"Very Difficult Choice" Mod, irc channel: irc.quakenet.org/vdc

[Overlord2]

What puzzles me is why it spawns so few ships, whereas the size of the fleet was considerably increased. I will look further into this matter.

[Semmelbaecker]

Here is an exampe of command line used in our games:

VDCGM2.exe /skipintro /nobh /nowh /nonebula /planets=5 /nosplint /noorion /noreport
mapgen.exe -tfixedhw -ttoxic -ttiny -tupoor -ssplint -mmonst -tlowg -sarti -tgaia
CRYOGEN.exe
VDCGM2.exe /skipintro /nobh /nowh /nonebula /planets=5 /nosplint /noorion /noreport

Thank you, it works for me now I just use the OR mapscript, but thats no big deall. Lets give it a try with a kind of a crazy race:
Dictator,
+60% Popgrow
+ 1 Prod
+ 1 Science
richHW, largeHW,
aquatic, subterran
Warloard

I have no idea if this race does any good. It will however produce a lot of pop.. my homesystem alone will support more than 100 pop.. lets see how it goes against the computer.

[Overlord2]

Interesting race, with this race might want to try taking VRN, then prod will be very good. However, initial pop 60 will hurt - pop growth will be low early on.
Generally the benchmark for a tech race is 42 pop by t50, while for dict prod race it is 50 pop by t50. Unification can do even more - about 55-60 pop by t50. This race goes more as a tech race, but the quality of this race could be measured only by t100: how much pop and tech it gets. Good performance is teching imperium by t100 and pop >180. Imperium by 105 is average performance. Hope this helps.
Edit: forgot to say about Warlord. Warlord pick won't be of benefit in this case. Extra attack won't play a big role, but economic performance will be more important. Better to switch Warlord pick to 100 pop growth or take arti hw and quickly research autofactory...

[Semmelbaecker]

55-60 pop by turn 50?? How on earth can do do that? I got a pop of 32 (number of people I counted through all my colonies).

Ok, I build a colony base, some freighters and then I set 3 people on the new planet and build a barracks for the -20%, a automated factory and a research lab (in that order). Than I take the additional 2 pop back to the home world and set the colony on housing. They do roughly 0.25 pop per turn and generate 5 science. The research-lab costs roughly 4 turns, so its totally worth (in my opinion).

My tech-path is research lab, fighters, auto-factory, biospheres, bio-terminator (which I got on turn 50) and now going for cloning centre, than super computer. After that, weapons of some kind.

Is that compatitive? Maybe I should look for some strategy guides in the forum. The 55-60 pop by turn 50 scare me to be honest.

[Overlord2]

55-60 pop by turn 50?? How on earth can do do that? I got a pop of 32 (number of people I counted through all my colonies).

Good unification races can do that. Remember you start with 5 planets in hw and can get 3 planets system for first CS and if it is rich, even better.

Ok, I build a colony base, some freighters and then I set 3 people on the new planet and build a barracks for the -20%, a automated factory and a research lab (in that order). Than I take the additional 2 pop back to the home world and set the colony on housing. They do roughly 0.25 pop per turn and generate 5 science. The research-lab costs roughly 4 turns, so its totally worth (in my opinion).

My tech-path is research lab, fighters, auto-factory, biospheres, bio-terminator (which I got on turn 50) and now going for cloning centre, than super computer. After that, weapons of some kind.

This is bad tech path for the race you pointed, should go straight for autofactory with arti hw, or start building colony bases immediately in case of 100 pop race.

The 55-60 pop by turn 50 scare me to be honest.

Makes a big difference for other governments than unification. For uni it isn't a big deal, since what matters is further space to develop. If the initial system is good, but you have no other good systems, unification will slow down it's development, and final result will be average or low.

[angra]

Antarans still are not real threat. First attack was at 100 turn and it looked quite potent. At least against other races though my own star base easily handle it alone. But next attack was at 150 turn and it was like a joke. No attacks between 100 and 150. Please make Antarans more aggressive in next patches. And do not forget about quantum detonator to prevent capture + scrap for advanced techs.

[Overlord2]

I will increase the frequency of attacks, did some tests, so know how to do it.
As for the quantum detonator, there is no need in it since in 1.40 patch LB made impossible to capture antarans ships.

[Overlord2]

43b uploaded with Antaran's attack frequency increased.

[Itzamna]

Hello.


First of all, thanks for the mod, it really revamps MOO2 into a more challenging and interesting game.

I've only tried it once, but it crashed me right after i killed the Antaran's on their homeworld. As soon i killed the base ship it went to a black screen and nothing else. Had to force quit it.


I've played singleplayer on a huge map, impossible difficulty and with 5 more AI's.

[Overlord2]

Hello.


First of all, thanks for the mod, it really revamps MOO2 into a more challenging and interesting game.

I've only tried it once, but it crashed me right after i killed the Antaran's on their homeworld. As soon i killed the base ship it went to a black screen and nothing else. Had to force quit it.


I've played singleplayer on a huge map, impossible difficulty and with 5 more AI's.

Hi,
Thanks for positive feedback.
About moo2 crash - which version did crash, the last one (43b)? Please, send me the save, it'll help me to find the error.

[Itzamna]

Hello.


First of all, thanks for the mod, it really revamps MOO2 into a more challenging and interesting game.

I've only tried it once, but it crashed me right after i killed the Antaran's on their homeworld. As soon i killed the base ship it went to a black screen and nothing else. Had to force quit it.


I've played singleplayer on a huge map, impossible difficulty and with 5 more AI's.

Hi,
Thanks for positive feedback.
About moo2 crash - which version did crash, the last one (43b)? Please, send me the save, it'll help me to find the error.

That will be quite impossible because i tried to re-install the game and the mod, and so i deleted the game files. But, ill make another game and ill see if it still crashes ok?

[Overlord2]

Sure.

[Semmelbaecker]

I tried the race I told you about, it got destroyed around the 100 turn mark. The silikoids were quite near.. I never got around to produce the first warship. I was too busy with producing colonies. I had around 30 pop at turn 50.. I really would like to know how you get to these ridiculous amounts of pop.. Ill try a unification race next.

Your modification of the race picks were successful. The computer is much more challanging now.

Also congrats on the antaran attacks! They are quite challenging (at least in my gamepace)

Cheers,
Semmel

[Catalyst_Kh]

After building Holo Simulator, “only” 44 pop of Dict or Demo “equals” to 55 pop of Uni race, due to morale, so don't be too anxious about pure pop number alone. Also, at early stages Uni race “wastes” a lot of production to build freighters and a lot of workers to farm food (if not Uni-Aqua), thus that “extra” pop doesn't mean extra power automatically. For example, Lith race doesn't need freighters for food and farming itself, so even “only” ~30 Lith pop (after Holo Sim) will be as good as 55 of Uni pop. Extra money from extra pop also halved due to food transporting cost. This is all rude and abstract rounding of course, but I hope you got the idea. Strategy approach should be complex and differ from one race to another.

To gain a lot of pop by move 50 you need to start housing on most planets with Factories early on, or be +100 pop growth. The best would be to get Robotic Factories right after RLabs and AFactories, to start powerful housing with Factories+Robotics, but that will temporarily slow down your science, due to more late Supercomputers.

[Overlord2]

I started working on the guide, where I'll give reference of main development paths for different races.