Progress Report, 2015 07 (July)
Welcome to the Jinteki.net open-source progress report for July 2015. In this report, we will highlight some of the recent changes to the Jinteki.net Android: Netrunner platform, plus preview some improvements we have in the works.
Jinteki.net is a service for playing Android: Netrunner in a browser. It requires no installation to play, is compatible with most operating systems and modern browsers, and includes an interactive deck-builder, chat room, and automation of most game rules and cards.
We'll get to their submissions below, but let's take a moment to thank the new developers who completed a variety of improvements to the platform this month. In alphabetical order, huge thanks to DominicKexel, gaverhae, justinliew, lanaganojunior, and Leffelin!
Interested in contributing? Check out our new Getting Started With Development guide, pieced together by DominicKexel, JoelCFC25, and mtgred! More interested in simply learning to use the site? darlingsensei led development of a great Using Jinteki.net guide.
mtgred polished off our hosting system this month, including face-down hosting for Street Peddler, and the ability to host cards that are already installed (which should only be used in conjunction with cards like Self-modifying Code or Clone Chip, which automatically install the targeted card in the Rig). We are now 100% complete for host cards!
With this challenge issued, nealterrell extended his June contributions to better track the "pump" strengths of icebreakers. The previous system worked well enough for simple breakers but struggled to capture the subtle behaviors of cards like Snowball, Shiv, and Net-Ready Eyes. Our new system categorizes icebreaker strength increases in three ways: base strength modifiers (The Personal Touch, Dinosaurus, Shiv/Spike/Crowbar, Study Guide, Atman, Sage); per-run modifiers (Net-Ready Eyes, Gordian Blade/Gordian Blade/Pipeline/Inti); and per-encounter modifiers (most "+X strength" abilities on icebreakers).
Is it crowded in here?
With ice and icebreaker strengths being comprehensively tracked, development shifted to an automated "increase strength to match this ice" button for pumpable icebreakers. Thanks to some voodoo magic (and some self-modifying code...), nealterrell and JoelCFC25 ported the entire catalog of icebreakers to a new system supporting the auto-increase of icebreaker strength. Any time you encounter an ice that your breaker can interact with, you will see a "Match strength with ____" button; click this, and the breaker will automatically apply its "increase strength" routine until it matches the target ice's strength. Corroder used to take 22 mouse clicks to break Curtain Wall; now it takes 2 to match strength and 6 to break!
Weyland players consider this a dramatic nerf to Curtain Wall, whose carpal tunnel-inducing effect was perhaps the faction's greatest asset.
Bad publicity is one of the last major game systems that has no automated support on Jinteki.net, and laganojunior took some major strides this month towards eliminating that weakness. His "run credit" system automatically grants credits for bad publicity or Stimhack at the start of the run, and takes any unspent run credits and the end of a run. We are still experimenting with how to best represent the credits in the UI, and under what circumstances they should automatically be spent, but the system lifts a big burden from Runners (who previously had to manually take credits to account for bad publicity).
Newer players will appreciate DominicKexel's contribution of a simple card name highlight interface, allowing users to see an image of a card by hovering its name in chat and most other text areas. Simply hover any orange card name you see to pull up an image of that card. It took a few iterations to get right: Grimoire showed Grim, a user named "TheCodeTroll" showed artwork for "Troll" when hovered, etc... but the latest update is running smooth as butter and is a great addition to the usability of our interface.
You can't see it, but I'm hovering my house over "Merlin" in the chat box.
NAPD Contract and Fetal AI had hard-coded mechanisms for adding additional costs to their steal cost; this month, nealterrell extended that mechanism to enable all cards that add additional costs to stealing agendas.
Utopia Fragment, NAPD Contract, Predictive Algorithm, Red Herrings, Strongbox, The Source. This should be illegal.
- Rez-cost modifications for IQ and "space ice" (Asteroid Belt, Nebula, Wormhole, Orion).
- Better support for "the first time this turn" requirements, leading to more correct implementations of Daily Business Show, Autoscripter, and Symmetrical Visage.
- Last month we implemented Wyrm... this month, JoelCFC25 continues the "just in case anyone uses these" mission with Hellion Alpha Test, Shiro, Raymond Flint, and Helium-3 Deposit.
- Joel also worked on fixing interactions between HQ Interface and Gang Sign / Raymond Flint. Multiple Gang Signs still give problems, but a single Sign will stack correctly with HQI.
As of this writing, we are at 87.7% card automation up to The Underway!
- Crisium Grid and Cerebral Static.
- Options for flagging games as Beginner/Intermediate/Expert and as Friendly/Serious/Tournament.
- Manual selection of access order.
- Lots of new cards :D.
Jinteki.net is an open-source project of love run and paid for by mtgred (Worlds 2014 runner-up!) and other volunteers. You can contribute by reporting bugs and even submitting fixes and new implementations on our GitHub page.