Distant Worlds is a vast, pausable real-time, 4X space strategy game which models a "living galaxy" with incredible options for replayability and customizability. Experience the full depth and detail of large turn-based strategy games, but with the simplicity and ease of real-time, and on the scale of a massively-multiplayer online game. Now greatly enhanced with the new Universe release, which includes all four previous releases as well as the new Universe expansion!
I have only very few issues with 1.7.10 and 1.7.12+ that are keeping me from playing very often and unconditionally recommending this game. Here a list as brief as possible (marked with "minor issue", "issue" and "serious issue" as best as possible), thank you in advance for your attention:
DESIGN:
- Issue / Bug: Setting "automatic" to upgrade or retrofit does not always upgrade or retrofit according to plan
- Serious Issue: pre-designed "optimal" designs for each race are too static, not always optimal for each research contingency, predictable; Solution: ShadowTiger's brilliant solution here.
UI
- Minor Issue: Certain race-specific conditions, e.g. "Own (largest) ocean planets", are impossible to find; Solution: an additional selection option in the galaxy map to potential colonies: Planets (and Moons) which displays all colonizable bodies in the galaxy, no matter to whom they belong or what tech they require. They are then sortable in the second tab according to type (Continental, desert, etc.).
- Minor Issue: Automated tax settings have low, medium, and high, but no selection for "zero"; Solution: Add option for "none" to tax rate
- Minor Issue: Alarm for "being attacked" undifferentiated; Solution: separate Checkboxes for "Attack by Creature", "Attack by Pirate", "Attack by Enemy"
- Minor Issue: Often difficult to see needs of colonies in early game (i.e. spaceport building queues halt at x% for undetermined time). Solution: tab in Construction Queue "Waiting for Resources (X, Y, Z)"
- Issue: With a valid construction ship selected in the selection window bottom left, we currently CANNOT select a valid target (potential resource) from the empire management lists middle left. Solution: Right-clicking on a valid potential target sends the valid selected construction ship to construct a default item at that target.
- Issue: The only way to see a ship's cargo / components is to call up the entire list of all ships (default double-click on ship), which after mid-game takes many seconds. Solution: Shift-Double-Click or Ctr-Double-Click lists cargo / components of that ship only
- Minor Issue: Only one portrait per race Solution: Five portraits per race!
GAMEPLAY / UI - Serious Issue: Starting mid-game, most luxury resources and often many strategic resources become superfluous (i.e. all needs are always met, all colonies have access to 10+ luxuries). There is thus no "reason" to engage in hostilities, because there is nothing worth fighting over. Solution: In Game Setup, add 2 sliders, one for Luxury Resource Proliferation and one for Strategic Resource Proliferation, from very rare to extremely abundant
AI / UI - Serious Issue: "Load Troops at..." command sends all selected ships in fleet to same colony, usual result of which is that 1 ship is loaded and X ships are empty. Troop loading is currently a severe micromanagement challenge. Solution: Command "Load Maximum Troops" to send multiple ships to various colonies.
- Issue: The order in which the AI carries out construction orders with its construction ships appears to be static and/or suboptimal. Solution: The player gains more control by opening a construction queue listing (hotkey: "Q") of construction ships only and those ships' queued tasks; the player can move items up and down in these lists or delete them entirely (much like the current construction queue listings for spaceports)
BUGs
- Issue: Some ships still will not refuel at resupply ships even if manually ordered to do so; some ships will never refuel at resupply ships if given the order to "refuel at nearest"
- if either a resort or a research base is queued to build at a certain location which gives bonuses to both, you cannot queue the other (resort or research base), but instead receive the error message: "CANNOT BUILD: Not enough money" despite having sufficient funds
- Minor Issue: space stations not at colonies cannot be retrofitted. Solution: Either remove retrofit button or allow space stations to be retrofitted with construction ships
Posted this(perhaps incorrectly) into the Wishlist Compilation thread as well. Apologies if that was incorrect.
I'd like to see:
1. More granularity for race policy. In a pinch I'd be satisfied being able to target an entire race family for specific policies. Ideally, I'd like to be able to specifically target eachspecific race within a family for migration control.
2. I'd also like it if races set to resettlement orders would migrate to a world with a more native environment when they have a choice. If I set the Ackdarians for resettlement and I have both volcanic and ocean worlds for them to choose from, they always choose ocean. If they don't gave a choice, they look to migrate out of the empire when possible but go to the volcanic world if there are no other valid migration destinations. Maybe they prioritize resort bases as a target until a more viable one opens up.
3. The ability to get rid of that last 1m on a colony short of extermination.
4. In addition to the ability to reject colonial allegiance in the original post, the ability to flag a colony for abandonment. Colony will be set as an independent colony after a certain period of time. In the interim, resettlement migration for all races present is automatically locked on so a percentage of the population can move to other colonies. Those that remain form the population of an independent world along with any facilities and bases that were not scrapped. The emigration time is there to represent the percentage of the population that wishes to remain in the empire, so it needs to be long enough for some to emigrate but not so long that everyone does. Some simply wont emigrate away from their homes or will be unable to due to the home empire's migration policies.
5. The ability to trade colonies, but with a delay like the one for flagging a colony for abandonment above. Colony will be queued for change of ownership in the near future, providing time for some of the population to emigrate away.
6. I'd like to have the ability to be a military goods broker, so to start I'd like to have the ability to sell ships and perhaps troops. To get more detailed, let's say I've set my empire up to maximize manufacturing(shipyard wonder, custom construction bases, mines to supply them all, etc), I'd like to be able to produce baseline ships and products to supply other empires in exchange for military and economic concessions. Of course, I'd want to be able to easily tailor the goods I produce to not give them an unfair advantage over myself, so I'd like a simple way of throttling my ship designs to a particular tech level so as to produce ships in bulk that won't be much good for analyzing for tech advances. Currently I'd need to manually design ships with old technology components, or refrain from obsoleting old designs and muck up my retrofit lists.
The way I imagine it, I could use the Legends tech level slider to choose a tech level and either let the AI design a ship at that level or design one myself with a components list restricted by the tech level slider. It would then be flagged outside my own ship designs so as to not muck up my own design progression and retrofit lists. This design could then be produced in bulk and sold to cash heavy empires short on manufacturing capacity who've recently entered into a war. Troops are shipped by private sector traders, ships change ownership wherever they are and move themselves to their new home.
ORIGINAL: onomastikon
GAMEPLAY / UI - Serious Issue: Starting mid-game, most luxury resources and often many strategic resources become superfluous (i.e. all needs are always met, all colonies have access to 10+ luxuries). There is thus no "reason" to engage in hostilities, because there is nothing worth fighting over. Solution: In Game Setup, add 2 sliders, one for Luxury Resource Proliferation and one for Strategic Resource Proliferation, from very rare to extremely abundant
I'd suggest an increased consumption rate for luxury goods might tweak this balance as well. As luxury goods are used more quickly it becomes harder to maintain a stockpile. Highly populated and developed worlds should not only demand large stockpiles of luxury goods but should use up those stockpiles at an alarming rate.
Ship actions and designs: 1. The ability to create ships by role, not class. Currently, the class is being used as the type or role. I have to choose from the list of existing classes, automatically making a new ship a newer version of an existing class even if what I really want is a ship of the same class just for a custom role.Say I want to design a planetary bombardment cruiser, a standoff missile boat cruiser, and a regular cruiser focusing on beam weapons. I'd like to have all three show up as valid design lines. Currently, I would need to devote one ship class entirely to a specific role, meaning that I have to make standoff missile boat destroyers, beam cruisers, and planetary bombardment cap ships. Depending on my tech level, I may want the ability to specialize roles before I can build or afford a larger ship class. As a workaround, the ability to create custom ship classes would be functional.
2. Patrol sector task for military and exploration ships. If a given sector is composed of gas clouds I would like to assign a ship the task of looping through them repeatedly to make sure no pirate bases have been set up.
3. Constructor ships should have the ability to scrap disabled vessels for money/resources. Ideally, they would not be able to analyze the ship unless they were also equipped with science labs.
Pirates, Corruption, and Criminal Syndicates: 1. Criminal Syndicates as a component or companion to piracy. High-corruption or high discontentment on a colony should influence the creation of a criminal syndicate that either acts as an invisible corruption engine to slowly increase corruption, or that begins to funnel larger and larger sums of an empire's income to local pirates. Pirates, of course, use these credits to build more, and more powerful, ships. Criminal syndicates infiltrate nearby mining bases, and can spread to other bases using independent and infiltrated private sector freighters. These bases/ships must be destroyed to eliminate the syndicate, and are slowly revealed by an empire's spies set to counter-intelligence. Syndicate mining bases still produce for the parent empire, though at a reduced rate. This would encourage wealthy empires capable of ignoring revenue losses from corruption to pay attention to the corruption of far-flung colonies.
[ol][*] Syndicates have a diplomatic component, and Syndicates can be contacted/allied with at risk of exposing your own empire to them. Contact with Syndicates can grant the usual discovery purchases, "black market" strategic and luxury resource purchases, and the ability to purchase diplomatic contact with foreign empires the Syndicate has infiltrated as well as pirate factions. Alliances with Syndicates grant both trade revenue and a reduction in the mining penalty at any of your mines that they have infiltrated, but greatly increases the likelihood that your empire's private sector will be taken over by the syndicate. Ships and mines infiltrated by allied syndicates are designated by a tiny colored icon next to the ship/base name. Syndicates do not forward contacts for other Syndicates as this would be helping the "competition," and rival Syndicate freighters will fire on one another if the freighters have weapons.
[/ol] 2. It has been suggested before, I think, but piracy should have a connection to empire corruption. By that I mean local corruption should influence the likelihood of a pirate base spawning in the vicinity. While overall corruption on a given colony might be fairly low, if the population is sufficiently large there would presumably be plenty of individuals willing and interested in engaging in piracy. This would encourage wealthy empires capable of ignoring revenue losses from corruption to pay attention to the corruption of far-flung colonies.
3. Pirates spawned near a given empire should either be made up of that empire's race, or of only the closest neighboring empires(including independent worlds). If the only Teekan worlds are on the other side of the galaxy, a Teekan pirate faction should not spawn near you. The race of the pirates should have a diplomatic impact on other empires. If the Securans are being raided by human pirates, the Securans should note this and suffer a mild diplomatic penalty towards human empires. A positive gain can be obtained by human empires by taking out those pirates. In this way, pirate alliances can better be used to frame other empires or influence diplomatic relationships.
4. When engaged in a pirate alliance, one should be able to direct their attacks. Rather than pirates engaging whatever targets they decide you hate, you should be able to point them at a specific empire in their area. They would, of course, still engage independent targets as normal, and would still defend themselves form other empires, but they would focus their efforts on the empire you designate. Exercising this option would incur a premium charge determined by the strength of the target empire, preferably as an increase of the monthly fee for the alliance. Perhaps multiple empires could be specified, with commensurate fee increases for each one.
5. The ability to build bases and/or ships, and transfer them to allied pirates would make pirate alliances more effective. While this would presumably be done in secret somehow, a diplomatic hit should be incurred if other empires find out. Perhaps such transfers made in view of another empire's ships, colonies, or bases would be made public, encouraging the player to only engage in such deals in out of the way systems. Alternatively, perhaps transferred ships and bases need time to take on "pirate colors" and until then are correctly identified as your empire's equipment. I should, in theory, be able to build my own allied Legendary Pirate faction(with associated AI changes) through support and funding of a regular one.
6. Direct connection to wealth and corruption. The greater the overall revenue of an empire, the greater the corruption. The concern is that a runaway economy will result in massive corruption. The challenge then is to find a way to manage corruption more directly(perhaps with colony facilities), legitimately throttle revenue though empire policy choices, or both.
7. Pirates seem to struggle a bit, especially with armed mining bases. I'm not sure if they have to pay maintenance on their base and ships, but they need a more guaranteed way to generate at least a subsistence level of revenue. I propose:
[ol][*] If they don't already, Pirates should generate a portion of their operating revenue off independent planets. Not only raiding their shipping, but simply orbiting their planet should net them a not insignificant slice of their operating and expansion expenses. Independent worlds may not have the economic clout of a full empire to skim off of, but the GDP of an entire planet should be enough to pay to build, maintain, and improve a small fleet at least.
[*] Raiding civilian shipping seems to be fairly impossible for pirates. Civilian ships are pretty much only vulnerable at their starting and end points, both of which are usually secured in some way at this point. Pirates need a way to intercept civilian ships in no-man's land. Perhaps civilian-grade ship engines are unable to bypass any large gravity wells that cross their flight paths and so must stop to re-calculate their FTL, pausing in a vulnerable state just long enough for pirates to make an occasional kill. Pirates, instead of hanging out at their base or in deep space could then hang out in those systems. Pirate bases would need an increased chance to spawn in a system or cloud nearby, but off the path enough that shipping isn't stopping there and bringing attention to the base. Later game pirates may have access to gravity well generators to pull ships out of FTL anywhere. This reduces the necessity of pirate encounters with fully armed military ships and bases, letting them do what pirates do best, raid lightly armed civilian ships.
[/ol] Bases, colonies, supplies, and stockpiles: 1. Defense bases built on, or in orbit of, an un-colonized planet project a zone of ownership around said planet. This planet could not then be colonized or mined by other empires save under normal rules for doing so(during war, granted mining rights, etc). When a colony ship is given an order to colonize a planet so defended an alert to the owner of the defense base should be issued. The rest of the system, however, is still fair game. Bases built in deep space(like in gas clouds) project a zone of control as far as their weapon range.
2. The ability to designate colonies and bases as strategic resource stockpiles. Private sector ships would deliver strategic resources to those locations beyond any immediate needs, attempting to keep its cargo bays full of a balanced load of each resource. Chromium surpluses should not lead to a resource stockpile starbase filled to the brim with chromium, leaving no room for other strategic resources. As planetary stockpiles can never be filled, they should probably be a lower priority destination than starbase stockpiles. Otherwise, starbase stockpiles may never get deliveries.
3. State sector super-freighter ship class who's automated task is strictly to supply strategic resource stockpiles. Slow and unmaneuverable, heavy shields/armor, point defense weaponry only, huge carrying capacity.
4. Government supply contracts. Instead of building the super-freighter above(perhaps before the technology for it is researched), a government supply contract can be issued to set a priority on private sector shipping to strategic resource stockpiles. As long as the contract is in effect, a portion of state revenue is directed back to the private sector, perhaps increasing overall corruption for the empire.
5. Bases are large stationary structures so should be able to be invaded with troops and captured. Obviously, there is only so much room in them, so a planetary invasion force just couldn't fit inside. Bases can only be invaded by one or two troop units at a time, giving elite defenders a chance to buy the base time for help to arrive. New design components such as an automated defense component(internal turrets, auto-locking bulk heads, etc) strengthens defending troop units. Actual troops can be stationed there by including troop transport modules, or cheaper(and weaker) security station modules may be installed instead. Security forces could be recruited onsite automatically, but troops should still come from planet-based academies/clones/factories. Micro-management of troop delivery needs to be avoided, so maybe private sector freighters can deliver troops to bases with troop modules as part of their resource pickup routine. Alternatively, perhaps it could be a function added to the automated routine of state-sector troop transport ships.
[ol][*] Pirates can invade mining bases, taking them over to generate revenue. They still produce for the parent empire, but at a reduced rate. Pirate faction receives any revenue normally generated or converts lost production to revenue directly. A base taken over by pirates tries to lay low, so is only discovered by spies set to counter-intelligence.
[/ol] 6. The unique trade resources can be exhausted from over-harvesting. If ten empires are sending mining ships to grab up as much Loros Fruit as they can from one planet, that qualifies as over-harvesting. Colonies can burn them out even faster from both local use by a large population as well as export. However, actual mining bases can automatically throttle the harvest, conserving the resource with sustainable harvesting levels. Also, they can be cultivated at a new location at great expense. Perhaps as part of a "Someone requests 'X'" event below.
Spaceport stations as trade hubs:
I'd like to be able to build spaceport bases anywhere and have them operate as trade hubs and bases for defense fleets.
As I imagine it, these remote trade hubs would be treated as a limited function colony:
[ol][*] Their population is handled like resort base population, and they have a corruption rating. The presence of military ships from the home empire reduces corruption, tying up a defense fleet for the trade hub. More trade means more corruption, requiring a larger fleet.
[*] The hub can serve as a home base for a fleet.
[*] The hub can be destroyed, but also invaded and captured.
[*] If their corruption rating gets too high, they can go independent. They are then somewhat like a pirate faction. If the spaceport has shipyards they will produce escort-class ships for local defense, as well as troops to prevent casual invasion, but they're just an independent merchant guild so don't expect them to be powerful enough to resist a determined empire. They still serve as a trade hub, but the majority of the revenue generated is retained by the trade hub's faction. You only get to keep whatever revenue is generated by selling(dropping off) resources to them.
[*] As a private sector facility they don't project a zone of ownership, but they are owned by your empire so they can be blockaded and attacked as part of actions against you.
[*] As a spaceport, they serve as a valid drop-off destination for mining ships and freighters from nearby mining sites.
[/ol] Trade and shipping: 1. There needs to be something that promotes trade aside from simple scarcity. Currently trade consists of shipping raw resources to locations with high demand. While simple and functional, with the general abundance of resources it seems like trade is somewhat superfluous. A simple solution might be actual trade goods as a resource in addition to raw resources. The private sector, with access to certain resources and certain planet types, produces trade goods to be consumed both internally as well as sold to other empires. Different empires place different values on certain trade goods.
These can be simple luxury goods such as perfumes, furniture, or gemstones. Luxury trade goods are manufactured using all luxury resources available at a planet in order to help reduce stockpiles. The more different types of luxury resources are available, the faster these are produced. This helps facilitate continued trade of raw resources as well. For example: Securan perfumes might be considered the best perfumes to Human noses, but Kiadians consider them foul. Atuuk, however, find them to be literally an addictive narcotic. Atuuk hardwood furniture is a positive pleasure to Humanoid rumps, but insectoid races simply don't see any value to it whatsoever. Gizurean gemstones dazzle the eyes of the simple(Atuuk), vain(Securan), or greedy(Human), but are uninteresting to the cerebral(Kiadian, Zenox). Absent luxury trade goods, luxury resources may still be used as normal to improve planetary development, but perhaps luxury trade goods grant an additional happiness bonus.
They can also be strategic goods such as manufactured ship and base components. Strategic components are manufactured using all strategic resources available at a planet in order to help deplete supply stockpiles. The more different types of strategic resources are available, the faster these are produced. This helps facilitate continued trade of raw resources as well. For example: The strategic trade good could just be a generic "construction supplies" item. Races with a bonus to starship maintenance might make the best construction supplies so theirs are in high demand commensurate with their maintenance bonus. When constructing a ship or base, these goods can be used as an alternative for any part or resource your construction project currently needs. Tech level is irrelevant, it is just assumed that the parts are sufficiently compatible to move construction along. These would have a higher priority for freighters to deliver to construction sites due to their ability to be used for any component. Absent these goods, a construction ship or planet can build from raw resources as normal, but using the trade good might grant a boost to construction speed.
Trade goods promote, well, trade. They could also promote raids to capture stockpiles. That said, large stockpiles should not be common. There should be a throttle on how many of these trade goods are built and stockpiled to represent some notion of supply and demand. The empire first seeks to satisfy internal demand, but will not significantly produce beyond that unless there is a trading partner who wishes to consume them as well. Once such a partner is identified, being either an independent world or another empire, the private sector will ramp up to produce additional supply to meet that demand, then level off again. Stockpiles occur primarily when trade is cut off, preventing the a given supply from reaching its intended market. Obviously, an empire that operates under a different political/economic system might get a bonus or penalty to trade good stockpiles to represent economic mandates.
2. Someone else suggested private sector ships forming convoys. I second that suggestion. I would expect that the auto-fleet AI could be used to do so. Armed traders in a convoy do a better job of defending themselves since they can combine firepower, but are also easier for military ships to escort.
3. Currently, civilian shipping is structured like a series of odd-jobs. Freighters take on a single job like "ship steel from Securan colony to Human colony" then wait there until a new task is assigned. While functional, it lacks a certain elegance. Instead, I'd like to see some manner of trade routes established. Perhaps small freighters(representing small-time traders) can perform the odd-job trades, but maybe medium and large freighters establish more regular routes. Rather than having a freighter just carry steel from point A to point B then just pick a new random job, it would be cool to see a trade route established where Steel was picked up from point A, sold at point B and Caslon purchased, Caslon is sold at point C and Bifurian Silk is purchased, Bifurian Silk is sold at point D and Carbon Fibre is purchased to be sold back at point A. This is a somewhat cosmetic request, I suppose, but ultimately it would be nice if trade routes generated some manner of bonus for the participating empires. Unfortunately, it seems like resource availability and revenue do not need any sort of boosting. Perhaps the diplomatic benefit granted from trade could be buffed by trade routes for each empire participating in at least one leg of the trade. Empires like other empires they can count on for regular trade, so a trade route could serve as a multiplier to that diplomatic boost.
4. Independent trade guild ships that just putter about buying up raw resources from large stockpiles. This helps reduce large resource stockpiles. Trade guild bases can spawn near large empires and have a diplomatic component so resources an empire is short on can be purchased in bulk. Trade guilds can establish trade sanctions against empires they don't like, refusing to trade with them absent large bribes. They can also be paid enormous sums(representing lost trade revenue) to do so. This helps to reduce money supply. An empire can also establish trade sanctions against trade guilds, preventing them from buying up their stockpiles at the expense of earning the guild's disapproval.
Someone requests "X" events:
A foreign empire, faction, or the parent empire's private sector periodically requests something such as a base be built, a colony be established, favorable trade agreement be offered, and so on. If successful, the parent empire receives some manner of perk such as an advanced ship, temporary research or economic bonuses, reputation increase or improved relations with another empire, and so on.
For example: The private sector suggests that a world needs to be studied for future developments left unspecified. They request that a science base be built over the planet even though the planet does not show any bonus to research performed there. If one is built:
[ol][*] A new resource supply might be found. Any resources so discovered would have a low yield, but the longer the science base is in place the yield of all resources currently present on the planet increases as access to those resources is developed or they are cultivated. Moreover, if the empire has access to one of the unique trade resources from elsewhere and the planet is of the correct type, it is possible that this unique resource could actually be cultivated on the planet.
[*] The planet's quality increases over time.
[*] New science bonuses might be discovered.
[*] New scenic bonuses might be discovered.
[*] Any and all of the above.[/ol]
Espionage and Diplomacy: 1. I'm not a huge fan of the Legends system of Intelligence Agent acquisition. Currently I have to wait for an agent to more or less randomly spawn, and if they get captured I have to wait for a new one. My suggestions would be for intelligence agents to be recruitable so I can engage in espionage with relative impunity, and have the intelligence characters that pop up represent department heads that provide bonuses to the intelligence actions I queue up.
2. New intelligence missions designed to frame other empires, or an overlay option for existing missions to do so. Intelligence agents would be sent in to either pose as a foreign spy and be detected while escaping, or just to set another empire as their cover so if they are detected you don't take the diplomatic hit. If they're captured, obviously, the truth is discovered(with maybe a small chance of the agent refusing to talk before execution).
ORIGINAL: Bebop Cola
Later game pirates may have access to gravity well generators to pull ships out of FTL anywhere. This reduces the necessity of pirate encounters with fully armed military ships and bases, letting them do what pirates do best, raid lightly armed civilian ships
As a unique pirate ability, or a tech device that players can equip on their ships as well? As it stands, there is no manner to intercept a fleet that's in motion. All you can do is meet it at it's destination and hope to pin as many as possible down with hyperjump inhibitors.
“That which can be asserted without evidence, can be dismissed without evidence.” ― Christopher Hitchens
not sure if this feature has been added or not, i did a quick search and couldnt find
i dont have the legends one yet, i have return of the shaktur
if this has been added then apologies but...
could you add an option to manually "obsolete" and unobsolete ship components? (like you can with ship designs)
this way you can upgrade your ships using the "upgrade selected designs" in the ship design menu without fear of having an item upgraded that you wish to keep (ie the "mega fuel tank" being replaced by the more expensive and lesser "ultra fuel tank", there are other items)
this would give you more control in ship designing
ok thats it
1 Make the values for character skills Int16 instead of Int8 because if you get a skill level high enough it flips and goes negative (+128 -> -127). Making it a Int16 should fix that problem since no one will get a skill in the ten thousands.
2 I notice the code is divided nicely between the exe and several DLLs. Perhaps an API could be released for the DLLs so we could make changes to the game logic in the DLLs and compile our own DLLs. Civ4 did this and the community was able to do some amazing things.
1 Make the values for character skills Int16 instead of Int8 because if you get a skill level high enough it flips and goes negative (+128 -> -127). Making it a Int16 should fix that problem since no one will get a skill in the ten thousands.
2 I notice the code is divided nicely between the exe and several DLLs. Perhaps an API could be released for the DLLs so we could make changes to the game logic in the DLLs and compile our own DLLs. Civ4 did this and the community was able to do some amazing things.
1 Make the values for character skills Int16 instead of Int8 because if you get a skill level high enough it flips and goes negative (+128 -> -127). Making it a Int16 should fix that problem since no one will get a skill in the ten thousands.
2 I notice the code is divided nicely between the exe and several DLLs. Perhaps an API could be released for the DLLs so we could make changes to the game logic in the DLLs and compile our own DLLs. Civ4 did this and the community was able to do some amazing things.
or just have it max at 128?
Codewise it would be easier to change the variable type from Int8 to Int16. It's a one place change with no chance of introducing bugs. Artificially maxing a variable at a number would require lots of checks in several location to make sure that variable doesn't exceed that value. I really don't think adding an extra byte to leaders' skills will be in any way noticible in terms of memory usage. You'd have to have ten's of thousands of leaders.
I like to play the game the normal way starting from the beginning and fighting the shakturi
but i also love it to play in a different way: For exemple:-play an old and
technologically advanced race trying to reach some kind of technological
accomplishment:
The goal would be to not allow any race to be destroyed, in order to get their
racial technology once they would be advanced enough
But first it would be needed to create some almost self sufficent starbase
in the space void to remain undetectable.
It would need something that could replace the energy to fuel generator
for those outpost, some "zero point module energy" for exemple ^^
Obviously it should be also very expensive and wouldn't be worth using
in another situation, and also it shouldn't be too large so it would be still
possible to cloak the starbase.
It would also be useful that it uses automatically racial tech in ship design
The goal would be to get all the racial technology: "to what end ?" you may think
Well there would be some "technological accomplishement" technology
or "galactic understanding" or something that would be only unlocked
when all those elements are present
For exemple this technology would allow to create incredibly big ships, or create
a planet from meteorites... Or miniaturized version of already owned tech ^^
This could be a way to play the game could be a way to continue a normal game
For ex: You are the strongest in your galaxy but many races are extinct: You decide to
traver to another galaxy with a very very expensive world ship and you find
already developped races here
Well it would be great
Thank you for reading me
This game fuel my imagination with beautiful dreams ^^
I love it
Speaking of research, I would like to see the race-specific versions of most techs count as a prerequisite for further cross-tech research in other branches. That is: currently, a race will have to research its poorer, suboptimal equivalent of its special tech in order to continue research in another branch; the special tech should count as a prerequisite.
Maybe some Racial technologies should be slightly upgraded:
I'm only talking about the highest technology in the tech tree
-wekkarus wave weapon is slightly less powerful that the best common beam weapon (the wave weapon range is lower, even with a lesser energy dissipation and less energy consumption its not worth using it)
-zenox shield not as good at meridian shield (even if the zenox shield cost only 9 space, while merdian 10, its not worth using it if the fight doesn't last a very long time which is not likely to happen)
-quameno reactor is too heavy and its not worth using it even with the best fuel/energy ratio (i've tried to do some simulations and it always seemed its not the best reactor)
-dahyut hyperdrive is also slightly not as fast as the best common hyperdrive
But for ackadarian,ugnari,kiadin, and some others, their technology is just far superior than the common one. I think it should be the same for the others races
Maybe some Racial technologies should be slightly upgraded:
I'm only talking about the highest technology in the tech tree
-wekkarus wave weapon is slightly less powerful that the best common beam weapon (the wave weapon range is lower, even with a lesser energy dissipation and less energy consumption its not worth using it)
-zenox shield not as good at meridian shield (even if the zenox shield cost only 9 space, while merdian 10, its not worth using it if the fight doesn't last a very long time which is not likely to happen)
-quameno reactor is too heavy and its not worth using it even with the best fuel/energy ratio (i've tried to do some simulations and it always seemed its not the best reactor)
-dahyut hyperdrive is also slightly not as fast as the best common hyperdrive
But for ackadarian,ugnari,kiadin, and some others, their technology is just far superior than the common one. I think it should be the same for the others races
I would like to support amiskatonic's idea of upgrading some racial specifick technologies. This is a big issue because researching for example Wakkarus' wave weapons is in a long term simply not worth. It is a loss of time and money. It is better to research common laser weapons. I thing that race unique technologies should be:
First option: Just better than it's common option (better damage, range, HP, cost, firing rate etc.).
Second option: On par with the best common option, but with upper hand in some areas, and with disadvantages in other (better damage, worse range, bigger cost, better firing rate etc.).
Third option (and in my opinion the worst one, but still acceptable): The same in effect as the best common, but accesible a lot faster (best Zenoxs' shields as good as best common shields, but to research Zenoxs' best shields You need to go through 3 inventions while the best common needs like 11).
Speaking of research, I would like to see the race-specific versions of most techs count as a prerequisite for further cross-tech research in other branches. That is: currently, a race will have to research its poorer, suboptimal equivalent of its special tech in order to continue research in another branch; the special tech should count as a prerequisite.
Maybe some Racial technologies should be slightly upgraded:
I'm only talking about the highest technology in the tech tree
-wekkarus wave weapon is slightly less powerful that the best common beam weapon (the wave weapon range is lower, even with a lesser energy dissipation and less energy consumption its not worth using it)
-zenox shield not as good at meridian shield (even if the zenox shield cost only 9 space, while merdian 10, its not worth using it if the fight doesn't last a very long time which is not likely to happen)
-quameno reactor is too heavy and its not worth using it even with the best fuel/energy ratio (i've tried to do some simulations and it always seemed its not the best reactor)
-dahyut hyperdrive is also slightly not as fast as the best common hyperdrive
But for ackadarian,ugnari,kiadin, and some others, their technology is just far superior than the common one. I think it should be the same for the others races
Tech modding would be nice as well. That way I could give each race its own 'special' tech. Even if both the Zenox and the Securans both get a shield tech special, each one could be different...IE one is rapid recharge, one is higher durability, etc.
ORIGINAL: Bebop Cola
Later game pirates may have access to gravity well generators to pull ships out of FTL anywhere. This reduces the necessity of pirate encounters with fully armed military ships and bases, letting them do what pirates do best, raid lightly armed civilian ships
As a unique pirate ability, or a tech device that players can equip on their ships as well? As it stands, there is no manner to intercept a fleet that's in motion. All you can do is meet it at it's destination and hope to pin as many as possible down with hyperjump inhibitors.
While I've not experimented with it yet I assumed that the gravity well projector component for ships/bases would do this. It's a different device than the Hyper-Deny components so I assumed it was something you could add to a ship or base and park it outside a system on a busy travel vector, pulling ships out of FTL. If so, Pirates would just need access to that component and the programming to know how to use it.
Must have:
- Allowing to disassemble bases (all), and upgrade bases that are not on a colony. Construction ships should be able to do that.
- OBEYING ORDERS: now this is a pain in the a*s. I bet others had this problem a lot of time.
Imagine (remember): I order the fleet to move to another system, while there's still an enemy ship, where they are. My station would beat the ship mentioned, and there's a big fleet approaching my other planet, and I want my fleet to defend it. The ships overide the order one-by-one (sometimes not all of them). So let's give maximum priority to the player's orders.
Should (not) have:
- In-star-system resource locator. It would be nice if I wouldn't need to click through 9 planets and 20 moons to find the best Gold-mining place in a star-system
- From disassembling advanced ships (and hopefully bases), the technological bonus should apply to TOWARDS ALL technologies multiplied by the number of components.
- with this the tech-bonus should be reduced.
- Components not yet researched should not be allowed to be repaired.
- So Construction ships should only be able to disassemble advanced ships which are not intact when found.
- A race-by-race Population Policy would be nice too. (I read that others suggested this too).
Longshots/not that necessary:
Fleet screen:
- Showing shield strength would be really nice.
- Different color-indication about armor.
I see the ship in red, when only 1 armor is damaged from 30, and the shield is intact.
Maybe green background from 1 to half damaged armor, yellow from half to all, and when there's no armor at all, red background.
- Sometimes during invasion of an enemy planet I can't see the troop numbers.
I can't remember exactly why, but if there's too much info on the colony/unit panel, you can't see all of them.
- Some empires won't accept Propose Protectorate or Mutual Defense Pact.
I'm talking about empires over-powered by their enemy.
For example a Quameno empire with 1 system, 2 planets inside and in war with a Boskara empire with at least 20 systems and 9 colonies.
Or an Atuuk with 3 systems, 2 colonies right besides a Naxxilian empire 6 times as great and powerful as them.
I had friendly relation with both of them, I was never at war before in that game and had an Admired reputation.
There was really no risk for them. Both of them died of course.
- Civilian ships should upgrade earlier/faster, if I've created a design for them that has lower maintenance cost for example.
I would even pay the retrofit cost to upgrade to a faster design.
- Agent in Deep Cover should provide a bonus for other agents doing an Intelligence mission in the same empire.
- Search option in the Massages window. (not that important, but can be really helpful sometimes)
If I'm a Teekan for example and I decide to hunt Sand Slugs.
- Passanger Compartments should be required in the Construction ship design (only for logical validity).
For example, if I am modding Black Sun, a criminal organization, they would consider illegal drugs a good money maker, but the Republic would never sell drugs, but the Empire might allow it....
Something similar to the 3 Resource enhancements we already see.
ResourceNameOurlawed:
ResourceEffect: <== for the Republic, it would cost money in to have police to stop it.
ResourceNameOurlawed: Romulan Ale (whatever resource number that might be.)
ResourceEffect: -1% (for law enforcement to prevent).
In the case of Data, defending against illicit stealing of Romulan Ale would bankrupt an Empire, but... [:D][:'(]
Remember that the evil which is now in the world will become yet more powerful, and that it is not evil which conquers evil, but only love -- Olga Romanov.
I have to say the idea of smuggling is great, that'd be an awesome feature but i could see it being hard to implement.
I'd like to see some more auto ship design options, when i play as most races it automatically sets concussion missiles as default and it's really annoying. It'd be nice to be able to dissable it or just tone it down so that it mixes both missiles and torpedos.
I'm sure this has been mentioned a billion times, Multiplayer would be awesome.
Seeing remote space ports would be good as well, this would enable the ability to have colonies half a map away and not have to wait to long to get resources to it or run out of fuel on the way there.
In regards to the idea of restricted resources and smuggling, I think that would be an awesome vector for more interactive spy missions. Smuggling a bomb onto a space station would be fun, and if the station has scanners this becomes riskier. This would give more reason for the scanners in the first place.
It could also be useful if smuggling things past blockades became a thing. Send much needed medical supplies to a blockaded ally. Heck, a new smaller troop module that can be used to smuggle troops past orbital defenses.
I'd like to see the tech system redone. I would have 2 tech systems. The first would be similar to what we have now and where your research points go. There are several greater families of tech and many individual techs in each family.So like
Weapons
Energy
Technology
Biology
Space construction.
Your research allocation to each family is based on your racial preference. Research toward a family provides minor value increase towards items within that family. Ie the more time you spend researching weapons the better you get with all your weapon types. The more time you spend researching space construction the bigger your cargo holds get. This is essentially weapon lvl 1, weapon 2, weapon 3 but with infinite progression. Now each race starts the game with a basic set of individual techs that fit them. So certain races might have one basic weapon type and 3 basic computer types (targeting, ecm, and ai units for example). Within a family the player can specify research projects to focus on one item increasing you ability to use that item faster than the rest of the family. Perhaps the benefit of not specializing will be random discoveries/inventions.
The second part of the tech tree is the discovery/invention part. Instead of picking new techs in a tree, new individual tech branch are discovered through the event system. So race x only uses missiles at the start of the game. At some point however ships get in combat with an alien and maybe the salvage crew find an intact beam weapon. This weapon type can be added to your tech family but starts at zero. You can direct a research project to divert extra attention to study of lasers so you get better faster but slows the entire families knowelge growth. All races might start with hospital tech but one race might also start with knowledge of a biological lifeforms tat aids healing while a different race would need to discover that somewhere. Two races visiting the same event might discover a new way to generate energy but while one might get a engine core out of it the other might see things differently and get a new bomb type. Discovering techs through events instead of picking techs from list will give the player greater reason to interact with the universe and add additional flavor to exploration and combat events.
"The nine most terrifying words in the English language are: 'I'm from the government and I'm here to help.'" - Ronald Reagan
The automation of the passenger ships is not good. Maybe it would be better to manage it manually. I think, perfect would be two options in the population screen of every colony - 1. migrate people from this colony; 2.migrate people to this colony
Solution: Five portraits per race! 
[:'(]
