Sakhari

[quote]I am given to understand that the original intent behind shield mitigation was to reduce the tendency towards focus firing in real time genre games.[/quote] I'm sure this debate is old news but since I missed the early days... why exactly do we 'want' to do this? Why was this mechanic included in the first place? What's wrong with focus-firing? Either way, the player who micromanages a fight is going to be better off than a player who doesn't so I'm not really sure w

[quote]Philosophically, it's a GAME that people play for FUN.[/quote] One of the things that I find 'fun' about ladder play is playing on a level field and I know I'm not alone on this one. I'm interested in playing against other people. Not overcoming their handicaps. [quote]A) Don't use it.[/quote] So are you suggesting an alternate competitive ladder just for people who want to waste time fighting uphill battles using a system that, in your mind, won't change the

[quote]Please show me what I'm missing.[/quote] Seriously, that's just how life is for the time being. They're a hassle for new players who don't know that they're coming and a minor nuisance for just about everyone else. I won't pretend that I know everything about how their AI or strength works but I do know that trying to exploit them offensively against a competent player (as they are now) is an exercise in futility and most likely to be a waste of resources.

Just to echo the above, they can be useful against the AI simply because the AI has no concept of proper defense. Against other players (the sort that actually know how to play), they're nothing more than a minor nuisance that's easily ignored once a few turrets are up on explosed planets.

[quote]You're STILL GOING TO WIN against a weaker player with a handicap, simply because you are better than them.[/quote] If that's the case, then what is this suggestion meant to accomplish? Then all this does is ensure that the higher-tier player has to waste more time trouncing the inexperienced player. Maybe you're making it more interesting for the newbie (though, having to spend more time waiting for inevitable grinding into the dirt isn't much of a boost to enjoyment) but you'

[quote]I read a post a little while ago, I can't remember where, where Frogboy mentioned that he has just won a game throughe extensive use of culture.[/quote] I remember this post. He didn't elaborate on it much but basically culture can buff your fleets, reduce allegiance of opposing planets (which, by extension, reduces the income of those planets and eventually 'destroys' them), prevent the enemy from taking over influenced planets that you don't control, and, if you're the advent,

[quote]...but doesn't work in a ladder situation where selfish better players won't use it so they can keep their ladder ranking.[/quote] It's not really a matter of being selfish. The point of a ladder is to test your skill and knowledge of the game in a competitive setting. If someone's getting an advantage in that arena simply because of their unfortunate history with that screen name, then the concept of testing skill alone goes out the window. Again, if this is a suggest

[quote]...and B would require 200% of the income that A does in order to have an even chance of winning, only give him 180% economy bonus, not the full 200%.[/quote] How do you quantify, in resource percentages, the amount that player B would need to beat player A? Why has player B been losing all of his/her games? And more importantly, does arbitrarily bumping up their resources teach them how to get better at the game? If they end up winning because the deck was stacked 2

[quote]What if you have a vulkoras desolator, and you are using it by itself at some point early in the game?[/quote] In my experience, cap ships 'quickly' build up enemy mitigation, maxing it in 1 or 2 volleys. Plus, unless you're just screwing around, it's probably going to be rare that a Desolator would be going solo at a point in the game where you have a respectable degree of Phase Missile research completed. Even with the other races, it's not going to be worthwhile to blow the

Is this a suggestion for friendly games between random players or are you thinking that this would be applied to a competitive ladder? If it's the former and it's totally optional, sure. Why not. If it's the latter... well, I hate to go comparing and contrasting the whole competitive vs. casual thing again but I can't imagine a competitive player who would be ok with this. I realize that you're trying to address the issue of disconnects which occur for the sake of preserving record

[quote]However, it only benefits during focus fire, so attacking a single target would have almost no benefit.[/quote] More often than not, focusing fire is going to be better for your health than spraying single targets anyway (especially when you're using phase missiles), even 'with' the current mitigation system so that really isn't much of an issue. The Vasari also have more ships (and turrets) that take advantage of the missile upgrade than the other races so that's anothe

As I understand it, the chance% is a chance to bypass shields 'and' mitigation so whether or not there are any shield points left, you're still getting a chance to ignore the potentially huge mitigation rating. I'm not completely sure that's how it works but whatever the case, you 'will' notice a difference in how quickly your opponent drops with phase missiles researched.

So basically, Warcraft III's style of upkeep. Personally, while I do think that upkeep costs should be dynamic in some fashion (not permanent once researched like they are now), I also think there needs to be a penalty for reversing upkeep costs. Otherwise, there's really no compelling reason 'not' to simply max your logistics as fast as possible.

[quote]Do you guys think it would be good if you could "un-research" the supply techs maybe? How much should it cost, and what other penalties, if any, would be needed to make it fair?[/quote] That's exactly what I was suggesting and where 'realism' is concerned, I think it would be far more realistic that way. If an empire isn't using facilities related to maintaining X number of ships, why on earth would it continue to allocate the resources to support them? There's nothing stopping

Well, what are you up against? Someone here could easily tell you, I'm sure. And there is a list of armor, weapon types, and such floating around but I'm not sure where to find it.

Unless I'm just screwing around, I very rarely hit the limit of Cap ships as it is. If they want to increase that limit at some point, I'd have no gripes but odds are, it wouldn't change a thing in my games. I also think the upkeep rates are fine though, personally, I think there should be a way to scale back with some penalty. While it's generally argued that 'realistically', the upkeep is for infrastructure and necessary staff to handle the amount of ships offered by the upgrade, I

If they're holed on one remaining planet and you control everything else, then yeah. Two Novalith cannon shots will win you the game. Otherwise, what's 'in' their huge fleet? Just make a pile of the appropriate counter, go in, and mop up. Or, failing that, a pile of Kodiaks will most likely do the trick.

This game screams for some degree of espionage. There's so much mischief that cloaked agents would be capable of in this game.

When a planet's allegiance hits 0% (which, for a 100% allegiance planet, would take ~28 minutes of heavy culture-barraging), the opponent loses that planet. Allegiance loss per-second is capped at .07 right now so hammering a planet with more than one DE shot isn't likely to make things go any faster.

1) Research and create a Broadcast Center/Media Hub/Temple of Communion (depending on race) to spread your culture to nearby planets. This will increase your allegiance cap by 10% and increase the rate at which your allegiance rises to that cap. 2) Set your homeworld to a more central location in your empire. Allegiance is measured by distance (in phase jumps) from your homeworld. 3) Research the tier 8 civilian upgrade for the Advent which directly raises your allegiance cap

[quote]BTW, what is the "artifact research done" in the end game statistics? It's always been 0 on my games.[/quote] It's just a leftover statistic from back in the betas when artifacts worked a little differently. So I've heard, anyway. It doesn't do anything, now.

The Advent also have a research option that gives you an up-to-date view of sectors under the influence of your culture so on top of the other bonuses, the Deliverance Engine can give you a good look at the opponent's empire. Plus, even if you don't completely knock out planets with it, reducing allegiance across your opponent's empire with culture will still cut into their income pretty badly.

To further elaborate, artifacts (the ones that actually show up on the research tree once found) grant you empire-wide passive bonuses. Planetary bonuses (which will show up on the planet's infocard) only affect that planet and anything applicable in that planet's gravity well.

This is something I'd like to see, too. We're not just talking about the difference between scuttling one ship and a huge fleet. Even if there are only, say, 5 targets, it'd be nice if you could simply click once rather than having to cycle through the whole lot. This is one of those options that I can't think of one compelling reason 'not' to have (unless it's much harder to include code-wise than it looks, I suppose).

I guess I still don't see why this sort of thing has to happen in the form of an orbiting 'moon'. Wouldn't it be easier to simply make a planet type that has more than the usual amount of tactical slots and make this sort of firebase require that many slots? Didn't I hear somewhere that some kind of defensive battle-station is already planned for a future patch/expansion? I'll have to look that up.