Any suggestions for speeding up turn processing?

[Uncle_Joe]

OK, with the 1.25 patch and Balance Mod 1.03, I'm again trying to get 'into' SE5. So far, I'm actually beginning to like the early game phase now that I'm starting to get used to the um...interesting...interface choices. The combat is pretty cool and the colonizing is more balanced (I actually feel like I NEED Organics and Rads).

However what is killing the game for now is the extreme time it takes to process a turn. I'm only on about turn 18-20 and each turn can take a full one to two minutes just to process. I get the 'Processing Turn' indicator and the green bar starts moving. It stops and the red (combat I assume) bar crawls across the screen. Then, the green bar will move another inch an so and then the red bar crawls across the screen again. This can be repeated numerous times and REALLY drags the turn out. To make matters worse, you cant even alt-tab out and do something else while it processess!

I have already turned retreats off but this has proven to be little help. This issue really makes the game feel like drudgery. In the early game, it can take 6-7 turns just to get ONE TECH that improves ONE AREA of your econ by perhaps 10%. That mean that you are going to be cycling a LOT of turns to get anywhere (not bad in and of itself...Civ4 has 600+ turns with no problems). But if even if the early turns are going to take MINUTES to process, then the game slows to a crawl and I spend an awful lot of time staring at an essentially blank screen watching those bars slowly crawl across the screen.

So, the original question stands...what can I do (in game, not PC-wise) to speed up the processing? Are there any other settings that will help? My PC is not top of the line anymore, but its not obsolete by any means (I can run Civ4, M2TW, EU3 etc with no issues). So I'm concluding that it must be something in SE5 that I can turn off or tweak or shorten or SOMETHING. To me, this can be a real game-breaker.

Any suggestions?

Thanks in advance!

[Suicide Junkie]

Smaller galaxy and/or fewer AIs makes for fewer combats...
Still, a minute or two is hardly excessive...
The best battles in SE4 can take three hours to process.

I think the main problem is the fact that SE5 demands fullscreen attention depsite the complete lack of user input.
Whenever turns are processing in SE4, I just alt-tab and bring up IRC or the forums.

If you play SE5 in windowed mode, then you can do that, but the rez is somewhat pathetic. I've already asked Aaron to add higher rez windowed modes, but more encouragement can only help.

[Tnargversion2]

I may be wrong about this but I was having the same problem until I tried a new game (p1.25, BM 1.03) and in the "in game" "options menu" towards the bottom there were some options to turn off logs and minimize combat replay and other stuff. This helped a ton. I went from 5 to 8 minute turns at around turn 15 to less than a minute on turn 20.

[Uncle_Joe]

Smaller galaxy and/or fewer AIs makes for fewer combats...
Still, a minute or two is hardly excessive...

Well, I guess your tolerance for 'dead time' in a PC game far exceeds mine.

If I'm going to be playing 60-100 turns, I really dont want to have to sit for up to 2-3 hours of time watching the turns process! To me, that is unacceptable in this day and age. For people playing once a day via PBW or something, this is obviously not an issue, but if you are trying to get some play time in one sitting its very time-wasting. And I havent even got to larger battles yet. This is just FG on FG type of stuff. I shudder to think what how long it would take with actual FLEET combat.

I may be wrong about this but I was having the same problem until I tried a new game (p1.25, BM 1.03) and in the "in game" "options menu" towards the bottom there were some options to turn off logs and minimize combat replay and other stuff. This helped a ton.

OK thanks, I'll try with the logs off and see if that helps.

Does anyone know if futzing with any of these settings might help without unduly screwing up the game?

Space Combat Maximum Time (Seconds) := 180
Space Combat Ends Only When Time Up Or No Enemies := FALSE
Space Combat Minimum Time Between Warp Transits (ms) := 500
Space Combat Time Until Ship Can Warp Again (seconds) := 30
Space Combat Chance For Warp Transit Interpenetration Percent := 10
Space Combat Maximum Zoom Out Distance := 150.0
Space Combat Map Radius := 2500.0
Space Combat Crew Boarding Strength := 1.0
Space Combat Allow Retreat := FALSE

[Raapys]

Give what Tnargversion2 says a try. Oh, and turning off retreat will actually increase time processing, as it makes retreat-combats run for the maximum allowed time( as opposed to ending when reaching the retreat barrier ), so put it back on. You could also decrease the maximum combat time in the ( mod's ) settings.txt file, but that's bound to affect gameplay as well, if you set it too low.

Afraid that's about it. Suppose you could send a mail to Aaron complaining about long turn processing; chances are he'll look into it( again ) if it gets enough attention.

Oh, remember to delete the DebugSettings.txt file in the Balance Mod's Data folder.

[Tim_Ward]

Still, a minute or two is hardly excessive...

It is 20 turns into the game.

[Fyron]

If you start with more homeworlds, you don't have to wait nearly as long to get new tech levels in the early game.

[xierxior]

The turn time is very excessive. I have a oc'd athlon 3800+ running at 3ghz (watercooled) with a geforce 7800gtx and 1gb of ram which is like 100000x overkill for this game yet the turn can still take up to 60+? seconds.
The green bar moves quickly but it's the red (combat) bar that slowly drags everything out.
is there a way you could speed up AI combat during turn processing so it runs at like 400x or something?

[Uncle_Joe]

Ah well. Thanks for the suggestions guys. I tried them out but without much change. In fact, since I'm about 30 turns into the game now, the turns are getting even longer...

Does almost everyone have turn processing times like this? I can't see how this is even considered playable other than something like PBW. In an hour's worth of gaming I might get 15 turns done and its pretty ridiculous when almost HALF of that time is spent on 'processing' the turns.

Its a damned shame too because for the first time since release I'm actually somewhat drawn to the gameplay. I still think the game feels pretty unpolished, but it is interesting and even somewhat addictive (ie, one...more...turn). But then I think how long I have to wait for that turn and I end up saving it and quitting. Perhaps I'm becoming A.D.D. in my old age, but more likely its recognizing that I have less gaming time than I'd like and the thought of spending half of it watching 'processing turn' doesnt thrill me.

Does anyone know if this is even a priority issue at this point?

Thanks again for the suggestions though. If anyone has any others, I'm willing to try 'em.

[Uncle_Joe]

Update....

Actually, I guess I'm only on turn 23. I thought it was farther along...

At any rate, turn 22 took over SEVEN minutes to process. Note that not one race (of the 6 in the game on a small map) has more than 9 ships/bases combined. Looking at the turn report, I was involved in 3 battles each involving only TWO COMBATANTS! And that takes SEVEN MINUTES?

Sorry for the rant, but I cant even imagine that people consider this as a playable product. Seven minutes of downtime and a little over 2 minutes to complete my part of the turn. Something is SERIOUSLY wrong with that.

Am I just totally missing something that is adding to the horrid processing time?? I was on the verge of recommending SE5 to my gaming group and trying to muster some multiplayer TCP/IP games (we play Civ4 every now and then). But I think I would be shot for recommending this game at this point. I cant believe its actually a retail release in 2006 with turn times like that.