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GalCiv IV Dev Journal #19 - The Roadmap

GalCiv IV Dev Journal #19 - The Roadmap

With Galactic Civilizations IV now generally available it’s time to talk about…THE FUTURE.

First, we’re really glad you guys seem to like the game.  Releasing a game, especially one where people have been working on for years, is, as you can imagine, very stressful.  This is doubly true when the game tries out so many new things.

Below is a very tentative roadmap of what we expect to release and in what order.  This is all subject to change based on feedback, scheduling and costs.

Version

Features / Changes

v1.1

  • Event dialog can be minimized.
  • Executive order for placing orbital defense sentinels to target planet.
  • Map Setup screen to support min/max variables (for sector sizes for instance).
  • More anomaly event types.
  • Planetary project to build Colonial defense sentinels that can then be used to upgrade colonies.
  • Sandbox MP.
  • Custom Civilization sharing in the Workshop.
  • More Events.
  • Add Alliance Victory.

v1.2

  • Research Center screen to differentiate between techs that are close to breakthrough (giving a 25% cost discount) and all the others available techs (that are normal cost. (i.e. no tech focus wheel).
  • Accuracy and Dodge used to determine the floor of the attack/defense rolls.
  • Survivor Mode MP.
  • More Events.
  • Military starbases will automatically attack enemies that enter its area of control (so you can fortify incursions from other sectors, protect your stuff).
  • Galactic Relations Overview (see the relations between all other civs at once on a single screen)

v1.3

  • Additional Mod sharing in the Metaverse Workshop.
  • Military starbases automatically protect nearby colonies / core worlds from invasion (you have to take it out first).
  • German language support.
  • Russian language support.
  • French language support.
  • Updated trade screen with more detail on how the AI values different specific trade items.

In the case of what you see here, many of these are ideas that came from the community late in development (too late to get into 1.0) but we think are great ideas and want to see added to the game.

We’ll continue to update this as we get more information.

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202,059 views 41 replies
Reply #26 Top

Quoting Basilisk83, reply 24

the more i think about it the more i'm not sure if the accuracy and dodge changes will work well. this will give all weapons a good chance of doing near max dmg every hit, with no chance for the opponent to actually dodge anything. it will always hit if accuracy and dodge work for ranges instead of actually hitting or dodging anything. to take out the dodge factor completely for smaller ships, and put everything on defense like that... well it's very unrealistic for one. one reason smaller ships are good and popular in life is because of their ability to dodge and get in close range for good accuracy. i really think that accuracy, dodge, and targeting need more tweaking in order to make combat more realistic and thus easier for players to understand. 

If I had my way, miss chances would be removed from the game entirely. We already have a wide randomization through the weapon and defense values going from 1 to max. That already creates a decent amount of uncertainty. Why do we need more?

Further, as far as player understanding, unless the fleet UI is changed, I would bet a lot of people don't even know this mechanic exists. When you click on an enemy fleet, you learn two main things: Its offense and its defense. Its range, accuracy, and dodge are all hidden mechanics, so people aren't considering it in their tactics.

Now in previous GC series, there was an issue where "bigger is always better", and generally you only saw big ships in the late game. However, I feel the new slot design has mitigated that, slot for slot smaller ships are superior to larger ones for the logistics cost (once you get some miniaturization). That's great, it gives smaller ships a solid niche, you don't need dodge chances to make that even stronger.

For me, the biggest areas to improve in combat is to make it faster. GC combat is NOT tactical, not at all, its strategic. Its about fleet positioning, scouting, building fleets to counter other ones. So I don't want complex combat mechanics, I want things clear and simple so I can make these strategic choices. If anything I want combat to move faster:

  • I wish there was a threshold where an enemy fleet was so "weak" it cost you no time to kill it, maybe an "overrun" option where I suffer a -75% to my offense/defense but my moves are not insta dropped to 0 and I can still make more moves and attacks. Its annoying to me that a lone ship can still siege my colony so I have to kill it, but it consumes my fleets move unless I spend the effort to break up and rebuild my fleet. I want to bowl over the weak!
  • Would love an autokill option for some of my ships. You get to a point where you know the enemy fleets can't kill you, and I would like a sentry mode that was "seek and destroy", and just kept killing ships that got in the area. I don't mind taking the risk that a sudden "super fleet" comes around if it saves me a lot of time and trouble.
+1 Loading…
Reply #27 Top

I find both your posts to contain quite well written suggestions.

Thanks both for taking the time to do so.

+1 from me on both accounts. :)

Reply #28 Top

hi according to your version marks there was snadbox mp and survivor mp on V1.1 and V1.2

we are on V1.4 and there is only arena on the multiplayer side of the game.

whats up with that? why aint the other options avalible for ppl?

you are advertising: 

  • Challenge your friends in multiplayer. Engage in tense 1v1 stand-offs in Arena mode, pivot your playstyle to take on new challenges and achieve ever-changing goals in Agenda mode. 

taken from your product page on epic games store.

when will be able to go on the other modes?

Reply #29 Top

Quoting TheZerg1989, reply 28

we are on V1.4 and there is only arena on the multiplayer side of the game.

We're on 1.0.4, not 1.4.

Reply #30 Top

Quoting TheZerg1989, reply 28

hi according to your version marks there was snadbox mp and survivor mp on V1.1 and V1.2

we are on V1.4 and there is only arena on the multiplayer side of the game.

whats up with that? why aint the other options avalible for ppl?

you are advertising: 

 


    • Challenge your friends in multiplayer. Engage in tense 1v1 stand-offs in Arena mode, pivot your playstyle to take on new challenges and achieve ever-changing goals in Agenda mode. 

 


taken from your product page on epic games store.

when will be able to go on the other modes?

As Publius said we are on version 1.04, 1.1 has yet to be released.

This thread does not even cover 1.4.

Reply #31 Top

oh shit missed the 0 XD but still why was the other modes in the beta and why advertise that the game have modes not yet released

Reply #32 Top

Quoting TheZerg1989, reply 31

but still why was the other modes in the beta

The other modes were in the beta to be tested, and were found to be too buggy to be released. Frogboy has said he's making the developers play multiplayer against each other until they can get enough of the bugs fixed that the other modes are stable enough to be released.

Reply #33 Top

Quoting TheZerg1989, reply 31

oh shit missed the 0 XD but still why was the other modes in the beta and why advertise that the game have modes not yet released

Ninjaed by Publius.

Multi-player was unstable when using AI opponents just prior to release so it was decided to remove it.

The 1v1 player mode was stable so was retained. 

If you had been on Discord for the past few months you would have read about a group of volunteers that are trying to work out the problems.

I have no knowledge of how it is going and because of NDAs might not be able to give a status report if I knew.

From released information on Discord however they are working on the problems. 

Reply #35 Top

SPAM ALERT

playzoffs has registered today and copied directly from Reply #19 on Page 1.  I think playzoffs is a future spammer trying to establish credibility for future spamming.

Reply #36 Top

Thanks! Gone now.

Reply #37 Top

Galactapedia coming!

Reply #38 Top

Fantastic news!

Though keep in mind if it isn't close to 100% comprehensive, it'll just cause frustration when someone can't find what they were hoping to look up. 

Reply #39 Top

Quoting Surge72, reply 38

Fantastic news!

Though keep in mind if it isn't close to 100% comprehensive, it'll just cause frustration when someone can't find what they were hoping to look up. 

So we should just get rid of it entirely I assume?

Because it ain't going to be even close to 100% comprehensive.

Reply #40 Top

Quoting Frogboy, reply 39


Quoting Surge72,

Fantastic news!

Though keep in mind if it isn't close to 100% comprehensive, it'll just cause frustration when someone can't find what they were hoping to look up. 



So we should just get rid of it entirely I assume?

Because it ain't going to be even close to 100% comprehensive.

I think it's way much better to have something that get's updated, than nothing at all to even begin with. Why would someone be frustrated by, to give an analogy, being thirsty and given 1 bottle of water with the promise more is on the way while they wanted let's say two of them, I find remarkable. Maybe it's the, again water based, half empty - half full glass of water perspective.

Things like that tend to happen with stuff that is dynamic and ever-changing in nature. Galacticiv IV seems to me huge in scope and possibilities. I mean to this day and time there are games out there that have players paying for them for over a decade, and still not close to being released for reasons like "the technology doesn't exist and we're trying to invent it now". Come on! Maybe someone that get's frustrated, is accustomed to get all the stuff at once, no updates whatsover and therefore a complete explanation, but is there such a thing ever in life anyway? If we had all the answers in everything what would be the purpose of thinking, searching, inventing, developing, evolving, creating?

I mean, thank God for progress.