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When looking at the exploration of aspect of Master of Orion: Conquer the Star (MoO4), the player can get what seems to be decidedly two strong points of view off the bat. Given that all the very similar hallmarks of explore new systems and planets is in all 4x space empire building games, the make or break for MoO4 would seem to lie in the exploration mechanic itself. Traditionally, the use of an open map with fuel consumption as the limiting factor forces the player to calculate outpost ship construction, fuel cell research, and speeding colony ship production up instead of other areas. In MoO4 exploration is though a fuel free starlane filled space. Currently there are two galaxy types, Circular and Spiral, with the Spiral galaxy breaking up sections of the galaxy by unstable Starlanes that can only be traversed after a early/mid-game tech is researched.
Using the Starlanes, a player will find a few interesting features but not much more than a few past the first playthrough. Additionally, a very early scanner tech assists exploration by allowing any player owned ship inside of a system to reveal all planetary information of the planets in system thus allowing players to be in and out of a system in two turns.
Result
While the Starlane mechanic is seen by some as a gameplay enhancer outside of the exploration, the use of Starlanes good or bad is not the issue as far as exploration is concerned. There is a need to have a player feel as though they are feeling a sense of wonder and even veterans of the title should see something new every now and then.
•No Fuel Limit - Not only does a player only need a minimal investment in scout ships which in and of itself means that there really isn’t a need to have a scout class in the game if only 2-4 are ever built, but there is also less of a need to speak with fellow races in the game. Without fuel a player can just send off a few scout ships on auto-explore and, barring any poor AI choices, never need to micromanage them again. As a result of this, the player doesn’t actually need to concern his/herself with exploration at all.
•Possible Solution - Add fuel to the game. This immediately adds a level of strategy as now a player must choose between investing in colonizing the local Starlanes within reach or investing in infrastructure to allow exploration of the game map.
•To facilitate this, consider allowing Outposts to be build around planets outside of of colonized systems. They should have the same costs to build (10 turns and 1 BC maint. per/turn) as standard outpost if not a little extra build time due to adding refueling station or what not. This would allow player to continue exploration but also once a colony is established, it could be upgraded to a station at a reduced construction time due to renovations.
The final note is that regardless of which side of the line a player falls, either loving or hating the use of Starlanes, the fact that there is a fuel free mechanic as well means that with just a few scouts, a player will have met all races by mid game and explored the entire galaxy by mid game, unless the player is playing a spiral map which forces the research of a tech to allow traversal of unstable Starlanes. This means that outside of a few interesting discovers there is nothing much out there to explore other than the standard planets and there is no challenge in seeing them all.
•eXploration: Poor
eXpansion
One of the hallmarks of a good 4x game is how fun can the title make building and maintaining an empire both during peace and while at war. MoO4 again hits all the needed spots for this while not quite hitting the mark. The three categories to really look at here are the Strategy Map, the Colony Screen, and the Empire/Planets tabs.
Strategy Map:
Early on, the player doesn’t have much to look at which corresponds to nearly all 4x titles, however, with MoO4 it given that scouts can be used as a fire and forget unit, the player needs to focus on planet management and ship management for expansion. On the Strategy Map, this falls to viable systems for expansion, fleets to hinder enemy movement & support said advancement, and Space Factories to build not planetary Strategy Map objects to assist the player in these goals.
Colony Screen:
Similar to most 4x space empire builders, especially similar to the Master of Orion series itself which solidified the model, There is nothing really special or outstanding here and really, there isn’t anything that needs to be. All the information is presented as needed and that is fine for what a colony management should be.
However, two key points regarding the colony management screen, the first being that there is a sub menu that shows a rotating planet with various interactable buildings plopped atop it. This is somewhat difficult to use, especially if the player is attempting to find a specific planet. Though I am sure there is a solution already on the way, there is an open space in the bottom left corner of this sub-screen that is perfect for a building selection list. Likely, this is already being planned as this space is noticeably bare.
Secondly, MoO2 had a great if not spread sheet like colony interface system with the initial screen for colonist movements and the secondary screen regarding in-depth building. A similar system could be used here or at the very least, try reworking the screens until all the same information can be displayed as neatly as MoO2 had it. Updating the presentation is great and commendable but not at the expense of presenting needed information.
A last point on the colony screen is regarding the Colony Focus. When selecting a focus, it moves all citizens over to the focused area with exception of those citizens needed to provide food for the colony. When setting an auto-focus it would be beneficial to have a small tic box under each cell or a drop down box on the right or left side of the cell lines to indicate how many citizens are wanted on the given cell lines
•Ex. Research focus: Using one of the options specified, the player is able to mark that 1 citizen is needed for production. Thus, all citizens not being used for food will fill the one production cell then move onto the focus which is research.
Empire/Planets tabs:
When managing the expansion efforts of an empire, a player needs to be able to make decisions at speed in order to move the game along, especially when playing multiplayer. In their current state, both the Empire tab and Planets tab are in need of some rework. Each tab seems to have information that would also be nice of the other tab. Some examples for each tab:
•Planets: Distance from nearest colony option, Amazing planet! Crap I know the whole map and the planet is on the other side of it.
•Planets: Moons? They tend to be important for research and shipbuilding.
•Planets: Owned by another faction?
•Planets: Don’t show flagged option.
•Planets: ‘Tic’ options for sort lists. Allow players to ‘tic’ certain options that will only display planets the player race is favorable to - Abundant and above, tier 3 or above biome, etc.
•Empire: Detail of planets on initial display. A player has to click a planet in order to view Mineral Richness and Biome type. Unfortunately, the only reason to go into the empire tab it would seem (aside from setting the tax rate) would be to pick a planet for a specific purpose like mineral richness to build ships at or high tier biome to manage citizen growth and export to other planets.
•Empire: Moon and station icons next to planets. Similar to how a fleet icon is displayed next to a planet in the empire tab, a moon icon and station icon should have a place as well given that these two objects are not visible to the player on High Galactic zoom.
Those are enough for now.
Result
Expansion is decent in MoO4 but the game of expansion seems to be hindered by a lack of freighters/general transports and a lack of ongoing work for Space Factories. The Space Factories primarily build the outposts that provide no fly zones for a players colonies, labs and mines for asteroids and gas giants and once the tech is discovered, producing new planets from the afore mentioned asteroids and gas giants. The issue with the Space Factories is that most of what they can produce is either a case of ‘Need it Now, Once built sit around.’ or ‘build it but doesn’t add much.’ With these factories, the outposts provide simple no trespassing signs to outside races but since they do not upgrade and since there is no fuel, they are useless later on in the game for any purpose other than being “No Trespassing” signs. The asteroid labs are decent for research early with the +2 but cost 2 bc/turn so expensive. The Gas Giant harvester give +1 bc/turn and the asteroid mine +2 bc/turn but ultimately the Factories greatest asset is the conversion to planets. These Factories are just under used currently.
The lack of freighters or general transports hurt the title as this single unit could if use properly change the entire game.
•X number of freighters could transport 1 colonist. Currently to maximize colony growth on all planets, a player must build civil transports. While the building of transports is not an issue, the needed micromanagement to do this effectively along with building colony ships and other buildings means the player must invest to much time to effectively expand while keeping time down on turns, especially for MP play.
•If fuel were applied to the game, then freighters could be dispatched to fleet from a colony or outpost each time they reach a %fuel below 100% or they could be used to replace fuel used up at Outposts by fleets.
•Freighters used as production/food carriers to planets.
•Used as Trade ships to other empires.
The points is that a physical use of freighters would enhance the game as now enemy fleets could raid player shipping.
All in all, the main issue is that the expansion process is hinder from a number of little things that seems like they were cut to make the game streamlined but there is a fine line between streamlining a process and simplifying it for a less savvy/hardcore audience. That said, the expansion for MoO4 seems simplified for said audience and doesn’t give the player the same gratification that other titles might for being in control of a vast interstellar empire.
•eXpansion: Decent
Sometimes they are doing nothing, but it is relatively minor. They can implement something like they can mine asteroids for additional profit.
*Still working on eXtermination, I might have to split it into two parts.
This section could go in many directions, however, here it would seem best to tackle general Research and Diplomacy. It could also be said things like exploiting the Strategic Map objects via the Space Factory could go here but since it was already touched on, a more indepth analysis can wait.
Research
The current use of research is fairly straightforward and as such there isn’t much to be said. A player chooses a technology or a technology line and left clicks on the tech. With that, the research is off and running.
The upside to this is that the tech-tree is very simply laid out and easy to understand. The downside of course is that there is no nuance to it. There is no, easy to learn hard to master because there is nothing to really learn or master, it is a simple tech-tree. In MoO2, a player would select a given field of technology and inside each field was a series of techs. Depending on the type of race a player was, standard, creative, or uncreative, the player could choose one tech, all techs, or be given a random technology out of the set. This provided a player with interesting choices, does s/he want a fusion rifle, fusion beam, or fusion engines? What matters most?
In MoO4, there is a standard tech tree that all players receive with a few technologies requiring a choose one or the other, an example being a moon base tech that allows for a shipyard -25% to ship construction time or a lab that provides +4 to ship production. The proble here is that in most of these cases, why is there even a choice? Yes it is obvious that some techs should require choices since both make that one tech a must have, but if all players receive the same tech-tree, why does it really matter that the tech is a powerful one especially if there isn’t a high degree of interesting choices in the tech tree to begin with. Seriously, think about it wit hteh example tech. Shipyard vs Research lab that requires a moon. Only a select few planets in an empire will benefit from a shipyard, particularly ones with high mineral consentration. Conversely, all planets with moons will benefit from a lab that gives +4 research for 1bc/turn maint. when the first research building in the game is a +2 research for 1bc/turn. There is no interesting choice. The only time a player would choose the shipyard is in the direst of circumstances.
That said, the research side of the game is currently in need of a bit of tweaking since the most interesting part of the research in previous titles was the area specific research which would see some races proficient in one area but not another and facilitate diplomatic trades.
Diplomacy
When speaking of diplomacy in MoO4 one need not go very far as the Diplomacy is decent for a 4x title though not very indepth. There really isn’t much to say currently as other aspects of the game get worked on, the Diplomacy can take ques from it and be enhanced. It isn’t the best set-up that has been seen, however, it is solid as is curently. The biggest issue here would be a tweaking of the AIs value system. Currently the AI seems to sell star maps for 10bc which gives a player easy understanding of an AI race’s planets and the ability to coordinate system blockades if they wish.
Result
The game is a bit underdeveloped here although there is much need of rework and integration with other aspects of the game. While there is potential here, this really needs to be integrated with the other side of the game to really shine which will require a lot of work on the parts of the design team to hammer out.
•eXploitation: Fair
we are playing different games then, as there is no single planet where I build eveything, and there is more building that give +cell bonus than +flat.
For the most part, once you get past the first level of buildings in the game the bonuses switch from a flat + to a per-cell increase. In some cases you end up with both. Have you gone through the full tech tree yet?
But with slower expansion or if you left the early game phase you can really build anything everywhere (just like in MOO2). Later most people will turn of auto build for unimportant planets and therefore get every building.
Ok, you all caught me, I tried to rush out a quick post before I went somewhere and the lack of a cohesive thought back fired :|
Early to mid game are where the game is currently decided and as such the majority of ‘+ (given bonus)’ buildings are flat bonus (Hydrofarm, Fungal Farm, Auto-Factory, Research Lab, Asteroid lab, Asteroid Mine, and Moon Lab. At least I think that is all of them) buildings as opposed to a few ‘+ pre cell’ buildings (Research one, Farm one, and neutron collider). The hybrids are not being counted as count as both and really, it is the ‘+per cell’ or ‘+flat’ that is important.
I do need to point out that while I have not completed the tech tree, against AI at least, the game is basically decided once robo miners have been researched (not that the tech is significant but it marks my point of research). By the time this tech is reached, most of the planets within the empire have:
Hydrofarms: +2 food
Auto-Factories: +2 prod
Fungal Farms (if able): +2 food
Crust Mines (or whatever they are call, if able): +2 prod
Research Labs: +2 Research
Moon based labs: +4 Research
Biospheres: +1 Food & +1 Research
Each building is a planetary requirement as any size colony benefits from them, and small colonies benefit the most despite the cost.
The issue with this is fairly straight forward from my perspective. I focus 2 extremes of planet types:
Population - Planets that can sustain high population and/or high growth rates.
•Biome: Tier 3 or above (generally Oceans)
•Size: Medium or above.
Production - Planets that allow for high production potential
•Richness: Rich or Ultra-Rich
•Size: Medium or Above
Now to the nitty gritty, perhaps my wording was off, it isn’t that “nearly all” the buildings are ‘+flat’ bonuses, it is that so many are that way. Only a few buildings are ‘+cell’ only and it is something on the order of ‘+1/cell’ of a given type. There is the ‘+5/cell’ research but it is a single planet within a system. There are 2 research buildings later on that are ‘+25 flat’ and ‘+50 flat (I think)’ for research and I believe a couple +% buildings but the point here is that there are significant number of building in the game that give a ‘+ flat’ bonus to a resource regardless of whether or not it also gives ‘+ per/cell’ bonuses as well. Why does this matter?
When a player has a choice of where to settle, a player considers the variables but almost always the type of planet a player wants determines the planet settled. In the early stages of the game, it is more or less a land grab which means two key factors are the top priorities more so than at any other point in the game. These priorities are Population and Production.
•Production is simple enough as it is what allows the building of fleets and ship to add expansion and defense.
•Population is the key part as the more there are of a population, the more things that can be done. This means that a cornerstone of any planet to raise a population that can support a given purpose.
So, producing getting a planet underway is very important. All of the early flat bonus buildings mean that a planet’s size in the short run does not matter as these inexpensive builds allow a population of at least 4-6 on a planet (Hydro, Fungal, Colony itself, and Biospheres. Later Subterranean farms are amazing further allowing support of 8 pop on their own ie. on a planet that doesn’t allow farming). Couple that with the flat bonuses to research and production means a player can easily field any number of small planets that can be productive on all fronts.
The point of all of this is that a +flat bonus helps fledgling colonies yes, but it also makes a plane’s unique aspects less important earlier in the game than would otherwise occur (terraforming and gravity generators). This is especially true when a player considers the cost of the structures.
Given that there are so many medium and Large planets present in the game already, large population planets with +bc/pop coupled with +2 to +3 bc tax/pop means that these small colonies are hardly even a burden on the the empire.
Additionally, the fact that seemingly all Planetary resources are +flat bonuses mean that aside from initial settlement, there is no real uniqure reason to choose one planet over another due to resources.
Though there are indeed a number of per/cell bonuses to be had through buildings, they are not as numerous or as important. These are the buildings that a player builds to augment a planet’s purpose.
The issue that I tended to encounters is that I hype spam expansion as my Empire’s export product. Sure other empires hate me but on turns 150-200 if I have 150 colonist 20-40 planets and the nearest competitor has ⅓ either number, it doesn’t really matter.
Result
By making a planet's resources +Cell bonuses and the majority of buildings, specifically farming and production, +Cell, a player would be more choosy on which planets to settle and the planets would gain character.
Reference - Endless Space has a pretty good take on planets regarding per pop/cell mechanic. It isn't perfect but it is a good starting point.
I don't disagree with your last post. The skew of planet sizes towards the larger sizes does mean the flat bonus buildings will end up having less of an impact on a planet's resource generation as the planets get bigger. Where I think this will be interesting is to come back to your posts in a few months, after the game has gone through a number of balancing passes, and see how things shake up.
Indeed, that is what I hope to do. I am looking to see what comes of the game. As it is, there is nothing wrong inherently with a +flat or +cell system, it is just all in the delievery. Currently, the +flat rate buildings are just too dang powerfull.
They benefit starter colonies enough to allow them to grow. If they are small planets, then they provide a significant base from which to make the planet viable. If however it is a larger planet, then that planet is able ot get major boosts to allow the large population to grow faster.
So it just tends ot boil down that there is no colony that +flat rate buildings should not be built on as the benefit every colony.
This section could go in many directions, however, here it would seem best to tackle general Research and Diplomacy. It could also be said things like exploiting the Strategic Map objects via the Space Factory could go here but since it was already touched on, a more indepth analysis can wait.
Research
The current use of research is fairly straightforward and as such there isn’t much to be said. A player chooses a technology or a technology line and left clicks on the tech. With that, the research is off and running.
The upside to this is that the tech-tree is very simply laid out and easy to understand. The downside of course is that there is no nuance to it. There is no, easy to learn hard to master because there is nothing to really learn or master, it is a simple tech-tree. In MoO2, a player would select a given field of technology and inside each field was a series of techs. Depending on the type of race a player was, standard, creative, or uncreative, the player could choose one tech, all techs, or be given a random technology out of the set. This provided a player with interesting choices, does s/he want a fusion rifle, fusion beam, or fusion engines? What matters most?
In MoO4, there is a standard tech tree that all players receive with a few technologies requiring a choose one or the other, an example being a moon base tech that allows for a shipyard -25% to ship construction time or a lab that provides +4 to ship production. The problem here is that in most of these cases, why is there even a choice? Yes it is obvious that some techs should require choices since both make that one tech a must have, but if all players receive the same tech-tree, why does it really matter that the tech is a powerful one especially if there isn’t a high degree of interesting choices in the tech tree to begin with. Seriously, think about it with the example tech. Shipyard vs Research lab that requires a moon. Only a select few planets in an empire will benefit from a shipyard, particularly ones with high mineral concentration. Conversely, all planets with moons will benefit from a lab that gives +4 research for 1bc/turn maint. when the first research building in the game is a +2 research for 1bc/turn. There is no interesting choice. The only time a player would choose the shipyard is in the direst of circumstances.
That said, the research side of the game is currently in need of a bit of tweaking since the most interesting part of the research in previous titles was the area specific research which would see some races proficient in one area but not another and facilitate diplomatic trades.
Diplomacy
When speaking of diplomacy in MoO4 one need not go very far as the Diplomacy is decent for a 4x title though not very in depth. There really isn’t much to say currently as other aspects of the game get worked on, the Diplomacy can take cues from it and be enhanced. It isn’t the best set-up that has been seen, however, it is solid as is currently. The biggest issue here would be a tweaking of the AIs value system. Currently the AI seems to sell star maps for 10bc which gives a player easy understanding of an AI race’s planets and the ability to coordinate system blockades if they wish.
Result
The game is a bit underdeveloped here although there is much need of rework and integration with other aspects of the game. While there is potential here, this really needs to be integrated with the other side of the game to really shine which will require a lot of work on the parts of the design team to hammer out.
•eXploitation: Fair
The toughest part of the review to not get bogged down in. The extermination ‘X’ in any 4x title to be good require a bit of effort, while to be great requires many game aspects coming together to make one heck of an experience. These areas for MoO4 include: Research, Ship Design, the Tactical Battlespace, and the interaction with the Strategy Map. Espionage and covert operations are not currently implemented and thus will not be discussed.
Strategic Map
When going about exterminating foes in MoO4 it seems that there is very little repercussions for destroying ships while at peace with them, they attack mine regularly if given the opportunity. Additionally, with no clear borders or ways to claim unclaimed territory, sending out small blockading fleets allows for easy measures against colony and scout ships. The trick is get them out early.
Defending on the Strat Map is easily done, building outposts early assist in enemies encroaching on a player’s territory however, an enemy fleet can easily overwhelm such a defense as the outposts are lightly armed and will do not upgrade to new variants of the weapons in use, ie. nuclear missiles -> Merculite Missiles, etc.
This said, aside from moving fleets around there isn’t much use for the Strat Map other than giving locations of fleets and basic map awarness. The Strat Map could benefit from more depth with regards to Outposts and other structures plus more utility from the Space Factory.
Research
Given the linear tech-tree of the standard 4x games of today, all the technologies that are unlocked are again very straightforward. A few however stand out as must have in the current iteration of that and because they are a must have tech, this hinders research with regards to the extermination X as it takes reasonable choice away from the player.
•ex. Shields are a must just as Mass Drivers, better missiles, Battle Pods and Dauntless guidance are a must. Shields though they com at a cost provide enough defensive value to of set the cost of offensive value of the best bang for the buck weapon, missiles, which would be taken away. Furthermore, Mass Drivers offer the best point defense weapon for the majority of the game as well as the Dauntless Guidance Systems that make missiles the best weapon, bang for buck, in the game at the moment due to the ability for the Dauntless to allow missiles to continues tracking targets after the current target is destroyed. Battle Pods and other techs like it allow for additional space within the ship hulls to provide room for more mounts. With these technologies, a player has a basic ship package set for the entire game.
This is a clear indicator that the tech-tree is in need of some reworking as a player, to be highly successful needs these technologies. I a recent patch, Anti-Missile Rockets were fixed to attack missile and were moved from a special slot to a main line weapons slot. However, the use of anti-missile rockets only uses one rocket per missile which means if a ship has more rockets than missiles, they are wasted and if a player does not bring enough along they can get overwhelmed. This means that Missiles on large tiered ships are still incredibly potent fighting platforms.
Ship Design
The ship design for MOO4 is a re-imagining of the MoO2 model in that each ship class has a a few key areas of focus coupled with a basic set of base stats for the class. As such the focus here will be on the Core Systems, Weapons, and Specials of the classes of ships. There is one additional feature and that is the Difference between the various classes of ships. This perhaps the single most impactful aspect in relation to the change between MoO4 and MoO2’s ship design.
Core Systems
The core systems are what run a given ship and as such when presented with a core system, there is no reason to not add it to the ship with exception, potentially, to the class I shields. Class I shields absorb 1 point of damage per shield point and a frigate sized shield has 15 shield point with a space requirement of 10. That being said it is arguable given that for most of the shields the space cost is nearly that of the value of the shield itself which means that a class I shield would need to be more valuable than the damage a ship could otherwise deal for the same space requirement.
•ex. A frigate with a class I shield gains 15 points at the cost of the 10 space. Conversely, 10 space = 1 missile. It is therefore not worth adding a shield (damage wise) if a merculite missile (20 damage) could be put to better use. So, if a player wanted to create a throw away frigate that has a sole purpose of launching one volley of missiles at multiple target before death because it was targeted by numerous enemy ships, then the use of a shield is ill advised as the absorbed damage can outweigh the potential damage a merculite (or above) missile could cause on impact.
Once Class III shields are researched, they are would be worth the single missile it would replace as a class III shield not only has the same space requirement as the class I, but it also absorbs 3 points of damage for every 1 point of shield. As such a 15 point shields could stop 45 damage which means, a throwaway frigate would need to be able to replace that 45 damage with the same space requirement.
Specials
These modules seem to operate on a one off basis meaning that although a player could place two battlepods on a ship, only one counts. The specials of a ship in MoO4 help define how a ship will execute a specific role for the fleet be it more armor, shield capacitors, and a repair unit to assist in the tank role, or some other set-up to define a completely different role altogether.
In this current state, another look should be take at specials and their uses as some are far more valuable than others, case and point, Battle Pods and Dauntless Guidance Systems. Battle Pods allow more space for weapons and Dauntless allows for Missiles to track a new target once the current target is destroyed which means that the missiles that would just fizzle out without the guidance will now seek a new target which allows ships to be reapers of death by stacking hoards of missiles into one slot instead of needing to spread the missiles out to multiple weapons slots (explained in the next section: weapons).
Number of Special systems slots per hull (Doomstars not tested):
Frigate: 2
Destroyer: 2
Cruiser: 4
Battleship: 4
Titan: 6
Weapons
These are what define a ship and it role, additionally, how the slots are managed are almost as important as what is on it. Currently, the targeting of weapons on a ship works independently per slot (left to right). This means that on a two slot frigate, the left slot (A) would fire first at a given target and the right slot (B) would fire next about a 1 second delay at a second target.*
So, if a player wished to design a base frigate killing frigate using merculite missile without Dauntless guidance than a frigate with 2 merculite missiles in each weapons slot would likely work. If the player had Dauntless Guidance, then 4-5 missiles in the 1st slot would work with the 2nd slot being used for whatever else. The reason why for this set-up is that basic frigates have 30 hull and a merculite missile does 20 damage on impact, thus, 2x20 = 40 damage in each of the two slots.
*Note certain ship formations negate this which is a bit messed up. A player ship targeting a group of enemy ships in echelon will likely not traverse enough battlespace to have slot B fire at a secondary target during the initial approach. This means that the first ship in the echelon formation will be target of both slots A and B which could be a waste of fire depending on the player’s ship design.*
Number of Weapons slots per hull (Doomstars not tested):
Frigate: 2
Destroyer: 4
Cruiser: 4
Battleship: 6
Titan: 6
Differences between ship classes
As seen by the above stats regarding numbers of Special Slots and Weapons slots, the ship’s hull size denotes it mission role given that and, that the hulls either double or more than double in available space per size class.
As such, this is the time where Command Points, Production Cost, and overall Ship Space, really comes into play. The command points for ships are likely the most important when deciding fleet composition and as such it is easy to draw correlations between a ship's size and use. Destroyers are the kings of engaging multiple (likely small) targets when looking at weapon spread for CP cost which would be a total of 8 weapon slots (2 Destroyers) at 4 CP when compared to say a cruiser at 4 slots for at 4CP.
The point being that with regards to differences in ship sizes, the weapons slots and CP costs of ships will determine how a ship should be used not really the player. This is tough since once Destroyers are researched Frigates become a waste of CP for any reason other than to cover larger amounts of space that a fleet of Destroyers could not.
Command Points (CP) cost per hull (Doomstars not tested):
Frigate: 1
Destroyer: 2
Cruiser: 4
Battleship: 6
Titan: 10
A Ship’s design
With all the information listed above taken into account, it is very tough to not come up with very simple and effective ship designs that at the current time cannot really be beat until perhaps that late game. However, by this time a clear strongest player will have emerged and by then it may be too late to employ new ship designs to defeat the stronger threats.
Tactical Map
Finally, the Tactical Map.
This section was saved for last because of the controversy surrounding the debate between Real-Time Combat vs Turn-Based Combat. This will not focus on that as they are both equally viable but just in different times/places/fields. A development studio should be able to achieve either well.
The Tactical Map review will instead look at what is, a Real-Time (RT) combat environment. Unfortunately, there is little functionality outside of both friendly and opposing fleets being inside the map and everyone rush towards each other. This would be acceptable similarly to how Star Drive 2 (pre-Sector Zero release, have not played the updated version yet) handles combat, except, with such a sparse offering, this is where AI; unit orders, formations, stance; loadouts from the ship design; research tree; all come together to deliver very dull experience because the afore mentioned areas of the game have yet to be developed and fleshed out.
Result
Combat is very much in need of fleshing out and updating.
•eXtermination: bad (tons of potential)
Master of Orion: Conquer the Stars Result
While very early (we hope) in the design process, this title very badly needs to be kept up with as there are many areas that scream decent or solid in concept yet scream equally loudly that it is broken or in need of dire designer attention to coalesce these areas together.
•Master of Orion: Conquer the Stars: Poor (with insane room for improvement)