Two 1.013 bugs & sad story & energy reactor & misc

[Admiral]

Hi guys,

I introduced my (much, much younger) brother to AI War last night. He loved it. We played the release 1.013, not the new balance test version. >7 hours, played until 4:30AM.

Two potential bugs:

1) I had a bunch of Eng II in FRD mode. I also had some cruisers in FRD mode which were on the move. Some were damaged. The Eng II's were not repairing them, but were instead way off to the side in their "home" position. If I selected them (N+9 rubber band) and hit END, the Eng II's came and repaired them, while they stopped for a brief moment before heading out on the warpath.

So, there are two bugs: The Eng II not fixing the cruisers while FRD moving, and END not taking the selected minions out of FRD. (I don't mind the latter, but I would like a way then to say leave FRD mode and stop, maybe V-END or shift-END?)

2) At one point I had Parasites I through IV. The IV didn't show on the right side bar display, but if I clicked the icon, they were indeed selected. Later on in the game when the enemy had some V parasites, they all showed up. I didn't pay too much close attention, but did keep a savegame where it was happening (attached).

1.013 was fun.

Sad story

We actually lost the game. 20 planets, 5 Moderate + 7 Easier AI. We destroyed one homeworld and were regrouping for the attack on the second when we noticed... My brothers homeworld was destroyed. We hadn't noticed the enemy on the warpath with about 350 core ships (mostly bombers). By the time we figured it out - our energy was in the negative 100,000's and we had no defenses left so far back in our enemy lines (we took all planets). I deleted all my front line ships (freeing energy), teleported my fleet of Eng II and IIIs to the homeworld, and built a frantic set of Mk I turret defenses... And 250 Core Bombers walked through them like water. Oh well - I have never been so excited about losing!

Mechanic question: Where did that huge fleet of enemy come from? AI Progress was only into Mk II territory? I loved it... And felt like a moron.

I wished we had the "keep N autosaves" because I would have loved to see what the minimum amount of time I would have had to go back in time to save our asses - in other words, I would have liked to figure out how long we were dead without having yet figured it out. I attached the final autosave if anyone wants to see if they can pull a cat out of a hat.

Energy Reactors, etc.

I have decided I really, really dislike the 40% less per reactor mechanic. I was always low on energy, especially on this small map - but that seems to be the case on any map I play (including my single player 80 world maps). I mean, I was out of energy perpetually before I even took my first world, and I had energy plants on almost every planet (2-3 of each kind). Could we please have an option to remove that feature - or change it to something less onorous - at game start? Or, at least, a Mk III Reactor or scale energy loss to the # of planets in the world (or that you own, but I had previously suggested that and X x'd it)?

I really liked the new 10k starting knowledge. Eng II and Parasites III rock.

Could we please have some speeds between +0 and +1? +1 seems too fast sometimes.

Single player from multi

Could we please have an option to continue a multi-player game as single-player, or with fewer players somehow?

Map generation

I noticed lots of maps seem to have a series of planets right up at the top left. Presumably a generation artifact or bias. I would love to have a way to say "show only starting maps with homeworlds including these types" and, perhaps most importantly, a way to show the maps much more quickly. I like to find a map (on a large 80+ galaxy) which has a defensible starting area of maybe 6-12 planets with a limited number (1-2) of links to the rest of the galaxy. It's so hard to find these maps, and I'd like to tell the generator to generate them or find them in some way, please.

Conclusion

1.013 is a winner. I look forward to a new "resource usage over time" version, but I actually think the current resource usage (mixed metal/crystal) is good and don't look forward to seeing the costs change.

Cheers!

[Revenantus]

I introduced my (much, much younger) brother to AI War last night. He loved it. We played the release 1.013, not the new balance test version. >7 hours, played until 4:30AM.

That's great. I'm still trying to convince my younger brother to play AI War. Unfortunately he's generally not a fan of RTS games, but I'm hoping that this will be the exception to the rule.

1) I had a bunch of Eng II in FRD mode. I also had some cruisers in FRD mode which were on the move. Some were damaged. The Eng II's were not repairing them, but were instead way off to the side in their "home" position. If I selected them (N+9 rubber band) and hit END, the Eng II's came and repaired them, while they stopped for a brief moment before heading out on the warpath.

Interesting, posted as a bug in the Suggestions section for X's consideration.

So, there are two bugs: The Eng II not fixing the cruisers while FRD moving, and END not taking the selected minions out of FRD. (I don't mind the latter, but I would like a way then to say leave FRD mode and stop, maybe V-END or shift-END?)

Good idea, I'd support END taking units out of FRD mode, there's really no reason for it not to. Added to the suggestions section.

2) At one point I had Parasites I through IV. The IV didn't show on the right side bar display, but if I clicked the icon, they were indeed selected. Later on in the game when the enemy had some V parasites, they all showed up. I didn't pay too much close attention, but did keep a savegame where it was happening (attached).

I've loaded your save game and the parasite IVs do show up in the sidebar section for me. I've added it to the suggestions section as a potential bug for X to investigate.

I'm actually also going to add a suggestion to create a dedicated bug report section.

Sad story
We actually lost the game. 20 planets, 5 Moderate + 7 Easier AI. We destroyed one homeworld and were regrouping for the attack on the second when we noticed... My brothers homeworld was destroyed. We hadn't noticed the enemy on the warpath with about 350 core ships (mostly bombers). By the time we figured it out - our energy was in the negative 100,000's and we had no defenses left so far back in our enemy lines (we took all planets). I deleted all my front line ships (freeing energy), teleported my fleet of Eng II and IIIs to the homeworld, and built a frantic set of Mk I turret defenses... And 250 Core Bombers walked through them like water. Oh well - I have never been so excited about losing!

Mechanic question: Where did that huge fleet of enemy come from? AI Progress was only into Mk II territory? I loved it... And felt like a moron.

This concerns me. I'm assuming that those Core ships must have flown from Ceres, but I'm not certain why they would have done this. Had either you or your brother sent ships to the remaining AI homeworld?

-Ships guarding "core" AI planets will now come to the aid of a core AI command station that is under attack, attempting to prevent the AI player from going out of the game.  If they succeed in killing the ships on the AI home planet, they will then turn on the human players, so this can be extremely dangerous and even game-ending if not handled carefully.  This behavior is so potentially deadly that it will only be used by AIs of difficulty 7 or higher.

It could potentially be associated with this behaviour. Why they would not have fought you on Cardassia instead of making a bee-line for a Home Command Station is odd.

-Fixed a bug with AI ships not properly guarding the command posts they are supposed to reinforce, instead attacking player planets too much.

PhilRoi experienced a similar attack on his HCS, though it occurred at the beginning of the game with fewer AI ships. This issue sounds slightly different and was supposedly fixed in the 1.012 hotfix but I suppose it could be related.

Added to the suggestions section for X to add his thoughts to.

I wished we had the "keep N autosaves" because I would have loved to see what the minimum amount of time I would have had to go back in time to save our asses - in other words, I would have liked to figure out how long we were dead without having yet figured it out. I attached the final autosave if anyone wants to see if they can pull a cat out of a hat.

A 'rolling' autosave feature has been suggested I believe. I'd appreciate it too. Actually, it turns out it was you - http://arcengames.com/forums/index.php/topic,293.0.html

Energy Reactors, etc.

I have decided I really, really dislike the 40% less per reactor mechanic. I was always low on energy, especially on this small map - but that seems to be the case on any map I play (including my single player 80 world maps). I mean, I was out of energy perpetually before I even took my first world, and I had energy plants on almost every planet (2-3 of each kind). Could we please have an option to remove that feature - or change it to something less onorous - at game start? Or, at least, a Mk III Reactor or scale energy loss to the # of planets in the world (or that you own, but I had previously suggested that and X x'd it)?

As it stands I'm not sure that I agree with you here - even with the new efficiency mechanics I'm usually able to maintain a healthy energy balance, assuming I'm able to effectively defend the reactors on each planet.

There is a MkIII Reactor in the works, but it's primarily to complement a new booster structure mechanic that will allow the player to regenerate their forcefields more quickly. Maybe the new MkIII reactor will go some ways towards alleviating your energy issues anyway.

I really liked the new 10k starting knowledge. Eng II and Parasites III rock.

Same.

Could we please have some speeds between +0 and +1? +1 seems too fast sometimes.

A simulation speed slider is listed in the future DLC section, suggested by us actually - http://arcengames.com/forums/index.php/topic,491.0.html

Single player from multi

Could we please have an option to continue a multi-player game as single-player, or with fewer players somehow?

Out of interest, how do you see this working? Would a player gain control of another player's assets as well as their own?

Map generation

I noticed lots of maps seem to have a series of planets right up at the top left. Presumably a generation artifact or bias. I would love to have a way to say "show only starting maps with homeworlds including these types" and, perhaps most importantly, a way to show the maps much more quickly. I like to find a map (on a large 80+ galaxy) which has a defensible starting area of maybe 6-12 planets with a limited number (1-2) of links to the rest of the galaxy. It's so hard to find these maps, and I'd like to tell the generator to generate them or find them in some way, please.

Interesting idea, added to the suggestions section.

Conclusion

1.013 is a winner. I look forward to a new "resource usage over time" version, but I actually think the current resource usage (mixed metal/crystal) is good and don't look forward to seeing the costs change.

Yeah, I don't want to see the effective costs and deployment times change significantly. The real benefit of the flow based system is the potential for very fine control of resources. Still, it's admittedly not perfect yet.

[Admiral]

Hey Rev,

Congrats on your promotion! (Did I miss a post/announcement?) Maybe you can make the post entry/edit box resizeable, and/or make it larger (vertically) please.

My brothers homeworld was destroyed. We hadn't noticed the enemy on the warpath with about 350 core ships (mostly bombers). ... And 250 Core Bombers walked through them like water. Oh well - I have never been so excited about losing!

Mechanic question: Where did that huge fleet of enemy come from? AI Progress was only into Mk II territory? I loved it... And felt like a moron.

This concerns me. I'm assuming that those Core ships must have flown from Ceres, but I'm not certain why they would have done this. Had either you or your brother sent ships to the remaining AI homeworld?

We had attacked one homeworld. We started an attack on the second homeworld, at which point our (or at least my) energy went negative which meant no more repairs, so I aborted the attack and peeled off to the adjacent safe system.

After I started investigating why I had lost so much power (I was down to over 100k negative) I noticed a whole swath of planets from the second homeworld to my brother's homeworld were destroyed.

a) I was a fool for not noticing I was under attack earlier

b) I would like a much more intrusive alert to being under attack in the future - sound, lights, maybe a whole section in the top left corner like the "warp raid incoming" timer. That flashing light at the bottom is meaningless as I almost always have one ship in one of my sectors somewhere (usually a cloaked something left over).

c) I would like an indication of my allies being under attack in the future as well

So, perhaps you're right and the second AI's ships came to help the home base of the first AI, but we took that down pretty quickly (left it for last in his home planet) and so maybe he just decided to screw with us instead. It was great; I wish I had noticed the huge fleet earlier so I could have done something about it (or died trying).

-Ships guarding "core" AI planets will now come to the aid of a core AI command station that is under attack, attempting to prevent the AI player from going out of the game.  If they succeed in killing the ships on the AI home planet, they will then turn on the human players, so this can be extremely dangerous and even game-ending if not handled carefully.  This behavior is so potentially deadly that it will only be used by AIs of difficulty 7 or higher.

It could potentially be associated with this behaviour. Why they would not have fought you on Cardassia instead of making a bee-line for a Home Command Station is odd.

It could have been this, indeed. As we had every planet scouted and there were no other core planets (but the remaining homeworld), I don't see how the fleet of core enemies could have come from anywhere else.

A 'rolling' autosave feature has been suggested I believe. I'd appreciate it too. Actually, it turns out it was you - http://arcengames.com/forums/index.php/topic,293.0.html

Yes, I did indeed request this.

Single player from multi

Could we please have an option to continue a multi-player game as single-player, or with fewer players somehow?

Out of interest, how do you see this working? Would a player gain control of another player's assets as well as their own?

This is what I had thought the first time I had suggested this (which turned into X's current multi-homeworld implementation through my poor lack of communication):

Each "empire" controlled by one player would be completely separate; there would be no comingling of assets (income, power, unit limits).

Some UI changes would be appropriate, e.g., multiple resource lines at the top, perhaps with the appropriate background color in some dark, transparent manner. Include each empire's ships in "my ships" counts (e.g., on the right side details), but consider allowing UI showing breakdowns.

Allow grouping of multiple empire's ships together (e.g., Control-1 can include all ships across all empires you control).

Show all the assets (e.g., research, constructors, etc.) at the bottom for all controlled empires.

Have a "resume saved game lobby" which would let players connect and be assigned to pre-existing empires in whatever manner desired. It could also, for example, let two players swap empires (e.g., save game, go to resume game lobby, and assign the other empires this time). It could also allow a new empire or empires to join in, although that would have to have some interesting caveats and (saved) universe modification issues. You could also play out a multiplayer saved game all as one player. You could even have an option to convert to the current multi-homeworld game if the player likes that style.

Cheers!

[Revenantus]

Congrats on your promotion! (Did I miss a post/announcement?) Maybe you can make the post entry/edit box resizeable, and/or make it larger (vertically) please.

Promotion? I think the Sr Member title is purely based on number of posts. If not, then we both have missed an announcement somewhere.

Cheers for copying your posts over to the Suggestions section, X has some crazy idea that if we filter our ideas into the suggestions section ourselves he'll have more time for coding.

[Admiral]

Stop posting already then! You should lose credit for re-posting all my suggestions. *wink*

[Revenantus]

Stop posting already then! You should lose credit for re-posting all my suggestions. *wink*

What's that, Admiral? I can't hear you all the way down there at 249.

[Admiral]

Okay, that's it. I'm scripting a post and delete routine.