Mistralok1

Reply to DA: some observations from the peanut gallery in Dark Avatar GalCiv2 Forums

Excellent post, Rataan. Well thought out. I agree with most of your observations. There are a few, however, that I feel I must address. Espionage appears to be largely dysfunctional. Espionage can be one of your most powerful tools, if you learn how, when, and where to use it. A single spy, used wisely, can do as much damage as a fleet of battle cruisers. A cadre of them can bring the most powerful civ to it's knees. Trade rou

Reply to the Dread Lords spawned, for about 5 seconds in Dark Avatar GalCiv2 Forums

Do they usually get a chance to get rolling? That depends on where they spawn, I think. When I got the event, they spawned on a planet very close to one of mine. I was alarmed, of course, but when I looked at them, I saw there were only twenty of them, and they had no ships or planetary improvements. I rushed a transport, invaded the next turn, and that was that. A sweet new planet for the cost of a single transport. Now, if they had spawned away from a

Reply to New patch already? SDC shows 1.50.059 in Dark Avatar GalCiv2 Forums

I updated midgame and had no problems. There are no release notes since this is just minor bugfix and DA compatibility stuff.

Reply to Questions on Spies in Dark Avatar GalCiv2 Forums

Curious, though, what stopped the Ai from neutralizing your other spies? Simple. I had more spies stockpiled than it did. Remember, spies cost bc to train. When I nuked the AI's economy, it had no money to train new spies, and couldn't do anything to nullify mine.

Reply to DA 1.5 Race Abilities in Bug Reports GalCiv2 Forums

The Terran trading bonus can be very effectively countered. Build the wonder that protects trade routes so they can't get it, then have a field day with fast small ships attacking their shipping. All of a sudden they have 9 points that are totally useless, bringing them down to 15 points and trashing a large chunk of their economy for little cost to you. Even better: Choose the Korx as one of the starting races. Trade/buy their trade techs. Then invade

Reply to Questions on Spies in Dark Avatar GalCiv2 Forums

an intelligent person who uses them wisely will always outdo the AI. It's good to be human.

Reply to Empire of Standards in Metaverse GalCiv2 Forums

Thanks for the warm welcome. Darn glad to be teamed up with a great bunch of guys. Let's show them what we're about.

Reply to Questions on Spies in Dark Avatar GalCiv2 Forums

it isn't much in the scheme of things Oh, Sir, I beg to differ. Your cadre of spies can be the single most powerful weapon in your arsenal. I'll give you an example from one of my games. Late in a large, common game, there were three civs left. The Terrans (me), the Iconians, and the Korath. The Iconians owned over 2/3 of the galaxy, and I owned the remainder, with the exception of the two Korath worlds. The Korath and Iconians were at war. I had been

Reply to Empire of Standards in Metaverse GalCiv2 Forums

All hail the Empire of Standards! Finally, a reason to post to the Meta. You are three of my favorite people on these forums, and it would be an honor to join your quest. If nothing else, this should be one heck of a good time. I should be posting my first game tonight or tomorrow. Death to the fraktards!

Reply to DA 1.5.057: Why am I playing against "myself?" in Bug Reports GalCiv2 Forums

"Dark Yor"? A dark version of me or something? The 'Dark Yor' are one of the minor races. I had them set to "occasional" yet there were anomalies everywhere--literally nine within grasp of my homeworld. Sometimes it happens this way. They are placed randomly on the map, and occasionally get bunched up. Once you explore farther into the galaxy, they should become much more of a rare find. Consider this a bit of luck

Reply to Advice for Game Settings in Dark Avatar GalCiv2 Forums

establish familiarity with the "baseline" game first, so you can make educated decisions, rather than soliciting everyones game preferences (which are many and varied). I agree completely. Learn the basics of the game first. This will give you a much stronger foundation to build your personal strategies upon.

Reply to When do I get to see some Mega Events? in Dark Avatar GalCiv2 Forums

It isn't necessarily the point in the game where you are at. They seem to be more of a balancing factor than anything, at least in the games that I have played. If I start to pull too far ahead of the other races, I'm almost certain to see the Pirates! spawn in my area of influence. In larger maps, this usually happens a little later in the game, but on a tiny map this can happen quite early. Really it's more how the game is playing out rather than the timeframe.

Reply to The Republic of Magaria in AARs GalCiv2 Forums

Yes, good job. Very enjoyable read. Long live Magaria!

Reply to AI, Am I wasting my time? in Galactic Civilizations II GalCiv2 Forums

Yes, the game does have a bit of a steep learning curve, but that is part of it's attraction. The complexity of the game leads to an almost infinite variety during gameplay, and should keep you interested for months to come. the manual is useless(ly out of date) Frogboy has rewritten the manual himself. It is night and day compared to the first one. GalCiv2DL has been updated, with a few bug fixes and DA compatability stuff, but since the .pdf manual i

Reply to GalCiv II Music? in Galactic Civilizations II GalCiv2 Forums

Mason Fischer and Eric Heverling did the music. I don't know if the music has any titles other than those given.

Reply to The difference between cats and dogs in Off-Topic GalCiv2 Forums

eeegad did i take a wrong turn somewhare? No, Mystic, not at all. I had just typed a funny (or so I thought) reply. I started watching the cockpit video of the friendly fire incident that killed that British soldier. It made me a little sick, and I just wasn't in a funny mood anymore. G.W., LOVE Python. I live close to the border of two states, so I get it twice a week on the different PBS systems. <img src="http://images.stardock.com/gc2/T_DL

Reply to Study says Pig Latin is good for the vocal cords in Off-Topic GalCiv2 Forums

A fifth of hootch and a hollow tree? Sounds like a pretty typical weekend around here.

Fog of War in Galactic Civilizations II GalCiv2 Forums

A number of you have asked what the 'fog of war' is. Listen to this. I guarantee that you will never ask that question again. WWW Link

Reply to The difference between cats and dogs in Off-Topic GalCiv2 Forums

[edit] I had a bit of a 'flip response here, but I just heard/saw something that made me feel that humor was a bit inappropriate. Sorry.

Reply to Difficulty Settings and CPU usage in Galactic Civilizations II GalCiv2 Forums

AFAIK, those values are still correct, as far the penalties and bonuses go. That being said- Frogboy has put in an enormous amount of work into the AI, and 'tough' in DL is quite a bit different than 'tough' in DA. [aside to Kryo] How do you do that? You seem to be everywhere at once. We should start calling you 'Hermes'.

Reply to Difficulty Settings and CPU usage in Galactic Civilizations II GalCiv2 Forums

Here is a link to the wiki article on the subject. Lots of info in there. WWW Link does difficulty setting affect the CPU usage setting? No, it does not. is there any way to just tell the game to let everyone use max CPU When you tick the max cpu, it is applied across the board.

Shout Out to the IT Dept. in Galactic Civilizations II GalCiv2 Forums

You work in relative anonymity, yet that work is so vital. I don't recall anyone thanking you for all of the hard work you have put in. I usually just read offhand comments, like, 'yeah, that works now', or words to that effect. The forums are great. Best I've ever seen. But they aren't the primary reason that I'm posting. When I downloaded the first beta it was, well...a bit of a chore. When I downloaded DA a short time ago, even with the large volume of traffic that you must be getting, it wa

Reply to Dark Avatar is here! Finally! in Dark Avatar GalCiv2 Forums

O frabjous day! Callooh! Callay! What a wonderful surprise. You caught me completely off guard. I logged into SDC, as I do about this time every day, and, there it was. All I can say, is- Bravo!

Reply to Spore Rush in Dark Avatar GalCiv2 Forums

I can win in 8 moves in a tiny galaxy in 1 on 1. Hardest level. Just when I thought that (eventually) I might be able to match this, along comes Kryo with his: 10-minute win. Aargh! I foresee much wailing and gnashing of teeth in my future.