Hello I just pre-purchased the Emperor Edition of endless spaceand have put in about 24 hrs of gametime so I thought I I'd share my thoughts.



Im am very happy to see a new space colonization game and the foundation of this one is very nice!



I feel right now that diplomacy is practically non-existent. Its almost always war right away and even with peace the options are very limited. Also diplomacy tech is so far into the tech tree that I have conquered half the galaxy and have supreme power before I can even consider making usefull pacts with other factions. Economy, research, industrial, and food pacts, etc. would be awesome if you could get them earlier on. Also ask ally to attack my enemy etc. Mutual aid pact, just a whole host of other diplomatic options are needed and need to be available early on.



The space combat is pretty but gets repetative quick, Fleets always start with same orientation and same sequence plays out. More options during combat would be cool even for individual ships like all power to shields for this one that is getting pounded, individual targeting, more power to weapons. More ship types with different bonuses and bigger fleets too.



The same type of space combat needs to be availabe for ground combat. You need to have troop pods that load population up from your worlds and takes them to their alien world doom. Even more epic would be to bring different unit types like artillery, tanks, infantry, air support (fighters, bombers), and ship modules that allow you to provide orbital support. With these things being required to defend your world as well along with a whole host of planetary defenses to build.



To land these troops on the planet you should have to break through enemy space defenses, Orbital platforms, and starbases!! Where the heck are they?!? Expand this to include minefields etc, planetary sheilds, planetary shield projectors for orbital fleets and starbases. This should all be included in a giant cinematic space battle to invade the planet. Would need a doomstar sized vessel as well to counter the best defended planets.



Thats just some first impressions, I'm sure I am pounding sand as this is way to much to put in before release but its what I was hoping for when I purchased this title. Thanks for your time. (Maybe in Endless Space 2)



P.S. Almost forgot, is trading disabled? I have seen no benefit to having trade routes nor have i seen any way to initiate or propagate trade.

Trade routes are only with other civs, and only while peace lasts. One tip to make peace last longer: Find a chokepoint on the AI's expansion and blockade it. Don't colonize it, but don't let them colonize it. Leave the system empty and neutral. If your borders touch the AI's, they go psychotic and will assault you, even if they're the usually-peaceful Sophons, even if you have an economy and military good enough to stomp them. They'll eventually sneak a colony ship past your blockade somehow, but until then, you'll be able to maintain peace.



The AI really needs to not go crazy when borders touch. This would mean reducing the Expansion penalty on diplomacy, as Expansion can cause up to a -150 and that means it will completely overpower other calculations, pushing the AI into warmode.



I really think internal trade options should be available, even if they aren't necessarily very good; trade boosting infrastructure should improve domestic specialization too! I think the external-only nature of trade is also leading to confusion among the playerbase, as the expectation from other games in the genre is that trade routes should apply internally too.



Personally, I like the invasion mechanics how they are, and I dislike all the calls to make invasions more complex. Simplicity can be a virtue. It's clean and comprehensible right now. Adding in huge hosts of military strategy elements would make the game harder to play. It would also make the game more distasteful to peaceful people like me.



Similarly, the combat mechanics are very simple, and right now it's about pitting fleet structures and ship designs against each other. There's a lot of depth in that, it just takes an unusual focus. All these calls to make it more complex would take the focus away from good ship designs and towards battle tactics. I already have admirals for handling battle tactics! Whenever I don't want to watch the pretty space battles, I just use the autoresolver. Unlike how it works in most games, the autoresolver seems to do pretty well in this game. I don't have to babysit the fleets. (I have admirals for handling battle tactics!)

I respect your call for simplicity Platescale, but the reason you are hearing the call for more involved combat is because that is what people that play and purchase this type of game expect, If there is any chance at all that this could be put into the game then they could always add a setup option for simple combat for people like yourself that don't want it. Yes, I did think that internal trade would be an option, especially for a galactic civilization.

Some or all your suggestion have been suggested and a summary list of improvement is listed here. If you feel certain ideas not rasied or have fresh ideas then please refer to this discussion thread

Yes Jetkar I am already painfully aware that you go through and blanket spam every suggestion thread with this response.

But jetkar is right, there are more than 3 Threads for the same topic/suggestion!

Preacher wrote:
Yes Jetkar I am already painfully aware that you go through and blanket spam every suggestion thread with this response.

I cant stop you making your suggestion but I find people dont look before they submit a post. Just making you aware its been posted. No offence meant.

My threads addressing combat may be of some interest to you: /#/endless-space/forum/28-game-design/thread/11640-5th-tech-tree-military-doctrine and /#/endless-space/forum/29-archives/thread/13307-expanding-on-combat-doctrine-and-fleet-construction



Trade populates automatically between notable systems when you are at peace with another empire. It's hard to find where the trade routes are, and they don't really provide that much.

Personally, I don't think adding in more depth to an invasion is all too good of an idea. Different battle scenes (as probably everyone has stated before me) would be brilliant, but adding in all the chaos of land invasion, starbases, minefields, shield generators.. it begins to detract from the game itself and start to make it feel more like an RTS. I love that genre as well, but not every game needs to follow the standard formula for gameplay in space. I thoroughly enjoy the change-up into fleet on fleet action. Makes you adapt from the normal strategies and think about fleet composition and ship design.