|
it's very frustrating to me to watch new space 4Xs come out. it's a genre with a lot of potential, but very few devs seem interested in exploring those possibilities. The last actually innovative space 4Xes i can think of are Distant World and Sins of a Solar Empire, both the better part of a decade old now. Everyone else seems trapped in back-of-the-box bullet-point adding mode. Gotta have planet tile management: that's a Feature to check off, whether or not it's interesting in a game where you're going to be running dozens and dozens of planets! Gotta have ship design, whether or not that's ever been a good feature that made the rest of a game any more fun instead of weakening it. Gotta have that civ-style one-planet-per-civ simultaneous start, with however many turns before you actually interact with another player... which isn't inherently flawed in the way of the other mechanics that i'm bitching about, it's fine, lots of games do it. Tons of games do it! It's done to death! Imagine a paradox-style space game, a space grand strategy, a game where you dive into the middle of a huge established interstellar political system and do your best to wrap it around your knee. How great would that be? But stellaris isn't that. It's not something fundamentally new and exciting like crusader kings, or victoria, or even europa universalis. It's just one more Master of Orion clone. And, perhaps unfairly, that's as frustrating to me as everything else about the game. Reading Wiz's diaries, he seems to have a good grasp of a lot of the problems with the game. For example, he responded to someone recently who wanted an expansion of the planet tile system saying that it wasn't very likely, since that kind of complexity wouldn't make sense over the scale the game works on (see?). If the game sells well enough to keep funding dev, I'm sure he'll eventually be able to turn it into a perfectly competent little space 4x. I'll buy it in a year or two, and play it for a few weeks, and then forget about it forever. There's worse.
|
#
?
Mar 26, 2017 16:44
|
|
|
|
| # ? May 14, 2024 17:35 |
|
|
AAAAA! Real Muenster posted:I've cut bait because I think the tile management on each planet and the solar system spanning (and generally just lovely) combat are both unforgivable and completely soil what could have been a great game. Stellaris to me feels like a 4X where only the exploration is any good - and that`s more due to the excellent writing and beautiful graphics than the actual gameplay loop, which is alright by itself -. Exterminate is awful due to the terrible combat, fleet movement and invasion like others have said; Exploit, thanks to the tiles, is just annoying busywork and Expand is just bland due to the diplomacy framework in single-player, even if exciting in MP. The work the Banks patch is promising in terms of making pop management more meaningful and racial differences with greater gameplay effect sounds promising, but not enough to make me care about Utopia`s release. I am still holding out hope it will be a game that can stand alongside EU4 and CK2 someday, but that still seems distant due to some of the base mechanics being untouched.
|
|
#
?
Mar 26, 2017 16:48
|
|
|
A scifi game set in a defined world with politics like ck2 or Vicky would be good. Instead Stellaris sucks and is bad
|
|
#
?
Mar 26, 2017 17:31
|
|
|
Stellaris 2 is going to be so good.
|
|
#
?
Mar 26, 2017 17:32
|
|
|
Stellaris isn't even as good as March of the eagles
|
|
#
?
Mar 26, 2017 17:34
|
|
|
spectralent posted:I'm not entirely sure how to tell; there's definitely some ethnic issues where the byzantine empire got punched down to size at the tail end of EUIV, though, and the USCA ended up with cores on basically all of america, which was pretty great. No peaceful, isolated trade empire for them! At the place you downloaded the converter, there's a wiki page that describes a lot. It's being moved to the official EU4 wiki, but I haven't worked on that in a while: http://www.eu4wiki.com/Europa_Universalis_IV_to_Victoria_II_Converter The file unions.txt in the converter directory is responsible for adding new cores based on cultures (it's only for some). Beyond that, it should only be cores from EU4. Colonies are complex, it's best to check the wiki for the description. And they don't work quite right, which seems to be caused by Vic2 not loading mods correctly (as far as I can tell). spectralent posted:Doubleposting because I'm having an issue where Vic2 keeps crashing Jan 31st 1859, no error log. Any idea what gives? Good catch on that! I've opened up an issue to track (and hopefully fix) it.
|
|
#
?
Mar 26, 2017 17:51
|
|
That might explain how the Salimids got annexed, though; do you get a claim on everyone with your cultures automatically, even if they were seperate nations without cores on each other during EUIV? Also, how does the game determine what is and isn't a "colony"?
I did do a bit of editing but I fudged it in my head by saying that there'd been a 25 year gap for everyone to have done a little annexing and integrating in.
|
PleasingFungus posted:i'm proud to have predicted this from before the launch of the game  ) and eventually the tile system teamed with the awful sector AI / awful Sector management tools, along with all of the other stuff I've mentioned, got me to swear off the game.ZearothK posted:Stellaris to me feels like a 4X where only the exploration is any good + .... PleasingFungus posted:it's very frustrating to me to watch new space 4Xs come out. + .... I know HoI3 is universally reviled, but I liked how the naval combat worked in a mechanical sense (could have used some more fleshing out but on the whole it worked well for what it was) - I was hoping that Stellaris would have a similar designing method - just tweaking numbers and maybe adding a "role" mechanic to it so you could have different ships that do different things to determine how they behave in the abstracted combat. I absolutely loath the way combat works in Stellaris - I can customize the poo poo out of my ships but the combat is so abstracted in terms of control, but also visually represented so well that I want control - its the worst of both worlds. If I can customize (to the degree Stellaris allows) and see my ships in combat, I want to control them; if I cant control them in combat, abstract it so I cant see it and just show me numbers like in CK, Vic, and EU. The whole way fleets engaging in solar systems like an abstract battlefield without any sort of zoom-in is really bizarre and I cant stand it. I also really dislike the over-used influence-in-space trope where an empire's influence extends through space in a linear and specific way regardless of other factors. Influence should spread because of a tangible presence - make that a more interesting part of the game rather than a Civ-style blob expanding for :reasons:. Instead of these magical mining and science stations that take some minerals then magically immediate quirt their resource into my stockpile, make space logistics a thing. FTL is probably going to be expensive in either time or resources, if not both, so try to make expanding more interesting than a colored blob that lets me put space stations down that dont require and other investment of time or resources. Let habitable planets be the major fighting points of the game and have accessing the resources of a system be more of what you are doing. If I want to research this Neutron star and mine the asteroid belt in the system, make me start by building the logistics - make me put an administrative hub up in the system, which claims it for my faction. Once that is established I can click a box to have it start automatically mining and researching, with the ability to have it prioritize. Make doing this something that you can only do so much of by having a limiting factor like, say, EU4 has with monarch points. This would give the galaxy some life to it, instead of each system either being empty or not - there would be logistics and tourism traffic, different systems would have different quirks based on what is there and how big the administrative hub is. Let me build a local defense fleet, or a staging ground for my Space Navy. Do something different.
|
|
#
?
Mar 26, 2017 17:52
|
|
|
"EU4 but with a bunch of dumb sci-fi crap instead of history" would have been awful and for all its flaws I'm glad they didn't do that for Stellaris.
|
|
#
?
Mar 26, 2017 17:56
|
|
|
I dunno, I loved the concept of Emperor of the Fading Suns, even though I could never really get into the game.
|
|
#
?
Mar 26, 2017 18:07
|
|
|
Someone make a space 4x with Empire of the Sun's naval mechanics tia
|
|
#
?
Mar 26, 2017 18:08
|
|
|
Chuck Buried Treasure posted:"EU4 but with a bunch of dumb sci-fi crap instead of history" would have been awful and for all its flaws I'm glad they didn't do that for Stellaris. Seriously this. Part of the fun of CK2 and EU4 is becoming the first Ethiopian empress of the Byzantine Empire, or making Reformed Tengriism the dominant world religion, and those things are fun because they deviate from established world history in a way that subverts the hell out of how it worked in real life. You can't have the same interaction with space civilizations without that same historical context. "Oh poo poo, the Umayyad Caliphate hasn't been pushed out of Spain and it's 1560 also they're Ibadi Visigoths" is different from "Oh poo poo the Galactic Javax Coalition colonized the Deneb system." The space combat does suck though.
|
|
#
?
Mar 26, 2017 18:18
|
|
|
it's absolutely possible to have an interesting sci-fi setup of that kind. you could imagine a grand strategy game set in the star trek universe, for example: 'oh gently caress, how did the bajorans end up in control of half the Alpha Quadrant?' or star wars: 'finally, my hutt empire has constructed its own operational Death Star!' it's harder with an original setting, but still not impossible. one huge thing is that a big part of the personality of nations in grand strategy games comes from their actual behaviour in games, not just from history. everyone loves to hate Otto Mann and the Big Blue Blob, even if you don't know much of anything about the history beforehand. you get attached to nations by playing as them and against them, and they gain character through consistent behaviour across multiple playthroughs. the hardest part would be getting a player into a game like this, before you've had those character-revealing experiences; after that, momentum is on your side. this is all hypothetical, since stellaris isn't a grand strategy game, and isn't going to become one. (and it's probably a little unfair to criticize it for not being a different genre of game.) but i don't think that a space grand strategy is fundamentally unviable or even unflavorful.
|
|
#
?
Mar 26, 2017 19:40
|
|
|
like, probably my favorite & most memorable eu3 playthrough was more or less rebuilding the Roman Empire as Ragusa; i still have a soft spot for little Dubrovnik to this day. That's not because i knew anything at all about Historical Ragusa beforehand: it's because it was a huge underdog that I mastered, and the process of that mastery endeared me to the country. As long as you have asymmetric starts and rich, challenging mechanics, you can repeat that same process even without real historical context.
|
|
#
?
Mar 26, 2017 19:46
|
|
|
Chuck Buried Treasure posted:"EU4 but with a bunch of dumb sci-fi crap instead of history" would have been awful and for all its flaws I'm glad they didn't do that for Stellaris.
|
|
#
?
Mar 26, 2017 19:56
|
|
|
You literally had the sots combat system right there. IT was RIGHT there. It was so loving good. It had SPACE WAR WHALES. and you dind't use it. my humanity has been shattered.
|
|
#
?
Mar 26, 2017 20:01
|
|
|
corn in the bible posted:why would you even play as a dictator lol you shouldn't that's why we're talking about stalin and his just defense of soviet democracy against trotskist kulakist usurpers?
|
|
#
?
Mar 26, 2017 20:40
|
|
|
Couldn't find a vic2 thread, gonna post in this thread. Just started my first game of vic2 ever (have played eu4, hoi4, ck2 a lot): picked The Netherlands, immediately declared on Belgium with help of ally Prussia, managed to re-annex Belgium. Then a few months later there's a popup about a crisis started by France, Prussia doesn't back me, and now Belgium is taken away from me again  . Is there anything I could have done to keep Belgium? Seems like a lot of effort gone to waste by a few popups.
|
|
#
?
Mar 27, 2017 10:51
|
|
|
amotea posted:Couldn't find a vic2 thread, gonna post in this thread. Crises just used to fizzle out if one side wasn't backed by anyone, but they patched it so the other side wins in that case. That definitely sucks for the small nations (i.e. you) who get hosed by it. You should have become a Great Power ASAP with all that Belgian industry.
|
|
#
?
Mar 27, 2017 12:16
|
|
|
GrossMurpel posted:Crises just used to fizzle out if one side wasn't backed by anyone, but they patched it so the other side wins in that case. That definitely sucks for the small nations (i.e. you) who get hosed by it. Thanks. How do I become a great power  ?
|
|
#
?
Mar 27, 2017 12:46
|
|
|
amotea posted:Thanks. How do I become a great power Rush all the prestige inventions asap!!!!
|
|
#
?
Mar 27, 2017 12:47
|
|
|
amotea posted:Thanks. How do I become a great power corn in the bible posted:Rush all the prestige inventions asap!!!! Yeah this. Make sure you rush the left most side of the culture tech tree as a small nation.
|
|
#
?
Mar 27, 2017 12:48
|
|
|
amotea posted:Couldn't find a vic2 thread, gonna post in this thread. Suck up to the major powers so they'll back you instead, but since you annexed them so fast you probably don't have time enough to get their opinions high enough.
|
|
#
?
Mar 27, 2017 13:41
|
|
|
Win Victoria 2 by becoming the master of opera, and then leverage that opera to suddenly have first dibs on everything in the global market. Make real good operas, so you can sphere Egypt with your operas.
|
|
#
?
Mar 27, 2017 15:12
|
|
|
Truly a faustian bargain if ever there was one
|
|
#
?
Mar 27, 2017 15:28
|
|
|
Thanks I shall rush the operas.
|
|
#
?
Mar 27, 2017 16:16
|
|
|
Star posted:Suck up to the major powers so they'll back you instead, but since you annexed them so fast you probably don't have time enough to get their opinions high enough. He was already allied to Prussia so likely had a maxed out relationship with them. Sometimes the AI just doesn't want to get involved. Even if they do, they often like to resolve crises peacefully unless the sides are very close to even - so even with Prussia's backing he might still have lost Belgium because Prussia decided to capitulate to GB before going to war. That's why the main thrust in the game is to get yourself up to the top 8 as quickly as possible - the GPs are going to gently caress with you and you have no real say in the matter until you're one of them. I've been playing a lot of V2 lately and something funny occurred to me - I have hundreds of hours in this game and I have not once played as Britain.
|
|
#
?
Mar 27, 2017 17:32
|
|
|
I have played Ricky for dozens and dozens of hours and I don't think I've ever played as the UK. Why would you? There's no challenge involved. It's basically cheating.
|
|
#
?
Mar 27, 2017 17:46
|
|
|
Phlegmish posted:I have played Ricky for dozens and dozens of hours and I don't think I've ever played as the UK. Why would you? There's no challenge involved. It's basically cheating. Yeah, I find it more interesting to play the lesser powers or even uncivilized nations and claw my way up. The UK is more of a "final boss" than anything else. I think part of it is that even the other "easy" nations like Prussia or the US have challenges involved - Prussia has German unification which will put them in conflict with both Austria and France (you don't technically have to go to war with Austria to do it, but it's a lot faster than trying to win the influence tug of war), and probably Russia as well since France loves to ally them. The US has both the civil war and the Mexican-American war, which they can generally win pretty easily but it's at least a speed bump. The UK starts in #1 and nothing tends to disrupt that unless you as a player go out of your way to gently caress with them.
|
|
#
?
Mar 27, 2017 17:55
|
|
|
I haven't been following updates for the new EU4 expansion, but I just saw a couple of pics Johan posted. You can declare bankruptcy and wipe all your loans! The penalties are pretty harsh so things would need to be dire, but it's good to have the option.  Manual breaches in exchange for 50 MIL. Again, not something I'd do often, but sometimes you just want to get a siege over with quickly.  With the new diplomacy planner that lets you give your diplomats long term missions, this is shaping up to be a pretty nifty expansion.
|
|
#
?
Mar 27, 2017 22:16
|
|
|
some drat fine swedenglish in this pop-up
|
|
#
?
Mar 27, 2017 23:26
|
|
|
Arrhythmia posted:some drat fine swedenglish in this pop-up Gee Johann! How come your proof reader lets you have SIX commas?
|
|
#
?
Mar 27, 2017 23:57
|
|
|
If there is a victoria III I'd definitely like to see the Crisis system be used instead of CB generation as-is and tie infamy into that somehow. It's really cool how you have the politics of great-power sponsors. Though, maybe have great power sponsors pledge other stuff than direct military involvement since it gets kinda gnarly when there's a world war over literally everything.
|
|
#
?
Mar 28, 2017 00:13
|
|
|
I like stellaris a hell of a lot better than standard space-4x fare, even the so-called greats of the genre seem lovely by comparison, because i've never enjoyed space 4x, unless you're stretching the definition to count SMAC, which is the best in the genre if you do. I like the real-time management of a space empire. the base of CK2 is kind of boring too but it becomes pretty amazing with the right DLC, and i think stellaris has an opportunity to grow like that as well. I know i'm not in a majority here, but Stellaris lets me go through great pains to make my own designer race and empire while encountering others. The early-game is absolutely great fun, the combat is better than a lot of paradox stuff too. Most 4x combat, and basically all paradox games for that matter, are more or less unseen dice-rolls and Stellaris actually bothered to animate the combat to make that somewhat interesting instead of CK2/HOI/Whatever style of "watch some numbers and a single bar go up or down as your fate is determined" thing. I say that having had a lot of fun in CK2 and HOI4 too, i just really like stellaris and the worst thing it suffers from is the lack of post-release add-ons to maybe flesh out the mid and late game, and deal with some of the problems that show up as an empire grows. A lot of paradox games have that problem. Their games seem to get better with active development, and it would be hosed if stellaris is left to languish like that with the pace of DLC it has been getting.
|
|
#
?
Mar 28, 2017 00:48
|
|
|
Another crash I can't directly find on may 31st 1891; I assume it's another nonexistent nation event. EDIT: Looks like this one happens every subsequent month on the 1st  Anyone know an event that triggers early-mid 1891?spectralent fucked around with this message at 01:51 on Mar 28, 2017 |
|
#
?
Mar 28, 2017 00:56
|
|
|
Enjoy posted:Gee Johann! How come your proof reader lets you have SIX commas? Proof readers? What's that?
|
|
#
?
Mar 28, 2017 07:25
|
|
|
I think that means "professional reader", Groogy. But we're not much for them fancy book-learnings at Paradox.
|
|
#
?
Mar 28, 2017 07:54
|
|
|
No they don't make dem fancy pancy books in Factroy's so there is probably no point in reading them 
Groogy fucked around with this message at 08:18 on Mar 28, 2017 |
|
#
?
Mar 28, 2017 08:15
|
|
|
spectralent posted:Another crash I can't directly find on may 31st 1891; I assume it's another nonexistent nation event. Have you checked the game logs to see if it's always the same event just before you crash?
|
|
#
?
Mar 28, 2017 11:03
|
|
|
LordMune posted:I think that means "professional reader", Groogy. But we're not much for them fancy book-learnings at Paradox. Keep your chins up, fellas, and remember what they always say: "The courage follows the bravery"
|
|
#
?
Mar 28, 2017 11:59
|
|
|
|
| # ? May 14, 2024 17:35 |
|
|
Groogy's desk has a book about tank usage in ww2 on it but he can't read so it stays unopened
|
|
#
?
Mar 28, 2017 12:06
|
|