Devnull Mod Gold: updates and discussion

Rollo · #1 April 11th, 2006, 08:07 PM

Hey, Henk!
good to see you are still around =).

henk brouwer · #2 April 12th, 2006, 01:06 PM

Yes, I still lurk here occasionally while waiting for the release of SeV

. Good to see you still around as well, I guess we are the only people here that actually link to dungeon odyssey related stuff in their sigs..

Anyhow, Judging by the lists of changes a lot of work was put into this version, I probably won't have time to play the new version of Devnull until somewhere next week but I'll try and give some more usefull comments when I do.

se5a · #3 April 12th, 2006, 04:28 PM

have the normal shield and phased shields been fixed so the normal sheilds don't upgrade to the phased?

and can you add a phased shield regen?
AFAIK the normal one doesn not work on phased shields.

Ed Kolis · #4 April 12th, 2006, 04:54 PM

There is only one shield regeneration ability. AFAIK it works on both types of shields...

Rollo · #5 April 12th, 2006, 05:53 PM

That's cool Henk, no hurry, but I am always looking for feedback, of course.

se5a, what exactly do you think needs fixing with shields? Can you be a bit more specific?

And yeah, as Ed already said, shield regen works for either shield.

henk brouwer · #6 April 21st, 2006, 01:29 PM

I finally got around to playing a game and so far it's great, one note so far, it seems that the AI's in my game are not investing as much in research as they should. I'm only 6th by total score but my research output is 5 times higher than any of the other races, in fact they are all still very close to the amount of research they started out with, and none of them seem to have build any research stations in the last 4 years (it's 2408 now). They keep up quite well when looking at the amount of tech levels they have researched because of their AI bonus, but they could do much better.

Here's a screenshot of the scores, it's a high tech cost, no intel game, I changed the monster's flag in my game because it looked a lot like the neutrals (I forgot to switch them off at the game start) I'm player 1 (the taera shipset)

The problem is probably made worse by the galaxy settings, (small, sparse galaxy) at this point most of the planets have been colonized and there's not much room to expand or build additional research facilities. Anyhow it couldn't hurt if one or two of the AI's were designed to build more research stations.

Anyhow, even though I'm doing well on the research front I'm having a lot of trouble keeping my empire together

, I did manage to conquer the Jraenar empire early on, but now the Cue Cappa attack me from behind. They use a lot of seekers (which are far more difficult to defend against in Devnull) and because of AI-bonus they can support huge fleets. (i'm having trouble with my upkeep at only 26 ships) My ships don't stand a chance against their fleets out in open space, but well designed weapon platforms with lots of pd at the planets bordering their empire can just stop them for now. I however still lost two far away systems to large Cue-Cappan fleets over the last year. Also the space monsters have picked me as their favourite victim

I'm getting monster attacks almost every turn. Looks like I'm really going to need the research advantage I have build up

.

henk brouwer · #7 April 24th, 2006, 05:55 AM

Never mind that last post, I just started a new game and the AI is building huge amounts of research facilities. I'm playing on a slightly larger map this time, but otherwise the settings are the same.

Why did I start a new game you ask? Well because the AI humiliated me in the last one

. I might have been ahead in technology but that did not save me from the Cue-Cappan fleet of 59 ships with missiles and fighters that suddenly entered my homesystem.

Anyhow, geat mod. the techtree (or what I've seen of it) is mostly the same as stock, but weapons and components have been tweaked a lot, and interesting new ones have been added. It seems far better balanced compared to stock and the AI does a very good job at using the new options it has. I'm looking forward to new versions

oleg · #8 July 13th, 2006, 07:24 AM

After a long distraction by normal life I want to start
playing SEIV again.
I never tried latest Devnull. One think I don't like
in unmoded sEIv is fast pace of research.
I often play with "high cost" and also reduced output
of research centers by 1/2.
I wonder what effect would it have on Devnull mod ?
Will it make game too slow ??
I'm planning to play large galaxy ~200 system with
~15 AI on low or medium bonus.

Rollo · #9 July 13th, 2006, 09:47 AM

Devnull Mod Gold plays at the same pace as stock SE4. So lowering the research output will have the same effects.
I can not think of any mod specific reasons that speak against it.

Will it make the game too slow? Yes, IMHO it will. But to each his own. If you like slower research, go for it.

Dizzy · #10 July 13th, 2006, 01:11 PM

Rollo, in the devnull mod Im doing, the Sonne race freaked out somehow and went on a mad rampage... Their research and resources are 5x that of any other empire cept mine... and I'm consistently ranking half they are in everything else... despite me capturing several early enemy race's HW's. Only thing I'm leading in is population.

What the hell happened? They are going nuts... You do anything special with their AI scripts or did they just get lucky this game? I'm especially impressed with their research and tech levels. Super impressive. When I got word they created a planet... I felt like a third world country at the advent of the atomic age...