Played some games, some thoughts
Posted: Mon Apr 08, 2019 2:36 pm
Having played some 0.4.5 and then upgraded to 0.4.8 and introduced some others to the game (helping out with their issues learning) I've got some thoughts. In no particular order:
- The quickplay guide is somewhat outdated but still linked ingame. That should probably be fixed
- The pedia description of the stockpile is a bit confusing because there isn't really a specific entry for the stockpile and instead the details are contained in the entry for the stockpile transfer production item so it has to explain multiple things at once. It would help to have a separate pedia item only for the stockpile, introducing it as a store for leftover production with an example and mentioning with a second example it can be used to move production without supply. Stockpile transfer should then be a second entry explaining that as a production item and how it can be used. I really didn't get what the entry meant until I played as the sly.
- There's no obvious indication you can put an outpost on a planet and then build colonies of specific races you're in supply with instead of micromanaging specific colony ships. I think it's mentioned somewhere but I discovered it first just by accident after evacuating a planet.
- Related to the above: when you have an outpost on a planet and can build a colony you get a list of all potential races as production items but to see which one is best for the planet you have to check planet suitability or similar. It'd be best to show their population score (same as you'd get when using a colony ship) on their entry in the production menu.
- As far as I can tell the pedia never actually explains how population interacts with things like production and research. In general it needs a basic guide section that runs through all gameplay elements in short form because right now information is very scattered with late game concerns next to things a first time player needs to know. I'd be willing to take a stab at this if it's really needed but it'd be better if someone with more experience with the game did it.
- Weirdly enabling the new turn sound seems to make turns take significantly longer/lag when changing
- The new change so that research points are never wasted is good. However often you will unlock new technologies you didn't select with points that roll over after something is finished even when the UI tells you no points will be wasted. This only happens if you haven't got a bunch queued but it's unexpected. I think what happens is when something is on it's last turn before being researched the game won't properly warn you that points will be wasted.
- I also don't think the ability to click on a planet and see it's suitability is listed anyhere.
- I love that 0.4.8 has the ability to tweak things like research rate. Can you please also add the ability to disable the Singularity of Transcendence victory type? While you're at it adding a toggle called 'super expensive singularity' which massively ups the cost of that specific technology would also be nice.
- Technology in general seems to advance a bit too quickly once you hit the mid and late game. A lot of the galaxy-changing techs like new planets and stargates all appear at once and you barely get a chance to use them before the game is won. If they were more of a thing you had to focus on and had more time to be useful that would be good.
- The tech tree is much more readable with an increased vertical distance between objects as you can set in the options. That should be default.
- Average structures going up would make fights last a bit longer. They're over very quickly in almost all cases usually no more than a turn and rarely going more than two. This means a loss is total and once the AI (or another player) has lost the entirety of a sizeable fleet there's no recovery.
- Exobots can be used to colonise planets as well as asteroids but they're better with inferno, radiated and barren planets. That makes sense from an in-universe perspective but it means that races which already like those planets get less benefit from using them early game or in games where other races are harder to come by.
- Scanning distance for planets ends up too far too soon removing a lot of the need to scout and guess at what's going on very early in the game if you spend even a bit of time researching scanning technology. Splitting detection strength and range up a bit more as technologies would help here.
- If you don't value speed or mobility there is only one core slot item worth using which is the spinal cannon. Alternatives like fleet support items would help.
- Similarly if you don't want speed/mobility, fighters or stealth/scanning there's not much to do with spare internal slots. For fleets wishing to focus on combat some variety here would be nice. Organic line ships have the solar concentrator which is a good example.
- The robotic hull line lacks spare internal slots outside of the super heavy ships which makes it significantly less useful now that carriers exist. You can of course mix in non-robotic hull types but then the robotic shield interface item (already weak) is made a lot less useful. Maybe a cheaper heavy robotic ship outfitted more towards being a carrier with some downsides would help.
- Repairing ships costs nothing but building ships does. This means tanky ships that can survive combat and repair are almost always a better investment than a swarm of small ships particularly now that we can use fighters as cannon fodder. If possible adding a production cost for repairs at a drydock (it can display when you mouse over production) would be good. This would also make auto-repair technologies or robotic hull line self-repair more beneficial as the free repairing could be subtracted from the cost of a full repair in addition to workout without a drydock. Fighters could also have a minor cost to replace though this should be very small as part of their attraction is being disposable (they could also just have no replacement cost).
- I read somewhere else about the idea that you can only resupply fighters if you're in supply with a system that has a special building. That's a good way to balance them.
- Supply seems very easy to handle for anyone who isn't playing too aggressively unless you're a race with bad supply though it does matter a lot more now that only one empire can ever have supply to a single system. This makes parts giving more/free fuel less useful a lot of the time. More empty space systems or systems that can't have colonies/outposts would help make it relevant.
- Non-colonisable systems having effects/objects in them would make them more memorable. It's strange than a system with a black hole in it doesn't matter outside of a specific mid-late game technology. Things like objects that can reduce supply effectiveness or that could delay fighters launching until the third round etc.
- In general fuel and speed is less useful for ships in most cases because as above supply isn't too hard to manage and turtling works just fine. In most cases you're better off taking systems nearby to you anyway.
- Flak guns could do with an upgrade tree. This shouldn't be too extreme since it would hurt fighters.
- The AI could do with being more aggressive when it outnumbers you. Even on the maximum aggression I found it to be a bit too passive. Also they'll never take the neutral-guarded worlds (ones with monster ships around them, dyson forests I think) even late game when they could easily crush them. They do invade neutral planets just fine though. The AI also does a good job of retreating and reinforcing where it needs to.
- Saved ship designs are great but it'd be nice to have a button on the main menu that let you edit saved ship designs without going into a game and with a better interface for doing a bulk load of them which are similar (e.g. I like to design a bunch of ships with gradually improving components and dragging them down from the top of the saved section down next to where the rest are each time I add a new saved design is a pain). Even just having newly added saved designs appear above the design they were modified from would help.
- The newer supply/blockade system is good but it'd be clearer if, when a fleet is blocking your exit out of certain starlanes, those exists were shown as blocked somehow (red or similar).
- As above I had no idea that saved ships, obsoleting ship designs etc actually existed until I got curious and started clicking on things at random.
- Detection range and Empire Detection Strength really need to have different icons.
- A more visible indication a system, planet or ship is under the effect of a molecular cloud etc is needed. They look like background effects on the map and it can be frustrating for new players to find out why they can't see a planet to invade it.
- The Abaddoni seem like they need a buff as far and away one of the worst starting races.