Combat System- Im new, its confusing and i'm out of here.

from GalCiv3 Forums

Hi,

Im new, I've just gone through my 8th attempt of playing this game, and Im losing constantly to war its incredibly frustrating. Specifically the Dregin empire pound me because I cant work out the combat system!

 

First off.

I unlock medium hull ships, theres 3 different types. Missiles, Kinetic and Beam. 

They each have sub types - Assault, Escort and theres sometimes a defence type. Thats approximately 15 ships to choose from for ONE HULL. Theres tiny, small and medium hulls and I haven't even got far enough into the game to get large hulls. Im left wondering what on earth to do with 30+ ships to choose from.

I dread to think what the shipyard list looks like when there is large hulls unlocked, How am I meant to navigate, compare and plan fleets from a huge list and no idea what each one does.

Second

I cant work out if im meant to move ships into planets, shipyards and star bases to actively defend them if they get attacked. Theres no guidance here how to properly repel and invasion fleet, and the AI spams fleets at you. I will have atleast 5 fully loaded fleets and I get pounded.

Thirdly

I have no idea how many ships the AI has, but they keep coming and I just cant repel them all, its so frustrating. My civilisation has amazing research and production values and im using in the top 3 rank for them but it just wont help me. I cant be bothered to read for hours and hours to get good at this game, its not clear and its exponentially decayed in the fun factor.

 

Im out

My initial reaction of this game after playing civilization games for years WAS galactic civilisation 3 is amazing. I can build an excellent civilisation domestically, However the in game support and lack of guidance leaves me completely clueless how to play the war system, which for any game like this is essential.

This is probably why you have such a low amount of players in steam... You keep your hardcore players that know the system from the other games but the new players the intial 100 turns is fun then you get completely smashed by the AI and its not fun losing constantly, game has potential but I'm out. See ya.

30,345 views 20 replies
Reply #1 from GalCiv3 Forums Top

If you're already gone, then I guess we'll be seeing you. You could have asked for help first, though. Like, what's complicated about the combat system? What are you even having trouble with? You can safely ignore everything except for guns, armor, hyperdrive, and life support. The other crap is fluff unless you know something.

You have 3 shot types, and each one is defeated by one of the 3 defense types. They're color coded for your convenience. Shields don't block anything but lasers, Armor doesn't block anything but Kinetics, and Point Defense doesn't block anything but Missiles. You'll want all 3 defense types on each ship in a good balance. Stronger defenses block more. Stronger weapons punch through more defenses.

Bigger ships have more room and more HP. More room means more guns and armor on one ship. More HP means they can keep shooting longer.

Each fleet can only have a certain number of ships inside it. Logistics is the pop cap of each fleet. Bigger ships use more Logistics. Increase logistics through research to make bigger fleets.

Reply #2 from GalCiv3 Forums Top

Ok, briefly: I suggest you make sure you play on the easiest difficulty.

Then, you should ignore the ship roles, or sub-types as you called them. Only focus on the attack and defense rating of your ships.

Then, if you didn't know already there are three attack weapons: beam, missile and kinetic. Correspondingly, there are three defense types: shields, ECM and armour. The shields defend against beam weapons, ECM against missiles and armour against kinetic. 

Make sure to research one type of weapon and improve it. Your enemy will also do the same, so make sure to research the defense type that will block their attacks. If they are coming at you with beam weapons make sure to research shields! Be careful though as they might do the same, equipping their ships with defense to block your weapons. 

It might also be important to research logistics to make your fleets larger (more ships) to be able to withstand attacks.

To make the chance the AI will attack you less, you will need to appear strong or make sure they like you. To appear strong you will need ships, and with a decent power. For them to like you you might want to research some diplomacy techs.

Lastly, it might be useful to choose the pragmatic ideology. If you are in the middle of the ideologies the evil ones won't feel too annoyed as when you were benevolent (and vice versa).

 

TL;DR: Beam, missile, kinetic attack> corresponding defense, logistics, diplomacy, ideology!

Enjoy the game!

Fences - Organize your desktop icons today!
Reply #3 from GalCiv3 Forums Top

Funny how you could take the time to post on the forum but not read the official gamepedia that describes everything. I made a post about how I kept getting owned. After reading it and asking for advice, I'm owning. Simple.

Reply #4 from GalCiv3 Forums Top

I've looked.

And another thing, If I was building a ranger ship with the terrans. Some shipyards would give me ranger medium hull ships with the red defence and others give me ships with blue defence. Its not user frieindly.

Reply #5 from GalCiv3 Forums Top

Hi,

I wrote up a gameplay example which might help you. Don't try this on genius difficulty unless you know what you're doing :-). But it should help on easy for a start.

https://forums.galciv3.com/471347/page/1/#3587928

Reply #6 from GalCiv3 Forums Top

Open up the ship designer. 

 

Pick a ship already that is a 'medium hull'.

 

Click use design...

 

In the designer at the bottom is a bar with all the components of the ship you are currently going to use. Lets assume you picked a ranger. 

 

On the bottom bar click each component TO REMOVE IT. Remove all of equipment parts. NOT the designer parts. 

 

Now  you have an empty hull. 

 

Now add an engine or two. 

 

Thrusters are Optional. Maybe not add them this time.

 

Go to defenses and add one of each you can place them or just double click on the defense and it should auto add. It may look odd but we are learning. 

Go to weapons. I try to have two separate types of weapons if I an fit them. One laser and One missile or One laser and one mass driver. 

 

Go to the life support tab, add a life support and if you have room a sensor. 

 

Click save and RENAME it a new name like 'KATANA' or Washinton or Cutter.....

 

The new ship will appear in your shipyards as a new ship you can build. It will be FAR superior to anything the game offers  you as default. 

 

Build many, crush all in your path. 

 

Dont forget to get transports as well. 

Reply #7 from GalCiv3 Forums Top

Quoting BobeBrown, reply 4

I've looked.

And another thing, If I was building a ranger ship with the terrans. Some shipyards would give me ranger medium hull ships with the red defence and others give me ships with blue defence. Its not user frieindly.
End of BobeBrown's quote

Is the game still doing that? I thought that was a bug that should have been fixed months ago. The game is SUPPOSED to give each ship a basic mix of all 3 defenses, and then add extra padding to whichever one is most needed in the galaxy at the moment.

Reply #8 from GalCiv3 Forums Top

Quoting Vidszhite, reply 7


Quoting BobeBrown,
reply 4

I've looked.

And another thing, If I was building a ranger ship with the terrans. Some shipyards would give me ranger medium hull ships with the red defence and others give me ships with blue defence. Its not user frieindly.



Is the game still doing that? I thought that was a bug that should have been fixed months ago. The game is SUPPOSED to give each ship a basic mix of all 3 defenses, and then add extra padding to whichever one is most needed in the galaxy at the moment.

End of Vidszhite's quote

Thank you for the advice, but as I said, this game is very rough and does not feel polished when you get down to the nitty gritty it just an awesome idea that looks pretty. If your an old player and played the old games I'm sure this game seems awesome to you, but coming from civilisation game its really not. Firaxis put a lot of effort into the UI and guiding the player through a game. Ive made a list of what I've noticed from memory but theres probably more, including what you have just stated.

Bugs

  • My ships never had a mix of defences. Its all on one or all on another, some shipyards are different and some mark versions of ships are different than their predecessor.
  • I have unlimited money - Even though im in a negative per turn, it actually gets added. Im super rich, 30k+ I would say half of my games experienced this.
  • With the mod option turned on, and no mods being used, I get a fail to load a game while in a game due to 'incompatabile versions' or some phrase. My work around was quitting to main menu and reloading.
  • Wormholes disappear after 1 use
  • My blackholes do not do anything, they do not pull any ships that get close or slow the speed for any ships that get close. Which is what they should do.
  • Unit graphics disappear behind 'anomalies' 
  • Unit graphics from steam do not appear in my ship designer
  • I click 'survey' on my survey ship and it will go all over the galaxy, in other peoples territory and from what I see, this gives me a negative diplo warning
  • Map editor - Dregnin empire do not spawn on their homeworld when its placed on a map when the planet is for 'AI only'
  • Map editor - Minor races some time spawn on 'Arb' planets with its set to 'AI only' and sometimes not. Very frustrating.
  • Map editor - place down nebula, save and reload and sometimes I will have nebula on top of radiation on top of a storm
Things that have slowly ruined my mojo for this game
  • No guidance in game
  • Dead planets are way too common and no tech to use them in the future.
  • The AI has such huge unit spam, that I have to have loads of fleets. My limit of before its tedious is controlling about 5 fully loaded fleets.
  • Planet colonising event. Ive seen them all and played 8 games.
  • No domestic challenge. No risk of planets or systems going independent if not looked after
  • Ship yard construction list is too long without any FILTER!
  • Blackholes, wormholes... umm its got stale after a few games. They dont do much, i thought they would.
  • Theres not many 'space terrain' features. Ask a cosmologist. Its just gets bland seeing black space all the time and not being surprised. It needs more. A galaxy is a pretty big weird place. Binary systems? Quasars? Ripples in space time (areas slower for units than others), Explode a sun or planet, say its unstable or something, moons.

 

 

 

Reply #9 from GalCiv3 Forums Top

Bugs:

1. Not a bug. Design the ships yourself if you don't want the default generated ones.

2. Gaining treasury at negative income is a bug. I don't think that's happening. 30K is not rich at all.

3. Because it doesn't want you corrupting your saves. Intended.

4. That's how wormholes work.

5. Black holes working as intended. No idea why you think they're magic vacuums.

6. This is an actual bug.

7. You aren't looking in the right place. They aren't default, they're downloaded so click that tab.

8. If you don't want automatic, don't tell it to go automatic.

the rest:

did you play the tutorial?

Dead planets are intended and will (primarily) stay useless. If you don't like it mod the game to make them rare.

You think 5 fleets is tedious? How did you ever survive a game of Civ?

Yes, we need some more. More will come.

I think revolutions are needed too. Why is this such a big deal anyway?

Obsolete ships you won't build and use the scroll wheel. It's not that hard.

You thought wrong, but the game never gave you that expectation.

You can't complain that there's too many dead planets AND that there needs to be more clutter.

Reply #10 from GalCiv3 Forums Top

Ok sooo

 

Bugs

  • My ships never had a mix of defences. Its all on one or all on another, some shipyards are different and some mark versions of ships are different than their predecessor. < not a bug. You are expected to design your own ships. 
  • I have unlimited money - Even though im in a negative per turn, it actually gets added. Im super rich, 30k+ I would say half of my games experienced this.< never had this happen except in late games.
  • With the mod option turned on, and no mods being used, I get a fail to load a game while in a game due to 'incompatabile versions' or some phrase. My work around was quitting to main menu and reloading. < may be a bug, submit a report if possible. Never had this happen. 
  • Wormholes disappear after 1 use < working as intended. They are one way trips. 
  • My blackholes do not do anything, they do not pull any ships that get close or slow the speed for any ships that get close. Which is what they should do. < working as intended. Way back in beta it was discussed about having ships being pulled in but was scrapped. They are hindrances to where you can move. 
  • Unit graphics disappear behind 'anomalies'  < likely an artifact at your end. again never had it happen in game.
  • Unit graphics from steam do not appear in my ship designer < when I down load ship parts from the steam store they show up as well as custom ships. Not sure why your parts are not. 
  • I click 'survey' on my survey ship and it will go all over the galaxy, in other peoples territory and from what I see, this gives me a negative diplo warning < working as intended. Its on auto. IF you want to dictate where it goes you can manually have it survey. Personally I never auto survey until the colony rush is done. 
  • Map editor - Dregnin empire do not spawn on their homeworld when its placed on a map when the planet is for 'AI only' 
  • Map editor - Minor races some time spawn on 'Arb' planets with its set to 'AI only' and sometimes not. Very frustrating.
  • Map editor - place down nebula, save and reload and sometimes I will have nebula on top of radiation on top of a storm
Things that have slowly ruined my mojo for this game
  • No guidance in game Try playing the campaigns and enable the tutorial, also this community is here to help. 
  • Dead planets are way too common and no tech to use them in the future. < Not enough actually. Not all planets are good. I play on rare/rare which really makes finding a habitable one special. 
  • The AI has such huge unit spam, that I have to have loads of fleets. My limit of before its tedious is controlling about 5 fully loaded fleets. < Not sure what the issue is. Most 4x games are about micro. Gal Civ III does have its own loads of micro but managing fleets can be done better. 
  • Planet colonising event. Ive seen them all and played 8 games. < No real response here. I think the events are well done. If you are saying we need more I agree. More will be coming with some of the larger updates. 
  • No domestic challenge. No risk of planets or systems going independent if not looked after < this is in the works on down the road. Look for the road maps and discussions on the expand alone coming up next year. 
  • Ship yard construction list is too long without any FILTER! There are filters there but I agree it gets messy late game. I only use my own custom ships so they are easy to spot on that long list. 
  • Blackholes, wormholes... umm its got stale after a few games. They dont do much, i thought they would. < See above. BH are static like planets, wormholes are one time use as intended. 
  • Theres not many 'space terrain' features. Ask a cosmologist. Its just gets bland seeing black space all the time and not being surprised. It needs more. A galaxy is a pretty big weird place. Binary systems? Quasars? Ripples in space time (areas slower for units than others), Explode a sun or planet, say its unstable or something, moons. < This can be considered personal preference. Too much on the screen and we end up cluttered. Its a 4x civ management game, not this is space. However as we move along I expect we will see more features. Some modders have added various nice planet types. 



Ask the community for help. We are all happy to answer as we can. When I hear "the game is in beta' or 'not polished', I tend to get a bit defensive. Its not my intention if it sounds like that. Another good tip is to grab Gal Civ II and play that. The ultimate edition is cheap and can help you with how the game has come along. 

 

 

Reply #11 from GalCiv3 Forums Top

I think the main thing is that you have just started playing. Play a bit more if you fancy and enjoy it. In the absence of in-game tutorial videos teaching the basics I direct you to this: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AiMTibbm8lE

It was made by makers of the game and explains the basics. Hope it's useful :)

Reply #12 from GalCiv3 Forums Top

My limit of before its tedious is controlling about 5 fully loaded fleets.

 

 

What the hey?  I sometimes have 5 just guarding 1 source of antimatter.  

 

And I go through the trouble of naming the capital ship in each fleet, and naming each fleet after an officer, and renaming the fleet (meaning reapplying the old name) every time a new ship joins it - which means I'm keeping track of the fleet names.  The game is all about fleets. 

Reply #13 from GalCiv3 Forums Top

Personally I think the 'Best Defense' tag and philosophy is all wrong, and I hope it is a bug. Conceivably new players could be getting smashed by the AI simply because they have researched the wrong defense type and don't understand it. It should be as another user suggested, a mix of all defense + a bit of padding.

 

Worse, it borks the AI, if they happen to get caught with the wrong defense type, or are facing two opponents with different weapon types. Ships should have a mix of defenses, period. It's just way to much of a disadvantage, especially for the AI.

 

 

Reply #14 from GalCiv3 Forums Top
Quoting bdtgazo, reply 12

My limit of before its tedious is controlling about 5 fully loaded fleets.

 

 


What the hey?  I sometimes have 5 just guarding 1 source of antimatter.  

 

And I go through the trouble of naming the capital ship in each fleet, and naming each fleet after an officer, and renaming the fleet (meaning reapplying the old name) every time a new ship joins it - which means I'm keeping track of the fleet names.  The game is all about fleets. 

End of bdtgazo's quote

You, sir, are a gentleman and a scholar.

Reply #15 from GalCiv3 Forums Top

Quoting tilyas89, reply 3

Funny how you could take the time to post on the forum but not read the official gamepedia that describes everything. I made a post about how I kept getting owned. After reading it and asking for advice, I'm owning. Simple.
End of tilyas89's quote

Quick question, what is this gamepedia you mention?  I may have missed that. Thanks for the tip

Reply #16 from GalCiv3 Forums Top

Its literally the first thing that pops up when you search for the galciv 3 wiki. And no problem. Ive almost exclusively played 4x games for the past few years and nothing can compare to what stardock puts out. We can whine about this or that but take a look at the paltry offerings out there and you'll quickly appreciate this game even more. When I see people bash the game I think well what are they comparing this to? Civilization, endless legend, etch have brain dead Ai. This, legendary heroes, sorcerer king etcmare the only games that give me a proper single player 4x feeling.

http://galciv3.gamepedia.com/Official_Galactic_Civilizations_III_Wiki

Reply #17 from GalCiv3 Forums Top

I was pretty confused when I first started this game but after one day I was like oh hey I see how it is.

 

Armor defeats Kinetic guns.

Shield defeats Lasers.

Point defense defeats missiles.

 

See 100+ Drengin ships charging at you with kinetic guns and shields?


Reequip your ships to Carry Kinetic guns + Armor and watch foolish drengin fleet get crushed utterly because you will be attacking their HP directly while drengin ships have to tear through your armor first just to hurt you.

 

That is extremely basic way of fighting in this game.

 

Ship roles, using them will help you win even harder but you're fine enough practicing with weapon system first.

 

Carrier's assault fighters/Drones regenerate after one turn on strategy map so if you gotta pound a fleet with carriers in it, make sure to destroy it in one turn.

 

Click this link to see one of my prototype battleship annihilating a fleet on it's own. https://forums.galciv3.com/474751/page/1/

 

 

\

See marauders getting annihilated by me?  Yeah, they were using laser weapons + armor so I went in with lasers + shields and slapped them silly.

Reply #18 from GalCiv3 Forums Top

^ Carrier fighters were taking 3 turns to be replaced the last time I bothered to take any notice.

Reply #19 from GalCiv3 Forums Top

Quoting The, reply 18

^ Carrier fighters were taking 3 turns to be replaced the last time I bothered to take any notice.
End of The's quote

 

Well, not sure. My experience with carriers is all from the human campaign which I just finished yesterday. XP

Reply #20 from GalCiv3 Forums Top

Quoting Ericridge, reply 19


Quoting The Sisko,
reply 18

^ Carrier fighters were taking 3 turns to be replaced the last time I bothered to take any notice.



 

Well, not sure. My experience with carriers is all from the human campaign which I just finished yesterday. XP

End of Ericridge's quote

 

It replaces X fighters every Y turns since 1.2 or 1.3. The exact setting is in the global defs.