Xervitus wrote:


Adding racial planet affinities is the best way as I can see it, that way not everyone is trying to terraform everything to the same type. Maybe sophons are native to ice worlds and thus get stats similar to what humans would get on terran worlds, etc

i disagree this would limit the Affinities to certain terraforming paths and so to certain strategies which is smallering the diversity and possibiltys.

Meedoc wrote:
Well, in my opinion it has a positive effect, making terraformation more interesting and breaking the "terraform everything into T1".

At the end game I don't think this is a bad thing, however it should be tempered by T1 should be the best overall FIDS with a lack of specialization with ALL upgrades included. I believe this is still the case but if it isn't in any case I feel like that should be adjusted.

Not mentioned in the design document but implemented in the SaveTheSowers mod - Are we also getting the change to the Colony Base (+5 food/+5 industry per planet) along with these planetary FIDS changes?

RobM wrote:
Not mentioned in the design document but implemented in the SaveTheSowers mod - Are we also getting the change to the Colony Base (+5 food/+5 industry per planet) along with these planetary FIDS changes?

plus the higher costs of the seed modul ?



and the buff to trade?

How are maximums for planetary populations going to be handled? I find it laughable that some of the most inhospitable planets by humanoid norms could present any increase of ideal planets for life unless the population numbers were just so greatly capped as to make it barely worth while. As in, you could claim that dust is an bonanza of a hydrogen world but regardless of size there is no justification for supporting more population than even the smallest ideal world. So while I am all for seeing it having benefits, after all you could just suck off the gas, I would be more inclined to have planets we either terraform or harvest, the later being through system tech meaning no population ever is landed.

Shivetya wrote:
How are maximums for planetary populations going to be handled? I find it laughable that some of the most inhospitable planets by humanoid norms could present any increase of ideal planets for life unless the population numbers were just so greatly capped as to make it barely worth while. As in, you could claim that dust is an bonanza of a hydrogen world but regardless of size there is no justification for supporting more population than even the smallest ideal world. So while I am all for seeing it having benefits, after all you could just suck off the gas, I would be more inclined to have planets we either terraform or harvest, the later being through system tech meaning no population ever is landed.

Never heard of domed city's? Or space stations?



Just because you can't go outside don't mean you can't build habitats there.

Awesome concept one tested well see how well it runs might need tweaks but definitely an awesome improvment

I'm definitely interested in seeing what these changes to the Pilgrims achieve. I've had quite a lot of success with custom Pilgrim builds in the past, using pre-nerf Legendary Heroes to bootstrap my expansion, but these days they really struggle.



The industry-food change for the Sowers (one of my other favourites) should help a lot to reduce the cripplingly slow start they have, but I'd almost rather they were brought up to 65 points. Giving them only 60 points - especially at the moment - is just cruel.

I can tell you now guys that the change to fids does make the game a lot more interesting. It makes almost every system worth colonising which is really strange to start with. Also you lot need to remember that this was posted 2 and a half months ago so some of the stuff in save the sowers came around after this was posted.

iam curios when we get the build ; )



Will there be any patch for the Vanilla Game



before the Expansion pack release?

I have to be honest, the planet changes are terrible. I won't even go into the "realistically" point of view, even though I feel you guys are stretching the realism vs game play balance quite hard with some of those numbers.



I would scrap this entire planet system if I were you. This system as it is is completely nonsensical, and with terraforming, there should be a gradual massive change and IMPROVEMENT. If you don't want "terraform everything into T1", there are better ways to do it.



Adding racial planet affinities is the best way as I can see it, that way not everyone is trying to terraform everything to the same type. Maybe sophons are native to ice worlds and thus get stats similar to what humans would get on terran worlds, etc



Another way to make systems more varied and promote diversity could be terraforming costs exponentially harder the further you get away from its base type, for example each terraforming "step" costs twice as much as the one before it. If you want to change a lava world to a ocean paradise it's possible, just not really feasible in most cases.



My biggest problem is that by making planets so specialized and discouraging improvement based terraforming you are removing a large dynamic of the game, as well as adding possible balance issues that are hard to overcome...I WANT to funnel massive resources and create ultra paradise systems, why would I be penalized by improving them? Sorry, but the rationale behind "this planet is better for research because its barren compared to terran" makes no sense gameplay wise OR realistically.

It's easier to test WMD's in barren wastelands then in lush paradises, making science easier to do.



And besides, ocean worlds should still be the best at science, but only with the max population.



While barren worlds have a large amount of science per population, they still have terrible population numbers, making the T! super worlds much better when at max population.

It does not actually remove the whole terraforming thing, on the contrary it makes it less tedious. Think about it, right now it's all to terran in some cases Jungle and Ocean are worthwhile but generally it's terran hands down. With more rewarding higher tier planets it's actually worth thinking about terraforming to something else than Terran. It also gets rid of the agenda to terraform ALL planets(which btw looks horribly boring) something that racial traits would not deal with. So sophons terraform everything to Iceworlds, great. that does not add diveristy that only adds nuisance(as you have to terraform all their planets "back" to Terran). With more worthwhile higher tier Planets also a lot of improvements actually are worth it. otherwise anything that does not affect Terran is simply out of date.

I'm not sure how much this will change. The happiness modifiers were always the best reason to go to T1 so that I could further increase my tax rate (UE). I don't know if even having extremely lucrative planets can make up for that.



I would love to hear more about these Golden Ages though. Pilgrims used to be my favorite faction, and I'd love to have a reason to play them again.

I agree with the general idea, but I think they took it too far. T1 should still be the "best", but it's not anymore. A lot of those FIDS are because of food, once your population is maxed, food does nothing (until you get that food > industry improvement).



Maybe excess food SHOULD give you something, but until it does, I think this is a huge nerf to T1.

Tier 1 still are pretty great, not as omnipotent as they were before but they have several advantages:



more population

no Approval malus

no need to research colonisation

You pretty much need a tier 1 planet to populate a system of tier 3+ Planets. You don't need 5 Terrans now but when you're planning on getting your people settled it's imperative to have at least one per system.

Am I missing something because from what I’ve seen the Sowers would almost always want to terraform to lava (the first terraforming tech) then methane when it is possible. Anyone else see the problem.

I have calculated the total FIDS on the planets based on the numbers given here. This may show some of my concerns.



For these numbers, I have included all of the population improvements. So, Improved Thermodynamics, Non-Baryonic Shielding, Personal Fields, and Sustained Supercities. But, no faction traits or anomalies.



This also includes using whatever exploitation is most appropriate for that planet type.



With the current values, here are the FIDS at the max population for the different types:

Tier I - 144

Tier II - 120

Tier III - 84

Tier IV - 66

Asteroids - 105

Gas Giant - 112



New Values:

Tier I - 162

Tier II - 136

Tier III - 119

Tier IV - 114

Asteroids - 126

Gas Giant - 203



I am suggesting a more moderate approach...



T1 - Same

T2 - Same

T3 - Same

T4 - Reduce from 12 to 11.

Asteroids - Raise from 5 to 6.

Gas Giant - Reduce from 20 to 15.



This would make the FIDS totals be this:



Tier I - 162

Tier II - 136

Tier III - 119

Tier IV - 108

Asteroids - 147

Gas Giant - 168

Well I agree that Gas Giants look pretty powerfull and that nerfing them may be a good idea. buuuut I don't see the need to nerf Tier 4 or to boost Asteroids. In addtion I would remove the 1s from the Gas giants so they only produce one resource.



PS: Anyone remember how this new Colonial basecamp works? what was the FIDS yield and was it flat or per pop.

Taure wrote:
Am I missing something because from what I’ve seen the Sowers would almost always want to terraform to lava (the first terraforming tech) then methane when it is possible. Anyone else see the problem.

I am okay with that they want to settle on the worst planets to colonize and terraform then...well atm they stay better to didnt terraform them (till late game or so) but who

what the Devs are planning for the new race specific technologys maybe it is something lore true (but still powerfull i hope)



Edit:this thread isent up to date (*Save* the Sowers Mod was posted later) sowers will get their NERF to 30% industrie conversion!



@ StriderV



I love the changes to Gas Giants as the Dev promoted them.



with the huge approval malus u cant affort to have many gas giants in one system (especially on higher diffultys) also who does atm terrform a planet into a gas giant...imo they need that buff in its full strength.



Well i definitly agree on the other side that asteroids would have needed a much bigger buff,

they are mostly going again to be regarded as *useless*



and that special asteroid Science Building which we got in the last free addon does not change this it comes far to late in the techtree and its far to expensive in terms of Industrie



->useless at all.



@ Ca_Putt



Colonial base now gives +5 FI bonus / colonized planet



its Flat.



But many changes from the mod are not yet in this EXP Balancing formular.

(good thing too many changes at ones are always a risk)

I keep seeing analysis using every improvement in the book, which is not the best way to go IMO. In what percentage of the game will you actually have all of these improvements?

I'm sorry but could someone clarify when they say 'Industry to Food conversion has been upgraded from 40% to 50%' how much is the reduction to food, would it still be -50% food?

taure wrote:
i'm sorry but could someone clarify when they say 'industry to food conversion has been upgraded from 40% to 50%' how much is the reduction to food, would it still be -50% food?

this thread isent up to date (*Save* the Sowers Mod was posted later) sowers will get their NERF to 30% industrie conversion!

Stalker0 wrote:
I keep seeing analysis using every improvement in the book, which is not the best way to go IMO. In what percentage of the game will you actually have all of these improvements?

Well, until you have many of these improvements you have no option to terraform anyway. YES, at the beginning of the game T1 is definitely the way to go. But, you can't switch existing planets anyway. My argument is that with these changes, once you get the option to terraform, the incentive to actually DO it becomes less and less. In fact, due to the high cost of terraforming, I seriously doubt I'll ever do much terraforming. It's not worth the expense.



I really hope the governor AI takes this in mind and doesn't try to terraform my planets for me. I already have enough other reasons to turn it off, and I like using it to make my turns quicker.

StriderV wrote:
Well, until you have many of these improvements you have no option to terraform anyway.

To an extent. Assuming has midlevel techs before terraforming makes sense to me. but some techs like sustained supercities i think comes a good deal after many terraforming options.

I feel it is necessary to give races with affinities toward invasion or fighters/bombers early access to these techs even in a super weak form.

Oh, and btw. If you come to buildings/exploits:



For the people who like cruncing numbers the following thing about exploits could be interesting:



Instead of only having Pop-Based-Exploits there also could be:

Flat-Bonus-Exploits and Percentage-Based exploits.



Example:

Industry-Exploit Tier 1, Type 1: +1 Industry / Pop | +1 additional Industry / Pop on Lava

Industry-Exploit Tier 1, Type 2: +5 Industry | +5 additional Industry on Lava

Industry-Exploit Tier 1, Type 3: +20% Industry | +20 additional % Industry on Lava



(That's something where the AI could shine by simply calculating the best one under the given circumstances. ^^)

I see a small threat with planets being too specialized: If you don't get enough of a certain type you might be in trouble.



But as with the fighter-things that are changes that are hard to judge without actually having tested them.

Well, in my opinion it has a positive effect, making terraformation more interesting and breaking the "terraform everything into T1".

Hmm you can indeed terraform in a different way...



Did you also change the max population for each planet type?

Wow, cool. This is totally different, but I think that I like it (not having tested it). I had a formula for which planets I would colonize first every game (depending on my species), but this would effectively eliminate the usefulness of my system... which is probably a good thing. I'll have to think about colonizing different types of planets now depending on the economic situation. Also, I like the affinity changes. I have to get back to you on balance, but it would seem this will help overall.



Question: As to the -50% to support module cost trait, what are the two levels, -25%/-50%?



Also: Arid Current FIDS have 2/2/5/1 (2 food 2 industry, 5 dust, 1 science); not 1/2/5/2 as indicated above. Are the new FIDS for that world correct or was it supposed to be 2/2/6/1? I would sort of assume the latter or certain affinities will be pretty heavily nerfed by the lack of food and no additional industry.

I'm rather concern about the potential OP of the Sheredyn - the ability to deny retreat is game changing honestly combine that with -50% buyout bonus and damn



Also will there be a cooldown or something with the Efleet? I could see literally rotating the colonies to maintain the golden age? System can only receive a golden age once every 20 turns?

Wouldn't it be more interesting to say: System can only have a golden age, if it was not settled, beforehand?

Then all the micro of rotating colonies would be left out and pilgrims would have one or several "errant fleet"-strains of systems.

I did not change the max population yet. I think it's quite cool for the moment but adding racial bonuses on specific planet type may be interesting. It needs to be analyzed.



For the Support trait it's effectively -25% / -50%.

The new FIDS for Arid are correct, I did a mistake on the previous FIDS, sorry ^^



For the Sheredyn Affinity, we'll see, if -50% is too powerful, we will nerf it. The intention is to give them an economic bonus in their affinity. For the moment we're still thinking about their traits.

For the Pilgrim Affinity, by using "new system" in the description I meant " not settled, beforehand". We do not want to have Fleets Errant doing a round trip between systems.



We hope to have a build online on Friday =)



We'll keep you in touch!

Racial boni would be nice indeed.



I hope the game becomes playable for me till friday... My blackscreen problem is slowly grating on my nerves.

Meedoc wrote:
I did not change the max population yet. I think it's quite cool for the moment but adding racial bonuses on specific planet type may be interesting. It needs to be analyzed.



For the Support trait it's effectively -25% / -50%.

The new FIDS for Arid are correct, I did a mistake on the previous FIDS, sorry ^^



For the Sheredyn Affinity, we'll see, if -50% is too powerful, we will nerf it. The intention is to give them an economic bonus in their affinity. For the moment we're still thinking about their traits.

For the Pilgrim Affinity, by using "new system" in the description I meant " not settled, beforehand". We do not want to have Fleets Errant doing a round trip between systems.



We hope to have a build online on Friday =)



We'll keep you in touch!

Meedoc wrote:


We hope to have a build online on Friday =)

Will the build include AMAS and the fixes to the bugs (Colony-Ship-No-Pop-Cost-Bug and AI-Fleets-not-attacking-bug) found in the AMAS-Build?



Also I'd have to say one of the main balance-concerns is with the buildings, not so much the planets. There's a clear seperation between the must-have-buildings, the okay buildings and the "I don't even bother"-buildings.

Yes the build will include the AMAS with the colony ship bug fixed. For the AI fleet bug, I don't think we can fix it for now because there are a lot of ongoing work on the Military Part regarding the expansion pack, and we cannot afford a "little" fix without a risk.



I know there are a lot of concerns regarding buildings, but before we get to it, I want to set a proper base. The second part of the balancing will come afterwards. =)

hooray! net-net more $$ err dust I mean.

Meedoc wrote:
For the AI fleet bug, I don't think we can fix it for now because there are a lot of ongoing work on the Military Part regarding the expansion pack, and we cannot afford a "little" fix without a risk.

Ongoing work on military ship-handling of the AI also sounds very promising.



If there's a need of input on algorithms to use, I'm always up to put thoughts into stuff like that. ^^



I would be particularly interested into thinking about how to teach the AI to behave like KingJohnIV, when it comes to handling it's military.

Hi guys,



We are currently working on balancing the Economy and the Factions in Endless Space. We’re going to release a build A.S.A.P to collect your feedback.

This build will contain only a first part of what we planned (the things that are detailed below). We may modify other parameters such as trait costs, hero’s skill trees and system improvements.







Planet Specialisation





Rational



The higher the class, the better the specialisation, as far as Industry, Dust or Science are concerned. However, note that Food decreases with the class (Class 1 will have the most food, and then class 2, and so on).





Updates

Here is the list of the different FIDS modifications on the planet types and the modification of bonus given by the different planetary infrastructures. N.B.: those modifications make the Tolerant trait way more useful, strengthening the Sowers.







Affinity





Horatio

• The fatigue recovery is now instantaneous (100%).
• Cloning will be related to the hero’s level: the higher the level, the more expensive the cost will be.
• New traits will be added to allow players to have a default class in their academy: the Horatio will have some of them.
  
  

Sophon

• The -50% cost on module support is now a trait with 2 levels, respectively costing 12 / 24 points.
  
  

United Empire

• The industry bonus starts from 0% tax rate and progresses at a rate of 3% per step (from 3 to 60%)
  
  

Pilgrim

• When a Fleet Errant settles on a new system, it triggers a Golden Age: this will give a FIDS bonus, depending on the imported population and improvements.
  
  

Sower

• Industry to Food conversion has been upgraded from 40% to 50%.
  
  

Sheredyn

• In addition to the ability to deny the retreat, they will have a -50% buyout bonus.
  
  

Bonus

• The Industry conversion, to Dust or Science, has been upgraded from 25% to 33%.
  
  

I am sure this is intentional, but I find the change in the Tundra World interesting as it is a substantial buff to the sowers starting position. After all these changes, I think I'm going to want to play them again :P



Also, these changes are going to be applied to ES standard, and not just the ES expansion, correct? Sorry if this was already mentioned somewhere and I missed it.

Oh, the homeworlds!

I feel they have a little too much of an impact as it stands now.



And the increase of planet-type-specialization that potentially will become even more drastical.

Hmm I am a little worried about this buff to the sowers because isn't that just returning them to their previous state? I'd have said a better way to balance them would have been to give them 45% rather than 40% and give them 65 points rather than 60.



I really am looking forward to playing this new build, I haven't had much energy to play lately but this looks like it will really give me a huge incentive to play and rekindle the fire once more

I posted this here after I finished a game using 1.0.67 but I think it is probably more relevant to this thread.

KingJohnVI wrote:
A few other balancing considerations affected by the world value changes I've noticed now that I completed a game in its entirety:



The relative value of the Businessmen and Scientist Traits have increased due to worlds with higher base values for these statistics. Entrepreneurs is now relatively less valuable compared to Businessmen.



Expansion is now more important than ever. With new worlds having increased specialization, you have to expand very quickly in order to assure a good variety of worlds to keep up with your opponents in all areas.



Starting locations have a larger effect on the initial opening phase of the game: Having a poorer starting constellation is now slightly more difficult to overcome.



Production is King: With the increased Production to Dust/Science Conversion ratio, it is easier to convert to dust or science as necessary, but if you lack highly productive worlds, it is difficult to do the opposite and you fall behind more quickly.



Plentiful Dust: I haven't noticed this as much for science, but I found dust management much easier. In fact, in the game I just completed (turn 54), I only ever had to raise taxes once above 30%, and that was only for 1 turn.



Hope this helps.

This game design document is now public.

InFlamesWeTrust wrote:
Hmm I am a little worried about this buff to the sowers because isn't that just returning them to their previous state? I'd have said a better way to balance them would have been to give them 45% rather than 40% and give them 65 points rather than 60.

I really am looking forward to playing this new build, I haven't had much energy to play lately but this looks like it will really give me a huge incentive to play and rekindle the fire once more

Edit:this thread isent up to date (*Save* the Sowers Mod was posted later) sowers will get their NERF to 30% industrie conversion!



Not Exactly, in the prevoius state the Industrie to Dust/ Science was crazy 50%! High which was were theire true power lied.



And for the case

well the -X% could still be increased.

why not just increase it to -60%



specialication is always better then pure nerfes.

(but 45% Conversion with 65 Race Traits Point is also totaly legit in the case of cases)





But i have to say iam realy positive surprised ; )

Iam gobsmacked.



i was thinking about to start a Save the Pilgrims movement after the Sowers would have been rescued.



But the Devs didnt forget them at all! Awesome!

I realy love the idea of the Golden Age ; D its Lore true and could be make the the Evacuation Ship (Remember its now cheaper then a common Colony Ship)

very usefull and valuable.



All in all this changes are a big step forward. Also for the MP cause i think now with this changes the races are finally more or less equal and with a little bit creativity every affinity can be used to create a powerfull race.



Even the Sheredyn just think what u can do with this -50% Buyout Bonus.

it adds new und more valuable Dust concentrate playstyles.



Because just to prevent the Enemy to flee well thats totaly UP...in MP this makes 0 difference and also the buggy Fleet Retreat card will also soon be fixed.







And if the thing with the Influence can also be shaped in a decent form (which will bring also the Horatio their final fine sanding) this will make Endless Space truely a better game.



So Far Good Job Devs:

I like the changes.



And I feel like the population should be left as they are, promoting the more habitable and larger planets as better late game, and smaller more specialized planets as good early game planets.

KingJohnVI wrote:
I am sure this is intentional, but I find the change in the Tundra World interesting as it is a substantial buff to the sowers starting position. After all these changes, I think I'm going to want to play them again :P



Also, these changes are going to be applied to ES standard, and not just the ES expansion, correct? Sorry if this was already mentioned somewhere and I missed it.

I'm pretty sure it's going to be integrated to the standard version as somewhere in a dev comment they said they hoped to have the build running on Friday. Sower power to you, and let's hope our Sheredyn friends don't steal the show...

Well you don't need to retreat when you are already a bad-ass.



http://i.imgur.com/2HDk8.jpg



I wonder if the denial to retreat works both ways? Then it could turn around to bite them in their asses.

desert planets go from 0 to 9 dust generation?

THE SPICE MUST FLOW! lol

vaendryl wrote:
desert planets go from 0 to 9 dust generation?

THE SPICE MUST FLOW! lol

.