Hey, i just started playing GC2 DA recently, and i have a question that was on topic when i stopped reading the thread (i plan to read the rest later):

with the all labs/factories strategy how does manufacturing capital/tech capital/power plants work? do the PP give a 100% to factories doing anything or just social production?

and does anyone use PPs, they look really nice +50%/+75%/+100% to manufacturing but i haven't seen any threads on the topic, anyway sry for dirupting your disscussion on whatever and thanks for helping the noob

Hi!

Power plants give bonus to production capability - that's for building ships and buildings. If you set focus to research, they also give you more TPs.


That's from an earlier version of DA. In 1.6 they give only 10%, 20% and 30%.

BR, Iztok

I agree with Iztok (surprise). And this was exactly my point. This game thrives on sandbox mode, where you set up a galaxy you want, against opponents you want, and then play how you want.

Perhaps the metaverse is the source of the greivance. I know for instance people defend using the endless Ctrl-N approach because they are, in theory anyway, "competing" with other people who might have gotten a lucky start. I like the metaverse, but don't take my competition to this level.

Even if you got rid of focus, the metaverse is still far from balanced. It doesn't really strike me as a problem that the metaverse is unbalanced. Once I figured out how the metaverse handled scoring I COULD have created a new character and just tried to grind giant abundant all gigantic galaxies to get a higher average score. (The metaverse lowers the credit you get for each game you submit) - instead I just kept right on playing, and thought I would see where I ended up. I can think of many ways to try and exploit the metaverse. What's the point? It doesn't make you a better person.

I agree, I probably don't disagree with Becephalus that much. And I do have some (limited, amatuer) experience with game design. But I don't think focus needs to be removed. I think a lot more options need to be introduced. Or re-introduced.

In fact, thats the thrust behind the changes I've asked for. I wanted defense to be strengthened, because a consistant all doom ray approach was boring. I wanted to be able to repair starbases so that you would have more options with them. I wanted more points for designing custom races, so that you could do more with them. I wanted to be able to spend points to change the starting tech alotment on custom races, so that you could also customize this. I wanted them to increase early year trade values so that it wasn't an obvious money sink, and instead was a viable strategy. Etc. etc. I want to give the player more options.


See, I disagree. There are people who want to be able to pursue an alliance victory, be a "peace loving" culture, and never once build an attack ship. I think those people should be accommodated. Is it going to be possible on every difficulty level? No, probably not. But as long as it is possible on Normal, all is well in the universe.


This is the line I'm just not sure about. I agree I want the player to have more choice. I guess what we disagree on is whether taking away focus increases a players choice, or reduces it. I see an all labs approach as an "additional choice" the player can try if you have focus. You see the many ways to approach the game if you don't use focus - and think that is more choice. However, you can already play all of the ways you imagine without using focus... just don't use focus. Its not like these "optimum play" strategies are easy to pull off. Why do you always need to take an optimum approach? I assure you there are people that try these strategies and have their entire empire fall into an economic hole they never recover from. It still happens to me occasionally. Those lost games might have been won if a more balanced, less money intensive approach had been taken.
But as long as focus exists, the all labs and all factories strategies CAN be TRIED, and those are two more choices.

Take care,
- Wyndstar

I have noticed gas prices change, but it had nothing to do with the election, gas prices fall every fall, becaus epeople aren't vacationign as mcuh and winter heating hasn't started, plus that was an unusually warm fall (global warming cough).

And of course all sorts of silly bills get passed, but I don't think it has any substantial effect. This is coming from someone who hates both parties and is incredibly cynical about the whole thing, but I think most people wildly overestimate how much actual impact governmental policy has on the economy.

As for Iztok's comment, I am under the impression that most of the reductions in mechanics I am suggesting the AI doesn't make much if any use of anyway. For example I am guessing having focus in the game helps a player about 50X more than it helps the AI. If you just took it out altogether I am guessing you would see the AI grow much stronger relative to the player. Its not hard to play without focus either, I haven't used it once in about my past twelve games, don't miss it at all. A lot less clicking, same exact gameplay, except slightly harder, and more immersive (less gamey).

Hi!

I'm not sure about that. I remeber brad's post where he said AI would love focus. However I'm pretty certain AI don't use it at it's extreme (all factories / labs), where it gives the most.

BR, Iztok

Along the same lines, I am relatively sure the AI wildly changes tax rates. I have seen massive changes in the happiness levels of AI planets, and I am pretty sure this is the reason....So the AI does Min/Max on some things.

The important question is does it do them well? The whole point is giving the player more power over these things is that it means longer turns, more things to manage, and more ways to outperform the AI. Anyway as Wyndstar is fond of pointing out I can play however I want, and I do, so it is little skin off my back.

But I am concerned about the design features of the game because I care about it. Particularly when I assume in a year or 2 they are going to start working on Galciv 3 I would love to see them start taking these things into consideration.

Very few games do and it is frustrating. I know this is not probably the case for Galciv due to the developers size, but I get the sense with a lot of them you have this whole department, a different people come up with features, and there is no overarching person saying no, this is a duplicate feature, or no this is fantastic but just adds to much time per turn, and the AI will be horrible at it, etc.

A cool mechanic which adds a minute to each turn, allows a player more control and adds a little flavour sounds nice. But pretty soon if you don't start making hard choices about which mechanics to include, the turns are taking 30 mins, the AI needs to have crazy bonuses to deal with the players godlike command of their economy, and the content gets swamped out by the clicking. Because people generally cannot help themselves from using the tools that are there.

I think switching to the model I suggested in my original post would benefit novice players, advanced players, and the AI, plus add more variety. That model eliminated one slider, was more intuitive, and would allow novice players and the AI to fully fund their factories and labs since neither will use advanced strategies like all factories or all labs. Advanced players will now need a mix of factories and labs (how much of each?), need to research both the factory and lab techs and consider structures to boost their output. This provides the human player more choices when playing optimally. Also advanced players playing the all labs strategy can't do all three military, social, and research production at the same time on a planet because they can only focus on military or social, not both.

In DL I was easily able to beat the AI on suicide with the mixed (factories and labs) strategy with tech trading on. In DA with the AI improvements (e.g., planetary development) and tech trading off, in my first game using the mixed strategy I was not able to catch up and was overwhelmed by the number of ships from the Drengin when they declared war on me. I can still win on suicide with tech trading off if I play with the all factories strategy. If the AI could also fully fund its production centers (which it could under my suggested model, where factory and research output are independent) then I likely would not be able to beat it on suicide. This would give advanced players more of a challenge.

Great ideas and discussions. Here is my 2 cents:

GC2 have many winning strategies available to players, depending on the the difficulties. Lower difficulties makes them easier to achieve, and naturally higher difficulties makes them harder to acheive. Depending on players' tastes and how much they can focus and learn the intricacies of this game, different winning strategies, different styles of playing are all possible here. For inexperienced players who have trouble keeping up with AI and the economy to experienced players to can beat AIs on the hardest difficulties, their needs are different. Therefore, the developers are trying to cater the game to both ends of the spectrum.

This thread is really a discussion between experienced players about how to beat the harder difficulties (Masochistic and above). If you want to win on Suicide, sure you can use it, but it sure takes a lot of patience and micromanagement that will take out the fun factor for you if you are not that type of players. So play at lower difficulties so that more winning strategies are available and forget about the uber approach. Remember, you make winning too much of a chore.

Have fun

Great ideas and discussions. Here is my 2 cents:

GC2 have many winning strategies available to players, depending on the the difficulties. Lower difficulties makes them easier to achieve, and naturally higher difficulties makes them harder to acheive. Depending on players' tastes and how much they can focus and learn the intricacies of this game, different winning strategies, different styles of playing are all possible here. For inexperienced players who have trouble keeping up with AI and the economy to experienced players to can beat AIs on the hardest difficulties, their needs are different. Therefore, the developers are trying to cater the game to both ends of the spectrum.

This thread is really a discussion between experienced players about how to beat the harder difficulties (Masochistic and above). If you want to win on Suicide, sure you can use it, but it sure takes a lot of patience and micromanagement that will take out the fun factor for you if you are not that type of players. So play at lower difficulties so that more winning strategies are available and forget about the uber approach. Remember, don't make winning too much of a chore.

Have fun

sorry about the double post

Becephalus

Interesting points and I agree with a lot of what you say. I have a lot of the same 'house rules' as you, especially no tech trading. I have been using focus and working on the various 100% strats after reading Wyndstar's posts. Already I can see suicidal is near impossible with no trading on many map setups (still possible on some). The tech one is extremely hard to pull off without getting money for techs, and I am fine with dropping a couple difficulty levels and dropping focus and the 100% strats, and playing a less gamey game.

I'm less critical than you about it I guess because my expectations are lower. You say it should be easier to balance the game, but in my long experience playing these and other types of games, this one matches up very very well in its genre. If it were that easy, I think it would have been done better a lot already, so my logic tells me it must be damn hard to do it better than they are. I think RTS multiplayer games are much easier to balance than 4X.

On a tangent, I have an idea for a self-balancing RTS multiplayer, like a WC3 style game. The idea is that the strength of units changes extremely gradually over time through automatic formula based on how often they are used in competitive multiplayer games. So as dominant strategies start to evolve, the units involved in the strategies self-nerf through formula until the strategy is no longer a peak. The only thing you'd really need is to set a baseline about how many of each unit you think there should be relative to others (i.e. 10 grunts for every dragon). You could do it for unit abilities too, so if people always used the dwarf's stormbolt instead of bash, they would rebalance until people were picking bash.

I obliterated AI a few times on obscene in 1.6 DA (playing Galciv first time since 1.2 patch) and got bored. Tried suicidal but got owned every time .So I thought to seek new ways . And found this thread and this strat (plus aar by wyndmaster).

And !wow! this a revelation strat. Just finished experimenting with it here are my thoughts on it:

All games I play are on large map, common planets, slow research. On paper research looks better -more efficient. But after about a dozen of attempts on it I figured it is very hard strat.

On my longest research only strat I got into midgame and by this time I realized it is lost. I could probably fend off the inevitable my diplomacy tricks ( make AI fight each other) but I was so way behind in production resources, economy , non existing military , poorly developed home worlds that it would be slow death anyway.

Research only is very sparse on everything .except research. You cant colonize fast ,cant upgrade colonies , cant build bases, constantly strapped for cash. Your only existence is whoring AI out of cash with technology trade. You are very dependent on minor races .And by mid game research edge is lost as well -then it is truly game over .you recover economically by this time, but it is too late- that is when game ending wars start, and you are in very poor position there.

After looking at wyndstar's game I tried to figure why it worked for him and my imho:

- I made poor choice with race. Research only if possible imho is only possible with altarians (+eco +research) and maybe terrans(+research +diplo) as a base . It nigh impossible with yor (my favourite base) - no matter how skewed it (trying to maximize res bonus,social prod, diplo, or mix of any of the above) it is just does not work out. - you need race with inherent bonuses to research and eco -Altars are ideal choice

-He played on small map. Small map offsets the overwhelming power AI has at start. -There is just not enough resource to get edge on. -E.g. there is total 2-3 worlds ai get during initial grab .And so can player (even with research only). Player can even grab some mining resources.

On large human will grab something ,but most successfull Ais will get 3-4 times that. Planets , resources, territory. - With research only you just cant pump out colonizers and constructors in time to have anything remotely ressemling competition with AI.

Now I tried other approach -factories only. And ohh boy does it make a difference:

You start strong. MC in first 5-6 turns. Colonizers /surveyours gets constructed fast. You can(and should) really compete with ai for inital grab. But it doesnt stop there - your mad production allows you to produce gal .achievement faster than AI does on suicidal. Your can afford to mine resource and build economic bases right of the bat.

Your worlds develop lightning fast and economy problems are solved as soon as you get stock exchanges(which again are built in a blink of an eye)

When it comes to military you can really crank out starport capacity to the max.

Now problems -well no problems really. My only mistake is I went with E50,s110,m30 d5 bonuses distribution with custom yor. In a hindsight I should have went e50, s40, m30 ,r40 ,d10 -you already have crazy amount of production. Question is never - "damn when this thing is gonna be built?" like in research strat)
- in emergency case you can concentrate 100% social and do social focus and get this gal. project build in 5-6 turns

The problem is always you dont have tech to build. It is constanst struggle to not fall too much behind - and you have to develop diplomacy ( in order to get anything from AI at all) and your prod research, and some military (those ai hardly trades unless you went with mad diplo bonuses) . I got unlucky and have to get extreme colonziation tree researched -that is what really tears my sparce research resources apart.

So strat can be summarized -pick race with good prod bonuses (thalans or yor) - get them full research bonus trough abilities and governement and start owning. Thalans have even more of an impressive start due to super hive bonus and PQ 15 homeworld.

Now I honestly think factory strat is ulitmate killer -based on the result I got so far. Few tips :

1.You can (and should) crush some weak ai early - with mass of cheap fighters ( AI seems always have huge mil. tech edge by mid game, but earlier you start less this edge is ) .

2.Beeline straight to techs which give gal. projects and build them first - you can do it. Get diplo tree researched and try get all you can from AI - you wont get much , but even that helps .I traded once 4k cash and about dozen high level tech for industrial sector - it was worth it.

3. Pimp out your worlds with eco bases and mine resources -ideally you can start doing it very early in the game. -This is prod bonus perk ,so use it

4. Get some friends. Use diplo to make ai fight your enemies -as your tech is lagging and some powerfull opponent can screw you mid game. Your economy by mid game should be crazy strong so you should have no problem bribing AIs to fight your fights. Combined with 1 that should give you 1-2 victories over your initial opponents -after that you should be strong enough to take on anyone .


In my current game my biggest struggle is research- I need to research extreme colonization ,since most world turned out to be non -normal. Combined with no resarch bonus pick and overwhelming amount of research I have to do(catch up on mil tech, especially logistics and weapons) -it is causing some concerns .But even with that it is looking good - I have some diplo edge over 2 strongest ais (drengin and Korath )and use them to fight my wars -while I am slowly grinding research tree.
I picked on weakest ai (terrans) and swarm him with my cannon fodder fighters -Terrans already lost 2 worlds.
Once I get psionic weapons and decent logistics my empire should be unstoppable .

That's fairly close to the lessons I learned while doing an all-lab AAR. I would rather have many worlds that trickle focused research than a few massive tech worlds any day. Part of the problem is that abilities add a trivial research bonus (though as you have noted, Altarians can get +65% and should; but I still did a factory build anyway). I don't play with tech trading, and I play gigantic maps, and this practically invalidates the all-lab strategy for me.

I've also heard that power plants and other bonuses are applied before conversion to focused research, while research bonuses are not. Either way, economy starbase bonuses can be much higher than ability bonuses (+24% per). Instead of +20% research, I'd rather get +50% military to build the starbases quickly to compensate (and all the other things that it helps). Building a strong economy is actually the weak point, if any, of the strategy (and so I take super breeder as a custom race). Being in a position to fully exploit any techs you do have vs. AIs allows you to steal techs and take more territory (or just simply out-produce them with slightly weaker ships).

Not related really to yout question but I noticed that mind control center does not work - worlds were not flipping ,even though they revolted for about 20 turns.


edit:bah wrong thread

I noticed in your AAR :

also noted that getting +40 research to supplement the factory build is a waste of abilities

I came to opposite conclusion. - I even did short game start with research bonuses and all factory build. You get noticeably more research. - You already have more than enough production with all factories ( I honestly most of the time just did not know what to use those prod points for -except pumping out crap fighters +constructores ,which after a while just is inefficient -no reason really to upgrade star base past 5 modules) .

Especially imho if you play with tech trading off - you will have to research everything yourself, and what if research resource is just not happening ( grabbed by strong ai ).

Maybe you're right. I will have to compare both situations. I normally have excess production, so I just build large warships. Since I am always focusing research on developed planets (no social queue), maybe it's unnecessary to have the social bonus. I do think the military bonus is important for self-sufficient colonies. Of course, surrounding colonies deep in your territory with starbases to increase research while not producing anything (unless at war) might help a lot, but I hesitate to do this on a large scale. I think the tech turns saved are less than the social turns saved (which would usually be 2 turns vs. 1 turns with bonuses) on a large number of worlds/projects.

In an all factory build, more production = more focused research. It seems that 1/4 base production values (without production +%) are taken as the research value when focused. Then the research +% would apply to this value. So it does help

I have a question: Military production goes back to treasury when not building anything. So can anyone come up with different scenarios comparing eco buildings/
farms/morale, all factories but no productions/research, and eco buildings/factories mix builds for maximizing making money when using all factories?

Hi!

That depends mostly on how far up you can push your morale ability. In my recent suicidal game with rare planets and stars I couldn't get it much over 70% (no morale resource close), and I also didn't have free tiles (got only 3 planets, but was lucky, AIs mostly got 2) to build anything that was not utmost important. So I haven't built any farm, any morale building and ANY ECON building but Econ Capital on my HW. My main source of income was trade routes - with Korxs' starting 11 routes I produced 250BC with taxes and 1000+ with trade. So my approval was never a problem. I could keep taxes at 40% and still enjoy 100% approval when I breeded pop for troop transports.

If you want to maximize your tax earnings with an numerically accurate method, I suggest you to check the thread NLC's and Industrial Sectors broke my economy. Despite the title says differently, there's fully explained the calculation method for planetary approval, and DA - producing money - a testbed results, where you can find a formula for planet's tax revenue. Now put those formulas in a spreadsheet, add some farms, morale buildings and stock markets, and start playing with numbers. I'm pretty sure you'll be able to get the best combo for most situations that can happen in the game.

BR, Iztok

The problem with comparing using math is that certain tradeoffs are not considered. For instance, labs provide more "points" per tile, but you must spend 75% of your base on research to get 25% focused production - you can't turn off research without turning off other forms of production. However, with factories you CAN stop building social projects or ships on any planets and produce focused research only. That's for a labs vs. factories build.

If you are looking to maximize your economy, then it seems best in most cases to build one advanced farm (total 13B population) on each normal planet. In DA, your native ability caps at +100% morale effective (when you have ~150% actual), so to push your tax rate higher (79%) and still maintain decent empire-wide morale you would need one high-tech morale building on each planet (+40% * 0.64 = +25% effective at 13B population). Since I use Super Breeder a lot, my "high pop growth" tax rate is 59% and my sustainable normal rate is 69% with morale in the 70-90% range. I don't waste time with morale buildings; I use the tile for a stock market instead.

Of course, now you have to consider the factory/stock market ratio. I would consider 3 factories to be the minimum for each planet to build itself and defensive ships. The rest can be stock markets, etc. However, the maximum ratio will largely depend on your economics bonuses and types of factories. Normally, strong economics bonuses can support about 50/50 between factories and stock markets. If you've got +50% in your production areas, then you only need about 30% factories (except on planets you wish to mass ships, like border worlds, or those with planet bonuses).

Why can't we get the best of both styles within the same game?

I'm been toying around with all labs/factories styles since Wyndstar's great AAR. It seems that the "flip" he mentioned is very important. So, I can start out using all factory and flip to all labs when economy has a good surplus and get a good lead on tech. Then either flip all back to factory or convert some planets while using the 1/49/50 spending to mass produce while still can maintain a good tech lead. The mix of these styles might cover the weakness of each.

Currently, I'm using Thalans to try both build. A factory that costs 960BC only costs 144 BC with Super-hive and gets built within 1-2 turn with a 13% social spending. Its PQ15 HW with 13 Factories and 1 Manufactory Capitol, colony ships (1690BC with Ion Drive), freighters, and constructors can be built within 2 turns. Having a 40% research bonus, it will still do great when flip to all labs or to the average 1/49/50 build.

I tried a Thalan Super Hive game on Crippling to see how the ability stacks up. Unfortunately the Korath are right next to me so I'm hoping I can still win after they took many planets in the colony rush and are spore-rushing now (I hate this AI more than any other, because I have full invasion techs, no one else can really touch me except those damned spore ships). I cannot afford to build labs at this stage because I need ships to defend, so I am ramping up more cheap factories to increase both production types now that my economy can handle it.

I think there is a minor bug: if you rush a factory on an empty tile, you get it at the lower price. However, if you upgrade a tile, it costs the full amount (so it is better to decommission and build/buy). The cheaper factories really didn't help me, because even with +75% economy I still busted out during the colony rush (population not growing fast enough) so that extra production was essentially wasted. I will have to find a new way to use them.

I also hate those spore ships. Try bribe others to go to war with Korath while you get your fleets online.

Over production is a downfall of Super Hive, however if I remember correctly, military production will change to BC when producing nothing.

For Thalans, alternating research between trade/econ techs, build econ worlds, frieghters, econ trade starbases is a must for not going bust during the colony rush. Try putting a few points into morale instead of economy. That will help your initial population growth rate and easier to maintain 100% morale. Don't waste your initial productions by micromanaging the spending sliders in the beginning. Don't try do both military and social production at the same time while doing research, alternate between building ships and building socials (in the case of HW factories, buy them at an amazing price of 144BC!! Instead of the usual 690BC). Do focus research and adjust military and social spending sliders according to project turns during the colony rush. Research Trade, Econ, and Republic early helps out too.

If you want to go all lab with Thalan, you should still start the game with all factory for colony rushing and prioritize research for Ion Drives, planetary improvement, 1 sensor (for survey), trade, econ. Don't build too many pure factory worlds, build more econ worlds and econ starbases for trade. Improve relations with neighbors with trade. Keep morale at 100% at first then at 75% for new worlds only (depending on income of course). When the money supply become a surplus of >200 BC. Start flipping your factory worlds to labs. It will have dramatic decrease in BC/turn but research will be boosted and if you choose 20% trait & 20% Technologist for research at creation, it will help tremedously!! Research more trade, econ, and government types while build/upgrade more econ starbase trade modules and freighters until BC/turn is positive again. Rince and repeat when necessary. You'll be leading the tech rating in no time and still be 1st-3rd position in production while having the best economy. I consider this to be a good beginning of the midgame.

It seems that the "flip" he mentioned is very important. So, I can start out using all factory and flip to all labs when economy has a good surplus and get a good lead on tech. Then either flip all back to factory or convert some planets while using the 1/49/50 spending to mass produce while still can maintain a good tech lead. The mix of these styles might cover the weakness of each.


I frankly dont think factories build has any real weakness. And "flip" imho is just waste of resources and precious time. What is the point of flipping to all labs?- by this time it will happen you will most probably need fleets - therefore production.

On suicidal tech lead will not happen (except early game) -but production with all factories is real. I am playing my 2nd game on suicidal with research bonuses now and research is good enough - with game set on slow research I develop stellar marines for example in 1 turn .

Plus again , as mentioned above , all factories is a lot more versatile - you can turn focus back to social if you need that gal. project built fast, you can play with the scale (mil/social ) according to your need.

I think all labs frankly is weak in a current state of affairs -that is why "flip" is needed. - with flip it is nothing really but delayed all factories. You might as well play all factories from the start (especially considering early rush advantage all fact gives)

Very good points to consider.