Ikariam US

• Feature -- Vacation mode has been revised: A player can always go into vacation mode now. Fleets and armies that are on their way to another player's city will complete their current missions. However, new missions can only be started when the current mission has been completed. Stationed troops and armies (ie. a players' fleets in general) that are currently on their way somewhere are scattered. Building jobs are stopped when you enter vacation mode and are continued again once you have logged back into the game.
• Feature -- Doubled storage capacity: A bit of Ambrosia allows you to double the amount of goods that are safe from pillaging.
• Feature -- Protection for new players: Newly registered players cannot be attacked until their Town Hall has been extended to level 4, they have attacked another player or founded their first colony. Players that have an active Premium account are safe until the level 6. If a player becomes inactive, protection is forfeited. Troops cannot be stationed at newly protected player's cities, as they cannot attack in the first place.
• Feature- Trade offers enhanced: The Bargain Finder's results list now displays the supplier city's trading port size. Thus the duration of a mission can be estimated.
• Feature- Research system has been revised: Previously, players could only choose their research section. The research points were then automatically invested into this section's research and the acquisitions were automatically researched. From now on, every player (taking the requirements for the research into consideration) can invest his research points into the research section of his choice. Research points are produced as normal. If scientists have produced as many research points as the possible research topics cost, the points can be swapped for the research by the research advisor. The feature 'Swap crystal for research points' has been omitted.
• Feature- Island forum: Each island now has a small forum on it, which can be used by each player who has a city on that particular island. The forums can be accessed via the theatres on the islands.
• Feature- Miracles revised: Every island has a miracle on it that has a particular effect. Players can build a temple in their cities, in which villagers can become priests. The maximum amount of priests is dependent on the expansion stage of the building. Priests produce a faith miracle over a specific time with a dynamic limit (depending on the level of the miracle and the maximum population of all cities on the island). Faith is reduced if a priest is removed from the temple or if the limit is altered. Every island miracle has a maximum of 5 levels and can be expanded by the community of the island. However in order to do this, luxury goods have to be donated. It is irrelevant which resource it is, but it cannot be a resource that is already produced on the island. Example: On a marble island, only wine, crystal or sulphur can be donated. The 5 levels determine the strength of the miracle effect. Players can trigger the effect of a particular level when the priests from all cities have achieved enough faith for the level. Triggering an effect does not reduce faith! Every player can activate the effect of a level regardless of the other players on the island. Miracle effects affect the player's complete account (all armies, fleets or cities). They have a limited period of effectiveness (usually two hours) and cannot be activated again for several hours afterwards (usually 20 hours). The previous effects are omitted completely.
• Feature- Battle system has been revised: Units and battle sequences have been completely changed. There are different positions or battle lines on the battlefield, which can be occupied by specific unit classes and that get involved in the combat action in different ways. The heavy infantry is at the front line on the main battle lines. On the sides, next to the heavy infantry is the light infantry and behind the main battle lines are the long-range units. The town wall has to be broken through in order for a battle to start in a city. Once a side manages to defeat an opponent's main battle lines, the battle is over. If there is not enough heavy infantry available, the battle lines are filled with other unit classes which will probably not be as successful during close combat. These positions, regardless of their city size have a limited capacity for units. The units who do not fit in any more, will not take part in the battle round, but will wait in reserve until they are needed. The units' parameters have been completely changed. This is also true for the building costs and the required upkeep. In general, these have reduced. You can find a more detailed description of the battle system in Ikipedia.
• Feature -- New unit Spear Thrower: The spear throwers are a new infantry unit which are a start unit.
• Feature -- Tutorial for beginners: A tutorial with eight steps has been implemented into the game. During the tutorial, advisors explain the most important steps to take when you are new to the game and have just started playing.
• Feature -- Barbarian village: There is now a barbarian village on the island of the player's capital city. It can be pillaged up to 10 times. The barbarians' loot and strength increases with every attack. Thus the new battle system can be tried out without making any new enemies.
• Feature -- Global news: A new system has been implemented so that we can directly send you important news in the game.
• Feature -- World map shortcut list: This is a drop-down list on the world map; you can decide which islands you would like the map to be centered on here. Islands on which you have own cities and own stationed troops are automatically entered. Additionally another 5 islands can be entered -- which becomes a maximum of 25 if you have a premium account.
• Bugfix -- Goods request at the Trading Post was not deleted when the building was demolished
• Bugfix -- Troops sometimes withdrew to the wrong city
• Bugfix - Errors occurred during the marking of new city messages
• Bugfix -- The display error in the in the Workshop has been fixed
• Bugfix -- Cultural goods could be accepted several times
• Bugfix - Sometimes villagers fled if an ally pillaged from the city
• Bugfix -- When the growth of a city stagnated, the unhappy smiley was displayed

Quoted

In a meeting with lead programmer, qa and game design, and with acknowledgement from Product Management, it was decided to modify the scattering in the version 0.3.2. Starting with version 0.3.2, Scattering will cost the same as troops in movement for the time it takes, so that it is not exploitable any more.

Quoted

Testserver is updated now. Small change in the version that is not in this release on the test server but will be fixed before the game rounds get updated. You will still be able to buy researches for crystal.