New v1.0.5.8 Public Beta Now Available!

[nammafia]

Excellent! Thanks the developer for this.

Now, I wish they will eventually associate moon names to the host planets and systems.

[shinobu]

We are still getting a situation (which was thought to be fixed in 1.0.5.7) where empires are starting in the same systems at the beginning of randomly generated games. If fact, the computer created one game with TWO other empires in my home system with me...

[tornnight]

Overall this version is great. I'm having a good time with it.

So far, empires have been expanding quickly and wars have been aggressive.

The Boskaran Empire blockaded me, then shortly thereafter proceeded to bombard and take over my homeworld.

Painful to see your homeworld quality pounded down like that.
There should be some way to increase/recover planet quality, but slowly. Or reduce the damage bomard does by quite a bit.

In less than a two seconds, my planet quality went down from from 88% to 61%.

[taltamir]

ORIGINAL: tornnight
There should be some way to increase/recover planet quality, but slowly. Or reduce the damage bomard does by quite a bit.

I agree, planets should recover slowly up to their original quality value. So, a planet that started as 90% quality, and gets nuked to 30%, will slowly recover back up to 90% (but not above it... well... not without specific tech, which should also be added I think but that is another issue and another discussion)

[MuthaF]

Surprised that the 'space' wars are devastating?

You think atomic wepaons are powerful? Bleh
Fission bombs efficiency is just up to 25%
Fussion bombs efficiency is about 40%

Thoeretical limits are measle too:
The theoretical maximum yield-to-weight ratio for fusion weapons is 6 megatons of TNT per metric ton (25 TJ/kg).

Then you can have anti-matter weapons. Think they are powerful for space combat? Bleh again.
In complete anihilation you have 100% efficient tranfer of matter to energy, according to Einstein's E=mc^2
Thats sounds impressive, most people would even consider it maximum energy potential of ANY matter.

Not exactly:

Now consider relativistic kinetic projectile - simplest weapon possible in principle, with teoreticaly unlimited yield..
As the c = apr. 300000km/s in vacuum, it is also the highest speed limitation in our space-time. Thing is, it is impossible to achieve with matter, unless you use photons(EM waves). The closer the speed of any object to speed of light, the HEAVIER it becomes, the more energy you need to accelerate it further, unitl as it close up to c, the mass and energy rasies to infinity...

A 1 kg mass traveling at 99% of the speed of light would have a kinetic energy of 5.47×1017 joules. In explosive terms, it would be equal to 132 megatons of TNT . (biggest fusion bomb ever detonated had yield of 'only' 57 megatons of TNT)
1 kg antimatter anihilation produces only 9x10^10 joules..

Also, at this speeds, there is no defense at all against it, even if you destroy projectile in miliard little pieces, it will stil devastate target area completly (as the principle energy is kinetic, not chemical/nuclear)

What im trying to say:
Given enough time, resources and determination, even civilization as primitive as our could completly wipe out more advanced civ and render their planet inhospitable for millions of years.
Just imagine 10 000 ton asteroid at 10% speed of light smashing into planet ;)
I calculated energy for that at:
4 534 033 733 290 867 940 436 J = 4.5x 10^21 J or 10 000x more than 1kg @ 99% c

Now tell me, it is planetary damage (planetary quality level in game) that CAN be repaired easily...or ever )
I seriously doubt that.
You would have more luck colonizing Gas giant

To pre-empt few responses:
Just check planetary history of Solar system's planets to get idea what kind of damage are we talking about....
In game terms, very last technology at top of tech tree COULD do some terraforming...slowly. It is completly unrealistic to have any kind of repair sooner, or faster working in my half-educated(?) opinion)

[taltamir]

Given enough time, resources and determination, even civilization as primitive as our could completly wipe out more advanced civ and render their planet inhospitable for millions of years.

No they can't... we could completely annihilate anything living on a planet, but it would NOT prevent it from supporting life in the future. Just import new living organisms from neighboring planets.

The only way for there to be a "fixed" quality that doesn't rise with the introduction of living creatures is if quality represents the maximum quality, which is determined by the distance from the star, the emission of the star, the atmosphere type, gravity, etc...
basically, radiation, pressure, and temperature range.
Nuking / astroid dropping / anti-matter bombing / whatever will annihilate all living organisms, but will not alter its distance from its sun, the radiation provided by its sun, its atmospheric pressure, its ability to deflect harmful cosmic rays, or its gravity or any other such permanent factor...

[WoodMan]

Hey Elliot,

The AI in this version is fantastic compared to the previous, very well done.  I'm at the year xx70ish now, which is where I posted my save game from the last patch where most the Empires had 2-4 planets.  This time round most have at least 10 on the same settings, one even has 36 [:D], this is in comparison with my 12, so its doing pretty well.

Also, the neverending war with no consequences that occured in those saves I sent you is fixed too.  I'm seeing actual planetary invasions this time round, and plenty of ship battles from the AI.

I still have some concerns about the AI, perhaps this should go in the wishlist rather than here, not sure, but I noticed the following:

1. I made a Mutual Defence Pact with the Quameno in my current game.  I get to see everything they can like this, including the Galaxy Exploration.  Upon allying myself and their map being revealed I discover that they had found both Korabbian Spice and Zentabia Fluid, but were not mining either.  The resources were quite near there main Empire too!  Does the AI have something built in to tell it these are extra special and they should always mine them when found?

2. The AI seems to regard the Space Creatures as not that important to kill.  In both my 1.0.5.7 and 1.0.5.8 game the AI was sending Construction Ships to fix the Devastation Moon without killing the Space Creatures guarding it first.  The Construction Ships would flee, then come back, then flee in an endless loop.  I have a save with this going on if you need it.  A second example I've noticed of AI not killing Space Creatures, in several games over several versions (including 1.0.5.8 )I've come across AI planets with Giant Kaltors over them eating Freighters that come near, resulting in an absolutely massive Kaltor or two over the planet, this goes on until I send my own ships to kill them.

Anyway, excellent job so far and on the latest patch (the increase in lvl 1 construction size is great by the way, for me and the AI).

[taltamir]

mmm... actually, the thing that bothers me most now is the inability to "claim" a debris field... i have to manually babysit it, as my constructors repair them... shooting every constructor that tries to claim them (aka, my allies constructors)...

Recently in game I got a sudden notice that I got a world annihilator... what? So i zoomed in, and there it was... with construction ships from SEVEN separate races all on top of it...

PS. the issue with insufficient collectors is still there. a ship should have enough collectors to cover its static power consumption, not just 1.... with just 1 basic collector (collects 24 energy IIRC) a construction ship that is standing still is quickly burning fuel (as it consumes about 55 static energy). Giving it enough collectors to cover its static consumption GREATLY improves it. Something I can do, but the AI will not.

Oh, and I am STILL getting enemy designs as non obsolete when conquering them... this is extremely bad.. I recently accidentaly retrofitted some of my awesome ships to crappy AI designed ships... see, I had the latest design, but then I conquered a planet building ships, i got the designs... they appeared and I thought "hey, must have got a new tech or something as the AI created new ship designs"... then I "upgraded" to a vastly inferior design (much older tech)... I am not asking for the designs to be deleted... just to show up as obsolete when captured.

[Erik Rutins]

Just responding to one note above - worlds should gradually recover quality after a bombardment. Is this not happening in your games?

[tornnight]

Ohh, my mistake. I don't usually get bombarded so I did not know that mechanic existed.

[taltamir]

I thought it was changed based on what he said. if it still works that way then great.

[MuthaF]

ORIGINAL: taltamir

Given enough time, resources and determination, even civilization as primitive as our could completly wipe out more advanced civ and render their planet inhospitable for millions of years.

No they can't... we could completely annihilate anything living on a planet, but it would NOT prevent it from supporting life in the future. Just import new living organisms from neighboring planets.

The only way for there to be a "fixed" quality that doesn't rise with the introduction of living creatures is if quality represents the maximum quality, which is determined by the distance from the star, the emission of the star, the atmosphere type, gravity, etc...
basically, radiation, pressure, and temperature range.
Nuking / astroid dropping / anti-matter bombing / whatever will annihilate all living organisms, but will not alter its distance from its sun, the radiation provided by its sun, its atmospheric pressure, its ability to deflect harmful cosmic rays, or its gravity or any other such permanent factor...

CHECK PLANETARY HISTORY IN SOLAR SYSTEM!!!! DAMN, just check EARTHs history. Then tell me this again.

Yeah, Earth's primordial atmosphere changed completly during weekend to support life as we know it... As do Ice/Warm Climate ages change...
Nevermind all the carbon from burned biosphere...

Being in habitable zone doesnt automatically mean the planet is habitable. Even Earth wasnt for most of its existence. And the change wasn't overnight either.
*sigh*
Really, i give up, forget all the geology, physics, climatology and biology u obviuosly just can tell better off your hat, i guess.

Well, lets grab some plants and animals from Earth and drop them off in Venus or Mars.. Biosphere restored overnight, you are elevated to Godhood shortly thereafter [&o]

To all other posters: sorry for off-topic comment [8|]

+edited-out emotional part - i am again sorry, but off-hands dismissals of at least partially documented posts (and i even calulated energies with Lorrentz tranformation etc...) REALLY annoy me
On the other hand, if counter argument was about major extinction events and/or biosphere regenerative potentional and/or terraforming possibilities or timescales involved... well, i wouldn't get hot-headed in first place for sure, on contrary, i LOVE factual discussion.

[Erik Rutins]

Please keep things civil.

[Nebuladon]

Great patch! I really enjoyed the improved UI. The real little things like potential colonies appearing red in the Exp. Planner if there are threats around make a big difference. The game is also much more stable at this version than it was at 1.0.4.9, which is great. I have experienced two bugs/quirks while playing, but they're nothing major. First, I had a unhandled exception error when I double-clicked a constructor ship, but when I clicked Continue, the game continued on fine. Second, the drop-down box for fleet selection in the Ships window acts like it's on LSD sometimes when you scroll with the mouse wheel to assign ships to fleets. It's hard to select the fleet, and the game will make new ones before realizing what I picked, delete the newly created fleets, and put the ship in the fleet I picked or put them in a new one like "11th Fleet". This happened only twice in my game, but it was quite strange.

A suggestion for the Fleet Window: Make it where you can select home colonies from the small galaxy map that shows your empire. [:)]

[MuthaF]

ORIGINAL: Nebuladon

A suggestion for the Fleet Window: Make it where you can select home colonies from the small galaxy map that shows your empire. [:)]

...and a current fleet position too, please and maybe have colonies with spaceports colored differently?

[taltamir]

ORIGINAL: MuthaF

ORIGINAL: taltamir

Given enough time, resources and determination, even civilization as primitive as our could completly wipe out more advanced civ and render their planet inhospitable for millions of years.

No they can't... we could completely annihilate anything living on a planet, but it would NOT prevent it from supporting life in the future. Just import new living organisms from neighboring planets.

The only way for there to be a "fixed" quality that doesn't rise with the introduction of living creatures is if quality represents the maximum quality, which is determined by the distance from the star, the emission of the star, the atmosphere type, gravity, etc...
basically, radiation, pressure, and temperature range.
Nuking / astroid dropping / anti-matter bombing / whatever will annihilate all living organisms, but will not alter its distance from its sun, the radiation provided by its sun, its atmospheric pressure, its ability to deflect harmful cosmic rays, or its gravity or any other such permanent factor...

CHECK PLANETARY HISTORY IN SOLAR SYSTEM!!!! DAMN, just check EARTHs history. Then tell me this again.

Yeah, Earth's primordial atmosphere changed completly during weekend to support life as we know it... As do Ice/Warm Climate ages change...
Nevermind all the carbon from burned biosphere...

Being in habitable zone doesnt automatically mean the planet is habitable. Even Earth wasnt for most of its existence. And the change wasn't overnight either.
*sigh*
Really, i give up, forget all the geology, physics, climatology and biology u obviuosly just can tell better off your hat, i guess.

Well, lets grab some plants and animals from Earth and drop them off in Venus or Mars.. Biosphere restored overnight, you are elevated to Godhood shortly thereafter [&o]

To all other posters: sorry for off-topic comment [8|]

+edited-out emotional part - i am again sorry, but off-hands dismissals of at least partially documented posts (and i even calulated energies with Lorrentz tranformation etc...) REALLY annoy me
On the other hand, if counter argument was about major extinction events and/or biosphere regenerative potentional and/or terraforming possibilities or timescales involved... well, i wouldn't get hot-headed in first place for sure, on contrary, i LOVE factual discussion.

We are talking about pretty advanced civilizations here, so some measure of genetic engineering wouldn't be unfeasible... Even without it, they wouldn't be dropping off zebras right away... you can get the right bacteria and plants first.
it is funny because its as if you are arguing against yourself... inhospitable for millions of years? ha? laughable. Now if you said "dozens of years" or even "hundreds of years" that would be a different issue. Also you seem to confuse "hospitable" and "populated". You can begin re-population the moment the last bomb exploded. (now, if its dirty bombs than that is not highly advised... but you can do it; Chernobyl has plenty of wildlife in it today; so its not like the area is sterile)

Anyways, its not just about being in the habitability ring of the star. That only affects the solar radiation levels the planet is exposed to. There is also the matter of mass (gravity), does it have a molten metal core (magnetic field that deflects harmful cosmic rays), does it have plentiful water and other elements required for life, does it NOT have dangerous and harmful elements? etc.

Also, its very arrogant of you to say I am discounting geology, physics, climatology and biology. I took all of those into account, I assure you.

Also, I think you mean carbon dioxide from burnt biomatter. And that would NOT make any difference. The planet still has the same amount of carbon, oxygen, and hydrogen atoms overall, they are just configured differently... you just need to ensure that you first introduce only http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Autotroph until you get the desired ratio of carbon dioxide, hydrogen monoxide, and oxygen.

+edited-out emotional part - i am again sorry, but off-hands dismissals of at least partially documented posts (and i even calulated energies with Lorrentz tranformation etc...) REALLY annoy me

Lets not get emotional indeed. We can rationally discuss this, and if needed either move to another thread, or maybe PM, or maybe just not discuss it if it is a problem.
I saw your calculations, but all they indicated is the amount of damage... enough to wipe out all living creatures on the planet... thing is, I didn't NEED for you to show me those, I already knew that you can wipe out all living creatures on a planet. I am saying that wiping out all living creatures on a planet does not make it inhospitable, merely depopulated.
Those calculations:
1. Did not show that the planet could not be restored after the last bomb dropped.
2. Did not show why it will be impossible to repopulate for MILLIONS of years. (or any amount of years for that matter)

unless you literally blast it out of orbit, or smash it into a new asteroid belt. in which case you have destroyed the very planet itself. (and that is represented in the game via the planet annihilator... a planet destroyed by it cannot be recolonized, cause there is no planet left)... if you destroy a planet you haven't made it into an "inhospitable planet", you have made it "not a planet"... and even the, btw, it will eventually reform unless you blast the pieces far away enough.
And yes, large enough bodies at near C certainly could pack enough punch to destroy a planet in such a manner.

[the1sean]

ORIGINAL: hidden_asbestos
Also, on my win7 it cant be minimized to taskbar, unless i minimize ALL windows... So this windowed mode has NONE usual features of windowed app...

Just like taltamir said, its a borderless window, I have Windows 7 and alt-tab out all the time to check the forums and manual.

[Shark7]

ORIGINAL: the1sean

ORIGINAL: hidden_asbestos
Also, on my win7 it cant be minimized to taskbar, unless i minimize ALL windows... So this windowed mode has NONE usual features of windowed app...

Just like taltamir said, its a borderless window, I have Windows 7 and alt-tab out all the time to check the forums and manual.

Yep, rather seamlessly I might add.

[WoodMan]

Hey Erik I have an issue that I've had since 1.0.4.9 and still have now.  I did mention it before but oddly nobody else experienced it I think.  I can't build Defensive bases between 9 o clock and 12 o clock around the planet, basically the top left side.  When I try it just builds smack in the middle of the planet instead, however I can build on all other sides of the planet.

[the1sean]

ORIGINAL: WoodMan

Hey Erik I have an issue that I've had since 1.0.4.9 and still have now.  I did mention it before but oddly nobody else experienced it I think.  I can't build Defensive bases between 9 o clock and 12 o clock around the planet, basically the top left side.  When I try it just builds smack in the middle of the planet instead, however I can build on all other sides of the planet.

Hmm, I havent personally noticed a problem with that, but I prefer mobile forces to static defences. I only build defensive bases at AI autosuggestion.