Great game, and some questions...

[Creepo]

I got my copy Last Thursday and I have to say that this is easily the greatest 4X TBS game ever made, and it is a contender for the Greatest Game Ever title. The only weakness SEIV has is the AI, but after I installed TDM that seemed to go away.

I just have a few more n00b questions:

1) Is there any way to retrofit all ships of a given class at once? I upgrade my ships fairly often, and it's a pain to go down the fleet list and manually retrofit each ship.

2) If a battlestation has a Space Yard and some cargo locations, can it make it's own mines/fighters and store them in its own cargo bay?

3) How long does a normal game usually take? I'm in a mid-size galaxy with 9 AI players, and it feels like it's taking a long time (~15 hours so far).

[Baron Munchausen]

1) No, we've asked for it before but it's apparently a lot of work to arrange for. There is an 'upgrade minister' but you can't give it directions. If you turn it on it does what IT thinks should be done, not what you want.

2) Yes, but this is actually a problem for the AI. Players can use it fine, but the AI doesn't know to get things out of the SYB cargo. A base with a space yard, cargo, and mine/satellite bays is a great way to make a self-sustaining warp point defense. Add fighters into the mix to chase strays that get away from the satellites and you have a complete defense without ships.

3) How long do you want it to take? You can play for days easily. That's what makes the game so great, you can get totally absorbed in it.

[Stone Mill]

Hi Creepo.

1) Just to add a little, which you may know already: You can multi-select ships for retrofitting in the retrofit window as long as they are all the same "beginning" class.

[DirectorTsaarx]

Originally posted by Stone Mill:
Hi Creepo.

1) Just to add a little, which you may know already: You can multi-select ships for retrofitting in the retrofit window as long as they are all the same "beginning" class.

And, of course, as long as they're in the same sector.

Oh, and to emphasize something in Baron Munchausen's post, the basestation with space yard and cargo bays also needs the appropriate launcher to use mines/sats/fighters.

Finally, as for game length, if you look at the AI Deathmatch thread, the games are typically Lasting 150-300 turns; and there's a cutoff at 500 turns in case neither empire manages to destroy the other. For a shorter game, try a smaller galaxy and start at high tech. I'm not certain if games are faster with more AI or with fewer AI. Oh, and if you want a longer game, try using the Proportions mod for SEIV...

[Fyron]

You can also get a longer game by playing as a pirate or a nomad in the Pirates and Nomads mod.

[Suicide Junkie]

Beware: Fyron's suggestion may result in a much shorter game, mainly due an unprepared human getting slaughtered