Hi there, I'm new to the forums and I just wanted to share some suggestions for the game to be better (imo of course). If I repeated any, excuse me :P.



1. A log system that shows you reports of actions made by you/your allies/your enemies (whatever's publically known) for the current and last turn, up to 5, up to 10, or 20, or unlimited, or whatever you want. Just some log system, which can be enabled/disabled for multiplayer as a setting. I find that sometimes I miss what some factions do, so this can be very helpful for analysis.



2. Being a huge Automaton lover, I've found that basically all of their unique Orange research techs are basically useless, which is disappointing . No offense, but I basically don't ever research them except for the last two ships. Maybe you could revise them? Thanks :P.



3. Over my experience, if you have a fleet that's relatively at least like 40% or even 30% and has sheer power, you can easily wipe out your opponent by just spamming the default Tactics (with the fist sign) for all three phases with basically no loss. I've come to abuse this, but it seems that AIs abuse it as well. Needs a rebalance IMHO, since there isn't really a way to block it since it's indirect.



4. I still think the scientific research victory (right tree) takes too long. You can basically win by other means long before you get all those turns. But that's just what I think, since really only Sophons goes for that, and they're not that great with sustainability.



5. Some of the late-game diplomacy tree stuff to help with the star systems (not relationships with other factions and not the stuff that helps your empire conquer) are kind of "too late" perse, and I think they should be boosted to occur a little earlier.



6. Maybe for the new players, you should revise the tutorial, since it's not so much a tutorial but just descriptions of what every button does, which isn't really all that helpful. I for one took hours to figure out some REALLY SIMPLE THINGS when I first played, which is really not that pleasing to have happen. Things like explaining how warp holes/lines work are important, since newbies wouldn't know about the research necessary. Some explanations about how colonization works would be helpful for them as well. You should also consider maybe having a tutorial scenario where it explains the basics of everything that happens in the game. P.S. I couldn't figure out how to queue research until like five hours into the game. That's really bad .



BUG 1: There is actually a small glitch (screenshot here) where when you discover a new star system, it isn't labelled and a neighbouring star system is given its name instead. Screenshot says it all. When you discover the other star system that has its name tagged on it, it becomes another name and reverts back to normal.



I think that's it for now; I'll post more if I think of some stuff to change . Feel free to discuss and shoot down the ones you think aren't important; I don't mind.

1: Not a bad idea



2: Most orange techs are the ships used by the Automatons, so yeah and as for the unique improvements, they are designed around the underlying theme of the faction: Small empire, defense.



So while you can go the opposite with the faction, its not what the orange techs are designed to capitalize on



3: If your referring to the ability to build glass cannons, here is a quick tip of the games current ship triangle:



Normal glass cannon: Lots of missiles or beams, no defense, attack boosting power module, tonnage boosting module - Expensive



Is countered by



Cheap glass cannon: Usually beams, could get away with kinetics, no defense, and only uses enough tonnage to kill a normal glass cannon 1 V 1 - cheap, cost effective.



Is countered by



Tank: Any weapon type, lots of defenses, usually a medium or large ship, comes with most other types of module - is able to withstand any cheap glass cannon long enough to kill entire waves of them, making these your capital ships.



Is countered by



Normal glass cannon.



4: Depends how long a game goes on for, if your conquering a lot or are building up to the wonders, then you won't get a chance to get there, but its good if you can't reliably get another victory type because your busy with other things in your empire.



5: It depends if you go for them, usually I always get them as Horatio because of the approval and dust needs of my empire. If you need it, get it, otherwise research is better used else where.



6: Fair enough, I can't comment on that as I kinda know the game by now.



And finally, please post bug reports to the proper section, thanks.



Have a good one.

Hi, thanks for the reply, and sorry for posting in the wrong section. If a mod could move it, I would appreciate it.



For Automatons, I ended up just expanding a lot and basically going pure offense, LOL. Don't mind me, I'm just different

It's alright, different is good!

Some other things for now



7. A counter offer function. Self-explanatory.



8. In the trade window, possibly add a percentage number onto each trade item to show the relative desire of it to an AI (allow the option with enable/disable). The bar at the top is good, but sometimes you want to strive for JUST enough 50/50, and sometimes even if it appears to be there, you can't see it well and have to keep testing combinations, wasting a lot of time.



9. Trading just seems inbalanced IMHO with the AIs. There's no sense of equality perse; it seems that regardless of your relative power to another AI faction, they'll never offer certain things such as star systems. Since I first started playing, it's like they're hard-coded to not care about who you are, they're still not going to give you certain things. I seriously believe there needs to be a rebalance. In the words of my friend: "Base it on two things: The importance of that star system to the other empire and their relationship with them.". For example, if one star system is just a lone one in the middle of nowhere and would better benefit an ally, the AI should maybe make it possible to at least barter for the system, instead of just purely "over my dead body".



10. In military view, you should have an inactive fleet window that allows viewing of ships just resting in hangars. Each time I want to check if there's a ship leftover, I have to go to empire management, which is inconvenient for me. I really think it should be implemented into that screen.



11. Upkeep column for military view. This seriously needs to be made.



I still think scientific victory needs to be made earlier. It's just too long and since basically only Sophons do it, it kind of makes it too faction-limited.



Also, to add to the point about the tutorial, the game should explain how command points work, or else players might wonder why they can't make large fleets.



A side question: Do you get charged upkeep for ships in hangar?

7: I agree.



8: Sounds good.



9: I dunno, simple trading the AI's should be expected to give up systems but for the acquisition of peace after being on the losing sie in a war the AI will often offer system in exchange for a peace treaty.



I kinda like it, like in real international politics, everyone is a selfish bastard.



10: That is a good idea. (Ironically I can't remember the last time I used that screen other then to design ships.....I have played as the Craver too much I think.)



11: Well upkeep is apart of the economy, and you can see it in the empire screen when you hover over the dust income/outcome.



I wouldn't bee to sure, as it depends on your science out put...I even won the science victory as the Craver (Ironically I had disabled the military victory some how) at around 200 turns.

As any of the peaceful races you can get there at about 150 turns or later without much of a problem, so this might be apart of your play style but who knows .



Indeed, many aspects of the game aren't exsacly intuitive.



And yes ships in the hanger are charged upkeep, but much less than an active ship (I think its something like 50% less).

@9: Well see, if a faction is on the losing side of a war, by the time they even think about offering systems, they'll have already died .



And some bug screenshots (sorry for not posting in right section, but I'm sure somebody will notice anyway):



Something that randomly popped up on galaxy screen, once:

http://puu.sh/1I7qG/6656ccfe2cf26b840156dc8b016a952a



Pops up when I try to click and drag the ship view in the Military Screen, not when adding/modifying ship. Happens every time I click:

http://puu.sh/1IjbV/3a1807b78236023ababbaffdc174a5ca



When lagging (Internet issues), creating a fleet out of a ship from a hangar and mass clicking it (because it doesn't react) can create an empty fleet that has nothing on it. Disbanding makes it disappear though.

http://puu.sh/1IjkF/1d4b1197b91d259a43655e7ae80bb934



If the links don't work, just copy and paste.



Edit: Okay, AI is seriously broken, and I seriously hope there's a revamp. I'm at least 30x stronger than this other Automatons faction, and they only have two star systems left with no fleets whatsoever. I can demolish them anytime (I let them be since I felt like it), and what they choose to do instead is offer me a deal that's just stupid:

http://puu.sh/1IlHV/3bbde7f2c6cc9295178941d7771b1fb7

And a similar deal from Hissho, but it makes a little bit of sense, I guess. Still, you'd think they'd just ask for a cease fire without any other terms included.

http://puu.sh/1IlUb/6bab9d0a364357b7419c37470eac5c5d

Just two more points for now:



1. The trade system seriously needs to implement some form of tech preview during the trade, or allow you to view the research trees while leaving the trade intact. It gets really tedious having to go back and forth between a trade and the research trees since you can't really bother memorizing every single tech, and the techs in the trades don't show you what they do but just what they give. I highly suggest something be implemented to help make this more convenient.



2. This is more of a suggestion, but basically, you can get punished for cancelling deals early with the AI, but the AI doesn't get punished for cancelling deals anytime, at will. This easily leads them into accepting lucrative deals that you make, and then cancelling soon after and just taking the goods with them. In an effort to alleviate this, I suggest that there be some sort of tip that shows when you try to make a lucrative deal that explains that the opposite player will likely not be able to keep their part of the bargain, even if they accept now. I learned this the hard way by trading simple resources and techs to AI players for outrageous amounts of Dust per turn, which ended up backfiring on me and the AIs would just cancel the deal in a turn or two. My purpose was to essentially just lure them into forcing up their taxes and dropping their empire's approval, but I guess they would rather just cancel the deal without even considering trying to figure something out to keep their end of the bargain.



I suggest maybe you could have it so that they automatically increase relationship points with you if they cancel their part of the deal, or they try to offer something in exchange to cancel it. See, my reasoning revolves around how the game is intergalactic, and thus, you'd think that deals would be contract-based and both parties should be obliged to fulfill their commitments. If the AI knew that they would not be able to meet the commitment after a turn or two, they should have just rejected the offer, or just made the offer much more difficult to accept, than a few simple resources and techs (really, that's all that's needed, which is a total joke). But the AI, of course, still needs work for being too simplified when it comes to diplomacy and trading, so I hope that there's a major overhaul sometime soon for trading with AI.



3. Adding onto point 2, I'm not sure if it's a minor glitch, but when I made that lucrative deal for dust per turn a while ago, I noticed that the opposite AI would have its "agreement meter" (I don't know what it's called) get stuck. Basically, what happened was I offered the AI some things it wanted, which caused the meter to max out to the right (as in, the AI totally wants everything I'm offering it). Then, I added Dust per Turn, and it started off at 2##. I increased it to 3##, and it moved left a bit. Did the same for 4##, 6##, and so on, up until roughly 12##. At 12##, it would reach about 3/4 of the meter, so it would still agree with my terms happily (halfway between 50/50 and max). When I increased it to 14##, it didn't change. When I increased it more, it still didn't change. Finally, when I topped it off at 18##, it still didn't change. It stuck at around 3/4. I thought this is a glitch, so I figured I'd mention it here.



Picture:

http://puu.sh/1LcBc/05a57b831d638d4d6c07bc97ba0c7b45



As you can see, it's roughly at around 3/4. But this was the same for the entire range starting at around 12##, which should not have happened. If anything, it should've kept shifting more and more to the left. Maybe you need to do a quick check to make sure there's no issues with high dust values? I dunno.



And finally, another question: Is there any particular reason why AIs are allowed to ask YOU for free stuff, while they reject every offer you make for free stuff from them? I don't get it. I figure it's just a way to boost your relationship with them, but wouldn't that go the same way in the reverse?



Edit:

4. I think there should be more of an incentive for you to bother learning the terraform techs. Over my experience, you could save more time by just scouting some good star systems and colonizing them, rather than learning the techs to change existing planets. I know there's some faction (I forgot which one) that benefits from all planets being the same, but its uses are too limited to justify its position in research.

A new one:

In Empire Management, the names of the systems should include both the name as well as its colonization status, for example:

Adana - Colony

Bushir - Outpost (13 Turns)



This helps a lot for those who focus highly on influence building



Another one:

Spying seems to be relatively useless to research (range of radar past the default values, without other additional modifiers from events and whatnot).

1. There doesn't seem to be much use for individual hero powers, let alone having to reduce their costs.



BUG - Missing picture when discovering an Endless Wonder:

http://puu.sh/1OicS/54b66698fd54edfdc6cde772dc8ec29c