Gameplay tips & tricks

[Alienboy]

Parasite said:
On Upgrading ships, write down the cost of each upgrade the first time you do it. Go to the ship screen, show orders and sort by Ship class, then orders. All the upgrade orders will then at one location in the list. It makes it easy to count and multiply even if there are upgrades at multiple locations.

Check out the turn order to see what comes first, but I am pretty sure that Maintanace, resource conversion and gifts/trades come first, then upgrades, then production and building.

According to what you are upgrading make sure you are mineral bound. Vast engine, SM, or PPB upgrades can really suck down the Radioactives... Even more than you expect. Production later in the turn will then cover up the lack.

Thanks for the advice, I have been working at building my resource storage and production. Where I think I have been caught out is converting too much Radioactive or Organic resources into Mineral resources, leaving myself short of the Radioactive and Organic resources. It would be great to have an upgrade cost tele in the Ship screen.

[Warshed]

This was proboably listed a million times already but from most important to least important:

1. Better AI (possibly upgradable/patchable through a learning algorythm like in galactic civilizations)

2. More interesting research tree (something like Master of Orion 3 or Civ 4), just not like lasers 1, lasers 2, but maybe lasers, then phasers, then quark gun, etc. Also have an option for your empires, like in MOO3, which determines how many techs are available to your empire to research (forcing you to trade for and steal techs from other empires).

3. Better graphics, and possibly combat using fleets, rather than moving one ship at a time, you move one fleet at a time, with damage being assigned just like in normal SE4, but to individual ships within a fleet.

4. More lucky specials (which is a selectable option when configuring the galaxy), lucky planet specials, lucky tech specials (on planets or a random event, or you get the option to buy them using resources).

5. Rare resources that can only be found on certain planets, which are used to build the most powerful weapons. This will force people into war or trade for those rare resources.

6. Ship and system heros like in MOO2.

[Slick]

Warshed, I think you posted this in the wrong thread. Looks like SE5 wishlist stuff.

[Warshed]

ohhh damn sorry. I hope it can be removed. I thought I clicked on the right thread. I guess not.

[Hunpecked]

With regard to upgrades, I believe the total of resources available for upgrades also does not include points reclaimed from recycled facilities in the same turn. I sometimes keep track of retrofit expenses with Excel, and I got burned one time when I was retrofitting down to (almost) the last mineral in storage.

[douglas]

In sequential movement mode, resources from scrapped facilities are available immediately. In simultaneous, unless this was fixed in the Deluxe patch, there is a bug that prevents you from getting the resources at all. They will show up immediately when you're playing the turn, but they disappear when the turn is processed.

[Hunpecked]

Ah, that explains it.

[CaptainAL]

The ship upgrading has been a source of frustration for me. I think it may be a bug - I am sure that others here must have encountered it. Here's what happens:

I give the upgrade orders. [when this happens there's usually pretty many ships and a large amount of resources involved, with maybe a stellar manipulation upgrade or two] I add up all the resources needed and check my STORAGE amounts to make sure I have enough. Sure enough, I have plenty because I have been good at building many storage facilities. Now I also convert some resources, because I have so many extra organics and radioactives but am light on the minerals. I am careful NOT to convert more organics and radioactives then are available for the upgrades. Great, good to go... next turn I'll be ready to move...

NEXT TURN: Sh--! Not one ship upgraded. "Not Enough Resources" message for every one. But there are all the resources - still in storage.

Anyone have this happen (or am I just really burned out and not calculating everything right -- nine or ten times now)? Sometimes it happens, sometimes it does not. Anyone know how to avoid it? It has screwed me up so badly that now I never convert and upgrade in the same turn, unless I really don't need the upgrades that badly.

[douglas]

Were any of the planets you had doing resource conversions on repeat orders? If so, that planet would have continued converting until you ran out of the source resource or it had executed the maximum number of orders.

Also, resource conversion happens before retrofitting, and retrofitting happens before income. Be careful that your current storage plus or minus whatever you convert is sufficient to pay for all retrofits.

[CaptainAL]

The fact that you have not encountered it tells me that it must be me. Jez, I thought I had added everything up very carefully each time, too. No, I did not have RCF planets on repeat orders. Weird, the times when it has happened nothing retrofitted at all - and I would think that if I were a little off on my numbers that at least some would retrofit. I know that if I were off those times it couldn't have been by that much. On my upcoming turns I will write down the numbers to be sure.

Thanks again Douglas.