Newbie Questions. For the love of GOD: help me. *whimper*

[Iron Giant]

Wow. I've had this game for a while now but never really had the time to play. Thanks to the blizzard that hit the Boston area Last Monday, I finally had the time to get into it.

Whoa. I finally have a game worthy of being called Master of Orion III (MOO2 is a classic, SEIV is a KEEPER.). I never thought I'd see a gam! Every time I play, I feel like I'm in a Grand Space Opera. The politics, the ships, the races and the options. Gawd this game is HUGE. I could go on, but MAN I need some help! I've looked through the htm manual but it seems a bit... skimpy... I've also looked through most of this site and found answers for some questions so I'll just post the ones I couldnt get an answer for:

1. Is there a list of every weapon and planetary facility in the game some place and what to research to get them? I don't know how best to spend my research points if I don't know whats available. I don't get to play much so I can't memorize what works best. I did look through the txt files but I don't understand the myriad of numbers after each component and its not laid out for easy viewing.

2. What do I have to do to make the other races happy? I will usually have a couple of other races in good treaties, just to have them end the treaty later on, sometimes shortly after they were "Brotherly" toward me? Should I give regular tribute? Just say "Hi" every once in a while? ("beware strang warp points!" hehe)

3. Do cloaked ships trigger mines?

4. I took over a small race that has 4 or 5 weapon platforms on each planet. Being a heavy fighter user, I don't want them, they get in the way and at this point they are WAY obsolete. So the question is: how do I scrap them? I can't see how.

5. If I set the minister of Population transfers to ON, will he automatically move conquered races to breathable planets to maximize them?

6. How do people here play against other people? Is there a multiplayer realtime game in SE4? (I'm not home or I'd look, sorry) but assuming there is, what is the most popular way to hook up and play against others? Some of the most fun I had in MOO2 was on my home LAN against my brother....

I'll think of more later. Thanks for the help!

[Nitram Draw]

I don't know all the answers but check the scenario/mod archive section for a list of the tech tree. There is an excel sheet someone made a while back that lists all hat stuff.
To get rid of old weapons platform click on the planet then look for the jettison button on the top toolbar, I think it has red arrows and a box on it. Click and choose what you want to get rid of.
Don't bother trying to figure out why your allies are murderous and your enemies brotherly. The diplomacy model is a little screwy. Just try to stay at peace with the ones you want. Don't get to far ahead or they will all gang up on you.

[mac5732]

1. as for list not that I'm aware of maybe some of the other players can help in this
2 give gifts and/or sweet talk them - use general message option. Some just will hate you not matter what, others will make treaties and break them the next turn no matter what you do
4 go to jettison cargo button on top scroll bar,
5 never used ministers, can't help on this
6 on opening screen where you set up game go to multiplayer instead of hotseat, to play on line, i haven't tried it yet, but I'm sure some of the others can help ya out on this. hope this helps, I'm sure some of the others can give you more info, I'm still new at the game myself... good luck

[jc173]

I believe cloaked ships will still trigger mines, at least a couple of my cloaked scouts hit mines a few updates ago. I'm pretty sure it's still the same

I think for your minister to shuffle population you will need to turn on transport ship minister under individual ministers and hand over control of some of your transports. There's a button to turn on individual ministers for a ship, looks kind of like a cartoon face.

[capnq]

I hate to waste weapon platforms by just jettisoning them, so I build the biggest cargo ship I can and move it around collecting the obsolete WPs. When it's full, I unload them all at a world where there's plenty of unused space left.

I also build satellite layers to scoop up obsolete satellites and lug them to somewhere more useful.

------------------
Cap'n Q

[raynor]

Here is a link to the Excel spreadsheet created by WhiteHojo with sorting code by Taterbill. It is *extremely* well done. It shows all the tech areas and what you get you research them. Plus!!! It has hyperlinks so that when you click on the stuff, it takes you to a complete description of the component, facility, vehicle or intel project. We owe WhiteHojo a *huge* thank you for creating this. Also, thanks to Taterbill for adding some cool sorting code.
http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/ubbup...hLevels_v2.zip



[This message has been edited by raynor (edited 08 March 2001).]

[jimbob55]

1. When you start a game, go to the 'Game setup'-> 'Game settings' screen. There is an option :Player can see complete tech tree.

If you tick that box (green blob it or whatever) a button on the research screen (it could be somewhere else) will allow you to view the tech levels + the tech levels in whole. It shows all the dependencies (Quite badly, but it does).

2. Making them happy means keeping treaties, not colonising planets they could colonise. As long as the aliens don't see your colonies, they don't mind them.
The aliens declaring war on you could be because you've gone for an alliance that lets them see your colonies and they suddenly get very annoyed at you for taking 'their' planets. The other option is that yuou are playing with Mega Evil Empire on, when your score gets to 200% of the second player (or lower, I modded mine) everyone will declare war on you 'because your growth threatens all races....'

3. Cloaked ships do trigger mines.