The SB sensor modules do need a look at. I wasn't happy with there being only one module, unlocked almost at the end of the sensor techs, and less powerful than the combined bonus of the original modules. The vanilla setup may not be perfect, but it provides a nice progression. Still, what to do with them?
Speaking of progression, I increased the cost of the sensor techs from 100, 200, 300, 500 to 100, 500, 2000, 4000. Basically the same as the life support techs. The Galactic Guide Book is now unlocked by Sensors Mark II. That should be a bit more interesting. Previosuly, you could simply rush through the sensor techs without much effort.
That's how I originally implemented it when the CU project got started. It wasn't well liked, from what I recall. After I left the project, it got replaced with a +6 Sensor-bonus. I'll add it back in, but I expect to hear complaints again.
IRRC the complaints came from a person who just wanted to rush to Eyes, build that, and from that point on never bother with any sensors again. The very same person also played Immense-All-Abundant maps on Very Fast techspeed so he could have all technologies at the end of the colony rush...
Just because someone wants to have it easy a whole line of play (=how many sensors to place on ships, build constructors to place sensormods on SBs, or create specialized sensorships, picking racial sensory perks... etc pp) gets moot from a single improvement (which is savely reserved for the player since the AI don't research that until very late...). It's faceroll...
Hated these discussions in GC3 as well when certain players defended sensor +50 ships, but sometimes you need to make the hardcall for the better good of the overall balance - because there're also players which actually do enjoy a challenge 
And I think the very same person would also now heavily object to your increase of techcost of the sensor-branch^^ (which is ok to my eyes...)
On the sensor-modules: the thing that turns me mostly of is that the first is relatively weak - an increase in +1 in times when the SB sensorial radius is still small = very little raw vision added. Paradoxically the last one adds +4 when that radius is already at 10 - but even a +1 increase to sensors would uncover 2-3 times for area than the first one, the current state uncovers perhaps more than 10 times parsecs.
Maybe +2 +2 +3 +3 would do likewise? Or +2+3+4? Personally I'd favour +4+3+2 - mostly realistic taking into account the inverse-square strength of the photonic force.... But it's depending on if you actually want that SBs are able to scratch at the 15 limit on their own - or only in conjunction with Eyes?
I know. Which makes it less than ideal. All the other starting SPs provide reliable bonuses. They always do something. That "something" is in all cases more than what a Cultural Exchange Center provides. Which the Innovation Complex was as long as Creativity didn't trigger. I had games were it only triggered once or twice over the course of fives years. With the vanilla bonuses I had been far better off.
Creativity +25 is enormously compared to +5 RP, I usually play all my games with it. It procs on average every 10 turns or so. It may not proc every game that often, but then there are games where it procs twice in a row, so it averages out. I actually found it far too strong but the current design isn't much better - the +5 RP planetary bonus can even *nerf* the Terran research - if there's a research-bonus tile at Earth (and no Influence-tile present) because in that situation they'll favour the Innovation Complex over a lab. And the speedbonus doesn't make much sense but I've already mentioned that... Maybe replace the +5 RP with a +10% research-bonus?
The map itself seems to have the biggest influence on the performance, along with how the AI behaves.
True - which is why you've got to give races more room to expand. Otherwise you'll just get blurred results - you can see it yourself in your picture that the favourable starting positions of Altaria & Earth led to what you see while the races which were locked into a corner - or had too much competition in their neighborhoods suffered. Although the pic itself shows already how strong the Terran AIP fares, I mean they've successfully thwarted off the Torians (which are always very strong early on) and even colonized right under the nose of the Altarians at the other side of the map, successfully got 5 planets there, with another colony ship in that vicinity when still extreme planets are free.... one may wonder what the Altarians did so long?
How is it not related to invasion? If you don't know by what means planetary conquest can be achieved, then how are you going to defend yourself against them?
Planetary Invasion tech is about finding ways to transport your soldiers to other planets. It's about the ability to construct and use a Troop Module. Originally even the basic Invasion-technique wasn't even attributed to it.
Planetary Defense is about fortifying your own planets, and teaching your soldiers to fight better. The Planetary Defense improvements show armed drones - they will shoot at invaders regardless of how they came to that planet.
And I don't understand why someone shouldn't be able to train soldiers - I mean this is something that can happen even in pre-industrial times, old civs like Arceans etc do that for half a million of years already. The tech PI itself doesn't even hold a soldiering-bonus when all 3 PD-techs do indeed, so I'd be inclined to say that the possibility of training soldiers to counter PI can be done without any knowledge about how aliens come to a planet.
There already is: build a fleet. Having a strong fleet makes all of the above easier, because it deters would-be invaders and makes other races like you more. It does slow down your research and production, but that's a small price to pay for not losing planets, in my opinion. It also fits in with the playstyle. You don't need to use the fleet for conquest. You are peaceful, after all. However, you're also not naive. Not every race is playing by the same rules. Some will want to take what is yours, and in that case, you'll need to defend yourself. Or others, too, if you want to be a protector.
First off, building & maintaining a fleet of warships that trigger the +your military might-diplo bonus is not just "a small price" but the single most power-consumptive undertaking that there is in the game - and for it to be effective you've also spend a huge amount of time into weaponsresearch - which, considering their costs, may amount to ~75% of all research spend. If you already achieved that then there's absolutely no point in not useing them to invade other planets - you would just artificially limit yourself otherwise.
But this - to spend 75% of my game militarizing + weaponizing myself - is exactly what I don't wanna do if I play a pacifistic game. I rather go the influence, social productive, food + popgrowth way to have strong planets that can successfully thwart off foreign invasion, esp in games where no Space Superiority can be achieved due to suicidal AI or Dread Lords. Thus, Planetary Defense should be easily accessable should an emergency break out, and it currently is crammed behind an offensive Military-tech which gets heavily hit by tech-inflation while defensive-techs remain relatively the lowest. Just another reason why that branch is illplaced.
I was just about to ask whether we could remove those techs. The same is also true for Capitalism and Entertainment Networks. In the vanilla game, only the Terrans and Torians started out with Market Centers. We could reimplement that. Or we could move the Markets to Industrial Revolution. The Torians don't need Markets at the start. They get enough money from their population. The Entertainment Network could also be moved back to Industrial Revolution. Though that would mean that the Korx and Krynn would have access to it again. In any case, I'm not particularily fond of the big amount of techs required to unlock basic buildings for some of the races.
Well, I agree. It looks awkward that some races do simply get a "starter-package" holding all improvements, or adding just one or two unique improvements when other races setup is sliced to pieces.
Moving the Markets to Industrial Rev would be a good start.
I kind of don't like it if races have access to improvements they won't be able to upgrade, esp. in a non-techtradeing game. That would be a nerf for just those races. The Krynn certainly don't need more moral and the Korx's game isn't the strongest to begin with. And because the <AI> tags of the Entertainment-line is almost double that of factories, banks or labs they will build lots of them at their planets.
That value isn't even accurate. According to the timeline in the GalCiv 3 databanks, the Drengin and Arceans achieved space-flight about 450,000 years ago. So they had to be around for much longer than that.
I'm trying to come up with something to expand on the details of that tech, but all I can think of is for the Korath. We simply know more about their recent history than about all of the Drengin-history.
Still, that should be okay. The tech is used for Korath as well. And if there's isn't much know about the very early Drengin history leaving it blank will more authentic than making something up.
I'd like to get some feedback on Point Defense. Currently, both Chaff and ECM are Tier 1. PD are the cheapest defenses. However, missiles do have the highest damage rating. So while PD are cheaper, you end up needing more to protect your ships. Now I'm wondering whether I should change ECM to Tier 2. That would raise the defense rating of ECM, PD, and PD Combo by 1 (except for PD Combo III, which is already at 4). That would also mean that Telepathic Defense and Advanced Point Defense would be moved up one Tier.
Is this a real issue? Am I just overthinking this? Could it be that this is an interesting differentiation between the defenses, and I'm just overlooking it? That's basically what I want to know.
I've just made a simple ingame comparison using a Medium Hull and no miniaturization, always using the latest/strongest defense per tier:
Name:____Defense:_Cost:_Rest-space:_TechCost:
Chaff______4________128_____8_________140
ECM_______9________188_____3_________500
PointDef___32_______320_____0_________1200
PDCombo__48_______400_____0_________2800
Titanium___9________188____3__________570
Duranth____18_______260____3__________1300
TriStront____27_______305____3__________1800
Kanvium____48_______480____0__________2900
Deflectors___12_______224____0_________720
Shields______24_______296____0_________1750
Barriers______48______480_____0_________2900
ForceFields___60______440_____0_________4500
Now this is only a very isolated example, showing problems which may not occur on other hulls, but if I would try to balance these mods for this very hull I'd do these things:
- Chaff & ECM needs to have their defensive output doubled. Just double their raw bonus. Missiles also work a bit like this.... Restspace of 8 at Chaff almost make it +5 defense, meaning that maybe ECM needs an additional buff, perhaps reducing sizemod a bit.
- Armor is well balanced.
- The jump from Shields to Barriers is perhaps a bit too great, maybe the whole starting line is a bit too strong. Maybe you've tried to balance that via their increased costs but then ForceFields are too cheap - they're even more cheap than Barriers may pose a problem when you upgrade a ship to a less expensive design, you'll get additionally charged alot.
On the other hand, if you take tech-costs into consideration the discrepancies get neutralized: For 720 RP a PD ship is already at 9 def and thus, in line with the rest of the defenses. And you'll be able to surpass the other 2 lines because you'll gain access to Point Defense-tier much more swiftly.
So, when including techcosts, I find the relative strength of all these mods quite balanced, just the cost of Barrrier/ForceFields is off....
