New Development Snapshot 0.49.14 for MegaMek, MegaMekLab, and MekHQ

[Hammer]

Welcome all to 0.49.14!

This release is a one of the largest releases for fixes and new features that we've done in quite a while. There are numerous bug fixes in all three programs, data wise we've added a few more units, few new sprites and updates and new boards. But the exciting stuff is a huge new Stratcon Feature, and lots of QOL stuff in MegaMek. Plus, it can print Record Sheets again.  cheesy

MegaMek
Make sure to click the link in some of the list for more specific information, also the full release notes are below. Here we go...

• Expanded unit data in the end report
• Improvements to Battle Value calculation and reports, adding missing reports and numerous fixes to calculations from errata, skills, bomb usage, and force bonuses
• The Weapons Panel of the Unit Display now shows considerably more info about the target see here for specifics

• Details of the current turn such as the planned movement or planned firing can now be shown as a list of actions in an overlay
• We've improved the GUI for the Unit Selector with better formatting

• We have a fix for the extreme lag players encountered when a Windows OS scaling other than 100% was combined with MM's HQ rendering. We are still getting some reports of lag between phases and investigating those.
• Fixes for Alpha Strike Conversion updates
• We have improvements to the mini-map, you can use it again in the board editor and improved it's performance
• Improvements to unit validation to capture more invalid designs.
• Improvements to the save games on dedicated servers
• The random map generator now supports ultra-heavy terrain (woods, rubble, rough), jungles and tundra
• We know everyone LOVE's (sarcasm) command line stuff so we've improved the Replace Player Dialog and you can now edit existing bot configurations

• Ever run a campaign as a GM, tired of players abusing your NPC techs? Well guess what techs (GM's) can strike back! Nothing like a lose panel on a fusion reactor to heat things up. See here for more details

Lets talk about Simultaneous (Sim) stuff.
Last release we created a bit of a storm with the comments around Sim Phases and their future. Guess what...we think we have a fix for them.

But we want to be specific about a few things. If this fix works, then the only one likely on the chopping block is Sim Movement. It's not coded well and doesn't follow TT rules used in Double Blind. So, lets say this another way.....Sim Deployment, Sim Targeting, Sim Firing, and Sim Physical will likely stay. Notice a key word in the last few sentences "likely" as defined by Merriam-Webster "having a high probability of occurring or being true : very probable".

What we would like players to do is test the fix in this release. Go back to using Sim Phases (try to avoid Sim Move). We are looking specifically for instances where a player gets there turned skipped. If you want to help with this, make sure to turn on "Paranoid Autosave" we'd need save games to continue to track down the issue.

MegaMekLab
Lots of fixes, and improvements to reporting BV and Alpha Conversion reports. We also fixed our packing opps in 49.13 and we can print Record Sheets again.

We are aware of an intermittent issue (won't run) with the standalone MegaMekLab release and Linux. If you have issues, please use the full MekHQ release to get a working MegaMekLab.

MekHQ
Has had some bug fixes, but the one...and for one of the coolest (in our opinion) features for Stratcon.

Stratcon Advanced Terrain Update

Tired of looking at the same gray hexes and square boxes while tactical battles take place only on generic grasslands terrain? With this update, that will be a thing of the past.


A note on features:

• Each track now has an average temperature that is transferred to MegaMek.
• The track's temperature determines which biomes may appear on the track.
• Each hex has its own biome which determines what tactical maps appear in MegaMek.
• The random map generator has been upgraded with a lot of new terrain possibilities. Fight in deep jungles, frozen wastelands or obnoxiously short foliage forests.
• Awesome biome and facility graphics thanks to Florian "SpOoKy777" Mellies.
  

This part is critically important!!! You must finish up your current contract/mission before updating versions.

A few reminders of things.
1. We have made changes to the unit files to align them with the MUL by removing the term "(Standard)". This was a significant data task and resulted in the removal of nearly 1000 instances of "(Standard)". Our Quality Assurance (QA) team has thoroughly tested these name changes by creating campaigns and loading them with every unit. However, there is a potential risk in MekHQ with CPNX files, as they rely on unit names for matching. If you encounter any errors while loading your campaign file, we apologize for the inconvenience and kindly refer to the following post for further assistance.

2. Lastly, we’ve ripped the unofficial unit band aid off. We've moved the unofficial units zip out of this release. The reasons and poll for this was discussed HERE. Between our Discord and this poll 75% of players were good with us removing them. It allows us to have the releases be focused on canon units.

The file is still available, but players will need to add the zip file manually. We have no plans to further support or add units into that zip. It would be safe to just set it up in a customs folder and move that folder between releases.

To add the units back:
1. Download the zip file from the MegaMek Extras HERE.
2. You need to right click and use the "save link as"
3. Save this as a zip to the data\mechfiles folder of the program.
     -As a suggestion save this to a customs folder in the data\mechfiles
4. On restart they will be added.

Remember that MekHQ campaign files **aren't** backwards compatible so if move your campaign from an earlier version to this you can't go back. But you can keep backups and play in both versions to see the difference.

See the notes above and below for specific things.

MekHQ StratCon Alpha
See the big news above!!

Stable 0.50.0 Status Update
We are still in the development portion of the current cycle. We've been able to implement a new version of Gradle (our build language) starting with the 0.49.11 release. As well as adding support for Java 17. This is still undergoing testing and we encourage players to use the programs with Java 17, but Java 11 remains our recommended choice for the .49.x Dev cycle. We are still working on the connection stability issues and are hopeful this release is the first step on the road to a fix.

We are getting to a point where we are starting to talk about 0.50.0 Stable, but we still have some significant things we need to complete and don't anticipate a new Stable anytime soon. At this point we have some good solid development releases and for security alone I'd recommend upgrading to Java 11 from Java 8.

Once that is done, we'd recommend trying a dev release like 0.49.12. With a milestone of 0.50.0 we need to make sure we get it right.

Java 11 and 17
We've updated to Java 11, which means you'll need to update to use the 0.49.x development branches. As Java is now open source, we recommend Adoptium Temurin 11. We have a help page for Windows and Mac. Further, for Linux, you should be able to use your package manager to install Adoptium Temurin from their repository. Finally, all our automated tests (with the exception of MegaMekLab) are done with Temurin 11.

This release implements support for Java 17. We need to stress this has had some testing and needs more players to use the programs with Java 17. But Java 11 remains our recommended version.

Social Media
We are also happy to announce we have an official MegaMek Discord. This is now our primary community location for the suite, providing superior voice support, individual channels, and assistance for the official public servers. There are also the following community Discords with regular MegaMek channels, namely Everything BattleTech and Classic BattleTech. We are also on Facebook, at MegaMek BattleTech and MegaMek for our group and page respectively.

Mac Users
Please check out this workaround for Mac Operating Systems.

Contributing
Please check out this document for contributing to the suite.

Updating Your Campaign:
1. Make backups of your campaigns and customs.
2. Always treat each release as a stand-alone release and only copy your data forward from older versions, never backwards.
3. Do not copy MegaMek saves nor any preference file from a different version.

Change Logs (Release Specific) and Download Links
MegaMek
Download

Code: [Select]

+ Fix #4452: Fixes a bug with detecting if Infantry dies due to extreme temperatures
+ Fix #4245: At victory in a double-blind game, a full unfiltered report is now available
+ PR #4458: When clicking on report hyperlink, center board on entity if possible
+ Fix #4460: Prevent blank lobby after adding custom units in multi-player games
+ PR #4454: End-round report shows visible active unit data (as displayed in tooltip)
+ Fix #4473: Realign phase done buttons
+ Fix #4471: Dont filter patchwork it causes the index to get out of sync
+ Fix #4467: Add client setting for Max Range to Draw Sensor / Visual Rings
+ PR #4468: Limit the width of the unit tooltip so that it does not grow really wide
+ Fix #4481: Incorrect availability ratings for Clan electronic warfare equipment
+ PR #4482: Minimap updates
+ Fix #4449: Delete PilotToolTip cache on client start and when portrait is set
+ Fix #4479: In fire phases, solo torso twist no longer triggers Done button enabling; corrected Done button handling during movement
+ Fix #4480, #3494: Selecting BA Anti-Personnel weapons during the firing phase no longer results in an error
+ PR #4474: Improvements to Battle Value calculation and reports
+ PR #4502: Map generator parameter dialog now loads theme from preset; various bugfixes to map generator parameter dialog
+ Fix #4462: Fixed the extreme lag players encountered when a Windows OS scaling other than 100% was combined with MM's HQ rendering
+ PR #4423: The WeaponsPanel of the Unit Display now shows considerably more info about the target
+ PR #4509: Stand-alone MegaMek now also contains pilot portraits
+ PR #4516: Additional icons, among them a large icon for grounded Buccaneer DropShips
+ PR #4514: The random map generator now supports ultra-heavy terrain (woods, rubble, rough), jungles and tundra
+ PR #4533: Displaying the visual/sensor ranges now has a keybind configuration field in the client settings
+ Fix #4523: Fixes an error with the unit status report (picked up pilots are now excluded from the report)
+ PR #4517: The BT Universe's Eras are now loaded from a definition XML file. The eras are moddable
+ PR #4513: Details of the current turn such as the planned movement or planned firing can now be shown as a list of actions in an overlay
+ Fix #894: TO fatigue is now calculated from the better of Gunnery/Anti-Mek for Infantry
+ PR #4539: Picked-up pilots are now shown on the unit tooltip in pilot info
+ PR #4532, #4536: BV Calculation updates for MG Arrays and Manei Domini options
+ Fix #206: The allowed weapons for the Sandblaster and Weapon Specialist SPAs have been corrected; some are available depending on game options; Weapon choices are now shown in the pilot tooltip
+ PR #4549, #4551: GUI improvements to the Unit Selector
+ Fix #4305: Environmental Specialist SPA is now properly reducing penalties from high wind
+ PR #4567: The unofficial sensor geek modifier is now applied to sensor ranges displayed on the map
+ PR #4565: Sensor info and sensor range are no longer erroneously shown in the combination of a ground map with TO Sensor Rules off and SO Advanced Sensors on
+ Fix #4548: Fix soft-lock after physical attack round report
+ PR #4573: The text export for the unit summary no longer contains HTML tags
+ Fix MML-#1256: The Flotation Hull chassis mod is now allowed for Wige vehicles
+ PR #4587: BA Cargo Lifter Manipulators can now have different sizes (different carrying capacities)
+ Fix #4598: Load from MUL in lounge now sets unit's deployment round to 0 by default
+ Fix #4574: Mortar turret ammo selection dropdown is empty
+ Fix #4543, 4547: Auto-success/fail message in to-hit display; set scroll to top when selecting new target for reduced annoyance
+ PR #4609: There is now a client setting to hide the unit tooltips in the game reports
+ PR #4607, #4654: Alpha Strike Conversion updates
+ PR #4610: Implemented Gas Hog quirk (only relevant for aerospace units at the moment)
+ Issue #4527: Allow indirect LRM launches from nose cones of grounded spheroid dropships
+ Issue #4614: unit display tab strip background respects theme
+ Issue #4553: offboard artillery Disengage causes uncaught nullpointer exception
+ PR #4632, #4630, #4627, #4626, #4660: Tests for flagging units as invalid have been expanded (Nova CEWS, internal structure slots, modular armor, industrial equipment)
+ PR #4622: Fluff images for some unit types are now loaded from the right directories
+ Fix #4618: Improved and unified savegame path resolution and error reporting for -dedicated and -host starts; should now find savegames without path
+ Fix #4540: Field of fire and sensors rings now display during indirect attack declaration (-> TAG)
+ PR #4576: Gamemaster mode can now edit units during a game
+ Fix #4591: Grounded SmallCraft now receive a -2 attack bonus instead of a +2 malus that only applies to fighters
+ PR #4637: There is now an indicator in the player table showing the GM player
+ Fix #4599: The Alpha Strike stats table that can be accessed from the lobby is now sortable; sorting also applies to printing AS cards
+ Fix #4582: Infantry (over) stacking in building hex
+ Fix #4439, #4638: Indirect mortar attacks without spotter and indirect semi-guided + tag attacks now ignore all terrain modifiers including those of the target hex
+ PR #4605: The Replace Player Dialog can now edit existing bot configurations
+ Fix #3654: Infantry/BA damage messages no longer accumulate
+ Fix #4641: In the lobby, setting the game master no longer requires a vote
+ Fix #4645: Display the correct conversion mode text for LAMs
+ Fix #4656: Game board key binds (wasd) now also work in the report phases
+ Fix #4653: Moving from prone to hull down now allows a free facing change the same way moving from prone to standing does
+ PR #4674: Fix potential race condition in Game::turnVector
+ Fix #4606: Half-roll maneuver allows illegal facing change for aerospace fighter
+ Fix #4652: VTOL Jet Boosters Not Applying +3 Modifier To Piloting Rolls

MegaMekLab
Download

Code: [Select]

+ PR #1267: Adaptations to MM's #4474 (BV calculation and reports update)
+ Fix #1250: The maximum turns at thrust display for Conventional Fighters now shows correct values
+ Fix #1262, #1258, #1245: Physical attack modifiers and damage values in reference tables have been corrected
+ Fix #1275: Large weapon critical slots can no longer be split into a Mek's legs
+ Fix #1273: Record Sheets now show Coolant Pods in the inventory
+ Fix #1212: Record Sheets now show appropriate heat MP penalties when inch or cm movement units are selected
+ Fix #1256: The Flotation Hull chassis mod is now allowed for Wige vehicles
+ Fix #488: Dumpers calculate weight properly based on linked cargo
+ Fix #1216: In the equipment database view, all ammo including that of weapons not present on the unit can now be shown
+ PR #1282: The critical slot view for fighter units has now reduced input lag and popup menus will work more reliably
+ Fix #1155: Reinforced Structure no longer uses a crit slot when loading a unit
+ Fix #1199: Prevented ProtoMek access to some weapons forbidden to them by the rules
+ PR #1286: The equipment database filter that hides prototype equipment now also hides "other" equipment such as Prototype CASE
+ Fix #1265, #1173: Several BattleArmor validity tests have been added
+ Fix #275: BattleArmor Detachable Weapon Packs can now be found in the equipment list more easily but will register as invalid when the unit doesn't have sufficient MP
+ Fix #1252: Mek partial wings can no longer be pod-mounted; the combination of partial wings and Mek mechanical jump boosters is now marked as invalid
+ Fix #1290: The Alpha Strike conversion report can now be accessed from the unit preview

MekHQ
Download

Code: [Select]

+ PR #3676: Gradle build fixes
+ Issue #3682: Prevent NPE when changing bot config
+ Issue #3683 - fix issue preventing loading saved campaigns containing MASC
+ Issue #3621 - prevent NPE completing ship search immediately after loading campaign
+ PR #3692: Adaptations to MM's #4474 (BV calculation and reports update)
+ Issue #3402, #3715: Only hostile units are now displayed on the killboard during scenario resolution, Stratcon fixes
+ PR #3694: New StratCon feature - tracks now have individual terrain hexes (with graphics) and average temperatures;
    the terrain influences the map presets used for tactical battles; temperature is passed to megamek (may be hot!)
+ PR #3724: "Clan Personnel" special flag now correctly sets the person's clan status
+ PR #3731: Fix nightly build from a missed method rename in MegaMek.
+ Issue #3713: allied turrets have upgraded network security; defeat in evacuation scenarios results in facility capture instead of destruction
Enjoy everyone!

[Hammer]

We have a minor bug in the reporting of this version. One of the new reporting slows the game turn over turn for some players. To fix go into Game Options -> Basic Options  -> Enable "Hide Unit Tooltip in report log"

[Tinyozora]

Thank you for taking the effort to try to save the sim options.  It's appreciated.

[Walrus Gumboot]

At which point I facetiously ask about the "Gray Death Standard" Battle Armor...

[Sartris]

MML windows link on the downloads page goes to a screen that just says "not found"

[Hammer]

MML windows link on the downloads page goes to a screen that just says "not found"

Yeah. We are looking into it. Short use the link in the post above.

[BATTLEMASTER]

At which point I facetiously ask about the "Gray Death Standard" Battle Armor...

Gray Death had standards?   

I guess to be fair there are very few standards in BattleTech now !   

[Colt Ward]

Is Change Tile Set Theme disabled?

[Hammer]

Is Change Tile Set Theme disabled?

Do you mean away from the default Saxarba tileset?

Client Settings-Game Board- First option. 

[Sir Chaos]

This is technically a remark about 0.49.13 but I didn´t see anything in the change logs so I imagine it may still be relevant...

I noticed that the base models of vehicles and of Clan non-omni mech designs no longer have the "(Standard)" model designation.

I also only just realized that those same models no longer show up in generated RATs (AtB unit market, RAT generator in MegaMek) or in the list of variants available for refit.

The latter was, IIRC, also the case before the "(Standard)" model designations were originally added, so I figure removing it again caused the current issue.

[Hammer]

This is technically a remark about 0.49.13 but I didn´t see anything in the change logs so I imagine it may still be relevant...

I noticed that the base models of vehicles and of Clan non-omni mech designs no longer have the "(Standard)" model designation.

I also only just realized that those same models no longer show up in generated RATs (AtB unit market, RAT generator in MegaMek) or in the list of variants available for refit.

The latter was, IIRC, also the case before the "(Standard)" model designations were originally added, so I figure removing it again caused the current issue.

We have regenerated the Force Generator and Quirks files and this should be improved. It will take time for all impacts to be captured and corrected.

[Sartris]

Yeah. We are looking into it. Short use the link in the post above.

ah. i'll wait for the fix. this is a very different package than i'm used to... unless i can just copy the zip into my current MML folder?

[Hammer]

ah. i'll wait for the fix. this is a very different package than i'm used to... unless i can just copy the zip into my current MML folder?

You looking for MegaMekLab only for Windows?

[Sartris]

yeah. this time there's a difference under the assets section when you click the download link in the top post vs previous versions



the current .14 zip has two folders (bin and lib). it's missing all the other files 

[Hammer]

Looks like the MegaMekLab dedicated release was a bad upload. Looks fixed now.

[Sir Chaos]

We have regenerated the Force Generator and Quirks files and this should be improved. It will take time for all impacts to be captured and corrected.

OKay... just checked with 0.49.14... they´re getting rolled on RATs now, but still not on the refit lists.

[Liam's Ghost]

Is there a configuration somewhere that lets me permanently turn off autofill unhitables and auto compact? Because I find these features really annoying.

[BATTLEMASTER]

Is there a configuration somewhere that lets me permanently turn off autofill unhitables and auto compact? Because I find these features really annoying.

Same here!  I always forget to turn them off, especially if I'm playing around with the fixed configurations of canon omnis.

[pokefan548]

Thirded. With gusto.