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PHost 4.1h
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PHost 4.1h

  • PHost 4.1a released on 31/Jul/2007
  • PHost 4.1b released on 28/Oct/2007 (limited distribution)
  • PHost 4.1c released on 20/Sep/2008
  • PHost 4.1d released on 29/Apr/2009 (limited distribution)
  • PHost 4.1e released on 25/Nov/2010
  • PHost 4.1f released on 04/Nov/2012
  • PHost 4.1g released on 21/Dec/2014

Instructions

Hosts: Replace the PHost program.

If you set CPEnableLanguage to No to avoid the language file bug in 4.1, you can now turn it on again.

If you use ion storms, and upgrade from version 4.1 or lower, delete grey.hst. This will delete all ion storms. Unfortunately, this is necessary to correct a file format bug in the mentioned host versions.

If you want this version behave like the previous one as close as possible, add the following values to pconfig.src. We recommend you to use the defaults, though, to try our new rules.

% PHOST

MinimumHappiness         = -300
MaximumIonStormRadius    = 500
MaximumIonStormVoltage   = 1000

New Features

  • The number of defense posts needed to block bioscanners can now be configured, DefenseToBlockBioscan. (v4.1a/3.5a)
  • Added inactivity detection for combat. With certain settings, combat takes forever. PHost now terminates combat when it thinks it will not complete, and displays a message 
    WARNING: combat terminated due to inactivity after NNN ticks.
    Please check your combat configuration. With the current settings,
    the fight might have taken forever.
    If you get that message (which, I think, is very unlikely), change your combat configuration to get closer to the default configuration or another one known to work. (v4.1a/3.5a)
  • The new UseBaseTorpsInCombat option allows hosts to turn off use of torpedoes from starbase storage in combat. They will still use the free torpedoes if PlanetsHaveTubes is enabled. (v4.1c/3.5c)
  • The new MinimumHappiness option provides a lower limit of happiness after a planet is conquered. This restricts the damage players can do to their planets if they know they'll be losing. (v4.1c/3.5c)
  • When a ship explodes in a minefield, PHost now generates a new util.dat record for all players. Previously, this information was sent to non-involved races only when they were using Winplan. (v4.1c/3.5c)
  • The ColonistCombatSurvivalRate option is now arrayized depending on the former planet owner, and there is a new ColonistCombatCaptureRate option depending on the ship owner, allowing you to configure races that are strong in surviving a fight, or integrate large parts of the former colony into their new one. (Idea and patch by Alexey Veselovsky) (v4.1d)
  • Academy ships' training advantage is now configurable using the new EPAcademyScale option. (v4.1d)
  • The limit on the number of level-restricted hull function combinations was raised from 64 to 256 to adjust to the growing demands of ship list makers. (v4.1e)
  • Battle order was slightly changed: ships without numeric friendly codes are now distinguished into aggressive armed ships, non-aggressive armed ships, and freighters, with battle-order values 1000, 1002, and 1004, respectively. Previously, there were only two classes, armed ships and freighters, with values 1000 and 1002. Idea by Quirin Herman. (v4.1e/3.5e)
  • Added EPShipBuild1000TorpUnits and EPShipBuild10Fighters options to allow giving experience for building torpedoes and fighters aboard a ship. Idea by lee (v4.1e)
  • Added BaseTechCost option to allow scaling tech level costs up and down. Note that this option is incompatible with most existing clients. Idea by Quirin Herman. (v4.1f)
  • Added MaximumIonStormVoltage and MaximumIonStormRadius options. These allow to reduce ion storms in small universes. (v4.1f)
  • Added AllowUniversalMinefieldFCode and AllowMinefieldIdentity options. (v4.1g/3.5g)
  • When -c is used to check one player's turn file, PHost now reports errors in command processor commands to the log file (check.log). The idea is that players can read these log messages, and correct their commands before the host run. When errors are detected during the host run, these are reported with subspace messages as usual. (v4.1g/3.5g)

Bugs Fixed

  • Version 4.1 crashed when player 11 was using a Language which was not used by anyone else in the game. Found by Markus Rektor. Another side-effect of the switch to the new language code was a control statement appearing on top of the wormhole scan message, causing VPA not to understand it. Found by Andreas Huettner. (v4.1a/3.5a)
  • Mines Destroy Mines could leave some overlaps around due to rounding errors. PHost now removes these as well. This can make mines lose a few more units than before. This also means PHost now generates util.dat record 53. (v4.1a/3.5a)
  • Non-existent planet lists were not sent until now due to an oversight. (v4.1a/3.5a)
  • Several ways to crash PHost with a floating-point exception or get it into an infinite loop have been blocked. (v4.1a/3.5a)
  • When the refit command was used, PHost was not properly unloading torpedoes before, and transformed them into a better type. Found by Mathias Kaeckenmeister. (v4.1a)
  • Ion storms were stored in host data files using wrong data format. This has been fixed, PHost now uses the same file format as Tim's host. (v4.1a)
  • Minefield friendly codes are now computed more often. When add-ons were used, friendly code assignments could have stayed around longer than expected. (v4.1a/3.5a)
  • After a base is given away or otherwise changes ownership, it could have kept more defense than allowed by its new owner. The excess defense is now destroyed, much like fighters in the same situation. (v4.1a)
  • util.dat record 6 was reporting six industry levels, whereas the message only reported five. They are now equivalent. (v4.1a/3.5a)
  • The Rob mission now also robs cash from transporters, in the same way it robs minerals and supplies. (v4.1a)
  • An overflow during computation of mining rates made it impossible to mine more than 655 kt of a mineral each turn; instead, the amount "wraps around". Found by Alex Timofeev. Bug only in 4.1 and 4.1a. (v4.1b)
  • Unclonable didn't work until now. Don't ask.... Reported by Holger Bauer. (v4.1c)
  • Some clients generate build orders with a defined beam type but a beam count of zero (instead of setting both to zero if user doesn't want a beam). PHost was not always detecting and fixing this anomaly consistently, causing those build orders to be reset to the end of the queue when the player misses a turn. Reported by Heiko Schlenker. (v4.1c/3.5c)
  • PHost now cancels Intercept missions during intercept resolution (part of movement) if they fail because the target got destroyed or cloaked. This prevents them from accidentally popping up later, which allowed players to track ships they shouldn't be able to track under various circumstances. Pointed out by Patrick de Groot. (v4.1c/3.5c)
  • PHost sometimes generated native races or governments that should not appear according to configuration. (v4.1c)
  • When minefields overlap, mine hits are now accounted to minefield owners in a more fair way. (v4.1c/3.5c)
  • The auxcmds.txt parser could get confused by strategically-placed spaces, causing it to ignore or misinterpret commands. (v4.1c/3.5c)
  • PHost could crash when some very specific tow chains with more than four ships were used. Found in classic179 @ planetsserver. (v4.1d/3.5d)
  • PHost could crash when receiving certain incomplete command processor commands. (v4.1e/3.5e)
  • CPEnableShow = Allies didn't work. (v4.1e)
  • When producing a DOS-style RST file, PHost now produces the same set of targets on all platforms. In addition, targets are now sorted. (v4.1e/3.5e)
  • PHost would produce invalid data when the refit command was used to upgrade a ship from no weapons to Laser/Mark 1. Found by ComCitCat at PlanetsCentral. (v4.1h)

Miscellaneous

  • Training now sends a confirmation message and util.dat record stating the amount of experience gained if ExactExperienceReports is enabled. The message uses a more condensed format in 4.1b and later for easier parsing. (v4.1a)
  • The refit command now overrides both beamup and extmission. (v4.1a)
  • For computation of tow resistance, hyperjump ships now always use the maximum distance (e.g. 81), independant of their actual waypoint distance. This is to reflect the fact that, in case they win the tow conflict, their movement will be the same independant of their waypoint. (v4.1a/3.5a)
  • If a meteor kills a planet's population, the planet now becomes unowned instantly. Previously, the now uninhabited planet could still fight and produce. The same problem also occured when ground combat yielded "almost" mutual annihilation. (v4.1a/3.5a)
  • Unless the Master program already set a default (PMaster and AMaster do, master.exe doesn't), PHost now initializes the default remote control state to remote forbid default. (v4.1c/3.5c)
  • If a player has no planets, his minefields were behaving as if controlled by a planet with friendly code "AAA". They now no longer match any friendly code. (v4.1c/3.5c)
  • If Rob fails (due to random chance), players now receive a message in addition to the util.dat failure notice they're already getting. (v4.1e/3.5e)
  • PHost now generates some more failure notices to help debugging "why didn't I do X?" problems. In particular, this information is sent for the Transfer Torpedoes, Transfer Fighters, Transfer Credits, Training, and Crew exchange missions, and the cln (clone ship) friendly code. (v4.1e)
  • Pieter van der Eems provided an update of the Dutch language file. Thanks! (v4.1e)
  • Like the other command processor commands, beamup commands can now be given through auxcmds.txt even when AllowBeamUpMultiple is off. They were accepted but not executed until now. (v4.1e/3.5e)
  • PHost can now pass its random seed to add-ons for repeatable invocation. %s in a pcontrol command will be replaced by the current seed. In addition, the seed is passed through the PHOST_RANDSEED environment variable. (v4.1e/3.5e)
  • The Repair Ship mission is now independant of ship Ids. If a ship performing this mission is repaired by another ship, it will still only repair its target up to its original damage level. (v4.1f)
  • When wrap is disabled, ion storms now still honor WraparoundRectangle, so they form in sensible places even when your universe is smaller or larger than normal. See Formulas for New Ion Storms for details. (v4.1f)
  • Slight change to boarding crew computation: if the captor has too little crew to beam anything over, make the number of traitors at least two, not exactly two. (v4.1f/3.5f)
  • Recycling ship parts using dmp now rounds after accounting for all parts, not after recycling each individual part. This usually produces a handful minerals more than before. (v4.1g/3.5g)

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PHost 4.1

  • PHost 4.0a released on 22/May/2003
  • PHost 4.0b released on 16/Aug/2003
  • PHost 4.0c released on 13/Sep/2003
  • PHost 4.0d released on 23/Oct/2003
  • PHost 4.0e released on 01/Jan/2004
  • PHost 4.0f released on 21/Mar/2004
  • PHost 4.0g released on 9/May/2004 (not public)
  • PHost 4.0h released on 10/Jul/2004
  • PHost 4.0i released on 23/Jan/2005
  • PHost 4.0j released on 22/Oct/2005
  • PHost 4.0k released on 04/Sep/2006
  • PHost 4.1 released on 09/Jan/2007

Instructions

Hosts: Replace the PHost program. If you want this version behave like the previous one as close as possible, add the following values to pconfig.src. We recommend you to use the defaults, though, to try our new rules.

% PHOST
AlternativeMinesDestroyMines = Yes        # default: No
TowedShipsCooperate          = No         # default: Yes
WrmScanRange                 = 0          # default: 100
EPTrainingScale              = 100        # default: 70
CPEnableEnemies              = No         # default: Yes
CPEnableShow                 = No         # default: Yes
CPEnableRefit                = No         # default: Yes

% PCONTROL
MinesDestroyMines = Skip

Remove the RobotsBuildFighters, RebelsBuildFighters and ColoniesBuildFighters parameters from pconfig.src, and add a matching AllowBuildFighters setting (usual default: No,No,No,No,No,No,No,No,Yes,Yes,Yes).

If you have used the default complete.src or tim-host.src, please check the settings for FighterSweepRate and FighterSweepRange. The files shipped with versions up to 4.0b were bogus. The settings should read FighterSweepRate = 0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,20 instead of just 20 - the latter allows fighter-sweep for all players! The same goes for FighterSweepRange.

If you have mentioned the WormholeScan phase in your config file, be aware that this phase was moved.

In case you have re-assigned hull functions, be aware of the changes introduced in 4.0i. For example, ImperialAssault ships do no longer have automatic PlanetImmunity.

The plang4en.hst file is no longer used, you can remove it.

Players: Update the PVCR program. The current version 4.0k(2) plays combat generated by all current PHost versions and all possible configurations.

New Features

  • PHost now reports ship-specific hull abilities with a util.dat record. (v4.0a)
  • Mine laying rules changed again: every player's ships lay in Id order, but sequences are randomly interweaved. This gets you predictability for the general case while maintaining fairness in extreme situation. This order of operation is called per-player Id order, we expect to use it as a means of conflict resolution in many more places (see below). (v3.4e/4.0a)
  • Per-player-Id order is also used for Super Spy Deluxe. (v3.5/4.1)
  • Mines Destroy Mines got improved: instead of laying mines and considering intersections with just that one field, PHost now does a complete Mines Destroy Mines after all mine laying. This gives us 100% Id independence and predictability (in other words: fairness). The main reason, however, is, that this will also consider mines which overlap by another means: when you use add-ons which lay mines (Starbase+, ACP) or a mine-level alliance is canceled. To get back the old behaviour, turn on AlternativeMinesDestroyMines. (v3.4f/4.0b)
  • Added a command line switch to set config options on the fly (-o option=value). See Command Line Options for details. (v3.4g/4.0c)
  • PControl got a face-lift. You can now execute commands before and after each stage, settings are cumulative, and you can specify shell commands directly in pconfig.src. (v3.4g/4.0c)
  • You can now use placeholders %d and %r in PControl commands. You can specify commands for Auxhost1 and Auxhost2 directly in pconfig.src. You can refer to canned pcontrol sequences to simplify your config files. (v3.4m/4.0k)
  • The AllowBuildFighters config parameter replaces the three original parameters (RobotsBuildFighters etc.). You can now enable lfm for all races. (v4.0e/f)
  • Towed ships can now be configured to cooperate (not break a tow). (v4.0e)
  • remote has a new sub-command, "give", to simplify use of remote control. (v3.4h/4.0e)
  • Wormhole scanning was made simpler. The WormholeScan phase now happens after movement, at almost the same place as sensor sweep. Therefore, you'll always (well, almost) see a wormhole you've just traveled through. In addition, a new config option WrmScanRange can be used to remove probabilities from wormhole scanning. (v4.0e)
  • You can now configure ships to burn fuel for each fight they're taking part in (FuelUsagePerFightFor100KT). This weakens a huge ship's position against many small ones a bit. Likewise, you can configure ships to burn a fixed amount of fuel each turn for staying ready (FuelUsagePerTurnFor100KT). Idea: Eugene Goroh. (v4.0f)
  • The effect of experience training can now be scaled up or down (EPTrainingScale); by default, you now get twice the experience as before. (v4.0f) In addition, training now takes the crew amount into account, so that a ship with little crew can be trained faster than a battlestar with thousands of people aboard. Idea: Degi. (v4.0g)
  • Combat experience can now be scaled up or down according to the damage taken by a ship, to award risky fights. Idea: Sascha Rambeaud. (v4.0f)
  • Players can now declare additional enemies. Idea: Maurits van Rees. (v4.0g)
  • Players can now transmit data about their units to friends. Unlike VPA Data Transmissions, this information is guaranteed to be current, and it interacts correctly with the cheat check (i.e. a ship shown this way will be interceptable). (v4.0h)
  • The Federation now has more control over Super Refit. The new refit command allows to precisely specify what components you want to build into the ship. Idea: Maurits van Rees. (v4.0h)
  • You can now unload (or jettison) money and ammunition, or transfer it to enemy ships, using command processor commands. In addition, these commands allow you to overcome restrictions imposed by your client's unload or transfer function. (v4.0h)
  • The Hull statement in shiplist.txt can now take a list of hulls so you can assign a function to many ships at once. RacesAllowed and PlayersAllowed are now cumulative. (v3.4k/4.0i)
  • There are now rules for combinations of hull functions. Up to now, these had undefined, undocumented or just not-well-thought-out behaviour. (v3.4k/4.0i)
  • There are a few new hull functions (v4.0i):
    • PlanetImmunity combines the previous special handling of the ImperialAssault ship and the Klingon/Rebel racial ability.
    • OreCondenser is a new terraforming function to improve the mineral density on a planet.
    • The ability to tow is now defined by the hull function Tow. The former Crystal/Privateer racial ability to board ships is now also a hull function (Boarding), ships need these two to be able to board.
    • The Chunneling special can now be split into ChunnelSelf, ChunnelOthers, and ChunnelTarget.
    • You can now make ships immune to Lokis and D19bs using AntiCloakImmunity, and you can make Lokis more powerful using AdvancedAntiCloak. (4.0k)
    • Academy ships specialize on educating crew and supplying battleships with new crew. There is a new extended mission Exchange Crew.
    • Repair ships can repair others in deep space using the new Repair mission.
    • Even when damaged, ships with FullWeaponry can use all their weapons in combat; ships with HardenedEngines can go full speed.
    • Ships with HardenedCloak can cloak even if damaged. (4.0j)
  • Hull functions can now be restricted to certain experience levels. (v4.0i)
  • There are now some new utilX.dat records: ships produce items, ships being repaired, modified hull functions. (v3.4k/4.0i)
  • Ion storms. This was the last major HOST feature PHost did not have. Our ion storms use similar, but not identical, rules. See Ion Storm formulas. Together with that goes the new Ion Shield ship function. Comments appreciated. (v4.0j)
  • There is a new command password to change a player's password. The main intention is to allow hosts to change the password of a dropped-out player. (v3.4l/4.0j)
  • A new hull function Commander allows you to build ships that give experience bonuses to other ships in combat. Idea: Quirin Herman. (v4.0j)
  • Ships must now decloak at once when they reach the DamageLevelForCloakFail in combat. Previously, they were given lots of time to supply-repair and stay cloaked. (v4.0j)
  • CloakFailureRate is now arrayized. Idea: Quirin Herman. (v3.4l/4.0j) The options AllowEatingSupplies, BorgAssimilationRate, ClimateDeathRate, CloakFuelBurn, DarkSenseRange, EngineShieldBonusRate, FuelUsagePerFightFor100KT, FuelUsagePerTurnFor100KT, HissEffectRate, MaxPlanetaryIncome, MaximumWebMinefieldRadius, PlanetaryTorpsPerTube, RecycleRate, RobFailureOdds, TowStrengthDistanceScale, TowStrengthEngineScale, and WebMineDecayRate are now also arrayized. Indirectly followed from suggestions by Chris Carr. (v3.5/4.1)
  • The alX and naX friendly codes now also work on refinery ships and can be used to limit the minerals consumed. Idea: Patrick de Groot. (v3.4m/4.0k)
  • PHost now includes the often-requested ability to change the cost of starbases and fighters (StarbaseCost, BaseFighterCost, ShipFighterCost, FreeFighterCost). The first two of these options need updated clients to handle the changed costs. Currently, no such client exists, but we hope that such clients will now be made. To avoid that hosts accidentally configure unplayable games, there's the new AllowIncompatibleConfiguration meta-option. (v4.0k)
  • Likewise, there is now also an option that allows you to raise or lower the number of fighters (MaximumFightersOnBase, v4.0k) and defense posts (MaximumDefenseOnBase, v4.1) on starbases. Raising these values needs updated clients as well.
  • You can now set the UnitsPerWebRate different from the standard UnitsPerTorpRate. (v3.4m/4.0k)
  • Planets can receive additional experience for good government (EPPlanetGovernment). Planets can receive additional torpedoes due to experience (EModPlanetaryTorpsPerTube) (v4.0k)
  • Due to popular demand, PHost can now send exact experience reports. The upper limit for experience can now be configured. (v4.1)
  • There are two new options to configure PAL awards for glory devices: PALGloryDevicePer10KT and PALGloryKillPer10KT. (v3.5/4.1)
  • hullfunc.dat is now described in the documentation, and includes level-restricted and ship-specific functions. (v4.1)
  • The new option BuildChangeRelativePenalty can be used to give a relative priority penalty to changed build orders (instead of complete loss of points in PBP/FIFO mode). This option kind-of supersedes SBQBuildChangePenalty. (v3.5/4.1)

Bugs Fixed

  • When given a PlayersAllowed or RacesAllowed without preceding Hull and Function in hullfunc.txt, PHost would exit with an assertion failure. This has been replaced by a proper error message. (v3.4e/4.0a)
  • Not really a bug, more sort-of a missing rule: Dark Sense and Super Spy now work properly even when many players play the same race. When many players Pillage or RGA a planet, or many players Rob, rules are now more fair (per-player-id order). (v3.4e/4.0a)
  • Version 4.0 would not correctly communicate Experience to PVCR, and PVCR would display bogus warnings when seeing experience. (v4.0a)
  • Experience score records came out endian-swapped on Suns. Found by Stefan Glasauer. (v4.0a)
  • When a ship got re-crewed, its experience level would rise uncontrollably. Found by Daniel Brüdigam. (v4.0a)
  • PVCR 4.0 would spam the user with bogus warnings when used in a 3.x game. (v4.0a)
  • When a ship changed ownership (combat, give, surrender, boarding), its ship name would be sent to the new owner even if AllowShipNames says it should not. Found by Daniel Brüdigam. (v3.4e/4.0a)
  • If the Beam up Clans mission was used to gather more than 655 clans, PHost would remove too few from the planet due to an overflow. It would report a bogus amount in the message, too. Found by Bart Dopheide. (v3.4f/4.0b)
  • The FighterSweepRate and FighterSweepRange now have correct defaults. With the original defaults, everyone could use that ability, not just colonies. Found by Holger Moritz. (v3.4g/4.0c)
  • Experience did not work at all on Linux in version 4.0b. This problem was caused by an error in the compilation. (v4.0c)
  • When writing util.dat records, PHost would have consulted the AllowMoreThan500Minefields of the minefield owner, not of the player who's receiving the record. (v3.4g/4.0d)
  • Units did not gain experience other than by aging when a PControl add-on is used. That is, neither Training nor fighting gave you points. auxhostX.ini works, though. Found by Heiko Schlenker. You now know why the 4.0 version is called "beta". (v4.0d)
  • util.dat Record 51 with current minefield counts used wrong value for "unknown" entries (65535 instead of -1). (v3.4g/4.0d)
  • When AllowShipNames was off, PHost did not include remote-control tags in the names. (v3.4g/4.0d)
  • Bioscanning was broken in version 4.0c and reported all planets as having Amorphs. Reported by Sascha Rambeaud. (v4.0d)
  • Not actually a bug, but a very strange rule: with UseAccurateFuelModel enabled, it was hard to have a ship end a turn with exactly 0 fuel: if you have 3 kt, and your ship burns 2.2, this yields 1 kt remaining. If you remove one kt, you now have 2 kt on the ship, which is too little for the move. The "fuel exhausted distance" formula was modified so that such a move now works. Encountered by Sascha Rambeaud. (v3.4h/4.0e)
  • If a fuel-less refinery ship makes fresh fuel, PHost did not allow that ship to use that fuel to defend against boarding or for movement, except if an add-on was used between these stages. Possibly, some other goofs lurked there, too. Again, found by Sascha Rambeaud. (v3.4h/4.0e)
  • If a pcontrol-add-on was used after Movement, cloaking devices would fail unless, after burning cloak fuel and movement fuel, cloak fuel for another turn remains on the ship. (v3.4h/4.0e)
  • With AllowShipNames restrictions in effect, PHost would blank some ship names in VCRs which it did not have to blank. (v3.4h/4.0e)
  • PHost now does explicit tow loop resolution, see the description of towing for details. Results were close-to-unpredictable before. (v3.4h/4.0e)
  • Winplan-shareware users were not able to jettison stuff. PHost now permits the Winplan-style of jettison for everyone. (v3.4h/4.0e)
  • Intercept now does The Right Thing[tm] for ships that broke free from a tow. It did not work before. Found by Sascha Rambeaud. (v3.4i/4.0f)
  • PHost could possibly crash when there are very many minefields (more than 85) on a ship's waypath. (v3.4i/4.0f)
  • PHost gave you a red error when you use planets.exe with certain 3rd-party maketurn programs. Encountered by Stefan Eilts. (v3.4j/4.0g)
  • After commands in PControl did not work if there were no Before commands for the same section. PHost did not complain if a file referenced through PControl did not exist. (v3.4j/4.0h)
  • Long file names in a PControl caused PHost to crash; absolute file names did not work. Found by Elfi Heck. (v3.4j/4.0h)
  • Fixed an overflow in money cost computation for Gather-build Torpedoes when more than 65535 mc were used in one turn. This is not possible with the standard ship list or PList, but can happen with other lists such as Penger. (v3.4k/4.0i)
  • With UseAccurateFuelModel enabled, cloaking could fail when you end the turn with exactly 1 kt, claiming you have too little fuel. The movement formulas can return fractional values, so your ship may end its turn with, for example, 0.8 kt. This is rounded to 1 kt, but at first it is smaller than the 1 kt needed to cloak. Found by Sascha Rambeaud. (v3.4k/4.0i)
  • AssignTo=Ship did not work. Strange. (v3.4k/4.0i)
  • Even when the build queue was full, one ship slot could remain empty. When the ship with the highest Id in the game was being destroyed, PHost was getting confused with the "total ships in game" number. (v3.4l/4.0j)
  • unload, transfer and refit commands were lost if add-ons were invoked before CargoDump resp. SpecialMissions_1 (for example, in Auxhost1). Found by Georg Strünkmann. (v4.0j)
  • If a hyperjumper was damaged above DamageLevelForHyperjumpFail, fixing it would still not allow it to jump this turn. Found by Sascha Rambeaud. (v3.4l/4.0j)
  • Add-ons could crash PHost by creating bogus build orders, for example by not building the necessary parts. Found by Ed Robinson. (v3.4l/4.0j)
  • Ships now de-cloak automatically when they change ownership. This is the natural consequence of the mission being reset. Problem pointed out by Martin Williams. (v3.4l/4.0j)
  • When a base changes ownership, clear the shipyard order (fix/recycle) to avoid a few goofs with "give". (v3.4m/4.0k)
  • Comments in hullfunc.txt could confuse the parser and make it do the Wrong Thing. (v3.4m/4.0k)
  • Ships are again allowed to drop all their fuel and some other stuff in one turn. Reported by Heiko Schlenker, Mathias Kaeckenmeister. (v3.4m/4.0k)
  • If a remote-control ship was doing imperial assault, the wrong player was receiving the message or PHost even crashed. Found by Ingo von Borstel. (v3.4m/4.0k)
  • PHost did not prevent ships from fighting each other even if they have no offensive potential or no effective weapons against their current target. This would generate combat recordings that immediately end before a shot has been placed. It would also prevent these ships from attacking following targets against which their weapons are effective. Found by Heiko Schlenker. (v3.4m/4.0k)
  • When using FuelUsagePerFightFor100KT, aggressors would continue fighting if they ran out of fuel. Found by Eugene Goroh. (v4.0k)
  • Ships that were cloaking and hyperjumping at the same time but had not enough fuel to do both crashed PHost. They do now decloak a little bit earlier, so that they no longer burn cloak fuel. Found by Thomas Klebes. (v3.4m/4.0k)
  • Add-ons could cause PHost to crash by submitting bogus cargo dump orders. (v3.4m/4.0k)
  • Mutual Intercept across map borders should now yield more intuitive movement. (v3.4m/4.0k)
  • In combat, ships can now fire at the enemy ship even if the enemy has fighters in flight, if BeamFiringRange and BeamHitShipCharge say so. In addition, with some (mis-)configurations, fighters could fly off too far and never return. This has been fixed. If a configuration is used where this is possible, you need to upgrade to PVCR 4.0k(2) to watch your battles. (v4.0k)
  • The shipscan.ext file now contains the turn number and timestamp of the current turn as stored in lastturn.hst, not the previous one. (v3.4m/4.0k)
  • PHost 4.0k was crashing on games mastered with fewer than 500 planets when experience was being used. Found by Chris Carr. (v4.1)
  • Moving at full speed with a ship repaired using supplies did not work when add-ons were used before Movement. Reported by Harry Bur. (v4.1)

Miscellaneous

  • All decloaked ships now generate a util.dat record (previously, only ships orbiting a planet did so). The record also includes whether the ship was caught before or after movement. (v3.4e/4.0a).
  • A mine-laying ship now sends you a util.dat record as well as a message even when it could not lay mines because the field was already maximal. The message will report that 0 mines were laid. (v3.4f/4.0b)
  • When you're hit by the Tim Continuum, your planets' happiness does not change. This way, you won't benefit from 0% tax, but you won't be hit too hard by growth tax. After all, you don't collect taxes either. Idea: Sascha Rambeaud (v3.4f/4.0b)
  • Messaging was completely revised. Therefore, you receive a number of new failure records (broken tow, gather failed, cannot colonize, cloak failure (incl. anti-cloak)). Some other messages are now also sent to the remote-controller of a ship (beam up, lay mines, colonize, hiss (planet and ship), rob (robber and victim), super spy deluxe, build fighters, ground attack, mine hit, minefield passed, cyborgs gather debris, wormhole travel, chunnel initiated/traveled, boarding, hit by glory device, cargo trimmed). This should end the confusion about "why didn't my remote-controlled ship end up with the same amount of fuel predicted" or similar. Some other messages are deliberately not forwarded (exploration, for example). (v3.4g/4.0d)
  • The absolute fighter bay limit was raised to 50. A 20-bay ship with 3 ExtraFighterBays now has 23 bays in total. (v3.4g/4.0d)
  • The CPEnableGive option can now take the value Allies to allow only ship givings between allies. (v3.4h/4.0e)
  • The wormhole scan record now includes the Id number of the corresponding Ufo as well as whether the wormhole is bidirectional or not. Messages now start with an (-u) tag (except for Tim-compatible English messages), which allows clients to link the message to the wormhole. (v3.4h/4.0e)
  • PHost now clears PBx fcodes after a normal (i.e. not clone) ship build. (v3.4h/4.0e)
  • Ramscoop now also works when you're intercepting, to match HOST behaviour. (Akseli Mäki) (v3.4i/4.0f)
  • The util.dat PAL record was modified so that it reports PBPs used. Idea by Stefan Glasauer. (v3.4i/4.0f)
  • The documentation now makes use of the <link rel="..."> element to provide some neat navigation possibilities with browsers that support it (try enabling "View/Show/Site Navigation Bar" in Mozilla). (v4.0f)
  • The default experience level settings were changed to allow faster advance. (v4.0f)
  • PHost now processes AssignTo=Ship statements for all ships created by Master, so you can create such ships more easily. (v4.0h)
  • PHost now accepts spaces in numeric fcodes. That is, a friendly code of "23 " or " 23" is accepted to mean the same thing as "023" for chunneling and combat. (v3.4j/4.0h)
  • Jorge Sánchez provided an update of the Spanish language file. (v3.4j/4.0h)
  • Gather-build Torpedoes now happens after mkt and does no longer override it. (v3.4k/4.0i)
  • Ships which are brought above the DamageLevelForCloakFail limit by a glory device must now decloak after the Glory Device phase; this prevents them from entering a foreign chunnel. (v3.4k/4.0i)
  • The definition of the Level2Tow function has changed. In alternative-tow mode, Level2Tow no longer is an absolute win over normal ships. (v4.0j)
  • Ships which have both glory devices now do low damage to own ships. They were doing high damage before. (v3.4l/4.0j)
  • PHost now enforces the rule that FCodes consist of printable characters only. (v3.4l/4.0j)
  • CPEnableGive now also configures availability of the gsX friendly code. (v4.0j)
  • Wormhole travel damage is now computed in exact numbers, not truncated, so you can now also get damage which is not a square number. Idea: Mathias Käckenmeister. (v3.4m/4.0k)
  • As a simplification, PHost now resets waypoint, primary enemy and friendly code on all events a ship changes ownership. This has almost no effect on gameplay, but closes another covert channel for anonymous games. (v3.4m/4.0k)
  • It was possible to name ships in a way such that planets.exe crashed when the ship name was cited in a message. PHost now includes a filter to avoid that. (v3.4m/4.0k)
  • The AllowDeluxeSuperSpy option was disfunctional since at least PHost 3.3, and has therefore been removed from the documentation (it is still accepted). To disable Deluxe Super Spy, disable the DeluxeSuperSpy stage of host processing. (v4.1)
  • The language file, plang4.hst, now has a different format. The file can be manipulated by standard tools, and compresses much better than the previous one, so that the PHost distribution files are much smaller now. (v3.5/4.1)
  • For simplicity and robustness, beamup now always has precedence over extmission, no matter what order they are received in. (v3.5/4.1)
  • The Formulas Document has been completely revised and expanded. It should now list all relevant formulas, and no longer require you to revert to the 3.x documentation. During that process, a few formulas were modified slightly. For example, actual climate deaths would often differ by one from the reported amount, due to hard-to-describe rounding effects not obvious from the formula (this one reported by Mathias Käckenmeister). The formulas should now be enough to reproduce PHost's behaviour in a prediction tool. (v3.5/4.1)
  • Mining now yields a little more minerals, by using Round instead of Trunc in the formula. Idea by Mathias Käckenmeister. (v3.5/4.1)

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PHost 4.0

PHost 4.0 released on 04/Mar/2003.

First public beta release. See What's new in PHost 4 for changes compared to PHost 3.x.

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Last updated 31 May 2015.
 
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