Forums are coming along splendidly. The ability to throw an instant chat at someone built in would be great. Understand if that is beyond the articture of Stardock Central. All in all an addictive little program. I have spent more time browsing and posting in SC than playing any game of late. I plan to correct that though!

~SDC~

I'd like to vote for #310 (off-line build queues). Actually, before starting my second game, I thought that the game already had the capability

//sjl

~SDC~

I'd like to see espionage make more of a difference. It seems like it doesn't serve to much use in the game. So I'd propose a couple things.

1) Make it to where you can possibly slow down the social, military, and research performance. This is in addition to crushing morale.

2) How about having a queue where you can pump money into counter-espionage attempts. (I think the planet level propeganda addresses this, but would like something more explicit)

This probably ain't new, but I'd really really like to see a menu/page that explains
A) What Trade Goods/Licenses and Galactic Wonders you have and
what they do/ give you.
(I mean, having those trade goods, for example, is only half the fun if you never even see they're there.)

Another thing that's a must-have for me: civil freighters on trade routes should always go through sectors with trade bases, if possible, and if it's not a detour.
If I watch these little white blips, they seem to take two different routes outwards/inwards by default.
(Sorry if I'm wrong and this is already in the game.)

One thing that would be useful to see in an espionage report, is a break down of a races trade. So we can know who a race gets most of its trade money from

I'd also like to see a break down of my own trade at any time.

The togglable minimap with 1.02 seems nice, but may I suggest you assign a quick button for it? Those zoom-buttons are very hard to use.

Oh, and when you're doing that, may I suggest that F7 (go to first planet) would rotate between the planets. Maybe even in the planet list sort order. And,when F7 is used, leaving the minimap open (so one doesn't have to open it again).

Currently F7 is mostly useless.

//sjl


~SDC~

Frogboy, I like the autolauch features in the newest build. However maybe you could consider making it a little more robust. How about several launch options which could be able to be checked.

1.) Launch all Attackers- launches all warships with an attack value greater than their defence.

2.) Launch all Defence ships- Oposite of above

3.) Launch all Constructors & Frieghters- Just as it says

4.) Launch all- (how it works now)


Just some thoughts. My main want it an option to launch all of my Frieghters and Constructers while other ships can be left in orbit.

Great game guys, really loving it!

Auto-Colonize

Once you have established your main area of control, you want to expand but not necessarily control the tedium of doing it. Enter auto-colonize.

Auto-colonize works as such:

1. Colony ships have an "Auto-Colonize" button much like auto-survey for survey ships.
2. As a global setting, you can specify the minimum level of planet you want to colonize. For example, if you have a PQ +15%, Soil Enhancement, and Habitat Control (?) then you may choose Class 12 planets as the minimum level.
3. Auto-colonizing ships either colonize closest or best planets first. It's a toss-up as to which one to code.
4. Auto-colonizing ships do not go into uncharted territories. They planet must have been discovered before it can be auto-colonized.

/ds

Eeek! 360 posts!

Okay, so here is another little list with suggestions from me. I'm using the 04/04/2003 version, with the update that came out today (yay!) LOL

a) Optionally showing the minimap when looking at a planet is very useful indeed! How about making it even more useful - could you simply show the minimap on the right, with the (now shorter) planet list beneath it?
And, of course, with the current planet selected on the mini-map.
After playing this game every day since it came out, I find that I need that minimap all the time - perhaps you should never hide it.

Saving a game: please also save the preferences set by the buttons underneath the mini-map. Yes, it's not important, but it would be nice.

c) When choosing the next technology to research, you have a small little scroll button. That I don't mind, but the scrolling speed matches the size; it can take forever to click through the entire list.
Could you simply scroll several technologies at a time? Say, nearly a page of them?

d) When a terror star goes underway and is part of a fleet of protective ships, sometimes the ships race ahead when on auto-pilot, leaving the terror star somewhat undefended.

e) When manually launching a ship, the "Auto-launch" (great idea, btw!) automatically deactivates. Why?

f) Thanks to Geo, I finally managed to submit a score to the metaverse. Turns out I'd used the wrong alias ('Klaus' instead of 'Klaus Breuer').
How come I wasn't told that by the system, and - more importantly - why do I have to enter a name and email at all? Surely the system knows my serial number?

So, now I've wasted enough game time on chit-chat, back to crushing the Yor under my iron boots!

And... thanks for the game. It's amazing.

I played on normal and I feel aliens still are getting hacked too much when exchanging techs. It could be easier on the rest, but this is unbalanced considering that they are more cunning on the rest. They'll be hard, until you get a tech lead they're dead. Tech exchange isn't THAT important in real politics/history.

I just finished another game with a Saintly reputation, but this time, I didn't deserve it. Early on I made lots of good choices, but once my reputation hit 100, I started picking "neutral" choices whenever they appeared. Doing so didn't affect my reputation.

This isn't how it should work. ("What have you done for us lately?" the people of the galaxy cry.) The better way would be to have each selection work to normalize your reputation towards its morality -- that is, if I pick a neutral choice while I'm good, my reputation should fall a bit toward neutral, though not as much if I picked the evil choice. Now, if I were already neutral, picking the neutral choice my reputation would be unchanged.

This would make alignment feel more natural; as it is now, it's just a number that can be fixed and forgotten.

Argh... that one line in the middle paragraph should read in part, "...if I pick a neutral choice while I'm good, my reputation should fall a bit toward neutral, though not as much _as_ if I picked the evil choice." Obviously, picking neutral should never decrease alignment more than picking evil.

1) Give Alien Civs Stellar Cartography right off the bat. This way it won't seem like they are cheating and potentially you could trade for it before you develop it. That would mean the backstory doesn't justify something that is artificial in the. It means that the backstory justifies the inclusion of that tech to the Alien technologies. This just seems more plausible...If they know it, they can trade it can't they?

2) Check to see if a Civ can handle the Prisoner Ships before that event is givin...Or...have that event die after 60 years. I have had prisoner ships existing in my game for nearly 70 years...that means the prisoners are in their 90s, and haven't docked in 70 years! Seems very implausible. What are they eating? How are they living? etc. Or...have a United Planets meeting item that comes up "Destroy Prisoner Ships with their self-destruct button" It costs each civ XXXbp, but it gets rid of the menace immediately, and in my instance I have the resources to pay somewhere around 300 for that kind of thing, but won't tech up enough to combat the ships for another 44 months! (Similarly, it might be wise to do some kind of check for space sharks)

3) Fix the SoundBlaster Live! issue. I like this game, but I'm not buying a new soundcard to play it with somes stability. I have had the game for 2 days and it has crashed 3 times on me.

I want to be able to defend someone elses planet... I was trying to help prevent one of the minor races from being taken over by the Yor, but it wouldn't let me put my ships in orbit around his planet...

Is this already possible somehow?

Hearing Stellar Cartography mentioned reminds me: why is this a technology at all? We have the ability to determine the color of stars today; this isn't a futuristic technology by any means. If the AI has a comparable ability innate, why not just make it so that Stellar Cartography is always on from the beginning for the human player, too?

For #366

Consider this:

There is already a built in understanding (supposedly) from the backstory that the Aliens have superior understanding of the Universe. That is fine. One of the things though that needs to be clarified is that this is NOT a cheat on the AI's part, but that they have the technology which allows them to identify the "best" planets etc.

I was simply providing an elegant work around for people who were complaining about it so much (especially on usenet). We can determine the color of stars, but we cannot determine the livability of the system currently. So, that is where the difference must be.

Uh, the colour identification of stars (while accurate) isn't exactly the worlds best SI unit of measurement (hello, we're talking about bright stars in the negative zone and dimmer stars having a positive number? (of course we're talking about something that was invented way before SI became a reality)

But I think Stellar Cartography probably relates more to the actual 3-D chartment of stars. Cartography as we see it is only evolving into a 3-D system proper now (although we have had 3-D relief models, etc. etc. they're not exactly accurate) with programs that allow us to design 3-D maps on computers for ground features etc.

I'm "guessing" that it's kinda like that comment from Star Wars

"Travelling through Hyperspace isn't like dusting crops kid.... etc. etc." (I think you all remember it :D)

~SDC~

Suggestion: Early in the game, find something interesting to do with all those uninhabitable planets. Because really, there has got to be some way to make them up your gdp. Mine them, build power stations on them, put them on the street turning tricks-- I don't really care. But something.

I also never really feel involved with a planet.. it's just a picture and a number. It's too bad there's no cheap way to look at your planet from a "Here's all the stuff I built on it" isometric 3d view, or something. I'm thinking Ascendancy, Fragile Allegience type stuff.

My 2c.
Sessile

Just one minor thing: the ability to dismiss all those modal in-game dialogs ("done" acknowledgements) with a keystroke... As it is now, I can't feel my right index finger and I fear it might have to be amputated...

All those other things would be pretty cool, too...

From another thread that's on its way to oblivion...


Somebody up the thread might have already said this, but I just had a thought. I love the ground combat. Let me say it again. I loooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooove the ground combat. It's the -only- realistic ground combat out there. Why? because in real life you probably would drop asteroids prior to landing. Unless of course you wanted the real estate intact. This is the first solid 4x that really gives you decent and realistic attack options.

Why not extend that to space combat? You could have choices like
"Cee-Fractional Approach. +20 stealth, -20 maneuverability".
"Sneak Attack +20 stealth, -20 speed (higher danger of catastrophe if they detect you and blow you up without shields.)
..etc etc. Anyway, if you just picked a strategy and a roll modifier, and watched it play out it would mesh pretty nicely with the ground combat style, without requiring a real AI.

The one thing I actually liked in MOO3 was the play by play in ground combat. It had me all excited. Then it was over, and it was back to clicking the end turn button again.

Sessile.

User friendly suggestions based on civ3:

1. A graphic tech tree that allows choice of a target tech and shows clearly all the techs required on the way. In the same vein, a right click to get info on any tech in the tree, and a link to a comprehensive "civilopedia" with game info.

2. An option to slow down or remove all the ship movements between turns. It is just too fast to see what is going on now. You cannot even be sure if that was a ship attacking you, where it happened, and who did it. I had one civ ask for peace and did not even know we were at war (It was not shown under treaties). Like in civ3, your own battles should be shown slowly and clearly.

3. The game would be enhanced considerably if planets had "special features" related to various abilities, trade goods, etc. that make them extra attractive (or the opposite), so that it was not just one factor (quality´) determining whether you settle or not. The downside may be that it makes decision-making too difficult for the AI, but if that can be handled, it would be a big plus.

4. There is considerable scope for extending and improving, or at least explaining, ground combat. It is too much of a black box right now.

Not sure if I would consider this a bug or a suggestion. The economic model for leasing rushed projects is way out of sync w/ real world economics. The yield curve is inverted (i.e. the longer the term of the loan, the lower the interest rate). The interest rate should be greater for longer loan durations because in the real world, a longer loan duration increases the risk of default for the lender.

For example I started a game and wanted to buy a Colony ship on the first turn. My choices were 730 all at once, 584 + 16 * 40 months, 246 + 10 * 79 months, or 173 + 5 * 193. Now since all three loan packages buys the same product, they all have a present value of 730. The interest rate of each package can be solved using Excel's RATE() function. The monthly interest rates came out to 10.8% for the 40 month, 1.3% for the 79 month and 0.6% for the 193 month loans. Because the lowest interest rate corresponds to the longest loan, the choice of which loan to pick is a no-brainer.

Marv

~SDC~

Playing Gigantic I found myself losing track of a few things...

- Would it be possible to highlight or otherwise mark (* maybe) unique items in the build queue which are already being built elsewhere? Saves me trying to remember which of five unique trade goods I hadn't started building yet...

- Propaganda spending seems divorced from the rest of the system. Would it be possible to get a galaxy-wide propaganda spending control (next to the tax and spend sliders) and then let the game AI control so that invidual planets will spend up to that max percentage but not more than is needed to get 100% morale? This would *really* help with reducing micro-mgmt.

One additional comment... if nothing else, can we at least get a colour-code in the planet list so that morale shows in yellow (like now) by default but in blue when boosted by propaganda?

-I would like to see research modules for the startbases, and the micro fighters and dread drones should add to ship defense also.

-Also, the need to build defensive armies to protect planets, with the appropriate upkeep costs.

-One last one, I would like for the mini freighters to use the best route to get to their destination. I have a long lane of trade enhanced starbases I would like them to use that lane. I am specifically talking about on the bigger maps over long diagonals. It makes a big difference in money but not in distance which route they take.

I appreciate the game and the chance to suggest changes.

Thank you,

.JG.

~SDC~