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A preview of the NEXT Galactic Civilizations II update!

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A preview of the NEXT Galactic Civilizations II update!

1.6 is done, time for 1.7!

from GalCiv2 Forums

Galactic Civilizations II: Dark Avatar 1.6 is available for free download by all Dark Avatar players but we're just getting started in our after-release support! 

We're already well underway with Galactic Civilizations II: Dark Avatar 1.7 (actually 1.61 will be available shortly which will have some graphics engine tweaks/fixes for some users who had problems with 1.6).

So what will 1.7 have in it? The screenshot on the right shows the new maintenance and leasing summary screen (and leases are getting a revamping to make them more attractive to use by both players and computer AI).

Other features include a new local high score list with a new hall of fame screen, Starbase managers, Starbase modules that raise maximum HP, Constructor rally point management, new mega events (based on player suggestions), Anomalies randomly return, a new type of governor based on rally point destination, updated computer AI, updated diplomacy AI, and more!  Stay tuned!

If you don't have Galactic Civilizations II, you can get Galactic Civilizations II: Gold Edition either directly via TotalGaming.net (which supports PayPal and most credit cards) or at your local retailer.  If you have Galactic Civilizations II already you can upgrade to Dark Avatar at the purchase page.

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Reply #76 from GalCiv2 Forums Top
it took me a while to see all the new buttons on the DA UI, but i think that testifies to 1) how little read (or look for) instructions, and 2) how seamlessly they weaved the new features into the existing UI.

One new DA feature that is hard to find and is not explained in the tutorial videos is the ability to launch your ships from orbit in any direction rather than always in the bottom right corner. Directed launch often makes the difference between colonizing a planet this turn or the next; which can (and in my games has) made the difference between the AI or I colonizing the planet.
I could not find the new controls for the directed launch and also tried launching when my orbiting ship was in the position I wanted to launch to. Finally, another player explained it to me in a private message.
Click on the colony with the ship in orbit. Look at the UI box at the bottom of the screen with general colony details on the left and the starport contents on the right. There is a very small box that looks like nine arrows pointing in different directions in the upper left corner of the starport contents (upper middle of the entire colony UI box). When you click on that box you will see arrows appearing around each square that border the planet (you should be zoomed in fairly close to see them well) from which you can select. Afterwards, all launches go to that square until you set a new direction. I hope that explanation is clear.
Reply #77 from GalCiv2 Forums Top
I have posted this a couple times, so hope I don't sound like a broken record, but...

How about putting Planet Type (HeavyGrav, Toxic, etc.) and status (red-0, yellow-50, green-100) on the Colony tab of the CivManager. Please!!  Pretty please!
TouchTasks - Access tasks with ease on Windows touchscreens.
Reply #78 from GalCiv2 Forums Top

I'll look again but I haven't seen any button that does that. If there is, that is what I was talking about.


it took me a while to see all the new buttons on the DA UI, but i think that testifies to 1) how little read (or look for) instructions,


To be blunt, I think this testifies as to how quickly some are to jump to conclusions and assume the worst in others rather than considering there can be honest mistakes even when people do read the material and run searches for help. You'll note the instruction manual says nothing about issuing a command to miners to auto mine, though it does list auto explore and auto survey and that the "Automatic Mine" and "automatic Mining" searches on here come up with no hits, or did prior to this post. I did look for the feature before making the post, I checked both the instructions and the forums, I just didn't see it. But, I digress.

Another addition that would be worthwhile to officially implement the extra techs from the mod that Stardock released; the self repair branch, namely.

Reply #79 from GalCiv2 Forums Top
Not to be contrary, but I found the Automate Miners button and the Directional Launch Buttons within minutes of playing my first DA game....

They were intuitive to me...I think the interface is well done. I never read a manual...have not read it from DL v1 let alone the DA one...I just sit down and start a game, then start playing with all the buttons and tabs... and 99% of the questions I do have are answeered by spending a few minutes a day browsing the forums or on the Wiki, without the need to even post...this community is so supportive of the game.
Reply #80 from GalCiv2 Forums Top
Better starbases! Exellent, I have allways advocated strong starbases, in fact, I'm not playing the metaverse any more, because I use a mod I created myself to enhance starbase weapon and defense systems. The repair module already implemented in 1.6 is a great feature!
Reply #81 from GalCiv2 Forums Top
Oh, and can you PLEASE make the AI more agreeable when it comes to tech trading or dealing, Brad!?! For Christ sakes, I getting only around 400 credits in exchange for something as valuable as advanced barren world colonization or terraforming is just ridiculous!!!



Well the really ridiculous part is if the tables were reversed (Trying to buy it from the AI instead of selling ). They value the tech alright. TOO MUCH. You'd need more than 10x that amount. Sometimes, late early game to mid-game - I still wouldn't get a trade if I gave them all my techs that they didn't have, all my cash and all my IP.
Anyways, I've gotten used to not trading with the AI anymore. After that, I became bitter at trading. Why bother? You're going to get screwed is what I end up thinking.


And yet the screen says we have the upper hand....
Reply #82 from GalCiv2 Forums Top
When the AI takes one of my planets, it would be nice to be told what tech of mine was lost to them.
Reply #83 from GalCiv2 Forums Top
When the AI takes one of my planets, it would be nice to be told what tech of mine was lost to them.

Who losses planets to the AI!? A few times I've been careless and allowed the AI to sneak attack a planet but their transport never has more than 1BC soldiers so my planet is able to repel the attack with my high soldiering (from researching all the invasion techs and sometimes having the Training Center).
Reply #84 from GalCiv2 Forums Top
What I miss most in the game are keyboard commands for various tasks, as finding the key on the keyboard is a lot faster than the current mouse interface.

Also, the ship/planet finder could use an update in how to sort the items.
How about making a drop down menu of the different categories so one doesn't have to scroll through all the various attributes (like highest defence overall/higest Beam defence/highest MD def etc)?

Finally, executing Automoves before ending turn would be most appriciated, especially since the moves pause when conquering a planet, but resume again when going to the Details or Ship build screen on the newly aquired planet.
Reply #85 from GalCiv2 Forums Top
I have not seen this so far, is there a way to set the game up with a check to see if a computer is using the same FLAG icon as the player, and if so, change it. I keep getting the computer picking the same Flag icon as i chose, mostly in larger games. I am surprised that this has not been looked into so far. Other than this small gripe, this game is Loads o fun. Great work

Drewcifer
Reply #86 from GalCiv2 Forums Top
Wow. Just wow. You people really keep cranking on this game and adding more stuff. Kudos to Stardock for continuing development after release - something a lot of other game companies won't do. Most of the time, especially with single player games, all you really look forward to after release is bug fixes and balance changes. Stardock has gone beyond those and developed new features and made some major changes to the game!

I know as a programmer myself, that graphical overhaul was likely to be a very large project. It may not seem like much from a user's point of view, but I'm sure it was a pretty big overhaul of the way things worked.

And as a user of Vista, I'm liking the framerates I'm now getting .

Kinda makes me wonder why Microsoft dropped hardware 2D support anyways - I'm sure GalCiv probably isn't the only game that combines 2D and 3D elements in this way, and this also means that a lot of legacy software may seem slower in Vista because of this.

Well, I suppose with Microsoft pushing .NET and DirectX, it sorta makes sense. But I still don't like it . . .

a new type of governor based on rally point destination, updated computer AI, updated diplomacy AI, and more! Stay tuned!


Ooh, details, please!

I must say, buying DA was one of the best purchases I've made in a long time . It's really worth every penny I've spent on it.
Reply #87 from GalCiv2 Forums Top
An other suggestion would be to implement the bittorrent protocol into SDC downloads.
Certainly would eliminate the server overload whenever a new stable version is released
Reply #88 from GalCiv2 Forums Top
Bittorrent? Blech, too slow and way too sensitive to firewalls. No thanks.
Reply #89 from GalCiv2 Forums Top
While I agree that it sometimes requires NAT-forwading, the speed certainly isn't a matter of complaint, especially not when compared to downloading files in high demand from a single source.
(least not if you keep your ratios high... I seldom go below 2:1 and usually end at 3:1)

To be given the option would be nice though.
Reply #90 from GalCiv2 Forums Top
I've come pretty close to filling my bandwidth with a single download, if the people serving it have good servers and a good connection. Sure, it can be a bit of a gamble sometimes, as many places still have slow servers, but most places I've encountered can now handle the bandwidth of broadband.

Due to being behind a router, I'm lucky to get 1/10th of my bandwidth filled with Bittorrent. IMHO they still need to do a lot more work to support clients behind firewalls and routers. I think my ISP is doing firewalling as well - I've played around with port mapping through my router to no avail.

My experience says the opposite - I can fill my broadband pipe with a single source, but not with Bittorrent.
Reply #91 from GalCiv2 Forums Top
One of Stardock's stated goals in its lack of anti-piracy measures combined with on-going updates is to assure the paying customer that there is always reason to keep checking in on the game. Although I have been deeply involved in other work, I find myself excited after several months away from gaming to start DA anew. Sure, many other titles have come out since then, but DA keeps drawing me in (kinda like the Mafia).

In other words, Stardock, your goal has been achieved with at least one person.
Reply #92 from GalCiv2 Forums Top
To be blunt, I think this testifies as to how quickly some are to jump to conclusions and assume the worst in others rather than considering there can be honest mistakes even when people do read the material and run searches for help


sorry, i didn't mean to make this sound like it was everyone's problem. my line should have read "how little I read instructions" but I typoed.

Not to be contrary, but I found the Automate Miners button and the Directional Launch Buttons within minutes of playing my first DA game....


ditto, more or less. it took a little while; the hardest one for me was finding the minimap pop-out button.

What I miss most in the game are keyboard commands for various tasks, as finding the key on the keyboard is a lot faster than the current mouse interface.


there are hotkeys for many functions and even a visual (somewhere) that you can print. it would be nice to have more keyboard support through most of the game (i'd love it if in most windows, hitting enter would close the window; i hate being mouse dependant).

Reply #93 from GalCiv2 Forums Top
One thing I don't like about the current system is that you can see all the planitery upgrades (buildings) without high espionage by pretending to put a spy on the planet.

Before you get high espionage each built on square should be a question mark, perhaps more reviled and you learn more about the race. Another thing is that you know which race built the galactic wonder, unless depending on your espionage level you should not know who built it and with advanced it should tell you on which planet it was built. Disguiseing it as another building until the required level of espionage.

This is what needs improving, the AI is awsome already. (I only play challenging though.)

Edit 1:
Two more things annoy me, the first is wide-screen support. It's gotten better over time but a lot of things look stretched. And secondly on a related note I think the game's movies need a makeover (higher resolution) as they all look fuzzy on screens 17 inch and above.
Reply #94 from GalCiv2 Forums Top
One thing I don't like about the current system is that you can see all the planitery upgrades (buildings) without high espionage by pretending to put a spy on the planet.


Totally agree. I actually just used this tactic to win a war in my last game much more quickly than I should have been able to. I used the place spy window to figure out which planets the AI was using as its main manufacturing hubs and just made a beeline for those, pretty much crippling its (superior) military very early on.

I think that hiding planetary improvements based on espionage level would actually be a huge improvement to the espionage system in general. It'd make low-level spying a little bit more, well, low level. Right now you can save up a few spies and immediately cripple one of the AI's planets in a first strike. It'd be nice if you were forced to place your first few spies blindly and work your way up to the intelligence level necessary to actually make more targeted strikes.

Hiding the military, social, and research production from the spy screen would be a nice change too. That kind of information is really valuable and it seems kind of silly to have access to it straight off.
Reply #95 from GalCiv2 Forums Top
Though this may seem minor, can you tweak the scale of the starships in the combat simulators? Whenever I match up a tiny to a medium, it doesn't seem like 14 meters in length to 100+ It looks like 1/4 the size of the medium. Not to mention smalls which DO look like Mediums.

If I may also ask for shipyards, starbases that produce starbases based on the planets in its influence. Basically, at a huge cost to the planet (25-50% of its military production), the resources are shiped to the starbase and the ship built there.
Reply #96 from GalCiv2 Forums Top
WOW. I am really looking forward to 1.7! More fun and more variety. Fantastic!
Reply #97 from GalCiv2 Forums Top

If I may also ask for shipyards, starbases that produce starbases based on the planets in its influence. Basically, at a huge cost to the planet (25-50% of its military production), the resources are shiped to the starbase and the ship built there.


It does not even need to be linked to the resources of a planet which might be hard to represent in a nice, simple way. DA has miners that can beam resources to planets. I would imagine that it would then be pretty simple to allow minors to be redirected to starbases so that starbases can use the resources for ship building modules, repairing, etc.
Reply #98 from GalCiv2 Forums Top
I agree with the sentiment of being able to turn passive AI on. I'm sure a lot of people are into the micro-management part of it, but not me. I've never found placing agents to make much of a difference, and they're a real pain on my planets. So what do I do? I research counter-espionage centers as fast as I can, build them on every planet and then create just enough agents to mop up the few I got hit with. Then I do nothing with them the rest of the game.

Short form: New spy system has just equaled on less tile on all my planets.


Also, I would be all for a revamped starbase system. Even with every offensive and defensive module built on the base, the first time someone attacks it with anything, it's toast.


That's it. Playing GalCiv 2 since it came out, and those are my two complaints.




...Aside from carriers.
Reply #99 from GalCiv2 Forums Top
I’m glad that you age giving starebases the boost that they deserve. I hope you still consider the suggestion I made in the 1.6 topic. It was, essentially, that ships and fleets that share the same tile as a starebase will always be attacked first. This would make the tactic of guarding a starebase with fleets less hit-and-miss.

Of course, what you do is ultimately your decision. I’ll be watching to see what you come up with.
Reply #100 from GalCiv2 Forums Top
Great improvements, i was wondering if there is ever a chance you guys can add a ramdom name generator as an option in settings so that every constructed vehicle will get a ramdom generated name such as Dragstriker or something, but can it be so you can turn it on and off in settings, and select it for either player or AI
can it also be for starbases?

Also can there be in custom race that just like homeplanet name, there is HomeStar name