thetraviler

Join Date 05/2006

Starbase NEEDS

Starbases. We all like to use them. Some of us more then others but I doubt there is a single player out there who doesn’t think they need an over haul. I have been thinking about this post for several weeks now; reading, researching, and brainstorming about how to fix this very broken aspect of the game. This post is LONG so I’ll break it up into 3 parts and give a quick out line for those who don’t want to read the whole thing:

Necessary Fixes:
• Hull needs to be upgradeable
• SB guns need to fire separately
• SBs need to be repairable

Improvements for a Better game
• Fleet support for SBs
• SB hit points should max at around 400 HP
• Officially adding the Repair Bay
• Adding more SB techs
• The Research Starbase/ship

Other Issues... their short but mainly for the developers.

PLEASE, you don’t have to read the whole thing but please respond. Let the developers know they are AWESOME, but this issue does need attending to!!!

Necessary Fixes:

• Hull needs to be upgradeable:
The current 30-40ish hit points just don’t cut it, especially in the end game. These babies, even when fully upgraded, are sitting ducks come mid to late game. I propose that as a minimum fix you add hit points to the Battle Station upgrades like so:
-Battle Station Mk1: +5 HP
-Battle Station Mk2: +15 HP
-Battle Station Mk3: +30 HP
-Battle Station Mk4: +100HP
This would give a fully upgraded Battle Station roughly 170 HP. This, in my opinion, is still low. I would like to see it on the order of 400 HP but we’ll talk about that in a min. As a minimum fix this would be acceptable.

• SB guns need to fire separately:
Currently to my understanding and from what I’ve read in this forum, SB gun’s fire in unison while all ship guns now fire separately. This needs to be fixed so that each weapons module fires independently, with the biggest guns firing first. This will help even the playing field when attacked by fleets, especially of smaller ships. And it will also give an incentive to spend a whole constructor on those +5 weapons components.

• SBs need to be repairable:
As far as I know (and I could be wrong) SBs don’t heal themselves. At least if they do, its so slow that I have yet to notice. A SB should, at a minimum repair itself or allow a constructor do the job. *see Repair Bay for idea*

Improvements for a Better game

• Fleet support for SBs:
I propose raising the logistic points of a SB to 10 (possibly more if upgraded) and allowing it to fleet up with other ships. After all any fan of Deep Space Nine will tell you that SBs are massive fortifications; a dug-in position that should be the safest place in the galaxy for a ship to harbor at. If we allow SB’s to fleet up with ships it will make defending these behemoths much easier and more tactical. A maxed out, well defended SB should be dang near impossible to oust (though given enough sacrifice should be doable).

• SB hit points should max at around 400 HP:
Thinking back to many a night watching DS 9 and I realize that a maxed SB really should be on the order of 3 capital ships. If a maxed SB and three massive capital ships were to duke it out it should be a bloody fight with no "for sure" victor. I figure a massive capital ship has about 130ish HP. So that x3 give you around 400 HP. Given a maxed out capital ships guns would for sure annihilate any SB. Maybe there should be one more SB gun available at the top of one of the weapons tech ladder. Just a thought.

• Officially adding the Repair Bay:
This idea is available in more Mods then I can count. Realistically, any strategic SB should fix ships. Maybe if so many moders have used this idea, that’s a sign it’s a good idea

sarcasm aside… really… add the Repair Bays, it’s a good component. And you could even incorporate SB repair into this idea. So that way if you want to repair your SB you add a repair bay and you get two for one. Self-repair, and starship repair. Or make two separate modules, I really don’t care so long as it’s added.

• Adding more SB techs:
Basically I’d just like to see more, but cheaper techs when it comes to SBs.

*And last but not least. My personal Favorite.*

• The Research Starbase:
I can not tell you how many games I’ve played were im out colonized and out gunned. If im the little guy in the corner that should not mean im week or unsophisticated! Take Japan for instance. They, land and population wise, are one of the smallest countries on the planet. But technologically and economically, they are one of the strongest powerhouses by far! So, I would like to see 4 kinds of SB (Military, Economic, Influence, and Research), The Research SB would be different then the resource mining and econ SBs. It would not "enhance" existing research. It would provide all new research points. It would have a high maintenance fee and be connected to the research slider. That way it truly is a research facility. They should be expensive and should have limitations on armorment. That way they are risky to build and should be highly guarded with fleets. This would allow smaller civilizations who simply do not have the surface area to not fall behind technologically. This idea really ties in with another of mine that kinda tanked in the forums.

The Science Vessel. In my opinion a peaceful civ should still have a reason to build a fleet! There for I think there should be more levels of survey modules that provide bass research points. This way peaceful civs get an extra little incentive to build a fleet, even if it means less guns. Just look at the Federation in Star Trek

Other Issues

• Add maintenance costs to all SBs except econ and mining
• The AI will probably need some tweaking to learn how to actually take out a fully upgraded SB, ex: luring the guarding fleet away with something and attacking with a separate fleet… or something along these lines.
• Resource Mining SBs should have IP points so they can be won over if deep inside another territory. They should be much harder to take then asteroid miners, but still do able.
• It would be nice to see SB weapons and defensive modules connected to the weapons and defense technologies. I don’t mind the way it is. But this would be a nice improvement.

Ok, in conclusion to my novel. The game is not territorial enough. Improving SBs the way I suggest will do just this. SBs would take back their rightful place as the massive territorial fortresses that they should be, like a stake in the ground saying MINE!!! Plus their one of my favorite parts of the game, if you cant tell

so please respond! Show the developers that I’m not the only one who thinks this way!

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I like the idea of designing starbases like ships myself. Then you could have different 'hull' sizes of starbases just like ships, and then outfit them as you like with, well, ship components, but more powerful.

My biggest gripe about starbases is the micromanagment issue. I'd like starbases once deployed to be able to build themselves up or something similar. If you consider the player designed starbase, a single ship would deploy the base, but over several turns. So, the base would need built twice: once when you design and build the starbase on your planet, and a second time when the ship deploys into the starbase.

Anyway, good ideas all. I'm not sure what will fix starbases in DL/DA, but it's likely it won't be fixed until GC3.

The Science Vessel. In my opinion a peaceful civ should still have a reason to build a fleet! There for I think there should be more levels of survey modules that provide bass research points. This way peaceful civs get an extra little incentive to build a fleet, even if it means less guns. Just look at the Federation in Star Trek

I think this is a great idea. By the time I'd be building these kinds of ships all the anaomalies have been explored, so this has to appear in conjunction with random recurring anaomalies. I'm in favor of both.

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DivineWrath

Join Date 05/2006

+135

• SBs need to be repairable:
As far as I know (and I could be wrong) SBs don’t heal themselves. At least if they do, its so slow that I have yet to notice. A SB should, at a minimum repair itself or allow a constructor do the job. *see Repair Bay for idea*

They do fix themselves, just way too slow for it to matter.

• Add maintenance costs to all SBs except econ and mining

In DA, all starbases have maintaince costs. Last time I checked, I think it was 5 bc per turn.

• The Research Starbase:
I can not tell you how many games I’ve played were im out colonized and out gunned. If im the little guy in the corner that should not mean im week or unsophisticated! Take Japan for instance. They, land and population wise, are one of the smallest countries on the planet. But technologically and economically, they are one of the strongest powerhouses by far! So, I would like to see 4 kinds of SB (Military, Economic, Influence, and Research), The Research SB would be different then the resource mining and econ SBs. It would not "enhance" existing research. It would provide all new research points. It would have a high maintenance fee and be connected to the research slider. That way it truly is a research facility. They should be expensive and should have limitations on armorment. That way they are risky to build and should be highly guarded with fleets. This would allow smaller civilizations who simply do not have the surface area to not fall behind technologically. This idea really ties in with another of mine that kinda tanked in the forums.

I don't think that will work right. If a small civilization could use them effectively, a larger civilization could be nearly unstopable. Why should a civilization waste slot for a research facility when it put an economic structure, and use that income to pay for the starbase.

Second. Japan, as best as I can recall, doesn't have much of a military. After WW II, they have not been allowed to have a powerful military. That does have something to do with Pearl harbor. Since then, economics and science was something that they could spend the money that they would normally spend on their military.

Suffice to say, any player can spend their ability points to maximize their ability to not only survive, but thrive in a small corner of the galaxy. High research and economics is one way to do so.

Sorry if I'm sounding a bit harsh, but anything that a small civilization could use well, a larger one can use on a terrifying scale. Try to think your idea over a little bit.
________________

P.S. I do hope that starbases improve. I really would like to build space fortresses in my games.

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i did think about that issue. thats why i say they need to be expencive and very vulnerable. that way a larger civ will not want to waist resourses on them... but then finding a ballence so that a small civ could use them would be difficult. and yes i realize japan doesnt have much of a military. wich would probably have to be the same for that small civ in the corner. they would have to put most of their resourses into keeping up with the research. either way. my science vessel idea i honestly my favorate. i think it would be a nice little twist to the game.

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Just look at the Federation in Star Trek

just remember star fleet is not the military of the federation

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I quite like your SB ideas, but:

Take Japan for instance. They, land and population wise, are one of the smallest countries on the planet.

Land-wise the main islands are about the same size as Britain and the nation of Japan actually includes over 3000 islands. Japan has the world's tenth largest population, with about 128 million people. For comparision, Britain has about 60 million.

Edit: @Devine: Japan's military budget is under 1% of their GNP, but that's still enough to make it the 4th largest in the world.

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This could easily fit into a "What I'd like to see for GalCiv3" thread . . .

I like starbases. I love building & upgrading them (versus the "upgrade themselves" wish). I had all kinds of ideas and requests for them, since they don't stand up to enemy fleets very well.

Then I realized you can "park" fleets on them, and came to understand that that's part of the strategy - they're precious resources (or mining such) and you must protect them with both fleets and strategic location. They were deliberately designed this way. It's a challenge.

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Then I realized you can "park" fleets on them, and came to understand that that's part of the strategy - they're precious resources (or mining such) and you must protect them with both fleets and strategic location. They were deliberately designed this way. It's a challenge.

Hmmm...but when enemy fleets attack, does the defense fleet get attacked first? Or will the fleet and the SB defend at the same time?

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hey're precious resources (or mining such)

but military starbases should not be...

or maybe add another type of SB, Fortress, and don't allow it to give ships any bonuses, but let it be a major powerhouse in a sector

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Hmmm...but when enemy fleets attack, does the defense fleet get attacked first? Or will the fleet and the SB defend at the same time?

The fleet gets attacked first; I think the enemy can't target the base while you have a ship there (but not sure). Regardless, I've never seen a base attacked or destroyed while a ship remains parked on it. I put small fleets on valuable ones and then click "Guard".

I also like to build military bases next to galactic resource mining ops. The mining base probably doesn't get the miliary bonuses (but that'd be nice), but any fleet guarding it sure does.

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Japan's economic might comes from its use of neighboring countries to supplement its income. While it doesn't technically own most of the land in Asia, Japanese corporations owning much of the economy devoted to building cars, for instance, in Thailand and Malaysia, makes it a moot point. The cash flows to the mother country, and that makes it powerful.

As well, its population is not all that small, and they're mostly fanatically loyal and possessed of nearly insane work ethics. That means the productivity is much more than what you would expect of such a small country.

Moreover, they're also been blessed with brilliant economic, scientific, and cultural geniuses.

It's a little like a couple planets having max developments and population against a largely undeveloped but technically large-area Civ. You're really the more powerful, it just doesn't seem that way - yet.

This is one of the reasons that early game colonization isn't as important as it is in many other games.

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Starbases fall under that *by design* category. Having said that it would be nice if they got a bit of a make over as well.

Make more powerful: No. Never. Please. The last thing I want is to be in the late game where I really need to take out that military space resource of an enemy empire to keep their ships from shredding mine only to find out its going to take me a dozen fleets all in wave assaults to dent it. Starbases are meant to be protected by fleets.

Research Modules: Why not. If you don't want to use a constructor to add it guess what... you don't have to. But those of us that would like to can. Options options options

.

Repair Bay: Yeppers. Since I said above that starbases must be protected by a fleet why not give the player a little incentive to keep that fleet parked there.

Separate Fire Weapons: Yeah when I saw this in beta it was a little bit of a head scratcher since ship's weapons rules were changed I naturally thought that SB ones would too. Wouldn't mind seeing this updated.

Hull Upgrades: I would need to double check but don't SB hit points increase any time you gain an empire wide bonus to your hull hit points?

Sphere of Influence: Would be nice to have a way to expand that circle diameter.

Overall I think starbases as they stand right now strike a pretty good balance between being strong enough in the early go to fend off the occasional attack but remain vulnerable in the late game so you can take them out.

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I think there are some interesting ideas, but even if (or maybe especially if) research star bases are expensive, then the only civilizations that could realistically afford to have many of them would be the large ones. And more importantly, with the current setup, if you play the Altarian Resistance with max bonus points in research and with the technologist government, you're getting a ridiculously high bonus out of the gate. It's like +85%. Now add extra research that doesn't take up planet tiles on top of that. I'd abuse the hell out of that.

I like higher hit points and repair functions, though. Those would be great.

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Now add extra research that doesn't take up planet tiles on top of that. I'd abuse the hell out of that.

but after all that expense of building all of those research bases guess what

research ends three turns later

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I don't think I agree that starbases need a complete overhaul. There's plenty of room to make them a lot better, though.

I really like the idea of being able to ship design them.
I like the idea of being able to fleet them with ships.
They could stand to have a little more self-defense.

I particularly would like to see Economic Starbases boost PLANET income, even if by a small percentage--not just piddly trade income. And it would be good to see Influence Starbases be able to pull in extra Tourism income.

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Mystikmind

Join Date 06/2004

+20

the argument as to weather or not starbases should be powerful depends on the strategic value of either having to defend weak starbases compared to the ability to build strong starbases and take down enemy strong starbases.

Both concepts have merrit.

My complaint is that the starbase defences currently in the game are so weak that there is little point in using them. Don't get me wrong, I do not mind the strategic value of having to defend weak starbases, but i just feel that if that is going to be the way it is in the game then the developers shouldn't have wasted their time coding in these crappy starbase defences at all. They could have used that time and effort to add somthing else that we can actually make use of in the game!

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PLEASE, you don’t have to read the whole thing but please respond. Let the developers know they are AWESOME, but this issue does need attending to!!!

You got my vote traviler. It's something that would make a great game better.

just remember star fleet is not the military of the federation

Really?? I'm not sure about that.... Star Trek 2, wasn't that the gripe of the scientists working on the Genesis project, that the "military" (Star Fleet) would come in and take it over?

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maybe but in both star trek and next gen they have said that they are scientists

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SBs need to be repairable:
As far as I know (and I could be wrong) SBs don’t heal themselves. At least if they do, its so slow that I have yet to notice. A SB should, at a minimum repair itself or allow a constructor do the job.

Agreed. The repair rate at present to dismal to say the least. It should reflect the repair rate %. What's the point of having 40% repair rate if starbases only repair 1 hp per turn. In my last 1.4 DL Yor game it seemed to work perfectly and my SB's would merrily repel the occasional attack and heal 3-6hp/turn fairly quickly, now playing Krynn, the bases are still reparing nearly 30 turns later if they haven't been finished off by a second wave in the meantime. Somehow I think repair got broken in the original DA release. I just patched 5 days ago so my new game is almost a day away from testing out the repair rate now.

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Mystikmind

Join Date 06/2004

+20

Agreed. The repair rate at present to dismal to say the least.

Repair rate for what?? In my opinion, the repair rate for starbases is as relevant as the repair rate for cargo hulls!!

Get some worthwhile starbase defences first, then we'll talk about the repair rate.

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I like the idea of allowing starbase weapons to fire on individual targets rather than shooting simultaneously on a single enemy. This would logically make them more difficult to destroy since a heavily armed station would probably inflict critical damage against multiple ships in the every round, so if that's too unbalancing, I'd also support some sort of upgrade to their hit points and their repair speed. Destroying a heavily fortified immovable base really should take a significant effort on behalf of an aggressor.

With the proper upgrades, we're talking about a massive artificial platform intended to establish a lasting foothold in a region of space. They are expensive, immobile, and passive, incapable of initiating combat themselves, and it seems reasonable to think that when a fight does land on their doorstep, they'd be an extremely formidable opponent.

I don't want to see space stations become impervious to attack. However, if we're going to spend dozens and dozens of turns researching all those special defense technologies and cranking out all those constructors and spending thousands of BCs to install all those modules and build up an advanced star base, I'd really like to see it able to withstand all but a concerted, focussed assault by a technological peer.

I'm not sure how I feel about the idea of allowing space stations to rapidly repair docked ships. While a star base is stationary and could potentially be ignored by an opponent who couldn't successfully destroy it, a "defensive fleet" could be used to lash out at enemy targets and then return to base for a quick fix-up. If the repair base in question is also a military facility, able to convey all those wonderful combat bonuses to nearby ships, you could wind up with areas on the galactic map which become impenetrable death traps lurking with indestructible fleets....

-Autistic Angel

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Mystikmind

Join Date 06/2004

+20

you could wind up with areas on the galactic map which become impenetrable death traps lurking with indestructible fleets....

Thats alright, just send in the pirate mega event! they will soon clean the place up!!

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Thats alright, just send in the pirate mega event! they will soon clean the place up!!

They actually have a hard time with Starbases, at least when it happened to me. The only thing of mine that remained alive was a mining starbase I managed to get a Battlestation module built on to it. I had a Constructor on route to another starbase when the event occured, but I managed to get it to a base that had already been built. They lost the battle and never bothered with it again. That was fairly early in the game however, before anyone had very powerful ships. Maybe if it had happened later on, that starbase would have been easy pickings.

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Mystikmind

Join Date 06/2004

+20

Maybe if it had happened later on, that starbase would have been easy pickings.

hehehe, yea about as easy as killing an ant with a nuke! (absurd amount of overkill)

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I'm in agreement that while I don't want starbases to be invulnerable - protecting them should still be a necessary consideration when creating them - I would like to see a little more "beef" in their offensive/defensive capability.

I'm in the middle of a gigantic game at Painful; the tech tree is almost exhausted so that probably gives you an idea of how long I waited until I opened the gun ports and started wiping the Yor out of the galaxy. The primary reason I waited so long was I wanted my bases - I had a LOT of galactic resource mining ops - buffed to the gills. I researched the entire starbase tree. Then I threw tons & tons of constructors at every one of them.

All it took was one Yor dreadnaught to knock out a distant economy resource on me - the fleet I had protecting it strayed to take out a passing troop transport. The base was fully buffed. Needless to say, I wasn't happy

oOO ( -censored- ).

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I don't really understand why they're only considered large hull vessels. Starbases are supposed to be huge, far larger than most ships. At least in any sci-fi program/movie I've ever seen. Even our lowly space station is much larger than the ships that are supplying it. A huge hull would be much more appropriate, and would help beef it up some. I've changed that in my game. I might alter the offense/defense capabilities of the various modules too, once I get that far into the game and see how they really stand up.

So far I haven't seen much combat in this game, I've only won through diplomacy and technology. I got my ass kicked last time I tried to go militaristic. Now I'm just trying to master a few of the basics and getting used to DA, and the patch. Man it sure is harder trying to trade techs. I like it better that way though, it's make negotiations a challenge. I just hope they tone it down a bit in 1.6X.

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