If You Could Overhaul One Minor Faction or Plot...

[TheVampire100]

They travel between different stations, but not on rails, it's a little more freely. There are stations seeded on several planets of the AI and the trains from one station to another and travel through every planet between these two stations. When it reaches it's destination it searches for another station and so on. You can destroy those stations and redirect the trains, preventing them from reaching your systems.
I never played with Astro Trains though (too bothersome, making the game a lot harder), so most stuff I know is fromt he forums and the wiki.

If you hav all expansions, Astro Trains are not the only thing that you have to worry. Dark Spire are a lot more chaotic.
I also never play with Dark Spire (except that one game that I started for videos to make it more entertaining for the viewer).i avoid everything that makes the game too annyoing or chaotic for me. They distract me from my tasks and I don't like this in strategy games. That's btw somethign I like about AI War.
You can direct the flow of the game with the minor factions Sort stuff out that you don't like and add stuff you like, create your own custom game. There should be more strategy games like this.

[Pumpkin]

Hey! Don't make more than one page thread while I'm looking away! ()

Overhaul one MF? Ast...

OTHER than Astro Trains

Damnit! ()

Neinzul Roaming Enclaves
Neinzul Preservation Wardens

Let start this report by saying I love the Neinzul and these two MF are among my favorite, lore wise.

Now for the gameplay... I think the hostile roaming enclaves (without considering preservation wardens) are not enough to balance the superweapon grade of the friendly armada. I played with them at intensity 10 (and Dark Spire 10)... I thought they were overpowered at intensity 4... At 10 They're near worth an easy golem MF. I'm exaggerating, of course, but really, dealing with the roaming hostile isn't enough.

However, I understand they can be a pain. I spent hours and many games thinking they are a pain in the... thruster. Until I learn how to manage them. Then they became mundane and I started always enabling preservation wardens at the same intensity to really start to balance them. (But yet I find it's not enough.) But I said I understand how they can be a pain, and Arcen seems to take the way toward separating benefit from pain and let players balance their games, like what they did with alt.champ.progress/nemesis). So my suggestion would be to remove neutral and hostile roaming enclaves from the first MF and improve the preservation wardens that I find not even enough as a balance.

Now for the Preservation Wardens overhaul, what I think it deserve is a smarter AI. Their problem is that they just suicide on human planets. Maybe a little banding (threat-like) behavior would be nice. Also, the fact that neutral enclaves are supposed to attack both AI and Human sounds interesting, but I never found them having the chaotic and !!fun!! impact on the game. However, the point is not to make a Dark Spire MkII ("dark roaming enclaves"? How lame!)... I don't know how to handle this idea, but I think it was quick-and-dirty by the time it came in the game. For the Preservation Warden specific behavior, they are supposed to attack humans because they mine metal. I won't debate the lore side of the question. ("What? The AI take all the galaxy, fill it with junks and guard posts and patrols, and the one to blame is me?!?" I said I won't!) but I can never tell the difference between hostile roaming enclave and preservation wardens (but by the type of younglings spawned).

>> Long story short: having friendly/neutral/enemy roaming enclaves sounds great, but ended poorly (IMO); maybe the best is to make one MF friendly and one MF hostile.

Human Marauders
Human Resistance Fighters

I'm not unhappy with the "spawn outside and come from deep space". Maybe because I'm used to it. Maybe because I think they are very thematic and lore-ish and I love that. Maybe because I think the no-wormhole-spawn/sniper-immunity is a very important thing in making them a different threat; the marauders would be too similar to AI waves. Enabling no-warning would make some surprise attack; maybe the game deserve a middle ground like "sometimes waves have no warning"; the "no-warning" would have an intensity, 1 is 1 wave out of 10 (10%) has no warning, and 10 is 100% no warning (intensity*0.1 probability that wave come without warning). Hey, that could be mantis'ed!

However, I find the intensity 10 very underwhelming. Compared to a dark spire intensity 10, the is no more a "dominating impact on the game" for Marauders/10. I'm not familiar with the formula behind the hood, but I know they both spawn during big battles, either to help players (Cavalry incoming!) or take advantage on the weaker (bully opportunist pirates). So the "when to spawn" mechanism feels good. However, I think they cap at 40 ships per wave, IIRC. This is underwhelming. For a "dominating impact on the game", I think they must spawn for at least 100. This require testing, but I think 100 would be a good first test.

>> Long story short: make them MOAR!

Dyson Sphere

This one will be a very short topic, because I know it's out of Red.Queen's hacking ability. No offense, but even for Keith, I bet it wouldn't be easy to make it.

Dyson mood isn't fun. Don't get me wrong: having a friendly dyson filling your empire with patrolling gatlings is fun. But the neutral and angry moods are never something the players can play with. Controlling the dyson planet would be stupid: just by insta-taking it (fast-build a OCS with engi then destroy it as soon as completed) is enough to capture all the goodies (ICanons, DNodes, ZReserves, etc), and gathering K doesn't require capture. The only drawbacks are: no metal, no energy, and need to have an adjacent planet to provide supply and build turrets on it. A very little drawback for the huge free-patrol benefit.

I read on the wiki that hybrids have ways to interfere with dyson's mood. That sounds very interesting. I'm sure the fun is somewhere along this way. The AI and the player fighting each other to influence the dyson and trying to be the "best friend" to earn it's valuable (and powerful) friendship: that sounds fun. But as I said, big feature.

Misc
Go home, Pumpkin, you're drunk.

Going along the list... Oh, the neinzul rocketry corp. Should be a plot. (And some plots should be common to both AI; there is no point in having a plot for only one of them, this is a matter of type/personality. Well, I won't debate this now and here.) Well, nothing more for the Minor Faction. However... On the chapter of plots, I think there is some modifications. Well, I wish Arcen make a big revamp in the lobby options (not the options themselves, but their organization in the lobby): some AI types are plots, some plots are modifiers, some MF are plots... Anyway, I said neither now nor there.

[Advanced] Hybrid Hives are overwhelming. I'm not saying too hard, just... did someone else try HH and AH at intensity 10 for both AI? Doesn't it feel absolutely ridiculous and absurd? Preemption too, IMO it also feels that intensity 10 is just insane and 4 isn't "a good middle-ground". Well, on that chapter, you can answer me "you're drunk, Pumpkin, go home". AI diff 10 is designed to be unwinnable, so having plots and MF that insane isn't the big problem. But maybe tweak the curve to make intensity 4 looks like the current intensity 1 or 2; this way newbs can set 4, be crushed and down it to 1 or 2; I feel that intensity 1 for preemption is already a lot. Well, I'm tired. Maybe I'll re-read this tomorrow and edit-cut this last part.

[Toranth]

Although fixed Astro Trains would be nice, and Hybrids could use a lot of tuning, I don't think those are in 'moddable' territory.

So I'll mention Beachheads.
Right now, they are insanely overpowered, basically an instant-lose button for the planet they arrive on, if you use turret-based defenses.  Also, they don't quite make sense for the name.

Instead, I think beachheads would be far more interesting if the acted as, you know, a beachhead - arriving with a cover wave, but then spawning new AI units (like an AI Eye) for as long as it survives.  To prevent serious scrap-gathering abuse, it should get stronger over time (the same way Hacking response does) by spawning more, more powerful units, at shorter intervals.

[Chris_Stalis]

Regarding the 3 human minor factions (marauders, resistance fighters & colony rebellions):

I'd like to see this overhauled and expanded. The Champion nebulas introduced the notion that you're not the only human faction surviving the great war. Personally, I'd like to see a faction that actually has an explicit set of goals that it tries to go after while the player continues their own objectives. Expanding on the idea that there are other human commands that have their own agendas would be an interesting way to do it.

Totally beyond the scope of a simple mod, but it's what I'm interested in seeing.

[Red.Queen]

Hey! Don't make more than one page thread while I'm looking away! ()

Hehe couldn't help it, it was quiet at the office this afternoon, and AI War is on my machine at home where I can't poke at it with my haxx0r tools for a few more hours.    Though said poking will likely not happen tonight, Mondays are a *long* workday and am tired.   Tomorrow starts my "weekend" though!

Overhaul one MF? Ast...

OTHER than Astro Trains

Damnit! ()

   And even despite that, Astro Trains still tried to <HOOONK HOOOONK> barge their way in.  Rude things.

<Neinzul Roamers and Preservation stuff>

Interesting, more votes for these.  I can see splitting them up, given how NPW are just moar Neinzul, but angry.  I still agree with you and Vampire about just too many of the buggers spawning from the Roaming Enclaves MF, at least at moderate to low intensities.  I did see the formulae for spawning these things while wandering around the codebase this weekend, they may be fairly easy to tame.

Pumpkin, do you have a sense for how many Roaming Enclaves should spawn at intensity 4 every 30 to 60 minutes?  Curious if you lean towards the same amount that Vampire does.  You've spent more time playing with MFs than I have so I'm quite interested in the input.

<Resistance and Marauder stuff>

It's definitely more than 40, but I'd have to look up how many.  I've seen up to 120 total Resistance fighters on 4, and the largest spawn of Marauders so far was 80 on 4.  They probably use the same formula, given how all their other mechanics are identical except for hostility and ship name/appearance.

Sounds like these guys might just need to spawn more frequently in fights and in larger numbers.  They're nice flavor, but yeah, not much impact unless you're very lucky or unlucky.  "MOAR!" is generally easy.

Dyson Sphere

This one will be a very short topic, because I know it's out of Red.Queen's hacking ability. No offense, but even for Keith, I bet it wouldn't be easy to make it.

Trying to use reverse psychology on me, Pumpkin?  You know saying things like "impossible!" is very dangerous around me...  >D

Yeah, I got nothing on this one at the moment.  Just from reading through old threads I can tell this one doesn't get much love, but I've no idea what to do with it even though it seems like a cool idea, and that seems to be the same for everyone else.  Maybe me/other people will get some inspiration at some point.

Going along the list... Oh, the neinzul rocketry corp. Should be a plot. (And some plots should be common to both AI; there is no point in having a plot for only one of them, this is a matter of type/personality. Well, I won't debate this now and here.)

Why a plot?  A Minor Faction is kind of a plot shared for both AIs.  Just curious.  I know we already discussed how this one should probably get renamed as it feels weird filing it under the Neinzul theme.  But renaming units is just opening up the ships.xml file in a text editor, Ctrl+F to the thing you want to rename, and that's it, so anyone can do it if it bothers them enough.

Anyway, thanks for the comments Pumpkin!

Although fixed Astro Trains would be nice, and Hybrids could use a lot of tuning, I don't think those are in 'moddable' territory.

Everyone's gotta go saying the "not possible" thing... <eye twitch>  Going to resist this repeated provocation, at the very least because these are such large, complex Minor Factions that seem to have generated a lot of talk over the years that they really should get their own discussion thread if I ever get stupid/crazy/drunk enough to think about messing with them.

That wouldn't be for a while though, I need to explore what the limits are of my reverse engineering tools before I even think about anything like that (because my old workflow where I worked purely in MSIL by hand is not practical for larger stuff, I need the ability to stay in C# to be able to ever have more ambitious possibilities on the table, good news is I am starting to see promising results with some initial tests, even on inserting edits to extremely massive methods), otherwise I'm not going to get much bang for my buck on modding time and effort, and well, I do like to *play* the game as well as hack it. 

So I'll mention Beachheads.
Right now, they are insanely overpowered, basically an instant-lose button for the planet they arrive on, if you use turret-based defenses.  Also, they don't quite make sense for the name.

Aha, I was *waiting* for this one to show up!  I figured the only way it wouldn't, is because it's been so unpopular for so long, that everyone would simply forget it.  I was hoping it would pop up though, because I was toying with some ideas of my own, but wanted to see what others would come up with.

Instead, I think beachheads would be far more interesting if the acted as, you know, a beachhead - arriving with a cover wave, but then spawning new AI units (like an AI Eye) for as long as it survives.  To prevent serious scrap-gathering abuse, it should get stronger over time (the same way Hacking response does) by spawning more, more powerful units, at shorter intervals.

<ears perk up>  Now *this* is an interesting one.  And quite possibly doable by cannibalising and reworking some of the hacking/Eye logic.  I was originally contemplating stealing some of the defense crippling but not total killing abilities off the Trains (since no one likes them anyway) and attaching them to the different tiers of Beachhead, so you get progressively more blocking of your defense the more you annoy the AI, but I *like* this.

Given how there are several tiers of Beachhead object, there's no reason why the spawn couldn't be tweaked a bit so that it randomises between an offensive model that acts like a Threat/Sentry Eye spawning ships, and a defense-buster that carries debuffs like the Radar Jammer II effect or some of the not so "lol YOU LOSE" effects like messing with Tractors or stuff like that...  That way you can't be sure exactly how the AI is going to try to screw with your planet.  Overwhelming force?  Or debuffs?

Thanks Toranth!

Regarding the 3 human minor factions (marauders, resistance fighters & colony rebellions):

I'd like to see this overhauled and expanded. The Champion nebulas introduced the notion that you're not the only human faction surviving the great war. Personally, I'd like to see a faction that actually has an explicit set of goals that it tries to go after while the player continues their own objectives. Expanding on the idea that there are other human commands that have their own agendas would be an interesting way to do it.

Totally beyond the scope of a simple mod, but it's what I'm interested in seeing.

Sounds like a very good idea for a potential expansion brainstorming thread.

[Pumpkin]

This one will be a very short topic, because I know it's out of Red.Queen's hacking ability. No offense, but even for Keith, I bet it wouldn't be easy to make it.

Trying to use reverse psychology on me, Pumpkin?  You know saying things like "impossible!" is very dangerous around me...  >D

Although fixed Astro Trains would be nice, and Hybrids could use a lot of tuning, I don't think those are in 'moddable' territory.

Everyone's gotta go saying the "not possible" thing... <eye twitch>

...

NREnclave and NPWardens

Pumpkin, do you have a sense for how many Roaming Enclaves should spawn at intensity 4 every 30 to 60 minutes?  Curious if you lean towards the same amount that Vampire does.  You've spent more time playing with MFs than I have so I'm quite interested in the input.

I would be interested in seeing the formula (promise, I'll read it, this time ). For friendly enclaves, they are ok IMO. From [http://www.arcengames.com/forums/index.php?topic=17215]Outa Track MkI[/url], intensity 10, counted 37 at 5:30, 44 at 6:30. Sounds like 7 each hour. Maybe "[intensity] each hour" would be a more player-readable formula, however intensity 10 would be really superweapon-grade. Intensity 4 would be 40 friendly enclaves at the 10 hours mark; sounds ok. For the hostile MF, I'm not sure; balance is always tricky. Maybe the same "[intensity] each hour" would be a lot, but maybe they should band each half hour for more impact: at intensity 4 a player would have 2 hostile enclaves each half hour, possibly banding to attack one world or dispersing to attack two fronts simultaneously. At intensity 10, each half hour, 5 hostile enclaves attack one planet, or 5 planets are attacked by one enclave. Sounds like a good impact, at least on the paper. So this is my vote: [intensity]/2 every half hour, for both friendly and hostile MF.

On the lore topic, I still don't know how to make NPWardens more "wardens"... But it would touch the AI behind it, and it sounds out of modding-land (really, no reversed psychology there )

HMarauders and HRFighters

I would be very interested in seeing the formula, too. I guess there is debug options to activate somewhere. I saw some core MkV veterans posting wave composition reports. If someone can teach me this master-trick, it would be nice. I hope MF stuff is covered by this debugging output.

I never saw the numbers you mention, R.Q. Having a look at Outa Tracks MkI, where only HRFighters was enabled at intensity 10, I don't remember them spawning more than a handful of time with minor effect. However, more (frequency and/or quantity) sounds required when intensity 10 isn't shaking things off enough (I expect a game with one MF or plot at 10 to be centered on it. DSpire/10 was really fun, for instance). I'm looking forward to see how the formula can be tweaked up and how the testing unfolds. So, yeah: moar!

NRCorp

On the topic of MF/plot, I'll try to be short, because it's a revamp-wish that matters a lot to me. So, short? Okay. Minor Factions are non-AI factions: this is thematic and important. The difference between modifiers and plots is that modifiers affect both AI and plots affect each AI separately. My grief about plots is that there is no point in separating AI1/AI2; this often ends up in just multiplying intensity by 2 or seeding the plot on one color only. I could debate more and more about AI type, AI distinction not enough clear for players, etc, BUT I WON'T DO THIS HERE (sorry, I'm shouting at myself because I feel the urge of continuing on the subject).

So renaming NRCorp isn't just a matter of renaming units to me, it's a matter of sorting out what's a MF, what's a plot, an AI modifier, and AI type, etc. And you (R.Q) are not involved in that. It concern the lobby and the general design. NRCorp is fine (and fun) on the chapter of pure gameplay. Conclusion: don't touch it.

Beachhead

This is an excellent idea. However, I disagree with you, Toranth, on the topic of difficulty. The point in every pain-option is to learn how to get with it. Like NEnclaves for TheVampire. The point with beachheads is to force the player(s) to rely on mobile defense, which some players already do on normal settings. The purpose is to push a turret player "out of its tracks".

However, I agree with the "not thematic" problem, and I think you are hunting a very good idea with the eye or raid engine spawning on player territory. I would be ok to name this new plot/modifier "beachhead", but please let the current beachhead as it currently is; just rename it "supply disrupter" or something if you'd like. So carry on!

[kasnavada]

If I could change something, I would not change the minor factions. I'd change the flow of the game.

First of all, I'd do a review of the "unlock" and of the "command station" mechanics. And I'd change the starting conditions.

About the stations:
- possibilty to hack to unlock building AI advanced command stations for yourself.
- remove lvl 2 stations, replace with level 3 stations.

About "hacks" and unlocks:
- remove most turrets and starships from research list and unlocks at game start.
- have a advanced research station unlock 2 things among: one starship, one fleetship, one smallcap ship, one turret. This includes making "smallcap" ship a new category of ships. Hacking it would enable to choose more finely what you get.

About "starting conditions": I end up making the same layout for game start again and again. Possibility to store that and the few "v" & "loop build" commands, not to mention basic group would be great. What I always start with is :
- mercenary as group 0, build at 2000000 metal, queued on enclave then beam & parasite.
- one starship constructor as group 9, 1500000 metal (and possibilty) which builds all starships. This one on "auto build" and "V".
- another starship constructor which builds the neinzul drone thingy and the scouts, on "auto build".
- one space dock for scouts, on "auto build" again.
- a dozen space dock on a line, each set to build a single ship line (one builds fighters, then the second one builds missile and so on). This way I can concentrate on building what I want fast. Those would be on "auto build" and "V".
- 2 dozen more engineers.
- a few well-placed shields.

Same, if I could "store" patterns for defenses, like a group of turrets to block a wormhole, a beachhead... and so on.

Next, I would remove AI reducers and adapt the game difficulty (reducing, probably) accordingly. As the game currently is, I feel they're not needed nor particularly useful except for the fact that the game is tailored to them being there. For "advanced" players the AI progress stays generally lower than 100 for 80% of the game, so it means that the AIs barely notice you until you beat up one of them. Kind of the theme, but... Despite you taking possibly taking about 10-15 planets, growing much stronger, and so on ? I personally don't feel like the AI is responding much to my actions in that situation, more that I'm abusing mechanics to make it sleep. And this would mean we can ditch the whole AI floor mechanic which barely makes sense in my opinion... by that I mean it's a mechanic which has been put in the game to create AI progress because of another mechanic which is there to remove AI progress. Does not make sense to me. Also, it would free hacking for other purposes.


Last, and that's the major dream I've got with AI war... I'd make it possible to start with neinzul, zenith or spire. Basically changing the story to "Humans unleashed a plague on the galaxy, but we hid, and survived... now it's time to take back what's ours (and so on...)". Yeah, sorry, I'm not much of a writer. All factions would then be tailored to what their theme is, Ie neinzul would have only mobile ships, spire would only build starships and larger ships, and so on. Unlocks, buildings and whole game mechanics would need to be reviewed for this to be viable, though. For example, spire would have to get asteroids to create metal, while neinzul might have "metal" (food ?) tied to the number of enclaves, and enclaves "cap" tied to destroying command stations and other specific buildings. However, this change is so far from the base game we might just call that game "AI War: fleet command 2". And we might also think about putting new factions (from SBR or TLF) with this.


Anyway, that's about it. About minor factions specifically, a boost to spire ship and "roaming" asteroids for the spire ships. I don't like that there is a limited amount of asteroids and would like some kind of mechanic to "catch" asteroids rather than "fixed" number of asteroids. So basically, in a given system, one asteroid might "pass" every 5 minutes, it's quality dependent on where you are. Maybe a "flycatcher" building could be use to attract new asteroids (and possibly could attract waves). This, coupled with a boost to spire ship (which are now quite weak compared to "regular" fleet ships), would make this minor faction much more appealing to me =).

[Kahuna]

Do human rebel colonies still increase AIP by 100? If yes, it's an "insta lose button" and should be nerfed. Also marauders and beachheads are overpowered. If I remember correctly marauders are sniper immune, have very long range and move quite fast. In addition to that they come from the edge of the gravity well. Making them about as annoying as Astro Trains. They're like AI 3 that's always a Warp Jumper.

Dyson Gatlings don't seem to do anything anymore. Even a single laser or needler guard post will pretty much shutdown the Dyson Sphere.

^^imo the neinzul MFs are balanced and "do their job" as intended.

[Pumpkin]

Also marauders and beachheads are overpowered.

The author of the most famous defense and turret placement guide think beachheads are overpowered? How funny!

If I remember correctly marauders are sniper immune, have very long range and move quite fast. In addition to that they come from the edge of the gravity well.

Correct. If they would come from the edge of the gravity well without sniper immunity, they would be just killed at spawn. If they would come from wormholes, they would be just lame no-warning waves. Their current unique behavior is what make them interesting (read hard and challenging, of !!fun!! if you're a DF player).

However, I agree they have a very annoying combo when dealing with turrets: long range and radar dampening. IMO, there is nothing else to tweak than dampening and dagger's range to make them a bit less annoying. However, their purpose is to be annoying, to force players use their fleet to defend because turrets are great against AI that come from wormhole but unable to cope with backstabbing marauders. Just like beachheads.

[Kahuna]

Turret placement becomes completely irrelevant the moment the AI Beachhead pops up.

Ofcourse there are ways to counter the AI Beachheads but it still seems like they're a bit too powerful. Counters include Assault Transports filled with Space Planes or some other Heavy destroying fleet ships. Space Planes are a very good choice because of their radar dampening and good dps too. Attack boosted Zombards woulf most likely do the trick too. Just keep them on stand down mode until the beachhead spawns. Then alpha strike it/them.If the AI likes to send zombards too then have some transports/fighters/swarmers absorb their alpha strike so you don't lose any zombards.

[Radiant Phoenix]

I would make Alt Champ Progress the default (intensity controlled by handicap), and make Nebulas a minor faction accessible to HCS players.

[Draco18s]

One minor faction or plot? Astro--right, other than those.
I'm tempted to say "beachheads" but really the only tweak those need is to be announced. I don't mind having to use my fleet for defense, but going "oh a wave of fighters,  i can take that" and going out on an attack only to find out that it was "fighters and a beachhead" and not HAVING a fleet to defend with is a problem.

Which brings me to what kills me:
Exowaves.

Every single time they show up right after I got my fleet ready for a major offensive and make me wait for the exo, after which I need to rebuild for the major offensive, at which point 20: GOTO 10. It's not fun, as it grinds the game to a halt where I'm unable to make a big leap forward and a smaller leap will kill me in the long run.

They are not really "trains". They are cargo transporters (even if this is space, somehow you have to transport supplies between planets, it does not magical appear anywhere) that are also extremly powerful and nearly impossible to destroy. They have also various special abilities like tachyons (removes cloaking from ships in the system).

http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Galaxy_Express_999

[Chris_Stalis]

Which brings me to what kills me:
Exowaves.

Every single time they show up right after I got my fleet ready for a major offensive and make me wait for the exo, after which I need to rebuild for the major offensive, at which point 20: GOTO 10. It's not fun, as it grinds the game to a halt where I'm unable to make a big leap forward and a smaller leap will kill me in the long run.

Don't wait for them. No, seriously, don't wait for them until they're 95% ready to trigger. Unless you like to crank the minor faction triggering them up to 7+, the timer is usually fairly manageable. They also tend to prefer taking whatever path minimizes the number of your planets they have to fly through from the AI homeworld. Knowing this, you can usually arrange for an anvil to get in the way, especially if you play with zenith traders and invest in the armor booster.

[Captain Jack]

http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Galaxy_Express_999

That was my first manga. 

For my part... I want a full overhaul of the Champion/Nemesis system. Frankly, the Nebulas drag and any Nemeses with melee drones can destroy three command stations in three different systems before you can mount a defense. Most of the later Nebulas are only possible with an insane amount of micro or multiplayer, so god forbid you try to multitask. Also the foldouts are fantastic for your economy, but pretty bad as far as their ships go, and to add insult to injury their descriptions are cut and paste. In all fairness, the advanced modular fortresses are super cool.

That's basically asking for a redo of Ancient Shadows though, if that's a bit much then I'll cheerily ask for changes to roaming enclaves. The allied ones shouldn't all camp out on your homeworld.

[Toranth]

Although fixed Astro Trains would be nice, and Hybrids could use a lot of tuning, I don't think those are in 'moddable' territory.

Everyone's gotta go saying the "not possible" thing... <eye twitch>  Going to resist this repeated provocation, at the very least because these are such large, complex Minor Factions that seem to have generated a lot of talk over the years that they really should get their own discussion thread if I ever get stupid/crazy/drunk enough to think about messing with them.

That wouldn't be for a while though, I need to explore what the limits are of my reverse engineering tools before I even think about anything like that (because my old workflow where I worked purely in MSIL by hand is not practical for larger stuff, I need the ability to stay in C# to be able to ever have more ambitious possibilities on the table, good news is I am starting to see promising results with some initial tests, even on inserting edits to extremely massive methods), otherwise I'm not going to get much bang for my buck on modding time and effort, and well, I do like to *play* the game as well as hack it. 

It wasn't a challenge, really!  It's a scale-of-work thing, as you said.  Last time those topics came up, people generated enough ideas that there could have easily been an entire full-sized expansion centered around just one of those ideas.  Heaven knows I've got all sorts of ideas for them, too

So I'll mention Beachheads.
Right now, they are insanely overpowered, basically an instant-lose button for the planet they arrive on, if you use turret-based defenses.  Also, they don't quite make sense for the name.

Aha, I was *waiting* for this one to show up!  I figured the only way it wouldn't, is because it's been so unpopular for so long, that everyone would simply forget it.  I was hoping it would pop up though, because I was toying with some ideas of my own, but wanted to see what others would come up with.

Instead, I think beachheads would be far more interesting if the acted as, you know, a beachhead - arriving with a cover wave, but then spawning new AI units (like an AI Eye) for as long as it survives.  To prevent serious scrap-gathering abuse, it should get stronger over time (the same way Hacking response does) by spawning more, more powerful units, at shorter intervals.

<ears perk up>  Now *this* is an interesting one.  And quite possibly doable by cannibalising and reworking some of the hacking/Eye logic.  I was originally contemplating stealing some of the defense crippling but not total killing abilities off the Trains (since no one likes them anyway) and attaching them to the different tiers of Beachhead, so you get progressively more blocking of your defense the more you annoy the AI, but I *like* this.

Given how there are several tiers of Beachhead object, there's no reason why the spawn couldn't be tweaked a bit so that it randomises between an offensive model that acts like a Threat/Sentry Eye spawning ships, and a defense-buster that carries debuffs like the Radar Jammer II effect or some of the not so "lol YOU LOSE" effects like messing with Tractors or stuff like that...  That way you can't be sure exactly how the AI is going to try to screw with your planet.  Overwhelming force?  Or debuffs?

Glad this sounds like fun to people. 
I think Radar Jammer II should be a higher mark ability, but yeah, that sounds fun.  Grav effects, tachyon range, Attritioner abilities, or let them spawn the Hacking special effects, too.  Maybe give the Mk V version cloaking, for extra special fun.

Beachhead
This is an excellent idea. However, I disagree with you, Toranth, on the topic of difficulty. The point in every pain-option is to learn how to get with it. Like NEnclaves for TheVampire. The point with beachheads is to force the player(s) to rely on mobile defense, which some players already do on normal settings. The purpose is to push a turret player "out of its tracks".

My biggest complaint is that while in the early game, your mobile fleet can match an incoming AI wave, as time passes and AIP rises, the incoming waves get stronger faster.  If you go heavy-starship, for example, your mobile fleet will be seriously outgunned by a wave on a regular basis.
Plus, there's the luck factor - Since it removes supply, the Beachheads also turn off forcefields.  That means that the Advanced Factory or Fabricator you were protecting is suddenly unshielded AND located at the same system-edge that the Beachhead waves arrive from.  A little bad luck, and *poof*!  That's just not fun to me.  When I lose, I want it to be because I screwed up, not just because RNG decided to laugh at me for a few seconds.