Kwok's Next Mod

This project is really exciting. The Balance MOD is already outstanding but any new features that makes the game feel more realistic is welcome.

Sounds really interesting, can't wait to have a go, hope you don't have too much trouble implementing your ideas. Good Luck.

Nice news!

I would like to see cities/settlements as major facilities just like seen in the Propotions-Mod. These could be heavily dependant on these often overlooked social techs.
It might make live easier for the AI when there aren't too many different facilities to choose from.. to reduce build time (compare Proportions-Mod..) one could keep build-costs low and make output more dependant on population.
I would also like to see a special hull-type 'space dock' which would be much cheaper than normal space-station and be only suitable for Space-Yard-use. AIs should also make use of such designs to allow for continous ship/fighter/sat-production while planets focus on facilitys.

Is there a way to implement Space Yard Extensions? These could come in handy for the bigger hulls/facilities.

Your concept on ship-sizes is really interesting: this way one could form more balanced/diverse fleets from the beginning on.

I would also propose reduced strenght of weapon platforms to make defense more dynamic or at least restict WPs to cetain weapons (misslies).

I just turned to SEIV for a moment and was quite shocked by the AIs aggressiveness.. I must have become a bit 'soft' playing SEV.. How does this come? Fleets of 20+ ships (good ones!) and 50+ battle-stations around the homeworld.. thrilling! What has to be done to improve SEV-AIs to this state?

Arne

---Sig---
Playing Touhou games (Go here if interested . No, nobody else is that good/insane as that replay). No rush for SE V bug fixing.

Space Yard Expansions per se are not possible in SE5. They exploited a flaw in the upgrade facility routine that did not check for duplicate SY abilities on a planet (upgrading a non-SY facility to a SY facility). In SE5, you cannot upgrade from one type of facility to another; only levels of the same facility type. You can make several SY facilities, of varying sizes and build rates, but you can only ever build one. You have to start on whatever size you wish from scratch.

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I love it, i really love these ideas, an the bit i love most is that yours keeping this and BM seperate, i love BM's style, and i love this ones style, but i've seen so many other modders (in other games) think that it'd be a good idea to merge their ideas. so i salute you sir ^_^

would i be right in reading that i could make short range but extra fast colony ships? oh i would be happy if thats the case.

i hope your endevers in this project go well

Good luck for you new mod!

it would be cool if you combine some of the IRM techtree with the BM gameplay and your new additions

I like the ship building process in gritty galaxy as well where large ships take longer to build but have lower maintenance than the equivalently armed larger number of smaller ships. I would also like larger ships to be less easy to take out with smaller ships (building large amounts of frigates). Similarly fighters without large weapons should be unable to damage large ships very easily. Thats just my opinion though.

That's why I always pump up emissive armor, so you have to research bigger nastier weapons. In my mod I have changed emissive to 5e at lv 1 to 340e at lev 50. Ships are also bigger, so they get more weapons.. it evens out.

"Genius is Simplicity" chris connors
"To win without fighting is best" sun tsu
those who think they know everything are annoying to those of us who do

Sounds like your mod does the main thing my change to the Balance Mod does, to give multiple ship sizes simultaneously with larger ships having both advantages and drawbacks. There are also a couple of things my mod does that a mod should do, IMO.

1. Troops should be treated like ships, and not like fighters. In my mod, troops are 100-200 kT and use ship weapons and components. This solves several problems: Ground combat will not break like it currently does from too many troops onscreen causing attackers to be forced past the corner of the map meaning that ground combat cannot ever be resolved on that planet. Fighters no longer dominate troops in ground combat. Weapon platforms can duke it out with troops without being able to destroy endless numbers of them effortlessly.

2. Large sensors and large ship yards. The former idea I simply lifted from the Gritty Galaxy mod, but I haven't seen the latter before. Basically, a large ship yard takes up 3 and 10 times the space for 2 and 3 times the build rate. Not something you'd put on every planet, but nice to have for those really expensive ships you want to crank out fast, like stellar manipulation. Also good if you want to outbuild an opponent. After all, it may not be that efficient space wise, but it's not like you can colonize 3 times as many planets and put normal sized ones on all of them if you've already colonized all the worlds in your territory.

I was thinking. Is there a way to have armor or shields take a percentage of damage based on how much damage it is receiving? For example if the damage is 1-50 take 25% of the damage. Or say a beam strikes for 50 damage. The armor takes 12.5 damage. There could be multiple levels of damage like 1-50 50 -100 and 100-150 or something. In this way weapons that are close to overpowering the armor will do a lot more damage but weaker weapons will still do damage and if you have enough weaker weapons you can still eventually destroy the armor. If this is possible I think this would be a really cool thing to put in your mod kwok.

*Nudges Kwok*
Brussels sprouts and Carrots.
If the BSG Mod Team ever finishes the BSG mod, I would be happy to work on that one.

You have some excellent ideas here and I can't wait to try them out. Have you any sort of time frame in mind for doing all of this?

I really like the idea of have reactors on the ships and would liek to see this go one step further with each component having a power rating that draws on the reactors. That way an unarmed scout could plug in a lot more engines for the same reactor and whislt a DU gun would use little engery it would suck ammo whilst the meson blasters etc would need loads of energy but use little supplies.

Just my two oence worth!

I'll just toss in a Bravo! and a good luck.

Well at a later date, if you still feel like it, you could always develoup a mod team...

But that would be later of course.

That is just a one-off thing though, isn't it? I wouldn't expect it to stack. If it doesn't, Space Yard Expansions are still not possible.

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I can tell you that you can't put a negative planet conditions effect into a facility (like a negative Climate Control Facility). Well, you can, but it doesn't do anything. I guess you could probably run it as an event that happens every X turns, checks all facilities on each planet and adjusts the conditions accordingly. Assuming that you can check what facilities a colony contains.

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Thought I would write and see what the stats of the new mod is? Sounds really interesting, lots of nifty effects... I love the polution concept and making a "city" add on is a really neat idea... giving boosts to happiness and stuff like that. Have it so 3 of them take up all the space of a tiny domed planet!

Kyle

Here are some of my suggestions. Some of these may not be feasible due to game configuration.

General:
- Improve AI all around!!!
- More emphasis on the other resources besides minerals ex: (1) organics should be a vital requirement for population growth (2) radio actives should be vital for engine/shield maintenance, etc…
- The requirements to expend resources in order to generate supplies/ordnance at resupply depots. For example, an expenditure of 1 x mineral, 1 x radioactive and 1 x organic will generate XX supplies/ordnance.
- In the ship list window include small icons of what each ship/planet is carrying. This pertains to multiple ships/planets in the same hex.
- The requirement to actually train crews for your ships (except colonization ships).
- The ability to set more than 9 x waypoints…as many as a player wants.
- Institute the requirement that a facility needs a certain amount of population to operate.
- The ability to set your TF or Fleet Flag ship as in SE IV.
- Include Pirate Ships, Space Monsters, etc…
- Include more random events…

Ship/Unit Design:
- The ability to selectively upgrade only certain components on a ship. For example, if I just want to upgrade just the weapon systems and sensors on a ship and not the engines, I should have the option.
- The ability to create your own design types as SE IV allowed.
- The ability to install any type of sensor on weapons platforms.
- The requirement for medical labs on destroyer size ships and larger. Health and welfare of the crew is vital…

Research:
- Limit the amount of research in any one area to 25%. Another option is to specialize the research facilities in to the different research areas: applied sciences, cultural advancement, theoretical sciences and weapons technology. Each type of research facility would only generate research points in that specific field of study.

Intelligence:
- Reduce the amount of Intelligence generated by Intelligence facilities. Allow collection of Intelligence through Spy Ships, Satellites, Drones, etc… (See New Components below – Intelligence Collection Array). Furthermore, these Intelligence platforms should receive bonuses for collecting while in an occupied system other than by your race.

Construction:
- Units should only be built at space yards. Another option is that units may only be built at specialized factories i.e. fighters at fighter production factories, mines at mine production factories, etc…
- The ability to retrofit units.
- The ability to upgrade ships or units while they’re in the construction queues.

New Components:
- Command Bridge – this component enhances the Task Force (TF) or Fleet operations (attack and defense). Only one Command Bridge would be effective per TF. The level of Command Bridge may also determine the number of ships that a TF/Fleet may hold.
- Intelligence Collection Array: This component is assortment of Intelligence collection systems that produce Intelligence points.
- Science Lab: This component generates research points.

Tactical Combat:
- The ability to select one ship in a TF, move it to a destination and the rest the ships of the TF follow suit while remaining in formation…Under the current game configuration I can never find my TF leaders.
- Upon selecting a ship, all other ships belonging to that TF should be highlighted.
- The ability to group fighters into one icon as in SE IV for easier C2.
- Fighters should automatically return to base (RTB) upon expenditures of all or low ordnance/supplies.

Congrat to you Kwok. You have the skills, you have dedication, you have the intelligence needed to do that. SE5 would still be unplayable without your work.

Seconded!!!

Here is my big pet peave...... The ship design naming process. Is there any way to mod in roman numeral suffixes?

Hello kwok and congratulations on the balance mod so far. It's been great! Also i'd like to wish you luck in you next mod!

Here a few ideas and suggestios for you: (more liek a wish list )

1) Crew should repair their own ships. Maybe the crew quarters component should repair the ship a little (maybe 5k damage/turn) (but no ability to repair units or facilities)

2) A special repair bay, smaller than the stock one, that can only repair units. Usefull on carriers.

3) Make a somewhat more inefficient version of a hangar bay that can launch fighters, sattelites, mines and drones altogether. Useful to place on the big ships, you may never know what you want to use it for later...

4) More typs of shield regenerators. At the same tech level you should get a small, medium and large shield regenerator. For instance i want to put a 10k shield regenerator on my frigate but a much bigger one - 40k - on my cruiser

5) Medical bays should add to boarding defences.

6) A bigger difference between ships turning speeds and acceleration. A battleship should turn reaaaaaly slow versus a frigate, making a frigates ideal for raiding atacks.

7) A bigger difference between engine speeds. Currently there is a too smaller difference between the ion engine and the quantum one. I really miss the slow exploration of the systems from SE IV.

A better balance on supplies. I think a frigate shouldn't eat up all the supplies of a small colony....

9) Bigger planets in the battle scene. Right now things are a bit disproportionate....