This patch fixes a massive issue where new players were unable to even play the game.
They were stuck in a buggy faction-selection screen.

Happy new year everyone!
This patch brings some crucial bug fixes and makes building ships much easier.
Biggest change: Players no longer need to add Outer Plating to their ship for it to float.

--------- SHIPPART:

[Added] Germen torpedo bomber: Fieseler Fi 167A
[Added] Ballast tanks which can decrease the bouyancy of your ship.


--------- SHIPS:

[Added] HMS Nelson


--------- MAINMENU:

[Added] Ships can now be deleted
[Improved] Ship downloads can now be sorted by downloads
[Change] Ships are now listed in a grid pattern for selection.


--------- EDITOR:

[Improved] Ships are now watertight by default. 'Outer Plating' has been renamed to 'Watertight steel' and is only used to build watertight compartments.


--------- BUGFIXES:

[Fixed] Metal fatigue sounds are played too frequently
[Fixed] Players were able to delete parts of the enemy ship.
[Fixed] Battles only chose ships from the players own coalition.
Now players get the chance to unlock and fight ships of the enemy coalition.


--------- BATTLE:

[Fixed] Weather and time changes were disabled.
[Improved] Score and settings panels are now seperate in the battle scene.
[Improved] Hedgehog depth charges nerfed against surface ships.

[Fixed] - Players were unable to copy any parts in the Editor

This patch adresses some major issues of the game like ships breaking apart in heavy weather, a step by step tutorial and finally adds the UNDO feature to the editor.
The french and italian navy will come with the next patch.


--------- EDITOR:

[Added] Undo button in the editor
[Added] Step-by-step guide for the Editor with speech bubbles explaining all features


--------- BUGFIXES:

[Fixed] Loading ships in ships selection for battles take too long
[Fixed] Ships falling apart in heavy weather or while driving
[Fixed] Equipment falling off the ship after filling up with water
[Fixed] Fire spreading too fast and consistently
[Fixed] Ships breaking apart when turning in another direction


--------- BATTLE:

[Added] Steam pressure gauge now indicates the pressure
[Fixed] Enemy ships were unable to extinguish fire in a reasonable amount of time and burned up


--------- GAMEPLAY:

[Improved] Extinguishing fires was too sluggish and unresponsive


--------- UPGRADES:

[Added] Default upgrade sets for every ship class


--------- MAINMENU:

[Fixed] Downloaded ships had no icons

My dearest members of the Ships At War community,
I have some sad news in regards to the future development of SAW.

You might have noticed that the development of SAW has been quite slow in the past couple of months.
This slowdown came from some personal issues (corona, broken arm and now nerve damage) but most importantly the existential dread of SAW as a game.

My original vision for SAW back in january 2021 was: A small multiplayer game where each player builds a ship during battle and tries to sink the opponent. (Forts but on water)

However the game has become something drastically different and the Forts - High Seas DLC has made the original idea obsolete anyways. That means that some of the features which were planned for the original Idea no longer fit the game that SAW has become. (especially the multiplayer)

I have come to the unfortunate conclusion, that multiplayer will not be technically feasible because the ships are made out of too many moving parts.
I would have to make some fundamental changes to the way ships are build in order to allow multiplayer. This would make any and all current ship designs obsolete and unusable with just one patch...

After pondering on this decision for a long time, I came to the conclusion that, I will scrap multiplayer and rather embrace what the game has become: A small sandbox game with a lot of creative freedom.

I will also have to scrap mod support because the budget and time constraints do not allow for it.

tldr: Multiplayer, Mods & the DLC had to be removed from the roadmap due to technical & budget related issues.


The planned DLC content (modern weapons) will be included into the game for free.
My plan is it to :

1. polish SAW as much as possible (especially the editor)
2. implement new weapon types
3. add more ships

And release the game out of early access in Q4 of 2022.


I am sorry to let those of you down, who bought the game for the promised multiplayer.
Thank you for your understanding.

- Julian

--------- PHYSICS:

[Fixed] Ships jumping out of the sea and destroyers floating too low

--------- PHYSICS:

[Fixed] Bouyancy was a bit too low, causing destroyers to sink.
[Fixed] Ships breaking apart too easily - increased strength


--------- BATTLE:

[Fixed] Fire spread way too fast

--------- GAMEPLAY:

[Added] fires that can spread through ship
[Added] limit time a submarine can remain submerged - diesel engines no longer procude steam when submerged.
[Added] submarines should become invisible when under water
they should also no longer be able to see other ships
sonar will make them visible
[Added] Bomber squadrons instead of a long line of planes
[Added] Add explosion effects when a weapon is destroyed
[Removed] Removed Limit of Outer Plating.
Outer plating now costs firepower and is counted as a defensive part.
[Change] Depth control where players can choose to dive or submerge


--------- SHIPPART:

[Added] barrel depth charges
[Added] Depth charge bombers


--------- BATTLE:

[Added] Kamikaze Planes: Crashing planes set fire to ships they hit.
[Added] Clouds


--------- STEAM PAGE:

[Added] Add gifs to game description
[Added] Improve description in the store page


--------- BUGFIXES:

[Fixed] torpedoes should float a minimum of 20cm below see level
[Fixed] Shell trails are horizontal when shells get re-used.
[Fixed] Fix effects on aircraft
[Fixed] AI did not move close enough for torpedoes to be in range.
[Fixed] Sign In reward showing up every time one comes back from the editor
[Fixed] Liners, submarines and merchant ships could not be unlocked through battle. Can now be unlocked in sandbox battles.
[Fixed] Sometimes Icons of ships vanished after leaving the editor
[Fixed] Ships broke apart too easily in heavy waves. (Especially the HMS Couragous)
[Fixed] Size scala of ships is broken
[Fixed] Enemy bombers would often miss the ship completely


--------- UPGRADES:

[Added] Remove water from entire ship Upgrade
[Added] Increase bouyancy upgrade
[Added] Watertight Hull Upgrade


--------- MAINMENU:

[Added] Animations in the loadingscreen
[Added] Intermittend loading screen when loading another scene
[Added] Option to enable AI on the player ship in sandbox battles.
[Removed] Removed all locks on ships for sandbox battles.


--------- EDITOR:

[Added] Materials should display the length as a tooltip
[Added] Bomb test weapon
[Added] Depth charge test weapon

--------- BUGFIXES:

[Fixed] Some players were not able to select a coalition.

I really hope this helps!