Shipbuilding/customization

from GalCiv4 Forums

The current shipyard and tech really removes options for customizing your shipbuilding.

1). Is there a tech that lets us minimize the technology?  So that we can get more items on a specific size of ship, e.g., get 4 items on a small ship (instead of just 3). So that you can add an interstellar drive to that little tiny or medium ship once you get some miniaturization tech.

2) Restricting each ship size to a set number of components instead of space, with each component taking up space,  makes it impossible to customize good ships.  Similarly, limiting ships to having only one type of component, e.g., only one titanium armor, prevents you from being creative and designing ships for specific situations.  I used to love to add extra engines to a ship class to make my Quick Reaction Force. Also like to make specialized ships from the large Cargo hulls, filled with engines and sensors. Or faster colonizers so you can reach a good world before the AI does.

Might be too late to change this back, but i really preferred shipbuilding in previous versions of GC.

galciv iv early access feedback
4,814 views 11 replies
Reply #1 from GalCiv4 Forums Top

Yeah what a nightmare lol, we finally got compartmentalized maps that make traversal fun and segmented (i don't know why this works so well but it does)  BUT they removed the absolutely essential ability to make big long beaky weird ships that can dash across a galaxy but will implode if you throw a banana at them (ie custom solutions to custom problems, ideally the cornerstone of emergent 4x)  lol the irony hurts :P   sigh.

Reply #2 from GalCiv4 Forums Top

I would certainly like better ship design/customisation options - particularly surrounding ship SCALE. The Tiny to Huge Hull options have always seemed restrictive to me.

I prefer to design fleets around set roles and different sizes i.e from smallest to biggest

Strikecraft - fighter/bomber

Corvettes - patrol/recon/assault

Frigates - recon/missile/escort

Destroyers - Antifighter/Antiship

Cruisers - command&support/Light/Heavy/Escort Carriers

Large Capital Ships - Battlecruiser/Battleship

Huge Capital Ships - Dreadnought (BIG gun Battleship) / Fleet SuperCarrier

 

The problem i've encountered trying to design a fleet this way, is that the ship designer seems to arbitarily decide the scale of a design which often leads to battlecruisers the size of a frigate or  light cruisers the size of a dreadnought.

I got around this slightly by having invisible parts spaced far out from a hull which allows "some" control over the scale.

In summary: It would be awesome if we could have greater customisation and control options for ship roles and ship size.

 

Star Control: Origins
Reply #3 from GalCiv4 Forums Top

oh yeah i don't mind the aesthetics, i play on 4k at a huge altitude so everything is icons, there's no need for aesthetics.  It's the mechanics of the game and the solution you're "role playing", with the current Ship Builder you have no personality / agency in the game, all ships will resolve to the exact same config and therefore you may as well just remove the builder or in my case i may as well just not play the game.

Reply #4 from GalCiv4 Forums Top

Quoting bradzoob, reply 3

you have no personality / agency in the game, all ships will resolve to the exact same config and therefore you may as well just remove the builder
End of bradzoob's quote

I agree, that is one of the many issues with the ship design/combat/interaction in GalCiv that really needs drastic improvement. Otherwise it just gets repetative, ending up clicking 'auto-resolve' continuously because nothing really feels meaningful.

Their should be different fleet doctrines for different races i.e Swarming small ships designed to overwhelm with quanitity rather than quality [Starcraft Zerg Swarm] OR a doctrine based around humongous slow capital ships [Starwars - Tarkin Doctrine] OR fleets based around stealth, deception and ambush [Star Trek Romulans] etc...

Combat needs to be more engaging and tactical so that with enough skill a player can defeat a superior opponent with a weaker force.

 

Reply #5 from GalCiv4 Forums Top

The problems with growing "out" (more ships, zerg swarms) rather than growing "in" (granular unit builder allowing you to fit near infinite combinations by weight) is a known quantity, and was maxed out 15 years ago by SC, it offers LESS personality because you have a million ships so you have 1/millionth interest in each.  I mean this is a lesson Blizzard taught everyone 25 years ago, it's not new info, they saw the reaches of the genre and they bailed entirely, avoiding the supreme commander event horizon completely, the outward growth model just has limited legs and can only resolve to grey goo, so the only way it works is inward. I thought GalCiv was on board with this 100%, the ability to build ships with the exact load-out you wanted was incredible and definitive. So this is odd.

Reply #6 from GalCiv4 Forums Top

the aethetical Part is one of the Mainfactors thats split GalCiv from other 4x Games , otherside ,her has nothing aspect for the mechanic ,what is sad , and lost potenzial...the designing of Ships optical is big and technical is has nothing influence ,...why im not can bring in different techs in a Tiny Ship as a Single Weapon? give each Tiny Ship 3 parts for minimum ,a Interceptor with a Interstellar Drive or a Deflector Shild ,a other only a Homedefense Fighter or Bomber with more Hull and 2 Guns.her make the Maps bigger and Bigger what uninteresting when the Gamemechanics so simple ..which will conquer yzx Sectors with standard Builds and fight uninteresting Fights against other Standard Builds

Reply #7 from GalCiv4 Forums Top


The current shipyard and tech really removes options for customizing your shipbuilding.

1). Is there a tech that lets us minimize the technology?  So that we can get more items on a specific size of ship, e.g., get 4 items on a small ship (instead of just 3). So that you can add an interstellar drive to that little tiny or medium ship once you get some miniaturization tech.

2) Restricting each ship size to a set number of components instead of space, with each component taking up space,  makes it impossible to customize good ships.  Similarly, limiting ships to having only one type of component, e.g., only one titanium armor, prevents you from being creative and designing ships for specific situations.  I used to love to add extra engines to a ship class to make my Quick Reaction Force. Also like to make specialized ships from the large Cargo hulls, filled with engines and sensors. Or faster colonizers so you can reach a good world before the AI does.

Might be too late to change this back, but i really preferred shipbuilding in previous versions of GC.
End of quote

The problem with mass is that some hard-core players love it, but it's really confusing for more casual players or needlessly futzy even for the hard core.

The problems we are trying to solve is this:

When playing a game with some mass upgrades I design a ship. Let's say a small hulled ship with great engines.

1. The next time I play a game I can't use that ship (because I don't have the mass upgrade tech yet).

2. When I get my next mass upgrade I'm incented to design another ship to make use of that additional mass.

3. Ships that autofill their mass becomes difficult/impossible to determine their stats. Is a player better to upgrade his lasers or increase the mass (that might allow another laser to fit on the ship)?

To address this we want to lock mass so its not as futzy. But we are totally fine with providing lots of components to allow you to customize as you want. The question is:

What ship design components would you like to see in the game? (or conversely, what sort of ship are you trying to build?)

I've already gone through and increased the number of slots on ships to help with this. But if there is a type of ship you are trying to build that you can't currently let me know (for example a ship engine that increases movement but halves hit points).

Reply #8 from GalCiv4 Forums Top

DerekPaxton,

I've been thinking about this exactly as you have it would seem - I completely understand the reasons to limit mass as a mechanic in general but I don't think the problem of "not being able to build that ship next game" is that significant. 

I like that my ship designs save but I often design new ships specific to the game I'm playing. I do use old designs but I'm not upset if I have to design a new ship to fill a role I need now with my current ability. I like doing that actually.

I do feel the mass limit radically changes the way I play the game. I think the additional mass you've added may offset this

If the solution is additional modules than I think a large number of specialized components to fill specific roles will be necessary to allow for the same flexibility of the previous system.

For example, if I can't build a ship with 5 interstellar drives than I should be able to build a ship with 1 drive as expensive as 5 interstellar drives that provides the same benefit. Movement and Sensors are the biggest 2 for me personally - I don;t like playing revealed maps - I want to have to build "sight ships" that make my sectors visible - so I would amass sensors. I like having interceptor fleets that have insane movement, etc.

So I guess specific niche modules/components that allow for very specific roles.

The issue with adding tons of components behind a tech wall is the "1 tech at a time" research format.

Perhaps this stuff can all be done at a shipyard?

 

Thanks for the time and opportunity to talk with you about this!

- Jakksen

Reply #9 from GalCiv4 Forums Top

Okay I'm making the following changes:

  • Hull Support is no longer limited to 1 per ship (feel free to load up your slots on HP).
  • Foundry now available in design (increases ship repair).
  • Boost Engine component available in ship design (+1 moves, add as many as you want).
  • Unshielded Thruster added in ship design (+3 moves, -20% HP).
  • Radar Array (+2 Sensor range) Thulium cost removed.
  • Subspace Sensor (+4 Sensor range) added with a Thulium prereq.
  • Beam Amplifier added to ship design (+20% Beam attack, requires Elerium)
  • Prism Cage added to ship design (+30% Beam attack, -20% HP)
  • Missile Amplifier added to ship design (+20% Missile attack, requires Antimatter)
  • Demolition Charges added to ship design (+30% Missile attack, -20% HP)
  • Kinetic Amplifier added to ship design (+20% Kinetic attack, requires Durantium)
  • Serrated Munitions added to ship design (+30% Kinetic attack, -20% HP)

Let me know if there are more components you guys would like to see in the ship designer.

Reply #10 from GalCiv4 Forums Top

I just read the above discussion.  The Boost Engine component seems like it will meet an issue I had.  I wanted to be able to make very fast freighters, colonizers, or any type of ship. But I'm not sure about "add as many as you want."  I will assume that you mean add as many as you want "as long as there are component slots on the ship."  That would be great.  If you have 5 slots total, you can add 3 of these Engine Boosts to take up 3 of the slots.  Though I was thinking more along the lines of, say, adding 3 Interstellar Drives at +2 moves each.  But the changes listed above seem like they will work just fine.

I would like to be able to multiple defenses.  For example, 2 or three  shield generators instead of only one per ship.  

 

Reply #11 from GalCiv4 Forums Top

Quoting Coggy, reply 10

I just read the above discussion.  The Boost Engine component seems like it will meet an issue I had.  I wanted to be able to make very fast freighters, colonizers, or any type of ship. But I'm not sure about "add as many as you want."  I will assume that you mean add as many as you want "as long as there are component slots on the ship."  That would be great.  If you have 5 slots total, you can add 3 of these Engine Boosts to take up 3 of the slots.  Though I was thinking more along the lines of, say, adding 3 Interstellar Drives at +2 moves each.  But the changes listed above seem like they will work just fine.

I would like to be able to multiple defenses.  For example, 2 or three  shield generators instead of only one per ship.  
End of Coggy's quote

You are correct. "Add as many as you want" assumes you have slots available on your ship.