Technology Research Suggestions

[Sinapus]

quote:

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Originally posted by DirectorTsaarx:
Hmmm... "Asteroid Sling"... is that anything like "Butt in a Sling"? Or maybe a "Highland Fling"? Or even "Static Cling"?

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Think 'mass drivers' as in

"Mass Drivers have been outlawed by every civilized species!"
"These are uncivilized times!"
"We have treaties!"
"EENK on a PAGE!"


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"What do -you- want?" "I'd like to live -just- long enough to be there when they cut off your head and stick it on a pike as a warning to the next ten generations that some favors come with too high a price. I would look up into your lifeless eyes and wave like this..." *waggle* "...can you and your associates arrange that for me, Mr. Morden?"

[ZeroAdunn]

Along the lines of new tech here are some ideas I had:

Rail Guns: Early incredibly cheap tech.
Size: 20
Damage: 20 20 20 20
Increaed chance to hit 50
Standard Everything else

Increase the damage done by fighter kamikaze warheads.

Mod weapons engines and supply storage (maybe armor too) to require more radioactives.

Mod life support and crew quarters to require more organics.

Extend current tech areas.

Just some thoughts

[PurpleRhino]

Not sure if anybody is intersted, but I have most of these suggestions in place in a MOD that I'm tweaking. I've done a lot of things... More mine warheads, some changes to shields, armor, remote mining, engines (not based on size, but I might try this.), couple more missile types, another planetary weapon, another point-defense weapon, a couple tweak to some of the ships, bunches more systems types, another quadrant type, and a bunch of other tweaks that I thought were needed. If people are interested, I'll put it up in the download area. BUT it IS a beta right now. I'm currently working on changing the AI to use all the new equipment.
Later,
-PR

[Sinapus]

I'm making a few mods myself. One I recently finished, but haven't had a chance to playtest much is something I did to phase shields. Basically, I just made their strength 315, 330, 345, 360 and 375 instead of the usual progression. I felt the old method was crippling to an AI player (or at least that's my story and I'm sticking to it)
when facing me since I don't tend to use PPB very much and if they reach lvl 6 in shields they suddenly get weaker ships.

Another thing I've done is make the fighter equipment require lvl 1 fighter tech and left the other tech requirements unchanged so the races I have that stay at fighter lvl 1 for awhile can build fighters with better engines, ECM and sensors to make life more painful.

I'm also working on some heavier missiles for missile lvl 6-8 since I've noticed the default AI research is showing the Norak and other missile-using races researching that far. Why not give them even more painful missiles that take multiple hits from a PDC V cannon to kill?

I'm thinking of modifying the massive planetary shield generator so that it gains strength with higher levels of shield tech (including phase shields at lvl 6) but don't know how far to go and if you can make a facility that requires two tech levels to build.

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"What do -you- want?" "I'd like to live -just- long enough to be there when they cut off your head and stick it on a pike as a warning to the next ten generations that some favors come with too high a price. I would look up into your lifeless eyes and wave like this..." *waggle* "...can you and your associates arrange that for me, Mr. Morden?"

[This message has been edited by Sinapus (edited 07 June 2001).]

[Suicide Junkie]

quote:

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Basically, I just made their strength 315, 330, 345, 360 and 375 instead of the usual progression. I felt the old method was crippling to an AI player (or at least that's my story and I'm sticking to it)

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Same reason I had
The only difference between our two methods is that my shield improvements happen linearly with tech level, while yours rise faster at first, then suddenly slow down as the technology matures.
Also, I have phased available earlier (lev2 vs lev6)

[Sinapus]

quote:

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Originally posted by suicide_junkie:
Same reason I had
The only difference between our two methods is that my shield improvements happen linearly with tech level, while yours rise faster at first, then suddenly slow down as the technology matures.
Also, I have phased available earlier (lev2 vs lev6)[/b]

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My technobabble excuse is that phasing the energy matrix in the shields, while protecting against phased energy fire, doesn't provide much benefit otherwise.

[Suicide Junkie]

quote:

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My technobabble excuse is that phasing the energy matrix in the shields, while protecting against phased energy fire, doesn't provide much benefit otherwise.

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And I considered that extending the shield to cover phased weapons spreads it thinner, so the phased levels have only a minor improvement in strength over the previous, normal level. "Normal shield" improvements cause the big jumps in strength.

[Wolverine]

How about expanding the colonisation procedure through research?

Personally, I think it's far too easy to build colony ships and colonise planets. Colony ships should be far more expensive.

However, how about having to research Domes to allow colonising different atmospheric planets. Or limit colony modules to a specific distance or timescale unless Cryogenics is researched.

[dogscoff]

Wolvrine: I just salvaged this from an arlir topic...

<COPY PASTE>
Space is big,
Space is dark,
It's hard to find,
A place to park.

While the above statement is undeniably true,
The universe currently simulated by Space Empires is very small and crowded. Within a few dozen turns, most systems have been colonised and explored, and all the empires are sitting in each others' laps.

How about a mod which creates a more "empty" universe? A universe where meeting another empire does not mean you will be squabbling over one another's home systems within a year. I'm thinking more Alien than Star Wars, more Red Dwarf than Trek, more Dark Star than Bab5.

Here's an idea of how to go about it:

First, the map generator files would have to be modded to make colonisable planets/ systems rarer and farther apart. This would increase their value and force players to look beyond their home systems.
Huge maps with fewer empires would also help.

Now, make colony ships and components far bigger and more expensive. I'm thinking maybe 800-1000 kt, with a 700-900 kt colony component and harsh combat modifiers.

Cargo components for smaller ships should be of limited use, forcing players to use large ships for any serious cargo movment. Adjust supply usage/ storage so that long range travel is really expensive for large ships. Different engines for different ship sizes maybe.

Setting up a new colony would now be a *major* investment (and hence a *major* risk)- especially in another system.

New colonies would also be much more vulnerable. This is good, after all it's a long way home. Facilities should take longer to build, so that a new colony does not establish itself and become independent of external defence/ support too quickly.
Each player might only have a few dozen colonies throughout the entire game.

The supply restrictions on bigger ships and cargo restrictions on smaller ones would limit the expansion of infrastructure, so
military domination would then revolve around the strategic placement of fleets, mines, sats, space stations and colonies rather than simply racing to develop the bigger production base and throw ships at the enemy.

Fleets of small ships would be able to roam from system to system and rule over frontier space. However they would be more or less powerless against the defences of established systems. Attacking an enemy system would be an enormous projct.

Remote mining would play a greater role, as would moons, storms and nebulae. Physical warfare would become the Last resort when diplomacy and intel fail, although having good defences around your home systems would be more important than ever.

Some of S_J's mods (ie hardened bulkheads, cheap/ quality mounts) would make good additions since they make ships more individual. Phoenix-D's primitives (still in development, I believe) would also be good here, since their isolation would give them more bargaining power and more effective defences.

It would make for a much slower and more deliberate game, since ships and planets would no longer be "throwaway" items. Combat would be rarer but when it happened it would be truly epic, with loads of allied empires in gigantic battles.

I don't know how the AI would cope with all this but it would be cool for human players - a whole new game with a whole new feel.

Thoughts?
</COPY PASTE>


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"Pinky, are you pondering what I'm pondering?"
"Uh, I think so, Brain, but balancing a family and a career ... oooh, it's all too much for me. "

[Wolverine]

That sounds excellent Dogscoff, but how big a project would it be to do all that? Would it require hard code changes or could it be done with the text files? I only bought the game a few months back so I'm still in playing mode. Looking forward to getting my hands dirty with some modding shortly.

I'm currently playing a Large Universe game with all Rock/Oxygen breathing races, restricting colonisation to Home Planet Type and Breathable Atmosphere. Plus I have removed Gas Giant and Ice Planet Colonisers from the Research Tree. With Finite Resources it makes an interesting game. Very few planets are available and each one is vitally important.

Unfortunately, the AI doesn't seem to be handling the restrictions too well Love to play a PBEM game like this though.