Feature Suggestions

[Lithari]

Hiya,

I have been playing this game for a while and I have had many problems with meeting an alien race and then when I colonize a world in my own home system, I get moaned at for expanding in their territory.

So I am thinking that they shouldn't moan about it in systems that do not belong to them (don't have colonies in them) and only complain like they do to me, when I enter their systems and colonize those worlds.

When it comes to the maximum buildings feature, which is cool and all, is abit wrong, I mean, I have my homeworld, Earth, with a limit of 12 buildings, but a world virtually 6x bigger with a limit of 9 buildings?? doesn't make sense to me.

I suggest that the maximum building allowance be based solely on world size, not colony type.

Small = 9

Medium = 12

Large = 15

Huge = 18

I would think that is more better, but that's just my opinion.

What do you guys think?

[GreenKing]

When it comes to the maximum buildings feature, which is cool and all, is abit wrong, I mean, I have my homeworld, Earth, with a limit of 12 buildings, but a world virtually 6x bigger with a limit of 9 buildings?? doesn't make sense to me.

I suggest that the maximum building allowance be based solely on world size, not colony type.

Small = 9

Medium = 12

Large = 15

Huge = 18

I could agree with that, as long as it didn't result in the game getting easier.

[Lithari]

Well, they could technically lower the outputs of the buildings in a way that balances out, based on how many buildings can be built....so, the lower the capacity, the higher the productivity, but the higher the capacity, the lower the productivity.

[Madbiologist]

If we go with something like this I still expect the Capitol to still get a bonus. Evolving and spending thousands (millions, depending when you consider a race begins 'developing' its world) of years on a planet developing it (ruining it and cleaning it up is more like it), should come with a perk.

Also, I wouldn't start at 9, 9 would be average with the largest worlds having a few more slots and I would make smaller and tiny worlds actually have even less slots. It seems limiting and makes smaller colonies very specialised with limited development, but that is the disadvantage of such small worlds. Even the largest worlds should have some limitations and the need to specialise to a degree.

Heck, without the archeo-tech or science breakthrough a capped planet is 15 (20 if you get every special upgrade). Considering the prevalence of Large and Huge planets, your scale would mean too many worlds will be like it was in alpha (build everything and have everything), never mind the inherent advantage of just already having a much larger population as a bonus. The whole point was to create specialisation, so your scale way too far generous and just turn large worlds into what we had in alpha.

[CellNav]

In the current beta (450), the growth rate of the population is very slow that I can see huge worlds (with 18 buildings) being ghost towns because half of those buildings would be vacant before the game is over. Now, if they included military buildings into the limit and added upgrades to those military buildings then I could see everything balance back down to what we have now, that is 9/9. It would be cool to have new military buildings like training facilities, extra missile batteries, etc. If they added the ability to have massive industry above 9/9, then we should take a big hit on pollution control (as an example).

The way I see it ... We might be capped at 9/9 but it's abstract. A small world's 9/9 isn't the same as a huge world 9/9, it's all relative meaning that we should see a 4x industry output on a huge world compared to a small world (just an example) with the same number of industry buildings.

[CellNav]

Sorry for the second post but I just had a brainfart that looks at the other side of the coin ....

Instead of looking at the size of the planet, lets look at the type of the planet. Since the game starts with Artic/Ocean/Desert as alternate colonies, then we should have a lower cap for those type planets, perhaps 5 instead of 9. Basically the cap should be based on habitable area. Now, imagine if we had Terraforming ... If we claim a Toxic planet at terraform level 1, then we could only build an outpost. Each level of terraforming gives the player (and AI) a +1 building cap.

So perhaps we should look down instead of up when it comes to building capacity. Just think of how quickly territory will change hands when at war. The only planets that become difficult to capture are the planets native to that race.

Just a thought ... thanks.

[Lithari]

I personally find that abit too limiting, considering that gaining terraforming technology tends to be purely random, several games I have gained it near the end of the game where it is pretty much useless, since I am close to winning the game.

I so look forward to race customization, you might be able to get it, so that you start with the terraforming tech at level 1.

[Zaimat]

We considered planet size as a factor for the 'Civilian buildings cap' initially but opted to go about it differently for several reasons.

As was pointed out the number of buildings is pretty abstract, representing the types of buildings and infrastructure the planet is focused on.. Two, we didn't want to double-penalize smaller planets vs large ones.

I tend to think of the Cap as a limitation of that planet's government to manage it's infrastructures. Normal colonies have smaller governments vs your capital being considerably larger as the central seat of your empire.

Initially we also considered multiple levels of colonies (or government levels), L1=3, L2=6, L3=9. It seemed like it would up the micro-management of colonies though which can work against the benefit of being able to queue multiple buildings at once (provided you have enough money).

Looking at the type of planet (CellNav's suggestion) to affect the cap, like size it would also penalize these planets further but it is an interesting idea, perhaps we can revisit after race customization.

Race customization is indeed going to change some things including the government type having an effect on the cap!

I have been playing this game for a while and I have had many problems with meeting an alien race and then when I colonize a world in my own home system, I get moaned at for expanding in their territory.

So I am thinking that they shouldn't moan about it in systems that do not belong to them (don't have colonies in them) and only complain like they do to me, when I enter their systems and colonize those worlds.

If you are not in their territory this shouldn't be happening, will keep an eye on it but if you come across or have a save, can you send us a report from the launcher. Just indicate over which planet.

[Lithari]

If you are not in their territory this shouldn't be happening, will keep an eye on it but if you come across or have a save, can you send us a report from the launcher. Just indicate over which planet.

Well, I will try to get a save, but its all random really, sometimes I am lucky and I am able to become strong enough that they don't complain even if I colonize a planet in their system, ultimately, I think their territory should be where they have colonies, not a section of space, not in its current state anyway, since little lines around a system is not a good territory indicator.

I like how Birth of the Federation and Civilization 4+ handled it, they colour coded it to the races' colours, if you came within x amount of spaces to their territory, they get concerned about it and so on.

When it comes to building capacities, you can't really go the government type route, since nations in the real world have cities bigger then their capital....just saying.

[Madbiologist]

I actually think we need to always be careful not to double dip when penalising a planet, smaller and bad worlds always have traditional penalties that already making them less desirable, it is becomes easy to accidentally stack too much and end up in a situation the good planets are just sooooo good, and the bad planet are like beyond bad. Though there should penalty and benefit, you don't want to accidentally over skew it in either direction.

Though I do agree some sort of variation between some colonies would be nice (help planet of different type be even more distinguished), you want to be careful with it. Hopefully there is a happy middle where we can keep things fair and proportional, yet establish that distinction that would be nice.

I actually considered the whole government building tier thing, but realise it would pointless micro. It would add something if the tiers were dependent on population ranges, thus limiting and giving meaning to the update but this comes to double dipping with the normal bonuses you get for having a good population (so previous problem). Or it could be based on planet type + terraform level so only some planets can be fully exploited while others will have to wait for sufficient terraforming levels. This last one can be very interesting, but will be tricky to balance.

Still plenty of food for thought about how to refine the system, I think it is true what Ziamat said, a lot of these systems are abstractions already... so it about finding a balance that works, that is intuitive, and is fun to play with. Specialisation limits between planets has a lot of potential to enrich the game, but is a double-edged sword that can cause other problems. Hopefully we will find something that could work and strengthen the game. Horizon has really improved a lot since its early alpha days .

[CellNav]

I have a suggestion to allow a colony to expand beyond the building limit ... We need to look up at Space Stations and Platforms.

If the player was allowed to design Space Stations and Platforms like we design ships, then the player can build these orbital structures with modules that enhance the colony below. Currently we have a basic space station, imagine a full blown research station with 6 research modules sitting above a mining colony. Or, perhaps a mining colony with no farming ... a space station with 6 farming mods could feed the workers on the planet ... etc etc etc.

How about this off-the-wall idea ... The Space Station IS the colony. We can construct a station above a hostile planet with 3 habitation mods (population), 2 farming and a mining mod. The workers eat and sleep on the station and work on the planet. The mining is brought back and converted to industrial units. You could even add a platform out in orbit to enhance the whole process. This idea even could be used for Asteroid mining instead of the abstract mining bonus. Perhaps even begin to work outside of gas giants too and their moons!

[Lithari]

Well, I am sure we will be able to colonize gas giant moons eventually, considering the moons have planet types, some have been barren, desert and metallic, so I am thinking a colonization tech that isn't implemented yet, might allow it or a hidden tech, like Wormholes, the game talks about wormholes, but there are none in the game, so its one of those 'not in yet, but likely will be.

[Yarodin]

If the player was allowed to design Space Stations and Platforms like we design ships, then the player can build these orbital structures with modules that enhance the colony below. Currently we have a basic space station, imagine a full blown research station with 6 research modules sitting above a mining colony. Or, perhaps a mining colony with no farming ... a space station with 6 farming mods could feed the workers on the planet ... etc etc etc.

A space station designer? Yes, please!

How about this off-the-wall idea ... The Space Station IS the colony. We can construct a station above a hostile planet with 3 habitation mods (population), 2 farming and a mining mod. The workers eat and sleep on the station and work on the planet. The mining is brought back and converted to industrial units. You could even add a platform out in orbit to enhance the whole process. This idea even could be used for Asteroid mining instead of the abstract mining bonus. Perhaps even begin to work outside of gas giants too and their moons!

A space station as a colony would have quite a limited population base (would be a hell of a station to put billions of citizens on it), but I agree it could well enhance research, trade, production etc. I very liked the concept of (deep space) stations in GalCiv 2 where you had various station modules to push one or the other aspect of your empire.

[GreenKing]

I think a space station designer would be good fun. In fact, I would also like to see a planet defence designer where you could deploy any of your available weapon technologies.