Surveying - quickly useless?

Hi!

... so make sure you got most of them. Create two-three cargo based ships (the number depends on the expected amounts of anomalies) with the survey module (Sensors 1 needed only), base speed at least 3, rest range extenders, and set them to auto-survey.


Asked quite many times, none so far realized.

BR, Iztok

The first thing i do in a game is build survey ships. Get to Sensors 1 asap, and then Ion Drive, and like Iztok said grab a cargo hull and load it up, though i focus a bit more on engines than Life Support. The quick cash you can make by having 3 or 4 survey ships out there easily off-sets the time and cost rushing for the needed techs.

What I have is a "Prototype" model that I build early and launch, at the least they can uncover the map while I research the needed techs. Once I achieve Sensor I, I can upgrade them. From what I've seen so far the other races never put out additional survey vessels, so when I have 3-5 of them out there its a definite advantage. Regardless, yes, the "Anomaly Rush" is over fairly quickly. The Galactic Guide Book is useless.

I wouldn't want anomolies appearing later in the game - the initial rush is fun, but it's enough for me!

You can upgrade your flagship into a warship later, so any bonuses it gets aren't necessarily wasted. Bonuses your additional cargo hull based survey ships (if you make any) get are kind of wasted though.

I've taken to building additional survey ships as early as possible too - often partially rush buying them to get them out faster, so they can pay for themselves faster and more. It's a great way to get extra BC and bonuses for your race. Unfortunately (depending on your perspective) the AIs apparently never do this, so it's borderline cheese in my opinion.

I'm not sure the AI should build extra survey ships - it's something else to code and make them consider. A simple solution would be to move survey modules from sensors 1 to sensors 2, so that a player has to sacrifice more early and critical research efforts to go crazy with surveying.

I remember that in GalCiv I the flagship was useful forever since anomalies kept on re-spawning. So maybe they changed that.
I´d personally would prefer having the anomalies to re-spawn but dimishing over time so that at some point there would be no more of them.

This due to the fact that otherwise all the anomalies are gone in a few turns if playing on a small map and after that the ship itself is useless.

On the opposite end of things, I'd like the option to turn the silly things off. I don't have the time or the inclination at the beginning of the game to spend resources collecting random 1% bonuses, nor do I particularly want to have to worry about them later. They really add nothing to the game for me, and even on rare you seem to get a ton of them.

The one I really enjoy is the 25% bonus to your current research, I usually can get one or two when researching planetary improvements and that really gives me a jump start early in the game.

I really enjoy the 25% research, too, but I NEVER use it on Planetary Improvements. That 25% is going to an expensive tech, like Impulse, Planetary Invasion, Xeno Ethics, Star Federation, etc.. I try hard not to waste it on a cheapo tech.

I agree, Galactic Guide Book wins the "most useless Galactic Wonder in the game" award.

Has anyone bothered to build the GGB? I wish i could delete it out of the improvement window.



Cool! Shame this feature was never in GalCiv II. It would really make your flagship worth keeping as i always destroy it after the anomaly rush is over, unless it is level 4 or something like that.



I like this idea. And maybe make the survey module a little bigger and more expensive. I for one do exploit the ease of rushing for the anomalies, knowing i can rush buy Colony Ships/Factories and recoup that money fairly quickly, but i would like it to be harder to accomplish. Has there been a change for this in DA? I haven't delved into it that much as of yet.

The other whammy that hit surveying is competition. You're not the only one after anomalies anymore.

Personally if i could disable anomalies totally i would!

It takes too long to access the servey module technology or to build the galactic guide book (the single most useless thing in galciv).

Not only that but the AI knows the range of your servey ships and won't bother collecting ones you carnt reach until they finish getting all the ones you can reach!

I generally keep mine around and upgrade it to a warship as soon as I have medium hulls, since it will generally have accumulated at least some sort of bonuses that make it an improvement over a brand new ship.

Unless you play as Terrans, you can research the required tech for survey modules right off the bat. I wouldn't call that 'too long' myself

Yea terrans. I could always reduce the number of opponents to make anomalies more interesting too.

I think anomalies were more interesting in galciv1, because the AI's were enclined to loose their flagships, especially with space monsters around, leaving more anomalies for me! Although reloading the game would cost anomalies - i'm not sure if that still happens in DL? Anomalies dissapear so quick in DL it is hard to tell if reloading has any effect?

Are the AI more aggressive with anomalies in DA? Very nice. I have only played a handful of games and haven't actually taken notice just yet, there's so much more to deal with!

I take it, JanuHull, that you have seen them go after anomalies with a bit more gusto?