Seth Gaines

Reply to [TA Beta1] "...But I don't *want* your crappy tech..." in Beta Reports GalCiv2 Forums

[quote] then i'd think being able to build other races' improvements would only enhance your roleplaying. SD's explicitly said that when you take over a planet as, say, the humans, and it's full of slave pits, you'll have to make the (out-of-game) ethical choice of whether to keep them or build over them. [/quote] If it were just ethics, I guess i wouldn't have so much of a problem, but most of these unique improvements are so specifically geared toward the races

Improvement Removal in Beta Reports GalCiv2 Forums

I see that the new beta will remove planetary improvements which you do not have the tech for. My only concern is that this might destroy galactic wonders. If it does, will the game allow new ones to be built?

Reply to TA Beta 2 - couple of bugs in Beta Reports GalCiv2 Forums

As soon as it happens again, I'll send you a save.

Reply to [TA Beta1] "...But I don't *want* your crappy tech..." in Beta Reports GalCiv2 Forums

As a side issue which I've seen other people mention, I do not want all these cool race specific buildings to be built by others. The concept of Korath using Falls of Wellness (unless you could fill them with blood), or an Altarian slave canyon is silly. SD just put a lot of effort into making the races unique. They should stay that way. Some, even perhaps most, of the unique techs should be tradeable, but the buildings shouldn't be an option for anyone but the race they were intended for.<b

Reply to Empty trade screen in Beta Reports GalCiv2 Forums

Huh. No, but I did have a similar issue. The Jessuins grabbed a resource deep in my territory. I figured I'd just buy the starbase off them, but it won't show any of their ships in the trade screen. The odd thing is that the scroll bar next to the blank ship list is scrolled down a bit, as if there were a few items in the list, which you can't scroll back up to.

Autopilot Trouble, Part 2 in Beta Reports GalCiv2 Forums

I've only noticed this so far with fleets/ships with movement 6 or greater. If I have set a fleet to target an enemy fleet, and they destroy it, with say, 5 mp left, I cannot do anything with the cursor but continue their movement. This makes it impossible to investigate planetary defenses, or the strength of the next closest enemy fleet.

Reply to TA - Mining base graphics disappeared mid-game. in Beta Reports GalCiv2 Forums

They will also reappear if you reload. I don't know why this happens, and I hadn't noticed it until last night.

Reply to TA - Quarterly reports referencing races I haven't met yet. in Beta Reports GalCiv2 Forums

Wait until the Drath make 4 people you haven't met declare war on you. This is something that needs correcting, especially before the Drath appear.

Reply to Jagged Edge and a Tech Capital in Beta Reports GalCiv2 Forums

Yes... so up to 17 of each capitol. So if you grab 10 of various sorts, which would be very easy with minor races, you could get a huge amount of bonuses.

Autopilot Trouble in Beta Reports GalCiv2 Forums

I've noticed that if you have one fleet following another, with ships sent to join them following the first, the entire chain will lose autopilot if the first fleet catches the second. I kept having to micromanage my invasion fleets, because all my reinforcements would stop if the slower transport fleet they were targeted to caught the combat fleet it was tagging along behind.

Reply to Jagged Edge and a Tech Capital in Beta Reports GalCiv2 Forums

So what happens now when you capture other capitals? Do you still get the full bonus? You could still end up with quite a few of them, even if no more can be built. Perhaps any additional capitals you acquire should only provide 25% bonuses.

Reply to Torians: First Impressions in Beta Reports GalCiv2 Forums

I found the Torians to be pretty easy as well. With their amazing morale bonuses, it was easy to run my economy at 100% for practically the entire game. The 'crash' set me back to 53%, the highest ever. They were pretty good at research, but I did have a planet with a 700% bonus, so... They even had a much better soldiering rating than the Korath.

Reply to TA Beta 2 - couple of bugs in Beta Reports GalCiv2 Forums

I have no. 5 happen quite a bit with autopilot. If I send the miner a long distance to asteroid fields, it sometimes will not do anything when it gets there. Moving it one space to the next field starts it back up.

Reply to Suggestion for TA: Research Speed in Beta Reports GalCiv2 Forums

I'd support that. I'm generally down to 2-3 turns for cheap techs the whole game.

Reply to Various Manufacturing Korath Buildings in Beta Reports GalCiv2 Forums

The only problem I've noticed so far is that the AI makes very poor use of bonus buildings. It loves manufacturing bonus buildings, and will put them in place without actually building up the base at all. I am always taking over low quality planets which have no factories, but do have a generator. The Korath planets are really bad, because they have so many buildings that will give bonuses. They do also like to build a pain amplification center when they have no labs, or maybe 1.

Reply to Excessive Debt Condition On Empire in Beta Reports GalCiv2 Forums

Right, but you should never let it get that bad in the first place. If you've been running at 100% early, you should have a lot of tech that you can sell to get you out of the hole. Getting a loan when you haven't got the economy to sustain it won't help, except to eliminate the morale hit from having a huge negative. You just have to wait until your tax base grows. Enough planets going from .25 to 6 population will put you back in the black. I tend to have to drop to anywhere from 0-15% ec

Reply to Bonuses in Beta Reports GalCiv2 Forums

[quote] The starport thing might be fun on small maps, but I am hung up on big ones and don't like one-planet things that affect ship production--too much bother to keep track of the faster/stronger ships separately when you have hundreds of hulls running around. [/quote] I try to use any planets with ship bonuses to produce warships, and the rest make constructors, etc. It can get a bit hard to remember where the bonus is, but if I have 20 shipyards, and one ha

Bonuses in Beta Reports GalCiv2 Forums

I'm pretty satisfied with the bonus distribution in TA, but I have yet to see one of the 700% bonus tiles. Have they been done away with? I did get one large world with two each of the 100% and 300% manufacturing bonuses, so it's nice to see that you can still get insanely lucky. I do have a few questions: Will we ever see even a second level of influence or approval? Will there ever be even a first level of economy? Here's an idea I posted quite a while ago for ship bonuses: <

Reply to Suggestions for New Combat Mechanics in Beta Reports GalCiv2 Forums

I do like the evasion idea. I agree that a swarm of small ships should be dangerous, instead of free experience. Perhaps a continuation of the ECM techs could produce modules that would increase evasion. Jammers, or something. Having all these new modules to put on a ship makes ship design much more interesting. It's no longer just a matter of cramming as many lasers as you can on the hull.

Reply to Limited ability of Arceans to compete in large maps in Beta Reports GalCiv2 Forums

I've done pretty well as the Terrans and Drengin, but every time I try the Arceans, I get my ass handed to me. It seems like I can't expand as quickly. I end up grabbing about 10 worlds on a large, go into the econ slump, and before I can come out of it, I am being flooded with colony ships from the other two. Literally 5 or 6 from each power at once.

Reply to Excessive Debt Condition On Empire in Beta Reports GalCiv2 Forums

If you're in that much debt, at least with a negative income, you already have a huge morale penalty. I never let it get that bad. The whole idea of having money is that you can't just keep running from the start at 100% and building whatever you like. Early on, I often have to shut my economy down, and bring it back up slowly as my population increases. Usually (as long as you've grabbed enough planets) you should have no problem eventually bringing it up to 100% and keeping it there.

Reply to Unusual Event in Beta Reports GalCiv2 Forums

Thanks for clearing up luck for me. That makes it a lot more worthwhile. A few of the really vague bonus descriptions could use some rewriting. Also, when you refer to hidden stats, are you saying that if I have, for example, a 10 attack ship, with a 30% bonus, I will see 13, but the AI will only see 10, and vice versa?

Reply to Armed Arcean colony ships in Beta Reports GalCiv2 Forums

I've seen the Drengin do it too. I wasn't aware of the issue, so no save, sorry.

Reply to Unusual Event in Beta Reports GalCiv2 Forums

Pirates is a good example. I was playing DA on the biggest map, and they spawned an immense amount of ships. Huge fleets were everywhere. At first I wanted to do a little 'illegal time-travel' (revert to save), but I thought I'd sit through it. Of course, all my highly developed starbases went down under a tidal wave of pirates. But, since I tend to seriously neglect my military, I had no ships to lose, and the two races that had just attacked me lost their entire invasion fleets, and all t

Reply to Zalon Defense Mainframe Discription TA Beta1a in Beta Reports GalCiv2 Forums

There's also an error with the cultists event. You do not 'sew the seeds of dissent', you sow them.