Unspeakable.Elvis

Reply to What's your play style? in Dark Avatar GalCiv2 Forums

Title: Kraken (a.k.a. Earthmonger) Description: There is one indispensable and invaluable resource in GC2: Planets. I will ruthlessly colony rush as far as I can go, then greedily colonise whatever the other civs leave behind, provided the planets aren't threatened by foreign influence (though, even if they are, I'm likely to push my luck). This means I leave [I]no[/I] habitable world alone. I tend to blitzkrieg minor civs I find hanging around for their PQ15's. War is always di

Reply to TA Latest Beta enemy ship HP goes up after attack in Bug Reports GalCiv2 Forums

I'm not totally sure how experience works, but ships [I]do[/I] gain some HP when they gain experience levels. I often have fighters flying about with 10/8 hit points. This seems likely to have happened in your case. J.

Reply to Creating a "Colonization slowdown" mod in Colonies GalCiv2 Forums

[quote]something like this would really put mass colonization on hold until later on in the game.[/quote] Do you mean that this mod [I]postpones[/I] the colony rush until later, or does it actually [I]slow down[/I] the colonisation process (i.e. does it obviate the old colony rush?) J.

Reply to Creating a "Colonization slowdown" mod in Colonies GalCiv2 Forums

[quote]I think just increasing the cost of the colony modules would do the trick the best as then the colony ships would be built really slowly. They would be expensie to buy of course as well.[/quote] I agree. That would make a colony ship a major project, not something you just pop out of your starport every three turns and fritter away on class 3 and 4 worlds. It should, after all, be reasonably costly (even relative to other ships) to construct a ship capable of transporting 250 mil

Reply to my ideas for GalCiv3 in Game Talk GalCiv2 Forums

[quote]It is true that they ignore a lot of ideas.[/quote] I'm [I]tempted[/I] to agree. Though I'll wait until TA is done before making up my mind about how open the devs are to players' ideas: I've been a regular at the Ideas forum since the release of DA, read (and posted) many thoughts, and although no-one gets an indication of which ideas they find attractive, I'll see how much of that "sea" makes it to the new expansion. I confess, though, that I'm not holding my breath.<b

Reply to New please join empire in Metaverse GalCiv2 Forums

How do you mean? If you'd like advice about the game you're certainly in the right place, but I'm not sure how an empire would help. I myself haven't joined any empires, but I've learned quite a bit from the forums -- if you're willing to dig a little you're bound to come up with a few gems. I'm actually not sure what all these empires are for: there are a few official empire threads around with oodles of posts (don't know what they say, since I don't really visit them) so it must be q

Reply to Essential Mods in Modding GalCiv2 Forums

Haven't come across any essential mods yet. Personally I've been using Kryo's Hull System, which is nice for [I]really[/I] designing ships from scratch; it doesn't change the ship design process dramatically though. I'm also playing with Gauntlet's Race Mod, which is certainly fun but again, not essential. Dunno what the other guys have been playing with. J.

Reply to The Galactic Empire has entered secret Negotiations with the Arrakis Imperium in Metaverse GalCiv2 Forums

Not so secret now, are they? ;)

Reply to Slide-bar Math in Dark Avatar GalCiv2 Forums

[quote]Just wanted to say that I thought 33% does not mean only 33% of your factory tiles get used, it means that all your factory tiles get used at 33% capacity[/quote] Saying that a portion of one's factories remain unused is just a different way of saying that a portion of each factory remains unused. The point is that you might have enough factories to produce 300 mp (and you'll be charged for their maintenance), and yet for the vast majority of the game you probably won't sap more

Reply to Slide-bar Math in Dark Avatar GalCiv2 Forums

[quote]4) Output. (This is the big one.)[/quote] I agree. The yardstick is not what you [I]are spending[/I] but what you [I]can[/I] spend. With a Research slider at 50% you're paying to power 50% of your factories, etc. This mechanic poses a particularly annoying problem: since two sliders power factories and one powers labs, and the three sliders' sum must always be 100%, you can never use your factories and labs to their maximum potential. It's like you're building all those factories

Reply to You guys rock in Off-Topic GalCiv2 Forums

[quote]I will continue to support this company as long as you continue to treat your customers with respect and continue to go above and beyond your duty to us. [/quote] I'll freakin' second that. J.

Reply to New way to fight in Galactic Civilizations II GalCiv2 Forums

Everyone gets bored of the invasion screen, sure. I myself have thought up dozens of ways in which it can be expanded past the "two lines going at each other" paradigm. The problem, however, is that if you make it any more intricate it might make invasion too much of a chore. If I'm going for a conquest victory on a Huge map I don't necessarily want to spend half of the entire game time managing ground battles on different fifty worlds. It's really all-or-nothing; if the game [I]doesn't[/I] impl

Reply to Earth Planet Approval Always Low in Game Talk GalCiv2 Forums

Interesting question. I'd look at it this way: A Stock Exchange gives a +25% economic bonus. Thus, theoretically, if you've got 13b people paying taxes, you get 25% more out of each individual; at the end of the day, with that stock exchange, you're getting as much money out of 13 billion people as one would out of 16.25 billion with no economic bonus. So, in replacing your stock exchange with a farm, in order to break even you have to add on population equivalent to 25% of your colony'

Reply to Earth Planet Approval Always Low in Game Talk GalCiv2 Forums

I've really given up caring about capital worlds as far as morale goes. I'd still happily build a farm on Earth, and if the morale later sits at 42%, so be it: the population by then is probably around 20 billion or more, a veritable gold mine as far as taxes go, and the approval isn't low enough to damage the existing population; so my asset remains stable. Later in the game, also, poor approval on my capital world is simply not enough to drop overall morale; so elections aren't a prob

lag on complex designs in Bug Reports GalCiv2 Forums

I'm certain one of the great attractions of GC2 is the player's ability to build their own ships and then play with them in-game. Unfortunately some of the more elaborate designs tax the engine so much that it becomes difficult to play in anything other than tactical view, which eventually defeats the purpose of those cools designs. (BTW I'm running a GeForce 8600 on a Dual Core 3.0 with 2GB RAM -- not exactly a setup with weak wrists). I'm definitely looking forward to TA's improved hu

Reply to And now for something completely different ... in Game Talk GalCiv2 Forums

This thing of the AI surrendering really takes the fun out of a grudge match (at best)! J.

Reply to And now for something completely different ... in Game Talk GalCiv2 Forums

You know, it just struck me that galaxy settings are often neglected in strategy discussions. For example, X posts a complaint about economy problems, and Y replies not understanding how X runs into such problems. Meanwhile, what remains unsaid, is that X always plays on medium maps with everything abundant, while Y plays on huge maps with everything rare. It's entirely unsurprising that these two players would develop different playing styles, tactics and strategies for their games. It's possib

Reply to Small map, population capped, approval dropping -- now what? in Strategies GalCiv2 Forums

In my opinion, there are three occasions when one worries about crappy morale (and ONLY three): 1) When one has many low-populace ( 2) When one has espoused a government other than th

Just popping in to invade in Dark Avatar GalCiv2 Forums

Howdy. In a recent game I managed to colonise a class 15 world in the middle of Yor space, quite far from my influence. I was at war with no-one, so I didn't bother about getting fighters in orbit just yet. Suddenly the Krynn invaded the world and took it from me; the most bizarre thing is that their relation with my civilisation before and after the invasion remained on "Close". Nobody declared war. They just staged a friendly invasion of one of my most promising planets. Shortly

Reply to economy war in Dark Avatar GalCiv2 Forums

[quote]Since I don't care about the metaverse, let me say that that's both ridiculous, stupid, and absurd, at the same time.[/quote] Is that in the right thread? Whatever the case may be, it [I]is[/I] rather bizarre that one can still research reasonably well with no research spending and no labs. I'm sure it's not something the devs would have wanted to happen (it just makes no sense) but that loophole has been found and thoroughly exploited. J.

Reply to economy war in Dark Avatar GalCiv2 Forums

[quote]The all factory strat has nothing really to do with the issue you describe. You basically describe the problem as one of either "bagging" four or more PQ10+ planets or not.[/quote] I'm talking about the broadest possible economic strategies here. I've had moderate success with that gung-ho, oh-this-looks-nice-to-do kind of modus operandi where one only does what seems necessary at any one point in the game; I'm hoping, however, that a wider perspective can pay large dividends. Th

Reply to economy war in Dark Avatar GalCiv2 Forums

[quote]the solution is simple: don't use that strategy in every starting position.[/quote] Let me hasten to add that the "all-factories" strategy, at least as it appears, is one the most basic available. And, in my experience, it works a damn sight better than the mixed factories/labs methods -- even though it does not win every game, it does show an improvement in [I]all[/I] situations. Even more basic than that is the "strategy" (more like an imperative) to capture as many planets as

economy war in Dark Avatar GalCiv2 Forums

Hi. The war for the perfect economic strategy continues. Lately I've come across quite a gem: the "all-factories" strategy (no research buildings on colonies, planets focused on Research, Research slider set to 0%). Unfortunately (and to my dismay) this excellent tactic does not prevent one's civilisation from sucking. I've been trying my hand at Challenging games for a while now, and success has been sporadic to say the least. One thing I'm concerned about is the amazing success o

Reply to Gauntlet's Race Mod - Full Version Released (PICS) in Modding GalCiv2 Forums

Love the Nesktil designs... far out! J.

espionage upgrade! in Ideas GalCiv2 Forums

Howdy. Let's face it, using spies to gain "high" levels of intel on other races is just not worth the effort. All you really gain is the ability to look at their planets, something you can do in the spy placement screen regardless of your intel level (although it's a smaller display, the improvements are still instantly recognisable if you're familiar with the game). I've been going through entire games neglecting espionage completely, because a) the information gains are too small, and b) s