Designing Starbases

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philcha
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Postby philcha » Wed Feb 13, 2008 11:09 am

The question of which beam weapons are best for SBs is complex. For example the AIs usually neglect shields, but very occasionally one AI goes for advanced shields and neglects armour. In the latter case SP phasors would be best. But: SP phasors would usually be very sub-optimal if the SB automatically used all mods in all games (you'd be better off with a larger number of non-SP weapons); and there's no easy answer if 2 AIs attack and one goes for shields while the other goes for armour.

The same arguments apply to Ground Batteries, and I can't imagine how player-designed Ground Batteries could be fitted into the game.

It's even worse with missiles. The normal approach with ships is 3 sets of missiles: fast, armoured, to soak up all the enemy's PD firepower; hard-hitting, often MIRV, to blow away their shields; and EMG for a quick kill. But SBs only have 1 missile group and Missile Bases only have 2.

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TheDS
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Postby TheDS » Mon Feb 18, 2008 9:01 pm

I like the idea of designing starbases, but I see too many problems to overcome. Many tech lines yield an improvement to systems, and you'd want to keep everything up to date (and presumably have your changes reflected to all your bases instantly). Would become a hassle.
Otherwise such change would make LBs patch very attractive for Singleplayers...and I smell new kali players when his patch is popular among Singleplayers.

So far, I see no convincing reason to convince a singleplayer to use LBs patch.
I am SP-only, and I find it impossible to play WITHOUT LB's patch on 2000 or XP. (His mouse-fix went far, but the full patch has eliminated ALL my CTDs (so far).) I have very little desire to play unknown people online in a game that, at its most entertaining, takes about 24 hours to play. I simply didn't have the will to figure out how to install his previous patches, but since he made it dead-easy to install, I'm using it and eagerly awaiting his next installment.
Why do they get to attack me without war being declared, but I can't do the same?

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Time
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Postby Time » Wed Feb 20, 2008 12:26 am

Is there a way to "See" what is on your sb, before being attacked?
for example, if a spy steals scout lab, will my research go up, becuase, it is automatically installed on existing sbs?
If not, I'd sure like to refit them sometimes, like when not playing a research race, or a random monster attacks a planet of mine.
MOO1 Fan, MOO2 Fan, MOO3 needed too many changes = hopeless, getting older waiting for a MOO4 (still).

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SLabs

Postby c'g~ » Wed Feb 20, 2008 5:41 am

Is there a way to "See" what is on your sb, before being attacked?

I don’t know the way. But about Scout Lab – yeah, they would be installed immediately on SB when U somehow get them (but I can said for sure only for EXPa Mod, because I tested that there)

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Time
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Postby Time » Wed Feb 20, 2008 11:18 pm

Really? That's great!
But wait, Scout Lab gives Research based on the size of the ship, so, what size would a SB be? or a BattStat? or StarFort?
How much research would those generate?
or does it just grant the bonus vs. monsters/antarans?
MOO1 Fan, MOO2 Fan, MOO3 needed too many changes = hopeless, getting older waiting for a MOO4 (still).

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SLabs

Postby c'g~ » Thu Feb 21, 2008 5:39 am

Unfortunately, SB/BS or SF with Scout Lab does not give U additional RP. But they gain the same Attack Bonus against Antarans/Monsters like BB/Titan/Doom Star correspondingly.

But while testing I found one good thing about Scout Labs – they have miniaturization (in another word they will got smaller if U research further on the same branch of the Tech Tree)

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Time
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Postby Time » Sun Feb 24, 2008 2:38 pm

That makes since. All except the extra RP part, but, I guess giving free RP, with each sb built would make prod races even more powerful.

It would help creative races compensate for their 8 point pick.
1,2,3 points respectively, could work, if someone wanted to code it in.
MOO1 Fan, MOO2 Fan, MOO3 needed too many changes = hopeless, getting older waiting for a MOO4 (still).

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Salvation

Postby c'g~ » Mon Feb 25, 2008 5:49 am

I guess giving free RP, with each sb built would make prod races even more powerful
Yea, I agree with it. But it would be salvation for Feudal races, doesn’t U think? But it’s true, along with salvation for Feud, it’s IMBA for Uni – original MoO2 is so imbalanced.

So again and again I will convincing everyone – play MoO2 with Modifications

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Postby Turbo Beholder » Fri Feb 29, 2008 10:52 am

An alternative to designing your own would be to have the AI become better at designing ships and starbases.
At least to exclude system-damage flagged weapons (Ion-Puppy Cannon) and change order of preferrence for all systems. Probably it will be much more easy... after someone will find where.
To make SBs designable you'd have to increase the number of "ship" classes shown in the colony Build Menu,
Build Menu is only one of problems here. And even design screen with hull selection would be only final touch.
First of all, Starbases just don't exist outside combat. At all. Just like missiles. They're nothing more than Building flags in colony. That's why
Unfortunately, SB/BS or SF with Scout Lab does not give U additional RP. But they gain the same Attack Bonus against Antarans/Monsters like BB/Titan/Doom Star correspondingly.
If they will become real permanent ships with ShipID, leader assignment and all — fine, but then it counts against 500 ship limit, so table needs to be expanded somehow, or it will be full of starbases.
Also ships are placed at systems, not planets. To replace PlanetID instead of SystemID ? And have "IsStarbase" checked near everywhere ? Maybe placing all ships to planets would be just as "easy".
Also right now there's 6 (yes, six — not five) design slots for each player in savegames. To add new or to reassign single slot for all bases ? It would do, but probably it needs to be assigned specifically and hull selection restricted.
All this would be quite simple on source-code level but almost impossible on executable which we even didn't mapped well.
make them a special type of "ship"
There's bases hulls in stats table after Doomstar, but when i change existing ship's hull # to any of those, MoO2 crashes on ship screen opening (right-click in fleet, etc), though it shows non-internal statistics on Fleets screen.
and you'd want to keep everything up to date (and presumably have your changes reflected to all your bases instantly). Would become a hassle.
The same with ships. But it works in "Stars!" which has much more massive management — swarm fleet-raising like in MoO1, lots of adjustable production queues, etc.
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- Michele Carter

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Re: SLabs

Postby c'g~ » Sun Mar 02, 2008 5:23 am

But they gain the same Attack Bonus against Antarans/Monsters like BB/Titan/Doom Star correspondingly.
Sorry for false information – Slabs just give the same +20% BA Bonus to all Ship Hulls against Monsters, but NOT against Antarans.

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Time
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Postby Time » Sun Mar 02, 2008 5:43 pm

You mentioned Stars!
I looked it up in the wikipedia.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stars!
It looks similar, just with windows.
Unfortunately for me, it is a 16-bit game, and my Vista cannot run 16 bit games. :(

If the authors remake it as a 64-bit game, I'll try it.

Edit: I also found this one: http://wiki.gible.net/index.php?title=Main_Page
from the game itself.
Last edited by Time on Sun Mar 16, 2008 12:08 pm, edited 1 time in total.
MOO1 Fan, MOO2 Fan, MOO3 needed too many changes = hopeless, getting older waiting for a MOO4 (still).

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TheDS
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Postby TheDS » Sat Mar 15, 2008 10:34 pm

Your link didn't work for me, Time, but this one does.
Why do they get to attack me without war being declared, but I can't do the same?

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philcha
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Oops, forgot to check page 2!

Postby philcha » Sun Jul 27, 2008 12:27 pm

I just answerd an old post at the bottom of page 1 - sorry, didn't notice the discussion had moved on.

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Postby Parabola » Mon Jun 08, 2009 3:14 am

If StarBases can be designed it would be good (then you don't have them using lame techs as mentioned by Time, like Ion Pulse vs Antarans) but this would bring up another problem - they would lsoe teh ability to be instantly updated with new tech, new shields/armor/etc. which would suck for a lot of reasons as well.

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Iceman
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Postby Iceman » Fri Jul 03, 2009 1:38 am

If StarBases can be designed it would be good (then you don't have them using lame techs as mentioned by Time, like Ion Pulse vs Antarans) but this would bring up another problem - they would lsoe teh ability to be instantly updated with new tech, new shields/armor/etc. which would suck for a lot of reasons as well.
They wouldn't necessarily have that problem. For instance, you could refit starbases for free. Then, if you got a new technology and you wanted to use it, you could just refit your starbases.


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