Proportions mod: So confusing!

[Mylon]

Oh... I guess those population modifiers don't modify bonuses in themselves. So building a spaceyard doesn't give me a 45% production bonus, it gives me a 300% production bonus (-75% to -30%).

Well... I guess hardy industrialist pretty useful for low level colonies!

[Suicide Junkie]

Building a spaceyard dosen't give you a build rate bonus, it simply sets the base build rate to the abilities of the space yard.
All your rate modifiers are then added up and multiplied with the new base rate.

[DirectorTsaarx]

Originally posted by Suicide Junkie:
Building a spaceyard dosen't give you a build rate bonus, it simply sets the base build rate to the abilities of the space yard.
All your rate modifiers are then added up and multiplied with the new base rate.

Building a spaceyard gives you the effect of a "build rate bonus" if you have the hardy industrialist trait (which gives a bonus to "planetary space yards"). IOW, the unmodded game allows planets to build at a base rate of 2000/2000/2000 without a yard; adding a Spaceyard I (without HI trait) keeps the base build rate at 2000/2000/2000, but you can build ships as well; adding a SY1 when your race has the HI trait gives a base build rate of 2500/2500/2500; if you also use racial points for increasing space yard rate, you can get even better figures (I've got a game going (non-Proportions) where I took space yard rate to 20% bonus, plus HI, and a SY1 on a new colony allows building at 2900/2900/2900; new colonies without a SY only build at 2000/2000/2000.

That appears to be what Mylon has done as well, since he refers to a "45% bonus" by building a space yard facility...

[ September 09, 2002, 18:02: Message edited by: DirectorTsaarx ]

[Aub]

Another question on Proportions design.

The cities and cultural centers have phased shields. This makes it nearly impossible to take out a homeworld in early or mid-game, even one of a minor race (we are talking about 20000 shield points!).

When you DO want to take one out, however, null-space weapons (and shiled-damaging weapons, if you're temporal) become priceless.

Doesn't it create imbalance towards shield-damaging weapons?

Thanks -- Aub

[Mylon]

Heh... Is what I'm concerned with is someone building like 10 space yards over their homeworld (or any non-domed planet) and dedicating most of them towards weapon platform/satellite construction. I know I do it!

[PvK]

The phased shield ability of cultural centers isn't perfect. Ideally, I would just give the facilities large amounts of hit points, but that is not possible. I may experiment with re-adjusting the "damage per population" in settings.txt, as I believe this still affects the damage required to destroy any facility. However there still isn't a perfect way to express the difference between the damage required to destroy, say, a resupply depot, and the damage required to destroy an entire civilization.

It's true that shield-skipping weapons end up being powerful against cultural centers, but who's to say that a null space weapon would not in reality have a great effect against at atmosphere? At any rate, there are still other ways to vaporize a homeworld's shields, such as planetary weapons, anti-planet drones, fighter-bombers, and shield depleters.

This is one case where I didn't see many choices in what I could do, but there was a very important balance issue, which was that it is a major game event if a homeworld is destroyed or captured, so it should be possible to defend one, and take a major effort to destroy or conquer one.

As Mylon mentions, players can and should keep some potent defenses at a homeworld. The cargo capacity is huge, so the 20K intrinsic shields are just part of the difficulty in attacking one. Defense bases and weapon platforms and fighters and satellites and drones and troops can be amassed, and should be expected.

Consider too that major effects can be caused simply by blockading a homeworld. That in itself has caused some human players to concede defeat.

PvK

[ September 10, 2002, 07:04: Message edited by: PvK ]

[Mylon]

I'll email you those save files latter today. Meanwhile, a few suggestions for Proportions:

Cultural centers. I'd like to see them at least halved in price. It _should_ be reasonable that a homeworld could actually build 18 of them within a reasonable time before developing useful space flight. Yes, they may be massive in size, and 50 years may make sense for their size, but that is also 500 turns.

Along the same vein, perhaps population production bonuses should be increased significantly. Most colonies with about 100 M population can produce almost half of what a homeworld can. I would think a homeworld would be more productive. Also, the population growth should be bonus significantly increased in cost. A +10 bonus to population growth is fairly cheap and is actually added directly on despite other modifiers (bad planet conditions, angry, ect), thus allowing a population to double in say 4-5 years rather than 15.

Another thing I would like to see would be enhanced cities based on other tech advances. This would probably be a pain to impliment, as there could easily be 81 or so combinations for each level of city. The idea is that a level of applied research would not only improve the quality of research centers, but the research bonus given by cities as well. Likewise for organics extraction, mineral extraction, ect. If this is followed through, I would suggest removing the current upgrade-chains in the current city lineup to make this a bit easier to handle. Likewise, without the city chain cities should be made somewhat cheaper (where a metropolis used to cost 65k (minor city + upgrade), they would now cost 100k! Upgrading the cultural centers on the homeworld would probably never happen unless there is a dramatic reduction in cost (or production in bonus), but it would be nice to add upgraded Versions for other well developed planets.

Considering how most other techs double in usefulness with the second level of research, it would make sense that this would apply to starliner modules as well. And I keep buging you because paying for the life support, bridge, engines, and solar collectors (They don't go very far without them!) gets expensive if you have to pay for 20 rather than 10.