Things (BUGS?) that didn't change

[wingte]

Ok, after 3 trys and about 6 hours I got the gold demo.
First game I find that the game setup still doesn't recognize the "Low, Medium, High" selector for number of other empires when "generate random empires" has been selected. The minimum is still 3 and even in the "low" setting there can be as many as 8 AI players.
It works properly when only "generate random neutral empires" is selected. Low resultes in 1-3, med gives 3-6 and high produces 7 or more.

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Wingte

[wingte]

Also right off the bat I find that satelites and base stations still don't distribute themselves evenly arround planets and there still isn't any mechanism to move them so they are still useless for planetary defense.
I am not a programer but this looks like it should be easy to fix. Just a little code to check for base stations and/or satelites and space them evenly during combat. Slighly more difficuly would be a tech level that would give very limited movement just like real stations and satelites.

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Wingte

[Psitticine]

I think even just auto-positioning the station(s) between the planet and incoming enemies would keep them more useful. At least then the enemy would have to go all the way around, keeping out of range, to circle around to the blind side.

[wingte]

Yes repositioning before battle would help but that would still leave the other side open.. Equal spacing 3 of those with long range weapons would force the attackers to take out at least one before spending a lot of energy on the planet. Even then to get in range to hit the planet would probably put them in range of at least one of the other two stations.

4 of them would always put the attackers in range of 3 defending stations unless the attackers choose to stand off a corner and attack one station only with missles. Again even if they take out one station they will have to put up with being in range of two other stations when they try for the planet.

I guess a human controlled very large fleet with very large ships with massive mount weapons could take out two stations at once and still have enough combat turns left to get the planet but the AI isn't that smart.

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Wingte

[General Hawkwing]

Wingte,
You can can destory 3 stations and a planet in combat with as few as eight ships. All you have to do is move, fire, move. I didn't notice any improvements in station range to conteract this, however I only had limited time to play the game this weekend. Stations must have a greater range or limited combat movement to conteract this attack style. Even stations with 8 (the largest I've seen) missiles can be defeated since they launch all the missles at 1 ship, leaving the others free to fire with immunity.

[Seawolf]

Guys,

This is being worked on. Planets now can target up to 10 ships at a time.

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Seawolf on the prowl

[Noble713]

What about bringing back player-controlled ship redeployment before the battle starts? SE3 had this and I found it worked quite well setting up ship Groups (back before we had formations ). If you could position your space stations in that one turn before the battle really starts (that one where you can't move your ships or anything), I think it would go a long way towards solving this problem, as well as the problem of multiple formations in really big fleets.

[wingte]

quote:

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Originally posted by General Hawkwing:
Wingte,
Even stations with 8 (the largest I've seen) missiles can be defeated since they launch all the missles at 1 ship, leaving the others free to fire with immunity.

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Hmnnn,, No Multiplex Tracking on Stations????



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Wingte

[wingte]

OK,,
Multiplex tracking does work.

AND

"Emergency Propulsion Pods" no specifically say they can be mounted on stations.

So,, this opens all kinds of interesting possibilities. The first one is to put 3-5 EPP's and 10 PD's and say 10 Organic armor and a Repair pod , a multiplex traking and 5 massive ionic dispersers. Finish with 20 fighter pods and fighters with shield depleters and electric cannons. Use the EPPs to get close, launch the fighters. Hit the biggest enemy with the shield depleter then the electric and then use the ionic disruptors to disable as many drives as possible so they can't do shoot and run. The planet should have mostly missles to pick off the imoblized and the PD on the station pick up enemy missles. Launch a secound fighter group on the next turn and regroup all the fighters into one group.


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Wingte

[General Hawkwing]

Wingte,
Great ideas for a human player. I doubt you'll ever see an AI use them. The stations I've fought have not used multi-tracking. I play a great deal of 1 player games becasue I like to play for a few hours at a stretch. I look forward to multiplayer games but not until after Christmas, since SE4 will be my Christmas gift to myself