Modding Space Empire IV Gold

Tobor · Post by **Tobor** » 2006-04-04 10:06pm

Thats not entirely true pretty much all of my ships can target planets courtesy of my second best gun. The almighty HEAVY BOLTER!!!

yep 9 squares of ranges, 1/3 turn shot rate, almighty damage of under a hundred, and weighing in at an impressive 13kt.

Only slightly more impressive than my fighter missiles with their 1/15 fire rate.

Why, oh why didn't i pick the Drakh!!!

brianeyci · Post by **brianeyci** » 2006-04-04 10:12pm

Heavy Bolter is a little better than what I have.

The Minbari and Earthforce have the most weapon options of the YR I think, and obviously the Shadows and Vorlons have the best, the Shadows having better with their armor piercing weapons.

<edit>It's better since it's 13 kT. What's the base damage on that thing? Mine is 2 reload around 100 damage.</edit>

Brian

GuppyShark · Post by **GuppyShark** » 2006-04-04 11:41pm

My weapons were more than capable of slicing up any planet I wanted. But I didn't kill a single civilian that I didn't have every intention of killing. The planets I stripped off defences were done cleanly because I came up with orders for that purpose, despite turn after turn of combat over them in some cases.

Specifically, the Llort homeworld launched defensive ships every turn and every turn my ships destroyed them without harming the planet. This went on for years of game time.

Ships and fighters attacking planets when they've got an order to isn't a bug anymore than my ships chasing yours through a jumpgate was.

I haven't seen the replays so I can't say where the orders failed you but we also can't retcon everything that turns out otherwise than intended. Especially when such an act is entirely in character with Vorlon RP.

brianeyci · Post by **brianeyci** » 2006-04-04 11:47pm

Hey what are you still doing here didn't you quit?

(j/k)

The problem was Kojiro gifted Nephtys the ships. So the ships are Vorlon construction and controlled by the Vorlons with Vorlon strategies that I suppose include "shoot planet." That's the risk I suppose.

Brian

GuppyShark · Post by **GuppyShark** » 2006-04-05 12:00am

If that were the case Nephtys could just blame it all (rightly) on the Vorlons and give her character a clean slate. I think there might be more to it than that, since she hasn't.

EDIT: Actually, do the strategies of traded/captured ships update live, or are they stuck in the Design strategy at the time of transfer? I suspect Kojiro may have been able to avoid it by changing his Zealot strategy.

brianeyci · Post by **brianeyci** » 2006-04-05 12:02am

There is more. Her fighters shot up the planet too even though they were given orders not to. And besides it stretches belief to think that the Minbari would accept vessels from the Vorlons and not thoroughly check them out before flying them alongside their own ships.

So in-character, none of it should have happened. But then again so shouldn't the point blank starting in front of people's faces thing.

Brian

GuppyShark · Post by **GuppyShark** » 2006-04-05 12:07am

brianeyci wrote:There is more. Her fighters shot up the planet too even though they were given orders not to. And besides it stretches belief to think that the Minbari would accept vessels from the Vorlons and not thoroughly check them out before flying them alongside their own ships.

What exactly would give it away? They would have to understand Vorlon AI for that, and we both know if the Vorlons want to hide something, the Minbari won't find it.

So in-character, none of it should have happened. But then again so shouldn't the point blank starting in front of people's faces thing.

A lot of things happen in game that shouldn't, but as has been said by others, the game drives the RP, not the other way around.

brianeyci · Post by **brianeyci** » 2006-04-05 12:13am

Hahahaha well if you play by the rules you die by the rules. I can safely say that Tuxedo will really kick ass with his ships, but I promised him I wouldn't say anything more about the designs. But they'll kick ass, and I mean really steamroll over anything

.

As for the Vorlon ships... the Minbari wouldn't let them fire on civilans. They'd probably destroy them first. At the least the fighters shouldn't have bugged.

Brian

Kojiro · Post by **Kojiro** » 2006-04-05 12:14am

I see it as more of a guide. It replaces the dice as our RP resolution system. If we use the RP as the drive the game becomes nothing more than a clunky and bad art section to our 'book'.

My explaination would be the vorlon ships tried to do what they thought was best, based on their orders. If they see Minbari ships attacking the planet, they'll attack the planet. They're like dogs, smart enough to follow simple instructions but not cognitive enough to really think things through. An well trained attack dog for example will maul a child if it's what it thinks it's master wants.

brianeyci · Post by **brianeyci** » 2006-04-05 12:26am

Well that would work.

Except the Minbari fighters attacked the planet too since units apparently don't follow orders.

Brian

GuppyShark · Post by **GuppyShark** » 2006-04-05 12:29am

MAAAAAAVERICK!

Kojiro · Post by **Kojiro** » 2006-04-05 12:33am

Well by ships I mean anything that they recognise as friendly regardless of size.

Uraniun235 · Post by **Uraniun235** » 2006-04-05 12:45am

brianeyci wrote:Well that would work.

Except the Minbari fighters attacked the planet too since units apparently don't follow orders.

Brian

That's good to know considering how much of my firepower is in fighters.

brianeyci · Post by **brianeyci** » 2006-04-05 12:52am

Yeah fucking fighters killed my capital ship, 50k minerals down the drain... they surrounded it and I could only kill 5 x 6 fighter stacks a turn while they whittled it down.

Turns churning now, I hope my 30 super battleships end up killing those 200+ fighters or I'll be pissed ha.

<edit>Holy shit what the fuck happened to my score all of a sudden I have 12 million score and the nearest is 3 million score

. Every single neutral race declared war on me including the Shadows, I'm MEE now! Whee!</edit>

Brian

Kojiro · Post by **Kojiro** » 2006-04-05 01:01am

I gotta say the turns are flying through lately. It's getting confusing with the RP being a few hours while months pass out there in the galaxy.

brianeyci · Post by **brianeyci** » 2006-04-05 01:17am

Anyway don't be freaked out, score doesn't mean anything. It's easy to inflate the score by building a lot of really large ships with nothing but bridges, crew quarters and life support. That's what most of my ships are actually, I can't field 400 heavy baseships with my small economy so relax

.

Brian

Uraniun235 · Post by **Uraniun235** » 2006-04-05 01:20am

brianeyci wrote:Yeah fucking fighters killed my capital ship, 50k minerals down the drain... they surrounded it and I could only kill 5 x 6 fighter stacks a turn while they whittled it down.

Turns churning now, I hope my 30 super battleships end up killing those 200+ fighters or I'll be pissed ha.

<edit>Holy shit what the fuck happened to my score all of a sudden I have 12 million score and the nearest is 3 million score . Every single neutral race declared war on me including the Shadows, I'm MEE now! Whee!</edit>

Brian

Thirty of those gargantuan ships should easily slaughter a thousand fighters let alone a mere 200.

Also, I love how EA is the only nation in good relations with everyone.

Kojiro · Post by **Kojiro** » 2006-04-05 01:50am

Just so I'm clear, if I tell satellites not to target a planet they won't do it right? Or will they go crazy cos they're units and not ships?

Tobor · Post by **Tobor** » 2006-04-05 02:56am

Thats not true. I have 4 classes of fighter in service and they all perform seperate battlefield roles with seperate orders.

They all act accordingly.

If you have a decent grasp of the order protocols then you can give them orders that you can reasonably espect them to follow.

FOr instance my fighters with 5 missile racks go straight ofr their heavist ships, my gun fighters go for their fighters then from smallest to largest ship ans my tactical fighters go for the closest target.

In a big battle though it gets jumbled pretty quick, but they generally do their job

brianeyci · Post by **brianeyci** » 2006-04-05 09:45am

Kojiro wrote:I gotta say the turns are flying through lately. It's getting confusing with the RP being a few hours while months pass out there in the galaxy.

Not necessarily. Game mechanics don't necessarily dictate the RP for me or for other people. I know they do for you (jubilant Hurr ha) but not the way most of everybody else is playing

. You really think they stand around in Council chambers for a month waiting for a brilliant reply while twiddling their thumbs for the next SE:IV turn?

.

Tobor wrote:Thats not true. I have 4 classes of fighter in service and they all perform seperate battlefield roles with seperate orders.

That won't work in a real fight when fighters can only launch a few dozen at a time and block each other's way since it's a 2D plane. Their weapons have shit range too so only a few dozen can shoot at a time while capital ships could kill hundreds every round.

Brian

Kojiro · Post by **Kojiro** » 2006-04-05 11:43am

Of course not Brian, but you're misunderstanding me. My point was simply that several turns pass in the game while the RP works through a single session.

As far as RP defining mechanics, it's a resolution system. The planet is jubilant, I see no reason not to use the same description. It doesn't mean I'm locked into game definitions, merely that sometime they coincide with what I want to write, in which case I see no reason to alter them.

brianeyci · Post by **brianeyci** » 2006-04-05 11:51am

Well when the place is "jubilant" under Corporate ownership, I'm sure I'll parade around Pack Leader Yreneck saying that he was telepathically mind controlled

.

If you live by game mechanics you die by game mechanics... you will be shocked by what Tuxedo has managed to find... I'll just leave it at that

.

As for gamey tactics, here is a list. I use some, I don't use others, it's a preference thing. It's not a hard and steadfast rule at all... most players do use retrofits (it costs 150% so it's expensive) and most players do use everything I think, but the only big no no is closing off every warp point so there is no way to get into your space. I think closing off every warp point except one is alright and fortifying the shit out of it. And in AI games, it's usually a bad idea to force the AI to trade you a planet, and wouldn't happen with properly written AI's anyway, but that depends on the game I guess.

Brian

Arthur_Tuxedo · Post by **Arthur_Tuxedo** » 2006-04-05 12:21pm

You're going to talk up my fleet so much it can't help but disappoint!

Trogdor · Post by **Trogdor** » 2006-04-05 12:24pm

brianeyci wrote:If you live by game mechanics you die by game mechanics... you will be shocked by what Tuxedo has managed to find... I'll just leave it at that .

All right, now I'm curious. The only serious weapon I ever found in ruins in the B5 mod was the Great Machine, and that's only a weapons platform.

Uraniun235 · Post by **Uraniun235** » 2006-04-05 12:47pm

Color me just plain confused because the only super-omg tech I'm seeing is this:

Unique Area:
This is a user-defined number which is connected to certain abilities such
as Ancient Ruins Unique. Some abilities will cause a unique tech to become
available. If this number is greater than zero, then this technology area
will only be shown to the player if they have the attained\activated the
ability with the corresponding Unique Area id.

20 - Cure for Nano-Plague
21 - Great Machine
22 - Ship Automation
23 - Stellar Balancer
24 - Ancient Neurotech
25 - Ancient Atmospheric Adjuster
26 - Unique Ship Class
27 - Universal Colonizer

That won't work in a real fight when fighters can only launch a few dozen at a time and block each other's way since it's a 2D plane. Their weapons have shit range too so only a few dozen can shoot at a time while capital ships could kill hundreds every round.

...holy christ, EA gets reamed! None of EA's anti-capital ship weapons can target fighters!

(or even fucking space stations!)