Milestone 5.24.0 Released! This is another hotfix for Milestone 5 that fixes a few crashes and other gameplay issues. We've got another hotfix planned for this week, so please do report any issues you encounter and we'll do our best to fix them!

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Changes:

Mind Control success chance now reduces by -2% for each tile between the caster and target (rather than -1%). Abduction tubes now stop their humming sound when opened.

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Bugfixes:

Fixed a tactical crash that could occur at end of turn, or when alt+tabbing. Fixed a crash that could occur when selling items on the strategy level. Fixed an issue that was preventing aliens from using Mind Control (introduced in the last build). Fixed aircraft armour plating sometimes not removing their +armour bonus when unequipped, causing the interceptor to incorrectly gain a permanent buff. Fixed the tactical UI soldier minitabs (at the top of the screen) displaying the name of a dead zombified soldier as "reaper Reaper Zombie". Fixed the crosshair / shot hit chance calculation not updating immediately if you're hovering over an enemy and then press "C" to crouch. Fixed some instances where some stacked shipping containers were not correctly destruction linked, occasionally causing floating containers and some other issues.

Milestone 5.25.1 STABLE Released! This hotfix for Milestone 5 fixes a serious gameplay issue, so we're launching it straight onto the normal branches without letting people test it for a few days on the Experimental branches first. There's therefore a higher chance of stability issues than normal - we'll be watching the bug report forums closely over the weekend, so please let us know if you encounter any issues!

The critical bug we're fixing can cause soldiers to suffer permanent stat loss if you're saving / loading during combat, as well as potentially getting stuck in the wounded state on the strategy layer. However, we're also toning down Mind Control and fixing an issue with night missions getting out of sync with the Geoscape night shadow.

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Changes:

Mind Control for Psyons no longer uses squad sight, so Psyons need to get direct vision on a Xenonaut before they can cast the ability (Eternals can still cast Mind Control using squad sight). Added new art for the Alien Antigravity Unit research project. Added new injury / death sounds for the Eternal.

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Bugfixes:

Fixed a bug where soldiers could permanently lose stats if a player loaded a tactical save in which their units had temporary debuffs from being Suppressed (Reflexes) or taking HP damage (Accuracy), as this caused the temporary debuffs to incorrectly become permanent. Unfortunately it's not possible for us to fix soldiers that have suffered from this issue - sorry about that! Fixed the day / night status of a mission on the Geoscape being set when it first spawns, rather than the time when the player actually begins the mission. Fixed a bug where smoke tiles and doors would sometimes appear invisible to the player, but still be present in gameplay terms. (Hopefully) fixed combat shields sometimes not disappearing when destroyed by enemy fire. Fixed the UOO Bridge Assault mission not allowing you to attempt it a second time if you abort the mission. Fixed soldiers getting stuck in the "airborne" state if you abort the Bridge Assault mission. Fixed the Geoscape objective text going off the edge of the screen on non-16:9 screens.

Milestone 5.25.2 STABLE Released! This is another quick hotfix for Milestone 5, fixing a second pathway for the Reflexes bug to occur that we missed in the last hotfix.

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Bugfixes:

Fixed a second variant of the bug where soldiers could permanently lose stats if a player loaded a tactical save in which their units had temporary debuffs from being Suppressed (Reflexes), causing the temporary debuff to become permanent. Unfortunately it's not possible for us to fix soldiers that have suffered this reduction with a patch, as the bug overwrites their original stat value - sorry about that!

Milestone 5.26.0 STABLE Released! This is another hotfix for Milestone 5. As always, we're monitoring the bug report forums and we'll continue to release further hotfixes for crashes and gameplay issues reported by players.

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Changes:

All aliens in the Terror Site around day 70 should now use Magnetic weapons (previously a couple of aliens were incorrectly using Plasma weapons). Made some small changes to the Endgame part 2 mission, ensuring the outer walls of the mission are indestructible and placing earth tiles in any of the internal voids in the map. Also fixed some misaligned floor tiles. These map changes mean that any existing save games from Endgame part 2 will now be broken!

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Bugfixes:

Fixed a crash that could occur when a Servitor fell down a level while also trying to perform autoheal. Fixed the Autopsy: Symbiote research project not unlocking correctly. Fixed the "Recovering" state of wounded soldiers incorrectly displaying as "<1 Day" in some situations. Fixed the western town double-sided chair tiles not correctly disappearing when destroyed.

Milestone 5.28.1 STABLE Released! This is another hotfix for Milestone 5 that fixes a few crashes and other gameplay issues. We're still tracking a small number of stability issues in Milestone 5 and will continue to release patches when we have fixes for them.

Please do report any bugs you encounter on the bug reporting subforums and we'll do our best to look into them!

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Gameplay Changes:

End of turn autosaves are now enabled by default (in addition to the standard start of turn autosaves), and we've cleared all existing user settings to ensure this feeds through. We're going to keep this enabled for a few weeks because we're getting a lot of end-of-turn bugs reported that we can't track down because we don't have an appropriate save. If you find these extra saves slow down the game too much, you can always manually disable them in the game settings. The camera is no longer forcibly locked to moving soldiers - the camera will now only move / change height level if the moving soldier is selected and the player is not manually moving the camera. This should hopefully remove the annoying camera lock while still allowing the camera to track soldiers in situations where the player would want it to happen (going through teleporters / climbing up onto roofs / etc). Please let us know if there's still situations where the camera is behaving awkwardly! Combat shields no longer take damage when the soldier carrying them walks through poison gas. Added new artwork for the Alien Singularity Core research project. Sped up loading times when loading a tactical save from the Load Game screen.

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Bugfixes:

Fixed a crash that could occur when loading a tactical mission. Fixed shot modifiers (heavy armour penalty, injury accuracy reduction) sometimes being double applied. Fixed soldiers initially being invisible after moving up a level via a teleporter. Fixed the Sebillian heal animation playing on aliens that aren't visible. Fixed transferred soldiers not being able to change armour if the type of armour item in their planned loadout is not present at the new base. Fixed the soldier HP bar for wounded soldiers on the Soldier Equip screen incorrectly rounding up, so showing some soldiers at full HP when they were still slightly injured. Fixed some of the objective text for the UOO Sabotage and UOO Bridge Assault missions not correctly disappearing after completion of those missions. Fixed various visual issues with the Western Town biome, the largest being the long-running issue with the restaurant interior walls rendering pure black (even when visible). However, there were several other more subtle rendering issues in this biome that we've also fixed that should clean up the visuals of Terror Sites. Fixed there being some "holes" in the walls of alien bases (this was just one particular wall tile not rendering correctly). Fixed some issues with the walls flickering in certain Farm barn buildings. Removed a filing cabinet that was obstructing an office window (but still allowing you to shoot through it) in a particular terror map. Fixed an issue with the text for a certain Geoscape anomaly in the German translation. Fixed the MARS showing age as -1 years.