Re: Balance Mod...
 

Does that actually make any sense, though? Neutrals sticking to one solar system, I mean.

What would, in my opinion, make far more sense, would be if the neutrals didn't have spaceflight at all, thus effectively just being populations for conquer, which when conquered would provide the conquerer with the unique abilities of that race.

Re: Balance Mod...
 

Containing them to a single planet means they will put up even less of a fight - making capturing their population that much easier...

Re: Balance Mod...
 

Maybe the carrier ought to behave like a human captain and go roving for fighters. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif It's simple enough to make the ship go and pickup fighters, isn't it? Even better, invent a new class of transport: "Military Supply Transport" and have this go around collecting fighters from planets and then delivering them to carriers near the 'front lines'. That would save the carriers from having to travel out of the way themselves. They could be sent to militarily useful locations immediately.

Re: Balance Mod...
 

I'm just not sure what the purpose of 'neutral' empires is if they're just going to be like regular empires but with a handicap, being confined to one system( which by itself doesn't make any sense ). Why, then, not just remove them completely and go with only regular empires?

Re: Balance Mod...
 

Question: can fighters be prevented from launching at all, and only deployed to defend a planet during combat? The player can do this, why not the AI?

Actually, this is why I usually do. I've never felt that neutral empires add much to the game.

Re: Balance Mod...
 

Yah, but that was my point; perhaps it would be possible to change them so they actually did add something ( interesting ) to the game.

Perhaps they could be made to be something akin to the antarans in MoO, having advanced technology but few ships and only one colony, or perhaps something else entirely. I just think the existence of the whole 'neutral empires' option should be taken advantage of.

Re: Balance Mod...
 

One more thing ...

Why aren't there plague warheads for drones? Now that the plague levels work, it makes perfect sense to have the capability to launch long-range 'sabotage' like this. You can mount the plague bomb on an anti-planet drone, I guess. But since the plague bomb seems to be a 'seeker' like any other (easily shot down by any reasonable amount of PD) I think the warhead is appropriate and necessary. It's simple enough to setup, just like neutrino or tachyon of ionic warheads for mines and drones.

BTW, have you actually tested the Alloy Burner missile? When I looked in the damage types file, I didn't see anything that indicated if the 'Burn Armor' damage type actually worked yet. It looks like a blank entry. And the Xiati AI isn't using it, so I can't say if it really works.

Re: Balance Mod...
 

The key entry is the 0 internal damage for the Alloy Burner missile. However I neglected to make it skip shields, which is why the damage amount was lower than you'd expect. Anyway, the idea was that a temporal ship might employ Shield Accelerators and ABMs to remove shields/armor quickly. Although thinking about it, not sure what advantage removing armor might convey... http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/image...ies/tongue.gif

Plague Warheads are a good idea, but it might be too effective. Plague Bombs on Drones don't suck though - they're only 20kT and fire every 2 seconds, so a small group of plague drones could still plague a planet even with heavy PD. That's a reasonable compromise given the nastiness of a plague.

Re: Balance Mod...
 

Yeah, I wasn't sure what that entry meant since I don't remember how the defaults work.

Right now, heavy armor is a problem for Temporal tech. Having a specific weapon that attacks it is good. If Emissive armor does stack as you say, then lots of Emissive Armor would be a specific (and very effective) exploit against Temporal tech without the Alloy Burner missile to break it down. The Temporal Shifter 'skips' armor but has a much lower rate of fire, and shorter range, than most other weapons.

I still want a plague warhead for my drones. Guess I'll have to mod it myself if you won't do it. I'm already adding my preferred 'seeker upgrades with technology' changes where seekers get ECM and Armor tech bonuses.

Hmm, what do you call a mod of a mod?

Re: Balance Mod...
 

I didn't say I wouldn't do Plague Warheads, but it's something that I would wait until the next save-game breaking version.

I'll probably fix up the ABM to do something like 2x or 4x damage to armor and let it do just normal damage versus shields. Then the Shield Accelerator / ABM combo would work much better since they could peel the protection of a target off faster than with normal weapons, and other normal ships could mop up the internals.