I like faser conquest, I feel like it's too slow in the original.



I also think free travel shoud not be removed completely, but rather left for some mobile races like Eldar, Dark Eldar or Necron.

How to change traits of the races around so the AI can use them

There is no way for an AI to play any custom faction. Modders cannot affect this. We have requested a number of times that the dev team should allow the AI to play custom factions, even if they play "poorly". But there is no response. This is rather fatal for SP "total conversion" mods. It is OK for MP TC mods, as long as all factions are played by humans.

Romeo wrote:


I have many of the traits in common with you, still trying to decide on an affinity. I'm trying to get every race to really play unique. As for the glass cannons, that'll be accomplished through traits well enough. I'm also going to try and get their special weapons in, though I'll see whether or not the game will accept a hyper-accurate-at-long-range kinetic weapon that only fires one round per salvo (Railgun).

IMO Tau affinity can do one or more of the following:



1. Offense boost. (maybe with focus on long range)

2. Science boost.

3. Some kind of galactic unity bonus. Given current diplomacy mechanics I'd hate to see a purely diplomatic affinity but maybe expansion/diplomacy. Like a small FIDS and approval bonus on empire for each allied or owned system.

Romeo wrote:


Hmm, that sounds really cool actually! I'm still sort've learning as I go, but let me know if that works out, because it sounds awesome. And of course, if you want to bounce any other ideas, bring 'em here!





As for my other question earlier, igncom1 has inspired me to attempt doing that. Basically I want to (eventually) give Chaos the option to Terraform a planet to either a Daemon World or Crone World, which would make every other race hate the planet, but would make Chaos love it. It would essentially give them the option to "corrupt" the galaxy, and add an interesting form of asset denial.

I've briefly tested the following:































Both seem to work. However, if this "Path" is anything like XPath #1 would add the bonus to all systems (tested it only with 1 system). In this case something more clever would be required to select the current system. #2 is OK for Science and Dust, athough Dust is probably a bad idea. The engine is pretty smart and automatically generates new tooltips for modules as well as adding "from support modules" section in the empire income statistics. However, only one module per ship actually works. In any case this can be incorporated in game design.



I have a basic idea of Eldar traits, still thinking about affinity...



Eldar Traits



Black Thumbs 3/3 (Eldar do not replenish their numbers fast)

Pessimistic 2/2 (Eldar are a dying race)

Deep roots 2/2

Fragile hulls 2/2



(The 3 first traits above are probably the worst traits ever, so the rest of the stuff is going to be pretty OP)



Masters of illusion 2/2

Fast travelers 2/2

Optimal structure 2/2

Scientists 3/3

Builders 3/3

Legendary heroes 2/2

Dust archeology 1/2

All level 1 tech

i just put the tau into the custom faction and there coming out at like 93/65 points so i added

anarchists 2/2

deeproots 2/2 because there religious ideals

masters of destruction 1/2

meticulous analysis 1/2

slow travelers 2/2

which brings it down to 64/65 just my take

MANoob wrote:
IMO Tau affinity can do one or more of the following:



1. Offense boost. (maybe with focus on long range)

2. Science boost.

3. Some kind of galactic unity bonus. Given current diplomacy mechanics I'd hate to see a purely diplomatic affinity but maybe expansion/diplomacy. Like a small FIDS and approval bonus on empire for each allied or owned system.







I've briefly tested the following:































Both seem to work. However, if this "Path" is anything like XPath #1 would add the bonus to all systems (tested it only with 1 system). In this case something more clever would be required to select the current system. #2 is OK for Science and Dust, athough Dust is probably a bad idea. The engine is pretty smart and automatically generates new tooltips for modules as well as adding "from support modules" section in the empire income statistics. However, only one module per ship actually works. In any case this can be incorporated in game design.



I have a basic idea of Eldar traits, still thinking about affinity...



Eldar Traits



Black Thumbs 3/3 (Eldar do not replenish their numbers fast)

Pessimistic 2/2 (Eldar are a dying race)

Deep roots 2/2

Fragile hulls 2/2



(The 3 first traits above are probably the worst traits ever, so the rest of the stuff is going to be pretty OP)



Masters of illusion 2/2

Fast travelers 2/2

Optimal structure 2/2

Scientists 3/3

Builders 3/3

Legendary heroes 2/2

Dust archeology 1/2

All level 1 tech

I'm not sure pessimistic is totally valid, because it implies the Eldar don't believe in their government (Approval loss). Will look in to your suggestions though. Thus far, the Eldar are the only faction I haven't planned out in any way at all.

ghazz wrote:
i just put the tau into the custom faction and there coming out at like 93/65 points so i added

anarchists 2/2

deeproots 2/2 because there religious ideals

masters of destruction 1/2

meticulous analysis 1/2

slow travelers 2/2

which brings it down to 64/65 just my take

I'm not on my PC, so I don't remember my list, but like you, Meticulous Analysis and Deep Roots were two things I had for them, same for Slow Travellers (As well as Fragile Hulls and Sniper). The Tau I have pictured as the ranged killers (Super accurate weapons that pack a serious punch) as well as the most Diplomatic of the races. They would be decent at Science as well, but slow moving, bad at expansion and delicate.







I have a surprise for everyone tomorrow. And before you get your hopes up, no, I'm not even close to done the Tyranids yet. Stay tuned!

I don't think that preset races should be under 65 trait points since it impies they are optimized while they are not. I think every race can have different ammount of points depending on how much the traits/affinity synergize and if there are any worthless or severely crippling traits. I agree that 93 may be too much though, I'd drop Deadly Weapons probably which brings it to 78. I think ~80 points is OK for a preset race.



I strongly disagree on deep roots for Tau, they've assimilated enough races and it doesn't make sense for them to gain ownership slowly.

Meticulous analysis is garbage and I don't really see Tau as super scouts. Anyway its a junk(flavor) trait and should be essentialy free for preset races.

Slow travelers makes sense, the early gameplay is tedious with it though, I would advise against it.

Anarchists - I don really see Tau as anarchists, I do see them having smaller but technologically superior fleets however.

MANoob wrote:
I don't think that preset races should be under 65 trait points since it impies they are optimized while they are not. I think every race can have different ammount of points depending on how much the traits/affinity synergize and if there are any worthless or severely crippling traits. I agree that 93 may be too much though, I'd drop Deadly Weapons probably which brings it to 78. I think ~80 points is OK for a preset race.



I strongly disagree on deep roots for Tau, they've assimilated enough races and it doesn't make sense for them to gain ownership slowly.

Meticulous analysis is garbage and I don't really see Tau as super scouts. Anyway its a junk(flavor) trait and should be essentialy free for preset races.

Slow travelers makes sense, the early gameplay is tedious with it though, I would advise against it.

Anarchists - I don really see Tau as anarchists, I do see them having smaller but technologically superior fleets however.

The Tau are the least expanded race in Warhammer 40000! And by a substantial margin at that, deep roots makes perfect sense for them. They also have access to the best scouts in the entire game - Pathfinders. Which is important, as Tau gameplay always revolves around identifying then eliminating from afar. Wanting to replicate that as best I can in game. And Slow Travellers may be a pain, but it is true. Ignoring the Kroot and Vespids, Tau units tend to be pretty bulky and slow.



Anyways, I promised a small surprise, and here it is!



BattlefleetGame.zip



What you're looking at is the universal gameplay alterations (The stuff that affects everyone). The most notable change is the removal of free roam. This was done to give some added strategic value to "Linchpin" systems. Wormholes and basic travel are unaffected (Though I may look in to adding a fifth basic travel speed upgrade). Another major change is that it no longer takes four turns to take over a colony - you can do so in one turn. This was also done to give some weight to expansion choices, as well as defensive system upgrades. It also has the unintentional bonus of giving invasion modules actual usefulness! Hell, I even found myself making things like dedicated invasion fleets to take advantage of it.



Other smaller alterations were mostly done for both balancing and pace: It now takes slightly less time to go from Outpost to Colony, "taking control" of conquered systems can be done 25% faster and while not in this version, I will be bumping the "Score Victory" count to 999 for those running massive galaxies (Actual win conditions will be unaffected).



Anyways, it takes a couple turns to get used to (Losing a ship-making colony in a single turn can be quite jarring the first time) but this should help prep you for the Alpha release of 'Nids and Orks! Please let me know if I've done anything painfully wrong (I've tried to keep it removed from the races and everything, so there shouldn't be any missing XMLs, and voice any balance concerns or suggestions after trying it out. Also, of course, anyone wanting to take the stuff for their own mod has my permission.



It installs in the usual way: Unzip to "My Documents", then "Endless Space" and finally "Modding" folder.

then the orks and nids might get over powerd just because they run shier volume of ships and if u give to much stuff to them like if we rase the cap to 80 the orks could pack a lot of stuff in to that and might break some things if we all keep it to 65 then we dont even have to mod it so we can keep it easier and romeo ill be hopefully testing that in the next game i play cant wait to give it a try

Romeo wrote:
The Tau are the least expanded race in Warhammer 40000! And by a substantial margin at that, deep roots makes perfect sense for them. They also have access to the best scouts in the entire game - Pathfinders. Which is important, as Tau gameplay always revolves around identifying then eliminating from afar. Wanting to replicate that as best I can in game. And Slow Travellers may be a pain, but it is true. Ignoring the Kroot and Vespids, Tau units tend to be pretty bulky and slow.

Tau are the least expanded because they are the youngest race, they never had problems conquering other races. Deep roots would mean that they won't be able to conquer systems fast and won't slow down their colonization speed (slow travelers will slow down their colonization enough if you add it). Deep roots implies more defensive gameplay with trying to keep and improve what you already managed to colonize, which suits races like Eldar. Tau have ambition to add everyone to their empire, so deep roots do not fit IMO. If you go for slow travalers give Tau a positive anomaly on their homeworld, they would fall behind too much otherwise.

we should be giving slow travelers to every race just because in bfg and in the books it take hundreds of years to get anywhere except elder and dark eldar because they can use the webway and the impirum uses the normal warp while the tau make jumps that Skimm the edge of warp space just deep enough to travel fast but safe enough from the horrors of the warp they cant travel as fast as the impirum the only faster race in the game is the Necrons they use a thing called Inertialess drive It reduces the mass of the ship and the Necrons in it to zero making faster-than-light travel possible

MANoob wrote:
Tau are the least expanded because they are the youngest race, they never had problems conquering other races. Deep roots would mean that they won't be able to conquer systems fast and won't slow down their colonization speed (slow travelers will slow down their colonization enough if you add it). Deep roots implies more defensive gameplay with trying to keep and improve what you already managed to colonize, which suits races like Eldar. Tau have ambition to add everyone to their empire, so deep roots do not fit IMO. If you go for slow travalers give Tau a positive anomaly on their homeworld, they would fall behind too much otherwise.

See, I find the Eldar far more mobile and nimble than the Tau. I will look in to your suggestions though. =)

ghazz wrote:
we should be giving slow travelers to every race just because in bfg and in the books it take hundreds of years to get anywhere except elder and dark eldar because they can use the webway and the impirum uses the normal warp while the tau make jumps that Skimm the edge of warp space just deep enough to travel fast but safe enough from the horrors of the warp they cant travel as fast as the impirum the only faster race in the game is the Necrons they use a thing called Inertialess drive It reduces the mass of the ship and the Necrons in it to zero making faster-than-light travel possible

Oh, there's a few things that don't fit, lore-wise. I don't want to make everyone uber slow, it'll slow the gameplay down far too much when combined with the other alterations.

Yeah, and considering that the eldar and necrons use FTL methods that amount to teleportation in their effects.



It would be unwise.....unless the slower factions get a huge defense bonus.

I'd rather give fast travelers to fast races than slow travelers to slow races.



Another thing going for high amount of trait points is that it allows to make races more distinct. The less traits you have the closer you are to the generic core.



For instance, my high points Ork idea:



Ork affinity:

+1% production per pop on system (favors heavily populated systems)

+100% invasion military power (easy conquest)

-50% fleet upkeep cost (big fleets)



Unique technologies:



Inter-species HR moved down on tech tree, cost reduced, overpopulation reduction increased to -50%. Renamed to "WAAAGH banners" or something =)

Same with permanent advantage.

All kininetic weapons buffed significally to compensate awful accuracy (like +30% projectiles across the board). Alternatively make a unique "More Daka" support module which increases number of projectiles.

Technologies increasing fleet cap moved down on tech tree.



Dust recyclers 2/2 (looting)

Knowledge gathering 2/2 (looting)

Cloning 3/3 (populating fast regardless of environment)

Crowded planets 1/2 (high population cap)

Fearless warriors 2/2 (difficult to drive off)

Militarists 3/3

Big fleets 2/2

Deadly weapons 3/3

Rebellion 2/2



Unskilled builders 3/3

Space cadets 3/3

Spray and pray 3/3

Eternal war 1/1

i understand where your going with the points now i think then u should also give them revenge 2/2 because when they lose a place they always come back and ive been rethinking the eternal war because they do team up at points when it suits there cause so i think it should be changed to no alliances but can cooperation agreement for only 30 turns then its over no because in the rule book the only race that has know one to friend with is the nids the orks can team with the necrons eldar and others

If someone wants to come aboard and help, we could look in to changing how that would work. In its current implementation, I don't want to give too many people Eternal War, because I already have Chaos and Tyranids using it, and if I do the Orks it wouldn't make sense as the Necron and Imperium are just as violent.



As for your suggestion Manoob, I already have some ideas going for the Orks now, though I may look in to custom traits/technologies later on. In the mean time, I'm still fidgeting with the Tyranid affinity to get it to work, so we're a ways off of that yet.



Did either of you happen to have any critiques or suggestions about the initial gameplay alterations?

Sorry, what specific modding information were you looking for?

Left to the races who are unable to conventionally conquer?



The Eldar aren't really empire builders, and the Necron seek only to extinguish life.



Both races who would probably win the game by eliminating the home worlds of the others, rather then bother slogging through their territory's. (Well, technically the Necrons are still amassing, but until then they would be seeking to reactivate their tomb worlds)

Inability to conquer can be reflected by deep roots trait and free travel would make it easier to reach and conquer other factions home systems for instance. As for eliminating all life, current game mechanics do not allow it I suppose.

Indeed and the use of deep roots fits well here.



Could also add on to deep roots making sure that any conquered system would starve to 1 population, making conquering extremely hard for the affected races to assimilate new enemy systems.