at finishing off damaged bombers.

Main Menu

• Clicking on a player and selecting ‘Report’ is now done entirely in-lobby.
• Decluttered the Community tab by removing the profile and ladder subwindows. Renamed to ‘Welcome’.
• Added profile and profile links (such as commander editing and ladder ratings) to the Friends tab. Renamed to ‘Profile’.
• Moved the first-launch tutorial prompt popup into the top of the news section of the new Welcome tab. Since a new entry is significantly less intrusive than a popup, it only disappears after completing the the tutorial or by toggling Settings -> Lobby -> ‘Hide welcome tutorial prompt’.
• Tweaked the button alignment and skinning of the main menu and top right status buttons.
• Reskinned the top bar to make it clear that the lobby can be toggled while ingame.
• Fixed a bug with updating subheadings of the main logo.
• Reduced the default command opacity in Settings -> Game.

Interface

• State toggles now react to commands instantly rather than waiting for the changed state to reach the server.
• Replaced the kick button in the Tab Playerlist with a report button, that brings up an in-lobby report form. The form has a kick option, but it should be used sparringly.
• Added a smarter Caretaker widget called ‘Auto Patrol Nanos v2’. It is not enabled by default as it requires more testing and fixes.
• Closing the mission objectives panel no longer unpauses the game if the game was already paused when it was opened.
• Space+Click can now be used on the factory queue, the selection panel, the mission objectives panel and morph commands.

Terraforming presets now come with some default hotkeys. These keys allow you to terraform areas with a set height, skipping the height selection step, and can be configured under Hotkeys/Construction. If you already created hotkeys then you may need to check your settings.[list]

• Alt+V makes the smallest wall that Vehicles cannot pass.
• Alt+B makes the smallest wall that Bots cannot pass.
• Alt+N makes a wall units such as Rogue can use to hide from Stinger.
• Alt+G levels the terrain to the height of the ground where the cursor was initially clicked.
• Alt+H is useful for putting a Crab high on a spire.
• Alt+J just makes a deep hole. This was more useful back when enemies could be burried.

More keybinds and unit behaviours can be set.[list]

• Trajectory mode toggle is bindable under ‘Hotkeys/Commands/State’.
• Unusual keys, such as 2, are now bindable.
• Added Overkill Prevention to ‘Settings/Unit Behaviour/Default States’.

Graphics

• Reduced strength of projectile lights by 13%. This multiplier can be tweaked in Settings/Graphics/Lighting.
• Upgraded the outline shader. The edges of the outlines are now smooth and they make units occluded by water and effects more visible.
• Improved Cerberus weapon effects.
• Improved the water on Folsom Dam.
• Death explosions are slightly less overexposed.
• Fixed missing explosion decal for Jugglenaut jump.
• Fixed missing amphibious sinking bubbles.

Fixes

• Added startboxes for BlackStar v2.
• Limpet now counts towards the kamikaze award.
• Fixed a bug with the factory plate placement visualisation when switching between multiple factory blueprints.
• Fixed right clicking on units with a command selected erroneously issuing the default command rather than cancelling the selected command.
• Fixed unit failing to reply to area reclaim and selection rank commands.
• Fixed a COFC crash caused by unbound hotkeys.