This topic (opinion request for actual development options) should be somehow highlighted.

To me there are still two sliders, overall spending rate vertically and production/research horizontally (so 66 and 50 gives the 34/33/33), I consider the dial only as a new UI tool that looks nice and is hopefully easy to use. Maybe our problem with the four sliders could have been fixed by using the military production (with the ship queue being empty) automatically for civilian production, not only the other way.

It sounds perfect to have both the governors and the individual planets a checkbox to follow overall setting or if not have their own dial setting, I back up that idea.

For improvements I can see both the percentage and the point justified, for example a school should improve the general population by percentage whereas a research lab (like CERN) should give a fixed point to research. By the way, if precursor mine and library are to remain, please make them actual improvements already on the planet.

On the other hand: What is a planetary improvement exactly? To answer this, what is a planet without improvements exactly? Is it a foothold only with the sole function to allow development of the planet? Is it the planet being (proportionally to its population) covered with civilian infrastructure? Is it the planet being (proportionally to its population) covered with civilian infrastructure plus factories and research centers - as in GalCiv 1? Is it the planet being fully covered with civilian infrastructure plus factories and research centers - as in GalCiv 2? I understand the colony ships are huge, but packing basically a whole planet into a single one is hard to imagine.

Yep, five billion of people aboard, yet we limited to tiny ship designs only... If that's tiny, what size huge ships have then?

Are you talking about colony ships you designed yourself or the ones that come with the game? The ones that come with the game come on a "Cargo Hull", which has almost 4 times the capacity of a tiny hull (60 vs 16 at the start of a game) but only one hit point. Also, a colony module requires a capacity of 20, which will not fit on a tiny hull without some tech research.

A colony ship holds 250 million considering the Enterprise holds only 10 thousand this ship is huge. I would think this is closed to a imaginary migration that takes place over months while the actual number is 10 thousand original colonists. Which is bringing a more realistic scenario where the original colony is 10 thousand what should be implemented instead is planetary migration this should probably  be private.

Actually that is 250 million per colony module on a ship.

I like it. Basically, it'll be like having sliders for each planet, instead of only having the focus-on-one-thing option.

It would be nice if we could save some planet profiles to quickly start a planet on a given setup. For example, you could save a 100% manu setup for building up a planet, have a 100% research setup, a 100% wealth setup, and a 50/50 setup for research, econ, and general worlds, a 50/50 research/manu setup for a research planet that's upgrading it's labs, a 50/50 econ/manu setup for econ planets upgrading their econ boosters, etc. Instead of having to fiddle with the dial each time, you'd simply be able to load up one of your presets.

One idea would be to have a slight bias on the dials based on civilization, something like a +/- 5% bonus based on dial position. For example, a 'good at research' civ might have a +5% efficiency on a planet that is set to 100% research, with the bonus fading and eventually progressing to a -5% penalty at 0% research.

We need some kind of que system for colony starting and ship building. I think we also need a better governor option.

I don't think I want the ability to micromanage individual planets' focus, because I will end up doing it all the time to make things finish 1 turn quicker (either local production or global research). Because everything will be useless until it's 100% completed, it will always be optimal to avoid spillover (even if there is carry-over).

This micromanagement moves the focus away from strategy and towards time-consuming tasks.

I think deciding which improvements to make at each planet is more than enough for specializing them. If that's not the case, I'm sure the game designers can come up with other ways that are more interesting than min-maxing sliders

In a multiplayer game, that minute level of micromanagement would really make people take forever making their moves

In GC1 we had ships capable to hold five billions people. Even they were kept in cryosleep, and stuck into small penals with minimum dead space used, imagine sheer size of ship, capable to hold that many people.

Even later ships, even with smaller modules, capable to hold "just" 250 millions are anything but small.

And that's people only - they need food, water, shelter, clothes, tools, at least starting set to build more from the scratch. Even if they will disassemble their ship for necessary materials, it only increases those ships' size.

As for micro, I agree with AdmiralWillyWilber - we need "templates' to create first and employ later on automatic basis (optionally, of course), otherwise any MP party risks to win "slowest cyber-sport" nomination: "it was seventh hour of blitz, sportsmen demostrate first signs of exhaustion..."

Templates, or patterns could be tied to several factors, like planets' types, population level, treasury, tech available. simply put, each planet should have personal governor or, at least, "assistant".

I'm getting worried here reading here that GC3 may not have separate cues for building improvements and ships. That is one of the main things that differenciates GC2 from MOO2 or Civ5 etc. I'll be quite disapointed to not have two cues.

+1. 

This, and maybe a snap back switch so we can reset all planets to a single setting late game. 

Wait I'm not getting anywhere about there not being a ship building and improvement building becoming a single build option. That would be terrible. All I'm hearing is everyone worrying about this.

The dial is already there. Separating between different productions would need:

- either an additional dimension, that I am not sure is possible to add without complete revision,

- or a declaration that production spendings are evenly distributed (with or without unused capacity being autotransfered) but military and social production might be affected by improvements separately.

For example in Imperium Galactica 2 there is a similar global "dial" that - only if there is not enough money to run everything in parallel - separates between building/production/research but within production the ship and tank building rates only depend on the separate facilities.

Actually I do not prefer the production/research redirection, it should only be possible for hive minds (Yor), I think the number of improvements should be maximized by the population (ie you can have 1 active research center per 1 billion population - but also 2 factories for the same 1 billion) with the ability to deactivate any improvement. There should be a tax or saving slider but everything else should be governed by the planetary improvements. However this is not GalCiv- ish.

Just to chime in:

• I like the option to micromanage - which I will probably do.  However, it would also be nice to bulk manage several planets together, not just all or one.  
• I'm not a fan of single building cues.  It just lacks logic - though I understand it makes it simpler.  If I had my way, there would even be the option for one planet to be working on more than one ship at a time.  I mean, really... 10 billion people can only build one ship?  

I'd like to think the depth and scope of 64bit computing would allow more flexibility and ability to micromanage if a player wishes to do so.  For example, as far as colony management is concerned, what is described here doesn't actually seem that different from GC2.  What would make things stand out would be, say, if production for planet improvements (buildings) or ships rely on certain resources (whether raw or produced).  And, different planets, based on conditions, may be better at producing the raw materials (mining) or smaller components (alloys, fabrication), and another would be better at computer systems, or at final assembly.  Or lets say base material is used by both buildings or ships.  Focusing on building those things would later help that planet with building the final products.  Or..... or... you can create ships transfer these major materials from planet to planet.

I'm just imagining here.  But I think when I think of "next gen" 4x... I think on these lines.  Going from sliders to dials doesn't seem like much of a increase in depth if the categories they control are still limited to 3 or 5.  

That's really should be the question. What factors should we control. That is more important than how to control it. Also not just what to control, but in space how does it manifest. The reason I mention Ques is that I can't think of what else to call something that can speed up my production. If I'm using a Que I would like the game to not report on it until it is done building as I said. That way it would speed up the game. I would like to set the Que to stop and show up on the build screen as being empty if this condition is fulfilled like a certain amount of population, my expenses are more than my income, the morale falls below 51@, if I discover a resourse, if I finish upgrading all my current starbases, or we go to war. I would like to mouse over planets. I would like to set up a default planet colonizing package; this package if for both improvement building and when you build a starport. Or when your population max out, when you run out of people, when you run out of building spaces, if your have an empty space, or if you research a terraforming techs. I would like to be able to set que priority. If you have a better idea I would like to hear it. I think if I know what I want to build I don't need to see it every time I'm done building. If I can't have global governor setting then I would like to see this option in a Que I would like to set for a certain range of class of planets. I would like to be able to set my Ques for a certain class and types of planets. I would like to be able to change my ques later.

One thing I'd appreciate as the game nears release is a super detailed explanation of exactly how the economy and colony production works.  Really dive down into the numbers...  Even after playing GC2 for years, I still feel like I have no idea how the colony production and economy really work.

But this is really big ship - capable to hold 5 billions of them (in GC1).

Though I agree with you, you can create concentration on single project for worlds in early colonization stages, when infrastructure is low, but on developed world we should produce smaller ships in packs, not by one - after all, if we have excess of research, we can study several consequtive stages of certain area (even if I prefer several different areas run in parallel).

Probably WWII analogy of US shipbuilding rates could be used, at least for comparison simplicity.

Muhhaha, has it (building ships to transfer materials between planets) been done in any free flow 4x space game since Stars! from 1996?

You could counteract that by being able to que up 10000 ships at once, and have your colony churning out 873 per turn at a given production level.  And if you're in the middle of making a planetary improvement but want a few more ships, you can put those ships at the top of the queue and any overflow production after they're finished will go to the planetary improvement.  With a well-designed UI, this could allow for efficient construction of both ships and improvements, without having to ditch the current research/production/money allocator.

Admittedly, letting colonies produce realistic numbers of ships might lead to problems when it comes to rendering them all in tactical battles, unless you take the Masters of Orion I approach of not showing them individually.

Tactical symbols of units, or reducing number of units could be used. In first case we'll have military style symbols for every unit and formation, be that squadron, flotilla, or fleet. In second case, squadron of planes is replaced with model of one plane. It all will depend on scale we will have.

Hearts of Iron use first approach, and Fantasy Wars used second. No matter of zoom level, you still have all info you need. SoaSE used somewhat mixed approach - we had "symbols" (even if not military, still, clear to read) for those units too small to be rendered, like fighters or bombers.

Just to put some things into perspective. Spaceships in every science fiction is not based on what you are saying. The inperial fleet a endor was 360. There was an elite group of 30 destroyers.

There were 10 grand admirals at endor. 7 admirals each. with the elite and the whole fleet of grand admirals. Thats 90 admirals. Lets not forget that each Grand moff gets an admiral. Not counting the  Grand moffs admirals. An admiral would count i galaxy class and 1 enpireal class destroyers, 12 shrike cruisers, and 22 escort frigates. This would total 3510 ships. Adding 48 destroyers because of the Grand admirals. Now lets count the patrol ships. Which is 250 victory class destroyers for the corporate sectors. For most of the empire it was made up a combination of 270 lancer frigates and carrack cruisers. Vader got a super class destroyer and 5 galaxy class destroyers. The grand moffs got 12 super class destroyers. The grand admirals had 12 more destroyers. There were an experimental 44 destroyers, but this was more of a experiment so I'm not counting it. Not counting the experimental fleet it was 5005 ships. What would of replaced it was more like the experimental fleet. The admirals would've had 270 super class destroyers. 3690 destroyers with no escorts. This changes the main fleets new total to 3960 making the new total of empire war ships to 5455 ships. I never read of any ship yards that produced more than 4 destroyers a year. Even though the only stats I saw on this was after the battle of endor.

Mow regarding the new raepublic they had 5 fleets of 200 shups each. A patrol group was made up of 4 assult frigates. Since I don't know the groups of patrol I'm going to use empire stats on that. Ackbar had a private fleet of one Mc 90 and 21 dreadnaughts.  Making this fleet of 2182. The calamari ship yards also produced 4 cruisers at one time. 

Let's not forget that the numbers on the original battle star galactica are 3000 ships on Adama's side.

If Cisco did not get the founders to close the wormhole. The Dominion would have had 4056 ships against the Federations 628 starships. The Federation had only 40 shi[s not in the time of war.

Now bringing this down to more like reality. For the pacific the fleet that was never build, but was planned by reagon was 600 ships. We had mustered 200 ships at desert storm. In the movie of troy the greeks had only 1000 ships. I think ships are more realistic than airplanes; because, logistically for reasons I don't understand we always have fewer of them than ships.

10000 spaceships at once for one planet does seem to not be feesable to me, but I would accept a private sector with a bunch of passenger ships. Since this is not on the game this you can't take into account.

Ph yeah the reason I quoted scyfy instead of real world is so I can have bigger fleets than 1000 ships.

Star Ruler

Cross post from the Overview thread, realised here would be more relevant!

On the macro vs micromanagement side of the equation I would love to see the ability to assign different worlds to different governors for focusing planets singularly on one type of output. The way that I would do it differently to everyone else is that I would only have the different 'focus's' unlock after the appropriate Capital Improvement has been built.

 

By doing that you wouldn't overwhelm new players with more options until they need them, and it makes logical sense that you wouldn't need to designate a group of planets to focus solely on manufacturing or science or economics or culture until you actually have one focused world of that type. This might upset some players who like to wait until they find really good planets to build the capital improvements on, but usually even they don't let their empires get to the point where they would need governors before building the capitals.

 

To be clear building the Manufacturing Capital would unlock the Manufacturing Governor and assigns that world as a manufacturing world. You could then also assign any other worlds to be manufacturing worlds and fall under that governors settings which would be player adjustable.

Fate,

2AdmiralWillyWilber

I don't get it - are we buying or selling in agreement or in disagreement?

Shouldn't we, actually, have all ministers unlocked from very beginning by default? It may not be best decision from learning curve point of view, as you said, overwhelming new players. Ministers either could be "universal omnipresent entities", that have no individuality, they simply remove certain degree of burden from us, and you can control their respective branch right from their page (so you could adjust global industry settings from industry minister's page, adjust research settings from science minster's page and so on), or they could be unique persons, with different parameters, acting as global bonus to their respective branch, so we would have several options for each post. We could have, say:

- Wartime simplifier; a minister who would allow us to manufacture more units cheaper and faster, at cost of certain quality control - they would have randomized characteristic (within reason), with reduced comfort (probaby reduced operational range), to reflect their hasted construction, and their maintenance cost will be accumulatively growing - the older vehicle is, the more expensive it'll be to maintain (that could be implemented for all units, IMHO, even if in different scale), because units produced this way designed to die fast, so no one is expecting them to serve for decades. Obviously, ideal for wartime, when enemy at the gate, when you're not quite ready for it. Optionally - for risky early expansion, if you want to scrap your victorios fleet afterward. To prevent rush (ke-ke-ke ), this minister could require actual war status, enemies in our space, and, maybe, developed industry. Or some other constraints. But I'm not really morning multiplayer person, so I don't really have experience in balancing that, sorry.

- Conveyor riveter; less extreme version of previous guy, who would allow us to produce more units, than usually, but less than in previos case. Of course, maintenance costs will be almost identical to normal ships. He could also be used for sped-up buildings construction. This guy could be useful during expansion stage, when we need more colony, freight, survey, and scout ships, but do not want to sacrifice their performance.

- Perfectionist; guy who could spent a bit more time, and/or money to construct something, but at the end, performance of constructed unit will be better, this would include buildings too. Ideal for research&development stage, when you don't need to expland, but need to create foundation for your empire prosperity.

- Logistics genius; guy who would improve logistics, hence logistics, maintenance, and overhead costs. Ideal choice for grown-up empire, when there is nothing to construct or upgrade, but a lot of maintain.

Those are four most obvious examples I could come up with. Optionally we could simply issue a decree, to reorient our industry into desirable direction - quantity, quality, something in between, or cutting maintenance costs.

Ministers in other branches could have similar qualities, or we should have options to issue different decrees, suitable for selected branch.