Re: Proportions mod Version 2.2 released
 

<blockquote><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><hr>Originally posted by PvK:


Heh, sorry about that. Yes, I'll make org generators a separate family. I never rely on the automatic "upgrade facilities" function, so I never noticed this.

PvK<hr></blockquote>

So riddle me this, Batman...how do you upgrade you facilities? How are you doing it? Is it possible for me to upgrade a Minor City to a City, I always only get the option to jump to Major City or Metropolis (depending on Tech Level).

[ 08 May 2002: Message edited by: RabidFan ]</p>

Re: Proportions mod Version 2.2 released
 

Well that can't currently be done (unless you hack the mod between turns), though I asked Malfador if he might consider doing it (his request list is still pretty huge at this point though).

The thing Oleg was talking about and I was responding to, was using the "Upgrade Facilities" command (not just the "Upgrade" button for a specific colony, which gives some [but not enough] choices), which automatically goes and gives all possible upgrade orders. The few times I tried to use that, it did all kinds of things I didn't want, even in the unmodded game, and I spent more time undoing upgrades I didn't want, than it could have saved me.

PvK

Re: Proportions mod Version 2.2 released
 

Rats, I was hoping there was some undocumented way to do this that you had discovered...

Is it on purpose that I cannot upgrade a Colony(GAS/ICE/ROCK) to a minor city?

Re: Proportions mod Version 2.2 released
 

Re: Upgrading facilities

Although it involves micromanagement on the planetary scale, I rather do it by individual planet (typically starting with those farthest from the frontier and staggered during wartime (if I even do it at all at that point)).

I find that the global "upgrade facility" is more trouble than it's worth.

Does getting up at 5AM to play a couple rounds constitute addiction? Sounds of a 3-pack-a-day smoker and SEIV player: "I can kick this whenever I want!"

Re: Proportions mod Version 2.2 released
 

<blockquote><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><hr>Originally posted by RabidFan:
...
Is it on purpose that I cannot upgrade a Colony(GAS/ICE/ROCK) to a minor city?<hr></blockquote>

Yes. You can upgrade a settlement to a community, but then the next thing is to build a Minor City from scratch (actually, it's more efficient to first build a bunch of simple facilities quickly to take advantage of the unused space, and then [maybe a good construction yard and then] work on cities).

Originally they were going to be upgradable to cities, but currently there is a problem in the way upgrades work in SE4 that would mess this up (you could upgrade from a cheap settlement to a Megalopolis and end up essentially getting Megalopolis [or other city type] for half the cost).

PvK

Re: Proportions mod Version 2.2 released
 

<font size="2" face="Verdana, Arial">Dresden, February 13th, 1945.

Re: Proportions mod Version 2.2 released
 

<font size="2" face="Verdana, Arial">Huh?

[ 10 May 2002, 00:57: Message edited by: TerranC ]

Re: Proportions mod Version 2.2 released
 

Is that a suggestion that the Terrans should be categorized as genocidal?

Re: Proportions mod Version 2.2 released
 

<font size="2" face="Verdana, Arial">Yes and No. If we could do it to ourselves, then most certainly we will do it to alliens. Since we are so far the only known sentient species in Universe, our bloodthirsty history is by default the galactic standard. Thus, given that human race is most certainly capable of aforementioned acts, it either does not classify us as genocidal race or genocidal behaviour is a trademark of advanced intellect. In either case, Proportion' *_AI_strategies.txt should be modified to include

Don't fire on planets := False http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon9.gif

Re: Proportions mod Version 2.2 released
 

I don't think I agree, although I suppose it's up for interpretation. You're of course free to mod out things you don't agree with, as always.

In this case, I suppose it is possible to interpret the destruction of planetary population by ship bombardment as "merely" the causing of so much damage that the civilized space age assets there are merely un-useful to their parent empire. That argument has some merit - it may be that "glassing" a planet is just making it effectively need to be rebuilt, rather than necessarily killing all of the millions or billions of defenseless civillians that may be there.

On the other hand, it is perhaps more easy, natural, and common, to interpret this game event literally - that it does represent wholesale extermination of civillians, perhaps even to the point of trying to kill them all or, to use the usual expression on this forum, "glassing" the planet.

The USAF's attacks that levelled German and Japanese cities in World War II were amazingly horrible and killed massive numbers of civillians, but they did not exterminate everyone. In SE4 terms, this could be seen as either literally destroying everything and everyone (what the AI does unless you set Target Planets to False), or as just destroying the facilities and leaving the population (which you could do manually in SE3, but I think in SE4 even a human player isn't shown how many facilities are left, so you couldn't really do that even if you wanted to in SE4, and certainly not in simultanous games where the AI leads the battles).

I don't think it's really possible to interpret the shooting off of all the population units on a planet as not involving massive numbers of massacreing civillians. The good ol' USA may have done this plenty in WW2, but a mere 60 years later, and long before real space expansion, I think the trend is definitely towards recognizing that there may be something just a wee tad evil/horrible/immoral/wrong about mass-slaughtering civillians to get a military advantage.

Anyway, I like to hold out hope that many otherworldly races, and even our depraved species, once they are so advanced that they spread into space, will have developed at least a modicum of morality in these terms.

Moreover, I generally leave Target Planets = True for the Capture Planet strategy, and if this strategy reaches a planet but forgot to bring troops, or other such accidents, the AI will go massacreing civillians anyway. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/image...s/rolleyes.gif For the most merciful races, I may even leave their "Capture Planet" strat set to not target planets, though then their AI will need to be tweaked so it has some chance of dropping troops without always getting annihilated by weapon platforms.

All of this brings up the other main reason why I set this to false in most cases, which is so that ground combat will be more a part of the game. If the AI would just show up and lay waste to planets from orbit, there would be much less ground combat. Given how long it takes (and how expensive it is) to develop a colony in Proportions, this is also, I would think, something of a practical advantage - if the AI conquers enemy colonies rather than bLasting them, it will gain a lot more. Even without transports, though, it may be useful for the AI to sit on enemy planets without attacking - blockading them without getting their ships creamed by the planetary defenses (maybe).

Of course, the AI is needing quite a few tweaks still, including getting more invasion transports out there.

Anyway, those are my thoughts.

PvK