Suggestions and feature requests

All input welcome!

from GalCiv3 Forums

Proposed Features:

In my opinion the game is currently heavily biased towards Research and/or Production in comparison to Credits. I would like to make a few suggestions and would love to have some input on these from the community and the dev team.

  1. I suggest that credits will be used to accelerate and/or enhance any of the other “resources” or “outputs” in game: Production, Research, Influence, Growth and Food. For instance, one way to do it would to add under the planetary govern window a new rubric or a new matrix on the graphic control (the one in which you can shift the emphasis between Economy, Production and Research) that will be used to specify extra investment in Production Development/Food Production /Influence Growth etc….. The player could choose to invest extra funds in influence growth or food production, for instance, to receive a percentile based bonus. Another possibility is to integrate this under the central govern window, and there choose either an empire wide emphasis or a par planet emphasis.  
  2. I dislike the existing “Rush” mechanic and find it a bit simplistic and crude. It forces the player to buy the building/ship at full price – even when a significant amount of production has already taken place. I suggest that this system be refined by making the price of “rushing” the building/ship directly related to the amount of production units remaining. Thus if I produced a ship that costs 200 production units for 3 turns, worth 90 production units, by choosing to outright buy this ship I will pay only for 110 production units rather than the full 200 price.
  3. Building on the two previous points, I suggest that credits could be used to accelerate the production of specific building projects directly on a scale system. If you want the creation of a new ship or building to be 200% faster you will pay x amount of credits, 300% faster y amount and so forth until you reach the point in which it will happen next turn, i.e. “rushing” as it is now. This will allow for a much greater versatility and make credits a lot more useful. If this is combined with a smart construction queue feature all the better (plan construction in advance, accelerate some projects and so forth).
  4. I would really love the possibility of outsourcing some projects to 3rd party corporations and/or minor races. For instance, if I want to order extra ships really fast but don’t have the capacity to produce them myself or if I want to buy ships that utilize techs that I don’t have or are perhaps unique (“proprietary” or “minor-race unique”) I could go to a new Market window and see what is on sale / make a new bid for the construction of x or y. This would add some interesting versatility and some unique items, techs and so forth.
  5. It would also be great to be able to hire mercenaries / pirates to disrupt enemy trade routes or harass ships, this could be a one-time contract or a continuous payment on an xx amount of turns clock.

I would also like to make a few other suggestions on the topic of starbases:

  1. I think starbases should be made a lot more versatile – they could potentially be used as center pieces of a player’s strategy and at present I think there are a few things that make this difficult. One of the key things is the area of operation of a starbase, I would really like to see some techs/modules and racial traits/abilities that allow a player to extend the effective radius of a starbase.
  2. Also, the limitation of a starbase to only specific kinds of activities is in my opinion highly problematic and doesn’t make any sense – why can’t a starbase be dedicated to both economy and mining activities? Why can’t a player build two starbases within the same zone, say one for mining and the other for culture? I understand why it would be wise to introduce some limitations in order to avoid absurdities and exploitation but I think the present system is rather limited and not particularly fun. I would like to suggest that starbases could in effect be continuously developed, becoming huge spacebound complexes of many interconnected stations and so forth, found especially in the vicinity of large planets or boundiful resources. **** regarding different ways of avoiding starbase spamming please see the discussion below. 
  3. I think it would be strategically very helpful if a planetary defense module will be introduced. When this module is installed the starbase will host a squadron of fighters that will defend all planets within its area of operation. This will prohibit planetary invasion until the starbase is destroyed.

EDIT: here is are some additional suggestions:

 

  1. Listening posts- Starbases that are built within or nearby an enemy's/opponent's star system or zone of influence. This kind of starbase is equipped with extremely long range scanner and can be upgraded with advanced cryptographic facilities and such that give a chance to steal a technology and/or syphon some of its research production. Either way the more listening posts a player has in an opponents the better informed he/she is of that opponent’s fleet movements - regardless of direct radar. It is thus possible to see all of an enemy's movements by listening in to its communications. It is also possible to set up a mercenary base on this kind of starbase to disrupt trade routes that pass in the area of effect - suspending or even terminating these. Finally it might also be possible to upgrade this kind of base with stealth or camouflage modules which make their detection very difficult.  

 As I wrote above, all input welcome!

 

111,589 views 20 replies
Reply #1 from Stardock Forums Top

I do like all your suggestions especially the starbase one.  It makes no sense that you can't build a mining and military module on one base. Nor does the 5 hex rule for building starbases.  They are just annoying. 

+1 Loading…
Reply #2 from GalCiv3 Forums Top

Very good suggestions.

The "no other starbases within x hexes" rule was introduced to avoid "starbase spamming", i.e. one Starbase gives you 10% production bonus, but if you plaster all the area around your planet with starbases, you get 200-500% bonus. This would be a tactic advanced players would tend to use, and to avoid it, the "one starbase" rule applies.

+1 Loading…
Galactic Civilizations III
Reply #3 from GalCiv3 Forums Top

Thanks! I understand why there is a need to limit starbases, but there are more flexible and surely better ways of doing this then a rigid x hexes rule. In fact if you guys are up to it, I think we can think of a few other ways to limit starbases that fit the bill better :). I will do so once I'm back home in a few hours. 

Reply #4 from GalCiv3 Forums Top


In my opinion the game is currently heavily biased towards Research and/or Production in comparison to Credits.

 

I agree with you on this but that's actually how I like it money for moneys sake is a bit dull and most of your suggestions would make money far the most important thing in the game.

 

Reply #5 from Stardock Forums Top

Quoting JTS80, reply 2

Very good suggestions.

The "no other starbases within x hexes" rule was introduced to avoid "starbase spamming", i.e. one Starbase gives you 10% production bonus, but if you plaster all the area around your planet with starbases, you get 200-500% bonus. This would be a tactic advanced players would tend to use, and to avoid it, the "one starbase" rule applies.

 

Ok then that is understandable and since you put it that way I can agree with it now.  So they really should allow multipule modules (Mining, Cultural. Military etc.)

Reply #6 from GalCiv3 Forums Top

Quoting econundrum1, reply 4

I agree with you on this but that's actually how I like it money for moneys sake is a bit dull and most of your suggestions would make money far the most important thing in the game.


Well, money for money's sake might be a thing in RL but in this game it simply a resource that is interchangeable to a degree with other resources, namely production in this instance. It would be (in my opinion of course) more interesting - both conceptually and game-mechanic wise - to use credits in more elaborate ways and in more mechanics. 

Reply #7 from GalCiv3 Forums Top

Ok, here are some ways to limit Starbase spamming abuse while still allowing multiple starbases:

1. make x amount of planetary population within the operating radius of a starbase a prerequisite for the construction of a module. For instance, only a single economic module can be constructed for every 15 planetary population units. For example if there is a single planet with 10 population than you can build only a single economic around it. Alternatively, it can receive the benefit of only a single economic module, which ever is easier to program. It is also possible to tie this to the overall population within the area of effect of a starbase. Thus a starbase with 3 planets in its zone of influence that have a total of 23 population combined can contain two economic modules. This system can be used to effectively limit the amound of bonuses without limiting the amount of starbases. It could also be use

2. Limit the amount of modules that can be built in a given radius without relating it to planetary population. This is the simplest solution, but also the crudest. 

3. Create dedicated kinds of starbases, Mining , Research, Production, Trade, Listening post and limit these to a given radius. This can be elaborated in a way that some starbases give bonuses to each other - for instance a trade station might buff all other bases and so forth. I personally prefer simply very large starbases with multiple modules. 

Reply #8 from Stardock Forums Top

Well, firstly-- rushing planetary developments scales-- meaning it is cheaper to rush somethign on a planet that only has 3 weeks to go than something which has 8.  & The fact that ships always cost full price actually adds to the game.  Now that 6 ship border patrol fleet you have actually has some worth.  Losing it means you actually lost something worthwhile & you can't just spam out replacements.  It also means that the decisions on whether or not to rush build ships are much more difficult-- thus adding to the challenge of the game.  Early game you often have to make a decision on whether or not to blow your starting bankroll on a constructor or extra colony ship  (your choice will depend on map settings), mid-game you have to decide if adding one mroe ship to your battle fleet will make the difference.  In both cases-- there goes your bankroll.

Reply #9 from GalCiv3 Forums Top

Well, this is all well and nice, but the size of the bankroll is directly tied to the amoung of income you have, what I am talking about is making the possibilities of spending your dosh more versatile and flexible. Being able to accelerate certain things using money will also scale and will also be dictated by the enviornment and immediate/longer term objectives. For example, if rushing something that has 4 weeks, i.e. an x amount of production costs 1000 credits, and something that has 8 weeks to go costs 2,000 credits, to accelerate the construction of the first by 200% will cost approximately half of what it would cost to accelerate that of the second. Of course you can also make the increments a-symmetric in various ways.

 

I would finally like to note an important fact: the bottleneck on production is not, at least primarily, the rushing mechanism but rather the fact that you can produce only a single object in a colony/ship-yard per turn. Thus even if you enough production output to build 3 ships of a certain class per turn, you will nonetheless produce only one, wasting 2/3 of your output. This is also true of colonies. Rushing here works the same except that you can on rare occasions rush two buildings at once - for instance when using the colonizer trait and also rushing a building. My proposals are not touching on this mechanic at all. 

Reply #10 from GalCiv3 Forums Top

I would like a couple of things:

1) Ability to switch through Starbases while only having one open (ala Colonies).

2) A list of all discovered planets, settled or not.

 

(Just happened to notice my own 'join date'---geez, I'm old! Of course, that's how a good company builds customer loyalty now too, isn't it? Most triple A's can't generally say the same, attn: Ubi, EA, etc. while ones that take care of their people [Stadock, Matrix, Battlefield, etc.] can )

Wow, that got off track quickly. :) Sorry about that.

Reply #11 from GalCiv3 Forums Top

These would be helpful, no doubt.

Reply #12 from GalCiv3 Forums Top

I agree it seems sort of silly that starbases can only go in one direction. They have practically unlimited space to spread new modules into. And from a game balance perspective I don't see why it should be impossible either.

+1 Loading…
Reply #13 from GalCiv3 Forums Top

Quoting ExNihil, reply 6

Well, money for money's sake might be a thing in RL but in this game it simply a resource that is interchangeable to a degree with other resources, namely production in this instance. It would be (in my opinion of course) more interesting - both conceptually and game-mechanic wise - to use credits in more elaborate ways and in more mechanics. 

Fair enough, we will just have to agree to differ on that.

Reply #14 from GalCiv3 Forums Top

There is the immersion thing, which of course is entirely personal.    A hex in GalCiv is roughly a light-year or so.   Hence a starbase in the Solar System would at present extend its range beyond Alpha-Centauri.

I can handle that fleet encounters are actually gigantic magnifications of the actual dimensions, and that somehow with advanced tech different fleets in the same hex find each other.   Fair enough.   But a starbase that extends its range beyond 5 hexes is a bit much for me.     I think one also has to consider cluttering of the screen, which already has a  lot of stuff on it.  

To each their own, of course.

 

Reply #15 from GalCiv3 Forums Top

Well, it doesn't seem to bother you as far as shipyards are concerned and these receive bonuses from planets that are substantially further away. Also, if this sudden peng of realism is the issue, consider that using the same scaling system the Milky way should be roughly 70,000 hexes across and 20,000 hexes deep and of course contain something like 100,000,000,000 stars.

Reply #16 from GalCiv3 Forums Top

You have just a few too many zeroes there. It's closer to 1 billion stars, not 100 billion in the Milky Way. See Fermi's Paradox.

Reply #19 from GalCiv3 Forums Top

Quoting JTS80, reply 2

Very good suggestions.

The "no other starbases within x hexes" rule was introduced to avoid "starbase spamming", i.e. one Starbase gives you 10% production bonus, but if you plaster all the area around your planet with starbases, you get 200-500% bonus. This would be a tactic advanced players would tend to use, and to avoid it, the "one starbase" rule applies.

People still spam star bases (they'll build 4 around a colony each 6 hexes from each other, but all covering the colony) to get the production bonus. I'ts ridiculous. 

Why on earth didn't the devs simply make the production bonus not stack?

Reply #20 from GalCiv3 Forums Top

Very good question. Also, I don't see a problem with some stacking - after all, a single top tier production building gives the same kind of bonus 4 or 5 starbases would at maximum development, compared to some other bonuses starbases are almost marginal atm.