two questions: one on AIC and the other on scanner-blocking nebulas

[Yimboli]

Hello!

AIC Question - my starliners, colonizers, and transports get a max of about 2-4 movement. What is to stop me from just using destroyers with full movement? If nothing, then what is the point of giving the transports and colonizers just a QN handicap?

Nebulas/Storms that block scanners - what level of scanner do you need to see in nebulas and storms that say "This storm is opaque to most scanners"? Is it feasible to put a single satellite somewhere in the system with a X level scanner to see inside it? Also, if my ship enters a sector that also has an enemy ship, will my ships see it and engage?

These should be easy questions

Thanks
-Tim

[ April 22, 2004, 20:45: Message edited by: Yimboli ]

[Fyron]

Nebulas/Storms that block scanners - what level of scanner do you need to see in nebulas and storms that say "This storm is opaque to most scanners"? Is it feasible to put a single satellite somewhere in the system with a X level scanner to see inside it? Also, if my ship enters a sector that also has an enemy ship, will my ships see it and engage?

That depends on the storm or nebula. Some have the equivalent of level 2 cloaking device, so can be scanned by hyper optics II. Others have the equivalent of level 4 cloaking, so can never be scanned in. This is assuming the stock game, of course. Mods might have different levels of cloaking on storms/nebulae.

[Yimboli]

thanks fyron. thats what i thought. i'll hafta check the data files to know how high the scanning level can go then, right? now to find which one...


any takers on the AIC question?

[Fyron]

SystemTypes.txt for nebulae, StellarAbilityTypes.txt for storms. Nebulae are coded to specific images, so the same color nebulae always has the same abilities (in stock SE4). But, storms are randomly assigned abilities.

[Wardad]

[ April 26, 2004, 04:56: Message edited by: Wardad ]

[Alneyan]

AIC Question - my starliners, colonizers, and transports get a max of about 2-4 movement. What is to stop me from just using destroyers with full movement? If nothing, then what is the point of giving the transports and colonizers just a QN handicap?

Colony Ships come with an in-built Colony module, unlike all other hulls. As the colony module requires more than 700kt, you would need at least a Battleship to carry such a module, which would be more expensive and maybe slower.

Starliners are used to carry population, since you would otherwise need a *lot* of cargo bays to get the 1,000 cargo space needed to carry one million settlers. I do not recall the purpose of the transports however, as it has been a while since my Last AIC game.

[Yimboli]

Yes, I noticed the colony module is very large. i thought about editing the post, i guess i shoulda

about the population transporting: I can just as easily put a population transport component on a frigate, and have it go much faster. so why have a starliner??

To top it off, the "large" starliner is a wopping 20 kT bigger - and just as slow. Why?

Thanks!
-Timbo

[Alneyan]

The Starliner module does *not* give you the 1,000 cargo needed to transport one million settlers, and is merely needed to give you life support. (You could also put the regular life support on them) The Starliner hull gives you almost all the cargo you need to carry these civilians, but you may need to add more to reach the 1,000 mark. (My memory is faulty on this one)

[Fyron]

Do not starliners have maintenance bonuses?

[oleg]

Originally posted by Yimboli:
about the population transporting: I can just as easily put a population transport component on a frigate, and have it go much faster. so why have a starliner??

To top it off, the "large" starliner is a wopping 20 kT bigger - and just as slow. Why?

Thanks!
-Timbo

AIC is based on Proportions mod. Now, the main idea of Proportions is "realistic" treat of the population in SEIV. Shipping 1M people (and their books, clothes, furniture, cars...)to other world should certainly require enormous ships, not puny military frigates. Just think of Titanic
Unfortunately, when calculating player strength, SEIV takes no account to the true military power but the total tonnage of ships. It upsets AI relations . Because of this, JLS moded small populations transports that can held a lot of cargo and very slow but still relatively small. Just use your imagination and think of them as huge lumbering space starliners !

[ April 24, 2004, 08:33: Message edited by: oleg ]