SupComStrategy.com

Hey guys,

I'm really stoked that we've gotten so many new members in the last couple weeks. Seems like several of you have come from other boards, or have found us through a few links that I've setup around the web. Well, welcome to SupComStrategy.com! Please feel free to let me know if you see something that's missing from the forums - whether it be a feature or functionality (hard) or a subforum that you think we could use (easy!). Also, don't forget to add your live ranking stats to your profile.

Already a few members have been able to schedule games against one another - so it's a good venue to find similar players to setup custom games. Share some strategies, kills or losses, and start posting already! Ha ha. Thanks again for showing up, and look forward in the very near future for some more tournaments and community features.

Cheers,

Dave

 

Okay, well GPG has been obviously trying to hurry their map vaulting feature in to production. Yet we've still got some issues with the original game and/or the 3251 patch. Oh well, the new patch is here, and its pretty small. They've added the vaulting features, and rumor has it there will be more details released on it soon. I'll keep ya posted.

Cheers,

Dave

 

Wow, this thing is a monster! I'm installing it right now - I was planning on playing a ranked game - I don't know if I'm brave enough to try my hand at a ranked game with all these new factors on the line... From GPGNet:

MISC
* New cartographic view for both main view and strategic map.
* Multiplayer/Skirmish maps now have a "no rush" timer option.
* Map props have been altered to balance player start positions.
* Overall performance enhancements in regards to memory management and AI.
* Saltrock Colony's civilian defenses altered for balance.
* Assist Icon now properly shows when mousing over a Quantum Gateway.
* Starting Mass Extractor locations adjusted for all ranked maps.
* Weapons that do splash damage no longer destroy other projectiles.
* Improved pathing and unit formation behavior, especially for naval and experimental units.
* Fixed issue where game would lock up if you were at unit capacity in campaign mode and captured an enemy unit.
* Ferry Beacon now has a Strategic Icon.
* Weapons now perform a terrain blocking test when choosing the best target to engage.
* Improved behavior for Engineers that are patroling and reclaiming resources.
* Attack Ground is now equivalent of Attack Move to Position.
* New Hold Ground stance lets units attack the ground instead of performing an attack move to a position.
* Fixed double Mass Extractor exploit.

AIR
* Scorcher now deals its damage faster.
* Build cost of Tier 3 spy planes reduced by roughly half, and they now have limited-range Omni.
* Transports will no longer chase planes.
* Gemini has been retuned to address a bug with its missiles.
* Tier 1 bombers now drop their bombs using a physics-based model.
* Zeus's health increased.
* Revenant's damage increased.
* Anti-air guns now prioritize bombers, gunships and transports over Interceptors and scouts.
* Gunships with AA do not chase planes.
* Multiple transports now use one Ferry Waypoint, as opposed to one per transport.
* New Dock Button orders planes to auto-land and refuel at nearest Air Staging Platform or carrier.

GROUND
* Aurora: Acceleration increased slightly and top speed lowered.
* Cybran ACU damage reduced; rate of fire increased; overall DPS reduced.
* Mech Marine can now fire correctly from a transport; health increased.
* Omni Sensors no longer have sonar capabilities.
* Flare: Damage increased.
* Energy Storage economy reduced; explosion radius increased.
* Cybran TML defenses improved and now have a charge time before launch.
* Aeon ACU Advanced Resource Allocation System cost reduced.
* T3 land factories upgrade cost increased.
* UEF ACU nuke now behaves like other nukes.
* T3 Cybran Siege Assault Bots will no detonate into an EMP if they are destroyed while under construction.
* Cybran ACU and sACU now have a general cloaking button that handles both cloak and stealth.
* Fixed an issue where factories stopped responding if the unit being built was killed during the "factory lower" animation.
* Shields will no longer fully recover shield health while in an Energy-negative economy.
* Shields no longer prevent nuke damage.
* Commanders now display warp-in effect during online ranked games.
* All Supreme AI now begin building at the proper time in skirmish rather than waiting for 13 seconds.
* Engineers can now assist Shield Generators and will repair and recharge shields while shield is taking damage.

* Tier 1 Tanks
- Striker has increased movement speed and has been retuned.

* Tier 2 Tanks
- Retuned to perform better vs. Tier 1 units.
- Increased movement speed.
- Obsidian Energy drain decreased.

* Tier 2 Artillery:
- Miasma: Damage reduced.
- Klinkhammer: More accurate.
- Gunther: More accurate, damage increased.

* Tier 2 Point Defenses
- Now lead their targets.
- Oblivion and Triad no longer deal damage to friendly targets.

* Tier 3 Siege Assault Bots
- Firing-range reduced.
- Vision-range reduced.
- Acceleration reduced.
- Harbinger and Titan build cost increased.
- Titan turret speed increased.
- Loyalist build cost decreased and DPS increased.

SEA
* Can no longer build Strategic Missile Defenses on water.
* Salem now moves similar to Aeon and UEF Destroyers; its speed on land has been increased and only goes on land if it has been given a land-based waypoint.
* UEF and Cybran Naval factories are now more susceptible to torpedoes.
* T3 submarines are now significantly cheaper to build, their TML damage has been reduced and their nuke cost increased.
* Amphibious units (that move along the sea floor) now have water vision equal to their normal vision. They can also now detect submarines.
* Carriers (including the CZAR) can now build Tier 1 through Tier 3 air units.
* Cybran carrier anti-air guns DPS decreased and accuracy increased.
* T3 Sonar Buoy’s cost reduced, health changed and sonar range increased.
* T1 and T2 Sonar Buoy’s health increased.
* T3 Aeon Sonar Buoy anti-torpedo rate of fire decreased.
* T1 Torpedo Launchers now have sonar.
* T3 Aeon Strategic Missile Submarine's tactical missiles can now be targeted by TMD's.

* Frigates:
- Health increased
- Build cost decreased
- DPS increased
- Beacon range decreased
- Anti-torpedo system retuned.

* Submarines:
- Sylph build cost increased and DPS decreased.
- Sliver DPS decreased, build cost decreased and health increased.

* Destroyers
- Build cost retuned.

* Battleships
- Summit and Galaxy build cost decreased.

EXPERIMENTALS
* Galactic Colossus and Monkeylord now always respond to attacks from Siege Assault Bots.

* Atlantis:
- Health reduced.
- Torpedo system retuned.

* CZAR:
- Health increased.
- Beam damage reduced.
- Flak damage radius increased.
- Crash damage reduced.

* Fatboy
- Build cost decreased.
- Can no longer build Engineers while underwater.

* Galactic Colossus
- Build cost decreased.
- Movement improved.

* Mavor:
- Accuracy decreased.
- Turret speeds increased.
- Build cost reduced.

* Monkeylord
- Turret ranges increased.

* Scathis:
- Energy drain per shot reduced.
- Health increased.
- Max firing radius decreased.

* Soul Ripper:
- Ground-damage doubled and splash damage added.
- Air-to-air damage reduced.
- Crash damage and radius increased.
- Build cost retuned.

* Tempest:
- Acceleration increased.
- Turn rate increased.
- Main cannon radius increased.
- Build cost decreased.

General Game UI
- Game no longer pauses when you minimize or press Alt-Tab.
- Messages are broadcast to every player when alliances are formed or broken.
- There is now a confirmation dialog for self-destructing units. (You can turn the self-destruct confirmation off in the Options Menu under the Interface Tab.)
- Removed auto-pausing from all dialogs except the Main Escape Menu in single player.
- Allied victory and share resources are now active by default.
- Construction/Queue Bars now shrink and grow according to how many options are available.
- Save, Load and Replay dialogs can now be sorted by name or date created/modified.
- A dialog similar to the victory dialog is now displayed when a replay has finished playing.
- Fixed duplicate weather effects showing up in right-hand corner of the world.

Map Control
- There is a new window that controls several things:
- Toggle Resource Icons on/off.
- Toggle Cartographic mode on/off.
- Toggle Minimap on/off (even in the minimal view).
- This dialog can be accessed by either pressing 'Y' or by clicking on the former 'Minimap' button.

Quick Select Groups / Avatars
- Units are automatically assigned to the same Quick Select Group that the constructing factory is assigned to.
- To support this, factories are now filtered out of Quick Select Groups when recalling them for selection.
- Shift + Control Group # will now add that control group's units to your current selection.
- Shift + Clicking on any Quick Select button (Commanders, Idle Engineers, Control Groups) will add an idle Engineer to your current selection.
-Shift + Control + Control Group number now selects only factories in the Control Group.
- Support Commanders now have their own idle tab.
- Fixed a bug with Avatar Icons that would play the "Commander is under attack" voice for any non-commander units modded to show up as an Avatar.
- Avatars should now refresh properly when the focus army is changed.

Strategic Markers
- You can send markers to your allies by pressing the following keys:
- F5 - Sends a "General Alert" marker.
- F6 - Sends a "Move" marker.
- F7 - Sends an "Attack" marker.
- F8 - Creates a custom marker.
- General Alert, Move and Attack markers disappear after 10 seconds.
- Custom markers are permanent until the user deletes them (Shift+Ctrl+Right Click) or their army is defeated.
- Custom markers may be moved by any ally. Hold Shift and drag the circle to where you want the marker to be located.

Options
- Added an option to lock the cursor to one screen when in full-screen mode. This is useful when you are playing full-screen on a dual-monitor systems and you're only using one monitor.
- Added options that control both keyboard scroll and keyboard rotate speeds.
- Moved keyboard pan accelerate key from Shift to Control.
- Added option to toggle bloom rendering. (Toggling this off may increase performance. This has also been set to off for the low configuration.)
- Separated render background option into render skycube and render background.

Lobby
- Changed tomato color to purple.
- Added a No Rush option for custom games. Does not apply to ranked games.
- During the specified No Rush time limit, you cannot issue orders to your units outside of your initial area. In addition, you will see a ring around your base that shows the area that you are limited to, along with a timer in the Score Display that shows the amount of time remaining. - Revamped the way map selection and options are displayed.
- All players now see a "display panel" where the option list used to be.
- The host can access a secondary configuration screen to change the map and game options.
- Rollover feedback shows which slot correlates with which spawn slot on the map.

Build Mode
- The B key now toggles build mode on and off. (Esc. still toggles it off, as well.)
- As a consequence, some keys needed to be remapped in order to accommodate the new functionality for the B key.

Mod Manager
- It is EXTREMELY likely that pre-patch mods will not be compatible with the new mod system.
- Mods now key from a GUID rather than by name.
- Exclusive flag works
- Before and after tables work.
- Conflicts table works.
- Example mods were removed from the main game data files as they were confusing players. The resource rich mod is still included since many players use that mod.
- Mod hooking now concatenates so local variables will be accessible.
- Added a new lua scd that moves generic engine files to their own scd.

Mod Support
- SupcomDataPath.lua has been changed so that directories are mounted instead of defined as a search path.
- OpenURL function is exposed to Lua scripts. It is simple to use:
Usage: OpenURL("http://forums.gaspowered.com")
- OpenURL will only open approved protocols. These protocols can be found in SupComDataPath.lua (in the same directory as the game binary).
- Please post in the mod developer support forums if you would like a new protocol supported.
- PrintText can now be used on the sim or user side to display text on the screen during a session.
Usage: PrintText(text, fontSize, fontColor [format: aarrggbb], duration [seconds], location [leftcenter|center|rightcenter])
- You no longer need to rename .zip to .scd
- For additional changes to mod structure, see this post:
http://forums.gaspowered.com/viewtopic.php?t=7819

File Structure
- There is now an option to save replays, screenshots and saved games in your My Documents folder.
- With this option enabled, you'll only be able to see files in the My Documents folder.
- If you have files saved in the App Data location, they won't appear in your file picker unless you turn the option off or manually move the files to the new locations.
- Files stored in the My Documents folder will not be removed if you uninstall Supreme Commander.
- You'll find the files in My Documents\My Games\Gas Powered Games\Supreme Commander\
- For convenience, game mods may now be placed in My Documents\My Games\Gas Powered Games\Supreme Commander\mods
- Game maps may now be placed in My Documents\My Games\Gas Powered Games\Supreme Commander\maps

This post is for anyone that might be visiting the site, but isn't familiar with Supreme Commander. Supreme Commander (aka "SupCom") is a real-time strategy simulation by Gas Powered Games, and essentially the sequel to Total Annihilation. Whatever TA started, SupCom continues, with massive maps, easy-to-use gameplay, and great multiplayer.

If you're thinking this might be a game up your alley, check out the demo. Worth Playing has a copy of it available here. The map is called Finn's Revenge, and you can only play as Cybran. Even still, it's enough to wet most gamers appetites for more. If you're looking for more info on how to play the map itself, check out our forums and the subforum for Finn's Revenge.

Update: I'm retarded. Read the next post by clicking here, and add live GPGNet stats to your SupComStrategy.com forum signature.

Hey SCS'ers... Looking to find some better opponents to play against? It seems like the ranking system doesn't really care what rank you're at - but if you're interested in showing off your ranking or just meeting some new "same caliber" players, you might want to add your game rank stats as a link in your signature. Here's how to do it:

Step 1: Look up your web stats at GPGnet. Visit this link: Supreme Commander Stats and use the search box in the top right to lookup your user name.

Step 2: Copy the link from the address bar in your browser that links to your player profile. For instance, mine is at: http://gpgnet.gaspowered.com/scstats/player/ByGametype.aspx?PlayerID=231889 The PlayerID part is unique to you.

Step 3: Updating your signature on SCS (SupComStrategy.com). You must first be logged in. Next, click on your user name to access all your profile information. Here you can add your sig, about info, contact info, and forum preferences. You'll want to click the signature tab.

Step 4: Insert the HTML to link to your profile. It's pretty straightforward. Feel free to copy this code, just be sure that the PlayerID is your own!

<a href="http://gpgnet.gaspowered.com/scstats/player/ByGametype.aspx?PlayerID=XXXXXX">View My Ranking Stats</a>

Just hit "Save" and you're all set! It takes our forum software a minute or two to update signatures, so if you don't immediately see a change on your posts, check them again a minute or two later.

Hope that helps! Feel free to add any other information in to your signature that you want. 

Click Here for the Full Article

So it sounds like GPGNet is actually in full swing!

"...the 100,000th registered player and the 500,000th game played."

 Sounds like SupCom is a HIT! I'm looking forward to seeing these guys implement some new technology for challenge games, clan on clan games, and tournaments. Add in map vaulting and some new units thrown in for good measure and we'll be in a good place.

 

I've played a few dozen games on GPG Net (hell, at this point, its more like a few hundred) and I've got some gripes! The system itself is alright - and by that I mean I have enjoyed most of the games I've played. But there are a few things that just don't make any sense to me...

Overall Gamer Stats versus Ranked Game Stats

Okay, I get it - you're supposed to play ranked games to be a legit player. But for a lot of players, ranked games just aren't that appealing. So. Where does that leave custom-game players? Every time I join a custom game, I wish it'd provide some information about the players. Simple stuff like: games played, games won, games lost, disconnects. That's all I need! That way, when joining a custom game, you can see if its full of noobs or if there are some players in there that are notorious for dropping.

AI Replacement of Dropped Players

This one is kinda up in the air since the AI's are pretty dumb - but still. There have been plenty of games where one player drops and then the entire game is ruined. If a dropped player were replaced by an AI, at least those units wouldn't go to waste. Another solution? Any dropped players units are divided equally among remaining allies.

2 on 2 ranked games - Teams on the same side?

This one seems kinda stupid obvious to me, but how are you expected to enjoy a 2 on 2 ranked game when you and your ally are on opposite sides of the map? Next to your opponent?!? WTF? If you play a 2 on 2, it should automatically realize that there are two players that should be positioned next to one another.

Connection Problems Connection Problems Connection Problems

Round here we have a "3 times a charm" saying. It seems like there are still way too many connection problems. If you host a custom game, usually you have to log all the way out of GPGNet just to be able to host another one. C'mon - these bugs need to be resolved!

Preview System Capabilities before a game

Lag is the worst enemy of Supreme Commander. Wouldn't it be nice if each machine were given a rating that says whether or not the player can actually handle the game about to be played? It wouldn't have to be complex - even just a 1-10 system value would be fine. That way players with average systems can play against one another, and the players that invested big money in their systems could play against similar players without lag.

Well, those are just 5 of the many things I'd love to see implemented in the GPGNet system. I know those guys are cranking away at updates, but I'd love to see these outstanding issues resolved before they go adding ladder tourneys and custom map vaulting. Priorities here people!