I sure hope devs will still read this. Respect yer work Ironclad.
So, here's couple of my suggestions:
- New ships. Yes, have been said many times but I actually thought about what kind they should be. All races (new ones included!) should get following ships:
- Advanced combat cruisers: High/late tech jack of all trade cruisers (mini-capitals) which have multidute of weapons to deal with different threats moderately. This ship is definetly needed as it would mess with spamming of certain ships.
- Siege frigate is now siege, but I think it should be something like siege/fire-support. So, give all siege frigates some kind of slow AOE attack against massed ships. AOE damage would not be big but still enough to punish frigate mobs. These attacks should not home in on targets, but to the point where target was in the moment of firing. This would give the enemy change to avoid massed "artillery" fire. I think this would make siege frigates a viable option in fleets.
- "Glass cannon" cruisers. Very fragile cruisers build around big guns that rip other cruisers to bits! Fairly fragile against anything. Ineffective against frigates because they are too nimble and small for the targeting systems of these cruisers; Targeting systems are finely calibrated against cruiser size ships.
- We have fighters and bombers, but I think we are missing something. Ah yes, the interceptors. Interceptors would be real effective ONLY against bombers (counter), and maybe moderately effective against fighters. They should be very fast and lightly armored; They would be ripped apart by flak fleets and massed fighters.
- Frigate/cruiser gunboats. (Maybe late-game) Ships with lots of guns covering 360 degrees around the ship. Could be used to perform "drive-by" and "dancing" tactics. Gunboats should be pretty fragile though.
- Late game caps. Yep, Advanced, high-tec capital ships that you get in the end of "prototype" research trees. Considerably more powerfull and expensive than normal capitals. There could maybe be two or three different "uber-caps" per race but you would have to choose only one of them. And you could deploy only one at time.
- Space stations. I mean big ones. Maybe each race could have their own versions of culture, warfare, and economy bases. These bases would give major bonuses for planet they are orbiting. They should be limited like caps, maybe to 2-3 of each in the empire. These would also be late games stuff.
Thats all I have to say about new ships and stuff.
And now to other things.
- I think that amount of research stations needed for techs should be adjustable like research speed. This would certainly give players more control over how fast/slow you get techs. Also, in big games you would not have all the tech before moving to another star system; you would not have enough planets for stations!. "Slowest" setting would increase the amounts of tech-stations needed by 3x or 4x, whereas fastest setting would 1/3x or 1/4x the amount of stations needed. BTW I think that all speed settings also need super slow and super fast extremitys.
- Culture needs some buffing. I wrote about the extra effects for different allegiance values in modding forums. Basically the idea was to make low allegiance more dangerous and harmful for planets and their functions. For example: If allegiance would drop to 10-20% some or majority of defence and logistics structures would cease functioning. These effects would make culture an efficient "softening weapon" against otherwise strong planets.
- About those new races. I sure hope the Vasaris nemesis (Not care-bears, though
) will make appereance in the expansion. I don't know what you devs have store for us but I bet that Vasaris nemesis may bear resemblaces to Inhibitors or "Wolfes". I'm pretty sure that many of you know what I'm meaning (Conjoiners are Advent without religious impressions
).
If you are planning more than one new races I sure hope at least other one are non-humanoid life-forms.
Thats all I can remember for the moment. Hope these helped, in someway at least.
