GalCiv4 Forums
Hey there, basically I wanted to get some community insight on a feature level. What is currently your favorite feature of GalCiv IV, and what features do you wish for in the future?
My favorite feature is the ability to customize so many things:
The features I wish for are:
Overall, this is a great game with the ability to play it many different ways, but you have to fix the stuff that doesn't work right before you spend resources adding cool new features (note that all of the features that I wish for start with the word "fix").
The ship designer has been my favorite part of the Gal Civ series and what initially got me to purchase the game. I have spent the majority of my hours in Gal Civ designing ships for use in game and 3D printing.
My favorite thing about the game is the storytelling. Taking control of a civilization and taking them through their wins/losses and steps from a minor power in the galaxy to an empire. Most of my storytelling comes from the creation and update of classes of ships, as well as battles won and lost.
I have two suggestions for things future expansions that I would like to see.
1. I know a lot is being done on this, but I really hope to see the combat system shine. It takes a lot of effort to make a good combat system and it's one of the last things I think the GC series needs. In my experience good combat systems have:
- Balance, there can be strong and weak strategies, but there needs to be at least 3 winning strategies that are comparable in strength and each of those should have their own pros and cons. Generally players will attempt to optimize combat strategy. If there is only one or two strategies that work, combat will almost always devolve into 1 of 3 outcomes stat1 vs strat2, strat1 vs strat1, or strat2 vs strat2. With 3 winning strategies there are now 6 normal outcomes, and with 4 there are 10 normal outcomes.
- Diverse roles and responsibilities. Each ship class should have a strength and weakness so players can't build ships that are all the same type and expect to win.
- A few small scale skirmishes, with a few large scale battles that cause losses on both sides. A major problem I see in a lot of games is the A.I.s ability to rebuild and regroup at extremely fast rates. This often can cause players to avoid losses at all costs because a loss for the player is not equal to a loss for an A.I. with bonuses to military production. Losses can be just as fun as the wins in my opinion as long as they were close and there is a chance to come back from them. If the A.I. has to take time to rebuild before coming after a player again, it can make the player more comfortable with the idea of taking losses and making sacrifices in order to achieve their goals. Maybe I have to sacrifice my old but well stocked fleet in order to try and give me time to prepare and finish equipping a new shiny fleet that is my hope for winning the war. To this end, I've really enjoyed the proliferation civ perk that outputs 2 weaker ships for every one ship that would be built. I took many losses than normal, but they were acceptable because I could rebuild and rearm at a rate that allowed me to compete with the A.I. Basically I want to see more uncertain outcomes.
2. More ship parts and civs are always appreciated. Ships with sloping tank like armor and ships that take ques from mech designs like armored core are at the top of my list.
I havent played galciv4 but it seems there is no turn timer like endless space 2.I wish there was.
Well, I think some quality of life stuff needs to be added.
For a long time, since galciv 3 beta, this game does not have a good way to select multiple ships at once. No drag select, no shift select.
Likewise, you can't import ship designs mid game. For example, a friend sent you a saved game that they want to see if you can beat. Loading the game, you would not have any of your ship designs or templates as there is no way to load them.
Some threads I made.
Missing ship components:
https://forums.galciv4.com/512096/page/2/#3874543
Design Starbases:
https://forums.galciv4.com/515822/page/1/
Ship management:
https://forums.galciv4.com/511960/page/1/
Want better rally points:
https://forums.galciv4.com/515541/page/1
Diplomacy:
https://forums.galciv4.com/513679/page/1/
Please add race ship parts from Star Control Origins to the ship designer?
Map Editor, with ludicrous map size/ ability to add many varied size sectors and streamlines .
Adding streamlines so that even if sectors might be next-door neighbors you might need to travel 15 sectors or more to "get there" ala Starfire. I did say I want large maps.
I am aware that Starfire's hyper lanes were to individual planets but the system should work for sectors.
The one possible glitch that could occur is streams crossing each other but hope I'm being paranoid or there is a work around.
I had one more suggestion for a possible future expansion.
Gal Civ 4 is a great storytelling engine. The leaders were a great addition and they help flesh out the world in use as governors, diplomats, ministers, and ship commanders.
Command ships are a fun addition to Gal Civ, and I think they should stay, but to me they are somewhat limiting. Basically it boils down to if one gets destroyed, it's gone so I am more protective of these ships, and they don't necessarily feel like a ship I built to be in charge of a fleet. They all have different roles and play styles which is great, but they don't function like the captain ships in GC3 which I made extensive use of. Basically I think something like being able to assign a captain to a player built ship would be a fun addition to GC4.
One way to go about this would be to have a couple of roles leaders could be assigned to. These roles could then be assigned to a ship that is already built. When a ship with an assigned role is destroyed, the leader is killed as well and the player must wait X turns before it can be reassigned. Leader roles could be:
- Squadron Leader: Can only be assigned to smaller class ships, and gives a buff to smaller class ships like fighters based on the leaders traits.
- Captain: Can only be assigned to larger class ships and gives that specific ship a large bonus to survivability and weapon power based on the leaders traits.
- Admiral: Can only be assigned to the largest class ships available. Give a fleetwide bonus to ship moves, defenses, and weapon strength based on the leaders traits.
- Explorer: Can only be assigned to surveyor ships. Gives a bonus to ship movement, and radar based on the leaders traits.
There is a lot of design space here and I think it could be used to give a real boost the to explore and exterminate aspects of the game.
It also creates an opening for what I am actually asking for, A.I. nemesis's. If a system like this were in place, I really want the A.I. to take full advantage of it.
In storytelling, the villain is just as, if not more important the hero. They are the backdrop providing the challenges that produce the tension for the story. Currently enemy Civs represent this backdrop and they work well in that role, but there could be some incredible additions to that roster. Namely in the form of these leader roles.
I would set it up so the A.I. would actively use these roles assigning leaders to ships and would actively seek to maintain fleets around these ships so that they present the biggest challenge that civ has to offer. In addition you could randomly generate a name for said ship and fleet that it is assigned to. If this were included players are no longer just fighting a random enemy civ fleet XVI.
Instead they are hunting the battleship Enslaver of the Black Eclipse fleet commanded by the Dregin Drathnik who has laid waste to several of the outer colonies of the Terran Alliance. These leaders could even send taunts to the player when they destroy a fleet, or capture a core world.
We have seen systems like this drastically improve other games like the nemesis system from Shadow of Mordor. Part of the reason that game was so engaging was in large part because when an orc killed you he was promoted and now became an enemy you wanted to destroy. That system is heavily patented and protected so you couldn't copy what they did, but something as simple as what I described above would provide some intense engagements and open up more storytelling options as well as provide the player with more tangible enemies that they could find and eliminate.
Best part: Ship designer. Would be cool to add more ship parts.
Top Fix. When you conquer an enemy core world or colony - you should be able to delete the "improvement" the AI built without having to assign a Governor.
Top Wish. Random galaxy-wide events that can dramatically shift the direction of the game. GalCiv III had something like this. You could turn it on/off at start.
1. The ability to alphabetically sort the available ships one can build in the shipyard. The current options are of no use to me. This alphabetical sorting is available in the ones for existing ships & fleets.
2. an additional command for non survey ships that would have them explore the perimeter of a sector. This way I can devote less time to them to accomplish this task.
3. the ability to automatically set how a fleet is named. The current approach creates incredibly long names that are hard to deal with in the listing of ones ships & fleets. If this exists already, please explain. Yes, I already know I can change it manually but it gets so tedious to do so. Why do you feel the need to attach lofty prefixes to the ship I created. It’s of no value to me.
4. a blinking indicator or brightness level or something to make finding the ship I need to issue commands to easier to find. These maps are so overcrowded with labels and such that I waste a lot of time trying to locate the ship. MAYBE a keyboard command or two to turn things off.
5. I’m shooting for the moon here but how about the ability to tell the survey ship (or fleet) what type type of anomaly to go for.
6. How about the ability to assign colonies to a particular core world. You do this with asteroids. It would make setting up a new core worlds easier. Right now it’s sort of a crap shoot what colonies get assigned to what core world. Yes, I know it’s based on distance but that shouldn’t be the only criteria.
7. can we please have a command or something to turn off the annoying background universe effect. It is sometimes so bright I can’t determine what’s going on. Yes, you’re proud of it, get over it and let the customer turn it off!
Have you tried turning down the Nebula Opacity setting? 
Are you playing in a room without light
I was and by turning opacity to zero cleaning my monitor and turning on a back light it knocked the shiny down a fair bit.
Give it a try.
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