Questions, part 5
 

Another batch ...

1. Does a resource converter work continually (as in automatically converts resources as you run low on one of them) or just once?

2. Once you click "upgrade facilities" in the construction queue is there any way to reverse it globally (without having to do each planet individually)?

3. I know more than one space yard per planet doesn't allow you to produce more ships, but can you build two or more and get the cumulative repair benefits?

4. Is there a bug with the fleet facilities? It say it will take you to 10 percent, for example. But then I look at the end of the cycle and my ships are at 11 percent.

5. Is there any way to set targets for your drones in tactical combat? (I certainly don't always like the AI's selection.)

6. When you capture an enemy ship and scrap it for analysis, what determines if you get any tech out of it? I've tried it a few times and nothing happened.

7. Drones appear to run out of supplies even if they have solar panels. Is this what I'm seeing or is something else going on?

8. If you garrison a captured planet, how many troops do you need to keep the population from rioting? Is there some particular ratio of ships and troops to planet population that you need to have to be able to stop the rioting?

Re: Questions, part 5
 

"1. Does a resource converter work continually (as in automatically converts resources as you run low on one of them) or just once?"

You have to manually use it every time.

"2. Once you click "upgrade facilities" in the construction queue is there any way to reverse it globally (without having to do each planet individually)?"

No.

"3. I know more than one space yard per planet doesn't allow you to produce more ships, but can you build two or more and get the cumulative repair benefits?"

One space yard per planet, full stop. You cannot build more.

"4. Is there a bug with the fleet facilities? It say it will take you to 10 percent, for example. But then I look at the end of the cycle and my ships are at 11 percent."

It goes up by a certain amount per turn; sometimes that will take you over the limit.

"5. Is there any way to set targets for your drones in tactical combat? (I certainly don't always like the AI's selection.)"

No; they always target based on their strategies.

"6. When you capture an enemy ship and scrap it for analysis, what determines if you get any tech out of it? I've tried it a few times and nothing happened."

If it has any tech that's better than what you have. Analyzing a DUC-1 escort isn't going to help if you have DUC-2 destroyers. Basiclly, if you can't make it, you'll gain tech. (exception: racial tech)

:7. Drones appear to run out of supplies even if they have solar panels. Is this what I'm seeing or is something else going on?:

They use 200 supply per turn by default; make sure you have enough panels!

"8. If you garrison a captured planet, how many troops do you need to keep the population from rioting? Is there some particular ratio of ships and troops to planet population that you need to have to be able to stop the rioting?"

depends on how pissed they are..and there's a modifer too I think. Not sure here.

Phoenix-D

Re: Questions, part 5
 

edit: beaten to the punch. hopefully my answers are not entirely useless.

lordy, i think you just ask these to make people feel goog about answering them. you can always start a high tech game and try a few out. that aside, i will now procede to feel good about answering a few. if someone else has not beat me to it.

1 - just once, but you can it once per turn. you have to do it each time by hand.

2 - you wish. or, start your turn over. or, no.

3 - yep. if you do something sneaky to get multiple spaceyards, such as the upgrade method.

4 - eh? training you mean? default training is 20%, and it has never taken me to 21. perhaps your ships have experience from somewhere else?

5 - not sure here, isnt there a drone strategy setting you can define? or did you mean tactical. in tactical, the answer is 'no.'

6 - you cant analyze racial techs. also, you will only get one level per technology per component. also, if the component is not of a higher level than what you have, you will not get anything even if the previously owning race has better tech than what was on the component.

7 - drones burn x number of supplies per turn, per settings.txt (i think). if they are burning more than solar panels are generating, you are out of luck. i have not tried puttin pannels on drones though, so they might not work at all.

9 - yes. it depends on number of troops and ships, and not size. therefore, you can drop troops with cockpits only, and no weapons. i dont know the exact numbers, but troops are better than anything else for happyness. 20 usually does the trick pretty fast for me, 80 will put the planet at jubilant after a coupel turns, 120 will put it a jubilant after about one turn. someone else can probably breakdown the formula for you, or you can find it floating around in an old thread.

[ August 02, 2002, 05:25: Message edited by: Puke ]

Re: Questions, part 5
 

<font size="2" face="Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif">Only way around this is like Puke mentioned, the upgrade method. But why don't you just build a small base on the planet with a few repair bays on it, repair bay III's repair 8 parts per turn. So if you put 3 or 4 on one base (150 KT per bay I believe) you would be repairing 32+ parts PER turn. That's enough to repair a REALLY badly damaged ship in one turn.

Re: Questions, part 5
 

I got a few myself actually... In regards to Puke's answer about the troops, do you really need just a cockpit? I heard somewhere that you need at least one comp, cheapest is armor unless you have an org weapon in which case you get defense as well as pop supress.

clarification: if i gave resource conVersion orders three times in a PBW game will only the Last one run? I'm in trouble if that's the case http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon9.gif

What is the point of drones, they are almost as much as a destroyer and much worse, for the cost of three or four or five or six you could put out a nice DN or baseship. Until you start seeing 30-40 you can stop them easily, they can get hit by most weapons making them worse than seekers in this regard. I guess on a low ship game with a high unit limit or something similar where you had a strong incentive i dont' see their use. It just doesn't seem like a good economical decision.

Also, you still need to be able to see your targets, and to get a spotter into one of my systems will take a concentrated effort, probably costing enough that you should have just built normal ships.

NOW, IF... you had the move to/warp order then you could begin using them like RD2s and SBM/SR HAWKS (explorers/warp missiles for you non-starfire ppl)

D.

Re: Questions, part 5
 

<font size="2" face="Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif">The effectiveness of troops and ships in orbit depends on your happiness type (peaceful, bloodthirsty, or neutral). From happiness.txt...

--*--
Population Happiness Levels:
Pop Anger Pct Description Res Mod
75 - 100 Rioting 0%
60 - 74 Angry 60%
45 - 59 Unhappy 80%
30 - 44 Indifferent 100%
15 - 29 Happy 120%
0 - 14 Jubiliant 140%

All values are in 10ths of a percent.

Peaceful:
Our Ship in Sector := -10
Our Troops on Planet := -2

Bloodthirsty:
Our Ship in Sector := -5
Our Troops on Planet := -2

Neutral:
Our Ship in Sector := 0
Our Troops on Planet := -2
--*--

It would look like it would take 52 troops to guarantee that a riot be quelled, but there are a whole bunch of other things that could affect the planet's happiness. (I'm not about to post the whole file, so you'll have to check for yourself. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/tongue.gif )

[edit] Math error. [/edit]

Quikngruvn

[ August 02, 2002, 06:36: Message edited by: Quikngruvn ]

Re: Questions, part 5
 

Troops just need a cockpit to give a happiness bonus. But they're nearly useless as troops then, of course.

Drones are cheaper than ships because purchase price is only a small part of a ship's cost - the maintenance cost is what makes a fleet expensive, and drones cost zero. Therefore they are very cost-effective for peacetime build-ups. They also have several other advantages, which have been described on other threads (speed, damage, to-hit, concealment, no happiness penalty for losing them, etc.). Low-tech drones may be easy to shoot down by themselves, but high-tech drones in hordes or combined with other forces can suddenly become a very serious threat.

However you and everyone else is right that they would be a lot better with a "move to" order!

PvK

Re: Questions, part 5
 

<font size="2" face="Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif">You can view the planet's orders with the eyeball icon. You should see that there are three separate "Convert Resources" entries.

All three should be done in one turn, unless there is a problem such as insufficent resources.

Re: Questions, part 5
 

<font size="2" face="Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif">I don't have the time to try out everything in test games. I just make notes of questions I have taken from actual games as I play them. Then I apply the answers to my next game.

<font size="2" face="Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif">You're the second person I've seen mention this. But what are you talking about? There's some kind of trick? When I upgrade space yards, it simply upgrades the existing ones--it doesn't add another.

<font size="2" face="Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif">Nope. I've seen it a few times now--a 10 percent facility takes me to 11 percent. Not that I'm complaining.

<font size="2" face="Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif">My beef is that in tactical I may want the drone to attack a specific enemy ship and not the one the AI has decided is the biggest threat (or whatever). Sucks that you can't do that.

<font size="2" face="Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif">I was trying to analyze the enemy ships to get the wave motion gun. I didn't have the tech, yet analyzing the ships still didn't give it to me. Of course, I had so many research points that I just gave up and researched it normally in a few turns.

<font size="2" face="Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif">Don't they burn supplies based on how far they travel per turn? Someone else in this thread has said the default is 200. But I thought supplies used was always a function of distance travelled. And by the time I start using drones, they're doing 12 MP per turn. ...

Re: Questions, part 5
 

<font size="2" face="Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif">Just a quick clarification to avoid any possible confusion: the "scrap" command is not the command to use if you want to get new techs from the ship. Scrapping it will just give you the resources. If you want to get new techs from the ship (provided there are any to obtain), you must use the "Analyze" button; this will destroy the ship without giving you any resources, but you will get the tech.

I'm not sure if this was understood or not already, but the wording of your question suggested that you were scrapping when you should have been analyzing.

Out of curiosity, what is this sneaky "upgrade method" of getting multiple shipyards?