observations and questions

from GalCiv3 Forums

Hey guys, I have been away from Galciv since a few weeks after release but recently had the time to boot it up again and play a few rounds and thought I would share my impressions (1.2) and ask questions. Please keep in mind that I play on medium maps with godlike ai.

I like what was done to carriers; the ships they spawn no longer seem to be the most broken thing ever. I still hope that there are hardcaps on them though; I should not get free doomrays IMO. It might be cooler if they were even weaker but you got many more per ship component, but I really do like where it is at now.

Bug: The ai is obviously very aggressive and likes to declare war on me a lot, but if I revert to a previous save (1/2 turns ago) and keep playing the ai seems to forget to declare war again. This exploit means that I can build at my leisure and never be under pressure.

The ai’s research seems to taper off really poorly; it will have 4x my strength and a massive amount of ships, but cannot win a single engagement versus me (I might lose 1 ship after 3 fights). Part of this is the fact that it does not use carriers and I do. It tends to have very good hull size tech way earlier than me, but garbage weapon and defence tech. Basically what I am trying to say is that by turn 80 I have a ridiculous research advantage; I can get anything I want in a couple of turns while the ai is still using harpoons. Its manufacturing seems fine, but maybe it cannot afford the upkeep of higher tier weapons?

Starbases seem completely useless (although I still build them). Please correct me if I am wrong, but they only give me a 20% boost to something when a single building would give me 50% (later-ish in the game). Do they give flat bonuses eventually? I think they give flat approval bonuses but I may be wrong. Is this a design choice to encourage me to build them near low tier planets?

More on starbases; they seem to get blown up extremely easily (low hp?). Does anyone know how their weapons work – do they only have a few weapons that do high damage? If so they will not be able to do anything vs any defence which may be the problem. I still would like to see starbase improvements that provide resistance/defense to planets.

On a side note I have never minded the ‘constructor’ spam since on medium maps there is only so many to build.

Invasions are still a complete joke; 1 transport (with no special invasion tech) can easily (100%) take over a planet with 5x the population. When I invade, I just use biological warfare and win every time regardless of what I am facing. I think that invasions are getting re-worked, but which aspects are?

Bug: Elerium does not like to spawn sometimes, very frustrating.

So thanks for reading, I look forward to the new updates :D

8,274 views 7 replies
Reply #1 from GalCiv3 Forums Top


Bug: The ai is obviously very aggressive and likes to declare war on me a lot, but if I revert to a previous save (1/2 turns ago) and keep playing the ai seems to forget to declare war again. This exploit means that I can build at my leisure and never be under pressure.

It also means you're a 4X game reloading cheater-head. ;-)

Reply #2 from GalCiv3 Forums Top

Quoting leiavoia, reply 1


Bug: The ai is obviously very aggressive and likes to declare war on me a lot, but if I revert to a previous save (1/2 turns ago) and keep playing the ai seems to forget to declare war again. This exploit means that I can build at my leisure and never be under pressure.



It also means you're a 4X game reloading cheater-head. ;)

 

lol, it's kind of like save scumming (wuicksave>quick load) in an fps and complaining about predictable pathing :p. Yea the Ai is a Wip, but that's not a flaw worthy of spending timeon

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Reply #3 from GalCiv3 Forums Top

Quoting Tetrasodium, reply 2


Quoting leiavoia,
reply 1


Bug: The ai is obviously very aggressive and likes to declare war on me a lot, but if I revert to a previous save (1/2 turns ago) and keep playing the ai seems to forget to declare war again. This exploit means that I can build at my leisure and never be under pressure.

It also means you're a 4X game reloading cheater-head. ;)

lol, it's kind of like save scumming (wuicksave>quick load) in an fps and complaining about predictable pathing :P . Yea the Ai is a Wip, but that's not a flaw worthy of spending timeon

What's actually going on is a smattering of randomness to AI decision making. If the AI were 100% deterministic, you could also call that a "bug" in that you could play until an AI declares war, invades planet, or some other unfavorable outcome, then rewind a few turns and prepare for it.

Reply #4 from GalCiv3 Forums Top


Starbases seem completely useless (although I still build them). Please correct me if I am wrong, but they only give me a 20% boost to something when a single building would give me 50% (later-ish in the game).

 

ok so economy starbases add 10% to production off the bat that increases raw production so thats multiplied by whatever bonus's you get from manuf/research/wealth

on top of that the bonus's that an econ base provide add to a worlds bonus its like a free tile.

as well you can stack 12 of them on a single planet

so thats 120% bonus to RAW production plus 12X whatever the manu/research/wealth bonus is 

Reply #5 from GalCiv3 Forums Top

how do you stack 12 constructors on a planet? the max one I could fit was 5.

Reply #6 from GalCiv3 Forums Top

Quoting rputran, reply 5

how do you stack 12 constructors on a planet? the max one I could fit was 5.

Well, if it's constructors you want to stack on the planet, I'd suggest docking them at the planet. Much easier than placing them in individual tiles around the planet, and doesn't have issues with accidentally fleeting up with something that passes through the area.

Stacking twelve starbases at the planet requires careful planning and a bit of luck with the map configuration (asteroids, nebulae, stars, resources, and planets can all screw up the 'perfect' starbase set, as can a slightly misplaced starbase). One configuration that'll do it is to put three starbases in a ring three tiles out from the planet and the other nine in a ring nine tiles out from the planet, another configuration puts three starbases in a ring three tiles out, another three starbases in a ring six tiles out, and the remaining six starbases in a ring nine tiles out from the planet. You will of course need to get the starbase modules that increase starbase support range, and I don't believe there's a configuration that allows you to max out the planet's potential starbase counts at each support range below the maximum, as if you put the full five starbases a planet can have without support range upgrades those starbases exclude any additional starbases around the planet within 10 tiles and the maximum support range in the unmodded game is only 9 tiles.