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Reply to Lame Game in Game Talk GalCiv2 Forums

May I rephrase the first post? "Many things in GalCiv2 don't make sense." Is that correct? It's the essense of most criticism around here. Things in GalCiv2 don't behave naturally. Actions don't have the effect you think they'd have, strategies that should work don't work, strategies that shouldn't work work, things behave unnaturally because the underlying gamerules don't reflect a sensable system, they're made up. That doesn't mean GalCiv2 is bad as a game, it just means i

Reply to Sins of a Solar Empire... in Games in Development GalCiv2 Forums

..and your UserID and PW from here will work there. Sorry for the necromancing, but it's just the perfect thread for this. The issue I'm having is that my UserID and PW from here don't work there. Over there it tells me my account isn't validated, which, as you can see, is not true. Yes, I'm using the identical login data directly from the eMail I was sent when I created the account I'm currently using. Is ther

Reply to The Good, the Ugly, the Bad of DA in Dark Avatar GalCiv2 Forums

Name that game that you play that has "lots more content," makes GCII/DA seem "unfinished," and that doesn't have any exploits. Sorry for disturbing your mud-throwing, but I'd like to pick that line up. There are many games that are far superior in creating a believable game-world. GalCiv2 fails to convince me that I'm looking at a galaxy with planets, empires and fleets. I'm looking at a PC-game, like a random flipper, Minesweeper or Super Mario Bros. <b

Reply to The Good, the Ugly, the Bad of DA in Dark Avatar GalCiv2 Forums

The object of a game is to be fun. Not hard. Not simple. Not complex. Fun. Features exist to make the game more fun. Thinking about it, I believe most criticism on GalCiv2 is caused by over-agressive application of that principle. You fudged with stuff to make it easy and fun and in the process made the game weird and illogical, destroying the whole athmosphere you tried to create. You fudged with the UP, espionage, combat system, movement system, economy (spe

Reply to A question about Spy's in Game Talk GalCiv2 Forums

and how do you detect that a spy is on one of your improvements ? Is it automatic ? Upon entering an enemy improvement the spy formally sends a request of sabotage to the enemy player, explicitly stating the type and position of the improvement he would like to sabotage, but not the agent's origin. Upon recieving acknowledgement of his planned actions he may then procede to shut down the improvement. The enemy may react by sending one of their own spies to the

Reply to Should Winning Always Be the Goal? in Off-Topic GalCiv2 Forums

There are a few things wrong with the game-system: The AI has some problems with it's concept. The AI should try to actively win or at least actively attempt to not lose. That means, if I gobble up half the galaxy the AIs should get the idea that I'm going to crush them and should better start a defensive alliance against me soon. Just read about history, that defensive-alliance thing happened quite a lot. Another concept completely lacking is demography. That's because to conquer a plan

Reply to I don't like using small ships at all in Game Talk GalCiv2 Forums

Up to now I found the combination of one or two big ships plus a few small ships to be rather effective. Usually the big ship takes the beating while the small ships deal the damage. My small ships thus have almost no defense in this configuration. This obviously only works as long as the big ship can take all damage the enemy can deal, otherwise the smalls go down like flies. Also the small ships need to be able to deal more damage than the enemy's defenses can absorb. Luck comes in handy here.

Reply to Restricting or removing features of Dark Avatar in Modding GalCiv2 Forums

Thanks for the answers. 1. If I made all buildings immune to espionage, would that mean I effectively disabled espionage completely? I'm talking about espionage-reports and stealing of techs. 2. It's sad that we have so few influence on the economy aspect of GalCiv. I'd like to reduce taxes and trade-revenue and remove the buy-now feature completely (because I don't agree with shelling out 3

Reply to The trade dillema in Game Talk GalCiv2 Forums

In my current game I earn 2500bc per turn in trade. And I'm not even maxing revenues out because I'm currently busy waging war. So about half my economy is trade. It is *very* important to me. The problem in GalCiv is that population doesn't influence trade revenues. I can set up 12 traderoutes from all over my empire to some class 3 rock and get a few thousand bc a turn from it. It's a nice strategy to take a smaller race, invade it's planet with mass drivers, immediately give the plan

Reply to Espionage in Dark Avatar in Game Talk GalCiv2 Forums

No, when you use a spy to counter another player's spy, it destroys both yours and his. As I understood it you train agents and keep them at stock until you use them. If I now take care to always have at least one agent at stock then I should be able to neutralize any enemy agent I get sent until someone sends two agents. That defensive agent is lost, but

Reply to Espionage in Dark Avatar in Game Talk GalCiv2 Forums

Just a few questions to see what I got wrong about the system: If I always keep one agent at hand and go through all my planets each turn I'm basically invinceable against espionage until someone sends two spies at once? Is it possible to recover from being struck by a few agents at your economic center? As far as I understand the victim gets fewer money, can effort less agents, gets more enemy agents, gets even less money, can effort even less agents, repeat. This agent-chase sounds

Reply to Independent Corporations and Smuggler Groups in Game Talk GalCiv2 Forums

Hope you get the idea... Interestingly I don't, actually. I believe you are trying to make two points: First, if handled carefully you can do everything the black market does, via diplomacy on the 'official' way. So instead of anonymously making pirates attack an enemy you don't want to wage war on yet you make some minor race declare war, pum

Reply to Independent Corporations and Smuggler Groups in Game Talk GalCiv2 Forums

How about adding that here: Foreign Relations -> Minor Races -> Black market -> Speak to They've got techs, they've got ships - and they have no conscience. They also maintain pirate ships and raid trade-ships once in a while, or even capture other race's military ships. You can trade with them and they'll like you and spare you. Or you just pay them tribute. Or you use espionage and gain knowledge of the location of their ships. Or you ask them to attack someone - costs money, but your

Reply to Independent Corporations and Smuggler Groups in Game Talk GalCiv2 Forums

I'm with the Eradicator there. You can't really go out and buy a aircraft carrier or submarine today. There isn't a free market for those things, that's all controlled by governments (mind you, I don't do that kind of business all day, so this is just a 'as far as I know'). So if you want to get some ships from a different branch of the techtree check out some other races. In my latest game the Paolos had some pretty good ships in stock (I was technologically behind because of the c

Reply to Independent Corporations and Smuggler Groups in Game Talk GalCiv2 Forums

Usually an economy works (very roughly) like this: You arrange your economic laws so that companies can prosper. Then the companies trade stuff, and from the traded value you get taxes. Currently in GalCiv2 this 'please the companies so their taxes please you'-aspect is replaced by 'more people = more tax', which is a very rough approximation. Actually GalCiv2 has companies, but they are just text-strings. Remember the screen where you can buy ships and see the price for it? Act

Reply to Four Ideas to Stretch the Game Out in Ideas GalCiv2 Forums

I was actually agreeing with you That's nice. Though I still felt that I needed to explain my views. About the idea of modding for my purposes. This is where I currently am: 1. Using a "propulsion per mass"-concept isn't possible in GalCiv. So the propulsion tech tree is gone completely. So are engines. All ships move at 2 parsecs a week. For

Reply to Four Ideas to Stretch the Game Out in Ideas GalCiv2 Forums

*If* it was supposed to be a "real" space strategy game, yes, it could use a lot of work. Maybe it's only meant to be an empire building game with a space flavor. IMO less eye-candy and more content would have been better. You are right, I did take the freedom of being subjective for once. Of course GalCiv2 is a good game. I like the folks at Stardock

Reply to Four Ideas to Stretch the Game Out in Ideas GalCiv2 Forums

1. I'm on the side of the "Why is this galaxy so tiny, I thought it said gigantic"-people. I'd like to send two colony ships and a constructor into the distance and have to wait for a few months until they arrive at the next planet. I never even considered not playing at gigantic galaxies with abundant stars, planets and habitable planets. More than 6 races and a gigantic galaxy is just crowded like a New York subway. Hardly what I call 'vast space'. Ships are just too fast for these tiny ga