Beta 2 status report

from Stardock Forums
So our internal build now has star bases in. Beta 2 won't have galactic resources, just the star bases so let's talk about those:

At a relatively low level of technology, you'll be able to build a new shiptype called a "Constructor". A Constructor is just a special type of a ship that you fly to a particular part of space and then click on it to turn it into a star base.

You can alternatively send it to an existing star base to upgrade the star base. To do this, you move the constructor on top of a star base and a dialog will pop up asking you if you want to upgrade the star base. If you select "Yes" you are given a list of possible upgrades.

What upgrades you can provide will be based on the technologies you research. The only other limit is the amount of space these upgrades will take on your star base (however, there will be technologies that lower the space things take due to miniaturization).

Starbases can perform a wide variety of actions. But because constructors are going to be VERY expensive to create (they are the true equivalent of a "settler" people have been looking for) you'll have to make tough choices.

Things star bases will be able to do:

1) Support of star ships in the sector they are in - i.e. give bonuses to the weapons, defense, speed, or hitpoints of friendly ships.

2) Trade bonuses - when a mini-freighter flies through a sector that has a star base with trade upgrades, it can increase the amount of trade you receive from that trade route while the mini freighter is in that sector. So a trade empire might create a whole line of trade star bases that follow its trade routes.

3) Influence bonuses. Star bases that improve your influence in a sector. Your overall influence determines the likelyhood of a star system rebelling to join you without you having to conquer it. So put star bases with nfluence upgrades in sectors that you want to peacefully conquer.

## Resources ##
When galactic resources are put in you will have somewhere between 5 and 10 types of resources that you can build a star base on. Building a starbase on it will improve your ability in a certain area by 1%, 5%, 10% due to upgrades made to your star bases.

## Battle Station ##
Of course, you also will want to upgrade your star bases to be tougher. By default, star bases are somewhat tough - they'll have 0 attack, 24 defense, and 500 hitpoints. But a couple of battle ships could certainly wipe it out.

So you can have upgrades that improve the attack, defense and hitpoints of your battle station. Of course...you can't move a battle station...

...OR can you? Well, yea, that's where Terror Stars come in. IF you get Terror Star Technology then you can mount various types of nasty weapons to your star base. And then research technology that will give your star base the ability to move.

So you could, eventually with enough upgrades make your star base into quite a nasty weapon for takng out star ships and then eventually entire star systems.

What's going to be particularly cool is that the star base will VISUALLY change as you do upgrades to it. I.e. a star base isn't some generic icon on the star map. Rather, it will visually morph depending on the upgrades. SO just by looking at a star base you'll be able to see if it is morphing towards being a Terror Star or whether it's mainly a trade port or a diplomatic base or whatever.

So if you see that Terror Star under construction, you'll have to make some tough decisions. ;-)

"The emperor has made a critical error and the time has come to strike!"

Beta 2 won't have all this in, but it'll be in before gold.
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Reply #1 from Stardock Forums Top
"Impressive".
Sins of a Solar Empire: Rebellion
Reply #3 from Stardock Forums Top
As Darth Vader, dark Lord of the Sith, once said : "Impressive. Most impressive." >:(
Reply #4 from Stardock Forums Top
sounds the business :)
Reply #5 from Stardock Forums Top
I am glad the game will get new elements not in the original idea.

The only thing that is scaring me off is the game is beginning to shape up as something for hardcore gamers only.

Even now with the game hard to win people are complaining it is too easy. Casual gamers will not put up with something that is overly complicated an impossible to win.
Reply #6 from Stardock Forums Top
That's why the release of Master of Orion 3 has been delayed : it had become too "overly complicated" for the "casual gamers", on whom the financial success of a game often depends...Personally, I like "complicated" and I do not wish that games are "dumbed-down", but I understand that marketing and financial necessities must often prevail.
Reply #7 from Stardock Forums Top
To illustrate your point, citizen Technician, in the current game I am playing on a gigantic map, I have just met the Arcean (which is a "neutral-average" race within a game set-up on the easy "cakewalk" difficulty-level). The Arcean has 29 stars, I have 12. He possesses 34 colony ships in Space whereas I only have 4! Either I'm really incompetent as a logistics strategist, or the game, as you suggest, might be too difficult for "casual gamers". And that's on the easiest setting: "cakewalk"! :notsure:
Reply #8 from Stardock Forums Top
I think the problem with ease has to do with the poor labeling of the skill point slider. I think we should probably do away with the skill point slider entirely and simply make it so that you can ALWAYS have 10 points to put towards stuff.

That way the difficulty is totally depdendent on how youset up the computer players.

If you put the computer AI intelligence to being low, the game is fairly easy. It will be increasingly tweaked to ensure that the game is easy to play for casual users.

What star bases do will be pretty straight forward. The "worker" unit in Civilization certainly didn't make the game not appeal to casual users. In many ways, a star base is a lot like the sci-fi equivalent of a worker unit.
Reply #9 from Stardock Forums Top
CayberMage,

What settings do you have your tax rate and spending rate?
Reply #10 from Stardock Forums Top
Those are design & programming issues which are beyond my level of comprehension...I'm just "pissed" this afternoon because the Arcean, at cakewalk/average, has so many more star-systems & colony-ships than I, relatively early on in the game, on a gigantic map...If I had set-up the AI-players as "idiotic" & "dumb", I would have felt like an abusive moron. :notsure: Thanks for your comments.
Reply #11 from Stardock Forums Top
And to add insult to injury, the Arcean is comparatively more advanced in Technology, despite the fact I had spent all of my initial 10 skill-points on Research! I have built research-centers on all of my colonies...but of course, while I was doing that, I was not mass-producing one colony ship after another. It's the colonize-or-civilize dilemma. Seems the "average" Arcean succeeded in doing both much better than me...I just gave him a Defender ship to charm him : as things are developing, it seems I am destined to become his "bitch". >:(
Reply #12 from Stardock Forums Top
CyberMage - my first couple of games were in a gigantic map. I could never finish them because of bugs & new game versions (:(, so I started play a medium universe @ cakewalk with idiots for opposition. I finished that one and started my next one with a medium universe at the next harder level with a few average opponents. The next game was slightly harder, as was the next and the one after that. Until you get used to the game, I don't think its a good idea the play larger universes. Its easier to get your feet wet in a smaller universe, and you don't feel you've wasted your time and get your head handed at the same time. I'm now playing a game in a large universe with an above average group of opponents at a fairly hard difficulty level. Remember that right now the AI doesn't use its survey ships very well, so improve your ship (by collecting the ship improvements scattered around the galaxy), add to your fleet (by running your survey ship into asteroids!), and maximize your research by flying into purple vortex's and plasma storms (but avoid wormholes until your empire is running more smoothly). Try and claim uncolonized prime planets (kill those colonizer ships before they get too close). This has worked for me up until now, and I'll continue doing it until it stops working! Good luck! :D
Reply #13 from Stardock Forums Top
Also, try starting with the tax rate a little higher than the default (33%) and the spending rate at max. Watch your treasury and reduce spending rate when it gets low.
Reply #14 from Stardock Forums Top
Sorry if I took some time to answer you, LJ : 33% (tax) / 50 to 60 % (spending) / 35% Research + 65% of one type of production.

I read your suggestions with care, MN. My survey-ship does become a powerful warship, but I could pay more attention to those vortices & storms...Attacking alien colony ships with it has gotten me into trouble : premature wars...You're probably right but I'm a megalomaniac when it comes to the amount of Space : I'm fixated on gigantic maps. I don't mind if I there lose games or leave them unfinished. I'm patient : I start all over gain.

But it does not answer my perplexed query : how can the Arcean (of average IQ) have become so strong so fast? Well, CyberMage, perhaps you are "dumb" or "idiot". But let's not forget the start of this discussion : we were talking about calibrating the game for the "casual user".
Reply #15 from Stardock Forums Top
One reason things can get out of hand is because the AI tends to colonize very rapidly because they already know where to find the good planets, and are besting your advantages through brute force. The AI basically works by throwing money at the problem. Once more non-conquest stuff is in that should not be as much of a problem.

What you need to do in the meantime is either slow down their colonization without ending up at war, or speed up your own colonization.

Something that may help with the later route: the AI apparently never colonizes anything below class 12. If your spending is above 30%, you can get usually useful production out of a class 7 when you change your government to Democracy. A class 6 can be improved to class 7 relativly early in the game. That leaves a lot of mediocre planets the AI will not normally touch that you can get running in concert to outperforn the AI's mediocre number of good planets.

Also: Diplomacy can accomplish both goals simultaneously, if done properly, or provide other ways to win without doing much work yourself.
Reply #16 from Stardock Forums Top
Thanks for your comments, Arthurian Mage. I never colonize below class 10 : if I read you right, I could try below that. My spending is never under 45%...Yea, I was aiming to eventually ally myself with the very powerful Arcean in my Sept. 10 game.
Reply #17 from Stardock Forums Top
DOn't forget that the class of a planet will affect its population level and its moral. While you can get useful production out of a low class planet it will limit the maximum tax level you can set before moral becomes a problem. Consider an empire with 15 class 14 or higher planets. It can set a high tax level. An empire with 15 class 14+ planets and 10 class 8+ planets will have a much lower tax level. Admittedly the current build is much harsher on moral, but in previous builds, when all planets class 14+ planets had harmony generators you could set tax at 100%. That was a major bonus and worth not colonising lower class planets.

Paul.
Reply #18 from Stardock Forums Top
CyberMage,

One problem with the OS/2 version with the social/military/research proportion sliders was that when they were unbalanced it negatively impacted the amount of total spending you could set. I found this to be true in the early alpha builds of this version as well. Since then I have not tried to set these sliders to anything that was off of the 33%/33%34% positions. I think it is time I started playing around with the economy sliders again and see if anything has changed.

Arturus Magi,

Have you seen any other race colonize a planet class lower than 15? I haven't.

Jack
Reply #19 from Stardock Forums Top
In my (limited) experience, if I set the two production sliders at around 33% each, the lower-class planets won't have enough production points to produce anything, in their first years of existence as a colony. To make those lower-class planets productive (to build there a research-lab or a colony-ship, for example), I must set one of the production sliders high to give production points to those poorer planets. So, I tend to develop according to a colonize-or-civilize alternation: during a year, all my planets produce colony-ships...then, I change the sliders so that all my planets spend about a year building only social improvements...and then, I go back to ship-building.

I should perhaps not proceed in that fashion to maximize production: maybe I'm wrong. As LJ suggests, we should play around with the sliders to test their effects on an empire's growth.
Reply #20 from Stardock Forums Top
' One problem with the OS/2 version with the social/military/research proportion sliders was that when they were unbalanced it negatively impacted the amount of total spending you could set. I found this to be true in the early alpha builds of this version as well. Since then I have not tried to set these sliders to anything that was off of the 33%/33%34% positions. I think it is time I started playing around with the economy sliders again and see if anything has changed.
'

It doesn't appear to intentionally do so, but depending on the setting, it can effect income. Right now, I have the sliders at 1% military (for colony ships from the few class 26+ planets I have), 45% social (to get enough social spending to terraform a couple class 5 and 6 planets), 54% research. The increase in income from the production I'm now getting out of the class 3-5 planets doesn't match the loss in income from the reduction in production from the high class planets, but that seems to be wholly a function of the morale on those low class planets.

'Have you seen any other race colonize a planet class lower than 15? I haven't'

I've seen AI occasionally colonize class 14s. It doesn't happen often, but I decided that since it does occure once in a while, that I'd shade it a bit in their favor. It may be, in part, a function of their intelligence settings and that of the habitability setting.
Reply #21 from Stardock Forums Top
Another reason that the AI could end up with planets of classes less than 15 could be the "earthworms" event. If they select the top response this could result in a planet class reduction.
Reply #22 from Stardock Forums Top
In the first game I won at Challanging level + all AI Smart, I used 2 points for speed and 2 for research (if I remember...).
I had colonies moving fast, I used research leaps to further develop speed and at midgame I was cruising through the galaxy at 8+ speed with colony ships! :)

Given the Huge galaxy and an unbalanced race distribution, I was able to secure good planets while shooting down all other races colony ships. I was at war with all of them, but with few BC I found with the survey ship and my speed, I was able to kill out almost all enemy dangerous ships.
The AI, put in the corner started to build more colony ships (strange) and for me was easy to continue to make some more shooting.
It ended up with me in 3/4 of the galaxy giving piece & techs for planets ;) and the winning with alliances.

Anyway, speed could be one path.
Reply #23 from Stardock Forums Top
Well...if that's the way to go to "win" at GalCiv, I quit! If one has to devise clever tricks to exploit game imbalances or the AI's fatal flaws, I'm going back to chess. That's why Blizzard released a patch to tone down the power of those creep-mines : some clever little sadists were exploiting a design miscalculation to spoil games by the abusive repetition of a trick, with the intent of winning at the expense of fair gamesmanship. Well...OK : it's a valid ethical choice : "Life is not always fair". Personnaly, I prefer games that have depth and subtle complexity : I don't seek to devise clever tricks to beat the AI because I'm exploiting "holes" in the AI design & programming. At the moment, I experience problems at the lowly "cakewalk/neutral" level of difficulty. But perhaps I'm an "idiot"...But to be fair, Gherardo seems to have done competent beta-testing : if he can win so easily at the "challenging/smart" level, deceiving the AI with his clever tricks, the Lieutenant is showing the coruscant Avatar that his game's AI needs much more intelligence & smartness. :notsure:
Reply #24 from Stardock Forums Top
While I can empathize with players struggling with the game (I admit my suckiness... ranked 29th on the metaverse:(), let's just keep in mind the fact that much of the work thus far has been put into feature addition. With Beta2, we'll have much of the game's key components in, and time will be available to 1. add content and 2. play balance! This is half the fun behind making this game...we'll be able to grab these little loopholes that players find and teach the AI how to counter-move.
In the final game, Gherado's fleet of colony ships would meet a quick end at the hands of the United Planetary Federation (all the races that he angered early in the game, joined together to wipe him off the map).
Also, the anomalies that many players are counting on for free money, ships, and technology will soon also cause negative effects to races exploring. Are you going to explore that purple spacal rift when theres a 10% chance of it completing your current tech, but a 90% chance of your Hero getting devoured by the SpaceBeast jsut unleashed into the galaxy?
So, when GalCiv goes gold next year, I'm sure many of these balancing issues will be resolved. So even players who think they found a way to beat the system quickly get pummeled! :)
Reply #25 from Stardock Forums Top
'Well...if that's the way to go to "win" at GalCiv, I quit!'

Keep in mind that this is very early in development. The game, as it is now, is really more of an engine test than a complete game. Right now we're really just making sure that the absolute nessesities in a strategy game are in and functional.

The AI is geared towards combat (and concequentially, expansioon) for the same reason. That's the core of the AI's nessisary functioning to be able to do everything else in the first place.

You have to exploit holes right now because most of the rest of the game isn't even there yet.