My biggest hope for Crusade

from GalCiv3 Forums

There is a single change which I would LOVE to be implemented with Crusade, which will give the biggest change to gameplay for the better:

 

Nebulae (nebulas?) should block sensor line of sight (as they would in the real world). Why?

 

  1. Introduce meaningful terrain to the map. A much needed change to the current bland galaxies where the terrain features are pretty meaningless.
  2. Ability to sneak fleets around the map - allows for guerrilla warfare and surprise attacks from multiple fronts.
  3. Meaningful scouting and positioning of observation ships/stations. In order to get visibility around your local nebulae, you will need to position dedicated ships and/or stations in strategic positions (and not just x number of tiles away from the previous one).
  4. Introduce meaningful strategic denying of adversary assets - Destroy one of the aforementioned stations and create a large blind spot in your opponents intelligence.

I can't stress enough how much added gameplay would be introduced by making this change! It would be awesome!  \o/

33,884 views 8 replies
Reply #1 from GalCiv3 Forums Top

Sounds like that would make a positive addition

Reply #2 from GalCiv3 Forums Top

Bad news. Line of sight calculations are expensive for the CPU. With the size of galaxies that people expect to play on and with the number of units running around the map, it would cripple your machine. Then people would whine about the game being slow.

Offworld Trading Company
Reply #3 from GalCiv3 Forums Top

What does not make sense is how can we see the whole universe if we cant see around nebulas. Now we only see galaxies not individual stars, but im sure thats around quite a few nebulas. You probably mean the small stuff, not the map.

Reply #4 from GalCiv3 Forums Top


There is a single change which I would LOVE to be implemented with Crusade, which will give the biggest change to gameplay for the better:
Nebulae (nebulas?) should block sensor line of sight (as they would in the real world). Why?
End of quote

In principle I am totally with you on this, but:

In order to have this meaningful, the AI needs to stop cheating with the fow on higher difficulties.

Reply #5 from GalCiv3 Forums Top

Quoting admiralWillyWilber, reply 3

What does not make sense is how can we see the whole universe if we cant see around nebulas. Now we only see galaxies not individual stars, but im sure thats around quite a few nebulas. You probably mean the small stuff, not the map.
End of admiralWillyWilber's quote

I have no problem assuming that sight through a nebula is accomplished by a combination of telescopes and general sensors stationed on all planets, all based on a ship first scanning and cataloging the tiles involved.  That there is any FOW at all is more puzzling to me, conceptually, than seeing past a nebula.  But I gave up trying to justify some one else's pseudo science and lore so as to reduce stress.

The real determining logic here seems to be what happens to between-turn performance if they try to implement your suggestion.  Comments from devs have established that dynamic sight calculations would heavily impact movement and pathing calculations.  And that is one of the worst places to add CPU load.

Reply #6 from GalCiv3 Forums Top

My biggest hope for the game in general is for the game to feel more realistic.  One of the best features I absolutely loved about GC2 was how real the game felt.  I would sometimes just sit back and watch how the computer played against other players and the strategy it used.  So far GC3 is far short.  Yes I realize that the whole game isn't out yet and is coming in stages but the hard core fans have been waiting and waiting for this to happen.  The AI of GC3 in its current state and I started a game about a month ago seems a bit easier then say a year ago or when it first came out.  I play on the largest maps possible to try and get a grand scale of the game, playing at its slowest pace.  Currently I'm ranked #1 in overall power and military power and tech.  Most the AI is against me but there are a few wars currently going on.  Its almost like the computer isn't playing against the other players any longer and just turtling up until I send my massive fleet to take them over.  In GC2 if this situation had happened the AI would try and still take out weaker AI to gain strength but not in GC3 its almost like they threw in the towel early and might not be worth finishing my game. 

Reply #7 from Stardock.net Forums Top

I would like to see ground combat become more of a factor in production choices, resource allocation, improvement choices, and even the tech tree.  Imagine being able to design legions of infantry, power armor, air assault, mechanized armor, etc with advanced weapons or make cheaper units to guard less strategic planets.

Then, taking it to another level, integrating space/ground combat with ship components designed to provide assistance to ground combat (Command and Control, Fire Support, Air Support, etc).

What if having an infantry school on an extreme world gave a bonus to units trained there on that type of world?  Special Forces Units for Desert Warfare, Low Gravity, even Toxic or Radioactive environments.  Maybe those units just wouldn't face penalties in those environments?

Reply #8 from GalCiv3 Forums Top

I also observed that the different AI factions very seldom wage war among themselves. I agree it would make the game much more interesting if they fight each other to gain more strength.