Some time ago I drew up grand plans (and appropriate code) to change the weather system in my online game from a generic one covering the entire map to specific spots of clouds and storms that affect just nearby units.

Shortly before jetting off to Hawai'i I gave the code a once-over, found that most of it was just what I wanted as a basis for the new system, and rapidly fleshed it the rest of the way out.

Now, various clouds move around on the map waiting for players to discover them and waiting to affect the game just as they did historicallyl. Each turn they can fade away or generate additional markers, and they can turn into storms, or vice-versa. Now players can try to hide their ships near them, and planes flying around will have their lines of sight blocked by clouds. Storms prevent launching airplanes from carriers, and also prevent combat for nearby units.

The whole system has been in testing by select players for the past six weeks and apparently has worked well enough that not a single problem was reported. This makes me happy, of course, but doesn't necessarily mean anything. Maybe they did not test enough. Probably a few bugs lie undiscovered.

Anyway, I turned the new weather system loose upon the public site today and we'll see what happens. It's a big relief to have it done and out there, and now it's time to turn to some other bugs the game still has.