New to the game, loving it, but cant figure these out: |
Hi everyone,
I am a big fan of all sci-fi tbs games, ever since the first MOO. I have just gotten SE5 and so far I am very pleased. The interface however is a total disaster in places, and the game is obviously still a major construction site - I think it suffers from the problem of the developer and the avid fans being so used to some "workarounds" that they can´t see them anymore. One example is the need to put supply on the bases (which is usually stored within the engines for ships, otherwise they won´t fire weapons needing supplies to operate. A newb will rarely figure this out, while every vet will go "why of course, you need to add supplies!"
So after reading through the (not really up-to-date and quite uninformative) manual, browsing through the forums at two dedicated websites and quite a bit of experimentation I still can´t work out these two issues (I am sure there will be more as I dive deeper into the game):
1.) How can I select more than one construction queue WITHOUT clicking the "blue ball" in each one individually? I tried the right-click, ctrl-click, shift-click, alt-click, ctrl-a, etc. to no avail. It is very tedious to click every single line with like 30 planets, if I want to add some troops to all of them...
2.) I like the "realism" of only seeing what my sensors uncover. So I enter a new system, survey it, and I discover some enemy planets. As soon as those planets leave my sensor range again, there is no way of having the game show them as "inhabited by xy-race at last sensor scan". Of course I could add some system notes, drop a satellite at each one, play with unlimited sensor range or get a pen and paper and draw myself a map - but I am thinking there might be a way of displaying this information, like there is in most other strategy games with "fog of war" like Civ4 and GalCiv2, for example.
Finally I would like to say a big thanks to the modders, especially CaptainKwok, whose balance-mod I am using, because without their effort the game would be as much fun and as big a challenge as copying the L.A. telephone-book by hand...
Jan
Re: New to the game, loving it, but cant figure these out:
Thanks, BT. One of those great, "Why didn't I think of that?" ideas.
Re: New to the game, loving it, but cant figure these out:
You can select multiple queues at once. There is a box you can click on the Construction Queue screen called "multiple queues" or something. You click that and the little circles change to squares and you can select multiple planets.
As for marking the explored planets, there is no way to do that. I mark "important" enemy planets with a minefield indicator (control-space). I suspose you could then record the info on paper... Kind of a pain not being able to mark enemy planets...
Re: New to the game, loving it, but cant figure these out:
Oops, I misread... I thought you were asking how to select ALL of your planets at the same time.
There is a problem with "add to all selected queues" command though... every planet on emergency will go into slow mode.
Re: New to the game, loving it, but cant figure these out:
*grumble* Double post...
Re: New to the game, loving it, but cant figure these out:
Thanks for the replies, everyone.
No, BlueTemplar, you didn´t misread, thedude did 
I knew that its possible to select multiple planets by clicking each and everyone of them, and asked for a keyshortcut to select ALL of them or maybe a subsequent set of 7 somewhere in the list - kinda like marking different files in windows - ctrl-a will select all of them, shift-click will select all the ones from your selection to your click, and so on...
I kinda like the minefield idea, but will just play with the "can see everything" option for now - it saves me the trouble of laying sensor-sats everywhere. The AI won´t clear these out anyway, and I dont suppose they are that great at cloaking either...
Jan
Re: New to the game, loving it, but cant figure these out:
Too many sensor sats in my empire clutters my systems and slows down my frame rate... if only we could desactivate their flags...
Re: New to the game, loving it, but cant figure these out:
Hi guys,
You could of coures leave a satellite with good sensors in range to keep an eye on things? or a scout Drone patroling the system which can move on at a later date? Or even a single scout Fighter?
The list goes on? Just adapt as you go its the easest way?
I hope this helps? Spuda
Re: New to the game, loving it, but cant figure these out:
Drones use supply each turn, so it'd be a short-lived scout. The satellites are my usual method. If I feel a sat is likely to be menaced, I put some cloaking on it once that's been researched but usually it's not an issue.
I'm another person smacking my forehead about the mark-planets-as-minefields idea.
Re: New to the game, loving it, but cant figure these out:
Doesn't cloak also use supplies?
Re: New to the game, loving it, but cant figure these out:
Adding to the minefield idea, you can use the System Notes to record supplemental information.
Re: New to the game, loving it, but cant figure these out:
There is a problem with "add to all selected queues" command though... every planet on emergency will go into slow mode.
There's a way around that problem. Filter so that only your emergency build constructors show, select all the ones you want to queue up, and then go into the Add All menu. Then before you add the thing you want to build, you select emergency build, and they'll all stay on emer. build. Then you can go back to the non-emergency ones and queue up as normal.
Re: New to the game, loving it, but cant figure these out:
Thanks, didn't know that.
Re: New to the game, loving it, but cant figure these out:
- Yes we should have some sort of warning telling you you forgot to place supplies on ships. I'd prefer to have engines and weapons not be able to store supplies and ordnance, since we have dedicated components for that.
1) You can't
2) Hope for a patch to change that, but IMHO this is not likely to happen. An easy way to mark enemy planets is to use mine fields (Ctrl + Space).