About Ships

[Astro]

Hi to everyone

I have to thank the devs for making a really good game in all aspects and respects which is quite original given that there are many 4x games out there.
It's almost perfect except for one thing which imo has been left unfinished and that is the ship battles.

First of all i think that after you engage a system you should play in full real time no point for more turns here although the idea isn't half bad.
Second of all the graphics of the ships are really dated like very dated.I don't mind the classic look and feel but given the things you can do with them in the game which is quite advanced ( like boarding other ships , scanning , attacking ) , the graphics do not , by far , give a reasonable feedback to the player.In other words the ships should look a lot better , more detailed and larger for a better overall experience.

With this being said i wish all the best to this game and i especially like the races , the encounters , the ability to dig and the very very detailed form of the star systems in and out that contrast quite a lot with the low detail work that has been done with the ships.
For a very good detail of the star systems and such ships that look like in Endless Space and StarDrive would be en par with the rest of Horizon's graphics.

Please consider revamping the ships graphics because it would be a pity for such an amazing game that Horizon is.

[Zaimat]

Hello Astro and welcome!

I very much appreciate you taking time to leave your feedback about Horizon and that you are enjoying the game, it's always very rewarding for us to hear honest specific feedback.

Horizon has had a very protracted development, started long before the availability of game engines like XNA/Unity (we had to build our own systems) so as noted the graphics/UI could be better in certain areas which we will certainly do better in the future.

[Astro]

Thank you for the reply

[keller]

First of all i think that after you engage a system you should play in full real time no point for more turns here although the idea isn't half bad.

I think this would defeat the purpose of the game.

ships should look a lot better , more detailed and larger for a better overall experience.

I believe that once modding has been made available it may be possible to add custom images for ships. So I expect that this part will also improve as time goes by and more people get involved in doing custom mods for the game.

[Astro]

Yes i agree and i was thinking the same thing.
Modding would be great.

After playing two more rounds i kinda got used to the ships graphics as they are and find them quite interesting.
They're a great blend between 2D and 3D.

I don't know why but the graphics send my thoughts to Starcraft 1 , like they're a remotely similar style of graphics of a game i used to play a lot and love which sends back a good feeling of nostalgia mixed with a reminder that Horizon is also a modern game.
A good mix.
I suppose they're not bad at all like they are but depends from what angle you look at them maybe.

However i must point out another thing and my apologies if it was addressed elsewhere.

I think that the ships maintenance is too high for instance a mothership having over 6bc credits maintenance requirement that the game doesn't let you accomplish a net gain of such a level too easy at all, because i'm thinking that the best way is to have a good armada of ships and in the same time a good net gain so you won't lose credits.

I find this impossible to obtain the way i see it until now.

Imo i think the ships maintenance should be at least 10 times less than they are or was this intended that affording ships must be very expensive to stop early rushes or maybe the game engine wouldn't allow swarms of ships?

My last game was with the Kamzak Matriarchate and i have 9 systems 5 of which have gem deposits , mineral rich , resource abundant and so on , highest level of industry and trade docks in every world and i barely could afford 7 Bomber type 4.
I'm allied with the other 2 players i used and now i'm at a stall.Should i attack or not ?
At this level i should be able to support at least some cruisers and a mothership and i don't , at least not without going over budget and having a net loss.

Was really the game intended to make ships so expensive ?
I got a bad feeling attacking with so few ships and i have seen what the AI does, they're very good when they fight back after you attack them.
Or maybe i'm just doing something wrong.
If you will i'd like some advice.

[True_poser]

To carry out war three things are necessary: money, money and yet more money.

But, honestly, I don't understand where do you get all these numbers from.
I've loaded an endgame (all techs to the 10), and my maintenance costs are as following:
- scout - 0.016bc/turn
- transport - 0.08bc/turn
- cruiser - 0.32bc/turn
- mothership - 0.64bc/turn

I guess, their maintenance cost can increase after a certain number of refits.
However, I've yet to see any single ship maintenance to pass over 0.8bc per turn.

Could you, please, share your savegame?

[keller]

ah , the decimal point is at times small and sometimes not seen or in some cases can be mistaken for a spec of dust on the monitor.

For building fleets success relies on you having a good economy and building the right buildings on the right planets but I have found in my many games that building an equal amount of trade and tourism centers will do the job nicely as one can make more money off of the trade and tourism buildings than anything else. Now you do get a bonus on a planets income when you have one that is rich, but you really don't get that much from making an industrial world. This of course will boost production but you still have to have money to build your armada which as said will come from your trade and tourism buildings.

Overall fleet maintenance is a very small amount. In fact, for star bases and missile bases its practically nothing.

[Astro]

First of all the tech levels that i reached are 5 in just 2 areas.It's an early game not a late game with level 10 for everything but this means the maintenance decreases the more you level up and that's good to hear.
Thanks for the heads up True_poser

But having to research that much to get reasonable maintenance costs for ships like you mention can be time consuming on the other hand.
I wanted to play more aggressively and in an average amount of time to build/research/create a good fleet and defeat my opponents, thing that i find quite hard to achieve , not go all the way to unlock everything in the game.
I suppose i need to invest more patience in this case.

I don't know how to upload the savegame but i'll upload these screenshots with direct links.I hope it's not a problem.

http://s13.postimg.org/f859u7xbr/image.jpg
http://s13.postimg.org/3lpr6tzef/image.jpg
http://s13.postimg.org/hqvk8n8fr/image.jpg
http://s13.postimg.org/8yelkynav/image.jpg

Like you people can see clearly my maintenance costs are really high and the ships are default , no refits at all.
The green empire is the Humans and the purple are the Barsig.
Fortunatelly i'm not at war with neither of them but unfortunately even if i look like an empire over there i bet they got a lot more ships than me.

I'm doing something wrong for sure

[keller]

well this is certainly interesting. That one screenshot definitely says 6.4bc
Perhaps it is visual bug ???

[True_poser]

this means the maintenance decreases the more you level up and that's good to hear.

Nope. Price goes up.
Unfortunately, I tend to powerplay, so I usually don't notice these rises.

I don't know how to upload the savegame

Your savegames are stored in your "My Documents/Horizon Game/Saves" directory.
Pick the one you'd like to show and upload it on any filesharing site, they're only 4.5Mbs.

Like you people can see clearly my maintenance costs are really high and the ships are default , no refits at all.

That's really interesting!
Could you, please, look into your empire's total expenses:


and in your fleet expences (F10 button):


?

I'm doing something wrong for sure

Maybe you've hit an interesting bug or an even more interesting ship design.
So I'd really like to look into your savegame, if you'll share it.

[Astro]

Here you go

http://www.mediafire.com/download/n99wz ... avegame.7z







As you can see , after i created these new ships i got myself a really nasty net loss.
Other than the ships you see on the list are 2 more scouts and that's all i have and i used no custom ship design of my own. unless i might have accidentally saved a custom designed ship while just checking them out but other than removing or adding a weapon , if that mistake was made , i didn't do.
So it's clearly something wrong. Yeah i wish it were just a visual bug

[True_poser]

Oh, and you manage to play with such maintenance cost?
My hat's off to you, sir.

I've loaded your save and I get surprisingly sane numbers:


I see the savegame version is 1.0.0.71.
What is your game version, actually?
It is written in the main menu in the lower left corner.

Maybe somehow things get mixed during updates, try reinstalling the game if it shows 1.0.1.103 (current) or checking the game via Steam option.

Also, try http://rghost.net/download/56647253/07c ... 0.1.103.7z
I've resaved your game using my client.

[Astro]

Managed to play like that but didn't win but thanks for hats off

Problem is , and i'll be honest with you , is that i didn't buy the game so i can't update and there's nowhere i can find the updates on their own.

I just took it to try it out and only played 2 rounds to get the idea about it and i like the game overall.
I checked out the screenshots for the latest version and the graphics look crisp too.
Makes me wanna really buy it and i'll definitely buy it once it becomes more polished gameplay wise.

Thanks for all your help

[True_poser]

Ah, I get it.
I'm in the same position with Distant Worlds.
And I shudder to think how could I've played The Last Federation with their humongous changelogs if I hadn't bought it.

Well, in 1.0.1 version there's new combat that kinda changes the game, you might want to check it out.
Also, see PM.

[keller]

Ah I understand now and that would explain the high maintenance costs.