The Power of Stellar Manipulation
 

Again, I'm still in the middle of my first game, and am just learning the components, but...

It seems to me that the Stellar Manipulation parts, such as those to create warp points and planets, seem a bit easy to reach and use, given the implicit power of what is really happening. Example: On a simple Cruiser hull, I have a planet-maker, and a repair bay, so it can waltz around making planets each and every turn (especially in asteroid belt systems) as it repairs itself each turn. Seems to me that this should not be such a casual or quick operation.
I would suggest:
- making the research more expensive, or with more tech prerequisites to reach these mammoth proportions
- making the parts heavier and costlier to build
- making the parts more "inconvenient" to use - such as slowing down ship movements containing them, rendering them uncloakabe, etc. (Q: can it be too easy to waltz these into enemy territories and wipe them out too easily?)
- making the parts destroy the entire ship upon use, rather than just the part itself burning out.
- making the parts harder to repair (i.e. must repair it for a few turns before it is re-usable)
- making the process (e.g. planet creation) take several turns to achieve once the process has started.

Since I've not actually played much, especially against other humans, I'd also be curious to hear general discussions about how easy or difficult these parts are to use, and how they affect gameplay & game strategy. I can definitely see planet & star destroyers ruining someone's day pretty quick.

Re: The Power of Stellar Manipulation
 

Actually I've always thought these components were too expensive (Hmmm so maybe MM found a happy medium?) Although most of the multiplayer games I've played have either been over or else one player has a major lead by the time these components get used.

Re: The Power of Stellar Manipulation
 

* falls out of bed with a start

Humph! They certainly seem dashed expensive to me! The little buggers take YEARS to build... Though, I do see your point. Maybe have them consume massive amounts of supplies (due to the extreme physical requirements of such a task) requiring large ships to hold enough supplies and frequent resupply stops? You could certainly add this property yourself if you feel the need. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon7.gif

Re: The Power of Stellar Manipulation
 

Heh - yeah, maybe they seem cheap to me because it's just me and one computer player left with a single warp-point separating our empires. I really have no other attack fleet built at this point, so maybe the economy of playing "real" people makes it much more prohibitive to build in the first place.

Re: The Power of Stellar Manipulation
 

Unless you have some major maintenance reduction, then you'll spend 15-25k or more in maintenance per turn.

Re: The Power of Stellar Manipulation
 

<font size="2" face="Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif">Actually this would be no good what-so-ever. Maybe if you had the tech to make planets BEFORE you had the Q-reactor. Once you research that it doesn't change a thing as far as supplys go. So this would only help if you research the planet creator before the Q-reactor.

Re: The Power of Stellar Manipulation
 

I may be missing something but was't it fixed in some patch that "destroy on use" components now require space yards to repair - repair bay is insufficient. But it was long time I used stellar manipulation - Proportions games are veery long.

Re: The Power of Stellar Manipulation
 

Against humans stellar manip ships are costly and must be guarded as valuable assets. In addition, there are system shields that stop their effectiveness, so you have to use conventional weapons to take out the system shield first.

System shields are costly, but require no maintenance. Stops Stellar Manipulation cold.

Stellar Manipulation are like Wrecking Cranes. They can do lots of damage if unopposed. But they can be vulnerable ships.

Re: The Power of Stellar Manipulation
 

Not vulnerable enough in my opinion. I've increased the sizes of all of the SM components to reflect their large-scale effects. It's still a bit silly to think of a ship-sized device destroying a planet or even a star, but at least it's a bit more balanced to force the use of a battlecruiser or larger to carry a star-destroyer component.

Re: The Power of Stellar Manipulation
 

"Actually this would be no good what-so- ever. Maybe if you had the tech to make planets BEFORE you had the Q-reactor. Once you research that it doesn't change a thing as far as supplys go. So this would only help if you research the planet creator before the Q-reactor."

Sigh...too true. I rarely use Q-reactors myself and forgot about that lil issue. although effective they are a tad unrealistic and a lot of research. I stand corrected.

Re: The Power of Stellar Manipulation
 

Technically, the star-destroying component DOES destroy the entire ship when it's used - along with everything else in the system. Same for the components that create black holes or system-wide nebulas. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon10.gif

I'd also have to say I agree with everyone else's points here: they're already pretty expensive to build, expensive to maintain, and use a lot of supplies (which is tricky until you research the Quantum Reactor); but I also think they're fairly expensive to research. Don't you need a level or two in Astrophysics, and then up to 5 levels of Stellar Manip to get star destroyers? Granted, the warp closer and the planet creators are pretty low on the Stellar Manip tree, but you're still sacrificing a lot of weapons research to get them.

Re: The Power of Stellar Manipulation
 

<font size="2" face="Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif">No. Technically it only destroys the star, and the star blowing up is what destroys the ship. But if you were a crew member of the ship, I am sure the difference would not mean a lot to you at the moment. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon12.gif

Geoschmo

Re: The Power of Stellar Manipulation
 

IIRC only emergency resupply and emergency propulsion need a space yard. I am sure that stellar manipulation does not.

Rollo

Re: The Power of Stellar Manipulation
 

<font size="2" face="Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif">THIS idea, I like. I also think that Warp Openers should not always create stable Warp Points.

Perhaps, when a warp opener is used something like the following would happen:
- 33% chance of a stable warp point,
- 33% chance of an unstable (damaging) warp point
- 34% chance of a warp point that will collapes withing 1-5 years.

Similaraly, with a Warp Closer there could be a 33% chance that the closure is temporary and the Warp point may re-open naturally within 1-5 years.

Re: The Power of Stellar Manipulation
 

What if you had to use your opener multiple times, in order to widen/stabilize the warppoint?

IE each time you use the opener from one point to another, the warppoint goes from temporary/small to medium to stable/large.

Where the size relates to the maximum size in kt of a ship that can safely navigate the WP.

Or maybe automate it, so when a opener is stopped over a warppoint, it will widen or stabilize it at the end of each turn.
Similarily with a closer. Each turn, the WP would shrink and destabilize a little bit.

Higher tech openers would stabilize faster in addition to having longer ranges.

Re: The Power of Stellar Manipulation
 

<font size="2" face="Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif">I'd be happy if "small" warp points in the game actually enforced maximum ship sizes somehow. I'd also suggest that the ranges on warp point openers should be lower than they are now (say, half the current range, or even less). Even the low-tech opener is extremely useful (in a large galaxy, at least); IIRC, in SE3, the warp point openers were much less powerful. Of course, SE3 didn't have a facility that could block the opener from working... (I've noticed that the AI is pretty good at building that facility, at least in "not connected" games).