Raising The Bar...

[Richard]

I think there are things both Malfador and we can learn from this release. The manual was certaintly below our standards but to be honest I have to wonder how we could have taken all of the necessary info and not had a 500 page book .

As far as the interface I actually like it. I think it is FAR more intuitive than say MOO2's interface. Yes there is clicking but I like the way that a lot of common info is in ONE area so I don't have to search for it. It makes micromanaging much easier.

As far as Aaron goes I just spoke with him and he is going through his email SLOWLY .

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Sarge is coming...

Richard Arnesen
Director of Covert Ops
Shrapnel Games
http://www.shrapnelgames.com

[Emperor Zodd]

I never played SE3 and then I found the SE4 demo and loved it. It was fun learning the game using the demo while I waited for my copy in the mail. I got the hang of this game in just a few days. When my copy came I wasn't upset with finding a small paper manual. I read the HTML manual and discovered I knew everything already from playing the demo. Some people are slow learners and need everything spelled out to them in manuals. I find this game very easy and straight forward,and I only wish the A.I. was improved,plus a few tweaks here and there. The Last thing on my wish list or mind is the manual. When I had the demo and had no manual,half the fun was learning the game by playing it.

[This message has been edited by Emperor Zodd (edited 11 January 2001).]

[dmm]

Poddu is totally wrong about the colony ships. Because, for example, sometimes my spaceyard is on a planet with O2 breathers but I want to colonize an H2 planet. I will colonize it with an empty colony ship, and bring a transport with H2 colonists. Or maybe pick up the H2 colonists with the colony ship. If the colony ship were automatically filled, then I'd have to jettison people.

If you want the colony ship auto-filled, use the colonize button. That's what it's for.

[Emperor Zodd]

There are times when I load zero or just 1m population. Usually when I colonize a distant tiny planet that has ruins.I would not want to be stuck with a auto full load system. Besides whats so hard about hitting the colonize button to get a full cargo load of people? Maybe thats too advanced for some people.

[ColdSteel]

On the manual issue, I've suggested to MM that they turn their HTML manual into a right-click, context sensitive help file that can be accessed directly from the game.

The hard part is done, all they'd need to do is link the indexes to the objects in the game code.

[Poddu]

Well, I seem to be in a singular minority about the Colony Ships. So be it ... it's a small issue, but here are some replies anyway.


WhiteHojo:

Yes, I understand, but why does the Colony Ship have to be full? You can colonize a planet with just a few million people, and have it be quite productive. This is a function of there being very little production penalty on a near-empty planet. You can send a Colony Ship to a new planet, build a Space yard in 5 turns, and build a Colony Ship 2 turns later. Even with only a few million (or even 1 Mil) people left on that planet, I can still crank out Colony Ships every 3 turns [only 1 extra turn], and send then off with a couple of million colonists. If there were a major production penalty involved it wouldn't be viable, but as it is, it works.

Richard:

About the manual issue, there is a similar comment in the user guide where Aaron says he would have needed over 350 pages to tell us all. It seems to me that there is a World Of Knowledge between what we have and these dense tomes that you propose. For example, when you are first playing the game, you might wonder what the differences are in the advanced traits. "Hmm", you say, "I wonder what is the difference between a Psychic race and a Deeply Religious race." When you look up "Empire Setup - Advanced Traits Window", you get a picture of that window and find out that this is where you select advanced racial traits. Yes, I figured that much out. But where do you get a brief description of what kinds of abilities or technologies are involved? I don't need a 20 page detailed description, but how about a 2 or 3 paragraph overview? As it is, one learns if a trait is interesting or useful to your type of playing style by investing an hour or so playing a game with it.

dmm:

Yes, this can happen, but usually by the time that it does, one has multiple spaceyards on multiple types of worlds, and one can systemize colonization. If the default were a filled colony ship, then once in a while one would have to offload and reload colonists. But the vast majority of the time, you'd be good to go. I'd rather micromanage the occasional exception, than every colony ship .. but, I can see that it cuts both ways.

Zodd:

Maybe you're right. Maybe, as you so kindly point out, some of us are just "slow learners" and need things "spelled out in manuals." Things like ... "which is better,computers or a real crew?" Things like ... "When you select to give the computer players a bonus, what exactly to they recieve?" We all have some questions, Zodd, and maybe a better manual would help some of us. Unlike yourself, I have not "discovered I knew everything already from playing the demo."

[Taqwus]

No manual is going to tell you how a race design plays, methinks. It's going to be heavily affected by the quadrant setup and your neighbors, and by your personal playing style (going for the quick conquest, building up first, etc). The same goes for many other questions, like Master Computers versus crew (in a Finite Resources game in an Ancient quadrant, for instance, you might want to be very, very miserly -- those MCs are expensive. But in a more normal setting, but surrounded by the Psychic Enemies Network, you'll probably want them. And so forth).

However, certain things *could* be extrapolated from the data files, and...

Perhaps a race trait's description should also include the names of the tech areas that require it? This could be automatically generated by the engine -- no need for hardcoding.

A certain amount of documentation could probably be auto-generated from data files, like a tech tree, complete with costs based on the game settings. This can also, of course, be studied by a user reading the files.

What can't be, are the details "under the hood", like --

- how do Ministers make their decisions

- what specific abilities mean (Some aren't that clear. For instance, looking at face value, it's unclear to me why the Economic Disruption op is more costly than the Resource Theft; presumably the Resource Destruction ability applies some multiplicative factor, or has some other hidden advantage, because otherwise it looks like it destroys no more than the Theft op steals).

- what occurs in a turn, and in what order

- how do the strategies work; e.g. what does "optimal range" optimize, when multiple weapon types are present?

and so forth.



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-- The thing that goes bump in the night