Heroes of Science and Fiction news & patch notes

New DLC: Typhon Map Pack

7 maps

"Underground" Update - #8

• Underground map layer with limited visibility, a custom battlefield, entrance and exit elevators, light rays. Available in editor.
• New preset for the energy fields effects in editor
• Two new units: Wild Ratlings and Bullrocks. The former can hide underground, the latter is immune to ranged attacks.
• Inventory items: Wild Geese Beret and Silver Iodide Rocket affect morale, Besieger Tools help when attacking bases
• Audio mix, better volume balance, better volume dropoff for map objects at the edges of the screen

• Neutral units with never join or always join flags are highlighted with different colors
• Support for DLCs, editor detects DLC content, added DLC link to main menu
• Hero action planner
• Proper dialog for the end of multiplayer battle between two players, previously was always "you lost"
• Improved text layout in unit info panels, lore text is scrollable, leaving more space for active/passive ability descriptions
• Improved AI pathfinding efficiency
• Added a camping icon over the faces of camping commanders
• Enabled resolution scale underneath pause menu
• Added icons to map alliances configurator in map editor so it doesn't only rely on colors
• Improved combat predictions (also helps the AI players)

• Fix Askon++ attack crashes game when using targeting system
• Fixed energy changes from quick battles not written back to the actual commander
• Fixed generator sometimes having to run multiple times because of bases placed at a position cutting off other objects
• Fixed Mortar attack is only damaging single hex units
• Fixed wrong long distance range calculation on Askon++
• Fixed commander tooltip not correctly showing 'friendly' for always-join units
• Fixed AI can get huge losses when accidentally attacking something when going to pick up a pickup
• Fixed custom scenarios heading size glitching for one frame when first opened
• Fixed switching layers in editor was triggering music 🎶
• Fixed a few achievements awarded in unexpected situations
• Text fixes ("phase" vs. "day" or "round", "hoard" and "keep")
• A few minor UI fixes (frames, text postions, a button staying in pressed state)
• Fixed Shocked effect reducing initiative by 70% instead of 30%
• Fixed auto combat against a base favoring the attacker
• Fixed markers of worms hidden underground in combat not correctly showing which worm is active
• Fixed wrong effect shown for entering exiting dungeons in specific cases
• Fixed triffid generation from the Root item overridden by army manipulation when auto-garrisoning commanders
• Fixed Scout skill was granting commanders the ability to avoid traps instead of the Tracker skill.
• Fixed quick battle ignored base defenses and duplicate defenses appeared in bases when starting battle from quick battle dialog
• Fixed retreat from quick battle
• Fixed 'dismiss unit' slot position in certain dialogs
• Fixed stack splitting could leave a commander with no units when spitting off the maximum number of units
• Fixed fast cast ability icons in combat could be used during tactics

Hi everyone! We're hard at work putting the finishing touches on our upcoming DLC, while also polishing new content and quality of life improvements for the next major update, which is coming soon.

In the meantime, to make the wait a little easier, we're excited to bring you smaller update of Heroes of Science and Fiction! This one brings a new battle feature, a round of UI improvements, performance optimisations, and a solid batch of fixes.

Changes

• Display equipped artifacts and equipment in battle,

• Heroes in kill zones are killed at start of each player's turn and not immediately at start of the phase,

• Consumables panel in hero selector not limited to 5 items any more,

• Added unit attribute tooltips in hire, recruitment and negotiation panels,

• Building base buildings now possible with the dialog confirm shortcut (Enter by default),

• Canceling commander movement now possible with the 'continue move' key,

• Attribute and skill buttons in level up dialog now activate on mouse down for a more responsive feel,

• Added missing UI sounds to exploration speed buttons, next hero button and its shortcut,

• Audio positioning now accounts for fog of war for map object sounds,

• Added missing ability info: burning damage for Pirate Mortar and AR84, no counter-attack for Triffids, no range penalty for Cannons and Torpedoes, army slot count in Outpost tooltips, Zieregal's no melee penalty,,

• clearer Explorer skill description, tactics note in Chessmaster skill,

• Added limit to army growth in commander properties in editor,

• Added Brazilian Portuguese and Russian translations for patch 13 content

Optimizations

• Removed per-tile cursor detector colliders (~10,000 fewer game objects on large maps),

• Found a way of sharing font texture between different font variants in our version of Unity, saving memory,

• Map generator performance improvements,

• Improved AI exploration pathfinding - better performance, more targets can be retrieved,

• Minimap texture was re-initialized on every commander step,

• Fixed repeated material loads in tile selection rendering

Fixes

• Brawler and Sniper skill bonuses not actually applied,

• Hero movement over network broken by hero caching optimization; doubled Steam send buffer size,

• Adding Mental Bond to a fast cast ability crashes next battle,

• Marauder Grenadier special attack not inflicting poison,

• Dazed unit was able to retaliate thanks to retaliation bonus gained via Defensive Specialist,

• Season Commissar special targeting doesn't show range,

• Wrong stacks placement in siege when stack count > 9 (full army and defensive sentries),

• "What a Journey" achievement obtainable by replaying a campaign,

• AI commanders disabled in editor still performing certain actions,

• Battle end not fully processed when retreating from quick battle dialog (e.g. map events not triggered),

• Quick battle dialog can show wrong amount of XP for max-level heroes,

• Level 2 abilities showing duplicated tooltip text (e.g. in level up dialog),

• Raiden energy tooltip showing incorrectly when another bonus modified max energy,

• Loud UNSS win/loss jingles; wrong sound on keyboard layout button; redundant sound on,

• upgraded Acheron death,

• Attribute panel positions in encyclopedia,

• "Unsupported parameter for formatting" when applying hex status effects,

• Battle-won events not triggered when a scripted hero kills themselves on an outpost, base, or neutral unit,

• Commander attributes could be set up to 100 in editor,

• Moles campaign mission 2: hatchery now forbidden for AI use,

• Maya may not be present for a cutscene in Crusaders campaign lvl 1,

• Hive Mind Dragon claw sorting (graphical glitch),

• 'back to editor' button in playtest not working if playtest was started via validator and 'ignore and continue',

• Localization: multiple CZ text fixes (Fraxinus feedback), Russian fixes, Sovereign Fleet and Empire,

• campaign EN/CZ typo fixes

Patch #7 - version b919bca2 Hotfix #1 - version 04567a37

• Fixed map generator can get stuck on some layouts

As always, let us know what you think on our Discord or here in the comments!

Features and improvements

• Quick battle window that pops up before a combat encounter (can be disabled in options if you want to play all battles yourself)
• Start-turn dialog in singleplayer can be disabled in options
• Allowed setting escape as a keyboard shortcut (it doesn't cancel the shortcut selection anymore)
• When setting Enter as a keyboard shortcut, it counts both Enter and numpad Enter
• ♫ Custom win and loss music stingers for each race
• ♫ Three new start-of-a-cycle music jingles/stingers (normal cycle, positive, negative)
• ♫ Updated Children of the Source campaign music
• Added stripes to tiles within the areas highlighting a danger zone, changed color to darker orange
• Animated base panels zoom in from the correct positions matching building locations at each base
• Set all new map markers on planets in the skirmish screen to be enabled by default
• Lowered requirements for a few very time-consuming achievements
• Updated checkbox and radio button UI elements so they can be easily distinguished
• Optimization: safer handling of resource memory
• Optimization: significant AI turn time improvements

Fixes

• Fixed feint ability breaking the start of combat when added to fast cast
• Fixed a specific set of actions could cause unit number manipulation: pick an incompatible unit from army A, switch for a unit in army B, switch for another unit in army B, escape
• Fixed units could get picked up in hero card and hero meeting card while moving an item from the inventory & fixed items could get picked up in hero card and hero meeting card while moving a unit
• Fixed largest dialogs not fitting on the screens in Large UI, fixed UI scale not applied after the next game launch
• Added best fit to main cutscene text and limited its height to 400 px so objectives can't extend over difficulty
• Fixed neutral day-night transforming units in slave camps in Fossorian bases ... not transforming
• Fixed skill academy panel had random size when showing that a commander had learned something there already
• Fixed portrait shader for characters "talking over radio" on Linux+AMD (incl. Steam Deck)
• Fixed two instances where exploration move segments could be executed while AI is running
• Implemented neutral army changes from lure/scarecrow in quick battle, fixed these not applied in hazard in tooltips, fixed equipping or unequipping these items not causing hazard to be recalculated
• Fixed map editor erroring out because of missing autosaves folder if you start the game for the first time, go directly to editor and try to playtest or exit
• Fixed position of limited range icon in small unit tooltip panel used for unit icons next to building in the building catalog
• Fix AI can sometimes trigger a battle twice
• Sovereign Fleet campaign, mission 2 - False Mother disabled by day one
• Empire campaign, mission 4 - Unreachable Fusion Core UNSS IV - fixed
• Fossorian campaign, mission 3 - added safety step on trigger that removes the objects that can block Muff form the rest of the map
• Small text improvements, fixed a few typos

Hotfix #1 - version 6d600633

• Fixed quick combat would leave defeated commander in a base stuck in the garrisoned slot with no army

Community discord server

Features and improvements

• Iron mole mode and old-school hazard are now separate options
• Single commander mode
• Team play in multiplayer, including shared fog of war, sending resources
• Added Vsync option to sync only to half of the refresh rate of the monitor
• Enabled cloud save for victory saves from the campaign which used to unlock other levels
• Added "Besieger Tools" equipment
• More optimization, including micro-stutters in combat and material handling (this is related to the slow base-to-map transitions where we kindly ask Unity to cleanup unused stuff)
• Progress on AI performance/memory optimization
• Changed transition from base to map to a more subtle fadeout from black, disabled whoosh sound
• Added simple procedural squash-and-stretch turn animation in combat for units without dedicated turn animations
• Added visual indication for not enough move points when using teleport, fixed route visualization not taking into account teleport cost

Fixes

• Fixed the "Who knew this could happen" achievement not unlocking when a commander gets caught in a dangerous object
• Fixed Tumori siege background was visible in the next siege battle
• Sovereign Base 16:10 bottom screen gradient bar fix
• Fixed AI commanders could get really confused when stuck on a bridge blocked from both sides
• Fixed Merchant badge usage disabling smuggler den and slave camp indefinitely
• Fixed tactics position not saved during first use of tactics on units that stayed at their original position
• Fixed tactics order could get messed up after transferring a commander's army to a base
• Fixed players with no commanders breaking Eyeball Tower statistics dialog and getting the game stuck
• Fixed Tumori base was never used in generated map
• Added a 'continue' button in multiplayer when the host loses during an AI player's turn as you would be currently forced to exit the match
• Fixed landlord achievement not unlocking when taking bases by combat
• Various small UI and text fixes and improvements
• Campaign - Empire level 3 - Fixed a rare occasion when the fight could not start properly if the enemy commander stood right in the middle of one particular even
• Campaign - Children level 1 Doctor Brown could appear to be stuck due to not having any targets nearby
• Campaign - Children level 3 - Tumori could kill Furret, which breaks one of the important events
• Campaign - Fossorians leve; 1 -The spacebar was marked as forbidden despite already being present in the base
• Campaign - Sovereign Fleet level 2 - a step on event on the same place as unit danger zone, causing troubles if commander has negotiator skill - fixed

Roadmap

Community discord server

Release notes - Patch #4 (673adb71)!

• More performance/frame pacing improvements on the world map
• Fixed difficulty levels not correctly applied in campaign (a bug introduced right before release)
• Fixed commanders could teleport on top of a garrisoned commander using teleporter consumable
• Fixed inventory cleared after losing a battle in Battle Arena, this could break campaign levels with keys
• Fixed quickly clicking the "Round X/Y" button in Battle Arena would skip the battle

Patches and future updates

Soundtrack update

Release notes: The current game version (042ca203)

• Optimization: heavily improved the overall memory usage by textures, enabled textures compression for more environments
• Optimization: improved memory garbage collection stutters on the map especially when just moving around
• Added reset button to keyboard shortcuts
• MP: fixed starting resources of other players than the host affected by difficulty as if they were AI
• Fixed replay of opponent's turns
• Campaign fixes/edge cases: Fossorians, mission 3 - Muff carried over to the next level, Sovereign Fleet, mission 4 - some checks that Fossorians will teleported properly and forced to proper area, Fossorians mission 4 could get stuck, Crusaders campaign: better music sync to events in the story, improvements to some texts and formatting

Version: ef60863b

• Added borderless window mode to options, fixed inconsistency in fullscreen mode between switching the fullscreen option and switching resolutions
• Added automatic switch from 4K to HD textures during first start of the game on machines with 1440p and lower resolution screens, added automatic switch to large UI on the Steam Deck, set hero textures to be always loaded in highest quality
• Implemented synchronization of ingame achievements on multiple PCs
• Enabled quickload shortcut
• Version text can be disabled in Tweakables.xml with TWEAKABLE_SHOW_DEBUG_VERSION_TEXT (proper solution upcoming)

• MP Fixed more cases of a client getting attacked by an AI player triggering the battle for the wrong player
• Fixed Memory Wiper used by AI players was moving camera to the position of the affected object
• Fixed 'Fusion saving' achievement not obtainable when building a new mine
• Fixed fast cast abilities in combat can be cast without sufficient energy
• Graphical fixes of a couple of map objects & vfx
• Fixed old saves from Fossorian campaign level 4 couldn't be loaded
• Campaign fixes and improvements in Crusaders campaign lvl 1 (resource and UNSS base), Crusaders campaign lvl 4 (ship), Sovereign Fleet campaign lvl 4 (Annika can beat the False Mother, mission details), Fossorians lvl 2 (balance changes for all crusaders commanders)
• AI fixes: AI could attack allies, AI hero could go through closed gate if there's free passage nearby

Version: 553ad8fe

• Cleaned roadmap and one mention of "Early Access" in loading screen text
• Fixed AI moves can be interrupted too early on slow PCs
• Fixed progress of achievements not shown on Steam
• Fixed achievement list not updating fonts properly
• Fixed new buildings not available in map editor
• Fixed Void Walker offering wrong area to teleport to after being defeated
• MP fixed error/disconnection when two players not including the host use abilities in battle
• MP Fixed battles where an AI player attacks the host who previously swapped themselves with somebody else in the lobby were triggered as network battles instead of running locally
• Updated how many Aura Coins the Pinpointer item gives
• Crusaders campaign mission 2 - Far away watchtower visible through FOW
• Fixed a few more recently reported issues in Fossorians campaign mission 2 and Crusaders campaign mission 1

Discount is still active - and a reminder about price update

Community discord server

Trailer

Mostly for our current players: what's new!

• Campaign for the Children of the Source to bring the story line to a conclusion!
• Online multiplayer
• Achievements
• AI improvements
• A new planet with more skirmish maps
• 7 new buildings and a few more collectible items on the maps
• Two more defensive buildings at the base
• The usual set of smaller improvements and bug fixes

Details about multiplayer

• Steam
• LAN
• Local hot-seat
• Steam remote play together

You might be already asking: What's next?

Early Access recap

• The UNSS faction with its campaign
• Map editor, workshop, random maps
• Tumori Tribes faction, Sovereign Fleet campaign

Launch discount and price

Known issues and unfinished features

• LIMITATION The host currently needs to select all player's factions plus assigning players in the UI is currently only based on the order of joining
• NOT YET AVAILABLE Official team (co-op) game support (a few final touches to the fog of war handling and it should be ready, for example gifting resources works already)
• LIMITATION Saves will be under the singleplayer/autosaves folders
• Joining friends-only lobbies: go to friends overlay, find your friend who is hosting and select join
• New texts are currently only available in English, Hungarian and Brazilian Portuguese
• NOT YET AVAILABLE Special multiplayer game modes and simultaneous turns are not in yet, currently in design/evaluation stage
• Arcane controller ability is broken

Testing and bug reporting

• Please join our Discord and have a look at the bug-reporting forum section! {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/43007216/38ed300360e4c0bb01e115044e60510995a183bc.gif
• To help us investigate specific issues, the last save/autosave file and logs from both sides will help a lot!
• Typical bugs will most likely manifest themselves as 1) the game disconnecting or 2) by getting stuck in combat and quickly switching who is the active player back and forth
• What will most likely cause bugs that we haven't caught ourselves yet? Big battles and siege battles, abilities and units with special features, unexpected combinations of skills, equipment, consumables, abilities etc.

Our questions for you :)

• Speed: should be always set to max?
• Simultaneous turns: how important do you find this feature/what are your best examples of games where it works well and doesn't get interrupted very early?

New content notes

• A few new buildings and items
• Updates to the AI (also WIP)
• Some of the new maps for 1.0
• There are achievements, not yet sent to Steam

Teaser Trailer - 17th March 2026!

Development progress

Multiplayer beta next week!

The final campaign

Multiplayer

AI and difficulty

Maps

Objects and items

Achievements

And after the game is out?

New creatures

• Void Walker teleports to a different location every phase and gives you an option to teleport back to any visited tile when you beat him
• Craborg gets really angry when its stack loses half of the original units
• Edge hog is just ... spiky! :) It also has unlimited retaliation and causes a few status effects.

New content

• Neutral Zone map that will give you an opportunity to play with all the different neutral creatures
• Neutral spawner map object

New items

• Biotic Mentor is an artifact that allows your commander to use BIO abilities twice per round
• Genie is an artifact that causes your PSY abilities to last twice as long!
• Triffid Root is an equipment that gives a commander 10 new Triffid units each cycle!
• Tax Collector's Banner gives you extra Aura Coins when taking over buildings
• Pathfinder Drone removes movement penalties for rough terrain
• Expropriator lets you take over turrets and outposts after defeating them
• Piercing ammo allows ranged units to always deal critical damage
• Burn Puncher deals burning or corrosive damage based on which unit gets hit
• Stim-tac is a consumable that increases Combat power by +5 for three phases
• Potion of Motion is a consumable that increases Exploration proficiency by +5 for three phases
• Brain fuel is a consumable that increases Ability power by +5 for three phases

Balance changes

• Biomancer skill revives more units
• Renewed Spirit skill restores both MP and EP
• Scavenger also provides more resources when picking them up on the map
• Fungors have a limit of how many stacks they can split into
• Drone dogs give debuffs to enemy commanders while in range
• Outposts have the option to buy an extra turret
• Defensive upgrades of mines: cheaper and better
• Draining coil steals some of the drained energy
• Overall nerf of PSY abilities
• Magnesium torch can be thrown on nearby tiles, has a new effect
• Free resources on the map give on average a little bit more

Balance changes - Globetrotter

• Show resources also shows production buildings
• Rush has a stronger effect
• Eagle eye has a bigger range and highlights discovered commanders on the minimap
• Protective field also protects against turrets, traps and environmental hazards
• Supercharged cloud can now be placed next to commanders to affect them immediately, it also stops them for one turn
• Evacuation now gives you the choice of which base to evacuate to
• Summon creature - a new ability allows commanders to summon random creatures on the map

Features and improvements

• Configurable keyboard shortcuts
• Polished a lot of the UI and dialogs (commander list, statistics, gateway panel at the base, commander meeting panel, added a little animation to level up and similar dialogs)
• Improved a few unit animations from the Tumori Tribes faction and neutral units
• Added a parameter for locking staring armies in maps

Fixes

• Fixed rehired retreated commanders showing up as DEAD in their tooltip
• Fix spawners can have wrong day-night variant of the units at the first part of the cycle, units in armies of commanders visiting bases were not updated according to day-night cycle
• Fixed morale tooltip wasn't showing actual value of active status effects
• Fixed Traveling merchant and Wanderer could spawn blocking routes
• Fixed dead Panzer Worm surfaced at the end of the battle if it died underground due to torpedo explosion
• Fixed planned routes not immediately updated in a few cases (like equipping items protecting from environmental hazards)
• Fixed the 4th tier unit next to its basic spawner building in the Sovereign base showed upgraded unit graphics and the upgraded spawner showed basic unit graphics
• Fixed commander/outpost selector getting enabled in negotiator panel when not used in actual negotiation but when an outpost exists (slave camp, base slave camp, war machine shop, spawners)
• Sovereign Fleet campaign, mission 1 - fixed Gran Manny could die "prematurely"

Tumori Tribes

• 7 units, each with its upgraded version
• Warmachine: the Goo Spitter
• 13 Commanders
• Unique base buildings (including item storage!), siege battle map and base music theme
• Biomacer faction skill

Sovereign Fleet Campaign

• 4 levels, 8 intro and outro screens
• 2 new music themes
• (Hopefully not a spoiler) Encounter both your old enemies and the Tumori Tribes!

Content and features

• New skirmish maps - Lost Connection and One Way Out
• Spawner buildings on the exploration map for each faction
• Scrapyard workshop sells different warmachines
• One-way teleports
• Encyclopedia with all commanders and units organized by faction
• Improved calendar panel layout with colored phase text and custom icons for different cycle events
• Icons of different layouts in map generator
• Added commander bio to commander tooltips in scenario configuration and encyclopedia
• Academy upgrade that allows to research abilities can now be used repeatedly but with increasing cost
• New music jingles for map win/loss screen ♫
• New music theme for Orbit, improved music crossfades, fixed a couple of cases of volume jumps, for example after battle ♫
• Improvements in various sound effects: item pickups, Cannon explosion, Sawty jump, crystal biome ambience, Worm underground movement, a few healing effects, Show Resources and Treasures
• Editor: New event action for controlling commander orientation
• Editor: New event action, configurable delay/wait
• Editor: Implemented a manipulate-commanders command to disable tracking of a commander as must-stay-alive in victory conditions
• Editor: New reward for defeating selected neutral army: a fusion core
• Editor: Automatic synchronization of colors of connected teleports
• Editor: Spawners can be configured to match the faction of a base (as the player can select the faction when starting the map)

Fixes

Roadmap

As always, thanks to everybody who helped us test the build before release and special thanks to the community translators! If you'd like to join the community, we'll be happy to have you on our Discord server:

{STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/43007216/38ed300360e4c0bb01e115044e60510995a183bc.gif

Hi everybody, we're happy to announce that we just released the next major content update for Heroes of Science and Fiction! The main focus is on the new Psyker skill and the PSY combat abilities it brings, but there are also new maps, events and the usual round of improvements and bugfixes.

In the meantime, most of the team has been already working on the next big expansion, which will bring Tumori Tribes (working title: Hive Mind) as the 5th playable faction and the next campaign/storyline, so this is not even the biggest update this fall!

Psyker Skill and PSY Abilities

A new skill with 13 combat abilities for your commanders, all about manipulating your and your opponent's units in different ways. This also includes faculties at academies at all bases.

New day night cycle rules

These bring more variety to what happens on the map and some come with active events at the start of the cycle!

• Eclipse - night during the whole cycle
• Cerebral clarity - more XP from battles
• Each faction gets their own festival with a few different bonuses
• Dead rising - some neutral armies respawn
• Rain of resources: some of the treasures on the map get replenished. Can only happen once per map.
• Workers strike: everybody loses ownership of some of their resource-generating buildings. Can only happen once per map.
• Resource collectors - these creatures are hungry for resources and will appear around some of the mines

New interactive objects

• Escape module - contains various treasures
• Traveling merchant - if you catch him, you'll be able to trade for the best prices
• Mysterious wanderer - if you catch him, you'll get to improve one of your attributes

Content, features and improvements

• New skirmish maps: Blue Border & Sudden Death
• Map generator with more variety, configuration options and various improvements
• 5 new loading tips
• Increased size of tooltips and some panels in large UI mode, fixed a couple of layout issues on the Steam Deck
• Added info about remaining force field HP to force fields status effect tooltip in unit info card
• Implemented a custom effect for cloned units in unit order panel
• Added hint about "unequipping items by right clicking" to item tooltips
• Enemy commanders on the minimap are now better highlighted
• \ New environment assets and brushes for Orbit
• \ When running a playtest from map editor, there is now a way to go straight back to the map editor with a button it the top left corner of the screen
• \ Re-enabled neutral faction as an option for level-based random units in editor

Fixes

• Fixed orbit not uncovered when starting a playtest from map editor
• Fixed army tooltips not taking into account modified army counts when showing exact or iron-mole army sizes
• Fixed stack can be healed over max HP when attacking with AOE on multiple stacks with walking rations
• Fixed consumables highlight effect rendered under roads and cliffs
• Fixed random units could sometimes choose fewer units than slots and end up with 0 unit count
• Fixed base UI erroring out after putting a unit into the gateway 'send to outpost' slot, closing the base and opening it again
• Fixed units from a defeated army showing that some have been saved by the renewed spirit skill
• Fixed custom unit hire buttons at UNSS bases sometimes not available when they should be thanks to Radiant discount
• Fixed tutorial text animation breaking with very high frame rates
• Fixed map completion not saved to player profile for scenarios that you win from a map event
• Fixed typing w-h-a-c-k in main menu wasn't much fun
• A few fixes in different campaign levels
• Fixed a few typos

Last but not least, thanks to everybody who helped us test the build before release and special thanks to the community translators! If you'd like to join the community, we'll be happy to have you on our Discord server:

{STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/43007216/38ed300360e4c0bb01e115044e60510995a183bc.gif

Hi everybody, we have some big news today: the next major update is out, with the Map Editor & Workshop, a beta version of the much requested Random Map Generator, new maps, units and features!

To address the elephant in the room first though, your eyes are not misleading you - after carefully considering this step for months, we decided to change the name of the game from Silence of the Siren to the long-term working title, Heroes of Science and Fiction. You're no doubt curious why, so here are the main reasons:

• It was really easy to mix up the name with other games in the genre, and we saw too many cases of for example Youtubers struggling to remember the name

• The new name should make it much more obvious to HoMM fans that this game is in the same genre as the beloved classic, which is really important when players see it on any list on Steam and decide whether to have a closer look.

And what happens to 'Silence of the Siren'? The name lives on as the name of the campaign/storyline of Heroes of Science and Fiction!

Now, back to the update itself - let's have a look at all that's included!

Map Editor

• The Map Editor we used to create all the maps in the game (there's an official Steam Guide)!

• A powerful Event/Scripting Editor battle-tested by creating the different campaigns (there's also a Steam Guide for this part of the editor)

• A simple Steam Workshop integration so you can share your maps directly from the Editor

Content

• A new planet with a 6-phase day-night cycle

• 7 new maps (plus some older maps can now be found on the new planet). New maps are marked with a 'new' icon for your convenience! :) This includes the map from the Next Fest Demo 2024 and an even older demo map uploaded as an example to the Workshop!

• New neutral units: Luminovores, self-destructing F1-Crackers and Slugtors and Malarions as a vanguard of the Tumori Tribes faction.

More new features and improvements

• BETA version of the Map Generator that can create simple maps for up to 4 players (you can find it under Custom Scenarios -> Generate Map)

• Random commander selection for scenarios and skirmish

• Statistics for the victory screen with army strength graph

• Eyeball tower building with exploration statistics

• New commander list UI

• Added error messages to main menu in case of errors after map load

• Neutral armies from other factions will sometimes offer to join the commander

• Tooltip for datascrolls shows the details of the skill you can learn from them

• Added custom tooltip text for friendly buildings that can't be taken over, fixed friendly bases showing the eye cursor

• Commander action selector now shows usable consumables first

• Limited-range (run-and-gun) units now also show a specific icon above their portraits in the unit order panel in battles

• Added a 'dismiss units' button also to dialog panel with armies used for outposts and defended mines

Game balance tweaks

• UNSS balancing pass (lowered trooper AoE damage, lowered chain lightning damage for consecutive hits, shield is more expensive)

• Bloodlust skill can now only be used once per round and 1-3 times per battle

• Engineer skill replenishes more EP (+10 +20 +30 instead of +5 +10 +15)

• Scout skill replenishes +10 +20 +30 MP according to skill level instead of always +30

Fixes

• Fixed cancelling special attacks of units didn't play a smooth transition back to idle

• Fixed only one of the not-selected skills in level up dialog could be shown again during the next level up

• Fixed hero 'can move' property and movement bar in right panel not refreshed after activation from events

• Disabled handling of submit events from gamepads as they might have caused random errors at bases

• Fix AI cannot go through building zone if it can't afford to build anything

• Fix day/night cycle doesn't affect units in garrisons and bases

• Fix Casting exploration ability near map border causes error

• Fix field promoted units switch to not-dead basic version when killed

• Fixed war machine hire custom panel was showing animated unit even when its building wasn't built yet

• Fixed Schließen in German localization not shown correctly as SCHLIESSEN when rendered in uppercase

• Fixed camera not following moving AI commanders to their map layer

• Added black cover behind neutral army join panel so the player can't open hero card behind it and break the armies and UI

• Fixed slots of the neutral army in neutral army join dialog could get a activated for unit placement by splitting one of your stacks or dropping a unit by right clicking twice to one of your army slots

• Fixed difficulty of previous campaign level applied to next campaign level before selecting difficulty in the UI, causing wrong neutral unit numbers; the UI now automatically selects difficulty from previous map

• Fixed dismissing units from their info panel opened from hero card wasn't updating armies in hero list

• Fixed Plant Mammas could spawn multiple babies on the same hex at start of the battle

We hope you will enjoy this new version and as always, let us know if you come across any issues or have any feedback to share. Also, we'll be looking forward to see all the different ideas you will come up with in your own maps!

And, last but not least, here's an updated roadmap for the road to full release:

Hi everybody, we managed to get the editor to a ready-to-be-tested state relatively early, so we're happy to share it a bit in advance compared to the release of the next update.

So, what is included? Well, this is really all about the map (and event) editor! You can now access it directly from the main menu. Other than that, you should be able to continue your saved games and play normally. Other content from the upcoming update is mostly WIP, so you shouldn't encounter it (apart from markers on the planets in Skirmish mode which show where new maps will be). One exception is that large maps now have a 6-phase cycle, so feel free to give these a try too!

So, how to participate?

Just switch to this branch on Steam (Properties -> BETAS): editor-beta-test-2025 Version: 39e0494f

There's also a written guide available here on Steam: https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=3493125391

We will appreciate any feedback, especially about what parts of the workflow need more explaining, what parts of the UI you found confusing etc. Also, should we add anything to the guide? Fell free to share any thoughts in the discussions or on the Discord: https://discord.gg/DAeGEtqHNS

Also, while we haven't enabled Steam Workshop yet in case we need to change something in the map format, feel free to share your maps on the Discord too! In either case, have fun building!

• Iron Mole Mode as a new difficulty setting that only allows one save per map and replaces enemy hazard rating by a rough estimate of actual unit counts
• 10 new items
• 2 new skirmish maps: Multiverse Madness and Doom of Eden
• New neutral units: Molvarks, slightly familiar mole beasts and Trifids that spawn their seedlings
• New campaign level select screen

• Added the option to retry battle from victory and loss dialogs, disabled retry battle from pause menu and from end battle dialogs during tutorial
• Units in unit list in combat get highlighed when targeted by an attack or an ability
• Friendly units on the map get highlighted in blue instead of orange, handshake cursor on friendly neutral armies
• Overall UI polish (layouts, backgrounds, unnecessary scrolling, one-frame glitches, smooth fade-in of dark background behind base panels, exploration map building tooltips)
• Improved buying abilities panel in the Academy
• Improved the different crosshair combat cursors
• Added a few missing UI sounds to different buttons
• Implemented switching to lower resolution energy field mesh and less dense energy field particles with the low quality terrain option
• Added difficulty info to the load dialog
• Added custom combat log message for bloodlust giving an extra move
• Vortex mines end moves
• Worm's 'buried' status effect can be dispelled
• Added a few new status effect icons
• Added missing info about status effects to a few unit ability descriptions, added more info about unit types affected, improved orbital bombardment description and changed empty base text to be more clear about no garrisoned units; changed vanquishers to cause shock instead of bleeding
• Re-enabled the "player lost" message when AI kills itself during its turn
• Updated credits

• Fixed controllers with stick drift causing the ingame camera to move
• Fixed skipping turn in battle could be sometimes activated during Custodian's end of turn ability, causing the next unit to skip its turn
• Fixed traveling between bases via gateways was skipping the teaching of abilities from the destination academy
• Fixed using resource beacon from the commander card in base would exit the base but keep the commandercard there open
• Fixed special academy panels would stay active after switching to another base
• Fixed buying and selling items at a base wasn't refreshing the state of the item buttons and army upgrade buttons Fixed lost war machines are not shown in the combat results
• Fixed commanders marked as dead when losing at the Warrior Monk Temple
• Fixed small random armies with only one unit in each stack would end up with zero units on easy difficulty
• Fixed a long pause between Bountyhuntress' casting special ability and teleporting
• Fixed a few issues with long texts in the layout of the right panel: AI turn, player name, end of turn button
• Fixed data fragments and data fragment chests were allowed to be used by max level commanders (level 30 or map-specific max level)
• Fixed commander auto-garrisoning at the end of turn would override active commander at the start of next turn
• Fixed shield war machines get a turn when the commander has a war hawk skill
• Fixed a rare campaign blocker: keys held by enemies who died against player's bases or guarded mines got lost
• Fixed equipped deep scanner causing discovered objects to rebuild their graphics with every commander move
• Fixed overlapping paths and tracks from the scout skill would glitch out
• Fixed camera not centered on active commander at the start of the turn (this got broken by another fix in the update)
• Fixed base statistics texts wrapping in German
• Fixed wrong resistances of 50-Cals and Crowd Suppressors
• Fixed a rare case of insane AI enemy army growth related to the radiant discount building you can build at UNSS bases
• Fixed resources gained from a scripted event at the end of combat wouldn't get correctly added to the numbers displayed in the top panel

Content

• UNSS - the United Nations of the Solar System!
• Commanders, base, 7 units x 2 tiers
• Campaign with 4 levels, and we somehow ended up with about 25% more dialog than in the Fossorian campaign :)
• Faction skill: Squad Leader allows you to split unit stacks during combat
• Faction buildings: Resting place restores movement, Holodeck allows you to hire commanders with higher attribute values, Corporate Lair gives various discounts when hiring expensive units
• New skirmish map: Chaos

Features and improvements - version 117c9dab

• Difficulty settings are now also available for campaign levels (experimental)
• Increased visible inventory space in commander panel (3 columns instead of 2)
• Added an option to reduce the visual impact/transitions between different times of day
• Added info about unit special attack cooldowns to the unit info panels
• Added a custom icon and tooltip for all limited range (run and gun) units to the unit info panels
• Commanders that originated in a different faction than the one they are in now have faction skills matching their origin (for example Pick is Sovereign but has the Fossorian skill)
• Added more versions of the garrison/ungarrison buttons at the base to make it more clear what happens in which situation (a single commander, commander and a base with an army etc.)
• Implemented automatic garrisoning system at the end of each turn: if you leave a commander "at the gates" and they get attacked during one of next players turns, they will be automatically defending behind the walls. If not, everything returns to the original state at the start of next turn
• Good progress in the optimization of AI turn times
• Sovereign Antimat (7th tier) unit's special attack now only allows horizontal direction
• Added outline around affected range of builder-skill objects when being placed on the map
• Added a highlight behind the outpost button in negotiator panel in case some units won't fit into the commander's army, but there's an outpost that can accept them

Fixes

• Fixed units sometimes getting slowly pushed outside of their hexes in combat
• Fixed random units appearing at bases recently taken over from AI players
• Fixed Earthshaker MK2 doesn't shoot twice against army consisting only of buried upgraded worms
• Fixed hazard indicated at threatened tile shows real threat even when the threatening neutral army is only discovered and the hazard should be unknown
• Fixed disabled teleport not automatically enabled when passing through.
• Fixed buried worm can get morale extra turn when skipping turn
• Fixed the game not always correctly detecting 16:10 aspect ratio for UI and combat camera fov, this was causing buttons on top of commander portraits to overlap stack number of bottom stack
• Fixed AI UPG mortar plays shoot animation only once sometimes
• Fixed orbital light preset stuck on when switching from a hero in orbit to a hero on the ground using the next hero button
• Fixed Bolts and Crowd Suppressors/Crushers didn't damage walls
• Fixed a couple of rare cases of AI players getting stuck
• Fixed object outlines in exploration rendered over other UI
• Fixed 'don't show again' options not saved when clicking the icon in dialog panel
• Fixed boosted mining probe could collect resources above limit

Winter Planetary Update

New content

• New planet in Skirmish mode with three large maps
• New colorful Crystal biome
• The main gameplay theme for the maps: Gates and keys! There's up to eight different colored pairs of gates and key generators
• One of the maps has a new victory condition: hold a base for a given period of time
• Added modified versions of a couple of existing maps now with 6 and 8 players (you can find these under custom scenarios)
• Two new neutral units will now appear on the maps: Apex and Primal Pylon
• Added Movement Node map object that refills commander's movement points

Features and improvements

• The Swordmaster building now gives the choice of which of commander's attributes to level up
• Status effects on units in combat now display the remaining duration in the unit info panel
• Added more info about units which transform during different phases of the day-night cycle to the unit info panel
• Added an indicator to highlight commanders bypassing turrets, cybersnares and other hazards thanks to their Scout skill
• Added the "switch commander to training mode" button also to the active commander button on the right
• It's now possible to change starting factions and commanders in the scenario menus with the mouse wheel
• Switched the "build for a fusion core" button in base building catalog panels from gold to white
• Camera now follows commanders traveling between bases to their destination
• Mining probes now indicate they have a production limit of 20 turns
• Added numbers to the Black Market UI to show how many items of each kind a commander has to sell
• Added support for custom tooltips on static map objects, like the shuttle in the Fossorian campaign
• When a low level commander has full skill slots, higher level skills show in the level up dialog instead
• Added a custom message to Liberator's special attack tooltip when there are no targets
• Range of buried worms gets displayed when holding shift
• Added custom texts for the retreat button when retreating is not available
• Factions of neutral bases in scenarios/skirmish maps get randomized when starting a new game
• AI now sells extra items in markets
• Improved use of the Scout skill by AI commanders

Community translations

• Brazilian Portuguese is now the third community-translated language in the game!
• Updated Hungarian and Russian translations with texts for this update

Fixes

• Fixed a couple of sneaky memory leaks
• AI commanders could get killed due to multiple threats on a tile
• AI commanders could get stuck on getting scouting bonus from building
• Fixed when AI siege defender had only melee units in loopholes, they didn't charge
• Fixed stack status effect preview on Meatboys was breaking the 'special' button tooltip
• Fixed when units go outside of shield and attack a Saw-ty, the Saw-ty retaliated against the shield even though the attacker is already outside
• Fixed Saw-ty pre-retaliation when attacked from a loophole
• Fixed a rare bug with overlapping units and objects on the world map flickering
• Fixed Regenerate ability at level 2 cost 1/10th of what it should have
• Fixed empty object preview in the dialog panel when re-opening a visited building by a commander that's out of frame by moving the camera to them first
• Fixed war machines couldn't be picked up after dropping one unit to a slot and then placing the rest of the moved stack
• Fixed trading buildings at some bases did cost other resources than coins, a possible soft lock in player progression
• Fixed dead units stuck with with white flash in auto combat
• Fixed retreated commanders were given the 'dead' flag, sometimes causing a player to be defeated too early
• Fixed a few sounds playing from the darkness during AI player turns
• Fixed random units on some maps always spawning as their upgraded versions, limiting variety
• Fixed inventory slots stuck as disabled once their item was once shown as disabled after encountering a supercharged cloud
• Fixed teleports on the map were becoming visible in the fog of war too early
• Disabled dangerous objects, traps and turrets getting triggered by commanders at nearby bases
• Fixed remembered armies in the orbital fog of war layer lost after load
• Fixed orbital layer showing editor random item markers when viewed after scenario start
• Fixed layout of objectives was sometimes a bit wonky after a new objective replaced one of the existing ones
• Fixed combat manuals and datascrolls giving movement bonus when picked up
• Fixed building biofarms on biofarm veins could block some neighboring tiles
• Hopefully fixed units artifacting on certain HW configurations on Linux

Known issues

• While we've been working on optimization, the AI turns are still relatively slow on the 6+8 player maps or the biggest maps with open layouts

Community translations

• Added Russian community translation
• Fixed missing outline on the JosefinExt font used with Russian texts
• Added Hungarian texts for the Festive Features update

Fixes

• Fixed progression blocker in the Await map if you chose a commander with only two units in their army and entered your base
• Fixed disappearing Aura Coin Storage in fog of war if a unit is standing on its first tile/position
• Fixed pressing to highlight objects was breaking the game when there was no active commander

Misc

• Enabled support for streaming the game on GeForce Now, feel free to send your game requests in the GeForce Now app or upvote here: https://www.nvidia.com/en-us/geforce/forums/gfn-game-requests/44/551525/span-classhighlightsilencespan-of-the-span-classhi/

Setup - "host" side

• Shift + Tab to open Steam overlay
• Switch to the Remote Play section and invite your friends from here
• When they join, make sure to enable keyboard and mouse controls for them

• Start a custom scenario and set your players to "human", feel free to choose the same team if you'd like to play a co-op game
• It's a good idea to run a voice call in parallel with the game session to coordinate who "holds" the controls at which point :)

Technical issues/troubleshooting

• If one of the players is on Linux, the video stream might not work, but it works the other way around, if the Linux player hosts the game
• Increase streaming quality to improve text readability

Festive Features Update

Features and improvements - version (commit) 493fe698

• Selectable starting factions
• Local coop / team support with shared Fog of War and resource gifting UI
• Saves in zip format and a new archive folder for autosaves to better organize them
• All globetrotter abilities now have icons in commander action menu
• Damage preview shows inflicted status effects and their probability
• Implemented canceling unit move by escape in hero meeting
• Added small/medium/large map info to scenario descriptions
• Cloud saves have been enabled for player made saves, will be enabled for autosaves soon (after the game has updated for most of you and has sorted out the archive folder)
• Remote play together on Steam has been enabled, so you can use local multiplayer as a simple way how to play online with your friends!

NEW: Factions skills

• Available to be learned by any commander of the matching faction
• Children of the Source - Renewed Spirit - victory in battle restores movement on the map
• Fossorians - Bloodlust - units have up to 100% chance to get an extra move after killing a hostile unit stack
• Sovereign Fleet - Field Repair - your units get healed when attacking units of the same class (tech-tech or bio-bio)

Balance update

• Exploration attribute: lowered movement points gain when the attribute increases
• Combat attribute: much higher damage bonus for units
• Ability attribute: lowered energy regeneration, more expensive abilities
• Brawler skill: double bonus for damage, no unit movement bonus
• Sniper skill: double bonus
• Chess master skill: double morale bonus
• Defensive specialist skill: 100% extra retaliation on level 3
• NEW War Hawk skill: movement and initiative bonus for units in combat
• Collector skill: up to 30% lower energy cost for equipping items, no fusion core reward bonus
• Scavenger skill: double resources
• Engineer skill: no energy pool bonus, lower energy cost for equipping items moved to Collector
• NEW Raiden skill: increases energy pool, increases effect of the Recharge Cell consumable
• Explorer skill: bonus increased to plus 4 - 8 - 12 movement points, movement attribute adds more movement points
• Scout skill: bonus to exploration XP, movement partially replenished when visiting buildings, removes movement cost for transferring armies between commanders, removed vision bonus and ? icon in fog of war showing various resources and buildings
• Tracker skill: removes penalty for bad terrain, extra fusion core moved here from Collector, removed Xenoslime breaking discount
• Eagle eye ability: now uncovers hostile commanders within certain range
• Show resources and Show treasures have been merged
• Supercharged cloud ability: available as level 2 ability, longer duration
• Invisibility ability: available only on level 3
• Acid Projectile ability: added damage on hit, was only over time
• Lighten Armor: increased effect
• Lure Local Beast: now available from level 2
• Walking Rations: also prevents affected unit from retaliating
• Armor Incrustation and Artificial Muscle Fibers have been merged, available from level 1
• Restoring Biofilm ability: available from level 1
• Glue Grenade ability: available from level 1
• Blast Wave ability: also pushes the targeted unit itself, not only units around it
• Resurrect ability: is now cheaper
• Vortex Mines ability: removed as hero ability, the feature stays as a defensive structure at bases
• Draining Coil ability: always drains half of remaining energy
• Teleport ability: now available from level 2 (friendly only, level 3 teleports any unit)
• System Equilibrium ability: available from level 1
• Sentry Airdrop ability: available from level 2
• Orbital Strike ability: increased damage

Fixes

• Upgraded Unity engine from 2020.3.17 to 2020.3.48, this fixes some issues with windowed mode and resolution switching on Linux
• Fixed progress blocker in some campaign levels in the rare case of an enemy commander killing themselves on a neutral army
• Disabled starting commander selection for AI players in maps with locked factions, fixed starting commanders getting overridden for maps with locked factions (Await specifically)
• Fixed Crusaders siege loophole had double health
• Fix Unit counts in combat are not updated on certain events(damage from mines, healing)
• Fixed unit count UI in combat not scaling correctly when showing damage preview
• Fixed Evacuation could leave the commander on an energy fields tile if it is right next the target base access point
• Fixed Evacuation ability not taking energy points after being used, because commander landed in base and was refiled automatically, but did not actually enter the base
• Fixed end tactics button stuck on in the next battle when retreating during tactics
• Fixed random neutral armies sometimes generating zero unit stacks and erroring out
• Fixed starting commanders with ability skills getting one random ability and one ability specified in their xml after first load
• Fixed broken tooltip on energy cost icon in inventory slots
• Fixed "neutral units run" dialog wasn't taking in account different effects modifying neutral army size
• Fixed Meatboy Shredder doesn't attack twice with activated berserker mode after waiting
• Fixed scroll bar enabled at exploration skill academy/pirate skill acedemy even if there's nothing for a commander to learn
• Fixed ability icons in ability book and commander action selector were not sorted in the database order but according to when they were learned
• Fixed Replay crashes on hiring new commander
• Fixed Fog of war is not updated on visibility change cycle event
• Fxed a lot of typos :)

Release notes:

Content and changes

Fixes

Audio

Features and changes

Fixes