Stardock and Ironclad Games were right on in their prediction that patch 1.04 for Sins of a Solar Empire will come out this week. Never leaving any room for procrastination, the developers have just released patch 1.04 of the real-time strategy game set in space.

For this build, tons of improvements were added to gameplay and balance as well as artificial intelligence, networking, multiplayer support, user interface and modding. It's also important to note that saved games and replays from version 1.03 will not work with patch 1.04.

The full changelog is as follows:

Please note that save games and replays from v1.03 and earlier will not work with v1.04!

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Gameplay / Balance:
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-Market value changes:
 -Ratio of buy/sell is now 2:1 instead of 3:1.
 -Min price now 200 instead of 80.
 -Boom/crashes now last ~twice as long.

-Multiple instances of the Embargo planet debuff from the same player no longer stack.

-Capital ships
 -All non-Colony capital ship top speeds increased from 500 to 525.
 -All Colony capital ship top speeds increased from 400 to 475.

-Siege Frigates:
 -Build costs decreased by ~15%.

-Javelis, Illuminator, Assailant:
 -Linear acceleration decreased from 200 to 150.
 -Top speed decreased from 800 to 500.
 -Range decreased from 130% to 115% of 1.02 ranges.

-Illuminator:
 -Hull points increased from 520 to 620.
 -Shield points increased from 450 to 550.
 -Attack type changed from CAPITALSHIP to ANTIMEDIUM.
 -Front bank damage increased from 33.8 to 58.5.
 -Side banks damage decreased from 33.8 to 30.3.

-Defense Vessel:
 -Reduced cooldown by 45%, damage reduced proportionally to maintain DPS.
 -Fleet supply increased from 3 to 4.
 -Now properly benefits from Advent laser research topics.

-Attack types
 -AntiVeryLight chance to hit bombers decreased from 85% to 75%.
 -AntiVeryLight damage vs Light armor decreased from 100% to 75%.

-Carriers
 -Slight cost reductions for all carrier cruisers

-Returning Armada and General Fleet Spawning
 -No longer possible to spawn ships past fleet point limit.
 -Ship slot count updated after each spawn to prevent RA exploit (clicking multiple abilities at same time).
 -Increased level 1 RA cooldown by 120 secs and level 2 RA cooldown by 60 secs

-Map Balance of Power fixed to have less Heavies and populated desert worlds.

-Stilakus Subverter's Distortion Field ability will no longer cause it to micro phase jump towards targets travelling to other planets.
-Fix for problem where after playing Sins for 100000 seconds (27.7 hours) damage and various other systems wouldn't update correctly.
-Fix for strike craft squads being able to launch when they should be grounded.
-Phasic Barrier now toggles off more consistently when it's 'autocast off' conditions are satisfied.

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AI:
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-Fixed minor bug in Unfair AI not behaving quite correctly.
-Fix bug where AI would retreat from his homeworld or last planet.
-AI is less likely to gang up on the leading player in Easy or Normal.
-Autocast logic for hull point restoring abilities no longer consider structures under construction as damaged.
-Fix for ships not auto-attacking after breaking alliances.
-Fix for AI difficulty settings not behaving correctly.
-Misc tweaks.

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Networking / Multiplayer:
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-Fixed minor bug in ico-join game screen where fleet size display was incorrect.
-Improved in-game chat text entry:
 -Escape no longer clears the chat buffer when closing the window.
 -Sending whispers is remembered (don't have to retype the whisper when sending again).
 -Sending to allies is remembered (don't have to retype /a when sending again).
-Chat string and colors changed.
-Fixed bug where joining a multiplayer game in a slot that was previously held by an AI player would have the AI still be enabled when you started the game.
-When a human player drops and an AI replaces him, the AI now has his happiness set to the required amount for existing alliances so he doesn't drop them all instantly.

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UserInterface / HUD:
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-Fix map names for Backstab and Balance of power.
-Fixed bug where fleet pip clouds would not show up when loading a saved game.
-Fixed string label for IDS_COHESIONRANGE_FAR_NAME and IDS_COHESIONRANGE_FAR_DESCRIPTION.
-Changed artifacts researched stat to be "artifact discoveries"
-Tweaked some ability descriptions to improve their clarity.
-'Unit under attack' events are now suppressed for trade and refinery ships.

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Modding:
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-Entity name lookup is now case insensitve.
-New options to enable error messages. This can be turned on by modders in the user.setting file to simplify tracking down errors instead of mysteriously crashing.
-Fix num particles in the user.setting file not actually increasing and added user control over the number of particle simulations since this is another main limiter for those with uber computers who want to push things.

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Misc:
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-Fix for saved games not respecting custom game options.

Head over the via link to find where to download the latest patch. Impulse Beta gamers will be prompted to a different set of instructions. More updates as QJ.NET gets them.