Galactic Civilzations II: 21 Feb

Post by **The Yosemite Bear** » 2006-03-05 01:14pm

living far from civilization has it's disadvantages. I hope my copy arrives soon....

Duckie · Post by **Duckie** » 2006-03-05 01:18pm

Hotfoot wrote:There's also the occasional United Planets vote to tax anyone who has starbases in territory they don't control. Same with colonies.

Seen that one. It's hardly a crippling disadvantage. Altarians ate a 5 bc/starbase/week penalty due to the Arceans and I voting that way and they still make a hefty profit due to having the Drengin surrender with all planets intact to them.

I suppose the demand method could work. Or since I'm hyperteching I suppose I could also trade techs in exchange for GTFOs.

Post by **The Yosemite Bear** » 2006-03-05 01:33pm

MRDOD wrote:
Hotfoot wrote:There's also the occasional United Planets vote to tax anyone who has starbases in territory they don't control. Same with colonies.
Seen that one. It's hardly a crippling disadvantage. Altarians ate a 5 bc/starbase/week penalty due to the Arceans and I voting that way and they still make a hefty profit due to having the Drengin surrender with all planets intact to them.

I suppose the demand method could work. Or since I'm hyperteching I suppose I could also trade techs in exchange for GTFOs.

lol

get off my land you peace loving son of a bitch!

wautd · Post by **wautd** » 2006-03-05 01:47pm

After a few trials and errors (read: I die), I finally get a good game going. 1 vs 1 on a huge starmap. We both control about half the star map and it has been a near continuous war. I got low quantity/high quality fending of wave after wave of inferiour forces.

Epic is the right word

Oh and this beat Civ IV because here, ticks don't take minutes to complete

Hotfoot · Post by **Hotfoot** » 2006-03-05 02:13pm

I won my test game late last night (damn one more turn syndrome), small map, stock settings, five AI, plus some neutrals.

Espionage is a fun way to get free techs easily, and lets you see what everyone's cards are. It's reasonably cheap, put it to max for about ten turns, and you hit the highest level very quickly, after that you can drop it down to minimal levels, there didn't seems to be a huge difference in how often new techs were stolen once you established an advanced level of espionage.

Also, with the espionage slider is an embargo option. If those starbases are really bugging you, you can embargo the race responsible.

Influence is a truly wonderful thing. If you keep building influence starbases such that other races planets are under your influence circle, enemy planets will revolt against their governments and join you.

For those of you who don't know just yet, you can build starbases anywhere, not just at the nodes. You upgrade them by sending in more construction ships. As a result, I've found that building construction ships constantly to build and improve your starbases in times of peace is what you should always be doing. Influence bases are useful all along your border, while trade bases should be built near trade routes to increase your trade revinue, and military bases should be built on the borders with potentially hostile races. The existance of a military base can actually make smaller ships a viable design strategy, as the military base defenses actually add to each ship's defenses, meaning a fleet made up of more ships would have higher defense totals than a fleet of larger ships (note: I have yet to test this, but it seems like it would work).

Also, influence starbases make invasions easier, since you can use information warfare to add defectors to your invasion force, with no penalty to the planet.

Duckie · Post by **Duckie** » 2006-03-05 03:07pm

Well, despite conquering the Carinoids, the Altarians are looking ever more like a paper tiger now that I used my massive tech advantage to go from Laser II equipped Corvettes to Cruisers [Medium Hull] with twin layers of Duranthium-3 and 2 1st generation Plasma Guns in a few months. My military rating looks like an exponential curve right now, surpassing the Arceans and Torians in weeks. I love Manufacturing Capitals, Terra can turn out a Hades-class Cruiser every 4 weeks.

After the Conquering of Carinoidia or wherever, the Arceans approached me and asked me to help them fund any powers at war with the Altarians secretly. The Altarians still outnumber the neutral Torians and the friendly Arceans combined with me...

Does anyone else find it fun to name your ships and bases? I do whenever I make a new one (unless it'll be expended like Colonies and Constructors, although I do name Troopships since they're a military ship).

Shinova · Post by **Shinova** » 2006-03-05 03:28pm

http://img136.imageshack.us/img136/3849 ... ot14jm.png

Okay, that's taking it too far.

(also not mines)

Ubiquitous · Post by **Ubiquitous** » 2006-03-05 04:14pm

Apologies if this has been asked before, but what are the minimum specs? Specifically, will my crappy geforce 4 440mx work?

Crossroads Inc. · Post by **Crossroads Inc.** » 2006-03-05 04:23pm

Shinova wrote:http://img136.imageshack.us/img136/3849 ... ot14jm.png

Okay, that's taking it too far.

(also not mines)

How the bloody hell can you do that???

Oberleutnant · Post by **Oberleutnant** » 2006-03-05 04:32pm

Ubiquitous wrote:Apologies if this has been asked before, but what are the minimum specs? Specifically, will my crappy geforce 4 440mx work?

Windows 98/ME/2000/XP, PIII 800 MHz, 256 MB RAM, 32 MB video card, DirectX 9.0c

According to Google your graphics card has 64 MB, so I don't see any reason why it shouldn't.

Duckie · Post by **Duckie** » 2006-03-05 04:50pm

I have a GeForce 4 MX 440. It runs on it. And that's about it.

With 512 MB Ram, the game slows down a bit at later turns although it could just be any number of causes so maybe it's just my fault. EDIT- It's the Autosave, I have it on Autosave every turn (paranoia about release versions of games) so it feels like lag but isn't.

But, and this needs allcaps so excuse more: GEFORCE 4 HAS NO FUCKING PIXEL SHADERS. GAAAAAAH!

So you won't have any textures and the graphics will suck for ships, and you'll be limited to 1X Antialiasing (IMX) compared to the highest 4X. I have confirmed with tech support that its is the case and plan to upgrade eventually.

Here's a screenshot. "Looks like you have Lego Starships" --Adrian Laguna

Look to upgrade. MX440 sucks more wang than the entire city of Los Vegas' output at newer games.

Is Military Rating a function of ship numbers + ship power or is it biased towards either? I have about 22 Light Cruisers with 7 attack and 8 defense after mining operations, plus a lot of Defenders from the early game, at least 15. The Altarians have a military rating twice mine, but they dont' even have medium ships yet. Just a ton of small, 1/2/3 mass driver fighters, the heaviest only having 1 point of armor. I also have a goddamn Ranger with 32+/20+ stats or so and it barely put me up, despite probably outmatching my entire military.

Netko · Post by **Netko** » 2006-03-05 05:08pm

IIRC Military rating is established by looking at your ships HP/ATT/DEF, altough I'm not sure of the exact formula.

It is also highly misleading since its easy to build up a "paper tiger" and production output is not taken into account. This has some issues on the AI, like in the last game where the Drakh Legion went to war with me when I had maybe a dozen defensive ships only which produced a very loopsided military rating - only I looked at what they were using, designed a excellent counter-frigate and started pumping it out with 7 planets building a unit in under 5 turns (and my manufacturing capital building it in 2). Needless to say, the Drakh regreted that decision.

I'm sure its going to get looked in one of the next patches.

Duckie · Post by **Duckie** » 2006-03-05 05:38pm

There is a Precusor Mine on Marshall II, the closest Altarian planet to Terra. 9x production...(Drools). There is also another Altarian planet with 3 Research Tiles... Time for an Influence bonanza, hopefully which will kill the planet. If not... we'll just have to take it the hard way. use the Ranger to drive a wedge up to Marshall II, use Cruisers to pick off troop ships and fighters near the Ranger, and to invade the Research World.

Does anyone else find Precrsor Ships dime a dozen? In one game, I saw the Arceans with a Fleet of 6 Precursor Corvettes, and the Drengin and I both had Rangers.

Rightous Fist Of Heaven · Post by **Rightous Fist Of Heaven** » 2006-03-05 06:19pm

Been playing a huge map with 9 opponents for a couple of days now, concentrating solely and only on teching for quite a while has granted me a massive advantage in tech over the others. Just so it happened that my peacefull time in the universe came to an end yesterday when a random event triggered me to go to war with the Thalans who at the time had the most powerfull military.

The first fights were nothing short of a curb-stomp. The best the Thalands had were some medium-hull cruisers with crappy weapons, my large-hull battleships with phasors (yes, you read that right), singularity drivers and nano rippers pretty much wiped them off the map. In a short while the Thalan's are pleading for peace, claiming that the declaration of war was just a joke. Having already conquered 5 worlds, I decide to end the war there.

Extremely addicting game, murder's social life.

Ubiquitous · Post by **Ubiquitous** » 2006-03-05 07:05pm

MRDOD wrote:I have a GeForce 4 MX 440. It runs on it. And that's about it.

With 512 MB Ram, the game slows down a bit at later turns although it could just be any number of causes so maybe it's just my fault. EDIT- It's the Autosave, I have it on Autosave every turn (paranoia about release versions of games) so it feels like lag but isn't.

But, and this needs allcaps so excuse more: GEFORCE 4 HAS NO FUCKING PIXEL SHADERS. GAAAAAAH!

So you won't have any textures and the graphics will suck for ships, and you'll be limited to 1X Antialiasing (IMX) compared to the highest 4X. I have confirmed with tech support that its is the case and plan to upgrade eventually.

Here's a screenshot. "Looks like you have Lego Starships" --Adrian Laguna

Look to upgrade. MX440 sucks more wang than the entire city of Los Vegas' output at newer games.

Is Military Rating a function of ship numbers + ship power or is it biased towards either? I have about 22 Light Cruisers with 7 attack and 8 defense after mining operations, plus a lot of Defenders from the early game, at least 15. The Altarians have a military rating twice mine, but they dont' even have medium ships yet. Just a ton of small, 1/2/3 mass driver fighters, the heaviest only having 1 point of armor. I also have a goddamn Ranger with 32+/20+ stats or so and it barely put me up, despite probably outmatching my entire military.

Thanks for that, you just saved me £18.

Duckie · Post by **Duckie** » 2006-03-05 08:29pm

My military surpassed the Altarians due to hypertech + influencing away their precursor manufactury. Every month, I would make around 2 heavy cruisers (Medium sized ships with 6/10 base stats but boosted by like 3 times by Military Resources and Starbases).

It grew so bad I evenually had to shut off production once I exceded every power combined and sent over 85% of my money to military upkeep. And then I allied the Torians and Arceans. I could have done a Diplomatic Victory at any time...

Instead, I went for something ambitious. Discovery Spheres. Then Deeper Knowledge. Then Galactic Understanding. By then, the Altarians had made battleships in small numbers. They loved me and gave me pittances of money every now and then, but their military was rising.

It was too late. I stopped running anything, focused on research and then upgraded all my planets' research facilities by sheer cash alone, upped the taxes to ridiculous levels to compensate, set my spending on 100% and 100% reserach, and then clicked the turn button over and over without looking at anything.

I figured it would be easy. Tech Victory is hoooolly fuck long. My cash started to flow out of my pockets. I was depending upon tribute from my allies and the Altarian friends to the north.

Over a year and a half later, I had transcended mortality. Nearly three years after that, with my borders collapsing from opportunistic influence stations and the Altarians battleships starting to grow powerful enough to challenge my massive cruiser fleets, I finished my lastest tech: "Technological Victory".

Woot. Terrans become God through the unwitting help of the galaxy, who kept giving gifts fo invaluable amounts of cash that allowed me to make Discovery Spheres and keep afloat until I made a victory.

Stark · Post by **Stark** » 2006-03-05 08:47pm

What does embargo do? I've looked through the manual, but can't find anything specific. If it did bad things to their starbases that'd be neat, but I wish the game had a 'politely request you fucking stop building influence starbases near my planets' option.

I won a game on influence yesterday: the Dregin and Korx loved me because I was evil, and the entire Dregin empire was inside my influence. I killed the Humans with big bombs for the win. On smaller maps, games don't seem to last long enough to get into the good stuff: I've only seen large hulls in a game with accellerated research. Just *looking* at the largest map size scares me.

Duckie · Post by **Duckie** » 2006-03-05 10:14pm

Medium Sized maps saw me with Medium Hulls. I could have had Large Hulls, and Phasors and higher-than-Kanvium Armor, but I went for Tech Victory so research ground to a halt.

Try a Medium Map, if you haven't already.

I assume Trade Embargo will kill all routes between you and the embargoed race, and also prevent either of you from making new ones to eachotehr until the embargo is lifted.

I just played the first campaign mission, won within an hour on Normal (so sue me, I suck). Colony Rush + Laser Rush + Troop Rush = Dead Drengin.

Fucking, hell, though, they put up a fight despite not having a navy left. I attacked twice with Gas Warfare against a 5 billion pop planet with 1000 Legions, and lost twice (the second time I had the 0 on each side bug and the planet lost quality despite staying in Drengin hands.) Then I invaded with a pair of enfleeted Transports on their 10 Billion world, and lost again. And again. Eventually they just surrendered after I killed almost all of them.

Stark · Post by **Stark** » 2006-03-05 11:27pm

I just finished the first campaign mission: dropped two transports on their 5b world, won, and they surrendered their other world to the Altarians.

Hotfoot · Post by **Hotfoot** » 2006-03-06 03:50am

Slowly getting acclamated to the game, and the AI. It has its flaws, but otherwise, it is ruthless. In my current game, I'm hanging on to void superiorty, but I'm relying on better technology and specially designed ships based on intelligence reports. However, the Iconian Empire is beginning to mix things up, and their industrial base is nearly twice that of mine. So far, they've been using it to keep me jumping, sending troopships galore at me, hoping I'll miss them and they'll grab a planet. My cash reserves are hovering at 1500 bc, so emergency building isn't much of an option. The other races are so intimidated by them and indifferant towards me that I can pretty much forget about support, and the Torians had enough pull to force the Ancarens to my south attack me, requiring me to redeploy my forces.

What I'm noting is interesting is that as a fleet faces more and more combat, they seem to get tougher - my heavy assault corvettes went up from 18 hitpoints to 38 hitpoints over the course of a campaign.

I have to say, I'm a little disappointed in espionage. It would be nice if you had to continually fund the operations to get benefits out of them, but it seems that once you've hit advanced, it stays there. There doesn't seem to be a counter-espionage tactic, so if you just spend X amount of bc's, you can get full intel on a nation.

wautd · Post by **wautd** » 2006-03-06 06:18am

My current game is as good as won. I now have both the numbers, tech and economy to keep my borders clear. Not a single ship Drengin gets trough anymore and his fleet is decimated since the last time he tried a large invasion. For all his money and trade goods, I offered them peace which they gladly accept. Planetary invasions were getting harder so I now started experimenting with some influence stations which seem to work pretty well. I decided to let him die very slowly so I could experiment some more with new techs and what not

I am dissapointed in the campaign game tough. I want to know hwo the story goes but it pissed me off you're research is dropped to zero again when you start the next level. I also miss the level of tactical combat like in MoO2. All in all, it's a great and very addictive game.

Stark · Post by **Stark** » 2006-03-06 07:58am

Yeah, there really isn't an 'espionage game'. You basically 'buy' information, and they can't do anything about it, raise the price, or reduce your current level. As you said, you're best off just getting a high level for everyone quickly and forgetting about it, which is pretty disappointing.

Anarchist Bunny · Post by **Anarchist Bunny** » 2006-03-06 02:54pm

I love how the third Campaign map ends(no spoliers).

As a famous philosopher once said "I've got a bad feeling about this."

Shinova · Post by **Shinova** » 2006-03-06 06:42pm

I don't have that planet core exploding thing under my tech tree. Do I have to get something else to get that?

I'm only seeing bombardment and tidal disruptors.

Duckie · Post by **Duckie** » 2006-03-06 06:52pm

Shinova wrote:I don't have that planet core exploding thing under my tech tree. Do I have to get something else to get that?

I'm only seeing bombardment and tidal disruptors.

I had Bombardment, Space Marines, and Tidal Disruptors and it was on my screen as of the patch right before 1.X (1.0d.009?). I don't know which really unlocked it.