brand new player with a couple dumb questions

[sincrofashad]

I have google searched, and been unable to answer either question, so please forgive me if the info is here somewhere.

I have the base game on steam, no expansions at all.  From what I have read, there should be an option somewhere in the new game screen to pick which sector I start at on the map, and to pick what my initial ship unlocks are.  I cannot figure out how to do either of those things.  I am guessing it is because I am missing the expansion that allows me to do that, but some confirmation would be great.  If I could also find out which expansion enables those option, that would be awesome, too.

Other then that, enjoying the game.  Played the tutorial.  Got brutally curb-stomped in beginner game 1, and now playing beginner game 1 again, at a lower AI setting.

-Sinc

[x4000]

Cheers, and welcome!  Sorry for the confusion -- and you can do this without any expansions.  Goodness we wouldn't hold that back to an expansion!

The confusion probably comes from the fact that you can't choose from ANY planet to start in.  But rather up there on the map in the lobby, there are certain ones with a circle, a number (how many wormhole connections come to that planet), and then an icon (for the ship type you start with).  You hover over those, of which there are I think 12 now, and choose the one you want.  It will turn the color of your faction.  I strongly suggest just choosing one, but you can start with more homeworlds at once if you want (making you filthy rich but the AI also way more powerful, too).

If you don't like the ship options available to you at start, then you can reroll those along with the map.

Cheers!
Chris

[sincrofashad]

Thank you very much!  Yes, I saw the thing about don't pick more then one, since it makes the AI more powerful, but I could not for the life of me figure out how to pick a ship/planet.

Oh, additional question:  Am I correct in assuming that to replace one command station with another I need to build a colony ship, scrap the original command, and rebuild the one I want?

-Sinc

[x4000]

Cheers!  Glad I could help.

For replacing command stations... I think we coded it so that you can now build a colony ship and then have it create a new command station (which automatically destroys the other one), but I can't recall for sure.  You definitely need the colony ship, and if it's redding out the options on there when it's on a planet with an existing station, then you will need to just go ahead and scrap the first one.  It was that way for years, but I can't remember if we actually got to the thing of switching them over more directly.  Could have sworn we did...

[Aklyon]

I think you or keith moved that to a build option in the command station's menu at somepoint, so that you can do it without the colony ship.

[x4000]

Did we?  Yeah, it gets hard to remember. 

[Imago]

Yeah, you can build a new command station directly from an existing one. The only drawback is that you can't place it in exactly the same spot as the old one.

[Traveller]

Unless I've been doing it wrong, even if you replace a command station while the old one still lives, you still get a time delay before construction can start--just like the 1:00 or 2:00 timer that happens when the AI blows your station up.  Keep that in mind before you say "hmm, wave coming in thirty seconds, let me research Mk.III military command stations and use their new guns to defend this vital chokepoint that has no external supply".

Not that I've ever done that or anything.

[Imago]

I'm almost certain didn't happen for me. The old one vanishes and the new one starts building instantly.

Which I guess could be abused that way but if you've shelled out that much knowledge on command stations you kind of deserve it.

[Toranth]

Unless I've been doing it wrong, even if you replace a command station while the old one still lives, you still get a time delay before construction can start--just like the 1:00 or 2:00 timer that happens when the AI blows your station up.  Keep that in mind before you say "hmm, wave coming in thirty seconds, let me research Mk.III military command stations and use their new guns to defend this vital chokepoint that has no external supply".

Not that I've ever done that or anything.

Back when Shark was introduced, people suddenly discovered that switching out command stations would trigger AI exowaves and give the AI bonus AIP - not a popular part of that feature.  So there was a tab added to the build menu, that would allow the construction of a new Command Station near the existing one, which would NOT count as destroying the previous one.
By using a Colony Ship to replace the previous command station, you can build anywhere in the system, but it counts as destroying the previous one - so you get Shark effects, and the rebuilding delay.

[sincrofashad]

I ended up using both methods.  The first, using the colony ship, definitely caused a rebuild delay, and also, as a *wonderful* side effect blew up my energy collector forcing me to rebuild (using the rebuilder thingie) then repair that.  I did not notice an AI Progress hit from doing that, however.  Te second, rebuilding from the Command Station menu, did not cause a build delay, nor did it blow up the energy collector.  In fact, I was able to do a complete replacement of an Econ I station with a Military II station in about 20 seconds, which was nice because I only had about 30 seconds before a wave of cloaked ships hit that planet.

-Sinc

[Toranth]

I ended up using both methods.  The first, using the colony ship, definitely caused a rebuild delay, and also, as a *wonderful* side effect blew up my energy collector forcing me to rebuild (using the rebuilder thingie) then repair that.  I did not notice an AI Progress hit from doing that, however.  Te second, rebuilding from the Command Station menu, did not cause a build delay, nor did it blow up the energy collector.  In fact, I was able to do a complete replacement of an Econ I station with a Military II station in about 20 seconds, which was nice because I only had about 30 seconds before a wave of cloaked ships hit that planet.

-Sinc

The AI Exowave and the AIP hit are part of the Shark AI Plot.  You don't have Shark A or Shark B enabled, you won't see them.