Gripe list » Forum Post by Jobu9092

Quoting ,

Let me preface this gripe list by saying how much i've loved and enjoyed the entire GalCiv universe of games. This game needs a little more tweaking to get it where it needs to be. Here's a list of a few in-game gripes I have about this version:

Version .65 alpha

Game gripes for this version:

1)I'm sick to death of seeing the same summary and action screens after executed turns. Every single turn, I get the "governor x is in love with you and is raising money. We will use this to our advantage" screen. It doesn't seem to matter if i'm flush or broke, it happens. Every. Turn.

2)Some of the ship upgrades that say stuff like, "your engineers have a %% probability to master this tech" asking if you want to try and get the ship upgrade, trade it in for antimatter or other resources. Once you get the tech for your ships, that should be it for that tech. I've "gotten" the slipstream movement tech about 20 times now.

3)Upgrading ships isn't sticky yet. How many cargo bays can I install in one ship? The mystery continues.... Maybe make the ship upgrades tied to the class of the ship rather than the individual ship with the option to upgrade ships when in range of a shipyard like the older games.

4)I want the border patrol option back from GalCiv 2, where you can tell a ship to defend your territory within your own borders and it will sentry until intruding ships are detected, then the AI will auto-engage pursuit of the enemy. I miss that.

5)Get more realistic on your structure build times for planets. In other words, it takes too long to flesh a planet out with a balance of planet sectors, much less upgrading those sectors. It shouldn't take 50 weeks to build a basic farm improvement. Maybe a level 5 farm improvement, but not a basic one. Scale the build times to the complexity of the build.

6)Some micro planets like Mars never offer up a habitat upgrade. Ever. Yet, i'm forced to attack and then defend these little tiny planets if i'm on a conquest campaign.

7)You could easily double the speed at which culture points are gained in the game.

8)Ship building is also painfully slow as is building drones for starbase upgrades. You could easily cut the build times here by 1/3rd.

9)The "ready for upgrade +" marker next to the starbases ready for an upgrade when available resources are ready need to update after every starbase upgrade. In other words, i'll show multiple starbases ready for an upgrade but after I burn up the resource on one of them it doesn't update the "ready for upgrade +" red indicators. Which means I have to click through the starbases to see if any need upgrading but none of them do or the upgrade options are blacked out.

10)Ranking planets by population doesn't work. It's a hunt-and-seek to find habitable planets worth colonizing using this method.

11)The species traits at the beginning of the game is much weaker than in previous GalCiv's. I'd like to see more options (including a return of the "lucky" option) for species and another point or two to assign to a species. Also a few more creative "negative" species traits might be fun.

# For ease of answering.

1) As these do not have choices they could be put with other upper left notifications.

2) If you get one of these improvements it works for all ships? I thought if use one you needed to discover another one to add it to a second ship.

3)As there are limited Slots for adding features to a ship my understanding is for "civilian" ship parts it is one to a ship, 1 colony, 1 cargo, excreta.

4)Ambivalent about this one.

5) this is a Goldilocks gripe some will say it is too slow, some too fast, and others it's just right. May need tweaking based on map size as well as game speed.

6) Make them colonies most planets do not rate being Core Worlds, Mars and the other Solar System planet are 2 of these.

7) Another Goldilocks.

8) Goldilocks.

9) Agree plus the Starbase can improve icon appears even when there are no available improvements.

10) This has been mentioned, the Devs have been asked for a sort by size option for planets.

11) As this is alpha not all features have been added. This includes as of .60 at least 11 major species many of which will have unique traits that will be available later. This is a "patient my young Padawan" gripe IMHO. 😉

Nice list.

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Frogboy

Join Date 03/2001

+2394

We're about to release an update before Christmas (not sure what it's going to be called). We'll be doing some surgery over the holidays based on feedback like yours.

Thanks!

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DerekPaxton

Join Date 03/2003

+309

Quoting ,

quoting post

Let me preface this gripe list by saying how much i've loved and enjoyed the entire GalCiv universe of games. This game needs a little more tweaking to get it where it needs to be. Here's a list of a few in-game gripes I have about this version:

Version .65 alpha

Game gripes for this version:

1) I'm sick to death of seeing the same summary and action screens after executed turns. Every single turn, I get the "governor x is in love with you and is raising money. We will use this to our advantage" screen. It doesn't seem to matter if i'm flush or broke, it happens. Every. Turn.

2) Some of the ship upgrades that say stuff like, "your engineers have a %% probability to master this tech" asking if you want to try and get the ship upgrade, trade it in for antimatter or other resources. Once you get the tech for your ships, that should be it for that tech. I've "gotten" the slipstream movement tech about 20 times now.

3) Upgrading ships isn't sticky yet. How many cargo bays can I install in one ship? The mystery continues.... Maybe make the ship upgrades tied to the class of the ship rather than the individual ship with the option to upgrade ships when in range of a shipyard like the older games.

4) I want the border patrol option back from GalCiv 2, where you can tell a ship to defend your territory within your own borders and it will sentry until intruding ships are detected, then the AI will auto-engage pursuit of the enemy. I miss that.

5) Get more realistic on your structure build times for planets. In other words, it takes too long to flesh a planet out with a balance of planet sectors, much less upgrading those sectors. It shouldn't take 50 weeks to build a basic farm improvement. Maybe a level 5 farm improvement, but not a basic one. Scale the build times to the complexity of the build.

6) Some micro planets like Mars never offer up a habitat upgrade. Ever. Yet, i'm forced to attack and then defend these little tiny planets if i'm on a conquest campaign.

7) You could easily double the speed at which culture points are gained in the game.

8) Ship building is also painfully slow as is building drones for starbase upgrades. You could easily cut the build times here by 1/3rd.

9) The "ready for upgrade +" marker next to the starbases ready for an upgrade when available resources are ready need to update after every starbase upgrade. In other words, i'll show multiple starbases ready for an upgrade but after I burn up the resource on one of them it doesn't update the "ready for upgrade +" red indicators. Which means I have to click through the starbases to see if any need upgrading but none of them do or the upgrade options are blacked out.

10) Ranking planets by population doesn't work. It's a hunt-and-seek to find habitable planets worth colonizing using this method.

11) The species traits at the beginning of the game is much weaker than in previous GalCiv's. I'd like to see more options (including a return of the "lucky" option) for species and another point or two to assign to a species. Also a few more creative "negative" species traits might be fun.

1. Yeah there is a bug in 0.65 causing the governor events to repeat. That is fixed in the internal build.

2. This will be easier once you have the vault where you can store these upgrades and see what you have and don't have. Though we also need more variety in events and upgrades.

3. Currently you can upgrade one component per level of the ship.

4. No plans to add that at this point. We do have the sentry command so you don't have to skip turn every turn and the ship will "wake up" if an enemy comes into range. It was poorly described but desc was improved for the next update.

5. Agreed on build times, we have lowered in for 0.7

6. Yes colonies are targets that can be won or lost. They can be taken from warships (they don't require transports) but the intent is to take the battle out to the main map and allow players to strategically attack their opponents. What part of this is frustrating for you?

7. We will be playing with those numbers, at this point I like how they are coming in the first 200 turns and I feel like we need more later in the game

8. Early game I like the ship building speeds. Late game it needs work.

9. Agreed.

10. Ranking by Population works. Uncolonized worlds all have 0 population. We need a sort by Planet Class.

11. We will be playing with balance on these too.

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Hey there. I'll try to communicate and respond as clearly as I can to the relevant questions that need a response to help the game. It's getting better.

"3. Currently you can upgrade one component per level of the ship."

Maybe it's the repetition but it feels like when you do a ship upgrade, you're repeatedly doing the same ship upgrade to the same ships. Maybe it's because of the sheer number of ships I have going in the game at this time. I just feel like it's a highly repetitive thing to upgrade your ships individually like this. For example, one constable ship looks like every other constable ship when you have three fleets of twenty of them and it feels like no matter how many upgrades you do, you repeat it with the next new ship you make starting over from ground zero. I'd rather have it where if a ship upgrade is unlocked, it auto-updates the ship designs so that newly constructed vessels don't need to start from ground zero with upgrades. It's fine if I have to go back and manually upgrade ships built previous to the unlocked upgrades, or at least make it where previously constructed ships can be upgraded automatically once in rage of a starbase/starport if you have the funds and/or resources to do so.

"4. No plans to add that at this point. We do have the sentry command so you don't have to skip turn every turn and the ship will "wake up" if an enemy comes into range. It was poorly described but desc was improved for the next update."

Yes, and it's convenient but nowhere near as convenient as the previously mentioned auto-patrol option from GalCiv2. I'm using the sentry option mainly to amass fleets around the sector portals in case of invasion at military starbases. That works pretty well, but when you get messages like, "34 ships in your territory without permission" it would make intercepting random ships in your sectors of control a bit simpler. Right now, when I get a message like that, I have to identify where the ships are and on what sector of the star map at mid-game. It's easier to deal with in the early game but sometimes finding small ships in different sectors across the galaxy is harder to track down than you'd think. I know i'm not likely to get this option but it never hurts to ask.

"6. Yes colonies are targets that can be won or lost. They can be taken from warships (they don't require transports) but the intent is to take the battle out to the main map and allow players to strategically attack their opponents. What part of this is frustrating for you?"

Because some of the tiniest habitable planets might only have one or two upgradable tiles. Even later in the game when you have habitat improvements and other options, several of the micros never allow me to do a tile upgrade simply because they have such a low planet class. When you conquer a micro planet, they're maddening to hold on to. Native populations are already upset with you and usually in some percentage of rebellion. Since planetary cultural resources are limited turn to turn for cultural upgrades where you're either quashing the rebellions, extorting the governors or making people happier, you wind up burning up those resources which could be better used on larger planets in your empire. For example, i've set up a simple conquest game in easy mode and the Dregen empire i'm fighting in-game has about 40 micro planets to conquer and hold onto in their sector. When I conquer them, I assign them a leader and have to burn those planetary cultural resource points to hang onto them or they'll rebel or get annexed by an adjacent empire they like better than mine. Also, the Torians and I have annexed the same planet about six times in the game so far and as soon as I assign a governor and start upgrading tiles, the Torians re-annex the planet back because I don't have enough planetary culture points to hang onto it. I know these annexations have a lot more to do with influence in the game, but the Torians and I seem to share a planet. They get it for a few dozen turns, then I get it for a few dozen turns.

"10. Ranking by Population works. Uncolonized worlds all have 0 population. We need a sort by Planet Class."

Yes. This. So much this. Once your probes have discovered more than a dozen worlds, it become a hunt and peck to find the planets with the best overall class. I thought the solution was ranking them by population but clearly that's not what's needed. Sorting by class size would speed up the process of colonizing the best planets in the early game.

upgrade ships once in range o a starport, like previous versions of the

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Ignore this.

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after 370 turns on 0.65 i have _5_ culture points applied. Something is very broken with that.

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scifi1950

Join Date 02/2005

+119

You really should switch over to 0.71 in test. They have added lots of fixes for issues we've raised in anticipation of going BETA. 0.65 isn't a fair reading of where the game is going now. I've earned 6 culture points by turn 203 so I know this one has been addressed.

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I'm playing the latest now and looks like I must be out of sync with the way 4x is going, I'd have thought we'd be innovating the maps further, custom zones, combat adjacency bonuses, flesh out heroes further so they have more feeling, not casualizing the mechanics. I love the new videos, they're incredibly well rendered, that's definitely StarDock punching above their weight, also i was drooling at the new civ list, absolutely gorgeous use of colors and animation, i didn't know who to choose. But randomized tech and a meaningless ship builder removes the most important aspects for 4x - agency, there's just no getting around that. This is like watching Creative Assembly nerf TW until it was just a pointless card game.

+1

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DerekPaxton

Join Date 03/2003

+309

Did you know you can focus your tech research on a certain area?

What components would you like to see to design ships with?

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Quoting bradzoob,

reply 8

I'm playing the latest now and looks like I must be out of sync with the way 4x is going, I'd have thought we'd be innovating the maps further, custom zones, combat adjacency bonuses, flesh out heroes further so they have more feeling, not casualizing the mechanics. I love the new videos, they're incredibly well rendered, that's definitely StarDock punching above their weight, also i was drooling at the new civ list, absolutely gorgeous use of colors and animation, i didn't know who to choose. But randomized tech and a meaningless ship builder removes the most important aspects for 4x - agency, there's just no getting around that. This is like watching Creative Assembly nerf TW until it was just a pointless card game.

I have to disagree with some of your post or agree to you being out of sync.

Much of what you are talking about IMHO is RPG not 4X.

1. We do not have or need heroes.

2. Your map suggestions puzzles me the only one I can speak to atm is combat adjacency each hex in GCIV is 3.26 light years apart, so having a concept developed for ground combat games is what IMHO immersion breaking.

3. Not casualizing the mechanics if by this you mean making the mechanics more complicated, pardon as I run for cover as the majority of players already whine about the micro-management.

4. Stardock punching above its weight? Stardock is not a gaming company it's a software development company whose CEO has decided to do limited development of games, because he wanted a more in-depth space 4X than MOO2. There is no one in their weight class.

5. Randomized tech is a direct attempt to keep Mini-Maxers from bee-lining tech to many players beeline up the tech to get that optimum building, ship, whatever it is then complain the AI is too easy to beat, random tech is an attempt to delay this outcome. Add that you can click the beaker icon in the upper right of the tech screen and chose tech from one of 4 subcategories it is not truly "random".

All in all, I just think what you want would take this game in a direction away from being what it has been to being less than it already is and way below what it will be at launch.

That is my opinion and as every knows opinions are like fourth points of contact everyone has one.

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DerekPaxton

Join Date 03/2003

+309

5. Randomized tech is a direct attempt to keep Mini-Maxers from bee-lining tech to many players beeline up the tech to get that optimum building, ship, whatever it is then complain the AI is too easy to beat, random tech is an attempt to delay this outcome. Add that you can click the beaker icon in the upper right of the tech screen and chose tech from one of 4 subcategories it is not truly "random".

Just to add to this, as Gypsy said, the point of random tech trees is to make sure every game plays differently and allow us to give discrete choices to players without overwhelming them. Hardcore players with the tree memorized might like having 30 techs to choose from, but its overwhelming game spew to 90% of players.

One thing I am realizing is way to many players dont realize you can focus your research. We definitely need to make that more clear.

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Quoting DerekPaxton,

reply 11

5. Randomized tech is a direct attempt to keep Mini-Maxers from bee-lining tech to many players beeline up the tech to get that optimum building, ship, whatever it is then complain the AI is too easy to beat, random tech is an attempt to delay this outcome. Add that you can click the beaker icon in the upper right of the tech screen and chose tech from one of 4 subcategories it is not truly "random".

Just to add to this, as Gypsy said, the point of random tech trees is to make sure every game plays differently and allow us to give discrete choices to players without overwhelming them. Hardcore players with the tree memorized might like having 30 techs to choose from, but its overwhelming game spew to 90% of players.

One thing I am realizing is way to many players dont realize you can focus your research. We definitely need to make that more clear.

There are many aids and tricks in GCIV that we are just finding out. Clicking or hovering on the Shipyard in the planet window brings up the production numbers for the Yard just as an example. I stated on Discord that this version may need a detailed manual so "casual" players can find them.

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well good luck guys, I hope you're right and majority of 4x players do want this and if not i hope you built the system to be flexible so you can undo it all

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Quoting gypsy2299,

reply 10

2. Your map suggestions puzzles me the only one I can speak to atm is combat adjacency each hex in GCIV is 3.26 light years apart, so having a concept developed for ground combat games is what IMHO immersion breaking.

And yet Stardock have introduced abilities to attack ships from 5 hexes away...

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Frogboy

Join Date 03/2001

+2394

Quoting Surge72,

reply 14

Quoting gypsy2299,

reply 10

2. Your map suggestions puzzles me the only one I can speak to atm is combat adjacency each hex in GCIV is 3.26 light years apart, so having a concept developed for ground combat games is what IMHO immersion breaking.

And yet Stardock have introduced abilities to attack ships from 5 hexes away...

While that is true, it's a very different thing than forcing players to move units into adjacent tiles to maximize effectiveness. This is a game that largely focuses on logistics instead of tactics. It's about the civilization you're building.

The ranged strategic weapons were put in in order for players to be able to position ships to defend star systems as we now have planetary sieges that take multiple turns (which is a big change from previous GC games and likely to be one of the real stand out improvements).

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I'm not against ranged strategic weapons. I like them. Like you said, they're great for setting up defensive positions.

Was just pointing it out for gypsy2299.

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I can't get this game out of my mind despite growing frustrated at the bizarre arguments regarding nerf'd core features, the segmented clusters are a brilliant idea that took me by surprise and galciv3's lack of it really kicks - but it suddenly struck me, i don't have to cry about regressive changes, i can just mod this damned thing to make me happy, just like cp77

So i played around a bit and managed to get a mod working in about 15 minutes that doubled the hull sizes, though it would only take effect on a new game. Next step is to super size them GC3 style and mod all the equipment, remove that pesky "onePerShip" attribute and boom got myself a galciv goulash goin. Hooly dooly.

I can write my own tools to automate a lot of that to make it work with future xml additions, but i see there's already some GC tools in the install path, are any of them useful for this task and/or documented?

Also is there some existing GC tools that let me write those changes back to a save game so i can use new XML edits in existing saves? lack of live modding is lamentable in most games let alone 4x which can last hundreds of hours, and often balance or bugs can't be tested until you reach an advanced state, if not then is there a reference to the save file schema or even just a block of code exampling what is written into the file (and if obfuscated, the rev engineer)? if it's just straight binary serialization maybe you can share the object/class so i can write some .net to de-serialize, modify and re-serialize? I understand how brittle this could be, any game change will break it, but most modders accept this is expected and the benefits to being able to mod a mid-flight game would be phenomenal.

This doesn't bode well;

https://forums.galciv3.com/499470/mod-save-game

Oh wait, easy, ok i managed to open the save with rar and extract save.tmp so that'll be easy to do programmatically but it's 300MB of binary, so hopefully you guys can help out with a schema/format and if you like i can send my source for a save mod "baker' back for you to use if this is something you'd like and isn't already a tool you have in-house.

Also how does GalCiv handle modding in general, i don't recall seeing a list of mods to activate or any tools to activate/disable them or set their load order?

Thanks!

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