Eranikus

Well it will always be a "law" that if the light shines, there will be a shadow. Nothin' to do about it. However to be exact, there are several problems with current piracy and the main problem is that it is a vicious cycle going round at the moment in my opinion. I admit, that I didn't study business or anything the like, so my opinion in this matter is of amateur interest only. The vicious cycle being that most game developers (Stardock excluded), spend a mountain of money on their copyright p

[quote]OK, the thing is, in my current game, I'm not seeing allegiance drop at all on the planets getting hit, and I'm certainly not getting the "eyes of the converted" effect. (I'm maxed out tech-wise, so I have all the culture techs)If I saw the allegiance dropping, and it gave me a view on their planets, that'd be something useful at least. But nothing seems to be happening.[/quote] It takes 2 shots or so depending on how many cap ships your opponent has stationed there to get the

[quote]It gives you +99 to ponies.[/quote] Discrimination of Space Mules I say! :P

In my opinion, they are nice as they are and NOT overpowered. First of all they add utility to a stalement problem. Here is an example: I play Advent, my opponent, may he be NPC or human has a chokepoint to the rest of his empire (I know no official maps are build like that but it is just an example). He amasses his entire fleet there, so what to do. Of course you could just fly through, lose alot of ships and have him chasing yours through I don't know how many systems. On the other hand I thin

Had it aswell ^^ Found it on a pirate base and my first thought was... leik woot? Though space ponies own :D

Another thing regarding the pirates that annoys me is that they act like they left their pirate senses at their base when attacking. Instead of just blocking the trade port and destroying it, they chase after each tradeship to the edge of the gravwell, move back, move forth etc. In my opinion a "raid" is something quick and either sneaky or brutal. It doesn't make sense if the pirates stay in your system until your defense arrives and keep knocking on that trade station while they are confro

I just can't resist posting it... [link="http://youtube.com/watch?v=B9q2jNjOPdk"]WWW Link[/link] Really try using the search button. There are I don't know how many posts regarding it and big discussions.

Well I am not sure this would fix the problem but as far as I see it until now the problem seems to be lying at connecting to games in ICO. So it might be an idea to display the IP behind the game (e.g. Systems of War, FFA, Hoster: 123.123.123.123:1234) and than make a seperate "Direct connect" function that allows people to connect to the game without having to go through ICO. As said, I am not sure this would fix it, but hey, at least it is an idea ^^. I am not gonna come into the taste of

[quote]I agree with most of the opinions of a previous poster (Melric), even though I have found some people (through this forum) with whom I can play ICO games without experiencing any problem : excellent host, no joining issues, no lag, no crashes, no save-game reload issues. I base my agreement, then, on reading a lot of posts, on this forum, concerning the hosting and joining difficulties of (too) many users.The fact that I have no problems with ICO cannot be generalized in any representativ

[quote]Why even make hangars? Bombers are only good against heavy cruisers or capships and if your enemy is attacking with those chances are it's a fleet. It's not possible to make enough hangars to get enough bombers to even dent a decent heavy cruiser fleet. Most times the enemy can probably just ignore your bombers. That's all assuming they use heavy crusiers. If they spam light frigates hangars are absolutely useless.Turrets are pretty useless too. Unless you make dozens your planet will hav

First of all I got to say that I love the game. I really do. Regarding the online point: I can't play online anyways as there are serious connection troubles due to street working in my area so I can't say anything about that (i.e. my connection breaks up after 30 mins which is too short for a nice game imo.) Regarding the Campaign thing. I don't mind it. Infact I enjoy it. I am glad that we got all those possibilities we have and that the game is so balanced as it is now. I think that often

Just right click the ability. You can see when the rotating circle is up on an icon that it is autocasting. Another important note is to disable autocast on colonize incase you ever take it on a Mothership. It sucks incase it colonizes a planet out of stupidity while still 389473979 siege frigates of your enemy are around that can blast the planet back to oblivion.

In my opinion the fleet cap should be combined in a relation of planets total in the map, stars and the distance, heck maybe even upon your culture. It might make culture more usefull (only logic for me that if more people like your culture that they try to enlist in your military thus giving you more recruits for your ships.) I am not saying however that it should work as a large multiplier just as a kind of influence on it. The problem I see is that if you play large maps FFA it becomes n

Yes and no. Some ships handle themselves astonishing well, while others, incase I may say so, act as if they listened to the Unity propaganda for a tad too long. As an example I noticed Iconus Guardians doing their job quite well without me having to look for them all too much (just checking that they don't sleep on the job every now and than), While the Mothership didn't even think about casting the shield restore ability when 5 ships were sitting next to it with 0 shields. But in gen

As stated before it all depends on your playstyle just like choosing your race. I enjoy keeping my range and trying to screw over enemy fleets before they reach my own so they either reach it shredded or run. It also depends alot on the race I must admit. I don't play TEC (Well I did but don't like it), but Illum's or Assailiants (misspelled I know...) with a proper unit defending them from being torn apart can be a horror. Try having a few robotic cruisers among them when playing TEC as pr

I had the same problem at first. Locking the teams definitly helps and fighting equal vs equal aswell. It is not that your AI mate needs to do alot (You can change him into a Defense oriented person instead of random). That way he can act as meatshield while not messing too much in the offense. The problem in a non locked diplomacy is that the AI becomes quite... stubborn regarding your missions sometimes. I had it that it gave me a "Destroy 15 defensive stations of enemy X" task only short

My usual start off as Advent runs kinda like this on normal ressource as start: 1) Build cap ship yard 2) Queue the Halycon Carrier (The extra bombers and the aura are aweseome at all times imo.) 3) Build the extractors and a Hostility Lab 4) Queue 2 scouts and a missionary. After that it depends on your personality but I usually build 5 frigates and than start researching the first tier shield upgrade. 5) Go off capture a romantic rock of your local liking and build a

In a game vs AI I try to pick maps without pirates. The AI really has a tendency to wreck itself with the pirates and than not being able to attack properly. A much better thing regarding pirates would be that they so to speak rather harrass your trade, i.e. as long as the bounty is on you, they block your lanes and reduce general income instead of flying to a planet, causing chaos and running off again. It would be smooth if by the size of the bribe the kind of attack would be distinguished

Regarding the Kostura it is a double edged blade in my opinion. Playing a round against a mate LAN was quite entertaining when he brought in his Armada and mistimed the shot so it hit after his Fleet was dancing mambo around my asteroid :P Too bad I missed recording his deep sighs regarding my not disabled bombers shredding through a defenseless fleet ^^. Anyways from the utility I think the Kostura is still the one that has the biggest advantage. The Deliverance Engine (I typed it wron

Well he can slow your culture down considerably if he just masses good enough (by the level) capital ships or a larger number of them. They repel culture and depending on your culture spread rate, it can stop completly (which is a bummer). Only thing you can do there is either send him a love letter from your Deliverance station or ... just basicly flatten the asteroid :P Regarding the resistance: Yes I think it is culture / sec vs culture / sec. Not to forget to mention that the culture sto

I use the advent cannon usually on a planet I am going to assault. Saves the shitty "you can not colonize the planet because the opponents culture is too strong" or something along those lines crap :D Not to forget that if you have a broadcast center nearby on a planet and enhance spreading your culture that way, it is fun ^^. (I really wonder if they only pack messages from the unity inside that shot... must be some more to it than just prayers :D)

Rather than using the ingame editor, try using the GalaxyForge tool, posted on in the download section on the main page. There is a nice guide attached to it, so it shouldn't be a problem to figure things out. If you want to connect Wormholes across star systems it is a bit complicated though :P Look at Voruk's Labyrinth than you should be able to figure it out easily :D (you can open the maps in the Stardock Games\Sins of a Solar Empire\Galaxy folder with notepad)

Okay for those not fond of math like me (not saying that I don't get the theory, I just prefer practical examples), just make a simple test with a friend. 3 Prognator Motherships, 5 Iconus guardians and than some random targets. Try it wihout phase missiles and with them. You'll notice one hell of a large difference :P And thats all you basicly need to know. Important note though... don't use autocast for the shield refill ability of the Mothership. They are a bit... brainless sometimes :P

Regarding the superweapon thing... why not limit it to one but allow it to move with a cooldown, e.g. every 20 min to another planet. That would a) get rid of those shots taking an eternity to reach their destiny and b) allow persons to get rid of them. They might need a buff though if they are limited to only one (not really sure about it). [quote] Can anyone explain how Illuminators could not be considered overpowered? They have a different damage type an

I am quite new to the game and like playing advent, but if my memory serves right, the Vasari Cannon has the ability to disable things in orbit of the planet which would effectively shut down his defense platforms and also that Vasari have some kind of Cruiser that is able to jump in system and disable enemy vessels (I don't remember the name just yet.. :P Probably will after a few more games ^^). Using that as a combo would help to buy you the time to take out the carriers. Okay I admit ha