Re: SE5, Tell Aaron what\'s on your Wish List
 

I definitely agree with that!

Re: SE5, Tell Aaron what\'s on your Wish List
 

I think the biggest problem for MM is that each jewelcase costs more than the stupid paper bag. But hey, if the total price of the game rises to 2 dollars more, you won't hear me complain.
Let's ask Aaron this in the Pre-Christmas Chat. Unfortunately I can't be there, so is there anyone who would like to ask this?

Re: SE5, Tell Aaron what\'s on your Wish List
 

What if you could send voice Messages to other players, with moddable modulators in each race's data files? Voice modulation is possible in DirectX, isn't it? http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/wink.gif

Re: SE5, Tell Aaron what\'s on your Wish List
 

Imagine if someone will decide to send voice message in the pbw game. I'd prefere embeded text-to-speech engine and option to disable it.

Re: SE5, Tell Aaron what\'s on your Wish List
 

A) If you capture an enemy ship, you should be able to:

1 Research the unknown parts via a long, long tech tree, then be able to repair the newly researched parts.

2 Capture a planet belonging to the alien race that built the ship, and have it repaired by them.



B) If you capture an alien planet, you should be able to:

1 After the period of rebellion, have them repair ships built by their race.

2 After the period of rebellion, have them build ships that were known to them at the time of capture. The ships would appear in the build choices but only from the alien planet......... Maybe they would not be able to build any of ships from my race until after I build a College or University on their planet.



C) If you have enough mine sweepers in your fleet to sweep a mine field, then no ship in the fleet should sustain damage.

Re: SE5, Tell Aaron what\'s on your Wish List
 

What do you mean? Isn't this how it works now? Personally, I'd rather see the absurd all or nothing system removed. Let mines have a chance to be swept by the sweepers, so there is never a 100% guarantee to sweep every mine in existence without fear. A minesweeper could have a percentage chance to sweep a mine, rather than 100% chance. Mines could have new components that provide a penalty to that sweeping chance, sort of like ECM.

Re: SE5, Tell Aaron what\'s on your Wish List
 

that would certainly offer more customisation of mines, and present a greater sense of trepidation in approaching minefields.

Re: SE5, Tell Aaron what\'s on your Wish List
 

How about a better handling of plagues by the AI?? As it is, if a plague breaks out on an AI planet, it never tries to stop the plague, and once the population is decimated, it never seems to repopulate the planet.

Re: SE5, Tell Aaron what\'s on your Wish List
 

In the combat report log entry, instead of just the final damage percent for each ship, show the beginning and final amount, so you can tell if a ship was damaged in that combat or it was already damaged:

COMBAT IN AETHER
LUMINOTH SOCIETY
Planet Aether 0% -> 35%
U'mos 0001 (LC) 0% -> Dead
U'mos 0002 (LC) 12% -> Dead
ING HORDE
Planet Dark Aether 0% -> 0%
X'helar 0001 (BB) 0% -> 0%
X'helar 0002 (BB) 16% -> 16%
X'helar 0003 (BB) 95% -> Dead
Drexel 0001 (SB) 0% -> 0%

Re: SE5, Tell Aaron what\'s on your Wish List
 

I would like to see ship commanders avaiable for hire, like MOO2 has them. that would realy be neat
and that those commanders would gain experience from their actions

Re: SE5, Tell Aaron what\'s on your Wish List
 

These are some ideas, and a few problems I met in some games, specially in multiplayer. It's a long and probably unsorted and bad explained list, but I hope you can understand these ideas:

- Waste of construction capability in spaceyards. Having 4500 of capability when building --for example-- monoliths means each 3 turns the spaceyard 'loses' 3500 construction points of capability (4500 * 3 - 10000). It would be desirable that the construction have a similar behavior to research / intelligence queue projects, with the "ability" of placing other objects in first position of the queues without losing completely the unfinished / partially built objects.

- Fixed planet position. I would like to see how nearly all objects (planets, moons, asteroids... ) rotate around the star(s) of the system. Objects like nebulae or warp points should not be affected, or affected in a very small amount. In tactical combat, also moons should orbit around their planet.

- Poor tactical options in a fleet. In this point, I have some ideas:
- It would be desirable to have different squadrons in the same fleet, each one with diferent orders. For example, escort, bombardment,command, attack squadrons, each one operating independently of the others.
- Some squadrons will have some bonus. For example, an escort squadron can provide defensive bonus against every shot which should traspass it to attack other vessels behind it. The command squadron can provide ofensive bonus for all attack squadrons in battle.
- The posibility of place every vessels in a fleet in any squadron, every squadron with different formations and every ship in the position in the formation wanted.
- A formation for each squadron and a formation for all squadrons in a fleet.
- Special "components" for command vessels, as "fleet command bridge". From it, the "admiral" pass the offensive bonus to the attack squadrons.

- Line of sight.
- Some objects in tactical mode (planets, moons...) should block LoS from the other side of the object. Aditionaly, big artificial ship/bases (like starbases or baseships) should block LoS for smaller objects. Only "ELINT" vessels can "see" to the other side of the blocking objects.
- Some objects in strategical mode (planets, wormholes, stars...) should block LoS. Only "ELINT" vessels can "see" to the other side of the blocking objects.

- Satelites should not be grouped staticaly in a unique point of space in tactical mode, but they should encircle the main body, orbiting it. The same should be applied to bases. If the satelites are placed in an empty sector, they also should be "orbiting" an empty point, or at least, be placed in a "loose" area of space.

- Planetary shields should be a general, costly, technology avaiable for everybody, and be a lot more powerful than the ship component equivalents.

- The imposibility of upgrading units (satelites, weapon platforms, troops, mines...)

- The surface combat mode is too simple, comparing with the space combat mode. It should be a bit more complex, with special buildings as fortress, bunkers.... Some ship weapons like planetary napalm could be used in special mode of orbital support. ¿Perhaps a tactical "ground" mode similar to the tactical "space" mode?

- The Point Defense Cannon is too much effective. It should be more loose, specially against fighters. The same for the Talisman. ¿Perhaps 2-3 levels for talisman, making it an overpowered combat sensor?

- Special damage mode of Area of Effect. It would work in a similar way of real artillery barrage. Some powerful AoE weapons could create an impassable/harmful area of space which could disipate in a few tactical turns. Some weapons should be able to target regions of space, not enemy fighters/vessels.

- The stealth mode is a bit strange. One sensor is able to discover every possible form of stealth, and one component is able to hide with every possible form of stealth. It should be done a more complex way, with stealth components too bulky so they are unsuitable to attack vessels, or passive and active sensors. The Last ones should add a defensive penalty for these 'ELINT' vessels, and "active" sensors make any "hidden" ship highly "visible".

- The idea of infinite supplies limits a lot the strategy from the half of a game. There should be only some supply ships which can pass supplies from resupply depots to ships/fleets. It should be transferred from/to the
supply ships in a similar way to the cargo.

- Only a sort of "supply" thing is a bit strange. For engines/energy weapons, it's admisible. For missiles it's a bit strange, except if there is a sort of builtin missile factory in every ship. Also there should be a diferent sort of "food" supply. The "matter" weapons, as the DUC, should have a different, cheaper, supply source.

- Having heavy repair components in ships. A ship should be able only to repair some 'minor' components (armor, some light weapons, a few engines...), but not able to repair, with time, all damaged systems in any
ship. For costly/bulky components, the damaged ship should go to a repair base.

- 'Free' repairs. Every repair should cost a percent of the undamaged component.

- Master computers too much 'effective' and affordable. Past certain tech levels, the ship designs are a lot better (cheaper) with master computers than with bridge/crew quarters/life support combo. Combat ships should
receive a penalty for having exclusively computers aboard, and they should not receive experience for combats. Also, they should not receive "neural net" bonus.

- The minesweepers should have a posibility to fail. Having only one ship with 20 minesweepers per enemy per fleet is enought to avoid every possible minefield in the game. The minesweepers should have a posibility to miss some mines in each turn, and/or make the mines a lot cheaper and increase the minefield size limit to make passing through a dense minefield a costly and time-consuming task.

- The fighters could have the posibility to carry heavier antiship weaponry, as missiles, torpedos or 'free-fall' bombs, so the idea of doing 'fighter only' raids against enemy fleets far beyond the fleet anti-air
defenses sounds more interesting.

- Newtonian propulsion. It's odd that having only 40TM dedicated to propulsion (2 QEIII and a SolarSail III), a baseship can move at the same speed than a cruiser, having the baseship 3 times the mass of the cruiser.

- Also, the solar sail shouldn't give its movement bonus in tactical combat.

- The spionage system is a bit strange. I don't know well how to resolve it, perhaps with "spy" agents more than a so abstract thing as "spionage points". Add the posibility of having double agents.

Re: SE5, Tell Aaron what\'s on your Wish List
 

I have some difficulty imagining what surface combat is going to be like, what with tactical combat being realtime 3d and all. If the surface combat from SE4 is used, you'll probably have to pause the tactical combat or otherwise things will get confusing. That means you'll just have conquered a planet in a matter of minutes.

I'd prefer a system where you'd just drop the troops in tactical combat, and when you are back in strategic, you'd have to manage your forces on the planet. That way it would also be easier to let firmly entrenched planets drag the battle out for a year or more. That seems a bit more realistic to me. And then you can also get stuff like reinforcements for whichever side. Big tough planets could also produce their own reinforcements for a while. Ofcourse the population's happyness is also going to be sinking fast. And something like a log message each turn updating amount of enemies defeated, casualties suffered and collateral damage (population/facilities). Hmm, reminds me of the Messages you get with plagues.

Looking back at it, I don't even think it would need to be the micromanagement hell most of the things I think of become. It would work with a simple surface combat system like there is now, only slower. Features like orbital support fire etc. could be added reasonably well.

Re: SE5, Tell Aaron what\'s on your Wish List
 

Naranek:
I think you're losing the point of this wonderful game. It's supposed to be an EMPIRE building game, not a micromanagement adventure.
Many of the things you suggest are good points, but don't forget that this game must be accessable for the more inexperienced people too and one game shouldn't Last a couple of months.

Re: SE5, Tell Aaron what\'s on your Wish List
 

You can set that up in SE4. Make militia a lot stronger and more numerous and set ground combat rounds to 1. Only one round of damage will be done, and you will need a lot more troops. Both sides can have a chance to send in reinforcements, and it can take quite some time to conquer the planet. Pirates & Nomads, Gritty Economics, and Adamant Mods do this. I think Proportions might, but not sure on the length of ground combat. Ground combat in stock SE5 definitely needs a lot of improvement. It would be great if things like range and rate of fire actually mattered...

Re: SE5, Tell Aaron what\'s on your Wish List
 

Note: Strong as-in-hitpoints, not damage.

In GritEcon, I used values on the order of:
1 round ground combat.
100% damage factor.
Militia: 1 damage/30hp. 1 militia per million population
Infantry troops: 1-2 damage, 50-70 hp (depending on design and cost) Average build rates are hundreds/turn on planet yards.
Light Tanks: 10-20 damage, 200-300 hp. build rate of a handful per turn (5-10 or so)
Heavy Tanks: 50-100 damage, 300-400 hp. About one a turn probably.
Artillery: 300 damage, 50 hp. A turn or two each.

Two evenly matched infantry squads would give you trench warfare Lasting forever as they wear each other down at the same rate.
Basically, you need bigger tanks or artillery to kill things, and you need lots of infantry reinforcements to act as cheap ablative meat armor for your tanks.

When dropping from ships, the bigger units have the most damage per kt-space, but lack in hp per space and are the most expensive by an exponential factor.
You need to either drop a pile of infantry first to sop up the massive hits from the defenders and establish a beach head for your heavier units, or drop mixed troops from your boats http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif

-----

As an extra bonus from the 1 round GC, having lots of small, lightly shielded transports deploy your troops is a valid strategy. The idea being that the enemy can't nail all of them, and they're cheap enough to replace often. It works because you know your troops won't all be killed before the single round of GC ends and next transport drops its troopers http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif

PS:
Making orbital bombardment and glassings expensive and time consuming is a key part of the scheme. Otherwise they'll just sweep through, glassing and recolonizing. The troop hitpoints above help that a lot. Adding some heavy-armor "bunker" platforms to boost planetary hitpoints can help too.
Just be sure to remove planet-based weapons. If you leave them in, players will have way too much trouble getting their transports to attack, and they'll be forced to use a glassing strategy. Without planet based weapons, the transports will merrily charge in and drop while the orbital battle rages.

-----

In one game against SkyAshton, we did some nice fighting over a chokepoint system. I surprised him with an early assault on a key spaceyard planet before he started building infantry. Then with waves of ships duking it out across the system, I had my transports running in with infantry. Ground combat broke out on most of his planets, effectively blockading them from the inside. Meanwhile, in space my fleet was held off, and with a massive maintenance defecit, they fell apart. As I worked at home to rebuild the fleet with more maintenance-efficient hulls, Ashton has the chance to fight back (build cost is proportional to size cubed while maintenance is constant independent of size).
He started with only the infantry he could Ebuild before my waves of troops hit, and his militia would have been getting thinned out pretty badly by now.
However, now that he held most of the system and could dump reinforcements from his homeworld and its stack of BSYs, time was on his side.
The spaceyard I had captured managed to fight off his attack, though, as it had been busy building some anti-ship fighters and sats(modded 50kt base hull). I came back with carriers full of anti-ship fighter-bombers and a few medium warships. With the help of the spaceyard I pushed him to the warppoint and held there while I flooded the system with troops in an attmept to secure it.

Most of the planets had fallen to my light tanks by the time Ashton had come up with another counter; kamikaze rammers.
Since I was close to his homeworld, he could pump out tons of tiny ships and not be killed by the maintenance costs, since they would all die ramming huge holes in my ships on the same turn. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif

The game ended before he had a serious chance to attack the chokepoint system again.
Overall this was about 50-70 turns, about a third of which was pre-meeting expansion and buildup.

Re: SE5, Tell Aaron what\'s on your Wish List
 

Cool story of the game SJ. I like that.

Re: SE5, Tell Aaron what\'s on your Wish List
 

Weel, maybe a basic AUTODESIGN for ship.. Like Colony Ship & so on..

It is funny to design BA, BC, DN.. it is not funny to design Colony Ship..

Then a Research like Moo2: when you finished in Shields, you can go on and have a miniaturization bonus (don't know, 5 tech level = 5 less Kt, stop this when component is 50% smaller tha original).

A "Fill queue" for all planets, so i do't have to manually buld 10 LC at 10 differente planet by clicking on them.

A more realistic land combat -> land combat like space combat.

For now, that's all.

Re: SE5, Tell Aaron what\'s on your Wish List
 

Although not typically exciting, Colony ships are trivial to design. Throw on the basics, and hit upgrade when you need a tech update.

You could turn the design minister on for a turn to get a basic set of designs, or even tweak the designcreation file for your shipset to get just what you want automatically as tech improves.

---

There is a "Fill Queue" button already. Just fill one example queue, and you can save that list of projects.

Re: SE5, Tell Aaron what\'s on your Wish List
 

Since 'heros' have been confirmed in the chat I want to make some points about how they ought to work.

The first thing that worries me is that he is saying their inclusion in the game will depend on the artwork getting done. I sure hope that the current design doesn't call for huge 'unique' portraits for each 'hero' like some sort of RPG game. This is not MOO II. These 'heros' are going to be only a small part of a really huge and complex game. They don't need individual characterization beyond a name. They are simply slightly more talented officers/politicians among vast numbers of more ordinary operatives. I would be perfectly happy with a 'generic' image for all ship commanders (captains, admirals, or whatever you want to call them) and a generic image for all 'governors'. Don't hold up this useful game feature for the sake of fancy artwork. The scale of this game is completely different from MOO II where each leader could be a unique character.

Since I'm not concerned about the portrait or other 'RPG' features of these 'heros' I hope we'll have more than a few of them? The limit of four of each type was OK in MOO II but that was a small game with only 80 systems max. I'd say about a dozen will be the absolute minimum required for SE V given the scale of the game. It would be best to provide for the possibility of every single system having a 'hero' governor and every single fleet having a 'hero' commander. Not that we should _expect_ to always be fully staffed like that... http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif But the game should allow for it. That could mean hundreds of them.

As for their effects in the game, I hope we don't go 'overboard' like MOO II and have magical renaissance erm, creatures who can do everything from fleet strategy to engine repair to original scientific research. They should have specialities related to their 'profession' (fleet strategy for the fleet commanders, population management for politicians) and not much else. What would make them interesting is if they have loyalties to their species and their home planet/system -- and populations should have loyalty to them, also! -- so that they can have reactions to events in the game and their reactions can have effects in the game.

Re: SE5, Tell Aaron what\'s on your Wish List
 

Aaron said there would be a minimum of 3 leader portraits per race. 3 isn't a lot. Presumably this would have to cover, at a minimum, one fleet commander, one planetary governor, and one other type of leader (master spy? general? system overlord?) So I think the leaders are going to be fairly generic, as you wish.

Re: SE5, Tell Aaron what\'s on your Wish List
 

Open request:

If the leaders are left out due to art reasons, leave the code for them in and let the modders turn it on if they want. Some of us don't mind ugly leaders. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/image...ies/tongue.gif

Re: SE5, Tell Aaron what\'s on your Wish List
 

I would love to keep the hero's stuff too. (Especially if it is the concept I proposed. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif )

Re: SE5, Tell Aaron what\'s on your Wish List
 

Weapon mount size increase reduces the probability of hitting for smaller targets.

Example: If a ship/base/etc. has a heavy mount and it is shooting at a target that can't have a heavy mount there would be a reduction in the hit chance. The below chart may better illustrate:

................................................Si ze
Mount.....ES......FG......DS......LC......CR...... BC......BB......BN......BA
Normal..-00
Large.....-15.....-10.....-05
Heavy....-30.....-25.....-20.....-15.....-10.....-05
Massive.-40.....-35.....-30.....-25.....-20.....-15.....-10.....-05


Rationale: currently there is no (or very little) downside to always having the largest mounts that the ship/base will allow. This suggestion should force more trade-offs in the design making process that should result in more balanced designs with a mix of smaller and larger mounts on each ship/base just as we find a mix of different weapon systems with the designs of current day navy vessels.

Comment: we may want to have an increased chance of hitting for smaller mounts shooting at larger targets but with the idea that we "never get something for nothing" there should be an offsetting consideration such as reduced damage per hit. For example, a 30% increase hit chance results in 30% reduction in damage done if there is a hit. An example of reduced damage applying in real life might be a single bullet having the real possibility of seriously damaging or destroying an airplane while a single bullet having the same size and velocity will have virtually zero chance of seriously damaging or sinking a battleship.

chart with smaller mounts getting bonus against larger targets:

................................................Si ze
Mount.....ES......FG......DS......LC......CR...... BC......BB......BN......BA
Normal..+00....+05....+10....+15....+20....+25.... +30....+35....+40
Large.....-15.....-10.....-05.....+00....+05....+10....+15....+20....+25
Heavy....-30.....-25.....-20.....-15.....-10.....-05.....+00....+05....+10
Massive.-40.....-35.....-30.....-25.....-20.....-15.....-10.....-05.....+00

Re: SE5, Tell Aaron what\'s on your Wish List
 

Ok, I'm having a brain fart - I can't find your post on heroes.

As for me I absolutely think that the artwork shouldn;t be a factor, simply becuase it isn't needed - I would say that you just need a "hero" image for each race in the game, which would just be one of the portraits, but perhaps with a different coloured background to let you know it represents a hero. The potential heros would only be from existing races, and so you could just use extand portraits with a
slight change.

Now, the question is: do hero's only work for their races, or can they work for others? That's a design/game play issue, and I can think of good arguments on both sides, but it really depends on what sort of philosophy Aaron is thinking about heros as...are they "legendary
star-wandering mercenary types" or just "really really extraordinary members of your own race"?

In any case, the artwork, I would think, would'nt be relevant really.. .just a "filler" image. Preferably a small one.

But can you point me to your post AT?

Re: SE5, Tell Aaron what\'s on your Wish List
 

Well, I was thinking on the "ground" tactical mode, of course. I was thinking in something like Imperium Galactica 2, in which surface combats are similar to space combats. The defenders have special buildings in the colony (fortresses, bunkers, ...), and the attackers with gained space superiority can have access to orbital bombing or quirurgical strikes from the fleet fighters.

Re: SE5, Tell Aaron what\'s on your Wish List
 

Ground combat should be simple.

Make it like space combat in SE IV, except replace the star field with a terran map. The ships with top down troops images, and so on. Have tactics and strategies like in space combat, but for ground combat.

I proposed this over three years ago and it still stands as the best way to do it.

Re: SE5, Tell Aaron what\'s on your Wish List
 

Thats the IG2 method. Excepting of course that that was fully 3d and required all planet to space weapons be destroyed before landing.
Of course, this would limit the planetary takeover time to just that battle. Though in such a technological era, we can expect that the victorious force would have devastated the resisting military into surrender.
In order to make this a bit more balanced, I suggest that the population resist, ala Civ3, for a length of time decided by the population size (causing riot status), and that this would be offset by having the military presence there. This should obviously be a changeable setting.
Also, the demeanour of population in pop transports should be recorded so that one simply couldn't lift most of the population off a planet to shorten the time to sort out complete order. Indeed, putting the population back down should send them back to riot status, or at the very least Angry, with a military presence there, if the average happiness was lowered enough.

Re: SE5, Tell Aaron what\'s on your Wish List
 

Components that increase the abilities of other components. ie:
Shield Booster: Increases shield generation by x%
High Energy Focus: Increases energy weapon damage by x%
Recycling Plant: Increases supply by x%

Another thing I'd like to see, which is something I've modded into my own SE4 game is that Base Space Yards have a higher construction rate than Planetary ones, however they can only be built onto Bases. Ships can carry Space Yards, but they have a significantly lower construction rate. This makes sense to me, since I would think that it'd be easier for a massive starbase to construct new ships than it would be for a planetary facility. The only thing I'm having trouble modding is that I want the Baseship to be able to carry a Base Space Yard.

Certain ships should have 'inherent abilities'. At the moment, I don't use many of the specialized hulls (ie: carriers, transports, colony ships) because of the restrictions on their construction. So, I suggest that these hulls have a certain advantages to outweigh the restrictions.
ie:
Colony Ships: Provide 10M colonists. So by using the colony ship hull instead of a LC or something, you basically get 10M 'free' population for your new colony. This would have to be coded so you only get the free 10M when creating a new colony, otherwise it'd be too easy to build loads of colonizers and fill a planet with free population.

Transports/Carriers: Get 50% extra cargo space per Cargo component. This way, a Transport/Carrier with 10 Cargo comps each with a capacity of 100kT would get 1500kT instead. Thus, using a Transport/Carrier hull would be more beneficial than using a 'normal' warship hull.

Re: SE5, Tell Aaron what\'s on your Wish List
 

There is a field in Settings.txt which controls this; it's called Automatic Colonization Population, IIRC. Not sure if it actually works because I've never tried it, though, and it would affect colonies created with any ship, not just a colony ship...

Something similar is in Adamant Mod. Colony modules are 3000kT so they won't fit on any normal ship, but colony ships have a scale mount which allows them to fit. Also, fighter bays are 60kT rather than 30kT, unless you put them on carriers, in which case a mount is available to reduce them to 30kT.

Re: SE5, Tell Aaron what\'s on your Wish List
 

See, even that would do fine, except without having to fiddle around with mounts. Carriers/Transports would just get an automatic size reduction for Cargo/Fighter Bays, so the same sized hull could hold a lot more. I'd still like to see inherent abilities make it into SE5, just because it would make for all kinds of modding fun.

Re: SE5, Tell Aaron what\'s on your Wish List
 

To many mounts. The components need to have a key or something that allows the modder to set the hull type and cost. If the component is mounted to specified hull then X cost, if not, then Y cost. (If allowed for any other hull at all.)

Also we need the ability to specify for each hull mandatory components that must be added in addition to the current Bridge, Life support, etc ones.

Re: SE5, Tell Aaron what\'s on your Wish List
 

This is why I suggested to MM that mounts be changed to attach to each given hull type, and/or even the mounting point, rather than being 'generic' and kept in a single list. We will have literally thousands of mounts in SE V given all the special situations we want to create. Instead of having to go to a seperate menu to get available mounts in ship design, you should be able to right-click on the component and select from a list of mounts that can be used on this component in this location.

Hopefully the 'requirements' and 'exclusions' that were promised in SE IV but never implemented will also be finished for SE V.

Re: SE5, Tell Aaron what\'s on your Wish List
 

Supply transfer:

Not automatically within a fleet like in SE IV but manually as for cargo. This would also allow to fleet units like drones without allowing them to be resupplied: transfer of supplies from/to each vehicle type could be allowed or not in the vehicle text file.

Re: SE5, Tell Aaron what\'s on your Wish List
 

As this thread continues to explode with information, I wonder if Aaron's migraine follows suit?

http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/wink.gifTurin

Re: SE5, Tell Aaron what\'s on your Wish List
 

Oooh, and arbitrary penalties for losing them!
Supply leaks, shield depletion each round in combat, only AI orders allowed (for destroyed radio/comms).

Re: SE5, Tell Aaron what\'s on your Wish List
 

I think there should be an 'Allowed Hulls' option as well so we can create components that can only be mounted on certain hulls. It'd also be a bit easier than using Min/Max Tonnage, if one wanted to create a component that could only be placed on say, an Escort or Dreadnought, but nothing in between.

Re: SE5, Tell Aaron what\'s on your Wish List
 

I would like to see the ability for a SUPPLY BASE to be able to resupply a ship much like a Resupply Facility does.

(I wonder if I can attack the facility ability to a component?)

Re: SE5, Tell Aaron what\'s on your Wish List
 

Yes, we wanted this very badly in SE IV. Let's hope that SE V allows us to have resupply and 'ordnance' available from bases as easily as from planets, since he has already stated that so many other wishes like facilites and colonies in space structures have been implemented.

Re: SE5, Tell Aaron what\'s on your Wish List
 

A few things I would like to see in SEV:

1) Since it was announced that detection/line of sight is going to be distance based, then it will allow for a 'fog of war' effect. Basically you will only be able to see what is currently in range of any sensors/scanners you have available, and in case of stellar objects, it will be visible when you first come into 'scanning' range of the object, and will only get updates of changes to object if there is a 'scanner' within range when viewing. This in conjunction with the ability to set cloak Ratings for Warp Points would allow hidden WP's or WP's that have to be searched for with specific sensors...

2) A second dialog box for when launching units (mines, drones, fighters, satellites, etc...) that will allow you to launch a specific amount of the unit when launching, up to the max launch limit of the component.

3) Yes a supply component that we can put on bases so we can have supply points would be great as well.

Kana

Re: SE5, Tell Aaron what\'s on your Wish List
 

This has probably already been said but in regards to supply, have only planets have unlimited supplies. Bases/Ships can still have components like the quantum reactor, but instead of the supply showing as unlimited, have a finite amount that gets fully recharged every turn. The Quantum Reactor would sill add to the supply pool for the ship/base.

This way, you can't have a small space station being able to refuel and entire 100 ship fleet in one turn, because realistically, where would they all dock? In this case it would take a little longer due to the amount of supplies the station has each turn.

Hope this made sense http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif

Re: SE5, Tell Aaron what\'s on your Wish List
 

Aaron has stated that even planets will have only finite supply capacity to give to ships, so I'd assume that stations would as well http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/wink.gif

Re: SE5, Tell Aaron what\'s on your Wish List
 

How about a 'Station Construction Kit' component? Basically, you equip a ship with this component, send it out into space somewhere, and when you activate it, it creates a space station. The station created would be one of your existing designs, and the component would have a very small construction rate, so it would only realistically be useable to set up small resupply bases.

Also, I think Bases built in 'empty' space should have to get their construction materials from somewhere. At first, it would only be possible to have Space Yards construct things if they're built in asteroid fields or around planets (colonized or not). Eventually you could research something like 'Mining Drones' which, when equipped on a Base would allow you to build the base anywhere you wanted. As for how to get the base there in the first place, see the above suggestion.

Re: SE5, Tell Aaron what\'s on your Wish List
 

It would make things interesting to require some sort of special infrastructure to be present in the system before space yards can build anything away from a planet. Either require a Supply Depot or invent a new special. Call it a 'Construction Support Facility' or something like that. For building in systems with no planets, you could have a ship-based component that enables construction at a high tech level.

Re: SE5, Tell Aaron what\'s on your Wish List
 

I'd like to see something along the following lines:

-Ability to build all classes of warships (DDs to BBs)whatever the current research status is. I think that as the research improves, the cost/weight of the ships should become less. Speed should also be improved over time.

-In addition to above, I don't think that planet shipyards should be able to build large class ships (CAs up). Perhaps they could be used to support orbital space yards (such as allowing the player to dedicate planetary shipyard building points to supporting orbital facilities - i.e. building modules for the larger classes) Also, size of spaceyard should determine the number of ships it can build at any one time (definitely ought to be more than one).

-Some sort of supply line system where the player has to build merchant ships/freighters to keep colonies supplied until they can stand on their own. Also can be used for economics/industry. Sort of like USN's MS pipelines. This would also allow for piracy, cutting supply lines, wastage, etc.

-Some sort of research for a ship component to allow use of the warp points. Initially this would be an expensive energy hog but come down in size/cost over time.

-OutPosts/military fortresses to be built on planets/in deep space that can act as resupply depots/early warning systems. Also establishes your claim on the area.

-Detection ability is too good. Should depend on current state of sensor abilty and proximity of sensors. This allows ships to sneak into unguarded systems.

-A better battle system for space combat. Particularly the ability to escape if you have the distance/speed on the opponent. Factor supply into it as well (low supply, low chance of avoiding combat). Nothing worse than getting stuck in the corner on the space combat screen.

-Ability to put some sort of points into economics/research/intel etc. With costs for not doing well in them (restive populations, revolutions, research dead ends, intel disasters).

-A method for capturing ships that run out of supply and a chance of discovering tech from them. Also, some sort of commander override (ship's commander decides he/she ain't going to sacrifice his crew for your greater glory) that prevents the player from sending ships on suicide missions without paying for it either in lower morale of fleet or politically (newspapers calling you incompetent/massive discontent in your political system).

-Weaker mines (they're way too powerful).

-Better planetary defenses.

-Troops would exist from start. Only research would be improvement in weapons and capability to combat assault planets.

-Ability for planets to surrender rather than face extermination. This would include the ability to land troops without combat assault.

Re: SE5, Tell Aaron what\'s on your Wish List
 

Several empire management suggestions:

1. Ability to add custom amount of units to a construction queue (just a small popup box with a textfield and a OK button).

2. Add Commands to a construction window. First obvious command is "Upgrade", which will pop up a small window with existing obsolete facilities, so you can select which ones you want to upgrade and which ones you want to leave as is. Second command is "Wait X turns", so build queue could look like that:
----------------------
Super Dreadnought
Defensive WP x 12
Wait x 5 turns
Mega Transport
----------------------
Third command is notification command which informs you that queue is empty. 4th - "Scrap facilities". Imo, scraping facilities should not be instant, and require at least 1 turn to accomplish (similar to scraping of ships). Certainly you can think of more commands and ability to make custom commands (directly in the Facilities.txt) will be appreciated. It makes sense to add Commands right to the Build Items list, under the Commands group. Just make it so that they will be always ontop of the list.

3. Empire-wide uprades: move this from Construction Queus window to Colonies window and name it "Uprade Facility Types". Should function identicaly to "Scrap Facility Types" command.

Re: SE5, Tell Aaron what\'s on your Wish List
 

Has anyone suggested this,

a base with artificial wormhole generator that requires a code to pass through. You can make wormholes and only your ships or allies can use them.

Re: SE5, Tell Aaron what\'s on your Wish List
 

This is 'Warp Gates' as we have requested for ages. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif It would only take some small changes to the way Warp Points currently work to implement something like this. I hope that SE V will finally do it.

Re: SE5, Tell Aaron what\'s on your Wish List
 

Aaron did say in the Last chat that effects of components could be set to limited durations, so you could always mod in warp point generators that create warp points that Last for 1 turn... http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/laugh.gif http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/laugh.gif http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/laugh.gif

Re: SE5, Tell Aaron what\'s on your Wish List
 

How about those system protector facilities (name currently slipping my mind) being able to be turned off temporarily, for, say, a turn? This would allow the creation and removal of warppoints of a protected system, while exposing it to risk of infiltration for that one turn. This would be good in conjunction with ships that can fly between systems without warp points, though of course at slower rates.

Re: SE5, Tell Aaron what\'s on your Wish List
 

The ability to chose whether to play with Warp points or with free warping, like in Star wars.