Dev Stream (Friday, April 17th) at 3pm EDT, Noon Pacific

Can you give us the scoop on Planetary Governors?

How are they are intended to work?

Where they stand in terms of implementation?

Questions for Paul on the livestream today:

1. What are the latest dates for release of Beta 6 (Brad said there would be one) and 1.0?

2. Will Pirates and the UP Victory be in Beta 6?

3. Can you tell us how the UP Victory will work?

4. Will we finally be able to rename Stars (and thereby their planets) that are not homeworld systems in Beta 6? Some of the names totally break the immersion and make me feel like I am playing a game for juveniles.

5. Any chance we can return to Armor providing some defense against beams and missiles as well as mass drivers? Several of us on the forums have expressed our reasons for wanting this to happen. 

Thanks for making a really great game for us!!!

Yes, please.  I thought that I was the only one who had a problem with this.  Some of the star names are absurd.  It really does end up detracting from the game and immersive experience.

If there's a file where we can add/delete stock star names (like in GalcivII), that would be fine too.

This has been suggested by brad to be a target date of May 14, 2015 Of course that may change...

Beta 6 has been said to be feature complete to attempt to squish any remaining major bugs, (although there are always bugs that slip through...)

They have already made this change. Armor now provides protection for all 3 weapons.

The battle viewer bug (pirates) is not listed in the 5.3 list of fixes. Will/was this a late addition to 5,3 or will this be fixed in beta 6?

From Galactic Civilizations III - Beta 5 patch 3 changelog 

1) Could you share your thoughts on the ship sensor debate on this forum?

Basics of the issue: Ships have been shown to be able to see as far as 79 spaces away as early as Turn 50[Excessive map], and can potentially reveal almost the entire map with 1 Ship later in the game.  This invalidates all other forms of vision[Starbases mainly, and Planets].

Read the full debate here: https://forums.galciv3.com/463518/page/1/#3538398

2) Any chance Influence modifiers will also be affected by Habitable Planet - Setting, in addition to hopefully map size?  Under "Rare" habitable planets settings the amount of Influence can be much more generous, in order to still have cultural takeover be a real strategy.

3) Can you re-confirm that many more prototype weapons will be added to the game to make full use of resources, and do you have an idea when this change is coming?

4) Starbases currently seem like an inefficient use of resources for the rewards given. Any plans to buff their usefulness?

Noteworthy: Starbase modules of the same type currently don't stack, and therefore offer very little bonus. If they were just made additive instead, starbases would feel about right considering the investment of so many constructors. This would also fix how weak they are militarily, if the bonuses were additive. 

Laid out reasons to their inefficiency here[Pg 3; Reply #67]:  https://forums.galciv3.com/463293/page/3

5) The request mechanism for constructors was great, but we really need it to work with ships carrying multiple constructor modules. Plans for this soon?

Really feel this will solve most of the complaints about their heavy micro, with this one addition.

6) Asteroids and Nebulae hurt movement and sensor range for good reason. But could they also apply a significant negative accuracy modifier to fleets/ships attacking you while you're in them?

Always looking for a way to get more strategic battle decisions into space games, where terrain (+)/(-) are less available.  The above gives a thoughtful decision of whether to run away with your fleet(avoid asteroids and nebulae), or to hunker down in a asteroid field or nebula and prepare to fight!

#wewanttheoldarmor, #keeparmor, #letthe3defensesunited!

Ouch, didn't catch that. Wonder why they changed it?

I am not getting you on this. The econ ring bonuses are not enormous but they are worth building and the relic bonuses are huge. I have increased my research/manufacturing/economy output by as much as 200% empire wide, by building relic star bases. I haven't used the culture relics that much but I will after the next patch I'll bet. I also haven't used the approval relics much since there is some question of whether they are working and I have managed to keep my approval up in other ways.

I'm not sure about the mineable resources. They will no doubt give you an edge I just haven't seen so far that the edge will be needed. I suspect it will be needed by the final release. They have put too much into the resources phase of the game to let them be an afterthought.

Map size. I heard on a previous stream about the number of tiles the maps have in comparison to galvic2.

What I haven't heard or been able to find is how many planets are possible?

Abundant habitable planets on an insane map would have to be well over 500,and that could be a low estimate. 

Closer to 2000, actually.

I mainly think the Econ starbases are at least a little too weak. Granted, making the bonuses additive may be too much, but even a 5% boost to the high end would somehow make me feel better about them. A 20% max boost to Manufacturing, Research, and Gross Income just doesn't quite hit the mark for me.

I'll test some more, maybe you're right. I'll retract the question for now.

yea its about 2K on Insane maps 'abundant planets...

Personally at this point I am going to have to use 'rare' as the uncommon' setting is now the same as 5.2 common. I like em rare like my meatsesss.

In GC2 with with medium settings on the biggest map you got around 200, so i guess a few thousend

Regarding the constructor spam and starbase building;

1. Do starbase bonuses provide diminishing returns? I'm confused about the posts above sorry.

2. I think my favorite idea is to make starbase modules upgrade automatically like planet tiles once research has unlocked the next tier of upgrades. To offset this the initial cost for each module should go up though. Any chance of something like this occurring?

3. Can starbases hold their own versus fleets if you invest enough constructors into them in the early and mid game? Is it a (planned) feature that starbases could shield planets (increasing their resistance or something) for the setting up of a defensive position?

Thanks! You guys are doing great work.

@Stardock Is there more intro loading screens available? The Drengin one is currently the only one, maybe one for every race? Maybe at each loading screen there can be a tip.

I have an issue with allowing people to change the star names.  People paid extra to get the honor of naming the stars, so people should not be able to change the star names.  Also if you have an issue with the star names, just suck it up.  It is no different then the planets being named after Greek/Roman mythology.  What if you are Muslim or some other religion, or an atheist, are you going to go cry and try to change the planet names?  No, you deal with it because that is what they are called.  You are never going to get 100% of the people to be happy with any given name.  It is just a part of life, so focus on something more constructive about the game; instead of the star names, which does not affect game play at all.

You realize that star names can be changed in the data files, right?  THis iis just an added convenience.  Personally as someone who shelled out $100 I ain't gonna mind if someone takes an additional step to rename a star.  Mostly because I figure the vast majority of people will never bother to rename a star.

'sides, I rather think the star name thing was a minor bonus and not the main selling point of the Founder Elite package.

Move folks won't change them or only if they don't like them. It isn't that big a deal. The fun is seeing YOUR name on a star. I wouldn't mind a notification when exploring and finding the star you named, that would be cool. Perhaps even a steam achievement. I could care less if somebody else wants to rename their stars.

replay?

I hope that the lack of a youtube replay means you guys are still hard at work and just spaced it out (pun intended) rather than leaving early to start your weekend...

.. for some reason 3 weeks ago they never posted the replay and squashed attempts at others posting it then 2 weeks ago they waited till monday to post it

i hope this isint becoming a trend i have to work on fridays and used to eagerly await the end of day so i could watch the stream