rebooted Steam just now.  My DLC list doesn't say mercenaries but the update DOES want to download 500 MB.  Elite founder check.  Nothing in game saying those races selectable either

Not yet, no.  Probably because it isn't an "offical" opt-in.

Already saw a fair amount of changes.  The Starbase Exclusion radius dropping from 5 to 4 might be the biggest, along with Max Coercion being bumped up to 50% .  Map generation was played with a fair amount as well. 

Got 1.6, not Mercenaries. Files are all valid.

Edit later: Re-installed GalCiv3. Still cannot see Mercenaries or access the 2 new races.

Thanks, just started playing.  

The first thing I'm noticing is that coercion seems to have been buffed, which is fine but it's created a bit of a trap for new players.  Currently to get the most of one thing you have to set it to ~70-75% (depending on your buildings) of what you want and then split the remainder between the other two.  Since it also reduces happiness but the coercion amount (up to 50% now, scaling up rapidly at the high end) someone new to the game could really hurt themselves while thinking that they were focusing on one type of production.

Perhaps the wheel could be changed to emphasize how bad it is at the extremes now?  Maybe instead of the blue/orange/green colours showing the different types of production it could be green in the center and changing more towards red as coercion increases?

Edit: Or maybe even change it to three bars that go from 0 to whatever the maximum amount of production for that type is, so that a player adjusting one could see how the other two drop extemely quickly to get that last few percent out of one type?

ie:

l----------

l----------

l----------

l---------------

l-------

l-------

l------------------

l

l

Edit 2: I don't know anything about coding a UI, but maybe the quickest fix would be to not allow you to select a spot on the wheel that would increase your coercion but not increase any of the three types of production.

Also, just to echo what others have said the only expansion content that seems to have made it in to the beta are the portraits for the new races.

The problem might be that it does not appear that Mercenaries is on my account. 

Plenty of other developers have been able to do this, so it's not a matter if "can you", but rather "how you" add it. Has Mercenaries been submitted to Steam yet? 

As I'm traveling and dependent on slow hotel wifi speeds, I hope the rest of you give it a good shakeout before I can get home and give it a try in two weeks.

Definitely missing the key Mercs files.  Though some of the English XML files are in.  From a very quick look I can see it looks like we're getting 4 new race abilities and that there appears to be 20+ mercs per tier (of which there are 3).

i also got 1.6 but did not get the Merc Exp

Same here...  I appear to have 1.6  but not Mercenaries...

Hi all - Apologies, we ran into some Steam config issues on the new expansion pack. I hope to have it worked out with Valve tomorrow. In the meantime, please enjoy the version 1.6 update.

What exactly is the 1.6 update doing? 

I know there's an AI update, but what else?

Thanks for the info Yarlen.

I think it was way above & beyond to even try to get the Beta out on a Saturday.  Kudos to everyone at Stardock!

Yes, thanks for trying. Don't worry we can wait until tomorrow.

I will chime in on the appreciation for what got out and when.  Somebody was working hard, that's for sure.  Been there, done that.

y question are we going to be able to play both games like 2, and can you have two separate icons on the desktop so we don't have to look for them. Also are we going have to reinstall the betas when you straiten this out, or will it do it automatically.

Just tried playing my first game of 1.6, and tried setting in game options in the escape menu, and it crashed on me when I selected options.

The Yor survey ship Moves three parsecs a turn while the Terrans move four parsecs a turn, and the Yor survey ship has 100 hit points while the Terrans has 105 hit points starting. Was that intentional.

Seems to be crashing when I load a saved game inside a game.

Why are Snathi minor, and a major species unless one negates the other.

Yeah, kudos for Stardock for that! At least you tried

Looking forward to Mercenaries soon

Working fine, thx Frogboy. Actually DL ...

Survey Ships: Differences like that can be easily attributed to racial choices and/or special resources.  One of you probably has a resource on your planet for +5% HP while the other has one for +5% movement (which rounds up to +1).

Snathi: They have always been a random minor race, but there was also a DLC expansion which turned them in to a major race.  They can be played by you or randomly show up in game as one of your major opponents.

First, what is in 1.6, exactly?

Second, were you able to fix it yet?

Mercs is now working.

Does this mean we can start the Beta Release Pool again? I hate losing...

*checks*

Confirmed.  Have Merc in my DLC slot. 

Had a quick look around in it.  Liking what I saw, have some questions about how the Bazaar will play on the larger maps, but there are some interesting Mercs (design and ability-wise) in there.  Liking the look of the Torians and Arceans and excited to go through the new ship parts.  From this initial look the only thing I immediately felt disappointed by was the campaign, which is quite niche in itself so might not really be something many others, maybe even the majority, care about.

Anyway, only spent 30 mins having a look so I'm looking forward to giving it a proper bash (though I think two issues I've been bringing up for multiple updates now are still not fixed, but that's a 1.6 thing not something related directly to the expac).