One of our most-requested features is finally here: dedicated servers! The patch notes below are huge and the culmination of several months of work that began before the end of last year. It required major rewrites of a lot of the netcode but it was definitely worth it both for the current skirmish game and as a stepping stone for Conquest in the future. And don't worry, the peer-to-peer hosted games you're used to will still be around.

There's a lot here, almost like a mini-major-update, so let's get started:

Dedicated Servers

Dedicated servers provide a persistent hosted game which players can use without having to host it on their own computer. This provides a lot of benefits such as improved performance and a more reliable network connection. Most importantly, you don't need to worry about your host ragequitting because their BB ate a dozen hybrids. The new server build of the game can be hosted on any computer, but a dedicated host is best.

You can recognize a dedicated server by the special icon in front of the name in the multiplayer match browser.

These server games will loop continuously between lobby, battle, debriefing and back to the lobby. You don't need to exit the debriefing to go to your next game, just click the ready button.

There will be 6 official server instances to begin with. We're also in the process of getting the server binaries available both through a Steam Tool installation and through a hosting provider so you can host your own easily. Unfortunately, this is a man-in-the-loop process and will take time to coordinate with these providers. In the meantime, if you're interested in setting up your own server you can contact me on our official Discord via the ModMail bot and I'd be happy to send you the server build for use.

You can find the guide on setting up your own dedicated server here:
https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2963605370

CPU Armor Model

There has been a known issue for a while where players running older computer with Windows 7 had issues with our GPU-based armor damage system. If one of these players was hosting a multiplayer game then armor shredding mechanics simply didn't work. Because servers don't usually have GPUs I have implemented a secondary version of the armor system that runs on the CPU. If your computer is running Windows 7 it will automatically fall back to this CPU system. You will not see damage effects on the hulls (which you probably didn't anyway), but at least armor damage will work properly.

If you do want to see damage effects, you can enable a special setting in the graphics settings menu which will periodically copy the armor damage to a texture. This is extremely slow and you will experience a significant performance impact, so it is disabled by default.

New Player Experience Improvements

The two most common roadblocks for new players are TF Ash and Tutorial 6.

Because Ash starts with an A, it is the first fleet automatically selected for new players. It is also one of the hardest fleets to play. Starter fleets now have a special sorting mechanism by their difficulty, so Oak is now the default fleet if you have only starters.

Tutorial 6, the Advanced Missile Tactics tutorial, has turned many a midshipman's face red with frustration. What's worse, missile pathing is not a commonly used tool except by the most dedicated missile players. To help remove this roadblock we've separated the missile-specific tutorials into their own set of advanced tutorials so they will not interrupt the basic tutorials with a difficulty cliff.

More Optimizations

Another pass on optimization was done for this update, specifically on cutting down unnecessary memory allocations and frequent HUD updates when gaining and losing lots of sensor tracks in a short period of time. The time it takes to start the game from your desktop has also been massively reduced.

Point Defense Exploits

Some of our players figured out that looping large missiles like containers in circles around a target, but outside its PD range, could exploit the PD Controller's prioritization logic and prevent it from shooting at smaller missiles like S2s. This has been fixed with a rework to the priority logic: the PD Controller now groups missiles into buckets based on their time to impact, and then sorts by other metrics inside those buckets. You should no longer watch helplessly as your PDTs stay pointed at the S3 missile outside of range while a dozen S2s crash into your hull.

OSP Weapons

With the help of the remaining OSP testers we did another pass on plasma balancing. Plasma's armor damage has been increased to 60cm BUT it now experiences a cooling in flight, so it will have its highest damage potential up close and rapidly deteriorate down to 30cm of damage at its max range. This makes plasma excellent at close range but not able to wreck all of your armor instantly at 8 km.

We've also changed the firing rates of some weapons. The T81 plasma turret is still a burst fire weapon, but the C81 plasma casemate is now oriented towards providing sustained-fire: one shot with a much shorter reload time. The base rate of fire is unchanged, but it now receives increased benefit from Energy Regulators. The C60 has also been changed to a sutained-fire paradigm to differentiate it from the C65, which previously was strictly better in all cases where it could be taken. There is now a choice between fitting your lineship to provide massive alpha damage or sustained damage.

Community Moderation Tools

With control of some games now moving out of the hands of a lobby host, we've added some additional tools to help with community moderation. The first of these is a voting system which can be used to not only change maps but also to kick players who are being belligerent. You can access all of these commands in chat (type !help for information).

Additionally, we've added a Report Player feature which allows players to report violations of community standards to our official database. Players who have more than a certain number of reports in the last 30 day rolling window will be flagged in the lobby with a yellow name. Our multiplayer terms of service have been updated and you will see it again the next time to open the multiplayer browser.

As always, full patch notes follow.

See you in the Battlespace,
- The NEBULOUS Team

Consolidated Patch Notes - 0.3.1.16

Changes/Features:
- Added dedicated server support.
- Added chat command processing system, available on dedicated servers only. Use "!help" to see all commands.
- Added a system to vote kick players from a dedicated server. Kicked players cannot rejoin until the next round.
- Added prompt for reporting players for bad conduct.
- Added dedicated server listing to the multiplayer match browser.
- Added multiplayer match browser filters for P2P and Server games.
- Match browser list is now sorted alphabetically by default, with dedicated servers at the top.
- Double-clicking in the campaign list now opens the selected item.
- Starter fleets are now sorted by their difficulty for new players.
- Added ability for modded factions to unlock an entire faction's equipment by adding that faction's key to the definition asset.
- Added authentication ticket processing for connecting clients.
- Added "IN DEBRIEFING" tag to lobbies which have are at the after-action report.
- Changed lobby ready lamp to purple when a player is in the fleet editor.
- Remaining players are now re-validated when a player leaves the lobby.
- Updated loading screen with new images, and added dark background to tip text.
- Added "permanent" flag to some stat modifiers like illuminator RCS increase so they aren't removed when power is lost.
- Increased map boundary radius of Caltrop.
- Updated Caltrop textures to be slightly darker and reduced opacity of trail particles.
- Increased Caltrop player count to 4 (was 3).
- Brought F and G points on Canyon, and their corresponding rocks, closer to the center.
- Re-organized tutorials into beginner basics and an advanced set for missiles.
- Kicking a player from a lobby will now show a "You have been kicked" message instead of connection lost.
- Optimized HUD updating when large numbers of tracks are being gained or lost.
- Optimized some common non-game-object data structure allocations with instance pooling.
- Lost tracks will now show as the Pending icon instead of reverting to a Ship icon for one frame.
- Split stock asset bundle into five smaller bundles to load in parallel and decrease update size.
- Added preferred scenario settings to maps.
- Canyon's default Victory Points for Control is now 1500.
- P2P lobby hosts and dedicated server admins will now show a badge next to their name in the lobby.
- Impact effects are now positioned relative to the hit ship, so slight position lag on clients will not show impacts offset in space.
- PD Controller threat priority sorting is now based on time-to-impact buckets, with threats in each bucket sorted by size.
- Plasma damage changed to be falloff-based. Damage is 60cm immediately after firing and falls off to 30cm at max range.
- Plasma shots will now fade to blue as they age.
- Changed C81 Plasma Cannon to fire 1 round every 12 seconds (was 4 rounds every 52 seconds).
- Increased accuracy of C81 and T81 Plasma Cannons.
- Changed C60 Cannon to fire 1 round every 18 seconds (was 4 rounds every 72 seconds).
- Changed name of Mk550 Mass Driver to Mk550 Railgun.
- Players running Windows 7 or earlier will now have the CPU armor system used as a fallback for the GPU version.
- Added new graphics option to enable copying of damage masks to the GPU if using the CPU system, with significant performance cost. Only visible if fallback system is necessary, and disabled by default.
- Updated multiplayer terms of service.
- Power generation stats now show percent change instead of percent difference, to match modifiers.

Bug Fixes:
- Fixed skirmish lobby being broken after being disconnected from a game by an error.
- Fixed modular missile bodies not being shareable with modded factions.
- Fixed hulls not being shareable with modded factions.
- Fixed badges being converted back into PNGs for transmission sometimes exceeding the 32kb limit.
- Fixed missiles spamming log with look rotation warnings after impact.
- Fixed component debug gizmos not being drawn when Nebulous.DLL was imported into editor for modding.
- Fixed collider error with Cargo Feeder hull causing some portions of the bow to not take damage.
- Fixed RPF rounds teleporting into asteroids when they trigger.
- Fixed components not removing their stat modifiers when losing power.
- Fixed EO seekers not rejecting decoys when used as a validator.
- Fixed Whiplash description to match changed stats.
- Fixed linear thrust bonus discrepancy between FM280 and FM580 drivers.
- Fixed geometry error on Pillars D rock.
- Fixed cruise guidance missiles resetting their flight time accumulator when switching from travel to search phase.
- Fixed cold gas bottle applying its affects for the entire duration of flight.
- Fixed semi-active seekers being able to see illumination from behind the target.
- Fixed PD Controller assigning weapons to high priority targets that are out of range instead of closer, in-range lower priority targets.
- Fixed discrete weapon stat report showing "UNUSED" if switching to a new ammo type on a target that has already been engaged.
- Fixed THE CYLINDER.