quick first thoughts from newbie

[jcjordan]

Game reminds me of MOO which I liked so I bought it.

So first thoughts as I tool around watching from the back of the pack on the front poarch of my galaxy -

Very large detailed w/ a pretty steep learning curve especially in how to navigate around through all the screens as well as what you should do for certain actions as they're not in the manual (like how to get abandoned ships & probably more stuff I've not come across yet) Manual is detailed but still missing those extra little things people need to know

Graphics are very good but downside is that on some of the higher zooms the ships overwhelm the background to the point it almost looks like a giant orgy if you're at a busy place, maybe too many screens show on game screen in each corner so things get hidden in the background

I think replayability is good since there's so many variables w/ races, galaxy size & other settings that you won't get the same experience twice

While the AI seems to handle things, it doesn't seem to handle things well long term in regards to final victory. In my current game I'm at the back of the pack of all the races but thought I'd be higher w/ letting the AI handle things but suggest to me which I normally accented to what they asked for. Jury's not fully in on that one as it's still a bit early in game

In my game the Pirates are very active in one way or the other, maybe too active???

[Tophat1815]

Not sure what your particular situation is,would need to see a save for that. But assuming you are starting out as pre-warp and are some 1-5yrs in then yes pirates will be very active. Consider buying off/paying the protection fee the first pirate clan or first few pirate clans come banging on your door for.

So when you made this post how many yrs of gameplay have gone by? Any chance of a savegame? What mod if any are you playing? Are you simply in observer mode? Just watching the computer run everything?

[andyinkuwait]

Most abandoned ships relate to missions. You won't be able to get it until you are involved in that mission which may be later on in the game.

[Aeson]

Most abandoned ships relate to missions. You won't be able to get it until you are involved in that mission which may be later on in the game.

This is inaccurate. Many of the abandoned ships present in a custom game can generally be acquired by approaching them with any state vessel and selecting the appropriate option when the dialog pops up, unless you're unlucky and the ship self-destructs or turns out to be a pirate ambush. It is nevertheless possible to acquire intelligence pointing you towards an abandoned vessel. Other abandoned ships present can be acquired after being repaired by a construction ship (you'll be able to tell if the vessels need to be repaired before being acquired due to their damaged appearance, though sometimes it can be difficult to see; regardless, if you don't get a dialog option to acquire the ship after you've sent a ship to sit next to it, it needs to be repaired before you can do anything with it).

It is possible that certain events may spawn abandoned ships. However, all major sources of abandoned ships - the debris fields, the weapons testing areas, etc - all exist at the start of the game, as can be seen by opening the game editor and examining the map, even though some of them may be in areas which would not typically bear investigation, such as an otherwise empty portion of open space, as do many or all of the lone abandoned ships and stations which can be encountered while exploring (the debris fields and similar are much easier to find, generally, as they'll be labelled on the map after being discovered or while the editor is open and will also show up as a cluster of independent ship and station markers, whereas a lone abandoned ship or station will only show up as a single independent ship or station marker). Be aware that the special locations are associated with the various storylines, so if you did not enable storyline events in the Victory Conditions screen during game setup you will not find any (or, if you enabled certain storyline events but not others, you may see different subsets of the special locations) unless you manually create such a location using the game editor.

[jcjordan]

By Pirates being active, I do mean they're constantly doing the protection racket thing plus a couple are attacking/seizing my ships, mostly due to shared systems so not unexpected there as I've just not gotten around to fully dealing w/ that issue yet. It just seems that being kinda early in the game(haven't really figured out what that means though in this game since it's not turn based) for this much activity as well as interaction. I would've thought 1-2 pirates & about the same for other empires that'd allow me some breathing room to get a base empire built before moving off into getting the elbow room.

I forget offhand what all settings I used but just a step up from easy & not too large or too many empires but settings didn't really seem to take in those regards as I'm aware of a dozen or more races w/ 6ish pirate clans & still a lot of space incognito. Since it's new this is just a learning game for me so don't really care about the outcome. Generally I'm in observer mode but do take control of some things on occasion like going after abandoned ships, maybe the occasional agent mission, build ship/fleet etc to learn how things go as well as maybe give the AI a bump in the right direction. No mods, ver1.9.5.1

Another thing I've noticed on colony taxes is that the AI seems to tax at 100% which kills happiness/development on colony after a bit but settings where the s/m/l were none/some/hvy (defaults)? Not to mention I had that set at manual just so that I could prevent that problem. Noticed that when I had a colony go revolt on me. Bug or I did something wrong???

[Bingeling]

ORIGINAL: jcjordan

While the AI seems to handle things, it doesn't seem to handle things well long term in regards to final victory. In my current game I'm at the back of the pack of all the races but thought I'd be higher w/ letting the AI handle things but suggest to me which I normally accented to what they asked for. Jury's not fully in on that one as it's still a bit early in game

In my game the Pirates are very active in one way or the other, maybe too active???

"Victory" is such a random thing. It is just a nudge trying to tell you that you maybe should consider to end that particular game.

The AI handles things for every AI empire as well. If they do better, it is either because of properties of the race of that empire, or luck. Luck in galaxy start position, including both empire and pirate neighbors, or a good nearby independent the AI manages to grab. That kind of luck. For alien races, the fast reproducers usually start well, one of them has some settings that usually reduces its longer term progress (the Atuuk).

The pirates are active, but can be reduced (and moved away) in options before starting the game.