Fall Update Patch Notes

Hello, folks! We’re happy to report the first major patch for Civilization: Beyond Earth is now available.

This is a sizable update, so we're breaking the information about what's been specifically changed into sections to make it easier to sift through.

Balance

Wonders and Buildings:

• Holon Chamber provides 3 Science, 4 Energy (was 5 Science)
• Mind Stems cannot be bought with Energy.

Diplomacy:

• Any diplo item can now be traded in exchange for a peace treaty
• Lump Energy trade requires a Cooperation Agreement.

Trade:

• Water trade routes no longer receive any increased yield.
• Revised trade route formula for city-to-city trade, with reduced yields.
• Trade Depots can no longer be purchased with Energy.

Aliens:

• Clearing a friendly alien nest now removes the Xenomass resource from player stockpile.
• Adjusting passive recovery rate for alien opinion to be slower, to permit easier aggression escalation.

Covert Ops:

• Establish Network now has 0 difficulty and produces 0 intrigue.  This prevents players from exploiting it to increase intrigue.

Health effects balancing:

• From -20 to -70, Production is penalized -1% per point (up to -50%).
• From -15 to -65, enemy Covert Ops Intrigue is increased +2% per point (up to +100%).
• From -10 to -60, Science is penalized -1% per point (up to -50%).
• From -5 to -55, Culture is penalized -1% per point (up to -50%).
• From 0 to -50, Outpost Growth is penalized -2% per point (up to -100%).
• From 0 to -50, City Growth is penalized -2% per point (up to -100%).
• From 1 to 5, nothing happens.
• From 5 to 25, Production bonus +1% per point (up to +20%).
• From 10 to 30, enemy Covert Ops Intrigue is decreased -2% per point (up to -40%).
• From 15 to 35, Science bonus +1% per point (up to +20%).
• From 20 to 40, Culture bonus +1 per point (up to +20%).
• From 25 to 45, City Growth bonus +1% per point (up to +20%).
• From 25 to 45, Outpost Growth bonus +2% per point (up to +40%).

Virtues:

• Eudaimonia (Tier III Prosperity virtue) now provides -15% less Unhealth (was -25%)
• Learning Centers now provides +1 Science for Academies (was +2)

Game Setup

• Kozlov Ability: Orbital units last 50% longer, +50% Petroleum resource (was Orbital units last 20% longer and first launch grants free technology)
• Barre Ability: +10% Growth when Healthy, all cities start with an Old Earth Relic  (was +10% Growth when Healthy)
• Rejinaldo Ability: Melee units +10% Strength, all units +5 Heal when fortified (was +10% Melee combat strength)
• Elodie Ability: provides 1 free Virtue for every 10 Virtues earned normally through Culture (was 1 free Tech for every 10 Virtues earned in any way)

• Aristocrats now provide +4 Energy per City (no Health bonus)
• Artists now provide +3 Culture per City (no Health bonus)

Tech Web:

• Clear Miasma now unlocks on Ecology (was Alien Biology)
• Miasmic Repulsor now unlocks on Alien Biology (was Ecology)
• Array Science bonus now unlocks on Astrodynamics (was Orbital Automation)
• Planet Carver now unlocks on Orbital Automation (was Astrodynamics)
• Markov Eclipse now unlocks on Transcendental Math (was Artificial Intelligence)

Stations:

• Station start turn base is now 30 (was 20)
• Station minimum allowed distance to another station is now 2 (was 3)
• Station minimum allowed distance to a city is now 6 (was 5)
• Station minimum allowed distance to an outpost is now 5 (was 3)

Affinity Perks:

• Harmony level 1 grants Miasma Immunity to the Explorer unit (was Alien opinion recovers twice as quickly)
• Purity level 1 adds double combat strength when defending to Explorer unit (was Aliens cannot attack Explorers)

Quests:

• Affinity rewarded as a quest reward now ramps up slowly over the first 100 turns (on standard). This ramp will vary with game speed.
• All players now get affinity quests within 1 turn of each other. If it's not possible for all players to receive a quest at the same time, the game waits until this is possible, then immediately gives all players a new affinity quest.
• Autoplant Building Quest grants bonus Production (was +1 Trade Route)

Units:

• Explorers now have 6 combat strength (was 3).
• Sea units now follow the same rules for ranged combat defense as all other units: they use the highest of their combat values (ranged combat or melee combat) when calculating defense.
• Combat Rover unit can no longer fortify, and no longer receives defense bonuses from the terrain it is on.
• Raising the secondary level requirement for the hybrid upgrades of affinity units:
• First affinity unit (ex. Xeno Swarm) now upgrades at level 10 of main affinity and level 4 of secondary affinity (was 10+2)
• Second affinity unit (ex. Xeno Cavalry) now upgrades at 12+5 (was 12+3)
• Third affinity unit (ex. Rocktopus) now upgrades at level 14+6 (was 14+4)
• Fourth affinity unit (ex. Xeno Titan) now upgrades at level 16+7 (was 16+5)
• Lowering strategic resource costs for many affinity units, to ensure consistency across affinities and make top tier units easier to build. The first affinity units require 1 strategic, the second require 2, the third require 3, and the fourth require 5.
• CARVR now costs 2 Firaxite (was 3)
• Rocktopus now costs 2 Xenomass and 1 Floatstone (was 3 Xenomass and 1 Floatstone)
• LEV Tank now costs 3 Floatstone (was 4)
• SABR now costs 3 Firaxite (was 4)
• Xeno Titan now costs 5 Xenomass (was 7)
• LEV Destroyer now costs 5 Floatstone (was 7)
• ANGEL now costs 5 Firaxite (was 6)
• Increased production costs of upgraded Combat Rovers and Missile Rovers:
• Combat Rovers now cost 80, 160, 260, 370 (was 80, 140, 220, 320)
• Missile Rovers now cost 100, 190, 290, 400 (was 100, 180, 270, 370)
• Lowering combat strength progression of Combat Rover:
• Combat Rover combat strength progression is now 12, 18, 28, 52 (was 12, 18, 32, 52)
• Changes to the combat strength of affinity units, to make non-upgraded ones more weak in general:
• Xeno Swarm now has 22 combat strength at start, 54 when upgraded (was 34, 54)
• Xeno Cavalry now has 36, 72 (was 48, 72)
• Rocktopus now has 60, 92 (was 60, 82)
• Xeno Titan now has 86, 114 (was 96, 114)
• Battlesuit now has 24, 66 (was 40, 66)
• Aegis now has 34, 34 double strike (was 40, 40 double strike)
• LEV Tank now has 44, 77 (was 52, 77)
• LEV Destroyer now has 74, 104 (was 84, 104)
• CNDR now has 24, 63 (was 38, 63)
• CARVR now has 38, 76 (was 50, 76)
• SABR now has 52, 86 (was 58, 86)
• ANGEL now has 78 with 78 melee, 102 with 88 melee (was 88 with 88 melee, 102 with 102 melee)

AI:

• Once the game is in Extended mode (after the player clicks the One More Turn button) the AI will now only pursue Domination.
• Warmonger threat per city acquisition is now capped.
• Warmonger calculation now scaled down when cities are taken by Sponsors that are reacting to a war that was declared upon them (that is, when that civ is not the aggressor).
• Adjusted AI bonuses on higher difficulty levels.
• Additional AI tuning, improvements, and tweaks.

Gameplay Feedback:

• Implemented anonymous gameplay telemetry for design feedback.

UI

Settings and Game Setup:

• The menu now displays EQAA modes instead of MSAA modes if in Mantle version and the GPU supports EQAA.
• Added option to disable UI/Map blur.
• The player is now informed that enabling max turns disables victory achievements.

Trade:

• Previous trade routes appear in their own category at top of trade route chooser

City/Production UI:

• Adding Health tooltip help in City View to explain health sources and population cap
• City production pop-up now shows the last item completed.
• Increased city renaming from 15 character max to 23 character max.

Misc:

• Allow "One More Turn" after the default win conditions (Contact, Promised Land, Emancipation, Transcendence, Domination, Time), added text to defeat screen explaining how you were defeated.
• Option to make minimap opaque
• ESC leaves orbital mode instead of raising in game shell menu
• Added a badge to covert ops button in the action corner which will show up, and a warning to the covert ops panel when a player has any cities with high intrigue.
• Tech web - adding color underlays to building and wonder types.
• Added additional Advisors for trade convoy and trade vessel. 
• Added support for third party wars in diplo overview.
• Full touch/gesture and pen support added (Ultrabook, Surface Pro, etc.).

Multiplayer

• Setting the internet server browser list distance filtering to worldwide.
• All players are notified when anyone completes a victory wonder.
• Multiple improvements to stability.

Modding

• 2D fallback image now supported for leaders on all video quality settings, not just the lowest.
• Added the ability to mod Quests.

Bug Fixes

• Embarked workers can now correctly repair pillaged improvements.
• Fixed an issue where Max turns was getting set on "Reload", causing achievements to not fire.
• Fixed bug where victory achievements would only unlock for the first player on a team.
• Fixed empty trade requests that could occur during the AI turn.
• Fixed multiple Quest issues (quest tracking, information, and reward bugs).
• Fixed multiple issues with screen resolution on specific displays (like the 144Hz full-screen issue), and a Mantle issue causing the game to not display on the correct screen.
• Setting MaxTurns only affects timed victory conditions.  For a timed victory, you must either not set MaxTurns (of which, there will be a default for the game speed), or set it to 100+ turns. All other victory conditions can be achieved regardless of max turns.
• Friendly aliens no longer blockade cities.
• Fixed some specific issues with resources not appearing properly in the player stockpile.
• Many additional bugs and crashes addressed based on community feedback. Thank you!