Rataan

I'd be happy with a modest graphical overhaul, a few new races and other goodies and a whole lot of rebalancing. On a commercial level, I think the invasion graphics was the worst part of GCII. The rest of the game is cute, but the invasion screen has always been substandard. I would also say to bring all variables out of the binary and into python or XML, but I think they have already said yes to that.

[quote who="Xrati" reply="6" id="1938719"]If you use the "cheat generated map" you cannot do anything once the game starts. The map and starting locations are all the the map editor will allow. Any built ships or movement will corrupt the map file and the editor will not work. You must generate the map and once the game starts, name it and save it, and then QUIT the game. The map should load into the map editor. It works for me, so if you can't get it to work, yo

OK, I figured out I can save maps using ctrl+shift+g with cheats enabled. Unfortunately, trying to load any of the maps in the map editor crashes it. Same result with DA. The cheat key doesn't work in DL.

[quote who="Xrati" reply="3" id="1937847"]There are no settings for controling the amount of planets the game generates. You can start a game, generate a map and then save it. Now you can go into the editor and edit the map that the game generated. That is the only way that I know of to get a map generated other than the randomizer in the editor... [/quote] I haven't seen a way to save in game maps. Can you explain further?

Bear in mind that the AI doesn't really go for high population planets, so modding the population/morale balance will make the game easier.

If you are still listening oh master of the GalCiv universe, I think what would be even better is an in game difficulty slider. I wish for this in every game. It would go a long way toward addressing the two fundamental problems facing turn based strategy games: the insanely competitive colony rush, which is invariably a losing battle on higher difficulties, and the "I know I will win, but how long long is it going to take?" syndrome. We could start the game at a moderate

One problem with the PQ1 worlds was that the AI never used them. We still have the odd fact that the low PQ worlds actually update to a higher PQ than home worlds. While we are at it, why do home worlds have such a mediocre PQ? I think home worlds should be PQ26, or whatever is highest at the very least.

I was just going to post something similar. The Drengin/Korath/Yor AI seems to be a very slow starter now.

I don't have time to read 170 posts, but I'll put my $0.02 in anyway. First of all, piracy isn't going to go away by getting mad, calling pirates bad people, or appealing to their higher moral principles. People pirate because: A) They can. B) Their disposable income is occupied elsewhere, possibly with buying games legitimately. C) They have a lot of time on their hands. D) They like the challenge. Even if no hacks are required, pirating a newer game i

[quote]Ditto, and it doesn't go away when I reload or start a new game.[/quote] True, but it will go away if you close out and restart. Of course, that will only help until you click on an AC again. Also noticed if you start a new game without closing out and uncheck Ascension victory, the game will ignore you and you will still get tons of AC's.

I just started a game with the settings Painful, Immense, 5 opponents. I've explored five sectors and found 14 ascension crystals, two of them on top of a star. I don't think anyone can use them in that situation and it prevents the star information from showing--the information that shows how many planets, etc. At this rate, the map may have 1000 ascension crystals or more. Was this intended?

[quote] It does not, however, magically appear on the ships that you have already built[/quote] Yes it does...I almost always build it in my games, and it is applied to every ship you have that has more than 1 hp. This is easily verified.

While we are at it, why would they need morale improvements or farms? I guess the bottom line is that we can't have a totally different game for the robots. Besides I always assumed they were biologically based.

I was able to get it to finish after I switched servers from us-2 to us-1. I remember this worked one other time I was having problems with SDC.

[quote]If you're having a download loop on XP then it is more likely just a lack of having prerelease versions checked. [/quote] I've tried it about seven times today and it still loops for me. I'm 100% sure I had the prerelease versions box checked every time. Also tried closing firewall software and opening sdcentral.exe with the 'Run as' menu and unchecked the box for 'Protect my computer from unauthorized program activity.' Nothing works.

I usually start my planet out by turning off the governor and building one thing at a time. Yeah, i have never used the governors for anything, except automatically queueing up upgrades to existing buildings That's about all they can do. They can automatically terraform--change yellow, orange and red tiles to useable green ones and automatically upgrade. I uncheck both boxes and make my own choices. The th

I usually start my planet out by turning off the governor and building one thing at a time. Most planets get four factories to start out, then a starport, then two each econ and research buildings, then entertainment and farm. That's just a general strategy, but I hold to it more or less. I might build the research buildings before the econ buildings if I am losing the tech race. I strongly suggest never building more than one farm on any planet and you may need the entertainment bui

All I have to do is hit any key which will recalculate the sheet and I get a new value for a simulated round of combat. Ok, I thought you were playing these in-game, in which case the Korath weapons bonus would have an effect. I was allowing for some leak-through damage in my 7-10 range, it's just that 11.5 was a bit higher than I expected from my seat-of-the-pants estimate. However, I don't think you can conclude

Rataan: Not at all. Defense Ships still win. Against anything less than maximum fleet power (and there can't be too many of those), your Defense Ships can handle them handily. If the attack edges higher, include one all-attack ship with a mostly Defense fleet. The purpose of the Attack Ship is to exchange with one of theirs. The exchange is in your fleet's favor because it lowers the attack of their fleet below your defenses. But if you

Well, now that I actually tried it, I'm getting an average of 11.5 damage for the attack ships, so there would be a slight advantage in favor of the defense ships in this case. But remember we are comparing 9/30 ships against 25/0 ships. Increase the attack ships to 27/0 and the advantage tips in their favor. 11.5 is somewhat higher than I'd expect, though I guess part of that is due to the Korath weapons bonus and

According to my quick calculations, which may be wrong, a fleet of three of my 9/30 ships against three Korath 25/0 ships would be a close battle, but mine would be more expensive to build. Not an especially close battle. On the first turn, you could expect to do 13 or 14 damage and they would do something in the range of 7-10 damage. Once you killed one of their ships, they wouldn't have enough damage to re

Roxlimn, the devs have been mostly silent on this issue, so what we say is mostly conjecture. Well, they were silent except for the part where they un-nerfed defense in the latest patch. I haven't had much time with the new defense costs, but defense clearly got a major upgrade. But too powerful? That debate may never be settled completely, because there are a lot of things at work. I don't think there is much doubt that there is now a point when it is worth investing in, but the earliest d

Fix the save game influence bug. Yesterday I had a planet flip because influence didn't update for more than 10 turns. I loaded an auto-save and it wasn't even in rebellion. An option to choose balanced starting positions would be nice. As it is now, at least one player gets a terrible start unless I ctrl+n a hundred times. Streamlined starbase upgrading. There are too many weapon/defense upgrades and they are far too costly. The ability to make anomalies truly r

It's a balancing act to be sure. Obviously, some may be more important than others depending on what is nearby. On larger maps with more available planets you will probably want them all before the colony rush is completely over. The catch is that if you speend a lot of time on them, you may end up at the bottom of the heap in all categories but number of planets. This probably isn't a big problem unless you get into an early war that you are totally unequipped to fight. I'm in a ga

Well, the point was that since the AI has a strong tendency to stockpile ships in orbit, we could make this a somewhat viable tactic instead of it being no tactic at all. I really don't think it is all that hard to understand. If you are afraid that this change would drag out the game or increase difficulty too much, then why don't you say that? If you really believe that the AI would be weaker for having orbiting fleets, then I can only assume you have spent far more time here than playing t