Code Monkey

Reply to New Tech Browser? in Galactic Civilizations I Stardock Forums

It never was supposed to be in 1.03, or in 1.04 for that matter. It's under development for the expansion pack that's scheduled for June. ~SDC~

Reply to Drengin always toughest? in Galactic Civilizations I Stardock Forums

What difficulty are you playing on. I noticed they seemed to do better on the lower diffs because their basic strat isn't exactly complex. Now that I'm playing all Intelligent, it's a total crap shoot as to who winds up dominant.

Reply to 1.03 and production bonus bug in Galactic Civilizations I Stardock Forums

Vynd, not quite. Your percent gov't spending is sort of like guaranteeing to fund that percentage of each of your planet's capacity. So, if you set gov't at 100% and military at 100%, unless you're < -500, you will have the money taken out of your funds for fueling it.

Reply to What is the logic behind Phoenix ships? in Galactic Civilizations I Stardock Forums

"I was thinking how useless it was that Rangers were survey capable. Guess I was wrong." Yes you were :) I wound up with something like a 54/43 ranger long before there was anything that big available through the tech tree.

Reply to Demo? in Galactic Civilizations I Stardock Forums

Aaaaaaaaah :sniff!: Not that sort of question, again. ZeroGreat: the game does not now, nor will it ever support multiplayer of any variety. It *might* support it in a full blown sequel, but the game was conceived and developed to be SP only.

Reply to Dear Frogboy.... in Galactic Civilizations I Stardock Forums

Ah, but see, there is a reason for the support. Stardock has built its customer base on the idea of subscribing to a period of support rather than simply granting a license. You don't just buy GalCiv or WindowBlinds, you buy a year's support as well. By actually giving that support, you get a bunch of loyal customers who are too used to being bent over the log by devs who figure they shipped it, so it must be done.

Reply to Points Total in the Metaverse in Galactic Civilizations I Stardock Forums

I'm not sure what you're asking in terms of avoiding math gibberish. You add up all your game scores and you divide it by the square root of the number of games played, pretty basic stuff. They went with this formula, I assume, because it walks a middle line between simply using a sum (which favors people just spamming the metaverse with lots and lots of quick games) and an average which would make it nigh impossible to see your score increase over time. Now, they could have gone with

Reply to v1.03, +10 PQ Ability has been nerfed in Galactic Civilizations I Stardock Forums

I don't know if the speed thing was *that* imbalancing compared to the PQ, but I do know it was one of my personal *always pick this* abilities. Just the +1 meant that your colony ships moved in 2 turns what everyone else took 3 to do and your survey and scout ships covered ground much more quickly. It made a HUGE difference in my beginning game. In my first pure 1.03 game I still took the +1, but it cost me more, and I still think it was worth it so their tweaks must not be too out of whack :)

Reply to Complaint - Lack of Game Variation = Boredom in Galactic Civilizations I Stardock Forums

Ultimately it breaks down to what sort of gamer you are - the longterm players of this game are going to be stathounds, I just don't see anyway around that given its core design. Everything you play on a computer is just a bunch of mathematical algorithms bouncing off of one another - it just gets prettied up with graphics and fancy names to make it more fun. This game, as much as anything else, is an economic and diplomacy game, even the military aspects are tied in very closely with the econom

Reply to 1.03: Notice on saved games in Galactic Civilizations I Stardock Forums

Hmm... so them offering you demos (not shareware) for their other commercial games is *pushing* products? Interesting world view you have there. Pushing products is if everytime I launched SDC I got a popup informing me I can upgrade to such and such a package for only $$$. Allowing me to download demo versions of their products through SDC is both a service and smart marketing. The day a company isn't trying to make money is the day that company goes out of business. I love ho

Reply to 1.03: Notice on saved games in Galactic Civilizations I Stardock Forums

Posted by pdifolco: "I fail to see why it is so needed to make incremental patches." Frogboy can correct me if I'm wrong, but I would daresay it has to do with the fact that they use this patching system for *all* of their products (between my Object Desktop and Drengin.net subscriptions I know I could have about 2 dozen or more different Stardock apps and widgets installed if I were so inclined). As such, they've got the how to package files and distribute them with SDC down to a s

Reply to Bug Report Thread in Galactic Civilizations I Stardock Forums

I'm not sure if this is a bug or intentional, but I've never seen the behavior before 1.03.051: Now, even though I'm completely in the red, the AIs are coming and demanding that I pay them sum huge sums of money or they'll attack me. Even though I explain that evey my creditors are after me, relations still tank. In every version prior to this the AI would say something about how my civ was too poor to pay them so give up such and such a tech and something.

Reply to 1.03: Notice on saved games in Galactic Civilizations I Stardock Forums

Watch it William, you'll rile people up with the idea that it's really not that complicated ;) I tried it earlier in the thread and look what happened ;p

Reply to After 20 hours, I give up...the UI wins. in Galactic Civilizations I Stardock Forums

Mostly good points that I hope Brad and Co. will consider over the next few months. I would definitely like to see the UI polishing as a higher target on their patching goals.

Reply to What is the logic behind Phoenix ships? in Galactic Civilizations I Stardock Forums

Re: Starhawks Yes, I have built them (well one). My initial USS Hero had been taken out in a war and, in spite of what you say, I've never seen all the anomalies used up on a huge or gigantic map, and only once on a large map - so when it came available I built it. Now, granted, I learned my lesson about how largely useless they were and switched my explorer over to a Ranger as soon as could and wound up with one extremely powerful ship.

Reply to 1.03: Notice on saved games in Galactic Civilizations I Stardock Forums

I would say the one thing that could be done to make it more intuitive to people not familiar with the Stardock family of products would be to give the stand alone GalCiv it's own tab in the software registration dialogue in SDC. That it is under Drengin.net, and moreso part of a drop-down menu within the Drengin.net panel (i.e. hidden at first), I'm sure has thrown off more than person.

Reply to 1.03: Notice on saved games in Galactic Civilizations I Stardock Forums

Also, before you get too riled up that last post, please consider that people may have completely different ideas of what 'competent' means. I come from a background of having been building and configuring systems for myself, friends, family, and even on the job sometimes for years. My idea of 'competence' is definitely out of whack with the general public, and probably yours as well. Lords know my wife has wanted to kill me on more than one occasion for the things that I just expect ev

Reply to What is the logic behind Phoenix ships? in Galactic Civilizations I Stardock Forums

"Maybe Brad can take a look at the metaverse and see if he can count the number of people use Phoenix ships on one hand" Do you really think he needs that much? ;) I took one look at the ship and *when* it was available and ran away quickly.

Reply to 1.03: Notice on saved games in Galactic Civilizations I Stardock Forums

And for the record, I do stand by that statement 100%, if you can run a computer *competently*, then you could figure it out without all the gnashing and wailing.

Reply to 1.03: Notice on saved games in Galactic Civilizations I Stardock Forums

"Code Monkey that last message was addressed to you. You have no respect for anyone it is obvious. Come visit me in Vegas I will adjust your attitude for you." Sure you will. My attitude is the same attitude in real life as it is behind a keyboard. I am helpful, I am basically a nice guy, but I give back what someone else gives. Make a whiney, bitchey post, and I'm going to respond in kind. Respect is earned, never given freely.

Reply to 1.03: Notice on saved games in Galactic Civilizations I Stardock Forums

Um, it is under downloads on the main GalCiv site, exactly where you would expect it. It's currently version 1.02, 1.03 will be out later. You must wait precisely for the reason I said: it takes a lot of time to construct a self-installing patch, whereas SDC does it on the fly automatically. Also, where do they push other products on you? If you do subscribe to Drengin.net, you get *all* of their games published to date, and all of their games published in the next 18 months for $20 mor

Reply to A Peaceful Galaxy in Galactic Civilizations I Stardock Forums

triCritical, on the lower levels the AI is very passive which will let you win just about any way you want. If you just build peacefully, you'll win by a cultural victory almost every time. If you go to war, they usually will roll over without too much stress so enjoy being the evil conquerors.

Reply to 1.03 in Galactic Civilizations I Stardock Forums

RayChua: that seems to be a side effect of patching midway. The last patch gave us increased morale, this one hurts it.

Reply to 1.03: Notice on saved games in Galactic Civilizations I Stardock Forums

Alank287, not sure what you're problem is, but it's not Stardock. Updates always show up with their exact version number and while not immediately obvious, the software is pretty intuitive. It's not much different than setting up an email client - if you can run a computer with any degree of competency, you can figure it out. Now, granted I've been using their Object Desktop client (which SDC apparently can replace) for some time, but I figured out exactly what to do on the first shot.

Reply to Metaverse!? in Galactic Civilizations I Stardock Forums

Well, one other possibility: are people running a firewall, and if so, does GalCiv have permission to access the network? One of the poorer choices is that there is no success/failure dialogue for a submission. If it works, it takes you to the front screen. If it fails, it takes you to the front screen.