NEWS

XCONQ RELEASE NOTES

*** 7.5.0

This has not been released yet.
Current estimates put it at 1Q of 2005 sometime.
There are lots and lots of bugfixes and new features.

*** 7.4.1

The Windows port has not been built, and probably won't build without
some work, because of networking changes in shared Windows/Unix code.

Made cconq build again.

*** 7.4.0

Hans Ronne contributed a new Tolkien-inspired game "Lord of the Rings"
(lord-rings.g), and its supporting modules 3rd-age.g and t-midearth.g.

Keir Novik's "Carrier Battles" (tailhook.g), a detailed game of WWII
naval combat, and "Coral Sea", a Coral Sea scenario for it, are now
part of the game library.

Erik Sigra and Michael Burschik contributed better random name
generators, for Swedish and German place names respectively.

Standard flags now include 16-pixel-wide versions, and the 8-pixel
version use more colors.

The program tracks views of units using individual objects, which
enables more accurate display of multiple enemy units stacked at a
single location.

Networked games can be started from a mix of interactive and
command-line invocations.  The game module will not be downloaded
through the network connection, which makes startup faster.

Some unused and un-useful GDL constructs are gone, such as extension
properties, program-version, and image palettes.

The program supplies more feedback on why actions and tasks fail.

There is a "new" AI type named oplayer, which is just the previous
version of the AI.  This is mainly for testing that the AI is actually
getting smarter rather than dumber.

There is now more control available for the behavior of independent
units, for instance, you can set whether they will research and build
other units.

Sides now get colors instead of numbers if they have no emblems.

Games can use unit images that fill an entire hex, where previously
they were limited to a smaller bounding box within the hex.  This
is controlled by a new GDL variable "bigicons".

The tcl/tk interface now has a working isometric display mode.

The tcl/tk interface now lists only finished games by default,
and includes a button to list all games.

The Mac interface has many display improvements, from terrain
transitions to more floating windows.

The old Xt/Xaw interface has been removed, since it was no longer
being maintained.

There have been a host of minor improvements throughout the programs
and game libraries.

*** 7.3.3

Fix pathnames to tcl/tk libraries.

Fix Mac bugs: 1-bit images, loading of emblems from saved games, large
map handling, removed variants.

Add better solid colors in advterr.g.

*** 7.3.2

Fix crash with no-indepside games on Unix.

Add terrain images for advances.g.

*** 7.3.1

In Unix/Windows player setup, make separate buttons to add/remove
indepside AI and to configure indepside behavior.

Add --enable-alternate-scoresdir configure option.

Update config.guess and config.sub.

*** 7.3.0

This release accumulates over two years of changes throughout the
program.  In general, the emphasis has been on improving the program's
usability, making the AI smarter, improving existing games, and
extending to Civ-type games, rather than adding random new games to
the library.

The Unix user interface has been rewritten to use tcl/tk.  It includes
a full set of menus, resizeable panes in the map windows, buttons for
common operations, a mouseover display, and many additional map
display options.  There is also a full set of dialogs for setting up a
game, plus a chat window to facilitate setting up networked games.

There is now a port to Windows, using the tcl/tk-based interface,
which means no more requirement to run an X server.  The Windows port
still has bugs though.

The Mac interface now has floating windows for most auxiliary windows,
city and research dialogs, and more display controls, including
player controls over most colors and imagery used.  Selected units
can now blink rather than being surrounded with a box.

Unix networking support now allows for more than two players in a
game, and the game setup dialogs are synchronized, so for instance
clicking on a variant checkbox causes all players' checkboxes to
change.

Hans Ronne added the game "Ancient Near East" (anc-near-east.g),
similar to Civilization but with more detail, such as different kinds
of wheat to discover.  The included map of the Near East is
spectacularly large and detailed.

A Civilization II emulation (civ2.g) has been added.  The game works,
but happiness is not implemented, most of the city improvements have
no effect, nor do the Wonders.

Linn Stanton added an extended version of the standard game (lhs.g)
that includes radar, artillery, aaa, engineers, mines, and minefields.

Many new graphic images are available, particularly for terrain.
Xconq can load images directly from image files in standard formats
(although only GIF is available at present).

Players in the standard game get towns with names appropriate to
their chosen nationalities.

It is now possible to play independent units as if they were a regular
side, and (more usefully), it's possible to have an AI run the
independent units.  Watch out for the marauding barbarians!

A second AI type, the "iplayer", is available.  It is a minimal
AI that does basic tactical planning for individual units, but
does not attempt to coordinate them.

A set of commands, agreement-draft etc, are available for setting
up agreements.  (Agreement support is still incomplete though.)

New commands:
	"c-rate" sets conversion rates for materials (division of 
		trade into science/shields/luxuries in Civ, for instance).
	"collect" sets up a task to collect materials from terrain.
	"research" sets per-side research into advances.

There is a new GDL type "advance", to represent scientific or
technological advances.  Game designers can lay out a whole technology
tree, and either units or whole sides may do research to achieve
advances.

To allow "research" to apply to advances, the existing research
activity to develop tech levels has been renamed to "development".
Its characteristics remain the same however.

The "extract" action is available for units to get materials
directly from terrain.

A game design can include "advanced" units that are like Civ
cities; they are variable-sized, and can collect materials from
the surrounding terrain.

GDL includes many more variables, type properties, and tables.
Some of the more notable additions include:
	global "combat-model", to choose algorithm for combat resolution
	global "indepside-has-ai", to control indepside use of AI.
	global "country-border-color" etc, to control colors used by
		interfaces
	side property "treasury", tables "gives-to-treasury" and
		"takes-from-treasury", to accumulate materials for the
		side as a whole
	table "advance-needed-to-build", to define how the technology
		tree enables the construction of unit types
	table "terrain-density", to add random variation to synthesized
		terrain
	tables "unit-consumption-to-grow", "size-limit-without-advance",
		and "side-limit-without-occupant", to regulate the
		growth of advanced units (cities)
	table "cellwide-protection-for", that controls protection for
		all units in a cell
	unit type properties "attack" and "defend", to define generic
		attack/defense strengths
	unit type property "advanced", to define advanced units
	unit type properties "advanced-auto-construct" and
		"advanced-auto-research", to automate the activities
		of advanced units
	unit type property "ai-tactical-range", to control the area
		of awareness for a unit's tactical decisions

Sami Perttu contributed a supply system model; see doc/README.supply
for more detail on how to use in game designs.

The tcl/tk port includes experimental support for isometric display,
but this needs more work, and so is turned off by default.  (See the
top of tcltk/tkconq.tcl to see how to enable.)

The Unix port uses autoconf for configuration.  Xconq now conforms
better to FHS; library files reside in /usr/local/share/xconq, while
score files live in /var/lib/xconq/scores.

Many many bug fixes and smaller cleanups.

*** 7.2.1

All image scaling and default image generation now happens in
generic code, which gives X11 interface the ability to draw
unit images that are shrunken or magnified to fit properly.

If a game design does not specify a side library, Xconq will assign
side names A, B, C, etc, in order, instead of choosing random letters.
(While technically this is a GDL change, this does not affect
compatibility with base 7.2.)

Now builds under cygwin32!  See INSTALL for instructions.

Bug fixes for crashing commands, Mac edge cases, name reporting,
Solaris builds, and networked game reliability, among others.

*** 7.2

Standard commands now include "doctrine" to set unit doctrine, 'I'
("idle") to sleep only for a limited time specified by the prefix
argument, '^P' ("repair") to do repair actions, "submit" and "release"
to change side control.

Xconq now includes basic support for networked games.  Use the
"Connect" button on the Mac startup screen, and the -host/-join
options in Unix (use host:port syntax, -host thera.com:1234 for the
first player, -join thera.com:1234 to join in).

Unix Xconq has updated configury for new versions of Unix, and it now
installs as a setuid program so that the scorefile may be shared by
multiple users.  Saved games go into the directory ~/.xconq .

The Mac interface to Xconq now includes offscreen drawing for smoother
and faster scrolling, more player control over color usage, more
preference settings, and other goodies, all thanks to Hans Ronne.

New games added to the library:
  "metz-1944", the siege of Metz during WWII
  "gazala", a North African battle in 1942
  "ww2-pac-41", the Pacific theater in WWII using advanced WWII units
  "ww2s-pac-41", the Pacific theater using standard units
  "africa-1850", exploration of Africa in the 19th century
  "space", exploration and conquest of outer space

The large maps "earth-1deg" and "earth-50km", and associated unit lists,
"u-e1-1998" and "u-e50-1998", are more accurate and up-to-date, as is
the list of nationalities "nat-names.g"

Many images now have full-color versions.

Most library games have been enhanced to use new features, or have had
serious bugs fixed.

Due to copyright issues, the tolkien and starwars games are no longer
part of the distributed library.

The manual's chapters on game design have been split into a separate
manual.

Maze generation now guarantees a completely connected maze.

Image colors are now handled as 1x1 tiles.

Games may now include a per-cell control layer that is like the people
layer, but is for temporary control that reverts if people revolt.

Predefined sides may specify preferred units, and predefined units may
specify preferred sides.

Scorekeepers may now allow a group of allied sides to win, by using
the last-alliance-wins test.

New GDL variables include action-movies, action-narratives,
action-notices, event-movies, event-narratives, and event-notices, for
customization of text output; create-units-from-specs, for use in
controlling unit creation when including modules in each other.  The
variable random-events is no longer defined, while
temperature-year-cycle is now a property of areas.

The material type property "description-format" is gone.  The terrain
type properties "color" and "description-format" are gone.

New unit type properties include acp-morale-effect, courage-min,
courage-max (currently unused), cp-attrition, fire-angle-max,
generic-char, hp-to-recover, lost-revolt-chance, lost-vanish-chance,
lost-wreck-chance, morale-max, morale-recovery, opinion-min,
opinion-max, revolt-at-opinion-min, see-terrain-if-captured.

New GDL tables include body-height, capacity-negation,
consumption-per-add-terrain, consumption-per-fire, control-range,
keep-control-range, looks-like, lose-track-chance,
lose-surrender-chance, material-per-remove-terrain,
material-to-add-terrain, material-to-attack, material-to-fire,
material-to-remove-terrain, material-to-research, morale-hit,
morale-hit-by, morale-on-creation, morale-terrain-effect,
mp-to-enter-own, productivity-adjacent, see-material-always,
see-mistake-chance, see-others-if-captured, speed-occupant-effect,
spy-track-chance, tp-damage, track-chance, weapon-height.

Innumerable bug fixes.

*** 7.1

"Long-name" commands (those entered via 'o') may now accept arguments.

Standing orders are now available, and are more general than those in
5.x.  The long-name command has the form "if <condition> <task>", so
for instance to move all infantry at a given location to Berlin, use
the command "if infantry at 32,25 move-to Berlin".  The X11 interface
includes a dialog to set up standing orders; the long-name command
"orders" gets to it.

View coverage changes are now calculated and displayed incrementally.
This means that for games such as "panzer" with both line-of-sight
and varying elevations, displayed coverage will update correctly
as units move around.

New players may be added to a game while it is in progress.

Nearly all of the defined commands have been implemented for each
interface.  The new command "disembark" (^E) causes occupants to leave
the transport but remain in the same cell.

Scores are now recorded and read back from a scorefile.

The X11 interface includes commands "side" and "unit" that display
closeups of sides and units, respectively, the command line allows
multiple -L locations to look for modules

The Mac interface now displays elevations using contour lines, the
command dialog is longer modal, and closeup info about the selected
unit appears at the top of each map window.

The mplayer AI is smarter in various ways.

The library now includes "time", a game of technological development
a la Civilization; and "omaha", the Omaha Beach landings in Normandy,
using the ww2-bn module.

In the standard game, aircraft now have no stacking limits, all unit
types get 1 free movement point, damaged ships move more slowly, towns
near roads get their own spur roads connecting.

Many of the library games have been improved.

GDL now includes the following new constructs (see the manual for details
of how they work):
Tables: counterattack, countercapture, fire-hit-chance, fire-damage,
fire-attack-terrain-effect, fire-defend-terrain-effect
Global variables: edge-road-density, initial-date-max, initial-date-min.
Unit type properties: road-to-edge-change, spur-chance, spur-range.
Side properties: material-view, temperature-view, etc.
Image/image family properties: notes.

GDL's "print" form works in all interfaces now.

Many many bug fixes and minor enhancements.

*** 7.0.1

The Mac interface now includes a preference for whether to dump the
game statistics into a file.

Keyboard direction commands for the Mac and X11 interfaces now work for
attack as well as for movement.

The library now include Chris Christensen's "insects" game.  It's kind of
silly, and still needs some design work to use more version 7 features,
but is worth trying out.

The "starwars" game now has various improvements and fixes, including
the ability of Death Stars to detonate planets, and its associated
"planets" module is larger, with many small planets.

Several bugs noted in 7.0.0 have been fixed.

*** 7.0

Xconq 7.0 is a comprehensive rewrite and expansion of Xconq 5.5.
Nearly every part of the program and its game library has been changed
in some way.

Xconq now includes a Mac interface.  This is a full-featured interface
that works on nearly any Mac, both b/w and color, large screen and small.

The X11 interface now uses Xaw/Xt to provide more interface
functionality, such as buttons for common operations, popups for view
controls, designing, and printing, and a panner to get to a particular
part of the world more quickly.  Each player may now have multiple map
windows.  Maps zoom in and out, from 1x1 to 128x128 pixels per hex.
The interface can display color images for terrain, units, and sides.

The curses interface now includes status lines and adjustable panes.

There is now support for printing maps using PostScript(tm).

The numbers of unit, terrain, and material (used to be "resource")
types may now range up to 126.  The number of sides may be up to 30.

Terrain may now be "borders" (such as rivers), "connections" (such as
roads), and "coatings" (such as snow).

The world may now be a hexagon as well as a cylinder.  It may include
elevations, temperatures, wind, clouds, named geographical features,
people, and materials for each hex (now called "cell").

Units may now get combat experience, they can be incomplete (meaning
that construction may start on a unit, halt, then resume later where
it left off), they can have an altitude, they have tooling (affects
startup time for construction), and they can be of varying size.

Multiple units may stack in a single cell.

Unit abilities are now defined by the "actions" that they can perform.
Previously, the actions were to move, build, disband, and attack; 7.0
also includes adding and removing terrain, research, change of unit
type, material production and transfer, detaching and merging
multi-part units, ranged fire, and detonation as actions.

The combat model is more sophisticated, now including the possibility
for stack and occupants to protect a defender, for retreat, and for
variable damage from a single hit.

Units now have plans that include multiple goals and a task agenda.
Tasks track successes and failures of actions, choosing actions as
needed to complete successfully.

Sides may have a "tech level" that governs usage and construction of
unit types, they may be in "classes" that restrict which types of
units they can own, may control other sides, and have an emblem to be
used for display.

Games may include a day/night cycle and associated effects.

Games may include a seasonal cycle and associated effects.

Random game synthesis methods now include maze generation, country
expansion, river and road generation, and grammar-based unit and
feature name synthesis.

Games may now have variants that are chosen at game setup time.

The AI machinery now supports any number of different types of AIs.

The generic AI "mplayer" has been rewritten; it now uses an explicit
strategy based on division of the world into theaters, and relies on the
new plan and task mechanisms to improve individual unit behavior.

The game library now has many new games, including a tactical-level
panzer game, detailed battalion-, division-, and strategic-level WWII
games, Tolkien-inspired fantasy games, a Russian Revolution game, a
Roman Empire game, and an Age of Discovery game with a Magellan scenario.

The period/map/scenario file structure is gone, replaced by a Game
Design Language (GDL).  GDL looks like Lisp, but is still a
declarative language oriented towards for defining the types, tables,
and other objects in a game.  Lisp syntax supplies power, flexibility,
and a degree of standardization, while the declarative nature of the
language means that the game designer can still concentrate on
defining properties rather than writing code.  Also, since all files
are in the same language and modules can include each other, game
designers can build designs by including an existing game and
modifying it, rather than by defining a totally new game.

There are now over 160 tables available to the game designer, over 100
unit type properties and over 60 global variables as well.  The designer
now has control over nearly every detail of a game.

Memory allocation is almost entirely on an as-needed basis, so Xconq's
memory usage starts at around 100K and goes up only with the size and
complexity of the game.

The source code is more portable, both to Unix and non-Unix systems.
It is also fully prototyped and ANSI-compatible.