Thanks for taking a look, Adam Here is some more info, There were 6 combat vessels at Lau before I arrived, 1BB, 2DD, and some FF. They have stronger force in the neighboring system as you can see. They're hurting alright but still have some significant forces available. Yeah I'm a little leary of the Moltar on account of how well those 2 FFs did against a much larger force and looking forward to seeing what they have in store
It's a bug. Ships are getting their armor upgraded after combat by mistake. We'll have a look at this. \Edit: This is now fixed. Armor now only upgrades after a refit, as it should. We'll discuss this internally to see if this justifies a hotfix or if it can wait for the next big version. In the meantime, yes, ships get their armor upgraded after combat.
The challenge will be making sure that the AI can also make the most of using mothball and use it in a way that is intelligent. Otherwise it becomes a player only feature
You know what CrazyElf, I'm beginning to think it isn't really needed, it's very rare now not to have enough SSPs. I too believe that it could easily become a player only feature.
The challenge is that no matter what you ask for, the AI has to use it well or it will be used by players against the AI only.
I think you could easily start a thread on this topic @CrazyElf For today though, I want to touch on one of the basic aspects of AI behaviour and one of the Xs in a 4x game, Expansion. It's still early and there will be many changes to the AI behaviour as Adam and Malrey continue developing and fine tuning ISG. One of the things that I am excited about is further refinement in the way the AI chooses what to colonize. My recent experiences for example, indicate that the AI will settle a tiny ideal world and ignore larger, richer tolerable ones. Since infrastructure upgrades are tied into planet size, this is not good. Tiny worlds should be avoided like the plague... except in cases where they offer a vital strategic benefit or a must have special. But then again, this is why we are here isn't it, to play the game and offer some feedback on what already exists as well as throw some ideas around. Being a single player game, it is crucial, as you indicate, to insure that the AI uses the tools available to it in the best manner possible.
Another minor observation regarding Star-bases, Battle-stations, etc. In combat, I notice that they do not rotate, (unlike their counter-parts in MoO2). This means that the same shield is always facing front, (for lack of a better word), and the base in question can be brought down that much faster as a result of the shield collapsing quicker. I'm fine if it stays as is, but it would give a small boost to the survivability of those bases if they did rotate every combat turn in the exact manner as MoO2
Regarding difficulty levels The below is hardcore, what I'm noticing is that starts are still highly random, not for the player so much, on hardcore you get the slums, but for the AI. Notice the expansion of both AIs, very good for this stage of the game. Interestingly enough, here the AI is aggressive and has pulled off some good raids as in the past, I had to retake Fluphant. I guess it helped that I was caught with my pants down and had a very small fleet... there is something here though, on this particular map I mean, this actually feels hardcore. If it could become more consistent it may be of value.
Yes, the AIs expanded quite well and seem well developed, as expected for Hardcore. The AI aggressiveness depends on how close you are, if the AI can reach you, and if it can "see you", meaning, it has sensor range over you and has explored your systems to know what's there. Three important factors for that are remote exploration status, logistics, and scanning technology. If any of those elements isn't well developed, the AI will not show much interest in you. We expect the "game" to change considerably when there's less room to expand to. When we add the fourth race (in the next release) we expect to see a lot more action early on. That and when we enhance the AI should make for more consistent and challenging sessions.
Fascinating that, it explains why the Moltar, who are less powerful than the Draguul, are far more active, they must have their scanning tech and logistics in a more advanced state. Not the the Draguul aren't holding their own, they are, but are acting more defensive whereas the Moltar, (as you can see), are flying around all over the place and forcing me to cover my territory well, thereby decreasing my ability to strike at them effectively. Very true, early on, in hardcore or even impossible, the AI has an advantage that gets eroded with time. The earlier the player meets the AI, the greater the challenge for the player, this has been my experience so far. A fourth race will aid greatly in multiple ways. First, the field will be more crowded increasing the chance that the player encounters an AI early Second, Planetary Engineering will increase in value as a player will have less room to work with, meaning that instead of skipping poor value worlds and looking for something better to colonize, he/she may have to settle and develop some nasty spots instead. And of course, the more factions, the harder it becomes for the player to take them out early. For example, right now a player could concentrate on one faction while leaving some forces to ensure that the second doesn't take advantage of it with a surprise attack. Add another faction and the player needs to consider leaving behind even more forces. Yes, the more I think on this, it becomes fairly obvious that the inclusion of more races will have a dramatic effect on many aspects of the game, not just how easy it is to beat it, but also the need for diplomatic approaches, Planetary Engineering, thorough exploration and exploitation etc. Looking very forward to seeing the effect of a fourth race in practice.
I'm noticing that fighters are behaving just like missiles. In other words, once their target is destroyed they are removed from play. MoO2 had a very cool way of dealing with fighters and I think that is what made them more valuable. I was wondering then... intentional? Placeholder? Oversight?
While I am always for MOO2 treatment of rules, I am also wondering why not let the players move a fighter squadron like a small ship. At the moment I am playing Order of Battle wihch has more to do with panzer general and WW2 than with MOO2. But one of the great features of OOB is it is how it treats fighters. Let me please explain how I mean this. -Aircraft do have a no. of turns they can be in the air. For example 10. There is a small no. counter under the aircraft icon which adresses how many turns the fighter has left till it has return to base to refuel. -this return-to base-refuel-launch again circle is great for sea wars and gives an excellent portrayal of the difficulties of carrier operation and, because the carriers have only a limited hangar capacity, so you have to plan ahead when to launch or land on it with your planes. And beware when they are sunk, then the planes they carried or which are waiting to refuel are also lost because they are running out of fuel. quite realistic. -another intesting aspect of OOB is that the player is naturally forced to have fighter CAPs in his fleet space to counter intruding bombers. (you have fog of war and a sight range of a few hexes) -the upside of plane warfare and its tactical planning is that the planes are quite effective against ships. They can so alot of damage to ships when used well. -Aircraft are divided between strategic bombers, tac bombers, fighters, recon planes and torpedo bombers cathegories with different values. Each of them is handled differently rulewise and simulates quite well its WW2 pendant. For example the tac bomber has to stay "over the ship" unit in order to bomb it, while the torpedo bomber can launch his torpedo in an adjacent hex. The fighter on the other hand has nearly zero ground capabililty but an air-to-air role. All in all this or a similar well thought out system I could imagine for ISG instead of the auto-way it is handled now. (space fighters/bombers as seperate units which require attention each turn) It would force to he player to think how to use his fighters in a tactical planning, battle roles, refueling and could make them more important and viable alternative to the usual missile/beam weapons ships.
