A Babylon 5 Mod for the Final Frontier Mod

[PsiCorps]

I do have a quick question, it seems some units can move outside of borders and others cannot. What is going on there?

See the post above #1754, it's not a bug.

 

[Premier Valle]

Hi!,

Hi Premier, the issue you have experienced is a deliberate one. There is now a movement restriction in place that prevents all but scouts, construction ships and colony ships from leaving the home solar system. This restriction is removed upon the completion of research on Space Exploration. To avoid problems with the tiles becoming in accessable after your borders expand try not to move your main military units outside of your claimed territory. You can beeline space exploration to get the movement restriction lifted but this would be done at the expense of other much needed techs.

Yep, I knew about this feature, I just found it odd that I couldn't move the ship even after the borders expanded (only to some of the newly claimed plots).

Thanks for the new version BTW, downloading

 

[God-Emperor]

RE: Research times

I will point out that there is an actual effect (which could be considered a bug) that is not immediately apparent that is involved. Before you click the end turn button the first time the reported research times can appear be a lot longer than they actually will be. This is because the output of buildings are not actually added in to the total commerce calculations until you click the end-turn button the first time. This is due to the way the yield calculations are done in FFP in the DLL (which is also used by B5). The planet contributions are added in on the fly, so to speak, but the building contributions are only calculated in the "between turns" processing, so before the first time you end the turn the variable that holds the contributions from buildings is still at its initial value of 0 regardless of what those initial free buildings actually provide.

It also has an effect when loading a saved game: if you more any population to a different planet the recalculated yields will, again, get a 0 from buildings (before you do that it will be correct since the total yields for a city are evidently stored in the savegame). Your apparent research times will tend to increase some then.

This is not a purely visual effect in the reported numbers: you really do not get the yields from buildings the first turn. You can tell this by looking at how many research points you actual have in the first tech you picked to research after ending the first turn. It should be 1 more than the amount of research points the thing said you would get in the usual upper left location on the screen (it is 1 more because everybody always gets 1 free research point per turn, and it is not reported in the total shown on the screen), which was just the total from the population on planets. Likewise, if you load a saved game and then adjust your planet populations in a star system before running a turn, that star system will lose the yields from its buildings for the first turn.

It is possible that sometime something might be done about this, eventually. In essence, the DLL needs to add up the building contributions at game start and on a save being loaded, at some appropriate point in each of those two cases (after the data is actually available), just like it does during play.

 

[PsiCorps]

Yep, I knew about this feature, I just found it odd that I couldn't move the ship even after the borders expanded (only to some of the newly claimed plots).

First way to fix it is to save and reload, the tiles that were blocked but within your borders will become unblocked once you have reloaded.

Second way to fix it is to research space exploration.

RE: Research times

I will point out that there is an actual effect (which could be considered a bug) that is not immediately apparent that is involved. Before you click the end turn button the first time the reported research times can appear be a lot longer than they actually will be. This is because the output of buildings are not actually added in to the total commerce calculations until you click the end-turn button the first time. This is due to the way the yield calculations are done in FFP in the DLL (which is also used by B5). The planet contributions are added in on the fly, so to speak, but the building contributions are only calculated in the "between turns" processing, so before the first time you end the turn the variable that holds the contributions from buildings is still at its initial value of 0 regardless of what those initial free buildings actually provide.

It also has an effect when loading a saved game: if you more any population to a different planet the recalculated yields will, again, get a 0 from buildings (before you do that it will be correct since the total yields for a city are evidently stored in the savegame). Your apparent research times will tend to increase some then.

This is not a purely visual effect in the reported numbers: you really do not get the yields from buildings the first turn. You can tell this by looking at how many research points you actual have in the first tech you picked to research after ending the first turn. It should be 1 more than the amount of research points the thing said you would get in the usual upper left location on the screen (it is 1 more because everybody always gets 1 free research point per turn, and it is not reported in the total shown on the screen), which was just the total from the population on planets. Likewise, if you load a saved game and then adjust your planet populations in a star system before running a turn, that star system will lose the yields from its buildings for the first turn.

It is possible that sometime something might be done about this, eventually. In essence, the DLL needs to add up the building contributions at game start and on a save being loaded, at some appropriate point in each of those two cases (after the data is actually available), just like it does during play.

Thanks for the information God-Emperor, I look forward to the day this gets resolved but as it's not a game breaker I'm not going to start screaming it needs to be fixed.

 

[Samson]

RE: Research times

I will point out that there is an actual effect (which could be considered a bug) that is not immediately apparent that is involved. Before you click the end turn button the first time the reported research times can appear be a lot longer than they actually will be. This is because the output of buildings are not actually added in to the total commerce calculations until you click the end-turn button the first time. This is due to the way the yield calculations are done in FFP in the DLL (which is also used by B5). The planet contributions are added in on the fly, so to speak, but the building contributions are only calculated in the "between turns" processing, so before the first time you end the turn the variable that holds the contributions from buildings is still at its initial value of 0 regardless of what those initial free buildings actually provide.

It also has an effect when loading a saved game: if you more any population to a different planet the recalculated yields will, again, get a 0 from buildings (before you do that it will be correct since the total yields for a city are evidently stored in the savegame). Your apparent research times will tend to increase some then.

This is not a purely visual effect in the reported numbers: you really do not get the yields from buildings the first turn. You can tell this by looking at how many research points you actual have in the first tech you picked to research after ending the first turn. It should be 1 more than the amount of research points the thing said you would get in the usual upper left location on the screen (it is 1 more because everybody always gets 1 free research point per turn, and it is not reported in the total shown on the screen), which was just the total from the population on planets. Likewise, if you load a saved game and then adjust your planet populations in a star system before running a turn, that star system will lose the yields from its buildings for the first turn.

It is possible that sometime something might be done about this, eventually. In essence, the DLL needs to add up the building contributions at game start and on a save being loaded, at some appropriate point in each of those two cases (after the data is actually available), just like it does during play.

There is something odd going on with the yealds of all "things" (food, hammers and commerce). See attached pic, by my reakoning I should be getting 7 food, 107 hammers, 11 base commerce, 5 extra beakers and 3 extra credits. I am getting many times that. It seems to happen when the city is connected to the trade network?

I am really enjoying it BTW, is here a good place for feedback to go?

 

[God-Emperor]

You might check what the mouse-over help for each trade routes says, and what the trait for your leader says for trade routes. As I recall, the display (not the mouse-over help) shows the regular commerce for trade routes and any flat bonus that a trait gives (which I added in the FFP display so it would show the bonuses from the Red Syndicate). It might not show the other kind of bonus which is a percentage of the base commerce for the trade route which can be for any, or all, of the yield types. So if you get a bonus from the trait of this type that would be one source of extra production. For example, +200% production from trade routes via a trait gives each 1 commerce trade route a bonus of 2 production that might not show up in the regular display, and you'd get +3 from a trade route with a base value of 1.5 commerce (which would be rounded down to 1 on the regular display). At least, I don't remember the percentage bonuses from that showing up on the regular display - no trait in BtS (or FFP, for that matter) gives such a bonus.

I do seem to recall that some traits give such a percentage bonus for trade routes in B5, but I don't remember if they have ever been so big or if they still do. Some or all of them may have been switched to the flat bonus. Or it is even possible that the +1 that is showing is from a 100% production bonus from trade routes. (I haven't actually downloaded the current version yet so I can't check the current properties.)

You may also be getting some bonus to production for building the religion related building. If you are getting +100% for this the "missing" production is only about 10. Check the help for each building type to see if any give percentage bonuses and what the "..." for the first building on the list is hiding. The very first thing after the last "+1" could be "".

You may also get some additional info if you click the hammer icon over the trade routes list to change what it shows in that location. It would not surprise me if that display was not completely correct either, since I don't remember if I went through those to made sure they covered everything correctly when I merged BUG into FFP (the ability to show other things in that area is from BUG) but it might show you something that is not otherwise apparent.

 

[God-Emperor]

[RE: the "first turn" and "first turn after loading a save" yields from buildings issue] Thanks for the information God-Emperor, I look forward to the day this gets resolved but as it's not a game breaker I'm not going to start screaming it needs to be fixed.

Sine it usually only happens on the first turn of the game, and it happens for everyone, it has never seemed worth the effort necessary to fix it.

On the other hand, I think it is a more serious problem for the multiplayer crowd for the forms of multiplayer that are sequential in some way. Especially for the play by mail people: For them, every turn is loaded from a save so they have the problem every turn, resulting in losses in yields any time they move population between planets during their turn. This makes fixing it for the "on loading a game" part more important than the "first turn" part.

 

[PsiCorps]

On the other hand, I think it is a more serious problem for the multiplayer crowd for the forms of multiplayer that are sequential in some way. Especially for the play by mail people: For them, every turn is loaded from a save so they have the problem every turn, resulting in losses in yields any time they move population between planets during their turn. This makes fixing it for the "on loading a game" part more important than the "first turn" part.

I hadn't considered the multiplayer aspect of that problem, I've never tried to play with Multiplayer except as a test, on hotseat play, to ensure all player started roughly the same.

 

[Premier Valle]

Hello everyone!,

I just started a playtest of the new version, this time I chose the Narns (I had always chosen Earth), so far so good, although I'm about to colonize a new system but my other ships (save the Sho'kar) can't reach it (due to the movement restriction).

But the thing I noticed is that the Narn homeworld is called "Homeworld", I thought that it was simply called "Narn" (I kind of remember G'Kar telling another Narn "Go back to Narn" it was in the midst of the Narn-Centauri war).

 

[PsiCorps]

But the thing I noticed is that the Narn homeworld is called "Homeworld", I thought that it was simply called "Narn"

I'd always believed it was just called Homeworld, I'll do a little research and see what I can find.

Edit- That didn't take long it would appear that either can be used but for the sake of giving a little more flavour I'll rename the Narn starting planet to just 'Narn'

 

[Samson]

Here are some thoughts I have had on this mod. I really hope they do not come accross as too negative, I have enjoyed this mod more than any I have played for a while though I cannot put my finger on why. It is harder to comment on the positives than the negatives.

1 - Why does the AI not build cities? I am currently playing on Emperor, and I stopped expanding when I got Space Exploration (only to give them a chance). It is now nearly turn 300 and they have not colonised another star system. A similar thing happened in my last game, but then I had colonised most of the map before I stoped playing.

2 - There is something odd going on with invisible output (hammers, food, commerce). In many cases this consitutes most of a cities output. I am sure it is related to being conected to the trade network, but more trade routes do not seem to increase it. It feels a little fustrating that the primary production of a city is not really under my control.

3 - Membari seem overpowered. Great start, with being able to build univisities, and the UB with double the science bonus is a game changer. Perhaps I am missing something.

4 - Bonus and detriment to ship building do not work (eg. the -50% with Pacifism is not applied).

5 - The sudden change from 0 barbs to lots at 150 turns is quite abrupt. The difference between getting a city out before them come and not is massive.

I am really enjoying the game, and I will carry on and hope to update my comments later. Congrats to the author(s).

 

[PsiCorps]

Here are some thoughts I have had on this mod. I really hope they do not come accross as too negative, I have enjoyed this mod more than any I have played for a while though I cannot put my finger on why. It is harder to comment on the positives than the negatives.

1 - Why does the AI not build cities? I am currently playing on Emperor, and I stopped expanding when I got Space Exploration (only to give them a chance). It is now nearly turn 300 and they have not colonised another star system. A similar thing happened in my last game, but then I had colonised most of the map before I stoped playing.

2 - There is something odd going on with invisible output (hammers, food, commerce). In many cases this consitutes most of a cities output. I am sure it is related to being conected to the trade network, but more trade routes do not seem to increase it. It feels a little fustrating that the primary production of a city is not really under my control.

3 - Membari seem overpowered. Great start, with being able to build univisities, and the UB with double the science bonus is a game changer. Perhaps I am missing something.

4 - Bonus and detriment to ship building do not work (eg. the -50% with Pacifism is not applied).

5 - The sudden change from 0 barbs to lots at 150 turns is quite abrupt. The difference between getting a city out before them come and not is massive.

I am really enjoying the game, and I will carry on and hope to update my comments later. Congrats to the author(s).

Thanks for the feedback, it is all useful and I'll admit that a lot of what I've done with the civics and trade networks is purely guesswork. I'm still figuring out what changes have what effects, some of them aren't obvious.

The AI does build colonies but not very quickly or very many. Some of the earlier versions of the Mod had the AI establishing a new colony only for the raiders to come in and capture or destroy it.

Don't forget there are a few different settings for Barbs now None, Normal, Limited, Raging and then there's the super Barbs (IIRC). I'll check out the pacifism and other civics to see if I can get them working properly for the next version.

 

[Premier Valle]

Hi!,

Edit- That didn't take long it would appear that either can be used but for the sake of giving a little more flavour I'll rename the Narn starting planet to just 'Narn'

I found it!, in the Season 2 episode 12 "Acts of sacrifice" G'Kar confronts its people and orders them to stay calm (the Narn plan to kill all Centauri in B5), G'Kar calls it world "Narn", he also uses "homeworld" to refer to it, however, "homeworld" is also used by others to refer to their home planet (this can be seen in the following video).


Link to video.

 

[Premier Valle]

Hello everyone!,

I'm currently playtesting v2.9 playing as the Narn, and I have found the following:

1. No Jump Gate improvement available.
2. Ships are misused.

Let me explain in more detail point 2.

The Narn Then'tus

Spoiler :

The Narn earliest frigate, one of the first we have access to, everything fine, at least for the early version, then comes the upgraded version featuring better engines, weapons, and a jump engine.

It is in IMO that the jump engine should be removed, jump capability is fine (paradrop), but the ship is too small to host a jump engine, also it is a pre-ISA ship so small jump engines (i.e. WhiteStar) are not yet available.

The Narn T'Loth

Spoiler :

Another of the early Narn ships, regarding the stats and capabilities looks good for the early Narn Cruiser, the problem?, it should be the Th'Nor.

It is clear that the T'Loth is actually a couple of Th'Nor cruisers plus the mid-section.

The Narn Th'Nor

Spoiler :

Although it barely appeared in the show (and not even as a ship on its own) it is widely accepted that the Th'Nor was the Narn's earliest major capital ship. In the show it can be seen either as the T'Loth or as the "Quadrant 37" type of starbase, this starbase is mainly composed of 5 Th'Nors as can be seen here:
http://babylon5.wikia.com/wiki/File:NarnoutpostQ37a.jpg

The Engines can be clearly seen. My recommendation is for the T'Loth and Th'Nor to switch places, so that the Th'Nor becomes the early Narn Cruiser; basically change the ship's name and art used.

The Narn Dag'Kar and To'Reth

Spoiler :

Both of these ships have similar features, both with Strenght 13 and both carry 4 missiles, a small cost difference, but overall I get the feel that both are the same (of course, they are a generation appart, being a 2nd generation frigate as capable as a 1st generation destroyer, which is OK) I would only suggest to increase the anti-fighter capability in the To'Reth (both have 5%).

Other issue is that both can open jump points, for the Dag'Kar that is fine (after all it is a destroyer), but the To'Reth is a frigate/corvette and it is pre-ISA, so I believe the To'Reth should not have a jump engine, althoug certainly it is jump capable (paradrop).

The Narn G'Karith

Spoiler :

Art-wise this is a fan creation originally named T'Rakk (by Amras Arfeiniel). The name G'Karith originally belongs to another desing (one not used by us):
http://www.agentsofgaming.com/ofanr.htm

Although I don't mind the name change, it could be confusing for other players (those who also played with the miniatures).

Also, the art used for this ship was originally meant as the 2nd generation cruiser (oposedly to the current 1st generation carrier).

Also, the ship desing follows the T'Loth model, being this two Var'Nic destroyers plus a mid section.

The Narn T'Rakk

Spoiler :

The current version 2.9 features the T'Rakk as the 3rd generation destroyer, but the ship design is actually a modified Th'Nor (2nd gen. destroyer), basically a Th'Nor with an external "carrier" island, making room for extra fighters in the ship's interior.

The suggestion here is to change the current T'Rakk to become the 1st gen. carrier, and the current G'Karith ship model to become the 2nd generation destroyer (EA Narcissus equivalent). Again basically an art switch.

The Narn Bin'Tak and G'Quan

Spoiler :

Currently the Bin'Tak and G'Quan classes have the same strength, both are capital ships, but as far as I know the Bin'Tak is more powerfull than the G'Quan.

Also (again AFAIK) the Bin'Tak is a later desing, but in the tech tree it appears before the G'Quan; that is, we can build a level 2 battleship before a level 1 command ship.

The Narn Rongoth

Spoiler :

The Rongoth is currently using a different graphic than it should, it is currently using the same model as the G'Karith, but there is a Rongoth model for it.

The Ship Construction Facility

Spoiler :

The problem with this building is that it is enabled by the "Advanced Ship Construction" tech. Which in the tech tree is after the Military Elite tech.

The problem here is that i.e. the Bin'Tak cannot be built until the Ship Construction Facility is available, so the Bin'Tak appears in the tech tree way before the Ship constuction facility appears, this is confusing and leaves the player guessing why the new ship cannot be built.

EDIT
===
Regarding the "Barbarians".

In my play test I'm currently in turn 274, I've been attacked by a lot of Raider wings, but few Raider Carriers, and no other "barbarians".

I'm currently in the middle of the tech tree, by this time I was expecting to be fighting the "Gallery Cruiser" and the "Streib collector" (as well as our beloved raiders), yet they haven appeared.

The Drakh were to be expected a little later.

And perhaps, even a 4th tier of "barbarians" (where Vorlon and Shadow vessels could appear??)

 

[Doomspark]

I downloaded 2.9 and played a bit (starting and quitting several games), and figured I'd offer my thoughts on the early game.

All games were set on Chieftain level (yes, I'm a wimp), with a total of 6 civilizations including me. AI civs were set to random. Time and Diplomacy victory conditions were disabled. Huge spiral galaxy map with wormholes.

Please note: I'm typing this at work, so I don't have saves, screenshots, or other extremely specific information available right at the moment.

BUG: In the leader selection screen, President Clark's second trait is an error message.

General nitpicky comments: The capitalization on the city production list, particularly with ship types, isn't completely consistent. Lots of sections in the Civilopedia need to be expanded. Some units need more information on their descriptions in the city production list.

Love the graphics, especially the ships! Good job to all y'all.

Gameplay seems very slow at first. Players must research several technologies before they can build ships and begin expanding. A player who doesn't "beeline" his or her technology may be put in the unpleasant position of running out of anything to build.

In the game I played as the Galm, even though I had all the proper techs researched, I was never able to build scouts or colony ships. I'm going to begin another game with this faction and make sure I didn't miss anything.

 

[Samson]

I have just got as far as tech trading on the hardest level, and despite a couple of civs getting as far as Vortex generation none has researched Space exploration. This obviously prevents them expanding. Might I suggest putting this ability on some tech path that is more attractive to the AI, or perhaps make going outside of your borders on getting to the second era rather than a particular tech?

I shall reiterate that this really is a great mod.

 

[Kiff]

Hello,

after finishing my first game on V2.9 i want to give you some feedback. First of all, the ship models are really great and hopefully Premier Valle will deliver more of these good looking ships.

So here are my thoughts about my first game. I played on a small map on normal speed and difficulty level "prince" with the EA under John Sheridan. At the beginning, the game was somehow boring, as in the first rounds there is nothing much to do then go for the right path of tech research.

Spoiler :

Maybe it would be good to have the ability to build early scouts (oracle class) right from the beginning of the game?!

With my first early colony ship on the way (somewhere around turn 130) i started to wonder, why my colony ships are able to leave their homelands but my artemis and sagitarius class vessels can't do this anyhow.

Spoiler :

In my opinion at the point were colony ships could be send out to outer space should be the same time, where your fist military ships can leave home space as well. So i would say switching this ability from "space exploration" to an earlier tech would be helpful, furthermore the AI could also improve from this switch.

Shortly after getting my first colony running (and luckily getting it outfitted with a set of ODS early enough) there were first raider activities spotted. Suddenly large raider forces started attacking my planets. Luckily they never send other ships then their standard Raider wings and some raider carriers after me, till turn 480 (where my game ended) i never saw any other barbarian vessels. Even since the raider didn't stand a chance against my troops, they didn't ever stopped attacking my systems, so that i rarely getting ever a turn without a fight.

Spoiler :

IMHO there are way to much raiders on the map, getting attacked every turn multiple turns getting boring after a while. just my personal impression.

After getting my first own fighter wings and even carrier vessels, i just recognised that this tiny early ship can pack quite a great bunch of firepower due to its capability of carryiing up to 6 fighter wings. Taking a look on the stats of other more modern ships i got a bit irritated about the high capacities of fighter wings, that my later ships will be able to get. So for example the Hyperion can take 3 wings, the Omega 2 (which is a bit irritating after the Omega is a larger ship than the Hyperion and packed with more starfuries on screen). The latest Carrier Vessel will even be able to take 9 wings with it.

Spoiler :

In my opinion the transport capacities are way to high. I would suggest to give the hyperion only 1 wing, the omega, nova and Warlock 2 wings and the carrier vessels a maxium of 6 wings (maybe only 3 for the early carrier). Otherwise there is to much firepower in small fleets in my opinio. I was able to wipe out the whole mimbar defense fleet with only 2 Hyperions, 1 Omega and 1 early carrier (can't remember the name right now) packed with around 12 fighter wings. Most of the work was made by the fighters, obviously the AI didn't build any fighters and therefore get overwhelmed. Maybe giving some of the smaller vessels (for example Artemis, Sagittarius and Olympus class vessels) a higher interception rate against fighters would give the AI the ability to withstand fighter attacks in a better way.

With research of the vortex generators i was able to test this ability for the first time. For me this function worked well all the times. With the new technology also some upgrades became available and even some bigger warships like the Omega. Nevertheless i could not build the Nova class (which should be the other way round, as the omega class was the successor of the older nova class). I took some time to compare the different available ship types (always meaning the later ones) and recognised the following:

Spoiler :

1.
Sagittarius class and olympus class have the same stats (with the olympus beeing cheaper then the earlier sagittarius). I would suggest to not give the sagitarrius the upgrade (so it stay with no hyperspace abilty, a strength of 12 and a movement of only 1). So the olympus will simply be a replacement of the earlier sagitarrius vessels.

2.
Omega and Hyperion have the same stats with the hyperion beeing more expensive and having one fighter wing more. From my knowledge from the Bab5 series the omega was superior to the earlier hyperion class and was also able to carry more fighters then the hyperion. So in my opinion these stats should be adjusted.

3.
Nova are superior to Omega and later available. AFAIK the Omega are superior to the older nova class vessels and were designed to replace these old battleships. In the current mod version these facts have not beeing taken in account yet. I would also suggest to take the nova to an earlier position in the tech tree (or removing the need of an existing fleet shipyard to build the nova).

4.
Some ships have the ability to bombard systems. So the hyperion can do this but the omega not. I would suggest to make this ability available only to the bigger capital ships (so for example the Nova, warlock and Nike class) to make them more necessary for system attacks.

Shortly after the research of the vortex generator the mimbari decided to declare war at me (this time they really shoot first). At this time all the planets were colonised, the mimbari and the narn both have 3 planets, the other 2 factions (markab and non-alligned worlds) 1 and myself 6 planets. Due to my fighter wing superiority (see my comments above) i was able to fight them back and occupy mimbar and one of the two other worlds. At one point the mimbar managed to destroy all my defences in this world, but obviously the AI don't know how to occupy a world. Because of this i was able to get my domination victory.

Spoiler :

I don't like the use of ground troops at all. Maybe it would be useful for the AI to give the "capture city" ability to some other units (transport ships)?

Some last points from my side:
I don't like the use of the trade and jump lanes on the map, maybe it would be possible to connect all the systems and ressources after the invention of the vortex generators without the use of such lanes (this way it is IMHO in the Star Trek Mod). It just isn't that bab5 look for me with all these lanes on the map. Furthermore i would suggest to make the vortex tech available much earlier, as this is the prerequisite for intergalactical trade and exploration in Bab5.

Last but not least the availability of Quantum 40 can be a game breaker in later games. When you didn't manage to get your hand on this spare ressources, you (or the AI) won't be able to build any advanced ships. In my opinion at least some of the later ships should be buildable without this requirement, otherwise it will be hard to get your hands on this needed ressource when they all are occupied by other races.

After this long text i just want to say thank you for your work, i really like this mod and would love to see some later versions.

 

[Premier Valle]

Hello everyone!,

@Doomspark

In the game I played as the Galm, even though I had all the proper techs researched, I was never able to build scouts or colony ships. I'm going to begin another game with this faction and make sure I didn't miss anything.

In my current game the Gaim declared war on me in the "early" game, and sent a decent battlegroup against my homeworld (Narn), their fleet was bigger than my homefleet.

@Samson

[...]despite a couple of civs getting as far as Vortex generation none has researched Space exploration. This obviously prevents them expanding.[...]

In my game the all the other factions have sucessfully expanded (some even up to 9 systems,... more than my 7, but a couple of assaults changed that ). Although that might mean I'm no much better than the AI regarding research.

@Kiff

First of all, the ship models are really great and hopefully Premier Valle will deliver more of these good looking ships.

Thanks, I've been in some kind of 3d-mind-blocking-status lately, but I'm happy to say that there is already a new ship being built.

At the beginning, the game was somehow boring, as in the first rounds there is nothing much to do then go for the right path of tech research.

The premise behind this is to reflect actual facts, as you know the game starts in the early space-flight, although I agree that there is need to do more in the early turns, particularly, something that I feel could be added to the game is "really early starbases", even from before the initial (standard FF starbase), I mean something like the ISS (International Space Station), that could be upgraded to an standard starbase when the time comes.

Also, I believe it could even be possible to build species-specific starbases, pretty much like the ships, that is to have a starbase model for each species (at least for major species, minor ones might be left with the FF starbase).

[...]why my colony ships are able to leave their homelands but my artemis and sagitarius class vessels can't do this anyhow.
[...]
So i would say switching this ability from "space exploration" to an earlier tech would be helpful

Yes, that bothers me as well. I agree that the "space exploration" tech should be moved down the tech tree.

IMHO there are way to much raiders on the map, getting attacked every turn multiple turns getting boring after a while. just my personal impression.

As you say, this is a matter of personal taste; I don't mind getting attacked by the barbarians, but what I found to be "boring" is that for much of the game only "raiders" (specifically their fighters) attacked me, I believe that removing some restrictions on other "barbarian" ships would be nice, i.e. I my game I haven't seen any "streib" or "gallery" ship attack me (only raiders and Drakh), also, the barbarians should represent a more "spicy" threat, the early raider wings are fine, but their carrier or all other barbarians should appear (IMHO) a little bit before the player acquires the capability to fight them on equal terms (so that at least for a moment, the barbarians will actually bother the player).

In my opinion the transport capacities are way to high.

I agree.

Most of the work was made by the fighters, obviously the AI didn't build any fighters and therefore get overwhelmed.

Bad luck for my assault fleet, which included two fully loaded carriers with tier 3 fighters (Ta'lon), my fleet was intercepted by the Brakiri in open space, and although my capital ships were able to destroy the enemy fleet, my fighter wings were sent first to "soften" the targets but all of them (highly promoted) were damaged (just a few) or destroyed (most of my fighters) by enemy fighter wings, the Brakiri used them in their fleet, and also (before hostilities broke) I spotted an Avioki carrying three fighter wings just touring around.

Sagittarius class and olympus class have the same stats[...]I would suggest to not give the sagitarrius the upgrade[...]So the olympus will simply be a replacement of the earlier sagitarrius vessels.

I've also identified this (same stats), but I disagree that "the Sag" should be denied jump capability and other upgrades, it is -after all- Earth's first heavy-hitter. Also take into consideration, that the Sagittarius belongs to the "destroyer" class, rather than the "frigate" class. True, the Olympus pretty much takes the role of the Sagittarius in the mid game, but denying the upgrade would make "the Sag" pretty much useless (mid game onwards).

I don't like the use of ground troops at all.

As far as I can remember there is an option (a check box) in the "custom game" screen where you can turn off GROPOS; but yes, that feature is still being worked on.

I don't like the use of the trade and jump lanes on the map.

Trade and jump lanes are meant to be the "standard hyperspace routes", travel an commerce in B5 is possible thanks to the beacon network and standard hyperspace routes (other routes restricted to military use); parhaps changing the art of those lanes to something more "hyperspace-ish" would fit better

Furthermore i would suggest to make the vortex tech available much earlier, as this is the prerequisite for intergalactical trade and exploration in Bab5.

I agree on this; although how for down the tech tree?, that is something that has to be considered. (pretty much anything involving the tech tree needs to be thoroughly considered ).

[...]the availability of Quantum 40 can be a game breaker[...]

Indeed, and this is something that is meant to be this way (pretty much like oil in standard Civ), if you dont have it, you have to find it, even start a war over it.


I also want to thank you for all your input and suggestions, these help us make a better mod. Keep 'em coming!.

One last thing, what do you think about the "jump point" feature... I've been thinking lately to remove the restriction that prevents to open the jump point in enemy space.

 

[Kiff]

How will the jump point work in enemy space? will it just replace the culture as long as the unit is there?

if it works this way, you will be able to take away enemy ressources by just opening a jump gate on these fields and getting your culture there? in my game the mimbari were able to restore control of an ressource by this tactics after they lost control over there nearby system.

i hope you understand my point..

 

[Premier Valle]

Hi!

How will the jump point work in enemy space? will it just replace the culture as long as the unit is there?

if it works this way, you will be able to take away enemy ressources by just opening a jump gate on these fields and getting your culture there? in my game the mimbari were able to restore control of an ressource by this tactics after they lost control over there nearby system.

i hope you understand my point..

Yep, I understand your point, a very good one indeed, jump points shouldn't be available in enemy territory... thanks Kiff.

Also, I found a "bug" in the jump point system, although it isn't game-breaking nor it threatens the game stability:
In my war against the Brakiri (I'm Narn) I razed one of their colonies, the territory becoming neutral, so I open a jump point to move away from the system (my fleet is on top of the system's star), the EA had a colony ship nearby, so they moved in (before I was able to jump), so the EA and Narn forces had ships in the same plot, the result was that the jump point was EA controlled instead of Narn controlled, so I couldn't jump.
As previously said, it isn't game-breaking, so fixing this isn't the priority.