Feedback thread

[Pfeffersack]

Rotrock from the German forum runned into an an issue with the new Empath-promoted Mass Drivers and the unit cycle - when they get selected, they have the icon of the former unit; also he reported that command buttons are affected (movement with the mouse still works).

To reproduce load the save, move first the Marine as you like, then the Rotor...after that a MD gets selected and the problem appears. The save loads fine with the latest version.

Edit: Save/Screenshot removed, as it is no longer needed.

 

[GeoModder]

Yeah, I reported this issue in the team forum. IIRC, Manaic fixed it for the next patch.
The same happened to me with a hovertank promoted with the forest promo's (it switches graphics then).

 

[Maniac]

with new civ changing system it seems bit odd that you can choose any civ and not only one you "discovered"

Given that there is no connection between the original civ and the one you switch to, I see no good enough reason to limit who can switch to a new faction.

also there is no documentation (i think so) for CoP having "Infest" promotion when others do not (or i missed it)

It's at the same place as all faction info is: the leader pedia page.

I noticed you can't directly select the Cha Dawn pedia age though. No idea why.

after switching to CoP you get no CoP era - so no cop music at city screen and CoP cities have modern era civ audio ambient (police cars etc) Oo

There is a Cult era - it just doesn't do anything special.

Also for missing music for Domai/Drones i have suggestion :
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-v4OBGIZp5c

Hmm, that doesn't really strike me as Drone-ish.

 

[ozymandyus]

I ventured out into my first game as one of the 'later' leaders...in my case the Consciousness. I knew something was a little off though, because whenever I met with another leader, instead of starting out with their soundtrack, it started out with the sound bite "Please don't go, the drones need you, they look up to you", then the normal soundtrack. Not terrible, although annoying after the fifth or sixth time.

The REAL problem though came after I saved and exited the game to go make a sandwich. Came back, started the game, loaded my save...and it loads up with me playing the civ that I had originally started the game with. I had 2-3 other saves with Consciousness and tried them all, same thing. Can provide some of the saves if you wish, it's really puzzling.

 

[GeoModder]

Have you tried loading them a second time? It solved it for me.
Btw, I reported it already to Maniac. I believe he said he fixed it for the next patch.

 

[Maniac]

I said I didn't know a fix. I just started a thread in the FfH though, given this feature is just copied FfH code. If they don't have a clue over there, I wouldn't know how to solve it.

 

[GeoModder]

Oh, sorry.

 

[Maniac]

I did not intend the tone you interpreted.

 

[Maniac]

I'm happy/sad to announce I've been soundly beaten by Yang in my just finished* game.

* well, I just gave up, as the situation had become hopeless; his army and production capacity was just too big to defend against.

 

[Maniac]

I'm unhappy so many of the last tier units have strength 8. What do people think about the following strengths?:

Behemoth 7
Interceptor 3, and differentiate the Interceptor and Thunderbolt in some way, both upgrading to the Penetrator.
Penetrator 5
Cruiser 10
Gravship 7, but give it the Flanking II promo for free
Bunker III 9

 

[GeoModder]

I'm unhappy so many of the last tier units have strength 8. What do people think about the following strengths?:

Behemoth 7
Interceptor 3, and differentiate the Interceptor and Thunderbolt in some way, both upgrading to the Penetrator.
Penetrator 5
Cruiser 10
Gravship 7, but give it the Flanking II promo for free
Bunker III 9

Behemoth: yeah, it's a bit overpowered at strength 8 with its ability to do collateral damage. Especially against an opponent with a bit weaker unit classes.
Thunderbolt the ability to bombard city defenses perhaps? And quite a bit less or no ability to intercept? Also, more effective against boat units, and the interceptor more effective against cruiser units?
On the Cruiser at strength 10: it seems to make sense having a warship with a higher strength then whatever land/vanguard unit.
Interesting twist on the Gravship. Will have to see it in action, but making it a bit weaker combined with making say a cruiser stronger doesn't make the latter feel obselete. Naval vessels still feel important then in the later game.
On the Bunker III, if Cruisers become stronger, the primal city defense should too.

 

[ozymandyus]

Have you tried loading them a second time? It solved it for me.

Now that's weird, but yes...that fixed it. Thanks a lot, Geomodder! Loading the same game twice in a row got me back to the correct civ.

I said I didn't know a fix. I just started a thread in the FfH though, given this feature is just copied FfH code. If they don't have a clue over there, I wouldn't know how to solve it.

I don't know why loading it twice fixes the problem, but it does.

I'm happy/sad to announce I've been soundly beaten by Yang in my just finished* game.

Yang is far and away the strongest overall civ in this game. I've yet to play a game where he didn't either kick my ass or at least fight me through the entire time period.

I'm unhappy so many of the last tier units have strength 8. What do people think about the following strengths?:

Behemoth 7
Interceptor 3, and differentiate the Interceptor and Thunderbolt in some way, both upgrading to the Penetrator.
Penetrator 5
Cruiser 10
Gravship 7, but give it the Flanking II promo for free
Bunker III 9

I don't have a lot of opinion on those as I don't end up using many of them outside of the gravship and cruiser. The cruiser definitely needs some love, particularly since it's so weak against native life. As it stands right now I only build hunters because cruisers are so weak. For the gravship, they end up being the go-to unit of the late game. If you tone them down, not sure really outside of psi powers how you can assault someone effectively in the late game.

 

[GeoModder]

I'm happy/sad to announce I've been soundly beaten by Yang in my just finished* game.

* well, I just gave up, as the situation had become hopeless; his army and production capacity was just too big to defend against.

You shouldn't play on megalomanical level, Maniac.

 

[Maniac]

Yang is far and away the strongest overall civ in this game. I've yet to play a game where he didn't either kick my ass or at least fight me through the entire time period.

It would be great to find out what causes this. Pfeffersack has suggested it's because he starts more isolated than the other factions, and thus has room to expand, but in that case the Spartans should perform equally well. In my game they were indeed powerful, but still way behind Yang.

 

[Pfeffersack]

It would be great to find out what causes this. Pfeffersack has suggested it's because he starts more isolated than the other factions, and thus has room to expand, but in that case the Spartans should perform equally well. In my game they were indeed powerful, but still way behind Yang.

The isolated start is one thing contributing, but it goes on if you have a close look at all the other advantages Yang gets. Nearly all of the seem to be prefctly suited for the AI:

* The AI isn't too smart in combat; it relies on sheer numbers often - +10% production and double speed Infantry help them greatly
* the AI is probably not to good at practising "mobile defense", too...so they will be caught in their bases often...and here those 50% help (they also help vs. NL, right?)
* no pillaging is useful as well - the AI is less smart and efficient in rebuilding, so any damage not dealt here is for the good
* Drones eating less food leads to higher population, for whatever it is good. Surely, the human player can send Yang's bases easily into disorder - but will the rest of the AIs be so intelligent as well?

The Spartans boni on the other hand are probably not so powerful in the hands of the AI:
* Cloned Units with full special ability slots are nice - but does the AI exploit that really? In the way they will on purpose focus on grow to "draft away" the excess population?
* MP might not come into play on the higher levels, where the AI gets happiness boni anyway (also unhappiness isn't theat problematic in PF at all)
* GGs are another feature that the AI uses probably suboptiomal (several choices what to do, likely they don't always pick the best and at least 1 of them is extremly problematic for the AI [promoting units])
* The Commando promotion shines best if you know how to use your units; the way the AI uses them it is just a minor strength upgrade
(* Starting outside the PC might be a disadvantage, too - but honestly I haven't noticed anything proofing this theory so far)

Also most of the Spartans boni seem to come into play/begin to shine later...and the beginning matters most, as we all now. Their might be also character differences, which fuel this.

 

[Maniac]

Yang spent most of his military energy on me, and only captured two bases from other factions. So at least in my game his military advantages didn't play a role. He won purely on economic strength. That only leaves the +10% hammers and drone benefit as economic advantages.

Anyway, I guess I'll use Yang as a teammate in a game and see if I can notice anything special.

 

[Pfeffersack]

Yang spent most of his military energy on me, and only captured two bases from other factions. So at least in my game his military advantages didn't play a role. He won purely on economic strength. That only leaves the +10% hammers and drone benefit as economic advantages.

A huge military can still act as a deterring factor (power graph does not take in account promotions!), also NL has less chances to overrun bases, if more units defend (and if they suceed, recapturing is easier)

 

[Lord Tirian]

Out of curiosity: As discussed here, BBAI changes barbarian behaviour, making it more "cautious" - and LunarMongoose noted that he disabled odds-checking for barbarians in his mod.

Is the change active in Planetfall, too? That would explain pretty well why native life is sometimes so... cautious (it tends to pillage more than actually attack cities - and why it favours attacking with spore launchers - because of the good withdrawal odds).

...because if there's one thing that annoys me about native life, it's the prevalance of spore launchers. Mindworms are iconic, dagnabit!

Cheers, LT.

 

[Maniac]

Out of curiosity: As discussed here, BBAI changes barbarian behaviour, making it more "cautious" - and LunarMongoose noted that he disabled odds-checking for barbarians in his mod.

I don't see any post quoting concrete code which is supposed to make barbarians more cautious. I at least don't see anything that could do this in the barbarian unit AI code. So they might just be imagining things.

Is the change active in Planetfall, too? That would explain pretty well why native life is sometimes so... cautious (it tends to pillage more than actually attack cities - and why it favours attacking with spore launchers - because of the good withdrawal odds).

What unit AI a native lifeform receives depends on the Flowering Counter. The chance to receive the 'animal' AI decreases as the Flowering Counter rises. If the FC is 20, a barb native lifeform will have a 80% chance to have the animal unit AI. If the FC is 80, it will have 20% chance to act like an animal.

If they're not animal, the unit AI depends on which unit we're talking about. Most units will have the attack AI (and the barbarian attack AI is different than that of all other civs); spore launchers have the 'collateral' unit AI.

Animal AIs attack anything in sight, but they won't actively seek out targets. They'll just wander around.

Animal AIs will never pillage I just noticed (hmm, perhaps I should change that); so if you're being pillaged, the pillager must have the barbattack AI. I haven't looked, but collateral AIs could be less likely to pillage, so that would explain why spore launchers are more likely to attack you directly.

I'd say native life would actually become LESS dangerous though if even attack AIs attacked everything in sight, regardless of the odds. Because if they attacked anything in sight, you could just hide in your base, waiting for the native intruder to suicide itself. If you are under threat of pillaging, you are forced to take more proactive actions to prevent the pillaging, thus possibly exposing your units to an attack while in the open, or forcing you to attack a native lifeform that's on a plot with a defense bonus.

...because if there's one thing that annoys me about native life, it's the prevalance of spore launchers. Mindworms are iconic, dagnabit! Cheers, LT.

What ratio of mind worm/spore launcher/locust would you prefer? And of IoD/sealurk/locust?

 

[Lord Tirian]

What ratio of mind worm/spore launcher/locust would you prefer? And of IoD/sealurk/locust?

Hmm... for locusts, it should be highly dependant on the state of planet - locusts shouldn't occur at all during the early game, during the late game (when the flowering counter is high OR as response to high eco-damage - probably higher chance for them to spawn during fungal blooms?), it should easily rise to a half of all native life. But then, I *want* Planet to feel dangerous at the end. Locusts are an easy way to drive that feel home.

For spore launchers to mindworms, I'd like to see something like 25% spore launchers and 75% mindworms; probably the same for sealurks to IoDs - though I think it works pretty well as it is now (haven't checked what it is now).

Ideally, most "lone" native life you encounter are worms, only stacks with 3+ units should have a quarter of them as spore launchers to assist with collateral damage.

Obviously, that's just my personal idea how it should be like - I just perceive mindworms as more iconic and they feel more threatening, while spore launcher attacks (due to the withdrawal) are more annoying than anything else, when they're not followed up by big worm attacks.

Cheers, LT.