Planetfall

[Agent327]

Hope this one is bugfree.

Great screenshots BTW!

 

[Maniac]

Hope this one is bugfree.

Guess what?

...

Patch a up.

 

[Deon]

Wow, I was missing for a month and you've made a lot! I am eager to try it!

 

[Cmcastl]

Another new version which breaks save, Maniac!

I don't know whether to hug you or give you a fist in the bazoo!

Live long and prosper!

 

[Cmcastl]

On reflection instead of a virtual fist in the bazoo, I give you a virtual hug, Maniac!

I love the improvements in version 10 and many thanks for giving me that Peacekeepers ambience which meant so much to me in the original SMAC.

Live long and prosper.

 

[Maniac]

I hereby announce the release of Patch 10b for Planetfall, the Alpha Centauri total conversion mod for Civ4 BtS. This patch needs to be applied on top of the main v10 file of Planetfall.

This patch makes Planetfall compatible with the recently released official patch 3.19 for BtS. Make sure you have downloaded and installed it too.
This patch breaks savegames from any previous version or patch of Planetfall.



Changelog:

1. New Farm->Eden improvement graphics by Lord Tirian.
2. Fungal Tower unit animations by Lord Tirian.
3. Drop Trooper unit graphics by GarretSidzaka and The_Coyote.
4. InVitro, Cyborg and Walker don't cause war weariness. Thanks to Priv_Joker.
5. Naval units can now be transported to sea and coastal bases with Psi/Dimensional Gates as well. Thanks to Priv_Joker.
6. Formers can be airlifted to any base. Aquaformers can be airlifted to any sea or coastal base. Thanks to Priv_Joker.
7. The Blink Displacer special ability allows a unit to ignore building defense (perimeter defense & tachyon field). Thanks to Priv_Joker.
8. Isle of the Deep can only carry Mind Worms and Spore Launchers.
9. The submarine unit can upgrade to the Carrier and has a cargo hold of one.
10. Submarines and Carriers can besides air units carry "people" such as Probe Teams.
11. Submarine-type units can acquire the Storage Bay special ability.
12. The Morganite faction gets 20% more War Weariness.
13. Espionage missions against University bases are 25% cheaper.
14. The Believer faction gains +1 mineral from the Psych Chaplain specialist.
15. The Believers get -1 Planet in each base.
16. For every 50 culture a base produces, it prevents a fungal bloom.
17. Under the Terraformed civic, fungus automatically gets removed at a speed of one plot per 50 culture produced faction-wide that turn.
18. Chopper and Gravship units can capture bases.
19. Greenhouses can now be constructed on Rocky Polar/Arid/Moist terrain.

 

[Cmcastl]

Just wanted to say, Maniac, as in the words of "Abba", "thanks for the music", for my beloved Peaceepers faction out of the old SMAC.

Live long and prosper.

 

[Agent327]

Played through 400+ turns of v10 without any serious issues.

One comment: are Spore Launchers/Fungal Towers supposed to shoot down Solar Power Transmitters (seeing as they're orbital structures)? See these screenshots :

 

[Maniac]

Not really. I'd have to think on how to change this. I wouldn't want native life to be completely defenseless against air strikes either.

 

[darkedone02]

the AI and my workers should build specific thing's depending on our civics like hybrid and terraform, if I choose to be a hybrid, even playing as the ecologist, my worker's should already be planting forests and stop building things that give me a negative boast on me. I also wish that the gaians have a food bonus for every hybrid forest so that i don't get small colonizes that is surrounded with hybrid forest's and non-negative planetary bonus's.

 

[arkham4269]

I'm most of the way through a game and while I'm not finding any bugs, I am finding some issues.

1. Lack of Units: A rather long time ago (in blog time) I made a list of units that I though would be appropriate. We discussed it and most of them you shot down. Which is fine, it's your mod. However, there just doesn't seem to be enough SMAC flavor since there aren't many units. Since so many of the units in SMAC were unique only due to their promotions, many of those don't currently exist so perhaps they need to be added as units. This issue dove-tails into #2.

2. Really tough Native Lifeforms: While I'm not surprised they are popping up everywhere due to playing w/the terraformed civic and planting lots of forests, my issue is that it is nigh impossible to gain ground against them. On land it's generally okay, but even with plasma throwers and cyborgs w/anti-native promotions, you need stacks of 4 all over to combat the fungal growth. A problem, but not insurmountable. However at sea, you are totally stymied since none of the sea vessels are a match for anything planet throws you (the fungal towers are EVIL) and the needlejets are practically useless. So unless you really do nothing but pump out sea units knowing that most will die, you might as well give up the ocean.

3. Lack of upgrades: Along with a lack of units (no artillery units?) there is also a lack of upgraded units. In my initial post I had mentioned how I felt that SMAC needlejets were too powerful. Well now they are to weak since they don't get nastier versions later on. Same with the hovertank, it's a nice unit but soon is outpaced by infantry units!

So going back to what I had posted earlier, I'm thinking that there needs to be a few tiers of units. Right now you have that with the infantry but not much else. So what do we have?

Recon Units:
Scout should promote to Ranger which would be a tougher unit and able to go where Rovers can't. Might have the ability later to see enemy spies coming into your territory.
Rover should promote to some form of light tank with perhaps the same spy hunting abilities as well as improved visibility.

Infantry Units: "straight leg" units come seem to come in anti-human and anti-native flavors.
'Anti-human' Infantry should promote to either Cyborg, Drop, Mobile or Marines. I don't think they should be able to promote to InVitro for obvious reason.
'Anti-Native' Infantry is pretty much the flame-thrower to plasma-thrower to Cybog units. However I think there also needs to be a further anti-native specific unit since later in the game I was losing very experienced cyborgs and plasma-throwers to initial spawned native lifeforms due to the high anti-Planet level. Obviously if things are bad, need a nastier unit.

Armor: To me it seem that armor is very weak. That and I felt that the hover-tank came to soon.
Armor: I think the initial armor should be renamed "Light Tank" and it should promote to a "Heavy Tank"
Hovertank: The game hovertank is really weak in comparison to the SMAC version. That's okay for the initial one as I would think of it more of a Ground Effect Vehicle (GEV) that is light. As the tech goes higher, you'd be able to promote to the much nastier hovertank.

Artillery: What is up with this? No artillery and even when you build spore launchers they lack ranged combat! I think two tiers is fine.
Artillery/SPA: Pretty much the basic mobile artillery in vanilla civ.
MRLS: I think the main difference in lethality between regular artillery and MRLS is that a MRLS will cause more collateral damage.

Jets/Missiles: As mentioned before, I think there needs to a 'tier two' unit that the initial needlejets promote to. I would think the initial aircraft would be pretty weak as you have them but they need to get nastier as the game progresses. Most of my n-jets die bombing native units.
Bomber: Not sure if one is needed if you have missiles, but having a designated unit that has a long range would be nice.
Missiles: Boy howdy when I'm wanting to attack the 10+ fungal towers in and around my territory, how I'm wishing for missiles! Plus it would be something that could be carried by subs.

Subs/Cruisers: Same as above, need a upgrade. Initial subs could upgrade to nuclear subs and could carry missiles like they can in many mods. Since Cruisers need to be able to upgrade to battleships since later in the game the hordes of sea-native life makes them not worth the time to build since you have to build so many to make a difference.

Formers: Lastly, a thought about formers. Since there is no 'super-former' perhaps you could use the code from Fall Further that allows workers to gain experience over time so you could upgrade them with defensive promotions as well as promotions that would make them work faster or have a higher movement.

Again, much of the issues I'm having with the latest version is that will all the different factions fiddling around with Planet, the natives get nasty really quick. That's fine but in my current game almost all the human factions are mostly just fighting Planet with almost no time (or the ability) to fight each other.

Plus, not sure if it's a bug, but I've never had any of my units capture a native after battle. Is the % chance really, really low?

 

[Pfeffersack]

(...) Plus, not sure if it's a bug, but I've never had any of my units capture a native after battle. Is the % chance really, really low?

I don't know the exact percentage(s), but as you say never...how's your Plant Attitude and especially, have you accumulated enough postive attitude points? You can see this by hovering over your Planet Attitude - you need at least 100, then you can capture one lifeform; if you have 200 a second and so on (not sure if ones that you have build count against the limit, though)

 

[arkham4269]

I don't know the exact percentage(s), but as you say never...how's your Plant Attitude and especially, have you accumulated enough postive attitude points? You can see this by hovering over your Planet Attitude - you need at least 100, then you can capture one lifeform; if you have 200 a second and so on (not sure if ones that you have build count against the limit, though)

Okay that makes sense. I'm playing University and am experimenting with the "I will see every squggily worm exterminated" as their leader once said in one of the techs back in SMAC. So at the last I think I was at -5. I normally play the Gaians and try to be a bit more Planet friendly so I guess I'm used to capturing them easier.

I did remember another two issues I had. One was that sometimes units after being created would not become 'unstuck' after their movement was complete. You have to select another unit manually. The only other time I've seen this issue was was in relation to units of the Scions in FfH/FF/Orbis when in the Haunted Lands.

The other issue may not be a bug, but is really irritating and I don't understand the rationale behind it. I've noticed that if you pick the APC promotion, it seems that you cannot pick certain promotions and likewise if you pick the anti-fungal promotion, you can't get the APC one. That really doesn't make sense. I mean I can understand that if you have the APC promotion then perhaps you couldn't go into fungus like a vehicle, but if you are playing under the terraformed civic, you will be fighting in your own terraformed territory and need the speed to react to fungal blooms.

 

[Lord Tirian]

I've noticed that if you pick the APC promotion, it seems that you cannot pick certain promotions and likewise if you pick the anti-fungal promotion, you can't get the APC one. That really doesn't make sense.

They are not promotions, they're special abilities. After production, you get to pick 0-2 special abilities (determined by unit and buildings in the production city). Afterwards, you get to pick promotions as usual. In your case, you probably build an unit and got one special ability to pick - and afterwards you get promotions, hence the mix-up.

Cheers, LT.

 

[Albertos]

Very well-said Lord Tirian.

Thanks a lot for your post because yesterday I was so confused about the promotions. Now after I read your post I already understand.

Great job.



Simulation pret

 

[Keeper_GFA]

Thanks a lot for your post because yesterday I was so confused about the promotions. Now after I read your post I already understand./QUOTE]

I think that the ability icons should be given a different background color than the promotion icons. That would go a long way to clearing up this confusion.

About capturing native life -- I think that it requires the empathy ability as well as some planet attitude points built up. In my last game (v10a) my capture rate was 100% with empathy and 0% without.

 

[arkham4269]

They are not promotions, they're special abilities. After production, you get to pick 0-2 special abilities (determined by unit and buildings in the production city). Afterwards, you get to pick promotions as usual. In your case, you probably build an unit and got one special ability to pick - and afterwords you get promotions, hence the mix-up.

Well that sort of dove-tails with my comments about the need for the addition of certain units. I mean it seems I can have a anti-native unit that moves slow or a unit that moves fast but isn't much of a native fighter. However, I think if there were artillery units and/or missile units, you could soften the enemy up a bit and there wouldn't be as much of a problem. Really, the lack of stand-off weapon systems is a real tactical pain.

 

[slugwalk]

Well that sort of dove-tails with my comments about the need for the addition of certain units. I mean it seems I can have a anti-native unit that moves slow or a unit that moves fast but isn't much of a native fighter. However, I think if there were artillery units and/or missile units, you could soften the enemy up a bit and there wouldn't be as much of a problem. Really, the lack of stand-off weapon systems is a real tactical pain.

The bunkers serve as stand-off weapons. If you're running terraforming faction its important that you get them (with High-Energy Chemistry if I remember right) as soon as possible. They make native life tolerable.

 

[arkham4269]

The bunkers serve as stand-off weapons. If you're running terraforming faction its important that you get them (with High-Energy Chemistry if I remember right) as soon as possible. They make native life tolerable.

Yes but since the bunkers often get killed doing these stand-off attacks, unlike conventional artillery pieces, it sort of a defense I'd rather not depend on. Besides, like so many units, I've noticed they do better vs. human units than natives.

Plus, I'm noticing that no matter what I've done, the longer the game goes, the newer units have little affect on native creatures. I've upgraded well promoted units to grave diggers and still they only have a 4.2 vs. 3.20 in many combats and often get killed if the terrain is bad. I'm not complaining; in SMAC natives where rarely a major threat later in the game. My issue is that there seems to be no appreciable advantage for the human player as the game progresses. Yes as Planet wakes up, things get worse, but the newer units seem to just keep pace with them. Plus with the lack of strong naval or air units or missiles, fungal towers off-shore continue to pump out fungal blooms on-shore.

Plus, it's not just Planet, but if I have to be worrying about 4-8 native lifeforms popping up every turn, I can't really attack any other human player very well can I? Now I don't to sound, "oh boo-hoo; Planet is mean to me!" but if you are going to take the terraform route, then you'd expect to have access to some nasty weapons against the lifeforms that more Planetphile factions wouldn't use.

Again, the lack of stand off artillery/missiles couple with the nerfed jets (hell the grav-ships get often die fighting mindworms in forest of all places!) makes the game a bit of a Red Queen sort of trap: you have to run just to stay in place.

I agree with the color coding of promotions vs. special abilities if it can be coded.

Oh, from an aesthetic point of view, I don't like the grave digger. What is it supposed to be? I would think you'd have power armored Mobile Infantry instead.

 

[Maniac]

Arkham, are you aware you can promote Armor, Mass Drivers, Behemoths and Cruisers with the Range 1/2 special abilities which give them a ranged strike ability.

I'll move the Range 1 special ab to Kinematics in the next patch, for the record.

Plus, it's not just Planet, but if I have to be worrying about 4-8 native lifeforms popping up every turn

Are you aware that fungal blooms cannot occur if you clean the area around your bases of all fungus?

At least that's how it should be. I had someone report that they get native life spawns even without any fungus present, but I cannot replicate this.