Minimizing Micromanagement

[Buttons840]

I will make one last comment regarding my desire for free rally posts and be done.  There has been much debate on a closely related issue (control nodes).

You don't gain anything by researching rally posts other than a little convenience.  With rally posts you can position your units by placing rally posts.  Without rally posts you can still position your units in the same position, only you must do lots of clicking to ensure you ships are going where you want them to.  There is some strategy in deciding where to place you units, and this strategic decision remains even with free rally posts.  There is no strategy in pausing the game and issuing a dozen move orders just to get your units where you would like them to be.

To my knowledge rally posts were the last of these "gain nothing" technologies.  As such, I will not be calling for anymore freebies.

[x4000]

To my knowledge rally posts were the last of these "gain nothing" technologies.  As such, I will not be calling for anymore freebies.

And that's why I made the change (which is out now), enough people feel that way and I sort of agree.  Sounds like we're on the same page.

[Fiskbit]

Black Bobtree pointed out on IRC that this is incorrect:

"So, therefore, press Shift+L twice to select 1/6."

That should be 1/9. To get 1/6, you'd use Shift+L and then L.

[x4000]

Black pointed out on IRC that this is incorrect:

"So, therefore, press Shift+L twice to select 1/6."

That should be 1/9. To get 1/6, you'd use Shift+L and then L.

Whoops!  Great call, that has been fixed.

[Black]

Huh what? I don't remember saying anything about that on irc. What does L do? 

[x4000]

Huh what? I don't remember saying anything about that on irc. What does L do? 

Different Black, I guess.   L subdivides your current selection by half, and shift+L thirds it.

[quickstix]

I kind of worry these days there's a bit of a trend where people expect that they should just be able to pick up a game in two minutes. I see it as partly from the increase of casual games, partly from the 'mainstreaming' of gaming in general and a mindset where everybody expects every game in one genre to be the same way, as well as the graphics-over-gameplay generation that seems to be ever growing.

Unfortunately, that kind of attitude tends to create games that all play exactly the same and doesn't encourage innovation or creativity. What makes gaming fun for me is coming across games that are completely new experiences and sitting down for an afternoon reading and learning about how a game plays.

[Buttons840]

Q: How do we know that AI War is NOT a mainstream game?

A: It cost less than 60$ and receives free updates and technical support.

I learned this when I had my first problem with the game, posted on the forums and Chris, the lead developer and company owner, responds with a fix (which worked) in under 5 minutes.

Definitely not mainstream.

[x4000]

[Captain Cake]

Q: How do we know that AI War is NOT a mainstream game?

A: It cost less than 60$ and receives free updates and technical support.

I learned this when I had my first problem with the game, posted on the forums and Chris, the lead developer and company owner, responds with a fix (which worked) in under 5 minutes.

Definitely not mainstream.

Heh, I loled.

Dev responses are top notch, and even on strategy discussion or general gameplay and not just bugs or issues. It actually feels like they genuinly want to be a part of the community, and that makes the community as a whole better. The only other company that I've come across that is like that is CCP, and what a coincidence, both companies make awesome games that only get better with time. I guess there's some merit to listening to the fan base after all.

[Lancefighter]

id largely agree that taking out the entire knowledge system would kill a major portion of the game..

Anyway, yes, indie games are the best (ever), i think thats one of the indie dev commandments. Not sure..

[Buttons840]

Thou shalt love the games with all the heart, with all the mind, and with all thy soul.

Thou shalt love the community members.

Thou shalt not charge for DLC which is mysteriously 2 kilobytes in size, and upon closer inspection is an unlock code for what was already on the disk.

Thou shalt be the best ever.

[Kordy]

Problem is, 250K is an odd number. If you're at 3750K and wanted to buy a new starship line, you'd regret ever getting auto-frd nodes or something like that, since knowledge is mostly used in bulk, thousands per deal.

Getting rid of 250 K prices by either nulling them or upping to 500 isn't that much of a problem, it's optimization in K resource handling, imo. And for the record, I don't use rally posts at all, I'd rather keep the control to myself.

Huh. So apparently this post had two pages, bah.

[Fiskbit]

Sorry about that, Black; there are too many names to keep track of and I get them mixed up sometimes. I had meant to say Bobtree.