Update Unofficial Alpha news for beta backers

[Cmdr Eagleboy]

Current state

We are at alpha 3.04 docking and outfitting test. It also includes multiplayer combat. There are both gameplay and code bugs reported. Currently there are two groups of bugs:

1. peer to peer session problems - 3.03 brought much bigger stability to network issues. 3.04 claims to have improved "disappearing station" issue, which could be related with other network problems.

Added 2.2: it is too early to say, but some people report improvements. Will test tonight during busy hours;

Added 3.0: RSoD. Enough said

Added 3.01: Main issue with RSoD fixed. Huge improvement.

Added 3.02: judging from FD feedback this patch won't deliver much visibly, but should be good foundation for fixing problems in future. It has certainly improved frame rate issues, and made game more fluid. People report more crashes and strange behavior, but less rubber-banding and jittery.

Added 3.04: "disappearing station" issue should be mitigated (not fully fixed though).

2. gameplay issues - combat still goes trough balancing and improvements, especially at AI side. There has been several problems with space station docking, mostly related with pad recall. Added space station and game loop.

Added 2.2: Testers report huge improvements, combat is moving in right direction. Tweaking will continue, but I see it as long term, possibly beta goal;

Added 3.0: space station added where you can do outfitting and selling canisters, game loop persistance enabled, about 10 new canister types added, new weapons and utilities for ships added. Jumping between places are done via placeholder rotating ship, which will be replaced with hyperjump effect;

Future

Currently alpha have just one additional phase planned - number 4 with traveling and trading. This will start after major issues of phase 3 will be sorted out - mostly related with MP, as docking and outfitting itself works rather well and in my opinion there's nothing much to report there (I expect two iterations of alpha phase 3). Premium/First beta starts right after stability problems with traveling and trading are sorted out.

01.04.2014

Alpha 3.4 is now available, it should reduce the incidence of disappearing stations, so as always take a look and provide your feedback.

Michael

29.03.2014

Regular network fixes update 3.03 was delivered on Friday as usual

Elite: Dangerous Alpha 3.3 is now available and as always thanks for everyone’s feedback and reports on the previous release, it’s helped us identify a number of issues that we’ve spent the last week busy hard at work, working through them. It’s still not perfect, but it is better. We’ve addressed a lot of the issues that were causing the common symptoms for multiplayer experience and stability, enough that we’re now ready for you all to hammer the build again to see what has improved for you and to isolate remaining problems. Please make sure to report any issues through the tickets raised in the launcher and feel free to post your experiences in this thread.

Michael

21.03.2014

Michael provided us with detailed changelog for 3.02, link to ED subreddit post http://www.reddit.com/r/EliteDanger...32_incoming_actually_its_already_here/cg89hvc

Update 3.02 was just rolled out and it is best summarized in this Ashley Barley post:

The main focus of this update was to add fixes for various common crashes, as well as to implement a range of networking improvements. So specific issues, such as the station disappearing or duplicate capital ships, will still be apparent - but this was an important update in regards to the general stability of the game. If you're still experiencing issues that are not on the list of known issues though let us know, as the more information we have on these the better!

17.03.2014

First patch for ED alpha 3.0 released - version 3.01. Fixed infamous rotating ship problem, which prevented people from joining multiplayer.

14.03.2014

Alpha 3.0 will be available shortly, I've listed the changes for this build below:

Unfortunately this message is already too big, so I will post changelog to reddit for everyone to see http://www.reddit.com/r/EliteDangerous/comments/20ec8a/alpha_30_to_be_released_shortly/

With Alpha 3.0 release coming up any minute, FD just released docking video manual for 3.0 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ey22m463104

07.03.2014

Alpha 3.0 will have stats reset due of introducing persistence and game loop.

A quick heads up that Alpha 3.0 will include a reset of all stats and credits, there's a few reasons for this. The first is that there has been a whole bunch of re-balancing and more importantly there is now added persistance between the scenarios. The exciting part of this is that we now have a simple game loop in operation and we want to analyse the feedback from scratch from people playing this.

Thanks!

Michael

14.03.2014

With Alpha 3.0 release coming up any minute, FD just released docking video manual for 3.0 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ey22m463104

03.03.2014

Very interesting bit about damage model from FD dev Mark Allen:

There's no reason you can't target something that's internal, there's just going to be more stuff that your shot is going to have to get through on its way to do any damage! Yep they're buried behind a futuristic alloy, but the weapons are designed to melt/punch/tear holes in that alloy too .

which is how the code works - the modules all have a position in or on the ship, and some calculations are done based on your armour to decide if there's any penetration at all (which gets more likely as your armour gets beaten up), then how far it's likely to penetrate and which modules are along the path of that penetration and might take damage (there's several more subtle rules, but that's the broad strokes).

The state as it currently is is the ongoing balance/experimentation/ideas by design, and I've got full confidence they'll mange to find the right balance of awesome as the alpha/beta process goes on

26.02.2014

Answer to question is there difference between current 2.x release and futher 3.x release

Nothing, we are continuing to fix issues, but some problems like the networking need more than a quick fix.

Michael

25.02.2014

The next Alpha release will be 3.0, and will include docking, launching and outfitting. We’ll release a dev diary in the next couple of week to reflect on the alpha process so far and look at the next release stage in more detail, and our plan to beta. We’re aiming to release 3.0 in mid-March.

Michael

18.02.2014

Alpha release 2.2 is now live, here is the change log:

Additions/Changes

- Pilot's chair and pilot added to cockpit
- Damage to shields is scaled based on the power distribution, now defined by the shield generator item.
- OPtion to turn off shadows added.
- Updated fire damage FX.
- "You died" is now "You were killed by [CMDR name]"
- Anaconda material tweaks.
- Weapons balance tweaks.
- Added small dot to center of targeting reticles.
- Added option for logarithmic or linear scanner scaling.
- [audio] latest soundbanks - numerous fixes and mix tweaks.
- Art pass on lens flares
- Pass on class 4 A drive lens flare and lighting
- Add UI messages for cargo scoop actions
- Loading screen movie replaced with model (not final)
- Updated options - players will need to resave their options!
- Thinned targeting brackets

Crash Fixes

- Crash fix: multiplayer joining another player would cause that player to crash immediately and the new player to crash shortly after.
- Audio: Fixed crash in AudioSourceBlendRTPC when the ship is destroyed
- Help debug and recover with out crashing from using the results of a raycast that contains invalid physics objects and shapes.
- Speculative crash fix for moon.
- Fix for crashes with multiplayerand guided missiles
- Fix AudioManager hang on shut down
- Fix for crash caused by failed loads on texture resources (seen on some low end Nvidia cards)
- Authority of multiplayer scenarios leaving while other players are able to take the authority will no longer cause the remaining players to crash.
- Fix crash exiting Endless War
- Fix crash for invalid factions in Endless War
- Fix zero length vector crash when loading new scenario
- Fix for crash when second capital ship created (don't create it)
- AMD crash fix worjaround no longer needed


General Fixes

- Sparks appearing on cockpit creation fixed.
- Audio: fix assorted aspects of cargo scanner, pulse laser, rail gun, gatling gun and submunition audio.
- Added improvements and lighting to damage effects and rolling out to all ships
- Fix for DamageParticleActivity destructor assert.
- Encourage the window to go full screen as soon as we can when creating the display. Prevents a window from appearing immediately before going fullscreen.
- Fix for VFXes in FireParticleActivity.
- Fixes and performance improvements in noise generators.
- Don't include the machine name in the upnp port description: we don't need it, and it sometimes causes trouble
- Hide the desired speed indicator when flight assist is turned off.
- Updated effects used for hull damage
- Make the restored game window appear on the monitor specified in options.
- Negative indent on the message to make blocks of text easier to read.
- Impact fires don't happen on every hit, now a 0.15 chance (the pyromaniac inside me is sad )
- Added separate path, for when you are disconnected from the server, that allows the game to unload while the dialog remains on screen. This prevents you getting

killed while view the dialog and the game trying to move you into the player has died state.
- Adjustments to the radar-highlighting of things firing at player
- Automatically time out and repoll for a different server if not connected
- Updated new heavy damage FX and added it to the various prototype files.
- Right of retaliation now implemented.If attacked, the victim can legally attack and kill the aggressor, but won't collect bounty unless scanned.
- Increased the min value of the velocity overrides as a temporary fix for the drives having strange velocity alignment behaviour
- Add the collidable flag to cargo canisters so they'll collide with things that aren't ships (asteroids specifically).
- Reduce aim assist effect at longer ranges
- Added distance scaling to the pulse and rail gun impact FX
- Network replication fixes for core system, following up with specific gameplay instances
- Stats updated after scenario end rather than shut down.
- Prevent missile lock audio looping
- Optimise network replication
- Replicating variable length variables is now guaranteed to give the correct variable value.
- Fix authority conflict slowing down return to menu
- Fix for joining a multiplayer game dupe-spawning the scenario ships for multiplayer factions.
- Fix multiplayer-join dupe-spawning on free for all.
- Fix for multiplayer-join dupe-spawn for ethics.
- Fix for wrong background when player is not the authority
- Occulus shadows fixed
- Occulus targetting reticule renders at appropriate distance

Michael

17.02.2014

We have a few fixes needed for today, so we're hoping for late today or maybe tomorrow - depending on how it goes.

Michael

Alpha 3.0 isn't trading, it's docking and outfitting.

Michael

p.s. please mods keep this one alive unless we have some dev log here too I will update this thread as long as necessary.

 

[Maxeren]

Current state

We are at alpha 2.01 (also called 2.1) multiplayer combat test. There are both gameplay and code bugs reported. Currently there are three groups of bugs:
a) connection issues - mostly due of routers not supporting game correctly, but also very specific configuration issues. Judging from feedback those aren't that many;
b) peer to peer session problems - either indestructible NPCs circling around, or human players not visible to others, or indestructible too. Lot of crashes very shortly in scenarios (20 - 30 secs); Usually during peak playing hours (7 - 9 PM UK time);
c) gameplay issues - mostly related with balancing and tweaking weapons, shields and interface for better performance and giving fighting chance to players;

About 70 known issues are identified (from both alpha stages), about 8 of them are currently marked as fixed for upcoming 2.2 release, judging from information, mostly peer to peer problems.

17.02.2014



p.s. please mods keep this one alive unless we have some dev log here too I will update this thread as long as necessary.

Thx for the update Pecisk.. nice to get some news on the progress/buggyness of the alpha for us beta backers

 

[Luniticisi]

Thanks for this Pecisk, I was just about to ask if we could get some info on the current state of alpha .... great job!

 

[M Pat]

Great idea Pecisk, really appreciate the info!

 

[Philip Coutts]

Here's a very brief rundown of the weapons we have been testing (only my opinion of course )

Gatling Guns – Fairly low powered but quite effective. A must for those sneaking about doing some silent running. Drawback is there’s a loading time between magazines and I suppose you could eventually run out of ammo if you weren’t careful. Also has the most awesome sound effect!

Gimballed Pulse / beam laser – Gimballed weapons are great, easy to use and have a wide targeting area. They are not the most powerful and can be confused by silent running where they can’t lock on because of the lack of a heat signature.

Pulse lasers – An old favourite, require a decent level of accuracy due to the pulsing but do a fair bit of damage, don’t overheat too badly either. The exception I’ve found is tri-burst pulse lasers which I think are tragically pants!

Beam lasers – My favourite for general play, powerful enough to do a lot of damage and they don’t heat up to badly (especially if you divert power to weapons). These will reduce a sidewinder to smoke in a few seconds.

Rail guns – Require great accuracy but are very hard hitting. Seem to be very expensive in-game as well. Great against larger targets but against a sidewinder far harder to use.

Lasers are available in different classes and that signifies the damage they do and also the time it takes for them to overheat. i.e. the more powerful the quicker they overheat. You also get some mixed load-outs combining lasers and Gatling’s etc. which can be quite handy. At the moment we don’t know what the weight of the different weapons are but I presume you will have to take that into account in the final game.

 

[SAB380]

So I can't get access to the alpha forum so can't see what problems other are experiencing. .....have almost finished the single player combat scenarios.

Was wondering why the multiplayer option (the bar to click and start it from menu) is bright red.

I figured I had to successfully complete the single player scenarios first.

We are at alpha 2.01 (also called 2.1) multiplayer combat test. There are both gameplay and code bugs reported. Currently there are three groups of bugs:
a) connection issues - mostly due of routers not supporting game correctly, but also very specific configuration issues. Judging from feedback those aren't that many;
b) peer to peer session problems - either indestructible NPCs circling around, or human players not visible to others, or indestructible too. Lot of crashes very shortly in scenarios (20 - 30 secs); Usually during peak playing hours (7 - 9 PM UK time);
c) gameplay issues - mostly related with balancing and tweaking weapons, shields and interface for better performance and giving fighting chance to players;

So I must be the group having connection issues ?
Or is there some reason other reason the multiplayer bar is bright red and unclickable ?

 

[Cmdr Eagleboy]

So I must be the group having connection issues ?
Or is there some reason other reason the multiplayer bar is bright red and unclickable ?

Yeah, you have connection issues, there are good detailed info how to solve these problems on Alpha forum. To get access, please contact directly with Ashley to get forum access.

In meantime while waiting for forum access, I suggest to check if UPnP is enabled and supported by your router. If it's disabled, try to enable it, restart router and try to run ED again.

 

[SAB380]

Yeah, you have connection issues, there are good detailed info how to solve these problems on Alpha forum. To get access, please contact directly with Ashley to get forum access.

In meantime while waiting for forum access, I suggest to check if UPnP is enabled and supported by your router. If it's disabled, try to enable it, restart router and try to run ED again.

ha thanks for the quick answer man, much appreciated !

I only started alpha 2 days ago and hadn't yet started wondering why multiplayer wouldn't work ..... have completed 7 out of 9 single missions so far .... would have been confused when that bar didn't start working on its own when I finished all the single missions

 

[mcfetti]

Thanks a lot for the update Pecisk. As a Beta backer its nice to know how things are progressing

 

[Fermats Folly]

Brilliant, thread - thank you.

Do we know if the imminent build Michael referred to is just a fault fix build or the next stage of Alpha? (trading or outfitting)

 

[Michael Brookes]

Brilliant, thread - thank you.

Do we know if the imminent build Michael referred to is just a fault fix build or the next stage of Alpha? (trading or outfitting)

It's a point release so mostly fixes and tweaks.

Michael

 

[Cmdr Eagleboy]

Brilliant, thread - thank you.

Do we know if the imminent build Michael referred to is just a fault fix build or the next stage of Alpha? (trading or outfitting)

It is 2.2, second patch for multiplayer alpha phase. At this point it is very important because there was no updates previous week and FD worked to get big fixes in (mostly related with peer to peer session judging from updated 'known issues' post in alpha forum).

 

[Komemiute]

You must spread some Reputation around before giving it to Pecisk again.

There... so you know...

 

[Fermats Folly]

Thanks again to Michael and Pecisk - good to know.

I'm toying with joining Alpha, but need my new machine to arrive first!

 

[Maxeren]

I would join alpha in a heartbeat if i had the money to shell out, but sadly i don't

 

[kilvenny]

Many thanks to the OP for this. Best piece of info we have had yet. It would be great if it was updated regularly so we knew how many issues were outstanding.
As the outstanding starts to continuously drop that's going to indicate we are moving towards Alpha 3.0.

 

[metatheurgist]

And apparently there will be 4 Alpha phases.

It's not correct, beta starts when alpha is done, we have two more alpha phases to complete before that happens.
Michael

 

[Cmdr Eagleboy]

We got clarification on what next alpha phases will be - so next one will be docking and outfitting, and last one will be trading and traveling. Post updated accordingly.

Alpha 3.0 isn't trading, it's docking and outfitting.

Michael

 

[Fermats Folly]

So some more weeks before a starmap is needed

Not that I'm expecting the whole galaxy in Alpha, but more than one star is needed for hyperspace!

 

[Mr_Jim]

More of this kind of information for us backers that aint part in alpha-testing, please!