Improved Extermination, New Game Settings and Better Map Generation

[p]We’ve been hard at work on the full version of Astro Protocol, adding new factions, units, anomalies and technologies. These additions are not available in the demo but update 0.18 brings a big wave of improvements for the demo as well.[/p][h2]Extermination Now Takes One Turn[/h2][p]Exterminating a planet used to be an instant action and didn't have any cost or drawback while colonizing cost you a ship and energy. This incentivised attacking planets and made any hole in defence very costly.[/p][p]This update changes extermination so that the ship must bombard the planet until the start of your next turn and cannot counter-attack during this period. If the ship is destroyed, the extermination attempt fails.[/p][p]This change makes extermination more tactical and increases counter-play opportunities for opponents.[/p][h2]New Game Settings[/h2][p]This update adds new settings to control over how each match plays:[/p]

• [p]Added setting to start a game without minor factions.[/p]
• [p]Added game length setting.[/p]
• [p]Added possibility to randomize game settings and faction.[/p]

[h2]Map Generation Improvements[/h2]

• [p]More variance in player starting positions.[/p]
• [p]Medium-level anomalies can appear anywhere instead of only in the center of the map.[/p]
• [p]Less stars, gas giants, and asteroids for more scarcity and room for strategic plays.[/p]
• [p]Added randomized minor faction spawn distance from the center.[/p]

[h2]Improved AI & More Defensive Minor Factions[/h2]

• [p]AI now makes better decisions in tech research, ship construction, and anomaly rewards.[/p]
• [p]Minor factions now behave more defensively, making them harder to wipe out early.[/p]
• [p]AI uses more efficient movement and production logic.[/p]
• [p]Early-game AI shipbuilding has been improved for stronger openings.[/p]

[h2]Performance & UX Improvements[/h2][p]A large part of this update focuses on speed and quality-of-life improvements:[/p][h3]Performance[/h3]

• [p]Faster turn-ending calculations.[/p]
• [p]Better research placement performance.[/p]
• [p]Optimized map rendering performance especially for large maps.[/p]

[h3]UI / UX[/h3]

• [p]New tooltip style[/p]
• [p]Smaller selected-ship panel and ship tooltips[/p]
• [p]Input icons added[/p]
• [p]Game settings now save automatically[/p]
• [p]Improved end game menu[/p]
• [p]Close menus when placing ships, stations and techs[/p]
• [p]Improved anomaly tooltips[/p]

[h2]Fixes[/h2]

• [p]Fixed minor faction relation visualization[/p]
• [p]Fixed tutorial texts[/p]
• [p]Fixed navigation crash[/p]

[h2]⚠️ Important Note: Your Settings Have Been Reset[/h2][p]Due to internal technical changes, your video, audio, and gameplay settings have been reset.
Please reconfigure them after updating the game.[/p][h2]December Playtest - Sign Up Now[/h2][p]We’re preparing a new playtest in December. If you would like to experience the content available in the full version before the game is released, sign up here: https://nullvectorstudios.com/playtest[/p][p][/p][p]Thank you all for playing, supporting development, and giving feedback.
See you in the weekly challenge — and among the stars![/p]