Biggest PBW game ever? [Archive]

geoschmo

July 2nd, 2003, 03:28 PM

Originally posted by Rojero:
<blockquote>quote:<hr /> For example, has anyone ever succeeded to reach maximum amount of ships if it is not limited ? How can you reach maximum if there is not limit to maximum?<hr /></blockquote>The maximum allowed is 200 ships by default, but that can be raised to as high as 20,000 at game setup. 200 in a game I have seen, 20,000 I have not. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon7.gif

Geoschmo

Fyron

July 2nd, 2003, 07:04 PM

You need to mothball more ships, and play on 255 system dense FQM maps. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon12.gif

Pablo

July 2nd, 2003, 07:06 PM

In one of my games there is a limit of 1000 ships and 15000 units. They are both very annoying because my build queue is almost always on hold. I even started to build kamikaze ships for that reason http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon10.gif This is a 17 players DNM game currently at turn 164.

PvK

July 2nd, 2003, 08:36 PM

I've reached over 1000 ships, and could imagine approaching 20,000 eventually.

PvK

Fyron

July 2nd, 2003, 08:59 PM

The most I have gotten in a PBW game was about 700. I would have gotten more, but the game ended...

tesco samoa

July 2nd, 2003, 09:21 PM

1600 ships, 800 bases 200000 units...is my record....

Hopefully i will be able to hit 5000 ships... that would be really really cool

Asmala

July 2nd, 2003, 10:12 PM

I've reached 1000 ships in the game where I had (and have) my all time biggest empire.

Btw it's pain to manage 1000 ships, at least in my 800 Mhz computer. It'll take about half a minute to open ships/units window http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/shock.gif You can expect that I won't open it very often http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon7.gif Is that normal in such slow computer that I have?

atari_eric

July 2nd, 2003, 10:26 PM

Originally posted by tesco samoa:
1600 ships, 800 bases 200000 units...is my record....

Hopefully i will be able to hit 5000 ships... that would be really really coolYikes! http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/shock.gif I couldn't even imagine having that many ships... I'm not sure I could even play with that many...

[ July 02, 2003, 21:27: Message edited by: atari_eric ]

PvK

July 3rd, 2003, 12:58 AM

It is a pain, but I haven't seen quite that much delay in opening windows with my 1000+ ship game on a slower machine, but then I didn't have 1600, nor 800 bases.

Mainly I would avoid using the ships/units window, which I don't use very much anyway.

And of course, most ships were in fairly large fleets.

Still, it would take me over an hour to do a turn properly.

PvK

primitive

July 3rd, 2003, 01:07 AM

Originally posted by Asmala:
I've reached 1000 ships in the game where I had (and have) my all time biggest empire.

Btw it's pain to manage 1000 ships, at least in my 800 Mhz computer. It'll take about half a minute to open ships/units window http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/shock.gif You can expect that I won't open it very often http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon7.gif Is that normal in such slow computer that I have?Nope,
Im running an Empire in RTH with some 3000 ships (half mothballed) and 1400 bases on a 750 MHz system. Takes about 5 secs to open the ships/units window.

tesco samoa

July 3rd, 2003, 01:38 AM

i may not see 5000 ships then

primitive

July 3rd, 2003, 01:46 AM

Originally posted by tesco samoa:
i may not see 5000 ships thenYou will Tesco, you will. My ships http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon10.gif

Or, we could just make peace. You know the terms http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon12.gif

Karibu

July 3rd, 2003, 01:59 AM

I am playing PBW game called Return to Hell. That is biggest game I have been so far, my scores are currently over 40M and rising. It made me wonder how much scores you or your co-player has had?

For example, has anyone ever succeeded to reach maximum amount of ships if it is not limited or same with units or perhaps made more resources in turn that it had turned into negative, etc.

So far I have had no problems, except when converting resources. 1M seems to be limit in one turn / converter.

tesco samoa

July 3rd, 2003, 03:57 AM

send me an email... I cannot send you email

Is their anyone who can accept email from me.

I get bounced from almost everyone now...

Fyron

July 3rd, 2003, 04:05 AM

Get a new email address.

narf poit chez BOOM

July 3rd, 2003, 04:15 AM

that seems a bit drastic

Fyron

July 3rd, 2003, 04:42 AM

If his email no longer works properly, it is one of the few options available. The other is to get the company to fix it, but that is not likely to happen. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon12.gif

Karibu

July 3rd, 2003, 10:02 AM

In my current game I have 1700+ ships, 16000+ units and 1300+ bases and my ship -window opens in few seconds (800 MHz Athlon TB). Only when I am cloacking a fleets of 100 ships, it takes some time (1-2 min) to do this (I think there could be done some code optimization). Heh, I will see if I reach 5000 ships and 100000 units http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon7.gif If I do, I will take a screenshot of the scores and send it to the board http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon10.gif

I have found that managing ships is not so hard if you develope some policies you follow. For example, use gathering points where all ships go when they are built. Keep them in fleets, not outside of them. Name ships so that you find them easily in the ship list, etc.

What I meant of reaching top limit of ships when it is not limited is that there must be a variable (word, double word or something) which is the hard coded limit for ships. Though it might be like 2 billion, so then it won't matter.

Have anyone reached a limit of how many ships can be added in a fleet (not meaning that you have 200 ships in a fleet when game ship limit is 200 ships)?

In one game I found out that ship limit counts also mothballed ships :/ So it does not help to make a huge mothballed fleet.

Asmala

July 3rd, 2003, 09:41 PM

According to your commments it should work fine in my computer. Too bad my computer doesn't know it http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon8.gif

PvK

July 3rd, 2003, 09:48 PM

Originally posted by Asmala:
According to your commments it should work fine in my computer. Too bad my computer doesn't know it http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon8.gif Are you using Win XP?

Karibu

July 3rd, 2003, 09:49 PM

Asmala, I think the problem may lie in your computer in general. Is it slow and do you have to wait with other applications? If so, I recommend you remove some programs, make disk defragment, etc. computer caring.

One thing might be also the amount of RAM memory. I have 384 MB. If you have Win 2000 and 128 MB memory, I do not wonder it is slow.

Base rule:
Win 95: 32 MB RAM
Win 98: 64 MB RAM
Win ME: unlimted RAM
Win 2000: 128 MB RAM
Win XP: 256 MB RAM

and this is only for running OS. Running applications, double the amount of RAM.

[ July 03, 2003, 21:20: Message edited by: Karibu ]

PvK

July 3rd, 2003, 09:50 PM

20,000 ships in space is the highest amount officially allowed. Of course, you could have two other empires surrender to you, and I think their 20,000 ships would also be given to you. If SE4 indexes with a 16-bit number, there might be overflow problems around 32 x 1024 or 64 x 1024.

PvK

Karibu

July 3rd, 2003, 10:35 PM

Well, in fact I do have two surrendered empires under my control, but I don't think their ship limit is added to mine (it is defined for a player not for empire, I believe but Imight be wrong too). Though I think that if someone gets 20 000 ships, the game is quite finito then. It require about all the resources any galaxy produces. Ever.

Asmala

July 3rd, 2003, 10:35 PM

My computer isn't slow in general. Of course new games doesn't work but all programs work and also a little bit older games. I have Windows 98 and 256 MB RAM.

Grandpa Kim

July 5th, 2003, 05:06 AM

Originally posted by Asmala:
I've reached 1000 ships in the game where I had (and have) my all time biggest empire.

Btw it's pain to manage 1000 ships, at least in my 800 Mhz computer. It'll take about half a minute to open ships/units window http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/shock.gif You can expect that I won't open it very often http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon7.gif Is that normal in such slow computer that I have?I have an antique P133 and one of my games has about half that many ships and it only takes a couple seconds to open the ship window. The empire, diplomacy and score windows take the longest-- maybe 5 or 6 seconds-- but the worst is the construction when set to "rate". That takes up to 30 seconds. I make darn sure I don't leave it on "rate" when I close the screen!

Atrocities

July 5th, 2003, 05:16 AM

New PBW Big Game Idea

Start a game at high tech and give each player 10 starting planets. Everyone waits 20 turns before leaving their home systems. NO EXPLORING until turn 20 to 21. Large Galaxy 250 systems, automatically generated with manual additions.

Image the carnage that would come from something like this.

geoschmo

July 5th, 2003, 05:20 AM

Originally posted by Karibu:
Well, in fact I do have two surrendered empires under my control, but I don't think their ship limit is added to mine (it is defined for a player not for empire, I believe but Imight be wrong too). Pvk wasn't saying that would increase your limit. What he was saying was that if you have 20K ships, and an empire with 20K ships surenders to you you now have 40K ships. Your limit is still 20K so you can't build anymroe until you scrap 20K or get them killed in combat, but they don't disapear just cause you are over your limit. Same deal with capturing ships in combat or having them gifted to you. The ship limit only interferes with new construction.

Geoschmo

Ragnarok

July 5th, 2003, 05:36 AM

Originally posted by Atrocities:
New PBW Big Game Idea

Start a game at high tech and give each player 10 starting planets. Everyone waits 20 turns before leaving their home systems. NO EXPLORING until turn 20 to 21. Large Galaxy 250 systems, automatically generated with manual additions.

Image the carnage that would come from something like this.That's what the game Karibu was talking about started out as. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon7.gif (I am the host of the Return to Hell game)
It started with 12 players, 255 systems, high tech, no intel, 10 starting planets on good setting. Then each played had their own cluster to work with until they wanted to come out or till someone wanted to come in. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon7.gif Very interesting game so far. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon7.gif

Karibu

July 5th, 2003, 04:19 PM

Originally posted by Ragnarok:
That's what the game Karibu was talking about started out as. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon7.gif (I am the host of the Return to Hell game)
It started with 12 players, 255 systems, high tech, no intel, 10 starting planets on good setting. Then each played had their own cluster to work with until they wanted to come out or till someone wanted to come in. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon7.gif Very interesting game so far. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon7.gif Actually, it was 3 starting planets and I think I waited too long to come out. However it has worked with me. By now everybody has made "turteling" (system graw shield on every system) and leaved one or two points open. I think in the late game those points will be so firtified, that breaking it may require several fleets of several hundred baseships (defender shoots first).

I think this kind of games should include house rule that no system shields are allowed. It would force people to lean more on tactics rather than raw power. But this might be the biggest PBW game ever. And I admit, it is micromanaging HELL (I think I understand now the name of the game: Return to micromanaging Hell http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon10.gif ).

Though, I admit that this game has teached me some tricks how to micromanage, things I haven't faced in my previous games.

geoschmo

July 5th, 2003, 04:38 PM

Originally posted by Karibu:
Actually, it was 3 starting planets and I think I waited too long to come out. However it has worked with me. By now everybody has made "turteling" (system graw shield on every system) and leaved one or two points open. I think in the late game those points will be so firtified, that breaking it may require several fleets of several hundred baseships (defender shoots first).

I think this kind of games should include house rule that no system shields are allowed. It would force people to lean more on tactics rather than raw power.
You could simply disable stellar manip tech at game setup.

tesco samoa

July 5th, 2003, 04:59 PM

Primative.... I have given you the system.

I agree to stop ship movement to that system

tesco samoa

July 5th, 2003, 05:04 PM

Actually I like the Shields... If we did not have them then my systems would have 10 warp points going to each system in my control with one warp point leading out.

Either way... Same result.

I look forward to Hell returns or what ever it is called ( same set up ) Not taking the talisman in a game like this has really put me at a disadvantage.

Next Hell game i will break down and play my first ever pbw religious race... ( or you ban religous from the next game )

Karibu

July 5th, 2003, 05:58 PM

IMHO religious trait is most powerful of all but we should not ban it outright because of the talisman. IMO we should make house rule that only talisman is not allowed. That would put religious at the same line with other racial traits.

I believe, then more people would go to other combinations from "religious trait + some other trait" to "not religious rait + not religious trait". It would make more diVersion, clearly.

BTW, do you have any knowlede if Aaron is making any changes to traits or the costs in the SEV?

Phoenix-D

July 5th, 2003, 07:27 PM

"You could simply disable stellar manip tech at game setup."

Not in this game Geo. The clusters weren't connected by warp points. No stellar manip = no contact.

System shields are fine; without them it would turn into "warp in, send sun nova, repeat". Only reason I'm building mine is that reason..several of my systems aren't even inhabitable, so no shields -there-.

Fyron

July 5th, 2003, 08:21 PM

Originally posted by Karibu:
Well, in fact I do have two surrendered empires under my control, but I don't think their ship limit is added to mine (it is defined for a player not for empire, I believe but Imight be wrong too). Though I think that if someone gets 20 000 ships, the game is quite finito then. It require about all the resources any galaxy produces. Ever.No, it is the limit per empire, not per player. If you have 10k ships and 10k are gifted to you, you can no longer build any ships.

Actually, Planet/System Gravitational Shield facilities require Shields 9/10, not any Stellar Manipulation tech.

[ July 05, 2003, 19:27: Message edited by: Imperator Fyron ]

PvK

July 5th, 2003, 08:27 PM

Interesting Geo - if ships can be gifted normally and that ignores the limits, then an alliance of two empires could have one empire gifting to the other to give the receiving empire an unlimited number of ships.

PvK

PvK

July 5th, 2003, 08:32 PM

Originally posted by Karibu:
...Though I think that if someone gets 20 000 ships, the game is quite finito then. It require about all the resources any galaxy produces. Ever.Nah, not with maintenance reduction. My 1000-ship fleet was using less than half my maintenance, and I wasn't really trying to increase my resource production, even though I had... about 9-9 systems. So the practical limit is probably more like hmmm... well, I'd say at least 100,000 _good_ ships, not to mention escorts etc., and of course, not including the infinite potential of mothballed ships.

PvK

Fyron

July 5th, 2003, 08:35 PM

Yes, that is true. But, that is a very gamey tactic and would give you a really bad reputation if you tried that in a PBW game.

tesco samoa

July 5th, 2003, 08:57 PM

moth balled ships count towards the limit do they not...

Fyron

July 5th, 2003, 09:02 PM

No, they don't. Check your score after you mothball a ship. It goes down.

[ July 05, 2003, 20:03: Message edited by: Imperator Fyron ]

geoschmo

July 6th, 2003, 04:28 AM

Originally posted by tesco samoa:
moth balled ships count towards the limit do they not... Originally posted by Imperator Fyron:
No, they don't. Check your score after you mothball a ship. It goes down.Actually Fyron, Tesco is correct. Mothballed ships still count against your ship limit. They don't add to your score though and they don't show up in the score display as you say, but they still show in the ship/units screen and they will cause you to hit your ship limit and won't allow new construction. They have to be scrapped, destroyed or given away.

Geoschmo

geoschmo

July 6th, 2003, 04:34 AM

Originally posted by Imperator Fyron:
Actually, Planet/System Gravitational Shield facilities require Shields 9/10, not any Stellar Manipulation tech.Yes, I am aware of that. But the system grav shields can't be disabled at game startup without disabling all shields, or without using a mod, and disabling stellar manip (which can be done at game setup) eliminates the need for system shields to begin with. Serves the same purpose as eliminating the shields. However, I see it wouldn't work for the game in question since the clusters weren't connected. In an all warp points connected map though it would be effective in eliminating the turteling problem.

Geoschmo

[ July 06, 2003, 03:36: Message edited by: geoschmo ]

Ragnarok

July 6th, 2003, 05:05 AM

Originally posted by Karibu:
Actually, it was 3 starting planets and I think I waited too long to come out. Oh really? I could've swore it was 10. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon7.gif Been too long since the game started.

When I made my empire I was still a newbie to PBW and didn't know how to best set my empire up and so forth. Now I am learning how to deal with my bad empire set up in this game and I have learned alot. I'm just like you, learning how to micromanage like never before as I have never had this large of an empire. (Though still small compared to yours. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon7.gif )

Phoenix-D

July 6th, 2003, 07:25 AM

Rags, getting over your own empire descisions is nothing compared to dealing with someone else's. hehe. I've retrofitted or scrapped pretty much all the ships I started with, re-designed many colonies..but the racial setup leaves me scratching my head.

Ragnarok

July 6th, 2003, 03:19 PM

Originally posted by Phoenix-D:
Rags, getting over your own empire descisions is nothing compared to dealing with someone else's. hehe. I've retrofitted or scrapped pretty much all the ships I started with, re-designed many colonies..but the racial setup leaves me scratching my head.I can understand that. It was my brothers empire. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon7.gif He was a newbie to SEIV and PBW all at the same time. So he didn't know much about how to set his empire up. And I didn't help him because at the time we lived an hour away from each other and I didn't make it down there much; nor he here. Then he decided to join the Army so he had to leave the game.