Off topic: How are games failing you?

[NKIcan]

I guess it just takes practice, and knowing which orders to use.

Zuul just give you problems early game...but after that they become managable. Heck if you can hold em off they will eventually run out of steam as they auto-overharvest all their planets.

I enjoy the Tarkas the best.

Either way, SotS is another example of a lot of things done right, but annoying enough in the few small things to drive many away.

[JimMorrison]

I really liked The Hive, just because as the game progressed, and more and more AI empires wanted to launch fleets at me from god knows where, I could do the gate dance and block each fleet with minimal attrition for the most part. Then yeah, here comes a Zuul fleet, and *pop* goes my defensive armada.

I felt like I was getting pretty handy at controlling my ships, such as the controls were. But they would still bind up, and IIRC I had huge problems with ships that had weapons of multiple ranges not wanting to close to use all weapons, and if they did, they would try to stack on top of eachother and get stuck while the enemy sailed back to take out my gate ships, and my command ships.

I don't know, as bad as all that was, it was most definitely the Zuul bastards with their imba weapons that drove me away. I have a very high BS threshold, and generally consider it a challenge to make faulty controls, bad pathing, and awkward AI do what I want them to do. But when someone can throw a fleet full of garbage at me, and do horrible damage just because one ship can fire the dreaded God Fart Torpedo, it's a sour sour day. You're actually making me want to install and play it again, and disable the Zuul from AI selection. <3

[rdonj]

Space Dolphins forever! I only tried the hivers once or twice briefly, never finished a game with them. I realized recently (yesterday) just how horribly incorrect I was playing them the same way I played the Liir, but with gate ships. The Liir pretty much perfectly fit my natural playstyle tendencies, the Hivers, not so much.

God fart torpedo, huh? The Zuul certainly sound like absolute jerks, leaving them disabled sounds like a good idea to me. I would say play as them to exact retribution, but they also don't completely sound like the most fun to play. I certainly would be terrible with them. I actually am somewhat wanting to play SotS also, and Rebellion! But I only have so many brain cells I can devote to games that require lots of thinking at once and dominions is pretty much maxing me out right now. Maybe when I'm done with most of my multiplayer games, but I'm not so sure that's happening any time soon....

[JimMorrison]

You will never be done with your MP games, people keep starting new ones, the jerks.

I started out with the Liir, I was shocked at how flimsy their ships were. Though, I didn't understand the Command limits, and how they affected combat (that game has such an awful manual, it's what, 15 pages? ), so their weaker ships had a lot of trouble once they were badly outnumbered.

SoTS Manual, First Draft: "So there's umm, some people, and they fight. There are some game concepts, and you'll pretty much figure them out as you go. Oh yeah, the whole game takes place in space!"

Dev2: Hey Jerry, I think maybe you should put a little more effort into the manual.
Dev1: Hmmmm, well I guess I could fluff it up a bit, do we have any illustrations to throw in?

[rdonj]

Originally Posted by JimMorrison

You will never be done with your MP games, people keep starting new ones, the jerks.

I started out with the Liir, I was shocked at how flimsy their ships were. Though, I didn't understand the Command limits, and how they affected combat (that game has such an awful manual, it's what, 15 pages? ), so their weaker ships had a lot of trouble once they were badly outnumbered.

SoTS Manual, First Draft: "So there's umm, some people, and they fight. There are some game concepts, and you'll pretty much figure them out as you go. Oh yeah, the whole game takes place in space!"

Dev2: Hey Jerry, I think maybe you should put a little more effort into the manual.
Dev1: Hmmmm, well I guess I could fluff it up a bit, do we have any illustrations to throw in?

Oh I know, they're so inconsiderate. I've already had to pass on several that sounded interesting because I am just too committed. I'm not even playing that many games, just putting too much work into some of the few I have :P

The Liir do have the unfortunate flaw of being ridiculously flimsy. And incredibly, horrifyingly slow in the beginning. Just another reason to make sure your research is years ahead of everone else

The manual IS pretty useless. One of those manuals that barely explains the basics of how the game works. The SotS wiki became my manual the day I found it.