This is a very nice mod. Also our sole source of behavioural changes until DW2 is released. I see you take feature requests and thence would like to throw in my lot.
In no particular order:
Add toggle to BaconSettings.txt to forbid non-friendly ships to dock at stations without a Commerce Center
Motivation:
A wide range of stations is better off in secret and/or immersion breaking to be accessible by foreign ships:
[*]Defense Station (if built in deep space, e.g. aside a World Destroyer, within other debris fields)
[*]Monitoring Station
[*]Research Station
[*]Star Base (if militarily used, e.g. as garrisons for uninhabited systems)
When such bases are built in remote locations, foreign ships refueling there may also "steal" fuel from same-empire ships arriving later.
Implementation details:
Code: Select all
// Domain: {false, true}
// Default value: false
// if true foreign ships will not attempt to dock with stations lacking a Commerce Center component, if false (vanilla setting) they may to trade or refuel
restrictTradeWithNonCommercialStations = true
[*]AI decisions must be informed of this setting (AI must not try-and-fail to create tasks to dock with affected stations; no such tasks should be generated in the first place)
[*]camouflaged Pirate ships must still be allowed to dock at their empires' stations
[*]ships of empires the station owner
- gives Military Refueling rights to
- is protectorate of
- is subjugated of
- is the subject of a protection arrangement with
must still be allowed to refuel (but not trade otherwisely) at affected stations
Add toggle to BaconSettings.txt to forbid mining bases at asteroids
Motivation:
Mining ships are a crucial element of pre-warp era starts, but the number of idle ships rapidly grows as the empires' Constructors build stations at strategic resources. Long before late game, most mining ships are idle at any given time, yet the AI builds ever more of them. At the same time, even the very earliest mining stations are usually larger than the asteroids they are built at. Restricting stations to planets will ensure that mining ships always have desirable targets and remain a relevant (raidable) part of the game, thereby providing easier (but less impactful) targets to Strike Forces, and also increase visual appeal of the game (e.g. the elemental asteroids stay visible).
Implementation details:
Code: Select all
// Domain: {false, true}
// Default value: true
// if true (vanilla setting) Gas and Mining Station type designs can be built on asteroids, if false they cannot
allowMiningStationsAtAsteroids = false
[*]AI decisions must be informed of this setting (AI must not try-and-fail or even succeed to create tasks to build affected station types at asteroids; no such tasks should be generated in the first place)
[*]The option should be absent from Player menus if not allowed:
- in the Selection Panel, when an asteroid is selected
- in the Right Click / Build at menu, when a Construction Ship is selected an an asteroid is right-clicked on
- in the Expansion Planer under both Resource Targets frames (the "Queue nearest Construction Ship to build Mining Station here" button)
Allow non-pirate empires to repair non-World Destroyer derelicts
Motivation:
Derelicts are usually up for grabs to the player, as pirates try to repair them but only have one Construction Ship for a long time (which they may indeed lose early in such an endeavour). Conversely, non-pirate empires actively try and repair World Destroyers but only patrol other derelicts. This is just not sensible behaviour and often means that Debris Fields last way into the late game.
Implementation details:
[*]Construction Ships without a higher priority task should attempt to repair known derelicts within their range
[*]this task should have lowest priority second only to repairing World Destroyers, as to not stifle economic growth
[*]on completion the possessing empire should disassemble the scavenged ship, if it has enough ships (if you want to refine this, e.g. keep cruisers and larger, feel free)
Override AI Empire Policies in certain situations
Motivation:
AI empires have one policy for their whole life, yet different stages of the game - notably Pre-Warp and "all systems explored" - fundamentally change which settings are sensible. Settings that may be very sensible for most of the game can seriously stifle AIs in such stages.
An alternative to this feature would be allowing different sets of policies and some sort of trigger system to swap them out. I deem this too complicated, but if you disagree, it would arguably be the better solution.
Implementation details:
[*]Exploration Priority should always be Low while no hyperdrive is available OR all systems are explored (for most of the game, High or Very High are the more sensible choices)
[*]Military Construction Level should always be Low while no hyperdrive is available (for most of the game, Normal or High are the more sensible choices)
[*]<any ground troop> Recruitment Level should always be Low while no hyperdrive is available OR no Troop Compartment component is available (High is the most sensible choice for all empires not always bombarding)
[*]Research Priority should always be Very High while no hyperdrive is available OR no Colonization Module component is available
Make Construction Ships prioritise World Destroyers least of all possible tasks and make empires ignore them completely previous to a certain tech level
Motivation:
AI Empires (at least the non-pirate kind) tend to dispatch a Construction Ship to any known World Destroyer within their range as soon as possible. This is not sensible in several ways:
- construction progress at early game tech levels is far too slow to have an impact: if only begun in the middle game, the construction would still be completed at roughly the same time
- while under construction, World Destroyers may be destroyed by Sabotage mission (thence I have yet to see a completed World Destroyer in any of my games)
- economic growth of affected empires slows down
- empires do not add more Construction Ships to compensate for those tied up for much of the game
Implementation details:
[*]repairing a World Destroyer should only become a task if no civilian tasks are available for an idle Construction Ship (mayhap until a certain - high - tech level, where the task may be done within a reasonable time span)
[*]repairing a smaller derelict should have priority over a World Destroyer (mayhap derelicts in range should *always* receive priority reciprocal to number of components damaged/unbuilt)
[*]repairing a World Destroyer should never become a task for an empire lacking a certain tech level (sadly I do not have enough insight into the repair speed calculation to suggest a value)
Allow for complex list tasks
Motivation:
My use case is the following: "list one planet per system, where said planet has all Fuel resources and lies in a system where all planets have Quality < 40%, ordered by range from my Homeworld". Currently there is no way to create such a list, as
[*]only one resource can be selected at a time (no way to filter for Caslon AND Hydrogen)
[*]other planets in the same system cannot be considered at all (no way to filter for uninhabitable systems)
[*]planets with known foreign bases at them or within foreign spheres of influence do not show up in the filter to begin with
I like to build Star Base stations on these planets, which provide refuel, repair and sensor capabilities within such systems, usually provided by settled planets with Space Ports elsewhere. As the game progresses, it becomes harder and harder to keep track of such locations as they are discovered. Similarly, foreign bases and spheres of influence may hide suitable planets for arbitrary amounts of time, disallowing to prioritise conquest of their systems.
Implementation details:
... I got nothing. Personally I could handle a linQ or SQL query, but that would require to expose the available variable names somehow. It would be great if this could somehow happen in the Expansion Planner, whose two Resource Targets frames I find stark useless in their current form, but I fear that would be unfeasible.
