random50

Reply to Base economics in Game Talk GalCiv2 Forums

I haven't checked with 1.3, but yes I'm sure the penalty was there in every version up to that point. Oh, one other thing, the formula I mentioned earlier on in the thread seems to become unreliable deep into the game. When you have a huge empire, you often end up with less income than you should for some reason. I never worked out what triggered this reduction, and unlike the 20K penalty (which is sudden and severe...look at your finance charts and you'll spot it easily) it's not a

Reply to More Tech Points? in Modding GalCiv2 Forums

If you want to keep the AI from researching a tech, simply set the prerequisite to IMPOSSIBLETECH. I didn't know that. Very handy. Still have the problem of the tech being nicked though.

Reply to Morale and Population Growth in Game Talk GalCiv2 Forums

Same thing happens with racial traits and wonders. Calculate the base first, which is the smaller of 3% and 75M as you say. Then apply the morale bonuses to that. Then apply the race bonus on top of that.

Reply to Morale and Population Growth in Game Talk GalCiv2 Forums

Lots of confusion on that page, Michael. The wikipedia (for once) has things right: https://www.galciv.wikia.com/wiki/Population Look at the stuff written after "game version 1.1". That's accurate.

Reply to More Tech Points? in Modding GalCiv2 Forums

It works, but I think there are restrictions. I tried adding a tech I created for my exclusive use which gave nothing but penalties. This worked fine when it was cheap. But the AI researched it, so I tried making it ridiculously expensive. Result: the game ignored my custom race file which was supposed to add the tech. Reduced the cost again...same custom race file had no problem. So it looks like there IS a cap, even if you add using the race file. That cap's higher than the st

Reply to AI suggestions in Game Talk GalCiv2 Forums

Planet development and planetary improvements: The more advanced a research lab or factory is, the more expensive it is both to build and maintain relative to its output. This difference is often substantial. Consequently, the best way to develop planets is this: 1) Fill every tile with low tech buildings first. The very first planetary improvements are probably just about worth researching, the industrial one for basic starbase modules, the research one because the *ea

Reply to AI suggestions in Game Talk GalCiv2 Forums

I agree mismatched, but could you give a bit more detail, please? What exactly do you think it's doing wrong? What should it be doing instead?

Reply to Base economics in Game Talk GalCiv2 Forums

I agree, it's very annoying.

Reply to Suicidal primer for the crippling level player in Game Talk GalCiv2 Forums

Aww, it can only be placed on one planet??? Does that mean that only one planet will look more powerful than it really is, or does it affect all of your planets? Just the one planet.

Reply to AI suggestions in Game Talk GalCiv2 Forums

The AI isn't very efficient with its military. It requires far more ships to defend your planets with "defenders" as the AI does than to defend them with roving fleets. Because there are so many more ships with the AI approach, it's also harder for it to keep all its forces at or near your current latest ship models. It ends up spending huge amounts of money maintaining an obsolete fleet. The AI also doesn't appear to assess its chances of success before attacking a fleet, or if it

Reply to Base economics in Game Talk GalCiv2 Forums

The income from any individual trade route varies depending on how far the freighter is along the route. And it can vary *wildly*...by a factor of 5 times or more with long routes on big maps. Multiple trade routes should smooth this out a little but it's still likely your overall trade income will vary quite a bit from turn to turn. Could that be the reason? The other possibility I can think of...there's an income penalty for your treasury moving over 20000BC, something like 20% I

Reply to Suicidal primer for the crippling level player in Game Talk GalCiv2 Forums

Interesting post. It seems for the people who win at the very highest levels, whether they tech trade or not, the spin control center is a vital part of the strategy. I wonder, have you ever tried on very slow tech trading? Can you get to it in time?

Reply to AI suggestions in Game Talk GalCiv2 Forums

I'll start the ball rolling with a couple of suggestions: Invasions My invasion attempts very nearly always succeed because I never invade without a force which I'm confident is large enough to win comfortably. Failed invasions are costly in time and money for invasion tactics and the destroyed transports. I think the AI should check more carefully that its invasions have a realistic chance of success before launching them. Related to the above is transport des

AI suggestions in Game Talk GalCiv2 Forums

Thought I'd do this in a (rare) attempt to be helpful. :-) This is a thread (hopefully) dedicated to what players winning at the higher levels are doing better than the AI with suggestions on how to bring the AI more in line. I'd *like* to see this be a useful resource for the devs so here's some ground rules I *hope* people will be kind enough to abide by. 1) This is not really intended to highlight cheesy exploits. However, I realise everyone's definition of that is di

Reply to Playing above Crippling difficulty in Game Talk GalCiv2 Forums

You have almost zero chance of keeping up technologically through your own sweat and toil. Maybe, just maybe you can keep pace if you build almost nothing but research buildings and set the slider high...but it'll be a race whether you get the infrastructure down before the other races come a-warring. If you have tech trading on, you can neatly circumvent the difficulty in keeping up in the research race by...not even trying. Build economy buildings instead and buy all your tech in.

Reply to Base economics in Game Talk GalCiv2 Forums

Are you certain you had no economic bonus? 'Cos those numbers are consistent with a 10% bonus (it may have come from tech, or political party...check your race stats screen). To calculate income on any given planet, you need: 1. Population in millions. Thus 5 billion is 5000. 2. Your civilization economy bonus. You'll find this under the civ stats screen. It contains a variety of things, so don't assume it's zero just 'cos you took that pick. 3. The plane

Reply to Am I The Only One Bent On Galactic Dominaton? in Galactic Civilizations II GalCiv2 Forums

I usually play huge or gigantic maps, so winning by conquest is just dead boring. Usual pattern is to wipe out the first race or two who are foolish enough to attack me, then ally with whoever's left. One of the problems with these sort of games is that the time between it being obvious you're going to win and *actually* winning can be pretty huge (Rome Total War anyone?!) It's nice to have the research and alliance victory options to speed things up.

Reply to Why AI must evolve after release in GalCiv Journals GalCiv2 Forums

It will also likely involve creating additional difficulty levels Hooray! The number 1 must have improvement for me...please please please change that from "likely" to "definitely". Intensive algorithms has done a reasonable job of getting

Reply to The game is too easy in Game Talk GalCiv2 Forums

Try masochistic or above with tech trading off and intensive algorithms on. Then pray.

Reply to At what level are the production levels equal for person and AIs? in Galactic Civilizations II GalCiv2 Forums

According to the book, production levels are the same for human player and computer players and never vary. The book is not to be trusted. It is often wrong, as in this case. I if remember correctly, tough is the first level the AI plays without handicaps.

Reply to Population in Galactic Civilizations II GalCiv2 Forums

Dreadarchon, I usually play on gigantic with plenty of habitable planets so my priority is sustainable expansion. This strategy enables me to have a 59% tax rate throughout the colonization phase (about as high as you can get away with without starting morale on a planet going below 25% where population drops), and a few turns after it's over and the last planets are finishing their entertainment buildings, I can immediately put the tax rate up to 80% with no problems. Actually, I wo

Reply to Difficulty levels= in need to fill a hole between 120% & 200%? in Galactic Civilizations II GalCiv2 Forums

Actually, it's not really the economic bonus that causes the problem, it's the fact the AI gets those bonuses to production and research too. I agree with you. There have been quite a few threads on this...unfortunately no sign yet it's on Stardock's list, but fingers crossed!

Reply to Population in Galactic Civilizations II GalCiv2 Forums

An even better way to keep morale at 100% is using entertainment buildings. During colonization I have my social spending at 100% and immediately build 1 or 2 factories, then 4 entertainment buildings on every planet I colonize. This allows you to keep a high tax rate and still get the double population growth bonus. That early on in the game you wouldn't be able to fund manufacturing or research on those tiles anyway. Of course, you'll eventually be destroying them and replacing

Reply to Black arts of Trade in Game Talk GalCiv2 Forums

Oh, one other thing...trade income seems to depend quite a bit on map size. ie 5 BC is a typical starting value on tiny whilst on gigantic it's 20 BC. This won't change the argument above about the number of starbases needed much, but it will have a significant difference on how long it takes to make back the cost of the constructors. On a gigantic map, a fully upgraded econ starbase sitting on 4 trade routes pays for itself in roughly 20 turns. On a tiny map it'll take 4 times a

Reply to Black arts of Trade in Game Talk GalCiv2 Forums

@ random50 what do you mean about econ starbaces? what else is their? I mean you don't get *exactly* a 60% bonus if you have 60% of trade modules installed. I got slightly less and the exact amount seems to vary depending on your trade ability (and probably other things). But it is in the right ballpark. <TABLE cellpadding=8 width=