Ticket #1572 QOL Numpad keys default for camera movement
Ticket #1559 PD Weapon size and cost calculation fixes
Ticket #1547 QOL Tactical chase camera toggle for selected ship
Ticket #1573 Synth multiple capitol fix
Ticket #1575 QOL- Population Tooltip breakdown formatting changes
Ticket #1576 Losing Galactic Council results in victory fix
Ticket #1577 Espionage sabotage not affecting capitols and non-support ship fix
Note: Prior saves are not compatible with this version.
Lord of Rigel - Roundup #31
Greetings Lords of Rigel!
We’re entering into Early Access 2.
Over the coming weeks the last two playable species the Tulocks and Synth will be added to the game. The Tulocks can live in nearly any environment and do not have food production. The Tulocks are also repulsive, and don’t engage in diplomacy the same way as other species. The Synth are a mechanical species and consume industry instead of food. They also begin as exiles from their home galaxy with a larger starting fleet but needing to colonize a new homeworld. The Synth have major research bonuses and also the creative trait that means they receive all technological applications at once. Gigantic galaxies (512 stars) will also be available.
We’ll also be adding in diplomatic victories with the galactic council. The council convenes when 2/3rds of habitable planets in a galaxy are settled and votes are determined by population. The faction with 2/3rds majority of votes becomes leader of the council and the Lord of Rigel. You can choose to defy the council and begin the Final War where a war of extermination begins against those that do not accept the ruling of the council.
Some EA2 features being unlocked later will include the Rigelans and Arcturans, the elder races, and the doomsday clock which is a measure of galactic tension which can boil over to the Final War. Certain actions will increase or decrease the doomsday clock and bring the galaxy back from the brink of a second great war.
The focus of EA2 will be on AI optimization and tactical combat. We’ll be adding in behaviors for the autocombat AI that you can select in tactical as well as a chase camera. Some new forms of space terrain other than the existing nebulas may also be added. Also in the works are some additional ground unit models for militia.
Since November we’ve done numerous bug fixes to reported issues along with under-the-hood reworking the end turn sequence, orbital bombardment, ground combat, ship designer, and the core economy. But what quality of life improvements happened over EA1 based on your feedback?
EA1 Quality of Life Features: • Ship info tooltip • Auto designed ship indicator • Autofire toggle in tactical • Tactical automode using player set formations instead of AI personality • Tactical combat event log • Load/Save Build Queues • Post combat report • Retreat option in fleet combat menu instead of AI personality based retreat or manual retreat in tactical • Build queue access in empire menu without loading colony view • Auto ship design generation in ship designer • Visual clarity adjustments to fuel and sensor indicators • Auto-exploring fleet indicator • Cycling occupied systems or planets in system or colony view • Build queue constructable building filters • Planets menu filters • Empire menu filters • AI personality type and description tooltip in diplomacy and info screen. • Weapon range indication in ship designer • Sharpness graphics setting • Gamma correction setting • Hotkey default binding adjustments • Simple mouse input • Going to colony view automatically on new colonization • Shift add for buildings/weapons for multiple items • Volumetric cloud effects for planet view • New starfield shader • New bomb effects • Offramps in tutorial and more open tutorial goals
As for our future roadmap the core of EA3 will include: • Custom Species • Research Victory • Grand Menaces • Legendary Galaxies (1024 stars)
Our deep dive this week is on the Tulocks, one of the two new species playable in EA2 and you may recognize them from the game banner! The Tulocks are a silicon based species able to handle hostile environments and do not require food production. Their form of communication is also quite different and so they have limited diplomacy options and tend to be isolationists. The Tulocks that you engage with and see in the game are a mobile polyp form, with their adults becoming sessile and entering a dream-like state. Design wise we wanted them to have a rock like appearance but also a bit like a tunnelling worm with a maw that could easily melt through stone.
With Tulock ship design we wanted it to reflect their large size, a vibe that felt connected to rocks, minerals and dirt as seen with their color scheme and almost rock like profiles, and their ships also being more vertically oriented than most sci-fi designs.
Image 1. Tulock Concept Art
Image 2. Tulock Destroyer
Image 3. A Tulock Soldier
Let us know what further changes you would like to see or if you have encountered any technical issues. Please post on the forums, reach out to us via Discord or send an email: contact@rhombus-studios.net Saved games and clear steps to reproduce the bug are critical. It helps us more quickly track down the bug and get it fixed. Additional information on bug reporting tips can be found here: https://steamcommunity.com/app/437440/discussions/.
As always, we appreciate the feedback, conversations, and support from all of you!
Early Access 1 Patch 2023.16
Ticket #1275 QOL Save/Load Build Queue
Ticket #1567 Gaia transformation on Dyson Sphere and Ringworlds fix
Ticket #1569 New game starts with no colony ship fix
Ticket #1570 No starship designs available fix
Ticket #1568 Pirate ships not moving in tactical fix
Ticket #1479 Custom ship designs not reloading in ship designer fix
Ticket #1563 QOL First Contact with species adds all of their known systems
Ticket #924 Main Game Order of Operations fixes
Ticket #1182 End Game score not a persistent across sessions fix
Ticket #1329 Outposts acquired upon unconditional surrender fix
Lord of Rigel - Roundup #30
Greetings Lords of Rigel!
We’re approaching the end of the road for EA1, and part of the final push is the implementation of our last main quality of life feature: loading and saving build queue presets. Along with this feature there will be some bug fixes for reported issues including Gaia transformation filters for megastructures and improving the space monsters usage of the optimized tactical AI system.
The preset build queue system lets you create and save build orders. These include buildings and support units. Certain items tied to specific star systems (Colony Bases, warp infrastructure, megastructures) aren’t in the build order system and require you to intentionally create them. Building a ringworld is a major effort and does require the attention of the emperor! Saved queues are held in a save file, and can be used between games if there is a certain build order that you like.
Overall, with auto-build, auto-design, colony focus instead of sliders, the planets menu for sending colony and outpost ships, auto-explore, and build queue presets Lord of Rigel has a number of automation tools that let you focus on high level decisions without letting the game outright play itself. These tools should help with end game micromanagement.
Image 1. Creating Preset Build Queues
Image 2. Loading Preset Queues
For this week’s deep dive: star shaders!
We wanted a slightly more naturalistic look for stars in LoR compared to some other 4x games. Like in real time star appearance is set by their temperature and mass. Cooler red stars also have larger solar flares and sunspots and hotter bluer stars have fewer flares and spots. The shader for stars also has a slight effect for “limb darkening” which is that the outer edges of a star or gas giant are darker because there is less gas or plasma that light is passing through. Some slight noise is also used for the convection cell effects but that’s more noticeable just on the edges or around sunspots. More exotic star types have different materials. Brown dwarves use a modified version of the gas giant shader. White dwarves and neutron stars have an almost featureless core but have particle effects that are stylized and hint at the magnetic fields. Neutron stars also have Einstein rings, distortion caused by their mass. Neutron stars also have a pulse effect in the galaxy and system views to hint at the radiation beams from their poles, but at a much slower rate than most actual pulsars or magnetars for visual purposes.
As we go into EA2 we’ll start going into the two new species, the Tulocks and the Synth and how their gameplay differs.
Image 3. A red giant star in system view
Image 4. Star shader material
Image 5. Neutron Star and Einstein Ring
Let us know what further changes you would like to see or if you have encountered any technical issues. Please post on the forums, reach out to us via Discord or send an email: contact@rhombus-studios.net Saved games and clear steps to reproduce the bug are critical. It helps us more quickly track down the bug and get it fixed. Additional information on bug reporting tips can be found here: https://steamcommunity.com/app/437440/discussions/.
As always, we appreciate the feedback, conversations, and support from all of you!
Early Access 1 Patch 2023.15
Ticket #1516 QOL – Retreat button added to Fleet Combat prompt
Ticket #1553 Hotkey fixes
Ticket #1561 Ship Designer weapon sort fix
Ticket #1564 QOL – Shift click add/remove 5 weapons from ship design
Ticket #1556 Clear button in build queue resets Auto button fix
Ticket #1478 Build queue filter included for built buildings on upgradeable structures
Ticket #1545 QOL – Defender defeated prompt added to tactical games with no defending fleets
Ticket #1560 Skirmish AI difficulty resetting on entering Ship Designer fix
Lord of Rigel - Roundup #29
Greetings Lords of Rigel!
We’re working on an update that will involve some cleanup to the order of operations at the end of turns, adjustments to autoturn and key inputs, and making the auto ship designer smarter about ship class use and space use. Some other adjustments include build queue filters considering items you have added to the queue. In the coming weeks we’ll be talking a bit more on what to expect during EA2.
For this week’s deep dive: the Xantus
We wanted the Xantus to fit with the mysterious shape shifting spymaster alien archetype.
Image 1: The Xantus are supreme spies
At the same time their reputation would also mean there would be some consequences for them like economic isolation so this goes into their traits as excellent at espionage but a poorer starting economy. In terms of backstory the Xantus we know of are an offshoot of a superorganism on their homeworld.
Image 2: The homeworld Xanthak
They reproduced how to make a brain and more conventional biology from a crashed ship during the last great war. From that they became self-aware, and also aware of the dangers in the galaxy. Design wise their default form we based a bit on cuttlefish in terms of skin and the eye shape.
Image 3: Xantus head concepts
Image 4: A Xantus researcher
Xantus ships we wanted to feel like stealth craft while keeping flowing forms with hints that the crew might be taking on any shape within it, much like how the Selach ships are fluid filled.
From what we’ve seen the Xantus have been an unexpected hit!
Image 5: Xantus Starship
Let us know what further changes you would like to see or if you have encountered any technical issues. Please post on the forums, reach out to us via Discord or send an email: contact@rhombus-studios.net Saved games and clear steps to reproduce the bug are critical. It helps us more quickly track down the bug and get it fixed. Additional information on bug reporting tips can be found here: https://steamcommunity.com/app/437440/discussions/.
As always, we appreciate the feedback, conversations, and support from all of you!
Early Access 1 Patch 2023.14
Ticket #1548 Colony ship missing from New Game fix
Ticket #1549 Starbase scrap value fix
Ticket #1543 QOL – Empire Menu filters for colonies, outposts, and colonies with empty build queues
Ticket #1542 AI placing outposts in systems with enemy colonies fix
Ticket #1541 Tutorial Empire menu Z order fix
Ticket #1544 Housing filter in build queue for max population fix
Ticket #1505 Food rounding and starvation event ticker fix
Ticket #926 Additional fleet movement event ticker filtering
Ticket #1550 Escape key in New Game menu starts new game fix
Ticket #791 Refined galaxy star placement to fix distant rogue homeworlds
Ticket #1557 QOL – Star shader optimization
Ticket #955 Tactical ship formation control fixes
Ticket #1280 Point defense weapon radius increased
Ticket #1555 Stolen tech overriding best researched tech fix
Lord of Rigel - Roundup #28
Greetings Lords of Rigel,
This update has some more fixes to user reported bugs, and AI improvements to build queues and colonization. Our next major quality of life feature for closing out EA1 is still a loading/saving system for the build queue.
Two of the larger quality of life improvements are the filters in the Empire (Image 1) and Planets (Image 2) menus. You can now filter controlled planets by if they are colonies, outposts, or have empty build queues. The top sorts do filter out outposts, but this makes it easier if you want to find a particular outpost or need to scrap them. The empty build queue filter also lets you easily manage your empire and enter into build queues or use autobuild.
The Planets menu filters include colonizable planets (removes asteroid belts and gas giants), habitable planets (ones with climates that support food production), mineral rich planets, and a gravity filter that filters out planets that would have gravity penalties based on your species traits. This should make it a lot easier for players to use filters and sorts to pick new worlds for colonies once they’ve explored the galaxy a bit.
Image 1. Empire Menu Filters
Image 2. Planets Menu Filters
For this week’s deep dive: the Yalkai!
The Yalkai play into the “blue space women” trope we see in a number of scifi franchises (Mass Effect, Master of Orion, Star Control, Star Wars). But in reality they are more starfish like predators that use telepathy and illusions (Image 3). As you’re a human player, you see the Yalkai as humans and not their true form. The Yalkai are feudal and have research penalties but gain bonuses to their ships. This is reflected in their larger, bulkier, ships and the large windows compared to Human ships hint that they are a bit different in their actual shape than what they show (Image 4). The arcs on their designs also hint at the true tentacle horrors that the Yalkai are. The Yalkai are not as great at ground combat as other species (minus the Ornithon who are terrible at it), but this is offset by their ability to use telepathy to outright take planets. From our initial concepts we wanted to keep a strong imperial vibe for them like the Centauri from Babylon 5 and an air of the Yalkai “keeping up appearances” (Image 5) to avoid them just being blue space elves.
Image 3. Yalkai true forms
Image 4. Yalkai Cruiser
Image 5. Yalkai Ambassador
Let us know what further changes you would like to see or if you have encountered any technical issues. Please post on the forums, reach out to us via Discord or send an email: contact@rhombus-studios.net Saved games and clear steps to reproduce the bug are critical. It helps us more quickly track down the bug and get it fixed. Additional information on bug reporting tips can be found here: https://steamcommunity.com/app/437440/discussions/.
As always, we appreciate the feedback, conversations, and support from all of you!
Lord of Rigel - Roundup #27
Greetings Lords of Rigel,
In our next update along with more bug fixes and AI tweaks, we’ll have an “Auto” button in ship designer that auto generates a design using the hull size you selected based on your species’ ship archetypes. You can build these designs, or use them as a base for your own designs. Another upcoming tweak is a new set of filters for the Planets menu to help make outpost and colony planning easier.
A loading/saving system for the build queue is still our next major quality of life feature on the docket for EA1.
This week’s deep dive is one where we want to get more feedback and comments on one of the more challenging parts of LoR to develop: the Tutorial. While an old adage is that all tutorials by nature suck, the issue is what audience is it being developed for and what does it serve.
While working on the tutorial the earliest version was the first time UI menu descriptions (like Master of Orion 1) with some very high-level goals that a player could achieve in rough order (Explore a system, Research a Technology, Colonize a planet) with the high-level goal of first contact with the Katraxi. Tester feedback, especially from those not familiar with 4x games wanted something more tailored with controls being unlocked as the tutorial progressed.
On release, we were surprised that the first thing many 4x game veterans did was beeline to the tutorial and were understandably frustrated by the restricted UI during the tutorial and emphasis on camera controls.
So out of all of this our questions are: 1) What are new players looking for in a tutorial? Does the heavily guided tutorial work for a first time player new to these games?
2) What are more experienced players looking for in the tutorial? Do we have other systems (first time UI help) that answer the questions that veteran players have?
Image 1. The Rigelan Probe
Image 2. Human space, Katraxi space, and Rigelan probe pulsar coordinates.
Image 3. Approaching for First Contact
Let us know what further changes you would like to see or if you have encountered any technical issues. Please post on the forums, reach out to us via Discord or send an email: contact@rhombus-studios.net Saved games and clear steps to reproduce the bug are critical. It helps us more quickly track down the bug and get it fixed. Additional information on bug reporting tips can be found here: https://steamcommunity.com/app/437440/discussions/.
As always, we appreciate the feedback, conversations, and support from all of you!
Early Access 1 Patch 2023.13
Ticket #1539 QOL – Tutorial Start prompt with description
