                        Concept : Merc Empire Changes

 There have been several changes/fixes made to the KSU code  for  the  Merc  V
game.  This will outline the various changes and how they will affect you.

Bridges

There was a bug which allowed planes that were on bridges  that  collapsed  to
remain  in  the  sea  sector  and  could be retrieved by either rebuilding the
bridge or moving them onto a 100% highway.  This has been fixed  so  that  any
planes upon a bridgespan which falls will be destroyed.

Uncompensated Workers

Uncompensated workers were not paying taxes, even though the  version  command
provided a tax rate for them.  They now pay the taxes that are shown.

SYNTAX:
   [##:##] Command: reject reject announcements *

                        Concept : Merc Empire Changes

This command now works, so that you can reject announcements  from  everybody.
This is not recommended though...

Technology

The tech formula has been fixed so that all increases in material result in an
increase in the amount of tech prodced.

           if(breakthroughs > 0.75) {
                   above = breakthroughs - 0.75;
                   tech = 0.75 + log2(1 + above);
           }
           else {
                   tech = breakthoughs;
           }

Grind

                        Concept : Merc Empire Changes

The grind command now requires available work to grind up bars.   It  takes  5
avail to grind up a gold bar.

Loans

Loans have been removed from Merc V.  This is an experiment to see how  things
go without loans being available.

Country Names

Certain commands only worked with country numbers,  but  they  now  work  with
country  names  as  well.   The primary comand that this affects for Merc V is
report.

Production

The production of dust/oil/rads is now limited to the resource content of  the
sector.  It used to be possible to get more out of a sector.,

Starvation

                        Concept : Merc Empire Changes

Sectors that have a very large number of civilians that starve  will  have  at
most  499 civilians after the update unless there was enough food to feed more
than 499 civs.

Attack

The attack command now uses at least 1 mobility point per sector that partici-
pates in any attack.

Pinpoint Bombing

Pinpoint bombing now lists all the commodities in a sector that can be bombed.

Production Report

The production report now contains a report of what will actually be  produced
by  your  sectors  at the next update.  Since some of the rounding done by the
update code uses a random percentage chance, it is possible that you will  get
1-2 units more of some of the items.  The production report command is conser-
vative, and assumes that all rounding will be down.

                        Concept : Merc Empire Changes

Version

The information in the version command was modified so  that  the  information
that was printed out would reflect the actual parameters of the game.

