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[quote who="Horemvore" reply="2" id="3669832"] This [/quote] Some cool stuff there, more informative diplomacy, but does it actually deal with these issues?

[quote who="Syrkres" reply="1" id="3669831"] Sounds like you just don't want trading... [/quote] No. As I said I definitely want trading just not so much OP.

Even with 2.0 it’s really easy to exploit the AI diplomatically. I’ve provided a bunch of posts/save games about this in the past, so no need to repeat, but as always I'll provide a save game from 2.0 if required. Now obviously Brad could code the AI to follow these exploits. But it's against a human. Consider: Would you give the AI awesome technologies just to get a bunch of weak ones in return? Would you give the AI heap

Very promising indeed! [e digicons]B)[/e]

[quote who="ScrivenerOfLight" reply="7" id="3666321"] In my last game, the AI were running some ships of 20+ moves--which I'd consider fairly good for their tech levels (I think they only had Warp). Not all of their ships were outfitted that way, and those that were, they seemed to be using to take out undefended or poorly defended targets. [/quote] "Some" doesn't cut the mustard, it needs to be consistent across designs. Otherwise, when they do fleet-up,

[quote quoting="post"] Anyone else seeing this kind of mess? [/quote] I haven't seen anything like that LongDeadFingers. That said, the AI does send plenty of single ship fleets. While it might seem like a good idea for the AI to go for easy targets like asteroid fields and the like, and might be annoying to noobs, the main problem still is that AI ships are very slow compared to competent human player designs (not enough engines on their designs in particula

Thanks Drifter-san. The problem is that at a strategic level I feel like the game is broken (again, I said strategically before anybody responds inappropriately to my statement). It's even worse with Mercenaries because I always end up with many more ships than all of the other AI combined which just makes the game even easier. Turn 75 with Mercenaries (Alliances Victory off) I just turned the game off and haven't been back since. Why? If I go with mi

I tend to prefer diminishing returns but to be honest I'm not that fussed. Debate away. The real issue IMO is that if you are going to give the human player the ability to wipe out an empire in a turn, then you need to give the AI the same capability. Unfortunately, as it stands, the AI doesn't use stacking well at all, nor do Mercenary Ships (with engine stacking that is) ... which makes all military Mercenaries totally and utterly useless past the early ga

I've made some notes and updates in the "all mechanics" version of this strategy to reflect the Mercenaries expansion. http://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=622615551

Unless something has changed between the Beta version and release, it's a real problem. On Godlike I have almost all of the mercenaries. The AI does buy mercenaries but does it very, very slowly. For a human player, it's partly a symptom of diplomacy providing lots of disposable cash (and AI resources if you want) while the OP motivation line under Malevolant ideology supports fast expansion. For the AI, they sometimes seem to have the disposa

To have integrity, a review needs to fairly reflect an individuals perception of the value of the specific content provided. I would caution against giving reviews that are positive just to express support generally. Personally, how content is organised for release doesn't bother me, but I would hope there is a conversation about priorities and focus for the future. I enjoy the game but feel there are significant issues, some of which have been highlighted for m

That's really cool. Here for example you can see the game I used to create the Godlike Strategy Guide which won in 67 turns despite a negative custom race, no sensor boats etc ... while being dead last on the power charts! http://galciv3.com/metaverse#/personas/eb467f15-9ea1-465f-b60d-25961adba0a7/match-details/23437772-

In that case, let's get back on topic. Interested in the thoughts of others on the below (it becomes much more noticeable well into the Age of Ascension). To supplement, as others have highlighted, the AI seems very slow in buying mercenaries. In my current game on Godlike there are 11 empires (i.e. so there should be plenty of available cash to buy them), but I have almost all of the mercenary ships (including everything purchased so far in the Age of Ascension). &n

I concur with Seilore's observations. I'm currently on a Huge map with 11 opponents on Godlike and have vastly more mercenaries than all of the AI combined. For a human player, it's partly a symptom of diplomacy providing lots of disposable cash, while the OP motivation line under Malevolant ideology supports fast expansion. For the AI, they seem to have the disposable cash given the Godlike bonuses, so prima facie should be more active buying them. <p

Cheers pshaw [e digicons]:beer:[/e]

[quote who="The Sisko" reply="31" id="3620141"] I never tried when it wasn't disabled but would being able to upgrade a merc even matter? The important stats are from a special ship part that the player has no access to. [/quote] It's worth considered the three classes of mercenary ship, as each case is a bit different. For ships that provide planet related abilities (e.g. production boosts), yes the military stats of the ship itself don't rea

The AI surveying defended anomalies is an important change so hopefully this is just a placeholder type issue and will be resolved. Playing without anomalies removes an exploration element from the game and isn't a good solution.

My point is, there are numerous suggestions various people have made that actually meet Frogboy's criteria which have not yet been actioned. I'd like to suggest they are considered for the future.

Yeah agree with XWerewolfX also. It's interesting, we play games in very, very different ways, but seem to agree almost always on these sorts of topics. It took me a while though, my first reaction was positive ... then I played mercenaries some more. I just noticed in the 1.6 patch notes that the ability to upgrade mercenaries was removed. Does anyone know the background on that? What I'm finding is that even the best mercenary ships (i.e. including th

[quote quoting="post"] Changed Coercion to have a max effect of 50% (was 25%) [/quote] This is a good change. I feel far less inclined to 100% specialise worlds. Strategically, 50%/50% seems like a great option as there is only a 10% penalty. The benefits of this are far too good to pass up and vastly outperform the AI. I assume the chances of getting the AI to act

Yes agree. This would be a good example of an AI method which would only be applied on higher difficulties. It's been too long, but isn't the sort of thing the Gal Civ II AI did? i.e. not just bonuses but apply better methods on higher difficulty. I'm going to have to boot it up again someday just to get my butt kicked for a change!

[quote quoting="post"] 3. Extreme exploits aren't going to be fixed. Most people who win the game are taking advantage of some level of exploit. That is fine and we can, on a case by case basis, determine which ones we should address. I tend to fix exploits that are too tempting to ignore. If the AI is making bad trades, for instance, that's something that should be fixed. But if someone has figured out that they can kite some unit in tactical battle for 45 minu

Personally I enjoy having technology trading in a 4X game. However, this topic is always going to be one where different people have different preferences and so I support the options approach. The problem then is, if the mechanic is available in the game, it should work well and it shouldn't be possible to exploit it to a ridiculous degree, which is the current situation. A much higher pre-requisite before tech trading is allowed would help, to an extent. &nb

Cheers LongDeadFingers. @Kurt_Blitzer, yes it seems the status quo with Gal Civ is a single survey ship. In other games with large maps like Distant Worlds you learn quickly how important having many explorers is, so I just took it as a given that you would need more than one as early as possible here as well. Unfortunately, I've never noticed the AI having more than one, which is a huge handicap particularly with anomalies that are as overpowered as artifacts around.

[quote quoting="post"] Free Trade Treaty Issues. Game allows trade every 10 turns this is a 50 turn time frame when traded. (very common) [exploit] Allows free income/tech/resources every 10 turns and is easy exploit. (very common) [exploit] [/quote] <p