StarMade Changelog

What's new in StarMade 0.202.86

Jan 31, 2020

Power:
Disabled stabilizer distance.
Set maximum power from stabilization to 100%. (25% was pointlessly unintuitive)
Chambers:
Rebalanced chamber capacity requirements across the board (see document below)
Changed chamber size formula, to not force certain reactor sizes for optimal mass efficiency
Thrusters:
Nerfed thruster scaling overall. There should be more variance in ship maneuverability and top speeds now depending on ship size and design.
Made diminishing returns on thrust harsher.
Increased TWR cap for max speed to 5.0
Armor:
Made armor lighter and more effective.
Made armor layering/stacking significantly more effective. (should make thick or slanted armor more viable)
Shields:
Buffed shields relative to weapons overall
Nerfed/adjusted Anti Low Damage chamber to only block actual low damage relative to shield capacity
Buffed Anti High Damage chamber, lowered threshold for "High Damage" to better protect against large hits.
Weapons:
Rebalanced weapons across the board
Removed cursor recoil on cannons
Helped to track down and resolve the infamous 'tunnelling' bug with cannon projectiles
Replaced the broken Doom Beam with a high-range pulse laser
Worked with Schine to fix missile guidance
Made missile capacity less restrictive
Adjusted bomb to hopefully be more usable (see document below)
Other:
Buffed Tractor Beam
Adjusted some chamber abilities, such as scanning and Thrust Burst.

New in StarMade 0.201.374 (Apr 22, 2019)

New in StarMade 0.201.142 (Aug 16, 2018)

New in StarMade 0.201.133 (Jul 26, 2018)

New in StarMade 0.201.126 (Jul 11, 2018)

New in StarMade 0.200.332 (Feb 3, 2018)

Reactor Dimension:
Our goal with this system is to make every entity shape equally viable. Stabilizer care about the distance between themselves and their reactor, which encourages you to build in one dimension. We worked on a method to allow this distance to be influenced indirectly by the size and placement of additional stabilizer groups. This mechanic does not change your existing ships but it allows you to now put the reactor in different positions with multiple stabilizers closer to it.
Stabilization Axis:
The bonus system works on fixed axis for simplicity. However, it is possible to modify this axis freely. There is a new tab “Reactor” in the advanced build mode, which lets you do that. These are also applied and saved by individual reactor.
You are only required to modify it if your stabilizer groups are in the “corners”, as then the game can’t really decide to which dimension it belongs to.
Fixes and Additions:
Fixed a bug that would fill up VRAM slowly (causing fps drops)
Added a system to search an entity by block type. Select a block in the dropdown in “Selection” in advanced build mode and hit the “highlight” button. All blocks of that type will be highlighted, which will help a lot when refitting ships
Turret aiming left click will now focus fire (like beams) if your cursor is on a structure. Right click will be unfocused fire.
AI now prefers to aim on reactors, chambers and stabilizers (will use the scanning system in the future)
Fixed several crashes
Fixed some chunks not being editable anymore
Fixed some ships not loading due to memory optimization using compressed chunks
Fixed warp-gates not loading due to data discrepancy
Fixed sector import failing with certain entities
Fixed reactor HP removal on block destruction issue
Fixed reactor overcapacity issue
Fixed energy stream not always disappearing
Fixed old blocks still appearing in factories (set deprecated to false to bring those back)
Fixed RHP not deducting correctly on integrity explosions
Overdrive, Ion, Piercing and EMP Effects are disabled now as they don’t work fully and will be replaced in the weapons update.

New in StarMade 0.200.315 (Jan 22, 2018)

New in StarMade 0.200.269 Pre-release (Dec 23, 2017)

New in StarMade 0.200.250 Pre-release (Dec 10, 2017)

New in StarMade 0.199.654 (Sep 2, 2017)

New in StarMade 0.199.651 (Jul 31, 2017)

New in StarMade 0.199.646 (Jul 19, 2017)

New in StarMade 0.199.611 Dev (Jun 19, 2017)

Fill Tool:
The fill tool allows you to incrementally fill (or replace) areas with your desired block. It’s quite simple to use: you can freely select your starting point with the camera (similar to ‘create docking’), and press the [Do Fill]* button with a block selected on your hotbar.
The fill tool allows both space-filling and block-replacing, depending on what the starting point is. If it’s empty space, the tool will flood-fill; if it’s a block, only that block type will be replaced. Also: this is a step-based system, meaning undo and redo work, allowing you to easily fix any mistakes.
For now, the filling process is done in a single step, and uses a fixed amount of blocks. We will change this over the next few builds to allow you to specify how many blocks to place at once, as well as allowing servers to impose their own limits to reduce server strain.
Line Tool:
This is an addition to the build helpers. You set two points (using your camera position, as with the fill tool) and it will create a line between them.
We’ll add more features in the future, such as splines and line thickness.
As with the new GUI, this is also a work-in-progress, so we’ll be improving it and fixing any issues that arise.
Load/Unload Rails:
We’ve added two new blocks to the game: the “Rail Load” block and the “Rail Unload” block. (We’re still working on their textures).
You can place them anywhere, and they work identically to normal rails, but they have an added feature: item transfer. These blocks allow transferring items between connected storages on a station and a docked ship via the Load/Unload Rail.
You connect a storage to your rail docker on a ship, and dock it to a Load Rail on a station. The ship is then able to pull items from any storage on the station connected to that Load Rail.
If you instead dock the ship to a Rail Unload block, the station may then pull items from the ship’s connected storage to any storages connected to that Rail Unload block.
Again, both docker and rail need active connected storages. Also, the station will only pull items if it has permission to do so!
The ship radial menu allows you to select between 5 different permissions for the load/unload rails.
Advanced Build Mode GUI:
The new GUI is much cleaner, and all of the controls are much more accessible. You may show/hide individual groups, and in later dev builds, these will be customizable in location, order and size. The game will remember these settings between instances.
We’ve added new sliders, too, which allow dual input: you may enter values manually, or use your mousewheel while hovering over the controls. This also allows scrolling through the GUI without changing sliders’ values unintentionally.
This is not the final version, of course, as we will continue to work on the design.
Outline System and New LoD mesh:
This completely new system is able to produce highly-optimized meshes of any number of blocks. It will be used for several effects in the future, especially for outlining the systems of a ship (e.g. for building and/or scanning). The outline itself will also be used for selecting entities in subsequent builds for this release.
This system is not able to replace the existing mesh and chunk system. Not only should any object realistically only be loaded into memory in chunks to begin with because of the sizes involved, but also in terms of graphics it’s not possible for the block meshes to retain all of the information needed. The new system simply doesn’t work with multiple textures in the same mesh. We’d have to use one mesh per block type, which would pretty much remove any advantage the system confers. Also, no lighting or material information can be stored in the limited amount of vertices of such meshes, and furthermore: making a mesh of a large object might be too much for the graphics card buffers to handle... so a chunk system would be needed anyway.
However, it is absolutely perfect for far-away LoD views of a model since block types can be mapped to a low number of colors, thereby producing one mesh per color. This, when combined with a higher-granularity chunk system, should give a large FPS increase when viewing bigger objects in the distance.
New Chunk Request System:
We’ve completely rewritten the chunk request system! The new approach streamlines the order of chunk requests over multiple entities. They’re now ordered in the background on a global level, meaning nearby chunks will have much shorter load times. This also benefits the lighting calculations, which should improve overall performance.

New in StarMade 0.199.535 (Apr 25, 2017)

FEATURES AND MORE NOTEWORTHY BUGS:
Fleets/ships losing entities:
After many iterations and tries, this error seems finally fixed. The main problem was a faulty database query when a fleet changed sector. It was supposed to bring all of their dock with it, but due to the bug only brought some of them. To catch this bug we implemented debug functions, so that fleets would be able to monitor themselves patrolling between sectors.
There is one leftover issue which is catched by a fallback method, and therefore doesn’t affect the game at all. It will just notify the admins with a small popup to send in the logs, since using a fallback isn’t the cleanest way solve this left over.
Thanks to all the testers and helpers on this bug! You really helped a lot finally squashing this pesky bug.
Collision solving for lagging sectors:
Server has a lot of problems when there were a lot of bad spawns caused by either a bug or intentional griefing. It goes so far that some servers has scripts to detect those sectors and despawn objects.
It comes down to that when multiple physical objects were in the same space, the physics would slow down the whole server. In the past this could happen with fleets spawning or asteroids in rare cases. These issues have been fixed. However, should it still happen, the game has now its own detection system, automatically warping objects to a save closest position after the sector was detected to lag from that object causing too much physics lag.
Rail logic switching:
Switching rails through logic interaction seemingly worked well but block data was not properly refreshed. You would end up with ghost connections and depending on building, could create an invalid link. A safety check done by the game would prevent any rail working on that entity because of it. This would most likely explain why quite a few rails stop working.
Rolling Ships:
Rolling ships has been significantly improved. By redesigning the algorithm used, rolling while looking around now feels a lot more natural and doesn’t do these strange figure eights anymore.
OS X Fixes:
We apologize for taking a bit longer to fix some of the more pressing OSX issues. Macs can finally use framebuffer and advanced graphics functions to speed up the game using the optimizations that come with that. Also some crashes with videos and some text input issues have been fixed.
If you find more problems that are OSX related, please report them and we will try to fix them for the next release.
Exploits:
We fixed a number of exploits. Thanks to all the players reporting them.
One of the more difficult things was implementing a system that would check connection validity without affecting performance, because it would be horrible to check every block that has a connection. The system we came up with distributes the load to check connections over time. It also only checks when the numbers “don’t check out”.
Optimization:
The drawing for display blocks has been significantly improved
Logic activation sending has been improved significantly, reducing bandwidth and improving performance
Features:
Fleets can now cloak
Fleets can now radar jam
Bobby AI can now be activated via logic
SIZE RESTRICTION VIA GAMECONFIG.XML:
Admins can now restrict the ship and station size per entity they want to allow on their server. The exact syntax has been added to /data/config/GameConfigDefault.xml
Also there is a general size restriction in the server.cfg now. RESTRICT_BUILDING_SIZE will restrict building size to multiples of sector size. The value in the GameConfig.xml has priority if set.
LIST OF BUGS FIXED:
Private issues are exploits or issues that, if known to the public, would cause a lot of harm.
Even though we fixed them, knowing the steps to reproduce could give you ideas on finding a way to bypass the fix and still abuse it, for that reason we do not share.
T2349 (Private): Grouping issue
T2139 (Private): Power and shield drain issue
T2138 (Private): Player max build area not working properly
T1969 (Private): Performance issues with logic
T1963 (Private): Missile and AI targeting issue
T1931 (Private): Shop module crash
T1851 (Private): Transporters and grapple beam issue
T1828 (Private): Jumpdrive/inhibitor charge issue
T1823 (Private): Bounding box issue
T1627 (Private): Performance issues with logic
T1602 (Private): Linking update issue
T1575 (Private): Undo issue
T1570 (Private): Ion issue
T1558 (Private): Crash when enabling shadows
T1299 (Private): Rail logic switching issue
T1227 (Private): Collision issue
T1145 (Private): Derelict stations issue
T1080 (Private): Faction protection removal issue
T1050 (Private): Docking issue
T1023 (Private): System claiming issue
T941 (Private): Docking issue
T895 (Private): Faction rank permission issue
T840 (Private): Asteroid respawning issue
T823 (Private): Another Ion issue
T659 (Private): Logic issue
T654 (Private): Warhead issue
T643 (Private): C+V linking issue
T512 (Private): Design issue
T2353: Sector Import fails to load ships docked to planet plates/asteroids
T2352: (Prebuild only) Shipyards causing disconnect and class cast exceptions
T2347: Caps-lock mouse interaction on OSX
T2339: /load_as_faction crashes server
T2333: Nullpointer being spammed in server console
T2309: /destroy_uid_docked command not working properly
T2294: Gold, silver and bronze bar icons missing
T2291: Autofill “ingame player name” from launcher
T2289: Make Bobby AI activation logic controllable
T2278: Cannot dock here
T2273: Adjust starter equipment for the new block selection method
T2270: Server deadlock, unknown cause
T2267: Server crash related to physics, and meta objects
T2252: Registry has a max password length of 128 characters but not stated anywhere
T2249: Flip flops not working properly
T2246: Torch cannot destroy faction module
T2214: Navigation menu mass of docks is always 0.1 and 0.0 for stations/planet plates
T2181: Nullpointer with processErrorDialogException
T2150: Radar jammer and cloak stay active on exiting core for fleet ships
T2140: Display module performance issues
T2118: Add dimensional limits to game config
T2101: Rail detection with rotators and set rotation broken
T2100: Sell available and price updates at the wrong time
T2099: Place order edit button is switched around
T2094: Fleets losing docked entities
T2044: /despawn command with fleet entities fails
T2009: Derelict stations get false positive removal for “ship only blocks”
T2004: Crash when attempting to access online play without internet connection
T1995: Importing sector fails with ArrayIndexOutOfBoundsException
T1980: Cargo spaces can be reused by multiple storages
T1957: C+V Rail detection doesn’t send false signals
T1776: Converted blueprints have undocked entities as response fleet
T1678: Uplink doesn’t save for OSX
T1664: Loading sector causes mass timeouts with colliding asteroids
T1658: Shop price not set without ownership doesn’t allow moving blocks in between
T1639: Nullpointer with joystick connected
T1616: ArrayIndexOutOfBoundsException with missiles or effects
T1553: Error handling for version mismatch and missing uplink insufficient
T1525: ffmpeg causing crash for OSX
T1510: Nullpointer in character file
T1466: Frame buffer capabilities not detected for OSX
T1465: Nullpointer with projectiles, causing invisible beams
T1422: NaN illegal comparison with shootout rail
T1384: Nullpointer when charging shields
T1337: Wedge blast door texture reversed
T1318: Spawning ships with same names as formerly existing one may lack docked entities
T1282: Creative mode doesn’t allow dropping specific block quantities
T1257: Incomplete build mode undo/redo
T1004: New unchanged stations turn into red hull blocks
T990: Rolling not working properly
T684: Shop permission resets when server restarts
T524: Weapons hitting deeper inside your ship
T428: Not staying attached to ship when logging out
T355: AHP and SHP is capped
T325: Asteroids can spawn in solid entities
T252: Startup crash with custom Windows theme
T25: C+V Linking memory leak

New in StarMade 0.199.491 (Mar 31, 2017)

Optimizations and New Features resulting from bug fixing:
Considerable improvement of network load sending logic activations, and improving overall performance of logic
Optimization of display blocks, making their drawing speed multiple times faster
Fleet Commands now include cloaking and jamming
Bobby AI can now be activated via logic
GameConfig can now include size restrictions on ships and stations to add more customization for servers. This also includes blueprint spawning.
Most likely fixed:
T2139 (Private): Power and shield drain issue
T2138 (Private): Player max build area not working properly
T1969 (Private): Performance issues with logic
T1931 (Private): Shop module crash
T1828 (Private): Jumpdrive/inhibitor charge issue
T1823 (Private): Bounding box issue
T1627 (Private): Performance issues with logic
T1570 (Private): Ion issue
T1558 (Private): Crash when enabling shadows
T1299 (Private): Rail logic switching issue
T1145 (Private): Derelict stations issue
T1050 (Private): Docking issue
T1023 (Private): System claiming issue
T941 (Private): Docking issue
T840 (Private): Asteroid respawning issue
T823 (Private): Ion issue
T659 (Private): Logic issue
T654 (Private): Warhead issue
T643 (Private): C+V linking issue
T512 (Private): Design issue
T2289: Make Bobby AI activation logic controllable
T2273: Adjust starter equipment for the new block selection method
T2270: Server deadlock, unknown cause
T2267: Server crash related to physics, and meta objects
T2252: Registry has a max password length of 128 characters but not stated anywhere
T2246: Torch cannot destroy faction module
T2181: Nullpointer with processErrorDialogException
T2140: Display module performance issues
T2100: Sell available and price updates at the wrong time
T2009: Derelict stations get false positive removal for “ship only blocks”
T2004: Crash when attempting to access online play without internet connection
T1995: Importing sector fails with ArrayIndexOutOfBoundsException
T1980: Cargo spaces can be reused by multiple storages
T1957: C+V Rail detection doesn’t send false signals
T1776: Converted blueprints have undocked entities as response fleet
T1678: Uplink doesn’t save for OSX
T1639: Nullpointer with joystick connected
T1616: ArrayIndexOutOfBoundsException with missiles or effects
T1525: ffmpeg causing crash for OSX
T1510: Nullpointer in character file
T1466: Frame buffer capabilities not detected for OSX
T1465: Nullpointer with projectiles, causing invisible beams
T1422: NaN illegal comparison with shootout rail
T1384: Nullpointer when charging shields
T1337: Wedge blast door texture reversed
T1318: Spawning ships with same names as formerly existing one may lack docked entities
T1257: Incomplete build mode undo/redo
T990: Rolling not working properly
T524: Weapons hitting deeper inside your ship
T428: Not staying attached to ship when logging out
T355: AHP and SHP is capped
T325: Asteroids can spawn in solid entities
T252: Startup crash with custom Windows theme
T25: C+V Linking memory leak
Partially fixed so far:
T1963 (Private): Missile and AI targeting issue
T1851 (Private): Transporters and grapple beam issue
T1602 (Private): Linking update issue
T1575 (Private): Undo issue
T1227 (Private): Collision issue
T1080 (Private): Faction protection removal issue
T895 (Private): Faction rank permission issue
T2291: Autofill “ingame player name” from launcher
T2278: Cannot dock here
T2150: Radar jammer and cloak stay active on exiting core for fleet ships
T2118: Add dimensional limits to game config
T2101: Rail detection with rotators and set rotation broken
T2044: /despawn command with fleet entities fails
T1664: Loading sector causes mass timeouts with colliding asteroids
T1553: Error handling for version mismatch and missing uplink insufficient
T1282: Creative mode doesn’t allow dropping specific block quantities
T1004: New unchanged stations turn into red hull blocks
T684: Shop permission resets when server restarts

New in StarMade 0.199.472 (Mar 3, 2017)

New in StarMade 0.199.468 (Feb 28, 2017)

New in StarMade 0.199.459 (Feb 25, 2017)

MISSILE PERFORMANCE UPDATE:
We developed an algorithm that is capable of handling any amount of missiles without adding extra network load. It is based on a lock step algorithm plus adaptive updating. This enables missile paths to become deterministic, even when chasing a moving target, and when that target is not in the same position for server and client, e.g. due to network delay.
With the previous system, 500-1000 missiles would generate a half-megabyte per second load (or more). With the new system, not only is the initial burst of data when firing much smaller, even a cluster of a thousand or more missiles only require a few bytes per second while flying.
Even the smaller servers should be able to easily handle 2000+ missiles flying at once without causing slowdown.
We will look into faster rendering and explosion calculations in the future.
PROJECTILE PERFORMANCE UPDATE:
We’ve also made some major optimizations for projectiles (cannon fire). Projectiles’ penetration always caused major lag on both client and server, which restricted our ability to balance the weapon system.
The new system uses a much leaner and more straightforward method to handle projectile penetration. We’ve offloaded some of the effort into threads, such as bounding box recalculations (which, since the box only gets smaller in this case, isn’t needed right away). Not only does cannon fire process literally hundreds of times faster now, it is also more accurate in terms of damage done. In addition, not having restrictions due to performance will help us balance weapons a lot better in the future.
The simultaneous destruction of large numbers of blocks still creates network load, but we have plans to reduce this.
POWER OVERHAUL THREAD:
We would like to thank everyone that has provided constructive criticism. Thanks to you, we’ve already made some major (positive!) changes to our proposed design, and eliminated some of its shortcomings.
We will still need a few days to present our plans in as clear a manner as possible so there’s no misunderstanding. We’ll write a more informative post about this soon.
MINOR BUG FIXES:
T235: Overridden blueprints show wrong mass
T2234: Galaxy map stops reading scroll wheel inputs
T2180: Placing wrong block when swapped on the hotbar with another
We’ve added a keyboard shortcut to open the shapes men. (It’s bound to ‘T’, moving sitting to ‘O’.) It only works when the currently selected block has multiple shapes.

New in StarMade 0.199.435 (Feb 6, 2017)

New in StarMade 0.199.434 (Feb 2, 2017)

New in StarMade 0.199.433 (Feb 1, 2017)

New in StarMade 0.199.432 (Jan 28, 2017)

New in StarMade 0.199.402 (Jan 14, 2017)

New in StarMade 0.199.357 (Jan 3, 2017)

TEXTURE UPDATE:
We’ve been working on an overhaul of our default textures for some time now, and this release implements the first and largest portion of that overhaul with all-new ship and structure textures.
Taking advantage of recent lighting improvements, these new textures provide better material definition, allowing glossy metals and matte plastics, and removing highlights where light should be occluded.
We’ve also added a unique texture for the Auxiliary power block.
VISUAL LOGIC CHANGES:
Logic blocks that do not emit a high or low signal themselves are now green colour-coded. For example, a Sensor or Area Trigger block will no longer be blue, potentially confusing the player that it is emitting a High state.
The Pick-up Point rail block now has an OFF state texture when toggled with an activator.
The logic pipes are a little less glossy, and a little more in line with the rest of the universe.
MISCELLANEOUS CHANGES:
Animations given to some decorative screens, water, etc. with more to come.
More blocks now make use of emissive textures, making those darker areas a little more exciting!
Fixed visual rotation errors. e.g. computers will now rotate correctly.
Water is now non-physical.
Lighting on 3D model objects is now a little more accurate.
New hotbar cursor, allowing better clarity when hovering over charged and charging systems. (Shoutout to Valck for finding this better solution in his mod).
Almost all artificially lit bevels within the textures have been removed, improving the illusion of cohesive lighting when rotated.
WHAT DON’T WE GET:
This update does not include terrain, flora, resources or capsule art.
Those will all be coming at a later date, as we still continue to refine the assets and implementation.
There is a known issue of block shapes being harder to see in this icon set. It will be amended asap.
SHADER UPDATES:
New, softer bloomed suns.
New lens flare. Less lens glare.
Removed big Lens dirt.
Added smaller Lens dirt.
Cleaned up Display Modules a for extra clarity: the scan lines reduced in strength, the flicker removed, and color brightened to fit better with surrounding screens and lights.
Patterns within the procedural backgrounds are now “softer.”
Please note unless Procedural Backgrounds and Bloom are enabled, you won’t see the changes to the backgrounds or stars mentioned here.
ASTEROIDS:
Reworked the asteroid resource placement system and fixing a bug causing inconsistent placement since the chunk32 update. A part of that was already in the previous update but wasn’t mentioned in the news update.
This new system also adds the ability to generate more exciting features on asteroids in the future! Ruins and debris, anyone?
In the server config, there are 2 new asteroid related values:
Asteroid resource chance
Asteroid resource size
EXTRA LANGUAGE ENTRIES:
We’ve found ~250 missing strings for translation, which we have added into this update. We expect there are still quite a few stray strings out there, which will take a while to locate. You can help out by reporting missing strings to our bug tracker phab.starma.de . We aim to have all missing strings included in the next update, ready for translation.
BUG FIXES:
T2106 NPC Faction Descriptions contain typos
T2105 Faction window "tab" area font is too large
T2103 Faction expansion takes the wrong systems
T2098 Fleet location broadcasted to clients on login
T2093 No pickup text when picking up credits
T1945 Flight mode minimap shows radar icons for radar jammed entities
T1895 invert hotbar scrolling direction (Council)
T1796 Close button of build mode info panel does nothing
T1734 display cursor coordinates in build mode (Council)
T1715 Username is erased after hitting enter/tab on username in online play
T1567 Crash on startup - /usr/lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/libstdc++.so.6: version `CXXABI_1.3.8' not found
T1394 Missile-Lock animation played after no longer selecting Lock on Missile
T1355 Mouse Option "Flip through hotbars... Without Control" incorrect
T905 Incorrect shield power consumption display values
T68 Incorrect texture face orientation

New in StarMade 0.199.353 (Dec 24, 2016)

New in StarMade 0.199.352 (Dec 21, 2016)

New in StarMade 0.199.351 (Dec 19, 2016)

New in StarMade 0.199.349 (Dec 19, 2016)

NPC Factions:
As mentioned in previous Dev Blogs, this update doesn’t require a universe reset and instead adds the NPC factions to all your existing universes without touching player created content.
Each comes with its own config and blueprints. The config defines their basic behavior out of all those variables. Factions are dynamic in their block demand and they adjust their trading, expansion and production to that. If a particular block is more used than others, it will be produced and traded more, even the blocks needed to make this block will have a larger demand because of that.
Other than what they have set in their config, demand and supply will also determine their expansion rate. They need to be able to build a certain amount of ships and stations before they can take more territory but they also need the same blocks to maintain what they already have. If they can’t, they’ll have to give away territory.
Keep in mind that most stations used by these factions aren't ready yet for release and they're using temporary placeholders.
Trading:
Based on their configuration and available blueprints, NPC factions will develop a demand for specific resources and blocks. Not only will they adapt their prices dynamically for that, they will also automatically trade with any trade node (human or NPC).
This means that there is now an actual economy in the game. However, the old stick shops are still there for now. They will change into trade node access hubs when we release the update that requires a universe reset.
They will select the trades they deem to be the best in terms of value. So if you will have a better chance to be traded with , you’ll have to make some good offers.
There have been also countless bugs fixed for the trading system in general which will make it a much smoother experience.
Physical Trade Fleets:
Possibly one of the coolest features in this update is that NPC trading fleets are fully physical. That means, they will have all the blocks used in a trade loaded onto them and you can actually intercept and raid them.
Trades initiated by a player will still use the non physical simulation until we made sure the system fully works and isn’t exploitable, so any problem with the physical trade system will not affect players.
Fleets and Fog of War:
An NPC faction has fleets in each system, as well as general fleets that get built for different purposes. You will likely see them fly by a lot if you stay in or close to an NPC owned system. They will mine and patrol, but also scavenge sectors where recent battles have taken place.
One of the hardest parts of this update was to build a scalable system that can handle potentially hundreds of fleets without slowing down the process, but to not use the copout of spawning non persistent fleets just to fake activity. Once a fleet spawns, its ships are actually persistent.
They will also attack fleets of their enemies as long as they are at war. NPC on NPC warfare will be fleshed out more in the future.
You can now see routes of fleets if you are in an explored system and if a trade route goes through it you can also see where the convoy is located at that moment.
Fleets that are flying around will have a blue dashed line pointing towards their destination. The defense fleets stay within their system and go from station to station.
Trade fleets go between 2 trade nodes, there is an additional green dashed line between those 2 nodes to indicate which ones are trading.
For admins, we’ve added a scan button to the map as an easy way to see fleets and their stations.
NPC Systems:
Like player factions, NPC factions can take systems as territory. They will also determine a contingent based on their blueprints and the relative position of the system to the faction’s home system. Most factions will have less density in the outskirts of their territory although you can adjust that in the config.
Some will spread faster and uneven, some prefer to be a big dense blob. The expansion behavior is also preferred towards the resources they mostly need for their contingent. Empty systems and especially black holes are avoided, although they still go into empty systems if there is really no other choice.
The contingent will also determine which and how many fleets will be in that system, as well as determining production and mining.
If enough ships and/or stations of a system get killed, the faction will lose control over the system. If the damage isn’t too much, the faction tries to replenish their losses at their next turn, and if that is not possible, they will abandon the system.
You can see the system status in the Galaxy Map at the top right to see how much damage the faction has taken in that system.
For testing purposes, NPC faction home-bases are currently indestructible and will also refuse to abandon their home base system, but that feature will open up after potential issues have been resolved.
Resources and Mining:
Systems now have a resource richness. This amount is hidden at the moment but will actually be reflected by spawned asteroids in an upcoming universe revamp. The factions will use their contingent to mine resources from their territory. The amount of resources they can mine is limited and will reflect on what the player actually sees when they go there. For example, if a system is mined out, there will be no more asteroids spawning. The npcConfig can define a resource replenish value if needed.
Production:
Factions will produce more advanced blocks from their mined raw materials each NPC faction turn. The rate of production is bound to config values as well as how many factory stations they have in their contingent for each owned system. The blocks produced will try to match the faction’s demand although this can take a while due to the large amount of blocks needed to expand and resupply.
Maintenance:
To counteract the introduction of countless blocks into the universe and to have a simple controller for NPC factions in general, they will consume general maintenance blocks per turn according to their config. This allows for an effective way to steer the growth behavior of NPC factions without touching other areas such as trading and production.
Diplomacy:
Diplomacy right now is at a stage where most of its functionality is in but individual player relation scores aren’t tied together with their player factions scores yet. The lack of that connection will result in odd behavior and will make you end up in illogical situations.
For that reason only, we force NPC faction to offer you peace after a few minutes of no aggression and your own peace offers will always be accepted. This is for this update only and diplomacy will be completely functional for the next one.
As mentioned above, NPC factions have separate opinions of players and faction. That means they could declare war at you personally while not declaring war at your faction.
The system for diplomacy is a point based system. There are two different kinds of modifiers: status modifiers that will apply to your points as long as the status is active, like being in a war.
The other kind are dynamic modifiers that will affect your diplomacy points permanently over time. These are triggered and increased/decreased by actions. After an action times out, the modifier will diminish and eventually be removed, but the change it applied to the points will stay.
This system will allow for a better approach of AI handling relationships than with just using status modifiers.
They will not like it if you are in war with their friends but they will like you for attacking their enemies. They also don’t like it if you mine in their territory and the longer you do it, the less they’ll like it. You can aim for getting an alliance with them if you want to, or you can make them your enemies.
Diplomacy is also fully customizable with each faction having conditions and reactions for actions in the configs for modders to customize their experience. It offers quite a lot of possibilities that also make it hard to balance.
The diplomacy values given to the NPC Configs are far from final and will receive a complete makeover when the diplomacy feature is done.
Admin Config and commands:
On starting new universes or on update, admins can control the starting conditions of NPC factions by copying the configs from ./data/npcFactions to ./customNPCConfig and modify them (for them to not be replaced on the next update). Most of the values in the XML should have comments on them for better understanding.
There are also several admin commands for better control over the NPC factions. The admin command list on the forums will be updated but these are some important ones: ~ /npc_spawn_faction.
Spawning an NPC faction yourself using the ones in the npcFactions folder.
Same as before with the ability to also set their home system.
Removing any existing faction using their ID (visible in the Diplomacy menu).

New in StarMade 0.199.253 (Oct 8, 2016)

FOG OF WAR:
Most of you already know this mechanic in one way or another. This is how it works in StarMade in its current state:
Fog of war happens on a per-system level with local granularity. This means that any sector and its neighbors become ‘scanned’ instantaneously when visited, and they keep being visible in the map until you log out (for personal usage) or the server/game restarts (for faction usage). You can ‘scan’ a system if you have visited at least 15 of its sectors (trackable in the galaxy map) or if you simply use your scanner. A system will be always visible in the map once available.
The reason for this two tier-system is simply scalability, as it would cause immense database load (and size) for an entirely per-sector fog of war.
Keep in mind that the Fog of War system is subject to change, since it’s an important piece of the NPC update. Scanners will also likely be rebalanced to be better at exploring. The system also already supports trigger based and time based “re-fogging” of areas.
Faction Sharing:
Factions share their fog of war. This not only means that newly scanned systems are instantly available to all members, but it also means that factions share progress per system: if a 16-member faction all warps into different sectors within a system, they would reveal it instantly.
There is also a new permission available for faction ranks: Fog of War Sharing
This means that factions don’t have to share their information to new members they don’t trust yet. However, once the information is shared, the player will retain the gathered fog of war information, even in the event they lose the permission or get kicked from the faction entirely.
At the same time, a player will always share their personal fog of war information when they join a faction, even at a rank that doesn’t provide the player with any faction fog of war data in return.
Additionally, a member with the ‘Faction Edit’ permission can share the faction’s fog of war information with other factions. This option is available in the diplomacy panel.
DISPLAY BLOCK UPGRADE:
In addition to last update’s new copy function, you are now able to modify the content of your display blocks in even more ways. When copying the content from one display block to another, you can now use the following tags: [shield], [shieldCap], [shieldPercent], [power], [powerCap], [powerPercent], [auxPower], [auxPowerCap], [auxPowerPercent], [structureHp], [structureHpCap], [structureHpPercent], [armorHp], [armorHpCap], [armorHpPercent], [mass], [blockCount], [sector], [system], [name], [docked], [cloaked], [jamming], [speed]
You can also use the sensor block to check if two display blocks have equal text content. Just connect the sensor block to two display blocks as input. The [password] tag is ignored when comparing text.
All this information is also available in the ‘Help’ panel on any display block.
It’s worth mentioning that, with enough logic circuitry, you could write a command parser using the above additions. You could, quite literally, type “open airlock 12” into a display block and have your ship execute the command.

New in StarMade 0.199.234 (Sep 24, 2016)

NEW LOGIC BLOCKS:
This update adds a new logic block and system to the game.
Randomizer Block:
As you probably guessed by the name, this block produces random results when activated. Each time it receives any signal (true or false) it has a 50% chance to change its state.
This can have several applications: Using multiple randomizers can create a random binary number depending on how many you use. You also can also modify the odds by chaining these blocks together with ANDs to reduce the odds, or ORs to increase them.
LOGIC SENSOR BLOCK (COUNCIL SUGGESTION T1756):
The logic sensor block is part of an entirely new system that can probe the current state of most systems on a structure, such as power or shield percentage. This means you can now include the state of those systems in your logic circuits.
The following systems can be probed:
Power and Power Aux: The output is based on the power/capacity percentage.
Shields: The output is based on the percentage of shields compared to its capacity.
Jump Drive: The output is based on the charge percentage.
Jam/Cloak: The output is 100% when it’s on and 0% when it’s off.
Doors: The output is 100% when closed and 0% when open.
Cargo: The output is based on that unit’s volume/capacity percentage.
The sensor block outputs a true signal to all touching logic blocks if its condition is met.
It only does this check when it’s triggered by an external signal such as an incoming true signal from a button/activation module. It’s best to make your own clock so it constantly asks the sensor block to check again.
Just link the sensor to any of the systems mentioned above to change what it should be checking. Linking it to a single block is enough. For doors it will look at the entire group, for systems such as power it will look at the total power. Make sure you only have 1 type linked.
Its default condition is 100% (or above but it’s already the maximum value). Meaning that closed doors, cloaker/jammer/… enabled, and fully charged power/shields/.. Will make it output a true signal when triggered.
You can change this condition by linking the sensor to activation modules. It’s using the same system as rail speed controllers so it’s looking at the ratio of true signals versus the total linked.
3 true activation modules out of 5 linked ones means the condition is set to 60% (3 / 5 * 100) and above.
The reasoning behind requiring a logic signal to pulse the sensor is that it both adds more control over signal rates and significantly reduces overhead. A reverse trigger (meaning the block automatically firing when sensing the desired value) had several problems: Not only would it be performance intensive by having to iterate through all sensor blocks on every update (as inputs don’t know their incoming connection), but it is also less versatile, since this logic-based approach lets you sense a value on events (e.g. a better automatic door that only sends a signal to close a door that is actually open).
The whole system also ties nicely into the general design of StarMade, which is to avoid countless menus of configuring systems with dropdown menus and entering numbers.
Radial Menu:
We have developed and included a new radial menu for this update. This menu will finally make remembering shortcuts for menus a thing of the past.
The default hotkey for the menu is TAB; everything that was previously bound to TAB has been moved to F1. Keep in mind that the design and usability of this menu is not final! We understand that there are several approaches and ideas on how radial menus work, and we will adapt it according to what feels the most comfortable for users.
New Graphical Effects:
This update also contains some shiny new effects, as well as improving existing ones:
THRUSTERS AND CANNONS:
We’ve added new post-processing to both the thruster plume and cannon fire that will make your ships significantly prettier, and the effect isn’t simply linear, so the more thrusters you expose, the more rockin’ that ship’s tail will be. This is a prototype and it will be expanded upon later.
Likewise, cannon fire now glows, and scales with that cannon’s damage. You can also customize the muzzle flash by connecting its computer to a light block. The same goes for the thrusters on your ship, just connect the ship core to a light.
This glow has also been applied to our beacon blocks.
Display Block Logic:
Due to high demand, we’ve had this planned for quite a while now. The content of display blocks is transferrable, and it works exactly the same as rail replacement. Just place an activation block next to a display block and connect it to a second display elsewhere. On activation, the content of the adjacent display block will be transferred onto the remote display. This allows, among many other things: cycling systems readouts, security feeds, and even a chat/alert system.
Since we’re aware that players will make some crazy things with this, we’ve made improvements to the network code so that changes only affect nearby players. In this case, it only sends the text to nearby players (as opposed to everyone) when displays change.
Rail Connection Logic:
You may now connect rails to activation blocks. This allows you to use logic without needing to place the activation blocks directly adjacent to your rails -- potentially in the middle of nowhere. This will, however, disable touch logic for the specific rail block you’ve linked.
Additional Features:
Rail pickup points are now invisible if the point is deactivated. (Council suggestion T1735)
Furthermore, it is now possible to toggle the logic pipe graphics on/off in the game’s graphics options.
Block Config change:
Power auxiliaries were changed from 100 SHP to 25 SHP. This should make it less punishing to lose them. We’ve planned other changes, but they’ve been delayed for the time being due to insufficient feedback.
We’ve changed the grouping of logic multi-slots to make room for the new randomizer and sensor block.
BUG FIXES:
T1869: Client crash in specific sector (nullpointer)
T1918: Power aux explosions aren’t random
Ghost linking by switching rails with logic is fixed.

New in StarMade 0.199.217 (Sep 12, 2016)

New in StarMade 0.199.172 (Aug 29, 2016)

New in StarMade 0.199.161 (Aug 17, 2016)

New in StarMade 0.199.159 (Aug 15, 2016)

New in StarMade 0.199.152 (Aug 13, 2016)

OPTIMIZATIONS:
Physics:
Physics are heavily upgraded now, as promised in the last update. Colliding or getting close to bigger structures should show a drastic improvement. This will bring down general load, and remove some of the high ping issues.
The only remaining bottleneck is two structures getting close with lots of smaller rail docked entities on them, but that should also be fixed soon.
Blueprints:
There was a problem with blueprint handling in the last update, where a change to the Catalog would cause a full read of every entry, causing high pings for a long period of time.
Memory:
Several memory issues have been fixed. One was that, as mentioned before, the catalog read and cached every ship, which resulted in a lot of wasted memory.
There were also some other minor to medium leaks that caused high memory usage such as when using lots of missiles at the same time, and physics data sets not being cleaned up properly when thrown back into the pool for reuse.
MODEL EXPORT:
Ships can now be exported as 3D models (.obj format) that can be read by most common 3D editing programs (3ds max, maya, blender, etc). With how our game engine works, most of the necessary elements were already there so we decided to turn it into a feature.
To export a ship, go to your catalog as if you want to save a ship and click on the export as 3D model button. You can then choose a name for the export which will be added to the modelexport folder in your StarMade directory.
Make sure, when loading it up in a program to use the alpha channel of the textures to get transparency on blocks and sprites.
Smaller Changes:
The game will now automatically set the resolution to what the desktop resolution is on first start on a fresh install.
The game will now warn you if you play with in 32bit.
BUG FIXES:
T1807 Dropped meta items stack when picked up
T1791 Creative mode can’t be turned off in singleplayer
T1785 Shipyard fail to load designs
T1782 Can no longer dock to a shipyard with core beam
T1698 Log files have an unexpected file extension
T1692 Catalog manager deletes wrong blueprints when not sorted as numbered list
T1689 Settings reset when starting a dedicated server
T1641 Collision detection in docked entity pilot mode has severe performance issues
T1544 Shoot out rail undocks too soon after direction change
T1407 /destroy_entity and overheat despawning makes some entities non physical
T1198 unfactioned ships will get stuck on pickup rails when re-docked without a pilot inside
T1148 Tooltip shows incorrect names for swapping meta item places
T574 Improper orientation of blocks when using undo in advanced build mode
Several typo fixes
T1698 means that our log files have changed names:
~ log.txt.# changed into logstarmade.#.log
~ serverlog.txt.# changed into serverlog.#.log
We’ve also changed the asteroid size server config value from chunk to block radius:
Default value is set to 64: ~ ASTEROID_RADIUS_MAX = 64 //Asteroid max radius in blocks (from -x to +x)
Furthermore, due to fixes in the FactionConfig.xml, servers might have to adapt their custom configs. Should the custom config fail to load, the game uses the default as a fallback.

New in StarMade 0.199.132 (Aug 2, 2016)

Chunk32:
With this update, all worlds will use the new chunk format, which (among other things) increases the chunk size from 16x16x16 to 32x32x32. Code wise, this was probably one of the biggest changes in a long time because it affects such a huge portion of the codebase: we needed to update pretty much every area that interacted with chunks. Not only that, but we also had convert old worlds and blueprints and make sure everything is still fully functional.
A new object always starts at the center of a chunk, so moving to 32-block chunks means all blocks in every object had to be shifted by 8 blocks in all dimensions. But not only that: all logic, connections, rails, and a lot more had to be adapted as well.
The reason for centering objects within their chunk is simple: small objects only consume one chunk (instead of eight), not only saving memory, but significantly improving the performance of nearly every operation (physics, lighting, etc.) as well.
This change also requires converting all files, which happens while initializing the universe. All existing blueprints are fully compatible with the new system, and are converted while initializing, or when used in-game if needed. They will also migrate on the fly if you upload an old version of a blueprint, or if you copy one directly to the blueprint directory.
Note: Converted blueprints are not backwards-compatible; however, the game retains backups of the chunk16 blueprints, so downgrading is not an issue.
The new format considerably reduces both the amount and size of files stored in the database, resulting in a significantly smaller overall size. As an example, the test server shrunk from 49GB to 9.2GB with the new format -- 81% smaller! Other servers can expect similar reductions.
The migration process automatically creates a backup of all old databases and blueprints in the installation directory before touching anything, preserving your data should anything go wrong. The migration might take awhile depending on the database size, so expect updating servers to be down for a bit. (The test server takes between 60 and 90 minutes)
Note for servers: If you have already made backups yourself, you can turn off the automatic backup by adding the following lines in the server.cfg, if not already present: BACKUP_WORLD_ON_MIGRATION = false, BACKUP_BLUEPRINTS_ON_MIGRATION = false.
We’ve also renamed ASTEROID_SIZE to ASTEROID_SIZE_MAX. We’ve lowered its default value from 4 to 1 because of the new larger chunk sizes. (Addendum: as it’s a radius, it doesn’t include the center chunk. We will switch to a by block radius in upcoming versions).
On top of all the conversions, we needed to make sure the new system can work with every prior version of the game as well. One of the hardest things to adapt was the planet generation, which in its current state may not see performance gains. However, the update greatly improves frame rates while looking at already-generated planets.
The new chunk size also made it difficult to adapt physics, requiring large changes and improvements to get everything to work. However, we’ve already surpassed the previous performance for turrets and rails. The same performance update will follow for the regular (non-rail) physics in the coming update. This will improve performance for collisions, and things such as flying inside a hangar. There are still a lot of ways to optimize the physics engine, so we can continue to improve performance in the future.
You may ask, “Why stop at 32-block chunks? Why not 64, or even 128?” Apart from diminishing returns, the biggest reason against this is that the gains from larger chunks begin to negatively affect any operation that looks at chunks as a whole. Not only would a larger chunk have more wasted space, the size would significantly slow down other lighting calculations, meshing, etc. The 32-block chunk size is the sweet spot, providing significant gains with only minimal performance losses.
The only thing that may temporarily suffer a bit is the lighting calculations. If the slowdown is too much, or if you’re having too high CPU when objects are loaded in visually, you can reduce the ‘Block light quality’ in the in-game options. We’ve already planned methods to eliminate any performance loss from this issue, and will include them in a future update.
One last thing we did, was implementing and upgrading the shaders to be able to handle the larger chunks. The new shaders make use of more modern Open-GL calls, speeding up drawing even more. However, as always, there is a fallback for older graphics cards.
New translation:
We’ve added Portuguese-brazilian to our supported languages. A big thank you to all the contributors on our Crowdin project!
Anyone can contribute translations, we’re currently working on 21 languages and need all the help we can get! Sign up to our translation site here: http://translate.star-made.org/
Gamma:
The gamma setting is now available in the ingame graphics options.
Bug Fixes:
LoD models act like rails
Cargo space/area trigger display issue
Teal standard armor config fix

New in StarMade 0.198.485 (Jul 19, 2016)

New in StarMade 0.198.477 (Jul 15, 2016)

New in StarMade 0.198.476 (Jul 13, 2016)

This update marks an important step in the overall progress. The trading system will be used throughout the universe -- not only by players, but in the future by NPC Factions as well. This will create a dynamic economy throughout the universe, and should make gameplay much more engaging.
TRADING SYSTEM:
The most important part of the trading system is the Trade Network. This network makes it possible to access inventories and prices without having to visit the stations themselves (or even having them loaded). Not only can they be accessed, but they can also be modified, meaning stations may trade with one another regardless of their distance and loaded states.
The Trading Guild itself handles trades made using the Trade Network. This means anyone can trade with any other shop in the network, given they have sufficient credits to pay the Guild its fee.
TRADE NODES:
A station with a shop module can now opt-in to the Trade Network. This option is only available to the owner of the shop. There are also now more options added for shop owners, such as the ability to let their faction, allies, or everyone use the shop as an owner (except for the right to add/remove owners, of course).
Everyone with that permission can make trades at that shop and set the prices. Keep in mind not to leave money and blocks in a shop with a broad ownership, however.
Player Shop Capacity and added functions:
Player shops now require capacity the same way storage blocks do. You will need to connect cargo blocks to the shop in order to expand its capacity. However, shops also gained some of the functionality of storage blocks: they can now pull items (and be pulled from), which should make it much easier to manage shop inventories.
Setting Prices:
As before, there are two type of prices you can set per block: the price that you want to sell blocks at, and the price you want to buy blocks for. Players can now also impose a stock limit, preventing blocks from being bought or sold past that limit, thus allowing reserves for ship building, repairs, and the like.
Players can set Prices both within the Shop tab as before, or within the new Set Prices tab. If the shop is in the Trade Network, this tab publishes all credit prices in real-time. The previous shopping permissions (located within the Options tab) still apply, but only to local trading -- that is, trading with ships that actually visit the shop.
Placing Orders:
To place an order, go to the Trading tab. This lists all shops within the Trade Network in a sortable and searchable list. Select a shop of your choice and click its [Order] button to bring up the order menu. Alternatively, you may search for offers by block type instead. This fetches the buy/sell prices for that particular block type from the server, making it easy to find the best price for specific items.
The order menu allows you to buy and sell from other shops. The availability of purchasable items of course depends on the target shop’s inventory and stock limits. Likewise, the amount of inventory that a particular shop can buy from you is limited by its cargo capacity and stock limits, as well as its credits.
The top of the menu lists the price/profit for a trade. Since the Trading Guild is handling the actual trading, they require a delivery fee, as well as a share of the profit based on delivery distance.
The delivery price itself depends on distance and quantity of ships used. As every ship has a fixed amount of cargo space, certain order volumes are more cost-effective. Example: if you buy only a single block (or a single block over the capacity of one ship), you must still pay for the use of that entire ship.
Keep in mind that buying/selling will send an individual Trading Guild fleet, because orders have different shops as starting points. Also: Trading Guild fleets are only virtual at the moment and therefore cannot be intercepted nor raided … yet. We will add this feature in the coming weeks, along with some of the NPC faction features. This will also include an upgrade to fleet AI.
Active Trades:
Once you click [ok], all credits of the trade will be instantly added/removed from shops in the trade. All bought/sold blocks are also instantly removed from the shop and loaded onto the Trading Guild fleet. When the fleet has reached its destination, it will transferred the cargo to the destination shop.
The shop’s Trading tab displays all trades to/from that shop. Shop owners will also receive a message when a trade completes, as well as a faction message (if applicable).
Galaxy Map:
Active trades to/from your personal or faction shops are visible on the galaxy map. Every shop within the Trade Network is also visible on the map. In the future, we will change how the map handles and shares information between players.
Trade Config:
Currently the values used in the Trade System are adjustable in the blockBehaviorConfig.xml (open with any text editor).
When other features get added, these values will change:
Cargo Hold of trade ship: 1000 volume
Cost per trade ship: 1000 cr
Cost per system travelled: 300 cr
Travel time: 1 sector every 3 seconds
Trading guild flat share: 20%
Trading guild share per system travelled: 2%
NEW LOD BLOCKS (AND GRAPHIC CHANGES):
To test the integration of the LoD (Level-of-Detail) system with existing blocks, we have replaced the mushroom (found on red planets) with a model that uses LoD. As you travel further from the model, it will reduce in complexity, thereby improving graphics performance. The LoD system will make use of multiple steps in the future to help further improve performance while retaining proportional detail.
Additionally, we’ve added a new block: the light bar. This block will make hallways look quite nice, but of course can be used in a variety of other ways. Unfortunately, due to the block requiring 24 orientations, it currently cannot be switched off; there are plans to fix or work around this problem soon. We are aware of some glitches in the graphics on the light bar. Those will hopefully be fixed till friday.
We have been slowly working on optimising our textures and their application, meaning less occupied VRAM. The footprint of our planet LOD textures, Non cubic model emissive maps and some UI sprites have been cut by up to 80%. We will continue to further streamline our assets wherever possible.
ASTEROID TWEAKS:
Generation is now 2-3 times faster.
Configurable asteroid sizes within server settings
Some FPS improvements for ice asteroids, more to come soon.
FLEET CONTEST RESULTS:
Results of the Community Fleet Contest have been made publicly available, you can find the thread providing more details here: https://starmadedock.net/threads/community-fleet-contest-results.25911/
BUG FIXES:
Unlisted bug fixed: shop panel could be unusable after logging out and in again without exiting the program.

New in StarMade 0.198.223 (Jun 23, 2016)

New in StarMade 0.198.222 (Jun 22, 2016)

New in StarMade 0.198.221 (Jun 20, 2016)

New in StarMade 0.198.219 (Jun 20, 2016)

New Asteroids:
A new (faster) system for generating terrain noise has been added. This system has tweaked asteroid generation to produce larger and more natural looking asteroids.
Thanks to native libraries and SIMD instructions this new system has a large performance increase over the previous system, therefore asteroids should generate faster and put less load on the CPU by doing so. Comparison testing has shown around 7 times performance increase compared to the old asteroid generation.
Further native library usage will be used for other CPU heavy parts of the game. This means, we now have the speed of C/C++ for the performance critical parts, while still keeping the convenience of java.
Custom Shapes:
The engine now supports custom shapes. Those shapes can pretty much be any 3d object. The game automatically handles natural Level of Detail. That means that from afar, shapes will automatically turn into either cubes, “sprites” (like current flowers for example), or completely transparent. Objects further away will not have any decrease in fps that way. The distance at which objects blend to blocks can be adjusted in the options.
We are adding just a few decorations for now to test the limits and how players will use it. There will also be functional objects later. However, these objects should never be a main build component. If needed, more restrictions can be done like a limit on objects per area (client sided), to avoid slower computers lagging out.
The shapes we will add in this build are a Pipe and a Console, both of which can be found in General -> Decoration -> NonCubic.
In following updates, there will also be options for physics meshes. For ship vs ship collisions, the cube (or nothing) will always be taken.
More shapes will be added over time, as the process to make new ones and get them into the game is very straightforward. Also depending on tests we will replace existing shapes like flowers, capsules, and light rods with custom shapes.
New Languages:
Thanks to the awesome translators that helped us, StarMade now supports seven new languages:
French, Russian, German, Japanese, Chinese Traditional, Polish, and Spanish!
The system we have set up for translations is very easy to maintain and add new or changed strings without messing up the code at all.
Languages packed with the game have most strings translated; translations may not be accurate. As translation progresses, we will update language packs and add new ones. It's a community effort, so if you can contribute, the translation project is here: http://translate.star-made.org/ . Anyone is free to edit, simply sign up and translate!
Reworked GUI Graphics:
We have reskinned the User Interface with a cleaner theme akin to our main menu. The noisy and heavier elements of the older design often cluttered up the denser menu structures. We hope this new theme not only helps with legibility, but allows us to easily scale up our assets to higher resolutions in the future.
Further fine tuning will take place in the coming weeks with updated HUD elements currently being worked on.
Bug fixes:
First and foremost: Logic Lag when loading in an object has been fixed. Inner logic (weapons etc) are also now loading a lot faster by using more Threads, but keep in sizeable tiers, so small calculations don’t fill up the queue and can be handled much faster.
T1540 Exit Test Sector brings up Tutorials instead
T1512 tutorial tile menu isn't constrained by menu size
T1509 new tutorial menu doesn't end processes when closed
T1484 Log spam...too much yhole (PDLDLKDJLKDJLKDJLKDJLKDJDLKJD)
T1352 Faction Permission Block Texture bug (Pixel texture pack)

New in StarMade 0.198.146 (Jun 5, 2016)

Tutorial Videos:
The engine can now play videos ingame. You can either watch it in a player or in the background while you play.
At the moment, the videos available are those from our youtube channel. We will be improving, optimizing, and expanding them for ingame tutorial usage. Also, while at the moment, the videos are 720p, in the future we will try to offer a low quality offline option with the ability to stream full quality directly from youtube if possible. It may be a while before a full series of quality videos are available.
We will also be looking into implementing an ingame browser for our wiki and link that to the game, so you could look up info about a block or a system via a context menu.
This is just the beginning of the new tutorial system, and we will further expand on it with dynamic suggestions, so that if a new player puts down a block, the tutorial system would suggest a video or a wiki entry based on that.
Currently, video audio only work with OpenAL sound enabled, however, for anyone having problems with that system, and other languages, there will be full subtitles in any supported language available in the future.
Speaking of languages. We are close to releasing the first bunch of translations, and that will probably happen in the next release. For more info about translations, visit https://crowdin.com/project/starmade
New Lighting System:
As most of you know, the shading on structures, especially on angled shapes has serious problems with lighting.
The reason why those errors persisted so long, was because the lighting normalizer required a full rewrite, and to make things worse, is one of the most brain scrambling things to implement. However, it was time to do it, and the new system is now able to be easily adaptable to new blocks. Fixing any remaining lighting errors and other related glitches should now be a lot easier, as the new system is now modular and abstract instead of just one big pile of if-then-elses, which grew with every new block shape added.
There’s a minor issue remaining where your ship mode view can’t see through non cubic blocks such as wedges or corners. We’ll make sure this is resolved in the next hotfix.
Main Menu Additions:
We’ve added a few improvements:
You can rename local worlds with the right click context menu.
Advanced settings for local worlds now has a Save and Discard changes button. Previously it only saved when starting a world.
Ability to use the default astronaut skin again, an X appears next to the Skin select button that deselects your custom one.
Bug Fixes:
The initial loading has been improved to take a little less time. There is still some things to be done there to speed it up further.
A few tasks were fixed too, lighting and tutorial tasks not included:
Talking to spiders causes nullPointer
Build helper is locked to ship core
Setting sell price to 0 of a block can cause crash

New in StarMade 0.198.131 (May 22, 2016)

New in StarMade 0.197.51 (Apr 24, 2016)

Small GUI enhancements:
Build helper now remember the previous settings
Inventory “search for name” filters now have quick clear option you can click on
Replace filter can now be picked from what block the player is looking at, button is located in the advanced build mode panel
If you replace a block type with another block type, it uses the orientation set in the build mode panel instead of the default orientation.
As mentioned in the bug fix list, dates on blueprints and faction members are implemented now. Blueprint description also works now
Bug fixes:
T1361 creating design new or from blueprint causes nullpointer exception
T1338 beta launcher overlay
T1339 class cast exception when firing lock on missile while docked
T1330 Search bar keeps focus when using right click resulting in unwanted behavior
T1290 a teleport or jump to another player can crash client
T1273 first person view should be placed on the astronaut’s head
T1269 using any hotbar slot undocks you from a shipyard anchor
T1250 Frequent Crashes In Latest Version
T1208 Can't add ship to fleet if it isn’t in the same sector
T1180 fleets get stuck with old orders (sometimes until they are unloaded?)
T1101 playerlist and navigation menu use the same saved size and position
T968 scrolling in tab player list menu also scrolls through hotbar
T943 all textures on t002.png appear broken on debris blocks
T942 shield sharing against explosions is fixed at 50% shield capacity no matter what the config says
T904 Cargo block doesn't become full if it's the only one linked to a chest
T881 Dark Grey Advanced Heptas incorrectly made in standard factory
T858 Build Mode for Shipyard design displays total power cap, including Shipyard's Station.
T853 shield effect overrides lighten mode
T791 display module formatting help button is not visible
T788 area trigger controller doesn't auto link with other logic blocks
T787 Ships/Stations do not save AI enabled state on docks
T753 Block count and mass is off
T750 Shield regeneration rate displayed on GUI does not reflect combat nerf
T736 Astrotech does not accept slave modules
T625 inventory filter needs a quick reset button
T542 Gravity Unit not working far away from core of the Ship
T469 Z Fighting on Galaxy Map
T437 Background noise persists even when game is muted
T386 Alignment/gravity overridden by vessel you're docked to
T340 "power failure" event does not check power inheriting
T303 beams passing through ship
T281 When in build mode, lighten Mode-esque shader effect is applied to nearby chunks of any nearby block-based entities.
T246 Clicking spawn multiple times after suicide generates multiple suicides
T231 Restricted build helper still applies in astronaut mode
T204 dates for faction members and blueprints do not work
T197 editing blueprint description also edits faction description
T187 Up and down Arrow key stuck between rail entities
T104 Safety element: Faction Menu
T103 Safety element: Structure Menu
T97 Replace tool doesn't always replace with correct orientation
T51 can't toggle Flip Flop manually

New in StarMade 0.197.36 (Apr 9, 2016)

StarMade now uses semantic versioning; while this doesn’t affect gameplay, it’s an industry standard, and will allow us to more easily (and accurately) identify revision/hotfix versions.
Other notable improvements in this release:
We have added a new model for the Marker Beam.
Shield hits now scale with weapon power. (For example: your pistol will no longer light up the entire ship when fired inside.)
We have made some small changes to the lighting shader which improves graphics at longer distances.
The atmosphere of planets now looks better when viewed from different a sector.
Mirror Cubes is now enabled by default.
The yellow/red build box now has a new appearance, and scales with box dimensions.
Shipyard computers now have an [Edit Design] button to access ship cores without having to manually get in.
Confirmed fixes:
T1294 star reflection makes some blocks appear white
T1293 Shipyards able to take over an existing entity
T1292 thrust circle slider can go under or above 100% total thrust
T1276 turning off gravity un-aligns you from ship
T1267 exit tutorial dialog menu appears on top of confirmation dialog
T1244 Missile Tracking inaccurate vs smaller ships
T1226 Cannot modify rotational thrust using out-of-ship thrust menu as astronaut
T1221 fleet on sentry or defend doesn't fight back if enemy is out of weapon range
T1211 AI aim is nearly 100% accurate, regardless of difficulty setting
T1248 "Preview Block to Place" appears inside Galaxy Map
T1185 Carrier recall first uses an old flagship position to home in
T1177 Faction description can't be blank (no warning message issue)
T1081 "Select Nearest Entity" while inside a ship core selects your astronaut
T1065 Unable to unlink weapons and effects in weapons menu
T1020 Diminishing returns of Inherited Thrust is based off the dock, not mothership
T971 storage pull on asteroid results in class-cast exception
T897 tooltip not showing for ship hotbar 2 -> 10
T798 Chat main log blank after first 100 lines
T794 Transporters preserves alignment but not gravity on the same ship
T778 scrolling through ship hotbar is jumpy
T709 LOD of planets are the wrong colour seen from other sectors
T8 Sector change moves players in gravity/alignment

New in StarMade 0.19624 (Mar 20, 2016)

Fleet Mining:
Fleets now have an additional order “Mine Sector”, that when given will do exactly that. Keep in mind that for now the sector they are mining in will have to be loaded. Also, the flagship will not participate in any mining. It currently only works on Asteroids.
Other Changes:
Newly generated Void Systems are mostly empty now.
Minimum Rail movement and rotation speed is now 5 times higher.
With fixing simulation through the introduction of fleets, simulation spawn (pirates/traders) frequency has been increased. This may need to be increased more in the future.
AI aggro range is now a lot higher.
Bug Fixes:
A bunch of bugs (47 confirmed) have been fixed. Also optimizations have been made to memory taken (RAM) and docking processing in bigger numbers (e.g. bigger numbers of turrets).
Another optimization was getting rid of a slowdown caused by non fleet ships, where servers would get bombarded by database queries which caused immense lag on server side.
A few unreported bugs have been fixed too.
List of confirmed fixes:
T1238 carrier recall drones unable to redock properly and get stuck in a loop, caused by non physical rails
T1205 nullpointer on entering tutorial
T1201 textures don't get extracted
T1199 Nullpointer when opening map after deleting a fleet
T1194 docked fleet members stay behind in unloaded move orders
T1191 Ship arrow versus Galaxy Map arrow
T1186 During carrier recall, drones can dock to the wrong pick up point
T1182 Fleet and normal AI is stationary in combat
T1172 ships assigned to fleet lose all rail based entities on unload
T1152 typos and oddities in fleet GUI
T1049 Personal Cargo drops at astronaut position on death w/ setting on
T1143 overheating fleet ships are still AI controlled
T1142 Cannot open calibrate thruster menu from build mode
T1125 removing shipyard computer while constructing results in item loss
T1122 shipyard nullpointer
T1121 Z-fighting with "preview block to build" enabled while using some build tools
T1118 explosions don't trigger shield recharge outage
T1115 ArrayIndexOutOfBoundsException on modified planet plate
T1110 "View Relations" does not display correct relationship values
T1106 Body moves when buying from shop
T1060 Cannons with penetration depth have damage loss
T1051 Defensive Ion Effect Not Affecting Docked Entities
T1021 Shipyard pulling extremely inefficient
T973 Creating ores by replacing cargo space with rock types
T969 Nullpointer when removing filled cargo blocks
T883 Forcefield Slabs Lighting is Fullbright and Uncolored
T733 creative mode hotbar doesn't allow you to remove items
T714 Game complains inventory is full in creative mode
T711 ship core can be destroyed completely
T689 Tab + F6 causes nullpointer when in build mode
T675 Multislot ITEM LOST at Ship Deconstruction by Shipyard with Storage
T663 Shipyard running out of power causes loss of blocks
T647 Turrets on ships built in shipyard do not inherit AI settings.
T546 Using "create docking" on station and planets causes nullpointer
T534 F5-screenshots of galaxy map appear with background transparent
T291 AI without thrust modules does not work well
T261 Server cannot be started because of one collapsed "SIMULATION_STATE.sim"
T256 Filter options in Catalog/Mail window
T251 Collision Damage: protected sectors don't protect you from collision damage
T116 unexpected behavior of infinite shops and credits
T107 using thrusters and mouse input while power outage causes fast spinning
T87 NoSlotFreeException Issues, Factory production losing product/raw material
T72 shop prices display prices incorrectly
T57 Inner ship remote toggles on ANY click, even in menu
T45 firing weapons on docked ships while cloaked
T28 Faction restriction does not apply for chests
T27 Invisibility mode ship issues

New in StarMade 0.19592 (Mar 3, 2016)

New in StarMade 0.19590 (Mar 2, 2016)

Fleets:
This is an entirely new system within the game’s backend. It is basically a cached virtual layer that can quickly operate on the main database of a server without the need to actually load in ships. We had to make some major modifications to the database’s tables to allow for this, so it took some effort to set up just right.
But enough of the technical details. Here’s an overview of how fleets work in-game: A player can create a fleet in the new fleet panel (default key ‘k’) and add multiple ships to it. There are several other management options for fleets in that panel as well. The first ship in the list is always the flagship (the ordering is easy to change later), and a ship can only belong to one fleet at a time. The flagship of every owned fleet will also always appear in the galaxy map. Ships don’t require Bobby-AI blocks to be part of a fleet.
Fleets can currently perform the following actions:
Idle: This is the default state. Ships in this fleet will neither move on their own nor attack. In the event of a server restart, fleets will automatically revert to this order. (In the future, the last fleet order will be saved.)
Move: The Move command sends the fleet to a sector, whether or not that sector is loaded. Currently the fleet’s movement speed while in an unloaded state is fixed, and the fleet is also unable to use jump drives as of yet. These will be added in the future.
Attack: A fleet will go to a specific sector and attack. Currently, attacks will only commence on loaded sectors; if a sector is unloaded, the fleet will wait on the sector’s edge until it is loaded.
Defend: Similar to Attack, the fleet will go to a sector and attack any (loaded) enemies. However, the fleet will not pursue any enemies beyond 2 sectors of the target sector.
Sentry: The fleet will attack any enemy in proximity.
Formation Idle: the fleet will assemble into a formation, but will not attack anything. The flagship can be manually controlled.
Formation sentry: the fleet will assemble into formation. Additionally, ships will break off and attack any enemy in proximity.
Carrier Callback: This order is explained further below.
Important: Formation orders are currently experimental and may lead to strange AI behavior or fleet pile-ups.
Carriers:
Carriers are now supported in-game thanks to the new fleet system. For this purpose, we’ve added three additional blocks: the Pickup Rail, the Pickup Point block, and the Shootout Rail. All of these blocks are non-physical and only visible while in build mode. This means that, while the two new rail blocks still function as rails and allow you to change them using existing logic systems, you can not collide with them even if you’re on the rail itself. They also do not provide any armor or hp to the ship.
New Blocks:
Pickup Rail: you can use it to lead your ship inside your carrier safely. It works exactly like a normal rail.
Pickup Point: these go on the entry points of your ship. They are kind of an expansion to contact docking. Each block you place has a 3 meter radius. If any ship flies in that radius with its rail docker, it will automatically dock that ship to any rail block adjacent to the pickup area block. You can use the pickup area and the pickup point to make pickup points outside of your ship. Then, as the ship gets reeled in, you can use normal logic to open doors and store the ship inside your carrier. Keep in mind that the last pickup point used will be saved in the ship that used it. That will enable the carrier to call ships to the last pickup point they used. In the future you will also be able to control whether a pickup area is active or not via logic. Flying a ship manually into a pickup area will also result in it docking and it can be used to allow touch docking of flat surface which wasn’t possible before.
If you have your rail docker selected in flight mode, you’ll be able to see all pickup areas on your display.
Shootout Rail: the shootout rail is a way for docked ships to leave your carriers in a safe and not obstructed way. Any ship reaching this rail will accelerate and shoot out the rails direction with some speed. To prevent misuse, ships will always undock on the end of a shootout rail even if you place a normal rail at the end of it.
Carrier Configuration:
To make a carrier, all you have to do is use the pickup areas on your flagship with your drones once. Your drones have to be fleet members. Then you can use the “Recall to Carrier” order on your fleet to order all drones back to their pickup points from anywhere in the universe. Keep in mind that currently only one carrier (the flagship) per fleet is possible, but as long as a ship has no pickup point, it won’t try to dock, so you can mix drones and other fleet ships. You can also wipe a pickup point in the fleet menu if you click on a member.
Fleet server options:
Option to only allow factioned ships (of your own faction) to be added to your fleet, servers probably want to put this on true to prevent ship theft.
ONLY_ALLOW_FACTION_SHIPS_ADDED_TO_FLEET = false
Option to allow fleet formations or not, it’s an experimental feature that could cause collisions and performance drops.
ALLOW_FLEET_FORMATION = true
Art Assets:
There is now a unique model for the healing beam, and minor adjustments have been made to the UI and other art assets as well. Furthermore some sprites (missile/shield effects) have been updated.
Bug Fixes:
T1197 Placing a block on an asteroid, removes said asteroid
T1107 GameConfig.xml on new install is broken
T1055 Nullpointer when sitting on blocks, crash
T939 unload/load will drop blocks if volume used is bigger than default chest capacity
T926 Cargo mass does not update correctly after over capacity bleeding
T903 tooltip doesn't always display or shows wrong data
T743 Linux version fails to start
T737 Shield Supply and Drain textures are swapped
T546 Using "create docking" on station and planets causes nullpointer
T510 undocking ship from shipyard will usually redock it immediately
T361 Missiles do no shield damage
T37 abandoned stations don't have decaying turrets
Performance ‘Bug’ has been fixed for servers where general performance would go down due to another fix for beams being able to hit objects in other sectors.
Possibly fixed problem where ships would lose block connections
Asteroids no longer vanish when placing blocks on them
Fixed some inconsistencies on sector borders
Pressing enter on any input dialogs now counts as clicking “Ok”

New in StarMade 0.19556 (Jan 31, 2016)

New in StarMade 0.19549 (Jan 17, 2016)

Personal Faction Rank:
Faction modules now have a new “personal” rank that will help make joining and working within a faction a lot more secure. Selecting this rank within a faction module will set you (and only you) as the owner of the entity. This means other faction members will not be able to use that entity regardless of their rank – including the faction’s founders. If you leave the faction for any reason (including being kicked), you will retain your ownership of the entity. In this event, the entity would keep the existing faction signature, but your ownership will override it. Pressing R on the faction module will allow you to reset its faction once it is no longer docked to that original faction.
It’s important to note, however, that you can only set something to “personal” if you have permissions to access the faction module’s settings.
The rank selected in a faction module will now propagate to any docked objects so long as you the player have permission to set the ranks on those. This propagation will not apply to docked objects with faction modules set to “personal.” This prevents exploitation of the propagation feature to gain access to personal-set objects.
Faction and Public permission blocks:
A new block has been added that will give faction-wide access to blocks it’s placed next to. The previous block, originally called “Faction Permission Block”, has been renamed to “Public Permission Block”. The new block has now been named “Faction Permission Block” since this makes more sense.
Permissions will now also extend to storage blocks, making it easy to protect your cargo.
There will be additional blocks in the future providing more rank customization.
Rails on Trading Guild Shops:
Advanced TG shops now have docking rails by default. Server admins can also activate this feature on normal TG shops if desired, or switch it off completely. Changing the option does not require a database reset, however the docking rails will only appear on newly generated shops.
Docking on these rails will function similarly to docking on a home base, with the exception that no weapons can be used while docked. This should give factionless and new players a lot more room to secure their ships without having to rely on a home base or a faction.
New Default Keybinds:
There have been some adjustments made to the keyboard.cfg which will provide a new default keybind set. Most of these changes were made to make controls more intuitive for newer players.
Your keyboard.cfg file should not be overwritten unless using a new install, so your custom keybinds should not be affected except in the case of a few buttons which were remapped to blank keys.
Any duplicates (in respect to context) in the keyboard settings ingame are now marked red for easy fixing.
Fixed issues:
T1010 can build on factioned entities regardless of permissions
T1003 Can overwrite any blueprint by uploading one with same name
T964 Teal and pink light rods have full-block collisions.
T939 unload/load will drop blocks if volume used is bigger than default chest capacity
T903 tooltip doesn't always display or shows wrong data
T894 "Create Docking" not working on factioned entities
T860 BufferOverflowException + render issues with mass placement of non cubic blocks
T846 In game can't show full-width characters (Chinese, Japanese, Korean) But it works in setup window
T820 stuck in ship core /stuck in undeathinator
T789 deleting shipyard core anchor when design is loaded, removes it from the database
T680 Ships not checking for collision before docking
T649 docked entities created in adv build under create docking will not undock
T618 Flora items missing from creative menu
T548 "Filter by block name" does not work for multi slots
T442 Old docks can still be bought at shops, when using 'Buy amount' instead of 'Buy'
T243 Player character repeatedly removing/replacing helmet

New in StarMade 0.19538 (Dec 19, 2015)

THRUST SYSTEM:
This also applies to your ship’s thrusted rotation. However, you can now influence the effect with thrusters. More on that later.
The minimum you will go is 0.5 server speed. The max is up to 3 times (with overdrive even 4.5 times) the set server speed at a 2.5:1 Thrust:Mass ratio. Going beyond this ratio will not increase your max speed. You can see your current values in the build mode stats.
Also, note that taking Structural HP damage will decrease your max speed. Please make sure your server speed isn’t set to more than 100 m/s (to start with at least) after updating.
Corrected Inertia:
Inertia is now physically correct to mass distribution. This means, that if you bump a stick by either end it will rotate slower that if you would cause any rotation on the axis along the stick.
Max Speed Differences:
Max speed is now thrust dependent. Your thrust to mass ratio determines how fast you can go. This should make smaller fighters a lot more interesting as scouts and agile fighters.
Thrust Customization:
This often requested features gives players the ability to customize thrust.
We don’t think having to balance out directional thrusters by themselves is all that fun, especially on bigger ships, so we tried to make a simple solution that will in later stages also be usable in a crewed ship.
To change your thrust balance go to the “Ship”->”Trust” tab in your top task bar when you are piloting a ship.
You can change what axis you want to put your thrust in: forwards/backwards, right/left, and up/down. You can also put thrust into your rotational thrust to make your ship turn faster. Changing thruster settings does take a little time though, 15 seconds to be exact. All these values are adjustable in the blockBehaviorConfig.xml, which is since the last hotfix also available as a mergeable custom config (check the customBlockBehaviorConfig directory in your StarMade installation folder).
You can now also inherit all the thrust of docked ships. Simply press the “Inherit Thrusters from docks” to enable this on your ship.
Flight modes:
We have now included a newtonian flight mode to all ships. The old, dampening mode is still there of course although you’ll most likely not use it a lot anymore. The newtonian mode comes equipped with an option to enable dampening if you leave the ship, like a parking brake, so your parked ships aren’t floating away into deep space.
CAPACITY LIMIT SWITCHED ON:
Personal stash will now have its limit switched on (you can still switch it off in the server config is needed).
To lessen the blow to people that didn’t follow the last update, all personal inventories that are overcapacity will automatically create a “block storage” meta item with all your blocks in it. You can take out as many blocks as you need at a time but you can’t put any blocks back into that item (except as admin, who can use this item to create rewards). You can move the item around and empty it in a high volume chest.
Next update we’ll enable chest bleeding when over-capacity. If a chest/factory/shipyard goes over capacity, it will drop blocks over time till it’s under capacity again!
The give_metaitem admin command has been updated to automatically adapt to current and all new meta items. Its description will also automatically be updated.
Also we forgot to mention in the last news, but as most of you probably already saw, you can now tether any storage from a friendly ship in the same sector. Just go to the storage you want to use and toggle the “Use as personal Cargo” button. Then a new tab will appear in your personal inventory to access it at any point, as long as you are in the same sector.
ASTEROID SPAWNING FIX:
The asteroid spawn system is based on temperature. Some asteroid types spawn near a star, in high temperature zones and others spawn near system edges where it is cold.
Some asteroids, such as blue Larimar would only spawn in very cold zones. Unfortunately this meant it only spawned consistently in system corners, the place where asteroid belts almost never cross.
We’ve adjusted all asteroid spawns now and you should be able to find the ones you need without a problem.
Because there’s not a lot of known information about what asteroid spawns where, Kupu has made some nice infographics to illustrate it, you can find them here: http://starmadedock.net/threads/asteroid-belts.22386/
NEW BLOCKS:
Pink hull sets have been added to the game, including Crystal Armor variants, slabs and lighting options.
FACTION CONFIG CHANGE:
By request, a mining factor for unowned system is now available. Server owners and others that use a custom faction config must insert this new value into their config, else the game will not start (ParseException)! A better solution (by xml merging) will follow in the future...
CONFIG CHANGES:
Asteroid spawn chances are more or less equal so we can finally tweak other crafting recipes. There are several resources not being used at all and some get used too much. We don’t want the same resource costs for everything though but decreasing the gap between them seems to be a good idea.
Other changes include a new config option to increase mining yield in un-owned systems. That’s set to 3x now, with other territory still sitting on 6x and faction owned territory on 12x.
They still get their meta items of course, but you don’t get any weapon computer or cannon barrels. If you want to arm yourself you’ll have to buy it from a shop.
There were more volume and cargo changes planned but those got reverted, we need more cargo feedback to get a feeling of what you want, and what you definitely not want.
If you don’t like some changes and you know something better, feel free to make a suggestion here: http://starmadedock.net/threads/game-balance-suggestions.22101/
We implemented some changes to accommodate for the new thrust system:
Total Thrust has been reduced by 25%. This is just to compensate for the new system, most ships should still be capable of moving as fast as they could before.
Cannon projectile speed is now 12.5 times the server speed, used to be 10.
Missile projectile speed is now 2.48 times the server speed, used to be 1.98.
Overdrive has been reduced to a maximum of 50% efficiency. However you do need 4 times less blocks to reach maximum effectiveness now. It also consumes a little bit more power now, 10 per block per second, used to be 6.66.
We’ve adjusted the complex crafting recipes for coloured hull:
Standard armor: 1 basic hull with 1 standard hardener.
Advanced armor: 1 standard hull with 1 advanced hardener.
Both hardeners use 1 asteroid ore which wasn’t used for much else before + some alloyed metal meshes:
Standard hardener: 5 fertikeen capsules + 10 alloyed metal meshes
Advanced hardener: 4 fertikeen ingots + 20 alloyed metal meshes
Starting players now receive a lot more essential blocks:
350 basic grey hull + 100 wedges + 50 corners + 50 heptas + 50 tetras
100 power reactor blocks
100 thruster blocks
2 salvage computers + 50 salvage modules
2 faction modules
5 ship cores
We’ve also adjusted the volumes of all basic resources:
Raw ores/shards and mineral blocks are 0.01 volume
Refined resources like capsules are only 0.001 volume, to allow easy storage.
BUG FIXES:
T1000 Structure HP condition triggers don't work for thrust
T984 ratio to mass uses block count and not thrust amount
T951 Micro assembler can't be linked to cargo space blocks
T949 Infinite money Glitch
T948 Planet textures disappearing
T939 unload/load will drop blocks if volume used is bigger than default chest capacity
T937 No way to reclaim large item stacks
T931 can't split or merge multi slots when over or near capacity limit
T926 Cargo mass does not update correctly
T870 Slabs act like full blocks with rails
T860 BufferOverflowException + render issues with mass placement of non cubic blocks
T786 Players that are attached to a ship via alignment share the ship's shield when shot
T680 Ships not checking for collision before docking
T640 game config: computer limitation does not work and acts like group limitation

New in StarMade 0.19519 (Dec 7, 2015)

Cargo has finally arrived. It is meant to improve gameplay mechanics having a physical representation of loaded goods on a ship while at the same time, being as usable as possible.
Cargo:
Cargo is a physical representation of things loaded in your ship or station/planet. The more you have loaded, the more boxes you will see appear in your cargo area.
There were some main concerns for it in terms of scalability, organization, usability and migration which I hope we solved sufficiently.
Since it’s impossible to organize your things into different little boxes with limited capacity, your storage block will still be the main piece to use. Because having a limit on both slots and stack capacity would be tedious, we decided to just have a overall capacity for a storage with unlimited slots. Each item’s needed space in the inventory is represented by its volume (which defaults to mass, but can be adapted in the block config if needed).
So basically, you can fill up your storage with as many slots as you like, as long as the total volume of all items is within capacity.
Because of this sudden change, penalties for being over-capacity are turned off by default in the server config. These penalties will be switched ON by default in future updates. A player whose inventory is over-capacity will move more slowly, and a ship which is over-capacity will leak items out of storage over time.
So how do you increase that base capacity each storage gets?
It’s simple: just get a few Cargo Area blocks and connect them to your storage. Each block adds capacity to your storage block. They are non-physical and not visible as long as they are empty, but they will fill up with the inventory reaching its capacity.
Keep in mind that items in storage now also add mass to your ship. It’s a lot less mass than it would add if you would build the blocks on your ship by using the patented “warp storage technology”, which stores most of the mass in the void.
Also please note that the balance is by no means final. We put it at the lower end, because buffing it in future version is a lot easier than nerfing (and also causes less anger amongst players ;) ).
Factory changes:
This same cargo capacity concept also now goes for factories and shipyards. Factories also now only pull as many items as they need to do one tick, so they won’t fill up. And instead of sending a signal to adjacent Activation (full not full) and ‘OR’ blocks (empty nonempty), they will send it to connected ones.
Docked Cargo pulling:
Cargo can now be transferred from or to docked entities. Just connect your docker and rail to the storage you want to pull from or of, then deactivate pulling on the one you want to be pulled from, and it will pull to the other just like it would on the same entity.
Docking on contact:
You can now also dock to rails by physically touching them with your docker block. After undocking you will not be able to re-dock to that rail for 5 seconds. In the future this time interval will likely be switched to a distance limit, where if you move a certain distance from the rail you will be able to re-dock.
Optimizations:
There has been a nice optimization done for planets which should add some fps for you (after the planet is loaded in)
Balance changes:
Thanks to player feedback and the help of the council, we’ve changed several values that should improve your gameplay experience.
Power soft cap has been increased from 1 000 000 to 2 000 000
Max shield regen under fire has been increased from 10% to 25%
Shields sharing is disabled when you go under 25% shield capacity instead of 50%
The system penalties you receive when you suffer damage are now less harsh.
Starting cash is now 50 000 credits instead of 20 000 credits for new clients and station cost price has been decreased from 1 000 000 credits to 50 000 credits
We’ve introduced multi-slots for lights and their respective light rods, the delay-signal is now also sitting in a logic multi-slot. We’re planning to add controllers + modules next release.
Missile + cannon its missile speed has been buffed from 0.5 to 2.0, now it can go 6 times the max server speed.
Bug fixes:
T917 Emissive mapping make rod lights appear on when they're off
T839 Certain weapons mounted directly to an asteroid and then fired will crash the game at the next autosave
T786 Players that are attached to a ship via alignment share the ship's shield when shot.
T680 Ships not checking for collision before docking
T655 Shipyards give free cores
T258 All blocks are rotatable

New in StarMade 0.19498 (Nov 21, 2015)

SLABS:
While implementing cargo, we looked at different options to display different states of a cargo area filling up, and a long planned feature came back into discussion: slabs.
With having finished a lot of ground work in the past year, they finally became possible, and here they are. As always, of course, scalability is our main concern, so we made sure that slabs wouldn’t impact performance any worse than any other block. This is possible because of the grid system in use.
There are 3 different sizes of slabs available: Quarter, Half, and Three-Quarter Slabs.
The slabs are taking a block id, but a system was built to make creating and maintaining them as easy as right clicking on a category in the block editor.
Since we knew that with another 3 sub-types of blocks, the inventory would become incredibly cluttered, the slabs aren’t items in the inventory, so only the full block version is needed. They can be placed down by selecting any full block that has slabs, and then conveniently selecting the slab size in the advanced build mode. Any slab can of course also be rotated in all 6 directions.
Slab versions of special blocks like wedges and corners will follow. If necessary the internal size of blocks can be expanded from 3 to 4 bytes, effectively doubling block ids a few times, so don’t worry about block ids running out.
Currently we have added slab variants for all Hull types, Hazard Stripe blocks, Doors and Force Fields.
NEW TEXTURES:
Good news everybody, we are expanding your range of building materials! We have monitored feedback over the past year and have begun to implement a few of the most popular requests. In this release, we have added Dark Grey Hulls. You can expect a few more in the run up to the winter holidays.
You may (or may not) have noticed some slight UI changes. We have begun to look into some legibility and scale issues. Our plan is to further streamline the UI, provide support for players using high resolutions and a wider range of characters for translation packs.
LIST OF FIXES:
We are working to fix the problem of spawning inside a block for good. For now, you can hit the 'up arrow' key after spawn to warp out of any stuck situation.
T839 Certain weapons mounted directly to an asteroid and then fired will crash the game at the next autosave
T789 deleting shipyard core anchor when design is loaded, removes it from the database
T786 Players that are attached to a ship via alignment share the ship's shield when shot.
T748 Tutorial Immediately Bugged
T722 Recursive use of create dock feature in shipyards breaks out of creative mode
T680 Ships not checking for collision before docking
T640 game config: computer limitation does not work and acts like group limitation
T490 Planet part entities does not vanish even without any blocks
T450 Fix for entity-flag exploit does not affect already created entities.
T400 Warpgate faction permission issue
T258 All blocks are rotatable
T233 Chat kick and ban options
T64 /Destroy_Entity and overheating making rail entities invulnerable/untouchable
T52 ArrayIndexOutOfBoundsException in storage UI
Black Hull textures are now darker.
Shield Drain & Shield Supply are now correctly labeled on their CPU texture.

New in StarMade 0.19488 (Nov 8, 2015)

New in StarMade 0.19485 (Nov 7, 2015)

Language Packs:
As some probably already found out in the last build, StarMade will now support language packs. Although, there isn’t a complete pack available yet , they can already be created and used by setting them in the settings.cfg. As soon as there is official packs, and option in the startup options to change language will become available.
There is a fully functional language editor already available in the startup options under “tools”, which automatically takes the original texts of the latest version and marks them as changed, so updating from version to version should just be a thing of translating new or changed entries. To create a language to use it will have to be placed in StarMade/language/languageName/pack.xml
Keep in mind that changing the default “english” as that is the original “blueprint” for language and will reset as that is based on the build itself.
The reason for the delay on that was to finally go over every text entry in the game and to re-engineer corrected text into the code.
Internationalization is always a critical point in development, since if it’s done wrong, it can severely slow down development from that point, or even cause a complete mess (I witnessed that happening in previous work experiences).
To prevent that, a lot of extra design work was put in.
Technically for a coder, using internationalization is as easy as using printf with just a different function name. There is now a preprocessor that will automatically process all uses of that function and create a Language Class with static variables replacing the occurrences. On startup those variables will be filled with the entries from the used language pack. This means, that performance doesn’t suffer at all from using language packs.
Furthermore this system even saves performance, as all occurrences of ingame server messages are automatically indexed and just the index and its arguments are sent, so the client can use a translation if possible. This means, a lot of text that took bandwidth from the server is now reduced to just sending a number.
Bug Fixes:
We heard the criticism about the transporter beacon and we agree that it makes shuttle play too irrelevant. The “beam down beam” will therefore be on hold for a little while until we further assess the balance and maybe come up with more elegant solutions. The transport beacon now has a charge time. The default is a little slow but item improvement will also be a thing. If there is future debuffing needed we are playing with the thought of having the beacon discharge on movement of the astronaut.
Some major bugs have been fixed. Foremost there seemed to be a NullPointer which was plaguing servers, which hopefully shouldn’t happen anymore.
Also, all weapons/tools have been a little bugged due to the optimization where it appeared that the entity behind another entity was hit. This issue has been fixed and does not occur anymore.
Race Gate laps have been fixed. There was also a bug that Race Gates wouldn’t always trigger when going through, which has also been fixed/improved.
Another bug was that people were getting stuck in their cores, which should have been improved now. Getting stuck inside a block prevented you from removing/using it but that has been fixed completely so it should be easy to unstuck yourself.
Furthermore the tutorial has been fixed. There was a problem that NPCs appeared to fall through the tutorial station, and also a NullPointer when talking to NPC-00.
AI macro Simulation was overall pretty broken, but should now be fixed. Response fleets should again work correctly, as well as other encounters/patrols. All weapons trigger a fleet event again.
Some minor fixes have been done to shipyards to prevent exploitation. Also there was a bug that any multi slot item in an inventory of a deconstructed ship was lost. This is now also fixed. The bug that ships are cut off was already fixed in the last release.
Collision damage has been improved and is now applied to both colliding entities. It is also now saved correctly.
Lastly, linking a computer to itself will no longer cause that computer to lose its link with the shipcore. This caused it to disappear from the Weapons Menu.
You can now also use the admin command /simulation_info and /simulation_clear_all to combat potential lag caused by simulation (pirate groups getting stuck, or just cleaning up in general).

New in StarMade 0.19476 (Nov 2, 2015)

Transporters:
A long awaited feature is finally here! Transporters! Transporters allow you to instantly warp between transporter platforms within a short distance (the current sector, and any adjacent sectors). Be careful though! Using a transporter between ships will temporarily bring down shields on both the sending and receiving ships. If shields drop from transporters, they will recharge back up at the ship’s set shield recharge speed.
Much like other systems within StarMade, the transporter system comes with a transporter computer and transporter modules. The modules are simply pads that you stand on, while the computer is used to control and activate the module. Make sure that you can either reach the computer while standing on the module, or have someone manage your transporter room. Logic will be added to the system in a coming update.
Destination setting can be done from within the computer. All available destinations will become available. Any transporters that are located within the current ship or any of its docks will be available as a destination. Any transporters that are on other entities located either in the current sector or adjacent sectors, can also be made available by setting them to “public/faction access”. Be aware though that upon warping to a transporter on another entity, the shields of both entities will be dropped and have to be recharged! So never leave your transporters open; or you might find your shields dropped or a boarding party invading your vessel.
Transporter Beacon:
The transporter beacon is a personal tool that enables the user to warp to a transporter as long as the vessel is in vicinity. Just use its beam to mark the transporter controller you want to be warped to, then open your inventory, right click on the item, and hit ‘transport’ to be warped to that transporter. This is very handy for exploration without a proper way to get back. In a future update there will also be a ship beam that lets the player set a manual target for a transporter.
Activation Gates:
Activation Gates work just like Warp Gates with the difference being that instead of warping, they will emit a ‘true’ signal when a ship is passing through. This is only activated on actual passing of an entity. This feature will help for logic with much bigger structures where the trigger area blocks start to lag.
Race Gates:
This is a feature I wanted to do for some time. It seems a bit random but is part of a bigger picture. There are most likely several bugs with the race gates, however they should be mostly functional for basic racing.
To create a race track, you will have to create a chain of Gates. These gates can be on the same or multiple entities. To link gates, the same method as the warp gates is used: the marker beam. Right click with the marker beam on the computer of one destination gate and left click on the gate you want to create the link from. Continue to do this process for each Gate in the chain, linking the Race Gate Computer to the next gate’s computer.
Then you can create a race by activating the Race computer with ‘R’. The computer you use is going to be the starting gate of that race. Players can join either from the computer itself (if it’s public access), or from the menu on the top (messages/quests) if you have any dialog open.
To start the race, you have to link from an activation module/button to the race computer you used to create the race (the starting gate). The race will start when a true signal is received in that race computer, so it’s possible for the builder to set up logic count downs and other mechanics that all racers can see.
The race creator can even set laps and buy-in money which is then paid out to the first 3 finishers. We will keep an eye on how this works in the real world and tweak the settings if needed in a future update.
Raycasting Optimizations, aka a lot less lag from extensive mining
Planet eating miners that in the past brought down a server in seconds now only create a fraction of the lag they did before.
Database update to get rid of block data for found stations:
Databases now load the NPC stations without copying them to the database as long as they are not modified. This means a huge decrease of database growth.
Admins can retroactively apply the feature to their db (as it only is applied to newly spawned stations) with the startup parameter:
-cleanuptransient
PLEASE NOTE: Depending on size, this can take hours (we are talking 48h+ for 200gb. This will most likely be optimized with the next update), as the program looks through every file looking for similarities and header matches.
Also PLEASE BE SURE TO CREATE A BACKUP before doing this.
Asteroid replenish server option:
There is now an option to periodically let the server replenish asteroids in the server cfg. To trigger, a sector will have to be unloaded and completely empty. If the time of the time it last replenish is beyond the waiting period set in the config, the sector will regenerate. This will help bridge the time until a better system takes its place.
Bug Fixes:
One bug that had haunted me for a long time is (hopefully) finally fixed. Players should no longer fall out of moving ships upon sector change.
T796 Items can't be dragged into inventory menus
T795 game crashes when trying to view relations of another faction
T782 Transporter unreliable in multiplayer/synch bugs with transporter
T769 Null pointer when pasting linked modules in un-initialized chunks.
T768 "create docking" doesn't check for already existing entities, duplicate method
T719 Shipyard exploit while server is updating block count
T711 ship core can be destroyed completely
T671 Not all weapons trigger response fleets
T663 Shipyard running out of power causes loss of blocks
T658 Shipyards cut off parts of a ship
T654 warhead explosion lag allows damage without warhead destruction
T653 Null pointer/GL_STACK_OVERFLOW when you look at rail blocks in build mode
T646 Game config: ship limit affects station and planet entities
T640 game config: computer limitation does not work and acts like group limitation
T639 Nullpointer when using "search by name" with meta items
T637 Shipyard Item Duplication Bug
T621 Keyboard help does not update without game restart
T614 Tech info shows confidential information
T576 Amount sellable appended instead of replace when overselling using sell amount
T561 creative mode allows you to drop blocks in a shop -> infinite blocks
T539 ship core not producing power when first spawned
T490 Planet part entities does not vanish even without any blocks
T450 Fix for entity-flag exploit does not affect already created entities.
T428 Stay attached to ship while being logged out
T400 Warpgate faction permission issue
T384 Power/Shield Drain and supply beams power issues
T379 Removing containers places there content in an offset position
T323 COLLISION_DAMAGE_THRESHOLD does not work
T313 JVM Crash detected: incorrect dialog
T297 Player hp doesn't get saved
T234 no meta items in storage filter system
T233 Chat kick and ban options
T199 able to lock on in zoom mode
T185 Multi slot items don't show tooltip
T86 Planet segments have 0 mass

New in StarMade 0.19431 (Sep 7, 2015)

Turret/Raildock Optimization:
Due to optimizations in several parts of the code to reduce the quantity of collision checks and make them faster altogether, as well as some relief in the docking chain updates, approximately 90% of turret lag has been eliminated. Depending on turret sizes and count, ships that before had a hard time to get 5fps with active AI now run smoothly with almost no lag due to turrets.
Also, some advanced algorithms have been implemented to reduce lag on very large turrets, once again making use of special properties in a block game. If anyone is interested in the techniques used, please leave a comment and I’ll write up a dev blog for it.
Jump Inhibitors
In pvp, the advantage of being able to change multiple one-block jump drives to jump into an enemy sector, fire all weapons, and jump out has been rightfully criticized a lot.
To combat this situation, but not to nerf long distance traveling, a new system has been introduced: The jump inhibitor.
This system works exactly like the jump drive with the difference that a player doesn’t have to actively charge it. It can be turned on/off at will. When on, the jump inhibitor will discharge all jump drives in the same or adjacent sectors. The rate of discharge depends on the amount of modules used on the jump inhibitor. This means if you have a strong enough jump drive, you can still overcome the jump inhibitor.
Inventory Management:
Better creative mode inventory
The creative mode inventory has been improved to now copy & paste items to the hotbar instead of moving them. Also, the search will no longer blend out filtered items, but display them one after another.
Inventory Pulling add-ons:
You can now set an inventory to pull whole categories (same as in a shop). This should make automated inventory management a lot easier.
You can now also pull meta items.
Admin Tools:
Server Update Lag Monitoring Tool
A tool to monitor sectors and objects that take very long to update has been added. This will make it easy to identify any sector where a lot of slowdown is happening. You can turn on the monitor in the general options ingame, but you have to be admin to enter the detailed view (F7). Lag will also be recorded so you can check on lag-spikes after they happened. Be aware that the reason, the “server not responding” message can appear is not only due to objects taking long to update on the server. It could be a simple network lag, too.
Restrictions for the Game Config
Admins can now add restrictions to the GameConfig.xml to better control their server and prevent possible abuse/lag.
There are examples for possible restrictions in /data/config/GameConfigDefault.xml (if you already have an existing GameConfig.xml in your install dir, you have to edit that, as the default is only a template that gets copied if no config exists)
Restrict ships by mass or block-count
Restrict ship computers by count per type
Restrict ship systems by connected groups per computer (prevents monster salvagers)
Starmote has been revived
The tool now once again works, but is still a little barebone. A lot more features will be added in the future though.
Temporary Bans/Whitelisting
Admins can now issue temporary bans. Players will be notified about the time remaining on their ban on attempting to connect to that server.
The option has been added to the standard ban commands like for example
"/ban (playername) (kick) [reason] [time]"
Wave management:
Admins can now manually manage spawnable waves. This will be applied to all the spawning AI on the server.
Each wave can be assigned a difficulty (should be between 1 and 10 for now), and even a faction.
Upon the game requiring a wave it will use the closest difficulty of a wave with the faction it needs to spawn on.
Wave Management can be accessed in the admin tab of the catalog.
If no wave is set for a faction, and the AI requests one for it, the old system of 'enemy usable' flags will be used.
Texture updates:
As some of you may have noticed, we are in the midst of working on new texture features.
In the coming weeks, emissive, specular and shine maps will be added to the game. The project is ongoing and still in infancy, should you spot any anomalies please report your findings to Kupu. He has an open thread for such things in the Texture Pack sub-forum.
http://starmadedock.net/threads/kupus-thread.839/
IMPORTANT:
As we found that the quality suffers too much from compression to the point where the next lower resolution looks almost better than a compressed higher one, Texture compression has been disabled as a default setting from now on. If you are experiencing extreme FPS drop, we recommend you either reduce the resolution of your texture pack, turn off normal maps, or re-enable Texture Compression in the Advanced Options within the Starmade launcher.
Emissive and Specular maps will soon be available in the Pixel pack for those running on slower systems.
Fixes:
T580 Nullpointer while saving of Station blueprints from multiplayer to local
T576 Amount sellable appended instead of replace when overselling using sell amount
T551 Turrets are not saved and linked correctly in shipyards
T546 Using "create docking" on station causes nullpointer
T544 reboot key combo (tab+y) in astronaut mode causes nullpointer
T543 Multiple Shipyards on single station cause issues
T531 Add resolution: 3440 x 1440 to selectable game resolution
T529 Unable to split multi stacked items
T525 doors and forcefields can make a ship invulnerable
T517 Multiplayer: Loading designs does not work.
T511 cannot deconstruct to design/without design if shipyard inventory is full but has linked empty chests
T510 undocking ship from shipyard will not allow you to redock it
T501 Cooldown/reload animation not intuitive
T490 Planet part entities does not vanish even without any blocks
T489 ship catalog manager does not sort anymore
T467 Highlighting/selecting sectors on galaxy map
T463 placing block on asteroid not previously built on drops asteroids' original mass to 0
T450 Fix for entity-flag exploit does not affect already created entities.
T436 Factories on asteroids
T428 Stay attached to ship while being logged out
T415 Unable to kick members out of faction
T233 Chat kick and ban options
T225 radar jammer pirate exploit
T99 Structure Tab: UNABLE TO LOAD GUI-UNIT: Jamming System

New in StarMade 0.19401 (Aug 20, 2015)

New in StarMade 0.19361 (Aug 5, 2015)

Spawn on ships:
Another feature is also the functionality that you can now spawn on moving ships. Even if the ship is moved after you logged out, and then in a sector that is currently not loaded, you will still spawn on your ship. This will work as long as you are in any way aligned to the ship while logging out: Pilot, in gravity, or simple spacebar alignment.
This currently is limited to spawn after logout, but mechanics will come for respawning on ships after death. There still have to be some gameplay aspects discussed, as you wouldn't want a player to spawn on a ship you just stole.
Ship Scores:
Another larger feature which is still in the making is ship score.
This is basically a way to automatically classify ships.
Ship scores are aggregated from multiple simpler scores.
Exploit Fixes and Optimizations:
There also have been lots of small optimizations in various parts of the game. For example, framerates on very large structures should go up a bit when higher max-segments are set in the options.
There also have been some fixes to exploitations of game mechanics like the shield drain/supply being overpowered. Also cloaking/jamming now has a reload sequence when switched off.
Balance:
Power consumption per second was changed to power consumption per tick, all related values were changed accordingly.
EMP power damage was doubled, the power damage dealt to a ship is 2 times higher than the power consumed to fire that weapon.
Shield drain, supply and power drain received some value changes, it should be balanced:
Shield drain has the same shield DPS and power use as any other basic weapon but it gives you 50% of the drained HP.
Shield supply is set to power supply levels, its power consumption is 10 times lower though since a supply transfers 100% of your own shield.
Power drain, drains 50% less power than an equal EMP weapon but you gain 50% of the drained power.
Shield drain and supply now allow supports.
Bug fixes:
T452 planet plate alignment odd when astronaut logout restart on planet surface
T444 Turrets shoot at targets out of range in "Selected Target" mode
T439 Blocks/items in crafting slots aren't deleted on death when inventory drop on death is enabled.
T424 Kicking someone out of the core with torch let Navigation Point disappear
T422 Block information not wrapping lines like shops do
T421 Missiles do once again damage mother entities (turret base and motherships)
T417 Moving stations as admin by using /change_sector or /change_sector_for breaks territory claims
T416 Entity flag editing
T414 Loot is not generated when the entity is destroyed by an AI/Turret
T412 Logic blocks with multiple inputs loose connections when pasted using the copy/paste feature
T407 windowPositionAndSizeConfig.tag sporadically corrupts.
T406 Attempting to place a block with nothing in slot will crash the game.
T405 Check if the player has a ship-core in the inventory is performed after the player is requested to enter the new ship's name.
T401 Pressing Left ctrl and left alt will drop the framerate to 10
T400 Warpgate faction issue
T397 AI ships can not use anti missile turrets
T396 Pirate AI does not work
T395 Missiles ignore shield sharing
T393 damage numbers don't show correctly for cannons, missiles and damage pulse
T391 Client logs show confidential information
T389 docked warheads don't explode on contact
T377 Failing Alignment after exiting docked entity
T374 faction inheriting mechanics override faction ID's
T366 Option for Personal faction enemy broken
T355 ship and armor HP is capped
T343 entering occupied build block causes several issues
T331 Redo/undo doesn't work correctly with Replace
T326 Astronaut mining bonus notice doesn't show correct bonus
T313 JVM Crash detected: incorrect dialog
T312 ship speed while being pulled into a wormhole can be limited by pressing a movement key
T310 Network data too large: priceUpdateBuffer, controllerKeyNameBuffer and controllerKeyBuffer
T278 Leaving a C aligned ship causes issues with searching a safe exit position
T238 Display Module text; shadow effect makes writing non-legible
T233 Chat kick and ban options
T225 radarjammer pirate exploit
T222 Can reset cool down of long cool down weapon systems
T215 Players on docked rail entities are left behind during sector changes or jumps
T203 Typo in /sector_chmod help
T173 Completely mined asteroids not properly saved / respawn of half mined asteroids
T166 Block list not working on Blueprint Catalog
T165 Trading Guild Resupply Convoys will resupply player-owned shops.
T148 Wrong warning when kicking Player from Faction
T136 Turret AI does not always follow its setting
T100 shield supply/drain beams are invisible
T89 Item Duplication Using Asteroid Respawn
T79 map filter shows text for turned off filters
T44 Rail enhancers consume power but running out of power does not change anything
T39 several menus allow background interaction
T37 abandoned stations don't have decaying turrets
T34 Phantom weapon and effect computers
T32 admin command mistakes: /sector_info /ship_info /last_changed
T24 Godmode does not transfer through rail docks
T14 mouse sensitivity sync
T6 shield damage applied by shield sharing is multiplied per chain

New in StarMade 0.19318 (Jul 13, 2015)

NEW EXPLOSION SYSTEM:
For the longest time, explosions were a big headache, not only because they were incredibly hard to balance, but also because their damage was unrealistic. Some visible cases of this are ships being hit inside hangars and players being killed inside ships, without the damage penetrating.
Since a system with actual rays doesn’t scale well, a completely new and unprecedented algorithm was developed to make explosions, in a fully three dimensional environment with any number of obstacles, as realistic as possible. With the help of complex data structures, it’s possible to approximate the explosion as if raytracing was used. Not only that, but also the whole system works fully asynchronously so that most of the work can be done multithreaded.
The performance can be finetuned through a server option which determines the maximal count of possible explosion threads. Server owners can increase that value by some, as it is currently set for a mid-level CPU.
Additionally, a new update system for transporting the data to the clients has been developed which means a lot less network bandwidth being used.
NEW BALANCE FOR MISSILES AND PULSE:
The new explosion system gave us a ton of new possibilities to balance explosions, especially for shield damage, effects, and scaling. Since now damage to blocks is exact, the damage will only penetrate as far as the rays can possibly go.
Missile damage has been adapted to compensate for the fact that on average half of a missile’s energy goes into the void of space if, for example, the missile is impacting a flat wall. They have also been adapted for armor on both ship and blocks.
All explosive style systems have been upgraded including the pulse, which will now also emit in front of it’s output block. Pulse will also do some piercing damage. This makes it an excellent weapons to bypass armor when you get close to a target.
AI TARGETING IMPROVEMENTS:
AI no longer targets the center of mass of an object. It will now specifically target blocks of ship systems. Of course target-seeking missiles will now also do the same.
Build Inhibitor:
Another little tool for boarding is the build inhibitor. This useful tool is turned on in the hotbar and prevents any building within a radius of 32 (which of course can be upgraded in the future).
The tool is available to buy from all shop keeps.
Note that there will be a lot more tools and gadgets coming for astronauts.
REBOOTING/REPAIRING STATIONS:
Rebooting stations either over structure tab or by pressing the reboot hotkey will now also repair all armor HP.
UI Text Box Fixes:
The text boxes now have variable sizes. They also now automatically dock to the radar or build mode, so they will no longer block the advanced build mode when building.
TEXTURES:
Kupu has updated some textures. We are also updating some Hud elements soon to give pilots better information when flying.
COUNCIL APPLICATIONS FOR NEXT TERM NOW OPEN:
Applications for the Council of Intergalactic Representatives are now open! (You must sign in with your StarMade Registry account to apply) Everyone is free to apply. Applications have no set date for closing at the moment, but will not be closed before the 19th of July 11:59 PM UTC. You can learn more about the council here and be sure to check out the applications news post for further details.
MUSIC SUBMISSIONS UPDATE:
In the v0.19282 news we announced we’re currently looking for someone to create SFX and soundtrack for StarMade. We’ve received an overwhelming number of emails, thanks must go out to everyone who has showed interest in the open role. We’ll still be accepting submissions till the 17th of July at 11:59 PM UTC. So, if you have the skills and are interested, be sure to send an email to [email protected]!
OTHER THINGS:
Work on Fauna continues and focus on it increases with this update. There will also be some graphical upgrades to the block engine to make it more and more shiny (always in the philosophy: make the game fun first, then make it pretty)
BUG FIXES:
T394 unable to repair armor and ship HP for stations
T387 Moving CBS links and vanishing blocks leaving behind links
T388 kick option broken for factions
T383 EMP effect power drain is multiplied by penetration depth
T376 Indestructible Warhead
T375 LOCK_FACTION_SHIPS = false on client, overrides server setting
T368 hitting an unshielded entity with damage pulse crashes game
T367 group power penalty does not work for most weapons
T321 EMP effect doesn't drain all power
T316 power supply/drain computer expected firing direction reversed from ‘normal’
T310 Network data too large: priceUpdateBuffer, controllerKeyNameBuffer and controllerKeyBuffer
T308 escape options menu, controls sub menu doesn't scale
T307 Ships can't undock from Rail Basics via Logic in certain directions
T284 forcefield and scaffold wedges don’t have icons
T277 overheating does not disable AI
T275 Storage box filter menu bug.
T274 Item duplication issue
T270 /shop_restock_uid and /shop_restock_full_uid do not work on player shops.
T269 Replace block with Active Slot - Factories
T265 Undeathinator not functional / Spawn point save broken
T247 Strange behavior on turrets attached to rail rotators
T222 Can reset cool down of long cool down weapon systems
T189 Blueprints incorrectly save wireless logic links
T180 Renamed planet. Name doesn't show on the galaxy map
T165 Trading Guild Resupply Convoys will resupply player-owned shops.
T146 "Destroyed" ship core blocks weapon projectiles
T142 Placing a salvage beam computer on an Asteroid causes Nullpointer
T108 build mode camera issue when hitting escape
T98 missile damage radius on nearby entities significantly higher than direct impact
T95 missiles hit behind a wall
T74 creating a new universe sets all blueprints to enemy usable/others and owner to none
T65 Turrets get stuck in collisions
T44 Rail enhancers consume power but running out of power does not change anything
T33 moving through walls exploit
T26 stack split item loss
T20 Logic Rail Detection on docking doesn't trigger
T14 mouse sensitivity sync
T11 Enable/Disable all AI only works for last chain
T6 shield damage applied by shield sharing is multiplied per chain
T4 controller block system exploit

New in StarMade 0.19282 (Jun 22, 2015)

This update is all about fixing a lot of things that still felt wrong in the game, and adding some more fundamental design changes, which will once again change a part of the game’s meta completely.
We redesigned how ship battles work, adding a completely new system, called the “HP-System”. There are also a lot of other enhancements and fixes in the update.
Updated the Pixel texture pack:
fixed missing logic signal when docking to a rail block
fixed defeated ships not being salvageable when overheating
fixed defeated ships not giving errors
fixed several issues in Galaxy Map.
Bug Fixes:
T255 can't load old templates
T253 Old docking system makes astronauts stop moving
T213 Numpad Enter causes newline in dialog, instead of "submitting" the value
T196 Blocks dropped on death do not spawn properly
T184 Diaply.Hide Help Screen typo
T160 TAB + F8 nullpointer
T155 texture faces are rotated
T139 Damage Pulse modules listed as "beam unit" in Weapons menu
T132 Hotbar indicators are missing
T131 Selected waypoint sometimes wrong color after closing Navigation menu
T130 Cannot access ship storage after removing named chest
T127 "Killing" the ship core kicks pilot out
T125 removing blocks as astronaut doesn't update ship or armor HP
T123 Destroyed entity will cause you to go back to where you got in.
T114 blocks discarded on deletion as astronaut when not enough inventory space
T112 HP System - tiny ships and cores cannot be killed
T110 shooting factioned planet with missiles crashes all players not in that sector
T88 Area triggers are invisible
T77 escape key does not close options menu
T60 Inner Ship Remote labels don't work until weapons menu is opened
T58 Joining a faction when not being in one causes all factionless players to recieve a " has left your faction" notice
T49 Crash when holding weapon menu items in your cursor and opening inventory
T48 rail basic acts like turret axis block
T38 Faction systems do not work for all 12 planet segments
T35 Scan history nullpointer
T31 Oculus Rift DK2 Error
T30 Anti-missile turrets ineffective
T23 Station not saving
T21 /explode_planet_sector explodes planets in all loaded sectors
T15 Serverlist ping-check only trying TCP
T13 Ship HP damaged systems does not change anything
T12 Rail turret blueprint and nullpointer issue
T10 Rail entities are not properly synced across clients
T7 Ship always inherits faction after reloading sector
T5 local rail blueprint errors with multiple chains
T3 Require auth + not uplinked does not show a clear enough error-message on connecting

New in StarMade 0.19228 (May 13, 2015)

New in StarMade 0.19226 (May 11, 2015)

This update contains a full redesign of the docking and turrets system, as well as a lot of new features. The new rail/docking system also solves a lot of old problems.
Furthermore, thanks to the new devs, a lot of work has been done to fix bugs. With them getting more and more familiar to the huge codebase, bug fixing and work on new features will continue to pick up the pace.
DOCKING SYSTEM COMPLETE REDESIGN:
Due to the lack of usability and dynamic in the old docking system, we have decided to completely redesign the system from the bottom up. The new design is a lot more suited for all the current demands, as well as things to come.
The old system is still functional and no ships, blueprints, or other structures will break. The only restriction is that the docking beam is replaced with a pure activation beam, but if necessary the docking can be turned back on in the server config.
Rail basics (docking):
The new Magnet block can be docked to any Rail so long as the docking ship will not encounter a collision by doing so. This means no more docking zone boxes. Also, the orientation of your docked vessel can now be fully customized.
Rail movement:
In addition to the removal of the docking zone, Rail blocks can be chained together in paths to allow for docked objects to move along them. The system is completely dynamic and allows for full control with the logic system.
Rail rotation:
Rails are not the only new block allowing for docked objects and movement. Rotor blocks can be placed in your rail designs, or separately from them. The direction and angle of rotation can also be customized.
Rail interaction:
Logic signal interactions and linked speed control blocks can dictate the direction, distance and speed of movement/rotation of the new Rail and Rotor blocks. Also, power and some of the shields are now shared between the rail-docks and the mothership, as well as every object in between.
Rail logic:
The new rail blocks also come with complete integration with the the logic system in Starmade.
NEW TURRET SYSTEM:
Since the old docking also included the turret system, it now has also been redesigned. Turrets can now be divided into multiple rotational axes. In the most common example that would be a turret base that can rotate horizontally, and a turret top which would rotate vertically.
NEW LOGIC BLOCKS:
Several new logic blocks were added to expand the functionality of the logic system with StarMade’s gameplay and to help integrate the new Rail system. These new blocks include:
Button block (Provides a short (0.5 sec) ON signal then deactivates)
Flip-Flop block (Will only change its output when receiving an ON signal)
Wireless block (Allows logic systems to connect from ship to ship)
Remote block (Allows access to ship logic to be triggered from your action bar. Each block’s label can be changed by hitting ‘R’ on it)
BUG FIXES:
An issue has been resolved that caused lag spikes whenever a new player join on more populated server. Also the configuration for the hotbar is now set by ship. That means when you load a blueprint after setting it, you will get the exact hotbar you saved the blueprint with.
This unfortunately had the effect that currently all hotbars reset once, but in the long run the new system is a lot more comfortable.
The login procedure on servers that require authentication has been improved so that non-uplinked players now get an explanation as well as a prompt to enter their credentials or go to the registry to setup a new account. Also, the pesky error messages which blocked the real message have been gotten rid of.
We fixed some bugs probably causing a lot of java version errors, making the code more strict to its version dependencies, so hopefully a lot less problems for new players will occur related to that.
Closed:
Dis-Integrator do not work on asteroids
unable to track down path calculation failed
Map: Interface skips the sectors near a system border
Sniper rifle can zoom in the galaxy map
Admins getting revoked of admin after logging on/off of server
Logic on asteroid crashes the game (ClassCastException)
IndexOutOfBoundsException with some handheld weapons
Non-linear camera movement speed
Ending tutorial brings you back to global spawnpoint
Weapon menu not refreshing correctly
Tab + F10 - Can be used to see cloaked entities
Asteroid name mismatch (Zerkaner & Zercaner)
Large, nearly complete blueprint quotas round to 100%
NEW claimed systems do not get saved
Overdrive power consumption doesn't scale with ratio
1th and 2th typos in Faction Rank
Renamed entities cannot be searched for
cloaked ships still have the "pilot" marker visible
Cannot enter build block on asteroid - prevent placing it, not entering it
docking module on asteroid crashes game on activation - prevent placing it, not activating it
Lag/Freeze on autocomplete
Tutorial fails to import sector correctly
Launcher's world manager has no scrollbar
/search only searching loaded entities
Resolved:
Gui Error - faction menus refresh too fast and endlessly

New in StarMade 0.19174 (Mar 24, 2015)

New in StarMade 0.189996 (Mar 6, 2015)

New in StarMade 0.1885 (Feb 9, 2015)

New in StarMade 0.1882 (Feb 4, 2015)

New in StarMade 0.1867 (Jan 26, 2015)

New in StarMade 0.1863 (Jan 26, 2015)

New in StarMade 0.1721 (Oct 4, 2014)

Astronaut Block Orientation:
Blocks can now be orientated in astronaut mode when holding the control key. The context of the orientation will adapt to what the character is currently aligned to (by hitting space or if in gravity).
Template Symmetry and Rotation:
Templates now come with a full preview. They also work with symmetry now and can be rotated in all 3 axis with the mouse wheel (or Pg-Up/Down). Rotation along the other axis can be done by holding left shift or control. Connections are also completely preserved when rotation or using symmetry.
Build Helper:
The game now supports build helpers. Those are made in a way that can easily be extended. At the moment, there are 3 helpers to choose from:
Ellipsoids, which are spherical objects defined by 3 radii.
Circles, which can be rotated in all dimensions
Torus, which can be defined by outer and inner radius. They can also be rotated in all dimensions
Sniper Zoom:
The sniper rifle now has a zoom by right clicking when selected.
New Doors:
There now are door wedges as well as two additional types of doors: Blast Doors and Glass Doors
Manual Storage triggers:
Storage triggers now also work if players put items in/out manually
Various New Blocks & Wedges:
There have a lot of new blocks added, as well as a lot more shapes for existing blocks
Lighting Shader improvement:
Other than creating all the new textures, kupu improved the values for the lighting shaders to look a lot more crisp. It also removes the problem of whites beeing flooded with light.
Universe Redesign Work:
The universe redesign is well underway, although all the done features are not active yet.
Crafting System:
The crafting system overhaul is basically done. We wanted to release a version before going into testing for it immediately afterwards.
API-Work:
Thanks to experienced modders now being in contact with us, I finally have a better picture of what requirements are needed, and how it's best to be implemented. Some parts of the code have already been deobfuscated.
Furthermore, thanks to Megacrafter127's ModLoader, it was a lot easier to understand what is needed for a solid API. Work has begun for a Mod-API. Mods can be registered and first hooks are already placed in the code for modders to insert their own code. This is still work in progress, but progress will go fairly quickly I think.
Bugs:
1022 Resolved: TutorialException #2
984 Resolved: Lag causes power production to stop.
979 Resolved: Friendly Fire - Turret vs. Infinite Chain Docking
965 Resolved: Orientation and textured face are wrong. Affects blocks and wedges (confusing)
960 Resolved: Updating SegmentsDrawn gives ArrayIndexOutOfBoundsException
950 Resolved: Radar Jammer and/or Cloaker is not working against homing missiles
940 Resolved: Docking beam switches between active camera and ship core when moving mouse
915 Resolved: Exiting a build block on planets changes gravity to sector alignment
847 Resolved: Using Thrusters + overdrive w/o Power Cancels Mouse Input
770 Resolved: Beam and missile weapons without a support don't use their effect.
767 Resolved: You can't build ships on planets
648 Resolved: Station alignment - depends on player position/facing
566 Resolved: Deffensive stop effect computer not working
488 Resolved: Linking already linked computers - hides but preserves the sublink
1036 Closed: Factories with enhancers have to have enough blocks to craft
1034 Closed: Exploit - when you buy a Blueprint you may overwrite other players ships
1028 Closed: Filter settings on storages are not preserved in blueprints
1024 Closed: Certain weapons unable to damage any ship (that has docked entities?), only happens for 0.1704 ships.
1017 Closed: Plexlifter fails to unlink after removal or to relink after adding more
1016 Closed: Defensive Effects using MUCH more power than normal
1009 Closed: Cloak NOT ending on docked ships when main ship goes to 'power outage recovery'
1003 Closed: When buying a ship from catalog with existing name you loose the credits
1002 Closed: Adv. Build / Remove: Replace with active slot always active
989 Closed: Effect computer does not change color on activation in hotbar / Effect indicator missing
985 Closed: Display module screens are visible while cloaked
969 Closed: Linux: Nullpointer on Startup
968 Closed: factories apear broken
961 Closed: Sort by ping not sorting properly
939 Closed: non-procedural backgrounds inoperative
937 Closed: Joysticks do not get recognized anylonger by the game
931 Closed: Chargestate of Jumpdrive is not saved
928 Closed: Template list is unordered
927 Closed: ESC not working intuitive #2
897 Closed: Camera marker in Build mode not disappearing when zoomed fully in - Yellow Box Frame
889 Closed: Template menu : can't click on end of text from list to load + buttons are (half) on each other
875 Closed: Settings for AI difficulty doesnt get saved in settings.cfg
853 Closed: Damage Pulse on Turrets/Docked Ships still damage mothership
850 Closed: Undocking Infinite Chain Docking Freeze and Crash the game with some larger ships
821 Closed: Copy and Paste debris even with proper parts in inventory
813 Closed: Passive effects stay active if module is connected to a weapon
554 Closed: d1000 missiles report "type=HeatSeeking"
539 Closed: Entities can overwrite others with case variant names
522 Closed: Copy/paste does not work with Symmetry
485 Closed: FileNotFoundException with blueprint naming
454 Closed: Turret rotation bug
428 Closed: Salvage cannons do not work

New in StarMade 0.171 (Sep 26, 2014)

Replace Mode:
This mode is now a checkbox in advanced build mode when selecting the "remove/replace filter" button in the bottom. Instead of just removing, this feature will replace the blocks taken with the one selected in the hotbar. This will make refitting ships a lot easier.
Missiles can be hit (Point Defense):
Missiles can not be shot by anything but laser. This will probably remain an advantage of using lasers. Missiles were the OP weapon in the game, and we hope, that making them attackable will allow especially smaller fighters a skill based chance to evade. Missile Point Defense is also on the way as a turret AI option, but not in this release.
Salvage to Storage blocks:
You can now finally link you salvage systems to your storage blocks. Just hit C on the salvage computer and V on the storage block you want all the goods to flow into. You can also select multiple storage blocks from one salvage computer, and overflow will be put in the next free storage (if they are all full you will still loose the item), and connect from multiple salvage computers to the same storage block.
New Storage Block features:
A bug has been fixed that would overwrite connections from multiple storage blocks to the same (n->1). Also you now have a "filter all" and "clear" button in your filter options to create filtered storage system much quicker. Finally you can now have the logic systems react to the fill rate of your storage blocks.
HUD changes:
as you will quickly see, the hud has been changed a little bit to be much more slick. This is of course the work of Kupu, who did the new icons of the new weapons as well.
You will not also have a hit indication popping up. This indication is synched to the server so whenever it flashes you hit with 100% certainty. Pilots get this indication on anything (blue when shields are hit, white when blocks are taking damage, and red if an astronaut is hit), while astronauts get them on anything but hitting planets and stations.
Also, the feature that astronauts blick red when hit is now back. This feature is also server synched.
New personal weapon: Sniper Rifle:
This new weapon is at the moment only available for admins with /give_sniper_weapon playername. It fires a high damage hit-scanning beam in a pretty long range but has a medium reload rate
New personal weapon: Rocket Launcher:
This new weapon is at the moment only available for admins with /give_rocket_launcher_weapon playername it fires a slot bu powerful missile and has a very long reload rate (also some stats have been changed in the laser weapon, so ask for a replacement from your admin (or alternatively start a new character))
Admin Command:
There are 3 new admin commands to help with the creation of PvP minigames:
You can now use for example /sector_chmod 2 2 2 + noindications, so no player in this sector will get any indication where others are (as if everyone was jamming) (using the same command with '-' reverts it back to normal)
You can now use for example /sector_chmod 2 2 2 + noexit (or noenter) to close down sectors from people entering or leaving
A new command /tint r g b a, lets you tint the texture of a selected astronaut. The values for r, g, b, a have to be between 0.0 and 1.0, so /tint 1.0 0.4 0.4 1.0 would tint the astronaut in red
The same command can be used as /tint_name r g b a playername, to tint an astronaut without having to select him
Missile Blast Behavior Change:
Missiles will no longer kill astronauts that are behind walls. The kill will only occur if the blast center has a clear line to the astronaut. It's far from a perfect solution, but it's a lot better, and I already have another more realistic solution in mind. Keep in mind that the check is most likely done before the blocks are killed, so you will survive one missile even if the blocks you got behind to shield yourself are being taken out by that missile.
Misc:
Amongst some other bugs (which I'm going to list next update), the power consumption of jamming/cloaking when flying with docked ships have been fixed. Special thanks goes out to all the testers :D

New in StarMade 0.1703 (Sep 17, 2014)

New in StarMade 0.17 (Sep 11, 2014)

New features:
Warp Gates
Jump Drives
Save/Load Templates to paste
Optimization for up to 50% more fps (depending on hardware)
Movement cancel (cancel rolling of big ships)
Storage blocks filters
Oculus Rift support
Lib extraction
Launcher version 14
StarMade Server List
Crafting
Bug fixes:
948 Resolved Copy/Paste and Undo/Redo gives free blocks
939 Resolved non-procedural backgrounds inoperative
937 Resolved Joysticks do not get recognized anylonger by the game
928 Resolved Template list is unordered
926 Resolved Factories/chests: Can't deactivate.
924 Resolved Mail Spam: Your faction declared war
891 Resolved Flickering Objects - Occlusion culling
889 Resolved Template menu : can't click on end of text from list to load + buttons are (half) on each other
878 Resolved Heatseeker missile targeting AI is bugged
877 Resolved Locking on entities when using right shift
853 Resolved Damage Pulse on Turrets/Docked Ships still damage mothership
850 Resolved Undocking Infinite Chain Docking Freeze and Crash the game with some larger ships
848 Resolved Crash on spawn—TutorialException
838 Resolved Some java versions prefer IPv6 stack over IPv4 stack
837 Resolved Changing install location throws ERROR "Please only use numbers"
835 Resolved Rotating Display Module 6 times causes exception
822 Resolved New Playerlist GUI-Buttons do not catch the clicks
821 Resolved Copy and Paste debris even with proper parts in inventory
819 Resolved Switching "Simple light" causes GL_INVALID_OPERATION
815 Resolved Encryption Operation not possible
782 Resolved Crash at 100% (cube shader)
774 Resolved Unexpected Behavior of Infinite Shops and Credits
728 Resolved Effects increasing power consumption on missiles and increase damage for cannons/pulse/beams + other issues, last message
632 Resolved Beam weapons do not report all stats in weapons menu
616 Resolved Plex Beacon Lighting Issues
554 Resolved d1000 missiles report "type=HeatSeeking"
540 Resolved UI is unusable in large lists
495 Resolved Docked Ships do not use Gravity correctly
488 Resolved Linking already linked computers - hides but preserves the sublink
420 Resolved importing sector from 0.153 to 0.154
933 Closed Occlusion culling: Warp effect is broken
900 Closed Irritating hyperspace effect with glazed cockpit
888 Closed invisible character-Dev build
885 Closed Using Jumpdrive while docked - crashes server
874 Closed Weapons hotbar not showing computers but you can still fire
871 Closed Marking a planet as faction home does not prevent the core from being destroyed by cannons/beams.
863 Closed Warp gate + jump drive : Moving cursor when warping causes ship to move but not camera
860 Closed Warp Gates and Jump Drives do not save ship orientation or position of arrival
859 Closed /remove_admin only works on online players
845 Closed Missile/Cannon computer ignoring direction
844 Closed NullPointerException when opening the Structure menu of a station with a warpgate
842 Closed Red Error Message when buying blueprint from shop
841 Closed some planets teleport away when approched.
840 Closed R no longer closes block inventory screens
823 Closed Handheld weapons 'alternate fire' removing blocks
816 Closed Spam in console: ACTIVATING::::
810 Closed Duplicated Block: burnt yellow dirt (206), burnt yellow dirt (131)
809 Closed ClassCastException caused by beam weapons
805 Closed Starmade now require authentification when offline
804 Closed Core /Ship Duplicates
779 Closed Crafting buttons in inventory screen capture input incorrectly
769 Closed Entities rendering partially invisible (Exception on occlusion computations)
768 Closed Mac Freeze on Game Start
760 Closed Firing Push Effect on stations causes ClassCastException
753 Closed Nacht ore block gives you a raw hattel shard
752 Closed Power supply handheld beam causes ClassCastException when used on a shop.
751 Closed Non physical micro assembler
747 Closed Can place ore blocks
745 Closed REQUIRE_STARMADE_AUTHENTICATION does not work even with USE_STARMADE_AUTHENTICATION is set to true.
742 Closed NullPointerException when clicking on handheld weapons if a plex storage is being used.
741 Closed Turning down/off in game sound does not remove background noise
740 Closed Game crash when using inventory "Craft factory" after using a macro assembler
737 Closed Plexlifter can´t get activated by logic
732 Closed planets not fully generating.
724 Closed When editing Display blocks, text is reset for all directions except one
723 Closed some keys are still functional while chatting
721 Closed Open Plex doors block beams and projectiles
713 Closed Area trigger blocks visible in build mode even when TAB+G'd.
710 Closed You can still see block info with right shift in a zoomed out view in astronaut mode
702 Closed Beams + cannon scale in the wrong way.
700 Closed Random elevations on planets do not look aesthetically pleasing
697 Closed You can buy blueprints when you are not near a shop
689 Closed Hard to build while moving ship
664 Closed Scrollbar for block type removal cannot be click-dragged
662 Closed Setting faction to auto-war on aggression makes it possible to auto-war traders guild
653 Closed destroying faction home planet cores with missiles
651 Closed Build mode switch inertia follows into flight mode
650 Closed Station bugs: Turrets and docked ships are not saved/loaded
649 Closed Scroll Bar Glitches on Plexstorage
639 Closed Update conversion recipes for new orange blocks
638 Closed Add 'Orange Paint' for recipe update
637 Closed display module re-edit sometimes places blocks
636 Closed display module not accessible with R while in ship core
628 Closed Ion system used defensively still causes invulnerability
625 Closed Non-Block Models On Ships Are Rendering Through Blocks
624 Closed Display Module: Orientation and position of screen, not correct on ships
613 Closed Destroy Entity not logging correct target
602 Closed Build Error with Symmetry
593 Closed Shields not updating properly when ship takes damage
582 Closed FAILED ACTIVATING - reenqueueing
579 Closed Missiles: impact detection often too late
559 Closed Radius on missiles incorrectly reported
544 Closed The online players list and Database window (F3) jumps back up.
526 Closed Ships that are undocked immediately turn to look in the direction they were in right before they docked.
523 Closed Dumbfire Missles + Overdrive Effect
519 Closed Line in the middle of planet pentagon
515 Closed Copy/paste does not auto-connect blocks
498 Closed Beams Do Not Consume Correct Power
493 Closed Salvage Cannons get stuck on if power runs out
484 Closed Damage Beam Incorrectly Calculated.
474 Closed Switching frequently to inventory/ai config tab causes heavy ship rotation
465 Closed Damage Pulse system does not gain damage from additional blocks
455 Closed salvage cannons stay on if you run out of power
452 Closed "Size of hit indications" option bug
448 Closed Planet HP can go negative
444 Closed /shop_restock over fills a shops stock
439 Closed Ghosted sections of ship after missile strike
419 Closed Shotgun beams don't work (Beam + D1000)
417 Closed Beam targeting doesn't match the crosshairs
413 Closed Several effects broken when used with beams
403 Closed Connecting new computers to weaponsystems allows quick reloading
402 Closed Weapon computer as master and slave at the same time
389 Closed Loading large ships causes tons of lag (400k mass +)
387 Closed SDBB type missiles and beam d1000 combo tracking docked turrets when zoomed out
383 Closed Sector border: Missiles fired at an oobject in another sector pass through objects without damaging
382 Closed Effect module bug: Firering with effect -> inactive
374 Closed Defense Effects & Docked Entity's and Turrets
371 Closed Releasing 'fire' button while weapon recharges influences power consumption
370 Closed Missiles do not do damage to planet cores.
369 Closed Inadvertent block placement when using ABM sliders
367 Closed Lighting in ships changes depending on orientation
364 Closed /ship_info_name requires server/game to restart
355 Closed Can't hot-swap between turrets/docked ships and main core
353 Closed /despawn_all ignores anything after underscore
345 Closed Lock on missiles lock onto targets that are not displayed.
344 Closed /clear_overheating Functions Erratically
340 Closed Turrets damage the entity they are docked to and each other
339 Closed Blocks become non-solid if you build far out on planets
338 Closed PlexLifter glitches out on planets
333 Closed Looking directly up/down while in gravity screws up movement controls
331 Closed Holes to Core in Planet Segments/Tall Cube Mountains - Terrain Generation
328 Closed Deleting a planet(-core) via /destroy_entity doesn't delete its segments
312 Closed Beams do not do any damage to planet core
303 Closed /shop_restock_uid appears to not work
287 Closed Planet setting changes not updating all segments
282 Closed Persistant 'locked target' marker
269 Closed Firing D1000 + Beam slave without modules gives warning about no effect
254 Closed Block orientations in Avanced Build Mode are not always saved when switching to other blocks
250 Closed Memory error - Build mode
230 Closed AMC "Slave" system firing with main, on turrets
217 Closed Unable to hotkey Docking modules on a ship/station
201 Closed Feature: Faction home should lock/protect entire planet
195 Closed /import_sector can ONLY add stuff to sector
194 Closed Long reload time trigger 'permanent effect' icon
191 Closed Power Sink
187 Closed Random Crash when using explosive effect
186 Closed Ion weapon system reduces damage against shields by half.
175 Closed Godmode doesn't prevent death from collision damage
141 Closed Damage Display at range
135 Closed New weapons - Output point / Control
134 Closed Antimatter projectiles fire much slower or don't move at all with a slave linkup
132 Closed Hazard stripes - Orientation mismatch on 'mirror mode'
118 Closed Explosive Effect
117 Closed Peirce Effect
95 Closed Settings defaulting to deprecated textures
93 Closed Explosions (missiles, etc) cause hit segements(chunks) to not be drawn until they are updates
90 Closed Symmetry plane graphics not working when ship dimension to small
78 Closed Obsolete textures still selectable - Oldstyle / cartoonish

New in StarMade 0.163 (Sep 3, 2014)

Shield Supply/Drain Beam:
This new beam will work like the power drain/supply beam with the difference that instead of power, it will drain/supply shields. This is just a first version, and it might not be balanced yet, but that will be done as soon as possible.
New Moddable Tutorial System:
When going into the main menu, there is now a new option "Tutorials" on the bottom, where you can select from a list of topics. These are at the moment mostly drafts as the most work went into making the system to externalize the tutorial system. The refinement, organization, and more of those tutorials will be done over time, as basically now anybody can make and change them. The data for them is in StarMade/data/tutorial, and itis based on a simple finite state machine.
Optimizations:
The lag from entering a large ship the first time should now be gone.
Planet generation has been improved to look a lot better on the edges. The algorithm now adapts per distance to the edges gradually in itself (hard to explain without getting technical (basically the noise generation is smoothing itself).
This will lead to a lot less hard lined cliffs.
Not that that only planets that haven't generated yet are affected by the change. Planets you visited, or flew by in a one sector distance will not change until universe reset or deletion of the raw planet files individually.
Bug fixes:
Importing sectors with planets will now also finally work as intended. You will have to export the sector again though, as the exporting was flawed and didn't include the planet core.
A very annoying bug, that the players faces glitch through helmets is now also fixed.
Also, missile radii were calculated with a wrong base always causing small craters, which is now fixed. Additionally we now have the option to assign explosion absorption to the block stats. This means the block damage itself will still be based on hp and armor, but the overall damage the missiles goes on to do in a bigger radius is lessened. This option isn't in use for any blocks yet though, to not accidentally make something overpowered.
And lastly one extremely annoying bug for basically ever was that the build indicator in moving ships was flickering. This has now be finally fixed, too.
Bugs fixed:
819 Resolved Switching "Simple light" causes GL_INVALID_OPERATION
816 Resolved Spam in console: ACTIVATING::::
804 Resolved Core /Ship Duplicates
782 Resolved crash at 100%
728 Resolved Effects increasing power consumption on missiles and increase damage for cannons/pulse/beams + other issues, last message
495 Resolved Docked Ships do not use Gravity correctly
420 Resolved importing sector from 0.153 to 0.154
383 Resolved Sector border: Missiles fired at an oobject in another sector pass through objects without damaging
303 Resolved /shop_restock_uid appears to not work
Closed 57
810 Closed Duplicated Block: burnt yellow dirt (206), burnt yellow dirt (131)
809 Closed ClassCastException caused by beam weapons
805 Closed Starmade now require authentification when offline
779 Closed Crafting buttons in inventory screen capture input incorrectly
769 Closed Entities rendering partially invisible (Exception on occlusion computations)
753 Closed Nacht ore block gives you a raw hattel shard
752 Closed Power supply handheld beam causes ClassCastException when used on a shop.
751 Closed Non physical micro assembler
747 Closed Can place ore blocks
745 Closed REQUIRE_STARMADE_AUTHENTICATION does not work even with USE_STARMADE_AUTHENTICATION is set to true.
737 Closed Plexlifter can´t get activated by logic
732 Closed planets not fully generating.
713 Closed Area trigger blocks visible in build mode even when TAB+G'd.
710 Closed You can still see block info with right shift in a zoomed out view in astronaut mode
700 Closed Random elevations on planets do not look aesthetically pleasing
697 Closed You can buy blueprints when you are not near a shop
689 Closed Hard to build while moving ship
662 Closed Setting faction to auto-war on aggression makes it possible to auto-war traders guild
639 Closed Update conversion recipes for new orange blocks
638 Closed Add 'Orange Paint' for recipe update
637 Closed display module re-edit sometimes places blocks
636 Closed display module not accessible with R while in ship core
625 Closed Non-Block Models On Ships Are Rendering Through Blocks
613 Closed Destroy Entity not logging correct target
582 Closed FAILED ACTIVATING - reenqueueing
579 Closed Missiles: impact detection often too late
571 Closed Trigger Area acting
559 Closed Radius on missiles incorrectly reported
544 Closed The online players list and Database window (F3) jumps back up.
526 Closed Ships that are undocked immediately turn to look in the direction they were in right before they docked.
524 Closed Blocksaround z -113 to -114 vanish on placement
523 Closed Dumbfire Missles + Overdrive Effect
519 Closed Line in the middle of planet pentagon
493 Closed Salvage Cannons get stuck on if power runs out
484 Closed Damage Beam Incorrectly Calculated.
474 Closed Switching frequently to inventory/ai config tab causes heavy ship rotation
467 Closed Mesh block face invisible next to area trigger
465 Closed Damage Pulse system does not gain damage from additional blocks
455 Closed salvage cannons stay on if you run out of power
452 Closed "Size of hit indications" option bug
448 Closed Planet HP can go negative
444 Closed /shop_restock over fills a shops stock
439 Closed Ghosted sections of ship after missile strike
413 Closed Several effects broken when used with beams
389 Closed Loading large ships causes tons of lag (400k mass +)
387 Closed SDBB type missiles and beam d1000 combo tracking docked turrets when zoomed out
382 Closed Effect module bug: Firering with effect -> inactive
370 Closed Missiles do not do damage to planet cores.
369 Closed Inadvertent block placement when using ABM sliders
364 Closed /ship_info_name requires server/game to restart
353 Closed /despawn_all ignores anything after underscore
344 Closed /clear_overheating Functions Erratically
338 Closed PlexLifter glitches out on planets
254 Closed Block orientations in Avanced Build Mode are not always saved when switching to other blocks
230 Closed AMC "Slave" system firing with main, on turrets
217 Closed Unable to hotkey Docking modules on a ship/station
195 Closed /import_sector can ONLY add stuff to sector

New in StarMade 0.15997 (Jul 25, 2014)

New Texture Pack:
A whole new texture pack by kupu has been added to the game. It is called "Default", and as the name implies will be the new default texture pack.
Debris:
A debris effect has been added to the game when taking out blocks. The game will spawn in debris modeled by Keaton (Omni).
It's made in a way to be as fast as possible for the computer. It is a client only effect so it wont affect servers in any way. It will also automatically adapt to the cpu performance, so the faster your performance is, the more debris will be kept around. There might be still some issues on spawning in larger amounts at once on slower machines, but I will sort those out. You can also just switch the debris off in the ingame options if you set the debris lifetime to 0.
Display block styles:
Upon clicking on a display block (which now has a better texture), you can now change the color and the font size. Furthermore you can now use variables like shields and shield capacity as well as power of the ship in the text. More variables will of course follow. Display blocks now also save correctly in the blueprints.
Lighting:
The lighting system has been overhauled. The first thing is, you will no longer see any change of lighting indoors when the ship is moving. Also, dynamic shadows will no longer darken indoor areas when turned on.
Furthermore occlusion light and light source light have been separated and extended to increase lighting quality by a lot.
An option has been added (at startup) to customize the amount of raytracing rays used by the lighting system. Increasing this will not impact your fps, it will just take longer for chunks to update lighting (or load in at start). The higher the number, the finer the light will look.
Bug Fixes:
The logic issues have been fixed. Signals now will only delegate if their state was changed. Because they forwarded before, logic could have a lot of false loops in them causing the logic circuit to be unusable, Loading of logic has been optimized so it should come in a lot faster.
Further optimization to system logic has been done to increase speed of loading the ship systems up and decrease its memory usage.
Several more optimizations have been done on various places.
All fixed issues:
690: View distance of planets and stars are fixed: increasing sector size doesn't change it
675: Undocking a ship, causes random logic updates.
673: Docking Module: Docking modules with enhancers cannot be triggered by logic anymore
653: destroying faction home planet cores with missiles
649: Scroll Bar Glitches on Plexstorage
624: Display Module: Orientation and position of screen, not correct on ships
618: Logging out in a build block -> Logging in near origin's point of the object (see notes)
613: Destroy Entity not logging correct target
608: Non-repeating delay trigger have no on/off texture
602: Build Error with Symmetry
593: Shields not updating properly when ship takes damage
591: Undocking stuck turrets from their motherships can cause both mothership and turret to fly off stuck at very high speeds
582: FAILED ACTIVATING - reenqueueing
579: Missiles: impact detection often too late
577: Missiles blow through shields and hull and damage players and docked entitites inside
571: Trigger Area acting
563: Docking Module: false triggers undock
524: Blocksaround z -113 to -114 vanish on placement
523: Dumbfire Missles + Overdrive Effect
470: Docked ships are immune to all movement effects
467: Mesh block face invisible next to area trigger
465: Damage Pulse system does not gain damage from additional blocks
454: Turret rotation bug
420: importing sector from 0.153 to 0.154
419: Shotgun beams don't work (Beam + D1000)
405: docked ship desync
403: Connecting new computers to weaponsystems allows quick reloading
387: SDBB type missiles and beam d1000 combo tracking docked turrets when zoomed out
382: Effect module bug: Firering with effect -> inactive
374: Defense Effects & Docked Entity's and Turrets
371: Releasing 'fire' button while weapon recharges influences power consumption
367: Lighting in ships changes depending on orientation
345: Lock on missiles lock onto targets that are not displayed.
340: Turrets damage the entity they are docked to and each other
333: Looking directly up/down while in gravity screws up movement controls
331: Holes to Core in Planet Segments/Tall Cube Mountains - Terrain Generation
312: Beams do not do any damage to planet core
282: Persistant 'locked target' marker
78: Obsolete textures still selectable - Oldstyle / cartoonish
692: Nullpointer - Serverside crash (Testserver)
691: ClassCastException: common.data.physics.CubeShape cannot be cast to com.bulletphysics.collision.shapes.CompoundShape
680: Switching to SD Cockpit view or removing a cockpit causes instant crash (ClassCastException)
656: Crash when using advanced build mode on rotatable blocks -> BufferOverflowException: null
609: salavaging/removing a docked core, does not trigger the dock to be 'free' (logic)
606: Continous 'signal looping'
598: Editing a ship causes power instabilities
596: New placed 'activators' not working until being linked
595: reply to message from schema causes client crash
586: Mail: Stacking [RE][RE][RE][RE][RE][RE]
585: Mails are not saved
584: Cannot delete mails
583: Chat glitch - not showing up chat when typing long lines
574: Thrust Logarithmically nerfed rather than buffed
564: Rollbackbug: First hit on new exception catcher
532: NullPointerException when attacking planets
518: Holding the "free look" key and looking at nearby blocks displays an option to "activate" non-interactive blocks
516: Switching From Build Mode to Flight Mode Doesn't Remember X, Y, Z, Settings
509: Paste mode: Blacklist blocks
508: Paste mode stays active after exiting ship
506: Config: ADMINS_CIRCUMVENT_STRUCTURE_CONTROL not functional
500: switch NOT, OR, AND-Gates with R from buildmode makes you exit the ship
499: Sector not found -> Crash
497: Crash when placing 10x10x10 (normal/paste)
496: NullPointerException: REQUESTED TYPE 0 IS NULL - on paste in adv build mode
486: Overdrive thruster boost + other systems - no cap
479: Logic Circuits freeze up on re-load
445: Some Computers Facing Port and Starboard Are Upsidedown
442: Ion system over 100% efficiency turns damage into shield power
407: Item Cloning - 2 Player with Chest
390: Pentas facing forward left have a concave face
366: Shift clicking does not work in hotbar
356: Feature: Shield Regen % mechanic
350: Dis-integrators explode when recieving a "false" signal from logic blocks
348: Feature: Beam Optimizations
307: Bug Reports from 0.151 (NullPointerException)
274: Build mode reporting shield block count as 0
256: Item Cloning - fast click on a stack (move around)
215: Shield health regen % curve
107: Killed another Universe upon approaching Planet
10: Faction permission module ignores 'controllers'

New in StarMade 0.1595 (Jul 11, 2014)

New in StarMade 0.1591 (Jul 7, 2014)

New in StarMade 0.159 (Jul 7, 2014)

New in StarMade 0.151 (Jun 7, 2014)

New in StarMade 0.1401 (Mar 24, 2014)

New in StarMade 0.14 (Mar 17, 2014)

improved character physics (hopefully no more gliding through lifts)
improved transformation pipeline in physics, so objects no longer fall out of other moving objects if bound (astronaut in gravity falling out of ship)
changed universe rotation system to local rotation of planet sectors
usernames now case insensitive (means, all variations of cases of the same name point to the same account [e.g. "Test", "test", "teSt" all point to the same player save-file, and have the same protection]. Same goes for
white/black lists, as well as admins. It will be applied automatically, so admins won't have to rewrite any files)
fixed crash on recipe (number overflow)
soft migration for block structure to allow for additional orientations. things get migrated as they are loaded, so no version compatibility issues will occur (unless a newly saved blueprint is loaded into an old starmade version).
old->new: ok, new->old: not ok
added additional corners front/back
added additional corners left/right
cleaned up orientation system (confusing bit of code) with migration
spawn_entity command now works from console
built system to automatically include all symmetry options for all new and old shapes
astronauts can now align themselves with a ship by pressing the jump button. the alignment works just like in gravity without actual gravity
improved block-orientation system to remember last selected for each block type
optimized character physics further (100 characters on the same planet from 10 to >200 fps)
fixed lighting not updating all surrounding segments when a block is added/removed
complete redesign of mid level segment data structure into a dynamic octree structure (on top of the existing low level octree)
integrated new structure for more performance in memory, light calculation, physics, simple iteration, etc. (especially on structure with lots of empty space)
fixed ugly little graphical glitch in planet atmosphere
fixed a memory leak that would fill up over a longer time (mostly on clients)
fixed occlusion bug that would cause areas to be brighter when there is non-opaque objects near (flora, glass, etc)
fixed bug that may have cause faction ids to be wrongly set on server restart
fixed bug where case of the names of members in a faction would cause bugs when logged in with a different case
implemented cascading shadow maps with zoom fitted frustum
improved shadow quality and fixed some bugs in the system
implemented shader preprocessor to efficiently handle options and backwards compatibility
fixed bug from new system where single blocks are not updated on server
fixed turrets not being controllable by players
a set-recipe a player buys (coarse/refine) will now refund credits instead of blocks if the recipe cost credits
fixed command auto-complete
added player name auto-complete to all command parameter as well as /pm and /f
improved method to check on modified blueprints (hopefully won't misfire modification)
fixed turret movement in chain docking
turrets no longer reset rotation when entered (and flight mode is used)
made restricted camera (turrets) homogeneous to be much easier to use for advanced application
turret rotation is now persistent (does not reset when turret get loaded after being unloaded)
chain docked objects are no longer excluded from faction home base protection
player movement speed in gravity now independent from look direction
added key for player walking in gravity (default left shift)
implemented multiple texture packs chooser
fixed graphical glitch where stars/sun would be visible on glass/water (or through any other transparent object) even when there is a solid block somewhere in the background
fixed client turret glitching if rotation has been already modified by another client before the client enters a the sector containing the turret
fixed docked structures becoming physical on client when the docking process was not completed yet (major lag)
improved loading times of structures by setting initial sizes of maps from expected data
improved blueprint loading time using a faster method to transfer block connection data
improved general block-block physics collision performance
debug mode no longer stays active when joining a multiplayer game after activating it on single player
fixed faction offer/relation id's possibly colliding leading to random war/peace declarations
added error handling for texture packs (to check if all files are there and if they have the right resolution), so modders get good feedback
added fixed helmet animation triggers
fixed character getting stuck on ceiling when jumping
implemented directional gravity blocks. Players can walk on walls/ceiling
fixed new-block-transmission not generating segments other then 0,0,0
further improved shadow quality (not quite there)
fixed bug that caused clients to have a 5-10 second delay when adding/removing/harvesting blocks or open/closing doors
decreased network overhead by using pure primitives for buffers when applicable
fixed background when using frame-buffer only
implemented signature fetching: clients request a map of what the server knows for sure at the time and the region file is going to be empty. This decreases load times and network overhead because empty segments don't have to be processed in the segment-manager at all. And thanks to the octree system, the update of empty segments takes 0 memory and is very fast
fixed out-of-direct-memory danger for 32-bit java when using texture arrays
fished shadows of characters being falsely frustum culled
fixed method of saving virtual memory (memory outside the heap). Out-Of-Memory crashes on 32-bit systems should now be eliminated
added auto-rotate camera
added gif recorder
chain-docked objects now also in home-base protection (if origin is home-base)
fixed faction home not resetting when removing faction block
added info to track a faction home change (faction news) to track eventual bug causing faction home resets (made that already more robust already, also)
redesigned AI panel
added crew tab
added fleet tab
implemented crew AI control
implemented fabricator animation control
docking beam origin is now currently used cockpit
fixed 6 sided gravity
implemented fabricator to harvest blocks instead of being able to remove at once
added scaling to bone implementation
added rest of the new blocks to the config
fixed bug that would cause brightness on blocks when a ship is exited when using shadows
integrated Luaj libraries for full Lua support
implemented Lua interface
implemented new conversation System
implemented system to create conversations with Lua
implemented networked conversation
fixed block modding tool not to crash when reflection reports non accessible field
improved shadows to not "shine through" far away objects when close up to something else that normally should be shadowed from that far away object
fixed some shader issues for mac-graphics card drivers
added failsafe for path calculation to stop after a threshold is reached
implemented normal maps
fixed source of bugs: on unloading entities were triggered to save twice. one time for the sector unload, and one time on unload of the object itself. This was a source of various random bugs like Objects completely vanishing
fixed characters controlled by players falling of moving objects when in gravity (or in sector change)
implemented skin files
implemented transmission for full skins
removed lag from flying through open doors
further improved physics performance with advanced lookup tables
removed unnecessary non-scaling transformation from physics cube-cube collision process
improved performance of single block-updates by a lot (building, salvaging, opening doors)
reduced lag from load of missiles in one place by a lot
improved A-Star path finding to avoid turning if possible
implemented basic path smoothing
implemented settings sliders
integrated sliders for advanced build mode
advanced build mode size now saved by ship entered
integrated sliders for weapon settings
implemented OAuth2 test communication
server config option for collision damage (damage and physical response is not yet calculated perfectly, but fast block transmission to handle from physics works)
minor physics optimizations
fixed small synch problem with octrees (server didn't apply the data it sent to clients (marking a segment as empty), and since the clients had teh data, empty segments where never requested and therefor checks if a segment has been loaded returned false on the server which sometimes lead to gravity not being applied
fixed several chunk error sources
fixed hidden flag not being updated correctly after docking process
implemented message log
implemented message log filters
implemented message log fast chat (system will place /f for faction chat or "/pm name" automatically if chat is used in message log panel with the according filter selected
fixed lag/bug on docked structures after the object has already loaded in, the server tells the client that the object is physics active
fixed extension error in skin transmission
implemented structure to handle unloaded AI entity for clients (in the future when a controlled entity e.g. fleet is not necessarily fully loaded and has to be simulated in the database)
fixed pirates attacking the NPC character in shops
redesigned AI crew Panel buttons and fixed functionality
added AI settings
implemented basic customizable AI behavior for NPC crew
fixed bug where gravity block cannot be turned off
explosion blocks (disintegrator) now cause chain reaction with each other
explosion blocks (disintegrator) now explode on damage
draw distance no longer an option (calculated over "max segments" now)
navigation filter setting is now saved on the client
fixed migration problem when a sprite style block was activated
fixed bug where object would be displayed from cache after spawning if before an object with the same name was deleted
buying from catalog with blocks now includes value of docked ships
if not enough blocks to buy from catalog, a list of total blocks needed will be sent to the player (using new chatlog panel to view)
core can now be entered on the same ship if someone already is in the build block
now skipping docked structures that are already occupied when up/down was pressed in flight mode
fixed bug where would not be able to pick up core as astronaut
fixed docking beam not resetting to core when cockpit changed to core
auto-completion of player name not puts right case
auto-completion of player name now works outside of commands
docking on faction base with faction exception will no longer change faction of the docked ship
possible fix for AI not firing on turrets
fixed bug where cache would be considered newer even if object has been modified in absence
fixed mass calculation in docking situations
fixed build orientation arrow
fixed bug where docking zone is not drawn in build-mode when the ship itself is docked
fixed possible crash in shutdown
fixed shield hit effect
home-base protection now extends to all docked ships (e.g. if faction permission block was used)
ship indicators of docked ships are now again displayed in structure (in build mode)
fixed missile sector positioning for new system
immensely decreased lag from loading in big structures with a lot of usable blocks (weapons etc) by first eliminating an unnecessary network transmission, using a better data structure in the grouping algorithm, and removing an unefficient exception
changed faction_create to include name of initial member, and added faction_create_as to also include faction Id to create faction as (useful when importing sectors)
fixed several bugs that might cause a crash of the lighting threads
fixed synchronization bug that lead to crash or other glitches when re-requesting segments (missile battles)
Turret/ship AI no longer engages targets in invisibility mode
fixed freeze on faulty transformation orientation
fixed narrow-octree invalidation by repeatedly removing the same position
AI now shoots on turrets
improved AI engagement behavior
improved menu vs in-game activity behavior
reorganized initial items a bit and added helmet
fixed exploding block update not triggering
fixed stations not being collectible by faction members
faction owned blocks can now be activated by docking beam of a ship without a faction signature, but being flown by the pilot of that faction
fixed missile head graphics
increased maximal number of missile trails
further decreased lag from missiles
improved long term performance of server by fixing a bug that could possibly prevent sector from unloading (even if players are no longer present)
fixed clustering of shops (for newly generated sectors)
implemented personal enemies of factions
made personal enemies of factions consistent
added GUI options for personal enemies of factions consistent. Editable if the rank of the faction member has permission to edit
attack on hostile action now will add a non-faction-player to the personal enemies, and no longer consider all neutrals enemies
fixed naming in AI dialog
added option to rehire/discharge AI by dialog
filled in some shop employee dialog
implemented buttons light up on mouse over (used in dialog options to make navigation easier on the eyes)
fixed AI exception (caused by another bugfix)
used chance for migration to set all 3-sided (e.g. grass patches) blocks as TOP orientation in preparation for them to be able to be rotated in any direction
fixed texure bug for some graphics cards (mac)
fixed possible server block service hang-up when placing auto-connected blocks like disintegrator (ty tominosama)
implemented texture compression
improved graphics memory cleanup function
improved physics performance by removing lag from removing calculation after microscopic fluctuations of object positions
fixed crash from pressing tab on some dialog text entries
added player name auto-complete to text input panels that require player names
added advanced options to deal with possible graphics driver bugs (compression, and mipmap options)
improved synchronization of server segment requests to hopefully get rid of physical chunk errors (those that won't go away after restart and cache clear)
fixed migration crash when trying to migrate block type that is not known in the block config (custom blocks)
compressed inventory-changed transmission for factory blocks to be more scalable
fixed AI error (FSMException) on servers
fixed bug that would cause crash on startup (ResourceException)
improved segment sorter to be more thread safe
fixed bug where player character could be considered neutral for a short time. player character now set faction id to player's faction id before spawning
fixed bug where sector information would not be updated correctly in sql database (causing protection mode of sector not to save, re-spawning asteroids etc)
added mining effect
improved responsiveness of all beams
hopefully fixed crash from sorting factions by relation in teh faction hub panel
implemented procedurally generated background (still a little slow, can be turned on in the in-game options)
fixed crash on loading shop AI skin (NullPointer)
inserted more tests to find a specific bug causing a gl exception
switched to regular textures for better compression and mipmap handling (some graphics card threw OUT_OF_MEMORY, despite having plenty on using compressed texture arrays)
decreased texture size of ultra quality shadows (not noticeable, but cuts memory consumption in half)
implemented adapting procedural backgrounds in different qualities (resolution. Please note that some graphics cards don't support 4096)
fixed NullPointer crash when joining multiplayer in the vicinity of an NPC player
fixed jiggling when traveling in docked ship or turret
slightly optimized object position transmission to reduce data that has to be sent on update
fixed crash when system tries to draw floating item that doesn't exist
added (probably) final vertex component mask for cube shader
added correct normals for wedges
added correct normals for corners
added correct normals for penta
added correct normals for tetra
fixed GL_INVALID_OPERATION Error happening in build mode. Happened when using multi-sampled frame buffers and reading pixels from it (in advanced build mode to check for mouse position)
improved lighting
reduced green color in procedural backgrounds
implemented admin-command "/delay_save seconds" for server admins to safely create backups. Make sure to wait a bit after using this command since in case there are running write requests, they will continue to run and finish.
(/delay_save 0 will turn the delay off immediately)
fixed possible server crash on invalid docking update
fixed object being declared as modified blueprint after it already has fully spawned (and then blocks where added afterwards)
fixed gravity bug where player would already be in velocity when activating the gravity block
fixed gravity (pointing somewhere other than downwards) warping the player to a seemingly random position
fixed glitching of active object when astronaut gets suddenly thrown out of an object(e.g. /destroy_entity was used on a ship with a player in it)
in case of emergency shutdown (forced termination from outside by an admin) the database will no longer attempt to compact itself (as that may under rare circumstances cause corruption)
fixed gravity bug where player would suddenly be put out of gravity. Also made some gravity blocks look like they weren't working at all (since it was instantly stopped). Gravity lifts should now finally be usable
added gradient to advanced build mode block preview
added extra alpha for block preview in advanced build mode, so that blocks that are completely transparent cans till be easily seen
improved lighting for back-shading being better handled with block light
fixed shadow not working in the last version
improved lighting for block light to illuminate shadowed areas better
fixed crash in sun sectors with shadows (light was at zero pos)
included tolerance for modified blueprints (server.cfg). New version blueprints should be more resilient against falsely triggering blueprint modification. Still, please make sure the object is fully loaded before saving a blueprint
kupu updated normal maps further
fixed build box flickering when trying to build in build mode on a moving object
fixed bug in recursive price calculation of blueprints+docked
fixed normal/bump mapping (some wrong vectors caused the lighting to change, and the bump look wrong)
improved self-illumination of light source blocks
fixed shaders for some graphics card (ATI (mostly mac ones))
fixed further 'vector-zero-length' exception
when GUI is disabled, indicators in build mode are no longer drawn
settings no longer reset to default if one setting is no longer valid
using bitwise operations on shader for graphics cards that support them (small fps boost for those cards)
fixed crash when more then one item is sold to a player shop at a price of 0 credits (divide by zero)
fixed crash when recording screenshot or give with frame-buffers and anti-aliasing activated (still minor bug with white background on screenshot)
improved error response when shadows are not supported on a graphics cards
fixed crash when in rotating cam mode and changing sectors
fixed occasional crash in cubatom panel when dragging from hotbar
put in some extra debug info to find the GL_INVALID_OPERATION that is happening on some cards
fixed one more GL_INVALID_OPERATION crash on 100% (on some graphics cards)
reduced memory consumption in several places
decreased consumption from lots of small groups of usable blocks
decreased consumption from control structure
improved control structure performance by using unified indexing data structure a lot better to handle in collections
fixed light shining through closed doors
implemented "lighten" mode for advanced build mode (makes blocks brighter)
fixed "NullPointerException: Exception: REQUESTED TYPE 0 IS NULL" client crash (happened when a block-connection came in too late after the source was already removed)
improved bulk-block-connection function to be more scalable and faster
(hopefully) fixed [KINEMATICCONTROLLER][UPDATEACTION] Exception possibly crashing the server on sector change in some situations
fixed faction protection from personal salvage beam
fixed NullPointer from AI trying to walk on object that no longer exists
fixed sudden change of background when changing systems (needs testing)
fixed huge video memory consumption when using high res procedural backgrounds with multi-sample (couldn't even start on powerful machines)
fixed mouse inversion when control is pressed
fixed crash when trying to talk to an NPC that has no affinity
fixed crash when using texture arrays
fixed server crash when update for a not existing network object comes in (after the object was deleted). It's normally already caught, but the debug message actually caused the crash in some situations
fixed server crash/freeze when a hacked old blueprint was uploaded to a server
added security that on other positions so the same method of getting the server to freeze can't be used there
fixed chunk error problem
added separate selling price and buying price for every shop
implemented abstract controller support
implemented controller custom axis support
implemented controller custom button support
implemented abstract system to apply the same system as for keyboard to any controller
implemented controller button duplication check
implemented controller saving
implemented controller loading
implemented individual controller axis sensivity
improved GUI a bit: no more moving when keys pressed in some menus; no more firing weapons when deactivating menus (might still be some menus missing to be included)
prevented OS from giving initial value for controllers (rotation when starting until controller touched)
integrated controller into camera system
implemented remote debug system to check on raw server positions
removed sector physics mirroring from sectors to a planet and vice versa (physics glitches possible, but will take care of possible heavy lag and random warps, until better solution found)
structure panel now available for any usable structure
fixed some missiles not showing up
fixed GUI texture compression (washed out GUI textures)
fixed a accuracy problem in segment sorting (small alpha errors on transparent blocks can still occur)
removed unaffected segments within missile blast radius from missile block update (missile performance)
missile damage now sends segment update directly instead of issuing re-requests on client (faster update when missile hits & better synchronization)
fixed possible bug in updating whole segments when missiles hit (collections (ship properties) not updating correctly)
implemented system in the pre-light calculation system to handle angles
fixed bug where on server restart an entry would reset to being enemy usable even it was turned off before
optimization in several areas (network protocol, group calculation, light calculation)
fixed another bug in segment sorting (distance was not calculated to the middle but the corner)
moved segment/chunk impact to synchronized chunk revalidating instead of doing it threaded (no gain in doing that except synch issues). This will hopefully take care of a lot sources of bug, like the mass being calculated wrong and several others that could happen absolutely randomly
fixed minor source of bugs: initially newly loaded objects had no way to know their sector for one update when the object was updated before the data was inserted as a network object. Bypassing that now for the server to check directly
right mouse click on docking beam now ignores activatable blocks (doors)
maxDrawnSegments can now be changed ingame without problems, and with correct cleaning up (problem was always to get all threads to either finish or stop at a point where they don't currently own mesh themselves)
categorized and reordered options GUI
fixed a cause of server disconnects (tried to change an object on server that no longer existed. Could happen when the server removed the object and the change didn't yet reach the client)
fixed crash when changing options
further optimized lighting calculations for faster segment(chunk) loading
fixed server crash when replacing only empty segment on a structure
fixed server NullPointer when projectiles fly in inactive sector
increased diffuse lighting
fixed data problem when generating new planets (discovered due to the synch update of earlier patch)
optimized block collection calculation to faster ditch requested updates from removed objects in the queue
new drawing optimization should improve display performance of blocks by ~10% (depending on graphics card/driver. Fallback available to switch and customize optimization) using bigger Vertex Buffer Objects and dynamically allocating and filling them reduces costly openGL calls since multiple chunks can be drawn from the same buffer context (drawback: more video RAM overhead due to fragmentation, but does not scale)
"file does not exist" should no longer spam log on multiplayer (skin files that cannot be sent will stop trying after the 5th time)
inventory slot merge may be fixed (synchronization issue)
fixed NPC-Command menu not working when exiting ship in build mode
fixed personal enemies of faction not working
personal shop buy/sell permission now working
fixed bug with collection not updating on block removal (e.g. weapons keep working even if all the weapon blocks got removed or shot off)
faction members can now salvage faction home in astronaut mode
fixed possible deadlock (server freeze) when writing universe data
fixed bug where both inventory stacks of the same type would vanish when trying to merge and the sum of both exceeds the maximum stack size
possible fix for frame-buffer error happening on some hardware when using shadows
fixed another inventory merge bug (when changing slots while server is still subtracting blocks from building)
personal shop permission should now cover all shopping transactions
fixed AI not shooting at objects
fixed serverAI transmission not being in synch (lead to heavy rubberbanding and server/client position differences of AI ships)
fixed permissions to edit AI config (admins can now edit objects by selecting them and open the AI control panel)
fixed possible source for segment(chunk) errors: server took re-requests of segments which hints at a synch error
fixed serious server bug, where in case a sector was loaded while saving (inactive sector becomes active again), there could be a several bugs (foremost docked ships undocking without reason)
fixed bug where docked object were not hittable by missiles
fixed eject from enterable block when block gets destroyed
fixed core overheating timer when core destroyed by missile
added another texture pack from kupu
added some character model fixes from omni
reactivated head tilting (only without helmet)
fixed bug in animation structure where deactivated animation would prevent other animations

New in StarMade 0.135 RC 1 (Mar 14, 2014)

New in StarMade 0.134 Pre (Mar 12, 2014)

New in StarMade 0.12 Pre (Mar 3, 2014)

New in StarMade 0.11 Pre (Feb 25, 2014)

New in StarMade 0.109 Pre (Feb 24, 2014)

New in StarMade 0.108 Pre (Feb 19, 2014)

New in StarMade 0.107 Pre (Feb 15, 2014)

New in StarMade 0.106 Pre (Feb 13, 2014)

New in StarMade 0.105 Pre (Feb 12, 2014)

New in StarMade 0.104 Pre (Feb 10, 2014)

New in StarMade 0.1 Pre (Feb 3, 2014)

improved character physics (hopefully no more gliding through lifts)
improved transformation pipeline in physics, so objects no longer fall out of other moving objects if bound (astronaut in gravity falling out of ship)
changed universe rotation system to local rotation of planet sectors
usernames now case insensitive (means, all variations of cases of the same name point to the same account [e.g. "Test", "test", "teSt" all point to the same player save-file, and have the same protection]. Same goes for white/black lists, as well as admins. It will be applied automatically, so admins won't have to rewrite any files) (needs further testing)
fixed crash on recipe (number overflow)
soft migration for block structure to allow for additional orientations. things get migrated as they are loaded, so no version compatibility issues will occur (unless a newly saved blueprint is loaded into an old starmade version). old->new: ok, new->old: not ok
added penta shape
added tetra shape
added additional corners front/back
added additional corners left/right
implemented fast threaded AStar pathfinding in an abstract way to be usable in various parts of the game
cleaned up orientation system (confusing bit of code) with migration
spawn_entity command now works from console
built system to automatically include all symmetry options for all new and old shapes
astronauts can now align themselves with a ship by pressing the jump button. the alignment works just like in gravity without actual gravity
improved block-orientation system to remember last selected for each block type
optimized character physics further (100 characters on the same planet from 10 to >200 fps)
fixed lighting not updating all surrounding segments when a block is added/removed
complete redesign of mid level segment data-structure into a dynamic octree structure (on top of the existing low level octree)
integrated new structure for more performance in memory, light calculation, physics, simple iteration, etc. (especially on structures with lots of empty space)
fixed ugly little graphical glitch in planet atmosphere (white parts)
fixed a memory leak that would fill up over a longer time (mostly on clients)
fixed occlusion bug that would cause areas to be brighter when there is non-opaque objects near (flora, glass, etc)
fixed bug that may have cause faction ids to be wrongly set on server restart
fixed bug where case of the names of members in a faction would cause bugs when logged in with a different case
implemented cascading shadow maps with zoom fitted frustum
improved shadow quality and fixed some bugs in the system
implemented shader preprocessor to efficiently handle options and backwards compatibility
fixed bug from new system where single blocks are not updated on server
fixed turrets not being controllable by players (in hotfix)
fixed received a player buys (coarse/refine) will now refund credits instead of blocks if the recipe cost credits
fixed command auto-complete
added player name auto-complete to all command parameter as well as /pm and /f
improved method to check on modified blueprints (hopefully won't misfire modification)
fixed turret movement in chain docking
turrets no longer reset rotation when entered (and flight mode is used)
made restricted camera (turrets) homogeneous to be much easier to use for any advanced application
turret rotation is now persistent (does not reset when turret get loaded after being unloaded)
chain docked objects are no longer excluded from faction home base protection
player movement speed in gravity now independent from look direction
added key for player slow-walking in gravity (default left shift)
implemented multiple texture packs chooser
fixed graphical glitch where stars/sun would be visible through glass/water (or through any other transparent object) even when there is a solid block somewhere in the background
fixed client turret glitching if rotation has been already modified by another client before the client enters a the sector containing the turret
fixed docked structures becoming physical on client when the docking process was not completed yet (major lag)
improved loading times of structures by setting initial sizes of maps from expected data (possible through new octree structure)
improved blueprint loading time using a faster method to transfer block connection data
improved general block-block physics collision performance
debug mode no longer stays active when joining a multiplayer game after activating it on single player
fixed faction offer/relation id's possibly colliding leading to random war/peace declarations (in hotfix)
added error handling for texture packs (to check if all files are there and if they have the right resolution), so modders get good feedback
added fixed helmet animation triggers
fixed character getting stuck on ceiling when jumping
implemented directional gravity blocks. Players can walk on walls/ceiling
fixed new-block-transmission not generating segments other then 0,0,0
further improved shadow quality (not quite there)
fixed bug that caused clients to have a 5-10 second delay when adding/removing/harvesting blocks or open/closing doors (in hotfix)
decreased network overhead by using pure primitives for buffers when applicable
fixed background when using framebuffer only
implemented signature fetching: clients request a map of what the server knows for sure at the time and the region file is going to be empty.
This decreases load times and network overhead because empty segments don't have to be processed in the segment-manager at all.
And thanks to the octree system, the update of empty segments takes 0 memory and is very fast
fixed out-of-direct-memory danger for 32bit java when using texture arrays
fished shadows of characters being falsely frustum culled
fixed method of saving virtual memory (memory outside the heap). Out-Of-Memory crashes on 32bit systems should now be eliminated
added auto-rotate camera (default key tilde)
added gif recorder (default key 'pause'). Press once for record, and again for stop and finish gif. Gif will be placed in the starmade folder
chain-docked objects now also in home-base protection (if origin is home-base)
fixed faction home not resetting when removing faction block
added info to track a faction home change (faction news) to track eventual bug causing faction home resets (made that already more robust already, also)
redesigned AI panel
added crew tab
added fleet tab
implemented crew AI control
implemented fabricator animation control
docking beam origin is now currently used cockpit
fixed 6 sided gravity
implemented fabricator to harvest blocks instead of being able to remove at once
added scaling to bone implementation
added rest of the new blocks to the config
fixed bug that would cause brightness on blocks when a ship is exited when using shadows
integrated Luaj libraries for full Lua support
implemented Lua interface
implemented new conversation system
implemented system to create conversations with Lua
implemented networked conversation
fixed block modding tool not to crash when reflection reports non accessible field
improved shadows to not "shine through" far away objects when close up to something else that normally should be shadowed from that far away object
fixed some shader issues for mac-graphics card drivers
added failsafe for path calculation to stop after a threshold is reached
implemented normal maps
fixed source of bugs: on unloading entities were triggered to save twice. one time for the sector unload, and one time on unload of the object itself. This was a source of various random bugs like Objects completely vanishing
fixed characters controlled by players falling of moving objects when in gravity (or in sector change)
implemented skin files
implemented transmission for full skins
removed lag from flying through open doors
further improved physics performance with advanced lookup tables
removed unnecessary non-scaling transformation from physics cube-cube collision process
improved performance of single block-updates by a lot (building, salvaging, opening doors)
reduced lag from load of missiles in one place by a lot
improved AStar path finding to avoid turning if possible
implemented basic path smoothing
implemented settings sliders
integrated sliders for advanced build mode
advanced build mode size now saved by ship entered
integrated sliders for weapon settings
implemented OAuth2 test communication
server config option for collision damage (damage and pyhsical response is not yet calculated perfectly, but fast block transmission to handle from physics works)
minor physics optimizations
fixed small synch problem with octrees (server didn't apply the data it sent to clients (marking a segment as empty), and since the clients had the data, empty segments where never requested and therefor checks if a segment has been loaded returned false on the server which sometimes lead to gravity not being applied
fixed several chunk error sources
fixed hidden flag not being updated correctly after docking process
implemented message log
implemented message log filters
implemented message log fast chat (system will place /f for faction chat or "/pm name" automatically if chat is used in message log panel with the according filter selected
fixed lag/bug on docked structures after the object has already loaded in, the server tells the client that the object is physics active
fixed extension error in skin transmission
implemented structure to handle unloaded AI entities for clients (in the future when a controlled entity e.g. fleet is not necessarily fully loaded and has to be simulated in the database)
fixed pirates attacking the NPC character in shops
redesigned AI crew Panel buttons and fixed functionality
added AI settings
implemented basic customizable AI behavior for NPC crew
fixed bug where gravity block cannot be turned off
explosion blocks (disintegrator) now cause chain reaction with each other
explosion blocks (disintegrator) now explode on damage
draw distance no longer an option (calculated over "max segments" now)
navigation filter setting is now saved on the client
fixed migration problem when a sprite style block was activated
fixed bug where an object would be displayed from cache after spawning if before an object with the same name was deleted
buying from catalog with blocks now includes value of docked ships
if not enough blocks to buy from catalog, a list of total blocks needed will be sent to the player (using new chat-log panel to view)
core can now be entered on the same ship if someone already is in the build block
now skipping docked structures that are already occupied when up/down was pressed in flight mode
fixed bug where would not be able to pick up core as astronaut
fixed docking beam not resetting to core when cockpit changed to core
auto-completion of player name not puts right case
auto-completion of player name now works outside of commands
docking on faction base with faction exception will no longer change faction of the docked ship
fix for AI not firing on turrets
fixed bug where cache would be considered newer even if object has been modified in absence
fixed mass calculation in docking situations
fixed build orientation arrow
fixed bug where docking zone is not drawn in buildmode when the ship itself is docked
fixed possible crash in shutdown
fixed shield hit effect
homebase protection now extends to all docked ships (e.g. if faction permission block was used)
ship indicators of docked ships are now again displayed in structure (in build mode)
fixed missile sector positioning for new system
immensely decreased lag from loading in big structures with a lot of usable blocks (weapons etc) by first eliminating an unnecessary network transmission, using a better data structure in the grouping algorithm, and removing an inefficient exception
changed faction_create to include name of initial member, and added faction_create_as to also include faction Id to create faction as (useful when importing sectors)
fixed several bugs that might cause a crash of the lighting threads
fixed synchronization bug that lead to crash or other glitches when re-requesting segments (missile battles)
Turret/ship AI no longer engages targets in invisibility mode
fixed freeze on faulty transformation orientation
fixed narrow-octree invalidation by repeatedly removing the same position
AI now shoots on turrets
improved AI engagement behavior
improved menu vs ingame activity behavior
reorganized initial items a bit and added helmet
fixed exploding block update not triggering
fixed stations, because faction members weren't able to pick up blocks
faction owned blocks can now be activated by docking beam of a ship without a faction signature, but being flown by the pilot of that faction
fixed missile head graphics
increased maximal number of missile trails
further decreased lag from missiles
improved long term performance of server by fixing a bug that could possibly prevent sector from unloading (even if players are no longer present)
fixed clustering of shops (for newly generated sectors)
implemented personal enemies of factions
made personal enemies of factions consistent
added GUI options for personal enemies of factions consistent. Editable if the rank of the faction member has permission to edit
attack on hostile action now will add a non-faction-player to the personal enemies, and no longer consider all neutrals enemies
fixed naming in AI dialog
added option to rehire/discharge AI by dialog
filled in some shop employee dialog
implemented buttons light up on mouse over (used in dialog options to make navigation easier on the eyes)
fixed AI exception (caused by another bugfix)
not checking if all textures use the same color depths for a texture array (prevent texture glitches)
used chance for migration to set all 3sided (e.g. grass patches) blocks as TOP orientation in preperation for them to be able to be rotated in any direction
fixed texure bug for some graphics cards (mac)
fixed possible server block service hang-up when placing autoconnected blocks like disintegrator (ty tominosama)

New in StarMade 0.094731 Pre (Jan 14, 2014)

New in StarMade 0.09473 (Nov 15, 2013)

New in StarMade 0.0947 (Nov 12, 2013)

New in StarMade 0.09444 Pre (Nov 8, 2013)

New in StarMade 0.09442 Pre (Oct 31, 2013)

New in StarMade 0.0944 (Oct 28, 2013)

mineral recipes now 1:10. Recipes for hull -> wedge etc (thanks to starcitsura)
finally fixed long lasting bug that was cauing an astronaut to be at local position 0,0,0 for one frame. This for example caused the sudden planet-kill (even if only in orbit) was it to happen near a planet that had lava at the center
items in space are no longer picked up if inventory is full
added borderless windowed mode to advanced options in the startup
inventory management for building has been moved to server to combat duplication/loss due to lag
fixed transmission synchronization of point distribution. (damage, speed, etc not changing, or saving) (player were unable to set weapon percent settings, or they didn't save)
AMC balance (more damage causes more time to reload) (impact has been reduced since the pre build. Still not final of course)
fixed physics ray detection (optimization calculated bounding box too small)
fixed server freezing from running out of buffer pool
fixed chain docking position
fixed client being able to kill server by purposly sending malformed command
fixed connection map not working (hash code did not produce valid values): weapons/connecting did not work
fixed server crash when admin attempted to sector change player in a docked ship
fixed vulnerability where clients could cause the server to "pause"
fixed bug that forbid client to dock in some cases
fixed core duping bug exploit with using symmetry
added spam protection for spawning cores
weapon slot assignment is now saved by player+ship
fixed HUD display when switching from missile lock-on mode
controls gittering should be gone (only happened on lower fps)
fixed AI shooting at dead target (and doing no damage)
shield recharge not deactivated under fire, but only reduced (the less shields left, the less the nerf is (up to 25%)) (see here for more information)
secondary weapon more for AMC: right click now fires weapons without focusing on the same point when aiming
shift clicking on full box no longer eats the item (stashes where that happened in the previous version should be removed and reset)
private messages can now be sent from console
new admin command: /faction_set_entity (changes faction of any entity)
new admin command: /faction_set_all_relations ally/neutal/enemy (sets all non-NPC faction relations to neutral, ally or enemy)
fixed chain docking's wrong orientation
non turret local AI search range from 750 to 2500 (about what a player can target)
AI will now engage at a weapon range that is more sure to do damage
implemented chaindocking to work with the blueprint system
fixed physics duplication problem with chain docking when undocking the middle link
fixed crash when switching to wedge in adv build mode from upside down spike
fixed bug where AI simulation would spawn blueprints with a name longer then the limit in the SQL database (name gets truncated now)
optimized file management to not stall as much for header writing
fixed bug where writing/reding headers was not thread safe (causing NoHeaderException)
fixed bug where projectiles and beams seem to be shot from another position than the blocks that are firering are

New in StarMade 0.094398 RC 1 (Oct 28, 2013)

New in StarMade 0.09435 Prebuild (Oct 22, 2013)

New in StarMade 0.0943 (Oct 22, 2013)

fixed crash on faulty sector loading
fixed crash when missile is trying to be updated in sector that gets unloaded
fixed crash when object tries to get added into sector that just unloaded
database set from table to lock to entry lock strategy
redesigned segment (chunk) request system to be more robust, and more efficient
fixed memory leak where segments would not be cleaned up on client
fixed explosion not refreshing all affected segments (causing ghost blocks)
fixed chasing missile target mode
fixed bug that would stop requesting segments
structures are now completely loaded on servers without having to move around
fixed crash when ships are loaded with metadata that exceed the buffer size
optimized ray test physics to be more scalable. Makes a difference from 1 to 130 fps in some situations (e.g. shooting a hole though a planet horizontally)
switched from synchronized to ReentrantReadWriteLock for raw block IO operations (multiple readers may acquire lock. all wait for writer)
increased max value for "draw distance" and "max segments" settings
optimized IO operations by using thread pools and a finer lock granularity
eliminated client lag (short freeze) when leaving areas with many objects loaded
fixed a source of segment(chunk) errors
better synchronization for file handle checking (exception on server: "Having to reopen closed file"). Possible fix for "too many files open"
fixed server local crash (causes freeze and spams exceptions) when player enters a ship directly from the gravity of another ship (physics cleanup wasn't done properly in some occasions)
optimized routine for simulation thread a little to not hog less database performance when triggered
mothership no longer stops when undocking an object
sector protection now includes shield hits
improved concurrency of segment generation (depending on type multiple segments(chunks) can be generated at once) -> better multicore usage -> faster object creation when generated (e.g. asteroids)
target chasing missiles will now fly in a straight line when the target no longer exists
slightly increased speed for target chasing missiles
fixed bug in target chasing missile that would cause the client not to have a reference for the target (glitches in flight path)
indicator of targeted entity now appears yellow when in missile target mode (to ensure right aiming with objects in the same line of sight)
re-enabled local segment caches and improved them with new request system (pooled requests from local disk)
fixed bug where entering a space station that reaches over in another sector from that other sector, the sector context would be wrong and the spawning points would get set wrong
Modified ships that have changed the type of the core to something else are now checked on spawn and destroyed should there be no block at the center, or if it's of the 'core' type
added admin command to destroy structures and all their docked objects at once (/destroy_entity_dock)
improved readability of log (consistent format) and scale (smaller timestamps and no unnecessary info)
blueprint/catalog transaction (buy/save) are now logged in serverlog
spawn/renaming of structures is now logged in serverlog
death/kills are now logged in serverlog
fixed bug in AI calculating missile range
AI will automatically switch to the according program now when docked/undocked
fixed bug where astronauts would be physically pushed on server by "no-contact-response" physics helper objects
fixed bug where astronauts cannot be hit by missiles
locked on missiles will now loose target when it gets unavailable (2 sector distance, killed, entered a block as astronaut)
death by missile is now displayed correctly
missile trail graphics will no longer glitch when changing sector
added server cfg option to deactivate skin distribution (for clients the upload will display but the server just throws away the data)
added upload logs to serverlog
fixed light-beacons spawning in space without the block
fixed bug where player would have to have the credits to buy a blueprint although it's set to buy-with-blocks
added advices for loading screen
fixed missiles not exploding (just stopping) but damage was done (last prebuild)
increased slowest turning speed by axis by 50%
increased basic value for shield recharge
fixed GUI for faction hub (player was able to click on things even with open dialog)
fixed a long existing bug that caused the game stop displaying new segments
fixed GUI bug where in some resolutions the "click-area" would be incorrect. Apparently LWJGL Display resolutions aren't always pixel perfect

New in StarMade 0.09423 Pre (Oct 14, 2013)

New in StarMade 0.0942 Pre (Oct 14, 2013)

New in StarMade 0.09415 Pre (Oct 11, 2013)

New in StarMade 0.0941 Pre (Oct 10, 2013)

New in StarMade 0.094 (Oct 4, 2013)

Turning speed now depends on ship dimension:
The turning speed per axis now depends on the dimensions of the Ship. This means if you build a long stick for example, you will have a good speed to roll, but less speed to look around. Mass does also still play a factor, but much much less than before
Pirate station difficulty:
newly spawned pirate stations are now fixed and also get a random difficulty level to be more challenging: Turrets will be more powerful, and or have shields (as well as shields for the station itself)
Quick search and quick switch for inventories:
inventories will now have a search bar. All blocks not containing the search term will blend out on the fly. Also you can now put an object in a chest and back when shift-clicking it.
Undocked objects now get velocity of mothership:
If you fly in a direction and undock, the undocked object will now continue to fly in that direction. This could be used to build your own torpedo with docked disintegrator filled ships.
Ship search and more navigation filters:
In the navigation filler, turrets and/or docked ships can now be filtered for the list. You can also now search for the last ship you have entered, making it a lot easier to find your ship if you die unexpected.
Notice for servers suffering from block chunk corruption:
There is now a server config entry called FORCE_DISK_WRITE_COMPLETION, which should help with the problem. It's adviced for servers to turn it on in any case, except for servers that have problems/lags with disk IO operations
MISC:
fixed god and invisiblity mode admin command causing docking area ignore mode
added profiling for sector loading to find source of lag spike
fixed naming bug when saving blueprints locally
fixed loading of locally saved blueprints
turret data now also force written to disk before saving as blueprint
fixed source of ghost objects (with no collision and no indicator): error when docking target UID does not exist
possible fix against raw block file corruption (for specific operating systems that have the problem)
sped up initial loading (check if object has any blocks is done progressively, and not forced). Reduces sector loading lag if there are lots of objects in there
eliminated frame rate drop from drawing shield hits on large structures
disabling GUI will now be reset on startup (disabling the GUI was often mistaken for a bug)
implemented fast invetory switch for storage (hold left shift, changable in key mapping options)
added server cfg option to make player invulnerable after death for an amount of time (spawn camping protection)
fixed undocking position snap back (as well as probably a few other glitches, since the network transformation controller reset the position on control change)
undocked objects now inherit velocity of mothership
chat can now be done in spawn menu
added quick search for inventories
shield is now synchronized from the server at a certain amount of percent (modifiable in server.cfg) changed, as well as always on full/empty
power is now synchronized from the server at a certain amount of percent (modifiable in server.cfg) changed, as well as always on full/empty
fixed faction permission for blueprints not working
overheating core status is now saved and persistent
server.cfg option to change way to buy blueprints from credits to total blocks of the blueprints
players can now search for the last ship they entered (last entered value is also saved in player state)
added background for advanced build mode orientation to make it easier to distinguish
cockpits now respect the orientation they were placed in (still a little wonky)
ship turning speed now directly depends on ship dimension (build a stick: great roll, not so good yaw and pitch...) balanced to be a bonus.
debug mode restricted to admins
fixed docks of pirate station (fixed for new generated stations)
added random diffculty to pirate stations to increase turrets size, and add shilds
docked entities will now be cloaked/jammed if the mothership is cloaked/jammed
fixed shield hits not showing on bottom faces
turrets no longer target NPC shops directly (friendly fire could still happen)
AI will no longer try to target overheating ships (and being reset because of it later in the FSM. Caused inactive AI)
AI now includes all missile modules in the check of engagement range (missile ship without amc only had 50 range)
fixed targeting (fire and forget) missile for AI usage
fixed connection bug (came with new method of reading the stream)
fixed (older) bug where initial connection tranfer to client wasn't fully completed (structural bug)
fixed fast inventory switch with existing stacks
moved option to force write all open files after writing operation to server config (as it was only relevant for some OS)
implemented base of system to increase amount of different orinatations for corner blocks (in place but not active, as the orientations have to be added individually, and that takes some time to do)
server cfg option to drop credits on death into space
turning speed now displayed in build mode stats
refined new turning speed model
fixed buying blueprint with blocks option
server shutdown more gentle to the database (waiting for unfinished buisness of other threads)
fixed bug where docked objects (turrets) would stop flying with the mothership (looks like lag, but was the object stoping to transfer its position to the turrets after switching to lightweight physics objects when the object is in another sector than the player on the client)
fixed bug where owners of the ship could only take items if they had enough credits to theoretically buy it
setting 0 for a price in a personal shop will no longer crash when trying to buy
fixed a compile error for a shader for some graphics card (game would not load)
fixed bug that would add a bad physics object on client (and make the client being stuck)
fixed blueprints loading wrong types of wedge blocks
fixed game crashing when adjusting sound volume
sound volume of entities is now updated on the fly
scaling of tuning speed vs ship dimension is now exposed in server config

New in StarMade 0.093992 Pre (Oct 1, 2013)

New in StarMade 0.093991 Pre (Sep 30, 2013)

New in StarMade 0.09398 (Sep 19, 2013)

New in StarMade 0.09398 Pre (Sep 19, 2013)

New in StarMade 0.093975 Pre (Sep 18, 2013)

New in StarMade 0.09397 Pre (Sep 17, 2013)

New in StarMade 0.093957 Pre (Sep 14, 2013)

New in StarMade 0.09395 (Sep 11, 2013)

New in StarMade 0.093941 (Sep 10, 2013)

New in StarMade 0.09394 Pre (Sep 9, 2013)

New in StarMade 0.093932 Pre (Sep 7, 2013)

fixed crash on missiles (hopefully)
default for credit lost changed to 10%
possibly fixed some docking position glitches resulting from forced overwrite when reading initial data
fixed bug where there would be multiple shop blocks possible on the same structure
fixed crash from 3rd party function that would stack overflow when trying to word wrap "-" in chat
fixed restock command for player shops
all admin commands now allow spaces in arguments: Arguments with spaces have to be written in single or double quotes (' or ")
fixed crash in inventory iteration
fixed crash in sound iteration
improved sound handling
issue of server spam with unknown types of connection now intercepted on client to get to the root of the problem, and the server won't be influenced by it anymore
changed build mode preview box drawing to another draw method to hopefully fix invisible block bug
G_DRAW_ADV_BUILDMODE_BLOCK_PREVIEW in settings.cfg can now be used to disable advanced build mode to workaround invisible block bug
improved check if skin file differs from server version
indicator animation should no longer reset on sector change
reduced lock-on gui-glitches (needs tests)
fixed rolling ships with keys to be framerate independent
fixed looparound when rolling ships, which caused glitches especially on bigger ships
added server config line to modify how much credits are lost on death (default: lose 10%)
added server config line to apply an time interval after death, in which players are not punished should they die again (default 5 min)
added server config line to force the player to drop the entire inventory on death (default: off)
added server config line to enable projectiles gaining the relative speed from where they are shot from
added server config line to customize starting credits of a new found NPC shop
added server config line to customize NPC shop credit gain over time
New:
navigation waypoint is now absolute
fixed crash on placing blocks in some cases: A connection to an invalid block was tried
preventing crash when recipes are used that have block types (from modding) in them that do no longer exist
fixed lighting on planets

New in StarMade 0.093931 Pre (Sep 5, 2013)

New in StarMade 0.09393 Pre (Sep 4, 2013)

New in StarMade 0.09392 (Sep 3, 2013)

This update takes care of some exploits that some players were starting to use to grief.
Hotfix #1: fixed bug where new anti-exploit function would forbid to take control legitimately. Ghost players showing up in ships are now gone.
Hotfix #2: fixed bug from hotfix #1
Exploits:
There was a possibility to take control of ships from the client, and also discard a kick with a hacked client. Control is now double checked on server. Kicking now severs the direction even without the client answering.
Re-Naming and Spaces:
Structure names can now contain spaces. You can also no rename any structure by placing down a faction block, declare it as a faction object. Activating the block again will give the "rename" option.
Other fixes:
cleaned up death routine and control units:
kicking now immediately disconnects client after kick command has been sent (fixes anti-kick exploit)
fixed bug that would cause lasers not to hit astronauts in certain situations (callback had wrong meta data)
fixed player directions
added admin command to issue debug routines to enhance log output (to specifically debug certain objects)
extra check on server to prevent players from using a hacked client to take control of structures
extra check when blocks are placed to prevent missuse
player object changes checks on server if the changes came from the right client, and will report otherwise (attempt to control another player)
improved memory scalability for bigger structures
structure names can now contain spaces
structure names can now be changed with the faction module
fixed texture array fallback (crash on startup for some graphics cards)
New fixes since the pre-releasefixed crash on suicide
fixed lighting of block bottom face
fixed initial position of build mode to where the object was entered
fixed crash in build block build-mode
fixed "preview block" being used when it's off in the options
added frustum & distance culling to buildmode wobble boxes to increase performance in high numbers
advanced build mode mass placement will now check for each block if it has enough space to be placed
added debug mode to trace corruption (versioned backup of every raw file before writing)