SE5 Demo Bug Reports & Annoyances/Requests

[Fyron]

Will said:
Until SJ makes Carrier Battles for SEV, and you need to add a bajillion armor components.)

Luckily, this will not be necessary at all. Components store individual damage, and you can make real leakiness with custom damage types. Damage is directional, not totally random as in SE4. There isn't much need for having 100 1kt armor comps in SE5.

[Wade]

-----In empire creation, governments list, "Oligarchy" does not have any positives or negatives listed.(This was missed?!)

-----In vehicle designs, vehicle name screen, the numeric keypad does not work. Only the numerals at the top of keyboard do. The numeric keypad worked in SEIV. (I use the game date in naming my vehicles. I wish the date was still visible in this screen. I mentioned this before. I know that I can just note the date before hand.)

I have seen a few comments about not liking the decks in ship design, especially for small ships. They say a small ship should have one deck. Without debating these points I want to point out some things.
The size of a vehicle is expressed with the ...size...the tonnage weight. The slots on three leveles are so that we are not limited in available spaces. We are limited in available tonnage.
Even though they all have three decks a small ship still has less slots(as well as tonnage) then a larger ship.
I like the decks. They add some creativity to design. Maybe later (or in a mod) they can be a factor in combat and dammage.
Also, who's to say how many weapons of future technologies will fit on future vehicles.

[Suicide Junkie]

Ogliarchy is the "Neutral culture" of the government types.

[MarkSheppard]

The size of a vehicle is expressed with the ...size...the tonnage weight. The slots on three leveles are so that we are not limited in available spaces. We are limited in available tonnage.

You're making no sense.

Tonnage and Space have always vied with each other in warship design since time immemorial.

Take for example, modern US Navy Warships from the Spruance Class onwards; their boxy sides allow for a lot of internal volume to carry volume intensive equipment like computerized combat systems; which while weighing less than a gun; take up a lot more space; with cooling requirements, etc.

Even though they all have three decks a small ship still has less slots(as well as tonnage) then a larger ship.

I wouldn't mind the three decks on smaller combatants if each deck wasn't an identical copy of the deck above it and below it; making the ships look like they were pounded out of cookie cutter makers

Real ships have decks that are smaller/bigger than other decks due to the shape of the hull.

I like the decks. They add some creativity to design.

As it is now, they really don't because there are simply too many slots for things, even on the smallest combatant, so you're not forced to make tough decisions on what you want on your ship.

Also, who's to say how many weapons of future technologies will fit on future vehicles.

Do you have any idea how idiotic that sounds?

Ships since time immemorial all have been designed around the weapons they carry. The Yamato's huge size was simply the only way to move 9 x 18" guns at 20+ knots with sufficient armor across the ocean.

For a gun, whether it be projectile or a ray gun, you need a clear line of fire from where the gun is mounted to the target, which limits where you can put it. Secondly, there are other constraints, like recoil from the gun if it's a railgun or chemical propellant weapon, you have to place them in areas where the hull is strong enough to take the recoil. If it's an energy weapon, you've traded one problem (recoil) for another problem, that of getting sufficient power from the ships' power plant to the gun itself.

Missiles and torpedoes on the other hand, do not need a direct line of sight; since they can guide themselves to their target; but they do need a clear launching area; look at the decks of modern VLS surface combatants; they're free of obstructions that a missile could hit while climbing out of it's launcher.

To simply handwave away ship design problems by saying "it's the future!" annoys me highly.

[Phoenix-D]

MarkSheppard: If SE5 is anything like Starfury, you'll be able to restrict weapon placement using custom slot types. Or simply require weapons to be in the Outer Hull region. Can't do anything about the decks all being the same size, though.

[Renegade 13]

MarkSheppard said:
Real ships have decks that are smaller/bigger than other decks due to the shape of the hull.

I completely disagree. We're talking about interstellar spacecraft here. These craft obviously don't have to contend with the restraints atmospheric craft have to put up with, due to aerodynamics, etc.

The point is, you don't have to have a ship with any particular shape. If you want a square ship, with decks that are identical to each other, it isn't inherently worse than a ship with a different structural shape. If you want true realism, every ship from every race would be spherical, since that's the shape that provides the most internal volume for the least expenditure of resources. In that case, every ship would have nearly identical decks, just slightly smaller or larger than the previous deck. Saying that decks being different in shape from each other is more realistic is, in my personal opinion, not at all true.

[MarkSheppard]

I completely disagree. We're talking about interstellar spacecraft here.

Tell that to the 3D designers who did the models for the spacecraft. The hulls angle inwards, do all sorts of things, the majority of them are not simple square slabs.

[Wade]

Like Captain Kwok said:

"I just think he's being a little too literal on the use of the term "decks". It's really just a way of providing the extra slots on a design."

[Wade]

-----Exception error: In vehicle design, Space Simulator list of vehicles. I added a star, a planet, and a warp point. I then clicked on "Add Vehicle" a few times. It was adding more warp points to the list. I double clicked on one in the list and got the error and a white screen.
Update: It does this error also if you click the "Remove Vehicle" button.

-----Exception error: During Space Simulation: Tactical: Five identical Frigates versus the same five identical frigates. One enemy ship came at my group of five. It started to explode after the attack. The explosion (and the simulation)froze. I tried to move my ships then the game crashed.

[Noble713]

I understand Mark Sheppard's point and was hoping for a similar mechanism, where the shapes of each deck were based on the design of the ship in question. For example, a Trek ship like the various NCC-1701 Enterprises would have the Upper Deck saucer-shaped with slots over the saucer, the Middle Deck with a few boxes over the front of the engineering section (where the neck is) and boxes over the nacelles, and the Lower Deck a rectangular group of boxes over the Engineering/Secondary Hull section.

Then again, I was also expecting weapon and engine slots ala Starfury. If you are going to go with the slot system, go all the way. Maybe in Space Empires V GOLD, if we bug him enough.

But on the flip side, I AM reasonably content to soldier on with what we have now. I like it, and try not to make abusive and non-sensical component arrangements.