Question About Starting Weapons (Full Version)

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vince0018 -> Question About Starting Weapons (8/4/2013 10:00:00 PM)

When playing the Pre-Warp Empire Tutorial I could have sworn it said you start without any weapons researched.
Yet in that tutorial as well as in a new game (Playing Humans, Shadows expansion, 1.9.0.9, no mods) I always start with Beam Weapons, Missile Weapons, Projectile Weapons, and Ground Combat. (It actually seems I start with the first tier of every research tree.)

Now it's been awhile since I last played Distant Worlds with Legends, but in Legends didn't you have to at least research missiles and projectile weapons?

I just think it would be cool if you start without any weapons researched as a pre-warp empire, that way you could even choose which weapons your ships start with (with design automated) for example by pursuing projectile weapons and avoiding lasers all-together.

So is this a bug or WAI? Do I need to completely reinstall the game from scratch or something?
Gonna quickly play through that tutorial again and see if I can find the text I'm referring to, then edit this post again.

Edit: Found the paragraph I was looking for, it's nearly at the beginning of the tutorial:
"You start with only basic space technology - no hyperdrives, weapons or shields."
Maybe something was just changed in a patch and this text needs to be re-written?

Though I would prefer to start without weapons to be honest, I think it would add to the whole feeling of being a pre-warp empire, sending out your first exploration ship to explore the solar system,
developing your first space weapons and actually choosing whether you want ot continue the human tradition of projectile weapons, or go for energy weapons instead. etc.



Lucian -> RE: Question About Starting Weapons (8/4/2013 10:46:35 PM)

I agree, researching weapons from scratch would be cool.



Fenrisfil -> RE: Question About Starting Weapons (8/4/2013 11:11:17 PM)

I think the change was before release. I had Shadows on day one and you always started with the basic weapon tech. I guess at some point, probably when they decided to drop pirates on your right away (if playing with the Shadows story events at least), they decided you needed some form of defence, so came up with those basic techs.

Personally I don't think they should have included a basic beam weapon, that seems mode advanced than a pre-warp civilisation should have. On the other hand, I do think they should have included a basic level of armour. After all, how hard is it to simply make a thicker hull!



Lucian -> RE: Question About Starting Weapons (8/4/2013 11:24:10 PM)

Maybe they could include a tougher option, a check-box or something at setup which results in having to research pretty much *everything* from scratch including basic sub-light drives. The default before that would be the equivalent of rocket drives (with horrible fuel efficiency) which would barely get you to your planet's moon and back, and slowly at that.

It would be significantly toughter because you would have to make some hard choices about what to research first but it would be far more immersive and more logical for a pre-warp empire. I would love it.



elliotg -> RE: Question About Starting Weapons (8/5/2013 1:47:16 AM)

Hi Vince

We had originally intended to have no weapons at all when you first start as a normal empire in the Age of Shadows. In fact we initially planned zero-tech at startup.

But we found that it was just too tough to survive against pirates without any weapons. Also was a bit boring not being able to build some military ships [;)] And having zero startup tech meant a long, slow, boring, research wait to build anything at all.

Thus that descriptive text you found is out-of-date. Will fix for the next update.

Thanks
Elliot



vince0018 -> RE: Question About Starting Weapons (8/5/2013 2:42:22 AM)

Thanks for the replies.
Though it would be cool to start without any weapons tech, it's still nice to know that it's WAI and not a bug.



Lucian -> RE: Question About Starting Weapons (8/5/2013 10:10:22 AM)


quote:

We had originally intended to have no weapons at all when you first start as a normal empire in the Age of Shadows. In fact we initially planned zero-tech at startup.


Sorry you couldn't manage to make it work. Starting with Zero-tech would have been awesome! Even it it were only an option you could select at startup.....



Thourion -> RE: Question About Starting Weapons (8/6/2013 6:05:34 AM)

Starting with 0 tech, although it could have its "fun" points, in the end it would just be another delay untill hyperdrives.
Without weapons or shields, you would only build scouts, since anything else would be a waste of resources.
Pirates on the other hand, coming from a somewhat "realistic" point of view, should just camp your planet and drain you till no tommorow.

Imagine earth, going out exploring solar system, while at the same time having space pirates already that much ahead in tech, wich in turn means they already have detected us, and of course know about our almost 0 research, especially in combat department.

Back to DW, while indeed an interesting concept, since the game doesnt focus much on planetary micromanagement it will probably be like i said, another delay, at least until weapons/sensors come up.
Or in another scenario, have the game prevent hostile forces to come near your system until you research a weapon path you like. But again the "end-feel" of that would be the same, just wait (or speed up time) until you get something reasearched.



Fenrisfil -> RE: Question About Starting Weapons (8/7/2013 5:33:43 PM)

The problem I find with the current design is that the AI races don't seem to understand the situation. They build far too many ships and as a result struggle financially. Not to mention that they don't adjust their research needs to meet the situation. Any race with a weapons focus will lag a long way behind due to the speed in which they research warp and colonisation.

So ironically if a race had to research weapons from scratch and perhaps had some hefty research obstacles (like one you require before you can build military ships) it would have two implications, first of all it could balance out the races research priorities so naturally energy focused races no longer have a huge advantage and also it may mean that without the weapons there will at least be a delay on the building of military ships and their drain on the economy.

As for the pirates, well the first pirates to pop into your system usually end up with a protection agreement (at least for a while) anyway.



Plant -> RE: Question About Starting Weapons (8/8/2013 4:45:16 PM)

That's funny, I find out that the AI don't bother building enough ships, so they lag behind greatly in military power even with greater economic power. As for focus, don't all the races tend to build one of each research station at the start of the game? It's more of a case that the human player is "gaming" the poorly designed research system.



Fenrisfil -> RE: Question About Starting Weapons (8/8/2013 5:21:08 PM)

Later in the game I sometimes find the AI hasn't got enough ships (or any in some cases), but not in the pre-warp stage. In general though the AI seems to struggle with finding the right number. Perhaps it's far too reliant on the policy setting and not able to dynamically adapt to it's own needs. I don't know, What I do know however is that when I flip on the editor and see what the other pre-warp races are up to, many of them seem to have built up huge armada's of warpless ships (apparently just in case the four defensive bases they have around their starbase aren't enough to protect their home planet) and unsurprisingly their economy is failing.

As for the research stations, it is dependant on what the race policy is set to. I've tested this by watching what the AI does when I have everything automated from a pre-warp start. If they have a balanced focus they will build one of each type, but if they favour energy they will build 2-3 energy stations and make a faster progress towards their warp drive. On the other hand if their focus is weapons or hi-tech they could potentially be very delayed in reaching the stars. Of those options weapons are the worst as they will be behind with both warp drives and colonisation tech.



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