Sword of the Stars II: Enhanced Edition

Sword of the Stars II: Enhanced Edition

Well, I won
I've no idea how or why - after a battle with the swarm, the game suddenly popped up a page that said "you win". The 2 opponents were still around and looked reasonably strong. Crazy.

So I've played a game to completion and I'm not too impressed. there are tons of issues with it still, from the terrible fleet order system that brings you fleets back from a mission before I want them to, to ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ like the F key refuses to centre the camera on that ship.

There's a lot to like in the design - added planets per system, starbases (though I never understood why you could only have a few to them), to the slightly better trade system (though i could never figure out why I had 10 white dots but only 2 freighters would operate), to the difficulty in telling the range of one of my fleets (seems adding supply doesn't do anything, or not in any obvious way). Plenty more ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ where that came from.

I think I will give it 1 more go, now I have some experience with it to see if I can get past the bugs and ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ and if its still unsatisfactory as a game (which is meant to be fun afterall!) then I will go back to SoTS 1, which is an awesome game.
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112/12 megjegyzés mutatása
Huh. Did you change the victory condition or ally with the other two players?

You can order your fleets to go on other missions while they're still out there, but if they have nothing else to do, they'll come back to their base. This is done a) for realism - no fleet would stay out in space indefinitely without orders - and b) to make it easier for players to keep tabs on their fleets. I secretly suspect that Mecron felt bad for all those lonely scouts who were forgotten in countless out of the way systems in SotS Prime.

Focussing requires, for some reason, extreme precision. You have to be perfectly on target, which gets harder the further you zoom out. It's much easier to do from the scan view, though. The icons are much easier to hit.

I'm not sure what you mean with the trade. As long as you have freighters and enough docks on your civilian station, they'll operate. Unless you're not close enough to planets that can import, but I'm not sure of that. We Hivers have unlimited range, after all.

The range of your fleets outside of your supply range is endurance x speed. Adding supply increases endurance, but since it's shared across all ships, if you have lots of ships with little endurance, you'll need to add more supply to increase the range of your fleet.
clearly what happened is you overwelmed the other 2 players with your awesome upon defeating the swarm and got an awsome victory.
Unwerth eredeti hozzászólása:
Huh. Did you change the victory condition or ally with the other two players?

You can order your fleets to go on other missions while they're still out there, but if they have nothing else to do, they'll come back to their base. This is done a) for realism - no fleet would stay out in space indefinitely without orders - and b) to make it easier for players to keep tabs on their fleets. I secretly suspect that Mecron felt bad for all those lonely scouts who were forgotten in countless out of the way systems in SotS Prime.

Hmm I also would argue realistically that in a military setting a unit, especially a ship, wouldn't return to base unless they were instructed to do so or truly needed to for supplies. I rather have a unit floating in space but near a point where I can control an enemies movements.
Desert Punk eredeti hozzászólása:
Hmm I also would argue realistically that in a military setting a unit, especially a ship, wouldn't return to base unless they were instructed to do so or truly needed to for supplies. I rather have a unit floating in space but near a point where I can control an enemies movements.

For that you have the patrol mission which will make a fleet stay at a system for as long as its supplies last. Seeing as one turn is one year (except for admirals, unless they've fixed this since I last checked), they can stay out for quite a while longer than I would ever care to stay in a metal box surrounded by near-instant death together with probably increasingly cranky mates.
Check what your victory conditions were, also were you allied with anyone? If not, maybe dig up your last save and post it on the Kerberos forums.

And yeah, if missions end for any reason the fleet does start heading home. Fortunately, you can now assign 'returning' ships a new mission if they've got the supplies to do it, which has been a much needed feature.

Not sure about the F key problem, but I have noticed that because the tactical maps can be pretty huge it can sometimes be difficult to accurately click on anything when you're zoomed out. Best option I find is to go to sensor mode, but then that's pretty much always the best policy when you're zoomed out.

As regards trade, the number of freighters you can use depends on the number of docking bays at the civilian station. If you want to field a lot of freighters, upgrade the civilian station. Also, heavy freighters (not Q ships) effectively count as two freighters for one docking bay.

If you look at a ships supply on the design screen, you'll notice there are two numbers, the first is how much supply the ship uses each turn. The second is the total supply capacity. Divide the latter by the former and you have the range in turns (which is also displayed below). Different sections, modules, weapons and the strength of the ship's crew and reactor will cause it to use different levels of supply, so if you want to build a long range explorer ship try giving it energy weapons instead of missiles, for example. If you want to increase range by adding modules, make sure you're not also increasing crew numbers or reactor, "Camel" modules, for example, just add to supply and nothing else.

I'd recommend taking a break myself, maybe come back in a few weeks or a month or so. It sounds like the AI is going to get another major upgrade in the next patch, which it badly needs.

I gave up on this thing for about a year after that horrible release build, but I have to say, I kind of like where it's going now. It's less of a tight, competative strategy game like SOTS prime, and I get that that's going to piss off the majority of fans, but I think there's a different kind of fun to be had. I'd compare it to something like Dwarf Fortress, in that while it's not a role-playing game as such it tends to lend itself very well to creating unscripted narratives, and I personally find that fun. Your tollerance may vary.
Legutóbb szerkesztette: Surimi; 2013. márc. 21., 3:26
Cheers guys. I did ally with the 2nd player too and i think that did it - but as the 1st player allied with me early in the game I forgot that I'd won an 'alliance victory'. Would have been nice for the end screen to say "well done for bringing peace to the galaxy in a new era of diplomatic prosperity" or something.

It does need a lot of polish to the UI, but I kindof like a lot of it, even the admirals make sense, even if transferring ships should be able to transfer without a new fleet being created. Docks - makes sense, but surely a single dock can be shared amongst several freighters (like a runway can handle many planes!)

Still, if they can keep fixing a load of things and don't assume that becuase it is no longer in the "WTF is this" category they can stop updating it, I'll try again.
gbjbaanb eredeti hozzászólása:
It does need a lot of polish to the UI, but I kindof like a lot of it, even the admirals make sense, even if transferring ships should be able to transfer without a new fleet being created. Docks - makes sense, but surely a single dock can be shared amongst several freighters (like a runway can handle many planes!)

You can actually relocate ships without needing a fleet now. After selecting the mission, there's a buttong called "reserve transfer" in the lower left corner, next to the target system. This allows you to put ships from reserve fleets into convoys and fly them wherever you need them to be.

Heavy freighters use one dock too, but they can transport double the amount of goods. It's not really a solution, but if you want to build less docks or can't build more, this is the way to do it.
This is indicative of the terrible UI. So I riight click on a target system, select "patrol" or any other mission, and in the screen that opens I can select a different type of mission (ie. transfer), ignoring anything to do with the patrol mission. So if I want to transfer a fleet, I must issue a patrol order! (ok, or relocate or colonize or whatevver). No wonder I couldn't find it!

edit: turns out it only applied to the relocate mission type, so that's not tootally terrible.

But there are more ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ I found today: I researched battlerider hangers that can be added to naval stations... no idea how to do this though. Nor could I open displomacy with the other empries. I think another 6 months before it ggets properly playable, it feels like a demo at the moment.
Legutóbb szerkesztette: gbjbaanb; 2013. márc. 27., 12:40
gbjbaanb eredeti hozzászólása:

But there are more ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ I found today: I researched battlerider hangers that can be added to naval stations... no idea how to do this though. Nor could I open displomacy with the other empries. I think another 6 months before it ggets properly playable, it feels like a demo at the moment.

The description of the hangars is wrong. You actually have to prototype and build battle rider platforms.

I'm not quite sure, but I think in order to open diplomacy you need to research Xeno-Colloquy in the political tree first.
Also with the fleets, I often forget it too but you can set them a new base, if you want them to stay at a freshly colonised planet it can be helpful.
Desert Punk eredeti hozzászólása:
Unwerth eredeti hozzászólása:
Huh. Did you change the victory condition or ally with the other two players?

You can order your fleets to go on other missions while they're still out there, but if they have nothing else to do, they'll come back to their base. This is done a) for realism - no fleet would stay out in space indefinitely without orders - and b) to make it easier for players to keep tabs on their fleets. I secretly suspect that Mecron felt bad for all those lonely scouts who were forgotten in countless out of the way systems in SotS Prime.

Hmm I also would argue realistically that in a military setting a unit, especially a ship, wouldn't return to base unless they were instructed to do so or truly needed to for supplies. I rather have a unit floating in space but near a point where I can control an enemies movements.
Clearly you do not understand that a single mission will take years at the very least. Would you wait for centuries, start a new civilization before you'd come back for a new mission? I think not.
there is an option under menu auto options to patrol post mission
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112/12 megjegyzés mutatása
Laponként: 1530 50

Közzétéve: 2013. márc. 17., 16:34
Hozzászólások: 12