Sins of a Solar Empire?

[tgb]

SoSE never did it for me. Compare and contrast, please.

[LarryP]

ORIGINAL: tgb

SoSE never did it for me. Compare and contrast, please.

I'm in agreement with you. I may not be the best person to do a comparison as I never liked SoaSE very much. I also don't want to belittle SoaSE as many players love the game. Also this forum would frown on me doing such.

I saw your post several hours ago and since then been trying to think of how to compare the two. Please bear with me as I have not played SoaSE for a while. Maybe I can get the ball rolling and other beta testers will jump in and help us out. [;)]

First off, DW has a fantastic help system that is always available. Did I say fantastic? It's excellent! At every menu you have help one click away. That is one feature I am partial to in games and this one did it right. It's a lot like the Civilpedia in Civ4.

SoaSE relies heavily on crystal and iron (I think it's iron? Doesn't look right though) resource gathering. DW has a lot of resources, I'm not sure exactly how many but tens of them. They are mined somewhat automatically as you set up the miners. I never ran out of a resource while spending many days on this game, versus always running out of crystal in SoaSE. Resource management in SoaSE was too time consuming for me. In DW it's a breeze.

Many of the menial tasks with SoaSE can be set up to be handled by the proper facilities in DW with minimal management on the players part. I remember I was constantly running from menu to menu with SoaSE, and at the same time always being on the lookout for intruders. Not so in DW. The events come to you in the form of messages, and clicking on these messages takes you to the event, if you choose to do so. In other words, nothing happens in DW that you won't be told about if you set the game up this way. That's one thing I like about DW very much. No surprises that will take you down as you had been notified along the line.

The graphics are equal in the sense of zooming in and out, but you cannot rotate the universe like SoaSE. However, my PC's do not heat up as much with DW.

Speed of the game is adjustable in both.

Pausing in DW allows you to manage everything the same as unpaused except of course battles. IIRC, SoaSE had some limitations in paused mode. Many of them.

DW relies heavily on exploration and expanding. Also on following a path of secrets slowly revealed to answer questions about why things are the way they are. Can't say more on this though, you'll have to play the game. [;)]

Where DW relies more on exploration and expanding, SoaSE relies heavily on extermination. DW is centered around making treaties and deals, including a nice system to manage spies. Trade routes with other races are encouraged and benefit the game play greatly. Dealings with alien races has been greatly enhanced in the last couple additions and add to the game value a lot. I love this part of the game as you have enemies, allies, and pirates. The pirates too are able to be wheeled and dealed with which makes for a much more rich experience with pirates than other games that uses them. This aspect of the game is more comparable to Galactic Civilizations 2.

Now the setup of the game has many choices. One is from timed games to sandbox mode and several in between. Actually, the game setup and options menus are huge with many choices. Not as many as Space Empires V, but more than most space games, especially Sword Of The Stars.

Let me do some more thinking and also see if anyone has something to add here... [:)]

[tgb]

Are there other paths to victory besides  conquest?  That's important to me.

[LarryP]

ORIGINAL: tgb

Are there other paths to victory besides  conquest?  That's important to me.

These are the options on the Victory menu for a new game:

1) Territory
2) Population
3) Economy
4) Time Limit
5) Victory conditions apply after xx
6) Sandbox mode

Each option allows you to change the percentage of each to control. You can mix all or pick none of the options so it varies greatly how the game plays out.

[ShadowX83@yahoo.com]

Can you still play the game when victory is reached?

[Joram]

Even though I am not a huge RTS fan I liked SoaSE because of it's slower pace.  A couple quibble's, SoaSE also had different ways of victory and alerts (though perhaps subtle in some cases).  

Question though about this one, what's the point of 10 resources, or any resources if you never run out of them?  At least in SoaSE it added a little to the strategy and provided an impetus to expand.

[LarryP]

ORIGINAL: ShadowX83@yahoo.com

Can you still play the game when victory is reached?

That's a good question. I haven't gotten to that point being that testing is my main goal. Elliot will have to answer this. [8|]

[LarryP]

ORIGINAL: Joram

Question though about this one, what's the point of 10 resources, or any resources if you never run out of them?

Whether or not you have the proper resource and amount defines your production rate and ability.

[ASHBERY76]

ORIGINAL: tgb

SoSE never did it for me. Compare and contrast, please.

Hopefully having ships and planets is the only comparison.

[elliotg]

ORIGINAL: ShadowX83@yahoo.com
Can you still play the game when victory is reached?

Yes, you can keep playing if you wish.

[Joram]

ORIGINAL: LarryP

ORIGINAL: Joram

Question though about this one, what's the point of 10 resources, or any resources if you never run out of them?

Whether or not you have the proper resource and amount defines your production rate and ability.

Yeah, I understand that but you said you never run out of resources so that doesn't really answer the question. What is the point of having so many resources in the game, why not just have one or none at all? Resources of some kind should be an impetus to expand but if you don't need resources, you then lose that impetus. I know you said it was easy but still then just sounds like additional management that isn't really needed.

[ASHBERY76]

ORIGINAL: Joram

ORIGINAL: LarryP

ORIGINAL: Joram

Question though about this one, what's the point of 10 resources, or any resources if you never run out of them?

Whether or not you have the proper resource and amount defines your production rate and ability.

Yeah, I understand that but you said you never run out of resources so that doesn't really answer the question. What is the point of having so many resources in the game, why not just have one or none at all? Resources of some kind should be an impetus to expand but if you don't need resources, you then lose that impetus. I know you said it was easy but still then just sounds like additional management that isn't really needed.

The resources are based on the CIV4 model and not RTS model of resources.

[hadberz]

Resources are broken down into 2 categories Strategic and Luxury. Strategic resources are used to manufacture components and used for fuel. Different resources are needed to build different components, also as you research higher tech items they require different resources to build that components.

Luxury resources are consumed by your colonies. The more luxury resources the more your colony develops, the higher the development the more taxes they pay.

Your access to a resource can be blocked, pirates or monsters attacking your mining stations, civilian ships. Trade embargo are never good for your economy. If you don't have the needed resources you cannot build anything and your colonies wont grow. So you need to protect the civilian ships to keep the resources flowing.   

[HercMighty]

But once you find the resource and can protect it, it doesn't run out?

[Joram]

Ahh, thanks Ashbery, that actually makes perfect sense to me.  I realize that's what Larry was saying now but it wasn't obvious till you gave the analogy.  Well, obvious for Civ fans at least!

[LarryP]

ORIGINAL: Joram

Yeah, I understand that but you said you never run out of resources so that doesn't really answer the question.

I said "I" never ran out of resources. I don't know if the game "can" run out of a resource. Elliot could answer this one. [:)]

[hadberz]

ORIGINAL: HercMighty

But once you find the resource and can protect it, it doesn't run out?

I have never ran out. I think they regenerate. I've had plenty of mining stations destroyed though, forgot to protect them [:)]

[elliotg]

The key thing with resources is that you need to maintain access to them. So you need mining stations and well-protected trade so that your freighters can get the resources to your colonies and space ports.

So, yes it's more like Civ4 in how resources work - though shipments of resources do actually move on freighters from source to destination - so you can intercept and disrupt this trade network.

[LarryP]

ORIGINAL: hadberz

I've had plenty of mining stations destroyed though, forgot to protect them [:)]

That's been an epidemic on my screen. [;)] [:D]