ICE 24

Information, How-to's, and discussion about mod'ing Master of Orion II.
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Rocco
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Re: ICE Mod 10l

Postby Rocco » Wed Aug 19, 2015 6:17 pm

Hey Rocco, I was playing around with ship defense picks. Recall if you will mentioning it comes along with missile defense, but I'm getting less than I thought. You were saying +50 ship defense should come with +50 missile defense. When I boot up a game with those defense picks, I only get half missile defense. I was pretty sure you didn't get the full 50. Was that what you meant or should I be getting more with the mod?
Also the tactical game mode is not free of screen info bugs entirely and you have found one of them. The missile defense you get is +50, but for some reason if you check a ship info while on the galaxy map or in Fleets section, you will see only half the value listed. However when you are in combat, you will see that the full +50 will be listed. It is one of these things I would like to look at whenever I have time for it and at the moment it has not been fixed in the mod.

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Dukinson
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Re: ICE Mod 10l

Postby Dukinson » Wed Aug 19, 2015 7:10 pm

Ah interesting. Do you think it's possible I do not get the bonus in strategic combat either? Maybe it's only truely measured properly in tactical. Maybe this was why you have so little faith in the ship details box. Are their any other 100% confirmed bugs in that screen or was this the only one?

Might I add that I like what you've done with some of the early game leaders. Especially the environmentalist chick. She's pretty good to get now.
A cob of corn in every pot, an outpost ship with fuel tanks in every garage, and two command points for every colony!

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Rocco
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Re: ICE Mod 10l

Postby Rocco » Thu Aug 20, 2015 12:13 pm

Do you think it's possible I do not get the bonus in strategic combat either? Maybe it's only truely measured properly in tactical. Maybe this was why you have so little faith in the ship details box. Are their any other 100% confirmed bugs in that screen or was this the only one?
You do get the bonus in tactical, it is just now shown in the ship info screen when not in combat. About strategic, I cannot say, as I only recently started to look at the mechanics.

There is also the Augmented Engines issue that shows to high BD in the Ship Design screen and the value is correct in Ship Info screen (described in other thread). This one I have looked at to fix, but could not find a way.

edit: there is also a screen bug with leaders: for example if you put a helmsman leader +5 on a ship, only that specific ship in the fleet will show the extra +5 SD, but in battle the bonus applies to all ships in the fleet and it is shown as well on in-combat ship info.

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Dukinson
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Re: ICE Mod 10l

Postby Dukinson » Sat Aug 22, 2015 10:19 pm

I was playing a game and I noticed something odd. I had Aquasarrious in my fleet and he was level 3. I could swear that by level 3 in vanilla Aquas navigator skill would read out as +2. It still read +1. Shouldn't it be higher by Commodore?
A cob of corn in every pot, an outpost ship with fuel tanks in every garage, and two command points for every colony!

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Rocco
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Re: ICE Mod 10l

Postby Rocco » Sun Aug 23, 2015 2:34 am

I had Aquasarrious in my fleet and he was level 3. I could swear that by level 3 in vanilla Aquas navigator skill would read out as +2. It still read +1. Shouldn't it be higher by Commodore?
Good observation. This was a screen bug that has been fixed by vdc team. Navigator skill was previously reading a too high value compared to what you actually got in speed.

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Dukinson
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Re: ICE Mod 10l

Postby Dukinson » Mon Aug 24, 2015 12:26 am

I'm really finding it shocking how many display bugs there are in this game. Tolerant maintenance, defense pick missile defense, navigator. Were the designers just asleep at the wheel? Moo2 was considered a great game in it's time and none of my friends knew of any of these display bugs. I still find it hard to accept that navigator specialists don't read true at commodore. I could swear when I had a slower navigator that the faster one could peal off from the fleet more quickly or could lead the fleet faster after getting +2 navigation. I might have to boot up a vanilla game for sanity's sake.
A cob of corn in every pot, an outpost ship with fuel tanks in every garage, and two command points for every colony!

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Rocco
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Re: ICE Mod 10l

Postby Rocco » Mon Aug 24, 2015 4:28 am

Well, the list of (minor) MOO2 bugs is quite impressive.
http://masteroforion2.blogspot.nl/2005_ ... 2652176415
I still find it hard to accept that navigator specialists don't read true at commodore. I might have to boot up a vanilla game for sanity's sake.
It is always best to check it, especially if your sanity is at stake :)

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Dukinson
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Re: ICE Mod 10l

Postby Dukinson » Mon Aug 24, 2015 2:59 pm

I went back and played a vanilla game today, fortunately a had a few old saves to play with that saved some time. I noticed something about my economy and maintenance. I do like the concept of how planet climate vary more rather than being so similar in maintenance and size as they were in vanilla, but it seems that it punishes repulsive. What I mean is that in vanilla, a given empire early on will have a spectrum of climates, a few being deserts, radiated, and toxic. The rest had no maintenance penalty. My empires now, with similar climate distribution, will have a higher net maintenance than they used to. Therefor, I will tend to have to set my tax rate higher. While most other races will have trade treaties to help offset this, repulsives will struggle to pay the bills. I like how maintenance progresses as climates worsen but I do wonder if it's too much for only a -9 pick trait to be forced to deal with. Maybe the maintenance could be dropped 5 percent for non radiated and toxic planets.
A cob of corn in every pot, an outpost ship with fuel tanks in every garage, and two command points for every colony!

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Re: ICE Mod 10l

Postby Dukinson » Mon Aug 24, 2015 4:06 pm

I noticed ship leaders abilities now read "improves all ships in the fleet" where in vanilla it says "improves ship". Was this a vdc/icemod change or yet another display bug? I searched the changelog but didn't see it.
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Re: ICE Mod 10l

Postby Dukinson » Mon Aug 24, 2015 11:36 pm

I've mentioned this briefly before but I thought I'd describe a cheap tactic I've been using to buffer myself from powerful empires with weak empires.

For some reason, the computer will not easily attack itself. I had the Klackons with a couple worlds, pitiful tech level and an almost nonexistent fleet. In order to keep the massive Meklar fleet at bay, I would immediately destroy any colony they made within my fuel range so they could not reach me. Instead, I let the Klackons colonize them. The Klackon could never hurt me, and the Meklar refused to attack them! If I were the Klackon, Henry Kissinger couldn't have talked the Meklar into not destroying me in an instant at such a miserable stage of development.

So, why does the computer have a propensity to avoid attacking other AIs it could easily add their colonies to their empire? I think if you could modify the AI to be more aggressive towards itself when the prey is easy pickings, it would make your mod more challenging.

Btw, I've done the same thing with the Silicoids in vanilla (not icemod, they're a joke now) so it's not like they are buttering them up with treaties, they were repulsive zenophobes! Still, there are many many games I could remember where I beat the silicoids because they refused to expand into an easily destroyable neighbor.
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Rocco
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Re: ICE Mod 10l

Postby Rocco » Tue Aug 25, 2015 4:16 am

I noticed ship leaders abilities now read "improves all ships in the fleet" where in vanilla it says "improves ship".
A textual correction. Ship Leaders also give their bonus to the whole fleet in classic.
...My empires now, with similar climate distribution, will have a higher net maintenance than they used to. Therefor, I will tend to have to set my tax rate higher. While most other races will have trade treaties to help offset this, repulsives will struggle to pay the bills. I like how maintenance progresses as climates worsen but I do wonder if it's too much for only a -9 pick trait to be forced to deal with. Maybe the maintenance could be dropped 5 percent for non radiated and toxic planets.
So in classic system the maintenance penalties are 50% for Toxic and 25% for Radiated and Desert.
In ice 50% for Toxic, 40% for Radiated, 20% for Barren and 10% for Desert.
While I can see your point that Repulsive race cannot offset this with treaties, you should still be able to play a Repulsive race without setting a default tax rate to pay the bills. If this need arises, it is an indication that your population is not growing fast enough, or in other words you are building too many buildings compared to your pop. base.
The reason to set Rep. at -9 value is so you can make combinations with -Growth, -Cash, Low-G and Uncreative.
These combinations add up the the max 21 negatives. If Repulsive would be revalued to -10 then all these combo's are no longer possible.
So, why does the computer have a propensity to avoid attacking other AIs it could easily add their colonies to their empire? I think if you could modify the AI to be more aggressive towards itself when the prey is easy pickings, it would make your mod more challenging.
Dunno, what can I say, I am trying to make single player more interesting than classic, but in the end the strategy and tactics of the a.i. are simply not up to par. I am not a programmer so cannot fix it, if it is fixable at all. One way it could be changed however is by changing the a.i. personalities. Example; I could make all a.i. agressive, ruthless or xenophobic but I haven't had time to experiment with that yet and am not sure if it would be an improvement if all opponenent become more alike.
Having said that, if you are lookng for more challenge than what ICE-X can offer, than I would suggest you take up Overlord2's invitation to play MP, as it would be a game of another level.

In what way are the Silicoids a joke?

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Dukinson
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Re: ICE Mod 10l

Postby Dukinson » Tue Aug 25, 2015 12:33 pm

About maintenance, I play subterranean and still end up setting tax rates to 20 or even 30 percent. More planets just means more buildings. It's a ratio thing, not a population thing. There are rare instances where I get many terrains early and I stick to around 10%. In vanilla is was a rarity to hit the 20% tax mark for me. That was tolerant, not even the size that sub gets. It's not a huge deal and you know I've already mentioned how I think repulsive was not low enough in picks as well as some other negatives no one would use, but that's another conversation. Like I said, maybe the maintenance on planets could be slightly reduced. If you think about it, there is more weather on a terrain planet than a barren. Why would buildings need maintenance on a planet with no weather? I get it's more of a balance thing, being in the lowest unterriformed state. I like how you boosted radiated too.

About silicoids, they do appear weaker in comparison to the some of the other more powerful races like the Meklar. They seem to languish with small empires. I noted they aren't always repulsive now, but they don't seem as "juiced" pick wise. Maybe because they were previously the most powerful in vanilla, they didn't get quite the love the other races did. When they are repulsive, they are a cake walk. Not being able to trade techs is a huge negative to the AI. I've had games where the Psilons made everyone else I had to fight MUCH more dangerous, and all because of tech trading.
A cob of corn in every pot, an outpost ship with fuel tanks in every garage, and two command points for every colony!

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Darza
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Re: ICE Mod 10l

Postby Darza » Tue Aug 25, 2015 12:38 pm

I think repulsive was not low enough in picks as well as some other negatives no one would use
Rocco, that guy is just some troll, why you feed him here?

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Dukinson
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Re: ICE Mod 10l

Postby Dukinson » Tue Aug 25, 2015 1:12 pm

Dunno, what can I say, I am trying to make single player more interesting than classic, but in the end the strategy and tactics of the a.i. are simply not up to par. I am not a programmer so cannot fix it, if it is fixable at all. One way it could be changed however is by changing the a.i. personalities. Example; I could make all a.i. agressive, ruthless or xenophobic but I haven't had time to experiment with that yet and am not sure if it would be an improvement if all opponenent become more alike.
Having said that, if you are lookng for more challenge than what ICE-X can offer, than I would suggest you take up Overlord2's invitation to play MP, as it would be a game of another level.
Don't worry too much, your mod is plenty challenging even if they Ai's tactics aren't perfect.
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Rocco
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Re: ICE Mod 10m

Postby Rocco » Wed Aug 26, 2015 6:13 am

Like I said, maybe the maintenance on planets could be slightly reduced. If you think about it, there is more weather on a terrain planet than a barren. Why would buildings need maintenance on a planet with no weather? I get it's more of a balance thing, being in the lowest unterriformed state. I like how you boosted radiated too.
I have no intention to change these rates as it is a really nice and subtle way to favour morale races. Uni can build faster but then has to pay the bill for maintenance. Morale races start slower, but with morale increase they can build faster and their tax income rises, which pays for the increased maintenance. Uni does not have the tax benefit and needs to get money buildings sooner.
Even so, If I play some UniRep race I never have to raise taxes to a default 20-30%, such tax rates should only be set for specific purposes like a rush build or even to get cash for a good leader - as Repulsive does not get many great leaders. Again, if you need to set a default tax rate of more than 10% your population base is too small.
As for the story line, it is quite easy to think of an explanation as you cannot build a standard brick house on the moon. It needs to be airtight and there need to be oxygen systems etc etc. These things require maintenance.


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