.com.unity Forums - Frequently Asked Questions for Newbies

Inspiration strikes again.... http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/tongue.gif

1.1.2.2 Crystalline Facilities
1.1.2.2.1 The Crystalline Restructuring Plant reduces maintenance of all your ships in that system.
1.1.2.2.2 The Energy Transmission Lens increases the shield strength of all your ships in the system.

1.3.3 Choose atmosphere of None can be very tempting, since then all those moons out there become breathable. The trade-off is that there are fewer regular planets with no atmosphere, and no gas giant will ever be breathable (since gas giants cannot have no atmosphere, even with an Atmosphere Converter).

4.3.1 [addition] Multiple Atmosphere Converters on the planet will speed up the process.

4.3.6 Climate Control Facilities can be scrapped once the colony's conditions are Optimal. Multiple CCF's will speed the process.

4.3.7 Value Improvement Plants can be scrapped once all resources are at the maximum level, which is 250%. Multiple VIP's will speed the process. You will only see improvements on turns that end in xxxx.0.

4.4.3.1 [addition] ...will go into slow mode (25% of normal construction rate)....
4.4.3.2 If a colony that is in Emergency Build mode starts rioting (meaning no production at all), those turns still count toward the recovery time in slow-build mode. Example: a colony has been emergency building for four turns. It then falls into rioting for two turns with no production, then stops rioting and emergency builds for two more turns before emergency build is turned off. The colony will be in slow-build mode for eight turns.

[formatting change] 4.4.9 through 4.4.12 should become 4.4.8.1 through 4.4.8.4.

4.8.2 In combat, a planet will launch any fighters and drones it has in storage when attacked. Fighters will be recovered, but drones will not. A planet will not launch satellites or mines while in combat.

5.5.26 You cannot retrofit a ship to include a Colony Module or a Space Yard if one was not present on the ship already.

5.7.6 [disagreement] Training a missile ship will not make its missiles more likely to hit, but it will still be more likely to be missed by enemy direct-fire weapons.

5.11.4 [addition] Mines can be ordered to self-destruct.

5.11.6 There is a limit of 100 mines per sector and 100 satellites per sector.

6.4.4 [change] In the post-1.78 patch, even if the Master Computer is destroyed, by Computer Virus or otherwise, the ship is still immune to the Allegiance Subverter.

6.9.5 A blockaded planet can still construct stuff, as long as the colony is not rioting due to the enemy ships in orbit.

7.2.10 [addition] The default setting is 1 militia per 20M population.

8.2.5 If a planet or carrier launches fighters during combat, any surviving fighters are automatically picked up once combat ends.

8.3.1 Range does not matter for troop weapons. All troop weapons are assumed to be fired at range 1.
8.3.2 Troops are deployed in the order they are loaded onto the transport ship. A devious tactic is to design two Versions of troops, one that has only shields and one that had only weapons. If you load the shielded troops before the weapon troops, the shielded troops will be attacked first by the enemy militia. This should give your gunners all the protection they need to wipe out the planet's militia.

9.5.1.1 The Matter Gravity Sphere will create a planet that is the same size as the asteroid field that is used, i.e. huge asteroid fields make huge planets.
9.5.1.2 Be careful when using less than the highest level of the MGS. An MGS 1 used on a hugh asteroid field will ony create a medium planet.
9.5.1.3 A created planet will have the same resource percentages as the asteroid field used. So be careful with remote miners if you plan on creating planets later.

10.0.2 The AI tends to get ticked off if you and it claim the same system(s). Relinquishing claims on contested systems (under Empires--> Borders) might make the AI less snippy.

10.1.2 [clear redundancy]

10.1.5 Counterintelligence (CI) points are drawn from points stored in CI projects. If a CI project is allowed to complete, all the accumulated CI points in that project disappear.

16.1 Popular mods [Note: these are my impressions of these mods. Anyone more familiar with them, please add/edit as you see fit!]
16.1.1 TDM-Modpack: greatly improves the stock AI and adds several new races and fleet formations, but does not change anything else in the game (components, techs, etc.). Created and maintained by Tampa_Gamer, Daynarr, and [K126]Mephisto.
16.1.2 Pirates and Nomads: introduces Quasi-Newtonian Propulsion (bigger ships need more engines to move), Pirate and Nomad racial traits (they do not need colonies to survive), and a whole slew of other gizmos and racial traits. Created and maintained by Suicide_Junkie.
16.1.3 Proportions: an attempt at a more 'realistic' game by dramatically slowing colony development. Reproduction is dropped to 10% of normal and production on lightly-inhabited worlds is significantly dropped, while homeworld production is boosted significantly. Also introduces many new components and facilities, and balances costs for racial characteristics. Created and maintained by PvK.
16.1.4 Devnullmod: Introduces new components and techs, a tweaked combat system, and AI's to use the changes effectively. Also includes the infamous Space Monsters. Created by Devnull, maintained by Rollo.
16.1.5 Fyron's Quadrant Mod: Introduces many new quadrant and system types, including several that are AI-friendly. Also includes nearly 40,000 (!) system names. Created and maintained by Imperator Fyron.
16.1.6 There are a whole bunch of other mods out there, such as the Babylon 5 mod, the Star Trek: The Next Generation mod, and Derek's Mod, that I am just not familiar enough with to comment on. There are many more that I have forgotten about as well. If I missed your favorite mod, please don't flay me, as I am just a scatterbrain (and I've written too much tonight as it is http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/tongue.gif ).
16.2 Managing Mods
16.2.1 Each mod is placed into its own directory in the Space Empires IV folder.
16.2.2 There are several ways to make SEIV use a mod instead of the stock files:
16.2.2.1 Use Matryx' Mod Launcher. Instructions are available with the program.
16.2.2.2 Edit the file path.txt. Instructions are in that file.
16.2.2.3 Launch SEIV using command line options. Instructions are in history.txt, under 'Version 1.39.'

Jeez, that was not intended to be as long-winded as it is. I guess I just got on a roll.... http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon7.gif

Quikngruvn

[ November 10, 2002, 05:40: Message edited by: Quikngruvn ]