rakenan

Reply to quick question: Thalan-MCC? in Twilight of the Arnor GalCiv2 Forums

[quote]@Herodias: Why are you playing the Thalans as evil? The Thalans are a good race, and should be played as such. They get incredible bonuses after choosing good as their ethical choice. The Altarians are the only other race that get bonuses that good.[/quote] Thalans get good choices no matter which way they swing. They're not really roped into any single ethical alignment. The Thalans are also the only race with unique bonuses for going neutral or evil - thus, if you want someth

Reply to TA 101 in Strategies GalCiv2 Forums

[quote]@Divinewraith Thanks for the prompt reply. I always get confused about the tech research speed. I always thought it has to do with the time cost in terms of research completion. If it is just economic costs, well i just muscle the money from taxes.[/quote] I can't be sure, but it sounds like you're misunderstanding what he said. Tech rate increases (or reduces) the tech cost. This has the indirect effect of increasing the economic cost, since every tech point

Reply to Painfully Inappropriate Random Events in Galactic Civilizations II GalCiv2 Forums

I really think the Jagged Knife shouldn't trash infrastructure, though. I get some damaged in the invasion, but all of it sold off so you are starting with fresh colonies? That's just lame. Then again, I dislike the mega events on a primal level, so I always turn them off. No thanks, not interested in having an easy game I'm about to win turn into an easy game I'll win in 10 more tedious hours of play as every advantage I've worked to obtain is given for free to my new enemies. Yeah

Reply to quick question: Thalan-MCC? in Twilight of the Arnor GalCiv2 Forums

[quote]I wouldn't be too miffed Herodias, 1.92 is going to 'fix' the MCC. I haven't DLed the zip to see what exactly 'fix' means, but if it means making it work the way it's description is...I wouldn't be too sad for it's loss.[/quote] Since Twilight broke the MCC entirely, any fix that causes it to do something at all is an improvement. Not that 1.92 will make the MCC go back to its insanely overpowered old functionality, but the loss of that functionality is not the fault of the 1.9

Reply to Thalons gonna need to be nerfed. in Twilight of the Arnor GalCiv2 Forums

[quote]Stick to the initial manufacturing+research buildings (the upgrades are less efficient), focus on most of the economic efficiency techs and the pop growth techs initially, this should give you a powerful starting position with a good economy. Use this to build up a quick army of transports+backing force and take over your neighbours. Mid-late game you'll have lost this advantage (other races tech's will make them more efficient, or gain better bonuses), but by this time you'll have more p

Reply to Thalons gonna need to be nerfed. in Twilight of the Arnor GalCiv2 Forums

[quote]hmm, ive been playing the Yor (on Tough) because of all the recent Yor bashing and ive nearly conquered the universe, and my economy is booming, and i have well-developed planets, so... i'd say their fine, but that prehaps the AI needs to be 'taught' how to use them properly.[/quote] Are you playing with tech trading on? It makes a massive difference. Tech trees with massive holes big enough to drive a Terror Star through still work fine when you can plug them with somebody els

Reply to Arcean speed penalty in Twilight of the Arnor GalCiv2 Forums

[quote]I've never seen aliens give each other their unique technology, what are you talking about?[/quote] Two responses to that one. First, it sounds like a bug bordering on an outright exploit to enable tech trading when the AI is that pathetically unable to use it properly. Second, some tech trees are defined as much by their weaknesses as by their strengths. The Yor with spammable econ buildings play like a completely different race. More on subject, the Arceans

Reply to invasions... one APC always dies. in Strategies GalCiv2 Forums

I think that only transports that can be filled completely by the surviving invasion forces survive. Unless you land troops and conquer the planet without suffering any casualties at all, you're going to lose a transport - or at least, I always do.

Reply to Question about race specific tech trees in Galactic Civilizations II GalCiv2 Forums

[quote]I'm curious why these alignment-based techs were added to only a few races -- seems like an idea that should have been implemented with all of them.[/quote] Maybe not all, but certainly more. Where's the race with tons of evil tech options and no good? It's Altarian for all good, or Thalan for any alignment. Drath get a little from good. I'd like to see a race with only neutral techs, and at least one race with only evil. The Drengin and Korath seem to be the most quintessen

Reply to Sliders Are Messed Up in Twilight of the Arnor GalCiv2 Forums

It might be nice to see that adjusted, in a future patch, or maybe just in the next strategy game Stardock releases. It would make good sense to just have the three sliders adjust each other, so increasing one decreases another, and having a slider halfway across the bar means that aspect is at 50%, period. The current way works, but it's not terribly intuitive. I guess I have too accustomed to various old MicroProse strategy games that worked that way to adjust easily now.

Reply to Arcean speed penalty in Twilight of the Arnor GalCiv2 Forums

[quote]rakenan: Unless tech trading is off, you can and should trade for another species' engine technology. All of them seem eager to trade that away for a fair price. Navigation centers combined with alien engines lead to Arceans being extremely fast in the later parts of the game. I would argue that Tech Trading Off goes against the way GalCiv2 is meant to be played, given that diplomacy bonuses become almost irrelevant without tech trading. My only problem with the Arceans was how gimped the

Reply to Arcean speed penalty in Twilight of the Arnor GalCiv2 Forums

I think my problem with the Arceans is that I just don't see them as having one of the best tech trees, or having one of the best super abilities. Oddly, I never noticed how terrible the Thalan bonuses are - about 6 points of bonuses, and about 10 points of penalties, and only 8 bonus points - and I play Thalans all the time. My issue with Thalans has always been their broken tech tree - defenseless starbases FTL. What is it about a tech tree with absolutely no engine techs that seems

Reply to Thougts on tech cost in Galactic Civilizations II GalCiv2 Forums

I don't like the idea, because it borks the concept of tech value equivalence. That is, some techs are more expensive than others - unless, under this system, you wait to research those others, in which case they cost more than the techs that are allegedly more expensive. There's two systems that have the potential to work well, as I see it. System 1: all techs have preset tech costs, scaled to galaxy size and tech rate. If a tech costs 200 research points on turn 1, then it

Reply to Update next week in Galactic Civilizations II GalCiv2 Forums

[quote]I just dont get it. Lets say you would buy a washing machine with a manufacturing problem, and you go back to the shop the next day to use your garanty. When you come there you get the message, yeah sorry we know there is a problem, but we are busy creating a new washing machine. This will take about 7 weeks, but after that we will surely fix yours.What would you say? "Oh ok guys, no problem. As long as you are working hard and you will make a nice washing machine in the meantime

Reply to Arcean speed penalty in Twilight of the Arnor GalCiv2 Forums

The Arceans seem [edit]fundamentally misdesigned. Usually, you can't make a custom race that has all the same bonus abilities as one of the stock races. With the Arceans, you can come pretty close. In fact, a custom race that spends its bonus points to mimic the Arceans as closely as possible is actually better than the Arceans in most ways. Consider: Arceans: +20 Hit Points (free, normally 2 points) +10 Soldiering (free, normally 1 point) +8 Logistics (free, cannot be b

Reply to TA 101 in Strategies GalCiv2 Forums

[quote]-ThalansSome say to place the Hyperion Matrix not on Thala due to it's +8 food content. I'm still on the fence with that comment, but it's worth putting in the info. I prefer to put it on Thala and just ferry people off Thala to fill new planets to help offset the pop growth issue they have.[/quote] The argument for putting the Hyperion Matrix somewhere other than Thala isn't just that it makes Thala too big. Thalans don't have any farming techs - without trading for or steali

Reply to Luck in Galactic Civilizations II GalCiv2 Forums

[quote]At some point I think we must create a race with 100% luck, and no other abilities, just to see how unbalancing it is. Given some of the seeming effects of 25% Luck, 100% would just be godawful - {G}.Jonnan[/quote] For extra fun, play with the Altarian tech tree. I wonder if 110% luck would crash the game, what with the minimum roll being higher than the maximum roll.

Reply to what's the greatest movie monster of all time? in Everything Else GalCiv2 Forums

[quote]Varen the Unbelievable!!! But seriously, everyone knows its Godzilla. When the cloverfield monster or whatever can shoot atomic fire beams, you let me know.[/quote] Note: only the traditional man-in-suit Godzilla qualifies - the CGI Godzilla from that awful Hollywood movie just doesn't deserve to be called Godzilla. I don't see how anybody can even try to argue anybody but Godzilla as the greatest movie monster of all time. There are lots of movie monsters, but

Reply to No economy for the Iconians??!?! in Twilight of the Arnor GalCiv2 Forums

[quote]You know, the one time I played Yor my econ was fine. Sure, I had to max efficiency studies and get the government techs early, but I happen to prefer passive econ bonuses to buildings. Although I did get trade centers off someone somehow - I forget if I bought it or got it from conquest. It's worth going for imo - an extra 5% universal eco and a cheap spammable eco building to fill up your spare planet slots.[/quote] So what you're saying is that techs that do not exist in the Y

Reply to Ethics techs in TA in Strategies GalCiv2 Forums

If the Galactopedia is correct, only the Altarians and the Thalans get any special techs from ethical alignments. That's pretty sad. Everybody else gets the "Concepts of. . ." tech for their choice, and that's it. Oh well, maybe they'll fix the Thalans soon and I can have fun declaring for different alignments.

Reply to No economy for the Iconians??!?! in Twilight of the Arnor GalCiv2 Forums

[quote]The thing about the Iconians is that all your planets tend to be pretty homogenous, they have a lot of powerful one per planet buildings, but other building horrible.[/quote] Sounds a lot like the Yor, with their Efficiency Center and Research Matrix on every planet because it's just impossible to justify *NOT* building one on every planet. And enough charging stalks to get up to 16-20 billion people on every planet too, because you just need the population to be able to keep yo

Reply to TA Campaign: Not bugged, just ridiculous (spoilers!) in Twilight of the Arnor GalCiv2 Forums

[quote]TA just says, "Shard acquired, now get a move on!" or something similar. it's called a cliffhanger my friend. Prehaps Galciv III can start out directly were TA ended.[/quote] I'll be looking forward to 2014 or whenever it is that GC3 actually comes out - remember, next 4x game scheduled is the fantasy not-MoM game, which (if it is successful enough) may get 2 expansions just like GC2 did). Then they need to develop GC3. So, um, don't hold your breath.

Reply to Population Unhappy Because of too much Population? in Twilight of the Arnor GalCiv2 Forums

[quote]Of course we have farming worlds: that's the basis of economy worlds. Step 1: Make one of your high classes planets go up to about 16-20 billion people and then biuld economy biuldings all over with the occasional morale building to keep them happy. Step 2: Rake in money.[/quote] But those are not farming worlds, any more than the 2 factories many players typically drop on a planet so everything else builds faster make them all manufacturing worlds. It never takes more than 3 f

Reply to No economy for the Iconians??!?! in Twilight of the Arnor GalCiv2 Forums

Interstellar Communication -> Interstellar Bartering Should let you build some econ buildings. The third tech gives a unique project for +50% economy, the first 2 give some non-unique econ buildings. This is all predicated on the assumption that my copy of the Galactopedia is working properly.

Reply to Sudden and extreme tech cost increases in Galactic Civilizations II GalCiv2 Forums

I haven't noticed it so far, but I usually play on smallish maps where the game ends pretty quickly. I don't think I've gone above a medium map, which means that, barring a miracle, the game's over while I'm still using medium ships armed with lasers.