Mainframe Defenders News

This small patch aims to adjust the balance for higher difficulty, where reducing armor becomes more relevant. I've also changed some unit upgrades to add armor penetration or armor breach stacks instead. Also, you will find a new loadout for the Arawen.

New Content:
- Arawen B: Rend Cannon, Repair Gel, and Nullifier.

Item Balance:
- Rapier: +25 armor penetration.
- Hoplite: +20 armor penetration.
- Laser Drill: now applies 10 stacks of Armor Breachper shot.
- Magnetic Cannon: now applies 3 stacks of Armor Breach per shot.
- Slasher: now applies 3 stacks of Armor Breach per shot.
- Morana: now applies 10 stacks of Armor Breach per shot.
- Phase Cannon: now applies 7 stacks of Armor Breach per shot.
- Laser Cannon: now applies 5 stacks of Armor Breach per shot.

Unit upgrades:
- Huntsman: A new T2 upgrade that adds armor penetration.
- Champion: A new T2 upgrade that adds armor penetration.
- Paladin: New T2 upgrade that adds armor penetration.
- Viper: A new T1 improvement. Applies 4 Armor Breach stacks per shot and -15 max. heat.
- Viper: A new T3 upgrade that applies 15 Armor Breach for non-burst weapons.
- Arawen: T2 armor upgrade no longer adds +5 heat per turn.
- All T3 armor upgrades now give 8 armor.

Enemies:
- The Enhancer cannot add more than one item for a unit and can no longer add a Nullifier.

Bug fixes and improvements:
- Escape can now be used to exit some menus and open the in-game menu.
- Fixed a bug when heat damage was still displayed despite the unit having Skadi equipped.

In this patch, I tried to stave off some obvious choices, such as Repair Kit and items and upgrades that gave a second move. Also, some weak items were strengthened, and the starting items of some units were changed (for which the new items were added). All these measures will make builds more diverse.

Item Balance:
- Description of the Razor now explains that damage to itself is reduced by armor.
- Autocannon: heat increased to 20.
- Plasma Cannon: heat is reduced to 10.
- Autocannon: damage changed to 7-9.
- Plasma Sniper Rifle: critical damage increased to 35.
- Broadsword: heat increased to 25.
- Armored Chassis: now does not add heat per turn.
- Heavy Armor: now gives +12 armor, and reduces max. heat by 25 instead of 2 move range penalty.
- Heavy Reactor: now reduces max. heat by 25 instead of 2 move range penalty.
- ExposedReactor: now reduces max. health by 15.
- Repair Kit: use cost increased to 2 AP.
- FC-31 Carbine: damage increased to 15-17.
- T3 Mechanic upgrade: provides only 10 bonus damage for Internal Damage.
- T2 Mechanic upgrade: now repairs 2-3 hull in a radius.
- AP Ammo: now penetrates 10/20 armor.
- Lightweight Propulsion: no longer reduces heat.
- Ray Gun: no longer gives movement bonus, minimum damage increased by 2.
- Scouting Equipment: now provides +4 secondary move instead of +6, and also takes 25 max. heat.
- T1 Oppressor upgrade: now applies a reduced amount of Corrosion from non-critical shots.
- All items and upgrades that give range now have drawbacks.
- Rend Cannon: heat is reduced to 20, and armor penetration is increased to 15/25.
- interference Matrix: now reduces the damage of enemies by 35%.

Enemies:
- Acarid damage now increases by 2 after each attack, up to 6.
- Overlord and Improved Acarid: damage now increases by 3 after each attack, up to 9.
- The maximum heat of T2 units is increased.

New Content:
- 2 new items: Cobra, Repair Matrix.

Unit loadouts:
- Oppressor B now has Autocannon, Liquid Cooling, and Acid Infuser as starting items.
- Mechanic B now has a Rend Cannon, Scavenger Nanites and a Repair Matrix (new) as starting items.
- Atlas B now has Cobra (new) and B-81 Reactor as starting items.

Bug fixes and improvements:
- Fixed bug when Propulsion Damage was affecting a unit 1 turn more than intended.
- Space now allows you to end the turn.
- Added new option to skip all menu animations.

I am excited to announce that Mainframe Defenders is released! This was a long journey that started with a simple question: can I make items in X-Com more fun? From there, it grew far beyond what I've originally intended. And hopefully, it won't stop there, so stay tuned for possible free content updates in the future!
If you really liked the game, help us to spread the word =D

Hi everyone!
I've been busy making final preparations for the game release. This should be a final patch before the release. Here are the notes:
Demo and full game:
- Added in-game patch notes menu.
- The "Propulsion damaged" effect now prevents any secondary moves.
- Enemies with heat-inducing attacks now prefer targets with a lot of heat.
- Acarids, Repairmen, and Sharpshooters now have a secondary move.
- Enemies can now retreat after shooting, preferring positions behind a cover.
- Numerous item balance changes.
- Unit balance changes. Enemies gain more stats on Hard and Very Hard.
- Void tiles are now more distinct from the fog of war.
- You can lock up to 2 items in fabricator (locked items stay when the shop updates).
- Units that were destroyed during missions are now considered "damaged". Damaged units will only have 50% hull but can be repaired for 50 matter.

The full game only:
- Hard and Very Hard now have increased rewards for progression.
- Enhancer items are now more powerful.

Hello and welcome to the next short Mainframe Defenders development diary.
Unlocking new items is fun, but playing with the same units can become boring pretty quickly. So, for the full version of the game, I've decided to add the unlocking mechanic for new units and presets. Unlocked units can offer either completely new upgrades or focus on alternative builds for existing ones.



An example of a unit built around a specific strategy is the reworked Vindicator. His set of upgrades makes it possible to use weapons with cooldown more often and adds bonus damage for each weapon with cooldown he has. This opens up a unique playstyle that allows the Vindicator to use a different weapon each turn efficiently.



The unlock gauge is filled after each game. However, the gauge becomes more difficult to fill with each unlock. In total, at least 9 units will be unlockable upon Mainframe Defenders release!