Author: Tom J Nowell

We’ve revamped PlanetWars for season 10. Most notably, there are now only two factions, in order to correct several long-standing issues with previous rounds. The factions are:
* The Empire Reborn, formed by the integration of the True Born into the reforged Empire of Old Earth.
* The Synthetic Front, formed by the Ascended and the Free Machines setting aside their differences to fight a common enemy.
The Unaligned clans have each been assimilated into one of the two new powers.

Other changes are as follows:

Homeworlds
* Only top 20 clans from the previous round may have homeworlds. They can pick a homeworld with 501 IP for free at any time.
* Only homeworlds may be renamed.
* Removed consolidation

Victory conditions
* Economic victory: Value needed increased to 80%

Zero-K v0.8.13.4 has also been out for a day or so, be sure to update. Changes include:

Gameplay (general)
* Fixed some bomber behaviour issues.
* Fixed Scorpion not being radar invisible when cloaked.
* Dominatrix has more speed; turret turns faster.
* Scout boat cheaper.

Modules
* Assault Cannon and Missile Launcher do more damage and have more range.
* Gauss Rifle reloads faster.
* Slasher unpacks 20% faster.
* Slow Beam and High Power Servos a bit cheaper.

GUI
* Player list should work properly now (minimum width, aligns to bottom properly).

Visuals
* A VR grid is drawn around the map.
* “Night” effect: Start at dawn instead of midnight (configurable).

A lot of little things have been improved. A few bugs fixed, a new mech and superweapon. Reserve metal is now properly implemented as a slider on the resource bars and mobile AA should be a bit better against Shadow.

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GUI
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Decoupled reserve metal from storage structures, reserve is now controllable with a slider bar on the resource bar. Energy is also reserved at the metal reserve level, does not affect non-constructor energy drain.

* Healtbars in unit selection and tooltip are now colored.
* Added minimisation buttons to Minimap, Chat and Playerlist.

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New Units
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Scorpion, a cloaking all terrain mech with a deadly stinger. Slow and expensive for it’s combat power this unit is best used stealthily to pick off unaware opponents.

The Zenith is a superweapon on the scale of the Planetary Energy Chisel. It calls numerous meteors from the sky to rain death upon your enemies, as an added bonus the meteors have some metal which can be reclaimed.

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Balance
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EMP missile
* Removed unintentional homing

Jethro
* Speed 3 -> 3.5

Archangel
* Health 1050 -> 1500 (now in line with Tarantula)
* Removed jump charge time.
* Increased aim speed dramatically (4.5x) because it could aim much slower than turn. This was annoying to use and unrequired.
* Made bullets fire properly on fixedwing (engine brokenness)

Copperhead:
* Fires properly on fixedwing (engine brokenness)

Shadow:
* HP: 1250 -> 1200
* Speed: 10 -> 8.8

Snake (light sub)
* HP:1100 -> 1250 (2 shots from prec bomber and sniper sub)

Serpent (sniper sub)
* Damage 1200->1100
* HP:2600 -> 2300 (So that its HP can be cut while still 3-shooting other sniper subs).

Torpedo Frigate
* HP: 1750->1800

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Bugfixes
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Fixed patrol orders in gunship factory queue

Overdrive behaviour improvement (may fix a bug that occurs at high energy).

Congratulations to Empire of the Old Earth led by Saktoth and his Imperial Vanguard Legion for surprisingly winning season 8 using cunning diplomacy and efficient warfare.

For more information check hall of fame: http://zero-k.info/Forum/Thread/314

We are also releasing new version of Zero-K and lobby:

Changes:

* storages now reserve the metal stored. To use it you need to set construction to high priority. Morphing or weapon reload (nuke) automatically taps from reserve.

* clan icons and avatars are visible in lobby and ingame. New playerlist shows rank icons and clan icons too (only works 100% for people who use Zero-K lobby).

* ingame GUI streamlined – playerlist, console with chat history and epic menu can be all displayed/hidden by pressing escape. Console appears when you start typing text. Important ally and enemy chat messages appear in bubbles.

* text to speach is silent for spectators

* various lobby tweaks in tooltips and player lists. Its possible to filter people by clan shortcut. Settings of lobby now contain frequently used engine settings like windowed mode or hw cursor.

* various minor planetwars tweaks – ships that cannot reach planet (broken wormholes) return home. Also ships orbiting allied planets return home.

Nothing fancy in this version, just a generally improved experience.

Design:
* Made some tweaks that should hopefully improve vehicle movement
* Commanders of disconnected people spawn at 30s instead of 2 minutes
* Bad target category improvements for Dominatrix and Reaper
* Fixed shipyard footprint etc. issues
* Chicken: changed some tooltips; added a new supporter chicken; made queen health scale with arrival time; added tech time floor
* Removed reload bonus with xp.
* Double commander recipient in planetwars now also has double storage. This is to prevent excess at the start of the game.
* Added target setting on the move functionality. It can be completely controlled with hotkeys but by default it will keep a unit’s target when an explicit attack command is cancelled by a move command.

Simplified armour system:
* Razor’s Kiss damage reduction 0.2 -> 0.25
* Pitbull damage reduction 0.15 -> 0.25
* Pitbull health 2250 -> 3000 to compensate
All armoured units now have 0.25 damage reduction. Crabe is the exception with 0.33.

Interface:
* Nano turret added to Unit AI -> Initial States menu under Static.
* Changed style of terraform icons.

Balance:
* Krow bomb reload time 20s -> 30s
* Hammer projectile even slower
* Napalm missile and Firewalker:Ground fire duration increased 1.5x, DPS halved
* Slight tracking added to prec bomber, it can hit subs that jitter out of the way
* Venom damage 800 -> 600
* Bantha cost 12000 -> 10500

Graphics:
* New Shield texture, small jitter effect for large shields.
* Added some pointless flashing lights to things