ElGranCapitan

Can't build orbital refineries in Beta Feedback Sins Forums

For some reason my construction ships won't build orbital refineries. I've researched them, built it on the map, but the construction ship won't go to it. If I try and send it to the refinery manually it says 'target must be an unfinished structure'. Yet I also know from looking at the graphs when I quit the game that a couple of AI have refineries that are producing resources. This is my first game with the beta, and I've never had this problem before.

Reply to Forge Tools for Sins v1.05 Now Available in Sins Modding Sins Forums

I was wondering why I can't open any of the existing .galaxy files using Galaxy Forge. I just get a blank screen when I try. Also, on a completely seperate topic, over the years I seem to have lost my nickname, with my actual name appearing. I don't seem to be able to change this using my account settings, I'd appreciate it if a mod or someone could get back to me on that.

Reply to Listing all the tech tree gaps/flaws in Twilight of the Arnor GalCiv2 Forums

[quote]If issue #1 were fixed and the Yor's advanced manufacturing and research planetary improvements made cheaper then they were be competitive mid-game.[/quote] Actually, I've edited the planetimprovements.xml file to do just that. I've found it really easy to copy the xml files into the default mod directory and edit them. Although for some reason when I put the planetimprovements.xml in the mod directory I got two of each improvement in the build queue, so I just backed it up and

Reply to Listing all the tech tree gaps/flaws in Twilight of the Arnor GalCiv2 Forums

Well, I have played custom races with most every tech tree, at least through the initial colony rush, and I find that tech trees significantly impact it. Note that I play on immense maps where there are generally quite a few planets up for grabs, and with a very slow tech rate. So the starting and early techs and planet improvements are very important. The Torians always kick butt. They are the best expansion AI race in every game I've played, and the easiest tech tree to expand with

Small suggestions ---> Great joy for me in Ideas GalCiv2 Forums

These relatively minor suggestions would be very much appreciated. Well, at least they appear minor to my non-programmer self. 1) I like big galaxies, and even immense seems small. A large part of that is due to range having been a complete non-factor for me, ever, in GCII. Your starting tech alone can just about send a colony ship as far as I've ever needed to have it go. I remember having to build starbases in GC just to extend my range enuogh to reach some isola

Reply to Petition for $20 Expansion pack in Galactic Civilizations I Stardock Forums

I'd buy direct.

Reply to Countdown Zero in Galactic Civilizations I Stardock Forums

V1.05.071 is showing up as available on SDCentral for me. :CONGRAT:

Reply to What am I doing wrong? (or How I Learned to Stop Whoring and Grow Econ) in Strategies Stardock Forums

Well, I haven't heard anyone mention the tax rate, so I will. I play on humongous maps, and trading tends to occur later and represent a much lower proportion of my total revenue. I play painful, and I find I can't use tech whoring as a crutch, even with diplo translators and superior diplo tech. Sure, if your morale is at 100% at the current tax level, building an entertainment center doesn't help boost morale. But it does let you raise the tax rate. I tend to peg my tax rate to Ea

Reply to Is Building Nothing Wasteful? in Strategies Stardock Forums

"The basic idea: You still have to pay the workers at your plants, but you haven't told them to do anything." This argument holds no water for me. Two words: maintenance cost.

Reply to Early game economic strategy in Strategies Stardock Forums

A high tax rate doesn't preclude the 100 morale. The only planets that need to be at 100 morale are Earth and any other planets that will be producing colony ships. So basically your tax rate depends on Earth's PQ. If it starts out high you can set your tax rate around 50% and stay at 100 morale. I micromanage, push it as high as it can go and still be at 100 morale, lowering taxes as pop grows and raising them when a colony ship leaves. Your first colonies should be on the best PQ planets

Reply to Early game economic strategy in Strategies Stardock Forums

You haven't mentioned your taxation levels, keeping them as high as possible reduces your deficit and keeps you at 100% spending longer. I always keep my taxes as high as they can go with Sol staying at 100%, which can be in the 50% range once Sol reaches (or if it starts at) PQ 20. This keeps Sol at max pop growth to feed your colony ships, there's no real reason at the start to care too much about keeping moral sky-high on your other worlds. I will even move most of Earth's population to a

Reply to Is Planet Quality +7% worth it? in Strategies Stardock Forums

IMHO for the cost +5 PQ is well worth it while +7 is not. What +7 gives you that +5 doesn't is really instant gratification, i.e. you only start to see the effect of +5 when combined with terraforming on PQ<20 worlds whereas +7 gives you a bonus of 1 upon colonization for PQ15-19 worlds. However, after soil enhancement and habitat improvement get built (my first 2 build items anyway) then there is only one difference, for PQ 15 worlds +25 gives 18 while +27 gives 19. You wind up with the same

Reply to Military/Social divide - what a waste (literally)! in Galactic Civilizations I Stardock Forums

"you still have mortgages on factories, severance pay, tool die storage, etc. " I continue to take issue with this line of reasoning as a justification for nothing costing you something. I would respectfully point out that all of the factories, etc. that you build have this little thing called a MAINTENANCE COST associated with, which pretty much seems to cover the above items. And if you want to take into account the above-mentioned costs, then for the sake of consistency w

Reply to Things you would like to see in a Galactic Civilization expansion set in Galactic Civilizations I Stardock Forums

I just had a quick thought, how about a new resource? One that comes to mind is a resource that gives a bonus to trade, seems quite intuitive to me, i.e. this resource provides us with sumptuous packing materials that make our products even more attractive or somesuch. Don't think it would be too unbalancing, and I think that it wouldn't require changes to the AI. Paul

Reply to Does alignment actually do anything? in Galactic Civilizations I Stardock Forums

How does being good affect relations with Tor and Altarians? Usually when I meet up with them I'm still Neutral, not having racked up enough points to be good. I don't notice any changes after I become good. Will my becoming good help anything, or do you have to be good when you first meet?

Reply to Leapfrog - Starting Strategies Part 1 in Strategies Stardock Forums

Actually, I have found that colonizing less means more in the early game. This is because in the early game with 100% max spending one of the keys is managing your deficit. All planets that you colonize are in the red, the lower the PQ the more so. So the more planets you have the greater your deficit, even though revenues are up. A lot of planets early chews through your starting reserves in a hurry. And what do those smaller colonies give you in return? They're still taking forever to pr

Reply to Bug Report Thread in Galactic Civilizations I Stardock Forums

I've got a problem after the game, ever since I've installed 1.3, continuing with all 1.3 updates installed since. After I quit the game, my system freezes and I have to reboot. I have no idea why, I have no problems in-game and never have. Win 98, GeForce 4 Ti 4200.

Reply to Minor cheese in Galactic Civilizations I Stardock Forums

You're welcome.

Reply to Leapfrog - Starting Strategies Part 1 in Strategies Stardock Forums

This looks like a good strategy for back-filling, especially on tight clusters and a gigantic map. I've found that often Earth is not near the edge of my cluster, or that it is in a different cluster from my frontier. I find that especially on tight clusters, where you can often set up choke points at one end or another of it, filling up the stars at the choke-points before the AI can be difficult given the often great distance Earth is, especially if you have to expand in more than one direct

Minor cheese in Galactic Civilizations I Stardock Forums

Last night I got curious and hit the escape key when presented with a colonization event. I discovered that the planet gets colonized without bonuses or penalties nor does your alignment change. I repeated the experiment a number of times to the same effect. The only time something happened was with the event with the ancient city ruins that you can choose to leave alone or not. Escaping from that choice led to the details screen showing a pop bonus of +17,000%, although after hitting end tu

Reply to Highest PQ planet? in Galactic Civilizations I Stardock Forums

I got a precursor PQ event colonizing a class 26 world that compined with my +5 stat made it a 39 before enhancements, ka-ching! Lost 10 morality points, but oh well, it was a sacrifice that had to be made. :D In this same game the Altarian capital is a purple star with a 26. Actually while I have seen a natural 26 PQ planet in most of my games (didn't always get them :sniff!: ), I cannot remember seeing planets with a PQ between 20 and 26 starting off. I find that a bit odd, up to 20 then o

Reply to Wasted Resources? in Galactic Civilizations I Stardock Forums

"But those players complained because it wasn't realistic. Even when you're not actually building something, you still have to pay your workers, maintenance on your plants and machinery, etc." Let's talk realism then. How about the maintenance you pay for your manufacturing centres, etc.? That sounds like it's covering the workers, plant and machinery maintenance, etc. The only thing that the production sliders change is the variable costs of production, i.e. the amount of resources

Reply to Good, Evil or Neutral? in Galactic Civilizations I Stardock Forums

I posted this in the suggestions for expansion pack thread, but thought it might be appropriate here as well: Right now being evil nets very tangible benefits (esp. in colonization events), being good doesn't really (o.k. maybe the Altarians like you more, and there are a few alignment specific techs). So basically you're good because you're trying to be good and purposefully giving up often juicy bonuses. You're evil by default if you just want the bonuses, or if you want to be evil yo

Reply to Things you would like to see in a Galactic Civilization expansion set in Galactic Civilizations I Stardock Forums

And I also wanted to plug my favourite notion of extending the explore and expand phases, perhaps simply by adding some sort of maintenance cost to new colonies for a period of time thereby preventing the initial pop rush that sees the galaxy filled up in relatively short order. The universe ought to be a pretty big place, yet I find there's not much elbow-room in them even on humongous maps. Other ideas including wormhole galaxies, areas of the map that are initially inaccessible, are also goo

Reply to Things you would like to see in a Galactic Civilization expansion set in Galactic Civilizations I Stardock Forums

"I would really like to see events that have bonuses for Good or even Neutral situations, and penalties for evil." So would I, and I don't think it would be at all difficult. Right now being evil nets benefits, being good doesn't (o.k. maybe the Altarians like you more, and there are a few alignment specific techs). So basically you're good because you're trying to be good and purposefully giving up often juicy bonuses. You're evil by default if you just want the bonuses, or if you w