[0.75][Beta Feedback] Various items that should be fixed before launch

from Elemental Forums

The game is very enjoyable but there are a number of annoyances and items that really should be fixed before the game is launched:

STRATEGIC MAP:

  • Need an intuitive way to stop city-spam. I'd be happy with a city limit you build (not conquer) based on research.
  • There needs to be a way to alert the player better when a city stops building. Forcing the player to keep pushing tab every turn to check what needs attention is what you'd expect from a 1990's game.
  • If wandering monsters destroy a city you really need to be able to rebuild back on the tile again instead of the beasts salting the earth.
  • If a hero is 'killed' while his army is successfully attacking a city you get two of the hero - one in the city you attacked and the other (along with the remains of the attacking army) in the closest other city.
  • Armour upgrades for units are way too expensive for what you get. Suggest nerfing the gildar costs of armour upgrades or allow the player to choose the items that need replacing. Problem is that a weapon is just a single item that needs replacing so doesn't cost a lot but armour is spread over about 6 items that all get replaced at the same time.
  • I had a situation where I'd stopped researching and the game let me play new turns.
  • Attacking caravans should just autoresolve (perhaps also vs Pioneers).
  • Would be good to have the map zoom to where caravans were destroyed (even though you most likely can't see through the fog of war).
  • Some caravans remain after destroying factions.
  • I chose the +25% XP option for my sovereign at an upgrade and afterwards it received less than half the XP of the other units in the stack. Not sure if this is a bug or some sort of game limit for units over level 10?
  • When you enter a Warg location you have the choice to raze it - even if there is nothing built on it. I didn't test what would happen if you tried razing it.
  • Need an 'Are you sure?' pop-up when declaring war.
  • I had a situation where ogres would keep building after the max had been reached - it may be a 'working as designed' feature based on getting new maximums after researching logistics, company etc.
  • The AI doesn't surrender.

TACTICAL BATTLES:

  • Berserk ability should not let troops have a second movement when selected (this is a game-breaker if you are Yithril)
  • Units should start tactical battles in defence mode.
  • Many of the maps have tiles that units can't move onto.
  • Melee units that move first in large armies start in the second rank or behind obstacles. Really annoying!
  • Need to be able to see units and terrain under trees and buildings in the tactical maps.

 

98,383 views 20 replies
Reply #1 from Elemental Forums Top

I think stardock has done a good job with limiting city spam. I don't build a city everywhere and maintain a competitive streak. I currently don't understand what the city spam is at the moment.

I recently discovered that the game doesn't update the terrain tile from city to plains after a city is destroyed. This is why one ends up with salted earth. If you can rejuvinate the land to convert the city tiles to plains tiles it would allow one to rebuild a city (with different stats of course)

Attacking caravans should just autoresolve (perhaps also vs Pioneers).

That would be a nice convience, but I do not really think that it's worth the programming effort to accomplish.

Reply #2 from Elemental Forums Top


The game is very enjoyable but there are a number of annoyances and items that really should be fixed before the game is launched:

STRATEGIC MAP:


Need an intuitive way to stop city-spam. I'd be happy with a city limit you build (not conquer) based on research.
There needs to be a way to alert the player better when a city stops building. Forcing the player to keep pushing tab every turn to check what needs attention is what you'd expect from a 1990's game.
If wandering monsters destroy a city you really need to be able to rebuild back on the tile again instead of the beasts salting the earth.
If a hero is 'killed' while his army is successfully attacking a city you get two of the hero - one in the city you attacked and the other (along with the remains of the attacking army) in the closest other city.
Armour upgrades for units are way too expensive for what you get. Suggest nerfing the gildar costs of armour upgrades or allow the player to choose the items that need replacing. Problem is that a weapon is just a single item that needs replacing so doesn't cost a lot but armour is spread over about 6 items that all get replaced at the same time.
I had a situation where I'd stopped researching and the game let me play new turns.
Attacking caravans should just autoresolve (perhaps also vs Pioneers).
Would be good to have the map zoom to where caravans were destroyed (even though you most likely can't see through the fog of war).
Some caravans remain after destroying factions.
I chose the +25% XP option for my sovereign at an upgrade and afterwards it received less than half the XP of the other units in the stack. Not sure if this is a bug or some sort of game limit for units over level 10?
When you enter a Warg location you have the choice to raze it - even if there is nothing built on it. I didn't test what would happen if you tried razing it.
Need an 'Are you sure?' pop-up when declaring war.
I had a situation where ogres would keep building after the max had been reached - it may be a 'working as designed' feature based on getting new maximums after researching logistics, company etc.
The AI doesn't surrender.

TACTICAL BATTLES:


Berserk ability should not let troops have a second movement when selected (this is a game-breaker if you are Yithril)
Units should start tactical battles in defence mode.
Many of the maps have tiles that units can't move onto.
Melee units that move first in large armies start in the second rank or behind obstacles. Really annoying!
Need to be able to see units and terrain under trees and buildings in the tactical maps.

 

Das, I usually agree with you, but you got a lot of bologna here.  First the bologna.

There needs to be a way to alert the player better when a city stops building. Forcing the player to keep pushing tab every turn to check what needs attention is what you'd expect from a 1990's game. [They already have this.  The TURN button turns yellow].

If wandering monsters destroy a city you really need to be able to rebuild back on the tile again instead of the beasts salting the earth. [Nope... not going to happen].

Armour upgrades for units are way too expensive for what you get. Suggest nerfing the gildar costs of armour upgrades or allow the player to choose the items that need replacing. Problem is that a weapon is just a single item that needs replacing so doesn't cost a lot but armour is spread over about 6 items that all get replaced at the same time. [Nope... nothing to fix here]

The AI doesn't surrender.  [Yes it does.]

Berserk ability should not let troops have a second movement when selected (this is a game-breaker if you are Yithril) [Nope, part of the Berserk ability should be an extra move.]

Now the non-bologna stuff.

Need an intuitive way to stop city-spam. I'd be happy with a city limit you build (not conquer) based on research. [They keep tinkering with how close a city can be built to another city.  It's too close again.  I've gone to setting my maps with sparse resources to try and curb some of this.  I love the settler costs population mechanic ... that really helps.  Now they just need to increase the tiles between cities limit again.]

Attacking caravans should just autoresolve (perhaps also vs Pioneers). [I don't really care about this, but caravans do need to stay out of my way.  We need to be able to interact with a tile that a caravan is on without it launching the diplomacy window for example.]

Need an 'Are you sure?' pop-up when declaring war. [Totally agree with this one!]

 

 

 

 

 

Galactic Civilizations IV
Reply #3 from Elemental Forums Top

Quoting Trojasmic, reply 2
There needs to be a way to alert the player better when a city stops building. Forcing the player to keep pushing tab every turn to check what needs attention is what you'd expect from a 1990's game. [They already have this. The TURN button turns yellow].

Don't forget the little "Zzzzz" in the city list as well.

Reply #4 from Elemental Forums Top

Need an intuitive way to stop city-spam. I'd be happy with a city limit you build (not conquer) based on research.

I initially felt this way to then I realized once you reach a certain point, building more cities is counter productive. Secure land gains if necessary with outposts instead of more cities.

 

Armour upgrades for units are way too expensive for what you get. Suggest nerfing the gildar costs of armour upgrades or allow the player to choose the items that need replacing. Problem is that a weapon is just a single item that needs replacing so doesn't cost a lot but armour is spread over about 6 items that all get replaced at the same time.

I suggested throwing out the entire manual upgrade system and just using the shop window for trained units. Certain things could be prohibited or require higher gildar costs to reflect training (going from spear to sword for example), but every unit could sell what it has, add new equipment and upgrade from the shop. I'm split on the armor upgrade costs. It should naturally be expensive. I don't want it to be easy to upgrade every unit to full plate. It's a brand new technology and should take time to fully integrate your armies. I think with this system, selling the old gear could help offset the expense.

 

Units should start tactical battles in defence mode. Melee units that move first in large armies start in the second rank or behind obstacles. Really annoying!

A setup phase is what is really needed. Especially with such small maps and armies starting on top of one another sometimes. Who was the Stardock guy that decided to make armies start closer for TEH ACTHUN! What is this? Legendary Heroescraft? :)

 

 

Reply #5 from Elemental Forums Top

There needs to be a way to alert the player better when a city stops building. Forcing the player to keep pushing tab every turn to check what needs attention is what you'd expect from a 1990's game.

imho ciV and cIV did it best, you always got a notification when a city is idle. the empire tree at the left side of the screen is a far worse implementation because you are forced to scroll through it quite often later in the game when you have more cities and it clutters the screen as well. since the game has no reward for idle cities (producing gildar, growth etc. is not being idle) i would love to see an implementation they way ciV did it.

 

 

Reply #6 from Elemental Forums Top

Yes, Civ4 always prompted you to choose something for the city to do immediately the last production finished.  All it would need is a loop that goes through immediately after any city completes something to check if the city is idle, and then give the option to choose something to produce, one of the special Produce functions, or specifically choose Idle (if you don't have any thing to produce, although that early in the game you are always building structures or units).

Reply #7 from Elemental Forums Top

Quoting StevenAus, reply 6
Yes, Civ4 always prompted you to choose something for the city to do immediately the last production finished. All it would need is a loop that goes through immediately after any city completes something to check if the city is idle, and then give the option to choose something to produce, one of the special Produce functions, or specifically choose Idle (if you don't have any thing to produce, although that early in the game you are always building structures or units).

The idea of the game not letting me end the turn unless I'm doing something annoys me to no end. It always did in civ. If I want a city to idle that is my choice, also in this game, if you don't do appropriate research you can end in an infinite loop of I can't end my turn because I didn't research anything that says produce wealth, produce research, produce growth. But I built all available buidings and I don't have the money to train any more troops... just let me finish my turn.

The game shouldn't tell me how to play. Let me play the game the way I want to play the game... It telling me that I have some idle buildings, I'm fine with that feature. It telling me that I can't end my turn until things are not idle or guarding is just plain annoying. If one goes any further with this the game will be a series of props of choices... would you prefer options a,b,c,d or e. Then the game will do 4-5 turns before asking you a new set of options you would like it to do for you again. At what point does the player stop playing the game (with his/her own errors), and the computer plays the whole thing for you. I might be in the minority of people who get annoyed when the computer plays the game for you...

Reply #8 from Elemental Forums Top

Quoting Leo, reply 3
Don't forget the little "Zzzzz" in the city list as well.

That's how I keep track.  They could make that icon a bit bigger, though.

Reply #9 from Elemental Forums Top
Agree with much said above about placement of units on the tac map. May I suggest: (1) The charge bonus that comes with units built in an upgraded fort (forget name of building) use the +3 moves and +3 attack the first time they move in combat, not the first turn of combat. (2) placement of units depends upon posture of army before combat begins. If the unit was stationary on strategic map (or, say had movement left and was ordered to 'dig in,') the units would begin in a defensive formation, and dug in on the tac map. (3) If the army used full movement on strategic map just before the encounter, and are 'defending, ' then they get set up strung along a 'path' in marching order. The attacker set up more concentrated, ready for battle. If the stack initiates the attack, they get set up in a reasonable formation, ready to attack. Also, perhaps the attacker, attacking a moving column (unprepared stack) get a temporary increase in initiative, or a first turn bonus of some sort on the tac map.
Reply #10 from Elemental Forums Top

Quoting parrottmath, reply 7


Quoting StevenAus, reply 6Yes, Civ4 always prompted you to choose something for the city to do immediately the last production finished. All it would need is a loop that goes through immediately after any city completes something to check if the city is idle, and then give the option to choose something to produce, one of the special Produce functions, or specifically choose Idle (if you don't have any thing to produce, although that early in the game you are always building structures or units).

The idea of the game not letting me end the turn unless I'm doing something annoys me to no end. It always did in civ. If I want a city to idle that is my choice, also in this game, if you don't do appropriate research you can end in an infinite loop of I can't end my turn because I didn't research anything that says produce wealth, produce research, produce growth. But I built all available buidings and I don't have the money to train any more troops... just let me finish my turn.

The game shouldn't tell me how to play. Let me play the game the way I want to play the game... It telling me that I have some idle buildings, I'm fine with that feature. It telling me that I can't end my turn until things are not idle or guarding is just plain annoying. If one goes any further with this the game will be a series of props of choices... would you prefer options a,b,c,d or e. Then the game will do 4-5 turns before asking you a new set of options you would like it to do for you again. At what point does the player stop playing the game (with his/her own errors), and the computer plays the whole thing for you. I might be in the minority of people who get annoyed when the computer plays the game for you...

I for one am tired of having to manually go through my city list with the crappy scroll function when I have a city that isn't producing. All I want is an option that does a prompt to stop me from being an idiot and ending the turn with cities doing nothing, or at the very least a "Select next idle city" hotkey.

Reply #11 from Elemental Forums Top

Quoting AlienFromBeyond, reply 10
All I want is an option that does a prompt to stop me from being an idiot and ending the turn with cities doing nothing, or at the very least a "Select next idle city" hotkey.

that I can agree with... I gives me the option when I want the option to look at all my idle cities.

Reply #12 from Elemental Forums Top

Would be nice to have an "are you sure" pop-up. "I declare war" is so close to "Propose trades" it is dangerous. (never misclicked it but I can see it happenning some time).

 

On the subject of items that should be fixed before launch, literally:

 

 

Would be nice to have it updated with the new berserker ability, +2 attack +2 initiative, losing control to AI.

Reply #13 from Elemental Forums Top

If a hero is 'killed' while his army is successfully attacking a city you get two of the hero - one in the city you attacked and the other (along with the remains of the attacking army) in the closest other city.

hmmm, has anyone else had this happen? I just tried to reproduce it and was not successful... more information would be appreciated.

Reply #14 from Elemental Forums Top

Quoting Kestral2040, reply 13

If a hero is 'killed' while his army is successfully attacking a city you get two of the hero - one in the city you attacked and the other (along with the remains of the attacking army) in the closest other city.

hmmm, has anyone else had this happen? I just tried to reproduce it and was not successful... more information would be appreciated.

I saw this a lot in FE, but haven't seen it in LH yet... probably cuz I've been kicking some major AI booty and haven't died yet!

Reply #15 from Elemental Forums Top

Quoting Kestral2040, reply 13

If a hero is 'killed' while his army is successfully attacking a city you get two of the hero - one in the city you attacked and the other (along with the remains of the attacking army) in the closest other city.

hmmm, has anyone else had this happen? I just tried to reproduce it and was not successful... more information would be appreciated.

 

I can verify - happened to me last game. the second iteration of the hero (without the army) I can't move or interact with, but he shows up in the city menu as there.

 

edit to add: sorry, I don't remember any details of hero type/army composition, or anything else that would be beneficial to trying to recreate - I just remember the occurrence. So I can confirm it does happen, but can't help with trying to reproduce! :p

Reply #16 from Elemental Forums Top

bummer... well if anyone has a save or any clues on how to replicate I would appreciate it greatly

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Reply #17 from Elemental Forums Top

Quoting Kestral2040, reply 13


If a hero is 'killed' while his army is successfully attacking a city you get two of the hero - one in the city you attacked and the other (along with the remains of the attacking army) in the closest other city.

hmmm, has anyone else had this happen? I just tried to reproduce it and was not successful... more information would be appreciated.

This has happened to me a number of times now playing both as Resoln and Yithril. In each instance the army is being led by a single hero with a powerful stack. They attack the city and the hero is killed during the battle. The rest of the army wins the battle for the dead hero. After winning the battle the hero is wounded inside the target city with no other troops. If you then look at the closest other city the hero is inside that one again, wounded, with the troops that had successfully attacked the city.

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Reply #18 from Elemental Forums Top

It has happened to me too, and I may even have a save (will check) but I think it's one of those things that disappears when you reload. However it can be reliably reproduced as Das describes: every time my leading hero has died assaulting a city it has happened.

Similar to another easily replicated bug in which the leading hero of an army dies but the rest of the army goes on to win, and then the whole stack gets sent home with the dead hero. If this one could be solved I guess the other would vanish too, since the victorious army wouldn't be being ported home so the hero couldn't be duplicated?

Both bugs can happen when there's more than one hero in the stack, but it has to be the leading hero who dies - the one who the army is named after. At least that's my experience of it.

About razing resources - this applies to a few others (Ogre lairs definitely). Might it be because some resources are (or in the case of wargs, were at one point) faction-specific and the option to remove is there for the benefit of the opposing side? If that is the idea, then it's definitely a bug for it to be on wargs/horses!

Reply #19 from Stardock Forums Top

Quoting parrottmath, reply 7



Quoting StevenAus,
reply 6
Yes, Civ4 always prompted you to choose something for the city to do immediately the last production finished. All it would need is a loop that goes through immediately after any city completes something to check if the city is idle, and then give the option to choose something to produce, one of the special Produce functions, or specifically choose Idle (if you don't have any thing to produce, although that early in the game you are always building structures or units).


The idea of the game not letting me end the turn unless I'm doing something annoys me to no end. It always did in civ. If I want a city to idle that is my choice, also in this game, if you don't do appropriate research you can end in an infinite loop of I can't end my turn because I didn't research anything that says produce wealth, produce research, produce growth. But I built all available buidings and I don't have the money to train any more troops... just let me finish my turn.

The game shouldn't tell me how to play. Let me play the game the way I want to play the game... It telling me that I have some idle buildings, I'm fine with that feature. It telling me that I can't end my turn until things are not idle or guarding is just plain annoying. If one goes any further with this the game will be a series of props of choices... would you prefer options a,b,c,d or e. Then the game will do 4-5 turns before asking you a new set of options you would like it to do for you again. At what point does the player stop playing the game (with his/her own errors), and the computer plays the whole thing for you. I might be in the minority of people who get annoyed when the computer plays the game for you...

This is not the computer playing the game for the player it is a reminder. I to like how CIV 4 and V and well as Warlock does this. Also it is very nice to have if you have a large Empire with many cities. Now this should also be an option so that if you don't want this you can simply turn it off. That way both camps are satisfied.