Reflections on 1.2 Beta 1

After running wtih 1.2b1 for three games now, I am finally able to post on it. First, let me say that 1.2 is a HUGE improvement over 1.1. Phat kudos to the dev team.

I have put a few posts out criticizing the AI, and many of my previous beefs have been cured.

This includes major improvements to:

1. AI ship/fleet building ability. They now field fleets in the end game that are a challenge to a fully developed human empire (tech wise, and military wise).
2. The AI will go after my starbases now, putting the hurt on.
3. They do a better job of defending their planets.
4. Planetary building is vastly improved, and quite effective IMO. This went from a 2/10 to a 8/10.

Some things that still need work include:

Definition: "Killer Fleet" - A fleet consisting of the strongest possible ships, and the largest possible based on MAX logistics.

1. The AI still fields a gazillion unprotected, or lightly protected transports. I believe this is the last major issue that is killing the AI. Transports should be guarded
by "killer fleets" only. I have said it before, and I feel strongly that this notion of escorts should be left to the hoes. As long as I have "eyes of the universe" which
I nearly always do, I am able to see and pick off nearly all transports before they reach their destination.
2. The AI is now "over-building" defense on ships. Defense is clearly a good thing, as long as your enemy has that particular weapon type. Unfortunately for the AI, a good
player will wait to see what the most worthy opponents are developing weapon-wise, and defense-wise, then focus on maxing the unproteched tech branch, and developing defenses
to match. Granted, I have seem the AI, do "a little" adapting, but still they are not adapting fast or nearly enough.
3. The starbase issue: I get SOOOO tired of pooring a gazillion constructors into developing a starbase, only to have it easily picked off by a strong fleet. Now granted,
starbases need to be able to be destroyed, but the cost of destroying one MUST be higher. The enemy must have to sacrifice enough to make it worth my while, which I strongly feel
should be AT LEAST one "killer fleet", and better yet, about two. A HUGE feature would be to make it so that I can add a starbase to a fleet, thus allowing me to stack ships with
the starbase, adding to its defense. Make it so the entire fleet can't move of course, and maybe make the logistics of the starbase 12 or so. Bottom line is there MUST be a way to
protect a maxed out starbase that I have poored so much into. They should not be so easy a target. Either that or add another level of attack and defense, say 100 att and 50 defense.
4. It seems that the AI isn't focusing on wonders and trade goods as much as before. Maybe I have perfected my technique of getting to the key ones first, but it would make it more
of a challege if they focused more on them.
5. The AI still doesn't build up it's starbases. It seems to have many of them, but mostly they are weak, easy targets. Starbases are relatively pointless without at least several
modules, don't you think?
6. The AI still seems to keep old, and way outdated ships around still. They should either purge them as they become dated, or upgrade them where feasible to save on maintenace.
7. The AI still seems to keep movement down relatively low. I am seeing "killer fleets" with 14 movement, but I am gaining a huge advantage when I have transports and constructors
with 43 movement, and ships with 25+ movement. Of course that sacrifices weapons, but fast "killer fleets" can reek havoc behind the lines, leaving the slower more powerful ones
at home to guard planets and starbases. I would like to see the AI do this as well.

Bugs: these are probably already reported, but I will list them anyway.
1. When you combine two fleets, or add ships to a fleet, you loose the rest of your movement after one attack.

Other things I would like to see changed:
1. I would like the mini-display to update after a battle instead of having to click on a fleet again to update them.
2. I would like to see the ship display window update hitpoints after a battle without having to click on the fleet/ship to get them to update.
3. When fleets are stacked together, I can't easily remove ships from the fleet without either moving it, or opening the fleet manager. I would
like to see the single fleet display pop up first, then have to click on the stack to get to the current multiple fleet/ship type of display. Or, click once
to get the single view, and twice to get the double view.
4. I would like to see the completely evasive precursor library added to the game. It is easy to get a precursor mine, but I have been playing "lots" since the game came out
and I yet to see a library, even going through a gazillion ctrl-n restarts.
5. The game does run faster, and this is great for when I play on my laptop (Dell M60 which is no slouch). It still seems to bog more than desired when there are many fleets/ships
on the screen at once. Is there any way to turn off some additional graphics features?
6. I would like to see an option for "instant movement", where ships just arrive at their destinations (or reach max moves) instead graphically moving 1 square at a time. This would
be a huge help. Another maybe better option would be a key assigned to "complete move" so that I can set a ship going, then hit this key and it automatically arrives at its
destination. Another key for "move all instantly" would be nice. When I have 20 constructors in transit, it really drags the game to have to wait for them all to move, especially
when I have the screen centered around a heavily trafficked area (I usually move the screen via mini-map to an unpopulated area, thus speeding up movement, but I would rather not
have to do this to accerate things).


Thats all for now, thanks for reading.