Slitherine

quote:

ORIGINAL: sayke

Icemania, this is bloody fantastic! Thank you =)

One question, though: Because my computer chokes on the massive space battles and fighter swarms in this mod, I would like to reduce the size of all fleets generally. Is increasing military maintenance cost for all governments, or all races, the best way to do this in your view? Thanks again!

quote:

ORIGINAL: johanwanderer

quote:

ORIGINAL: AKicebear

Playing as Boskara and appear to lack an automated Troop Transport design (build-able or otherwise) - is this intentional?

It happens from time to time, in the vanilla game as well, when some condition wasn't met for the design to be created. Just create a new design and set it to automatic. Then the game will figure it out for you.

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ORIGINAL: Tanaka
Hey Ice could you request the devs fix this like they fixed the capitals not being built?

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ORIGINAL: Tanaka
A bit confused about the ship size changes you say you increased size 230 to 300 but I looked and see that escorts are still 230?

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ORIGINAL: Tanaka

quote:

ORIGINAL: johanwanderer

quote:

ORIGINAL: AKicebear

Playing as Boskara and appear to lack an automated Troop Transport design (build-able or otherwise) - is this intentional?

It happens from time to time, in the vanilla game as well, when some condition wasn't met for the design to be created. Just create a new design and set it to automatic. Then the game will figure it out for you.

I wonder when this happens if it is not in the designs if the AI is not able to build it?

quote:

ORIGINAL: Icemania

Increased docking bays on Gas Mining Stations. I must have been asleep at the wheel on that one!

quote:

ORIGINAL: Icemania
I need help with observations in-game.

Capital Ship Tractor Beams work great but please have a close look at Spaceports.

(1) There are more Tractor Beams on Spaceports than Vanilla but are there enough?

(2) Are Tractor Beams powerful enough or do I need to buff them?

(3) Do you find the Spaceports use their Tractor Beams on multiple targets or do they focus on one?

If (1) or (2) this is easy to change for 1.02 release. If (3) we will need more help from Erik and Elliot.

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ORIGINAL: lurchi
I just wanted to mention that Research Reloaded delivers more powerful tractor beams, also ones with longer range.

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ORIGINAL: Icemania

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ORIGINAL: lurchi
I just wanted to mention that Research Reloaded delivers more powerful tractor beams, also ones with longer range.

Cool. Did you modify the initial Tractor Beam technology or does that come as you follow down the research tree?

'Distant Worlds Design Template - 1.9.0.0

'Specify amounts of each component type below. The amount should be a whole number greater than or equal to zero, and should be placed immediately after the semi-colon.
'Note that it is not necessary to specify Command Center, Life Support or Hab Module components. A sufficient number of each of these components will automatically be added to all designs.
'Also note that while Reactors and Energy Collectors can be specified here, an adequate amount of these components will always be added to meet the energy needs of the design.
'Also, for ships you do not need to specify a HyperDrive - a single hyperdrive will always automatically be added to ship design templates.

'Gas Mining Station ship type

*snip*
EnergyCollector				;1

quote:

ORIGINAL: NephilimNexus

Suggestion for improving the pre-warp stage:

#1) Drop the Warp Bubble speed from 2000 down to 500 and make it an even bigger energy hog.

#2) Place a new type of warp engine between the Warp Bubble and the Gerax Hyperdrive, with the old Warp Bubble stats and research cost.

#3) Make the research cost on the new Warp Bubble really cheap, so it can be learned in a year or less.

What this does:

It let's players get entry level warp tech faster than before, but does so in a way that still almost completely restricts them to their home system. Thus it extends the pre-warp tier while making it more interesting, as ships will now have enough speed to build mining bases in your home system, even if they lack the fuel to go beyond it.

See, the drag of the pre-warp phase is two things: Waiting forever for the basic Warp Bubble (which is way overpriced in vanilla), and the tedious drag of trying to get your initial mining bases built with ships that can barely do a speed of 20. This solves both of those problems, as it makes the first step of warp cheap & quick to access, which in turn lets you get into building up your home system faster. It is balanced by the severely limited range that probably won't get you to even the next system over unless you overload your ships with fuel tanks, which in turn makes them useless anyway.

The regular Warp Bubble isn't removed per se, it's name gets changed & it stats instead are simply moved up a notch so players still do have to learn it. This extends the research timeline a little, but that's okay because now people won't get bored with it.

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ORIGINAL: Tanaka
Saw this in Lurchi's mod thread and thought it would be a great idea for your mod as well since the AI really struggles with Pre-Warp games!

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ORIGINAL: Icemania

All:

I've updated the OP with the 1.02 Release including the Changelog. The only change from the 1.02 Beta was docking bays on the Gas Mining Stations.

As posted earlier more Developer support is required with Tractor Beams on Spaceports.

Cheers,
Icemania

quote:

ORIGINAL: Icemania

All:

I've updated the OP with the 1.02 Release including the Changelog. The only change from the 1.02 Beta was docking bays on the Gas Mining Stations.

As posted earlier more Developer support is required with Tractor Beams on Spaceports.

Cheers,
Icemania

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ORIGINAL: Tanaka
Thanks Ice! So the only change from beta was to the designs file?

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ORIGINAL: Sithuk
Ice: Congratulations on the latest release. When can we hope to see a game report of your play on the hardest settings with the mod? I know there would be interest in an experienced player's strategy with the more challenging AI.

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ORIGINAL: Icemania

Hey Blackstork:

I have a very busy period at work coming up over the next month or so. I certainly intend to help with the mega-mod and will be around the forums, but any serious modding will have to wait until that busy period is finished. In any case it looks like you and lurchi still have plenty of work to do for your 1.0 releases, when I really need is your Mods integrated to really get into the AI.

That said applying the design templates and policy files changes in the AI Improvement Mod should generally be in place as you've already applied them well to Beyond. It's the Research Build Orders that will need some thought with lurchi's new tech tree as they will need to be reworked entirely. This phase should wait until lurchi's new tech tree has been Beta tested (and I also wouldn't recommended integrating with Beyond until that is done either). We should maintain the same weapon type (e.g. phasers) and energy research themes for each race but focus on using the specific branches lurchi is introducing in the Research Build Orders. lurchi's mod may lead to some better builds/strategies and it will also be important to do balance testing. I'd also like to play a few game with lurchi's tech tree before designing the Research Build Orders i.e. keep them blank initially.

A few additional volunteers with interests in particular balancing areas would be very useful for the team.