ZEPHON News

The sixth playable demo of ZEPHON will be available from April 4th (@ 12 pm CEST) to April 9th (@ 12 pm CEST) and from April 25th (@ 12 pm CEST) to April 30th (@ 12 pm CEST) on Steam.

The biggest change in this demo is the additions of the Honorable Aristocrat leader. See the full changes below.

Come join us in celebration and let us know what you think of ZEPHON.

https://store.steampowered.com/app/1481170/ZEPHON/

This is an early look at an in-development alpha version of the game. As such, there will be bugs, imbalances and missing assets.

The demo includes single player and multiplayer, but is limited to up to four player on a medium-sized map. 5 different leaders are available for selection and 3 NPC factions are present. Research progress is limited to the first 4 tech tiers.

The full version will contain larger maps, advanced game setup options, 8 leaders, over 50 units spread across 10 tiers of research, more terrain features and quests, an end-game grand finale, unlockable game modifiers, achievements, multiple languages as well as full workshop support.

[h3]Changes in Demo 6[/h3]
## New

* Added Honorable Aristocrat leader: *“Oh, you simply must try one of these. Deviled Abkluth eyeggs, my chef pulled the spines by hand. Eine Delikatesse, I won’t take no for an answer!”*
* Added The Summoning quest.
* The AI now condems certain diplomatic relationships with a third party based on their own relationship with the third party.
* Breaking peace, a trade agreement or an alliance within 10 turns of entering it now makes a player Untrustworthy for 20 turns.
* AI players condemn Untrustworthy players.
* Select unit and select city hints now mention the player name (useful if color blind).

## General
* Don’t allow disbanding, equipping or unequipping units you’re not owner of.
* First contact now also triggers when an outpost or city tile of another player is revealed.
* Blink incoming call so it's harder to miss.

## Balance
* Increased research costs by approximately 50%.

## Bug Fixes
* Adjusted Vulkan device scoring to use order of devices as tiebreaker for otherwise equally scored devices.
* Changed normal texture buffer format for wider hardware support.
* Make sure player influence amount is always shown in the Concordat shop, even if the player name is very long.
* Fixed Cr'la's Gambit not always sacrificing one model.
* Fixed river resource bonuses not showing on the tile hint.
* Fixed double movement from assault transports.
* Fixed Pathcutter applying permanently instead of 1 turn.
* Fixed percentage bonuses of certain player traits applying twice on certain outposts.
* Fixed temporary weapon traits like Low Power not showing on clients in multiplayer.
* Ending turn declines all calls.
* Fixed diplomacy actions that do not require accepting call sometimes not getting through.
* Fixed not being able to call someone while there are pending calls.
* Fixed Bunker sounds.
* Fixed destroyed cities not exploding for clients in multiplayer.
* XML parser support for escaping < and > with \.

The fifth playable demo of ZEPHON will be available from February 12th (@ 12 pm CEST) to February 19th (@ 12 pm CEST) on Steam.

The biggest changes in this demo are the additions of the multiplayer mode, Furtive Tribunal leader, Anchorite NPC faction and tier 4 technologies. See the full changes below.

Come join us in celebration and let us know what you think of ZEPHON.

https://store.steampowered.com/app/1481170/ZEPHON/

This is an early look at an in-development alpha version of the game. As such, there will be bugs, imbalances and missing assets.

The demo includes single player and multiplayer, but is limited to up to four player on a medium-sized map. 4 different leaders are available for selection and 3 NPC factions are present. Research progress is limited to the first 4 tech tiers.

The full version will contain larger maps, advanced game setup options, 8 leaders, over 50 units spread across 10 tiers of research, more terrain features and quests, an end-game grand finale, unlockable game modifiers, achievements, multiple languages as well as full workshop support.

[h3]Changes in Demo 5[/h3]
## New
* Leaders now have a path affinity which determines their starting units and research tree.
* Added Furtive Tribunal leader: *“Bright stars shine so sweet—but bright stars die first. In the long tomb, blinded, we felt the aria of the dark stars, who live forever. Now our only taste is for their harmonies.”*
* Added Anchorite NPC: *“To travel three millennia. To see Kin as horrors. To drink poison from your hands. Yet cannot but love you.”*
* Added tier 4 technologies.
* Added new technologies to tiers 1 through 3.
* Added multiplayer mode.
* Added The Dream and The Sky, Fallen quests.
* Added new unbranched research complete illustration.
* Vegetation shadows now move with the wind.
* Overhauled save and load game screens to be easier to use and show more information.
* Added Mute In Background audio setting.
* Added network stats to the performance display.

## General
* Medium map size can now be selected in the demo.
* Up to 3 AI leaders can now be added in the demo.
* Teams and colors can now be selected in the demo.
* Expedition Outfitter effect now shows on tiles where it would trigger.
* Buying and selling resources is now done in stacks of 5 instead of 10.
* Unit overlay health bars are now fully transparent again below maximum.
* Rewritten many diplomacy dialogue lines.
* AI now buys and sells resources.
* Improved AI item usage.
* Improved random number generation.
* Improved performance.

## Balance
* Flying units now affect and are affected only by other flying units' zone of control.
* Non-flying units can now pass through enemy flying units.
* Increased starting algae and chips from 10 to 20.
* Reduced Speciment Containment research per kill from experience from 4 to 2.
* Increased Abkhan respawn from 10 to 20 turns.
* Increased Survival Training experience from 6 to 9.
* Removed hero production level scaling.

## Bug Fixes
* Fixed being able to communicate with defeated players.
* Fixed not getting rewards from killing Abkhan when using Erelim Assassin's Assassinate ability.
* Fixed Expedition Outfitter not working.
* Fixed being able to use Data Hack on non-enemies.

The fourth playable demo of ZEPHON will be available from October 25th (@ 12 pm CEST) to November 22nd (@ 12 pm CEST) on Steam.

The biggest changes in this demo are the additions of the ZEPHON NPC faction, 2 new neutral units and 3 new quests. See the full changes below.

Come join us in celebration and let us know what you think of ZEPHON.

https://store.steampowered.com/app/1481170/ZEPHON/

This is an early look at an in-development alpha version of the game. As such, there will be bugs, imbalances and missing assets.

The demo is limited to single player against two opponents on a small map. 3 leaders are available for selection and 2 NPC factions are present. Research progress is limited to the first 3 tech tiers.

The full version will contain co-op and pvp multiplayer, larger maps, advanced world generation parameters, 8 leaders, 3 NPC factions, over 50 units spread across 10 tiers of research, more terrain features and quests, an end-game grand finale, unlockable game modifiers, achievements, multiple languages as well as full workshop support.

[h3]Changes in Demo 4[/h3]
## New
* Added ZEPHON NPC faction: *“Communication channel established to ZEPHON-3. How may I help you?”*
* Added Dreameater neutral unit: Large hovering creature that reduces enemy morale and takes control of low morale enemies.
* Added Shoch'itris Lair neutral unit: Large biological structure that breeds Deformities.
* Added The Great Hunt, Black Site and Who Was Thursday quests.
* Show attack area when holding shift with unit selected, or when hovering over a weapon or weapon ability. Enable in settings to always show without holding shift.
* Unit overlays now show darkened out bars for missing health and morale.
* Added additional liked and disliked diplomacy dialogue.

## General
* Units in transports are now cycled to like all other units.
* Volcanos now block vision.
* Reduced forest growth chance in swamp from 5% to 3%.
* The tile acquisition radius of native cities now grows with their population.
* Reduced AI attack score against summons.
* Heartless Artificer AI now uses Foundation of Blood and Quench Resistance.
* Improved diplomacy behavior for accepting gifts, paying tribute and paying for deals.
* Diplomacy actions now show when instigated by a third party.
* Unit groups with appear animations now no longer appear fully simultaneously.
* Left click in empty space or right click anywhere to deselect player in the communications screen.
* Researching technology can now be right clicked to show details in compendium.
* Silence Between Tracks setting now goes in steps of 10 seconds from 0 to 240, defaulting to 120.
* Moved Show Cliff Highlights and Show Grid to general settings.
* Renamed Housing to Habitat.
* Pathfinder performance improvements.
* Minor GUI tweaks.

## Balance
* Reduced Deformities group size from 6 to 5.
* Increased Abkhan Bite damage from 8 to 12.
* Increased Frost Breath damage from 2 to 3.
* Increased Malakim Destroyers hitpoints from 12 to 18.
* Changed Cicadas from +50% healing rate to max 0% healing rate.

## Bug Fixes
* Fixed Undying healing the transport instead of the unit that has the trait.
* Fixed Distorted Lens not working.
* Fixed diplomacy deals not showing result when demanding payment for deal.
* Fixed regen showing over units even when they are at full hitpoints.
* Fixed building effects like smoke to not be removed instantly upon city destruction.
* Fixed hero overlay being prevented from refresh when leveling up an ability (after getting a level from nearby enemy death) due to superfluous attribute updated messages.
* Fixed an error in the calculation of light volumes.
* Fixed dust not showing when units are moving.
* Fixed dust showing when Aegyllan Worms are tunneling.
* Fixed Chieftess headquarters having no lights.