🎉 OpenFront v30 Changelog 🎉

Hey everyone! We've got an giant update packed with new features, maps, UI improvements and fixes. Here's whats new:

🌟 Main New Features

• Three public lobbies - Homepage now shows separate FFA, Teams, and Special lobbies - Special always has between 1 and 4 modifiers (by @ryanbarlow97 and @evanpelle)
• See who's playing - Visible lobby player list and settings after joining a public game, just like in private lobbies - Plus improved connection speed & handling (by @ryanbarlow97)
• Trade ship meta updated - Trade ship cap raised from ~100 to ~400, enabled by last version's pathfinding performance improvements (by @evanpelle)
• Railroad snapping - Structures built over railroads now properly split and connect to the network (by @DevelopingTom)
• 1v1 ranked config updated - Now uses original tournament format - 40% Australia, 20% Iceland, 20% Asia, 20% Europe Classic - 50% normal map size, 50% compact (by @FloPinguin)
• Attacker troop loss rebalance - Adresses attack loss imbalance (by @1brucben)
• Reconnection - Internet problems or accidentally reloaded the page? Reconnects are possible now (by @ryanbarlow97)
• Attack ratio panel redesign - Is now centered and combined with the units display, more compact and mobile-friendly (by @evanpelle and @hkio120)
• Player info panel moved to top - Redesigned, optimized for mobile (by @evanpelle)
• Mobile UI improvements - Fixed numerous layout issues on mobile: overlapping elements, cutoff panels, inconsistent spacing and borders, tap-to-close overlays, ... (by @FloPinguin)
• Configurable nation count - Slider (0–400) replaces "Disable Nations" toggle in singleplayer and private lobbies (by @FloPinguin)

🗺️ New Maps

• Alps ⛰️ - Large land-only map for pure land warfare, train trade only (by @TsProphet94)
• The Box 🟩 - Completely flat, large land-only map, train trade only (by @sardidefcon)
• Hawaii 🏝️ - The Hawaiian island chain with real volcanic terrain (by @gabigabogabu)
• Traders Dream 🏝️ - Island-heavy map focused on trade with two large islands (by @FloPinguin)
• Yenisei re-added 🏞️ - This map got removed a while ago (technical problems), returns at ~3x smaller size (by @Duwibi)
• San Francisco - Bay area map with 21 nations based on local cities and towns (by @RickD004)
• Arctic - North Pole-centered map with Cold War themed nations using azimuthal projection (by @RickD004)
• Nile Delta - Egyptian delta region including the Suez Canal (by @gabigabogabu)
• Passage - Long, thin island-filled map with naval choke points, great for contested sea warfare (by @bijx)
• Bosphorus Straits - Smaller Turkey-focused map centered on one of the world's key strategic waterways (by @TsProphet94)
• Bering Strait - Smaller map of the Alaska–Russia strait with an enlarged center island for strategic battles (by @TsProphet94)

🧪 Public Game Modifiers

• Crowded modifier - New modifier simulates a youtuber lobby, cramps 125 players onto a small map - Can you handle the chaos? (by @FloPinguin)
• 25M Starting Gold modifier - New modifier creates chaotic high-gold matches with 2.5 min spawn immunity for preparation (by @FloPinguin)
• Hard Nations modifier - New modifier makes nations tougher in 20% of HvN games (Because the medium difficulty got nerfed), also in some Non-HvN-games (by @FloPinguin)
• PVP immunity in 5M gold games - 30s immunity to prevent instant nuking (by @FloPinguin)

⚔️ Gameplay Changes

• Baikal & Four Islands team games - Baikal now favors 2-team games and Four Islands favors 4-team games; both appear twice as often in team playlists (by @FloPinguin)
• Alliance renewal in radial menu - Extend expiring alliances directly from the radial menu (by @deshack)
• Railroad hover highlight - Hovering a railroad highlights the entire connected line (by @DevelopingTom)
• Transport retreat to nearest shore - Troop transports now path back to your closest owned shoreline instead of their original launch point (by @bijx)
• Confirm building with Enter/NumPad - Buildings selected via hotkeys can now be placed with Enter instead of requiring a mouse click (by @wozniakpl)
• Configurable attack ratio increment - New settings dropdown to choose the step size when adjusting attack ratio via keybinds (by @Aotumuri)
• Requeue button for Ranked - "Play Again" button after ranked matches to instantly re-queue (by @Skigim)
• Public game nations - Switched public game nation difficulty from "Easy" to "Medium" - Because easy nations got nerfed a lot in v29.11 (by @FloPinguin)
• Reduce bot farming - Bots try to delete captured structures to prevent farming exploits (by @FloPinguin)
• Block nuking teammate structures - Nukes blocked if they'd hit a teammate's structure (that was possible by nuking oceans / rivers) (by @FloPinguin)
• No gold from inactive players - Conquering players who joined but never played (0 attacks executed) no longer gives gold (by @FloPinguin)
• Nuke trajectory shows alliance break - Trajectory accounts for SAMs that become hostile on launch (by @bibizu)
• Cancel nukes on alliance accept - Nukes cancelled however an alliance is accepted (by @deshack)
• Improved team colors - LCH color space for more distinguishable team variations (by @rubenperezrial)
• Accept alliance during cooldown - Accept incoming requests via radial menu even during cooldown (by @deshack)
• MIRV warheads land after death - Warheads continue separating even if launcher dies (by @VariableVince)
• Nuke wars necessities: disable boats & team spawn zones - Boats can now be disabled; Four Islands (2 teams / 4 teams) & Baikal Nuke Wars (2 teams) maps support team spawn zones for random spawn (by @FloPinguin)
• Coordinate grid overlay - Hold spacebar to see an A–J / 1–N grid for easily calling out map positions to friends. Toggleable in settings (by @bijx)
• Quick chat: "Stop trading with all" - New chat option to ask a player to disable their trade-with-all setting (by @DeLoWaN)

🧠 Nation (AI) Improvements

• Nation difficulty rebalance - Cleaner steps, more beginner-friendly: Medium and Hard is easier now (by @FloPinguin)
• Nations overwhelm SAMs - On Impossible, nations can coordinate bomb salvos to destroy enemy SAMs (by @FloPinguin)
• Nation building upgrading - Nations can upgrade buildings and have improved difficulty-based build orders, they no longer have problems with high starting gold (by @FloPinguin)
• Smarter factory placement - Nations place factories to bridge rail networks and reach trade partners - The higher the difficulty, the smarter they are (by @deshack)
• Various nation improvements - Nations can wave 👋, ship destruction affects relation, smarter embargo/alliance logic, nations prioritize bots with structures, they no longer double-MIRV (by @FloPinguin)
• Nations reject spawn-phase alliances - Nations now reject alliance requests made during the spawn phase, fixing an exploit (by @deshack)

🐛 Bug Fixes

• Fix nation spawnkilling - Nations get 5s spawn immunity and attack earlier (by @FloPinguin)
• Ally won't annex dead defender tiles - Allies no longer accidentally take your last tiles (by @VariableVince)
• Remove alliances on death - Alliances properly cleaned up when a player dies (by @VariableVince)
• SAM targeting fix - Fixed stacked SAMs only engaging one nuke, letting others slip through (by @abdallahbahrawi1)
• Random spawn avoids water - No more reduced start tiles because of bad random spawns (by @mepoohsta)
• "Spectate" when dead on winning team - Correct button text now shows for dead winners (Instead of "Keep playing") (by @GhadiSaab)
• Multi-tab detection during replays - Multi-tab detection no longer falsely triggers when watching replays (by @FloPinguin)
• Compact map player count - Fixed incorrect public game player cap calculation for compact maps (by @FloPinguin)
• Long game save - Games now save at 170 minutes before the 3-hour server kill, so long matches retain a valid replay (by @ryanbarlow97)
• Username update on rejoin - Players who change their name and rejoin a lobby now see it correctly updated pre-game (by @ryanbarlow97)

🎨 UI/UX Improvements

• Bots renamed to Tribes - "Bots" are now called "Tribes" across the UI (by @VariableVince)
• Kick players in-game - Lobby creators can kick players mid-game (by @MitchZinck)
• Attacks display panel - Attacks now shown above the attack ratio panel, separate from events (by @evanpelle)
• Ghost railway preview - See railway connections before placing a city or port (by @deshack)
• Lobby close confirmation - Added a confirmation dialog when closing the host lobby via click-outside or Escape, preventing accidental exits (by @FloPinguin)
• Troop count on transport boats - Shown in invasion messages and hover info (by @FloPinguin)
• Starting gold in millions - Starting gold input now accepts values in millions with decimal support (e.g. enter "5" for 5M, "6.6" for 6.6M) (by @FloPinguin)
• Map picker with tabs - Featured/All tabs and random map option in singleplayer and host lobby (by @Aotumuri)
• New favicon - Updated browser tab icon to a blue warship matching the game's color palette (by @evanpelle)
• New version notification dot - Red dot on "News" when a new version drops, plus mobile dot improvements (by @FloPinguin)
• Troubleshooting panel - Diagnose common issues and copy system info for bug reports (by @jrouillard)
• "Catching up..." indicator - Message shown when replaying ticks after reconnect or refresh (by @FloPinguin)
• Orange betrayal button - Orange when no betrayal debuff applies (by @FloPinguin)
• Usernames linkable in news - Contributor GitHub names are now clickable (by @ryanbarlow97)
• In-game UI improvements - Panel offsets, text overflow, unified backgrounds and border-radius, relation coloring (by @FloPinguin)
• Improved 1v1 and clan leaderboards - Consistent tables, visible player names on mobile (by @FloPinguin)
• 1v1 leaderboard refresh time shown (by @wneel)
• Win modal animation removed - Snappier feel (by @FloPinguin)
• Singleplayer modal improvements - Achievement warning shows after enabling custom settings, no medals on maps without nations (by @FloPinguin)
• In-game leaderboard button improvements (by @martinIvovIv)
• "Not Logged In" opens Account page - Clickable in skins, singleplayer, and matchmaking (by @FloPinguin)
• Leaderboard modal background aligned - Matches other modal styling (by @Aotumuri)
• Text truncation fixes - Button labels, language names, and flag names no longer get cut off (by @Aotumuri)
• Join Private Lobby form enhanced - You can now press Enter to submit the lobby code instead of clicking the button (by @Nonolanlan1007)
• Performance Overlay rework - Draggable/resizable overlay with TPS reporting, per-layer tick profiling, and zero overhead when hidden (by @scamiv)
• Settings dropdown layout - Settings select controls now appear below description text instead of overlapping it (by @Aotumuri)
• UI interaction polish - Disabled accidental dragging in selectors, removed flag shadows, added bounce animation to language selector (by @ryanbarlow97)

⚡ Performance

• Spectate/replay catchup - Faster catchup mechanic for spectating and replays (by @ryanbarlow97, @scamiv)
• Less lag during combat - Territory captures, border changes, and nuke explosions are smoother - nukes in particular dropped from ~100ms lag spikes to 4–20ms (by @scamiv, @DevelopingTom)
• Smoother railroad performance - Destroying large rail networks and spawning trains is more performant (by @DevelopingTom, @scamiv)
• Better FPS overall - Multiple core game systems were optimized; ghost structures alone dropped from eating 20–30% of frame time to just 1–3% (by @scamiv, @jrouillard, @VariableVince, @Skigim)

🌐 Flags

• Occitania flag added (by @SwayLE3)
• Rising Sun Flag removed (by @newhajinyoon)