Things I don't like in Space Empires 4

[Taqwus]

A 'ship class tree' might be an intriguing way to go (for a future installment; it's almost certainly too much to add at this point. I'd be happy to see it someday, 'tho.).

Essentially, one should be able to construct a directed acyclic graph (DAG) out of the various classes. The DAG may have branches where one class was upgraded into two different Versions (one earlier, one later but still not 50% more expensive -- or whatever limit is set in the .txt), both of which may be upgradable to the same. Alternately, if we have

in the case that A came first, some were refitted to B, then a design C was created that was barely cheap enough to be upgraded from A, but obsoletes both A and B -- and then D obsoletes C. However, ships of type A or B just returning from extended tours of duty (actually, that's rather limited by supply... as long as ships keep running in trouble faster than the _Enterprise_ =); but if there were ship morale, long tours between returns to port would surely affect it) have too high a price differential, so they'd have to be upgraded via A->B-D. The computer could easily calculate the upgrade cost (resources and time -- well, the latter needs to factor in repair time. Hm. Measure in damaged components.) per edge of the graph, and compute the 'best' upgrade path given either priority. Then, having a setting like 'Automatically upgrade idle ships using up to NN% of net income', or 'Automatically upgrade idle ships N or more generations behind' becomes possible, because it can figure out how to upgrade without fear of turning your missile boats into beamers, or so forth, unless you so choose -- because it can ignore disconnected ship class hierarchies (like E->F).

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-- The thing that goes bump in the night

[wingte]

[quote]Originally posted by Paladin:
[b]Btw, there is an "Upgrade Facilitites" option in the construction queues main window (F7

This button doesnt work to purchace the planetary upgrade facilities like the Atmosphere changer. Also when these upgrade facilitys have done their job,, you have to goto the planet and then click a seperate scrap facilitise button then find the facility and ... well it is tenious....

Not as tediuos as that ship list though...




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Wingte

[jars_u]

quote:

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Originally posted by Mark Pavlou:
Don't forget the actual ground combat itself which appears to be the same as SEIII - everyone lining up in one neat box for a simple elimination calculation.

Given the ability to design troops now it is a pity that the tactical space combat section could not have been modified for ground combat too.
Of course, this would be so much more interesting if other games could be tied in to handle some of these areas. Droooooooool!

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Have limited exp. using in ground combat in SE4 but the ship/troop design elements of SE4 are one of the things I like about it best. I do think it would be nice though if ground combat was handled in a similar way as space combat - perhaps with limited radmom generated land maps, and number of actual units consolidated i.e. each chasis stands for more then 1 actual unit.

Now the idea of other games being used to handle different aspects of combat is sweet. If I am not mistaken the old Breech games tied in with another game to handle ground/space combat in a similar manner. Now if we could get Shrapnel to tie SE4 and AOA:WDK2K together into one HUGE game that would be something. I realize the work that would involve but think (I know someone from Shrapnel is reading this) you could sell two games to a lot of people, I already own the one and pre-ordered the other. Now that would make for some really sweet and interesting Online play think of the possibilities...

My .02 of rambling for the night.

Jim

[Fionn]

I remember having both Rules of Engagement and Breach II - the pair that "fit together" to handle ship-to-ship and boarding actions with the two seperate programs. It was awesome in the extreme! I think the only reason I stopped playing was because my Amiga died and I finally went PC so I could bring work home. Couldn't find copies of the games for that platform by that point . . . :-(

If it were left in my little monkey paws, I'd come up with a data packet protocol that'd allow stats such as boarding party info, ship layout and so forth to be handed about between applications. That way, 3rd party developers could come up with various add-ons (the boarding module, the ground combat module, the super-fancy 3D space combat with retreat option module . . . ) that could be added or subtracted from the line-up as desired.

SEIV Plug-Ins, IOW. :-)

A note on the interchangable launch facilities - I agree (for whatever that's worth) that it is probably just a bug. I picture the facility as specialized launch and recovery faciities that can handle just their specific type of "cargo". I think an interesting addition, however, would be a generic Hanger component. At the cost of increased size and cost, to handle the larger multi-purpose facilities and tenders, it could launch anything from mines to fighters.

Oh, and I'm also a proponent of being able to change star (system) names. I'm tired of setting up shop in the Devonshire star system. I thought Devonshire was in England, not out beyond the Crab Nebula.

[wingte]

Found a new one I don't like.. When I put a space yard ship into a fleet.. I lose tha ability to access it's construction que and it appears to stop building and will only do repairs.

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Wingte

[Master Belisarius]

Wingte: are you using a Space Yard component, or the Repair Bay?
I'm using ships with Space Yard component, and have not problems...

My complaint with the Space Yard, it's that the Space Yard component have a great size, and also, I don't like the limit of only ONE Space Yard per Ship/Base...
In SE4 I can not build a lot of ships at the same time, like I did in SE3: now is very costly to create 10 Space Stations with one Space Yard each one...

[Darwin]

Every time MM does another SE the ship yards get worse and worse.

I loved SE2's build method.