How Starwatch Commander came together — milestones, features, and balance passes. Legend: ADD new feature · BAL balance · FIX fix · CHG change.
Games now always end — faster and more decisively — and every settings toggle became real. tsc -b clean, production build green, 192/192 tests passing.
BAL Homeworlds now open with a 16-ship garrison (was 0) — real defense, and early aggression is possible.
BAL Added a +3 effective-Tech homeworld defense bonus so a same-size fleet can't flip a homeworld on a coin toss.
BAL Retuned all AI difficulty tiers — earlier homeworld strikes (Hard cy 4 / Normal 10 / Easy 20), lower attack thresholds, higher commit — while keeping easy < normal < hard ordering.
ADD Real audio: synthesized UI blips and a soft ambient music pad — no audio assets — each gated by its toggle.
ADD Five interface themes now re-tint the accent color; high-contrast, colorblind-friendly, and reduced-motion modes wired through CSS.
ADD Planet glow effects and arrival-timer display wired into the galaxy renderer.
FIX Honesty pass: fictional community links now show a clear SOON chip; Exit Game explains that a browser tab must be closed manually instead of silently doing nothing.
Measured: 100% of simulated games now resolve (previously many ran past 300 cycles); Medium games land in the ~20–40 min target; human win rate falls as difficulty rises.
CHG Trialed a dominance-percentage win and a hard cycle cap to kill stalemates — then removed both once garrison attrition proved it could keep endgames decisive on its own. Win condition is now purely last commander standing, faithful to the classic lineage.
ADD Garrison attrition system — attacking stacks are capped, so cracking a fortified homeworld requires a committed or pooled force.
ADD ELO model (start 1200), Rookie → Legend tiers with I/II/III divisions, demotion protection, and the softer "Rank adjusted" wording.
ADD Leaderboard tabs (Ranked, Level, Wins, Win Rate, Captures, and more) as labeled UI stubs pending online data.
CHG ELO changes only in ranked online matches; solo earns XP but never ELO; sandbox earns neither.
ADD Commander XP and Levels (permanent, never decrease), Commander Points for cosmetic-only unlocks, and a post-game results screen with the full XP breakdown.
ADD Autosave after every cycle, Saved Games screen (continue / rename / delete), and an in-game menu with Save & Exit prompt.
ADD Active AI that builds, researches, expands from cycle one, and commits real attacks; a combat modal; and victory/defeat with homeworld-capture elimination.
ADD Stationed ships on the map, fleets drawn on route lines with cycles-remaining labels, click-to-send and drag-to-send with route preview, plus map pan/zoom and reachability highlighting.
ADD Central planet catalog with fixed name-to-quality mapping, the 18-step S+++ → F rating UI, production multipliers, buildable-land ratings, and tooltips.
ADD One-page command center: full-screen map, top bar, Galactic News ticker, right selected-planet panel, and bottom owned-planet bar.
CHG Removed the old Research / Fleets / Reports nav tabs entirely.
ADD Home screen and logo treatment, the New Game flow (Solo, Pass & Play, Online Private, Quick Match, Sandbox), player setup with AI gamer tags, saved games, commander profile panel, and friends/chat/leaderboard placeholders.
CHG Reworked range and speed into intuitive planet "hops" (1 hop = 11 map units = the original Tech-0 range). Speed scales at half a hop per Tech level so long jumps take two cycles, preserving incoming-fleet warnings.
BAL Front-loaded the research cost curve so an extra hop of reach costs a handful of cycles, not ~20.
FIX 20-game automated harness surfaced key issues: enemy homeworlds discovered too late (~cycle 19 avg) and naive ship-rush going 1/8. Findings fed the reveal-homeworld and tech-pacing proposals.
Note: some study proposals (starting-position tweaks, a base ship trickle) are documented but intentionally held pending follow-up simulation.
ADD Project scaffold on React + TypeScript + Vite + Phaser + Vitest, with rules separated from UI, centralized constants, and the serializable GameState model.
On the horizon: online multiplayer (private lobbies, quick match, ranked), live friends & chat, real leaderboard data, and additional commander cosmetics. These are present in-app today as clearly labeled stubs.