List and Observations in BETA testing

[naarn]

Greetings,

 

Seems I haven't put it far enough to the right; you shouldn't be able to see that. It's for the filler ships; it exists for the AI to function right. I'll be expanding on those a lot in the near future, so the AI properly researches everything.

 

Ah I see, that already came to my mind too.

 

I had another game yesterday, and only then discovered the Holo Net feature...and I like it very much. It adds a nice Star Wars feeling being able to jump to any planet, plus it adds some nice tactical possibilytis.

 

I found two more things:

 

The K-Wing for the NR is buildable before Advanced Fighters is researched, but the E-Wing is not. Intentional?

 

Then I had a plant of the type "Large Low Industrial Planet" and it had an ability called "Large orbital shipyard". In the descriptive text it says it gives a 30% Bonus to ship build rates, but it actually only gives a 10% bonus.

[wbino]

Just a couple of ideas to throw out there...

 

Any thought into allowing the frigate factory to be able to repair as well as build? There are a few mods that do this as it make sense, if it can build new units it could certaintly repair them. And is better than the magic that is the repair platform in it's current role. The repair platforms current range is way to small, I hardly build them.

I thought originally this would have the added benefit of relieving the game of an unneeded model, but then the above post got me thinking....you could use the now current repair platform as your holonet device. Even though I don't like the idea of skipping planets, it seems to TAKE a little strategy away from gameplay.

Holonets would then become as separate tech to upgrade to...instead of being part of the civilian broadcast center.

Good, bad, horrible?

[Lavo]

The K-Wing for the NR is buildable before Advanced Fighters is researched, but the E-Wing is not. Intentional?

Eh? This was changed for everything but star bases in the last revision. Unless you mean B-Wings.

 

Then I had a plant of the type "Large Low Industrial Planet" and it had an ability called "Large orbital shipyard". In the descriptive text it says it gives a 30% Bonus to ship build rates, but it actually only gives a 10% bonus.

I will look into this, thanks! Edit: I've fixed the conflicting description; as of the next revision it will say that these shipyards only provide a 10% boost.

 

Any thought into allowing the frigate factory to be able to repair as well as build? There are a few mods that do this as it make sense, if it can build new units it could certaintly repair them. And is better than the magic that is the repair platform in it's current role. The repair platforms current range is way to small, I hardly build them.

This would kill the whole role of the Repair Platform, and there's no way to "disable" the repair ability when the factory is building ships, which would be a necessity for this to work without being extremely out of place.

 

Holonets would then become as separate tech to upgrade to...instead of being part of the civilian broadcast center.

Good, bad, horrible?

Well the Civilian Broadcast Center represents the Holonet Network ingame; Holonet being used by civilians and military alike. However, I do like your idea of it being something that is researched; I will put it into one of the culture research techs so it's a later game item, versus something you can get instantly.

[wbino]

I was thinking the repair ability would always be on, regardless of ship building. I believe thats the way S0A2 handles it.

Or if it's a antimatter thing..sorry I'm more of a player I don't get technical.

[sloosecannon]

Ya SOA has the shipyards do repairs just like the repair platforms... but realistically speaking, if your shipyard is constructing a ship, there should be no way to also do repairs on a ship... its resources are eaten up by the new ship...

[Lavo]

but realistically speaking, if your shipyard is constructing a ship, there should be no way to also do repairs on a ship... its resources are eaten up by the new ship...

This is pretty much my point. Though if you are the Republic... Just build a star base and give it Resupply ability; repairs ALL ships and structures within a grav well.

[sloosecannon]

but realistically speaking, if your shipyard is constructing a ship, there should be no way to also do repairs on a ship... its resources are eaten up by the new ship...

This is pretty much my point. Though if you are the Republic... Just build a star base and give it Resupply ability; repairs ALL ships and structures within a grav well.

Heh I love resupply! lol yea that works much better than the repair platforms

[wbino]

Zooming in on some s/c got me thinking are all those muzzle effects costing you a performance hit?

And can they be lowered in someway?

I don't know the way the Sins engine works..if your zoomed out does the cpu still have to render?

[Lavo]

Zooming in on some s/c got me thinking are all those muzzle effects costing you a performance hit?

And can they be lowered in someway?

I don't know the way the Sins engine works..if your zoomed out does the cpu still have to render?

SCs themselves cause a performance hit regardless of muzzle effects; it's their existance that kills CPU. Docking all your fighters causes a performance boost. Even when zoomed out there is still lag.

[sloosecannon]

albeit maybe less lag because it doesn't actually have to draw all the models. Keep in mind that the lag is caused by 2 things, CPU lag (keeping track of all your units, objects, and life in general) and graphics lag (due to high poly models, etc)

If you have a (few) high quality graphics card(s) then graphics lag is not an issue. (that's my situation)

CPU lag would be caused by having sooooo many units that your CPU (or, technically, the one core of your CPU that sins is running on) can't handle it. This causes a number of problems, namely lag, poor AI responsiveness, and random disappearance of objects (visual effects. Try zooming in on a comet cloud with a giant fleet and watch the lasers, missiles, etc, disappear.)

 

If you have a low end graphics card, then life REALLY sucks. Your CPU has to handle both the visual effects that your card couldn't AND the high-stress job of keeping track of everything (which it probably couldn't do anyways).

 

The only way to guarantee that you will not have lag (especially late-game) in Sins is to get a VERY high end SINGLE CORE processor. As of now, I have no access to that kind of processor, and most people probably don't. This is the reason that Sins is notorious for terrible performance, even in Vanilla.

[Evaders99]

Most modern CPUs will ramp up clock speeds if only one core is being used. I don't see the whole bolded statement about single core processor being relevant. Yes you could try to artificially disable cores and ramp up single threading performance by overclocking, but that doesn't seem all that useful.

 

That being said, get a Sandy Bridge i7-2500 over a Pentium 4, etc. You will again a lot in performance by instructions-per-clock efficiencies and power efficiencies. Plus all modern CPUs are native multicore anyway.

 

Sins just needs to be rewritten to use multicore processors. But I doubt we'd see that until the engine is rewritten.. Sins 2 maybe?

[MrPhildevil]

Sins just needs to be rewritten to use multicore processors. But I doubt we'd see that until the engine is rewritten.. Sins 2 maybe?

 

I'll pray for that...

[wbino]

Are there performance improvements to Diplomacy that are not in the mod because we are still in Entrenchment? And is the plan to move right into Rebellion as it incorporates all of Diplomacy?

[Lavo]

Are there performance improvements to Diplomacy that are not in the mod because we are still in Entrenchment? And is the plan to move right into Rebellion as it incorporates all of Diplomacy?

I think Diplomacy has some improvements, but how much I don't know. While there will be a Diplomacy and Rebellion version eventually, I'm personally not in a rush to run up to Diplomacy before the ships are truly completely done and balanced. Admittedly, I don't even have Diplomacy, not sure if I'll even buy it at this point as Rebellion will have everything it has and then some.

[wbino]

So your the one holding things up.........

[01lude]

- there is no way to research the heavy munitions (something volley its called) ability for the providence capital ship. also the damage from this ability seems a bit small.

 

- when i try to update recently it says the target folder "is already locked." not sure if this is something on my end or an issue with svn.

 

- trouble accessing the forums at various times. i log in and it will take me to this blue page that says "justhost.com."

[Lavo]

- there is no way to research the heavy munitions (something volley its called) ability for the providence capital ship.

I'll fix this ASAP. I forgot to readd it to the CIS once I forced capital Torpedo Volley to require research; it's the only CIS ability that (now) calls upon the research. Thanks a bunch for the heads up!

 

also the damage from this ability seems a bit small.

The ability is also one of the best capital ship abilities, as it can hit and damage multiple ships. Level it up a bit and you will see it in fact slaughters ships that are clustered in groups.

 

- when i try to update recently it says the target folder "is already locked." not sure if this is something on my end or an issue with svn.

Try using the clean up SVN feature before updating. It's under TortoiseSVN -> Clean Up.

[zoommooz]

Been playing for a couple of days now and would like to post some observations.

 

 

1. I love the huge scale of ships compared to planets and each other. I would definitely leave this as is.

 

2. What is the thought process behind so many resources asteroids? In terms of limiting lag (which as I am sure you know, is a big problem for sins, and an even bigger problem for SOGE) why not have less of them, but make them produce more resources? Even if this was intended to provide a bigger difference between planet types, I think 1-6 would be more then sufficient.

 

3. In the search for an epic and realistic (in a fantasy setting no less lol) I think that research, hull repair rates, population growth, planet health growth, antimatter refresh rate all need to be balanced. Now admittedly I love VERY long, VERY slow games, so what I suggest here is sure to be over the top, but even generally, I think steps in these directions could be done, in order to make the game less arcade like:

 

Hull repair. I slowed this down by 500%. This means that there is a reason (tactically) to try and remove ships from a fight when hull damage takes place. (Also see point 4. below)

 

Anti mater refresh:A 400% decrease here, which means that special abilities are not going of ever single second. Even with this reduction, I find that there is plenty of special ability usage (the zero anitmatter travel cost also encourages this), and, it is a bit more crucial on timing, planning ahead for battles etc.

 

Planet pop growth: I modified this by a huge 900%. It just does not make sense to me that a planet can be bombed to near destruction, and become fully populated within 5 minutes of game time (some variations here, depending on planet type, infastructure here).

 

Research/stations required: Now it seems to me that by having research so cheap, this mod is really a combat simulator, or battle simulator rather then a empire simulator. I have read that the research cost will be looked at, but for me, I did a X8 cost increase, which while sounding excessive, takes into account the massive amount of money that comes poring in from those mega planets (Coruscant). Also, this plant types colonization slot is too far into the tech tree (only because the ai struggles here, while me the human makes a beeline for it, which in my games of expensive research and 16 stations, means I get to colonise these planets well before the ai).

 

4. I've read a bit about the time in which it takes certain ships to be destroyed in the starwars universe, and while its probably canon to be able to do this, from a tactical and game play point of view, the combat is just too quick IMHO. I have increase all ships,station etc shields and hull by 125% and found this amount to work very well. I've still had my Star destroyers destroyed very quickly (20-30 seconds of combat, damn those Vong lol), so its hardly slow or boring, it just means you can think and react a bit more.

 

 

Also wanted to add that the weapons range is fantastic, with the ability to take pot shots at range, or move in close for all weapons to fire a real tactical, and realistic idea, which had been very well done. What is the chances of have an attack toggle which commands your ship to move into optimal firing distance (shortest range weapon can reach target)? as, as it is now an attack command is for long distance only.

 

 

Lastly, I would just like to reiterate that because I like long games I am sure my ideas will be viewed as excessive (which they are), but I would like the general idea (that is a move towards) to be considered for just normal speed games. Regardless, these a just some thoughts in a beta, and in no way take away from what I consider to be a fantastic, hugely complex and 'lots of work' mod. Now, if only there was a way to reduce lag, we could begin to see a real star wars universe come alive.

 

Cheers

 

 

Edit: Just forgot to add that I think the capital ships supply costs are a bit excessive (I've only played the empire so far) when compared to there cruiser counterparts. If you have an increase cost in capital research slots (as above point 4.) this still means that capitals are not a dime a dozen. For example, while I am more the happy for the SSD to have a huge supply amount (hell, 150 might actually be too low for this monster) if we compare for the 53 ship point for the command star destroyer, to the 18 for the standard star destroyer, the difference here is too great. Perhaps 30-25 vs 18 seems more realistic to me. (Also, in the quest for low lag, I have my game constant ship supply setting at .50)

[sloosecannon]

First off, thanks for the reply... unlike a lot of internet users out there, I actually like to see a wall of text in front of me (it shows me that you actually tried to test the mod rather than just playing it for the lolz)

 

 

Been playing for a couple of days now and would like to post some observations.

2. What is the thought process behind so many resources asteroids? In terms of limiting lag (which as I am sure you know, is a big problem for sins, and an even bigger problem for SOGE) why not have less of them, but make them produce more resources? Even if this was intended to provide a bigger difference between planet types, I think 1-6 would be more then sufficient.

 

Umm... I think it's to kinda change the way that the game feels... if you're raking in the dough from hundreds of asteroids, rather than running off of a handful, it feels more empire-like

 

Hull repair. I slowed this down by 500%. This means that there is a reason (tactically) to try and remove ships from a fight when hull damage takes place. (Also see point 4. below)

The problem with this is if your ships take years to repair, why wouldn't you scuttle it and get a new one? especially for cruisers... Unless there's a way to get repair rates to increase out of combat.. (lavo? Any ideas? is this even possible? I don't think so, but maybe)

 

Anti mater refresh:A 400% decrease here, which means that special abilities are not going of ever single second. Even with this reduction, I find that there is plenty of special ability usage (the zero anitmatter travel cost also encourages this), and, it is a bit more crucial on timing, planning ahead for battles etc.

 

Until you have an ability that you have to wait 30 minutes to activate...

 

Planet pop growth: I modified this by a huge 900%. It just does not make sense to me that a planet can be bombed to near destruction, and become fully populated within 5 minutes of game time (some variations here, depending on planet type, infastructure here).

This could work... maybe not 900%, but I could see this working.

 

 

Research/stations required: Now it seems to me that by having research so cheap, this mod is really a combat simulator, or battle simulator rather then a empire simulator. I have read that the research cost will be looked at, but for me, I did a X8 cost increase, which while sounding excessive, takes into account the massive amount of money that comes poring in from those mega planets (Coruscant). Also, this plant types colonization slot is too far into the tech tree (only because the ai struggles here, while me the human makes a beeline for it, which in my games of expensive research and 16 stations, means I get to colonise these planets well before the ai).

Maybe, but keep in mind that a crippled AI is a bad AI... if it can't figure out how to colonize those planets (which it can't without excessive work) then it's stuck, and your game is no fun

 

4. I've read a bit about the time in which it takes certain ships to be destroyed in the starwars universe, and while its probably canon to be able to do this, from a tactical and game play point of view, the combat is just too quick IMHO. I have increase all ships,station etc shields and hull by 125% and found this amount to work very well. I've still had my Star destroyers destroyed very quickly (20-30 seconds of combat, damn those Vong lol), so its hardly slow or boring, it just means you can think and react a bit more.

Not a bad idea... I actually like that idea...

 

Also wanted to add that the weapons range is fantastic, with the ability to take pot shots at range, or move in close for all weapons to fire a real tactical, and realistic idea, which had been very well done. What is the chances of have an attack toggle which commands your ship to move into optimal firing distance (shortest range weapon can reach target)? as, as it is now an attack command is for long distance only.

 

Unfortunately, not likely... That kind of stuff is really hardcoded... nothing we can change there...

 

Lastly, I would just like to reiterate that because I like long games I am sure my ideas will be viewed as excessive (which they are), but I would like the general idea (that is a move towards) to be considered for just normal speed games. Regardless, these a just some thoughts in a beta, and in no way take away from what I consider to be a fantastic, hugely complex and 'lots of work' mod. Now, if only there was a way to reduce lag, we could begin to see a real star wars universe come alive.

Thanks for your thoughts... I like long games too... Fun stuff... Unfortunately, until rebellion comes out (maybe... not even sure about this one) we can't really do much about lag... even if you get a 12 core supercomputer style processor, it still won't help because Sins runs only on a single core... period. Unless the devs make entrenchment multi-threaded (which isn't gonna happen), then we're stuck as is.

 

Edit: Just forgot to add that I think the capital ships supply costs are a bit excessive (I've only played the empire so far) when compared to there cruiser counterparts. If you have an increase cost in capital research slots (as above point 4.) this still means that capitals are not a dime a dozen. For example, while I am more the happy for the SSD to have a huge supply amount (hell, 150 might actually be too low for this monster) if we compare for the 53 ship point for the command star destroyer, to the 18 for the standard star destroyer, the difference here is too great. Perhaps 30-25 vs 18 seems more realistic to me. (Also, in the quest for low lag, I have my game constant ship supply setting at .50)

What're your thoughts lavo? I would be open to tweaking this...

 

Some of your tweaks may be a little excessive, but I'm still happy to hear them. I like that you're playing around with the mod and trying new things out... That's how this has been since I joined... It's good to have you on the team as a tester.

[zoommooz]

1.I agree, I like the 'idea' of many asteroids, just thinking in terms of reducing lag.

 

2. Ships do indeed take ages to repair hull damage (not shield) but this does quite a few things. (a) It adds tactical consideration to combat/shield damage/hull damage. B. Ships that are heavly hull damaged need to be 'taken of line' and return home to a repair dock-added realism. C. Because of the very expensive ship cost (which I love btw) simple building new ones is not really an option, not to mention capital ships with experience are irreplaceable. In addition I have a MUCH slower build rate in my games, so a basic star destroyer, on a non ship building world take in the order of 1500 seconds to build, so scuttle/rebuild is just not an option in my games. Overall I just like the idea that heavy hull damage is a relatively serious/long term problem.

 

3. Even with my animatter rates set to -400%, in game condition, I always seem to have plenty of antimatter. I just means that its a bit more selective, rather then a constant stream of usage.

 

4. Agreed with the ai/research. While I love long game and expensive research tree's, the ai's ability to use them comes first. I will tinker with this more and see what the ai can handle.

 

 

Edit: While I don't know how to increase repair rates out of combat, the games constant file has a repair rate reduction 'in combat' which could be used to essentially do the same thing. Is has a penalty rate, and a timer for how long after combat this rate is incurred.

[sloosecannon]

Edit: While I don't know how to increase repair rates out of combat, the games constant file has a repair rate reduction 'in combat' which could be used to essentially do the same thing. Is has a penalty rate, and a timer for how long after combat this rate is incurred.

 

That's actually good to hear... If you want to mess around with that, then go ahead... I'd be interested in the results...

 

As a side note, Rebellion apparently will not be multithreaded... or 64bit friendly... (thanks great oracle of google)

So, it looks like our lag problem won't be fixed any time soon

[Lavo]

Yessss... Moar commentary!

 

B2. What is the thought process behind so many resources asteroids? In terms of limiting lag (which as I am sure you know, is a big problem for sins, and an even bigger problem for SOGE) why not have less of them, but make them produce more resources? Even if this was intended to provide a bigger difference between planet types, I think 1-6 would be more then sufficient.

To be fair, mines don't generate a much of lag, as they are static. Things which don't move, don't fire weapons, and don't "create" ships and/or effects don't cause notable strain on a CPU. However, for the starting Terran planet, I'm thinking/planning to reduce the number of resource asteroids it has, though increase each mine's production (so there isn't a net "loss"). To re-balance the mines would take a lot of time, and literally mean editing hundreds of files.

 

3. In the search for an epic and realistic (in a fantasy setting no less lol) I think that research, hull repair rates, population growth, planet health growth, antimatter refresh rate all need to be balanced. Now admittedly I love VERY long, VERY slow games, so what I suggest here is sure to be over the top, but even generally, I think steps in these directions could be done, in order to make the game less arcade like:

 

Hull repair. I slowed this down by 500%. This means that there is a reason (tactically) to try and remove ships from a fight when hull damage takes place. (Also see point 4. below)

Hrm... While I think, for out of combat time, that the hull restore rates are good enough, in combat rates can indeed be a bit excessive. While they currently have a 50% in combat penalty (thanks for that Gameplay.constants heads up!), when I think about it I agree that it is not enough. As such I'll increase it heavily. Really good suggestion, I hadn't thought about this. I also noticed another interesting constant right under the hull rate, which if it is what I think it is, will be a nice thing to play with...

 

Anti mater refresh:A 400% decrease here, which means that special abilities are not going of ever single second. Even with this reduction, I find that there is plenty of special ability usage (the zero anitmatter travel cost also encourages this), and, it is a bit more crucial on timing, planning ahead for battles etc.

I have to disagree with this, while some ships seem to never run out of antimatter, there are some which run out of it VERY quickly, such as the Munificent and Jedi Venator. Reducing antimatter refresh rate would be a killer for these ships, and planning is still a key factor in SoGE, even more so when up against human players.

 

Planet pop growth: I modified this by a huge 900%. It just does not make sense to me that a planet can be bombed to near destruction, and become fully populated within 5 minutes of game time (some variations here, depending on planet type, infastructure here).

Planets with large populations take a long time to entirely become repopulated. Smaller planets don't take much time to build up, because they are small (circular reasoning I know). However, medium sized planets do take time to rebuild, if a faction keeps bombing something, it won't rebuild right away.

 

Research/stations required: Now it seems to me that by having research so cheap, this mod is really a combat simulator, or battle simulator rather then a empire simulator. I have read that the research cost will be looked at, but for me, I did a X8 cost increase, which while sounding excessive, takes into account the massive amount of money that comes poring in from those mega planets (Coruscant).

I really appreciate this comment. You are the first person to comment on research costs since they were first increased, if memory serves. I wasn't sure if I increased them enough, I personally think I didn't increase them enough, but wasn't entirely sure. Seeing this, I will increase the costs more, and possibly will increase research items which are later down the research tree more, in order to reflect the fact that they are supposed to be "late game" techs.

 

Also, this plant types colonization slot is too far into the tech tree (only because the ai struggles here, while me the human makes a beeline for it, which in my games of expensive research and 16 stations, means I get to colonise these planets well before the ai).

Yeah, this is a known thing. I mean, as per Star Wars the current set up makes sense, but in terms of Sins gameplay it kills the AI. I've somewhat mitigated this by making the Extra Planets maps, where each player starts with three planets (Asteroid, regular Terran, modified Low Terran), which means more logistic slots. I've hesitated to modify these techs mainly as I'm not the one who made the planets mod, and as it does make sense from a gameplay perspective.

 

4. I've read a bit about the time in which it takes certain ships to be destroyed in the starwars universe, and while its probably canon to be able to do this, from a tactical and game play point of view, the combat is just too quick IMHO. I have increase all ships,station etc shields and hull by 125% and found this amount to work very well. I've still had my Star destroyers destroyed very quickly (20-30 seconds of combat, damn those Vong lol), so its hardly slow or boring, it just means you can think and react a bit more.

After the next release, there are plans to rework weapon and health stats. This applies a lot to frigates (whose current state IMHO, is terrible), and due to the planned implementation of real ion cannons (that is, actual weapons which only deal shield damage).

 

Also wanted to add that the weapons range is fantastic, with the ability to take pot shots at range, or move in close for all weapons to fire a real tactical, and realistic idea, which had been very well done. What is the chances of have an attack toggle which commands your ship to move into optimal firing distance (shortest range weapon can reach target)? as, as it is now an attack command is for long distance only.

Unfortunately AI weapon ranges are hardcoded. You COULD modify each ship's entity file so they by default move in to range so all of their weapons, including anti-fighter weapons, will hit a target. However by doing this you lose that long-ranged strike capability, as a ship will ALWAYS move into that short ranged distance.

 

Lastly, I would just like to reiterate that because I like long games I am sure my ideas will be viewed as excessive (which they are), but I would like the general idea (that is a move towards) to be considered for just normal speed games.

When I play my games are usually a minimum of 8 hours. I've played 10 and I think even 12 hour games before.

 

Regardless, these a just some thoughts in a beta, and in no way take away from what I consider to be a fantastic, hugely complex and 'lots of work' mod. Now, if only there was a way to reduce lag, we could begin to see a real star wars universe come alive.

To be entirely honest, the beta needs more people like you. Whenever I see these walls of text, they make my day, as they give me feedback and data to work off of, and more things to consider.

 

Edit: Just forgot to add that I think the capital ships supply costs are a bit excessive (I've only played the empire so far) when compared to there cruiser counterparts. If you have an increase cost in capital research slots (as above point 4.) this still means that capitals are not a dime a dozen. For example, while I am more the happy for the SSD to have a huge supply amount (hell, 150 might actually be too low for this monster) if we compare for the 53 ship point for the command star destroyer, to the 18 for the standard star destroyer, the difference here is too great. Perhaps 30-25 vs 18 seems more realistic to me. (Also, in the quest for low lag, I have my game constant ship supply setting at .50)

The difference is mainly to take into account abilities of leveled up capital ships, plus their increased starfighter counts and slightly higher stats. For example, a leveled up ISD Command boosts the fighting capacity of an entire fleet, never mind it's own firepower. However, when I think about it, what you say does hold merit. I agree that a decrease is in order, perhaps not to the 25-30 range, but a reduction nonetheless. Your point on supercapitals os also quite valid, and I think that those could definitely use a supply increase, the SSD/Viscount/Vong BB in particular. I will get onto these right away. Edit: After doing some tests, a high level capital ship can take on three of it's cruiser variants (with all tech researched for both sides, starfighters docked) fairly easy. For example I put 3 ISD Is against a level 10 ISD Command; the ISD Command beat them all without going under 10 000 shielding. As such, I'll leave capital supply costs as they are, mainly as one cannot increase supply cost via ability. In another I put a level 5 Jedi Venator up against 3 Venator cruisers; the Jedi Venator did not lose it's shields while the cruisers were all destroyed.

 

2. Ships do indeed take ages to repair hull damage (not shield) but this does quite a few things. (a) It adds tactical consideration to combat/shield damage/hull damage. B. Ships that are heavly hull damaged need to be 'taken of line' and return home to a repair dock-added realism. C. Because of the very expensive ship cost (which I love btw) simple building new ones is not really an option, not to mention capital ships with experience are irreplaceable.

Mmhm, to add to this it would make the repair bay/dock, which exists for this very reason, more useful. Or in the case of the NR and Republic, keeping ships with repair abilities in fleets at all times.

3. Even with my animatter rates set to -400%, in game condition, I always seem to have plenty of antimatter. I just means that its a bit more selective, rather then a constant stream of usage.

Again, this depends on the ship. It would also cripple the AI as the AI cannot "choose" whether to fire an ability off or not, save for a non-auto Scout.

Edited November 20, 2011 by Lavo

[zoommooz]

Firstly, thanks for taking the time to respond to my observations.

 

 

1. While I agree that in in combat rate can be heavily increased, I feel that the timer here is equally important. If the timer is short (as default) a ship which slips out of range can find itself up to full repair rate very easily, while still technically 'in combat'. I am really harsh in my games here with timer for ship in combat/ planet being bomber / constructor replenish/ fighter replenish all set MUCH higher then standard, in the order of 300-450 seconds. This suits my long game style but could be looked at for the normal game.

 

2. I've only ever played the empire so far, so I accept your point on antimatter. From my point of view the 400% makes the empire work realistically and well, so perhaps an across the board 400% is not selective enough. I am going to give the jedi guys a go at my settings, and see how it goes.

 

3. Bit of a difference of opinion here. From what I have observed planet pop growth is just way to fast, regardless of planet type. I also made a typo here, I reduced planet growth by 9000%. Even at this level, Corascant, at the infrastructure level of 4000-6000 pop increases its pop by 1 ever second, so to fully reach 6000 takes approx 2000 seconds, which in the scheme of things (ship build types/travel time etc) seems entirely appropriate to me. Admittedly the pop growth rate at the infrastructure level is massive, around 12.4 IIRC but still, on standard settings, watching this pop go up looks like a stop watch running LOL. I guess I'm happy for a really slow pop growth for my games, mainly because planet bombardment of a nice, juicy 1000 pop terran planet becomes a real problem, and something that cannot be recovered from in 3-5 in game minutes.

 

4. Like your idea about late game techs, as there is a bit of 'not high enough' compared with earlier tech's. Rather then just a 'have a big increase' I will look at the tech tree much more selectively and add some observations specifically about it (tech tree's are a tremendously important aspect of games like these)

 

5. In my current game I am trialling ship supply at .50 (so you have 50 supply before any research is done) and basically halving capital ships supply (not SSD, as you say 150 is just too low). What I am aiming to do is a bit ai related, as due to lag, I don't want the ai to comes at me with 1000, 1 supply ships, but rather smaller, better quality fleets.

 

Edit: Total different topic. I cannot see what the real difference between the ISD 1 and ISD2 are. There are the different abilities, 1 supply point and stats, but in my games, I find that I will take a ISD2 every time. I think there need to be either a 1. Larger difference between to two in terms of cost/stats/suppy, or perhaps some tech requirements for the newer ship, or actually both. Just a thought.

[Lavo]

1. While I agree that in in combat rate can be heavily increased, I feel that the timer here is equally important. If the timer is short (as default) a ship which slips out of range can find itself up to full repair rate very easily, while still technically 'in combat'. I am really harsh in my games here with timer for ship in combat/ planet being bomber / constructor replenish/ fighter replenish all set MUCH higher then standard, in the order of 300-450 seconds. This suits my long game style but could be looked at for the normal game.

I'll play around with the timer as well.

 

3. Bit of a difference of opinion here. From what I have observed planet pop growth is just way to fast, regardless of planet type. I also made a typo here, I reduced planet growth by 9000%. Even at this level, Corascant, at the infrastructure level of 4000-6000 pop increases its pop by 1 ever second, so to fully reach 6000 takes approx 2000 seconds, which in the scheme of things (ship build types/travel time etc) seems entirely appropriate to me. Admittedly the pop growth rate at the infrastructure level is massive, around 12.4 IIRC but still, on standard settings, watching this pop go up looks like a stop watch running LOL. I guess I'm happy for a really slow pop growth for my games, mainly because planet bombardment of a nice, juicy 1000 pop terran planet becomes a real problem, and something that cannot be recovered from in 3-5 in game minutes.

I think you aren't taking into account how long it takes to reach this stage, as the upgrade times themselves scale up per level. Though yeah, opinions.

 

4. Like your idea about late game techs, as there is a bit of 'not high enough' compared with earlier tech's. Rather then just a 'have a big increase' I will look at the tech tree much more selectively and add some observations specifically about it (tech tree's are a tremendously important aspect of games like these)

Looking forwards to this.

 

5. In my current game I am trialling ship supply at .50 (so you have 50 supply before any research is done) and basically halving capital ships supply (not SSD, as you say 150 is just too low). What I am aiming to do is a bit ai related, as due to lag, I don't want the ai to comes at me with 1000, 1 supply ships, but rather smaller, better quality fleets.

Yeah, I don't blame you on the lesser supply bit. Also, not sure if you saw my edit, so I'll copy/paste it here. After doing some tests, a high level capital ship can take on three of it's cruiser variants (with all tech researched for both sides, starfighters docked) fairly easy. For example I put 3 ISD Is against a level 10 ISD Command; the ISD Command beat them all without going under 10 000 shielding. In another I put a level 5 Jedi Venator up against 3 Venator cruisers; the Jedi Venator did not lose it's shields while the cruisers were all destroyed. As such, I'll leave capital supply costs as they are, mainly as one cannot increase supply cost via ability.

[zoommooz]

Yes, you are right the supply for capitals is correct when looking at the combat results you have supplied. However, my original supply observations came from a thought process of real life (ie a command ship was still based on a stock ISD, but with a better crew, some better equipment), and while good, not some sort of super ship. For my own game I am going to stick with the halved supply but correspondingly, raise that amount of experience needed for level ups (so I probably will not see too many level 10), and nerf the amount of increased shield/armour/damage etc that capitals receive on level up. However this is just for me, I think that for the mod itself, your testing is right.