Not fun parts of the game: Planet Capture, Scouting, Megafarms/Hydrogenators, resource redirects, pop ups

[Drasca]

Planet Capture is bloody tedious. It is the least fun part of this game with the other micro intensive actions: Building Mega Farms/Hydros, scouting micromanagement, and failed resource trade links.

The Planetary capture mechanic is micro intensive, and just overall not fun. Fleets may be vulnerable and that might be a balance objective, but it just is NOT FUN to babysit fleets on every planet for 1.5 to 6+ minutes.

Especially with all the counters, and hidden methods of preventing capture that don't even pop up. Psionic reagents, Protect system, Patriotism's up to 100 labor worth of support ships, equivalent to ~500-700 scale of support (so OP), HD/Fling.

Military is still pretty worthless because the capture mechanic is impotent, and micro intensive. It is less bad now than before, since the maintenence costs were slashed in half, but still pretty bad.

I loved station capture for one primary reason: It made end game possible. Devs hated that fast end game, and didn't like orbitals capturing faster than they expected. Something about the speed of supply.

There needs to be a new/better mechanic than the current planet capture as it is resoundedly UNFUN.

Sins of a Solar Empire had a nice way of doing planetary bombardment. Some weapons worked for planetary bombardment, some didn't. I would imagine city infrastructure to count and be required to be killed in addition to civilian/imperial infrastructure in order to annihilate a planet-- and the buildings have a high natural DR / damage blocking. Bunkers / Defense buildings obviously harder to kill than others. That would make smaller munitions not effective at bombardment, but high alpha burst weapons useful. Carpet bombs would obviously be under the high alpha category.

I've also liked the civilian population as invasion force mechanic, sending & depleting one's own population via troop ships-- which in this game would be targetable and potentially shot down. Your own population kills enemy population, and each player has the option to reinforce / invade with a simple invade/reinforce toggle. Fleets in space are there to make sure enemy cannot reinforce easily rather than abstracted supply.

Variety in empire traits & tech, civilian infrastructure, could also potentially affect the population vs population combat-- but on border planets with no infrastructure highest pop invasion wins.

Fights for planetary ownership when first colonizing would be resolved with whose population is biggest instead of first to land.

In any case, planetary capture as it stands right now sucks, and I would much prefer another mechanic to replace it.

Scouts should automatically try to scan if they have nothing to do in a system, or have a toggle to auto-scan anomalies while exploring. If they get within weapons range because of that...

Scouts also still all go for the same bloody system, targetting nearest. This is a major step backwards from SR1, where they could all go to seperate unexplored territories.

Megafarm/Hydrogenator building's just annoying. Absolutely need a toggue / AI governer to auto build these-- with seperate options to build on developed / core worlds with infrastructure, and ones that aren't.

Redirecting failed resource import/export links. One of the least fun parts of the game, when one or more of your planets is taken and you have to redirect all those failed import/export links MANUALLY. Need a way to cancel all these, preferably semi- automatically. Governer toggle for empire wide planet management would be nice. "Cancel all failed links automatically: Check"

Finally Pop ups management. They suck. There's no way to select what types appear, or to automatically close them. This UI element also outright interferes with selection of all other management tabs. Clicking on hundreds of pop ups just to close them is not my idea of fun at all. I would also mute them if I could do so without muting all other sound effects. Edit: Nope, cannot even mute them without muting master volume too.

[myrath]

+1 on quite some of these issues.

Sins of a Solar Empire had a nice way of doing planetary bombardment. Some weapons worked for planetary bombardment, some didn't. I wo

Scouts should have a toggle to auto-scan anomalies while exploring

Redirecting failed resource import/export links.

Don't agree with you on bases though;

You also have some interesting thoughts about planet capture. But I'd like to add that in Sins of Solar Empire capturing planets could be quite time consuming. Especially if you were on your winning track and had sooo many worlds left to conquer. Consider how many worlds you have here... Perhaps that system would not be optimal.

Perhaps something simpler like the old MOO2 system? Or was it Pax Imperia. A bit fuzzy. It's been a while :) You just had drop ships there with soldiers with certain tech levels. Quite clean really. Still it would take a lof of effort in larger galaxies.

[Drasca]

Potential ways for current capture system to be improved:

Designate ship fleets for invasion
Right click star / select entire systems / galaxies, to set for capture.
Ships move automatically to move to capture until supplies exhausted, then hold / until other capturers arrive or retreat for more supplies as designated by a command toggle.

Instead of the current paradigm of micromanaging every planet capture AND ships getting stuck during capture due to zero / negative loyalty.

Toggle planet capture behaviour for fleets. Capture behaviour automatic for fleets within system. Queue Capture system command (like queue auto colonize), tha works for fleets with planet capture toggled on. Fleets automatically move (with/without FTL) to capture if they have supply.

Planet capture is a chore in revision 3390. Let the player do important things, like directing their combat fleets to fight and intercept, not boring & otherwise unnecessary micromanagement.

[Tal Maru]

Originally posted by myrath:

Perhaps something simpler like the old MOO2 system?

MOO3 gave you a few options as well
You had to assemble armys and then put them onto troop carriers.
Then blockade the enemy planet and send down the troops.
Different planets had different terrain which affected how well different units fought.
In lieu of sending in troopers you could just bomb the $&@! out of the planet. Kill off its population then send in your own colony ships.
Any weapon system could be used for orbital bombardment but certian weapon systems were specifcally made for it and could not be used in ship combat.

At the very least we should have the option to either capture the colony or simply obliterate it.

[Lellasone]

In the general case, I would agree that capture needs a bit of work, but I would propose that it actually needs to be more difficult. Planets are big places, and losing one is a big deal. What I would love to see is a system where capturing planets takes 3-5 minutes, but setting up a sort of provisional government (that would prevent it from sending out resources but could be overthrown at the drop of a hat) would take more like 10-40 seconds.

[Solarus]

+1 to planet capture being pretty un-fun, as well as very quick. It makes fleet engagements pretty much not-happen. Since capture is so fast (1.5 mins is very fast), enemy fleets just run and try to capture another planet. Your military just keeps chasing their fleet around all over the place.

Defense of planets should really be easier, and / or they should be much more difficult to capture. There also needs to be some system built to encourage the attacking fleet to fight it out while capturing, else they just run and then turn on another planet, then turn around again on another one...... its an endless cat and mouse chase as of now.

[Dalo Lorn]

Personally, as somebody who's about to buy the game (EDIT: It's done :D), I think planet capturing could do with a couple of lessons from Space Empires 5. :)

(Before you ask, I've done some research and a friend of mine's talked about it quite a bit, so I'm relatively familiar with the core game mechanics.)

[jakinbandw]

Idea: Conquest points

Planets are made harder to capture, but when you lose a certain number of lvls (say 10 or something (maybe more? lvl 1 is 1 point, lvl 2 is 2 points. lvl 3 is 4 and lvl 4 is 8? get to say 20 points?)) the entire empire falls. This would make battles for planets important, but also remove the tedious cleaning up of an empire that is clearly defeated (Because right now losing 10 planets or so puts you in an almost impossible situation) When an empire falls it's planets become like the reminants. They are AI controlled, but don't really do much.

[Davor]

What I would like is ground combat, something like they have for diplomacy. Buy your ground troops. Malitia, Marines, Tanks, Mecha, fighters, orbital bombardment, missle bases, plaentary shields etc.

The more you have, or better level you have the better in favour. Instead of having a cicle have a bar at the top of the panet. The bar goes Defender on left, attacker on right. Have the battle duke it out while the space battle is going on as well. This way the planet is caputred not from eliminating all space ships but the ground units. This way a planet can defend it's self and not be caputered but their defense space ships are all destroyed. The planet will be blockaded but still in your empire.

Then you get your planet to build planetary turbo lasers or what not to prevent a blockade or battle the invading fleet. If the player doesn't want to or can't caputer the planet, then a planetary bombardment can happen and wipes out the plane or servely reduces the infansturture so it can then claim the planet, but then take a long time to rebuild.

Gives more options and maybe make it more fun.

Just an idea. :)

[Nomad]

I agree with almost all of the posters here but the thing that pings me off the most is chasing fleets around all over the galaxy when at war. Especially single capital ships taking over planets in far flung reaches of my empire.

I know I should probably have defences for most planets / systems (and play more cards) but the AI's guerilla tactics are just a pain to behold.

Maybe I am doing something wrong but the mid to end game is just not fun for me as it stands.

Any advice?

[Dalo Lorn]

Originally posted by n01487477:

I agree with almost all of the posters here but the thing that pings me off the most is chasing fleets around all over the galaxy when at war. Especially single capital ships taking over planets in far flung reaches of my empire.

I know I should probably have defences for most planets / systems (and play more cards) but the AI's guerilla tactics are just a pain to behold.

Maybe I am doing something wrong but the mid to end game is just not fun for me as it stands.

Any advice?

I'm encountering the same problem. However, as you pointed out, cards are handy (Patriotic Surge should have enough kick to hold off any such AI raid), and it helps if you launch a counterattack. Other methods have so far proven ineffective as my fleets are usually not maneuverable enough to compensate for rapid changes in the enemy's plans.

Orbitals, of course, should be defended by placing them into planetary orbit. If this is not possible, build a couple of defense platforms around the orbital - if done right, its orbit SHOULD sync up with the platforms.

[Shadowcast]

Hi Devs

Like to also suggest

Auto Patrol. As it is impossible for us to move a fleet to every place.

Fleets must destroy orbital platforms before they can capture the planets in that system.

Orbitals are so boringgg. need more toys!

And maybe also Anti-FTL ships. its annoying when enimies burst off when you killing them.

Invasion
A small little fleet can do a invasion whichs is every annoying.

Change it that they perhaps must have troops or requirement to invade. And also how much troops is required.

Would be annoying if they sent 100 scouts and go cap all your planets.