Beta Observations and Thoughts

[ara]

Ok so am new to the beta but wanted to get started with my notes and thoughts and have a thread I can put it all in - things that aren't bugs at least - so I can keep track of what I'm jabbering on about and if I decide to try and fix/alter things myself.

 

Plus before I start a huge thanks to all the people who've done so much work on this mod, its already a joy to behold!

 

Oh and planets are awesome, makes a massive difference to the game playing with a decent variety.

 

30 March 2011

 

1. Venator ARCS Frigate Speed

Are these supposed to be the fastest ship in the game? They are so fast in fact that if I ask one to move to an equal distance between a planet and the edge of its gravity well by the time the ship actually comes to a halt it is almost twice as far from the planet as the edge of the gravity well and has to fly back again....where it of course overshoots...rinse and repeat. Its partly a byproduct of 'Intercept' which seems to fire every time they are ordered to move (so its now turned off) but even without this the frigate seems to be much faster than the cap versions which I don't understand since they are basically the same ship.

 

2. Ships turn transparent during hyperspace jumps. I've watched ships in hyperspace before and not noticed this in 1.0E or vanilla but will go and check for myself soon. For some reason the ships all turn semi-transparent during their hyper jumps, no idea why unless its a texture saver which I guess makes sense.

 

3. Scout Frigates are still a total waste, especially early on when you actually need them.

 

4. In Republic Tech Tree there are various upgrades that state unlocks 'missing string'. Can list but I'm sure you're aware of this.

 

5. Republic Colonizers seem to no longer auto colonize a system if they are in it, they seem quite happy to just sit there. Not sure why this would be. Edit: This is only when a fleet is present, if they are alone they colonize, if a fleet is there they join the fleet instead. Is this an Ironclad issue or something we can fix?

 

6. Clearing the systems of their militia is now just a chore. With 1 Jedi Venerator and two basic Venerators I was never in trouble at all, in fact I don't think my shields ever went below half even when facing off against 10+ ships on my third planet in a row. Needs more testing and checking of numbers compared to support costs but if those three ships (that can be owned without any upgrades) are more than double a match for 2 Broadsides, 5 Dreadnoughts and a whole bunch of smaller cruisers why would you ever need to build anything smaller? And thats with fleet size set to small as well!

 

Overall I found the mod stable and looking great. My only issue is the whole Cruiser vs Frigate issue. I realise most people want to play big ships off against each other but if there is no point in having smaller cruisers for anything why not replace them with better ships of a usable size (if there are any in the canon of course and I know that means more modelling).

 

More later

[Lavo]

1. Venator ARCS Frigate Speed

Are these supposed to be the fastest ship in the game? They are so fast in fact that if I ask one to move to an equal distance between a planet and the edge of its gravity well by the time the ship actually comes to a halt it is almost twice as far from the planet as the edge of the gravity well and has to fly back again....where it of course overshoots...rinse and repeat. Its partly a byproduct of 'Intercept' which seems to fire every time they are ordered to move (so its now turned off) but even without this the frigate seems to be much faster than the cap versions which I don't understand since they are basically the same ship.

In SoGE, the cruiser and capital variants of a ship are actually quite different. In reality, there was no such a difference, this was purely a game addition. The primary reason the capital version does not have the Intercept ability is due to making room for it's other abilities. As for the overshooting, this is my fault. In the past, the Intercept ability caused ships to make massive turns, which in fact caused them to veer off course from where they actually wanted to go. In order to remedy this, I attempted to slash the turn rate boost. This fixed the issue of veering off course, however, this brought in the new issue of overshooting.

 

2. Ships turn transparent during hyperspace jumps. I've watched ships in hyperspace before and not noticed this in 1.0E or vanilla but will go and check for myself soon. For some reason the ships all turn semi-transparent during their hyper jumps, no idea why unless its a texture saver which I guess makes sense.

This is a game engine thing, nothing that can be done really.

 

3. Scout Frigates are still a total waste, especially early on when you actually need them.

Depends on the faction. Though personally I don't build scouts much, I either build Hardcells as the CIS and/or micromanage the ones I already have.

 

4. In Republic Tech Tree there are various upgrades that state unlocks 'missing string'. Can list but I'm sure you're aware of this.

I'm looking at this now, will edit post. Edit: Do you mean the Republic, or New Republic? As if it's the former, I'm not seeing anything missing. Either way, if you can, tell me which you don't see, and/or provide screenshots, as I'll deal with it if so. However, if you are referring to the Health and Armor upgrades in the Defense tree, this is known. I've tracked down the two abilities responsible, and will put in strings for them at some point.

 

5. Republic Colonizers seem to no longer auto colonize a system if they are in it, they seem quite happy to just sit there. Not sure why this would be. Edit: This is only when a fleet is present, if they are alone they colonize, if a fleet is there they join the fleet instead. Is this an Ironclad issue or something we can fix?

This is likely due to having auto-join fleet on. Thanks for bringing this up, I haven't noticed this occurring until I checked the file. This should be fixed next update.

 

6. Clearing the systems of their militia is now just a chore. With 1 Jedi Venerator and two basic Venerators I was never in trouble at all, in fact I don't think my shields ever went below half even when facing off against 10+ ships on my third planet in a row. Needs more testing and checking of numbers compared to support costs but if those three ships (that can be owned without any upgrades) are more than double a match for 2 Broadsides, 5 Dreadnoughts and a whole bunch of smaller cruisers why would you ever need to build anything smaller? And thats with fleet size set to small as well!

When you start, the best strategy is indeed to build 1-2 capitals. This isn't gamey at all, it's just strategy. I've personally been doing this since I first started playing SoGE. The AI does not use this strategy however. It is interesting that you notice this now, as the Venator has actually been somewhat nerfed over the past capital updates.

 

Overall I found the mod stable and looking great. My only issue is the whole Cruiser vs Frigate issue. I realise most people want to play big ships off against each other but if there is no point in having smaller cruisers for anything why not replace them with better ships of a usable size (if there are any in the canon of course and I know that means more modelling).

There's two benefits to frigates, cost and abilities. For many factions, there is indeed no point to get frigates, as is the case for the CIS (imo). However for factions like the Vong and Empire, frigates can be extremely useful, and provide a large amount of cost-effective firepower, cheap carriers, and/or abilities. Ships all have their time and place, what you use or find useful depends on your strategy or play style.

[Evaders99]

Thanks for the feedback ara! That's exactly what we need from beta testing

[ara]

In SoGE, the cruiser and capital variants of a ship are actually quite different. In reality, there was no such a difference, this was purely a game addition. The primary reason the capital version does not have the Intercept ability is due to making room for it's other abilities. As for the overshooting, this is my fault. In the past, the Intercept ability caused ships to make massive turns, which in fact caused them to veer off course from where they actually wanted to go. In order to remedy this, I attempted to slash the turn rate boost. This fixed the issue of veering off course, however, this brought in the new issue of overshooting.

 

Ok, understand the lack of Intercept on the Capital version, but still think the 'smaller' ones just move too fast in general. Even with intercept off they traverse a gravity well about 33%-50% faster than their big brothers. Also I think the speed bonus of intercept could be brought down a fair amount, right now it's actually a useless ability since the ship only gets 1-2 volleys in before its back out of range and if you're using it to cross systems to get to another place it actually doesn't save time due to the overshoot at the system edge. You could happily halve the intercept speed and it would still be a powerful ability for getting them across systems quickly and would even possibly be useful inside a single system during a fight....although having said that its entirely possible it should be unusable if an enemy is within gun range (not sure if thats possible though)

 

I'm looking at this now, will edit post. Edit: Do you mean the Republic, or New Republic? As if it's the former, I'm not seeing anything missing. Either way, if you can, tell me which you don't see, and/or provide screenshots, as I'll deal with it if so. However, if you are referring to the Health and Armor upgrades in the Defense tree, this is known. I've tracked down the two abilities responsible, and will put in strings for them at some point.

 

Yep, Republic not NR. There are now 3 missing as of the update I just did which are (as you said) the tactical tree in the defense tab. Tactical Fortification, Tactical hardening and Tactical Damage Increase.

[Lavo]

Ok, understand the lack of Intercept on the Capital version, but still think the 'smaller' ones just move too fast in general. Even with intercept off they traverse a gravity well about 33%-50% faster than their big brothers. Also I think the speed bonus of intercept could be brought down a fair amount, right now it's actually a useless ability since the ship only gets 1-2 volleys in before its back out of range and if you're using it to cross systems to get to another place it actually doesn't save time due to the overshoot at the system edge. You could happily halve the intercept speed and it would still be a powerful ability for getting them across systems quickly and would even possibly be useful inside a single system during a fight....although having said that its entirely possible it should be unusable if an enemy is within gun range (not sure if thats possible though)

The Venator cruiser is not the only ship which uses this ability. And it isn't a useless ability at all, it merely needs refinement. With the ability it makes sense that they are faster than the capital version, as that is exactly what the ability does. I could put the old turn rate back in and fix the over shooting issue right there and then, though like I said, this brings back the issue of ships going way outside of a gravity well. The rate of turn is not fixed, and indeed, needs work in order to ensure that the Intercept ability works as intended. That restriction of gun range is not possible, and it would also hamper many positive uses of the ability (such as getting away from ships in gun range).

 

Yep, Republic not NR. There are now 3 missing as of the update I just did which are (as you said) the tactical tree in the defense tab. Tactical Fortification, Tactical hardening and Tactical Damage Increase.

This is an issue with all factions. As I said, I've tracked down two of them, the Tactical Hardening improves the armor and shield regeneration of tactical structures, and the Tac. Damage Increase boosts their rate of fire.

[ara]

What about simply halving the speed increase, which would be I think a 60% speed boost. This would halve the overshoot as well in theory at least and would still keep it as a very usable ability without it being quite so insane.

 

Also whats the speed difference between the capital ships and the regular ships in general? Even with intercept turned off this seems quite a difference. Maybe bringing this down a little and then less of a reduction maybe to 80% would be a better solution?

 

I haven't played much of the other races so far but playing on hard these ships just seem overpowered as frigates. Sure they cost a bit but about an hour into the game I'm usually sitting on about 8-10 planets and 200000 credits so can just spam them and walk across the galaxy. Star destroyers seem no match at all especially once you add a fully charged battle meditation into the mix.

 

---

 

On a slight tangent is it possible to alter the in game support mechanisms? For instance would it be possible to make the current small fleet sizes be represented by medium and medium by large and then alter small to something like half the number of caps per upgrade and halving the support costs. This would create a game mode that would force players to think much more carefully about where to put their cap ships and also create fleets much more like we would expect to see with a cap ship and then a decent amount of frigate and destroyer support. Obviously a big issue would then be systems defences that would most likely be overpowered and too hard to overcome without using a 'main' fleet. Just wondering if its possible though.

[Lavo]

What about simply halving the speed increase, which would be I think a 60% speed boost. This would halve the overshoot as well in theory at least and would still keep it as a very usable ability without it being quite so insane.

 

Also whats the speed difference between the capital ships and the regular ships in general? Even with intercept turned off this seems quite a difference. Maybe bringing this down a little and then less of a reduction maybe to 80% would be a better solution?

 

I haven't played much of the other races so far but playing on hard these ships just seem overpowered as frigates. Sure they cost a bit but about an hour into the game I'm usually sitting on about 8-10 planets and 200000 credits so can just spam them and walk across the galaxy. Star destroyers seem no match at all especially once you add a fully charged battle meditation into the mix.

Why should it be halved when the ability works well for the other ships that use it? The ability is very usable in it's current state, and lowering the speed bonus would diminish it's effectiveness.

 

There is no speed difference between regular ships and capitals; both have a 1000 max linear speed. The difference is in acceleration, the cruisers are superior in this regard.

 

All the ships in the game need price reworking. This is due to the current prices having been made before planet mods were added to SoGE.

 

On a slight tangent is it possible to alter the in game support mechanisms? For instance would it be possible to make the current small fleet sizes be represented by medium and medium by large and then alter small to something like half the number of caps per upgrade and halving the support costs. This would create a game mode that would force players to think much more carefully about where to put their cap ships and also create fleets much more like we would expect to see with a cap ship and then a decent amount of frigate and destroyer support. Obviously a big issue would then be systems defences that would most likely be overpowered and too hard to overcome without using a 'main' fleet. Just wondering if its possible though.

I don't understand what you are trying to say here. Could you possibly rephrase this?

[ara]

Just a difference of opinion on Intercept then. For me I see it as overpowered and making little sense to have a cruiser of that size with such an ability but thats obviously just me.

 

 

Erm rephrase.

 

What I'm suggesting again is probably personal taste but I'll try.

 

Either up the support cost of all the larger ships leading to the need to use combinations of smaller ships to get the best firepower overall creating a system of Big Ship+ Support = most firepower

 

Or lower the bonuses of the support and command upgrades to allow for less ships in general.

 

Obviously there are huge flaws and problems with such a simple suggestion, especially in balance, and like I say it's more personal preference for the game I think Star Wars should be. I get bored quickly of any game that is effectively a 'tank rush' scenario which currently this feels like, however if ship costs are all being redone this could very well be improved on then.

[ara]

New Beta Question.

 

 

Is is a design decision/issue or flaw that means I can't put Acclamators and Venators into the same fleet? In fact it seems Venators struggle being grouped with other ships as well. I would have thought the whole point of a fleet was to have a cap ship, some cruisers and then support ships all under 1 movement order. Engine issue or something we can address?

[Lavo]

Either up the support cost of all the larger ships leading to the need to use combinations of smaller ships to get the best firepower overall creating a system of Big Ship+ Support = most firepower

 

Or lower the bonuses of the support and command upgrades to allow for less ships in general.

 

Obviously there are huge flaws and problems with such a simple suggestion, especially in balance, and like I say it's more personal preference for the game I think Star Wars should be. I get bored quickly of any game that is effectively a 'tank rush' scenario which currently this feels like, however if ship costs are all being redone this could very well be improved on then.

Yeah, ship costs will be redone eventually. However, before this is even started, balancing out ships and making sure things are working properly aught to be done. In terms of costs I've been trying to make sure that things stay well priced in proportion to their stats and whatnot, as once ships are balanced out in all regards, a price change may simply be doubling the cost of all ships, or increasing them by 100, or something along those lines. Though this has the effect of limiting players who are unfortunate to start with being surrounded by base or fortress level worlds (I've seen it happen), but this is life. Perhaps when Rebellion comes out we could make the first capital ship of a faction free, however, until then this cannot be done as supercaps count as capital ships by the game's engine.

 

Is is a design decision/issue or flaw that means I can't put Acclamators and Venators into the same fleet? In fact it seems Venators struggle being grouped with other ships as well. I would have thought the whole point of a fleet was to have a cap ship, some cruisers and then support ships all under 1 movement order. Engine issue or something we can address?

I have absolutely no idea why this is occurring, nor have I personally seen it. Do you perchance mean the Acclamator I? If so, then this is an engine issue, as the game treats colonizers as being "separate" from fleets, even though in some cases they can be made to hyperspace with fleets (like the Trafed Carrier).

[Saituros]

I'm also new (just tried the mod for first time today) and if the OP doesn't mind I'll post my thoughts as well to make everything fit in one thread. Bear in mind as of this post I have only played it for under 2 hours, playing Empire and watched about 30minutes of the replay viewing the NR and Vong factions I'm up against. As a whole, the mod looks awesome. The game runs smoothly, the fights look excellent, and to whomever did the planets on this did an amazing job. The attention to Star Wars Cannon on ship types also impressed me, I gave a special omg seeing a Hapan Battle Dragon for the first time haha. The Vong are also great looking as well.

 

I do have a few questions though. I'm sure like the OP you guys are aware of a lot of these things but I have to play it safe.

 

First off, are some of the planets supposed to start out so that when you colonize the planet, the population upgrade is already full? The reason I ask is this has led to several frustrating colonizations, leaving me unable to upgrade the population, and having a planet now sucking credits since it is in the red on tax income. Also noted is one Asteroid colony I had was raided, destroying my structures and more importantly my construction vehicle, which for some reason would not auto respawn like normal, leaving me unable to rebuild.

 

Secondly, the resource drain upgrading the planets I felt was a little high. I was unable to really afford any higher tier planetary upgrades unless I just focused entirely on it, then leaving me with a small fleet, which I learned quick has big trouble when its outnumbered. So it seemed either expand really fast, don't upgrade more then 1 step of population and try to spam trade ports to build an economy or turtle and concentrate all your money on slowly doing 1 upgrade at a time, hoping you didn't get utterly slammed.

 

Also, I noticed several ships having irregular movement patterns. The most extreme case was the Imperial equivalent of the Cobalt frigate from vanilla sins, which would basically at full speed strafe the target, fly off to the other side of the planet, turn around and sometimes move backwards and then repeat. The speed of the ships also seemed a little high to me as well as a whole, with a fleet moving so fast across your planets, it seems easy to just move an assault fleet quickly out of range of defensive areas, then attack the weaker half since your ships move so fast.

 

Like the OP, I felt maybe the smaller ships are a little pointless, once you hit the point of massing your cruisers, it seems they just die really fast. Early game I think there's use obviously, but once everyone gets in a little they just seem cannon fodder.

 

Otherwise the other things I noticed were rather small, and mainly minor things.

1:Coralskippers (Vong starfighters) represented as Y-Wings and X-wings and when you scroll into them, the x-wing variant i believe comes up as string not found. Also fire green lasers like tie fighters.

2:M60 for NR is partial visible.

3:One minor thing that frustrated me was finding the Imperial's colonization frigate, none of them had a description that clearly said the ship colonizes or "invades" a planet. Meant building one of each ship till I found the right one.

Also on that note, out of curiosity where did the two capital class variants of the ISD come from? Most of Star Wars novels I recall have Imperial fleets led by ISD class II attack star destroyers, such as the famous "Chimaera" and a lot of the Imperial fleet consisted of Victory SD's as well, which I note are also absent.

4:Constructed the Starbase Golem Defense platform, and the volley technique seems to be a one/two fire only, after using its antimatter down to 15, the station would not regenerate any antimatter. Also, how come the one buildable from the tactical slot on a planet has more hull/shields?

5:Dreadnoughts "Slave Rigging" ability yield range also seemed kinda small, and requires really close knit fleets if its to work at all in my opinion.

 

Thanks for reading, hope maybe I caught something new and didn't just waste your time! haha.

[NovaCameron]

I really ought to put out a 'Guide to Planets' just due to the shear amount of changes I've done. Yes planets work as intended. You need to be careful at which times you colonize what. This is not like vanilla or sins plus where you can colonize EVERYTHING all at once and be just fine. You have to pick and choose which planets you want when. Low planets are weak, normals are ok, Highs are the best of the best. After the Novus Universum mod officially comes out most of these changes will be better shown and balanced. Unfortunately this probably means there is even MORE resources floating around. Do not expect to even upgrade all your planets in a game. They cost too much and take too much time. If a game drags on long enough you can, but for a few hours no. You can cripple an enemy with a few surgical strikes against high production planets in either credit, metal, or crystal production. This is intended to add more strategic value to these planets. High yield metal and crystal planets are weak and expensive to maintain. It is highly suggested to get a highly populous lvl 4 world to pay for them. These worlds are you cash source. A few of them will balance out your credits in no time. lvl 5 worlds are your main resource points. though weak and expensive they have to best metal and crystal income in the game (beside the crystal planet type which is in lvl 3). Lvl 1s are what you want to start out with. They are cheap and relatively easy to maintain. Go for these FIRST. Once you get enough of them grab some lvl 2s and 3s these world types are more expensive but have more resources and some nice trade bonuses. Your Lvl 4s, I can't state enough, are the core of your empire. These provide substantial trade and construction bonuses. They are also the cheapest relative to the other classes to upgrade. They are expensive just due to their shear size. They are heavily guarded so you can wait a while before cracking these. But once you do you can quickly upgrade them so they are your fortresses. Also Dwarf planets are the cheapest grab these first of any type. Then Normal, Large, Huge, and Super. Always watch your income to decide which planets you need and can afford.

[Saituros]

I really ought to put out a 'Guide to Planets' just due to the shear amount of changes I've done. Yes planets work as intended. You need to be careful at which times you colonize what. This is not like vanilla or sins plus where you can colonize EVERYTHING all at once and be just fine. You have to pick and choose which planets you want when. Low planets are weak, normals are ok, Highs are the best of the best. After the Novus Universum mod officially comes out most of these changes will be better shown and balanced. Unfortunately this probably means there is even MORE resources floating around. Do not expect to even upgrade all your planets in a game. They cost too much and take too much time. If a game drags on long enough you can, but for a few hours no. You can cripple an enemy with a few surgical strikes against high production planets in either credit, metal, or crystal production. This is intended to add more strategic value to these planets. High yield metal and crystal planets are weak and expensive to maintain. It is highly suggested to get a highly populous lvl 4 world to pay for them. These worlds are you cash source. A few of them will balance out your credits in no time. lvl 5 worlds are your main resource points. though weak and expensive they have to best metal and crystal income in the game (beside the crystal planet type which is in lvl 3). Lvl 1s are what you want to start out with. They are cheap and relatively easy to maintain. Go for these FIRST. Once you get enough of them grab some lvl 2s and 3s these world types are more expensive but have more resources and some nice trade bonuses. Your Lvl 4s, I can't state enough, are the core of your empire. These provide substantial trade and construction bonuses. They are also the cheapest relative to the other classes to upgrade. They are expensive just due to their shear size. They are heavily guarded so you can wait a while before cracking these. But once you do you can quickly upgrade them so they are your fortresses. Also Dwarf planets are the cheapest grab these first of any type. Then Normal, Large, Huge, and Super. Always watch your income to decide which planets you need and can afford.

 

This makes a lot more sense, and does explain why because I am used to just grabbing up every planet I can asap.That also explains the Low and High variants I had noticed. Again props on the planets, and adding that element as well, and thanks for the help in clearing that up!

[Lavo]

I'm also new (just tried the mod for first time today) and if the OP doesn't mind I'll post my thoughts as well to make everything fit in one thread. Bear in mind as of this post I have only played it for under 2 hours, playing Empire and watched about 30minutes of the replay viewing the NR and Vong factions I'm up against. As a whole, the mod looks awesome. The game runs smoothly, the fights look excellent, and to whomever did the planets on this did an amazing job. The attention to Star Wars Cannon on ship types also impressed me, I gave a special omg seeing a Hapan Battle Dragon for the first time haha. The Vong are also great looking as well.

Glad to see you like SoGE!

 

Also, I noticed several ships having irregular movement patterns. The most extreme case was the Imperial equivalent of the Cobalt frigate from vanilla sins, which would basically at full speed strafe the target, fly off to the other side of the planet, turn around and sometimes move backwards and then repeat. The speed of the ships also seemed a little high to me as well as a whole, with a fleet moving so fast across your planets, it seems easy to just move an assault fleet quickly out of range of defensive areas, then attack the weaker half since your ships move so fast.

Well, in SW, ships are fast, which is really the reason why this occurs. As for the Corvettes, I've noticed this as well, and is something I am currently looking into.

 

Like the OP, I felt maybe the smaller ships are a little pointless, once you hit the point of massing your cruisers, it seems they just die really fast. Early game I think there's use obviously, but once everyone gets in a little they just seem cannon fodder.

Agreed, for the most part. Frigates like the Bayonet, Carrack, Nebulon B, and Loroner Strike Cruiser can be very powerful, in numbers. I've personally used a fleet of some 16-20 Bayonets and 3-5 Centaxs to take on an NR fleet, and with nice shift-attack use, I butchered their fleet with far less losses than them (they lost a capital ship, among others).

 

1:Coralskippers (Vong starfighters) represented as Y-Wings and X-wings and when you scroll into them, the x-wing variant i believe comes up as string not found. Also fire green lasers like tie fighters.

2:M60 for NR is partial visible.

These are known. The first is something I plan to work on, at least in terms of strings, when I tackle the missing Defense tech strings.

 

3:One minor thing that frustrated me was finding the Imperial's colonization frigate, none of them had a description that clearly said the ship colonizes or "invades" a planet. Meant building one of each ship till I found the right one.

Apologies for this, I've been meaning to write up a colonizers list, I'll try and get to this sooner.

 

Also on that note, out of curiosity where did the two capital class variants of the ISD come from? Most of Star Wars novels I recall have Imperial fleets led by ISD class II attack star destroyers, such as the famous "Chimaera" and a lot of the Imperial fleet consisted of Victory SD's as well, which I note are also absent.

The Tector was a unique ISD variant, seen in Episode 6 during the attack on the Death Star II, and has been expanded upon in movie-related literature and the EU. The ISD Command is in essence an ISD II. I'm not entirely sure why it was named as it was, perhaps to distinguish it from the cruiser variants, though it's name is reflected by it's fleet-wide abilities.

 

4:Constructed the Starbase Golem Defense platform, and the volley technique seems to be a one/two fire only, after using its antimatter down to 15, the station would not regenerate any antimatter. Also, how come the one buildable from the tactical slot on a planet has more hull/shields?

With full upgrades the two have around equal health. The tactical Golan will either be nerfed or removed eventually, please refer to this threadfor more details. I'm going to look into the Empire/NR Golan's Volley Fire, Thanks for the heads up.

 

5:Dreadnoughts "Slave Rigging" ability yield range also seemed kinda small, and requires really close knit fleets if its to work at all in my opinion.

I haven't used Dreadnoughts much, thanks for the heads up, I'll look into this.

 

I want to once again thank all of you for your feedback, it's really appreciated and I can't state this enough.

[soul0reaper]

frigates never see much use in my games, with the exceptions lavo listed, along with the tarkin and lancer.

 

One thing I just noticed was the really short ranges defense platform has. IMO these ranges should be greatly increased. To me it seems that they have normal sins range, but because of the bigger zones around planets, seem smaller. (some of the abilities too have this issue, like slave rigging)

Also what was the rational with reducing mines to 30? one of my only ways to funnel is now gone

 

edit, just noticed, some planets can't even be upgraded to get rid of underdevelopment penalty. Is this intentional? I noticed desert planets having the worse of it. I think you should just bump the cost of such upgrades as given sufficient investment any planet should be able to be developed. Another thing is, planets that have zero constructors, once you lose your 1st one, you would have to abandon the planet and recolonize. This becomes really bad when such a planet is a fringe world. The drastic logistic and tactical slot alterations should be redone closer to vanilla sins imo. the tactical slots really limit fleet deployment possibility. A decent sized fleet can punch though any defense anyways, and what pitiful defense 6 tactic slots offers...might as well not bother and save the credits for better things.

Edited April 2, 2011 by soul0reaper

[NovaCameron]

Because mining in space is unrealistic. There is simply too much room. If you want more mines get a higher tech planet. Plus I was tired of the AI just spamming mines EVERYWHERE. The building haven't changed. Yet. I MAY double the mine capacity of planets if Lavo ups the mine detecting distance though.

[Saituros]

Noted the update given and downloaded.

1:Antimatter recharge is indeed now fixed on Imperial Golan's, so I assume NR is fixed as well.

2:I still notice the odd turning with ships when moving at full speed and ordered to make a hard change in direction. Again at points Star Destroyers will be moving sideways as if thrust is carrying them in a slingshot like motion. The heavy corvette still performs its "strafing attack" however it does seem to have reigned in its extreme flying to the edge of the planet.

Again I understand that ships in SW do move at a faster rate, but I still wonder if the current speeds it makes defensive platforms/strategies useless. If I jump into a planet and its filled with defensive systems, my ships move so fast I can just speed to the other side, jump again, and keep going until I find a weak point. I feel this makes the whole concept of "choke points" a lot weaker and defenses in general weaker.

3:Researched Gravity well generators, the ability that is -100% antimatter and 30% hull points work, but I do not see anything preventing phase jumps, and when putting the mouse cursor over the ability there is no radius of effect to be seen.

[NovaCameron]

Faster rate is my fault. Lavo can turn it down. Make it whatever it was before. .5,1,1.5 I think.

[Lavo]

Noted the update given and downloaded.

2:I still notice the odd turning with ships when moving at full speed and ordered to make a hard change in direction. Again at points Star Destroyers will be moving sideways as if thrust is carrying them in a slingshot like motion. The heavy corvette still performs its "strafing attack" however it does seem to have reigned in its extreme flying to the edge of the planet.

Corvettes have not changed yet. As for the slingshot motion, this is a game engine issue, once again been brought up on the Sins forums before.

 

Again I understand that ships in SW do move at a faster rate, but I still wonder if the current speeds it makes defensive platforms/strategies useless. If I jump into a planet and its filled with defensive systems, my ships move so fast I can just speed to the other side, jump again, and keep going until I find a weak point. I feel this makes the whole concept of "choke points" a lot weaker and defenses in general weaker.

Use more ion cannons. Though this is one of the reasons that, when fully implemented, you will be allowed four Golan platforms/stations per planet. This will also address the "lack" of tactical slots per planet, as they will be what makes planet 1 harder to defend than planet 2, rather than make planet 1 indefensible.

3:Researched Gravity well generators, the ability that is -100% antimatter and 30% hull points work, but I do not see anything preventing phase jumps, and when putting the mouse cursor over the ability there is no radius of effect to be seen.

There is no radius as it effects all ships within a gravity well. As for preventing jumps, this is once again a game engine related issue.

 

As for mines, the proposal to up mine detection range is an interesting one. Indeed, I've seen mine clearers detecting mines only to be slaughtered BY mines while clearing them. This is somewhat obscene, to say the least.

[Saituros]

Corvettes have not changed yet. As for the slingshot motion, this is a game engine issue, once again been brought up on the Sins forums before.

 

 

Use more ion cannons. Though this is one of the reasons that, when fully implemented, you will be allowed four Golan platforms/stations per planet. This will also address the "lack" of tactical slots per planet, as they will be what makes planet 1 harder to defend than planet 2, rather than make planet 1 indefensible.

 

 

There is no radius as it effects all ships within a gravity well. As for preventing jumps, this is once again a game engine related issue.

 

As for mines, the proposal to up mine detection range is an interesting one. Indeed, I've seen mine clearers detecting mines only to be slaughtered BY mines while clearing them. This is somewhat obscene, to say the least.

 

1: Interesting, is there any reason why the game engine does this?

2: In order to just use Ion Cannons whenever this would require me to park a fleet there it seems, and chase the enemy fleet if it decides to stay out of orbital defense range and move on to raid a more inner hegemonic resource planet I control. Its not a major thing, just something I find a little odd, even in fleet vs fleet combat the increased speed leaves each side almost no time to make a decision on fight or retreat, or if to change a formation. It also makes simply running another fleet to reinforce extremely easy. I can have a fleet of ISDs parked and able to zone defend 3-4 planets because they move so fast. Sorry if I come off as bitching, not my intention at all.

3: On the interdictor, why don't you just take the 700% increased jump time that is from vanilla sins and give it to the interdictor cruiser? That would be a pretty good imitation of the ability IMO.

4: Lastly, because I'm not well versed in ship building in mods, is it possible to just make a dedicated mine locator/destroyer? For example, take the Tartan cruiser, which can lay mines. What if it could also have a decent detect range, and have light lasers that can take down the mines at a fair rate. This would actually give a reason to using an anti-mine defense as well as solve the issue of mine spamming if you had a task force of anti-mine frigates jump in before the main assault fleet, and time it so that they get 30-40seconds to clear a path before the fleet comes in to begin the main assault.

[Lavo]

1) Devs want it that way.

2) Eh, if you slap in a hanger defense, or missile turret, you can either use the structure itself to kill ships or fighters.

3) Because that isn't how the GWGs work in SW at all. It works while a ship is contained in the gravity well it is restricted until it leaves.

4) Technically the game already has that, with the mine detectors in game. The Tartan has detect mines and can be used for this very function. Though jumping them in before a fleet would do jack squat, as the mines would rip them to shreds. :v Though I've been thinking of raising the mine cap back to 150, esp. considering the limitations of tactical slots.

[Saituros]

1) Devs want it that way.

2) Eh, if you slap in a hanger defense, or missile turret, you can either use the structure itself to kill ships or fighters.

3) Because that isn't how the GWGs work in SW at all. It works while a ship is contained in the gravity well it is restricted until it leaves.

4) Technically the game already has that, with the mine detectors in game. The Tartan has detect mines and can be used for this very function. Though jumping them in before a fleet would do jack squat, as the mines would rip them to shreds. :v Though I've been thinking of raising the mine cap back to 150, esp. considering the limitations of tactical slots.

 

Don't really quite understand your third statement. From every book I've read an interdictor powers up, and creates an interdiction field (gravity well) and nothing inside of it can jump. So I don't really understand why putting the 700% ability is undoable. If there isn't an actual "interdict" then why do we even have the ship in the game?

 

As for the mines, at the least you could have those mines wasted on those ships instead of your main fleet. From my experience as well the mine detectors ability to kill the mines isn't very good, and takes too long, so while they do have the function, I feel they aren't really able to perform it very well.

[soul0reaper]

Because mining in space is unrealistic. There is simply too much room. If you want more mines get a higher tech planet. Plus I was tired of the AI just spamming mines EVERYWHERE. The building haven't changed. Yet. I MAY double the mine capacity of planets if Lavo ups the mine detecting distance though.

True that, I guess it makes sense. What about planet development? Imo with late games, we should be able to fully develop any type of plant at the very least to erase undeveloped tax.

Tactical slots are another thing, if mining is unrealistic, Theres going to be a huge need to more tactic slots. These are my main problem, having just a few structures on key defensive asteroids is just not enough. Most sins maps place dead asteroids/asteroids near some key chokes so getting rid of their tactical slots forces me to make a separate version of every map i want to play with SoGE. having 6 slots near an asteroid literally means no tac structures are going to be build unless the map is small enough to make a planetary shield viable. on large maps, no one builds any tac structures on asteroids due to the fact that your just dumping resources better spend on more ships. The most I've seen is a repair platform for a heavy choke with a backup fleet/starbase.

Also whats with the fact that you can't colonize dead asteroids? Some chokes use those 2 -.-

 

1) Devs want it that way.

2) Eh, if you slap in a hanger defense, or missile turret, you can either use the structure itself to kill ships or fighters.

3) Because that isn't how the GWGs work in SW at all. It works while a ship is contained in the gravity well it is restricted until it leaves.

4) Technically the game already has that, with the mine detectors in game. The Tartan has detect mines and can be used for this very function. Though jumping them in before a fleet would do jack squat, as the mines would rip them to shreds. :v Though I've been thinking of raising the mine cap back to 150, esp. considering the limitations of tactical slots.

 

Don't really quite understand your third statement. From every book I've read an interdictor powers up, and creates an interdiction field (gravity well) and nothing inside of it can jump. So I don't really understand why putting the 700% ability is undoable. If there isn't an actual "interdict" then why do we even have the ship in the game?

 

As for the mines, at the least you could have those mines wasted on those ships instead of your main fleet. From my experience as well the mine detectors ability to kill the mines isn't very good, and takes too long, so while they do have the function, I feel they aren't really able to perform it very well.

Same, I was under the assumption that GWGs in sw just made it impossible to go into hyperspace and ships in hyperspace come out. (Thrawn Trilogy)

 

Lavo you taking a look at those defense ranges?

[Lavo]

What defense ranges? The Golan station has good range, the Golan tactical I'm not bothering with, and the Hanger Defense is good as well. As for dead asteroids, those were made uncolonizable to give the non-colonizables more variety. Besides that, a colonizable "dead" asteroid makes no sense. If it's dead that means there is nothing there. You can slap a station in those however, not sure if you thought of doing that. If you slap it right before the phase lane to the planet you own, it will effectively act as an additional defense for that planet.

[NovaCameron]

Which planets have too little tac slots? There is a reason for that. I want them hard to defend. I want them weak. Since these are usually high resource planets. And No for fully upgrading planets because they are priced for what you get. You think you have too many credits now? If you upgrade a few tech 4 planets all the way you will have ZERO money issues. (not to mention 120k HP) I want you to think about upgrades. Decide which ones you want and can afford. I do not want vanilla stuff where you que up all the upgrades and leave. And yes I know I'm not making it easy for you....