Space Empires End Game With Big Empires

[Gozra]

I have managed to reach SEIV Gold Nirviana(if this is how you spell this). I am in a game that has Lasted nearly 200 turns I am the biggest player in the game at 800 or so planets and over 1600 ships. It takes me hours to move one turn. I know about the system notes, setting waypoints, putting several project into the que etc. How does the rest of the SEIV community cope with Empire Bloat?

I have noticed that there is a trend to limit a games size to 10 systems per human player. Is this a good ball park figure or to big/to small?
Or should I just shut up and do my turns?

[Slick]

This is a pain, I agree. One way to limit it is to make some victory conditions. A good one is that when player 1 is XXX percent of player 2. That way, when you are, say, 300% of player 2, you win. If no victory conditions exist, you have to kill off all other players or force them to surrender.

As to how to deal with empire bloat, you have mentioned some things. Others would be putting ships, planets, etc on "repeat orders", or *shudder* using ministers. Or when you have the game comfortably in hand, just concentrate on your fleet movements and let the other things sit - not very efficient, but it will cut down on those long turns.

Slick.

[Azselendor]

I would decommission ships, shut down colonization and go micromanage systems a handful at a time. About 6 or 8 systems tops. Basically I'll dismantle everything in the systems I don't need and automate them so I don't need to visit them again.

Also, I can suggest building a large number of warp-point closing/opening ships and reconstructing the way your warp points are laid out. This way traffic can be funneled along 3 or 4 main routes allowing effective fleet movement.

[Gozra]

I understand the 'make is simpler for yourself concept', But Add in that you are in a big war and not micro manageing can lose you the war. And winning is in the details. Add in that the situation is constantly changing and it is still going to take 2 plus hours to get a turn done. I am not whining just hoping for some thoughts on future games and did I miss something in SEIV that could help. ( have never used ministers ever and have heard not much good about them and actually know a player that uses them but does not have good results).

[Loser]

I picked up a game where a player decided to leave because his empire got too big, so I think I know what you mean. I am currently in two wars, each requiring it's own design of ships to keep up to date, each benefiting from a different path of research. Add to that my feeling that my economy is the strong point of such a huge empire and attention to it is of greatest necessity and my turns can take up to four hours.... Still, it's fun and I have no intention of handing it off to another poor soul.

There are some things I use that I don't see you've menitoned.
[*]You can save a build list in the contruction window. This is useful not only in newly-colonized worlds, but also in loading multiple-ship build orders. As soon as you have a Weapon Platform design, or set of designs, that you know are going to be in use for a while, save the order the next time you load them into a queue.
[*]I use the various super windows to keep track of what I need to do, and use various sorting methods to navigate them.

1. F9 opens the Diplomacy window, and I use it to make sure I'm both aware of all the recent changes as well as to make sure I've sent Messages to everyone I intend to message.
   
2. F8 opens the Science Window so I can siwiftly confirm that I have properly queued up what I want to research the next turn.
   
3. F7 opens the Construction Queues window so I can manage my economy. I sort this by how much resource each Yard uses if I am fine tuning my economy, by what is being built if I want to change all of one thing to another (when new ships come out), or by what is being built, with the Facilities displayed if I want ot make sure no planet is unfilled, but also not building anything important. This is also where you'll find the Upgrade Facilities button.
   
4. F6 brings up the Ships window. I typically sort this one by Orders so I can scroll through and tell what ships do not have anything to do and where they are. In a simultaineous game I may give the large stationary fleets orders to move to their own current locations, just to keep them from interfering in my search for slackers. I also sort by type so I can find certain ships, like Population Transports, and make sure they are doing what they should.
   
5. F5 brings up the Colonies window. I really only use this one to find out who is Unhappy. I sort by Happiness and try to do something about the Unhappy, or at least about the Angry colonies.
   
6. F4 brings up the planets window for colonization management. The trick here is to sort by atmosphere, and to set all system in which you would not build colonies (enemy systems) as System to Avoid in the F11 window (the name of which I forget). This can be a pain as you may need to switch the systems back in order to assure that our ships will not waste turns questioning your orders, but it keeps you informed of exactly what planets are availabel for colonization in your own space.
   
   

[*]The Upgrade Facilities button in the Constuction Queues window (F7) will not only add upgrades to the queues of all planets with upgradable Facilities, it will also convert all upgradable Facilities in queues into the latest Version, this includes Facilities currently being built, without restart penalty (unless I am mistaken).
[*]Name fleets with the system they came from or the system they are crusading toward, if you know, so that they are easier to keep track of.
[*]Rename Base Sapce Yards with the name of the planet they orbit so that you can easily tell where they are in the Construction Queues window.
[*]Add the Mineral cost of a Unit to the end of its name, that way you can tell how many you'll be able to produce at any one planet simpy by look at the list, without adding them to the queue. For intelligence reasons, I don't recommend you do this to ships.
[*]For Weapon Platforms, which your opponent will never see without also seeing thier components, consider naming them in such a way that you'll know what's on them, like "S.PPB5/2 PDC5/3 a40 1970" or "M.APB12.4 Rel" or whatever.
[*]Give single-race-spreading Population Transports long strings of orders or looping orders. Make sure to account for Resupply stops they may make on their way.
[*]If you can, use Hibernate to shut your system down while your Space Empire turn is still open. You can then start the system back up and the Space Empires turn will still be open and waiting for you. Make sure this one will work right at the begining of a turn, of course.
[*]Play a Single Player game agaisnt 20 TDM races on a 255-system map all the way through to the end, adjust difficulty so that you will have a massive empire by the end. This will help you find your own ways to cut corners, as you will have to.

This is all I can think of right now.

[Grandpa Kim]

Like Loser, I take a long time to do my turns and though his ideas are slightly different from mine, the theme is the same.

One thing that's saving me a lot of time is troops. In one game I currently have three systems dedicated to building troops. Each system has its own transport collecting these troops and dropping them at my staging area. The planets are on repeat and the transports are on repeat paths, therefore no management is required at all for this project.

One thing that's killing me is retro-series building. All my ships-of-the-line are being built this way and its been that way for about 5 game years. There is no quick and easy way to manage this. First generation ships are much too slow to move to the staging area so they must each be retrofit in place until they have enough engines to move efficiently. If anyone has any ideas on how to speed up this micromanagement hell, I'm all ears.

[ September 01, 2003, 17:21: Message edited by: Grandpa Kim ]

[Loser]

Originally posted by Grandpa Kim:
One thing that's killing me is retro-series building. All my ships-of-the-line are being built this way and its been that way for about 5 game years. There is no quick and easy way to manage this. First generation ships are much too slow to move to the staging area so they must each be retrofit in place until they have enough engines to move efficiently. If anyone has any ideas on how to speed up this micromanagement hell, I'm all ears.

I dislike retroseries in simultaneous games for exactly that reason. But in sequential, well, you're just up against the AI anyway, who won't retroseries, so you'd better have a darn good excuse for such flagrant disregard for the limitations of your retarded opponent.

Anyway, change your Repair Priorities so that the Engines and Solar Sail are repaired first. Also, have Repair Space Stations on hand. Late in the game, these Bases can usually be built in one turn, so crank a few out and Mothball them until they're needed. (I am guessing that you already do both of these, really.)

I don't think there is a way to get around the oppressive baby-sitting, though. It's the price you pay, in addition to the increased mineral cost, for quick production.

[ September 01, 2003, 18:01: Message edited by: Loser ]

[rextorres]

One retroseries time saving solution:

The first ship in the series should have the maximum amount of movement. On all your ship building planets: repeat build your basic hull design and have the "go to waypoint" set to your main repair facility and just repair at one location.

This is not the most efficient strategy but usually you can't repair all your ships at once anyway so you'll save your mouse finger from all that clicking through all the different menus if you do your retroseries at one spot.

[ September 01, 2003, 18:27: Message edited by: rextorres ]

[tesco samoa]

at the pbw site check out the game fourms
there is one called return to hell

there will be tons of info there

A small empire on that map has 500 planets and about 1500 ships and another 1500 bases.

We have talked and talked about it....

But the key is to use the build ques ( always )
Waypoints for fleet assembly.
Then waypoints for the fleets to go once there trained.
ANd for cargo movement repeat orders on cargo ships and assembly plants for the ships to pick up the cargo.

I have my turns down to about 20 minutes... tops...

It is also recommended to make your systems so no one can pop in ... That way you can concentrate your static defences on the outskirts and then have a couple of bases building the static defences in the core systems ( on repeat )
That way you can do the defend build and forget. And not have to go to every planet.

Repeat is your friend added with waypoints and build ques your set. Also another recommendation is to put those warp points at a planet with the most moons... And have them build the static defences for that warp point.
And then build and channel to the training grounds and then to the fronts.