Rise of the Automatons

Overview

Rise of the Automatons is a free add-on for Endless Space released on Tuesday October 2nd, 2012 that adds a new playable Faction "The Automatons", new Trade Routes, alliance, Diplomacy and Hero management systems, as well as improved AI and modding tools to load custom Ship and Planet models.

Content

The add-on includes a brand new Custom Faction called the Automatons, its background was created by a community member called "Panzer", winner of a Faction creation competition.

Amplitude forums: Faction Creation Competition thread.

Here's the list of all the add-on's addition:

CHANGES AND ADDITIONS

- Separated the visual affinity from the gameplay Affinity. [G2G vote]

- For instance, you can now customize your own Faction with the gameplay of the Cravers and the art of the Amoeba.

- Added the "System Population Balancing" in the Galaxy's advanced options. Ranges from "Random" to "Perfect". For "Perfect", constellations with Home Planets now possess the same number of Systems (with a maximum difference of 1 System).

- Added a panel for the Empire-wide factors in the Empire view.

- Added a disclaimer when entering the Mods section for the first time.

- Changed the Faction colors to differentiate the shades of green.

- Added Polish language.

- Added the possibility to load custom 3D models and textures for Planet and Ship modding.

THE AUTOMATONS

- Added the Automatons Faction with a specific gameplay Affinity and properties for specific Buildings, according to the community hero Panzer, the winner of the Faction creation competition.

- Automatons Affinity:

1. At the end of the turn, if there is an Industry Overproduction, it's stacked instead of being reported.

2. At the beginning of a turn, an interest is applied to the stacked , allowing it to increase a bit.

3. The stacked is capped at 5 * System's .

4. If the overproduction cannot be stacked, it's conserved for the next turn like the current mechanism.

5. When the Automatons build Improvements & Ships, is used in the following order:

a. System's

b. Overproduction

c. Stacked . When a system from the Automatons is invaded, the stacked is destroyed, reset to 0 even if the invader is an Automaton.

- Added Automatons unique tech icons.

- Added a gauge bar for the Stacked of each System in the Empire view.

- Added the Stacked value on tooltip of each System in the Galaxy view.

- Placed the Automatons' Overproduction Stack in the Development bar (in System view).

- Added the Automatons' portrait, Diplomacy hologram and loading screen. Automatons will use Cravers' ships 3D models.

TRADE ROUTES

- Added a Trade Routes summary panel in the Empire view.

- Added the possibility to directly click on a Trade Route's origin System in the Trade Routes panel, to enter this System's view.

- Added a Trade Routes panel link on the System view.

- Added several tooltips for the Trade Routes panel.

AI

- Added several AI Prerequisites from the community mod (by Ail, Grubsnik and Davea), globally improving AI when building System Improvements.

- Improved the Tax Rate management for the AI.

- Improved the formula that computes the response given by an AI to an Alliance request.

- Changed the formula for trading a Technology with the AI. Before, the price was related to the most wanted Technology, now, it is related to the most expensive Technology available.

HEROES & ACADEMY

- Added arrows to switch from a Hero to another in the Inspection view.

- Added arrows to switch from a Hero to another in the Academy.

- When recruiting a Hero, he is now automatically selected in the active tab.

- Added an "Accept" button when assigning new abilities to a Hero and the possibility to click on a selected ability to remove it before validating the final choice.

- Added empty slots to show how many Heroes can still be recruited in the Academy.

- Added a tooltip to Heroes' attributes to show what effect they have.

- Added a visual Hero identifier in the Academy, to determine if a Hero is in a System, a Fleet or unassigned.

ALLIANCE AND DIPLOMACY

- Updated the Alliance management system.
- When offering a Treaty with someone outside of an Alliance, a request is sent to allies. They can now either:
1. Accept the Treaty
2. Decide to leave the Alliance.

- Added a tendency panel for Diplomatic negotiations. Shows how an ally AI will likely respond to a Treaty you offer to someone outside the Alliance. Human players will always respond "Undecided".

BALANCING

- Changed the upkeep formula (cost 1 per CP --> cost 0.4*CP max per CP).

- Reduced the deflectors' evolution in stats, they were too efficient in late game: (3,5,8,11,14,20,25,30,36,45 => 2,4,7,10,13,17,22,27,33,39)

- Increased the Hulls' HP to increase the probability to reach the Melee Phase: (small: 300 , medium: 600 , large: 1200 => small: 450 , medium: 1200 , large: 3000 )

- Increased the cost of Tonnage and Repair Modules' cost as well as Modules related to Strategic Resources (to reward abundance).

- Reduced the Hissho's Bushido (20% on FIDS => 15% on FID).

- Increased the length of the Bushido but without the reset after an invasion (15 turns WITH reset => 45 turns WITHOUT reset after an invasion).

- Changed the Revenge Trait's condition of activation (activated whenever a lost system was re-invaded by the player => will only activate during invasion if the lost System was previously owned at 100%).

- Changed the length of the different Cooperation Agreement steps (0/15/30 => 0/10/15).

- Reduced the AI bonus on Weapons, Defense and buyout to balance the difficulty. AI has been heavily improved and therefore needs less powerful bonuses.

IMPORTANT FIXES

- Fixed an issue where trying to display the “end of auto explore” alert message after destroying the corresponding fleet provoked a NullReferenceException.

- Fixed an issue where displaying the Trade Routes panel without Trade Routes provoked a NullReferenceException.

- Fixed an issue where global random events were not synchronized for all players.

- Fixed an issue where the AI was using obsolete ship template designs.

- Fixed an issue where the AI didn't use Modules, resulting in partially empty Ships.

- Fixed an issue where the number of turns, before a Peace Treaty was made available, was not saved. The Peace Treaty was then automatically available after loading a game.

- Fixed an issue where the interception module still intercepted attacks even when the Defense Module had 0 in interception.

- Fixed an issue where the game would hang when loading a game without available Ship designs.

OTHER FIXES

- Fixed an issue where Pilgrims' fleet errant wasn't concerned by Faction traits that improve Ships' .

- Fixed an issue where the scroll bar would overlap with the resources in the diplomatic negotiations screen.

- Fixed application of Approval bonus on Improvement using %.

- Fixed an issue where loading a saved game could remove contracts for many Empires.

- Fixed an issue where creating an Alliance did not spread the cease fire status across the allied Factions.

- Fixed an issue where the beginning of a cease fire wasn't synchronized for all allies.

- Fixed an issue where infinite Improvements in the queue could prevent using Overproduction Stacking.

- Fixed an issue where after invading a System with infinite Improvement Buildings, the modifier stayed active until the end of the game.

- Fixed an issue where Diplomatic Status resolution wasn't correctly done in an Alliance vs Alliance situation.

- Fixed an issue where the worst Diplomatic Status wasn't correctly spread when one of the 2 allies didn't know the 3rd Empire.

- Fixed an issue where the AI lost use of some of its Fleets, leaving them unattended in a System.

- Fixed several GUI issues.

- Fixed several localization issues.

- Fixed several text issues.