Release notes here!

This one started with more work on differentiating the planets. In the last release we made it so the AI’s controller on each planet can be in different places. Now we’ve gone the rest of the way with all of the code for determining the position and type of the AI’s defensive units. The current set of AIDefensePlacer implementations (which you can mod, or add new ones to the mix) includes ones that split the AI’s defenses into two or three distinct locations on the planet.

Next, we’ve integrated four of the best map types developed by modders in our community. Draco18s’s “Density Map” is especially cool: it uses a bitmap to build a spiral galaxy by establishing different planet zones and only connecting planets within a zone (and each zone to each bordering zone).

Along with that, we added the framework community modder BadgerBadger developed for having map-type-specific lobby options, so you can configure how many arms an Octopus map has. This is still in early days, but it’s an exciting customization method beyond what AIWC offers.

Finally, we’ve made some more strides on the still-awful (because still-unfinished) UI: an improved metal display from Badger (along with tooltips up along that top bar), and the ability to color the lines between planets on the galaxy map. AIWC has a similar feature that is very helpful, and AIW2’s version of it is very moddable.

Enjoy!

Keith