DesConnor

Reply to Observation about Diplomacy and Diplomatic victory... in Sins Diplomacy Sins Forums

The relationship points victory is too easy. A start might be to lower all faction animosities a further point and then increase the effect of improved xeno relations by a point- I'd include same-same relations in this, you can't assume that two TEC factions have the same culture. Pact requirements might need dropping a point as well, to compensate. Incremental adjustments will help to get the points balance right, but I'd still like some further requirement, if you'v

Reply to Pirates: OMFG! in Sins Diplomacy Sins Forums

Try this: http://datafilehost.com/download-448aad49.html Just place it in your mods folder then enable it in-game. Disable after you've tested it out. If you like it then perhaps we could lobby for the standard pirates to be more like they are in the mod, less stats focussed, but with better abilities and more inclined to attack trade? If not I can always adjust it more.

Reply to Four Military Technologies that Need Help and a Discourse on their Enhancement in Sins of a Solar Empire Sins Forums

I'd have to test it, but I suspect that Martyrdom, which I have as one of the more useless military techs in the game, in fact creates 'mines' that are nearly as cost-effective as the TEC ones, even when ships run into a TEC minefield ... Two TEC minefields cost 1000cr 260 metal and about 150 crystal(?).. you might get 10 Seekers for that. If 6 hits from an undetected double minefield is as much as you can expect, then if 10 martyrs did any more than

More Custom Maps for Download in Sins of a Solar Empire Sins Forums

I've got some more custom maps available for download from this site, use the red download tab above. Some revisions of older maps are also included. Pasquinade- a smaller 4v4 or FFA, good for single player as the AI don't attack all at once. Lumaran's Curse - a 3v3v3 or FFA multi, again it should also be good for single player. Prospero - a 2v2 multi intended for online. The pack also includes Sphinx, a 1v1 multi for balance testing. Any comme

Reply to Fan Features you would like to see made official in Sins of a Solar Empire Sins Forums

I'd like some fan-made maps to be included! Maybe not fifty maps but a dozen or so would be good. I find the the game has many similarly-sized maps that seem designed for multiplayer and are yet very small- and the bigger multistar maps are too large. If there were more appropriately sized balanced maps included with the game then perhaps the deficiencies with the random maps might not be as important.

Reply to Four Military Technologies that Need Help and a Discourse on their Enhancement in Sins of a Solar Empire Sins Forums

A combat update on my issue with TEC mines: I finally trapped a damaged and fleeing capital into one of my TEC double minefields, it hit six mines going through them, which is fairly good, as the detection radius of the mines is somewhat limited. The ship began with 48% mitigation about 1850 health and 20 shields.. after hitting six mines in rapid succession it was on 64% mitigation about 1000 health and 0 shields. Effectively, the mines hit for&nbsp

Reply to Four Capital Ship Abilities that Need Help and the Problem of Balancing With Ultimates in Sins of a Solar Empire Sins Forums

I was using the 1.18 ability tables... it says radiation damage is 5s duration not 20s..? Early game twenty targets in that small an area would be fairly unusual? It was always good against massed scouts though! I may have been misled by the Guidance summary, it says increase rate of fire 1.67 times, but that might refer to the ability? You've used it more often than me... I have used Surge to get out of combat occasionally however, so I'm surprised

Reply to Four Capital Ship Abilities that Need Help and the Problem of Balancing With Ultimates in Sins of a Solar Empire Sins Forums

Shield Restore - Though I understand the interpretation of the purpose of the reduction, it still doesn't make any sense... so there would have been 'excess' had it been kept at the same level with its cooldown and antimatter costs reduced- so what? It just means that it wouldn't have hurt to have left it at the same level. When you need to get a capital out of trouble, there is less upfront restore though. Perhaps the ability might work better if it could in

Four Capital Ship Abilities that Need Help and the Problem of Balancing With Ultimates in Sins of a Solar Empire Sins Forums

The Skirantra could be an Awful Warning for improvements to capital ship abilities, and unless the buff to Scramble Bombers is simply reverted with the sync fix, we will simply have the Illuminator bug issue all over again, with months with a severe balance problem. How to avoid a recurrence of this issue when recommending ability alterations? The Skirantra was already a powerful and much used ship- it could kite, it has antimatter-free strikecraft which is like a fifth a

Reply to Four Economic Technologies that Need (major) Help and What to Do About Them! in Sins of a Solar Empire Sins Forums

From the other thread, the Civilian Ship Safety Act would be a better option if the trade and refineries ships moved more slowly, at most half as slowly, so that it didn't take a fair-sized fleet to destroy them quickly enough. Has anyone been able to confirm that the bounty on trade ships is functional? Communal Labour is another one of those technologies where you don't want to have to pay twice- as it already requires more than one constructor at the build planet,

Reply to Formal Proposal For Refocusing Pirates On Economy Destabilization Over Military Conquest in Sins Diplomacy Sins Forums

I made a mod for players who want to test ability-based pirates with more normal armour and attacks: http://www.datafilehost.com/download-448aad49.html Just put it into your mod folder, enable to test, disable to return to normal. Details in the 'Overwhelming Pirates' thread in the strategy section. I used Subversion and Detect Mines among the abilities added.

Reply to 3 Halcyon Carriers with 13 Fighters Vs 3 Skintra Carriers with 30 Bombers, who wins? in Sins Multiplayer Sins Forums

The sticky on capital ship abilities for 1.18 had Scramble Bombers as a four star ability, superior to both Microphasing Aura, another possible choice for the Skirantra, and Heavy Strikecraft, the Sova strikecraft buff. I'm not sure where else the received wisdom of the community is better expressed? As for 'pro level' knowledge, it has always been that Vasari are the hardest faction to play, I wonder why you do? A 1.18 Skirantra should defeat a Sova, the

Reply to 3 Halcyon Carriers with 13 Fighters Vs 3 Skintra Carriers with 30 Bombers, who wins? in Sins Multiplayer Sins Forums

One Skirantra could defeat a single Sova of equal level before this patch, and would defeat a 75%, damaged one easily. You must have been playing poorly, to lose two!* Is Scramble Bombers working in plasma storms? Was it always bugged like this? I presume that it works in magnetic clouds as well then, or at least the extra strikecraft can be taken into the cloud? If the Skirantra 'fix' had beeen omitted the last patch would have been so much bett

Reply to Observation about Diplomacy and Diplomatic victory... in Sins Diplomacy Sins Forums

If the relationship points victory had further conditions, like having a majority of the planets owned under your direct control, then it might be a good method of finishing a won game so it didn't drag out, and everyone would want it. As it is the points system needs work, the couple of times I tried you can starbase on about 4-5 planets, go three stages up the tech tree and wait for your win.... What the game might use is the Dimensional Cascades.. An sf superweapon th

Reply to Does a "fear" of experienced (or pro) players keep you from playing Sins online? in Sins of a Solar Empire Sins Forums

Why would new players want to join 5v5 games? Don't join 5v5s, they are bound to be too hard for you, and no-one has enough time to give you the advice you need. Even if the teams are 'balanced' rather than stacked, the odds are that you'll be right next to a player far better than you, who is in a hurry to stomp you on behalf of his team. Not even the best players like 5v5, or they wouldn't play under false names so often- and why should good players allow 'balanced teams'

Reply to Four Military Technologies that Need Help and a Discourse on their Enhancement in Sins of a Solar Empire Sins Forums

This is the military technology thread though... You're welcome to start the relationship thread, especially as Darvin hasn't got the expansion yet, and I only play single player occasionally. I have noted that you could win on unfair simply by researching the first three levels of relationship boost tech. Isn't what you're claiming like observing that the last level of shield research 'only' adds another 5% shield...? Gravity mines -

Four Military Technologies that Need Help and a Discourse on their Enhancement in Sins of a Solar Empire Sins Forums

While I wouldn't pretend to be an expert on the military techs of all the other races, as I was the one who suggested a complementary military thread to Darvin's survey of financial techs, and no-one else took the hint, I decided to try to produce one. Planetary Shields - Overrated even before starbases, as they were most useful against siege frigate raids and before the carrier cruiser revision, when the ships couldn't simply take the shield generator out first.&

Reply to 3 Halcyon Carriers with 13 Fighters Vs 3 Skintra Carriers with 30 Bombers, who wins? in Sins Multiplayer Sins Forums

Agent, though they aren't tanks, two Skirantras, without using scramble bombers, can defeat one Sova of equal level. Your tactical situation was different- one of your Skirantras had been damaged and the other was brand-new, plus your opponent had many other frigates and a higher-level cap. However your main problem was that you vastly overvalued a roid. You could simply have stayed outside the range of the missile batteries with your Skirantras. A roid only costs th

Reply to 3 Halcyon Carriers with 13 Fighters Vs 3 Skintra Carriers with 30 Bombers, who wins? in Sins Multiplayer Sins Forums

I'm not sure about this at all- you want to compare bombers to the Sova's batteries, and then claim that bombers won't be valuable at all later on if it is revised? I prefer the other thread to this one, a player's thread should have replays rather than garbled recounts. The 'buff Skirantra' replay showed a pair of Skirantras being employed very poorly, but the ship was buffed anyway. 1.01/1.05/1.19 would have been a better patch without the S

Reply to GIVE UP ALREADY? MAKE sins 2 in Sins of a Solar Empire Sins Forums

Nabs is a playa, when he says he loves the game he means it. Apart from Zombies I'm not familiar with the rest of you. References to only having played for 5 minutes, or needing the game dumbed down are well out of order. He's too much of a gent to call you either, I'm not. I'd be happy to team with Nabs against any two of you. Anytime, trash talkers. Also, Nabs has a point, the game has suffered from some kind of mix-up where the crashes were reported

Reply to Four Economic Technologies that Need (major) Help and What to Do About Them! in Sins of a Solar Empire Sins Forums

Even if you manage to sneak a light force into the enemy trade system, with the current version the payoff is mixed. A bonus of 100 credits per trade destroyed seems great- if you can destroy one every 15s, that is the equivalent of over 6 credits a second, very useful. However, is this bonus still working, can someone else check and confirm it? The other aspect of trade warfare is very discouraging. If you could destroy an enemy's trade ships then he would have

Reply to Scramble bombers, overbuffed? in Sins of a Solar Empire Sins Forums

It is another of the peculiarities of the game that there should be flak frigates designed to protect long range frigates rather than the heavy ships of the fleet, compounded by the heavy ships also being unable to protect themselves against bombers. This is just wrong in terms of history- though only a very limited timespan is applicable at all and it might not be especially relevant to space warfare. However, it's also wrong in terms of design- if players were a

Reply to Patch Stat Changes Forum Version 3 [First Up: BUGS!] in Sins of a Solar Empire Sins Forums

If you want to quicken the early game why not use quick start, not normal start...!? The home planet extractor bug is clearly a bug, it didn't exist in earlier versions of the game. It doesn't make a great deal of difference either, the few 'free' resources will scarcely speed the game up any. Its more like a graphic bug- after all, a gap when looking at the Kol "from an odd angle close in" wasn't much of a bug either. You're going to 'vote' against a bug? A&

Reply to Overwhelming Pirates. in Strategy Sins Forums

The details on what I attempted in the mod- -I slowed the trade and refinery ships from 300 to 150 to give the pirates more chance to destroy them, though I still consider that they might have too much health. I also increased the rebuild time from 12s to 300s so that the destruction of a trade ship had some sort of financial impact. The pirates can then be directed in small groups to attack remote trade planets rather than the front line, the outstanding

Reply to Four Economic Technologies that Need (major) Help and What to Do About Them! in Sins of a Solar Empire Sins Forums

Well, at least there's substantial agreement on improvements being needed to the four technologies mentioned in the original post. The focus on early builds, because of the peculiar emphasis on 5v5s, might otherwise lead to economic techs being ignored. We may also need a complementary military tech thread, (or perhaps a revival of an old one?), to highlight other useless techs, in this phase, before the final version of the game is fixed. However