Patch Notes Update 1.4.01 update

[CMDR Pugwash]

Hey, the squeak in my chair has gone. Thanks FD!

 

[sirpepstench]

I was one of the earlier players of Entropia Universe (called Project Entropia (PE) back then), joining the game in its first year, and I can't help comparing the current development progress of E: D with the development progress of PE all those years ago.

PE had limited content, what content it did have was very 'samey', many of the lauded features were bugged beyond belief (personal storage being the one I remember the most - I lost real money in that game because of the bugged storage system), the game servers fell over on a regular basis, new patches just added to the bug list, and the game forums and in-game chat channels were full of people saying the game was dead before it had even had a chance to grow. Much of the content originally advertised took, in some cases, years to appear (usually with a whole new slew of bugs), and even when new content was added it was invariably only in the form of 'placeholder' mechanics that gradually got added to. And then in 2009 the developers behind the game adopted a new game engine and the process all started again pretty much from scratch.

I still have an Entropia account, and still boot the game up from time to time, and guess what. It's still going strong. The game today is unrecognisable when compared to the game ten years ago, and for the most part is a much better game, but it still has its problems. There are still parts of the game that exhibit buggy behaviour, there are still some features that don't work as intended or feel a bit like 'placeholders', much of the content has been nerfed and buffed back-and-forth a number of times, and there are still naysayers and complainers populating the forums and chat with their naysaying and complaining. But it's *still* going strong despite all of that, and the developers are *still* adding content on a fairly regular basis.

If E: D comes even close to following a similar development path then the bugs and issues we're dealing with now will fade into the background soon enough. A whole new bunch of bugs and issues will crop up as new content is added (and there will be complaints and naysaying aplenty) but those too will go away. We may even experience the phenomena of some features being removed or disabled, but you can be pretty much be sure that when they get put back in they'll almost certainly be better than before they went away. Things will get nerfed and buffed over and over again, and there will always be people who take such activity personally. But the game will continue to grow, the developers will continue to wow us with shiny new things, and all being well, ten years from now the game will be totally unrecognisable to those of us who are playing right now.

So, TL;DR, give the developers time do what they need to do and until then just accept that along the way some things may not go as smoothly as you might like. I'm pretty sure that those of us who stick with it will eventually benefit from the development process in ways that we can't even begin to imagine right now.

A big rep for posting this breath of fresh air and positive outlook

I also played PE in the early years and have seen what online games have to go through over time as they evolve. I've loved playing ED so much and look forward to many years of new content and planets exploration... what are we going to find?

 

[Faded Glory]

Haven't managed to dig up the one where they asked yet.

This is an early report of this behaviour: https://forums.frontier.co.uk/showthread.php?t=149949

Thanks. I'll keep my eyes open for this, I really never thought it was a bug, just the way the game is designed, but as I said, I don't believe I've ever had NPCs already populating a SC instance. I'll go into SC, and a variable amount of time later a variable number of NPCs will spawn immediately around me then magically disperse across the scanner...

 

[DAOWAce]

Anti aliasing?

^

SMAA specifically.

52 pages of threads, can't read through all of them, though I see the hyperspace travel issue being mentioned in the last page, which is what I want to complain about.

I know that's a server issue, so whatever was done with the servers (screwup that happened during the exploration server upgrade?) between 1.3 and 1.4's release has caused this issue. That, or it's just overloaded by the playerbase, which doesn't make much sense..

 

[wstephenson]

Thanks. I'll keep my eyes open for this, I really never thought it was a bug, just the way the game is designed, but as I said, I don't believe I've ever had NPCs already populating a SC instance. I'll go into SC, and a variable amount of time later a variable number of NPCs will spawn immediately around me then magically disperse across the scanner...

Without disagreeing with you that ships appear on your six and spread out, the "no ships when I enter a system" could be an artefact of the way the scanner works in SC - anything within 40 seconds (IIRC) travel time of you is visible on the scanner. Thus when you enter the system, at a low velocity, your scanner range is quite low (unless an object happens to be heading right for for you), but as you accelerate, you become able to perceive ships further away.

 

[Faded Glory]

Without disagreeing with you that ships appear on your six and spread out, the "no ships when I enter a system" could be an artefact of the way the scanner works in SC - anything within 40 seconds (IIRC) travel time of you is visible on the scanner. Thus when you enter the system, at a low velocity, your scanner range is quite low (unless an object happens to be heading right for for you), but as you accelerate, you become able to perceive ships further away.

Yes, that's possible, but I don't think that's what's happening. Essentially, I'll engage SC, and once the 'loading screen' is done, I'll see stars /planetary bodies, and then at some point later, a random number of NPCs will spawn almost as if they are coming out of my ship (in other words, they spawn from the triangle that represents my ship on the scanner). I will get the lights and the sound effect of an NPC spawning, and after that they morph out across the scanner, traveling the distance of the scanner in a matter of seconds.

I wonder if this could be another symptom of network issues, as I also notice that other ships are very often jerky on the scanner, and will sometimes zip from side to side, different to how they do when they buzz you if they are going to interdict you, or are trying to get your attention (alternate mission offers). I always assumed that all NPC activity was actually local on my computer.

 

[Kingtutuk]

Greetings Commanders...

Don't worry, your eyes aren't playing tricks on you! Here is the patch notes for tomorrow's update. The update is due to go live from approximately 10:30am BST and will last for roughly an hour and half.


Patch notes are as follows...

All platforms

• CQC Matchmaking Improvements
• Improvements to interdictions
• New Mission Templates
• Fix for multiple fines for the same illicit cargo in the same system
• Fix for Federal Assault Ship and Gunship Ranks
• Speculative fix for mining hopper with unallocated ore

Xbox One Specific

• Fix for GFX settings
• Kepler Eye fix for multiple discoveries
• Upload App now supported
• Updated User Guide
• Non supported language resources removed (fixes issue with NXOE Preview)
• Improvements to our package builder to reduce update size

OSX specific - Updated

• OSX: Added support for Retina native resolutions. Users of Retina machines may need to reboot their Macs to see this change take effect.
• OSX: the Mac client now has three ‘window modes’, like the Windows client. FULLSCREEN and BORDERLESS are both full-screen modes, the only difference being that FULLSCREEN now sets the display’s resolution to match the game’s. The previous Mac FULLSCREEN mode (which did not set the display’s resolution) is now known as BORDERLESS. On Retina displays, high resolution should be available in all three modes.
• OSX: Fix for asteroids being distorted on radar on AMD GPUs

Thanks,
Zac

Fixes not working as intended eg interdiction with imperial clipper a2 interdictor and pulled a deadly dropship from supercruise but lost a harmless sidewinder ?
This has happened frequently since 1.4. Before 1.4 could predict who i could successfully interdict based on ship type and rating but now seems just random and unpredictable.
Some players might like this form of unpredictability but most i would think would like to assess a situation before interdicting and making an informed decision based on ship type and rating considering you take damage for failed interdictions ?

 

[Gastion]

I wholeheartedly disagree. I do not want to PvP but I do want a whole, challenging experience. I do not want to be treated different than any other NPC in the game, I do not want it to be easier for me to interdict an NPC than it is for them to interdict me. I want it to scale off their rating and the quality of my equipment (1.4), if you are going to interdict mostly harmless, sure, have fun, it isn't hard if you use the tools you've been given. If you're going to go after dangerous and deadly NPCs, buckle up. If you want to try to interdict in a space whale, good luck, otherwise get the proper tool for the job (the same way you get the proper tool to trade or pirate hunt or explore).
-
I want to struggle to interdict, I want to struggle to evade, I want it to be a game. It isn't a game when I can get out of interdictions eating a piece of toast while watching Netflix, it isn't immersive or challenging or rewarding. Interdiction from high ranked NPCs should be hard, the game already babysits us by protecting players from NPCs that are much higher ranked than them. Lets not nerf one of the main, potentially challenging and rewarding mechanics involved in interacting with NPCs so that it's less a gameplay element, and more a colorful way to select which NPC we want to kill from a menu.
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Fitting an FSDi should not be an "I win" button for deciding which NPC interactions you want to have.

You are not an NPC - it means Non-Player Character. You are a player.

If you want a struggle, and want to evade, and if you want a game, then you could get all those experiences from combat itself rather than some tangential 80s added-on mini-game. The mechanic is not challenging or rewarding, it's tedious, frustrating, time-wasting, irritating, annoying, arbitrary, inconsistant, bug-ridden, and infuriating. Apart from that it's excellent.

 

[horizone]

My biggest issue is the SC framerate issue. It is especially bad in VR but I understand it has also been widely reported to be affecting non VR players too. The rest of the problems are merely annoyances that will no doubt be addressed sooner or later.

Yep, same for me, the biggest issue from my perspective. VR perspective. I updated my bug report https://forums.frontier.co.uk/showthread.php?t=188548 with a video of the problem https://youtu.be/Ld08wpFL49A framerate starts dropping at 1:30. Thought I'd notify you and others here who might want to compare bugs

 

[blubberman98]

Thanks for the update, this game is an incredible amount of fun. Im assuming you guys already know about the whole teleporting pirates bug, right? Like if a group of 3 or 4 AI pirates follows you to an RES, and you frame shift away and go to a new location, only to have them teleport 300 meters behind you and demand whats in you empty cargo hold, then open fire. Kind of annoying, but a rare bug that doesn't retract too much from the game. Looking forward to Horizons!

 

[Torchie_2012]

Hi Folks

Just reported a bug with the frameshift feature as it wouldn't disengage in fact my keyboard stopped had to exit via the xbox controller but restarted and seemed to work not sure if I played too much today lol. it has just downloaded the patch will look again later time for sleep

take care folks need to update signature as I am using Windows 10

 

[Faded Glory]

You are not an NPC - it means Non-Player Character. You are a player.

If you want a struggle, and want to evade, and if you want a game, then you could get all those experiences from combat itself rather than some tangential 80s added-on mini-game. The mechanic is not challenging or rewarding, it's tedious, frustrating, time-wasting, irritating, annoying, arbitrary, inconsistant, bug-ridden, and infuriating. Apart from that it's excellent.

Sadly, I have to agree with you...

Yesterday, having tried some interdictions in an FDL, I thought it was improved, thought I might even be able to live with it. Today, in an Imperial Courier, which should by all accounts be a more effective ship for interdicting in, I failed miserably. The mini game was back to it's erratic old self, it was frankly almost impossible to stay on the target, and when I finally did get back on my bar never recovered.

Rep incoming for your excellent description of the interdiction mini game, it's the only thing that has made me smile since I started playing today.

 

[MasterW3]

Solution for the 1,ooo,ooo+ missions...
ANY of these missions over 1 million, have a unique flag.
if you have any missions with a unique flag, you cannot GET a unique mission.
so simple.. one at a time folks...
problem solved, yet still initiated, and nerfed, since they can only DO one at a time.

 

[ashton7771]

When will you fix the mining bug?

 

[Six6VI]

*Catches up on 52 pages of mostly complaints about the latest non-patch...*

Erm, guess it's back to Minecraft for another couple of weeks then. Shame...

(Was loving ED until 1.4, absolutely gutted I can't even be bothered to load it)

 

[shadowwar]

When oh when are you FD going to fix the bug where it takes ages and ages and ages to jump from normal space into SC. this is a game breaker for me and many other people here. It only appeared after 1.4 was issued. Please fix this crap bug!

 

[Ursagi]

When oh when are you FD going to fix the bug where it takes ages and ages and ages to jump from normal space into SC. this is a game breaker for me and many other people here. It only appeared after 1.4 was issued. Please fix this crap bug!

I've never seen this, nor 1.3 no 1.4 It takes me couple of seconds to jump out from SC.

 

[EternalHaze]

Is it safe to explore yet?

 

[ExRex]

In 1.3 you had to mine while constantly assigning fragments to the bins in the refinery --> underscored a selective mining strategy and as small a refinery as possible.
In 1.4 the refinery was fully automated but assigned any fragment to any empty bin --> underscored a strip mining strategy and as large a refinery as possible
In 1.4.1 the fragments often, but not always (often if you have 1+ empty bin in the refinery, less often if you have a large refinery), need to be assigned to their bins --> underscored a selective mining strategy and a medium sized 7-8 bin refinery.

For my personal mining needs, the 1.4.1 update hits the sweet spot as I am in a mining clipper with a 2A refinery.

What is the Mining fix compromise please? I dearly want to go back to some peaceful mining!

Thanks

 

[wstephenson]

Yes, that's possible, but I don't think that's what's happening. Essentially, I'll engage SC, and once the 'loading screen' is done, I'll see stars /planetary bodies, and then at some point later, a random number of NPCs will spawn almost as if they are coming out of my ship (in other words, they spawn from the triangle that represents my ship on the scanner). I will get the lights and the sound effect of an NPC spawning, and after that they morph out across the scanner, traveling the distance of the scanner in a matter of seconds.

I wonder if this could be another symptom of network issues, as I also notice that other ships are very often jerky on the scanner, and will sometimes zip from side to side, different to how they do when they buzz you if they are going to interdict you, or are trying to get your attention (alternate mission offers). I always assumed that all NPC activity was actually local on my computer.

It looks like tweening - the NPCs are instantiated at your coordinates, then their intended coordinates are set on the next update and the game tweens them from one to the other. Normally the difference should be so small that you shouldn't notice tweening occurring.

NPCs can be owned and controlled by any player in your p2p session, and this can cause them to move jerkily.